But here I am. Alida turned 9 and now 10 months old. I turned 32. We traveled to Florida and California and for a while we were just surviving. Now we are better than just surviving and that much happier for having gone through the valley.

At the end of January, Jonathan’s aunt, his father’s only living sibling, turned 95. We couldn’t make it for the exact date, but we were able to visit her a few days before. It was the first time I’d met a lot of that side of the family, and we had a really good time. It was fun to have extended family all sleeping under one roof, drinking coffee in our pajamas in the morning, and chatting late into the night. Those are the things you miss out on when you stay in hotels.

Alida also got to play at the beach for the first time. She’s put her toes in the sand before, but it was in San Diego in October and even the sand was too cold to enjoy. We went with her second cousins, a bunch of big girls (12, 10 and 8) and a tiny one, and tried to imagine what was going through her head as she watched the waves come and go. She didn’t like the water and started to cry when we put her in it, but it might have been a little cold. Once she got up on the sand, she started “helping” with a sandcastle and chasing seagulls. This seemed to be much more her style. Other than a slight disaster when she got tired and started rubbing her sand-covered hands in her eyes, it was a very good day.

A few days later, we flew out to California to visit some of Jonathan’s family and friends. Most of them hadn’t seen Alida since she was a couple of months old, so we decided to take advantage of a lull in the schedule and go. Plus, we thought it would be fun to watch the 49ers play in the Super Bowl in 49ers’ country.

On the way to California, Jonathan was unable to make the same flight as us. Alida has gotten to the age where she never wants to hold still. These two factors combined to make that flight one of the most difficult and tiring things I’ve done since giving birth. I’ve told several people that since then, and like I would have pre-child, they ask why it’s so hard.

I could explain to you what it feels like physically to restrain a child who never wants to stay in the same position for more than 5 seconds (literally), who finds every light, window, button, ding, person, magazine, and announcement attention-worthy and sometimes edible, who believes you are a ladder to provide access to the people behind us, and who thinks the in-seat screen is a drum set that she should beat on constantly. I could explain that even if she is hours past nap time and hasn’t eaten all day, neither are as important as exploring everything and everyone. And that if I even dare think about *gasp* making her sit down and hold still (like any well-behaved child should, right?), she’ll start screaming and thrashing around. (Why don’t I train that child better??)

And, of course, to a parent, none of the shoulder, back, hip and arm aches of holding a spinning monkey for 5 hours (oh, and don’t forget when she accidentally bonks you in the nose with her head) are as important as not being the person on the plane with the screaming child.

I’ve heard these stories before and nodded my head in sympathy. “Yes, it must be so hard when all they want to do is move.” I’ve even been the flight attendant that is doing her best to keep the child from screaming “Here, have a biscoff/ empty water bottle/ plastic cup/ ID badge/ my soul.” But, I never really got it until I did it. That’s one more thing I can add to the oh-so-delightful “I know how you feel because unfortunately I’ve been there” list.

It was a great trip though. Alida got to hang out with some more “big” cousins, and I got to enjoy wine country. The 49ers didn’t win, but the Super Bowl party was still fun. Traveling pains aside, I’m glad we went. I want to make sure Jonathan’s friends and family are always a part of Alida’s memories. Plus, I was due for some In-N-Out

Jonathan and I traveled to Dubai to visit friends of his. The city doesn’t seem to have a middle ground; it’s opulent wealth and migrant workers, sunbathers on the beach and shadows in burqas, water and desert, fast food chains and open-air souqs. In places like this, it’s hard for me not to stare at everything.

This afternoon, we visited one of many Dubai’s mall with its luxury shopping and wondered who was keeping all of these stores in business (in case you can’t tell, this is a Manolo Blahnik shoe store.) Later in the day, we took a boat across the river to visit the older section of the city and some of its shoe stores.

As they say in Asia, same same, but different.

In early November, we found out that I was pregnant. We were hoping to have children fairly close together, but didn’t expect it to be so soon. It would probably be due in July when Alida would be 15 months old. When we told people, most said “you’re crazy” and we kind of agreed with them.

Almost immediately my milk supply dropped and I reached out to the ladies at our church. I was heartbroken at the thought of robbing Alida of my milk. She was only 7 months old. But, as I heard from the ladies, I was encouraged. I heard how close in age their children were, how they were best friends, how the oldest was too young to know jealousy when the second one was born. They reminded me that a sibling would be more of a blessing to Alida than a few more months of milk (if indeed those were our choices.)

