Early Modern Mom

DO. NOT. WANT.

2012-01-28T11:53:00.000-08:00

While eating my lunch today, it occurred to me that eating at McDonald's should register on my "sin meter" somewhere up there with pornography and drug abuse. It's abuse of my body, abuse of the animals, supporting a corporation that encourages slavery (the toys, wrappers, and boxes) and destruction of the environment (through CAFOs, cross-country shipping, and the excessive wrapping that becomes litter and landfill fodder) and ever-narrowing genetic selection of God's beautifully wrought plant and animal creations (every hamburger should not taste the same, and high fructose corn syrup is not a "real" food).

Sadly, lunch was a quarter pounder with cheese and french fried chased by a manky Dr. Pepper. I need to permanently make the shift in thinking that eating this food and supporting these practices are offenses against God, against Creation-with-a-capital-C, and against my own self. It is Destruction of the worst kind.

Kind of a boring update, but I did it.

2012-01-13T08:41:00.000-08:00

Well, it seems 30 minutes is harder to find than I thought it would be. That's a good thing for me to know, though. What's the point of planning my days if I have no concept of how my time flows?

I'm doing moderately well at holding on to routine. My worst enemies are procrastination and errands. On the one hand, it's hard to make myself set the timer for two minutes. But I know how important those 2 minutes are to keeping the house clean. The idea is to work on 1 horizontal surface that somehow collects crap for just 2 minutes every day. I did it back in early 2010, and I swear it worked miracles in my house. All I have to do is set the timer. But then I think, "I can find 2 minutes any time of day. I'm going to play another game of sudoku." And I go to bed with more clutter on the crap-magnets than was there when I woke.

Meanwhile, the longer routines like vacuuming and sweeping on Monday or making a menu on Friday are pretty straightforward in theory, but get bulldozed by changing diapers, taking Burgundy places, feeding Holden, lunch dates, etc. All the same, it's slowly getting done. Monday's routine didn't get done until Tuesday, and Tuesday's routine (dusting) didn't get done at all, but I did Wednesday and Thursday's on Thursday. I even cleaned out the fridge and found two containers of leftovers from Thanksgiving. I had to stop for a while to bring my heaving tummy under control before proceeding.

Last night my little brother called me for our weekly tag-up. We agreed to be accountable to each other this year for our goals: He wants to pay off his debt and buy a house, and I want to walk for 1/2 an hour every day to prepare for labor. He also decided to quit drinking for six months to see what his life is like without it. He seems really upbeat and is running full-steam toward his financial goals. Of course, I haven't walked for exercise at all in the last week. When he asked how it was going, I said, "Oh, I walked a lot. I walked from the bedroom to the bathroom; living room to the kitchen; kitchen back to the baby's bedroom;" he was amused, but gave me the encouragement I needed. Today, I'll walk.

I haven't done any serious knitting in a few weeks. I'm ready to start on a pair of socks for my dad, and I've been ready for over a month. I just can't seem to make myself cast on. I owe another pair of socks to my friend Lizzy, an independent dyer whose yarn will be featured in trunk shows of sample products for a book. I must get these done; the first is a gift, and the second is needed by someone I love.

I'm working hard on planning the trip with Burgundy to New England during Spring Break. We have a ridiculous list of colleges and universities she wants to visit, and I need to call them for their schedules, for tour appointments, etc. Originally, I planned for us to visit New York City, too, but I don't know whether we'll go now. It's expensive, dangerous, and I think the only university she's interested in there is Columbia.

Holden changes a little every day. The last couple of days, he has begun using his tongue a good bit when he tries to talk. The resultant babble remains fairly unintelligible, but he's definitely saying, "Thank you," (tae te) "I love you," (I yuh yuuuh) and "I did that," (Ah dee dah). His new favorite game is kissing. In the morning, he crawls over me and drools open-mouthed across my face, saying, "OOOOOOOM-MAH." He does this until I get out of bed. No amount of kissing in return will satisfy him. Only my eventual capitulation and desertion of the warmth and comfort of my bed. Once I'm up, he does the same to Mark.

In the evenings, Mark comes in, and if he does not pick up Holden and love on him right away, Holden throws a fit. Once in Daddy's arms, Holden kisses him all over his face repeatedly. Anyone who tries to come near is violently repulsed. Only Daddy will do. He also insists on kissing whoever is feeding him during his meals. These are without a doubt the most disgusting manifestations of physical affection that I've endured. Except for maybe Burgundy's corn-laden kisses.

Holden's First Birthday Party

2012-01-09T20:02:00.000-08:00

Oh, man, yesterday wore me out. I woke early, fed the baby, and packed my family off to church. I stayed home for a decadent morning of (wait for it) housecleaning. Oh, yes. I know how to live it up.

We finally threw a 1st birthday party for wee Holden yesterday afternoon, and I panicked over the state of my house. Thankfully, Mom drove down from north Houston on Friday, and she joined me Sunday morning to finish the preparations. Together, we vacuumed and shampooed all the carpets, swept and mopped all the floors, scrubbed the bathroom, cleaned the kitchen (several times), washed walls, cleaned cobwebs from corners, dusted, and made the house magnificently presentable. We even Windexed the front hall mirror and the glass on the front door.

I made cream cake on Saturday: a two-layer, six-inch round cake for Holden, and a two-layer, 10-inch round cake for everyone else. I made the quick fudge buttercream icing featured a couple of years ago on Smitten Kitchen, and I was pretty impressed with my results!

The party was a great success; Holden's friends from Kindermusic, from our childbirth education class, and from my knitting group came out to celebrate with him. My friend Tabby led a Kindermusic class, and we sang songs, played with musical instruments, danced and tried to catch bubbles.

Of course, the best part of the afternoon saw Holden's introduction to sugary, chocolatey goodness. Daddy prepped the camera while I put the candle in the cake. And because pictures are worth a thousand words, I give you the photo story:

Happy birthday to you;

happy birthday to you!

Happy birthday,

dear Holden!

Happy birthday

OH SNAP!

Most satisfying 1st-cake experience, ever.

This is how we do it, yo.

Papaw, you want a kiss?

How we convinced him to keep that hat on for so long is beyond me. Actually, I think he was a little distracted by the MMMM CHOCOLATE CAKE.

Apparently, Holden does not like getting his hands dirty. Never mind that I dug chocolate boogars out of his nose 24 hours after the party; his hands were clean! Once he determined that face-planting in the cake would yield minimal chocolate ingestion, he employed Papaw's hands to get to the rest of that elusive delight.

We opened presents much later, after most of the guests had left. Holden usually found it hard to divert his attention from one gift (or its box) to rip the paper off another one. He received and has had a great time playing with a number of awesome gifts, but that will have to wait for another post; I have work to do!

Cheater, Cheater, Pumpkin Eater!

2012-01-07T06:04:00.000-08:00

Burgundy's former school, Clear Lake High School, has been hit with a pretty big cheating scandal. It appears that about 200 seniors were caught cheating on their English IV semester exam. The result is that all the English IV exam grades have been voided, and students have the option to retake the exam or to have their grades calculated without the exam grade. Because the semester exam counts for 20% of the semester grade, this is a significant decision. Basically, by cheating on an exam the students otherwise would have failed, the students have ensured their GPAs won't be impacted at all by the grade.

Now according to the article linked above, it appears that the district still is investigating and has not decided yet on punishment. However, I don't understand what the delay is. From the CCISD Student Handbook, which students must sign every year certifying that they have read and understand the rules:

Academic Dishonesty will result in academic and/or behavioral consequences.
A. A grade of zero will be given on the work involved, and the grade of zero will be averaged with the other grades.
B. The building principal will be notified of all incidents of academic dishonesty. C. Other actions as determined by building principal such as assignment to In School
Suspension (ISS). (Page 68 of the Parent-Student Handbook from the ccisd.net website)

I don't understand why there's any confusion about what to do to the students caught cheating. They cheated. They do not deserve to choose not to take the final exam. They deserve a zero averaged into their semester grades. Yes, that impacts their college acceptance. Yes, it's a harsh penalty. And yes, they understood the risks when they decided to engage in the behavior. Voiding the final is not a punishment; it's a reward.

For example, take my daughter's Pre-AP Physics class. Her first nine weeks' average was an 82. Her second was an 86. Unfortunately, her semester exam was a disaster, and she earned (after many hours of hard work and study) a 76. This brought her semester average all the way down to an 82. If we could void that exam altogether, her semester average would be an 84. While this seems insignificant on the surface, Burgundy's GPA literally is within hundredths of a point of being in the realm of Ivy League eligibility, and the difference between her average without and with the exam is .2 GPA points. That matters.

I think CCISD has several reasons for its apparent leniency:

CLHS has an Exemplary rating, making it one of the best schools in the state, not just the district. Handing out 200 zeroes would significantly impact the school's overall competitive performance statewide. I'm not certain whether the Texas rating system impacts a school's budget allocation, but I think it does, and everything comes back to the money, honey.
CLHS has the highest concentration of moneyed families in the district. I swear to God, I am not exaggerating when I say that the parking lot at that high school has nicer cars than the parking lots at NASA. Parents with money have influence; I learned that firsthand. I just did not have the money to compete, to hire a lawyer, to campaign at the district level for action. I didn't have the money to run in the right circles to get people with power to give a damn about Burgundy's situation. The school and district administrators will be hurting their own and their friends' kids, and heavens, we can't have that.
CLHS is a high-pressure, extremely competitive environment. Giving 200 zeroes to seniors who won't have time to recover their grades will wreck some students' college aspirations and plans. Moreover, it will reduce the admissions rate that the school enjoys to some of the best universities in the nation, and students like Burgundy suddenly will be able to compete with the kids at Lake. Oh, the horror.

Frankly, none of these are compelling reasons to void the tests and let the kids choose whether to retake them. If they live in a world where they don't have to be responsible for their own actions, well, we're all screwed.

In closing, let me say this. If you really want to be fair, CCISD, why don't you reward the kids across the district who didn't cheat? Who studied hard and did their best? Why don't you let the kids who actually took responsibility and did not cheat either drop or retake their lowest semester exam? Oh, but we can't have that. Everyone here gets what they deserve. Unless they have money, apparently.

A Much Less Depressing Update

2012-01-06T04:45:00.000-08:00

I'm at a crossroads.

I'm pregnant again; Holden is a year old, and Burgundy's almost done with high school and suddenly in love with all her opportunities. Yesterday she got herself appointed to the prom committee; today she picked up an application to join student council. Her Gold Award project is gathering its own momentum with one of the Assistant Principals now advocating with the district to allow her to use its facilities and advertise district-wide free of charge. She's spearheading an effort to get an elected student advisory committee for the Class of 2013 booster club, and she joined the district's robotics team, the Robonauts.

Meanwhile, we're trying to decide where to allocate our meager funds for traveling to potential universities over spring break. Rice remains her first choice university; she plans to apply there for early admission. Her second choice is Harvard, and Stanford and University of Chicago are tied for her third choice. After that she's lumped Princeton, University of Colorado, University of California, Abilene Christian University, University of Houston, Southern Methodist, Vanderbilt, and God Knows Where Else into her pile of, "Sure, we can try that," options. Since we live next door to Rice and they're already involved in her Gold Award project, we can tour there anytime. Her remaining, "OMG MOM I HAFTA TOUR THERE," options are in Massachusetts, Illinois, and California. We do NOT have that kind of money, so we have some tough choices. Harvard also is involved in her Gold Award project, so it seems prudent to tour there, and we can hit Princeton while we're at it.

I didn't mean for this entry to ramble on about Burgundy's school stuff, but I suppose that's the brain dump I needed.

How does all this put me at a crossroads? I guess because I don't know what to do with myself (other than survive). I would really like to bring in $500 a month regularly in home-based income by the end of the year. There are so many ways for me to make this happen that I feel like I can't possibly make any of them happen.

My options: Let me enumerate them for you:

Pampered Chef. I've done it before; I like their merchandise, and I like doing the parties. It feels crazy, but the tools sell themselves, and I really love cooking and teaching others how.
Continue selling my bread. I have a couple of customers who would buy regularly if I baked regularly. So far, I haven't been able to make myself churn out a batch a week, much less the batch a day I would need to sell $500 in bread every month. It's do-able, though.
Tutor high school and early college students in English and writing.
Teach a class on finding and cooking local, sustainable foods.
Freelance writing and editing.
Prostitution. Ha ha, just checking to see who's reading.
No really, prostitution. Without a pimp, I could make a killing.
Okay, that took up three numbered options; any respectable list should have 10; surely I can come up with two more.
Home inventory: basically, I would help people inventory and document their homes' contents for use in the event they need to file with their insurance for hurricane, flood, or fire damage.
Life coach (because mine is going so brilliantly well). I seriously think the world could do with an attitude adjustment about fat people, and it needs to start with us fatties. Fat is not the problem; self-image, love of others, and poor nutrition and health are the problem.

Things I WON'T do:

Prostitution. Jeez, people. Give me a break. ~~Nobody's going to pay a fatty for sex.~~ I mean, I have WAY too much self-respect for that.
Knit for money. Just to make minimum wage, I'd have to charge something like $250 for a pair of socks. Too much work, not enough dollars.
Substitute teach. I am not a fan of other people's children at large. I love lots of individual offspring of other people. I do not want to endure abuse from the population of children at large in return for bureaucratic nonsense and $8/hour. Christ, I could do better with less abuse at Starbucks.
Work outside the home. I am qualified to make pretty decent dough working in the professional world, and I voluntarily gave that up to stay home with my children.
Ghost write someone else's blog for $.01 a word. Seriously? I can't even keep up with my own damn blog.

I have some pretty consistent problems (personal problems) that get in the way of making any of the money-making ideas work.

Follow-through. I no can haz. Really. My last order for bread (pizza crust, actually) was in October. I still haven't delivered. She's being very patient.
Enthusiasm. I get really sold on an idea really fast, and then I realize that in the grand scheme of things, I don't actually give a flying fart. See also #1.
Everything Else Life Demands. I usually don't have the energy to wash diapers and cook dinner in the same day. Running a business, even at 10 hours a week, seems a foolish idea if I can't keep the basics taken care of.

The foregoing lead me to a second conclusion: I have to do something about my energy and fitness levels. Please don't mistake this for, "I have to go on a diet and start exercising all the time because I'm FAT OMGWTFBBQ!" However, regular exercise contributes to better sleep and better energy levels, and I know it will make my next labor and delivery less agonizing. Better eating also contributes to better energy levels and improved overall health, and given my near brush with gestational diabetes during my pregnancy with Holden, it's imperative for health reasons to eat well right now.

I hesitate to say, "From now on, I will take a 30 minute walk every day and eat only wholesome, local foods." I won't do either religiously; however, I've cooked every night this week, and tonight I made a delicious quiche with homemade crust and mustards harvested from my backyard five minutes before they were needed.

Thus my crossroads. It isn't as easy as, "just commit." Even with healthful eating and daily exercise, sometimes I just don't give a rip. However, I only have two real resolutions this year, and both of them require me to be better organized, to increase my energy, and to put some routine and self-love into my day to day life. We'll see how it goes.

Holden's First Birthday; What Will I Remember in Ten Years?

2012-01-05T16:55:00.000-08:00

Holden's first birthday was last week on the 28th. We're having his party this Sunday at our house; let the stress rain down.

God, our house is a dump. The garage is full of crap. Shelf upon shelf of musty, dusty, often mildewed books "rescued" by Mark from other people's trash line two of the walls. At least 20 large boxes are stacked four and five boxes high, forming a wall barring access to the books and housing all the things Mark can't throw away: movie stubs, binders of his work in high school and college, boxes of pens and reams of paper. A third wall houses all the games we never play and with which Mark can not bring himself to part. A large, never-used table saw, an air hockey table (likewise virginal), and a dining table and six chairs given to us by Burgundy's grandmother eclipse any hope of actually parking in the garage, and our cats live in there. Enough said.

Inside the house, our pantry's contents have found their way out and onto the floor in front of the pantry. The laundry room exists in a perpetual state of overflow. Our dog lives mostly outside, but at night he sleeps in the guest bathroom. Guess what that room smells like? Well, dog and dirty diapers; Holden's diaper pail provides a heady, pungent aroma that permeates the back half of the house, eclipsing the fragile wisps of candle smoke competing for recognition in our olfactory palette. My craft room has a treacherous, 3-foot long, winding path by which I can reach my desk to sigh over unpaid bills and pray for a rain of money. The hallway is crowded with about 10 boxes of Christmas decorations, more than half of which never went up in the first place.

Throughout the house, baseboards are mismatched in both size and color, and walls bear the distinctive striping of people rubbing against them in an attempt to traverse a pathway without knocking something over. The front and back yards are overgrown (in January!); our lawn mower is broken, and I have no idea where to even start with getting them cleaned up.

Somehow I must organize, clean, disinfect and somehow apply the mask that I keep in a jar by the door to my whole [profanity redacted] house by Sunday while attending to all doctor appointments, keeping Holden fed; keeping him from sucking on electrical cords; keeping him in dry, unsoiled diapers; keeping him from eating the dog and cat food (in all honesty, I sometimes give up on the latter in order to buy myself a precious 5-10 minutes in which to wash, dry, fold, and put away all the laundry in the house); making and cleaning up from dinner for the family; driving Burgundy all over creation with a happy smile on my face, and employing grace and dignity while dealing with all the minor emergencies that populate every human being's day to day life. All with 3-5 hours per night of sleep interrupted every 60-90 minutes by Holden's near obsessive need to suck on my teats. It goes on. And on. And on.

Once I've disguised our trashy hovel as the respectable suburban manse the world expects, I have to bake a cake for everyone and a cake for Holden, ice the damn things (can you believe the standards people hold me to?), and decorate the house for our illustrious guests.

I'm honestly tempted to pick up a cake at Wal-Mart, set the house on fire, buy a plane ticket to Paris (France, y'all; I don't think Paris, TX has an airport. Holy crap. Paris, TX has an airport), and let Mark handle the rest of the birthday party.

Christmas!

2011-12-25T07:44:00.000-08:00

Two days, two months; oh well. I have so much to feel guilty for; I won't add this blog to the list.

Merry Christmas! It's a bit chilly outside, but my snow peas and mustards are doing great. Even the broccoli appears to be growing. Sweet potato vines, alas, do not hold up well to the brisk wind that passes for autumn here in Houston. Drought? They thrived. But heavens, not a temp under 80!

I woke early and made a pan of cinnamon rolls and two loaves of fresh bread for Christmas breakfast. While waiting for the rolls to rise, I washed and put away the dishes from last night's dinner and washed this morning's bread dishes. I have no idea what to cook to go with the cinnamon rolls for breakfast. Eggs and sausage, I guess. I'd rather have nothing at all but the cinnamon rolls, but if I don't have at least a little protein with the junk, I might as well plan to lay in bed and lose the whole day.

I have a huge ham sitting on the stovetop waiting to be stuffed into the oven for late Christmas luncheon. Mark requested asparagus to go with Formal Christmas Dinner, and Burgundy wanted green bean casserole and macaroni and cheese. I have a great recipe from my friend Tiff for mac & cheese, so those four meager things will comprise our family meal.

The rolls are risen, as is Holden, whose cranky whine of indignation has alerted me to the unacceptably milkless condition of his nearly one-year-old existence. Even though I'd rather blog about Burgundy's wonderful Sweet 16 party, I'll go turn on the oven, cook breakfast, and feed the baby. Such is life, and it is good.

Baby Symphony

2011-10-18T08:22:00.000-07:00

It has taken me weeks of thinking and planning to bring myself back here. Holden learned to say Mama, Dada, Teeteetee (Sissy), sprouted 4 teeth, began imitating his Grandmother's cough and laughing like a loon. At each milestone, I thought of how I'd immortalize it, what I'd say to preserve the moment forever on the Internet. My days are filled with loads of diaper wash and hours of errands in the car, and one minute, hour and day bleeds into the next until the moment is gone, and I indulge in the wistful self-flagellation of my Baptist upbringing without ever actually doing anything to fix it.

This morning Mark let me sleep an extra hour, Holden snuggled softly against me, for once not demanding my breast in his sleep. At 8:30, I dragged myself into consciousness, and as we said goodbye to Daddy, I heard the wind howling around the house. There's a blissful chill outside today, and by blissful chill, I mean that with the wind, it might be in the low 70s out here. So I made myself a mocha, and I'm sitting on the swing, sipping the dregs and watching my sweet son, my boy-no-longer-an-infant, play in the flower garden at creating a scale model of the Desolation of Armageddon.

He's standing with help from furniture, knees, the dog, and hapless vegetation doomed to wilt under his weight. He surfs from edge to handhold to couch and back, and just today I think he mastered the art of squatting and standing up in one motion, using only the pole of the swing to keep his one-handed balance. A couple of days ago, He began sitting upright on his knees, realizing that it was a faster route to standing up than sitting on his butt.

He touches new things with only his index finger, eyebrows furrowed and lower lip sucked into his mouth until he decides he needs the additional experience of tasting and gumming the object. I try to keep the house clean, but Saturday I swear to God I found a man's toenail clipping in his mouth.

Burgundy loves school, and a good thing, because it's her whole life right now. Her first nine weeks' grades are finalized, and she has 4 As (100, 99, 99 and 90) and 3 Bs (86, 85, and 82). She's taking six out of 7 classes at the college level; I'm very impressed with her drive.

She's learning that life is full of setbacks and people who just don't care about your story. I guess I'm learning that, too. It's so difficult to see people treating your child unfairly or even with fair disregard. In my world, she'll never be just another kid with a late paper and a good story. It's vitally important though, so when she made the decision not to extend an appeal against what I thought was an unfair penalty, I honored it.

