Had a good day yesterday, with a meeting with the Northside Parents' Network babysitting co-op; I'm hopeful that we can do a bit of babysitting exchanging. Maybe Kev and I will actually be able to go to a movie or a play one of these days... And then we went to dinner at Daniel and Anne's gorgeous new house in Oak Park, to ogle the house, new baby Catherine, and enjoy an amazing dinner that they whipped up. Roast lamb with roast potatoes and sweet potatoes and two gravies, asparagus, mushrooms, delectable bread/tomato/fresh mozzarella salad, fruit tart. I couldn't stop eating, it was so good. I'm pretty sure I wasn't hosting dinner parties when Kavi was only two months, but they claim it's easier to cope the second time around. I'm dubious. Kavi had a great time playing with almost-three-year-old Robert, although she got pretty exhausted trying to keep up with his energy.
I have serious house envy -- not that we can afford anything as huge as theirs, but we could get a nice little house in Oak Park, with tree-lined streets for Kavi to bike on, and a back yard to send her out to when she gets stir-crazy this winter. Not actually bigger than our current place in terms of square footage, but more usable for our needs. Very tempting. We drove by a very pretty Victorian that we could afford last night, but it's flanked by two tall apartment buildings, which I worry would mean that we wouldn't get to know the neighbors. In my semi-suburban imaginings, there are lots of other kids with families on the street, and the kids all play together and we know and like all the other grown-ups, trusting each other to help keep an eye on the kids. That sounds really nice to me these days; I'm starting to really hunger for parental community, and am willing to give up my restaurants and bookstores and theatres and other hip young city things in order to get those. I want a quiet house, with a nice backyard, in a reasonably safe neighborhood. Somewhere I can put in a garden that has a chance of lasting ten or twenty or fifty years.
When did I get so old and boring???