Tuesday Evening in the Park

On Tuesday evening, after hurriedly eating our spaghetti and meatball dinner, we drove up to Kirkland for an outdoor concert with a local community orchestra. I know what you are thinking. Either we need to just move to Kirkland and get it over with, or we need to get a calendar of events for our own city already. But in this case, Jim's coworker is a member of the orchestra, we saw them play last summer as well, and the venue is a grass-surrounded gazebo on the shore of Lake Washington- really lovely.

First, let me comment on the awesomeness of community orchestra programs. No one on the planning committee feels any motivation to go any deeper than the absolute surface of pop classical music. So most of these concerts are greatest hits concerts, and this one was like the greatest hits of all. "Skater's Waltz"? Check. "Eine Kleine Nachtmusik"? Check. "Carmen," "Camelot," "Stars and Stripes Forever," "William Tell Overture"??? Quadruple check.The weather was great, too. It has been a cloudy, gloomy couple of days (or, let's face it, entire summer, on which I would totally like my money back, Seattle area, you big cheater), and the clouds seemed to break up a bit just in time for the sunset.

We found a seat on the wall of a big planter, and also immediately bumped into the daughter of Jim's coworker. She shared her blanket with Naomi, and tried to share her snacks, but Naomi could not be convinced to eat a cool ranch Dorito, for some reason. Then Naomi began her starring role as cute little lunatic, becoming obsessed with the idea that she needed to see Brad (the coworker) up on stage, and dragging the helpful daughter closer and closer to the stage, at one point almost going up onto the stage, and finally, narrating to all around, for the rest of the night, with great dramatic sweeping gestures, the saga of how she really wanted to see Brad, and looked and looked, and couldn't see him because there were other people all around him. Wacky little girl.

For myself, I got confirmation of what I already know- that I am lonely. I clung to every scrap of conversation offered by Brad's wife, by Jim's other coworker and his girlfriend, by the high-school and college age daughters who patiently listened to Naomi's endless oral tradition. It's not as though work is some kind of social whirl- I can go for four or five hours at a stretch without speaking a word out loud when I'm in my office. But something about being in the house so much, and offering a constant stream of supportive chatter to the afore-mentioned kooky toddler, results in acute adult-conversation starvation.

I also got confirmation that Muriel is a super cutie, when two women and their daughters came from across the park to admire her. At least that's what I thought was happening, until one of the daughters, a camera-ready 13 year old, gave me her contact information, including the fact that she had taken a babysitting class and her mother was always close by for backup. Heh. Maybe if Muriel were six years old instead of six weeks. I didn't get a picture of Muriel that night (a shame!), but I just took one before her current nap (with a nice unflattering flash), so here it is.

A Handful of Embarrassing Tidbits

- I am weirdly delighted that the ventriloquist won "America's Got Talent." I watched this show last year (I have already forgotten who won), but had to skip it this year due to a middle of the night wake-up on the couch which resulted in a hazy, unwanted, for some reason really horrifying viewing, on one of those Access Hollywood-type shows, of the footage of the blotto Hoff trying to eat the hamburger, which resulted further in me having a higher than normal case of the heebie jeebies when I see the guy on TV (which one does a lot when one indulges in "America's Got Talent"). I watched maybe forty-five minutes of the show altogether, in little channel flips, but still managed to catch the ventriloquist, and unlike so many of the contestants (my friend C. has offered that the name of the show should actually be "America's Got Skills"- dancing on stilts? Right, more of a skill...), he really does have talent. Also, so so out there that America's best new act, as they bill the winner of this thing, is a ventriloquist.
- I was flipping through the Pottery Barn catalog (because we need some specific drape-related hardware that is specific to these people, and it came in the mail, and whatever), and I couldn't help but notice that some bored catalog editor decided to sprinkle the pages of this direct-mail retail shop with inspirational quotes. The embarrassing part is not that I was reading the PB catalog, or that I just now used their own precious abbreviation for themselves, but that I really like the quotes. Which means I am going along too easily with the Pottery Barn ethos or whatever. The quote picker did a fine job. From Pab To the Lo Picasso: "Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working." And from Einstein: "Joy in looking and comprehending is nature's most beautiful gift." These quotes do not make me want to shop, however. So in that sense, maybe, quote picker, back to the library with you.
- This isn't really embarrassing, but it is a tidbit- Naomi has suddenly turned a corner, or is conducting some kind of social experiment, wherein every stranger is just a friend she hasn't met yet. So everywhere we go, she yells out "Hi!" to whoever we see. Even people that are twenty yards away and looking in the other direction. This is great when we're on walks, because there are people going by who fully intended not to make eye contact and give the minimum acknowledgement due to a passerby (in my book), and they are surprised into social grace by my obnoxious little diplomat. Hee. I hope this phase or social experiment lasts. It's fun.

