Go on, it’s semi-social, you can bring your baby or toddler, and you can GTD. (That’s “get things done” in Internet language. Seriously.)
When our firstborns were too little to know the difference between Target and the Children’s Museum, Whitney and I would meet with the boys to do some shopping and wonder if it counts as an outing. I say “yes”.

Meeting a friend out for errands is your 51st Rookie Mom challenge! Not ready yet? Pick another challenge.

Once, I met my (child-free) pal, Olivia, and we wandered the aisles at Whole Foods toting the little man in his cart and handing him banana chips at his every sign for “more”. We chatted amiably and I went home with ice cream. Ice cream purchase really put the kibosh on post-Whole Foods coffee dates, so plan carefully.

Thingamababy offers 10 excellent tips for how to get out of the house and shop all day with a toddler. He includes a great suggestion on what to keep on hand and what to leave in the car. If you’ve tried to take your toddler anywhere and run into frustration, you’ll appreciate the advice.

Nine months on, nine months off? Something like that.

Your 46th weekly challenge is to obtain some new-to-you clothes that you’ll enjoy along with an afternoon of girlfriend hilarity all for the cost of some cucumber-scented spa water. The end of the year is a perfect time to plan a clothing swap.

Whitney totally hates this photo series but I love it. To be fair, she was trying on outfits from the “pass-through” pile.

We’ve mentioned this idea here and there, but here are the instructions for how to throw a clothing swap on your own.

I have hosted no fewer than nine clothing swaps with my stylish friends and spawned at least three known copycats. For the record, this is better as a a no-kids-allowed event (or just pre-crawlers), so let Daddy take the bambino out for a hike while you get some well-deserved girlfriend-time. The whole event can take less than two hours.

Here’s the step-by-step to planning and hosting:
(kind of long, but I want to make it mindless for you)

1. Stake out a day. Work with your partner or a babysitter to find a good day for the swap. Plan around naps and try to avoid mealtime so that you are not trying to be Martha Stewart while you are running around your living room half-naked.
2. Invite the ladies. Send out an evite to all your potentially willing friends.
3. Purge. Set aside a good hour and clean out your closet of stuff you haven’t worn in a year or wouldn’t want to wear right now even if the proper situation presented itself. Be brutal. If you’re feeling those flipping annoying post-partum body issues, get a good friend to help. (Do your marriage the small favor of not asking your husband if your “butt looks big in this” because it probably does!)
4. Merchandise. Clean and fold the things for the swap. Bust out the iron even. Create a separate bag of clothes so ugly you’d be embarrassed for your friends to see (stained t-shirts for instance) — these can go in the pass-through pile (modeled by Whitney as “Before”)
5. Think about how you’ll set up your space for the event. Is there a mirror handy in the living room or will you have to tidy up your room too? Is there space for hanging clothes? If you have room to “merchandise” your stuff, it is a little more fun to “shop”.
6. Make little signs — use the computer or write on index cards what the categories of clothing are so that guests can sort their offerings. (Download our labels here.) And, have a few blank labels available for the day of.

On the day of the event: tidy up, wear cute underwear, get some appetizers or have your friends bring them, and wait for everyone to bring you new clothes! We usually start out browsing the piles casually enough and trying stuff on here and there. Once you try on a cute spangly dress, it is fair game for someone else to have a go at it. Let your friends decide who really looks best in it. I am notorious for trying to get my hands on everyone’s good stuff.

Afterward, get someone to help you load the car or take stuff directly to the charity.

Note: we often have a grab bag category, maternity, men’s clothes, shoes, and baby clothes.

If you’re still not convinced, here are my top eight reasons to host a clothing swap:

1. eat drink and be merry (just easy snacks and spa water)
2. enjoy a fun afternoon with friends
3. feel good about donating to a worthy cause
4. get a heap of new clothes for free (especially good if you have a changing-mom-body!)
5. get a license to buy a couple new pieces for all your thrift
6. play dress-up and get silly
7. purge yourself of unwanted clothes
8. re-gift your recent holiday loot (I like to hold mine in January)

… I’m getting off my soapbox now.

So, do you love or shove the clothing swap for moms?

