Sammy Dow, how precious you are.  You are the first one of my babies that haven't brought me anxiety.  I feel more akin to a grandma with an aching heart, longing for the days to hold my newborn again.  Each day drifts into another and you grow away from your newborn self.  Sorry to be so mellow dramatic kid.  I know there will be a place for this again in Heaven. 

Yesterday afternoon, I slipped out the backdoor to sway on the porch swing.  The sun was hugging me tight, but not such a squeeze that I wanted to wiggle away.  Cora eventually found me.  Her daddy must have wedged a balloon between her shirt and already round toddler belly.  "Ah, does Cora have a baby in her tummy?" 
"Yeah, baby Kin" (Quinn, her cousin) She says as she gingerly rubs the balloon.  How tender.  Then she wants to swing with her baby.  So, she lays on the swing belly side down because baby makes a great cushion. 

 

When these two are left bored and alone, someone is going to lose a chunk of hair or a piece of skin.  That somebody is usually Ender, poor guy.  But when they are left with a spark of an idea, they play like storybook friends.  The air softens around them and their laughter almost makes me faint with nostalgia.  I swoon extra when they end up playing with things you didn't buy to encourage developmental growth.  Such as this fine specimen of child's pool discarded by the previous owners because their dogs weren't using it anymore. 

Someone to celebrate

Oh Sammy, my love, my little darling, you're here!  I bottled you up in my body along with so much fear and anxiety for far too long. 
You smell amazing!
You feel amazing!

Leave it to your siblings to play ping pong with pink eye and finally hit daddy straight in the face the day you were born.  I am also sick with some sorta nasal drip, such as it is, welcome to the chaos.

The sky rushed our way when it caught wind of your birth.  It rains, it blows, it cools my after birth sweats :)

Ender entered this world under such serious matters.  IUGR, a c-section, freaked out parents.
Cora sashayed into  a party- so many females laughing and cheerleading for her in the delivery room.  Fitting for the extrovert.
Sam came with quiet reserve to live and just be here.  Fears told us you shouldn't be here, you shouldn't be healthy, but you came with confidence paying no heed.

Gentle July

July has come gently this year.  A week of very warm embraces and cool kisses.
Junipine didn't get to have us this Fourth.  I'm sure the sycamores drooped and the creek slowed.  We spent the holiday at Grandma's and Grandpa's and it made us all very happy and peaceful. 

Clearly Zander shopped H&
M by himself.

Grandma's patriotic red velvet flag.

Zander's antics he smuggled onto the plain from the midwest when he was twelve as claimed by him.
Cora, plugged her ears and scowled.
Ender shimmied a tree.

Dog Days of Summer

So our Samuel Dow.  Many a men have come before you with that name, and many will come after.  But you will never be one of them.  You fill out your own flesh.    
These three eagerly await your arrival.  I thought I might have to warn you about them, but if you are smidgen like them in diabolical madness and heavenly joy, it is me and the world who must brace ourselves.

The anticipation of you is on the eastern horizon.  Charcoal clouds smudged across the sky have me wondering when they and you will come and bless the hot days.

Another unexpected pet of your's is Claudette.  I'm not sure if she will make it to your birthday though.  She has laid two eggs and thus caused your daddy to close the system in case her babies escape.  The other night he caught another black widow, tantalizing her from her shadowed hiding place with a sacrificial cricket.  Eight, black sewing machine needles work in precise motion to stitch their pray into their webbed coffins.  Unfortunately, when daddy went to deliver Claudettes new room mate/assassin, that is when he noticed an egg was hatched.  With his typical shriek he closed her lid, shivered, and regrouped.  I went inside as he contemplated the fate of the ladies.
I had time to read, use the loo, scan through Taylor Swift's instagram, and take a snooze.  I woke up to find him still outside with the jar in his hand, looking a little dejected "I can't think of a way to dispose of her".
He smashed the unbonded spider, but what of Claudette?

Last night, Grandma and her gang (Ender the apprentice, Cora, the tag a long and Zander her back up, I suppose)  collected a slew of fresh scorpions.  Zander froze about a fourth cup experimenting with humane death penalty practices.  After the thaw it was just a soggy mess of dead bugs.
So I think Claudette will be frozen.  Bless her.  I suggested baking, Zander's dad suggested fireworks, but the freezer it is!

I write this as though this is how my mind works.  This is all your dad's influence.  Once I'm in the presence of my mama (your Nana) we decide that a nice trip out to the desert for a freedom
release party would be best.

Oh Sam, come soon and make our lives even more eccentric and happy.