Caleb Growing Up

One of the families we've known since Caleb was in utero and their baby Ventura was in utero, is moving to Spain.

We got together one last time before they fly off to their Spanish castle.

I always get so nervous every time we invite people over into the apartment who have babies or young toddlers, because our apartment is not exactly baby-proofed. But it's a true mark of kinship with Julian & Claudia and our other friends Meghan & Mike, because they're very relaxed about this sort of thing - not too worried about their kid crawling around on our concrete floors, or climbing up and down off the sofa...or about the fact that our walls are a mix of unpainted drywall and marker...

While I couldn't be more excited for their new journey ahead, it's sad to see them go. We're going to miss them and their sense of humour and their casual and laid-back European-ness and seeing how the boys grow up at the same time and develop in the same but in different ways. I will miss embarrassing them by testing out my Spanish on them, and by calling Ventura Caleb's "hermano" (thanks for the Spanish lesson, Arrested Development).

Just this last time we met, I think Julian brought up how they don't always use soap when they bathe their little guy, and I was shocked to find that Jon and I weren't the only ones. Caleb's bath is mostly just trying to rinse off the yoghurt in his hair and bit of blueberry from between his toes in between splashing around. But having had zero training or preparation in keeping this little booger alive, you gotta grab reassurance that things are okay wherever you can get it.

It is something special to find mamas & papas & little humans who are at the same season of life and part of the journey as you - our babies were all born within two months of each other. And so for me it's also a bit sad because in some ways, it's like saying good bye to Caleb's babyhood as well.

We became nervous and excited about our forthcoming babes together, and then once they roared into the world, we shared birth stories and horror night time sleeping stories and questions about diapers and solid foods and crawling and walking and vaccinations.

It really feels like a million years ago that both our little guys were just peanut blobs. Sometimes I look back on photos of Caleb as a baby, and I can hardly remember him so small. I guess forever we'll think of our Spanish friends as the friends we had when Caleb was a baby. And now Caleb's no longer a baby!

Not that we won't see them again, but, you know. I'm prone to nostalgia.

Of course we had to give them some fountain pens as a parting gift, including an ABC for Ventura, and Claudia read my mind in hoping that one day Caleb & Ventura will write to each other from across the ocean. You have to plant that seed young. Jon says my bubble of hopes and dreams for Caleb is really going to burst if it turns out that Caleb isn't really into letter writing.

 

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Other than that, it's the usual going on here. Pens and notebooks and things.

It's gotten a bit chilly over the last couple of days, but we're finally calling it spring, and updating our online inventory for Diamine and Platinum Preppies - the cartridges for those burst so easily that we take them offline for the winter. All this means we'll be shipping those inky things out starting tomorrow. Diamine is one of my favourite ink lines, so I can really empathize with the famine over the cold months.

Just today, I had to wash out and sacrifice my very own F-C Model 20 to loan out to someone looking to check it out, since we're all sold out. He's doing a test drive for his blog, and I have to admit I'm a bit sad about the empty pocket in my pen roll.

He very kindly assured me he would take excellent care of the pen over the five days he'll have it before returning it to me. The assurance was completely unnecessary, since I know he takes excellent care of his pens, plus he's a really nice guy, but I guess it makes me feel vaguely better.

Still, it's like a missing limb over here. All the other pens in the roll are looking at me suspiciously, like they can't quite bring themselves to ask if their newest brother got sent to some "farm." Which is ridiculous, because I have so many pens that are just un-inked and cleaned and on some shelf somewhere, but no one's asking about those.

 

Also, don't forget we're closed this Friday for the holiday, but open again on Saturday (11-6). We'll also be closed as usual on Sunday & Monday. I almost forgot that we would be closed on Friday, but I hope some of you all get to celebrate a long weekend as well.