Ten Minutes Ago

Last Spring, a local high school put on Rodger & Hammerstein's Cinderella.  I couldn't resist taking Addie.  My three-year-old was delighted and wanted nothing more than to meet the elegantly dressed high school actresses who played Cinderella and her fairy godmother.  After that, the soundtrack was introduced into our daily repertoire.  My husband is always singing something and the girls are always putting in requests, or demands, as the case may be.  We found that toddler-approved music goes a long way to keep the peace, especially in the car.

So it happened that, as we were starting off on a road trip, a few weeks after the play, Ben and I were belting out lyrics at the top of our lungs:

"...In the arms of my love, I'm flying, 

"over mountain and meadow and glen, 

"and I like it so well, that for all I can tell, 

"I may never come down again!  

"I may never come down to earth again!"

But every time we reached those last two lines, we were interrupted by an adamant little voice, who insisted, "No, 'I may yes come down again!'"  There was no other way to pacify her and to restore harmony to the atmosphere within the car than to alter the lyrics to her liking.

I suddenly felt that Ben and I were riding a red balloon, buoyant with helium.  The hiss of the gas that had filled it - those dumb jokes that had first drawn us to one another, the pitter-pattering excitement of courtship, the silliness of those newly married, figuring-things-out days - was all fairly fresh.  We were still riding, somewhat, on the rush of new love.  And looking down from this imaginary reverie, I saw this determined little person, clinging for all she was worth to the balloon's ribbed ribbon.

She wasn't thinking about her mom and dad floating away, of course.  I'm pretty sure that her main concern was the idea of Cinderella and her prince floating permanently out of reach.  Then the show would be over and who would wear the tiara?  But to me, she was holding, white-knuckled, to that balloon's string, giving it a little yank, even.  She was making sure that her parents would not float beyond her reach, that, to the fullest of her abilities, she would be mirrored on every facet of our lives.

Being a mom, for me, has been all about re-realizing things.  Each time an idea re-enters my head through a new door or an open window, it stains the walls with greater tenacity, settles deeper into the cracks between the floorboards, or leaves a more lingering scent than it did before.  That morning in the car, revising the lyrics of "Ten Minutes Ago" to fit my three-year-old's criteria, was one of those moments for me.  Not for the first time, but more deeply than ever before, I realized that much of what was between Ben and me, and where we would take those things, was not only ours - not anymore.

We would - and will - continue to renew the helium that lifts us, little sips at a time, through stolen moments together; a thoughtful note here and a little act of kindness there; endless discussions about the things that make us tick; quiet dinner dates, though not without the occasional glance at our phones to check the time or for any news from the babysitter.  And maybe someday, years yonder, I'll realize that we were never riding a balloon at all, but a kite; that we have been riding on a breath of wind, and that those little hands on the line, those little heels digging divots into the ground have carried us higher, further, and more steadily than all the freedom of our unshackled wanderings could have done.

Just a thought.

Thoughts from My Rocking Chair

We were out late the other night, which almost invariably means that a tantrum will follow in the wee hours of the morning.  As I sat in the rocking chair, cuddling my girl, finally calmed, it struck me just how big she has grown.  Her feet hung over the side of my lap and through the arm of the chair.  Her head rested on my chest and her little eyes blinked slowly and quietly in the darkness.

A year ago, she was a baby.  I nursed her and rocked her to sleep many a time in that chair.  Now she is, in every sense, a toddler.  A little girl.  It made me ache to realize how swiftly and surely time is already taking my babies from my arms.  This girl who scarcely sits still, who can climb almost anything, and who repeats everything I say, is becoming every day less mine and more her own.  It's such a sweet little ache.

When silence had reigned for a several minutes, I found myself hesitating, not only because the transition from Mom's arms to bed is always a delicate one, but because my desire to hold on to that quiet moment, that peaceful embrace, rivaled the desire to return to bed at 2:30 AM.

It was just another one of those moments that convinced me all the more, that there must be more to what we are and why we are here, than the life that ends when we stop breathing.  Too many mothers have snuggled their little ones only to see them grow up and walk away, too many of these perfect moments have happened and ended - not to mention myriad worse things - to have this earth, this life be anything but a tragedy, were it not so.

This moment need never be reduced to only a memory.  This child is and will always be more than a complex structure of molecules, forming cells and tissues and organs, governed by external stimuli and external chemical reactions.  This life extends beyond the confines of time.

