Babies and Bad Fashion

To the proud, ecstatic new mother in this picture, the idea of being a grandmother was such a distant and surreal possibility that I'm sure she rarely gave it a thought. She was much too busy wrapped up in the euphoria of finally being a mom--her lifelong dream--and having a precious little boy to nurture and care for, to snuggle and cuddle and kiss. As you can see, she was on Cloud 9. That new mother, who was younger by several years than the baby she was holding is today, never would have imagined how quickly the little peanut in this picture (who was about a week old when it was taken) would grow up and become a daddy himself. Yep, that's right; that sweet little newborn baby boy is my oldest son, the father of my twin granddaughters.

Last night, my husband and I babysat for this son and his wife so that they could enjoy a rare night out, dining and dancing, at an Army Ball held in honor of all the troops attached to my son's base who recently returned from their year-long deployment to Afghanistan. The opportunity for date nights is almost nonexistent for these extremely busy parents of twins, so we were happy that we could be here to watch the girls for them. My son and his wife got all dressed up--they looked fantastic!--and were able to get about a six hour reprieve from their usual 24/7 job--a job that's twice as challenging and twice as hard as mine was when I became a mother to my firstborn son. (But on the flip side, there is also twice the cuteness.)

By the way, did you notice what I'm wearing on my face in this picture? Are those ski goggles? Could those glasses BE any bigger? I know big glasses were all the rage in the eighties (the era of truly bad fashion), but why didn't anyone tell me that I looked ridiculous? Now I know why my older brother used to call me "the fly"! I hope my granddaughters don't laugh at their Grammy when they see how silly she looked when their daddy was a baby!