Yesterday our landlords announced that they are selling 251. I was surprised at how devastating this news was to me.

As i lay here in bed beside my sleeping baby, listening to the wind and rain own the night outside the open window, i'm not contemplating the meaning of home. I believe in the old adage that home is where the heart is. It's wherever you are when you're surrounded by the people or things you love. It can be several places at one time, or one very specific place on a number of different occasions. But home, i've decided, is really more of a feeling than a place.

Warmth. Laughter. Memories. Hardships. Support. Love.

Alright, maybe i am contemplating the meaning of home. But yesterday, i wasn't. Yesterday i knew that, no matter how frustrated i sometimes get with our little postage stamp of a living space, right here and now, this is home. And i'm not ready to leave.

This is our first home together. It's where we had all our first arguments. It's where we went from engaged to married. It's where we made our first friends and neighbors as a couple. It's where we transitioned from sleeping on a mattress on the floor to a real bed. It's where we made meals together and chose paint colors and tracked beach sand that will be stuck between the creaky wooden floorboards forever. It's where we've put up two real Christmas trees and broke in through a window three times after locking ourselves out. It's where i labored all night long and where we brought our first child home.

All of these things make my heart ache when i consider the possibility that we might have to leave with summer. It makes any complaints that i've had in the past about this place seem so petty.

Where i once saw problems, i now see potential.

I hope. I wish. I pray...that we can stay.

Well, the title pretty much sums it up. Abby got her first tooth!

I'm not sure when exactly i realized this. People have been telling me for months that she's teething (seriously, i swear - starting from birth if your child drools even once, everyone that notices is going to proclaim that he or she is teething. After a while i stopped debating this and just did the whole Smile At The Woman Who Thinks She Knows Everything Including My Child Better Than Me thing. You'll fare well to do the same, when it's your turn.).

So now i can say it: No, Abigail wasn't teething.

But she is now.

Thankfully, the tooth doesn't seem to be bothering her too much - yet. I had been running my finger over her gums for days, thinking it might be That Time. My instincts were right. I finally felt it while allowing her to gnaw on my knuckle one day - ouch! My, those are some sharp gums! And, oh...that's a tooth.

We often find her sliding her tongue over the tooth, and she's been getting slightly whinier when she's tired. It's so sad. As a parent, your heart breaks when you know your child is in pain (kind of like the two times i've had to watch her endure a round of shots at the doctor's office - worst part of being a mom so far). Because there's simply nothing you can do about it, at least at this stage of their lives. You can comfort them, and that's great, but they can't yet understand that pain is only temporary. And that's something you just have to wait for them to realize when they're older.