I still felt like we were crazy, but became even more joyful at the thought of this little one that would join our family. I had very similar symptoms to my pregnancy with Alida – one day of nausea, serious smell aversion (rosemary this time), and extreme breast pain (now when breastfeeding.) I didn’t feel nauseated, but that didn’t come until later with Alida.

My first appointment was schedule for December 6. At this point I should have been almost 9 weeks. The midwife said my uterus felt about 8 weeks along, but since they only have a Doppler at their office, she was unable to find a heartbeat. She offered the option to go for a dating ultrasound, or I could just wait until my next appointment in January. In spite of the fact that there is no history of miscarriage in my family, I felt an urgency to know that there was something in there, so we scheduled an ultrasound.

The next day, as I lay on the ultrasound bed, we saw the gestational sac, but there wasn’t anything inside. The technician tried every angle and even did an internal ultrasound, but there still wasn’t anything. We met with Dr. Bootstaylor who told us, with hands pacing gently with his words, that only time would really tell us what was going on. Maybe my dates were wrong. If I was only five weeks pregnant than there wouldn’t be anything but a sac.

I felt that this couldn’t be. My symptoms lined up with the timing. But, I’m no doctor, and I don’t know my body perfectly. Maybe I was wrong. They sent me upstairs for bloodwork. If the hormones in my body indicated that I was eight weeks pregnant, then we would have a problem.  He said we were looking for results much less than 10,000.

The wait in the doctor’s office and the lab was long. I cried in fear and disappointment. I couldn’t keep it together.  I knew that whatever the outcome was, God was still in control, but I had grown attached to the dream of this little one. It was supposed to be the size of a grape by now.

That afternoon, I got the 24-hour stomach bug that was going around. It made me miserable in a different way and was a good distraction. As the weekend went on, Jonathan and I talked and agreed that neither of us were hopeful. I knew that there were times that nothing showed up on the ultrasound and then the next week there was a baby, but I also knew that many, many pregnancies end practically before they’ve even begun. As I nursed Alida on Sunday night, I realized that it no longer hurt, and the suspicion became stronger.

Monday morning, Dr. Bootstaylor called to tell me that my hormone levels were 38,000. It was a blighted ovum, which is an egg that never grows in spite of the fact that your body still thinks you’re pregnant. I was not surprised. After spending the weekend in a state of limbo, it was good to have confirmation. I asked him what happens next. I’d had no cramping or spotting. The only change was that my symptoms had disappeared. He told me I could take medicine to make it pass, or I could let it happen naturally. I believe in the body’s ability to do what it needs to do, and hoped that I could let it happen.

But, less than twenty-four hours later, I called the doctor to get the name of the medicine. I still wanted to wait. I knew that if my body did it, there wouldn’t be a mistake.  I didn’t want to wonder if I had waited, would something have shown up. But, I’m also not a very patient person. It was on my mind all day, every day. Every time I went to the bathroom, I looked for blood. When was it going to start?

Dr. Bootstaylor had also suggested I call the midwives to get their opinions. One thing I love about Intown Midwifery is that they are less concerned about the decisions that you make and more concerned that you make informed decisions. He wanted me to know all my options. So, on Thursday I called and talked to Anjli. She suggested that I come in to have my hormone levels tested to see if they were declining, as they should in a miscarriage. Or I could go to the ultrasound that I still had scheduled for the next day. That would provide me with more immediate answers.

The next day I went, and saw the same thing I’d seen the week before. The only difference was that the sac was smaller (around 6wks when I should’ve been almost 10wks) and they said it looked like there was blood in it. This, along with my lack of symptoms, gave me peace.

I spoke to the P.A. there who told me she had also had a blighted ovum. She had worked for an OBGYN before her current job and told me that she had seen people spot for up to two months. The patients would call every week waiting and wondering when it was going to happen. I knew how I was already feeling after a week, and could understand the feeling. I decided that if it hadn’t happened naturally by the following Thursday (Jonathan’s last off day before Christmas) I would take the medicine. It was bad enough not being pregnant anymore without having to remember this Christmas as the one where I spent the day miscarrying.

As many of you know, we announced our pregnancy online the day I went to the midwife. We had already told our family and many close friends because my theory is that if something were to go wrong, I would tell them anyway. I did not anticipate having to tell so many well-wishers that something had gone wrong. I struggled with feeling bad for making others feel bad. Then I realized that in this situation, the feelings of others are the last thing I should be worried about.

