Mack...and cheese!

I wish I had captured a movie of tonight's dinner experience with Mack, but I had my hands full - it was a pretty fun one. Charles is out of town today, so we were on our own, which usually means leftovers or takeout. Tonight Macklin helped me warm up some ravioli and veggies for him and leftover mac and cheese with veggies for me. He loves to help cook and will howl until he's picked up so he can assist and see what's on the stove. He had a lot of fun stirring the pot of macaroni, and when we sat down to eat he looked at his plate of ravioli - then at my bowl - then back at his plate and decided nope, this isn't what I want. So he reached over, grabbed my spoon with one hand and bowl with the other, and proceeded to shovel macaroni and cheese into his mouth. He ate almost half my bowl, including vegetables! He followed up his dinner with a dessert of not one but two bowls of applesauce. Needless to say, when I put him in the tub for bathtime, I had a good time rubbing his poky little Buddha belly.

I'm a big fan of The Office, and tonight's episode featured the birth of Jim and Pam's baby. Whoever wrote it must have had a baby recently, because they captured it all perfectly - the worry about labor, the exhaustion and confusion, the obsession in the early days with things like the perfect latch and swaddling a screaming, wriggling newborn. In some ways, I miss those days - my tiny little guy who depended completely on me. These days Macklin doesn't want to hold my hand, and he runs all on his own at the speed of light. But he also grins when I look at him sideways, and he grasps my hair like reins to pull me close to his face and laugh in my ear.

Good luck, Jim and Pam. Record every minute of that babyhood while you still can.


The first giggles with Mommy, on her 34th birthday