Snippets From Our Recent Life

I don't know if I've mentioned this yet, but Lily Ruth is taking swimming lessons! Well, a her age they are more like survival lessons. A good friend found an instructor that will take babies this young, and even enjoys them at this age ;-) The lessons are at her home in a saline pool. It has been a really neat experience. The class was originally six babies ranging from 8 months to 16 months. Three of the babies had been through a class before and were there to continue their progress.

The first day was full of screaming - from almost all of the new babies. I say almost all, because while Lily Ruth and her pal Sidney cried a LOT (in Sid's case, continually), Henry took to the lessons like a fish (or, as his mama says, a SHARK). The second day had less crying (from Lily - Sidd-o was still ticked), but Lily was not yet convinced about the whole process. There is an exercise that requires the baby to sit on the edge of the pool and wait until you count to three to fall into the pool and 'swim' to you. I would say 'One', and Lily would clap hesitantly - hoping that I was leading up to something fun. I would say 'Two', and she would sign 'all done/finished'. I'd say 'Three!' and a resigned look would settle onto her face as she took in a breath and plunged. It was adorable, funny and a little bit heart breaking.

Each day has been consistently better and by Friday, Lily Ruth and I were playing and laughing through our time in the pool.

We have a whole week left, and I'm really looking forward to it. I hope that Lily Ruth is, too!


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My friend June has a great bracelet with her son's name spelled out. She's been wanting one with her daughter's name as well. I decided to make one for her, and one for me. I really like the way that they turned out.


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Lily Ruth has become obsessed with putting the tops back onto anything that has been opened and fitting things into other things - like her bottle into my shoe...





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Lily Ruth also spends a lot of her time talking softly (and occasionally loudly) to the animals. Even Frank has softened toward her. In retrospect, I should have known that he was ill when I took these because he was holding so still for her... don't worry, he's fine. Just ANOTHER abscessed bite wound. No more sleeping outside for either boy cat.



Lily had a supermodel moment while we were taking these :-) She was moving so fast that the wind blew her hair back


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This weekend, Lily Ruth and I were both congested. This meant that I got almost no sleep, and she got very interrupted sleep as her usual 'half-wake to nurse back to sleep' routine was broken by the need to suction out her tiny nose.

At one point, I had almost drifted back to sleep when she turned toward me and (still asleep) whispered "Mama... Mama... Mama...' in the saddest, most plaintive tone that anyone has ever used. That was it. I was awake.

In my quest to keep her breathing as even as possible, I kept propping her up on my shoulder or my pillows. We spent a good portion of the night cheek to cheek. My exhausted brain burped this out:

breathing face to face
baby lashes on my cheek
fingers drum my lips

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We go to Starbucks a LOT. Lily feels very comfortable there. She even likes to show off for her 'friends' there - like 'talking on the phone', 'drinking mama's coffee', and my favorite - wearing her sunglasses!