smile

yesterday mom B. and i took elenora for her first professional photographs. i was hoping she would just sleep through them and we'd get some cute pics of ella asleep. i fed her before we left, but it was a rushed feeding because i needed to get to the appointment. when we got to the mall, ella was sleeping...kind of. as we started the picture taking, her eyes were doing the up-down dance of a light sleep. the photographer kept catching her with half closed eyes. but the flashing bulb and the commotion woke elenora up. she was cute for about a minute. then she pooped. then she realized she hadn't eaten nearly enough at the last feeding. then she started fussing.

i told the photographer she wasn't going to get anymore good pictures until i fed ella.

so they brought one of the prop chairs into their incredibly dingy bathroom and i sat there and nursed her. but i was in a rush, so when she appeared to be falling back asleep, i took her out of the bathroom. she woke up and demanded i keep feeding her more. so, back into the bathroom again for another rushed feeding. this time, when she seemed to finish i burped her and she spit up on both her own shirt and mine. i blotted the shirt with a washcloth and changed her diaper. by now she was wide awake. mom B. heroically carried her around the mall while i picked out three photographs from the few the photographer had gotten.

they were really cute, though. the store even asked for a release to hang one of them up on the wall as a model.

the photographer had managed to catch one of ella's sleep-smiles, so i guess the outing was a success. elenora managed to do everything a baby is meant to do: poop, nurse, spit up, cry.

of course, it left me with somewhat of a headache.

i drove mom B. home and then started the twenty minute drive back to ipswich. elenora started crying really hard in the back seat. i'm not good at letting her cry. it breaks my heart. so i pulled over into an empty parking lot behind a flower shop in hamilton and climbed into the back seat with her. she was so upset, and i knew i'd given her three really poor, rushed feedings, so i took her out of her seat to nurse her in the dark of the back seat.

now, only in hamilton are the police so bored that they have to pull up next to a running car that has been idling in a parking lot for about seven minutes and shine a bright light into the back of the car. idiots. (luckily i was wearing a good nursing shirt and had a blanket over us.) i rolled the window down and the cop did too, and i said "i'm sorry, but i'm just nursing my baby."

"oh, okay," he said, and drove away.

don't they have anything better to do???

the red sox won the world series last night. maybe it's being a new, tired mother or maybe it's the fact that the red sox just won a world series so i don't see it as such a big deal, but i went to bed before the end of the game. figured i'd hear about it later. they were so far ahead anyhow.