I suppose it’s fitting that, the day before my younger daughter’s birth (and while making her a cake, no less) I would sneeze and forget to catch it and pee myself a little.
Happy birth day, indeed.
Illustration, photography, and all-around geekery
I suppose it’s fitting that, the day before my younger daughter’s birth (and while making her a cake, no less) I would sneeze and forget to catch it and pee myself a little.
Happy birth day, indeed.
Ellie got an Instax camera for her birthday (basically a modern-day Polaroid). Gwen, watching one of the pictures develop:
“Oh look! It’s starting to load!”
Seven years ago today, I was feeling pretty miserable. I was a week overdue with a pregnancy that had been a long slog, and I’d developed a cold that kept me up in the wee hours. My midwife prescribed me antibiotics and Tylenol PM, and I went to bed that night hoping to get a good night’s sleep.
The next morning, Gwen entered our lives like a superhero, with one little fist raised in protest. She’s been our little fighter ever since.
Gwen is our wild child, our goofball, our daredevil. Her imagination knows no bounds, her stories are endless and filled with dramatic delights. Murderous villains, triumphant superheroes, bullies, and best friends. One day she’s a puppy or a kitten or a bunny rabbit, and we’re hard-pressed to convince her to break character to do mundane things like eat or do chores or homework.
She builds amazing things out of LEGOs and plays with them for hours. She eats ketchup on everything, and by everything, I mean one of the three foods that’s currently in her Acceptable Foods rotation, which changes on a daily basis. She’s her big sister’s best friend. She loves to be tickled until she can’t breathe, and then she’ll catch her breath and beg for more.
Gwen does everything with gusto. Sometimes her love is so fierce, it physically hurts. She throws herself into my lap like a canon ball, squeezes tight with her arms around my neck like a vise. She’s loud; we have yet to find her volume control switch. She’s told me she’s meant to be a monkey who lives in the trees, that she’s too wild to be contained in our house — then she says, “I’m not a nature girl” when I tell her to go outside and play.
Gwen is the kid who makes me laugh when I’m not supposed to laugh, who makes me question everything I’m doing as a parent, who brings me to the edge of patience and tips me over just to see how I’ll react. She learns the hard way, over and over and over.
She’s the reigning champion of the time-out corner.
Her hair still smells a little like it did when she was a baby. She still reaches for my hand when we cross a busy parking lot. She crawls into bed with us and tucks herself under Tim’s arm, and her face still shows faint traces of babyhood when she sleeps. She still has my whole dang heart.
Happy birthday, Guinevere. May we survive your tenacity so it can serve you well, as you do all the big, dramatic things you dream up.
Christmas blew past in a whirlwind of food and family. We’ve had a wonderful time with my brother and sister-in-law, plus birthday festivities for Ellie. It’s been a great week, and I’m looking forward to a few days of solid R&R before the new year.
Ellie has decided that in lieu of a treehouse or a playhouse, she would like us to build her a research lab.
One of the things they don’t tell you when you have kids is how much of a pain in the ass car seats are. They’re hard to install, hard to uninstall, the straps and buckles constantly have to be adjusted and untwisted, many babies loathe them to the point of screaming, and they take up a ridiculous amount of real estate. I suspect the SUV manufacturers and the car seat manufacturers are in cahoots, but that’s another post.
After Gwen was born, we bought a pre-owned minivan because we couldn’t physically fit our family in a Nissan Sentra with a forward-facing toddler car seat, a rear-facing infant car seat, and a 6’4″ husband. My knees were crushed against the dash, and Tim couldn’t fit in the passenger seat. Bizarre, because a Sentra isn’t even a small car by most standards, but I digress.
In 2011, we said goodbye to what little cool we’d salvaged as new parents in favor of something practical. Admittedly, it was nice to have the extra space when we needed to haul things, and it made longer family road trips comfortable. Our Honda Odyssey served us well for four years.
Until a few weeks ago, when we realized both kids are in booster seats, and we don’t need a minivan! Why don’t they write about this milestone in the baby books?
There’s a new baby in the family, and its car seats come pre-installed:
Our new Honda Fit hatchback fits us comfortably with room to spare, and it’s a hell of a lot more fun to drive.
(I know it’s hopeless, but I like to think I’ve gained a smidge of my cool back, too.)
Me: Do you know who Chewbacca is?
Ellie: Do you know who Chewbacca is?
Me: No, really, I’m curious.
Ellie: No, really, I’m curious.
Me: Ellie…c’mon, remember how we watched Star Wars yesterday?
Ellie: Ellie…c’mon, remember how we watched Star Wars yesterday?
Me: …
Me: WE THE PEOPLE OF THE UNITED STATES IN ORDER TO FORM A MORE PERFECT UNION ESTABLISH JUSTICE, ENSURE DOMESTIC TRANQUILLITY, PROVIDE FOR THE COMMON DEFENSE, PROMOTE THE GENERAL WELFARE, AND SECURE THE BLESSINGS OF LIBERTY TO OURSELVES AND OUR POSTERITY…
In other news, I’m finally putting all that fifth-grade memorization to good use!
Ellie, trying to name all 50 states: “Louisiana, Maryland, Maine, Massachusetts, uh…Colorado…Divorce…”
Not sure if she has a future in interpretive sculpture or architecture. Either way, I am one proud mama.