grandparents galore

this little baby is so loved! she had a wing ding of a week while four of her grandparents battled over holding her, oogling at her, and generally and fabulously adoring her. they also hosted an unofficial competition to see who could take the best picture of her with their digital camera (grandpat don don is into the artistic shots, full of shadow and light, while roseann does the more direct, point and shoot approach, but did, by the way, end up with the best pic!). while she easily woos people with her delicious round head and delicate features, she definitely was not on her best behavior the whole time the crowd was around. my dad and his wife, mary, drove out from maine and found us eating at the old post on wednesday evening. after living in africa for three months, i was more than impressed with their ability to hop in the car and motor across the country to see their latest grandchild. but i guess i shouldn't be so surprised. about three weeks ago, my husband's parents, mort and roseann, packed up their whole life to rent a house up the road from us in missoula to be near eliana too. apparently grandchildren make grandparents do crazy things! it's been such a blessing to have them here. every day morty says, "she's getting longer!" and "look at that perfect head!" and "i'm telling you, she is the most beautiful baby i've ever seen!" and at his 82 years of age, i'm inclined to believe him. everyday roseann does her wash, perfectly folding her onesies just so and making sure they get put back into her newly organized drawers neatly (her mama is not so neat about those sorts of things!) nana roseann is also great at trying to imitate jeff's fantastic bouncing style and has even begun to master the football hold (as this seems to be her hold of choice when she chooses to be a fussy bucket). while it's not the sweet, cradle of a gentle grandmother, i applaud her efforts at doing what eliana wants, not what we think your average baby wants (because, as we all know, she is not your average baby!) deed (the so anyway, back to her bad behavior. so the little missy decided last night that she had had enough time out on the town. she was fabulous while we went to restauraunt #1 meet my dad's old artist friend for a glass of wine. then she continued to sleep like a champ as we walked to restaurant #2 where we were meeting jeff and his folks for dinner. but upon entering sa wathai place), she woke up and generally seemed disenchanted. i changed her while waiting to be seated, then fed her at the table (here we go again with nursing on the road), but she still wasn't content. luckily dad was there to walk her around the block and do some good jiggling. but still, not good. finally i sat down on the sidewalk under this little awning (judging by the smell of urine in that spot, i wasn't the first to camp out there...it was sorta gross but made me feel like a tough and dedicated mom, who cares if there's crusted urine on my skirt, right? my daughter needs to eat!) and gave her a good, dedicated mom feed. apparently at about six weeks of age they go through a growth spurt, which is clearly happening by the length and frequency of her feeds. so after that nursing, elsinore still continued to wail. we raced home and i tried to feed again in her rocker with her tunes. no luck. so my dad and mary offered to walk her around the block to give jeff and a break. they were in for it! i took them up on the offer and quickly took a shower and brushed my teeth (i've found that i have to do these two things whenever the opportunity presents itself as i never know when i'll have the chance to again...) we could hear them coming back towards the house as elsinore's wails are easily recognizable. the minute i took her from them she sorta calmed down (she's definitely into her mama right now) and we got back into her rocker and stasrted the whole nursing shabang again. an hour later she settled down and we went to bed. she slept from 11 to 4, which i'm totally down with, and then again from 5 to 8. not so bad for a little wailer. luckily my dad left his coat here, so they had to come by again this morning and they got to see her as her best self, little sweet, swaddled elie. it was sad to see them go, but so wonderful that they made it in the first place. this little girl will continue to be loved by people all over the country, and will become an excellent traveller, just like her mama, in an attempt to keep up with all her "peeps". we will hop on planes and drive long distances to greet her fans, but still be able to live in the peace of our little mountain valley home.