Growing Out of a Name

At last, true signs of Spring. Most of the snow is gone here, and any that replaces it is now likely to be short-lived, a last rear-guard action. Now all the talk on the news and among government officials is of flooding, with Emergency Operations being planned and patrols looking for road closures. There are also robins in large numbers, as well as a sighting of the first outdoor spider of the season, along with a fly large enough to carry off that spider if it so desired.

Saturday was also the first day in the yard for Grandbaby this season. She had noticed with great excitement the gradual reappearance of rocks and grass from under the snow after 5 months, which is a considerable period when you've only put in 32 months on earth. Now the ground had dried sufficiently for running about and swinging and chasing a local squirrel and generally wearing out Grandpa. Happily for my cardiovascular functions she finally slowed down when she got the idea to use a tree branch to "catch fish" in the water running along our curb (her timing was spot on, too; by Sunday all that water was gone). It's interesting to see what sticks in a child's memory. She hadn't been fishing since last summer, yet she still recalled it well enough to reenact the basic mechanics.

Typing this also brings up something I have been contemplating. If you saw my previous post (sorry) you know that Grandbaby is no longer The Grandbaby. That and her movement out of Babyhood have led me to consider a name change for her in this humble blog. (I know, she'll always be her Mom's baby, just as her Mom is still my wife's baby and my daughter is still her Mom's baby, etc. I'm not going anywhere near that.)

Granddaughter is accurate, but not distinctive; we have 5 granddaughters. I admit to giving Stink Pot serious consideration for reasons that become obvious to anyone who experiences more than 10 minutes of her...shall we say... precociousness. Bean has been given to her as a nickname by her Grandma. Then there's always Whitney because - as she would say - that's her name. I will have to give this more consideration. Certain decisions should not be rushed.