You may be wondering whether we’ve disappeared off the face of the earth or, more importantly, why we’ve posted no pictures recently!! Things have been busy, lighting has been poor, and Nathaniel comes running as soon as he spies the camera. But he will be celebrating his first birthday very soon, and I plan to take a lot of pictures to celebrate that fact.
Currently, I’m going to focus on feeding, playing, and walking with the kids; Sydney was surprised by a third interview, which will take place tonight, and then he’s off on a three-day work weekend to the coast. Sounds kind of nice, right? Unfortunately, he’ll need to pour out a paper over the weekend, a paper that will be presented next weekend on the Continent, so there’s some pressure to make the most of the work time (which may keep him from birdwatching as much as he would have liked). But I am very proud of him: he just added another journal publication to his CV, and he’s been braving some teaching this term, in addition to interview preparations.
Since I’ve had the kids more mornings recently, I’ve been taking them to a variety of playgroups around town. It’s wonderful to see them interacting with other kids, to see Nathaniel walk the length of a church nave (quite a feat after his practice in our tiny house!), and to hear Katherine singing the playgroup songs all the way home.
Nathaniel really does not sleep well unless one of us is right next to him, so I have to choose between freedom during his naps and, well, a nap time of any real length. Thankfully, my recent work is all about reading (which I love, especially after what seems like years of just writing), which I can do with him next to me. We’re going to try getting him to sleep without his pacifier, since the thing falls out all the time anyway and wakes him up, and then we’ll try getting him to sleep without us around. Yes, it’s sweet when he sleeps with us, and I love cuddling up with him . . . but it’s just not possible to get him to sleep except when Katherine’s also down, and that leaves us with no just-Katherine time for puzzles and books more suitable to her age group. So, we’re making strides (no more 1.5-hour feeding intervals, and more sleep at night), but we’re going to see if we can afford to shake things up in order to get us all a bit more independence.
Erin
Alan Schmierer