Things to Teach

When I decided to leave partnership at my old firm and become a part-time senior counsel at my current firm, I never made an actual list of pros and cons. This was a gut decision, not lending itself to effective list making exactly. After all, I left a job with a lot more money, a lot more friends, a lot more responsibility, to come to a job where hmmm... I would have less responsibility but more time off??? But my "time off morning" yesterday consisted of a brief workout and a walk in the 30 degrees with Daisy and then a rush to work to meet some very rushed deadlines that someone else dictated (a role that I used to enjoy and no longer get to do!). Some days, the visions of my extra teaching time with Sadie, or hours to organize the closets and get together with friend more... they just don't come to fruition. I kept thinking I was going to discover a new passion, a new calling maybe? Instead I feel like I am  largely stuck on number 2 of a 12 item to-do list for projects around the house. I guess the good thing is, generally now I have time to get the lists made, whereas before, I rarely even got that accomplished.

But I digress... one of the known cons to this job is not having an assigned parking space. Ever since I made partner at my old firm, I had an assigned parking space. Now I enter on the ground floor and I often don't find a space to park until the upper part of 3, so you can envision all the right turns I take to get up there (and left turns to leave). And since I drop Sadie to school in the mornings before work and leave to meet the nanny in the evening, I am always in a hurry.

Which brings me to the real point of this post... and that is how well I can drive in parking garages. I drive well. I am slick. I go fast, I make narrow and tight turns. I have never had a wreck. I cut around poles.  I do the things that the signs say not to do. And I despise following someone closely who rides his or her breaks all the way up and down, even pn the straight-aways. One might think I sound reckless, but I am not. Because I was taught exactly how to drive in parking garages.

My father taught me.

My father grow up one of five boys in Pittsburgh. He is as close to all of his brothers now in friendship as he was to them in age growing up (typical Catholic family, these children were born one immediately after the other). They get together at least once every couple of years and we, their 13 descendants, sit in rapt attention listening to them telling the stories of their youth.  In fact, if you don't listen very closely, you won't hear the story, for they often break out in laughter and struggle to tell the end, just slapping each other on the shoulder as they tell the tale, which probably has grown taller through the years. Weddings of my cousins have always been great as everyone attends, and the reminiscing goes late into the night before and after the wedding. In fact, I will confess, that as the bride, I really did miss out on the rituals of hanging out with everyone in one hotel room and sharing stories (though being the bride was fun in so many other respects!).

Here they are at someone's wedding comparing their bald spots for the photographer!  I also have several pictures from different functions where they are comparing their backsides (clothed). They are rarely serious, always laughing, always happy.

My Uncle Jim, who is the third in age (my Dad being the second), loved cars. So the brothers somehow managed to pool some funds together (coming from a middle class family, they were all working at young ages) and bought a car, probably before Uncle Jim could legally drive. Needing to keep this a secret from their very strict father, they hid the car for years by parking it on a neighboring street. They worked on this car though to keep it operational, and drove it all over town. Can you imagine now, in the day of "helicopter parenting," how 5 brothers could keep this secret effectively?  They did. And they sold that car and bought others. These boys were banded. They would never snitch on each other to one of their parents. They were a troop that would do anything to support the others. I believe they still would.

So my Dad and his brothers, some of them worked in downtown Pittsburgh's parking garages. And they have stories to tell on how the joys of this job. Those days, as I understand it, people didn't park their own cars but instead, the attendant (and his assistants, like my father in his younger days) parked them, often like sardines in a can. And when it came time to move one car and others were in the way, well it was an art how they did this effectively and quickly, worthy of a tip! The stories of others' mishaps parking cars made us all laugh.

So my father,  he knows how to drive in a garage. And he taught us to do the same thing. Quick but safe. Confident... but fun.

This morning I was behind a poky person (on his cell phone) and I was exasperated. I needed to get to work and was already running late. For a minute I contemplated passing him on the straight away, but instead I got lost in a few minutes envisioning how my dad must have felt. A teenager, with a job on a Saturday night parking cars for all the movie goers heading to the theatre. Getting behind cars then that were expensive, luxurious, ones that he could only dreaming of owning one day. Driving them up and down the ramps, safely but confidently. Veering around poles to find the right space, backing into tight spots for ease of pulling out or moving later.

It makes me a little sad that he won't be able to teach Sadie the art of driving in a parking garage.

