Oh my!

Wine! I've been without it for about eight months, and I have certainly missed it. So I celebrated Valentine's Day with a lovely Trimbach Gewurztraminer during my date with my husband tonight.

Yes, I actually said Patrick and I went on a date to one of our fave restaurants -- Annam in Dearborn. My awesome parents volunteered to babysit so we could go out for a few hours. (We were so tired that we kept it to about two hours and had our first 6 p.m. dinner reservation ever. We usually make dinner reservations for about 9 p.m. and complain that more restaurants should have later dining hours. Ha ha!)

It was a terrific night. (I even resisted the urge to duck into the bathroom several times to call my folks to check on the baby.) Those few hours out gave us a chance to digest all we've been through this past week -- the surprising birth two weeks early, the extreme joy we felt first holding Madeleine, the amazing moments watching her make 15 different faces when she's waking up, the incredible exhaustion from the late-night feedings, the love we didn't know we were capable of.

We also enjoyed just talking and reminiscing about our first date...and just talkin' about whatever. We really needed to just sit down for a minute and chat. The time alone also made us recall our "other lives" of freedom -- restaurants, bars, sleeping in, spontaneous trips to Chicago, etc.

But I can honestly say, as I sit here writing this -- with little Madeleine sleeping on the couch next to me-- I'm so glad to have the life I now have.