Even more meetings

Madeline had a busy day today. (Forgive me, but not many pictures resulted.) This morning she and I dropped Summer off at her work, returned home for a bottle and a diaper change, and then got back in the car for a visit to my work. People had been eager to meet Madeline, and today's baby shower for coworker Angie presented the perfect opportunity.

So we stopped by for a while. Madeline was very good, sleeping all the way to the elevator, looking with great interest at both office and coworkers, shouting just a few times, and then falling asleep again. She seemed to appreciate being held by new folks, and folks seemed to enjoy her, too. For my part, I had fun (and of course beamed at others' expressions of admiration for my daughter) but also found it hard to cast my attention away from Madeline even for a moment and thus rarely felt totally present with everyone else: a new feeling.

Summer made her way down the big hill to my building, and Madeline and I met her in the lobby. We proceeded to the post-natal reunion of the pre-natal group at our clinic. It was wild to see the little people that somehow resulted from the pregnancies we'd observed over several months. Summer and I noticed that the five babies present were quite different in size and appearance but remarkably similar in their mannerisms. Group leader slash grad student slash Americorps volunteer slash doula slash potential future midwife Bianca held a still-happy Madeline for a bit. Mostly, though, we just had fun sharing notes with the other new parents. The babies didn't seem terribly interested in one another.

When we returned home, Madeline was wired. Summer set her up on some blankets for tummy time -- the exercise didn't last too long, but Madeline seemed more or less content to lie on the floor for a bit. She still looked intense, though.

She went through her evening fuss pretty quickly and then conked out early on the futon next to us. Today was busy and fun; tomorrow will likely be significantly less stimulating.