New Dresser

Several years ago Dev and I bought a desk on Craigslist for his garage. We went to pick it up at the home of a young girl in Pasadena who was selling all her stuff and moving to Colorado to get married. While we were there, I noticed this great old trunk. She said she'd bought it at an estate sale and that supposedly it had once belonged to Zane Grey. I gave her my email address and asked her to contact me if she ever wanted to sell it. A few months later, she did - and I wound up with this gorgeous, huge, impractical steamer trunk which is almost four feet long and weighs 90 pounds.






For the next several years it lived in the garage while I kept promising Dev that someday I would do something with it. Well, I finally did! Today during Beatrice's nap time I transformed it into a dresser for the guest room (while Arthur and Shackleton lay together on the floor watching me work).

First I cleaned off about 80 years of grime. Then I removed all the very stained and faded fabric and replaced it with new Michael Miller fabric I ordered online (of course this required removing the many little tacks and screws holding things in place).



I lined the drawers with some great paper from The Paper Source.

And then I added a few things guests might need, like a set of house keys, a notepad, and a stack of cards with our contact info on them.

Now I'm really looking forward to renovating the guest room . . .

Arthur, Month Two

Thank you, Arthur! For sleeping through the night almost every night since you first managed it at only four weeks old. I couldn't be luckier!

Of course he has to eat a LOT during the day to tide him over during his long nights of sleep, but I'm not complaining.

Arthur is super strong - not only rolling over every day but also holding his own head up for long stretches of time and even scooting himself a few inches across the floor.

He's a clever one, too - he's already figured out how to use his foot to move the mobile suspended over his baby seat, an arrangement of stars, moons, and planets that he loves to look at. He can focus on objects, bat at them, and at seven weeks he started smiling, though his smiles are so sudden and unpredictable that they are hard to capture on film.

This month he continued to tag along on his sister's outings, including a children's Korean music concert at the Hollywood Bowl, and he met our friends Sam, Lilli, Monty, and Travis. But mostly, of course, he ate, storing up energy for new feats ahead.




Working on crawling (while dressed as a surfer):




Hanging out after his bath:

Tanking up:


Keep up the intensity, Kumar!

Summer Visitors

This morning we bid farewell to the last in a long line of visitors, starting with Naresh and Suzan, then Gillian, my parents, and our friends Sam, Lilli, Travis, Monty, and Richard - with more to come! as we expect visits from more friends and family before summer ends. I am so, so grateful we have a guest room to welcome all these friends (even if it still has a popcorn ceiling and a mysterious hole in the floor . . . )

Beatrice is finally at the age where she can remember and repeat names, understand relationships ("Amy is Miller's mommy"), and recall people later when she sees them in photographs. It's really fun to watch her begin to make sense of all the people in her life and talk about them even after they've gone.

Thank you, Mom!

Now that I have finally recovered several weeks worth of photos, I wanted to post a delayed thank you to my mother, who came down for two weeks in June to help me with Arthur and Beatrice now that Dev is back to work from paternity leave.

We packed a ton of activities into her visit, including the baby gym, one of Descanso's Thursday evening concerts in the park, a session of Toddler Treks with Acorn Bear, Alejandro Wasserman's first birthday party, Kidspace, Paintbox Kids, a swimming lesson, and a trip to the zoo!

Swimming at the Rose Bowl Aquatic Center

Planting a pumpkin seed at Toddler Treks

For the third year in a row, the Descanso Gardens Thursday night concerts are my favorite part of summer. Check out Arthur at his first concert compared with Beatrice at hers at the same age.

Beatrice painted "doggies" at Paintbox Kids and we took our usual Sunday morning trip to the farmer's market.

Beatrice and Dev at the farmer's market

Beatrice visits the guinea pigs ("pee-gos") at the farmer's market

And as always Mom also helped a ton with housework, errands, and projects, most notably helping me cut out the pattern for my (foolishly) ambitious Halloween costume. (It may sound ridiculous to start sewing a Halloween costume in June, but not once you see how elaborate this pattern is.)

Beatrice adored both my parents (my dad joined us for the last few days of my mom's trip) - in fact, she declared, "I love Grandpa, I love Arthur" - her first time ever using the word "love."

Of course, she was heartbroken to see them go - she kept asking, "Grandma potty? Grandpa outside? Grandma Starbucks?" guessing where they might be. In fact, my parents' departure triggered renewed sadness for Nani and Nana and she started asking where they were, too. Now she talks about all four grandparents all the time.

Finally, a Fence!

This weekend Dev built a wooden fence across the driveway with the very kind help of our very kind friends, Travis, Sam, and Monty, who were visiting from San Antonio, San Jose, and Irvine, respectively. Thanks to them, we can now give our dogs and children access to the entire backyard without worrying about them running into the street.

Working late into the night

It's a marked improvement over the "temporary" patio furniture barricade we were using to contain the dogs before. ("Temporary" in that we had it up for three months.)

And as a bonus, it also means we have our patio furniture back!

Visit from Aunt Gillian

This post, like several I am writing tonight, is long overdue - a hard drive crash caused me to lose all my photos and saved posts - but I wanted to post a delayed thank you to Gillian, who came and visited for a week while Dev was away at Aubrey and Melissa's wedding in Boston. A series of minor disasters unfolded, everything from a lost wallet to a clogged toilet to a (mildly) injured infant, but we did manage to squeeze a few fun moments into our chaotic week.

The best trip we took was to the Santa Monica beach at sunset, where Gillian, Lucas, and I gave Arthur his first glimpse of the coast and Gillian showed Beatrice the ocean for the first time in her memory (the last time Beatrice went to the beach she wasn't that much older than Arthur is now).

Lucas provided Beatrice with lemonade and corn dogs

Arthur on a beach adventure (whether he knows it or not)

And thank you Gillian for helping manage the disasters as they unfolded! Despite it all, we had a great time.

Santa Monica on Dwellable