Piedra

I finally got to meet Sweetie Pedie! She was born at 12:09 this morning, and she is so beautiful and tiny. Her full name is Piedra Sage Jones, and she is named after the prettiest canyon in Colorado (I suggested Piedra Obama Jones, but I like Sage, too). She is very vocal and makes squawks and sighs to Gretchen nonstop, and Dennis said she sounds like a squeaky toy. She has those tiny fingers and toes that always remind me of a tree frog for some reason. Dennis also said she makes old man faces, because she scrunches her face up like potato. She looks like her parents. Gretchen was on the phone with her sister in Africa, and Dennis was changing her diaper, and Piedra was not happy so she started bawling, and Dennis said, "Well, she is real," and I said, "Yes, she is very real."

You can't see her very well in the pictures — she's just a tiny head poking out of the blankets — but the photos are great anyway (visit their blog soon for updates and more photos; with a professional photographer as a father, Piedra had better get used to having her picture taken). None of us could decide what to do with our glasses, so they're in various states of disarray. My favorite is the one where G is taking off her glasses; she looks like a librarian studying Pedie: 

Meeting Piedra for the first time made me think about the day Emmy was born. I remember the dish of hard candy in my mom's hospital room. My parents have always told me that since I was a C-section baby, I didn't cry at all when I was born. I just looked around at everyone. But not Emmy. Emmy screamed and screamed and screamed, and her head was lopsided, and her face was red and angry. Sometimes my parents still tease her about this. Even though she's cuter than me now, newborn-wise, I'm the winner. 

I remember even earlier than that day, too; I was lying stretched across the coffee table (kids are weird), and my mom was sitting on the floor in front of the fireplace, which was made from big blue bricks and looked like some ice furniture from the White Witch's castle. She told me that I was going to have a baby sister. I don't remember what my reply was, but I remember thinking something like, "WHY?"Also, I remember my dad asking me which name I liked best for the baby: Emmalynn or Emmaline. (My mom was reading Anne of Green Gables). I wanted to name her Lacey, but my input was ignored, because she became Emmalynn. Obviously. In retrospect, I'm glad they didn't let their less-than-three-year-old choose a name, because Lacey is a hideous name, like if I named my daughter Doily or Tea Cozy.

When I was five, we adopted a puppy, and I insisted on naming her Lacey. She slept in a box with blankets, and my dad put a clock in the box so it would sound like her mother's heartbeat. I remember I thought that was so odd, that her mom's heartbeat was folded up with all the cogs and gears of the clock. I pretended Lacey was my baby, and I swaddled her and held her against my chest so she could hear my real, ticking heart, not the strange cogheart.

Whoops, tangent. Anyway, welcome to the world, Baby Jones! Piedra's a lucky girl to be brought into the world by such amazing and loving people. Also, she's lucky to have such brave parents, because I think so much courage and faith brought Dennis and Gretchen together. I'm not just talking about the note Gretchen wrote Dennis, or Dennis moving to Maine, but the fact that they both acknowledged wholeheartedly that they were made for each other. Because that's a terrifying thing to do, to tell someone how you feel, and give them your heart. It's the second scariest thing in the world (after velociraptors). But obviously worth it.  

I love all three of you. And please tell Shelby that Pedie is NOT a squeaky toy.