Flannery, I missed your nine-month update and then felt so guilty about missing it that I missed the next three updates, too. So I am trying to backtrack. Here’s what I recall of your tenth month.

Flannery turned ten months on the 30th of February, which doesn’t exist. So we will say it was the 28th of February instead.

Biggest occurrence this month was another stomach bug. I don’t remember who started with it, but I’m fairly sure we got it from an indoor playground.

This is not a picture of Flannery sick with the stomach bug. This is her sleeping in my arms at said indoor playground. She had been sitting in the stroller as we walked around the mall–myself, Flannery, Beatrice, Aurick, and Eldore. She was quite late for her nap, but as she typically does, she will not sleep if there is too much activity, sights, and sounds to grab her attention. When we finally got to the playground, I sat down to nurse her. While her head was covered she promptly fell asleep. Poor thing!

Flannery, I wish you would just nap when you need to. You are given to just holding on until the bitter end, though.

A couple of days later everyone started getting sick.

Beadie got it first–she almost always does. Then it wiped out everyone else one by one. I remembered the last bug Flannery got, and waited for her to make that same strange sound she made before. I heard it in the middle of the night one night (why always in the middle of the night?) After getting her cleaned up, she sat with me out on the couch while I alternately took care of her and the other sickies that were spread out around the floor. She were such a trooper, though. She never cried while vomiting. Thankfully this bug was a very fast one, and it wasn’t too bad for her.

Another repeat experience for Flannery was we attended another funeral, this one for a relative on Grandmaggie’s side. Flannery did well; it was my first time taking five children to a funeral alone. Eldore forgot his shoes, but other than that we were mostly OK, and Flannery stayed quiet. (This is good, as once she gets going, she is hard to stop.)

She has quite the grabby hands, and a good grip. Here she is checking to see how secure Anselm’s hair is. Caveat frater (or something like that.)

Another frequent victim of Flannery’s Grabby Hands, Aurick began making his peace with her, though he still guards his toys closely. He also keeps an eye on whether or not she’s being quiet in her high chair or not. (Typically she’s not.)

In hindsight, Flannery did seem to be getting louder and spunkier these months. Her red hair and blue eyes stayed the same, however,

other updates:
ephraim – clive – anselm – elvie – eldore – beatrice – aurick