I love the relationship that Sadie has with my Dad (to her, he is Papa). Like the nieces and nephews before her, she views him as a very calming influence to the firestorm that is often my mother (said only in the nicest of ways). As babies, Papa could hold his infant grandchildren safely swaddled in their blankets and get the fussiest babies to calm down. My mother says he did it to us too, as children, and I watched with awe as he did it to my own child. He would come visit Sadie on the early days of my maternity leave when I couldn't fathom a shower or load of laundry and he would pick her up and wrap her in some blankets and say "I am taking her outside, she needs sunshine and a walk." And I would watch from the window as he would walk with her slowly up the block on the sunny side of the street. Sometimes he would put her in the baby stroller but a lot of the time he would just hold her up on his shoulder, so she could look out at the world around her, and yet feel the pressure of his shoulder on her tummy and his hand on her back. He would talk to her the whole way, about things that he was seeing, cars that were passing, houses that looked nice or flowers that were blooming (this was March, most likely, or early April). In a soft and calming voice. He was magic.

This is a picture of when we told my parents that were expecting Sadie.

He won't be able to teach her to drive in a parking garage in all likelihood. But one day, I will. And I will tell her how he taught me to do it. And I will tell her as many of the stories I know from my dad and his brothers growing up. And the joy and friendship that they all had with each other. And how it is that positive outlook, that sense of brotherhood, that keeps you alive and happy. As it has for them.

We have had a tough few weeks with relatives growing older and decisions needing to be made. My parents, God bless them, seem to be in a window of good health. But it doesn't last, we know that. One of the prices that I have learned must be paid for having a child late in life as we did with Sadie, is that you deal with caring for your parents at the same time you are caring for your toddler. My own parents didn't face these things until their own children were largely grown.  This will not be us. And the more I watch and learn how to deal with these difficult issues, the more I fear that one day my own child will face them. And that she won't be as old as I am!

So we are grateful for what we have right now. I am grateful for the memories. Even as I find myself going through them as I drive around the parking garage. After all, my father taught me how to dream and drive at the same time. I, on one hand, am reliving some memories. He, on the other hand, he would look to his future. He probably had the better approach, even then!

More Winter Memories

This weekend, Mark set up a fire-pit that he had bought a few weekends ago in our back yard (which isn't really a yard, but an assembly of pavers, patio-style, with lots of shrubbery). Does it look like we are cold and it is smoky? Both are true, and yet we had the time of our lives. Sadie LOVED it the most!

We are slowly leaving the Christmas season. And I mean, slowly.  I have never experienced a holiday like this one where I had not transitioned to the next thing coming by its end. Well, maybe our wedding. I remember the day after our wedding wanting to replay it all in my head over and over again, so this is kind of like that. But give me a break, am I really equating one year's Christmas break with something as important and live-changing as my wedding was? And by the end of the day after our wedding, I was on a plane to Italy very much looking forward to an awesome honeymoon. And honestly, by the end of our honeymoon I was kind of ready to come home and get settled again in our house.

But for some reason, I am having a really hard time leaving Christmas this year. The Boden spring line did help me for a few moments, they have some wonderfully springy new kaftans in there, but still, I go back to my Christmas CD in my car every chance I can. Sadie's still lugging around her Rudolph and Clarice reindeer dolls everywhere around the house (two nights ago, we made a card for Rudolph because yesterday was to be his birthday, and the kitchen table was completely set for a party).  She took them to her grandparents this weekend, and only allowed Rudolph not to come to Red Lobster because we convinced her that Daisy would be lonely in Grandmom's house without him there.

So Mark set up the fire pit this weekend, and we all sat outside for an hour or more and toasted marshmallows and watched the flames.  No hurries, no need to speed anything along. Fire pits are wonderfully warming... all of us had 'toasty buns' as Sadie kept saying.
Even Daisy wasn't scared of the fire, which is amazing considering that she freaks out usually when the oven is turned on if it has any remnants in there or when a smoke alarm battery is about to die.

We truly had the most amazing Christmas ever. And it wasn't made that way by one gift, or an assortment of them even. Or spectacular weather. Or even anything extraordinary, like a surprise visit by a long lost friend or family member (though having Aunt Carolyn with us is special every year). On paper, this Christmas was no different than the ones we have had before (except the Great Pine Beetle Infestation, requiring an 11 foot tree take down, rebuy, and redecorate in 14 hours).

But it just was a great time. 

