Discovery

16 JANUARY, 2025

At 10 months, the stage my daughter is in is all about discovering new things. On the day that I took her "monthiversary" photos, she had just learned how to make noises with the back of her hand to her mouth. As I quietly followed her around her room snapping the moments where she wasn't trying to interact with me, she picked up a toy that she hadn't shown much interest in for a while and, after examining it for a few seconds, put it up to her face and shouted the adorable gibberish - or rather, her version of talking because what she said certainly wasn't nonsense to her. Then in an instant she threw down the toy and crawled to her window sill to gaze up at a stained glass decoration that has been hanging there since she was a few months old - which she now insists on being held up to so she can stare & giggle at it at least once a day. I could see in her eyes the way her brain was working to put together sequences of actions; the delight that she felt when she succeeded and the confusion that furrowed her brows when something didn't make sense. Her sense of curiosity and determination to learn everything she possibly can about anything in her line of vision are strong reminders to me to always find the magick in the ordinary, the remarkable in the mundane.