A Sunday Night with Naomi

It's pretty easy to remember to pick up the camera and document the more exceptional moments of our little lives - holidays, milestones, travels - and those moments usually get priority in the [increasingly rare] opportunities that I find to blog. But Drew is great about picking up the camera in the routine, ordinary moments, too - dinners, baths, and play - and he encouraged me to share some of those moments from today - right now, before they have time to get lost in the photo archive on our computer and out-competed for blog air time. So, here is a small glimpse into our very normal Sunday evening: 

A quick lesson on gratitude:

Proudly showing Dad her letters and artwork:

Adding an "airplane!!" and a "sun!!" - two of Naomi's very favorite things:

Bathtime!

For the record, this is usually Drew's domain, but I'm pictured here. Naomi still gets giddy about bathtime every night, and it makes me giddy to watch her streak through our apartment towards the bathroom when she hears Drew turn on the water.

  Time for jammies + a comb + lotion + a good toothbrushin':

Sometimes she cooperates, usually she has to be coerced...

Identifying her kin-folk in photographs:

And identifying the "animals!!" on her toothbrush:

That was all followed by a trip to her bedroom, no books (usually it's Goodnight Moon, On the Night You Were Born and Sandra Boynton's The Bedtime Book, but Naomi was beyond sleepy tonight, and just not interested), then we said prayer (she's not typically super excited about this little delay in nursing with mama, but she's always emphatic about the "Amen!"), then she turned on her noise (the sound of the ocean), ran to the door to hug and kiss Dada goodnight, shut the door, and then ran back to me in the rocking chair. Naomi nursed for a little while, then I put her in her crib with her lovey (actually two of them; identical, and identically ragged, lambs), her pillow (a relatively recent, highly favored addition to her bed), and the quilt Mimi made for her. Sometimes she protests my leaving for a few minutes, but often enough she relishes sleep. Tonight, she talked to her ceiling for a while, then drifted off to sweet, sound sleep.

This is what I'm most grateful for. These simple, normal, and ordinary moments that get etched into my mind by their repetitiveness, but also by the deep joy they bring to our lives. Given my rather atrocious long-term memory, I'm also grateful that, thanks to Drew, they're now etched in some small way into what is likely a more permanent [digital] memory.