In Honor of Grandpa

Today Tadhg turns three months old. And today would've been my dad's 75th birthday.

Tadhg will never know him, just as I never really knew my grandparents. In honor of the Grandpa who Tadhg will certainly hear about but never know in the flesh, here are a smattering of photos. Looking at them made me feel old and all sorts of bittersweet.

We surprised Dad with a large 70th birthday party. In the following two photos he was just realizing what he was walking into. I love it because it's genuine Dad--anytime he knew his picture was being taken he froze up, so all of the real gems are candids.

 

One of my favorites. Mom and Dad came over to my apartment (I don't remember what for), and I fed Dad leftover something-or-other from my fridge. He immediately laid down on my bed and began relaxing in earnest.

A rare occasion of hamming it up for the camera. The key? Take so many pictures in quick succession that he's utterly overwhelmed by the assault and starts acting like himself.

 

Ahh. A classic. Dad in his trusty blue van going on his rounds. 

[a.k.a. The Neighborhood Watch] 

[a.k.a. Driving Slowly Around Nanticoke Thinking You're Being Subtle When, Really, Everyone Knows Exactly What You're Doing]

[a.k.a. Being a Snoop]

What can I say? 

Dad got bored in his retirement.

Peering over Niagara Falls.

 

Another classic. Pacing the pond's edge ensuring that no one drowned.

 

Yep. He knew this one was being taken...

Watching annual 4th of July fireworks up at Andy and Wendy's house before they became Alaskans.

 Deep conversations.

And another candid shot to cap it all off.

You are still missed, Dad.

Boy

breath in
breath out
living ebenezer
in his bones
and in his breath
the Lord
has thundered
with a loud thunder
each day
month
year
each lungful
a whole life-ful
heaps
stone upon
stone upon
stone

Mother

It's a new name for me.

A name I tried on over and over in my head growing up, and one I felt in my heart after God kept our first two babies.

But today, on this very first Mother's Day spent holding a son in my arms, I think I'm closer than I've ever been to understanding the ponderings of Mary and the sword piercing her heart. I've scarcely been a mother to our boy for two months, and already I'm finding the name to be both profoundly beautiful and deeply sobering.

"Mother" is a mirror for all my sin.

"Mother" forces me to stop and take stock of all the brokenness in this world and all the brokenness in me.

"Mother" makes me catch my breath with the horrors I am capable of apart from God.

"Mother" shows me my smallness, my weakness, my utter insufficiency.

"Mother" shows me the deep canyon of my need for God.

So on this Mother's Day, a new first, I pray God's mercy on me, a sinner. His mercy to forgive me and His mercy to bear me up, His love to hold me and His love to fill me.

The Waiting

It's been a little while since my last post. Much has happened.

My belly has grown, skin taut and stretched and full of baby. Husband, son, and I have been showered (and showered, and showered again) with the love and gifts of generous-hearted people who are rejoicing with us in our growing family. I've just recently joined the vast community of women who experience time morphing into a much slower version of itself during the last week or two of being pregnant.

And...

I fell down the stairs on Valentine's Day (while holding my lovely gifts from Rundy) and injured my tailbone; just my tailbone, though, not the baby! Nothing like heading into labor nice and bruised.

[But the state of my coccyx isn't the point of this post; it's just a minor detour since I am so very conscious of said tailbone as I sit upon it writing these words.]

Basically, I just wanted to share a few photos. I've nothing really profound to say; the things inside me are wordless now, and I imagine will remain so after our son, God willing, comes into the world. Memories come in flashes in these days of waiting for our boy: memories of the grandpa he'll never know, memories of the ultrasound image of his older sibling whose heart we never saw beating. Memories of so many things, and dreams night after night of what's to come.

In lieu of words, I give you pictures.

Valentine's Day gifts from Heart: chocolates, homemade soaps, and an orchid (floating bloom courtesy of my fall down the stairs).

 And pictures of my 39 weeks pregnant self, waiting for the rest of life to begin.

Frills and Folderol

Living in a house that's being renovated for a year and half (and the road stretches ever on) has been difficult at times. Not because it's impossible; not because we don't have what we need and more; not even because of the tools lying everywhere.

It's more been that intangible sense of home that I've missed. The colors. The frivolous things that aren't necessary but make you feel as though you've got your name stamped on the place. The sense of being interwoven with the walls that enclose you.

As time has gone on, those more ethereal things have started taking shape. Thanks to a lot of hard work from Rundy and me chipping in where I can, the skeleton of this old house has put on some flesh and started to breathe. It's beginning very much to feel like Home.

And it doesn't hurt that it's Christmas time.

 

 

Waxing Moon

Rundy just took pictures of my pregnant self for the first time. 

We just entered our seventh month together, my son and I.

She Said It'd Never Be So

Nope.

No animals in the house.

No scratching furniture, no chewing things, no cleaning up messes made by the hardly-housebroken.

I grew up with a mother who was pro-animal and anti-having-them-in-the-house. So...when Rundy and I woke at 5:30 in the morning on Black Friday to the yowls of a sickly, half-grown feline sitting on our doorstep, my natural inclination was to take care of the unceremoniously dropped off kitty, but to do it in the great outdoors.

But then it got cold. And I have a tender, weak heart. And Rundy's heart is basically mush.

And so it happens that we now have a cute gray and white kitten who curls up next to our woodstove and chases our shoelaces and climbs into our laps.

And who lives in our house.

Rundy named him Munchkin.