These Are a Few of My Favorite Things...

Around here, eating has become a spectator sport. As Dory ventures into fine cuisine like Cheerios, banana and any fruit or vegetable you can puree (which is pretty much any fruit or vegetable), I'm paying a lot more attention at mealtime.

Let me stop here and say, sharing the table with someone whose communication skills involve the words "dada" and "dog" and dropping things on the ground, sometimes I am not as present as I might be. I am not in the moment. Sometimes, I'm thinking about other things, I'm mentally making lists, sometimes I'm physically making lists, sometimes I even bring a book to the table. I read out loud, sure, but this could be a year ago and I could be eating lunch by myself.

Then sometimes I look up and realize I am missing absolute gems. Diamond and emerald moments and they're flying right over my head. More specifically they're falling around my feet...

This was Dory today, at lunch, over a delicious meal of pureed winter squash, plain pasta, and, of course, Cheerios. You will observe she's wearing a Hippo pocket bib and all of her meal.



After watching her refuse any real food offered on a spoon, for some reason that I could not explain, I gave her the lid from the jar. Voilà! A baby who eats, drips, drops, and wears food! Ms. Independence gobbles it down.



Because I am sometimes occasionally a clever mama, I finally gave her the spoon.


Whatever method she uses, our furry sharks always circle the boat...


Here, in all her glory, is the full picture...


To think I might have ever read through this...


what a silly mama I can be.

Happy Father's Day

I think it's safe to say, few of us ever know how we'll handle a new situation once it's upon us. I know in my experience, I can have great intentions, but the proof doesn't show up until the actual occasion comes.

Parenthood was very much that way. When I was pregnant I had lots of daydreams about Matthew or myself, playing with a baby, bathing a baby, feeding a baby. Always, in these mental vacations, we were laughing, tender, loving- sometimes there might have been a soundtrack from a Hallmark card commercial playing in the background.

Now the baby is here, the reality has manifested itself, and there isn't a soundtrack playing. Besides that one point, most days are not that different from my mental pictures.

I was reminded of this a few nights ago. After Dory's delicious dinner of pureed squash and Cheerios, while I tended to the aftermath of dinner and dishes, Matthew and she played their newest game. Imagine a five foot ten, thirty-two year old man squatting behind a dining room chair while a Little One bobs back and forth, as he asks...

Is she over here...?


Is she over here...?


There she is!


Now picture it over and over and over...







Dory would play this game all night long, but eventually it was bath time. As Matthew hoisted her up into his arms and carried her down the hall, I heard him making up lyrics to his newest baby tune: "We're gonna give you a baby bath/We're gonna give you a baby bath/ Whyyyyy?/ Because you're covered in slime/ Oh, yeah, you're covered in slime." (I think we should trademark that one...)

What a treat for me, when the kitchen looked a little less like the remains of a cereal bomb and a little more like a kitchen, to hurry down the hallway and catch the end of bath time.



What a treat, what a pleasure, when daydreams turn into reality.

Happy Father's Day to that bearded man o' mine.



And Happy Father's Day to my own wonderful Pops, without who I wouldn't know most of the literature I do, feel the need to sketch out a detailed story when I'm explaining it, sing loudly and badly and proudly, or insist on reading funny stories out loud, only to become so overcome with laughter a few sentences in, I have to stop and let someone else finish.



And Happy Father's Day to Aaron, and Dave H, and Dave S, and Brig, and Randy, and Jacob, and John, and Steve, and Bill, and the many, many, many amazing men in this world for whom the title "dada" rests proudly on their shoulders- and sometimes covers their eyes and pulls their hair and shrieks in their ears. I wish a grand day for all you fellas.

Things that Interest Me...

If you're a babywearing mama please check out the great blog about babywearing over here at: Nature's Child Blog. It's so true and that sling sounds wonderful!

And maybe I get entered in a contest for mentioning this...

Doesn't make it any less true. I love Sakura Bloom slings- would love to have this one!

So cross your fingers for me!

Baby at the Beach

Our first trip to the beach took place a few brief weeks ago. Thanks to a very kind friend (Hello Lois!) Gram Mojo, Dory and I managed to slip away for a few days to the grand little island of Hilton Head in the fine state of South Carolina. For the first time Dory saw the ocean, felt the salty breeze in her face, wore sunscreen, played in the water, saw an alligator, swam in an outdoors pool and crawled across real, honest-to-goodness sand.













And somehow, for most of that, we managed to keep a hat on her.

It was a great trip.