Maya's Dedication

Our family, perhaps like most families these days, is somewhat religiously eclectic. I was raised in both the Disciples (my mom's) and Catholic (my dad's) traditions. I was baptized in my mom's church, University Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) shortly before my 15th birthday (I think. It's possible I was almost 14?). And now I'm a Disciples pastor.

I think it's fair to characterize the religious aspect of Tim's upbringing by saying that Tim's parents transitioned from practicing Catholics to cultural Catholics over the course of the first years of his childhood. Both he and his sister were baptized and have godparents, but weren't "raised in the church" after that point -- attending kindergarten in a Catholic school was basically the extent of his religious education. (As babies, my three siblings and I were neither baptized nor dedicated, since my parents wanted us to choose for ourselves. They made sure we got as much religious education as possible in BOTH traditions... so we could have the information to make that choice.)

So, when we had our first kid, it was pretty clear we would not have her baptized as an infant. This was interesting because I was serving a United Church of Christ church at that time, and it is their tradition to baptize babies. So, we had what we think was their first infant dedication, a brief ceremony during a Sunday worship service where the parents dedicate the baby to God, and the parents and congregation dedicate themselves to nurturing the child in faith -- I put together the liturgy. This is a pretty common ceremony in churches that practice "believer's baptism" (that is, baptizing people who are old enough to decide for themselves). Fortunately, that congregation is very open to a variety of experiences and perspectives (even in worship!), and it didn't seem to be anything other than a joyful moment for everyone.

Anyway, it turned out that even though it didn't matter to Tim whether water got sprinkled on the little baby or not, the *godparents* part was important to him, because those relationships have been special to him throughout his life. So, we had an infant dedication with godparents -- we chose the alliterative pairing of Jessica and Jesse (Tim's only and my oldest sibling).

Okay, yes, I realize the title says *Maya's* dedication... but you know me, I had to go into the theological background at least a little bit... and it turns out this is one of those "second child" stories, too. Because Quinn's dedication was an Event. We planned it so that Tim's parents and sister (who was the godmother, after all!) could make the cross-country trip to be there, we borrowed a fancy christening gown (which made the cross-country trip with the grandparents), and nearly ALL my in-town relatives came. Which was a lot.
See?

Well, sometime during the first, California, half of our whirlwind, bi-coastal baby tour introducing Maya to her family and friends, I realized something. While still in California, we had developed the following vague travel-planning guidelines: 1) After we get home after this, please let's stay in Nicaragua for a good long while 2) Let's come back to California next time we visit the U.S. and 3) maybe Christmas in the Washington, DC area in 2012? That meant that AFTER the baby-tour visit, it would be more than a year until we were back in the DC area, in the congregation where we are members (University Christian, the location of not only my baptism, but also our wedding and my ordination). And, since it's called "infant" dedication, it might be a good idea to take advantage of visiting our home church while the kid is still an infant.

So, instead of the big family event that Quinn's dedication was, it was planned totally at the last minute. The Dress was handed off to us the day before we left Fresno, just in case (we still hadn't totally decided/ figured out if we could even make it happen). We called the church to see if we could still get it into the bulletin at the last minute. We asked the godparents at the last minute (and in one case, after the fact!). My sister said "what would you have done if I hadn't been able to make it to church?" Little did she know... we had no Plan B! We barely had a Plan A. My older brother's family already had other plans. And then, my dad had a (mild!) heart attack two days before, so it wasn't just the California grandparents who missed it -- all three of her grandparents got a copy of the church bulletin in the mail. Fortunately, my aunt and uncle and even some cousins who were in town for Thanksgiving did come and help fill in a couple "family rows" near the front.

But, I was really happy that it worked out. It felt good to present Maya to our church family in that formal way.
Gloria, the acting senior pastor, talked about children and the raising of them in faith, and asked us to make some commitments. She then took Maya and walked her down the aisle, presenting her to the congregation.
And then, when she came back up front to our assembled family and handed Maya back to me she took Quinn from Tim's arms, carried her out and presented her as well.
I loved the way that took what could have been a tough moment for Quinn (of little-sister-getting-the-spotlight) and included her in the blessing of the moment.

We decided to think outside the box a little when choosing godparents.
Tim's "honorary sister" Elisabeth is her godmother,
my younger brother Eric is the godfather, and my sister Amy (a pagan who goes to a UU church) is the goddessmother. :)
The one thing that we learned from Quinn's dedication and did *better* the second time was to get more photos of Maya in the dress.

Maya's Money Shot

My most faithful readers may recall a post from Quinn's babyhood with a stunning photo that could be used to sell baby products (or at the very least, picture frames).

Well, being a second child myself, I was determined to try to capture a similarly enchanting photo of my equally gorgeous younger daughter at this age (also known as "the age when they really start to look cute").

So, here it is:

Success!

Quinn, born in winter in Washington, DC, sported a knit hat. Maya, born in Nicaragua in a tropical climate, is relaxing in the hammock.

5 Months Later...

I have to say, my frequency of posting is pretty pathetic at this point. Quinn is now 15 months old! She had her 15 month checkup at the doctor yesterday, and is 50th percentile for weight, and possibly 25th percentile for length, but she was really mad and squirmy when getting measured, so it's not clear that it was at all accurate (for example, the head size reading was *smaller* than at her 12 month checkup). Anyway, here's a picture of our girl on Valentine's Day, in her Valentine's dress, doing one of her favorite things -- carrying Mama's purse. She often says "Bye-bye" and pretends she is going to walk out the front door when she does this.