I have a lot in my life that I am really grateful for, and nothing in my life begging change, right now. That is so rare for me, and particularly rare considering some of the changes we went through in the last year. But everything is great right now. Sadie is just at an incredible stage and age right now, reminding me of a mother at the pool last summer with a newly turned 4 year old who told me "When she will turn 4, you too will realize that you have the daughter you always wanted."  It is true, for us at least. My new job is going well.  No part of me really misses being a partner or fully engaged in the practice of law. I love my part-days off. I love time to exercise, to organize something in the house, and most importantly, more time with Sadie. I am fully 100% in love with my primary role as Mom right now. I don't regret moving to this sooner, but I am sure happy I made the change when I did.  Just in time to spend some afternoons sledding!

Sure I could be 12 lbs slimmer, and have a lot less gray hair (that is the most disappointing thing about turning 41, I am going gray rapidly!!). The lines on my face seem to be etched more. And my house is never tidied up. I wish my husband were less stressed and had more free time too... but I am thankful that he finds work rewarding and fulfilling, and that his commitment allows me to be less committed. Our parents could be younger and healthier, but this is what happens when we are older parents ourselves. I hate watching our parents falter, but they have lived long long lives and they all watched their children, and several of their grandchildren, grow up and prosper. I can think of many friends who have already lost a spouse, it seems pretty much the norm to be watching a declining parent at my age.  Our house is decorated just the way I want it to be. Sadie's childcare situation is just perfect. The list of things that I am truly thankful for now, and the people that I am thankful for, goes on and on.

I do love the concept of bucket lists. And as Sadie grows older, I think I will start one. Something that will replace our trips to Disney one day with things more adventurous for Mark and me. But for now, it is so great to be just where we are. And I am incredibly thankful.

I'd be fibbing if I said...

... that there wasn't a large part of me excited to go back to work tomorrow.

We have had an incredible Christmas. And I mean that from Halloween through this week, basically.  Faith gave us the most incredible nanny in early November and she has influenced Sadie in a truly wonderful way. The whole experience shined a bright light on a faith journey that I have been fumbling on recently, which made the whole Advent and Christmas season so much deeper and more fulfilling than I could have ever wished for.

And Sadie, she just couldn't have been better. Her behavior (no tantrums!) was perfect, and her true belief in the birth of Jesus as well as the visit of Santa (guided by Rudolph, who was the shining start this Christmas and the story that she couldn't hear enough) was just inspiring. It was just all together great. We had a terrific time with my sister who visited for several days, a white Christmas, my parents were great when they came on Christmas day, and a visit with Mark's family later last week was just marvelous too.  Sure our parents are aging and presenting more complicated health problems than we would like to be dealing with, but they are alive. It was just a great time all around (once the snow melted).

Yesterday Sadie had her first tearful meltdown "please don't go back to work day after tomorrow Mommy, can we have Christmas vacation for just a bit longer?" It made me tear up too.

But it couldn't all last. The tree (our second of the season after the Great Pine Beetle Infestation) must come down. The toys must be sorted through to fit the new ones in. It was a warm day today before the rain came and I got in a great long run. I was inspired to commit to my healthier living goals for resolutions, but to do that, I need to fit working out in every day, and working downtown with quick lunches at my desk allows me to do that much easier than being at home with Sadie does (we did a Mommy/Toddler yoga video today which was hilarious though).  She needs to get back into a rhythm and so do we. I don't think we have woken up before 8 am in a week or more. Even the dog has a sense of relaxation that made me suspect carbon monoxide poisoning more than once (kidding!).

So tomorrow, we begin what I have always hated, the doldrums of January - March. Hated, despised, barely survived, countless times. Bad memories of so many struggles find themselves in those months. Meningitis, miscarriages, etc.

But hark back, four years ago now... God gave me Sadie in the midst of that period. My March 8th baby, with a due date just into spring, came to me instead squarely in winter. My last trimester with her was heaven, it was blessed, it was a Lenten Journey that yielded, not taketh away. I never thought I would celebrate a birth of a child in any other season than Summer, which was when Mark and I celebrate our birthdays, and when the most wonderful childhood memories are gathered. But no, she was a March baby. A reminder than in the periods of darkness, that is when the light is needed to shine.

So we start tomorrow, back to work, back to school, back to routine, and judging from tonight's dinner, back to tantrums. Part of me sees Spring in the distance. But a lot of me is saying to enjoy these moments, and begging them to slow down.

