Listen to the Rain

Being a family man, that's where.

The High Holy Days are over and the HHD season is almost over too. sashagee, Laila, and I all went to Rosh Hashanah day service together for an hour or so, long enough to stay for part of the Torah service before Laila got too restless and had to go. She made friends with an older man sitting next to us with his two daughters and spent a chunk of time wondering at how many people were packed into the Athanaeum (filled to capacity--we had to sit in the far back corner and there were still people standing behind us). She loved all the times that we were singing and lost all interest when the rabbi started talking. The same thing happened the morning of Yom Kippur--I went to Kol Nidre myself just fine, but sashagee had scheduled two doctors' appointments on Yom Kippur day itself, one for Laila and one for her, so for most of the day I watched the service on livestream and wrangled Laila. Again, she loves singing. I think that's universal to babies.

Before the HHD sashagee and I went apple picking with my family, sashagee's family still being on vacation. I have a lot of pictures from last year, but didn't take as many this time because it was just the five of us. We didn't go out to dinner afterwards either for the same reason, though we did stay over at my parents' house for the weekend. They made us dinner and played with Laila, we relaxed, and they took us home the next day. I'm glad that we live so close to both of our parents and they get so much time with her during her cute baby months!

It's currently Sukkot (or "The Festival of Booths" if you read the KJV), but Sukkot is the worst holiday for urbanites without yards like me because we can't do any of the requirements. So we went to a picnic put on by Mishkan where Laila kept trying to crawl away to other picnic-goers and, when we went up to enter the sukkah, attached herself to an older couple ahead of me in line named Rob and Eileen. Laila gave them both hugs and tried to steal their food, standard baby behaviors. She didn't like the nuts but she did really like the nut crackers they gave her, and they were really happy to get some unexpected baby hugs.

Simchat Torah is coming up too and we're going to a family pizza party before that. I think little baby Laila will love the singing and dancing, though it'll be quite a while before she can hold a Torah.

This weekend we're going out to visit my family again, since my world-traveling veterinarian sister wanderluster_kp will be world-traveling basically through the end of the year afterwards and it's the only time we have to get together. It'll be a big Thanksgiving dinner except spooky--well, not really, since my parents decorate for fall and not for Halloween. We do have costumes planned though, and we'll be taking Laila trick or treating!

Alright, Laila's asleep so I can get some real work done without her trying to crawl under my desk to look at all the cords and flashing lights.