I ask you – what’s the point of being the friend who lives in Ireland if you don’t give Irish gifts? Below are my offerings for Koko’s baby shower, held today at Franchia Restaurant on Park Avenue a precious few weeks before Baby Bruce drops. Baby Bruce will be born during the Chinese Year of the Tiger – a fact honored by the many tiger-themed baby gifts he also received today – but as far as I’m concerned, this is the Irish Year of the Sheep.

LOOK. JUST LOOK. SEE HOW CUTE.

Ahhhhhh. No, really. LOOK HOW CUTE!

An Aran jumper with sheep on it!!! Count ‘em. Four sheep. One, two, three, four; a haon, a dó, a trí, a ceathair. Four!

Hee hee hee hee hee. Little buttons, Donegal wool. More sheep. Farm scene. COZY BABY.

I bought them from Trinity Sweater Shoppe a couple of months ago, as soon as Koko told me she was having a boy. Have been sitting on them like a hen with her eggs. The day I snapped them up, I brought them with me to the writing centre at College, where one of my classmates – a poet from Donegal – was busily at work on her thesis. I showed her the sweaters. I pointed out each and every little sheep. She smiled politely, barely masking a wince.

“This is for an American baby, I take it,” she said.