Adaptability

Today was a great day for at least three reasons. The first was my morning - I got back to the gym for a great workout this morning, the first since the rush of the Christmas season was upon us, with its lack of time and abundance of sweet treats! The second reason was my evening, when I went sledding with Sadie over at her best friend's house in Windsor Farms. Sadie and Bella were hilarious as they rode down the sled together time and again. It was the first time that Sadie has sledded down a hill (versus Mark and I pulling her sled around our local park) and she just loved it, no fear, all laughs, for hours.

But the third reason my day was great was my unexpected bonus hours playing with Daisy.

In the way Mark and I generally divide things, he gets far more Daisy time than I do. It just is the way things fall, far less than by design than just by routine. I seem to require far more sleep than Mark does so he ends up taking Daisy for her early morning and late night walks around the block. I am often the one who heads Sadie up into her bath, or finishes a project with her, and he will take Daisy out for a quick walk when he comes home. I feel like once a week or so, we make a point to switch things up and I will take Daisy. But those walks are generally times of quiet solitude, where I am thinking through the list of what still needs to be done at home, or what happened that day at work, or other deeper issues. I admit, they are rarely times that I spend dwelling on positive thoughts about Daisy. And... it has been really cold here!  So those thoughts that I have are often "Come on dog!  Mama's freezing out here!"

This Fall, Daisy had some recurrent health problems. I felt terrible for her, and worried about her, but in hindsight, I resented having another thing added to my to-do list on the days that I had to take Daisy to the vet. It is clear now that a large part of her issue was not liking the nanny who was with us for a short time between Lisa's departure in September and Tyler coming to save us in late November. But Mark and I were stressed about the nanny situation as well, so while Daisy's position on the issue was very evident, we were more concerned about Sadie at the time.

So the last month has been heaven for both Sadie and Daisy, both adjusting so well to the new nanny.  Daisy came with us to Thanksgiving dinner at Mark's brother's house and the 24+ attendees all remarked at what a great retriever she was, even when she accidentally fell into a fish pond trying to catch a tennis ball that someone accidentally threw in there. And of course, when we had our Christmas party last weekend, 90+ guests got to see Daisy hanging out under the dining room table.  We never shun Daisy, or Sadie for that matter, from our parties.

Then my sister Carolyn came in from Denver a few days ago, as she hadn't been to our house since she and her dog Nella came to the beach with us in late June. And late the first night, after we had all been driving around to look at Christmas lights and she and I were wrapping presents and drinking red wine, she said to me "Daisy has really aged."  And I turned and looked at my yellow lab, asleep right next to us on our new shag rug, and it hit me like a cannon ball... she really looks old.  Her face is almost all white now.

So today, back to today, was a bonus. After I worked out, Sadie's best friend's nanny called and asked if Sadie wanted to come play in the snow with them today. And my afternoon was suddenly free!  Before we left, I looked around the kitchen to survey all that needed to be done in that room alone... there was something on every counter that needed to be put away from our big Christmas Eve and Christmas Day dinners. There were three sets of Playdoh cutting sets that Santa had brought, along with the crusty remnants of various shreds of the doh left out on the counter for two+ days. Laundry needed to be washed and folded, toys organized and put away, perhaps a long bath and magazine read for me, the day was my oyster. But as I was getting Sadie ready to play, Daisy sensed that snow play was in the cards and she ran to get some tennis balls that were hidden from her after Christmas morning and was rapidly dropping them in my lap. Sadie suggested it out loud "Can we bring Daisy Mom?"

And into the car we all went. Daisy sits on the front seat now, generally too achy (or too stubborn) to hop into the hatch back of the Pilot. And after I dropped Sadie off at Bella's, I took Daisy to the park by the house where she and I first lived for three years before Mark and I got married.

Daisy is a yellow lab, and by nature, she likes almost anything.  She is happy to see any visitor to our house, whether they be the cleaning lady, contractor, or a grandparent. She is happy to go for a walk any day of the year, even in the rain. But aside from the deep devotion to her People and tennis balls, she loves nothing else like she loves the beach, and a good snow.

Williamsburg and Hampton, the moment comes out of the tunnel crossing the Chesapeake Bay, she is awake with her head at the window whining for it to be opened so she can breath in that good salt air. She is the first in the ocean (the moment she hops out of the car at the beach house) and refuses to stay in the house when she knows that any relative in our family is down there (she hopped a gate to follow Mark down there one time a few years ago and ran into the ocean thinking he was throwing a ball when in fact, he was surf fishing... but when he saw her go after the bait, he quickly found a ball in his fishing gear and threw it to her). She loves to swim and retrieve and will do it for hours on end at the beach.

