for the love of children

Last Friday the boys and I met Blake at the main branch of the New York Public Library so we could catch one of its current exhibits, The ABC of It: Why Children's Books Matter. It lovingly outlined the history and importance of children's literature, and was beautifully designed. We didn't arrive with enough time to give the displays full justice, but the exhibit, which was originally set to close yesterday, has been extended until September 7th. So if you're a reader who'll be in New York City this summer, I highly recommend you stop by. I know I will be going back to see it again.

 The glorious New York Public Library.

 Garrett wanted me to take his picture by one of the big lions (this one is Patience; Fortitude sits to the north); Caleb wanted to climb him.

 Reading Dick and Jane.

 The great green room. Matthew really didn't want to be there.

 Watching Alice grow and shrink absolutely fascinated Caleb.

 I have a very special place in my heart for Charlotte and her web.

 The original Winnie-the-Pooh dolls.

Some of the best stories are New York stories.

Afterwards we walked the few blocks over to the Morgan Library and Museum to take advantage of their free hours so we could see The Little Prince: A New York Story exhibit. I might have been a little too ambitious to think I could haul my three boys, not to mention the one I'm trying to grow, through the subway system and streets of New York because, while I didn't fully realize until that evening just how amazing the Morgan is, I wasn't able to fully enjoy very much of it. While Blake, whose favorite book is The Little Prince, got a good look at the exhibit, I mostly sat on benches with our tired children trying to catch my breath.

Photography was not allowed in the gallery, but if it was I'd be showing here some really lovely original illustrations and scribbled up manuscript pages from the book.

Speaking of the One I'm Trying to Grow, I'm now halfway through Week 32. That makes me five weeks away from the time Garrett and Caleb decided to show up, and only three weeks from when Matthew made his grand entrance. Whatever happens this time around, we're definitely getting close to the end, and it sure is starting to feel like it. As per my norm, I've been having very frequent (although irregularly spaced) and often very intense contractions, and I spend my rare moments of downtime horizontally on my bed. I was reassured by my OB this morning when I brought up how for this delivery I'd like to avoid the apparent hospital protocol of making me labor miserably in triage while they try unsuccessfully to stop labor leading to a last-minute and incredibly painful rush to the delivery room just in time to push a baby out. I mean, I'm all for letting my babies cook for as long as necessary, but is it too much to ask to be able to do so a little more comfortably? She said that, because of my history of early and precipitous labors, as well as the fact that this is my fourth baby, as soon as I called to let them know it was time and I was en route to the hospital, they'd put in a call to the L&D unit at the hospital to let them know of my situation so as to hopefully put a rush on getting me into a delivery room. Fingers crossed that this plan works.

32 weeks

She also gave me the green light to get a minor procedure done by my dermatologist. When I went in a couple weeks ago for my annual skin check, they discovered that one of the weird moles they removed was a basal cell carcinoma. I'm pretty sure this is the same thing I had in high school (please reference the weird scar on my arm, happily not shown in the photo above). It's nothing life-threatening, but it does need to be dealt with, so, since I didn't already have enough on my plate, I go in later this week to get the surrounding cells surgically removed.

Which reminds me: I need to go lie down.