Toothless grin #2 on it's way out--another memory on the way

Today I felt Willa Ann's first tooth. It's going to be visible in the next week. I'll try to get as many pictures as I can of her little toothless grin before it's gone forever.

Last night I went to look at her while she was asleep and just sat and stared at her for about half an hour. With my second child I know something that I didn't realize as a first timer--that no matter how mind blowing the moment, the memory of it is a whisper compared to the moment itself. That regardless of your iron willed determination that this memory will stick, it probably won't be anywhere close to clear when you think back. That in order to even visualize your sweet baby at a younger age, you are going to need a picture. I'm sure that last one has some evolutionary purpose--to better be able to recognize your children you can only visualize their faces as they are at the current time--but it kindof stinks. I remember a few very specific moments of Charlie Mac's babyhood--a little lip purse that overcame my family's law of no kissing on the lips, a couple of particularly precious times when I was nursing him and the talk he and I had when I told him he wasn't going to nurse anymore-those aren't crystal clear though. My point is this: last night when I was looking at Willa ann as she slept, in awe of how beautiful she is, how precious--I knew that I may not be able to remember it later, and that the feeling I had at that moment would never be so sharp as it was right then. And I didn't want it to end, so I just stayed there and stared. Her little finger would twitch every so often and her side rose and fell as she breathed. Her face so lovely in it's peace. I was alternately sitting on the ottoman peaking through the slats and leaning on her crib looking over. Both views unique and beautiful. This picture is hard to see because it wasn't very bright in there and I took it with my cell phone, but I imagine you can tell why I was so captivated.

I wrote this after I tore myself away:

There is no instrument to capture
the acheful beauty of your being
the wingspan of your lips
the settle of your sigh
  oh my child
    it is as starving
       to crave the impression that will flee with the moments passing