But she is just as passionate about the snow, even though she really only knew it her first three years, and then had a break for five years or so until true snowfall returned last year. And as the snow was falling on Christmas Day, Daisy looked out the window whining for someone to take her out and throw ball. Both Mark and I obliged, usually with Sadie and her sled in tow.

Today, the focus was all on her. I was well bundled up and had nowhere really pressing to be for a few hours. And boy did we have fun. I was thinking about all the days that I had taken her to that park before Mark and I got married, when it was really just Daisy and Jill, pretty much every morning and night, retrieving there. Then she could sniff the ball from far away, even if her eyesight didn't follow my throwing it (we use a Chuck-it to throw the balls, so they can go really far). Today she missed the ball's path a lot of times, and it was clear that her eyesight and her nose are not as good as they used to be. She runs a lot slower than she used to, and sometimes will walk back instead of run. But she always wanted to do it again, and again, and again. And several times she did this trick that she did even as a puppy (nothing we taught) where she would spy the ball, and then slink down to the ground and tip tow to it, like she was a lion being sly and quietly approaching something to kill, and then from 10 feet away pounce on the object of her attention. In Daisy's case, it is always just a tennis ball. But in her mind, she must imagine all sorts of wonderful things that it could be instead, and this trick that she has done now for nine years, it never gets old for her, or for me.

She's asleep with me now, at my feet, as I type this. She sleeps a lot more now than she ever has. The vet told us earlier this month that she is in good health but that we would notice her really start to slow down now, and I feel like once he said it, it has been dramatic. While she enjoyed Christmas morning, she spent most of the dinner time asleep on the floor of the living room instead of lining herself up for scraps under the dining room table like she has in year's past.  While she's only nine, she just seems old. Maybe that's because up until a few months ago, she always looked and acted like a puppy. So it is like she went from looking like she was four years old to like she is thirteen in three months.

At my old firm, I worked with a wonderful older gentleman who lived in Atlanta. He became very much of a father figure and mentor to me, as well as a terrific attorney. He could talk to me on the phone for hours a day, which admittedly I resented a little when I had other things to do. But in the midst of a 70 minute conversation, he always dropped these nuggets of wisdom that made the other 69 minutes worth the wait. And one thing he said to me that I always remembered was that the problem with dogs is that they died just too soon. He loved dogs, has always had them, but it was clear that the dogs he loved the most were those that here about 6 years old and older. When they don't chew, need only walks instead of constant exercise, when they would nap along with you instead of wake you up wanting to go out. When a dog became a truly devoted companion. He told me how he buried all his dogs in the back of his property and how he still goes and talks to them a lot of evenings because he really misses them.

Daisy has always been a great dog, she was a fun puppy and I was lucky to have the time and energy to devote to her then. But now, she is just such an incredible companion dog.  Thanks for a great few hours today my Daisy girl. I promise to do that a lot more often. Now could you please promise to stop aging?

Forever Grateful

Yesterday was Sadie's school's Song Fest. Sadie has gone to this preschool since she was 18 months old, but the one-year-old class and the two-year-old class are too young for this wonderful tradition. As Sadie proclaimed proudly, "They are still babies Mom, only big kids like me get to be in Song Fest." She was so excited about it, randomly practicing her songs (most of them with words that I had never heard before, and we didn't have the words, or thankfully, any "practice requirement" from the school). Several kids in her class have come down with strep over the last couple of weeks and I was sure that Sadie would be the next victim, based on her track record of the last three years. But the days were passing, she was humming along (literally and figuratively).

Mark, Tyler the nanny and I all made it to the school's Sanctuary at the appointed time. As did more than a couple hundred other parents, grandparents, caregivers, et all. All of us had digital cameras with charged batteries, most also had video cameras. We were all craning our necks to see our child process in the door.

I was so proud!  I tear up now thinking of watching her coming in. Looking for us way back in the rows of parents. And then her face just lit up upon seeing us. She broke into a grin and waved madly at us. Notwithstanding the fact that over half of the kids were waving to over half of the parents probably at that same instant, my daughter was just elated that we were there. And I, once again, was elated that she was there. That she... is... here.