Drowsy But Awake

Before we had Naomi, a couple of coworkers of Jim's recommended the book "Healthy Sleep Habits, Healthy Child" to us. We (I) read it, and although it is not the best written book (a common thread in parenting publications, for some reason), the main points are important and good to know, and we became staunch (and to to childless friends, pretty aggravating) nap and bedtime advocates. I hadn't read it in a couple of years, and because it feels like Muriel is no longer in the newborn, "anything goes" period, I thought it would be a good idea to read through the 0-4 months section for a reminder of what's supposed to happen. As I was reading, last night, that around five to six weeks, patterns of "going down for the night" emerge, I realized that she has been falling asleep just after Naomi's bedtime (7:30, on our best days), usually in her swing, and going from there to the bedroom for the traditional three nighttime wakeups/feedings. So, neat, right? I should mention that although it is a bit of a drag waking up three times, the point of the wakeup has been eating and going back to sleep, so it's not entirely stupefying.

And then, there was last night. Jim turned the swing off and let her sleep in there until she woke up, just before 1. After she ate, I did everything I normally do to get her back to sleep- swaddling and rocking in her bassinet until I doze off, she makes her little grunty "I'm still awake" sounds, then I wake up, rock her bassinet some more, and eventually there are no more sounds and we're all sleeping. Except that last night, the night I am feeling all confident and well-informed on baby sleep issues, she didn't go back to sleep at all. Finally, at four-thirty or so, I brought her back to the living room (a.k.a., Jim's bedroom), put her back into the swing, made apologies to the groggy dad, and went back to bed. zzzz. The book advises that babies be put to bed (for naps and night sleep) "drowsy but awake," so that they can learn the process of falling asleep themselves. I wouldn't say I am in the position to be offering master classes on this particular process, but yeah, I'm pretty sleepy.

Despite her newfound party ethic, life with Muriel is good. I was worried that I would feel overwhelmed and unhappy staying home with a baby and a toddler, but I have found to my amazement and delight that I do not feel that way at all. I am finding Naomi to be really good company most of the time, and pretty agreeable in general. When I have some activity planned for her/us to take part in, such as an art project or an outing, I feel like a super mom. When I don't, we just dork around the house and read "One Fish, Two Fish" for the seven hundredth time this week, and I feel like a pretty good mom. It doesn't hurt that Naomi has taken to saying things like "You're a great, great, great Mommy that takes care of everybody." Hey, yeah, thanks! Nobody at work gives me that kind of affirmation, heh. "You're a great, great, great technical writer!"

I am worried that Muriel is not getting quite the amount of stimulating (constant) attention that her big sister got at the same age. When she generously offers to sleep through Naomi's breakfast, my doing the dishes, our reading of a hundred books, and a trip to the park, really, I just take her up on it. Even though the sleep book says (in a little inset text box) "Remember: never wake as sleeping baby," I can't help thinking that she's getting cheated a little.

There are so many things to say about both of them, and really, I should just keep a bulleted list going so I can throw it in here once in a while, but I hear one of them making nap is soon to be over noises, so this is it for now. I just have time for a shout out to the 'Tudes who visited us over the weekend- it was so fun, and way too short a visit, and Naomi enjoyed having you here, especially Maria's books, which she quotes now and then. Thanks for reading them to her, and thanks for coming!