I want more than anything to storm the front office of the school with a broomstick in one arm and a baby in the other, hair wild and reeking of baby poop and sour milk and demand that they adjust the grade. Or. Else. It's her decision though, and if I'm honest, it's probably the right one. She has to work with this teacher the rest of the year, and the teacher did not count off as much as she could have.

My house is a mess. I have about 7/8 of a warp wound for a weaving project. There's a bright, clean patch on the library rug where the dog took a dump. Mark shampooed the carpet. Just that spot. I hesitate to do more than giggle about it because if I'd had to do it, Mark eventually would have had to clean up both vomit and dog crap.

Holden pulls every object off of every surface he can reach, and I must be on constant, high alert for his ginger exploration of sundry electrical plugs with his baby index finger. So far, there has been very little oral exploration. He did manage to get enough slobber in the end of my MacBook plug that I had to buy a new one.

I volunteer with Burgundy's Class of 2013 Booster Club. We're raising funds to throw the kids the best Project Graduation party ever. As of right now, I haven't done nearly enough, but I'm working on a fundraiser next week (we're selling BBQ sandwiches at lunch), and I have several thank you notes to write on behalf of the elected board.

I have gone so far as to reserve the venue for Burgundy's sweet 16. We're having a masquerade ball, and I found a banquet hall that seats 300 (no, she's not inviting even half that many) for $150 on a weeknight. Her birthday is December 18, so we're holding the ball on Monday, December 19. First day of Christmas break. I'm really looking forward to this; I think it will be awesome.

I've enjoyed writing; alas, my list of things to do is long and detailed, and I am having my hair cut in less than an hour. My son is exploring the detritus in the cracks of our sidewalk, and I really should eat something besides chocolate and milk for breakfast. Until next time (and praying that will be tomorrow).

2010 Christmas Letter

2011-06-30T07:15:00.001-07:00

Holding Space

What Now

2011-06-15T13:23:00.000-07:00

I'm overwhelmed; I'm not ashamed to say so. I begin to fear that I will not get even half of what's important done, much less everything. This sense, I'm certain, is exacerbated by the fact that I spend a goodly portion of my day ~~killing zombies with watermelons, cabbages, corn, and peas~~ playing ~~video games~~ one particular video game on my cell phone.

Holden is sitting up with very little assistance. That is, I have to sit him up and make sure he has something to lean against, but he's practicing holding himself upright. Even now, he's sitting beside me on the couch, munching on his sock monkey, and he's been doing so for a good ten minutes.

Burgundy is home this week, and we put the kibosh on most all social stuff so that she and I could get to work on her academic stuff, cleaning the house, and preparing for her mission trip next week with the U.M. A.R.M.Y. She spent this morning updating her online resume and choosing which scholarship she wants to apply for this week. We're going to apply for one, no matter how small, every week until school starts. After that, we'll re-evaluate.

I'm finally pulling together Holden's birth announcement, and I want to mail it before his six-month birthday. So I have . . . less than two weeks. Holy crap.

We have let him taste several solid foods over the last couple of weeks. Banana was the most rousing failure. He continues to blanch and shudder for several minutes after every taste. Oddly, the most successful so far has been a lemon wedge. He lunges for the wedge when we eat out, and he cries when he drops it. I think it feels good on his (as-yet unrevealed) teeth, but that doesn't explain his indifference toward oranges and lime.

Right now, I have tons more work to do, and so little time left! Just wanted to pop in and say I'm still alive!

Craftiness

2011-06-08T05:23:00.000-07:00

Holden bounces like this every morning. He wakes, we nurse, and after a diaper change, I put him in the bouncer. He spends the next half hour (often more) burning off energy in true boy fashion. God help me when he goes mobile.

I made a mocha this morning, and I'm sipping it slowly while working on this blog entry. I fell off the housework wagon. I even fell off the keeping-up-with-the-laundry wagon. Right now, I just want to make my bed for a few days in a row. And slow way down on the sugar. I am a grown-up, yes. That does not mean I may eat Oreos for breakfast.

I bought a weaving loom. Upstairs Studio, a local fiber arts store (so much more than just yarn), took two floor looms on consignment. The smaller of the two holds up to 20 yards of woven fabric up to 60" wide. I decided to give up my table loom (24" wide) and my spinning wheel in order to buy it. I need to sell both, and I'll list them on Ravelry today. It's going to be difficult to say goodbye to the wheel, but I know in my heart that I just didn't "click" with spinning. I still have a lovely two or three drop spindles and plenty of fiber, so I'm sure all will be well.

I bought the loom because I've always had an interest in weaving, and I've decided to try my hand at plaid. My little brother wants a kilt; ultimately, I'd love to be able to weave him a true kilt in his family colors.

Meanwhile, I need to finish a pair of slippers I agreed to knit on commission (just about halfway done), and I have no idea on what project I'd like to work next. I still have a pair of socks on the needles, and I recently pulled out the 936 granny squares I've crocheted over the last 12 years to make an afghan. Also, several friends are crocheting another afghan, so I felt compelled to buy the yarn to make it, too. Meanwhile, Holden needs socks, and I want to start on a sweater for which I bought the yarn last November, also for Holden.

Right now, though, I guess I'd better rotate the laundry and make my bed. I can do anything for 5 minutes.

School's [Almost] Out for the Summer

2011-06-01T11:30:00.000-07:00

Burgundy, smart little monkey that she is, earned exemption from all of her core classes' final exams. She had to take Band, Introduction to Education and Training, and German II. Band did not actually have a final exam, and the final grade for IET was a project they put together in class throughout the semester. I am sitting in a comfy chair at Starbucks, amusing Holden and typing while Burgundy works with her tutor to prepare for the German test, and after tomorrow, she is free.

Holden stares hopelessly out the window, contemplating
potential uses for his amazing toejam.

Holden's hair is starting to thicken, and I've noticed glints of golden at certain angle. At present, he's cramming a stuffed elephant into his mouth and drooling copiously. I'm rather impressed with his powers of drool. However, his truly astonishing superpower is toejam production. I never thought a baby could have icky feet, but holy God, Holden's sweaty feet rival my own. Sometimes they merely clam up. Others, he produces a veritable sweat slick more slimy than an athlete's. He produces toejam from thin air, and when be-socked, he produces vegetation. I swear, he makes lint-infused toejam vines. I don't really nom his sweet feet anymore.

Burgundy's hair reaches halfway down her back. Her lithe figure is that of a self-assured young woman. She smiles, and the young men fall before her like wheat before a scythe. Her summer promises a time of reflection and fun. She and I are going to take cooking classes and attend a woman's Bible study together. She'll take her first college-level class at the local community college; it's a speech class. We also need to enroll her to audit a calculus class in preparation for the AP Calculus class next year.

I think I've decided to go ahead with enrolling her at the other high school for the 2011-12 school year. That school has had a number of problems this year, so I am not certain of the wisdom of this decision, but I think it will at least place Burgundy back in the peer group for which she has pined so relentlessly the past two years.

And now, I have lunch to eat before my beautiful son decides he must be held.

Housework Lists

2011-05-24T08:36:00.000-07:00

Mark is gone on travel this week, so Burgundy, Holden and I are throwing parties and living the high life in the absence of his sobering aspect. Last night, Burgundy and I played Ghost Parcheezi. It's where you put all the colors on the board, and each player gets an extra set of players to manipulate. When we have three players, everyone takes turns manipulating the one ghost player. It can get wicked and quickly.

After Ghost Parcheezi, Hannah and Christi came over, and we engaged in yarny arts while hanging out. Burgundy studied for her Chemistry test. Holden had naked time and refrained from assaulting anyone with his urine.

This morning, I had an appointment with the doctor, and I stopped into the firm where we do our retirement investing. I still need to rollover my Roth 401K from the last job into my Roth IRA. Now Holden is napping, and I'm trying to decide whether to nap myself or do some more housework. I feel as though I will never catch up on the housework; ironically, it makes me even more determined at least to maintain what I've done so far. Happily, with school being out after next week, Burgundy is a little more able to help. A good thing, all in all.

I think that for today, I'll finish the diapers and start another load. I'll clean the Kitchen and do the Half-hour Housework Maintenance (H3M). I'll sort the mail and spend some time, maybe 10 minutes, on my desk. And somewhere in there, I'll take a nap. Oh, and I'll call the exterminators, because the darned fleas are here.

Completed:

H3M: Both bathrooms cleaned
H3M: Both bathrooms + kitchen swept
H3M: Spot cleaned kitchen floor
Kitchen clean-up: Emptied recycling, cleaned up trash everywhere, moved all dirty dishes to the sink, put away food
Mail sorted
Diapers washed
Change sheets and make bed (Holden barfed on the sheets I had just changed following his decision to pee on my pillow the other day)
Wash dishes and put away clean dishes

To-do (and here I thought I'd done so much already:

10 minutes on desk
Vacuum carpets
Sweep living room and hallways
2 minutes on crap-magnet
Grocery shopping

Monday Monday

2011-05-23T08:13:00.000-07:00

This morning, I've enjoyed a leisurely cup of coffee - a vanilla latte that I made myself at home - and spent some time gazing out the kitchen window into my awfully overrun backyard and garden. Holden sat in his Bumbo seat for a time, staring with me and chewing on his teddy bears. He tired quickly, though, so I transferred him to his swing. He graciously played in the swing for a few minutes, really just long enough for me to work up the desire to start a post. Now he's crying in earnest and beating the toy bar on the swing with fat, enraged, impotent little fists. I guess I'll go change his diaper.

Well that was an adventure in parenting self-confidence. First of all, Holden's diaper contained a considerable amount of poop. I mean, I'm pretty sure an adult male gorilla could have produced more, but I wouldn't actually lay a wager on it. So the poor kid had to sit in a diaper full of poop and wail and beat his fists against his swing in true furious despair to drag my attention away from the admittedly fascinating sight of my backyard. I mean, I've only lived here for seven years. Something in the backyard might have changed last night, and I needed to stare at it to know for sure.

Then, as I sweet-talked to him and wiped the poo off his poor little butt, I realized he wasn't cooing back. I glanced up to see him peeing into his mouth. Yes. I allowed my son to pee into his own mouth.

Yes, thank you all for voting for me for parent of the year. I'm so proud to have been selected and to stand as an example for all pa... what? You were voting me out of the running? Automatic disqualification?

I kinda feel like I should explain or make it better somehow. I mean, it all happened very fast. I don't think he got more than a couple of swallows. But then I realized that you know? It doesn't really matter how much or little urine was involved. My son just peed into his own mouth. I am both horrified and a little proud.

I had planned for this post to be a happy discussion of how I am coming along in the organization and planning, improving little by little. I think instead I'll go make another latte, but this time I'm adding liquor.

Progress

2011-05-18T07:21:00.000-07:00

It feels great to get back into the swing of things. I enjoy setting my own agenda and managing my day, accomplishing the goals I set to improve my home.

I didn't finish out my list yesterday, and it's tempting to feel like I'm behind. However, once I started on the game cabinet yesterday, I knew I wouldn't finish most of the rest of my stuff. I really wish I had taken a "before" picture. About halfway through the job, I wanted nothing more than to stuff everything back into the cabinet and shut the doors and lock them. I stayed with it, though, and it paid off. First, the pile of games for the garage sale Saturday:

Yeah, we buy games at garage sales.

Yes, that is three copies of Phase 10 you see there. And TCM Sceneit, Harry Potter Sceneit, the original Sceneit, and another Sceneit just because. And yes, that's a VCR and video cassette rewinder. So glad we're getting rid of those. We still have a DVD player that isn't even hooked up, but I'm not going to push my luck with that. I think the hardest thing for me to part with is the rubber band tommy gun made of pencils that's front and center in the photo. I've held on to it for a loooong time. Irrationally long time. But we all agreed: even though every child needs a rubber band tommy gun and twister and trouble, Holden won't be ready for them for some years yet, and we're not going to store this crap for years on the off chance he'll be interested in a few years. Removing all this stuff made the cabinet so much more accessible for the games we do play (and we play a number of games).

Yep, that's Axis and Allies - the original game with an
expansion pack - and Risk (also original).

You can see our projector on the top shelf. I sold my television to my parents for a hundred bucks in 1994 (I needed party money), and I've never looked back. Five or so years ago, we acknowledged that it would be nice to be able to watch movies at the house, so we bought the projector. The clear, relatively empty space below it is where we put the laptops for playing Netflix or DVDs, and it also houses the Wii. It's the perfect set up for our family. The Netflix account means that Burgundy and Mark watch more TV than I would like, but it still amounts to only 3-4 hours a week. And they enjoy it, so I just make sure to go to bed early. Besides, very soon, Holden and I can start watching Veggie Tales. Yay Netflix!

Last night Burgundy's band put on its Spring Concert. As always, they did a great job. Mark took video of it on his Flip camera (Christmas present), and I took a short video of four-month-old Holden staring enthralled at the stage, totally in awe of the music. Burgundy loaned her friend V a pair of my shoes, and they took Holden's picture in them. Personally, I think a boy with a big sister has more to fear than a girl with big brothers. I hope I can get the video downloaded and trimmed to their final piece, which was from Pirates of the Caribbean. Their director wore PotC Mickey Mouse ears complete with a pirate sash and an earring.

That's all for now! I'm tired from yesterday's work, but today's still must be done.

May 18: To Do

2011-05-17T20:03:00.000-07:00

Things I obviously don't want to do:

Call Samsung about phone repair
Put notes about Samsung call in Evernote

Yesterday's Leftover Tasks:

~~Laundry: diapers - fold - put away~~
Strike zone: Clean the front door
~~Call Dr. Moran re: Clear Brook transfer~~ Called yesterday - off campus. Called 9:50 AM today; he will have to call me back per Pam, his secretary.
Repair the crib
~~List bread machine on craigslist~~
~~10 minutes on finances~~
Put away tools in garage

Today's Tasks

~~Morning Routine: Make bed; potty pass; breakfast; dishes; process mail~~
Laundry: diapers - wash - dry - fold - put away
Laundry: towels - ~~wash~~ - ~~dry~~ - fold - put away
Call Comcast (CRITICAL)
~~List garage sale on Craigslist~~
Process one box in garage for garage sale
5 minutes on desk (sorting)
5 minutes on desk (actually doing tasks)
~~Write a real blog post~~

Parking Lot:

Get curtain rod from Lowes/Home Depot/Wherever
Hang curtains in the craft room

May 17: To-Do

2011-05-16T17:02:00.000-07:00

Okay, so I don't want this to get in the way of posting regular stuff, you know, about my family and all, so I'll go ahead and post tomorrow's to-do list separately.

This is where I'll concentrate my time in the living room;
it should actually complete the work! Yay!

Leftover Tasks from Yesterday

~~Fold and put away blue jeans~~
Call Samsung about phone repair
Put notes about Samsung call in Evernote
~~Dry towels (YES! I did an extra load!)~~
~~Fold and put away towels~~

Today's Tasks:

~~Morning Routine: Make bed; potty pass; make breakfast; put away dishes; clean up from breakfast; load of laundry; 2 minutes on the crap-magnet; process the mail~~
~~Laundry: white clothes - wash - dry - fold - put away~~ (supposed to have been Burgundy's colored laundry, but she didn't sort it.)
Laundry: diapers - ~~wash~~ - ~~dry~~ - fold - put away
Strike zone: Clean the front door
~~10 minutes in the living room (oh my God, it will be done!)~~
Call Dr. Moran re: Clear Brook transfer
~~Pick up Grandma Margie to help with Holden~~
~~Errands: Lowe's or Home Depot - Curtain rod for craft room; hardware to fix the crib~~ Did not get the curtain rod. I'm not going to get the curtains hung today anyway, and it's an extra cost. I'm waiting.
~~Hem Burgundy's dress for band performance~~
Repair the crib
Hang curtains in the craft room
~~Clean out game cabinet~~
List bread machine on craigslist
5 minutes on desk (sorting)
5 minutes on desk (actually doing tasks)
10 minutes on finances
Put away tools in garage
Process one box in garage for garage sale

Monday is Half-Hour Housework Day!

2011-05-16T11:06:00.000-07:00

But I haven't started yet. I feel like I always will be behind, and even though I know the best way to defeat that feeling is to just do something - anything - I have trouble making myself follow through. I've had a productive day, though. Before leaving the house this morning, I folded and put away a load of diapers and a load of towels. I put another load of diapers in the machine to pre-rinse, and early this morning, I had already done a load of dishes and made breakfast.

Around mid-morning, I went to have bloodwork drawn to see if I'm anemic. It would explain a lot of the symptoms I've had lately. I can't seem to recover from a low-grade cough and sore throat (could be allergies). I'm exhausted all the time. My period was over a week late (so glad I wasn't pregnant). And so on. If I were a better housewife, I would have bought a liver at the farmer's market on Saturday and prepared it for myself and my husband. In some fancy french way. Alas, I'm not, so I didn't.

I don't know why I'm so put off by the idea of preparing and eating organ meats. Let's think about it from an emotionless standpoint. Why am I willing to eat a cow's buttcheek or shoulder, a pig's cured belly, or a chicken's chest muscles, but I'm not willing to eat a piece of liver? Or heart? These are supposed to be some of the healthiest meats I could eat, especially while breastfeeding. Why so hesitant? Cow's ass vs. cow's liver: Why is the liver the unappetizing option?

Photo courtesy of foodpeoplewant.com

And before you say it tastes funny, I have the power of Julia Child in my kitchen. I have faith that her many menus for preparing liver will provide me with a delicious option. In fact, I know for certain I am inhibited by squeamishness, not flavor: Last month, my lovely sister-in-law insisted that I try barbacoa (basically a cooked cow's head). I did so under duress, making clear that I did not want to. And once I did, I had to admit that I could not tell the difference between it and other shredded, marinated cow meats in a tortilla. It tasted great. And one still can not pay me to buy barbacoa on my own, much less to consider cooking it. Sorry. Still too squeamish. So yeah, I should buy and cook a liver. It's still a long way from cow head, but not too far away from cow butt.

So yeah, I had my blood drawn, then I ate breakfast and returned a book. I came home again and put the diapers on a wash cycle after laying Holden down to sleep. I still need to make my bed, wipe down the toilets, spend 2 minutes on a crap magnet, and do my weekly bit of half-assed housework. It's half-assed because the point is not to be thorough. The point to the floors vacuumed, bathrooms scrubbed, and kitchen floor cleaned in one half-hour sweep. Efficiency of completeness.

After that, I want to spend 10 minutes throwing away trash in the living room and 10 minutes putting away clutter in the same room. And then I'm going to use that room as a staging area for the garage sale I plan to have this weekend. Finally, my goal is to put up one craigslist ad per day for stuff in our home that we're not using. Each add takes me about 20 minutes including taking and uploading photos, so one a day is kinda ambitious. So yeah, today's checklist:

~~Get bloodwork done~~
~~Return book to Borders~~
~~Fold diapers (yesterday's load)~~
~~Fold towels (yesterday's load)~~
~~Wash diapers~~
~~Dry diapers~~
~~Wash blue jeans~~
~~Fold and put away diapers~~
~~Dry blue jeans~~
Fold and put away blue jeans
~~Call dentist about refund~~
~~Put notes about dentist call in Evernote~~
Call Samsung about phone repair
Put notes about Samsung call in Evernote
~~Check for Burgundy's Science National Honor Society paperwork~~
~~Deliver Science NHS paperwork to school if necessary~~ Not necessary, as it turns out. Due next Friday.
Morning Routine: ~~Make bed, potty pass~~, ~~2 minutes crap-magnet~~, ~~sort mail, 1 load laundry, 1 load dishes~~
~~Housework Half hour~~
~~10 minutes pick-up~~
~~10 minutes trash toss~~

I'm so pleased with how well my work paid off
in the living room today!

I'll update as I get stuff done, I guess. Tomorrow, my MIL will come over to watch the baby, so I need to plan this evening what I want to accomplish with her here. I slept last week. Don't want to "waste" that time again by resting. Jeez, what am I, a new mom?

Update at 1:45 PM: I finished the half-hour of housework with 2 minutes to spare just as the baby started to cry. I cussed all the way through it, but it's done, and that's a first since Holden's birth. Now I just have to repeat that every week.

Update at 6:51 PM: Holy cow! I've done everything on my list except folding jeans and calling Samsung, and I even made dinner! I'm sore all over, though. My back is killing me! I hate PMS.

This One's for the Children

2011-05-13T14:01:00.000-07:00

First, I haven't spoken of my beloved firstborn in far too long. Burgundy continues to amaze and impress at every turn. This year's science fair project compared bacterial growth on pasteurized milk, to see how fat content affected bacterial growth. She won fourth place at her high school science fair and progressed to the district fair, where she took second. In early April, she went to the Houston-wide science fair for the second year in a row.

She attended the Military Ball again this year with Ben, whom she'd been dating for about a year when they went. They're on hiatus right now, which probably is best. Both of them were mildly interested in other kids, so they took a break.

She was inducted into the National Honor Society two weeks ago, and she received an invitation to the Science National Honor Society. Here she's posing with her Honoree, her 7th grade English teacher, Ms. B.

Just two days ago, Burgundy ordered her letterman jacket for her high school. She already has three letters: two for science fair and one for band. I still giggle inside every time I consider the fact that she lettered for science fair as a freshman. We could not afford to go all out on the package; even though the school pays for the jacket itself, we have to pay for all the patches and to have them sewn on. We paid for one letter, her graduation year, having her last name embroidered on the front, a huge (4" tall) script patch of her first name on the back, and a nickname embroidered into the first-name patch on back.

