Since 'feeding the ducks,'...

..I've really grown up.
For example, Chaim Potok has replaced 'Goodnight Moon.' Well, almost replaced it. I still like to read that one three or four times a day.


But I've grown in other ways too. I now prefer spoons and forks over using my fingers...most of the time.

I've been practicing a lot more lately. Since I decided to pull the 'rock-rock' chair over to the piano, it's been easier to use the pedals and play at the same time. It was just so hard to play expressively without the 'sustain' pedal.


I also really love to 'hang out' in Barnes & Noble now. I guess it's the books, the coffee, and the hushed conversations reflecting on great literature and new ideas...
...or maybe I just like the 'Choo-Choo.'

But my biggest new trick involves the potty. . . (I've used it twice now!) . . .and lots of stickers. This one seems to make Mom and Dad the happiest.

This is my 'peek peek' cupboard. I spend a lot of time here during the day...playing, re-arranging, reading, relaxing, drinking my water.







A few saturdays ago, my cousin Emma took me to the park while cousin 'Lee-Lee' played soccer.


Isaac and Will even came too!



..we've been busy.

feeding the ducks

By Saturday, the air was crisp and cold...a perfect fall day for finding pumpkins and sipping fresh apple cider (though I abstained to avoid ecoli).

But on Monday...
...it was summer. And we enjoyed one last picnic in Grand Haven in the 80 degree sun. It felt magical, to walk in October through fallen yellow leaves, sipping an icy blended coffee drink, sweating in the hot sun. We visited the Art Gallery downtown, the toy store, and the deli to buy some bread to feed the ducks.

One of our favorite stories these days has a picture of ducks in a park. For the past month or so, whenever we get to *the* page, we pause and 'throw some bread to the ducks' (ever since our last picnic...where a few left over crumbs were thrown to the ducks in the water). So with all of that practice, Maya turned out to be rather proficient at feeding the ducks. We blew them *lots* of kisses and waved for quite a while when it was time to go home.

Unbelievable!

Maybe my memory isn't clear any more, but I think I could have 'hidden' my first pregnancy almost entirely until around Christmas (when I was almost five months along)...

Apparently second pregnancies can be very different.

This is at 14 weeks...



...and I'm actually *trying* to 'hold it in.'

At fourteen weeks, our baby is probably three and a half inches long (head to bottom) — about the length of a lemon — and weighs about one and a half ounces. By next week, he or she could be around five inches long and might weigh about two ounces. Although the eyelids are fused shut, his or her eyes are now sensitive to light. And sometime in the next few weeks, he or she will be able to hear my voice, though we've already begun English, French, Italian, and Music lessons.

I think I'm even more aware this time around of just how little I understand of how wonderful and heavy and mysterious the process of life is...how entirely unprepared I am for the depth of love that will soon painfully consume me.

And as determined as I am to just *be* in the joy and fear and hope... I am finding it even harder to be aware of the fleeting moments as they pass. The weeks are just racing by.

So even as I long to hold this baby and look into tiny eyes, ...and as part of me lives in the coming April...I'm a little reluctant to say goodbye to right now.

our silly 17 month old