And it is no tragedy.

Happy Thought - Extension

At the risk of sounding like a broken record - yes.  This post is also going to be about motherhood.  That's where my mind is these days.

As we have settled into our new routine, I can't seem to get a handle on all of the additional clutter that is appearing in every corner and on my counter tops.  Junk mail, toys, lonely socks and even vegetables from the garden (one of Addie's latest obsessions) accumulate more quickly than I can find homes for them.  I never was one for tasteful decorating, much less perfect order and cleanliness.  I can confidently say that my home is appropriately sanitary.  Beyond that, it's never been anything impressive.  Even my nesting instinct, in the last days of pregnancy, translated into massive amounts of canning rather than decorations for the nursery or deep cleaning.

I'm coming to accept that, despite my best intentions and daily efforts to get on top of my household chores, I'll always be a little bit behind.  Always, or at least, for the next decade or so.  Still, there's something special about the things I see around me lately, from the pictures on the walls to the homeless boxes that live, stacked, in corners, alphabet magnets on an around the refrigerator door.  My earliest memories are of similar things - cracked sidewalks, a screen door that I struggled to open, a blue rocking chair, a wicker laundry basket...  None of them were remarkable, but in my mind, they are accompanied by a soft, pleasant glow.

And this little house, even with my poor decorating and organizational skills, suddenly seems so much more significant as I look around it with those memories in mind.   I begin to see how the little trappings in and around our home now will remain with my children, pixels of the images that they will one day call their childhood.  

Sandcastles

Before...

I don't think I need to explain that things have been a little bit hectic around here.  We're all a little disheveled, more often than not.  But once in awhile, we're not.  Once in awhile, there are a few, lustrous hours of order - clean clothes, clean faces, de-tangled hair...

...and after. 

But of course, those hours are always numbered.  By the end of the day, we're usually a step behind our pajama'd beginning.  The now dirty clothes end up in a little heap somewhere.  The hairdo has disintegrated into chaos, and happiness is now a matter of pasting a sticker to our bare skin, using the best adhesive available: sooty rainwater.

At this point, I'm often tempted to ask myself why I ever bother in the first place.  It's not as though there is ever a day that doesn't end looking like a disaster.  But I just have to laugh instead, because this is life - mortality in a nutshell.

What do we do, if not build things to be decayed?  We wake up each morning and create each day like a sandcastle on the beach.  We build, often carefully, pouring our creativity and energy into the cast of our priorities, packing and shaping, and hope for the best result.  Nevertheless, whether by waves or wind, we will find that, by its end, the day has dilapidated considerably.

Especially as a mom, I've come face to face with this reality: that all of my efforts, all of my accomplishments will, at least seemingly, fade away.  Nothing but my (more and more sporadic) journal entries and occasional photographs will remain in years to come, to prove that today ever happened.  And yet, today matters.  The exertions with which I attempt to bring order or beauty into my life and the lives of my little ones are not insignificant.

When the evening has come and finds all that I have built or done in a limp state of disrepair, what will remain, but the patience that I have worked into my fingers?  The ability to endure, that has seeped into my reddened knuckles?  The new understanding in my tired eyes, of the redemption of every new morning?  What will remain of my creations in the sand are the memories that my daughters will someday carry away with them, that their mama loved them.

Surely, there is something that we are meant to learn by the cycle of creation and destruction.  Doubtless, there is wisdom behind the mortality and fallibility of our bodies and of all that we do here, calculated to allow us to grow.

My Happy Thought

In the few short weeks that have followed the appearance of our Ellie, I have found myself daydreaming from time to time.  I have caught myself thinking, half-consciously, now we're a real family...

I know that that's ridiculous.  We were a real family before Ellie was born, before she was even thought of.  Ben and I were a real family even before Addie came to us.  We were a real family from the day we were married, when we committed to be a forever unit, to build one another up and to grow together for the rest of our lives and long after.

But life is a long time - not to mention eternity - and I can't help thinking about it, envisioning family photos taken someday in a studio or on a carpet of fallen leaves.  When I was a new bride, my husband was one of the only real certainties of my future.  There would be him, me...and whatever other family members might happen along.

Almost a year and a half later, Addie came into our lives, and they were, of course, changed forever.  My imaginary family portraits began to feature her little face as well.  Alongside the baby pictures that began to appear on our walls, I saw, in my mind, other pictures - the first day of kindergarten, Christmases and family reunions to come.  And yet, in addition to Addie, the pictures included a number - no one can say how many - of nameless, faceless little strangers.