Burgundy's the first family finance decision consisted of ordering the letter jacket. We explained that the jacket would come out of family money. We could pay or the full package ($199), a partial package ($140), or a very basic package ($110). Each option affected the family budget in different ways. If we paid for a full package, there would be other things we wouldn't be able to pay for later. If we split the cost with her, it would make a different kind of impact. We let her look at the family financial situation and the options and then make the decision herself. She went with the partial package, and we are paying for all of it. I will have to sew the additional letters onto the jacket, but I think that's okay. I'm willing.

And speaking of Burgundy's intelligence with money, she finished saving and paying for her trip to Orlando, Universal Studios, and Disney World, then saved an additional $250 in spending money. She went in early April, and she had such a great time. She bought a wand at Ollivander's in Harry Potter World, and when I asked her if it was made of real wood, she said, "Pff. No. I paid thirty-eight dollars for a plastic stick." She cracks. me. up.

Holden is four months old. Maybe four and a half. He's made so many changes; it seems he does something new every few days. He laughed, really laughed, for the first time on April 30. He smiles quite often, and just in the last three or four days, he's begun giving kisses. Last night, he grabbed his toes for the first time while I changed his diaper. He loves naked time now, and his favorite game is pat-a-cake.

I think he is not much of an adventurer. He enjoys swinging backward in my arms, but he does not enjoy being upside down, sudden movements, or big surprises. Burgundy loved all those things, but Holden's eyes widen, and he actually grimaces. His lower lip pulls away from his mouth like a [ set on its back, and he flares his nostrils.

We just finished a six-week Kindermusic class, which he seemed to enjoy. He began to smile when we play peek-a-boo while at Kindermusic two weeks ago, and I could swear that I caught him holding up a hand as if to wave last week.

Just this week, he found his tongue, and he has been sticking it out with his mouth wide open, as if to relish the experience of air moving over his tongue. He has a very expressive face, and his most familiar face is "anxious." I fear he inherited Daddy's anxiety levels. We'll have to do what it takes to ensure he feels secure in his home as he grows.

He started teething in earnest last week, and now experiences most of his teething pain in the evening. We still can't see any teeth beneath the gums, but when we pull out the Orajel tube, he goes from crying to cooing immediately.

It won't rain here for any significant period. Yesterday there were thunderstorm warnings all over the place. It was a light spring rain and lasted less than an hour. I feel like a dried-out husk.

I have made my bed today, and I've run numerous errands. I met with the principal at Burgundy's school, returned a book, went to half-price books and Lowe's. I picked up my MIL for her help with Holden, dried a load of diapers and washed a load of colors. I made my bed and sorted the mail. I still need to do the potty pass and two minutes on the crap-magnet. And I'm sick, so I really just want to go to bed.

Living the Dream

2011-05-12T08:01:00.000-07:00

So it turns out that being a stay-at-home mom really is a dream-come-true. I have to admit, I was afraid that I would be home for a couple of months, then realize I was bored stiff and hated it. That has not happened; anything but.

Here's an ironic thing: I never thought I would derive a sense of personal satisfaction and fulfillment from having clean toilets. I never dreamed that it would hurt me is my husband didn't notice said clean toilets.

Back when I started this blog, I wrote about my housework routines. Well, I'm back at them. During the pregnancy, I was so sick that I could barely function, much less keep up the house. I was surprised and pleased at how easy it was to get back into the swing of things once Holden was born and I didn't feel terrible all the time. Previously, I made sure to make my bed, wipe down the toilet, open and sort the mail, wash, dry, fold and put away one load of laundry, and wash, dry fold, and put away one load of dishes. I've been doing most of these things most days, and I added washing a load of diapers every day.

So far today, I've

Made the bed
Washed dishes and emptied the dishwasher
Folded and put away diapers, started another load of diapers, and washed and dried a load of dark clothes
Wiped down the toilets in both bathrooms
Checked and updated the grocery list, planning for tonight's dinner.

With a wee baby, it takes me the better part of the day to accomplish these few things, but it's getting better and better. I'm starting to add other routines, weekly things and projects. So today, I'm going to spend 20 minutes decluttering my living room; it's still full of tools, etc, from JB's last visit. He insulated the attic over our bedroom, by the way. Thank goodness!

Right now though, it's time to change a cranky baby's diaper, make my lunch, take us grocery shopping, and go to our Kindermusic class.

Oh my goodness. Poor little guy. I almost feel bad about waking him up to take him out of the bouncer.

An Update from San Antonio

2011-03-17T23:02:00.000-07:00

Burgundy, Holden and I are in San Antonio, visiting the most awesome sister-in-law and brother in the universe. We drove over here Wednesday evening, and we're leaving Sunday.

Burgundy spent the first part of spring break at our church doing UM Army. This was her first time to participate in an actual UM Army event; last year, she attended "boot camp" in the summer, which is intended to prepare youth who are too young to participate at the full event. UM ARMY stands for United Methodist Action Reach-out Mission by Youth. Young people from churches all gather at one church, organize into teams, and go out into the community to perform work for people who need it. This week, Burgundy's team tore out and replaced the subfloor and floor in a wheelchair-bound man's bathroom and repaired the floor in his kitchen. They also patched his siding, leveled his stove, and hauled off a broken refrigerator. Other groups, painted, built wheelchair ramps, repaired rooves, and served people in our community in many other ways.

Holden will be 12 weeks old in just four more days. At last measure (9 days ago), he was 14 pounds, 12 ounces. He currently wears size 3-6 months clothes. In short, my son is huge. He tries to talk to us now, cooing and gurgling and occasionally squealing. He smiles often and beautifully now, and when he does, it lights up my world.

Today, he started trying to use his abdominal muscles to pull himself into a sitting position from a semi-reclining one. When he was 3 weeks, 2 days old, he lunged at me from Mark's lap. The last month has seen copious drooling, and he spits up at least once now after every meal. He still doesn't care for car seats or long car rides, but 3 days ago I bathed him, and he appeared to enjoy it. He even smiled at me a few times.

Everyone tells me that he looks like me. I think he must, because the only features that I can really identify as Mark's are his eyes. They are large and rich and beautiful; however, he even inherited my slight slant to his eyes. He hair remains mostly blond, but sometimes in the sunlight I think I see a glint of red. I want a "ginger" so desparately. But I'll love him even if he's blond.

Burgundy competed in science fair again this year with wondrous results. She placed 4th in her school for health and medicine, and she placed 2nd in the district; she'll go to the Houston-wide science fair in April now.

She made a 190 on her PSAT this year, which as a Sophomore qualified her for an invitation to an exclusive and very effective prep course for the exam. The PSAT/National Merit Scholar classification is the pivot point for a number of scholarships.

Right now, I still have a chance of sleeping tonight, so I'm signing off.

I could be less consistent.

2011-02-04T10:43:00.000-08:00

Holden is 5 weeks and 3 days old. Yesterday he wanted to eat every 2 - 2.5 hours all day. I obliged, hoping he'd sleep through the night. He did not. He wanted to nurse all night, too. Today he does not want to eat every two hours, so I'm presently attached to the Booby Sucking Machine of Doom, which thankfully has a hands-free option, and I'm watching Holden do what I so desparately desire for myself: Sleep.

In the last couple of weeks, he has started to coo and gurgle without it being a presage of imminent screaming fits. I love cooing back at him, making faces at him and watching him try to process them, watching the little faces that he makes when he's pooping, peeing, or excited about the cool breeze on his nether bits while being changed.

He's just woken from a sleep previously so deep and gratifying that not even milk expressed into his mouth could induce him to wake and nurse. Now that I'm typing, my boobs are attached to the machine, and Burgundy is in the shower, he's awake and has just begun to scream.

Ha! What a little curmudgeon! He's out to get me. I turned the computer to get a shot of him wailing with my webcam, and he went back to sleep. His habit of thwarting me does not bode well for the future.

Three Weeks Postpartum

2011-01-19T19:11:00.000-08:00

I suspect I'm moving too fast. There's so much to do, and I'm so exhausted, and I'm afraid that if I let anything go, all of it will go to Hell in a handbasket. Just today, I:

Made the bed (HUGE accomplishment given how dearly I wanted to crawl back into it)
Sorted through all the clothes in the dresser and made a huge pile for Goodwill and a much smaller pile of cotton tee-shirts to be turned into diapers
Folded and put away a load of laundry
Took Burgundy's UM Army registration form and fee to the church
Went to the midwife's clinic to pick up my copy of the video of Holden's birth (absolutely not! I will not post that)
Went to a local yarn store to show off Holden, visited with dear Jordan and Clarice, and ate some damn fine chocolate
Attended chemistry tutorials with Burgundy
Heated leftovers for dinner
Ordered photo prints for Burgundy's science fair project
Cleaned up dishes from dinner
Washed, dried, folded and put away a load of diapers
Washed and currently drying a load of jeans
Washing a load of tablecloths, napkins and other random crap
Made a giant batch of granola (oh granola! How I have missed you!)

Let us not overlook the fact that the Parasite still wants to eat every 2-3 hours.

Tomorrow, I need to get a hands-free pumping bra so I can pump my excess milk and knit. Not that Holden leaves any milk for pumping. No, he guards his treasured horde of boob juice with a burning, jealous rage. If I try to pump one side while he nurses the other, he squinches up his face so his eyes fold away into the crease across his nose, and he alternates between the squinch-face and a death-glare at the Medela, which continues its swisch-gulp, swisch-gulp, swisch-gulp rhythmic sucking, oblivious to the danger it courts from a fat little three-week-old booby tyrant. And you can see that he's starving, right? I mean, clearly there's not enough milk to feed both man and machine. He's only gaining about a pound a week, after all.

And with that short but tantalizing insight into our fascinating life and times, Holden would have me sign off because he is starving y'all. Wasting away into nothing, while the Milk Lady just sits there and types as though nothing is wrong. It has been two and a half hours, and he is faint with hunger!

And the Stats . . .

2011-01-13T12:56:00.000-08:00

Holden was born at 8:38 PM on December 28, 2010, a Tuesday. He weighed 9 pounds, 2 ounces, and his head was 14.5". He was 22" long.

In spite of my absolute conviction that I would tear apart as I pushed him out, I had only one very minor tear, requiring 3 stitches. That was less tearing than with my 7 pound, 4 ounce daughter.

Labor lasted, from first notice of clock and contraction to Holden's birth, 12 hours and 8 minutes. This was 22 minutes shorter than my first labor.

Perhaps because of the difficulties I had in the labor, the intense pain, and the cord around Holden's neck, I am more firmly convinced than ever that our home was the very safest place for us to be during this labor. Hospital protocols would have cut his cord earlier, but its delivery of life support while we brought Holden around to breathing on his own was crucial. Well-meaning hospital staff would have intervened much earlier when I made my first tentative pushes. If I had made it to the screaming, out-of-my-head point, I surely would have been sedated and sectioned. I'm pretty sure my neighbors could hear me screaming. Finally, Holden stayed with me from the very first moment of his life. He never had to scream alone in a sterile nursery under observation to prove to strangers that he was alive enough to be with his family.

Ultimately, I'm very happy with the labor and its outcome. While I never want to endure that level of pain again, I know that a good bit of it was brought about by my ambivalence over having another child at this point and after so much trouble in our marriage. I know that I was blessed with caregivers who could allow me to suffer, as difficult as that was, until I had resolved myself.

I Had A Lot To Think About

2011-01-12T12:28:00.000-08:00

To give fair warning, the birth was not easy and was not what I expected. I would do it again in a heartbeat, but this story is not sprinkled falsely with fairy farts and hippy flowers and the Untold Joys of Squooshing a ~~Butterball Turkey~~ Baby out of My Nether Bits. That's Burgundy's birth story, which I've yet to write in 15 stinking years. Not traumatic enough, I guess.

Ultimately, I decided on a plan of increasing aggression against the wee parasite. I would wake Tuesday morning, go for an ultrasound and run a couple of errands. Then we would have Christmas lunch with Mark's parents, keeping it to a reasonably short visit. When we came home, I planned to take black and blue cohosh tincture and have Mark massage my uterus with castor oil. I really didn't want to drink that stuff.

My Wise Woman Herbal for the Childbearing Year assured me that these steps all were efficacious in starting labor assuming the baby was ready. The same book recommended ingesting the castor oil only after taking these steps; I happily complied. I decided that if labor did not begin Tuesday night, then Wednesday morning would find me in the kitchen, gagging down castor oil.

I went to bed Monday night with the plan fixed in my mind, relieved finally to have resolved on a course of action.

Tuesday morning I woke at 8:30 and went to the bathroom. When I wiped, I came away with traces of my mucous plug, and when I stood, I had a contraction. I lay back down and snuggled against Mark, telling him what had happened. Five minutes later, I had another contraction. Mark and I decided to go ahead with our errands for the day, and after several more contractions came in rhythm, I texted Jackie, our midwife, to tell her what was happening. We cancelled the ultrasound.

I have no idea why I thought it was so important, but over the course of the morning, I insisted that we go shopping. We went to Michael's for green beads, and when we couldn't find the right shade of green there, we went to Hobby Lobby. I suppose I thought that I might knit so much after the baby came that I would run out of the beads. We went to a local yarn store for a purse to give Mark's mom for Christmas, and we went to Kroger for carrots and broccoli, because I knew I could not live without them while laboring. I continued to have contractions throughout the shopping, terrifying the store clients, thrilling the store staff and doubtless puzzling my poor family beyond repair.

We made it home sometime between 12:30 and 1PM. Mark began setting up the birth pool in the living room, and I sat in the swing in the front yard to call Jackie. I told her the status and said that the contractions were getting intense enough that I couldn't laugh or talk through them. She said she would be on her way after making a couple of stops.

Meanwhile, Mark discovered the vagaries of indoor birth pools and their total lack of instruction on assembly. Once he finally got it assembled (amid my protests of, "I WANT TO BE IN THE WATER NOW. MAKE IT WORK."), he ran the water hose from the hot water heater relief valve to the pool and began filling it up. With cold water. We never have figured that one out. How do you get cold water out of a hot water heater?

While we worked this conundrum, the midwife's assistant, Camellia, arrived with instant calm. She chatted with me between contractions, encouraged me through the hard ones, and swapped stories with me about mutual friends; turns out, she'd heard Burgundy's birth story from Tracey years ago; she was thrilled to make the connection. It was pretty clear I wasn't having the baby anytime soon, so at Camellia's suggestion, Mark ran to Home Depot while I sat in the pool of tepid water, having Burgundy pour pitchers of hot water all around me during contractions.

After a couple of contractions, I discovered that looking right at someone and holding eye contact throughout a contraction really helped me to get through it. When Mark returned, I gave Burgundy the job of sitting across from me through every contraction and looking into my eyes.

Burgundy brought her own phenomenal energy to the birth. She stayed remarkably calm and collected throughout. As she sat across from me through each contraction, every time I began saying, "Nooo, nooo, nooo, nooo, no," or shaking my head, Burgundy would very firmly nod her head yes while pursing her lips to remind me how to breathe.

With the pool filled up with hot water and Jackie present, labor continued to do its job. I remember needing to pee so, so badly, but I simply could not do it. At one point I sat on the toilet in the bathroom, looked at Jackie, and said, "I don't want to do this. I don't want to! I already have a kid; I've done this already, and I don't want to do it again!" I don't know what she thought, but she just smiled and said, "Well, it's coming, and you can't stop it now." Camellia chose that moment to compliment my well-shaped, nursing-ready nipples. I have no idea why that helped, but there you have it. Existential crisis? Grab it by the boobs.

I labored in the pool; I labored in the bed. I knelt, squatted, sat, stood, floated and leaned through the contractions. At one point, Mark had to hold my leg in the air, pushing back against my foot while I used him for leverage. Eventually, Jackie asked if she could check me, and she discovered that I had a little cervical lip. She tried pushing it back, and I hollered like an angry cat on Halloween. She gave me a choice. I could let her try pushing it back during a contraction, or I could try breathing through a few contractions to let it move back on its own. I chose the latter.

I had called Tracey at some point while laboring in the bedroom, and she remained on the phone, praying and breathing with me through the contractions. About every third contraction, I would become completely overwhelmed and simply scream. Those contractions frightened me; I'd had nothing like them when in labor with Burgundy. Eventually even Tracey's prayers over the phone were too much of a distraction, so we hung up.

After several contractions, Jackie checked me again, but I still had the lip. She and Camellia agreed that breaking my bag of waters would hasten the birth. I asked Jackie if I would be angry with her tomorrow. She paused, then said, "I don't think so." I told her to break it. I had gone from, "I don't want this," to "Get it out; I don't care what it takes."

She said she had to go to the car for her amniohook, and I told her I had a wide range of crochet hooks in all colors and sizes in the next room. She declined to use them. I moaned, panted, and chanted through another contraction, and Jackie returned with the hook, breaking my bag of waters just as the next contraction began.

Reclining into Mark's arms, I relaxed a little as I felt the warm rush of water between my legs, and then a steamroller flattened my last hopes for a dignified birth as a contraction like none I had ever felt before took over my entire body. Instinctively, I curled myself forward and felt myself strangling on a scream of horror as I lost control of myself. I could not will myself to breathe, much less to relax, open, or allow my child to be born gently into an open flower or whatever other hippy nonsense I thought would happen. I found myself on my hands and knees, writhing in agony, screaming into poor Jackie's face. Through it all, I had to pee so badly that I could feel myself NOT-PEEING through the pain of the contraction.

This contraction started with a feeling like something had grabbed my uterus and was trying to wad it like aluminum foil into the smallest possible ball. It spread out from there around my back in bands, making me want to buck against it even though the very action made the crumpling feelings in my uterus even worse. Lightning pains shot down both legs, and my chest felt compressed as though Mark and Burgundy together sat on it.

As it passed, I turned to face Mark. Yes, the poor man watched that contraction from behind. He might never again desire my intimacy. Before I could catch my breath and recover, the next one hit. I felt like a cat being stretched by its limbs and tail; I felt I could come apart at any moment. I briefly saw a visual of the dead wife in The Last King of Scotland, feeling I could easily end up torn limb from limb and sewn back together askance as a warning to all women. I never caught my breath; I remember seeing Mark's face crawling in pain as I grabbed a handful of his stomach flesh in each hand to anchor myself against the screams I couldn't stop.

The contraction passed, and I felt ashamed of the screams. I wanted to take them back, apologize, pull myself together and behave like the grown-ass woman I was. I had birthed Burgundy with dignity and not much trouble as a naïve, broke, and idealistic 20-year-old. Surely as an adult I could do the same? I hardly registered the thought before the next contraction ripped another scream from my throat.

Mark's face kept its rigid, wide-eyed, flared-nostril expression through however many more contractions passed. I mauled his flesh, screamed in his face like a braying donkey. I said I couldn't do it; I didn't want to do it.

Jackie said "He's coming; he's close now," and I asked how long. "Maybe 10 more minutes."

I did the math on the contraction spacing and said, "Okay, so that's four more contractions? I can do this four more times."

After that, I managed to get behind the contractions. I pushed with the next few and each time felt myself blacking out. I told Mark not to let me drown. Jackie told me not to push so hard, and I told her that I didn't have a choice. Then another extreme contraction hit, and through my screams, I told them I thought I would rip open. I could feel myself holding the baby inside of me, clenching my whole bottom shut, trying to protect myself from pain, from the baby, from motherhood itself. The contraction eased, and somehow we managed to get one of my legs up so that my right knee and left foot supported me, and my left knee pointed out and away from my body. Jackie used the Doppler to check the baby's heartrate again; it remained in the 150's.

Another contraction, another push, and between screams I begged Mark not to let me drown. Then through the haze, I heard Jackie's voice: "Melissa, listen to me. You need to do exactly what I tell you to do." I felt argument building inside me; wasn't I already doing everything I could? But I had nothing left to give it a voice. Without a pause, I heard Jackie say, "This is a matter of life and death. You have to get this baby out now."*

I don't know what I said or if I said anything. At that point, I decided that if I had to be ripped open, I would survive it. I remember thinking that I would have to tear him out of myself because I couldn't relax my bottom enough to let him out. So I curled my husband's flesh into my fists, closed my eyes on his face, and I bore down on the baby's body with all the strength in my own, refusing even to grunt until I felt myself blacking out. I stopped, gulped air, and hearing calls of, "Great job, again, again," I closed everyone out again, bore down again, and moved the little body down, out, and away.

I felt him come free in a rush of limbs. Whatever happened next, I found myself reclining next to Mark, back against the pool, with a blue, limp little boy on my chest, snuggling into my breast, the midwives rubbing his feet, his back, his chest, and encouraging me to do the same. I talked to him and rubbed his glorious little chest. "Oh, you're beautiful!" I said, "I'm so glad you're finally here, baby; stay with us now."

Jackie set her stethoscope on his bulging, fat chest, and she heard his strong, big, heart pounding him into existence, insisting on life, forcing his lungs into a long, lusty scream. He began to wail, and I noticed huge, bulbous cheeks; thick, fatty eyebrows, and little white flecks of calcium deposits all over a sweet baby face. His head of peach fuzz looked blond, and his lower lip folded far under his upper lip. When he pinched his face to scream, his eyes disappeared into a fold between his brows and cheeks, a fold that extended across his nose.

His heart rate slowed again, and his noises died down, and we discovered his cord was compressed under his leg. Once freed, his heart raced to catch up, and our son yelled with all the rage of a happy man evicted from his warm, cozy home. Happily, we have milk, the warm flesh of family's embrace, and all the love the world can offer to make up for it.

