No? Well, you really should. Let me do the honors.
She blogs with her daughters at Like Mother, Like Daughter. Well, actually her daughters are listed as contributors; but it’s mainly Leila who writes. And that’s fine because she is funny and wise and takes great pictures.
My sister-in-law, who homeschools but seldom reads blogs, sent me the link the other day. I clicked on over and read a few posts and even linked to one of them in my post on Gentleness and Patience. And then I stumbled across another link to her lovely blog a few days later (Ask Auntie Leila: I Don’t Want to Be Yelling, Screaming, Crazy Mom—ah yes, Elizabeth Foss linked to it in her sidebar and then in her Friday Favorites post.) and so I went back for another peek, another great post about discipline. And this time I looked around a little more and saw a picture of Leila in the sidebar. Wait a minute! I know her! She came to our wedding!
Leila (on left) talks to my mom at the wedding.
Yes, Leila Lawler is the wife of Phil Lawler, who at the time we were married was editor of Catholic World Report and Dom’s boss. During our courtship—and in the years since we’ve been married—I heard many nice stories about both of them. (Dom has told me many times that Leila gave him the single best piece of advice ever about dating and courtship, a piece of advice that led directly to our marriage. So I have her to thank for that.) And then I met Leila and Phil face to face at our wedding. And I wish we could have sat down for a nice long chat; but it was a wedding, you know. The bride doesn’t have the luxury of conversing at length with her guests.
But now at last I feel like I’m able to get in a bit of that chat. Go read her lovely blog and see what I mean. Now that you’ve been properly introduced.
Greta photos! … I must admit that I am obsessing about your baby these days Melanie—when are you due?
Ahem. Of course I mean GREAT photos. Greta is my friend from high school.
Awe, poor Sophia. I can see how you wouldn’t brush off that bump but at least she was still able to enjoy the rest of the day. She looks like she was the badminton champ of the day!
Katherine, The main thing was having to ice it down. I had to turn that task over to my heroic sister-in-law. I was simply not up to holding a writhing toddler. Poor Sophie was most indignant.
And you should have seen the awesome badminton scrimmage. I think at one point there were more than a dozen children with rackets all bouncing around under the nets.
Danielle,
Thank you. And thank you. My c-section is scheduled for Thursday (Jul 9) at 10:30. Four more days…. It feels very strange to have such a concrete countdown. And even so, I am so not ready! And yet I so am excited to finally meet my little guy.