Family
Today was a great day for family. Both Nikki and Fran, Lori and the girls came today and it made it special for everyone. Nikki is Oscar’s godmother, and it was the first time she got to meet him. It was also the first time Lucca and Colton met their new baby cousin Lexie (11 weeks), who is delicious in every chubby, sweet smelling way a baby can be. Seeing her especially drove home how tiny O really is. I used to have babies like her, all round and hungry for milk all the time. With Oscar its different, or early, or whatever you want to call it. I was so happy to have so much family in the house, and it made the day go much quicker.
Nikki and I headed over for my second visit around 2:15, I nursed and then Fran and family arrived. Lori graciously brought her camera so there will be wonderful photos of the moment I am sure. Eva and little Lexie peeked at Oscar through the glass, and for the second time I got to see in Eva’s eyes the wonder of a child beholding a baby so tiny and special. She was so curious and interested in her littlest cousin. I thought of our collective lives together. Fran with the girls and me with the boys. Who would have thought it would be like that? Now that it is it all makes perfect sense and seems as everything is as it should be. They are going to have a lot of fun, and I can’t wait to see it happen. Eva also brought Oscar a thoughtful gift of pacis. Very sweet of her. It was a lovely visit. Lori even came into the NICU (now that I am very friendly with the nurses, I can manage these sort of things 😉 and took more photos of Oscar. She also held him. It is an amazing thing to see someone hold O for the first time. Of course I am biased but I think he is such a tiny version of the perfection manifest in any baby that the experience is heightened. The sense of precariousness, of Oscar’s fragility always overwhelms. But not for me so much any more. To me now, after nearly five weeks of life in the NICU, he feels like my baby. Not yet chubby but on his way.
To see his godmother with him, well, I won’t soon forget it. Nikki has been a sister, friend, and mother to me for so many years now it is hard to recall life before her. My nearest and dearest friends, the ones who go so far back as to remember my mother well and understand me in the context of my life before and after she passed, live in a sacred corner of my heart. To see them with my children is to feel my mother ever closer. Its like they know how magical life was with her here, and because they knew her she put some of her fairy dust in their pockets to sprinkle on my kids. Only a few friends have these powers to me, and they are irreplaceable because of it. Today Auntie Nikki came with her velvet pouch full of sparkles and so the day was. Magical.