A year in review

My blogroll this morning was full of posts thinking about the past year, appropriate for the day. So here goes some of my year.

This was a big year for us. Buying house and having a baby are some of the biggest events in people's lives, and we did both!

I went from being a complete virgin as a doula to being one who has a birth under her belt, two if you count my own.

I went from being a complete recluse, with a social life entirely conducted online, to acknowledging my social needs and fulfilling them, forming new friendships with like-minded moms in my area. My social life is now conducted about 50% in person. :)

I went from being completely out of shape, unable to walk even a few blocks without exhaustion (although some of that was because of gestational changes), to regularly walking the mile or so to the nearest "downtown" area without thought, even with an increasingly heavy baby strapped to me.

My baby went from this:



a twenty-two week bump in my belly;

to this:



seven months old today and loving french fries and pickles. (I've invited Gran to write the story of the pickles, and I'll post it when she sends it to me.)

Things I want to do in 2009 include posting here every day (as I mentioned yesterday) and growing my doula business (and oh the social things I'll have to do for that... not fun for this introvert). I also want to stop thinking of myself as an overgrown teenager who's just faking this adult stuff (I'm 32 years old and a mother now! way past time to work through that), and to see if I can't get my teeth fixed. Lesser goal include going to the Sock Summit and working on growing my hair out.

2009, here I come!

Some videos

First off, some videos of the Infanta. You can see all the videos we've taken and edited of her here, but for those who don't have time to check them all out, here're a couple of my favorites.





Secondly, I realized the other day that (duh) I could find bellydancing videos on yootoob, so I did a search, and found some great stuff. First up is a video of "superstar" Rachel Brice doing her thing (with a couple of friends, ultimately):



And here's a dressing-room interview of her talking about an incredibly inspiring moment she had watching another dancer:



My New Year's resolution is to post here every day in 2009!

Christmas

Yup, we had it. My folks traveled up from the Bay Area by train; my dad stayed with my brother and SIL, and my mom stayed with us. Due to the snow and there only being one car (seating four adults and one baby) between two households and seven people, we didn't get together nearly as much as we'd intended, which was a bit sad, but we'll do better another time.

We did get a chance to get together both Christmas Eve (over at my brother's place) and Christmas Day (our house); the picture above is the Infanta giving the Nom of Approval to the tag of one of her presents. She loves the present itself, too, but you know babies and tags...

There has been Knitting! But I'm saving that for another post. :)

Fun stuff

I promise a baby news post in a bit, but first, something completely different.

My friend Bethany is a writer... and like many writers, she's in a writing group. Well, one of the other members is about to be published!! And she's holding a contest on her blog. Linky below!

I mentioned it's cold, right?

I mean, this is the Willamette Valley. It's supposed to rain a lot, get frosty now and then, maybe have a light dusting of snow in late winter. Right now, there's a pretty thick blanket of snow on the ground, enough that a little while ago Josh and I saw a couple going up the street on skis! This photo is of my front yard right now - that's snow up to the top of our bottom step. Incidentally, we had rain overnight, so that this was bare ground this morning. Right now? Freezing rain. What's going on, are we turning into Canada or something?

Baby, it's cold outside!

First of all, I apologize for having lied on Sinterklaas. I really did mean to come back and post that recipe and such... What can I say, it's reeeeeeelly easy to get sucked into not being able to do much besides chasing the Infanta (who's at the on-all-fours-and-rocking stage of learning to crawl - I would not be surprised at some real crawling by Christmas!). I promise, I'll post it sometime soon!

Now then, for the members of the audience who don't live near me, this was the view out my front door at noon today:



Notice the white stuff? We had a couple inches of it fall yesterday afternoon and evening. It had melted/settled a bit by the time I took that picture; now it's preparing to get verrry icy overnight. Go go down comforter!

Save Handmade!