Ellie is yet another piece to that puzzle.  Now that she is here, I feel that I know something more about both of my daughters than I did before.  Each one adds a new backdrop to the other's life.  Each adds a clarifying line to the vague contour of our future as I see it before us.  All of those yet-untaken photographs are one less part imagination and on more part reality.

So, in those moments of sunshiny contentment, this is what I see - lots of murky, undefined years, but each one is filled with my girls, my husband and with abundant promise.

Venturing

I thought I had this parenting thing figured out.  Surely, being able to go about my business with a rambunctious toddler in tow, and being able to keep her happy entails some sort of motherly prowess, right?

Well, this week, with my mom gone back home and my husband gone back to work, I'm getting to really get my feet wet, on my own with both girls for the first time.  As if being at home with both of them weren't sort of a trial by fire, our 2-week well-child check-up fell on the first day of mommy's lonely reign.

I spent all morning preparing, trying to get myself and both girls in a state of being fed, clean and ready to go.  We still got out the door barely on time.  As I pulled onto the interstate, anxieties began to rise.  I felt a profound weight of responsibility hanging on my shoulders.  I had forgotten something, I was sure of it.  Reaching behind me, I found Ellie's little head with my fingertips, just to reassure myself.  It wasn't enough.  I pulled off again at the first exit and found a place to pull over, just so that I could turn around completely to see that my baby was, indeed, asleep in her car seat.  Sufficiently calmed, I took courage and we continued along the freeway toward town.

Despite its inauspicious start, the outing went quite smoothly.  We got back home all in one piece, but exhausted, and I found that I suddenly had a new respect for my sisters-in-law, mother-in-law, mother and the other women in my life who raised or are raising their children cheerfully and accomplishing and learning other things besides.

If anyone would have asked a month or two ago, whether I knew what I was getting into, I would have had to answer honestly that I didn't.  While I understood conceptually that a second child would add substantially to my stress and busyness, I knew even then that I hadn't really internalized it.  Then again, I wonder if anyone is ever really ready to have a child.  I'm convinced that it is always, to some degree or another, an act of faith.

As I walked from the clinic, I was shepherding Addie along beside me and had Ellie's unwieldy car seat slung over my opposite forearm.  A passerby observed, with a smile, "You have your hands full!"  My mind went back to words from a blog I had read years before, and I almost repeated them aloud: "Yes they are - full of good things!"

I am so grateful for my life and what it has become.  It is not what I envisioned.  I am grateful for these little years and for the opportunity to choose to embrace them.

I was blessed to come across this video a couple of months ago.  The address on which it is based is one of the things that really gave me the courage to unashamedly pursue motherhood...but that's a topic for another post.

While the Dust Settles

Through calls, texts, and Facebook, most of our family and friends already know about our new arrival.  I was overwhelmed to see just how many of our friends and neighbors were eager to help us when the hour came, and so grateful for all of the support we found among our family and friends, both here and far away.  While I have so much to say and tell about the most memorable Labor Day weekend of our lives, I am currently far behind in the process of writing it down, and there is a little girl who will only sleep between the hours of 8:00 PM and 2:00 AM if nestled in my lap or arms (it's now about 10:00 PM).  Since a picture is supposed to be worth a thousand words, though, I thought I'd post a little visual of our new reality and let that speak for itself while I catch up on everything else.

Sisters

A Much-Belated Baby Post

I acknowledge that I've been pregnant now for...almost six months.  At 25 weeks and a few days, I'm only a little over three months from our due date, and I've been meaning to make more than a casual mention of it in a post for quite some time.

The tummy.  I'm pretty sure it looks bigger in person.

I started this blog during my first pregnancy, so while my posts were few and far between, most of them focused on Addie and on the eager anticipation centered around her.  That was a different time, for certain.  I was working full-time, attending school full-time, and adjusting to a new home, new friends, and still had so little time at my own disposal that I had almost no need to figure out what I was going do with any of it.

Since Addie made her appearance in our family, my life has changed drastically.  While the decision to be a stay-at-home mom was one of the best I have ever made, it has also had a lot of unanticipated effects.  My life has become an unending balancing act.  There was suddenly so much time and so many, many important things with which to fill it, but no one looking over my shoulder to supervise.  It has probably been one of the most overwhelming things about motherhood for me.

