HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

February 1, 2012 at 6:27 am (a new year, catching up, holiday, picture post)

“The days are long, but the years are short.”

– Gretchen Rubin

FEBRUARY??! Whaddaya mean it’s FEBRUARY?  When did that happen? Goodness, this year is already flying by! Sorry for my long delay in posting –  hopefully we’ll be able to return to our regularly scheduled programing (whatever that is). I know I’m a couple of holidays behind, but let’s start at the very beginning, shall we??!

Happy New Year!

Rowan 1.1.2012 (21 months old)

I am really looking forward to all of the fun changes this year is going to bring us. Baby Rowan will be turning TWO in just a couple of months! (wasn’t she just born, like, yesterday or something?). Somehow, my littlest baby is already leaving her babyhood behind her. Of course, she’ll always be The Baby to us, being the last of our brood, but it’s been very difficult for me to give away all of those tiny little booties and rattles with the knowledge that this time, they’ll really be gone forever. *sniff sniff*

Rowan 1.1.2012 (20 months old)

She’s grown so much since last January. . . but still looks exactly like her naughty little self. Ro has been little Miss Mischief since day one, I’m almost afraid to find out how the terrible two’s are going to manifest themselves – she’s already gotten quite a head start in that department!

Rowan 1.1.2011 (8 months old)

Teagan also has a very exciting year ahead of her.  She turns five years old this summer, and kindergarten is right around the corner. . . talk about milestones! I can’t wrap my brain around the fact that she won’t be here with us during the day anymore. I’m looking forward to having some one-on-one time with Rowan, but. . . lets just say this is going to be a major adjustment for everyone involved! I’m really excited for Teagan to be starting on such an incredible new journey, but it terrifies me at the same time!

Teagan 1.1.2008 (6 months old)

I’ve always had this idea (pre-motherhood) that babies  become actual children at the age of five. I know that it’s silly, and that there won’t be a magical change that occurs on her fifth birthday, but still. . . she’ll always be my baby, too. And just because she’ll *officially* be a child doesn’t mean that I will ever be able to stop seeing her as the baby she once was. . .

Teagan 1.1.2009 (18 months old)

. . .and just because she’s so darn BIG now doesn’t mean she can’t play with the Baby New Year photo props, too! Of course, I must draw the line at the diaper. Sorry kiddo.

Teagan 1.1.2012 (4.5 years old)

Can’t you just see the teenager lurking behind that sweet little face just waiting to come out??! Eeeep! She’s growing up too fast!

Teagan 1.1.2012 (4.5 years old)

Since this is the last year I plan on having a baby New Year, I want to put in a word or two about the other character who has been present in all of these images. No, not that awful sash. . . I made that thing with iron-on letters and a strip torn from an old pillow case. Another obvious testament to my failure in making straight lines – surprised it’s held up this long. But no, not the sash. I’m talking about The Hat.

There it is in all it’s battered glory. . . it really is a pretty old thing, full of personality and its own kind of charm. It’s persnickety, and damn near impossible to convince to show up against the black that I’m forced to use as a backdrop. It’s been my husband’s since before I was, price haggled and purchased from a shop of wonderful old things. Obviously, The Hat isn’t in the greatest shape, but I think that adds to its appeal.  We don’t know much about it, but that it came from England, made in 1822 in a hat-shop attached to a hotel.  Just think of all the January firsts The Hat has seen – nearly two-hundred of them! I wonder what it would say about our silly New Year’s tradition . . .

Husby 10.31.2002 (I think - four months after our marriage!)

Of course The Hat has been used in the past for various bad Halloween costumes, but I’m mostly attached to the old thing because my husband wore it to our wedding. For that reason alone I love having pictures of our babies with it – plus, you gotta admit, it’s a killer photo prop to have just hanging around the house!

My husband, on the other hand, is less than enthusiastic about my ritualistic use of The Hat. It’s his, and he  has made it extremely clear to me on many occasions that I am never to touch it. EVER. Yet every year I take it down from its place of honor and place it into the hands of a very small (and usually delighted) toddler. I don’t sneak, exactly. . . I just don’t flaunt the fact that I’m about to touch The Hat. It isn’t as if he doesn’t know. I do the same thing on the same day every year for the first two years of my current baby’s life. If he really didn’t want me to touch it, he’d hide it or something, right?

But this year he didn’t say a word about it. . . I don’t know if it’s because he’s finally figured out that he’s been beaten (doubt it), or if he realizes that this is the last year it will be an issue (until another fantastic opportunity to take pictures with The Hat comes up, that is).

At any rate, The Hat, I love you. Thank you for being steadfast and patient with my babies through the years. Hopefully you enjoyed playing peek-a-boo and being a drum as much as they did. It is my sincerest wish that you live to see another two-hundred years, and are able to grace the heads of my daughter’s grooms (if they so choose) and play peek-a-boo with my grand and great-grand New Year’s Babies.