When my husband had to be gone for six whole nights on business leaving me alone with baby Holden, I panicked and called in my smartest mom friends for advice.

They had perfectly reasonable suggestions about lowering my expectations, keeping it simple, and making plans to keep from going stir crazy.

This tip came from my friend Molly, a mom of two, and thus an expert:

Think about one thing you might do if it were just you on your own, or perhaps if you were going to play host to a dear friend who you rarely see and wanted to impress. Visit a museum with an important art show? Take a drive to a beautiful place and go for a hike to see the magnificent view? Go to a cafe and chat with the strangers at the tables nearby just to feel the buzz of the city?

Now then – dive in and do that thing with your boy even if it seems like it might be stressful. I promise, it won’t be.

It will be fantastic and fulfilling because it will be the first time you intentionally planned something for your shared enjoyment and edification. A touchstone for all the many many times you will do things together, just you two, in the coming years.

Not wanting to let Molly or myself down, I saddled up the boy with most of his corresponding gear and we tried a new brunch spot, just the two of us. Me with a cocoa and him in his nasty highchair. We flirted with folks at other tables and shared our food. He ate some of my pancakes, scrambled eggs, and strawberries (I did have to pull the pancakes and strawberries apart in a decidedly un-adult fashion) while I licked some of his cheesy cauliflower off my hands.

What would you do with your baby if you treated him like a dear friend you wanted to impress? Now, go do it!

This is your 45th weekly challenge.

Today is the day to dig way into your closet and pull out something that doesn’t get enough love. Aren’t you pretty much guaranteed that others will be dressed in more eye-catching outfits than yours?

My son will be dressed as Santa Claus, so I will be an elf. The hat is the key to this outfit, so I’ve got a lot of freedom with my choices from the neck down. I will be wearing a red dress, a green scarf, green knee highs and purple pointy-toed shoes.

Oh, and I allowed the woman at the nail salon to do this to me.

So, what’s your plan? If not a costume, do you have a sweater that’s just a little too orange? A skirt that’s a little too weird? What is stored in your dresser that you have been avoiding? Pull it out and, as Tim Gunn would say, make it work.

This is your 44th weekly challenge. Read the rest of our challenges for Rookie Moms and complete them all!

Your 42nd weekly challenge is a seasonal photo assignment. You can’t take a bad picture in a pumpkin patch. Good assignment, right? Find a pumpkin patch. Go. Take pictures.

Use hay as a background, too.

photo: backpacktobuggy

photo: Marketing Mommy

If you do this, we would LOVE to see your photos on our rookiemoms facebook page. Is your baby too little or is it the wrong season where you live? Choose another challenge.

Most classes for babies provide a free trial experience. Take advantage of these freebies before committing to a paid class. Try to talk your other mama friends into joining you so it’s the most fun for YOU.

Your 41st weekly challenge is to contact a local music, dance, or exercise class for moms and babies, and arrange to take a free class.

• Kindermusik Village classes are for babies under 18 months and each class is 45 minutes long.
• Gymboree classes for babies focus on either music or playing – you can choose.
• Music Together is mixed age classes up to age five and the classes are an hour long.
• The Little Gym starts as young as four months old with a general movement and socialization curriculum.
• My Gym is a children’s “fitness center” that starts classes with parent participation at age – get this – six weeks!

You may find that your local independent music or movement centers for kids offer a free trial visit as well. Have you tried any? Let us know!

Not ready for this rookie mom challenge? Go back and start with an easier one.

This week’s challenge is a summery activity for babies that can sit up on their own; this is your 34th challenge.

These ten-month olds (Theo, Del, Julian and Paxton) are having so much fun slurping on plastic toys and touching one another’s toes that they don’t realize their moms are having fun too.

Ingredients for a successful Margarita Mommies Group:

1. Shady backyard on a nice, warm day
2. Kiddie Pool with a couple inches of water
3. Mom-sized lawn chairs with toes dipping in the water
4. Plastic pitcher of margaritas with plastic cups
5. Splashing babies (diapers optional) — keep them in the shade or slather heavily with sunscreen before the party starts!
6. Daddies available to pick up mommy and baby afterward

This was suggested by my hairdresser as an awesome way to enjoy the summer!

Did you complete this challenge? Share your story and pictures.