Of all the comments that well-intentioned friends and relatives said to us about when we were going to have another child, the most memorable one that stuck in my claw so-to-speak was someone who said "You need to have another one Jill, you are going to suffocate the one you have with love otherwise."  Because part of me worried that she was right. 

Can you love a child too much? Will she one day say to me "Leave me alone... don't you have something else to do other than smother me?" 

Even with four children, my mother had an amazing ability to make each of us feel smothered at one time or another. Loved to the extreme? Ummm, not words any of us would have used. But she meddled, she focused, she intervened. She knew what each of her children were doing when we lived at home, at all times. I yearned for a mother who "had a life" other than her kids' lives.

Here I am a career mom, but am I getting soft? Will Sadie judge me the same way as I judged my mom?

I used to be known as being somewhat "contrarian" in my ways. I know more than a few of my partners at my former firm (and a lot more than a few associates) who would say that I have been, let's say, difficult on occasion. Not particularly understanding of others' priorities when it came to my transaction.  Sometimes argumentative. Kind of a bitch, some days, a few would say. I wouldn't say that this is a requirement for a female attorney with a financing/transactional practice, but the few that I have met over the years that do what I do, we all face the same criticisms.  People don't usually refer to us as most agreeable. Or laid back. Or grateful. A ball of fire, yes. Maybe pretty fun once the closing dinner comes along, yes. But appreciative of life's blessings? Humble?  Not so much.  A partner at another firm who I knew, but really hadn't stayed in touch with after having Sadie, ran into me after I moved to my part-time counsel role at my current job.  "I was really surprised when I heard you left the partner role," she said to me.  "You never seemed the type of woman who would give that up voluntarily... I think you will have it back in no time," she laughed.

Sometimes I wonder if Sadie will know me as a mom who had character, and spine, and independence when a lot of days now, I would rather be at the Song Fest than anywhere else. Yesterday she just saw a woman standing on her chair trying to get the perfect picture while tears were swimming in her eyes. I am just so grateful for this kid. I am so grateful to go through life as her mother, to have some afternoons and most every evening to talk with her, explain things, engage in debates, read to her, laugh with her, lay with her, listen to her. I am so grateful to be the person that she reaches for, that she waves to when she leaves, that she runs to when I come home. She is at such a fun age, going through such a great stage.  I honestly can't get enough of it.

Will she grow up suffocated by this love? I hope not. Will I become the dreaded helicopter parent that wants to be present at every occasion? I hope not. But for now, I can't stop feeling blessed.  I can't stop feeling like God gave me this tremendous gift to be her parent. And I am so very grateful for it.

Stay just like this... now.

We had a wonderful weekend. In all honesty, we have had an incredible month.

Sadie made the transition to another new nanny in the middle of November, and Mark and I can't believe how fast and how well she has adjusted to another change. Our new nanny was truly an answer to a prayer and she is already feeling like a member of our family. Sadie bonded to her very quickly, and nothing could make me happier. Even in our very chilly last couple weeks, the house has been warm with celebration as they make cookies, lots of great art projects, and play pretend games like turning the house into a restaurant complete with menus, waitresses, and quite an array of choices. It is a wonderful feeling -- Mark and I both remarked the other evening -- to come home and hear Sadie laughing and singing, so very happy with what she is doing.

And thus, the weekends have been great too. We saw The Nutcracker for the first time yesterday. Sadie didn't quite make it though the length of the production -- she and her best friend Bella insisted on sharing their seat and once things got a little scrunched (in the second hour), there was a little bit of a battle over who was going to move :) And I forgot to bring a snack (the play was from 2-4:15 or so) and the lines for the food there were way too long during the intermission. We have learned that Sadie is a different child when she gets some nuts or some other protein mid morning and mid-afternoon for her snacks.

Today we rewarded her great behavior recently with letting her sit up in the balcony at Church. She loved being so close to the choir, and most of all, the massive organ that is St. James's.  There was a few times that my heart skipped a few beats as I worried that she was about to thrust the hymnal over the balcony's edge to the crowd down below, but that never happened. And up and down the stairs we went, first for Children's Chapel during the sermon (kids go to another smaller chapel), then to sit on the stairs of the altar during the Liturgy of the Eucharist, and finally during Communion.  Sadie loves going to Church though, and I could use the extra stair climbing workout.

