Serial, Cereal

What if growth isn't just diet or proficiency or knowledge or fitness or skill, or replace all those ors with ands? And what if it is also the composite of the time you spend doing them, and getting really good at spending time doing them? Like sitting on your grandparents' lap.
Olivia is seen here growing into the laps of the Grandparents Vande Berg. Getting good at spending time doing it.

Job Satisfaction

Olivia has taken on a role for herself in the house. We hadn't previously realized how important it is to rotate your drink coasters, but we certainly appreciate the dedication that she demonstrates in the task.

I'm still a little unsure whether I should be concerned about this, but right now I'm deciding that she seems to enjoy it, is easily distracted from it, and it doesn't seem to bring anxiety for he while she's doing it or if she doesn't do it on any given evening....

So I guess I'm documenting it to hear your thoughts, and maybe to embarass her when she's a little older?

Here's a picture from the same day, in case you have a slower connection and can't download the movie.

And another photo of another interesting habit: leaning backwards on the couch.

What is Love?

What is love? 'tis not hereafter;
Present mirth hath present laughter;
What's to come is still unsure:
In delay there lies no plenty;
Then come kiss me, sweet and twenty;
Youth's a stuff will not endure.

The road less traveled

This was last weekend: her first trip to Hickory Hill Park.
Little Girl in a Big Woods; Ambulatory.
She doesn't have the range of the dogs here, but then again we also don't have to give her a bath afterwards from jumping in the muddy creek.
Many more such trips to come, kid. Soft grass to fall down on.

In a clearing stands a boxer?

An update from yesterday: Pink Eye. The poor little girl started gobbing up yesterday morning and her mother wisely had me take her to the doctor in the afternoon. Got antibiotics started quickly and she was able to open her eyes this morning. She is actually in a great mood, but looks like Rocky Balboa in the first movie, when he wants Burgess Meredith to "cut his eyes" so the blood will release and he can see to keep fighting. This one just wants to see the bananas in front of her and books to be read. The hardest part of this is holding her down to clean the eyes and put in the clindomycin. The wails of a very independent little girl who hates having things in her life dictated to her, especially physically. It has been a bad last three weeks for illness: parainfluenza on her birthday, lingering at a low level for quite a while, now Strep.pneumo or Haemophilus influenza. She has been a good host. And during some of the nicest Autumn days yet. I am even more frustrated having sore throat myself. But it does cause me to appreciate vaccination: if I struggle with these small ailments, what would have been my reaction to her acquiring pertussis or malaria or measles? She and I live in fortunate times.
Adrian! I mean, Mommy!

The end of natality; beginning of integers

Olivia is One.

October 13, 2007

She's going in fighting.

Obviously we're proud of this kid. And feel incredibly fortunate to live in a time and place where this sort of survival rate is relatively commonplace. When we are worrying about what kind of food she gets to eat, the moisture content of the heat in her bedroom, the color of the clothes she gets to wear, she and we are indeed fortunate. Melissa and I thank those family and friends reading this for helping us get her to this point. We are sheepishly grateful for all we have in you and Olivia and each other.

She's had The Croup over her birthday. Nice gift. Lousy sleep, surly at times, rasping cough. And yet she was also frequently in a good mood. I hope that this happy demeanor is the warp of her cloth in life. It is a gift in itself, and I appreciate this opportunity to see it, even in adversity. Last night I needed to rock her at my shoulder to coax sleep back into her cough-wracked little body and rattled thoughts. When I hefted her to my shoulder, she whispered, "Daddy", then started sleep breathing. I don't know what I did to deserve it, and frequent late night rockings do not seem a full enough explanation for that little whisper. I can't believe that the few things I've done for her in her short life could rate her calling me by that honored title. I will continue to try to live up to that name. I feel sanded smooth by my daughter. She is polishing me; sometimes brushing against my grain; finding ways to shape she and me together into a sturdy, functioning, beautiful thing that will be passed on through our family.

Like Baseballs Flying Off Your Bat.

Analogies don't abound for the resounding thrum in a paternal chest for the simple pleasure of taking pictures like this in your own kitchen.
I didn't know enough to really savor that feeling of solid contact in peewee baseball, or the delicious feeling of creek water and sand beneath summerhot feet, or a cool breeze ahead of the thunderstorm when the last bales of hay are going on the elevator up into the mow.
But with age comes the wisdom of relishing these sensations.
So I take and look at pictures of these ladies often.