Much later, after we'd left the pool and dried off, snuggled into our bed together, let Burgundy hold and play with him (Mark has video), nursed and bonded, the midwives and Mark all announced their guesses for birth weight. Camellia guessed, "Well north of nine pounds." Jackie guessed he would be, "Just under nine pounds." Mark looked up from his son and said only, "Nine Two."

Jackie set up her hanging scale, laid him in the sling, and weighed him. She grinned at Mark, "Nine pounds, two ounces." Mark grinned back. He was 22 inches long, and his head was 14.5 inches around (as were his chest and abdomen; what a little rock).

We ultimately decided to stick with the name we'd chosen for him, and our son, Holden Elijah, is grunting and squirming in his bouncer next to me as I type. Yesterday marked two weeks of life, and at the birth center for our two-week checkup, he weighed in at ten pounds, five ounces. Currently he's growling and grunting at his wee left fist, which he insists should produce milk. He continues to try to eat it in defiance of evidence to the contrary. A left-handed fantasist. He'll fit in great here.

* I wanted to write this story entirely from my perspective, but for the sake of those wondering what in the world happened, it was this: The cord was wrapped twice around the baby's neck. It was too tight to pull it over his head, which would be the normal procedure, so I believe Jackie planned to clamp and cut it after I finished delivering the head. When I pushed the head the rest of the way out, though, the cord cinched up like a noose, making clamping impossible as well. That was when Jackie told me that I had to get the baby out now. I pushed the baby out in two pushes that were, I think, between contractions. Jackie flipped the baby as he came out and freed him from his cord, which she then left intact to give him support while we helped him start breathing.

I'll Think About It Tomorrow

2010-12-27T08:44:00.000-08:00

Oh, Scarlett.

I didn't take the castor oil yesterday. The more I thought about it, the more I figured, "Hey, if God wanted to give me the opportunity to hang with friends and watch Dr. Who yesterday, who am I to turn my nose up at it?" So I called the midwife (Jackie), chatted with her for a few minutes, and we decided I'd wait one more day.

Last night on the way home from Dr. Who, we stopped at Walgreens and bought the castor oil. This morning I texted Jackie as follows: "Good morning! I have 1 errand to run. After that, I can have an ultrasound, castor oil, patience, or some combo of the three. Guide me, o wise and gentle one."

I just knew I would hear that we should have an ultrasound followed by castor oil. Instead, she told me somebody cut in line in front of me and is in labor now; no castor oil! Tomorrow I'll go in for a biophysical profile if I haven't yet had the baby. I won't have the baby because he's too darn comfortable. Why should he come out? Jeez-o-Pete.

Mark just came home with eggs, bacon, and other yum-yums, so I suppose I should go cook and eat a late-ish breakfast. Wake Burgundy, run a couple of errands. Straighten the house and do laundry.

Buh. I'd rather be coping with contractions.

Red Raspberry Leaf Tea

2010-12-26T05:43:00.000-08:00

At 6:30 AM the day after Christmas, the whole family sleeps. I would sleep, too, but I can only lay down for about half an hour to an hour at a time. Of course, I can only lay on my side, and it causes a horrible burning feeling down the sides of my legs. Naturally, I can't sleep through the burn, and I found myself squatting on the floor next to the bed, composing the first lines of this post in my head while I waited for the burn to stop. "Why not?" I thought. I haven't actively avoided the blog; I've only been lazy.

By the way: I think making teenage girls watch labor is not the best form of birth control. They should have to watch a heavily pregnant woman get out of bed. First, I use my husband's formerly sleeping form as a kind of wedge to keep from falling onto my back. If I end up on my back, I lay there like an oversized, upended bug, all my limbs waving at the air in futility. So I start with a funny backwards shimmy that lets me roll onto Mark. Then, I use my hands to fling the covers off myself with as much force as possible. This must be done with force. If I fling them away but they don't completely clear my [useless and constantly pained] legs, I will be trapped. Mark will have to get out of bed to rescue me, I'll fall on my back in the process, and we'll be back to the Palmetto Bug Pose. Once free of the covers, I use my legs to kind of bicycle the large pillow I have to use for my lower body out of the way.

All the foregoing only clears the obstacles; still I must somehow get my body out of the bed. Please understand, I am not a giant fatty. I've only gained 14 pounds since the day I found out I was pregnant. My face, arms, butt, thighs, everything is smaller than it was the day I got pregnant. Unfortunately, I'm carrying Hercules the Mighty in my uterus, and nothing works right.

From here, I have to wriggle and squirm for several minutes until I'm close enough to the edge of the bed to fall out of it. Sometimes, like this morning, I can slither off face up so I land in a kind of stable squat. Other times, earlier in the night, I just have to roll off and pray. Sometimes, when my bladder is really full, I give up and say, "Mark, I really need to pee." And he gets out of bed and helps me stand and makes sure that I'm over the tile before falling back in bed. Can't have urine in the carpet.

I lurched into the kitchen and turned the heat on under the tea kettle. Tea is so boring. It's bland; it doesn't bring any kick. I insist on using a real teacup and saucer if I'm to punish myself with tea. And today, I will punish myself with tea. Red raspberry leaf tea. I don't hate it, but I wouldn't notice if it never appeared in my life again either.

I gathered my cup and saucer, my spoon, a little brown sugar, and the tea. The tea almost has finished steeping, and I'll drink it. Bitterly.

Honestly, I wonder why I bother with the tea. It's good for the uterus. It's good for the pregnancy. Blah blah blah. Thing is, I'm going to be pregnant forever. The baby will keep growing past his anticipated 8.5-9 pounds (as of the 23rd), and my cervix will hold firm. I will walk 5,000 miles (and I will walk 500 more), and he will stay put. He's comfortable in there, curled up like a gargantuan elf, kicking me when he's hungry (or when I've just eaten), punching my bladder for fun, sucking his thumb and enduring the hiccups like a proper boy. Red raspberry leaf tea will not coax him out. And it's boring. Why bother?

I think I'm a bit of a spoiled child. Laundry bores me too, and no matter how many loads of laundry I process, still more will be required. Talk about why bother. I just started the washer on the third hot cycle to prepare the cloth diapers that Dad and Gail, his wonderful wife, sent me. I'm excited about diapers (for now), and still my Little Voice is whining and throwing a temper fit. "Isn't there something more exciting to do? I wanna surf the web! I wanna knit! I wanna go into labor! I wanna do something FUN!" GAH. Blah blah blah! Shut! UP!

Even when I'm doing things I like, I'm whining on the inside. Like knitting. I made Burgundy a really awesome pair of knee socks with a matching beaded cowl. It's gorgeous and presented a real and legitimate challenge to my knitting prowess. I know it's bragging, but I'm a pretty good knitter. Most projects get boring fast. This one took almost an entire sock to bore me! I think I had six pattern repeats done before I memorized it enough to go mobile without a copy of the pattern. And boy once I hit that? Whining non-stop. "This is boring. This is stupid. I want to be finished with this project. They're not gonna fit anyway. I wanna go play! I wanna bake! I wanna do laundry! I wanna go into labor!"

I swear to God, I'm never going to have this baby because I am FOUR YEARS OLD. No four-year-old should parent a child. So God in his infinite wisdom has decreed that I will never go into labor. I'm doomed to sleep in 2-hour fits tapering to 30-minute dozes, to waddle and lurch from bed to bathroom to kitchen to laundry room, to whine and moan and sulk for the rest of my born days.

And that is why I got up and opened the blog. Turned the heat on the kettle and set out the damn teacup. Turned the washer on for the third cycle of clean diapers and started to type. I found my big girl panties, and I'm wearing them [yes, Little Man, I know you're in there; thank you for that lovely punch. I'll go put on a clean pair of big girl panties now]. I know this post is the longest, whiniest rant in all of history, but I'm banishing the whiner, too. She has to shut up or have a different conversation.

I'm 41 weeks. Women all over the world are wrinkling their brows and saying, "What? Only one week overdue? I went two weeks over! My Aunt Sally's cousin, Billy Bob, got some poor girl pregnant, and she went four weeks over!" Well, more power to Billy Bob's girlfriend and to you. I have had enough. This little man is coming out; I plan to serve the eviction notice in just a little while in a form that only a gestating baby will understand. Castor Oil.

The midwife said not to take it in the afternoon and not to take it before noon Christmas Day (she had family in town), and as an act of love only (simple obedience could not have induced me to wait), I waited. As soon as my family arises from their gilded sleep (grumble grumble), I am off to Walgreens.

I know it will be nasty. I don't care.
I know I will miss visiting with my friend from North Caroline, who's here for one day. I don't care.
I know I will miss the Doctor Who Christmas Special over at my friend Christi's place tonight. ~~I don't care.~~ Uh, yes I do. I care about the Doctor and one last hoorah with my knitting friends. If it was earlier in the day, I might care enough to wait on the castor oil, but it isn't, and I don't.

I made cinnamon rolls and bread yesterday. Neighbors brought veggie and meat/cheese snack trays and a plate of cookies and fudge (I'm borderline gestational diabetic, so I really can't eat that stuff). I made gift bags and mailed them for all our close family (I made marshmallows. You should have heard the four-year-old whining on that project), and I have a few undelivered under the tree; those people will want to come see the baby anyway. My kitchen floor is clean (thanks to the awesome teenager), the living room and library are passable; in short, it's time. So I'm going to shower and wake my husband, and we're going to buy some castor oil. Wish me luck.

2010-09-29T07:05:00.000-07:00

I realized recently that one of the reasons I haven't posted is that I'm worried about taking the time to write a post. So I put it off, then spend easily twice as much time surfing Ravelry as I would have spent typing a post. That's just dumb.

I had a great midwife appointment yesterday. I'm still not gaining much weight; I've had a total gain of 12 pounds in 28 weeks. However, the baby is still growing by leaps and bounds, and I'm right where I should be in terms of size. Meanwhile, I've noticed and others have commented that my face seems to be thinning out. I think my double chin is a little less pronounced. For now, I'm not going to worry about the gain (or lack of it). I'm certainly eating whatever I want; I ate a whole pint of Ben & Jerry's the other day in one sitting. Mind, that's no model of dietary intake there, but I offer it as evidence that this is my body's doing, not my will's. I'm not dieting. I promise.

At the appointment, I was able to hold a model that's about the size of The Parasite and weighted to mimick his density. All curled up, the little doll fit neatly in my two hands, and Jackie held him against my belly in the position we believe he's taken now (head-down, left-side and facing my spine. Textbook). I had to fight the urge to cradle the doll and coo at it; I'll save it for wee Parry.

High School Drama; Feel Free to Skip

New drama at Burgundy's school with band. There's continued drama with the bullies; Burgundy elevated the issue to the Assistant Principal. Then Burgundy re-twisted her ankle at the game Thursday night, and Saturday morning, the directors put someone else in the show to march for her. On the same day, the doctor told her she could march again. Monday, she told Band Director #3 (there are 3 total; I'm labeling by rank) that she'd been cleared to march, but she knew she'd been replaced in the show. She asked him what she should do? BD#3 told her he wanted her to do something in the show, and he'd tell her at practice.

At practice, she was instructed to sit down and watch. About halfway through the three-hour practice, she got up to help the sound guy. BD#1 yelled at her to sit down because he didn't want her to hurt herself. After practice, confused between BD#3's affirmation that she should help and BD#1's insistence that she sit out, she went to the directors again and asked them what they needed from her. BD#2 replied that they wanted her to march. Burgundy implied that this was said with condescension and the intention of humiliating. Neither BD#1 nor BD#3 bothered to point out that she'd been instructed by both of them specifically not to march.

Burgundy came home, and we talked it over. I concluded that the three BDs must not be communicating clearly and told her that she needed to ask them where they wanted her to serve them and the band. She did so after class yesterday in their office, and when she did, BD#1 yelled at her, told her she was sending mixed signals, and she needed to decide what she was going to do.

Burgundy went straight to the AP's office and called me sobbing. I went straight to the school and had a good long chat with the AP. This afternoon we have a meeting with BD#1 at 1:45, and we'll decide what to do from there.

High School Drama Concluded; Feel Free to Tune Back In

Well, I've said you can tune back in, but I have nothing more to write.

I Want to Be All Professional and Stuff

2010-09-23T07:24:00.000-07:00

But I've decided I'll have to settle for updating however and whenever both the spare time and the motivation to write collide in my life. If there's one consistent thing about me, it's that I am inconsistent. It drives me batty, and I bet it drives the rest of you even battier. Is that a word?

I mean, how many projects have I started on here? Let's see . . .

Eat and buy products sourced only within 200 miles of my location. Status: Failed. Reason: The parasite rendered me incapable of anything but laying on the couch and whining. Mark had no interest in procuring locally, and it fell to him to keep us fed, clothed, and at least one step above misery. He's done a great job, so I have no complaints about our continued global shopping habits. Now that I'm feeling better, maybe we can try again.
The Why I Choose Homebirth series. Status: Failed. Reason: I'm a chicken, and I'm afraid I won't do the argument justice. But I haven't squeezed him out yet, so maybe it's not failed. Maybe just on hold.
The Julia-isms: posting one bizarre thing Julia said everyday. Status: Failed. Reason: Julia moved out.
The 30 Days meme. Status: Failed. Reason: I tell myself the topics are boring.
I'm sure there's something else, but I want to write, not scour my old posts for evidence of my failure.

I plan to complete the Homebirth series no matter what. I really need to take a bit of time to organize my thoughts and decide a coherent approach, and that will help a lot. Every time I think about it, I think of a new order in which to present the material, and each time the new order seems like it's more compelling than the previous one. You know what would be really compelling? Actually writing something down. Yeah. Now there's a thought.

Meanwhile, here's where we all are:
Mark:
My dear, sweet husband is doing well. I still want to scalp him from time to time, especially when he starts hovering over Burgundy. I know my stuff when it comes to parenting. And I know my child better than he can ever hope to, but he insists on micro-managing and cross-examining me about Burgundy's progress in school, and it drives me crazy.

Having said that, in every other area, we're doing great. He's even been [slowly] working on the garage, and yesterday he mentioned cleaning off his desk. He's perfectly happy with our steady diet of rice, beans and pizza with the occasional Julia Child-inspired gourmet meal whipped up when I don't feel like I've been trampled and pooped on by a giant dog.

We're one week from the end of the 2010 fiscal year, and his job in FY 2011 (starting October 1) still isn't solid. The good news is that the rumor mill holds that the task order will be signed, it's just a matter of time. In other good news, his new company has excellent benefits. His new insurance actually covers maternity medical at 100% with no co-pay.

His book-selling business is going well. He's subscribed to an online service that manages his inventory and sales for him, and he currently has books listed on 15 or so sites. Last month he sold over $1,200 in books, and he was able to reinvest over 80% of that in the business. At first I groused because I thought the profit (some $900) should have been put in savings. The more I considered it, though, the more at peace I am with his decisions. First, if my hobbies paid for themselves as well as his clearly does, we'd be rolling in it, and second, if we consider this a legitimate business, he should be reinvesting most of his capital early on. Of course, he's done it all debt-free and from the ground up.

And starting in mid-September, his book business is contributing a small amount every week to our emergency savings account. He's as tickled as a little boy bringing a bouquet of wildflowers to his mom, and I am just as happy for him.

Me:
I'm 27 weeks pregnant, and The Parasite is now 2.5 pounds and about 16 inches from head to toe. All curled up, my little man supposedly takes the space of a head of cauliflower. And if a head of cauliflower shoved up my hoo-ha doesn't make you giggle, I can't help you in the humor department.

My weight gain has been very slow. I think I'm still under 210, for a total gain of about 14 pounds in 27 weeks. Given my obesity prior to pregnancy, I'm very comfortable with the slow gain. Most people, upon learning I'm "only" 6.5 months, blurt out, "Are you sure you're not having twins?" So I'm pretty sure (she says with an exasperated eyeroll) that the Parasite is getting everything he needs.

I, too, have a week of employment remaining. I'm told that the budget for the next fiscal year's task order funds me through December, which is really great news. The only problem is the minor question of Congressional inaction. Our task order depends on a chain reaction of bureaucratic activity: Congress must pass a continuing resolution (CR); the CR must fund Constellation, which in turn must fund MOP sufficient to justify the task order on which I work. MOP then must decide to fund our task order, and if all that happens in the next seven days, I have a job on 10/1. If not, well, that's why we have unemployment insurance.

A small rant: Thank you Congress. I can't tell you how much I appreciate your dithering on the NASA budget. [Profanity redacted] you bunch of [profanity redacted]ing imbeciles, how difficult is it, really, to say, "Huh, dur, ya know what, uh, NASA oughta be funded, ah-yup," and pass a darn continuing resolution? For the love of Pete, the House and Senate versions aren't that far apart. Our Illustrious President said he would sign it. Get it together and pass something! WHARGARBL!

Burgundy:
I hate band season, and I hate sending my daughter off to high school every day. I don't mind most of the challenges. It's good for her to face authority figures who drive her nuts. It's good for her to figure out how to deal with bullies and how to face her own temptations down. However, I hate that she comes home from school so upset with listening to cursing and swearing all afternoon on the marching band field. I hate that her teachers don't have the time (and some not even the inclination) to help Burgundy really learn instead of asking her to regurgitate facts.

Having said that, it's going well for her over all. As it happens, Burgundy lettered last year, her first year in high school. She did not letter in writing, debate, or band as we might have expected. After all, she wants to major in English and Music. She lettered in Science Fair. Yes, science fair.

She started pre-Calculus this year, a Senior-level class in which she is the only Sophomore and definitely the youngest person. She has two Seniors paying her $10/hour for tutoring after school. We don't know what to do for math in the next two years. The only two non-remedial math courses at the school that she hasn't taken are AP Calculus and AP Statistics, and the counselor said she won't be ready for AP Calculus if she hasn't taken pre-AP Pre-Calculus, but there's no non-AP Calculus course offered. She could take AP Statistics, but I hate for her to leave the Calculus track for a year to head in a completely different direction. We might have her take AP Cal over the summer at Rice.

She's very excited about her little brother, and she chose our nursery theme: Monkeys. The picture here is a piece of wall art we registered for, but those are the general colors for the nursery; we love them.

Soren (Disclaimer: The dog said he had something to share, but I can't be held responsible for his frippery. He is, after all, a dog.):

WOOF! WOOF WOOF! AAAAAHRUUUUUUGGH, woof.

Oh! oh! oh! oh! I am so excited because I am a dog and my eyes are big and OH MY GOD HAVE YOU SEEN MY TAIL IT'S HUGE AND WITH IT I DOMINATE ALL THINGS!

My lady, she taught me a new trick! It has to do with the puffy air thing and the drool! She says it is, "Stop breathing!" and then she makes the hand motion, and I close my mouth and do not let any of the air out, and when I feel all blown up and my tail is sticking out because it is full of air, then my lady says, "Good boy, free!" and then I can let the air out, and I puff and pant and do the thing that is blowing slobber all over the big puffy soft thing that my lady calls the couch and she yells, "Gross! Get away from me! Ew, GO AWAY!" and then I use my tail to dominate the room while I turn around and walk away!

And the man! The man is so NICE! But he doesn't know how to do the thing where I stop breathing. Because that is only for my lady to tell me to do! And the man gives me food and makes me stand on my back legs and he tells me, "LEFT PAW!" and "RIGHT PAW!"

And yesterday, my lady took me to the dog park! And it was fun, and there were other dogs there! And some of them wanted to do the thing that is hop up on my giant, dominant tail and hump me to prove they are more dominant than my dominant tail, but I did not let them! I said, "WOOF!" And also I am very big and my lady says "One hundred pounds" and talks to the invisible man about me and calls him, "Christ," because he knows I am big too and that's why the other dogs can't hump my tail! And then I found a dog that was very small; my lady said that dog should have gone to the little dog park! And I tried to hump her face to show her how special I am, but my lady yelled at me and called me a BAD DOG, and it made me sad.

And then she put me in the car, and she made me put my head out the window because she does not like it when I drool on her shoulder, but I left lots of drool on the door and also some of the stuff that she says is snot on the car seat.

I'm so glad my lady loves me! Peanut butter!
_____________________________________________________________
Well. I guess we can all see why Soren does not have a regular spot on this blog. I'm so sorry to have exposed you all to his sordid, canine mind.

2010-09-09T06:40:00.000-07:00

We had another appointment with the midwife Tuesday. I really appreciate how much she puts me at ease. I've had a very hard time communicating to anyone how much pain I'm having. The only person who seemed to "get it" was my friend Camille. While working on my trigger points, she said, "Melissa, your sensitivity levels are up there with those of a fibromyalgia patient." So when Jackie told me that her second was like this and described the pain as being, "like the bones of your pelvis are rubbing together," it really helped me to be confident that this pain, awful as it seems, is not the harbinger of doom that I fear. She even said out loud what I'd said to Mark just a couple of nights before: "The pain was so awful that I was afraid I wouldn't be able to handle the birth." And then she reassured me, "but the birth was just fine. We were fine."

I bought a maternity support belt while there, and I'm surprised by how much it helps. Not much for the fashion statement, but I can walk without wincing now.

Our baby boy is 25 weeks old now. I try to imagine his little fingernails, his eyelids fluttering open for the first time, and the fat beginning to fill out his skin. I wonder whether his lips will be shapely, like mine, or round like Mark's. Either way, they'll be full. Mark and I both have big lips. He spends the morning stretching and rolling, and the best I can figure, trying to divebomb my cervix. I feel a ridiculous amount of movement extremely low in my pelvis. It's like he keeps his hands over his head and bounces on them.

