The owl and the patriarch
I mentioned that we had plans yesterday, plans that ended up canceling my mom's original intentions of getting together with friends. That was something in the works for a year, so she was sad to miss out, but then again a year ago the reason for yesterday wasn't even a twinkle in her mother's eye.
Yes, we were invited to see my cousin's baby, who was all of 16 days old. My grandparents were going to be there, and it turned out the baby's other grandparents, who live two hours away, also came. That was actually really nice, since we haven't had a chance to spend much time with them; they're cool people, and my cousin's MIL made the hit dessert of the night, some sort of orange jello/tapioca pudding concoction that tasted like a Creamsicle.
When my uncle called last week, while we were in Wisconsin, he said to get there at four and they'd serve sandwiches. My grandmother called yesterday morning while mom and I were gone and said they'd be *serving* at four, and it was a sit-down dinner my aunt had made. It was very reminiscent of a holiday dinner, except of course these are the relatives who don't celebrate holidays. We'd had one of these dinners before, and I recall somebody being missing, and it popped in my head that it was when the new mom was still exiled from the family. It was for her youngest brother's 8th grade graduation in 2009, when none of us could attend the actual grad party because of a family wedding (my parents and grandparents) and because I came home from camp that day. We'd had a family-only dinner the following week, which was nice. And then within a day or two another relative died (father of the groom, if you remember what happened) and we saw them twice in a week--strange since we're lucky to see them once a year, usually.
It still amazes me that my grandparents are now great-grandparents, and I got pictures of them holding the baby. She's a little doll. I got to hold her, too, but not for long because it was close to feeding time. Her hair is on the dark side, what little there is of it, and her eyes are this lovely blue. We're hoping they stay that way. We also took a number of group shots just before we left. I'd kind of wanted pictures of the four generations, meaning just my grandparents, uncle, cousin, and the baby, but oh well; I'll take what I got, which is virtually everyone there in one picture. My dad took nearly all the pictures save for ones where my cousin's husband took the camera and made dad get in too. It was a really wonderful night and I think we all enjoyed it.
By the way, my cousin's theme is owls, and the first outfit the baby wore had a little owl on it. And my uncle is insisting we call him the patriarch instead of grandpa. I said, what does that make your father? Father of patriarch. Oh, okay.
Yes, we were invited to see my cousin's baby, who was all of 16 days old. My grandparents were going to be there, and it turned out the baby's other grandparents, who live two hours away, also came. That was actually really nice, since we haven't had a chance to spend much time with them; they're cool people, and my cousin's MIL made the hit dessert of the night, some sort of orange jello/tapioca pudding concoction that tasted like a Creamsicle.
When my uncle called last week, while we were in Wisconsin, he said to get there at four and they'd serve sandwiches. My grandmother called yesterday morning while mom and I were gone and said they'd be *serving* at four, and it was a sit-down dinner my aunt had made. It was very reminiscent of a holiday dinner, except of course these are the relatives who don't celebrate holidays. We'd had one of these dinners before, and I recall somebody being missing, and it popped in my head that it was when the new mom was still exiled from the family. It was for her youngest brother's 8th grade graduation in 2009, when none of us could attend the actual grad party because of a family wedding (my parents and grandparents) and because I came home from camp that day. We'd had a family-only dinner the following week, which was nice. And then within a day or two another relative died (father of the groom, if you remember what happened) and we saw them twice in a week--strange since we're lucky to see them once a year, usually.
It still amazes me that my grandparents are now great-grandparents, and I got pictures of them holding the baby. She's a little doll. I got to hold her, too, but not for long because it was close to feeding time. Her hair is on the dark side, what little there is of it, and her eyes are this lovely blue. We're hoping they stay that way. We also took a number of group shots just before we left. I'd kind of wanted pictures of the four generations, meaning just my grandparents, uncle, cousin, and the baby, but oh well; I'll take what I got, which is virtually everyone there in one picture. My dad took nearly all the pictures save for ones where my cousin's husband took the camera and made dad get in too. It was a really wonderful night and I think we all enjoyed it.
By the way, my cousin's theme is owls, and the first outfit the baby wore had a little owl on it. And my uncle is insisting we call him the patriarch instead of grandpa. I said, what does that make your father? Father of patriarch. Oh, okay.