so, i’m finding it must be during the hollow and dry, puddly low tide times there is more to drink in as, in these last few days, i haven’t put my camera down (oh, prepare) and am finding comfort and inspiration in both the mundane routine moments of our life as well as a few moments to celebrate.

it is cold and rainy and we here in the south are madly scrounging for boxed-up sweaters and coats as this lengthy cold snap has taken the wimpy sun-lovers by surprise. (freeze warning tonight and wind chill temp of 20 degrees. that, my friends, is what neapolitans call…cold.)

*currently obsessed with pockets. notices them on all our clothes. ‘you got pockets, mama?’

i, on the otherhand, am loving a taste of the north and affirmation that my huddle-and-nest tendencies the last couple weeks are perfectly excused. after hop-scotching three stores this morning in search of sold-out fire logs, we managed to rig up some tiny camping fire starters, a bundle of dry wood, and a few piles of paper plates and old mail…and i’m happy to report, we have a weak but semi-substantial fire despite the fact it requires frequent poking and blowing to keep it aflame. but, there is indeed a husband-less initiated fire today. badge of honor #1.

and routine has welcomed us back as i have spent the last three mornings washing her wet-the-bed sheets (badge of honor #’s 2, 3 and 4) and trying to keep the house clean and baby-ready (no badge there yet). but i am loving routine, its sameness a comfort and calm. i think the mornings are my favorite…just the idea that the day is fresh and new and welcoming. we’ve spent more morning time than usual in our bathroom lately as our baths are a little longer and getting ready has been drawn out to be somewhat more enjoyable than the quick wash & run. when it’s clean and laundry-free, our bathroom is a happy place…the east morning sun drenches its rays into the big window above our tub, and the golden light contrasts with our dusty blue walls in just a way that makes you want to stay. and so we do.

i always kept some sort of baby seat in the bathroom when lainey was tiny so i could get ready and yet still peek at her from the foggy shower door. the baby seat is back and ready, but it seems the older sister thinks it’s for her.

*she’ll stand on her stool in front of the mirror and wash her face for twenty minutes if i let her. loves, loves soap & water and all the possibilities it has. entirely worth the mess.

we escaped our routine a bit earlier this week to indulge in a present from a girlfriend…a delicious pedicure. it was lainey’s first trip to get her little nails done, and my cheeks hurt from smiling at her satisfaction.

she was speechless. just stared at the sweet woman who carefully painted her tiny fingers and toes and did exactly as she instructed. stayed perfectly still, balanced her hand in front of the fan, froze her arms in the slot of the uv dryer and watched. and, while perched on my lap watching the pedi guy buff the nerve endings off my feet, she kept asking, ‘what dat boy doing?’

i knew she felt big and special and honored to be there with her mama. and, as if sinking into a massage chair for 45 minutes to have your legs and feet pampered isn’t heavenly enough, sharing the experience with my girl made it so much better.

in honor of our soon-to-come, sweet, soft little bundle of girl, we both chose a whispering shade of pale pink.

sandwich in a few more moments of happy home routine…

*note: this is a frequent scene in our bathroom and hardly a good sign…often followed with emergency call to my hair girl, but i think we managed to pull it off this time. product of impulsive nature, i suppose, but key ingredient to risk-taking creativity, if you ask me.

yesterday morning, lainey renamed the dogs lake & ape. i have no idea what compelled her or, more interesting enough, where she got the names lake & ape, but she told me in the morning that latte’s name was ape and sophie’s name was lake and, although i questioned her creativity or ability to realize it was indeed possible to up and change a dog’s names on whim, this is exactly what she did. c’mon, lake, she called after sophie…or ape eat num-num after latte predictably snatched my toast. and it lasted one full day, i’m happy to say, and the dogs have returned to their originally given names this morning. kids are so cool.

finally, our routinely beautiful days interrupted last night for the equal beauty of gathering with my friends to celebrate my birthday in the happiest of ways.

we created.

nestled on a stretch of dark street downtown sits a hidden gem…earth & fire, a quaint pottery painting studio that sits high above the sidewalk and hosts girls nights or kid dates or what have you.

we gathered late with good wine and food, a couple littles (i couldn’t bear to leave mine), and a huddle of girls as the black, wet streets soaked up the sprinkling rain outside, and we laughed and talked as we stroked paintbrushes across crisp, chalky white pottery to create little masterpieces to remember our evening with.

we often celebrate each others’ birthdays at fancy restaurants along stretches of long tables, and although fun and special, i found it refreshing to do something a little different. i love to create, and i love to love while i create, so it suited me just fine, to be in the presence of my friends, painting, talking, nurturing my own little artist and finding time to snuggle some other little loves in my life…

