September 7, 2015

Jeremy found the baby crack.  For those of you who aren’t familiar with the voodoo that is the baby crack, it is a mysterious video of folksy children’s songs performed by Hap Palmer in the 1980s.  The songs are acted out by children of various ages – including lots of babies – and their parents, with some psychedelic animations from time to time.  Hap Palmer is a strange dude, but he sure knows how to hypnotize the kiddos.

Grammy poses a copy of the baby crap at her house, and she makes good use of it when things reach fever pitch.  Jeremy randomly searched YouTube for “My Mommy Comes Back” — the Hap Palmer tribute to second wave feminism and a full generation of latch-key kids.  The song made him famous, and his memory lives on in the dazed eyes of my 11 month old.

The other day, Grammy had Li Li and Bastian over to her house at the same time so that they could play.  Of course there had to be some Paw Patrol.  Selah June is now a big fan of the puppies in uniform.

Paw Patrol

(should’ve been posted on 9/26)

It’s getting harder and harder to keep up with this little monkey.  Our days are really structured and full of chaos — all at the same time.  We go through tons of diapers, bananas, puffs, wipes, milk, bibs, and onesies.

And yet I know that we are experiencing the calm before the storm.  As soon as she can keep herself standing upright and moving forward, we’re in big trouble.

September 5, 2015

We went on a family adventure to an out-of-the-way antique store looking for big barn doors for the house.  We found them, but they were hugely expensive.  Selah June wasn’t much a fan of large, dusty oak chests and long rustic farm tables.  Luckily, we brought tons of snacks and roadies.

IMG_2704

September 1, 2015

It’s always hard to leave Selah June for a day at work, but some days are harder than others.  She’s turning into a little kid, and we’re developing our own little inside jokes.  When I see her light up at the sight of others, it makes me so grateful that I live near my family.  I am thankful that she can see her cousins at least weekly if not daily.  They play well and play hard together.  I’m grateful that she brings me and everyone around her joy.  Her eyes light up with spunk, and her smile breaks right into giggles.  She is a blessing, and I never want to take her for granted.

August 29, 2015

Jeremy always gets to experience the joy of Selah June first thing in the morning.  He’s out of town for a few days, and so I’ve been getting up with her. (She’s actually sleeping longer than she usually does…  I’m thinking we’re on some kind of girls vacation.)

morning time

August 28, 2015

Selah June and I spent the late afternoon on an awesome adventure with Grammy.  I saw a couple of houses that looked interesting and talked Mom into jumping in the car and going for a ride.  SJ did her best to get into the conversation.  Noises and laughs, gurgle sounds and tongue clicking, screeches and singing….  She tried every trick in the book.  And I have to admit that they worked like a charm.  We yelled and laughed up and down nearby streets.

It was like a trip down memory lane.  I saw the house that Marty and Ruth Moore lived in.  That little section of Fox Run has turned into a fancy little neighborhood of home renovations. We drove through River Gardens and saw houses that all my faculty friends live in.  We drove through the other end of Mom’s street and spied on the neighbors.

Two episodes were priceless.  First, we went into a neighborhood over by Azalea Trace.  I didn’t realize that it was full of patio homes until I got there.  So Mom looked at pictures on my phone of the one house that seemed interesting, and I drove by it slowly on the way outta there.  But an old sweaty guy saw us lingering.  Ugggghhhhhh…..  He walked right up to the car, and I rolled down the window.  (Stupid, stupid, stupid.)  “Can I help y’all folks?”  He told us some stuff about how great the neighborhood was and the house that was for sale.  Whatever!  He had his grimy dripping-with-sweat hands all on my car door.  Sweat beads were rolling down my leather interior.  Even now, it makes me vomit a little in my mouth.  We quickly made our exit, and Mom cracked up because she new how much that had bothered me.

The next stop we made was in what I thought was supposed to be River Gardens.  But no!  It was some weird Riverina place.  The houses looked like crazy psychedelic houses.  We rolled the windows down to get a better look at the craziness, and I started running my mouth.  “This looks like some architect started trippin’ on LSD and headed from River Gardens into the woods and ended up here with a hammer!  Look at all those cars and boats and crap in that driveway!  I can’t handle this place!”  And then Mom noticed a man sitting in the boat in the driveway full of cars in front of the crazy house that looked like it belonged in the Middle East somewhere.

Needless to say, that’s two neighborhoods I won’t be visiting anytime soon.

Then we got a call from Dad asking us to dinner at Tijuana Flats.  I can’t remember the last time I went there!  They didn’t even recognize me…  sad times.  We sat outside.  It was probably too hot to sit outside, but I don’t ever have the chance to eat food like a normal person or be outside, so it seemed like a good idea until it wasn’t.  Little Miss did good until about 6:40, and then she just got tired.  We made our exit, but I only had 9 miles of gas left in my tank.  I rolled down the windows and played peek-a-boo with her while I stood at the pump.  And then I realized that my back seat is a really good reflection of my life in 2015.

• regalia… because an administrator never knows when dress is academic formal
• a white paper… because everything is always a working draft waiting to be torn apart
• a baby…. because that’s the biggest thing and comparatively speaking nothing else matters

August 25, 2015

This morning, I spent some quality time with Selah Juney.  We had breakfast together and packed my lunch.  We talked to the puppy.  We made lots of funny noises, silly faces, and crazy moves.

SJ and Grammy had a wonderful day today.  It started with lots of little pink piano playing.

duets

Then they spent the afternoon enjoying Satie’s excitement as she experienced her first ballet lesson!

How precious is that?

August 24, 2015

Daddy is really really good at making sure that the family eats well after we all get home from our busy days.  Sophie keeps an eye on him as he goes in and out of the house to watch the grill.  And SJ keeps an eye on both of them.

Sophie and SJ

You can see that their relationship is evolving…  a work constantly in progress.

August 23, 2015

The theme for this post is “catching up on all the photo shoots I’ve done in the last few weeks but not had enough time to edit and post.”

I keep trying to do photo shoots outdoors against the beautiful backdrop of lush summer grass…  but Selah June HATES the feel of grass.  She’s so incredibly distracted by it that she won’t even look at the camera.

So we moved to the rocking chair, and it was a little better.

As you can see, I got a few shots in before she decided enough was enough.  The last pic is her “I’m about to really not be happy” face.  This face is pretty cute, but the one that follows is not so much…

This second set is just closeups for me to commit to memory.

Her eyes every once in a while strike me as so blue that I get lost in them.

This is her ticklish spot.  You get up on her neck right under her chin and she lets loose little baby giggles.

She has trouble pacing herself when it comes to particular foods she likes.  Right now, I think her favorite is mandarin oranges.  She’s also a big fan of watermelon — or “gagamelon” as Grammy calls it.

That face is a mixture of yummy and mischievous all rolled into one.

I love baby toes.  Lately, I’ve just been holding onto her feet and rubbing them to try to commit to memory all the feeling and snuggles of her tiny little baby toes.

Lastly, here’s a set of pics from our time together at her highchair.  This is some of the best quality time because she’s strapped in and concentrated on eating and visiting.  She loves cheerios and chicken and bread and all kinds of fruit and green beans and broccoli and baby crackers and biscuits.  We’re pretty much done with purees.  She’s all about the real stuff.