Phase .01

Hello!

So to begin the next phase of this blogging attempt of mine.

First, I want to put a disclaimer on here that my grammar and spelling, although I will attempt to be correct, may not always be.  I have discovered that although I feel I have become more able with this whole computer thing, I still have more that I don't know to learn. Yes, I am sure that there are many tools, links, apps, I have no idea about, and so far, for the last 56 years, I have been fine without them.  I will continue to attempt update my skills, yet I do not have a deadline for that accomplishment.

As I said in my last blog, already a whole month ago, I am going to try a new format idea.  Maybe format is not the right word, but a new way of sharing.  I had to first ask all my kids, and by all I mean 3, if it was okey dokey with them if I actually talked about them in this next attempt, and they said "Yes".  We will see if that stands... :)  I have of course shared some stories about them throughout the past 3 years in my blogging, but here I want to design this next part as a "How to Grow a Family" idea, and all that comes with that...all that my husband and I know of what we have done and shared and learned up to this point.  And, we are at a new point...we are about to become Grandparents for the first time.  A new chapter, a new chapter for our whole family, each and every one.  Bill and I will become Grandparents, and the main character is yet to be announced...we do not know who this baby is, or even if it is a he or she.  Anne and Patrick are going to be parents for the first time, I suppose they technically already are, or there would be no baby on the brink of arrival.  My other children Megan, and Bill and Bill's fiancee Megan, are about to become aunts and an uncle....a big new chapter for all of them too!  I know I had a phone conversation with my daughter, Megan, yesterday and she was informing me that her goal is to be a big player in this new person's life.  When I talked with Anne today, she said Bill and his Megan are excited about babysitting. And, Bill and I are renting an apartment in New York for 6 weeks, at the request of Anne and Patrick, to be there. To help them, to be right down the street instead of a plane ride away...so here we go!

I titled this Blog Phase .01 because I thought it was clever ( self serving of me) and thought it described  the facts.  Anne and Patrick and all of us in this family are about to be part of a big new adventure, yet we are all still in the waiting phase.  I also thought about calling this blog a number of other things, like
"No Clue", "Blissful Ignorance", "What Have We Done", "No One Told Me", you get the idea.

I had the chance today to have a lovely conversation with Anne, one of the main players in this new endeavor, about how she was feeling and what she was doing.  She shared with me that she was talking recently to a number of new Moms who took some time off before the baby arrived to settle and get organized and catch their breath before the baby arrived.  I told her I thought that was an idea that held a lot of merit.  Yet, knowing my daughter, she will decide for herself what makes sense, and how these last few weeks of waiting will look for her.  I told her what I thought....that was it.  She gets to make up her own mind.

And, so we come to the part of the blog that I think really gets to it.  When you are expecting your first child, you really, and I mean really, have NO CLUE about what your life will become quite shortly.  I know that I shared a story in one of my previous blogs, about the first night we brought Anne home from the hospital.  Every time we brought her into our bedroom to feed her, we thought it would be a great idea to change her diaper on our bed, and it took us 6 times to realize that maybe that was not a good idea, as she peed all over our bed each and every time.  REALLY?  Yes, really...you would have thought that given the fact that Bill and I both have college degrees and are, in my opinion, pretty smart people, that we did not need that big of a learning curve, yet we did!  I laugh now and love to share that story, and it also speaks to the heart of parenting, trial and error.

No one truly knows what it is like to be a parent until it actually happens.  I know that Bill and I had a rough idea of what we were hoping to be and do as parents.  I know Anne and Patrick have talked about it.  I love them both, yet know although the talk is good, important and necessary, all it is right now is talk.  Becoming a parent is an action verb.  Parent is a noun, and parenting is a verb.  When we become parents, we spend the rest of our lives in the action verb phase.  I know that at 56 I am still in that phase, and love it.

I told Anne today as we were talking, that although you can imagine what holding your baby will be like, you can not anticipate the unadulterated joy and unconditional love you will feel and have once you get to actually meet your baby.  I shared with her again, how I felt holding her.  Soon, I will get to hear her version of that unique, life changing event.  I can't wait....

Let the games begin..... I am off to buy a crib and and some other new baby bed that connects right to Anne and Patrick's for the baby's first months.......and attend a Baby Shower in New York, where I am the Grandmother to be....WOW!

Until next time,

Pam