…and so proud of my little picasso who took four hours of girl time and creativity like a champ…
unholstering the hair dryer and blasting pottery (not to mention people, tablecloths and any other random item) with wind and heat, for sure, taking prize for her entertainment for the night.

after painting about fourteen layers of her grayish/blackish/pinkish concoction, we managed to slap a handprint on for her creation of gift for sister.

and me? with two weeks left and counting, feeling sentimental and holding on to the remaining beauty of this very moment, i wanted something to remember this all by…so a mug it was, her secret name painted on the bottom, inside where i can always see it…once the coffee is gone and the day remains.

thank you, girls, for such a special night. my painted cup may have been left to be glazed and fired, but my real cup is feeling…full.

we watched lainey’s birth video today, and it was surreal. as she huddled under the afghan next to me on the couch and watched her tiny little self enter our world (that me? that me when i was tiny?), it was amazing to think another one of the most meaningful, happiest days of our lives is just days away.

bring it.

love. ~k

i can’t sleep. i’ve been awake for a good section of the night the last few nights, and somewhere in the still and blackness between two and four, i have alternated late ‘morning’ sickness with attempting to weave together the emotional strands nine months of pregnancy and life change brings. and no matter just how overwhelming everything is, i arrive like an ambitious runner the morning of a marathon, slightly intimidated but mostly aroused at the challenge of the race that lies ahead. i stretch and straighten the awkwardly pinned number tag that sets me apart from all the other runners on this race, ease into my starting stance and breathe in the courage and strength i’ll need.

i will support my husband. i will efficiently run a home. i will take time for myself. i will further my career. i will take new risks. i will be creative. i will write. i will be inspired and, in turn, inspire. and most importantly, i will nurture our family and consume the two little souls i’ve created with more love than their tiny hearts can handle. i will keep a good pace and run hard and good through the achy parts. because i can.

brett’s only been gone three days and although just a three hour plane ride away, it seems like he’s so far, and perhaps amplified by this out-of-bodyish hormonal emotional surge and anticipation for new life we’ve created together, i miss him and love him more than i ever have. it just seems that the ebb & flow of life and creativity and inspiration has all puddled and settled in low tide right now, and it feels a bit dry and hollow.

and yet i know that the tide is rising and in the distance i can see the waves of euphoric elation sailing in. at 37 weeks and 2 centimeters dilated, i am embracing what lies on the horizon and yet a little sad to slowly close the shop i have so enjoyed. i will miss looking down at the miraculous little globe that rests round and perfect in my middle, and that once-in-a-lifetime phenomenon of feeling movement of life inside will soon fade to a distant memory. i’ll miss reading american baby in the waiting room of my doctor’s office each week or laughing when lainey insists on peeing in a cup too and scribbling her ‘name’ on the outside. what i wanted to go by so quickly, i’m now realizing i don’t want to end. the miracle and beauty of carrying life…how i love to be pregnant.

my nurse, my friend…dot, i love you.

i picture her arrival and the moment i first touch her about a million times a day…the moment lainey is squeezed into our huddle and the boys walk in and smile and her tiny cries fill the room and i convulsively eject all of this pent up anticipation and love through tears and ‘i love yous’ and ‘happy birthdays’…it’s so close.

and in less emotional musings…

we headed up to gasparilla island new year’s eve to spend some time with mama’s dear friend, rebecca, who was visiting from indiana and lainey immediately fell in love.

her shyness is slowly slipping away as she quickly entrusts anyone she senses we love, and usually within a half hour, she is performing her charming laineyness…dancing, singing and not-so-subliminally vying for anyone’s attention. even if it does include pushing the start button on a hallmark dancing snowman for the eighty-ninth time and shaking her boot to an annoying rendition of jingle bells, inviting us to laugh at her every time. ‘ook, mama. ook,’ she says smiling as she dances. and you have to look every time. and you have to pretend like it’s the first time you’ve seen this move. and you have to insert some form of verbal praise and adoration for her cuteness…every time.

we returned from the island just in time for the last sunset of the year where we stood on the beach with family and quietly watched the sun drop with all of our 2009 happenings…and i thought about all the goodness the dawn of the next year would bring.

in new book-reading quirks, i’d like to inform she now licks pages before she turns them…

…and she insists they only be turned from the top right hand corner. oh, and she’ll make you go back and do it over again if you turn it from, god forbid, a hair closer to the middle, say.