As far as I know, I have only three weeks of employment remaining. My company continues to hunt out work for me; I can only pray we are able to find it successfully. Mark's employment has not come through yet; however, he fully expects that it will. So we continue to hold.

We had a death in the family this week. My father's wife, Gail, is a delightful lady who really has worked hard to have a loving, real relationship with her adult stepchildren. We're so lucky that Dad married such an open, ingratiating, loving woman. Unfortunately, her stepfather, Albert, passed away this week. He had Alzheimers and had been living with Gail and my father for the past couple of years. Dad said that Albert had just come home from visiting his children in Dallas for his birthday. He'd been to see the rodeo and spent time with his great-grandkids. Dad said that when he came home, he was sitting at the dinner table talking about going back to Houston and getting back to work.

Suddenly he went catatonic and unresponsive at the table. They called for an ambulance. Dad said that Albert revived once, briefly, and Gail was able to say goodbye to him. Then he went out again as the ambulance arrived. A scan revealed massive hemmorhaging on both sides of his brain; they pulled life support that night, and he passed within about 10 minutes.

I did not know Albert very well at all. Gail and Dad have been married about twelve years now, and it's possible Albert already had Alzheimers when I met him. He was a sweet old man for all the exposure I had to him, and my heart goes out to Gail, who is occupying her mind and heart with funeral arrangements, schedules, lodging for family members who are traveling to Houston for the funeral, and so on. I hope she's able to cope well when the chaos and business of the funeral and burial have passed and she's left with time and quiet on the long drive back to Mississippi.

Pray for her, if you think about it. I think Dad will be fine. Ultimately, Gail will be, too. But my heart goes out to her.

Day 04 – What you ate today, in great detail

2010-08-26T07:21:00.000-07:00

or, How I Confirmed I'm Still Rebelling After All This Time.

I finally summoned the strength and courage to return to the ~~Den of Iniquity~~ kitchen. The blueberry jam sessions and subsequent jelly sessions went a long way toward boosting my confidence that I can, in fact, handle cooking while pregnant. At least this trimester. Then I also washed, par-boiled, and froze 20 bags of pink-eyed, purple-hull peas. And I want to make and can many pints of the base for butternut squash soup.

I clambered into bed Sunday night with a glimmer of a plan to make breakfast for Burgundy on her first day of school. Let me explain something to the world about having an independent, easy-going, joy-filled teenager. Sometimes, it's too easy. I have never, ever been the get-up-and-make-breakfast mom. Ever. And she has never complained. Just asked me to buy another box of cereal.

Monday morning the alarm went off at 5:30, and I clambered out of the bed, caught a quick shower, and made my way to the kitchen. I threw five strips of bacon into one of my skillets and two slices of bread into the decrepit little toaster I've had for at least a decade. While I waited for the bacon sizzle to start, I found a pancake recipe online and started mixing the batter.

Halfway through the batter, I flipped the bacon and set aside the last three eggs in the refrigerator to be fried and scrambled. I added the melted butter to the batter, beat it in with a fork, the thick sludge oozing around the fork while I smashed flour lumps against the side of the bowl until I had a nice, consistent goop.

I flipped the bacon again and gathered my salt and pepper. I folded a paper towel in half and scooped the bacon into it, setting it onto a plate on the opposite counter and hoping enough grease would drain to assuage my guilt. I cracked the first egg into the still-spattering bacon grease and quickly sprinkled a smidge of salt over the top. I ground a little pepper over that and let it fry while I washed out the eggshell and threw it into the oatmeal box I converted into a holder for eggshells (Mark likes to spread them in the garden).

I flipped the egg, grabbed another paper towel and folded it, then slipped the egg onto it and laid it next to the bacon to drain. I did the same for the second egg and breathed a little easier knowing I still had 30 minutes to clean the skillet of bacon grease, melt some butter, and scramble an egg for my vegetarian daughter's breakfast.

While the second egg fried on side one, I broke the third egg into a bowl, added salt and pepper, and I beat it frenetically. I hate half-beaten scrambled eggs. Gross. Flipped the second egg, whipped the pancake batter, set egg number 2 to drain with number 1 and the bacon, and poured the bacon grease into a dirty pot to cool for the trash. Used yet another paper towel to wipe out the skillet, threw in a dollop of butter, and after a final quick thrashing, poured in the final egg. It took about 32 seconds to cook.

After that I spent what felt like hours at the tedious task of pouring, flipping, and scooping out pancakes. By 6:15, we all were seated at the kitchen table for one of our few real breakfast meals ever as a family. I said a prayer, and we dove into our food with the reckless abandon of a family that eats out too often.

The pancakes lasted through Tuesday, and I made more bacon and eggs to go with them.

Please excuse the crappy, cell-phone
quality photo. I wanted to eat, not take
photos, so this was my compromise.

Oh, the quiche. I don't know how to tell you what a lovely, wonderful cook and writer is Julia Child. Her quiche "base" recipe is so perfectly simple and elegant; it cooks perfectly every single time I've ever made it. Tuesday evening I also undertook to make her pie crust for the first time. If it's possible, I didn't keep it cold enough. Next time I will freeze the butter, flour and shortening for a little while before I make it, and I'll use ice water instead of just the cold refrigerator water. I had a hard time getting the dough rolled out to a consistent, thin thickness. Anyway, the quiche rose high and serene from the gorgeous pie crust, standing like a tower of princess eggs over her realm. We ate half for dinner Tuesday night, and I forbade Mark to touch it again before morning, when we shared the remainders for breakfast with bacon and toast liberally smeared with butter and homemade blueberry jelly.

Inspired by my incredibly repeatable success with her quiche recipe, I decided to try her recipe for fish poached in white wine and baked in a sauce mornay made with swiss cheese. I served it with bow-tie pasta served with very slightly wilted spinach all mixed up with the liberal amount of leftover sauce mornay from the fish.

Today I served breakfast for the fourth day in a row, bacon, eggs and toast - an English muffin each for me and Burgundy - and Burgundy tentatively remarked that she felt so much better at school for having eaten a good breakfast. Normally I will take a grateful, loving remark like that and turn it into a reason to beat myself up for the 14 years of breakfast opportunities lost. Not today, though. Today I will use it to say, "Well done, Mel. You're a good mom Right Now." Even though I employ random capitalization for emphasis, unnecessarily provoking the wrath of the Minor God of Anal Grammarians.

Tonight the main dish is spaghetti and meatballs so I can focus on doing something evil and delicious with the box of fresh brussels sprouts in my refrigerator. I'm pretty sure it will involve the last of the white wine from yesterday's adventure, some garlic, and a number of fresh herbs from Mark's garden. I feel such delight and joy to be back in the kitchen.

So you wonder what this has to do me being rebellious? It's this: I took one look at today's topic and thought, "What? Food. That's dumb. I don't want to write about what I ate. I want to write about what I've been doing in the kitchen." *headdesk*

Day 03 – Your parents, in great detail

2010-08-25T08:17:00.000-07:00

Is anything ever just about one's parents? I could tell stories about my grandparents that would tell you more about my mother than anything I ever wrote about her. I'll take the bait though, and we'll see what I come up with.

Mama
I think no relationship is so complex, contradictory or bizarre as a girl's relationship to her mom.

Mom has brown hair, curly and short, and she suffers from terminal self-loathing. No matter where she is or how she's doing, she knows she could improve something. She could exercise more. Make the house prettier. Cook better. Look better. Be better. I think sometimes that keeps her from being just as awesome as she already is. At the same time, I understand through my own experience that it's the same drive that allows her to be brutally honest with herself, to take responsibility for her failings, and to be deeply connected to the people she loves.

Mom has brown eyes, I think. But now that I try to conjure her image in my mind, I can't see her eyes. Maybe they're kind of green? I know that they're striking and clear. She's dark-complected, almost olive-skinned, and I always envied her easy, crispy tans. I go from milk-white to lobster in half the time she turns native brown.

Mama loves me. She taught me to sew, to crochet, and to write. I remember picking vegetables with her as a very little girl. Okra, purple-hull peas, corn and butterbeans. We picked them every year. She taught me not to fear the fat, happy caterpillars we found hiding in the corn husks. She canned spaghetti sauce, cut-off, creamed and froze corn, and for some unholy reason cooked a lot of summer squash. To this day, the smell of summer squash turns my stomach. No amount of butter can render it edible. That stuff is nasty. Word to my mother: NAS. TEE.

I remember baking bread with her. Drinking buttermilk for the first time at her urging. Learning to make perfect southern biscuits (the secret is lard and buttermilk). Once I spilled hot coffee down my 9-year-old chest. I remember the skin peeling up. Mama raced me to Mrs. Janice's house. I don't remember how we treated it, just that Mama let me cry and held me.

I hate this entry. It's boring ME.

Day 02 – Your first love, in great detail

2010-08-24T07:20:00.000-07:00

Noone said I had to do all these back to back, right?

I put this off for a couple of days because I ~~am a master procrastinator~~ didn't know quite what to write about my first love. My first boyfriend can barely even qualify as a first like based on what I know of love at the ripe old age of 35. Even my first few lusts don't qualify for any kind of love label.

So rather than talk about my first love in great detail, I think I'll write about my first kiss. I hope that's not a topic for a future day. I'll warn you, this could get . . . raunchy. Or not, but I love that word and want to use it. See? It's even in a tag now.

Before I go there, you should know about my first boyfriend, too.

The Boyfriend I Had When I Was 8 from Mize, Mississippi

I don't remember his name. I don't remember what he looked like. This was an arranged marriage. Mom never quite noticed that I preferred reading a good book by myself to playing with other kids. And she certainly never accepted that I had no interest in boys. She came to me one day and told me that her co-worker's son wanted me to be his girlfriend. "Isn't that cool?" she asked.

"Why?" I answered. I'd never met him. He didn't know me. I wondered whether he liked books. I wondered if I'd have to kiss him. Ew. "What does he look like? Where does he live?" I wondered whether the ubiquitous "other kids" at school would torment me for having a boyfriend. Would it be worth it? In retrospect, I think I was an anxious kid.

Mom took me to visit him one day during the summer, and we rode around on his go-cart. I wanted to read, but he didn't. So I rode the go-cart and was surprised to discover I enjoyed it.

Stephen - First Kiss

Five years later, thirteen-year-old me lived with Mom and Charles the Stepfather in a decrepit, converted travel trailer parked outside Mamaw's house in her large, circular driveway. We called my step-grandmother Mamaw. She made me nervous, looming over me tall and thin with a halo of iron-gray frizzy curls and her bulbous, beaky nose. Her belly bulged oddly out, permanently seven months pregnant. A cousin told me that her last child, my stepfather's baby brother, died in utero, but she never went into labor, and they never had the money for the operation to clean her out. I understand enough biology now to know this could not have been true. I did not understand that then.

We lived down the road from Missy Walters, who lived with her grandmother in a wood-frame white house. Missy was a bad girl with bad-girl hair, heavy makeup, and a little bit of a reputation. Missy's cousin, Stephen, enjoyed a bad-boy reputation. All the bad girls thought him perfectly dreamy. I didn't know he existed until Missy told me about him. Again with the books. She offered to set me up with him, telling me he was an amazing kisser. At 13, I at least had an awareness that I should be into guys, so I agreed. It would be a little longer before I found out that Missy should not have known whether her cousin was a good kisser. Yuck.

I don't remember much about him. He was tall, thin, and dark-haired with big blue eyes. We went to a school dance together; he had a Band of Merry Metalheads. They trailed him everywhere. I don't remember feeling particularly in love with him, although I doubtless had, "I <3 Stephen" scrawled all over my books and notebooks.

The dance, held in the gymnasium, I remember in shades of brown and gray. I'm sure they decorated the gym somehow, probably with black and orange streamers. I don't remember any food being there. We danced once. Someone turned on a slow song by Poison or Ratt or Motley Crue or some other suitably horrible hair band, and Stephen grabbed my hand, dragging me to the floor.

Slow dancing consisted of him arranging our arms around each other and swaying back and forth to the music. I concentrated on not stepping on his feet, farting, or swaying out of time. These are all pretty engrossing mental and physical challenges, so imagine my surprise when I found my face tilted toward his. All my attention was focused on my feet and my tightly clenched buttcheeks when Stephen opened his mouth and came at my face like a gaping, surpised catfish.

I didn't have time to draw back and barely registered an, "OHMYGODHE'SGOINGTOKISSME," before I found the lower half of my face engulfed in slobber and a thick, fat, wet something plopped lazily into my mouth. The something sat on my tongue, resting against the teeth on the right side of my jaw for what felt like an eternity while I tried to figure several things at once:

What had he put in my mouth, and why was he keeping it in his, and how hadn't I noticed it when we went out to dance?
What in the world should I be doing? And what if I farted now?
When would it ever end?

I couldn't maintain focus at both ends of my body. I'm still not sure whether I ever farted. I know that after at least ten minutes (probably about 20 seconds), I realized the something still sitting in my mouth like a dead sardine had to be his tongue. His tongue, y'all. Imagine my thirteen-year-old horror as I came to grips with the notion, buttcheeks still clenched, that I had this boy's tongue sitting in my mouth.

I gave up the notion that I wouldn't step on his feet. I also gave up on keeping time in any way. I focused on not biting his tongue (what if I bit it off?) and not farting. Eventually, a lifetime later, he came up for air. I smiled weakly at him, hoping he'd been pleased with my performance. The song ended, and I excused myself to repair my lipstick. A week later, he dumped me. I correctly pinpointed our lackluster kiss as the source of his fading interest, and I set about correcting my perceived deficiency in kissing.

I did figure it out eventually, and I came to understand that Missy Walters was wrong. That boy definitely could not kiss.

Whoa!

2010-08-20T21:51:00.000-07:00

I just finished watching The Godfather with Mark and Burgundy. Somehow, I made it 35 years without ever watching this amazing movie.

I think the biggest surprise is the rating. It's rated R, but if this movie came out now, it would be PG-13 at most, and that because of one scene featuring breasts. After the couple is married. Criminy. You can see that in a strip bar on a PG-rated film now.

Anyway, it was an awesome movie. We all really enjoyed it.

Day 1: Introduction

2010-08-19T13:36:00.000-07:00

Okay, seriously? I have to introduce myself?

What if I just take this meme and say, "The topic for today looks lame and silly. It isn't worth the effort. Instead, I'll write about the impact of flatulence in weather patterns over the US and the relationship of said flatulence to fast food consumption rates." I think that's what I'll do. Today, I'll introduce my family.

Me!
I'm 35, currently working for NASA's Constellation Program on the Mission Operations Project and trying hard to go home. At the same time I want desparately to be at home most of the time to serve my family, I also feel a bit conflicted about keeping my identity (I am competent. I am sane.) and continuing to participate with rational adults. I'm contemplating a couple of different ministry/volunteer options that I might work through our church, and I'm planning to teach Generation Change to our youth in the fall semester. Generation Change is the youth/teen-targeted version of Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University.

I'm 5 months pregnant now, and I still haven't quite gotten my head around the idea. It's been a difficult one so far, and while I'm thrilled to have a baby, I am less-than-jazzed about this particular pregnancy experience. I do not feel like a goddess-earth-mother-bringer-of-life. I feel like a nauseated, overheated, fat, old, wet dog who, if kicked one. more. time. will hork everything from her toenails upward onto your favorite carpet.

I have not been eating well because it matters not how well or badly I eat, I still feel like microwaved cat crap. I think I need to stop eating out of the trash can, though, because the indigestion and nausea have continued to improve in spite of the garbage I'm eating. I bet if I just ate reasonably healthy food, I'd feel even better now. Not a month ago, though.

Mark
My beloved husband. How do I describe him? Imagine Ichabod Crane. Now imagine young Ichabod with bizarre, lustrous corkscrew curls falling around his face like the most adorable little (six-foot tall string-bean) hobbit ever. Add a really bizarre sense of humor with timing that will make you shoot orange juice from your nostrils, and you have my husband.

Maybe that doesn't tell you so much after all.

Mark works for NASA's International Space Station Program; he manages repairs for Boeing, but he isn't employed by them (grumble grumble). He's a very intense, very personal man who has the biggest, gentlest heart God made. Unless he's hungry or over-tired, in which case, I stock up the house with dark chocolate and take extended visits with friends.

Mark wants to name our baby Gallifrey for God's sake. Why do I need to explain anything else about him?

Burgundy
Burgundy is not just my child. In that peculiar way that we do, my daughter defines her mother. I defined mine, too. I rearranged my life when I found out she would be joining me, and I'm still shocked (a little) that she's here. What a perfect gift.

When I held infant Burgundy, I sang Brahm's lullaby to her. I rocked her, and when I came to "Little [insert baby name here] is sleepy. And she's tired, and she's sleepy, and she wants to go to sleep!" I thought those the most idiotic, uninspired lame bunch of words ever fitted together to make a rhyme. So I cooed, "Little Burgundy is lovely. And she's gracious, and she's generous, and she wants to go to sleep!" At the time, I thought it couldn't hurt to sing to her all her possibilities in life. All her best qualities.

Fourteen years later, we finished her Girl Scout Silver Award today. Burgundy volunteered over 52 hours during the last 3 weeks to organize and run a food drive for a local homeless service. She collected 208 cans, boxes, and bags of food, and we drove them to the shelter this morning. She came up with the idea after riding the bus and rail system in Houston this summer and seeing the homeless everywhere rooting through trash for a sandwich scrap. She packed extra bags of Cheerios with her lunch and handed them out at the stops. Yes, she's gracious and generous. Lovely.

Back Flips

2010-08-18T08:37:00.000-07:00

Our parasite hates the jeans I'm wearing today, which sucks because they're not too tight, not too baggy, not falling down, and not giving me indigestion. Also not buttoned (yay belly sleeves).

I know he hates them because he is one laid-back, calm, cool, and collected little dude. He's so much like his dad already. Content just to be, he only moves when I'm uncomfortable. *TMI WARNING* The other day, I got all constipated, and he literally kicked the crap out of me until things got moving again. Hilarious. *OKAY, YOU'RE SAFE*

He goes mad after a long day on my feet when I lay down and put them up and the blood starts to rush back into the rest of my body. As my heartrate speeds up with the sheer pleasure of feeling the pain drain out of my feet, he rolls and squirms and pokes and wiggles like wild. When I sit for too long at work, he sticks and kicks and yanks (God he has a grip) until I get up and walk.

For the most part though, he just enjoys being there. As long as I'm happy, he's happy. However, today we are at odds. In spite of these wonderful, lovely, comfortable maternity jeans that aren't even buttoned, he's having little hissy fits. Does. Not. Want. Tough cookies, kiddo. Your big sister will tell you in a heartbeat: you just lucked out to get stuck into the least sympathetic mother ever. I like the jeans, and I will wear them again. Partially because I love to feel you moving.

August is half-over, and contrary to my dire predictions, I have not yet expired of heat exposure. I'm certain I will; I mean, God still has two more months of Houston summer with which to assault me. So hang in there. I'm not dead yet . . . [but I'll] be stone dead in a moment.*

Meanwhile, one of my favorite bloggers ever (I mean, GOD, she's so funny and real and raw [and wriggling]), grammardog at livejournal (y'all, I miss the old livejournal so much!), decided to do this meme. And given that I can't stick with the same topic for more than 15 minutes either way, I figured I'd announce my intention to do the same so that you'll all know that in fact, I will not do more than 1-2 posts. Then I'll see something shiny and chase it down and come back in two weeks blogging about Russian organized crime and its impact on the environment of Saturn or something.

Anyway, it's a 30-day thing with a different topic each day:

Day 01 - Introduction
Day 02 – Your first love, in great detail
Day 03 – Your parents, in great detail
Day 04 – What you ate today, in great detail
Day 05 – Your definition of love, in great detail
Day 06 – Your day, in great detail
Day 07 – Your best friend, in great detail
Day 08 – A moment, in great detail
Day 09 – Your beliefs, in great detail
Day 10 – What you wore today, in great detail
Day 11 – Your siblings, in great detail
Day 12 – What’s in your bag, in great detail
Day 13 – This week, in great detail
Day 14 – What you wore today, in great detail
Day 15 – Your dreams, in great detail
Day 16 – Your first kiss, in great detail
Day 17 – Your favourite memory, in great detail
Day 18 – Your favourite birthday, in great detail
Day 19 – Something you regret, in great detail
Day 20 – This month, in great detail
Day 21 – Another moment, in great detail
Day 22 – Something that upsets you, in great detail
Day 23 – Something that makes you feel better, in great detail
Day 24 – Something that makes you cry, in great detail
Day 25 – A first, in great detail
Day 26 – Your fears, in great detail
Day 27 – Your favourite place, in great detail
Day 28 – Something that you miss, in great detail
Day 29 – Your aspirations, in great detail
Day 30 – One last moment, in great detail

I suppose that's it for today. I and The Parasite have a lot of work to do, so I suppose it's time to put my nose to the grindstone.
* Anyone want to identify the quote source for minor geek points?

Please Forgive

2010-08-07T09:32:00.000-07:00

I need to post a couple of photos on the internet and need them hosted somewhere, so I'm going to post them here. Please to ignore, will explain more later.

Big Night Tonight

2010-08-06T11:36:00.000-07:00

I still have at least 15 pounds of blueberries from last weekend. I plan to make two batches of jam, one batch of jelly, and if there's enough left, a few pints of blueberry pie filling. Those will have to be frozen.

