At the Opera

Like previous years, Elizabeth is teaching at the Accademia d'Amore, the Baroque opera workshop run by Stephen Stubbs and Maxine Eilander.  Unlike previous years, this workshop is at Cornish College of the Arts and now necessitates childcare.  This is being handled by Paul and Oma (Grandma Derksen).  They found a lounge on the bottom floor of the building and have been camped out there.  Auntie Kathryn also stops by at times.  They have milk left for them, but most of the time Elizabeth has been able to come down at breaks to feed Lotty.

This first pictures, taken outside the main concert hall, makes it looks like Lotty wants her space.  Instead, she got taken to the student lounge/computer lab.  It is a pretty nice space, but has gotten rather hot over the last few days with the outside temperatures getting to be about 90°F.  Fortunately, the weather has turned cooler and that makes it easier on everyone.


Sometimes, a wonderfully sleeping baby decides that things which were just fine maybe aren't so fine any more.  Maybe there is reason to be a bit grumpy.  Or maybe things are downright terrible and a formal complaint must be made to management.

But Oma is there with a bottle to make things all better.

Grammy & Grandpa Brown Visit

Paul's parents were in town for a longer visit at the beginning of August.  They got a chance to get to know their granddaughter.  There was time for "reading" stories, and snuggling.  Of course, Grandpa found time to wash and clean out the cars.  This was also appreciated, but more by Paul than anyone else.

The Sunday before they left, we had Lotty's baby dedication at church.  It is sort of like a baptism, but less wet and letting her decide about it later.  It was an opportunity to use the wonderful, antique blanket that our friends Ryan and Nikki gave to us.  It was a very nice service, especially since our pastor, Jeanne, has a wonderful way with babies.  

Life at home with Lotty

Elizabeth has found her iPhone to be very valuable while nursing.  She can make calls as well as check email while nursing.  At least 2 fingers are involved in typing with one hand.  Note the blur of her fingers above the small screen.  Maybe the iPad would be nice for this, but the small size of the phone lets her put it just about anywhere and be able to use it one-handed.

Several people have asked us how max is doing with the new baby in the house.  He is really doing well.  He was very careful around Lotty when we first got home from the hospital, but we encouraged him to come over, sniff her and say hi.  He has aways furiously wagged his tail when he has been close to her.  Lotty is completely comfortable around Max, not knowing any different.  All the time spent with Max as a puppy teaching him that he was never allowed to bite people is now paying off as we have no worries that he will be gentle with her.  The one stuffed toy with the squeaker in it is another matter. That one probably will meet an untimely demise.

This last picture was an experiment. Lotty was pretty much asleep and hardly moving, so I (Paul) set the camera on the floor, stopped the aperture down to F22 with the ISO set at 100 and let the camera take about a 20 second exposure.  I guess this is more like the way portraits used to be taken.  In any case, the small aperture gave me a really wide depth of field, but the perspective in the shot still gives it a 3D feel.