• Comment below with details.
• Share a picture with us on Facebook.

Do you hate this challenge? Yeah, we’ve heard that one before. Go on, tell us why you hate it in our comments. Then pick another activity from our challenge list.

Don’t miss the opportunity to let someone else entertain your baby. Go to a bookstore during story time. Some will even serve you a latte. This is your 32nd rookie mom challenge.

Many of these storytimes happen during the work day but some are on weekends. Use the “search by zip code” feature on the Barnes & Noble website to find when story time happens. Search carefully; there are different events for babies from preschoolers. Or find a local indie bookstore near you.

If you have a photo of you and your little sidekick chilling at the bookstore, post it to our facebook page!

Misty’s found a way for her baby to enjoy some summertime water fun: Fill baby’s high chair tray with water for warm weather splashing!

I love this activity for hot, housebound babies everywhere (especially those of us jailed by an older napping child).

Baby Madeline’s high chair has a very deep lip, enough to hold about half an inch of water. Misty filled that with tap water, stripped her down, and let her splash around as she wants. It is amusing to see her reaction when she splashes herself, and her obvious enjoyment of the new experience.

[This fun trick discovered on ParentHacks]

Presenting the sixth installment of our Very Rookie Summer series.

Nicole sent us a photo essay of her walk on the wild side, a hike with baby Reagan in a Florida Nature Preserve.

My husband and I took our nine-month old baby girl, Reagan, to The Enchanted Forest (A local nature preserve in Florida) to hike through the woods; she strolled and we walked.

There were many trails to choose from so we picked carefully to be home in time for nap.

Reagan enjoying the hike

Reagan talked and babbled for most of the hike.  I think she really enjoyed seeing something other than the same old houses in our neighborhood.

Daddy and Reagan make a plan

Related Rookie Mom Activities:
5 Super Green Baby Activities
Activity #153 Take a hike
Activity #503: Start raising a treehugger

Read more from Nicole at her blog Running the Marathon of Life

Voila! It’s the second installment of our Very Rookie Summer series.

Baby S.A. is 9 months old and lives in Nashville, TN with his parents, Alana and Dan, who wrote it to share two summer adventures with us.

Swimming at the YMCA outdoor pool.

This one seems obvious, but I think a lot of new moms are afraid to take their baby into a pool. We started taking our son, S.A., to the Y pool when he was 6 months old. We wanted him to feel comfortable in water. He is now 9 months old and loves the pool (and bath time too!). I put on his UV shirt, swim diaper and trunks, grab sun screen and a sippy cup of water and we’re ready to go.

Since we live in the city (Nashville, TN) and don’t have our own pool, going to the Y is a great way to cool off during the summer and build community. I always see other moms from the neighborhood or our church at the Y pool. And if you’re not currently a YMCA member, you can always sign up for just the summer.

Summer hair cut.

I was hesitant to cut my 9 month old’s hair, but it was getting kinda wild and uneven. After some coaxing by my mom, my husband and I decided to give S.A. a summer haircut. I broke out the scissors and went to town.

It was an easy process since we sat him in the Bumbo and used scissors instead of the loud, scary clippers. He didn’t even realize what was going on. I cut off FOUR precious inches of hair {and of course saved some locks for his baby book} and now he looks like a big boy!

–
More from Alana (aka Nala): She blogs at nalasmagic.typepad.com.

Related Rookie Mom Activities:

Activity #96: Go swimming
Activity #559: Use Bumbo seats for a photo shoot

Call it a Mom’s Group, call it a playgroup, call it whatever you like, but be sure that you’re clear on the objective: connecting with other mothers who you are going to enjoy.

If Gymboree is not fun for you, don’t go!

It is extremely helpful to have a circle of moms who you know in real-life who are also sleep training, breastfeeding, toilet training, or working full-time when you are so that you can compare notes, share resources, swap toys, and support each other. So while we encourage you to join a group of some kind, it is also important to give yourself permission to try a different one or a different solution.

Some moms have told me that the mom’s group they joined made them feel bad.  Not ok.  Quit, and look for a different option, alright?

But do not believe for one second that your 10-month old simply must socialize with other babies on a weekly basis or you are failing him.