marmite, meditation and moving forward

from this teeny hand

That teeny tiny baby who spent the first few weeks of life in a spaceship incubator is now very nearly one year old.  Life has moved on, her mother is now back at work 3 days a week and to my utter joy, I get little windows of time with her.  On the downside, Grandpa and I trip over the baby walker and the legs of the high chair and we knock into toys which repeatedly play Row, Row, Row your boat as you struggle to keep your balance.  On the upside, we spend hours, she and I looking out of the window and as she is enchanted by the trees and the birds, I am enchanted by the simplicity of life through her eyes.  I have noticed that Grandpa has suddenly come into play, he plays hide and seek with her when she is in our bed in the mornings and never passes her without having a conversation.  

To these bigger ones

This interplay of people in her life is the way life works best, the interweaving of generations is a blessing to everyone.  The hard-working parent gets a little help from the retired grandparent, the retired grandparent gets down on its knees and crawls round the bedroom floor playing all the old games.  Grandpa walks the dogs, I fiddle about in the kitchen with the baby, picking her up, putting her down, helping her stand, offering her toys and apples and bits of toast and marmite.  Meditation in the early mornings has taken a bit of a hit but I find that I can sit on the window seat and circle her with my hand holding on to the back of her dungarees and dip in and out of little bits of meditation.  She twirls round and rests her head on me and that doesn't disturb me a bit, not a bit.

But I love it when her mother comes home and so does she.  I love to be able to tidy up the surfaces and spaces and put the wretched toy which sings at us, right at the bottom of the toy box!  And of course, having a proper uninterrupted 30 minutes of meditation at the end of the day is a bonus.

How lucky are we!