It’s not diaper-duty, keeping the baby occupied or even the whole bathing/cleaning thing. It’s also not the whole changing thing—after some initial debacles, I’ve pretty much mastered the process of administering onesies.

No, the toughest part of my time with L is the act of selecting which combination of onesie, pants and socks in which to dress her. My challenge is being my daughter’s stylist.

I’m certainly no Rachel Zoe. When it comes to style, I haven’t evolved much beyond ape. I’m the guy who wears mesh shorts and t-shirts out in public, the dude who’d wear running socks with dress shoes, then pair them with one of those boxy button-down shirts that make men look like we’re carrying guns, guts or both.

In short, my wife has frequently considered nominating me for a makeover on “What Not to Wear.”

Presented with this evidence, it’s no surprise that I’m so challenged when matching clothes for L. The other day, I paired her yellow onesie with blue pants. The day before that, I matched a green top and brown pants with purple socks.

Today, even after I vowed to write about these shortcomings, I opted for perhaps my most disjointed outfit yet: a blue onesie, purple pants and an orange hat.

Readers, help me.

Are there any books designed to make dads better at this whole dressing-baby thing? Does Carson Kressley make house calls? Is it totally lame and eviscerating to ask Powergirl to lay out L’s outfits before she (my wife) heads off to work?

In any event, some of you might remember my post about people mistaking L for a boy. At the time, I blamed these dolts for being thick-headed and blind to the color pink. Now, however, it’s clear there is an entirely different cause for the confusion: me. I just hope I can pull it together before L heads off to kindergarten (you know, in four years).

The problem, of course, was that she was with me on a reporting assignment at the Sharpsteen Museum in Calistoga, Calif.

Calmly, I asked one of the volunteer docents to point me in the direction of the restrooms.

“They’re outside,” she said. That meant they were not air-conditioned and probably dirty, a definite no-no for my little girl.

“Thanks,” I muttered. Then I pushed the stroller out to the parking lot, where I did what any former-car-camping-addict-turned-stay-at-home dad would do, and MacGyver-ed the trunk into a makeshift changing table.

I managed to get L out of the car seat relatively quickly; the poop had oozed only halfway up her back by the time I opened my travel changing pad and pulled her onesie off. What followed was nothing short of performance art—in less than three minutes I cleaned the crap off of her, changed her diaper, got her in a new onesie and strapped her back into the seat, good as new.

I was quick. I was graceful. I was efficient. And I only dropped four F-bombs in the process.

Technically, this performance wasn’t unrehearsed. Last week, during a visit from my parents on my mother’s sixtieth birthday, L gifted us with another one of these explosive poops in the middle of lunch in Healdsburg. That time—the first time in public—Powergirl and I were completely unprepared: only a few wipes, no spare onesie and a flimsy changing pad.

The results were gruesome. We were both pretty much covered in poop. Lunch was ruined. On top of that, mid-relief bickering sparked a mutual silent treatment for nearly an hour.

Because of this, the Sharpsteen incident was a major victory. The baby didn’t cry once. The poop was contained efficiently. Hell, I even managed to get the quotes and information I needed for my story.

Most important, if you had seen the baby just after the episode and didn’t know what had transpired, you wouldn’t even have suspected it was Poop City moments before.

The lesson here is that the only way to see if your baby can “be good” in public places is to try. Get out there. Bring the kid. If she needs to eat and you’re at a truck stop, you feed her in the Burger King. If she has a massive blowout in the middle of a community historical museum, you head to the car and do whatever you must to clean her up.

Kids are easy—they don’t care where or how they get what they need. The sooner we moms and dads solve this great mystery, the easier it is to feel like we’ve got this parenthood business under control.

Yes, you know the onesie—one part t-shirt, one part undies. These little numbers fit the little torso like a regular old tee, but they have a tiny flap of fabric that passes under the crotch and snaps closed between the legs. Admittedly, the suckers are great for facilitating the diaper change – unsnap the snaps, lift up the flap and voila, there’s the poop.

My gripe, however, is that nobody ever tells you how to put the damn things on.

Naturally, at an early stage in the process, the onesie has to go over the baby’s head. For any Dad this can be challenging, but for complete neurotics like me, the task is hell on Earth. How do I know I’m lifting the head in exactly the right place? How do I know I’m not brushing up against that soft spot of L’s little cranium? What if the onesie gets stuck and the kid can’t breathe? I have these panic-stricken thoughts every single time I change (or attempt to change) my baby girl.

This mind-numbing panic caught me by surprise. Somewhere around Day 4, Powergirl was busy harvesting milk (another post for another day) and asked me to change the baby. The onesie came off with minimal cursing (of course I disguised all F-bombs with a sweet voice and a smile). But when I had to get the new onesie back on, I started sweating profusely. Then I froze.

It was a worse choke than the Yankees in the 2004 playoffs. I mean, I just stood there, feeling my face turn beet-red, flailing my arms in a subconscious effort to fly away.

The scene ended when Powergirl came in, gave me the customary (and deserved, at least that day) tongue-lashing and changed the onesie in front of me in about 0.65 seconds. Mission accomplished, I suppose.

Or was it? I watched her change the onesie and marveled at how effortless and almost instinctive it all was. Why can’t it be as easy for us Dads? Why does it seem like fathers just aren’t programmed in that way? Furthermore, why isn’t anyone teaching Dads how to these kinds of things? Why are onesies such a big secret?

Since the fateful day of what we’re calling “The Onesie Incident,” I admit that I have gotten marginally more efficient at clothing L. This morning, I actually managed to change her onesie in less than one minute, and didn’t curse more than twice.

Sometime in the next 12 months, I’m sure I’ll be a onesie whiz, able to change those suckers blind. I just hope it happens before L starts wearing regular clothes.