(cat in lower left quadrant was daddy’s christmas present to her…but is likely to become quickly lost as a glance at its presence has since scared the crap out of me about a trillion times. and it cries. and rolls over. and licks its paws. and, i swear, crawls into our bedroom at night and watches us sleep. i don’t trust him.)

with daddy traveling more, a new sister on the brink, and a two-year-old infatuated with mail, we had the idea of getting her her own mailbox for her room. a smashing idea it was. she loves it. beams crazy smiles when she sweeps her hand down the cold metal of the inside to land on paper. an envelope. a card. a scribbled scrap of paper…it doesn’t matter.

she asks for tape after she gets her mail and adheres any and all cards all crooked-like on her wall. she loves getting mail so much, after three days of new correspondence and us forgetting the fourth, she swept the empty box and greedily proclaimed, i want mail. (hint-hint to any family member/friend who might want to drop her a line. or a used coupon. heck, a used band-aid for all she cares. smack it in an envelope with her name and send it and we’ll drop it in her box for some sure-fire satisfaction)

i’ve had many offerings of friends and family to take her for awhile so i can rest or get things done, but i can’t bear to part with her lately. with all the changes, i feel this indebtedness to be there for her a trillion percent and sense her awareness that things are a bit different. i can’t tell if she needs me or i need her more right now but our little symbiosis is working quite well with quiet days in the house together.

brett’s absence fuels me with so much responsibility to love her extra much…

…and while i would normally look forward to a good night of girlfriends or night on the town, even this weekend’s girls night in honor of my birthday has me a little saddened to be away from her…even just for a little bit. i will go, i will have fun, it will be good for me, and papa will take good care of her…but, for some reason, i feel like every second of our remaining mama & me time before our new little arrives is precious and valuable.

i trace the outline of her face with my hands every night before i fall asleep, memorizing all the babyishness left that i know will soon vanish, replaced by big sisterhood, and i whisper to her all about the night she was born and how it changed our life. you’re going to be the best big sister.

for now, we immerse ourselves back into the comfort of routine as much as possible as i figure out how we’re going to do it all. my mind is so preoccupied, on top of the already present a.d.d. tendencies, i find small tasks are difficult to concentrate on right now. like i sat down to edit a batch of pictures today and, after finishing two, i just sat and stared and found myself spraying the skinny straw of a can of keyboard cleaner so long between the ‘s‘ and ‘d‘ keys, the bottle got all cold in my palms and the ‘s‘ almost dislodged and blew off. we’ll figure it out. sometimes the shoes have to be broken into before the race or we need to stretch a little more than everyone else. maybe we start at a slower pace and gradually build up to our comfortable gait, but we’ll get there. we’ll run our marathon and triumphantly cross through the tight tape of the finish line. …even if we blow a hammy on the way.

…but through it all, we will love. and we will love good.

i’ve meant to post, really…
but lately, i look at the computer and it’s the last place i want to be.

i want to be with these people…

…and even though we may not have blustery winds or shut-in blizzards, home feels very much a shelter these days…our calming nest.
perhaps it is the season.

as dickens put it…

happy, happy Christmas, that can win us back to the delusions of our childish days; that can recall to the old man the pleasures of his youth; that can transport the sailor and the traveller, thousands of miles away, back to his own fire-side and his quiet home!
~the pickwick papers, 1836

so, home it is.
with chilly temps (yes, really!), fires and gingerbread houses.

i yearn for simplicity these days…and am truly taking in what life is really all about. or, at least, my attempts at figuring it out and adopting my ever-evolving perception of it…which seems to be more prominent on my mind at the end of a year…a decade, and the beginning of a new one that holds change and yet promise and good things for us. and i keep arriving at these themes of love and simplicity and family and using all the experiences and adventures, both good and bad, to grow and learn and give.

and if i could magically wish for some unrealistic christmas wish, it would be to wake up in a log cabin, deep in some snowy woods far away…with a wood burning stove and cozy quilts and our family burrowed together for a couple weeks with nothing to distract us but perhaps some baking obligations or a board game or rocking a baby to sleep.

i’ve decided ‘terrible twos’ is a ridiculous term…there is nothing terrible about it…in fact, i am so loving this new girl she is. this conversational, animated little spirit.

she’s loving ‘school work’…

…and beginning to listen to night time stories from big girl books with no pictures…one of those bedtime rituals i’ve always looked forward to and really thought she was too little to get it until i took a shot at it last week. we bundled under the down comforter in our jammies and opened the hard cover to the delicious smell of new pages in a thick trilogy of mouse adventures…tumtum and nutmeg. and yes, there are some wordier passages and descriptions above her little two-year-old head. but i found her listening…taking it in, repeating phrases and even laughing at appropriate funny parts or dialogue that has allowed me to debut my squeaky mouse voice…a talent i’ve become quite proud of.
and so we continue each night, reopening the dog-eared page from where we left off the night before and reading until her eyes get heavy…which doesn’t take long at all.
and, although i love my picture books, i love the combination of a good story and something better than pictures…the opportunity for her to use her precious imagination.

loving our weather…our family…and the next several days of continuing traditions that will remind our littles someday of all the love our home holds for them.

happy whatever-it-is-you-celebrate. and happy days… ~k

new book spreads: