"She's so beautiful and happy!" - Sophia's profound effect on the city of Atlanta

Sophia had a great time in Atlanta. She and I both love to explore new places and meet new people. She especially loves to have new faces to stare at, and new people to impress. Boy, were they impressed.

She has always had a special something that draws people in, but it was either especially keen or the locals were particularly vulnerable to her brand of charm. Either way, the entire week, Sophia seemed to draw a swarm of admirers with her wherever she went. These were men, women, old, young and all nationalities. We met a lovely young woman at Panera who told Sophia she loved her. She said that Sophia is a common name where she came from in West Africa. A construction worker from Mexico told us at lunch one day that he had an uncle named Sophia (Sofia). I can only guess that his English was a little rusty, and that he meant aunt because I can't find it listed anywhere as a man's name. Still, it's hard to say for sure.

Here she is at The Grape, a wine restaurant in Buckhead (where we stayed). Everyone was commenting on how she was as relaxed as any of those enjoying wine that evening.


A group of seventh graders from Martin Luther School in Joplin, MO flew with us from Atlanta to KC. As soon as we arrived at our gate, Sophia spotted them and she and Lulu strode right into the middle of their group, interrupting what I can imagine was a very important discussion, just to look around and allow them to admire her. You can imagine how a group of 13-year-old mostly girls reacted to this intrusion. "Oh my gosh! What a sweet baby! Look at her eyes! What's your name?" and so on. This went on for quite some time. Sophia occasionally wandered away from their group to give the other passengers a smile and introduce Lulu, but she always returned. When we landed in Kansas City, Sophia again held court as Erick heard the girls whisper to each other, "There's Sophia! We need to go say hi!"

Not everyone is so susceptible to her charms. Here she is trying to engage some older boys, but they weren't impressed at her imitations of themselves.

I am so glad that Sophia enjoys people and is so adaptable to many situations. I am sure that it will help her as she gets older and is just introduced to more and more adventures. I like to think that a big part of her charm is her eccentricity. She's already quite the little nutjob, and people enjoy that. For example, each time we walked into our hotel, she insisted on hugging both of the lions that held up this marble table. She would always insist. "Hug ninons." How can you argue with that?