The nursery!

Here is baby boy's room, or part of it--it's a huge bedroom. The windows need curtains or valances, and the walls are a bit bare (save for the awesome alphabet decals from Etsy, painstakingly applied by Dave). The dresser was Dave's parents' dresser, then it was Dave's bachelor dresser. It used to be black and white. It was such a groovy piece of furniture we decided to store it in the basement until we could come up with a clever use for it. As you see, now we have.

I am nothing but a design amateur, but one thing I have learned is how much it helps to photograph a room to get a feel for how it really looks. Now I know that corner is too cluttered--you know the one I'm talking about. It's hard to see the big picture until you actually take it!

Then and Now

On the eve of Anneke's 3rd Birthday: Then, and Now:

Then

Now

Then

Now

State of the Mother and Child

Update before Anneke's THIRD Birthday, and this one will probably be more about me. Lest you think my daughter is already getting her Comparative Religions groove on, I'll first clarify that this was Anneke's pretend birthday celebration she threw for herself while I was getting dressed. We sang happy birthday and blew out candles, and it was the icing on the cake to a deliciously slow morning where we stayed in our jammies and played on the floor a lot.

And Anneke is very conscious of her birthday coming up. In fact, she was a bit jealous when I celebrated my own birthday on Friday, and I had to assure her many times that her's is right around the corner. I only hope I'm not in labor and delivery that day! In the long run, if I am, life will go on, but I just hate for her first birthday that she's really aware of to be overshadowed.

So far, I don't just hate how things will change with two kids--I think it's too hard to imagine. I thought by now I would have gone through a period of feeling sad about how it's not going to be just the three of us, or, indeed, two of us since that little girl and I spend so many days together. I haven't, though, but have felt the need to savor this time we have left, just like I did with Dave before Anneke was born.

Speaking of which, I went downstairs the other day, and Dave had put in the DVD of our diving trip in Thailand for Anneke to watch, and it was one of a few times I felt nostalgic for those carefree days--videos of diving in a tropical paradise will do that, I guess. But there's nothing at all like being a family together. It's not always as fun as a liveaboard dive trip, but it's infinitely more precious.

Anyway, this afternoon: good thing we had such a sweet morning, because this afternoon was a storm of tired, about-to-pop mommy and tired, not-quite-done-with-her-afternoon-nap little girl. Basically, Anneke and I got into a Big Fight. No, I didn't lose my temper, and no, I did not spank or otherwise use any physical punishment. No lasting damage was done, but I escalated a power struggle and she came at me with her little hands, looking both shocked and furious when she did manage to hit me in the face! I made her stay in her room, and she wailed and wailed until she crashed, exhausted, in her new big-girl chair. I felt terrible, knowing part of the reason I was handling things this way was because I needed a break, physically and mentally, and would mismanage her exhaustion if that was what it would take to get it.

I know how much worse it could be and how much worse parent-child conflicts get because of what I do for a living. I listen to wonderful, loving parents beat themselves up all the time and spend a lot of time pointing out all the things they're doing well. But now I understand that nothing changes the fact that it feels really bad to play a part in exacerbating your child's meltdown, even if you didn't mean to, and even if it just makes you a human being and not Super Mom. I even believe that messing up as a parent--within limits--can help kids be more resilient, and I know that my relationship with Anneke is good. But I sure felt terrible when I peeked into her room today and saw her crashed out on her chair, knowing she wailed herself to sleep.

I guess I know a big change is coming up for all of us, and especially for her. Maybe in place of feeling sad I just deeply desire for these last few days of Anneke being two to be sweet, as sweet as these past three years have been.

Snowday

I took 2 hours off of work this morning to play in the snow with Anneke.

Two friends

I haven't picked up the camera much lately, but I'm glad I got this shot--a lovely photo of two most amazing friends, one of whom is celebrating her birthday today!

 

The family that sings together

So, as it turns out, we seem to be kind of a musical family. Not the Von Traps, or even the Mandrells, but when we get together, at some point, often enough, someone busts out the piano, the beatbox, or, this year, the clarinet.

I'm so proud of Sidney. She started playing clarinet this year, and she's really good.

And I'm so proud of...Dave? Who still remembers how to play the clarinet after Jesuit High School shut down the band program his junior year of high school? Who knew? I really do believe Dave has some untapped musical talent. He doesn't have a bad voice, and has a huge music collection. He was in a band back in the 90s, when he was a bachelor with a million hobbies. When Anneke is old enough to take piano lessons he wants to study alongside her, which makes me very happy.

The Texarkana family started a big old' Christmas hymn sing. I suggested getting an early start on Lent with a Lenten hymn sing, you know, for a little Lenten comic relief, but no one else was dorky enough to think this was funny. Emily sang harmony since she's a better musician than this Soprano one-trick-melody-line-singing pony, and my uncle sang a beautiful tenor. We threw in "Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing" for good measure, and I found out that it's my and my cousin M.L.'s favorite hymn. I love this, especially since we're ten years apart, we grew up with some fairly disparate Protestant music traditions, and, although we don't talk about it, are on way different ends of the political and sometimes theological spectrums. Still, I have a feeling we love that hymn for very similar reasons, and that also makes me happy.

Then, at the Louisiana family get-together all the grandkids were trotted out to the piano to show off their budding talents, and Sidney gave us an encore. My cousins Lori and Lisa do more of a country/gospel vibe, and they're total altos to my and Emily's sopranos. Once again, very different politics and theology and all that if you want to stop and focus on those details. But loud, funny, fun, and family, and who cares when we can all get together and sing?

Camden: it's history

Hmmm...I don't feel super inspired to blog Christmas photos, after all. Picture extended family gatherings and toddlers drowning in wrapping paper, and you've got it covered. Actually, I think I will do a posting of the impromptu family music fests after this. But first! If you haven't been to the South, you might not know that everywhere you turn you find some kind of Civil War relic, battle site, or memorial, and Camden, Arkansas is no different. For the first time in my life I toured the historic Chidester House, made famous first by being occupied by Union troops during the Civil War, second by being continuously occupied from antebellum times through the 1960s by two different families, and third by being the set for a few different scenes in the soapy, steamy, boob-alicious "North and South" mini-series. Usually mention of the Civil War gets my eyes a-glazin', but our tour guide's description of 10,000 Union troops descending on our little town of 3000, marching up Washington Street (still lined with antebellum homes to this day) was pretty interesting.

After our tour Dave, Anneke, Chloe, and I went to the Confederate Cemetery to go geocaching. I used to hang out here in high school out of sheer boredom, and because the riverfront park was always flooded. Not a lot else to do in my little hometown...except maybe then walk on over to the Jewish Cemetery.

Remember the scene where Patrick Swayze's character attends classes for the first time at West Point? This was the classroom. Obviously, they removed the furniture. There's an outbuilding on the grounds where they filmed a steamy love scene I was far too young to watch, but was allowed to because so many locals were extras in the film (but not the love scene).

Nary a creepy vibe to be felt here...just lots of interesting headstones and stories.

I really do love hanging out in cemeteries.