Hollywood

Somehow I just can't keep myself from drawing analogies between my life and a shallow hollywood comedy:

One baby - Mia
Three men - Mia's dad, someone I love, someone I can't forget about
A flat in dire need of a cleanup
A facial skin that could put up with some scrubbing as well
A mom who believes that grandmothers have a bigger say in the upbringing of grandchildren than the granchilds' mom has
A mother in law that is not quite a mother in law but would still be happy to babysit whereever I decide to work and live
A dog who loves sunbathing on his back in the garden at 30 something degree
A bunch of lovely-crazy self declared aunties of Mia, around the world
And a group of other moms for the occasional gossip-coffee meet ups in town

I'm confident the happy-end is just hiding around the corner.

Früh übt sich

Pictures taken during a recent - improvvised - martial arts training session.

She's a real little fighter...

Thinking - screaming

At least she knows what she wants.

Sweet life, where are you??

It all started off so quiet, but I guess babies just can't continue sleeping away day and night. As I discovered over the past nine weeks, babies grow at an enormous speed, and with their body size, their voice gains power. And they discover that there are more interesting things to be done than sleeping (the day when she will appreciate a afternoon power nap will come again one day). Mia does keep me quite busy these days, both with smiles and with cries. When she smiles, she smiles all over her face, when she cries, she cries with her entire body. Though I prefer the smiles, I do have to smile over her cries, too. One wonders: what is it that makes such a tiny being turn from total joy into complete weltschmerz? What does she think when she's throwing her hands against her head while screaming the lungs out of her body? And what does she think when she's smiling away at the little pandabear which my mom bought in the souvenier shop of the Vienna zoo? But to be honest, there isn't actually much time left to read her body language. Between feeding, nappy changes, comforting her, pushing the stroller, a bit of homework, garden work, walking Argo, grocery shopping, meeting other moms, and the occasional glass of wine in the evening, it's only thanks to a bit of multitasking that I still manage to read a newspaper or write an email. Sweet life, seems gone. And yet, happiness is all around.

Just happy

Can't really say why or about what, but woke up this morning with a feeling of just being happy and content about how things are. Looking at Mia, as she is smiling away in her cradle next to me, she must have the same feeling, maybe even knowing less why so than I.