Grateful.

Thank you for these wet summer days.

We get to stay wrapped up in our house like a birthday box-- 

sitting at the table, eating eggs at 2pm and listening to the cd's Violet checked out from the library.  

I am grateful for this day.  I feel like I don't say it enough-- 

--for Tyler who makes oatmeal with raspberries in the morning

--for the healthy happy baby that smells like apricots and cotton.  

--for my work that sits and waits for me in my closet-studio, and I can put it down and pick it up whenever I want.  

-- for my girl that fills this house with curiosity and laughs and arguments that are surprisingly sophisticated.  

I am grateful.  

  

Summer musings

Hey, remember that summer when your cousins -- Big S and Little S-- came up to Whidbey?  

With crayons and stickers you made that box into a rocket ship.  

You three played fat-bat, and hit the ball over the bluff.

Later, you went with your dad out in the kayak for the very first time ever, and helped him throw the crab trap.  You dug clams, and found oysters.  We picked cherries.  It was grand. 

-------  

And hey, you.  The tiny one with the big smiles.  

Do you remember stretching out on a towel in the shade, on the beach with the aspen trees and eagles flowering the sky above your glassy eyes? 

And snug against mom's chest in the carrier, snoozing to the warm steady beat of her footsteps, out through the eel grass, through the tide pools, and the sun on your bucket hat.  

Everything was warm.  

Uncles, Aunts, Grandparents, cousins-- all holding you, on the deck, in the living room, in the big chairs, and under the trees.  

 

3 Months Old

3 Months.

A milestone.
--Because they always say the first 3 months is just an extension of life inside the belly.
But now you're really here.  Cracking jokes, watching the petunias grow.
Now you've hatched, and the screen has been lifted, and you're seeing things, more and more each day.
Things are funny, like your dad pretending to eat your belly.
Your sister is fascinating.
We look right into your eyes and talk to you, and you focus in and smile this huge smile that almost lifts you off the ground, and then you reply in this rolling singsongy language.
You have found your hands to be useful for sucking on, and yesterday you rolled over for the first time.  I suppose you have places to go?
You scoot this way and that.  You spin around on your back like a turtle.
You are a jolly little thing.  Wide eyed at 4am, ready for a snuggle and snack, and then you sleep until 6 like any decent person.
Well done, Eloise.
And welcome!  Fully, completely, wide-eyed, welcome.
Our little sprite of sunshine, you are adapting to this world quite well.

1 Month

2 Months

3 Months

PS: This one too (below).  I had to share, even though she is just shy of a month here.... amazing what 11 weeks can do!