But I digress.  All excuses aside, the facts are these: we are expecting again, we are very excited, and I haven't bothered to really blog about it yet.  Usually when people ask me how I'm feeling, my response has been that "the second pregnancy is not like the first one."  I don't know if the little aches and discomforts really are more intense by themselves or if I feel differently because I simply wasn't chasing a toddler around last time.

Not the best images of our ultrasound, I admit, but the radiologist did a pretty nice job at
sharpening them up for us.  I'm thinking this one has Ben's nose and pronounced brow...
but maybe that's just me. :)

But this second pregnancy has also been sweet in its own ways.  I wasn't sure that I felt stirrings until about 18 weeks, which was the same with Addie.  Ben, however, could detect the little movements only a week after I could.  Again, I can't say whether this little one is a more enthusiastic kicker or we just knew better what we were waiting for, but it has been fun to share those things with my husband earlier on.

We've also had the new challenge of trying to prepare Addie for the coming changes that this baby will bring.  There's no way to let her know just how it will be when Mom and Dad suddenly have someone else to hold and can't pick her up whenever she wants.  We have however, begun to work on the concept that Mom has a baby in her tummy.  She learned to say "baby" weeks ago, since that's what we call the baby doll who comes just about everywhere with us.  A couple weeks back, I started pointing to my belly and saying "Mommy has a baby in her tummy."  Since then, when we ask, "Where's Mom's baby?" she pretty consistently points to my tummy.  I do wonder how well she understands even this, though, since on Sunday, when we asked her this, she pointed first to Ben's knee, then to hers.

Either way, it's going to be an adjustment to her.  If we can just get her to lavish the same little kisses and attentions on her brother or sister as she does on her baby doll, and can keep her from trying to forcefully share her cheerios the way she does with us, I'd say we're off to a good start.

As I watched Addie grow through her first year, I constantly found myself thinking that the second child couldn't be this much fun.  I was sure I would just spend the entire infancy being overanxious to see him/her reach the same landmarks as his/her big sister.  I found it hard to believe that, having experienced a toddler, I could go back to enjoying a newborn, but that, too, has changed.  Every day, I feel more and more astonished to realize that my little girl has become such a toddler, and I'm seeing my friends' babies through new eyes.  I am looking forward to this little one and to the curve balls he or she is going to throw us.

Looking Up by Looking Down

Good morning!  In case any of our friends to the north are wondering, Spring has fully descended upon us here in Somewhere, complete with occasional rain, windy afternoons, and lots and lots of warm, buttery sunshine.  Little bits of - yes, green! are beginning to appear here and there, and I'm finally acquiring an eye capable of seeing them from day to day.  The past couple of weeks have been full of walks.  Addie loves to be outside - where else can you find so much dirt to taste and little sticks that can be used to poke just about anything? - and almost has sufficient stamina and focus to get from our house to the school track, where we usually meet her dad for an afternoon stroll.

I took a moment, the other day, to flip through the pictures on my camera, and realized that the little girl in those pictures taken back in October was a very different one from the girl walking beside me on these walks.  The baby in my kitchen cabinet, gleefully sorting through cooling racks, cutting boards, and casserole pans is already fading to a shadowy memory beside the vibrant toddler she has become.

The girl who is now napping in our second bedroom is as mischievous as she can be, always looking for a way to get mom or dad to say in a scary voice, "Hey!  Where do you think you're going?" before chasing her across the house, ready to tickle.  She's full of new words and signs - some that we've taught her, and a few of her own making - and she's learning how to get what she wants, even when her parents think they've laid down the law.  She blows kisses pretty liberally, and when in the right mood, she gives the sweetest hugs, complete with little "ahhh" sighs to mimic mom's and dad's.

Someone's got to help dad eat his breakfast.

At a year old (plus a few months), Addie is all about sharing...especially when someone tries to give her food she's not interested in eating.  She has acquired a taste for pickles, though, and a love for grapefruit that comes and goes.  

Mom's attempts to tame her hair, which is finally long enough to tangle, have also caught her interest.  She's more and more willing to sit patiently while I comb and spray and fix rubber bands into it and once in awhile, laughs delightedly upon seeing the result in the mirror.  Pretty trinkets - usually bracelets - are also becoming popular items.  