The up side of it being broadcast so widely was that we had many people reach out to us who have gone through this same type of miscarriage as well as other miscarriages. After the initial disappointment of not seeing an embryo, there were very few tears. We didn’t feel like we had experienced a death. The life had never begun. That’s better, right? We had never seen the little heart beating. Nothing had died. It had just never been.  What about those who lost a fully formed little person? How can we be heartbroken when we have such an amazing child already?

Maybe this was a second chance for Alida and me. My milk supply was almost back to normal. No more worries about where I was going to get enough breast milk to feed her or if I would have to use formula. She could get all of our attention for a while longer.

On Thursday, December 20, I took the medicine. I made sure Jonathan was home to take care of Alida in case I had to take the pain medicine and in case it was difficult emotionally. I had read about a few experiences and knew it might be very painful. It ended up being fairly uneventful. I felt like I was having a bad period, and was able to see when the sac passed. Yes, it is a little gross, but it’s life. Evidently it happens to millions of women every year.

When it passed, I didn’t feel sad or cry. I actually felt relief. I knew that my womb was now empty and ready for the next little one.

I know classics are classics for a reason, but the more I read, the more I’m amazed at C. S. Lewis’ writing abilities. The books were intended for children so the language is simple. Yet, the stories have charm that appeals to everyone. He uses phrases and situations that any child can understand. I also love reading about Aslan and the different characters’ reactions to him.

When I first started The Magician’s Nephew, I began writing down the phrases that appealed to me until I realized I would never get through the story that way. He is so unpretentious and honest in his writing. Who doesn’t know what he means when he says that “his face went the wrong sort of shape as it does if you’re trying to keep back your tears”? Any child can immediately imagine what Digory’s face looked like.

In The Horse and His Boy, Shasta doesn’t know how to use the horse’s reins because he was taught to ride by a talking horse. So, the first time he had to ride a regular horse “he looked very carefully out of the corners of his eyes to see what the others were doing (as some of us have done at parties when we weren’t quite sure which knife or fork we were meant to use) and tried to get his fingers right.” I think a person would be lying if they said they’d never done this – or something similar.

My favorite quote so far is at the end of The Horse and His Boy when he is summing up what happened to everyone:

“Avaris also had many quarrels (and, I’m afraid, even fights) with Cor, but they always made it up again: so that years later, when they were grown up, they were so used to quarreling and making up again that they got married so as to go on doing it more conveniently.”

Do you have a favorite children’s book that you still enjoy reading as an adult?

January 4, 2011 was the last day of our trip to Siem Reap, Cambodia. We had spent the last three days hiking up and down ancient temples with four of our friends. We also suffered through a fish foot massage, and enjoyed seeing US dollars come out of the ATMs. (Everyone uses USD, but they will refuse your money if it isn’t in perfect condition – or they reserve the right to take 90% of the face value. True story.)

Before we headed back to the airport, we spent the morning touring one last temple and the afternoon taking a cooking class. The food had the freshness of Vietnamese food and the warmth of Thai curries, which is the perfect balance for me. One of my favorite things about Cambodia was the people. They had an openness that we had missed while being in Vietnam. They also weren’t afraid of the sun, which was a refreshing change.

The beautiful, brown children were always smiling and waving at us. Each of these girls had a Disney princess backpack on.

I can’t believe they serve beer to people wielding large knives.

I remember seeing tourist carrying babies as they went up and down the temples. It was nice to see that once children come, the traveling doesn’t have to stop. Hopefully that’ll be us with our little ones some day.

Well hello, 2013. Nice to see you. Let’s see if you can one-up 2012. It was a good year.

I flew and hitchhiked to Charleston, SC last night so I could ring in the new year with Jonathan. It was my first night away from Alida *sniff sniff*. She stayed with my parents and probably had such a good time she won’t want to go back home.

It was wonderful to spend the evening with my husband, my love, my best friend, the most amazing father of my child. Here we are on the way back to the airport this morning having our first cup of coffee – gotta start the year off right.

I’m looking forward to what this year has to offer. What are you hoping it brings?

(This was posted from my phone, which I’ve never done. We’ll see how it turns out.)

Their apartment is near the back of the complex, and as I drove toward it, I passed people walking everywhere. This is nothing special in and of itself, but as I looked at the people I could see that this wasn’t your usual Atlanta complex. I saw faces whose origin I couldn’t pinpoint. The residents are mostly (if not all) refugees.