I probably could stretch this project out over the weekend, but I found a source of pink-eyed, purple-hull peas. They've been picked this weekend, and I can buy a bushel for $30. That will work out to somewhere between $3 and $3.75 / pound of shelled peas. If I come out on the $3 end, then it was worth it. If I come out on the high end, I'll just buy $30 worth of shelled peas at the farmers' market during the week for $3.50/pound.

Anyway, I'm driving 90 minutes to Conroe tomorrow morning to buy a bushel of peas, and they really need to be processed the same day. So tonight, I need to finish up my jam, jelly, and pie filling. There's no room in our kitchen for two projects to run simultaneously.

I just dropped Burgundy at the house this afternoon to spend time on her Silver Award project and to clean the kitchen. I hate that her summer is winding down. I hate that I'm not there with her right now.

Much Ado About Nothing

2010-08-04T06:59:00.000-07:00

Mark had his interview with the new company yesterday, and they're having an open house tonight. I still don't know whether the open house is for employees only, so I'm planning to stay home and get dinner ready.

Meanwhile, we're going to see Much Ado About Nothing at Miller Outdoor Theater tonight. The Houston Shakespeare Festival celebrates its 36th anniversary this year, and Dr. Sidney Berger is directing it. Dr. Berger founded the festival and directed all the plays for years, and his really is the major name associated with the festival. I had heard he was retiring, so I'm thrilled to learn he's still directing for the festival.

Much Ado About Nothing is one of my all-time favorite pieces of work. It ranks behind Othello because of its profound treatment of women. Now don't get me going too much about Othello, but I will tell you that from my perspective, the whole play seems to be constructed as an opportunity for Emilia to blossom and grow from a cardboard cutout (in the beginning, she describes herself as "Iago's wife" who is there only to do his will) to a fully developed, self-referential woman capable not only of independent action and decision but also of self-recognition and self-sacrifice in the interest of truth and in the face of her abusive husband's threats.

Um, sorry. Much Ado About Nothing. One of my favorite pieces of work. It actually is Burgundy's favorite, and will continue to be until she's old enough to understand why Emilia merits a higher ranking for Oth- Oh, sorry. There I go again. We're going with my mom for certain and possibly with a couple of Burgundy's friends. As soon as I leave work today, we're driving downtown to pick up free tickets for the covered seating, fan-cooled area.

Houston Shakespeare Festival is something we look forward to every year. Through this program, we've seen world-class performances of Othello, MacBeth, Hamlet, Measure for Measure, The Taming of the Shrew, Twelfth Night, Pericles . . . I could go on and on. This year I refused to attend any other outdoor events on the grounds that I am pregnant and saving my pittance of heat tolerance for the Shakespeare Festival. In addition to Much Ado, they're also performing A Midsummer Night's Dream. We're slated to see that Saturday night.

2010-08-03T09:23:00.000-07:00

Burgundy spent last week at Spurs camp with the Girl Scouts. In the end, she felt really good about going, but she faced two challenges.

First, she went to Spurs late in the game. All the other girls in camp were 11-13 and entering 8th grade. One young lady was 14 and entering 9th grade, and Burgundy is 14 and entering 10th grade. One of her good friends from school was a camp assistant! She said it felt awkward and disappointing at first, but when she realized that all the other girls looked up to her and thought she was cool, the experience improved. When we picked her up, the camp nurse told me that Burgundy, "is just the coolest kid. She really loves the other girls, and that is so wonderful. The other girls all called her Mama." I really appreciate that Burgundy took a potentially negative experience and used it as an opportunity to lead other young people by example without the "carrot" of recognition in front of her.

Second, she had a bad time with one of the camp counselors. I found Burgundy's way of telling the story had a fascinating subtext; I'm pretty sure she was unaware of it. Throughout her descriptions of the counselors' behavior (there were several episodes she told us about), she referred to the counselors as women, ladies, or counselors. Each time she mentioned the one she had trouble with, Burgundy took great pains to be clear that she was a counselor, in charge, and in authority. But she talked about her as she does her peers, referring to her as a girl more often than not.

Apparently, the "girl" acted as though Burgundy was a threat. She went out of her way to compete with Burgundy about music, and she tried several times to exclude Burgundy from social interactions with anyone else Burgundy's age.

Asked how she decided to handle it, Burgundy said, "Well, after the first conversation I could tell that she didn't like me, and I had no reason to like her, so I just worked hard to stay out of her way. And whenever she got really out of line, one of the other counselors would step in and redirect her. She was just really immature."

Aw, shucks. My kid . . .

2010-08-03T05:34:00.000-07:00

Man, there's so much I want to say. At least three times a day lately I notice something I want to blog about. And I still want to write another "installment" on the homebirthing stuff. I am working full time right now through the month of August, and it's exhausting even though it's actually not 40 hours a week. Right now I have about 5 minutes for a quick update, so I thought I'd post a super-quick update and thought.

Saturday we picked blueberries; Saturday afternoon we cleaned house a little bit, and Saturday night we made blueberry-lime jam. Heaven in jars, I tell you. I still have 14-15 pounds of blueberries to do something with. I have in mind blueberry pie filling, blueberry compote, another batch of jam (I have 1.5 dz right now), some berry jelly (with strawberries, blackberries, and blueberries from my freezer), and maybe I'll just leave a few in the freezer for later in the year.

Yesterday Burgundy started band camp. When I dropped her off for the second half in the afternoon, I used the girls' room. On the wall of the handicapped stall, I saw this:

Yes, I did snap a photo in the bathroom with my cell phone. And?

It says, "'I have found that the harder I work, the more luck I get.' -Jefferson, Thomas" Beneath it, in blue, someone wrote, "Leave it to the orchestra kids to write graffiti like this."

I think you'll all understand that I could not help but giggle that this is what passes for depravity in our school's band hall. I love music nerds.

And time's up! Off to get myself some luck, yo!

Money and Family

2010-07-29T08:38:00.000-07:00

My grandfather had money, and he lived in north-central Alabama. One hot July when I was fourteen, we went to his big, classy house. The epitome of new money, it sprawled, a brick fortress set on a hill. It had four bedrooms and three bathrooms in the upper level. Granny Jean had a carpeted kitchen, a living room with a glass wall that looked out on a patio, a living room with a silver and blue Christmas theme, including a fake, silver tree decorated in blue. Grandpa had a little office off the side of his carpeted garage where he kept his jewels. He poured a bag of sapphires onto his desktop, and I watched them catch the thin fluorescent light from the little lamp on his desk, and I used all my teenage self-control to stifle the urge to tell him I wanted a sapphire ring, not emerald.

"Grandpa's nervous," Mama explained to me when we arrived. "If he gets mad at you, don't think anything of it." I couldn't understand why he would be nervous. He owned the place. Why should he be nervous?

The master bedroom had a bathroom the size of my parents' bedroom in our trailer home in Laurel. Granny Jean showed me into a closet the size of my bedroom where she let me try on her Levi jeans. She even gave me a pair of button-fly jeans, the only pair I've ever owned. By the time I made enough money to buy my own, Levi's didn't make them in my size. A glass wall in their bedroom opened onto a sprawling, wooden deck raised out of the hillside, and from the deck we could traverse two flights of stairs to their Olympic-sized swimming pool. It had a yellow slide that, in my memory anyway, climbed as high as the wooden deck outside the master bedroom.

When nobody paid attention, Granny Jean and I would sneak out to the second, detached garage where we would get on her little motorcycle (really only a ramped-up moped, but it was red and would go 40 mph) and ride the length of their long, serpentine driveway. Up and down the hill, back and forth, until Granny announced she had to make dinner, do a load of laundry, or get a drink. Or all three.

From the pool, a sliding glass door led into the lower level of the house. It was an open area about the size of the front of my house now. It contained a second kitchen, a bedroom the size of our living room and kitchen combined in Mississippi, a full bathroom, and another closet the size of my bedroom back home. The internal stairs to the upper floor marched along the top of the triangular wall, the entirety of which had been painted in a floor-to-ceiling mural of a number of dogs dressed in suits, 30s-style, smoking cigars and playing poker.

I fell in love. The carpet in the garage, the extra kitchen, the glass walls all sang the siren song of luxury. I drank it up, listened with abandon, and loosed a teenage girl's exuberance upon the house. I half-ran down the main hallway of the upper level, impatient to be in the pool, my mind completely occupied with trying to calculate whether it would be faster to run down the stairs and out the glass door of the lower-level apartment or through the master bedroom and down the deck stairs. My left hip bumped into half-circle hallway table, and a curio fell over.

My heart leapt into my throat, and I grabbed the curio to save it, right it, put it in its place. An iron fist closed on my upper arm, and Grandpa stood in my face, screaming, asking where I'd learned manners and how to behave. He had a smell, one I didn't recognize at first. Not beer; that was a smell I knew. It reminded me of the whiskey-and-peppermint "cough syrup" Mama used at home when I got sick. "Never run in a house; what's wrong with you? Try to move like a lady for God's sake; you should be ashamed of yourself." I stammered apologies, tried to shutter my face; I knew instinctively not to cry, but the tears came anyway. I felt ashamed, such a horrible disappointment. He shook me, "Stop sniveling. You're too old to be a crybaby."

Mama appeared and took me away, telling Grandpa she'd deal with me. We went downstairs, and she surprised me with a hug, told me everything would be okay. "It's okay baby, you didn't do anything wrong. You just bumped into a table," she spoke in a rhythm, a cadence. A chanted lullaby. "You didn't do anything wrong. I promise. Grandpa's the one who has the problem. He's nervous, and he doesn't know how to handle having people around. It's okay. It's okay. It's okay." I began to understand that when Mama said nervous, she meant afraid of people. Maybe territorial.

A few years would pass before I realized that the dogs-playing-poker picture was ubiquitous and not the invention of my rich, alcoholic grandfather's twisted imagination. Even more time passed before I learned it was tacky. To this day, my gut association with that picture is New Money. Dirty, oozing, filthy rich new money.

Ten years later, he knelt by the wall-to-wall brick hearth in the living room, put his pistol muzzle against the bottom of his chin, and pulled the trigger. Granny Jean called Mama, and by the time Mama drove from Mississippi to Alabama, Granny Jean was dead drunk. Unable to function. Mama called me in Texas where I lived with my four-year-old daughter and told me the news. I took my company's bereavement leave, three days, and relished the time off to catch up on laundry and dishes. I played games and went swimming with Burgundy.

Mama said she cleaned it up. Wiped the blood and flesh from the hearth and scrubbed it from the carpet and the walls. Granny Jean drank.

He never met Burgundy; Mama feared he wouldn't be able to handle the shock of knowing his oldest grandchild had failed at chastity. That probably was for the best, but I always wondered how in the world I could have lived without her. How could anyone look into the eyes of my daughter and wish I'd been chaste?

Granny Jean never met her either. She had photos after Grandpa died, and she lives in a home somewhere in Alabama. They sold the magnificent house. I never saw it after the summer of 1989. I've never seen her again, either. I just realized it's been 21 years. I send her a Christmas letter, but I've never heard back from her.

Grandpa left a tape recording. In it, he addressed how he wanted his money doled out. He didn't exactly say goodbye or try to tie bows on the packages of relationships. It was a settling of accounts. He left each of his three children the same amount. He made sure to deduct the amount of a loan that he'd made to my Uncle from his inheritance. He told Granny Jean that although they'd had a lot of fun for a number of years drinking together, it was time for her to grow up and fly straight. No more drinking.

Der Behbeh - Un Update

2010-07-28T12:52:00.000-07:00

What a full weekend! Friday morning, Mark, Burgundy and I drove to an office in Pearland where we would have our ultrasound done. My mom met us there, and I have to tell you, regardless of what you think of interventions, there's something miraculous about seeing your bitty baby right in front of you, kicking, waving, and heart whumping away. Mark stood under the monitor completely mesmerized by our child. Burgundy stood next to me yelling, "WOW" and "OH MY GOD, THAT'S A FOOT!" every couple of images. My mom stood behind Burgundy, just as enthusiastic but oozing sentimental tears the whole time.

He's beautiful, by the way, in that black-and-white, grainy way that ultrasound babies are. He weighs 289 grams, about 10.2 ounces. The ultrasound showed my date almost spot on to our calculations based on last menstrual period, and yes, he gave us every view we needed.

Meanwhile, I feel a little bit of something every couple of days. I had a lot of trouble sleeping Sunday and Monday nights, but last night I slept until 3:30, barely made it to the toilet, then slept soundly again until 7. Mind, I'm supposed to be at work at 7. Thanks God my start time isn't critical.

We've been throwing around names. Mark suggested Gallifrey, and much as we love the Dear Old Doctor, Burgundy and I both vociferously denounced the idea. That led to a round of who-can-come-up-with-the-worst-sci-fi name. So far the best contenders are Gandalf, Frodo, Bilbo, Adversary-Destroyer of Kings-Angel of the Bottomless Pit-Great Beast That is Called Dragon-Prince of this World-Father of Lies-Spawn of Satan-and-Lord of Darkness (the real name of Adam Young in the link), and Aragorn. We've encountered surprisingly little resistance to Aragorn, perhaps because I named my first child Burgundy and people simply are relieved that we aren't seriously considering Gallifrey (hands-down top contender for worst sci-fi name, by the way). I think either way we're going to have to call the little guy Strider just to honor this laborious process we've undertaken.

Serious naming contenders: Lucas (general acceptance), James (Burgundy's on the fence as it's her name as well), Darcy (Burgundy has decided the child should be called Darcy James), Tristan, Colin, London, Phoenix and Bob. Well, not really Bob, but you know. I think I really like Tristan Lucas, Colin, Darcy James, and something with Phoenix. But Phoenix is a little too close to trendy for my money.

This weekend, I pick up Burgundy from horse camp Friday evening in Conroe. We'll spend the night in a cheap motel and get up super-early Saturday morning to pick blueberries from Moorhead's Blueberry Farm. Saturday evening, several friends are coming over, and we'll all make blueberry-lime jam together. Very excited about that.

Midwife Visit, 18 Weeks!

2010-07-20T11:13:00.000-07:00

I went to the midwife yesterday for my second visit. I've gained 5-3/4 pounds rather than the 8 I thought I'd gained. Turns out I'm a bit math-challenged, having somehow calculated the difference between 200 and 196 as 6. Now the whole internet can figure out how much I weigh. Oh NOES!

The baby's heart raced loud and strong. Whumpwhumpwhumpwhump. My measurements show a 16.5 cm increase over my last visit. Jackie said, "Whoa, big growth! I'm surprised you haven't gained more weight."

It would help a lot if I could eat. Without heartburn, nausea, or insurmountable fatigue.

We're at ~18 weeks now, and Jackie ordered an ultrasound. Of course I want to run out and do it tomorrow; I can't wait to see him. However, I really want both Burgundy and Mark to be there, and Burgundy will be at Girl Scout camp next week. So we'll probably do it either Friday of this week or sometime week after next.

I brought a number of questions this time. We talked about her backup doctor. She seems really to like him and said that if he's working when I need him (IF I need him), he will take the time to assess my condition and labor carefully, to treat me with respect. Basically, the other hospitals in the area all will automatically perform a C-section if I come in during labor having attempted a home birth. We think that the best thing, assuming the need to transport without the presence of an emergency, will be first to go to her backup hospital IF her backup doctor is available. Barring that, we'll go to LBJ Hospital, which she recommended as also being staffed by respectful doctors and nursing who will take the time to address me personally, figure out my history, and then decide how best to treat me.

The most ironic thing for me is that her backup hospital is Bayshore Medical Center where I gave birth to my daughter. The experience was so bad that I swore I'd rather eat my own toe cheese than set foot in the place again.

Of course, if we have an emergency, all bets are off. We'll go to the nearest hospital, the same one in which Mark was born over 36 years ago!
The conversation left me with a bit of a to-learn list.

I've read a number of ads on cord blood collection, donation and storage, and after talking with Jackie about it, I think I need to do real reading. Big con: in order to collect the cord blood, we can't allow the cord to finish pulsing. I sort of had a "duh" moment when she explained it to me. I don't like the idea of the baby not getting all his (or her) blood.
In addition, while I didn't talk to her about immunizations, we need to learn more (a great deal more) and decide which ones we'll give the baby and which ones we won't.
Need to learn a little more about waterbirth and decide whether we'll go that route.

I better end this missive on that note because I am tired, cranky, and ready to take the afternoon for a nap.

Bad Dream

2010-07-13T05:26:00.000-07:00

I dreamed terrible things last night.

I think I was at a picnic. I know I was somewhere outdoors. I began to bleed. Because I'm past 17 weeks now, I didn't worry at first, but then I began to cramp. I felt dread creeping in, and I shoved it down and ignored it. After the third bout of finding blood with worsening cramps, I admitted that something was dreadfully wrong, and I called my midwife, Jackie.

Suddenly, Jackie was there at the picnic with me, and she told me that she needed to examine me right away. She wanted to check for a heartbeat. She told me that her backup physician's office was closer to us than her birthing center, so we began to go there. I think we walked. On the way, she asked me questions.

"When's the last time you felt the baby move?" I haven't felt the baby move at all, and in my dream, I realized that this should have worried me. I should have been worried long before now not to have felt the baby. In real life, this would not be cause to worry. Just so you know.

"When's the last time you had caffeine?"

"This morning," I told her. Her expression changed to alarm and shock, and I began defending myself. "But I only had like half a cup," I pleaded, "And I never have more than one cup in a day." I felt a knowledge that the caffeine had poisoned my baby. Jackie's disapproval and judgment confirmed it. I slipped into a denial and began shouting the facts that I know: Nobody knows how much caffeine is too much, and most experts agree that a cup a day or less should not hurt the baby. Jackie just watched me, then disappeared. I was at the doctor's office.

I went in and explained to the doctor who I was. He led me into a glass-walled exam room, put me on the table and in stirrups, and two interns came in. They looked like rednecks, hard day laborers, rather than physician interns. The doctor told them they should leave. He explained to me that we'd need to wait for Jackie so she could examine me. The interns protested, so I sat up, looked the beefy one in the eye, and said, "I don't want you in my room for this exam. Get. Out." The doctor looked smug and justified, and the interns left, all dejected.

I removed myself from the bed and stirrups while I waited for Jackie, and people began pouring into the room. The doctor and all the visitors were watching a Discovery Channel show about flowers. I wanted them to get out. By the time Jackie arrived, 20 or 30 people lined the couches, chairs, floors and walls, and more poured in by the minute.

Jackie looked at me and said, "I think the baby stopped growing. You should be showing more by now."

"But I AM showing," I yelled, "Look at this," and I pulled up my shirt. "The fat is covering my baby, but I'm showing, I swear." And then we sat on the couch and talked, and I woke up never knowing whether I'd killed my baby with coffee or whether my baby was dead at all.

I woke Mark and said, "I had a horrible nightmare. I dreamed I was bleeding, and I think the baby was dead."

He rolled over and opened his arms and said, "Come here, Baby," and he cradled me until I fell asleep again.

Underwear, Spinach, and Sausage Gravy

2010-07-02T07:31:00.000-07:00

We leave this morning for a long drive to Mississippi. I'm frankly dreading it. Once we get there, we'll have a lovely time with my sister, her children (including the wee niece I haven't met yet), my father and stepmother, and all my father's family. They're a delight, let me tell you.

We spent most of yesterday and last night getting ready. I think I washed, dried, folded, and put away (or packed) at least five loads of laundry. That's six loads more than I really wanted to do. I also ran out to the maternity store because certain of my few remaining non-maternity clothes felt rather uncomfortable. Turns out that my, um, girls have grown about 4 sizes. The store doesn't carry anything close to my band size in the appropriate cup size, so we had to go up TWO band sizes and buy the largest cup in that size, then fasten it on the tightest clip. We're barely hanging in here. Now I understand why I've felt so uncomfortable.

I also bought a pair of maternity spanx. I don't know what they're actually called, but whatever. I have a couple of really cute maternity dresses, but wearing any dress or skirt without shorts or something underneath is for the birds. And I bought a couple of belly bands (some of the maternity pants are too big, and none of my non-maternity jeans are comfortable) and an adorable navy blue sweater dress with a white color.

The upside is that compared to the same bunch of purchases in a normal store, maternity clothes are pretty cheap. Bra was half what I expected, dress was $15, belly bands were less than half-price; only the spanx really cost what I expected.

Anyway, yesterday ended on a very productive note. I slept like the dead for once, truly exhausted, and woke as usual at 4:30 this morning cursing my body for waking me.

And a story to underscore that I am definitely pregnant:

This morning, my tummy started rumbling, so I walked down to the cafeteria to grab a bite to eat to tide me over. The table of offering looked less than thrilling, so I ordered a sausage biscuit with gravy. The man served it to me in the to-go container, but before passing it over the counter to me, asked, "Anything else?"

I said, "Well, only if you have some spinach."

"No," he laughed, "Well, actually, I do have some in the back. Do you want some?"

"Is it cooked?" I asked, because cooked spinach is re. volt. ing.

It must have shown on my face, because he said it was raw and ran off to fetch what turned out to be about a half-pound of spinach leaves.

Thus I find myself at my desk this morning facing a styrofoam tray of spinach, gravy, and a biscuit with sausage. I don't want to like the spinach; I really don’t. But I want it.

Dreaming of the Doctor and Dirty Socks

2010-06-28T05:53:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was a bad day. I woke feeling well enough, but after a breakfast of junk food and orange juice, I began feeling sick to my stomach almost immediately. Throughout church, I felt waves of nausea alternating with waves of heat, and I had to leave the service a couple of times.

Mark took us out to IHOP after that, and while I appreciated the break from trying to cook in the kitchen, I feel I can say with fair certainty that IHOP is not a good choice for alleviating nausea.

We dropped Burgundy off with Tabby for a babysitting job, and I slept for the rest of the afternoon. I felt a bit better for having slept, and we had spaghetti for dinner.

I went to bed around 9:30 and slept fitfully until about 4:30. After that, I couldn't even doze. I dreamed ridiculous things and tried to ignore the aching in my belly and the itching. Every time Mark touched me or the sheets shifted against my skin, I would come fully awake, itching like mad.

The itching had me dreaming of laundry as I somehow convinced myself that the problem was dirty sheets (even though I wash them every week). I dreamed I took all my knitted socks into the shower with me, and later I dreamed that this caused some kind of alien problem that required Dr. Who to show up and fix the damage. Sadly, this dream did not feature David Tennant in my shower.

That leaves me at my desk at work at 7:00 in the morning, still achy, nauseous, and now quite unable to focus on the myriad tasks at hand. I can't recall the details from last week, the plans I made while discussing transition with L, the plans for addressing disconnects that I formulated with K. I'm just here, lost, and you have the privilege of reading the most boring blog entry ever written.

Except for David Tennant in my shower with my hand-knit socks.

Why Homebirth, Part I

2010-06-23T08:11:00.000-07:00

So I'm pregnant. Very exciting news, isn't it? Even more exciting is the news that it's sticking (for now); we're officially out of the first trimester, making it much easier to grin and announce the coming baby with gratitude and joy. That trepidatious sense of impending doom recedes a little more each day, and as my tummy begins to grow (only the faintest hint right now), so does the thrill and anticipation. Soon I'll feel movement (the quickening), and soon after that, Mark and Burgundy will be able to feel it from the outside. I'm making a baby.

Given how long and dearly we've wanted this child, some people have asked, all incredulous, why we would take the risk of a homebirth attended by a midwife. After all, isn't a hospital safer? Isn't a doctor more knowledgeable? For those who have been in my home, there's the gingerly asked (and possibly quite valid), "Um, is it sanitary enough?"

In a word, No, No, and NO. I mean Yes. The answer to the last question is definitely YES. No Freudian slips here; move along.

I want to spend several posts exploring these questions and the scientific evidence in favor of midwifery care (as opposed to obstetrical care) and home or birth-center-based labor and delivery. Childbirth is one of the most important rites of passage in our culture, and the way we approach care for this event in a woman and family's life has implications for safety, maternal and infant morbidity rates, cultural assumptions and attitudes toward life and toward the value of people. Childbirth is a fine example of the interconnectedness of life, love, science and progress. Childbirth is my soapbox, my love, a saving grace (for me). Healthy, normal childbirth is a passion, its promotion almost a mission for me.

These posts might be far between because I want to present them in a way that demonstrates the interdependencies of the childbirth process (for example, the well-documented "cascade effect" of our technological advances that has lead to our inexcusably high Cesarean rate in the US). I often find that when a person asks me about one thing, for example, electronic fetal monitoring, I don't do a very good job of presenting the big picture, the whole argument.

I begin discussion logically enough. Unfortunately, as I connect the dots mentally, I get a little rabid. I stumble over my own words; I get "Libertarian Eyes" (a term for the slightly wild-eyed look of a zealot in full-on Preach-the-Gospel-of-My-Cause mode coined by my friend Hannah in discussion of, um, excessively passionate people), and apparently, I lose my ability to form a coherent sentence.

When I come back to my senses, I'm out of breath, spluttering, and whomever I've just assaulted with a vitriolic denunciation of anything short of squatting in a rice paddy backs away slowly and refuses to return my calls for a month. As they back away, I follow them, saying things like, "And that's not even the half of it! I once discovered a coven of obstetricians mired in a Ritual Cesarean chanting insurance codes! I DID! And they are the reason that our society is crumbling! It’s the Demonic Obstetricians of DOOM! You must birth [spittle flies on the heels of birth; I pronounce it like a televangelist] NAKED! Do it for the CHILDREN [I begin to shout because they're running now]! JESUS WANTS YOU TO RECLAIM YOUR FEMINIST POWER! WHEN YOU BIRTH YOU BECOME A SUPER WOMAN; YOU ARE CAPABLE OF ANYTHING!"

So yes, I want to write something coherent and accessible. I want to write something that friends can read without thinking, "Christ on a cracker, don't tell her you're pregnant!" Most of all, I want it to be effective. I want people who read me, who stumble on my journal, to understand that there is a better way than epidurals, episiotomies, and cesarean sections. A safer way, a gentler way. A loving way.

2010-06-22T06:43:00.000-07:00

NASA recently released this image of the Gulf oil spill. Let me hasten to add that this is a false-color image "created by combining data from different color bands on two of MISR's [multi-angle imaging spectro-radiometer] nine cameras."

I think everything that I could think of to say about this spill has been said, including the call by Scottish Twins to be proper stewards of Earth as a fundamental Christian responsibility. I don't have a lot to add, but the NASA image is the first I've seen that so clearly conveyed the magnitude of the spill. I wanted to share it with you for that reason.

Meanwhile, the link above will explain the two lower photos, the white arrow in the picture, and the little red +, which marks the spot of the actual well.

As an aside, if you find this sort of thing useful, please take a moment to write your Congressperson urging them to kill the proposal to cancel Constellation. To be fair, the MISR and this photo nominally have nothing to do with Constellation. The key is that Constellation *is* our future plan for manned space flight, and without MSF, we will gradually make fewer and fewer of the kinds of advances that the MISR represents.

Finally. I Have Returned

2010-06-21T07:19:00.000-07:00

Two months. I know; it's a long time without an update. I'd tell you I'm sorry and beg your forgiveness, but honestly, I'm not sure my eight or so readers felt a significant vacuum in their lives for my absence. Just another blogger who didn't stick with it.

The thing is, I actually will stick with it. You just have to put up with the occasional dry spell. I really am sorry. Mostly just because that's not how I want to blog, not because I think my absence did a powerful harm to the Internetz.

So April 23, I posted about depression. Several things have happened since then. Perhaps most significantly, I've carried a pregnancy past the first trimester (officially today). I'm as shocked as the rest of the world, and I'm slowly getting excited.

The difficulties in our marriage have been getting better. Both of us work hard, and while I think we're also both kind of waiting for the other shoe to drop, we're also enjoying this anomalous experience of actually liking our spouse.

So much and yet so little has happened in the past two months. Burgundy finished 9th grade with straight As for the second semester. She went to Chicago with our church's youth choir, and they sang in churches, cathedrals, and nursing homes as they toured their way up and back. She saw Blue Man Group on the trip, and I think she's decided to become Catholic just so she can marry in a St. Louis cathedral with which she fell deeply in love. She began a summer school enrichment program at Rice University last week.

That's a post in and of itself. It's a testament to the power of great teachers that young people in their teens, an age glorified for recalcitrance and rebellion, flock to this school in the summer. Burgundy's boyfriend begged his parents to let him go (I'm sure Burgundy's attendance had nothing to do with that), and Burgundy, who is 14 and starting her Sophomore year in August, a musician and an English nerd, comes home chattering gaily about Calculus and Chemistry. I mean, really. Maybe standardized testing isn't so effective after all? Maybe giving teachers the freedom to teach to their students is effective? Pshaw, you don't say.

It turns out that Burgundy's Calculus teacher (who has her gobbling up the limits and derivatives regardless of her lack of pre-Cal and tutoring her classmates) teaches at the Awty International School. I wanted so badly to send her to Awty when she was little. I could go on and on about them. I'm tempted to pull him aside toward the end of the summer school program and ask him about scholarships. The tuition is tens of thousands per year, but if we could put her in an environment where the teachers are free to teach (and she could earn her International Baccalaureate), I know she would thrive.

Oh, once I start writing, it's so easy. I missed, you, little blog!

Mark has been working on his book business, and I've been laying on the couch whining about morning sickness that lasts all day and all night. His business is going pretty well now, and I would guess he's selling an average of two to three books per day. He still needs to take one more class before he can sit for his Project Management Professional (PMP) certification, but NASA keeps cancelling or completely overselling its occasional class for PMs. I think we're going to just pay the tuition for him to take this class. It will hurt financially given our impending unemployment, but given the value of a current PMP cert, I think it's completely worth the effort. It could double his salary.

I've continued to work part-time right up until now. I received word last week though that beginning next week, I will begin working full time. This is a blessing in disguise for me. I have been so tired and sick for the last three months that if I had needed to go full time even a week earlier, I don't know if I could have done it. Luckily, the sickness is getting less and less prohibitive, and my energy is coming back now. By next week, I should be ready to go. The real blessing in all this is that we'll be able to almost double our emergency fund if we're very careful. If we can (God willing) find a way to fully fund it and pay for the midwife before my employment ends, I'll be so very grateful.

I think that has to be all for now. I could go on and on, but I think I need to save some words for tomorrow.

Gordon Gano and Hope

2010-04-23T08:11:00.000-07:00

Now I might be silly, I'll admit it. I discovered the Violent Femmes in 1991, my 11th-grade year, just as I realized that my life never would line up with my expectations and hopes. The last two years of high school and the next two years of college remain the darkest days of my life, with extreme depression ruling most of my decisions. As a depressed, promiscuous, 17-year-old girl on the Mississippi Gulf Coast, I fell hard for the idea of Gordon Gano the lyricist based on their wild, uninhibited, and (to me) very new sound on the 1981 Violent Femmes album. I played Blister in the Sun over and over and over, cackling to myself that my mom didn't know it was about masturbation. I played Add It Up at full volume, and I shouted Gano's words and channeled all the fury and hatred I had through my voice, trying to feel the horribleness that I felt leaving my body through my mouth.

It's really a very good thing that I never saw this 1984 photo of Gano as a teenager. I think I would simply have imploded. At 34, I still might:

Photo from Milwaukee Rock Posters

Much later I discovered their album 3. I loved it, too, but not with the intensity and excitement of that self-titled debut. I found some of the songs more singable if less infectious. My particular favorite for years was Fat, a song I've taken as a bit of a theme song for myself. I'm sure Gano wrote and sang it just for me. And oh! just for a moment to sing the praises of Guy Ritchie's bass playing on that song! The song is utterly predictable and an absolute masterpiece. It never fails to make me smile, and I always end up dancing.

I digress. Here and now, I'm writing for a different reason. In spite of the angst and worldly teen suffering he codified and recorded for posterity, Gano always has described himself as a devout Baptist. Knowing that, in my later years as a Christian, I've found hope in a good bit of his supposedly profane (as opposed to sacred) and secular music.

Over the last six months, I've suffered awful, terrible depression. Some of the worst depression I've endured since those years at the end of high school has haunted me right here and now. I have been overwhelmed by it, and have often had to remind myself that you can't "lose" hope. You either choose to have it, or you don't.

This morning on the commute to work I plugged my iPod into the truck stereo system as always and scrolled through the bands. I'm sick of Sting, of the Police, of the Chemical Brothers. My depression has been too serious for me to risk listening to Nine Inch Nails (another discovery of those horrific late-teen years) or Tori Amos. I saw Violent Femmes at the bottom of the artist list and thought, "Ah, just what I need." I selected the ever-so-slightly more mature 3 album for the ride in.

As I pulled onsite, a song I'd completely forgotten came on, and it spoke to me. The first hope I've felt in a while welled up, and I sang along thinking, "Oh my God. He's done it. Gordon Gano has fought this very depression in this very way, trying to reconcile it to this very faith. And he wrote it down and sang it out for me."

Now I'm certain good old Gordon's never gonna see this blog, and that's okay. But I have to say, it's been nice hearing him all these years, and I surely would like to thank him.

Outside the Palace

I've been outside the palace

I've been outside the gate

I still don't feel that I made any mistake

When I got off that train

I felt my feet hit the ground

I didn't want to know

Where that gravy train was bound

To me, the palace here is the protective home we have as Christians. The palace is that shelter that Christian parents want to give their children. We want to save them the sorrow of knowing and being hurt by that world; ultimately, though, we can't do that. They (and we) choose to step outside God's palace, to know the world. And that might or might not be a fundamental mistake. Regardless, how do we appreciate the palace for what it is if we never leave it?

God help me to see

I've been loved all along

And not to get too confused

Between the moonlight and the dawn

The moonlight and the dawn here represent the actual depression. The confusion and darkness that descend when you've been too long in the world and you begin to question God, his love for you, his desire for your happiness, and our purpose here. I read these lines as a literal prayer, and a literal promise. I have been loved all along, but I need help remembering and living that; the depression, the time of darkness between the moonlight and the dawn, confuses me and obscures the fact of God's love.

If I go back to the palace

I'll walk right through the gate

Nobody knows how much here was at stake

I might get on that train

In feel the wheel on the track

Move it on up the mountain like a foregone fact

Going home to the palace really is as simple as walking right through the gate, but the simplicity of the act masks the incredible cost of staying away. It's simple to forget the palace, or to relegate it to a time in my life, a phase I went through, and to continue in the world as though it was ordained that I must: I can forget the palace, leave it in the past and stay on the train (here representing the world). Now working on the world's mountains becomes a foregone fact of my life. My purpose becomes about the world and its problems.

God help me to know

I've been in love my whole life

And not to get so confused

Between the struggle and the strife.

Maybe it's a function of the depression in my head right now, but these last lines make me want to weep for their reassurance and simple faith. Again, this is a prayer, one that asks God for the simple reminder that I am in love with him, that he is my choice; I am not bound as a Christian just because the Hindu gods didn't get to me first or because I'm not Buddhist. My faith is not by default, and it is not a reflection of God's ownership of me. No, God relinquished his ownership by giving me the freedom to choose him or any other god. The struggle and the strife, the products of the world and of being outside the palace, can so easily overwhelm and confuse, sending me back to depression and separation and allowing me to forget that I chose this faith and this walk.

Dog Barf

2010-04-14T07:28:00.000-07:00

Mark got himself in trouble a couple of weeks ago.

I tried a new recipe: pasta with arugula and parsley cream sauce.

Now I like arugula in salads, so I thought, "Hey, why not be adventurous?" I am a fool.

First, in accordance with the recipe, I went outside and picked a handful of Mark's arugula. Now the recipe called for a bunch, so I felt that with only 5 or so leaves, I was really skimping. It also called for four sprigs of parsley, so I dutifully picked those as well.

Back inside, I washed and dried each leaf, then chopped them up fine and put them in the blender. I put in a cup of my precious homemade sour cream and another 1/3 cup of goat and feta cheeses and pureed it all together for a nice, springy, Easter green sauce. I have to admit: it smelled funny, but I decided to trust my sense of adventure. "It smells woodsy and earthy," I told myself.

I boiled the pasta, thinking, "Oh boy, this is going to be gourmet." (Note to self: If you start having delusions of gourmet about a given dish, it might be best just to throw it out preemptively.) I drained the pasta and sprayed it with cold water. One of my nicest serving bowls appeared perfect to showcase this spring green pasta wizardry: two-tone cornflower and sky blue, and set the table. Congratulated myself on getting adventurous in the kitchen, on feeding healthful food to my family, and on using the food in our garden. I poured the "earthy" sauce onto the pasta and mixed it together in that beautiful blue bowl.

Burgundy came into the kitchen; I speared a piece of pasta and said, "Taste it!" with a big grin. Burgundy grinned back; she's learned to trust my cooking. After all, how many times have I said, "I know! It sounds awful, but just try it." Without trusting me, she'd never have had buttermilk pie. Zucchini bread. Peanut butter and honey. I held the fork between us, smiling happily, flush with the accomplishment of a new dish, fresh from our yard and my labors. She sniffed the fusilli and immediately, involuntarily assumed her Careful Face. "I know," I said. "It smells funny; just try it."

Ever the obedient child, Burgundy opened her mouth and gingerly took the fusilli from the fork. Her eyes widened, her head tilted to one side, then the other. The Careful Face prevented me from determining whether these were signs of surprised delight or surprised disgust. I decided to walk the line: "It's not bad, is it?" She shook her head and swallowed. "See? It's maybe not something I'd make again; I mean, it's not delicious, but it's a passable meal." Her sweet smile and affirmative nod, eyes still wide, should have told me everything. Unfortunately, I lay in the grips of my own inflated ego. I ate another piece myself and waggled my eyebrows. Burgundy excused herself to do algebra. Another clue.

About that time, Mark came home from work. Sauntered in, smiling innocently, and kissed my cheek. "What's for dinner?" I grinned and told him about my awesome arugula-sour cream-goat-cheese-and-feta pasta. "Arugula?" he said timidly?

"Yeah, smell!" I said, and thrust the bowl under his nose. He inhaled deeply, recoiled sharply, and didn't even try to hide his disgust. Count on Mark for honesty. "I know, It smells funny, but it really tastes okay, honest!" Unfortunately, Mark trusts me in the kitchen as much as Burgundy does, and I still suffered under my delusions of culinary grandeur. "Here, try it," I said, holding out another lone noodle on the end of the fork. He looked at me, looked at the fork.

"Um." He looked back at me and sniffed the concoction again. "Well, there's always Casa Ole." Casa Ole is our go-to crap food. Everything is smothered in cheese, lard, and corn syrup. It's awful and awesome and a threat and fun. He leaned forward, took the fusilli between his teeth, and pulled it into his mouth. I waited; he chewed. Swallowed. "Hmm," he said, looking at my hopeful face, "uh, how about Casa Ole tonight?"

I admitted defeat. Suddenly I knew the dish really was that bad, and I had tormented my child and my own stomach in hopes of its salvation. Burgundy, who'd come back in to watch Mark taste it, heaved a long sigh of relief and punctuated it with, "Oh thank God." I suppressed a self-conscious giggle, and we all prepared to leave.

I know. If you're still reading, you're wondering why Mark would be in trouble. Well, honestly, at that point he wasn't. He simply told the truth, and I know the food really was that bad. It's what happened next that really has him in the doghouse.

While Burgundy got ready to leave, I looked at the bowl full of expensive sour cream and cheeses and pasta and said, "God I hate for this to go to waste."

Mark nodded and said, "Mm, yeah. Cost a lot?"

"Just the cheeses and sour cream, but yeah." We both looked mournfully at dinner's lost cause. "I bet the dog would eat it."

Mark looked at me a fraction of a second too long, and then said, "Uh, do you really think he'll want that?" He placed just a little too much emphasis on 'want that'.

"Only one way to find out," I said, and I place the bowl on the floor. Soren immediately began inhaling the green, smelly pasta without even a hint of hesitation. I turned to Mark in triumph. "See? Not a total waste."

Mark looked from me to the dog, who paused to hork a fusilli spiral out of his lungs and transfer it to his stomach. Soren looked up at us warily, as if we might try to take this miracle of deliciousness from him. He bent his head back to the bowl, now half empty.

"Maybe," Mark said, not weighing his words, not considering the punishment he would earn or his impending immortality on this blog, "Maybe we should put him outside on the patio in case he barfs it all up."

The Anti-Pop-Tart Post

2010-04-11T08:38:00.000-07:00

Aside from The List, I have personal goals and changes I want to pursue regardless of the impending crisis. I have posted a few times about our local eating efforts, and I want to expand that to local living. My friend Hannah and I talked last weekend about local living for hours while we drove to and from Brenham, Texas to buy fresh, local meat.

I concluded that I want to try to live and shop only in my own hemisphere, preferably only in North America. Yes, this means no more Belgian or German chocolate, and it means no more Ethiopian Sidama coffee. However, I can buy sustainably farmed coffee from this continent and hemisphere without paying for the tons of petrochemicals involved in transporting the Sidama from Africa. Sure, we still pay for oil to transport the coffee from Columbia (yeah, I know. Not my continent) or Central America, but it's certainly less than from Africa. And before you suggest it, no, I will not stop drinking coffee. Mother Earth can kiss my Heiny if she thinks I'm taking that one for the team.

This also means I need to shop for American-made clothes, shoes, electronics . . . you name it. I might not succeed all the time. Given the job situation, if I need a car part and it costs twice as much for American as for Asian, I might have to buy the Asian-made part for now. I feel I must at least make the effort, though.

Here are my proposed guidelines and challenges to myself:

The experiment will last six months: the period of time remaining before we enter the Season of Unemployment Armageddon.
90% of food should be raised and grown within 200 miles of Houston. The only reason I'm giving myself such mileage is that most ranches and my source of raw milk are between 90 and 100 miles away. The only reason I'm giving myself a 10% freedom to buy from farther away is for items like coffee, chocolate, and avocados. I don't know if avocados grow within 200 miles of Houston or not, but I want to make sure I can have them.
90% of consumer goods should be made on this continent. Again, I'm giving myself room so that if it turns out that the ingredients of my homemade laundry detergent are only made in China and I can't find any other US-made detergent, I'm not screwed. I want to make sure that I still can buy toilet paper, you know? Oh, and DH thinks I'm being dumb, so I need room to not have to fight with him about every little thing.
When we eat out, we suspend the experiment for obvious reasons; however, we should try to eat only at locally owned and run restaurants. I want to limit eating out to twice a month.
I want to prove a corollary theory: That while shopping only locally is more time consuming, it should be cheaper. It's true! Local, humanely raised chicken might be more expensive per pound (a lot more!), but if you eat less of it (a common surprise when people begin eating locally and in-season) and dress it with locally grown, in-season vegetables, it's practically the only expense of the meal. Our $12 chicken with $5 in vegetables from Sunday before last fed us for four days. That's about $4.25/day or $127.50/month. Um, that's cheap. The average American family spends about $289 on food prepared at home. Our current grocery budget is $90/week or $360 - $450/month for food and non-food items. I want to show at least a 10% reduction in food expenditures over the next six months. That means I should have $9 left at the end of each week. I'll put that money into an envelope and keep it in the desk.
I want to prove (for myself) another corollary theory: That eating locally is more healthful. I do not believe that weight loss is a good indicator of physical health, nor are body size and BMI. After thinking a lot about how to prove this, I've settled on bloodwork. I'm going to ask my doctor for a blood panel to figure out where I am right now. I'm not going to do anything differently than I do right now. I will not restrict calories or intentionally up my exercise. I won't not exercise either. I'll just do whatever comes naturally. I enjoy soccer, and the season is starting; therefore, I'll play soccer once a week if I feel up to it. At the end of the six months, I'll have another blood panel done. I'll publish the results of each panel here.

