K at 4 months

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extremely rare shots of elsie quiet and comtemplative...

sister act

mommy and daddy love their little bear

a family affair

some shots of gran ann, pop roy, aunt meredith and charles, cousins madeleine and buck, uncle tait and rebecca, grandad david, uncle richard and aunt judy, uncle benji, and great grandmom dorothy. oh and happy birthday granny!

wedding day

so elsie wasn't asked to be the flower girl but quickly proved that she was up to the task, taking the discarded flower basket post-ceremony and delicately dispensing them throughout the yard. the bride, cousin madeleine, and groom darren looked smashing. and david got the rare opportunity to join his siblings in a group shot. what a great looking family.

We're off to see the Wizard Noz

Elsie talks A LOT. She says lots of things and things in funny ways. She sings "Old Miss Donald" for "Old MacDonald"--our budding little feminist. She'll whip a burp cloth around calling out "Look Mommy, I'm a rodeo cowboy!" And she was so excited to see what she understood was the Wizard Noz when we showed her YouTube clips of the Wizard of Oz in preparation for our big movie night in the park.

Last Friday, we headed downtown to Forsyth at 8pm--past her bedtime--to see the giant screen set up with giant speakers in the park. Elsie couldn't believe all the people were up past their bedtime. And as she told my mother on the phone in anticipation, "we'll sit on a blanket and eat snacks and Mommy will drink wine." That did happen--we sat on a blanket and ate chocolate covered strawberries and Mommy and Daddy and Nathan and Allison did drink a bottle or two of red wine. And we lounged on the blanket and watched the Wizard Noz and it was a gorgeous night.

I remember years ago when my mom had one of those early movie disk players, pre-VCR. She would rent things like Grease and Flash Gordon and the Jane Fonda Workout. I have fond memories of summer when her best friends, Donna Davis and Jo Turville would come over with their kids and we'd camp out watching movies--one week it would be movies based on the Bible, the next week it would be musicals set in Paris, the other week it would be Judy Garland movies. I came to love movies in this way. And then, I also remember watching movies like Wizard Noz and imagining that I would always watch movies like that even when I was grown, even when I had a little girl, and here that moment has arrived.

Yes, that night at the park made me feel like we had arrived at something. Warm little Elsie buried in my lap entranced by Dorothy, "scareman," the "wion," oh and "whasshis name? the silver man, the tin man, that's right." She'd scootch over to D's lap after a while, long after Lillian had drifted off in Allison's lap, up way past bedtime. Here was a peaceful parenting moment, a perfect parenting moment. After all the hard work of parenting, with the newborn and the potty training, the messy tearful hard work of parenting with its little spots of joy, here was one of those moments that I imagined parenthood would be like. Here was one moment where the imagination and reality aligned right there "somewhere over the rainbow."

aunts uncles horses oh my!

the flight to alabama for a family wedding paid off. e got some long over due time with cousin yana, aunt jamie, aunt mere, and uncle benji. more pics to follow of the wedding weekend....

above it all

so it was elsie's first plane ride and daddy's first trip with girl. the week before departure was used to explain the physics of flight and logistics of travel and airport insanity. elsie seemed to understand completely. it was a shaky start. our morning flight was grounded due to inclement weather in atl. so we sat on the plane. hot, cramped, confused. the backpack full of a week's worth of distractions was depleted in 3o min. please let us take off. prayers were answered. off we went. "fast and loud". nervous laughter and true giddiness. priceless parent/child moment. quickly to 10K feet. now what? peanuts and ginger ale, of course. thank you tired flight attendant. the drop down tray table totally trumped the g-force on take off. the rest of the trip spent explaining "we only use the table for snacks and then it goes up, or the flight attendant will not be happy". on the return trip, immediately after boarding, requests (many and frequent) were made to let down the table. "after we take off and are up in the air," daddy says. no sooner had the wheels left the ground "daddy can we let the table down now?". but overall an amazingly good trip. would and will do it again. one of those many moments daddy found himself amazed that this was his little girl and that he was capable of such things.

day at the beach (in a box) with addie

A special thanks goes out to Addie. When David and Elsie headed on for their big adventure in Fairhope, she came to Savannah to help Beth with Kit. She also created Elsie's lovely dress for the wedding. We are so grateful for all of her kind generosity!

Here is a photo of Elsie and Addie right before E's big trip.

easter has come and gone

A Berry Good Spring Day!
April 2008





April 2009
Look back at the pictures from last year's Strawberry Festival and you won't believe what a difference a year makes. A big girl Elsie and a new baby Kit... and a much older mommy and daddy--here we are at the Ottawa Farms Strawberry festival. Elsie and Camille had their usual fun--Ginger, Lee, David, Kit, and I tagged along for face painting, mini-train riding, bounce-house jumping, and strawberry picking, of course. Luckily, the Heidels had a camera--as did the Martins who we happened upon--and got us some pics of our picking for you!