Relief.

Two days off. This is a relief.


Today is my Mom's birthday. She is 62... I think. She is a a big family reunion this weekend in Saskachewan along with a whole bunch of other Farrers. I think it would have been neat to go if our circumstances would have been different. I do have another family reunion to go to at the beginning of August with my mother-in-laws family. I think it will be quite fun. There are four babies all born within a year as well as many proud grandmas, grandpas and great aunts and uncles who will be arguing over whos grandbaby is cuter. Well, we all know who's right! :D hehe. Iris has it in the bag.

Chris is out mowing the lawn in 91 degree heat. He's going to die. I don't think the two bottle of water he took are going to cut it. He has a sun allergy and I'm afraid that he'll get sick. :|

Iris is ONE on Thursday. Can you believe it? Truely the fastest/slowest year of my life. It went by so quickly, but the individual moments were so slow. Today I saw her clap her hands together for the first time on her own. I watched her grin and slap those small pudgy hands together and I got all teary about her getting so big and Oh My God, Where Did the Time Go!

She stand on her own and bounces up and down bending her knees with out holding on to anything. We call this dancing, not too much different than how Chris and I dance for her. She knows that if she presses this button that Mom and Dad will stop what they are doing and do silly seated dances for the duration of the music. She calls momomomomomomomom when she is distressed. Her Daddy is the funniest person ever. He makes her laugh with his funny faces, he hangs her upside down and he changes practically all her dirty diapers. ( Except for today! I did one) She likes bananas cut up in her morning cereal. She eats most things easily so it is fun to feed her. She isn't very messy usually, which is good because neither Mom or Dad like when she smears food all over. She loves bath time, she grabs at the water flowing out of the faucet. She likes bubbles and cups them in her small hands and inspects them, well, before she tries to eat them. Chewing on her shoes is a favorite past time. When you to try and take away something she wants she shakes like she is the Hulk and will grow large and bust out of her little baby girl outfit. This hasn't happened yet, but I keep waiting.

I can look back from here and see everything that has happened this year and how things were in the years before we had her. I think of all the time I wasted when I could have gotten so much done with no baby to watch. There was no urgency then, no huge motivation about if you don't do it now who knows when you will have a spare moment again. ( This reminds me that I should be doing one of many, many things on my list instead of typing in my blog)
Days of doing nothing, or something, deciding in a moment and going. A very diferent type of planning. I miss those giddy irresponsible days, but not as much as I love my daughter.
I could go on and on about the wonder of it. I could also go on and on about how HARD it all is. It is so very, very hard. As a person who has alwasy been fond of rules as a way to make life easy to understand and books a way to kind out what you don't know, it is very hard to not KNOW what to do. There is not an answer for every question, no solution for every problem. Being a parent is nothing so simple. ( much to my chagrin) Being a parent is based almost solely on trial and error and after one success instead of knowing the answer for that problem for next time, next time the answer is ALWAYS DIFFERENT. Maddening. But I digress. ( heh)

I almost can't remember the early months when things were so awful that I constantly asked myself "what was I thinking" and thought "I can't do this, I'm not strong enough". Now, I can see why I did it and I know that I am strong enough. I'm also much more patient than I ever thought I could be at 5am. :D

I think this is the time when other people get misty for their little baby and in a moment of weakness try for another. I'd like to tell you all that I am not anywhere close to that yet. I think I'm doing pretty well at everything now, but I have serious doubts about how both Chris and I would handle all we went through again. Plus a toddler running around. I'm scared about how unhappy I would be. Right now I am happy focusing on my very sweet baby girl.

Did I mention she is almost one year old.

I am so proud.

:)