My friend, Meredith, invited me to join the book club her and her friends decided to start one night after too many glasses of wine. Today, it's [sort-of] evolved, and one woman is working on creating our website (although that may have been an I'm-bored-at-work moment). We still drink wine and only manage to discuss the book 5 minutes before it's time to break, but I think it's a much-needed once-a-month meeting for us ladies, and sometimes, even our babies.
Maybe its because of the cycle phenomenon - where a group of ladies will all start their cycles at the same time - but the majority of our book club got pregnant around the same time (don't worry, not by the same man); thus we all had our babies one after the other. Zoey was the hold-out.
While I always look forward to these nights of adult conversation with adult beverages, I get excited to bring Zoey to see how she interacts with the other kids and babies (I don't always bring Zoey 'cause I need my 2-hours of not being a mommy). She is always extremely fascinated with her surroundings so, of course, this is no different. So I took her to this months' meeting on Wednesday and she met a couple of kids for the first time.
This was the first time Whitney's daughter, Jules, had met, seen, or known of Zoey. Whitney hosted our meeting this week; the last time she did I was pregnant and in the throes of violent sickness. Jules took an immediate liking to Zoey, offering up a plethora of toys for Zoey to play with. But since Whitney had her second baby, Jane, a month before I had Zoey, Jules is already an experienced, super helpful, and super loving big sister that translated into how she interacted with Zoey. She expertly washed the toys before offering them to Zoey, and knew exactly what Zoey needed to stay away from, offering up a scary story involving Jane almost hurting herself. She is a very capable, intelligent, and adorable 5 year-old. Oh, and she loves having her picture taken.
Jules helping Zoey play.
In turn, Zoey was very intrigued by this older, bigger, more experienced girl. She sat on my lap while I ate munchies, chatted, and, sorry, yes, had a glass of wine (is it only a red-neck thing to do if it's beer?), while she sucked her thumb and looked around at everything. She did this for about an hour. The things that caught her interest the most were Jules and her dog, Hilde, although Hilde was afraid of Zoey and always scurried out of the room when she was placed on the floor.
Our first lesson in sharing with Ander, Lacy's first-born. She is currently pregnant with her second, due in June. And, of course, Jules is on-hand to supervise.
It always ended up working out that when I brought Zoey, Whitney didn't bring Jane; and vice versa. Unfortunately, although we'd be meeting at Jane's house, she was napping for about the first hour we were there. By the time Jane and Zoey finally met, Zoey was preoccupied with working on crawling and communicating to me that she was hungry and tired. Jane, however, was very enthralled with Zoey and often stared at her when in close proximity. The two even reached out and held each other for balance at one point.
After we had been there for over an hour, Zoey started to jabber. You can't tell in pictures, obviously, but it's hard to tell in person as well since she
always has something in her mouth.
We were able to stay until right before 8pm, usually when we break anyway since there is only one member of our book club who doesn't have children (I think she's beginning to avoid us, thinking there is some cosmos at work that got us all pregnant at the same time and that she might be next. From what I understand, most of her bowling league is pregnant).
So far, Zoey loves books, but mainly because they're bright, colorful, and semi-hard so she can put the corners in her mouth. She's getting stronger by the minute so reading to her before bed has become an arm-wrestling match between me and the teething monster. She will pay attention to the story or the pictures for a micro-second before it's back to THIS MUST BE IN MY MOUTH RIGHT THIS INSTANT!
Our next book club meeting is in mid May and I've decided that this one shall be a time for mommy to be a grown-up.
