Baby Spec

Two of my favorite people on earth are having a baby! My brother David and his wife, my sister Kim are due almost exactly one month after Baby K. How does this happen?!
Don't answer that cause I already know.

As it turns out, when DK and I announced to the family over Thanksgiving we were having a baby, unbeknownst to all of us Baby Spec was present for the announcement as well. But it wasn't until Dave and Kim returned to Malaysia that they discovered there was a little miracle growing in her womb. Wow, I get chills just thinking about it.

And somehow they were able to contain the news until the next major holiday! So on Christmas Eve, Dave and Kim Skyped Andrew, Arwyn, DK and me here in Houston. We were all being goofy talking about who knows what until Dave pulled a lovely gingerbread house up in front of the web cam... and then zoomed in on two little ginger people standing outside the ginger house... with one little tiny ginger baby.

Again it was Arwyn who was coherent enough in the moment to yell something like "It's a baby!", Andrew went weak in the knees, DK skipped around whooping and hollaring and I cupped my hands to my mouth in complete shock. I still can't believe it at all. What a Christmas to remember, ya?Meet my niece/nephew Baby Spec :) Isn't he/she beautiful?!

(We Are Going To Be Friends - The White Stripes)You should listen to this throughout the rest of the post and think about Baby K and Spec together.

When I think about Kim being pregnant and how excited I am to learn more about one of my best friends as she goes through this most incredible transformation, I wish I could express to you how much love I feel. And when I think about this baby entering the world and how much my heart is already bursting with love for this kid, there are truly no spoken words to describe the feeling. (At least for right now.) But then, while thinking about all this I look down at my own growing belly and remember how I too am pregnant, wondering how on earth we are so blessed to go through this together?! I would say it's overwhelming, but it's really not. It just is what it is, our family, our timing, our turn. It's beautiful.

Kim and I talked on the phone for hours on Saturday, gushing and giggling and asking what we think about this and that. We send one another blogs and links and thoughts every day through email and are counting down the days till they move back to the states so we can go for walks, decorate nursuries together, and sit down to reflect on how noisy things are about to get.

I love to daydream about how one day soon, we'll sit in the kitchen drinking tea and eavesdrop on the little ones playing together in the other room, or watch them react to slobbery heartfelt kisses from Katie, Kenai and Orson, or watch them help each other learn to crawl and walk, and then cry when it's time to go home cause they just don't want to part.

When I think of my brother David as a dad, I feel like I know so much about how he'll be, based on the last few decades we've gotten to know one another but I know he'll be full of brilliant surprises. There will be so many elements of nature and adventure in his child rearing methods and he'll always have a lesson involved, whether the kid realizes it in that moment or 10 years from then. Heaven help the boys at school if the baby is a girl, because she will be so guarded, loved and protected for the gem she is. In order to even take her our for an ice cream, there will surely be a test of the boy's intellect and street smarts... and maybe even a loop around the dirt bike track out back, just to test his physical reaction time. But above all, I know David will love the kid so fiercely and when he looks into the baby's eyes, he'll love Kim more than he ever realized was possible.

Remembering the incredible adventures we had growing up together, I'm elated that now our kids get to discover life together. To think about the contribution of life and adventure they'll receive from weekends with Uncle Andrew, I'm cracking up at the thought of it right now. He's going to be AMAZING with our kids, I can't wait to watch him with the minis. * Deep sigh. *

I leave you with the most cherished photo as of late, my sister Kim and me. This was taken around Thanksgiving in Houston on a carriage ride from the Ferris Wheel to dinner at Sambuca.
Though we didn't realize it at the time, this is the first photo of us taken together, pregnant.