As we set off on one of our walks last week, I found that my gaze was turned downward almost throughout.  While I was surrounded by the arid landscape that I am still slowly learning to appreciate, my view consisted mostly of a little head, almost as high as my hip, with two little ponytails, jutting out at slightly odd angles from either side; it was of two little feet, shod in bright little shoes, that move with ever-increasing certainty along the roadside; a little hand that, with a little insistence on my part, holds on to mine.

During the first couple months of the year, after having returned from a long Christmas vacation with our families, I found myself constantly nauseated, exhausted, and chilled, despite the mildness of the winter.  My feelings about our home here (as well as my attitude about mostly everything in my life) plummeted and hung low for weeks.  Yet, now that I am re-energized, free from the cold that kept Addie and me indoors, and awakening to the changing seasons, it's as though a shadow has passed from my life.  We've crested the lip of a deep, and, walking alongside my daughter, I see all of the aesthetic I need for the moment.  

Despite my dreams of greenery and mountains, I'm realizing that this is a time in my life that I will look back on with fondness.  Not just this time, either, but this place.  This safe, sturdy home, these brush-clad mesas, dusty highways, and thorn-studded paths are and will have been the context in which I watched my baby grow into a little girl.  They have provided the backdrop for her first steps, first words, and for the hundreds of little discoveries and developments that come with each month of her life.

I've been reminded often, of the importance of optimism and the need 'to look up,' and for so many weeks, I could only respond to those encouragements with the cold counter, "Why?  I won't like what I'll see."  A few days ago, I finally began to understand that sometimes, looking up means looking down.  The opening of Springtime has been like waking up from a long and tedious dream, and blinking, bleary-eyed, and looking down to see the little girl who has all along been walking at my side.  It's been like waking up to realize that I am passing through one of the simplest and best times of my life.

Carpe Diem

I have to capture today, while it's still fresh in my mind - a perfect little piece of our clear, sunny February.

Little Red Poncho Hood. :)

I've suspected for awhile that Addie is an outdoorsy sort of baby.  When she was four or five months old, I could take her out into the yard with me while I hung laundry and I found her surprisingly content to pick at (and taste) the blades of grass and fallen leaves.

When we got here, the thorns were one of our first discoveries.  Naturally, I was hesitant to let our barely-crawling girl venture out of doors into the minefield of prickly things that was our new back yard.  Today was pleasant, though, far too much so to stay inside.  I had a two-year-old neighbor visiting, my own wiggly daughter, and a box of big, round sidewalk chalk, as well as an empty driveway.

At first, Addie showed an interest in coloring the concrete, but soon found her true passion alongside the pavement: dirt, and little rocks.  I let her venture, often warning her to "spit it out," when she grew too interested in tasting the new-found wonderland.  For the most part, though, she behaved herself, screaming now and then to hear her voice echo off the mesa.

A couple hours later, Ben and I took her for a walk around the school track.  We stopped often to allow her to explore the football field and the track perimeter.

It's all fun and games...until Mom won't let you play
with the camera.

  Eventually, she found just what she had been looking for: a sandy shoulder, smoothed by the wind and just waiting for her.  We placed her on the ground and watched her scoot-crawl a few feet onto the sand.  She plopped herself down on her bottom, found some sticks for poking, and didn't move or pay us any attention for the rest of the outing.

Ben and I watched and did our best to document the event, finding that not even the ever-coveted camera could tear her interest from the dirt.  I was surprised and delighted, and I'm pretty sure Ben was too.  By the time we took her home, her left knee was, of course, tanned with dust from the crawling.  Bits of grass stuck out of her socks and she was less than happy to be leaving the fun behind.

There was just time for a quick (and much-needed) bath before nap time.  Part of me was discouraged with my Saturday and the amount of work I planned to and did not do, but at least the time felt well spent.  In the midst of my bad attitude about the lack of cold or snow, I remember just a little what it was like to be a child at the onset of Spring.  I certainly wouldn't mind having more days like this one, even if my house is still messy.

As I write this, thoughts of the coming summer, and of the energetic girl who will need exercise and entertainment, are also floating about in my head.  I think it's decided - we need a sandbox.

Happier Post

So much for the happier post I promised yesterday, but to make up for it, today will be the happy-post-day.  With pictures.  And I'm eating a pickle, so everything is pretty much OK in the world. :)

This girl is a year old and already I can hardly keep up with her.  That is in spite of her stubborn belief that it is way better to be carried than to try to do that whole walking thing on her own.  One of her favorite things to do is riding in her 'wagon,' to help mom tidy up.