It is nice to be writing this blog about how great things are, rather than sitting at the computer researching  the Internet to see if a developmental phase will pass. It is tempting to want to freeze her right here, right now. She is so loving, so apologetic when she misbehaves. She wants to do chores... loves to help sort the laundry, put it in the washer, fold her sheets up (though most of that happens on the rug in her room, which no doubt has some dog hair on it).  She helps me unload the dishwasher, and puts the silverware away. Pinch me and wake me up!!

I love to see her growing and changing, but it scares me sometimes to see how fast it happens. We received a Christmas card from a wonderful friend from my childhood this week and her grandchildren, who I babysat for when they were infants when I was in college... two of them recently got engaged. Shouldn't they still have their braces on? Speaking of braces, one of my nieces got hers off recently and I just saw some profile pictures she posted on Facebook which are... quite grown-up.  Not in a bad way... but not in the fun loving wide ear to ear grin that I am used to seeing. I won't stop them from all growing up, I just want to freeze my own little one.

I remember when Sadie would wake up during the night for, let's say, maybe 2 years?? Something like that. And I would think "when will this pass??" I was impatient.  Now she sleeps on, very well, from 8:00 last night to 7:40 this morning, and woke up in the best mood that Mark and I can ever remember. Pinch me.

The days do fly quickly, and what I can do is write about them. Try to memorialize the funny things she still says. The way that she has asked me so many times how Jesus could be born in the manger with no doctor there, and then resolved it as she play acted with her own manger and found some hospital equipment under the hay. She's a creative girl, always finding the solution. I just need to listen for it every day.  She has indeed completed our family.

We Decorate to the Extreme

This is our house. Yes, our gingerbread house, but it kind of looks like our real house too. Ok, well not really. But it isn't so far off the mark. We love Christmas decorations. I am actually not sure where this stemmed from in my case. My parents were never without a wreath on the front door, and I remember a childhood "chore" being the one who had to go around and plug in each of the candles in the lanterns every night (my mother can't believe that Mark and I leave ours plugged in all the time). But we never had lights on trees outside, or bushes. The inside was decorated, but I remember the tree always went up around the middle of December. Mark and I put our tree up here on the Friday after Thanksgiving. 

In fact, just the other night we agreed that our tree might not make it until Christmas with all the needles that it is quickly dropping (most of them, on my head as I crawl under it to water it every morning and night, as thankfully it is still drinking). This would be the first year that we had to get two trees for one location (we do have three threes in the house, so getting more than one tree is not that unusual for us actually). I can't imagine taking down the tree and all the decorations to just put it up again, so that would be a first.

The Christmas before Sadie was born, we were moving on December 27th. We were moving to a house whose property line was actually 12 feet from our then-current house. And in the Fan of Richmond, where houses are built on an eighth of an acre I think, saying we were "a stone's throw away" means literally that I could throw a stone, accurately, out of the dining room window of one house into the kitchen window of another, with little effort.  We still needed a moving company (most importantly to empty the attic of our first house, which was stuffed full with no easy way to get items out of, especially for a woman in her third trimester). 

But notwithstanding the move, and the fact that I was due with Sadie in March and had basically sworn off any activities that required any more exertion than growing said child, we decided to put up a Christmas tree at our old house. And since Mark was helping the movers move our belongings as well as finish the actual remodel of the new house (we moved in three weeks before the kitchen was usuable), I was the one in charge of decorating and undecorating the tree. It was still worth it. I remember standing in the old house with no furniture left in it, taking ornaments off of the tree, and thinking to myself that it was still worth it.

So far, this is the best Christmas we have ever had. Sadie's yet to catch anything more than a cold (knock on wood, she usually has an ear infection or strep by this week annually). And she is so into Christmas. Last year, I remember how she was learning Deck The Halls and singing it enough that we grabbed the video camera to preserve her newly understandable voice. This year she sings every song. And she randomly makes up her own songs, all of them praising the birth of Jesus Christ in some totally exaggerated way, while working in Santa, reindeer, and her list, all in one song. It is just so cute to watch. She is loving toward Mark and I and Daisy in a whole new way. It is just really cute. It is like the celebration of the season that Mark and I take to the extreme has really been passed on to her. 

Sure one day, she might choose to take a different path. I now practice a different religion than that which I grew up in (Catholicism), and I sure do a lot of things differently than my parents did. But right now, it is really fun having a mini-me (or mini-us, giving Mark some credit). It is a great Christmas so far, and to think, we are only half-way through Advent!!