xmas time

not only a funky bib with wide-eyed frog, but a giraffe-elephant-lion puzzle, a two-legged wooden purple polka-dotted brontosaurus (yes it had four but the scissors were quite sharp), and a very vocal yellow duck puppet for the bathtub. pretty good day after christmas christmas.

she also got to hear Reggie Houze sing Oh Holy Night on Christmas eve, along with Rosemary Woulard's I Wonder as I Wander and Tom's traditional Ring the Bells. i think Tom pointed straight at her, and if throwing her gold shoes on the floor and laughing counts, Vivian rang the bells as loud as it gets.

milk can drum

There's a red metal milk jug circa 1920 sitting in the corner of mom's kitchen, a relic from G'dad. It stands just next to the north window, toward the river, and on top, typically, sits a coaster for mom's coffee. This is Vivian's drum, the coaster her drumstick. The sound is a low-bass hollow thump, the kind that tickles the stomach. And it seems to bring a laugh up from her little potbelly.

hattiesburg zoo swings

Found a quote in The Sun from Alice Miller, "Children are messengers to us from a world we once deeply knew." There's not much more I can ask for than to hear Vivian laugh the way she laughs on a swing. My heart swells.