Before we started unpacking, we saw a man standing outside the next apartment. Figuring there is no time like the present, we went out to meet the neighbor. He is from Bhutan. It took a little while for us to figure this out because he kept telling us the words for things in Nepali. He spent 26 years in Bhutan, 18 in Nepal, and has now been in the US for 3 years. (When I googled Bhutan, “Bhutan refugees” is the third option suggested.)

He asked if we were American, and when we said we were, he was confused that we lived in an apartment. Why not live in a separate house with grass and a place for growing vegetables? We tried to explain that many Americans live in apartments by choice, and also that houses are expensive for everyone. He and some of his male relatives work at a chicken factory (he brought out his ID to show us).

His adult nephew joined our conversation and helped with some translations. I always feel bad when non-English speakers apologize for their “bad English” – especially people like these. I would rather they be proud of what they have learned. A little while later, his wife arrived from shopping at the Dekalb Farmers Market, and we got to meet her. They invited us inside where she quickly cut up apples, and with a “namaste”, offered a plate with bananas and apples on it. I couldn’t help but think that maybe she would teach Joy to cook some foreign food. During the whole visit, Alida sat quietly on my lap and watched everything. The husband kept saying he loved us, and Joy was able to explain the difference between love and like – you love your wife, you like your neighbor.

They were surprised to find out that Joy and I come from such a large family. The neighbor is one of eight, but only has three children himself. His two older daughters were gone and live in Texas and Pennsylvania – something his wife mentioned with a hand gesture that could’ve either meant “they’re out of my hair” or “I can’t believe they’ve left me.” The nephew has two children, but doesn’t plan to have anymore. He talked about how much it costs for children to go to university. I thought it was great that that was part of his plan for his children.

I found out that several of their relatives work at the Dekalb Farmers Market – a place we have been going to as long as I can remember. One of my favorite things about the market is the variety of cultures and languages represented there. I love the flags hanging from the ceiling. I don’t recognize many of them, and it reminds me how big the world is. How much is out there besides the stars and stripes. Some of the jobs there seem really difficult and I wonder how they feel about working there. Are they happy ‘just having a job’, or do they go to work every day dreading it? When I think about it, though, I saw people every day in Vietnam who spent their lives elbow deep in fish guts. Of course, that doesn’t mean they like it.

I am so spoiled.

Talking to them took me away from Atlanta. I miss those conversations in Vietnam where half of the story is told with your hands and face because neither of you know the words. I hadn’t realized how deeply I’d slipped back into our culture of sameness, comfort, and ease.

I would say that I envy Joy and Xavierian’s opportunity, but instead I’m just going to have another reason (besides my soon-arriving new nephew) to visit them.

I’m curious – is the possibility of liking your job a Western luxury?

Last July, we flew back to Atlanta to attend my sister’s wedding. After I returned to Vietnam, you might remember me complaining about the terrible jet lag I had. I felt disoriented and exhausted, and also felt bad physically. On my layover in Narita, I had to leave my place in the check-in line to go throw up. I blamed it on lack of sleep and red wine. While unpacking my suitcase, the strong lavender scent of the dryer sheets I had brought from Atlanta made me gag.

When I told Tanya this, she gave me one of those “something’s up” looks, but Jonathan wasn’t concerned. I had quit taking birth control long before because of how it made me feel, so he was used to me being The Girl Who Cried Pregnant. He was happy either way, though, since he had decided the previous November on his 39th birthday that he was ready for children.

But I wasn’t ready. I had things to do. We had four trips planned in the next month – including a honeymoon to the Maldives. We were trying to book an all-inclusive sailing cruise in Thailand for Tanya’s 30^th birthday. I was starting to do restaurant and bar reviews. I did not want to be pregnant in Vietnam. Whenever the time came, I wanted to be in the States where I could be around our families and friends. Also, I’d spent enough time caring for children to know how much work it is. I knew that having a child with a pilot would mean I was a single mom a lot of the time. I wasn’t ready to give up my freedom.

There was still some time before I really needed to be concerned, but all the symptoms made it hard not to think about it. I spent the week dwelling on it and talking to those around me. Everyone told me that things would be okay either way. Not being able to drink champagne on your honeymoon wasn’t the end of the world. Lots of people had babies overseas. Lots of people had babies with pilots.

