They May Take Our Binkies, But They’ll Never Take Our Freedom!

 

Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to go and build a more secure fence.  Perhaps I will also read her The Poky Little Puppy for moral instruction.  But I feel certain she would learn precisely the wrong lesson.

Margaret Loses Brain Cells, Or Another Sleeping Pose

When Margaret was first born (and before) I pored over tomes on the proper care and feeding of infants.

I found them to be more terrifying than helpful, as they detailed all the things that could go wrong.  All the things I hadn’t even managed to begin to worry about were there, laid out in black and white.

One of these books warned me against letting the baby sleep in the car.*  This sleep, the book told me, was not as restful as proper sleep in a bed, and would keep Margaret’s brain from developing properly.

Well, Margaret’s SAT** scores took a hit today.

Still, she’s awfully cute, so maybe it won’t matter if I’ve made her dumb.

*Presumably, I should have hired someone to ride in the back of the car with an airhorn to blow in Margaret’s ear when she showed signs of nodding off.

**Or ACT, since that seems to be the preferred test in our neck of the woods.

When I Was Her Age

I was almost certainly not allowed to brandish pokers at my mother.

I was also not allowed to play with the fire shovel.

She seemed relatively willing to give me the poker, however, and we have reinforced the barricades.

Much Better

That looks so much more like the way that reasonable and responsible people would sleep.

And it means that I can get a good, peaceful profile shot.  I usually am only able to get pictures of Margaret sleeping when she goes to sleep on top of me, like this one.

My room at my parents’ house, however, has a lot of natural light, which means that I can take a good picture of Margaret when I put her down, so that’s why there have been so many.

Try not to go to sleep; there’s something perniciously relaxing about a picture of a sleeping baby.

St. Patrick’s Day

We’re having corned beef and cabbage for supper tonight, as one does, and Margaret seems to know that there’s a treat in store for her.

And here she is eying the cart next to us, hoping that there’s some mistake.

Cheer up, kid.  There’s corned beef hash for breakfast on Saturday.  Who wouldn’t like that?

Mine!

Those of you who are regular readers may recall that my mother and my niece made a quilt for Margaret for her birthday.  You can see Margaret trampling all over it in this picture.

While they were making it, something terrible happened to a square that was meant to have a bookish owl on it.  They made the quilt smaller, but were sad, because the owl was a really cool design.  I suggested that they might make Margaret a pillow with the owl on it (because I’m always trying to help people feel happy, you know?  No attempts to wring pillows out of people, none at all).

So this afternoon, they made it.

We kidnapped Hannah from school*, and chained her to a sewing machine all afternoon.

Margaret looked on with great interest.

The finished product was pretty amazing.

It was so amazing, in fact, that Margaret wanted it immediately.

Hannah moved to another part of the room so I could get the picture, but Margaret was fast in pursuit.

She snagged the pillow

And took it away with her.

*Seriously, they just let me get her from school, even though I don’t have a note or anything, and she didn’t know that she was supposed to come with me.  Small towns are awesome.

It Doesn’t Look Comfortable

Margaret is an odd little sleeper.  Her favorite napping position* is up on her knees with her hands tucked under her torso, and most of her weight on her head.

It does not look comfortable, not one little bit.

*Well, her favorite napping position is draped across me so that I can’t get anything done.  She’s more like the cat than she knows.