In The Parent Crap, Alice Laussade chronicles life as a mom in Dallas. Worried you're screwing up your kid? Tweet questions to @thecheapbastard and she'll confirm that, yes, you're screwing up your kid. See previous entries here.
"Scrapbooking" is what happens when you take a normal person and you give them a binder, a metric shit ton of photos, stickers, those weird zigzag scissors, a rainbow of cardstock, a poorly ventilated room and a hot glue gun. The process usually ends in a neatly bound vomit of memories with a bow on the cover.
If you do happen to have a moment of free time during your child's first years, and you choose to spend that time sticking "Mommy's Little Darling" stickers to stuff instead of chugging boozes, let's make sure you do this scrapbook thing right. Because everyone knows that if you create a crappy scrapbook, your baby will be ruined forever.
Of course, your first scrapbook instinct is going to be to make pages for big moments in a small human's life, like first steps and first words. But let's not forget the other important milestones of a toddler's first few years on The Earth:
1. Action shots. Be sure to take plenty of pictures of your newborn -- it's best if you document every single second, so you can make a flip book of her life without ever really having to pay attention in the moment.
2. Make your scrapbook into a book that teaches your kid about feelings, using real-world examples.
3. It's always more meaningful when you document traditions that are passed down in the family, generation to generation.
4. Seeing the world through a toddler's eyes is truly amazing. Document that shit.
5. They grow up so fast. Take time to appreciate (and obviously document with unicorn stickers and tiny, expensive Martha Stewart-branded stick-on bows) the little things.
