little bit of this, little bit of that

Mother's day was sweet this year. Dan sent card from himself and Will, Kari brought over a beautiful orchid and I got to spend the day with my Mom. It's crazy thinking that someday I might be spending a Mother's day with by own adult child and grandchild...

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Will is enamored with his Nana. Every morning when he sees her he gets this huge smile on his face and says "Hi Nana!" and then tries to leap out of my arms to get to her faster. He is such mimic these days and she has taught him so many funny little games like covering his mouth and laughing, wiping off his feet when he comes in from the deck, helping with cleaning...so maybe not so much games but it's cute in any case. She gets him chocolate milk and berry smoothies and makes him pancakes for breakfast and he will just follow her all around the house with this look of total devotion. I wish she and my Dad lived closer so they could do this more often with him. It's wonderful to see.

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My Mother and one of my best friends totally ganged up on me last night about Will still getting a nighttime bottle and the whole sleeping in the pack and play in our room thing. They make a pretty intimidating pair when coming at you at 11:30 at night, but despite almost making me cry it's secretly kind of cool when two women you respect so much find common ground despite not knowing each other that well.

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Dan will be home in one week and I can't wait. I miss him terribly.

The heart - it can be so full

So, I was sitting in my living room tonight half watching the Office and half working on spreadsheet 9,000,064 for my current work project and I hear a rustling over the monitor.

All of a sudden, in this amazingly clear, super gentle, sweetest voice ever I hear it:

"mama? mama..."

I go in to check on Little Man and he was talking in his sleep.

That SO trumps the "daddy?" every day when we drive up to the house.

Feeling like a grown up

When I was younger I recognized that I had pretty hip parents. They had a fantastic group of friends and I remember them all getting together to do things like play cards, probably have a couple drinks and listen to Prairie Home Companion. All of us kids would be in a playroom or basement putting on plays, playing school or whatever until we got tired. Then we would go to sleep on extra couches and mattresses until we were scooped up by our parents and shuttled home where we sleepwalked our way into our pajamas and crawled into bed.

My brother and I had such a full and rich community of adults in our lives and it has always been one of those things I hoped to provide for my children someday. When Will was born, Dan and I made it a goal to involve him with our friends as much as possible. This weekend, on two separate occasions, I saw that we might be succeeding at this.

On Saturday, Will and I met up with Kari and Andrew at the Farmer’s market downtown. If you ever come to visit me while this is going on, we have to make this a priority. It is such a wonderful market, filled with produce and wine and cheese and chocolates and seafood. There is also live music and a TON of kids. Will was in heaven. Not only did he get his very first real chocolate chip cookie (which took him almost an hour to eat because he was savoring it so)...






...but he also got to spend time with Kari and Andrew (who he adores!) and put in some serious people watching time (one of his favorite activities). It was one of those perfect spring mornings, a warm sun but still a bite to the air. We pushed Little Man around in his new stroller and he even fell asleep in it…which he has never done before!



Sunday we met with a Sarah, Dave, Kari, Andrew, Becca and Nicole and had breakfast at one of our favorite breakfast places. It was such fun to watch Will flirt with Becca and Nicole and sit on his beloved godmother’s lap and ask her to read him a book.



The thing that struck me most was not only how comfortable our friends have gotten with the addition of this little person, but how comfortable he is with them. Being able to actually see him feel safe within this full, rich, amazing community of adults made me feel incredibly lucky…and a little like my own hip parents.