well, we’ve been trying to make valentines for 2 weeks now.  i’ve cut out big hearts, small hearts, offered myriad sequins, gems, glitter glue, markers, paints.  my mama even came to town and had a valentine-making session with koruna.  so the girl has made some valentines.  but every time she finishes one, she reveals that it is for her.  “it is for myself” she says.  and every once in a while she says that one is for me.

i did manage to sneak a precious few out in the mail this morning so they’d be just in time for the day-or-2 after-valentine’s-day.

i’ve explained to runa several times that on valentine’s day it can be fun to tell our friends and family that we love them.  that we can make them sweet somethin’s or surprise them with little love notes in the mail.  but it seems she is content being her own valentine this year.  i hope she is as kind to herself in the years to come.

so to all of you who find nary a thing in your mailbox from the ingrams this year…

happy valentine’s day.

this morning marvel and i watched the morning sunlight come in through the living room window and illuminate all the fine dust floating in the air (yikes).   it was mesmerizing.  i tossed him up uP UP in that sparkly beautiful air over and over and caught him as his giggles rained down all over me.

this tossing-up-in-the-air thing is one of my favorite daily rituals.  it gives me joy to see mars at the peak of the toss in that moment of weightlessness – so light, so buoyant, so trusting.  i wish i could leave him there suspended above me, lay down on the ground below, and gaze upon him.  how often in the years to come will i wish i could freeze time?

marvel is 5 1/2 months old now. he is big.  he’s solid.

i realized that i won’t be able to toss him around forever, so i threw him until my arms hurt from throwing, my neck hurt from straining, my cheeks hurt from smiling.

one of the most beautiful gifts i give myself as a parent: prepping the coffee maker each night for the following day.  it can seriously make or break a morning.  it’s the little things….

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we whooped it up again with shana the other day and took the 5th portrait in our american gothic, south austin style series. (our first with marvel.)

this series (which can be seen on my portraits page) was inspired by a random photo that ian and i took of ourselves years ago in anticipation of our travels to india in 2006.  (see the last photo at the bottom of the portraits page.) we started the series with shana when i was pregnant with koruna in 2009.

i am always amazed at what shana can capture.  a 2-and-a-half-year-old and a 4-month-old ain’t exactly easy to corral.  i dig the photo below.  rooster is sneezing and mars is just DONE.

i hope we hope we get to keep adding to this series until all four of us are old and gray.

i love my family.