Sunday block party

Reason #789 that I love Portland: Block parties. Anna & Judy, our friends who live three blocks away, always invite us to theirs. Our block can't have one because we are on a bus line. Anyway, Drew took Rachel over there last night while I was out on the Willamette River with a bunch of dragon boat paddlers for a story I'm working on that will probably run on 1A sometime this week. I got to the party late, to find most of the food gone -- including my chocolate-covered toffee bars, which Drew said were a hit!

Rachel was unimpressed by the fire truck and was kind of whiny until we figured out that her diaper needed a change (it's still a guessing game with her moods, which I know will only get worse when she gets older!). At the end of the evening we played the blanket game, which consists of Drew & I grabbing opposite ends of the picnic blanket with Rachel in the middle and swinging her back and forth. She LOVES it, and always giggles. She never wants us to stop!

She had kind of a fussy night, so we let her sleep late -- very late -- this morning. She got up at 8:15 and Drew had barely enough time to see her before he had to leave for Seattle. So I took her into day care, fed her breakfast, and was just about to leave when she tucked her head under my chin and snuggled against my chest. Rachel hasn't done that in a while, and I was so touched that I just stood in the center of the room, swaying back and forth with her in my arms. I was just about to go to a rocking chair and stay with her a while when one of the daycare ladies got free and took her.

It's funny -- when Rachel has been alone with Drew most of the time, she doesn't seem to want to be with me that much beyond her first excited realization that "mama's home!" But when it's just us, she really responds to what I'm doing and we have such a delightful time. I wonder if that will continue into toddlerhood, puberty, adolescence, beyond...