Standing is no big deal, though.

She talks all the time and enjoys it when her dad and I talk back, although most of the words don't come out in English.  We've tried to teach her sign language, mostly hoping that she could tell us when her diaper needs changing, but the only sign she's really picked up is 'more,' which, to her, means 'food.'  That is a sign we have been seeing plenty of, especially in these last few weeks.

I can only assume that we're on the cusp of a growth spurt.  Every time I sat down to eat breakfast this morning, she was there, signing 'more' and waiting to be fed.  Thank goodness she won't touch pickles. :)

As always, Daddy's glasses are the thing to have, and the newest thing to do with them?  Get Mom to put them on or to put them on Addie.

She's out to prove that ballerinas, though cute, are not as innocent as they may appear.  Just after I took this picture, I found her against the opposite wall, muscling her way through the barrier of suitcases we had put up to barricade to computer desk.

And, at long last, she has almost enough hair for me to play with, though the cooperation is usually still lacking, at best.  

Afternoon Nap

Usually, she won't fall back to sleep for me.  Most often, I'll pick her up, out of her bed, and she'll look about tearfully until the sleepiness wears off.  Naps are shorter and shorter, these days.

But today, when I come to rescue her, she rests her sleepy head on my shoulder, and no sooner have I lowered us into the rocking chair than her whimpers subside.  Had I known, had I expected this, I might have grabbed a book or a magazine on the way in, but she's a paper-thin sleeper in the daytime, and I don't dare disturb this moment by standing up.

In front of me, the blinds are closed, and I can only see through an oblong, rectangular hole, from which she has bent and broken the flimsy slats in nap-times past.  I see bare branches and a blue sky, little else.  From behind me, the west-facing window is beginning to leak sunlight, marking our passage from afternoon to evening.

I've read that small children don't sleep as deeply when rocking or riding in a car, and I try to sit still, but the effort causes my muscles to tense. Beneath her head, my bicep twitches.  Her steady breathing quickens, ever so slightly, so I begin to rock again.  Her little hands - not so little as they once were, I'm all too aware - stir slightly, resting across her chest.

I begin to string words together in my mind, unravel them, and begin again.  I call up other fond memories.  I am deliberately building this moment into the continuum of peace that stitches my life to unbending, unchanging reason.  Part of me still wishes for something to read, but I am willing that this nap should last as long as it may.  There are already so few like it left to me, in her lifetime.

Eventually, she stirs.  Her eyelids flicker, sleepily, blinking, drooping, and blinking.  She sighs a time or two.  Instead of her typical, tearful awakening, the little strawberry lips begin to form sweet, nonsense words, and I talk back.

Now, she is seizing a toy and scrambling, as best she can, across the floor, with a mischievous laugh, ready to be chased down and tickled.  Our moment of stillness is over, and once again, she's growing up.

How to Hold Your Ukulele

Since we were out of town for almost two weeks and took scads of pictures during that time (OK, not scads, but...), and since I've turned out to be pretty negligent when it comes to posting pics, I feel like a picture post is about due.  Most of these are actually from just after we got back home, but they'll give you a little glimpse of what our life is like with an impish one-year-old.

This isn't exactly how Dad holds this thing, but she's pretty sure
it's the correct way.

 We pulled out the ukulele for family night, and she was all too willing to help us figure out what to do with it.  Every time she picked it up, it went over her shoulder like this.  It was too funny.

...I'm going to Alabama with my ukulele on my knee...

 Of course, when she realized she was being photographed, she was willing to try all sorts of new  poses for us.

Recently, she's discovered her baby rocker and it has become the new center for her acrobatics.  When Mom turned on the vibrate, she didn't know what to think, but for a rare moment, she sat still, trying to figure it out.

Story time!

And finally, this is how we celebrated the new year.  The party going on downstairs woke her up, and in an attempt to calm her down, we all sort of passed out.  I woke up just after 1:00 and had to document it.  Hopefully this won't be a precedent for the rest of our year.

I think those pajamas make her look like a little elf. :)
Please forgive the poor lighting.  I had to be stealthy.

And there you have it.  Our little even-more-important-than-pecans.  Our life's work in the making.  There really aren't words to sum up what she means to us, but my mom often coos to her, "are you what life's all about?"  And we all know the answer.

Yes.  Yes, she is.