Okie Dokie!

 March 7, four days ago, Rosie surprised our family chat with this: 

Not even a warning, so that I could suitably worried. (And do a lot of praying!) She waited to tell us until it was a done deal! Little nameless Baby Girl Barker arrived, weighing 7 lbs. and 21 inches long. 

It was 9:36 PM when she sent the message, so the baby was born before then, but I don't know when. Rosie hemorrhaged again, as she had done when Ireland was born, but this time, they (the medical staff)  were expecting there might be trouble so were prepared, so she didn't need a transfusion. They did use a balloon to hold her uterus in place, or something painful like that. So, one healthy baby, one mama who needed close attention in recovery. (Which is why I would have been suitably worried before the fact, had I known, and still was after the fact, and did indeed do a lot of praying!)

The next day, March 8, was Women's Day, so Patrick sent all of us flowers from Vienna, the inexpensive way: by drawing and then coloring a picture and sending us all a picture!

 

Kelli and Allen went to visit the Barkers in the hospital on March 8, as Josie and I did at Rosie's invitation, but we were not there at the same time, which is good because less is more when you are not well in the hospital. At least, in my opinion. More is stressful!

There they are, being sweet grandparents. Making eye contact with that sweet baby.

Now here is a photo dump of pictures Josie and I took. Mostly Josie, unless Josie is in the picture, and then it was me taking it.

On Thursday, before they could go home, Rosie and Austin had to come up with a name for baby. After much debate (Oaklynn Marie, Oaklyn Marie, Holland Elizabeth, Emberlee, Vienna...) and after a spelling poll, they finally decided on Oaklyn Marie. Also on Thursday, Allen went back to work!! Recovered so well since his accident on October 23.

Thursday afternoon, Kelli visited and sent these pictures to the family chat:

Baby has lots of hair, which looks dark and a bit reddish in this picture:

And Rosie took this very lovely picture of her mother with baby Oaklyn:

The old babies in the family are just a-getting into mischief! I took no pictures to prove it, but Ireland was up and on and over Rosie's bed in the hospital like a little going concern. Meanwhile, Nancy's Phoebe and David's Millie were both up to mischief as well:

We are happy to have Oaklyn join this bunch of mischief-makers!

February 2023 Books Read

 Five books again this month, but six if I am allowed one children's picture book. And I will allow it, so Six it is!

1. The recovery agent by Janet Evanovich (2023). Someone left this book on our floor, though it of course doesn't belong there, and so it was sitting on the sorting shelves in the "other floors" slot, and I happened to see it and pick it up, and decided to read it. I had not read any Janet Evanovich books before, even though she is a prolific and NYT bestselling author. And I really liked it, this story of Gabriela Rose and Rafer Jones, and their efforts to recover the Seal of Solomon in order to rescue their hometown from the aftermath of hurricane damage. Mind you, it was a bit fighty and gory in parts, so if it was made into a movie, I think it would be too much for me. But as a book, it was in fact really good.

2. The final gambit by Jennifer Lynn Barnes (2022). This last of the Inheritance Game YA series tied up all the loose ends neatly, and gave a very satisfying end to the inheritance. All the pieces of all of the puzzles fell into place, and Avery handles coming of age and inheriting billions in a very satisfying way. I very much enjoyed this well-written ending to the story.

3. Before Now by Norah Olson (2017). Well. This was an interesting decision made by the author of this YA book, to start the book at the end of the story, and progress to the beginning. The story is a Romeo and Juliet-esque tragedy, only one of them wakes up from a coma in the first chapter, while the other one is dead. And from there, the book unfolds to before the two of them met, mostly revealed through what Atty writes in her diary. I read about half the book the way the author meant for me to read it, but found it frustrating, so I started at the last chapter and read in the opposite direction for the second half. I am not sure the book gained anything from this backwards approach, except that the title makes sense, as you read from each now to its before.

4. One for the money by Janet Evanovich (1994) was her first book. Since I liked The recovery agent so much, I thought I would try her Stephanie Plum series, so I started with its first book, which was her first NYT bestseller. Well, suffice it to say I was disappointed. It was good, I suppose, in its own way. Maybe I just liked the characters better in the other book, but I was not engaged enough to want to continue reading the series.

5. The Body: A guide for occupants by Bill Bryson (2019). I can't imagine not enjoying a book by Bill Bryson. He just has a way of explaining things in engaging ways. This book was very thick, and I have been reading it slowly over time, mixed in with other things, and I really liked it. I would like to read it again now that I have finished!

6. The first notes: The story of Do, Re, Mi by Julie Andrews and Emma Walton Hamilton (2022). I was looking for books about Guido d'Arezzo for one of my faculty--books with color facsimiles hopefully. All the ones in the music section had only black & white facsimiles. Given this book's topic--Guido himself--I hoped that maybe, as a juvenile book, it would have the illustrations I needed. It did not, but it was very interesting and well told.

Funny story from last weekend: Our student Nicole was singing in Opera Scenes, and Mary and I, independently, decided to go on Friday night. We happened to arrive at the same time, which was with only a minute or two to spare before curtain time. Mary was with her husband, Don. The three of us walked into the new music building, and found the concert space--there is only one of these that is finished in the new building. Normally, in my experience, the audience at opera scenes is not huge. But, this time--full house! We were turned away because there was standing room only!

As we walked away, Mary said, "Well, that's too bad." And Don responded, "Too bad?! I feel like I've been given a reprieve."

"A reprieve!" Mary responded, "What do you mean? You've come with me to opera scenes before. I thought you liked it. You said it was good."

"Good?!" Don said, "I never said it was good. I said it wasn't bad!"