I knew they were right. I also knew that it was a possibility that when I decided I was ready, my body might not agree with me. At my age, I’d seen enough friends struggle either to get pregnant or to deliver a healthy child. Who knows – maybe I was worrying about something that couldn’t even happen.

A few more days went by and though I started feeling better, I still didn’t have my period. The day after our anniversary, I spent several hours interviewing a lady. She smoked throughout our conversation, and it was all I could do not to throw up. I couldn’t take it anymore. I went to a pharmacy and bought a few tests. They each cost $1.25 and were individual plastic packets, each containing a cup, a test strip, and instructions – much less tidy than what we are used to. I took one that afternoon, and it was negative. I didn’t feel any sort of relief though. Afternoon pregnancy tests aren’t usually accurate; I distrust medicine and drugstore items made in Vietnam; and I was no longer sure what I wanted the outcome to be.

The next morning I took another test. As I came out of the room holding a test strip with a very faint line on it, Xuan and the maid walked in the door. They started patting my stomach, smiling, and saying “baby, baby, baby!”

“Woah now!” I thought. I’m not sure about this yet. And the line is so faint.

That morning we had a long power outage in our apartment building, so Tanya, Joe, Jonathan, Kari, and Evan (friends and apartment neighbors) all met downstairs at the café. After my cooking lesson, I went to meet them and told them about the pregnancy test. I said that I would wait until I was a week late and then go to the doctor. Kari and Tanya both looked at me in shock.

“How can you wait that long?”

I asked “If you were me, when would you go?”

They both immediately replied, “Right now!”

With that, they paid their bills and five of us went out front to the taxi stand. Since the power had been out, none of us had really gotten dressed for the day, so baseball hats, sweatpants, unbrushed teeth, and all, we headed to the doctor. The staff seemed amused that all of us were there for one pregnancy test. They took my blood and told us we would have to come back after lunch for the results.

During the longest two hours of my life, we went shopping in the nearby stores and then to a restaurant for a light lunch. I couldn’t focus on anything. I was pretty sure I was pregnant (Tanya said there are rarely false positives), but I tried to imagine my reaction if they told me I wasn’t. Then, I thought about the implications of a positive result. I didn’t think I was ready to have a child, but part of me knew that I would never be completely ready. It would have to be something that just happened, and then I would be thrilled.

Finally, we were back at the doctor’s office. She took the two of us back into her office and told us the test was positive! I couldn’t believe it. I was really pregnant! There was a tiny little speck of human life growing inside of me. At some point, I started to cry. I was really happy. My heart rate was high enough for the doctor to question me about it, but it was all the excitement. Our lives were changing. We were going to be parents.

Wow.

As we left the consultation, I told Jonathan everyone was going to know because we were in there so long. But as I walked into the waiting room I said, “I can’t believe they took that long to tell us I wasn’t pregnant.” Their faces dropped until they saw Jonathan standing behind me, hands in touchdown pose saying “I have swimmers!” It’s true. That is the father of my child.

Coincidentally, Jonathan had just told me two weeks before that he wasn’t going to say anything else about children until I was ready. Way to come off as a gentleman and still get what you want

But, I’m tired.

It’s hard for me to even put this into words because I love traveling. I don’t want to seem ungrateful. I’m thankful that we are able to see our friends and family more than most. I’m thankful that our trips take us beautiful places. But, traveling all the time also has its drawbacks.

When I first started to fly, I didn’t have any control over my life. I flew when they told me to. Because of this, I missed out on a lot of things. Anything that required regular attendance was out of the question. And once I got a little flexibility in my schedule I started taking advantage of my flight benefits. I mean, what’s the point in having them if you aren’t using them?

During this time, though, there were major changes happening in my life. I left the church community I grew up in because it was unhealthy. I was finally single after years of on and off unhealthiness. I had moved back to Atlanta after 8 months overseas and was out of touch with loved ones.

Traveling didn’t help any of this.

I had difficulty finding a new church because I was never home on Sundays. I missed out on a lot of events with my family and friends because I couldn’t plan anything and was gone all the time. And try dating someone when your off days are Tues-Thurs. (This is one reason people date within their industry.)

Fast forward five years. I’m married and living in Vietnam. One of the main reasons we moved there was to travel, so we did. And while I managed to establish several relationships in Saigon, I know I missed out on a lot by not having a consistent presence in the city. Even among the pilot group, it was difficult to really get to know people unless you traveled together (which we did when we could.)

