Primary Season Tour: Kissing Babies from DC to New Hampshire

At the tender age of five weeks, Shalvah's as-yet-undeclared candidacy is creating a sensation across generations of family and friends, up and down the Northeast corridor. In addition to greeting adoring crowds at her DC headquarters, Shalvah has hit the road and taken to the skies, canvassing door-to-door from DC to New Hampshire. She is a unprecedented crossover hit whose approval ratings are steady across every demographic, from great-grandmas...


to great aunts and uncles...



...great cousins...




She's been seen talking up the issues with parents' friends who will hereafter perform the important role of being the people who "knew you when you were this small"...


...and their children, for whom Shalvah's parents will be performing the same important service (she's already working the next generation of voters)...



Combining popular appeal with political savvy, Shalvah has already secured the support of notorious Beltway insiders...



...and key New Hampshire power brokers...

...hugging trees with the environmental lobby...

...while establishing her foreign policy credentials by meeting leading trade partners from Latin America...

...courting both sides of the Middle East divide...


...and emphasizing "values" with important faith constituencies...



This touring schedule is enough to make a newborn almost as sleepy as her parents, which may be why sleeping on people is Shalvah's second favorite activity (guess what the first is). See next update for details...

shock and awe

6:03 a.m.: This is Shalvah's Dad reporting. It's 6 a.m. Unless I missed something in the middle of the night, which may well have happened, my daughter has been sleeping since about 10 p.m. last night. She is alive; I checked repeatedly (note photographs). I didn't really need to check; she has been grunting, stretching, tossing and turning but--in a manner entirely without precedent in my career as a father--kept on sleeping. I, on the other hand, woke up somewhere in the 4 a.m. haze and couldn't go back to sleep. I have no idea what to do with myself. I mean, yes, this is cause for celebration, but the 4 a.m. feeding is my job. If there's no 4 a.m. feeding, who am I?

7: 29 a.m.: CORRECTION--there was no Memorial Day Miracle. Nahanni just woke up and informed me that I slept through the 2:30 a.m. feeding. Never mind. It was all a mirage, a sleep-deprived hallucination...

Once a kickboxer, always...

Don't let the peaceful name fool ya. Shalvah started kicking in the womb and she's never stopped. Her daily regimen includes at least two sessions of kickboxing practice, usually on the changing table (preferably but not always after all changes have been made). See here the positions of her own original martial art, complete with Bruce Lee combat facial expressions and sounds (we're not sure what to call it yet: Shal Vah Tsu? Shal Vah Do? Tai Shal Vah? Suggestions welcome)...

Milestones

Shalvah is just two weeks old, but wise beyond her weeks; her list of milestones is already staggering (much like her parents are when they carry her to the changing table at 3:46 a.m.). It is amazing what you can accomplish by scattering a few naps across 24 hours and otherwise staying awake all day and all night. This week, we celebrated not only her two-week anniversary, but Shalvah’s first date: Sam Lieberman took her to Kalorama Park for a sunset picnic, which went great, although it was hard to get away from the chaperones...

Shalvah did have some butterflies beforehand, and threw up on her outfit on the way there, but they seemed to hit if off afterwards...

(They’re actually out walking in the park again today, which is allowing Shalvah’s Dad to finally update the blog...)
Making a splash on the DC singles scene of course creates an impetus for other milestones, such as the first bath...

and inevitably, the afterbath...
...
The cord is out, the bellybutton is in...

This kickboxer is up to 9+ pounds, and is showing off reflexes and flexing newborn muscles everyday:

She has figured out how to eat her own hand...

to pull her own hair, her Dad’s hair, even borrow her Dad’s prescription...

and to untie knots with her eyes closed;

She has been observed focusing and following with eagle eyes:



She’s displaying refined taste in music—her favorites so far are Bach, B.B. King, and above all, AM radio static. Her social life is beyond active; every day she is chatting up new visitors, receiving fan mail and gifts...


Thank you so much to all of Shalvah’s loving and generous extended family for welcoming her and supporting us in her first two weeks on the planet. (for more photo highlights of Shalvah's first two weeks in the world,click on photo album links listed on the right side of the blog)

Please allow me to introduce myself...

So they finally let us outta that hospital long enough for my parents to give me a name! Thanks everybody for the suggestions... and the winner is... envelope please...



"Shalvah" means "calm, tranquility, serenity" in Hebrew. My parents say that's how they felt the minute they saw me.





If my grandmas got to choose, I might be named "Naches" or "Kvelling"--how do you define that? It's, well, how grandparents feel about their grandchildren, you know?



So, here are my career statistics so far... I measured 21 and 3/4 inches, and weighed in at 8 pounds, 8 ounces at 6:09 a.m. on April 17, 2007.



I was born after my Mom fought through 32 hours of labor; in the end, the doctors brought me into the world with a C-section. My Mom and I got great care from our doula, the midwives, doctors, everybody, and we are so grateful.





But we were also grateful to be set free on Friday! Phew! It was busy in there--every five minutes a different person is coming in and poking and prodding and testing me, and Thursday they had me hooked up to some space age tanning machine all day and night...



When they gave us the word, you bet we were ready to go!





So come visit us at home sometime soon! I can't wait to meet everybody. But maybe bring some takeout for my parents; they're too busy changing diapers and feeding me to remember to feed themselves...