The photo at right, by the way, is a polaroid from yesterday; my friend Suzette Bross was commissioned to shoot a series of photos for a local hospital, and Kavi and I volunteered to come model. Kavi was super-sleepy throughout, probably due to recovering from the immunizations, so almost all her photos had closed eyes. Ah well. She's cute like this too, even if you can't see her pretty eyes. (Her fever came down pretty quickly, in case you were worried.) This is just the first polaroid Suzette took, while setting light levels, but I really like it, in part because I think I look very capable in it somehow. I look like a mom who knows what's she's doing. This is not actually the case, but it's nice that I can look like it once in a while. :-) I'm looking forward to seeing how the rest of the shoot comes out.

Today, there's a tremendous amount to get done, before Kavi and I get on a plane tomorrow to go visit my family in CT. Apply for citizenship is the big task, but also smaller things like picking up dry-cleaning, signing student thesis forms, dropping off lots of borrowed infant things at Nilofer's, and attending a Chicago Moms Blog dinner. Hectic day, and not particularly birthday-ish, but that's okay. I'm just happy and grateful to have such a good, rich life. I feel very lucky.

I'd like y'all to share my birthday happiness. Tell me something that's good in your life, right now, something that makes you happy. Me, I'm happy that I just drank some mango lassi leftover from last night's takeout dinner -- in fact, I'm happy that we *finally* have an Indian restaurant willing to deliver to us, a recent and desperately delightful development. It takes so little to please me...