She's also getting really good at walking.

And she loves to play... this picture of her riding on the dump truck was just too cute. It seems like she's learning new words at the rate of one a day... but that's probably a slight exaggeration. She does say "Please" and "thank you" when prompted, and was trying out "sorry" yesterday (but I'm pretty sure she hasn't grasped the concept). It is amazing how fast she is learning and growing. Next thing you know, she'll be learning to drive!

The Big 10 (Months)

Well, Quinn is ten months old, and I haven't really blogged about her since she was 5 months old -- that's a whole Quinn half-life. It's hard to believe it's been that long... the second 5 months definitely flew by even faster than the first five.

She is a playful girl who has six teeth now. She gets around and gets into everything -- she has been crawling for two and a half months, and pulls herself up and "cruises" (that's walking while holding onto furniture, etc) at every opportunity... we are pretty sure she'll be walking before her first birthday (and are appropriately terrified!).

Sadly, my camera has broken, which has seriously derailed my "picture a day" project, but here are some nice shots from the past month.


Quinn made her debut at the Miller picnic, a reunion of my maternal grandmother's side of the family -- and she was the youngest clan member, and so got to be in the traditional "youngest and oldest" photograph.


Here she is taking in the bathtub-warm waters off the Mississippi Gulf Coast with her Daddy.


She's very much in the "monkey see, monkey do" phase. And, of course, takes dental hygiene very seriously.


And here she is frolicking in the living room of our new place! (Yes, we moved again.) We are all really enjoying living a home that includes a little room just for Quinn to sleep in -- we're getting a lot more sleep now.

We continue to be totally impressed with her. Happy ten-month birthday, Quinn! We love you!

Quinea Pig

Quinn participated in her first experiment yesterday. (As a subject; all babies are mini-scientists who are running experiments all the time as they figure out how the world works.)

She was in a study at the linguistics lab, one of three labs at the University of Maryland that do infant studies. I held her on my lap and had a visor over my eyes so I couldn't see the large screen TV she was looking at. Apparently, the screen was split in two, with different versions of a woman's face on either side. One was saying "ooo," the other was saying "eee." For the first half of the time, the woman's voice saying "ee. ee. ee." was played. For the second half, it said "oo. oo. oo."

A video camera recorded where Quinn was looking when this was going on. Apparently, she (like other babies who are 4 months old) looks more at the face whose mouth matches the sound. Anyway, it was pretty fun, and I always like doing my part to advance the cause of science.

Do I Look Like My Mama?

Well, here are some shots of her vaguely posed like my baby picture.

Here's Quinn:


Here's Baby me:


And here's a little better smile from Quinn:


I have trouble catching the full magic of her smiles on camera. Perhaps that's because the squealing isn't picked up along with it... well, seriously, it's probably because she gives her biggest smiles to people face-to-face. And I haven't yet figured out how to implant a camera in my face. :)

What do you think?

Do I Look Like My Daddy?

So, I had a silly idea that we should pose Quinn like baby pictures of her parents to help decide who she looks more like. The challenge is that I really don't know how old we each were when we got our first portraits taken. I suspect we were older (around 6 months) than she is now (3 1/2 months). But, we got the one to compare with Tim.

Here's Quinn:



And here's baby Tim:



Or does this one look more like him?



What do you think?

Stay tuned for "Do I Look Like My Mama?"...

Money Shot

With a nice camera, great sunlight, and an adorable subject, taking photos is really fun! And sometimes they turn out incredibly well, like this one.

Quinn had a doctor's appointment today, and she weighs 13 lbs, 14 oz (90th-95th percentile), is 23 1/2 inches long (75th-90th percentile), and has a head diameter of 43 cm (off the charts!). She was very sad about her shots -- she cried loudly, but didn't make a special new, "ouch that hurts" noise, like I thought she might. It was just loud crying with extra flailing of limbs. Fortunately, the crying was over pretty quickly, and she fell asleep pretty much as soon as we got her into the car seat.

...And the sleeping continues!

This is what a happy, well-rested baby looks like. Quinn continues to sleep like a champion. She has slept 5 1/2 hours or more 6 nights in the past week -- and 4 of those were 6 1/2 hours or more. We are feeling much better rested and loving it! Time will tell if this will last, but I'm just appreciating it.

In other news, Quinn (yeah, right, you didn't think it would be about anyone else, did you?) is discovering her hands. Several times in the past couple days, I have caught Quinn looking at her right hand -- sometimes moving it around a bit, but a lot of times just staring very calmly and intently. She will grab things that are placed in her hand, and try to reach for things. She still doesn't have total control of her arms -- she gave her self a good whack in the face with a rattle two days ago. It was very sad, and shocking to her -- she had her mad, crying face with the mouth wide open, but no sound came out for the first 20 seconds or so. We've decided to stick to softer toys for now.

I should also note that in this photo, she is smiling AT the camera -- I was holding it out, and she smiled when the little red light came on, looking at it rather than my face.

She just keeps getting more interesting!