A few of my readers may have heard about the law going into effect this February that will basically make it impossible for anyone but big manufacturers to sell items that come in contact with children. It seems reasonable in theory - protecting kids from lead - but it basically requires everything that goes into any item that's going to be used with or for children to be tested for lead. Every part of every item. This will absolutely kill the WAHM (work at home mom, for those not internet-acronym-savvy) industry, as well as many others, including all small craftspeople that make kid's toys.

This particularly hits home for me, since I was hoping to soon start a small sideline in things like soakers, just to have a little coming into the family budget from me.

At any rate, I've put a button in the sidebar that will take you to a site with more information, including details on the Act and contact information and sample letters to nag your politicos with. I strongly encourage you to do this!!!

Sinterklaas

First, a gratuitous baby shot, taken just moments ago:



Today is Sinterklaas. Now, I'm not Dutch, but my SIL is, and we thought this was such a good idea that we've adopted it ourselves. I have a few gifts for our immediate party - Josh and Lina and me, and my brother and his wife (we'll be celebrating at their place tonight) - and I can't show you pictures because that would spoil the surprise, now wouldn't it? Tomorrow, I promise. :)



I also have cookies - at least, cookies in progress. It's kinda hard to make cookies late in the evening with a tired baby and no daddy to take his shift... Nonetheless, I did manage to make half a batch of Dutch Letter Cookies (thanks to Norma for sharing the recipe!), with the rest to make this afternoon, and I have the dough chilled for Pepparkakor. Yay for ethnic European spice cookies! I would post the recipe, but I have a sleepy baby in my lap, and getting up to get it would disturb her. Again, tomorrow, I promise!

Reality Check.

My mom had a cancerous tumor removed yesterday. It was, as these things go, a minor deal - a melanoma "in situ", meaning it was just in that spot, nothing extending elsewhere, not even all the layers of skin - but is cancer ever a minor deal, really? And, to pound it home even more firmly, I just read a post about another blogger's mom's cancer, and now I'm getting pretty upset about it all. I mean, I can't even go be with her right now, because we're hundreds of miles apart. She's planning to come visit for Christmas, but I'd like to be with her now, sharing Lina's toothless laughter in person and helping with her recovery.

I think I'll start keeping enough room on a credit card for an emergency train trip.

Now, with knitting!

Josh has been playing chess online recently. One morning about a week ago, he came in while I was in denial about getting up (standard practice for me on weekends) and asked if I'd make a hat for a lady he's been playing with who's going through cancer treatment. Well, of course I would! So, we hopped in the car (once we were all up) and went to my favorite LYS, the Rose and Ram in Independence. The yarn is Fibra Natura Exquisite Bamboo, 77% bamboo, 23% superwash merino, in Fiesta; pattern is Turn a Square by Brooklyn Tweed, but in only one colorway. It's yummy! Light and warm and soft and silky, and very cheery. :)



My socks have started wearing out. All but my very newest socks have either HYOOGE holes, like, too big for darning (darn it!!), or are showing distinct wear in spots. So I'm trying to churn out a few pairs while I still have some to wear. I had started this pair - Knotty or Knice by Chrissy Gardiner - pretty much as soon as the fall issue of IK landed in my mailbox back in... August? But what with them being a traveling pattern and me having a baby to chase, I didn't finish them until This past Friday. Hey, I finished them!!! And when I was at OFFF back in September, I showed the WIP to Ms. Gardiner herself, and she was happy to see her design "in the wild", and said that she liked the colorway I was using better than the one she'd had to use for the sample in the magazine. Yay! Yarn is STR lightweight, Star Sapphire. And yes, I'm a total dork. But you knew that.

Life with Squirmy Baby.

The first picture was taken just instants after Lina'd stopped pulling that blanket over her face, a favorite game since she was young, but one she can now play by herself. The second two were taken this weekend; we spent Thanksgiving with our dear friend Br. Vincent. In the first of those, Br. Vincent and Josh are playing chess while Lina wiggles on the ground (shortly thereafter Br. V draped his scapular over her head, leading me to joke about telling the abbot he was letting girls under his habit). In the second we are at the monastery's lodge, a lovely building on the Puget Sound, as the two share a package of popcorn.