Now we are back in Atlanta. Because of my pregnancy, we didn’t travel very much in the winter. We started attending church regularly, but didn’t really make friends. We thought of joining a small group, but since Jonathan’s schedule is always changing, we never did. I was able to do several things on a fairly regular basis (prenatal yoga and serving chili to the homeless). Jonathan joined me when he could (chili – not yoga.)

Slowly, I started to connect to people around me. I attended a ladies brunch at church and met a few people. I made friends with a girl in yoga. I started catching up with old friends.

Then Alida came, and everything got thrown into disarray. And about a month later, we started traveling again. Now it’s all I can do to keep up with my family – much less my old friends or any new ones. I can never plan a week of meals. All the herbs I’ve tried to grow have died.

Occasionally, I browse the archives of my blog. Whatever month it is, I pick that month every year as far back as I can. Looking back recently, I found a post where, in the same breath, I envied and pitied people who sleep in the same bed in the same city every single night. I still feel the same way. Part of me craves the consistency and stability of staying at home, while the other part of me is planning the next trip.

Now that Alida is here, I’ve been thinking about it even more. She is getting to the age where it’s possible to establish routines. I don’t want her to have my terrible sleeping habits, so I’ve been trying to learn how to help her. Everywhere I look, it tells me “be consistent.” But I’m not sure how to do that. I don’t know how to reconcile the fact that we are a traveling family with our need for routines and regular bedtimes.

Now it’s time to head to the airport. What are your thoughts? How do you balance the need for consistency with the demands of being active people? How do you plan meals and budgets when you spend half the month on the road? Is it just as hard to keep up with people when you’re local?

She’s been squirming a lot lately, but mostly spinning herself in circles in her bed. Last night, she really started working on the roll. I put her in bed on her stomach because lately she tends to fall asleep easier that way. After she was sound asleep, I went back in and turn her on her back. (I hate doing this because, like I said, she sleeps more soundly on her stomach, but currently we’re told babies have to sleep on their stomachs until they can roll over.) A few minutes later I heard her making noise and went to see what was going on. Still asleep, she had turned on her right side by arching her back and was trying to get the rest of her body rolled over. She was working really hard, grunting and flexing her body. Knees to chest. Shoulder to stomach. She started acting frustrated and upset. I wanted to help her – to give her shoulder a little nudge, but that’s cheating. She has to be able to do it on her own.

Eventually she gave up for the night. This morning we had a talk and I asked if she could wait until Jonathan got home before she did any tricks. She agreed that it was a great idea.

Or so I thought.

Tonight I put her on her back beneath some toys and walked away for a minute. When I came back she was on her stomach with her right arm trapped beneath her body. I watched as she raised her torso just enough and freed it. I didn’t want to be mean and flip her right back over, but I was anxious to see if that’s what really had happened. After a polite pause, I turned her back over, and sure enough, she did it again. And again.

This week, she is three months old. During this time, there have been two particular changes that really stand out in my mind:

When she was born her hands were always clenched in little fists. Even when she was sound asleep, her fists were tight. I read that they were this way because she didn’t even know they were part of her body. How strange! Around the third week, I remember nursing her and feeling a little fluttery tickle on my side. Her fingers were opening. Like ten little creatures – each with a mind of their own – tentatively wandering around a foreign landscape. I don’t even think they were investigating. Just stretching their little legs.

Her hand movements have become much more intentional now. The right one found the left one about two weeks ago. They didn’t seem to know what to do with each other at first, so they just grabbed on. I don’t think either hand knew if it was their job to let go. Now she is actually making contact with toys hanging over her head.

I think this development stands out so much to me because it makes me see that we have literally had to learn everything. Our hands, arguably one of the most important parts of our bodies, were once foreign objects. Things that followed us around and got in the way.

The other development that has been so significant to me is her smile. I think new parents get through much of the beginning on adrenaline. She was never a difficult baby, and since everything was still so new, it didn’t seem tedious or tiresome. When I would wake up in the morning, I’d look over at her, happy to see her beautiful face. She would open her eyes – and look right past me.

Um, hello? I’ve spent the last few weeks keeping you alive. I nurse you. I burp you. I change you. I bathe you. I hold you. I rock you. Can you at least acknowledge my existence? (Now I sound like every mother that has ever walked the planet.)

So you can probably understand why I was so pleased when she started to smile. And as cute as her “my brain just told my face muscles to form a smile” smiles were, nothing is as rewarding as when she opens her eyes in the morning, looks directly at me and smiles.