Lila Eleni Manning. She exists. In this big, beautiful world, there she is. Growing. Learning all about it. A glowy pink little mammal with trust as big as the ocean. She belongs with us. Her whimpers, her night squeaks, her sighs and her swallows. She is our daughter.

That was the first thing I wrote post-Lila, mere hours after giving birth. Since then, it's been difficult to write or to do much else besides get used to baby life. And it's been busy.

During her first month, Lila had many visitors. My mom and her husband Rick came in our very first post-partem days and took very good care of us. Shaun's parents followed, then my step-dad Tony and his girlfriend. Friends came over to cook us dinner, chat, and take our first family photos. Aunts brought bagels. Small trips around the neighborhood---the drugstore, the farmers market---felt like great feats. We went to a few parties and Lila chilled out in her snuggly front-pack while we gradually re-incorporated ourselves into society.

Just after her first month birthday, we drove to Michigan to introduce our daughter to all her friends and family there. Instead of a baby shower, we had a Welcome to the World Party. It was wonderful to see all of our family. My grandparents even came from Colorado to join in the fun, which was a real treat. Instead of traditional baby-shower gifts, we asked everyone interested in being gifty to contribute to Lila's education fund. She's now got a very nice start to her piggy bank.

After Michigan, we bought a car. Reality set in and trial and error taught us that it is very difficult to run errands with a baby on public transit. Especially with me working and breast-feeding; things have to be timed in a very specific way. So we are the proud owners of a 2007 Chevy Aveo. Did you know you can buy used cars from Enterprise rental? Totally competitive prices and extraordinarily well-maintained cars.
 
Lila had her two-month check up on Wednesday. She is a healthy 10 lbs, 3 oz now. She's 23 inches long with a happy little head. She's a social little animal now; she returns any smile beamed her way and smiles spontaneously when she thinks something is funny. Her sense of humor is developing nicely. Horray!

I had to be back at work on October 12. I had six weeks off and would have loved to take the FMLA-protected 12 weeks, but my I would have to go without pay (and thusly insurance) for 6 of those weeks and that was just not possible for us at this point.

I love my job, but six weeks is too early for mothers to go back to work. Physiologically too early. Lila is an exclusively breast-fed baby and had a really hard time learning how to eat from bottles. A completely different kind of coordination is needed to chow on a pumped bottle of boobie snacks than to slurp fresh from the tap and at a mere six weeks, Lila was just struggling with it. She's mastered it now, but it was an extraordinarily difficult week and 1/2 for all. A giant pat on the back to Shaun---her daytime caregiver---for teaching her how to rock the bottle.

Otherwise, back-to-work has been interesting. Shaun has been brining Lila to the museum when I work Tuesday evenings. She cluster-feeds in the evening, so I do desk-work with a baby attached to my boob. We also walk the galleries together. Currently, we have a really colorful Sol LeWitt piece called Wall Drawing #311 that she loves. She also really likes a red and yellow Dan Flavin piece. You know she likes something when she breathes like an excited puppy, smiles, and flails her hands and feet around in happy-dance fashion. Then she pauses, makes a cute "o" mouth, and coos before starting her flailing again.

My staff has been hired by performance artist Tino Sehgal to implement his piece, This is New (2003). During the admissions transaction, my associates recite headlines from a major daily newspaper, apropos of nothing. Done right, the headline comes off as a complete non-sequitur. Do people think we're nuts? Yes. They are meant to. And it's hilarious. I'm on call to be interviewed by a local television reporter about the piece next week, and barring breaking news, will be on TV talking it up. Crazy!

Last weekend, we took Lila to her first gallery show. Heaven Gallery was hosting their annual show, The Yield, and I had a few colleagues exhibiting work. We met another baby there and enjoyed some interesting work together. Lila loves going out in the world---she just chills in her front-wrap carrier, checks out the world sometimes, sleeps---and the gallery opening was no exception.

Today, we're headed off to Michigan to attend our neices baptism. Shaun's been named her Godfather, which seems totally crazy. It's one thing to have your own kid, but another to be cited as a "responsible person" by another, enough so to tend to the spiritual well-being of their children. To be clear: we are secular humanists, but a spirit is a spirit is a spirit. It needs nurturing and I'm proud of Shaun for being up the the challenge.

Here's some cute pictures I took yesterday, after realizing that time is passing at light-speed and I've just been letting my camera get dusty.

Shaun reading Lila some bedtime comics. Note her flailing arms: she loves the contrast of black print on white page.

Goodnight kiss from mama.

I hope everyone is staying healthy during this nasty flu season. And I hope not all my blog posts will be so update-y moving forward. But it's been a while and I just felt a weird need to document all the massive changes that have happened and the small acheivements that make all the night-feedings and diaper duties seem like no trouble at all.

Saturday, August 29, 2009. 3:32am. Lila.