More Ergo giveaway props!

I mentioned this contest a few weeks ago, and here's another! Ergo must be having a field day...

Swallow First.

Lina supposes her toes are roses

Lina has recently discovered her toes. I took these shots a few days ago, and then happily discovered that I could set up a slideshow on Picasa (Google's photo application).

Whaddya know?

Well, it really was contagious. Turns out my illness Saturday night wasn't from the turkey I treated with improper respect, but a 24 hour bug that's been making the rounds. I've been myself today, mostly... except that I'm not really interested in food. I'm kinda hungry... but every little flavor, especially sweetness, is very intense, and my tummy is still a touch queasy.

This is bad, especially when you consider that I'm still Lina's sole source of nourishment (and even if she was eating solids, the which she's shown no interest in yet except as toys, it would only be token amounts at this point), and that she's nursing very frequently right now - every couple of hours or less! I'm suspecting a supply decrease from ovulation... Oh yeah, did I mention I got my period for my birthday a couple of weeks ago? Guess I'll be eating oatmeal for breakfast and drinking Mother's Milk tea to wash it down.

Aaand the house is a mess. And while I got the laundry folded this afternoon, the baby sleeping on my front prevented me from putting it away. and while L's mom was able to make other arrangements for today, I'll have her again tomorrow. Ah, well, such is life...

I think it's contagious.

Here's the obligatory baby picture so Gran doesn't complain (as much ;P ). It's a few weeks old; she's currently asleep on Daddy, part-time miserable with her first real cold.

Megan had food poisoning in the middle of last week, from some bad fast food. I wouldn't bother to mention it here, except that I saw her Friday at the LLL meeting, and then spent all of last night puking my guts out, I think from something I ate at dinner. Josh, the lucky bum, had no issues at all. So today, he's doing the majority of the Lina care while I'm miserable on the couch. I'd enjoy it more if I didn't feel like a$$.

Meanwhile, I think I'm going to work on preparing for the Pendragon game I'm ramping up to running; I have the Howard Pyle version out from the library (different edition, but meh). They also had Malory, but I thought that choosing an edition that I could (and would) actually read in the time I have was the better part of valor.

Sue me, kids eat time!

I know a bunch of other moms who not only also have infants, but older children as well. How they manage to blog so much more regularly than me, I don't know. Must be practice...

I'm posting for once because someone on my babywearing list posted about this contest - and the site looks awesome enough in general that I decided to play. Besides, I so wouldn't say no to an Ergo!

And now, I know you're all champing at the bit for pictures of Little Girl.



This was Halloween - mama and baby kitties!



With Great-Grandma, on my birthday (as it happens).



Baby's first garb (and this is a dual purpose shot - something I've been working on!!! It's a UFO, but I'll finish it, I hope soon...).




This is L, a 4 year old I've been watching during the day for about a month now. And no, she's really not mine, but everyone thinks she is! This is a shot of her at Gilbert House.

That's all for now!

Happy Halloween

Art

has been requested.



First up: at OFFF, this is Lina and Mia's Gunner, who is generously sharing his big sister's cold. To be fair, after he sucked Lina's thumb, he gave her his, too.



Lina and our friend Penelope (Penny) at Gilbert House. Penny is about two months older than Lina (hence she's sitting while Lina's doing tummy time), but because she's very petite, Lina's actually a touch bigger. But they're wearing about the same size clothes, so at the swap yesterday, Penny's mom and I were snapping up all the cute girl's clothes in size 6-9 mos.



It's not a mouth, it's a clown car. I can say no more.

I promise!

We have not disappeared down a hole. Lina is alive and well (and making raspberries in the other room). Just... time gets away from me, you know?

There has been knitting. There have been baby pictures taken. There has been sewing - even quilting!

But I'm watching a four-year-old four mornings a week now, and that really eats into my time and energy! So... bear with me. I will post about our doings as brain, energy and children permit.