From the time I was about 24 or 25, I began to secretly hope that I would someday have a daughter, and if I ever did, I would name her Madeline.  I met her father a year or two later, and then my Madeline, who apparently had been hanging out on a cloud somewhere, saw her opportunity and got herself born.

On her 18th birthday, we celebrated with tattoos…of course, I got Madeline.

“In an old house in Paris
that was covered with vines
lived twelve little girls
in two straight lines
in two straight lines
they broke their bread
and brushed their teeth
and went to bed…
The smallest one
was Madeline
She was not afraid of mice
She loved winter, snow and ice,
to the tiger in the zoo
Madeline just said, “Pooh-pooh!”
And nobody knew so well
how to frighten Miss Clavel.”

–Ludwig Bemelmans

(To hear the story read to you by a 2-year old child, check this link:  Susanna reads Madeline)

Photograph by Madeline