If any of you smart people out there can think of a better (read: less expensive) method to prove the healthful theory, please tell me in the comments.

As I re-read this for publication, a co-worker brought me a Pop-Tart, and I devoured it. I might have snorted the icing without ever once considering the irony of what's displayed on the screen. I might have, but I will neither confirm nor deny such an allegation. I have avoided bringing snacks and food to the office because I work only half-days. Clearly I need to change my approach. Pop-Tarts do not meet a single criterion listed above. They are everything that this effort seeks to remedy about my life. This post is my Manifesto! My Master Plan! My Anti-Pop-Tart.

Unemployment Armageddon

2010-04-09T07:24:00.000-07:00

We found out two days ago that in addition to the end of my current employment on September 30, Mark's contract ends October 1.

I feel angry, paralyzed, motivated, frightened. I am a walking maelstrom of emotions.

The only things we can do are the obvious:

Job hunt. My company has said that if we can move, they will help us find positions elsewhere in the company. In addition, Mark's skills transfer easily across industries. If he can find a position in petrochemicals or one of the other industries around here before the rest of NASA is laid off and saturates the market, we can stay in Houston.
Cut expenses. This will be the most difficult proposition because we already live pretty close to the bottom of the threshold, and there still are many things we need to buy. Burgundy wants to attend the Rice summer school again, this time for enrichment. Given the trouble she had in Algebra last year, we really want her to take a pre-Calculus enrichment class before she takes it for credit next year. She wants to take a class in writing, a class in Chemistry (she's taking Chem next year), and a class in US photographic history. We will pay for this because her education is important. It's worth it. $775. And that's only one expense. There's my truck, repairs to the house, medical bills . . . you name it.
Save money. As much as we can. We're working on that now. Mark is selling his books again over the internet, and I'm thinking of selling all but my most cherished yarn, fiber, and fabric. With all the above expenses, we're going to have to be brutal with each other about saying no.
Sell the house. This decision hurts the most. Mark loves our house. His garden is thriving, and we like our neighborhood. We're five minutes from Burgundy's high school, great location, yada yada. However, once NASA "refines" its workforce, housing here will plummet, and we'll lose our meager equity. We need to sell it now. Mark and I disagree on this, so the common ground we reached is that we need to get it ready to sell. I plan to call a realtor friend next week and ask her to help us prioritize what needs to be done. I know we need to get the clutter out of the house; Mark won't want to get rid of anything, so that will represent more expense. As will new carpet, replacing the tub in the guest bathroom, painting rooms and landscaping. We have pine trees.* I hate pine trees, and I have ten of them in my front yard.

I'm not sure exactly how, but I know we'll make it. Even if we end up drawing unemployment, we should be able to make it.

* Good God I hate pine trees. Perhaps it's that I grew up dirt poor in pine country, Mississippi, but they scream, "I AM TRAILER TRASH AND CAN'T AFFORD OAK TREES OR LANDSCAPING, SO I PLANTED UGLY, WEEDY, FAST-GROWING TOOTHPICK TREES INSTEAD! FEAR MY SHOTGUN!"

A Love Note

2010-03-31T20:55:00.000-07:00

Dear God,

I know that strawberries aren't a new invention or anything, but I have to say that after eating fresh berries for a week and then making ice cream with them, I've decided you're a genius. You know, I think the way to this woman's heart might just be through my stomach. So what else am I missing, huh? Are you holding out on me? Are fresh peaches this palatable? Because I always thought they were kinda gross. Like strawberries.

Love,

Ms. Lilly

Ice Cream

2010-03-31T20:30:00.000-07:00

I hate that I'm posting so sporadically. I'm beset by a pretty harsh apathy lately; I think it's the result of coming home to This Mundane Life after the week of vacation. I've resisted laundry, wanted only to nap in the afternoons and sleep in every morning, and I hope against hope that my love of the kitchen will snap me out of it.

Tonight I marshaled my resources for a second attempt at strawberry ice cream. Last night's attempts ended in failure when I didn't read the directions carefully enough. I ended up with an expensive, lumpy mess that noone would eat. I fed it to the dog.

Tonight I started over. I had to supplement the cream with some from Kroger; I knew my cream was richer, yellower, and generally better, but it was like looking at the difference between an egg white and an egg yolk.

That's how I feel lately about all the foodstuff in the grocery store. It feels like our Science and Sanitation culture has taken over, and everything should be Properly Sanitized, Whitened, Homogenized. All the eggs in a carton must be brown or white. None of the beautiful blue-green ones I get from my coworker. The cream - heavy cream - was thin, white, and tasteless. I'm bummed that I had to use it in my ice cream.

I won't go off on that rant though. We've been doing pretty well with our home eating. We're still working on the chicken that I roasted Sunday morning with carrots and potatoes and served with the leeks, kale, and mustards. Monday we had black bean burritos, and for lunch, Burgundy and I had the leftover kale/mustard concoction. Last night, I made leek and potato soup, and tonight we had salad (Mark bartered some of his garden herbs for two lettuces on Saturday) and black bean burritos. Mark and I added chicken to ours.

I invited my family over for Easter, but I don't know whether they'll come over or not. Mom said something about going somewhere with Dad for the three-day weekend. I want to try boeuf bourgignon again, this time with the dog firmly locked in his kennel.

The timer's just gone off, telling me I should check in again on my ice cream. I still had 5 pounds of strawberries left, so I've been eating them with my granola. Last night I pureed and strained a couple of pints of them, and tonight I took my second stab at adapting the recipe for raspberry ice cream from Alice Waters' Chez Panisse Fruits. Lord, please let it be good.

The Fruits of Our Labor

2010-03-27T22:45:00.000-07:00

Tonight the arches of my feet ache so deeply I can nearly taste it. The ache leaves a tang in the back of my mouth. My calves burn, a deep, low smolder echoed in my lower back and shoulders. My neck muscles remain tight, ready for me to find one more thing to do, one more little task.

Mark crawled out of bed at 7:00. Yes, you read that right; my husband the night owl clambered out of bed as the sun himself protested with me to crawl back between the warm sheets. He spent the better part of the next three hours outside in his little garden trimming, clipping, and snipping his herbs into shape.

At 10 he took Burgundy to tutor her student, and I began to gather my wits for the day's to-do list. By 11, Mark had amassed a sorted pile of excess herbs and greens ranging from arugula to lemongrass, and he bagged them all and drove to the farmers' market. By then, I already had cash in hand and waited patiently to pick up my fresh milk and chicken. I have never bought chicken through this person before, and I'm eager to see whether this chicken lives up to Michael Pollan's hype on free-range, local, well-fed chicken.

Next I gathered Marie, who wanted to join Burgundy and me on our day's outing. Burgundy had loaded her typewriter into the car, and after relieving her student of Burgundy's company, we headed downtown to Dromgoole's, a tiny, mom-and-pop, pen and stationary store in Houston's Rice Village. So we began our foray with retail therapy. I bought a beautiful new fountain pen, deep navy and mostly metal with a bladder for ink instead of only a cartridge option. I also bought more notebooks, beautiful notebooks with heavy, thick smooth paper designed for fountain pens and writing. Burgundy left with a new red and black ink cartridge in her [likely] 40's vintage corona typewriter.

From there, we went to a tiny chocolaterie where we spent a really inexcusable amount on truffles. And not the French mushroom kind. No, we spent twelve dollars on four pieces of chocolate. We ate lunch at Star Pizza and proceeded from there to Froberg's Market in Alvin.

I'm so glad we went. We arrived to find scores of people in the fields with their families plucking red, juicy strawberries from row upon row of plants, so we picked up four little buckets and spent the next hour stooped over in the fields abandoning first dignity, then shoes and socks for as many of the berries as we could fit in our buckets. We found that the walking rows in one end of the field were waterlogged and muddy, and into these clearly uninhabitable reaches, less stalwart folk had failed to wander. Thus we plucked nearly 20 pounds of ripe berries without covering more than three planted rows.

We visited with my mother and friends of hers who had come into town to visit briefly for a few minutes before discovering we were late for my father-in-law's birthday dinner. We called to ask for a later start time, which was granted with good grace, and the girls and I left for home.

By the time we bought my FIL's gift (a copy each of The Omnivore's Dilemma and In Defense of Food, books he will love perhaps too much), wrapped it, met them at the restaurant, stopped by Half-Price Books (where I snagged What to Eat by Marion Nestle for $4, thank you very much), we were verging on 9:00 PM.

Back at the house, Burgundy began her studies, Mark showed his parents the latest in his garden, and Marie and I began washing and coring berries. We finished 10 pounds, and I froze 11 pints of sliced and quartered strawberries. By 11 PM, we had 5 remaining berries, so we poured ourselves a bowl each of my homemade vanilla granola, sliced in the strawberries, covered it all with milk, and enjoyed the most decadent midnight snack I could imagine. At that moment, I felt so grateful to the earth for her fruit, to God for his genius design, and to genetics for making sure Burgundy did not want any part of our strawberries.

Now it's half past midnight. Mark's catalogued his garden's contents for me, and he's perusing a large picture book on organic gardening. We each have a glass of Haak Winery's Syrah, and I feel alive, accomplished, and utterly spent.

Can We Live Locally?

2010-03-26T07:59:00.000-07:00

Yesterday put hair on my chest.

I finished The Omnivore's Dilemma last night, and it has had a real impact on our eating. We started buying our milk and beef locally over a year ago, though finding a reliable dairy source has been spotty. About three months ago, we found a local woman who makes the three-hour trip to the best dairy I've found: Stryk's Dairy. We buy from her when we can't get out there ourselves.

For beef, we have used Law Ranch in the past, but they only produce beef. Georgia's Ranch meat is available to us, but they are very expensive, I think even more so than Law or Jolie Vue, the only other local meat source of which I know. Yesterday I signed us up for JV's every-other-month meat delivery program, and I'm excited to get our first shipment in April.

Reading TOD opened my eyes to just how spoiled and ignorant I am about food. I did not know meats were seasonal. I still don't know which fruits and vegetables are in season at what times, but I'm starting to educate myself.

And I'm getting really fired up to live only locally. That means living according to the seasons, learning to cook a lot of food that I previously wouldn't deign to cook, much less eat, and learning to be creative in the face of seasonal limits. We eat tomatoes year round; therefore, I will spend the better part of tomato season canning and putting away all forms of tomatoes for all the months that I can't buy them locally. This also means living locally in other ways, too: shopping family owned for office supplies, clothes, and other basics fits right into the same value system.

Yesterday I wanted to serve fish for dinner, so I found a local fish market and bought a pound of beheaded, deveined shrimp for dinner. I supported a local merchant and ate locally. Win!

Meanwhile, kale and leeks are in season, and I have wild mustards growing in the back yard. I wanted to saute these together in olive oil and finish them with white wine. Obviously, olive oil isn't local. However, just 20 or so miles from here, in Santa Fe, Texas, Haak Winery produces a very tasty, very palatable range of wines. I picked up a bottle of white table wine and a bottle of their Syrah. I think that's the first time I've ever volunteered for a second glass of white wine. I haven't tried the Syrah yet. Again, I supported a local merchant (family-owned, Houston-based liquour store Spec's) and a local grower (the winery), and I ate delicious local food.

So I came home with my bounty; Mark picked the mustards, and I washed them and the kale together. I used my new pasta machine to make fettucine (new lesson: if you think it's thin enough, think again), and I chopped the leeks and sauteed them in olive oil, then deglazed the pot with a splash of wine. With the water still clinging to their leaves, I tore in the kale and mustards, poured in the remainder of a cup of wine, then left them to simmer for a few minutes. Simplest, most delicious greens routine EVER.

During a few down moments, I'd chopped a bell pepper with some onion and garlic, and I sauteed these together with the half-pound of shrimp Mark had just finished peeling. I added a couple of cups of chopped tomatoes and a handful of fresh basil and oregano from Mark's garden.

I threw the pasta into a pot full of boiling water, and I let everything meld together for five or six minutes. Finally, I mixed the cooked pasta with the tomato-shrimp saute and served it next to the brilliant, sweet, sharp kale and mustards for the most local meal I've ever made. We washed it down with Haak's excellent white, sweet table wine, and Burgundy pronounced it one of the best meals I've ever made.

Can you tell I'm just beaming with pride?

This Week, I Want to be a Chef When I Grow Up

2010-03-24T07:22:00.000-07:00

Holy cow, how did I make it to Wednesday without posting? Clearly, this isn't my day job.

We made good time on the trip home from Hill Country. We stopped outside of Schulenberg at Stryk's Dairy for more raw milk. I found cream and buttermilk, too, so I'm delighted about that. I have a little under a gallon and a half of raw milk, plus a half-gallon of buttermilk and a quart of cream. I have been waiting a while to pick up enough extra milk to process into cream cheese and yogurt. I'm not sure what to do with the buttermilk. I honestly picked it up mostly because it was $3 for a half-gallon, and I figured I could find something to do with it, even if I just used it for pies.

So if the world out there has any good buttermilk recipes, let me know!

While on vacation, I also picked up a small pasta machine and a frittata pan set. I made a frittata Sunday night using onions and red and green peppers we had in the refrigerator along with parsley, basil, chives, and marjoram from Mark's garden, and I augmented the eggs with a bit of the abundance of raw milk in our refrigerator.

I made another frittata last night, this time attempting to use up some of the kale that my friend Hannah picked up for us at the farmer's market. It's in season right now along with mustards, leeks, brussels sprouts, and lots of other noms. Eighty cents for a HUGE bunch of kale. Anyway, I made the frittata with onions, garlic, marjoram, and some of Stryk's local cheddar cheese. I wanted to add another local, small dairy's goat cheese to it, but it's a spreading more than crumbling cheese, so I left it out.

Tonight I want to use the pasta machine. I figure I'll master the "art" of pasta making using the called-for unbleached all purpose flour first, and once I have it down, I'll begin the trial and error process of converting to my self-ground whole wheat flour. I'll get there, slowly but surely.

Anybody want to guess what book I'm reading right now?

Vacation Day 3 - Adventures of a Snot Junky

2010-03-16T11:30:00.000-07:00

First, @($*TWERJGOIW#%)(T&Q#$%)(*#$%@#)(*%@RJGFSDFGJW#$!

WARGARBL!

There. I feel better having gotten that out of my system. Saturday night, I laid down for bed, and the roof of my mouth started itching. This is a warning sign of an impending allergy attack, so I leapt up, guzzled a glass of water and an allergy pill, and my sinuses promptly exploded in a shower of unwanted, stubborn snot.

Sunday Mark did most of the preparation and packing for our vacation while I moped around, occasionally throwing myself across the couch and moaning, "Oh woe! WOE! Why me? Why now? What have I done to deserve this?" and blowing my nose and wiping my runny eyes.

Mark drove to San Marcos while I knitted, bitched fairly consistently about everything, occasionally wept, and pouted.

When we arrived in San Marcos at our neighbor's beautiful second home she graciously offered to us, we all unloaded the car while I continued to whine and the snot continued to flow. I collapsed into bed at the first opportunity and cried. Like a big baby. Because I'm on vacation and suffering one of the worst, most painful allergy attacks I've had in years.

In what I'm certain is completely unrelated news, we celebrated Pi day on our arrival by splitting a bottle of Shiner Bock and eating Moon Pies. Burgundy had an orange Fanta.

Monday I managed to drag myself into consciousness long enough to note that I could not stand without dizziness from the congestion, and my ears and throat hurt horrifically. I told Burgundy that it felt like someone was stabbing a needle into my ear. Burgundy and I drove into town, where I called Christi for help. She recommended Zyrtec D. I dropped $23 without hesitation and took one in the parking lot.

We drove to the Prime Outlet Malls for girl shopping time, where I slavered and swore and tried not to drown in my own snot while finding a parking spot.

We shopped. Not as much as Burgundy would have liked and a little too much for my liking, but we both picked up some nice and needed stuff.

Once home, Mark announced that he'd found free venues in Austin. I almost stayed home, but Mark really wanted me to go. We saw a band called Trey Brown at the Mohawk on Red River, and Mark and Burgundy saw a documentary about chip music at Alamo Draft House. By the time it started at 10, I felt fairly certain that my own death by cranial implosion was imminent, so I parked the car, kicked the seat back, and slept until they called to say they were done. I took another Zyrtec on the way home and fell into bed in a heap upon arrival.

I woke several times throughout the night to blow rivers of snot out of my sinuses. Rivers. I'm pretty sure I blew the Amazon out of my nose last night.

This morning I woke at around 9 AM and took another Zyrtec. I made a heavenly quiche this morning chock full of leeks and kale. I downed it with potentially lethal coffee and some revoltingly sweet orange juice. I really wish I had thought to bring my Vitamin C tablets.

Now I'm sitting in the garage, borrowing a neighbor's unlocked wireless and telling you about the amazing adventures of a Snot Mommy.

I'm desperate enough to try my last resort remedy, one that works pretty well but is beyond the pale in terms of its Nasty Factor: 1 table spoon of apple cider vinegar, a bit of water, and some honey. I will drink it, and it will clear my systems - all of them - out. For a little while, anyway.

I Love Saturday Morning

2010-03-13T09:26:00.000-08:00

To begin with, I have nowhere to run. I can make a leisurely breakfast, or I can reheat soup and make cupcakes. I can sit and type, or I can do several loads of dishes. The coffee tastes better. The counters look cleaner. Whatever I do, my progress is of my own choosing, and I feel happy, like Mark's plant, reaching joyfully for the sun.

This morning I made the cupcakes for Burgundy's party tonight, and Burgundy spent a few minutes putting away her books, bags, and props for yesterday's science fair. We really did have soup for breakfast, too.

Last night I made white bean and kale soup with kale I'd bought at the Houston Farmers' Market last Tuesday with Hannah. The recipe, from the absolute must-have book Greens Glorious Greens, is incredibly simple and wonderfully tasty. I omitted the three cups of butternut squash and added extra kale and an extra can of beans. I love butternut squash as much as the next gal, I promise, but I didn't have any on hand and didn't want to leave the house in pursuit of it; not to mention that I'd then have to use the rest of the squash on something. It called for about half a squash. Regardless, it was delicious and fairly intuitive.

Basically, saute onions in olive oil until they're translucent. Add garlic, curry, and cumin and saute for a minute or two longer. Add the beans, reserved bean "stock" plus vegetable stock, fresh marjoram or basil (I used marjoram because it has taken over Mark's garden, choking out everything else he wants to grow including the basil), butternut squash (I think you could also use potatoes or sweet potatoes), and cook it for about 10 minutes. Add the kale and cook an additional 10 minutes.

Honestly, it's a little too late in the year for such a hearty soup, but it tasted so good. Ironically, it felt a little sinful because it was so rich. I suspect my experience has more to do with my body's absolute craving for the nutrients in kale than with the actual taste of the soup. I found myself daydreaming about fish tacos with lightly steamed kale yesterday. I'm sure the family is glad I went for soup instead.

And another recipe. This one is all mine, so I can give you the exact amounts and tell you just how I make it. Except that as with any "all mine" recipe, it's a little bit of whatever I have on hand at the time.

Lentil soup is our go-to meal. Very seriously, this is one of the most important staples of our diet. I rather suspect that kale or mustards would make a really good addition as a throw-in ingredient, so if they're in season where you are, give it a shot and let me know what you think.

Lentil Soup

1 onion
Olive oil (I just pour until it looks right. Don't skimp though! I was stunned at the difference it made the first time I used all the oil a recipe called for.)
Garlic (1-2 cloves depending on mood, body odor concerns, and general household health)
Cumin
Parsley
Marjoram
Oregano
Rosemary
Curry (I've never added this before, but it was amazing in the soup last night, so I'm definitely trying it next time)
5 - 7 Carrots, peeled and roughly sliced.
About a pound of lentils - I buy 25 pounds of lentils at a time, and I don't measure a pound every time I need one. Instead, I have one of those 16 oz plastic Dixie cups that holds just shy of 1 pound of lentils. So I pour one full Dixie cup of lentils into the pot.
Chicken or vegetable stock - maybe 6 - 8 cups depending; I eyeball it. I measure 8 cups of water, pour it in until the lentils and veggies are swimming, and figure out how much I added based on how much is left. Then I add the appropriate amount of powdered bouillon.

Saute the onion in the olive oil until it's translucent. Add the garlic and whatever other herbs/spices you want to use and saute another minute or so. Whatever you do, don't go buy a bunch of those spices if you weren't going to use them anyway. I almost never use everything I listed up there. Sometimes it doesn't even get garlic. Just throw in whatever you have. That's just how this soup rolls. A hint: if you're using fresh herbs, don't saute them now. Throw them in with the lentils, water and carrots.

Pour in a bit of the water/stock and use it to deglaze the bottom of the pan. Add the carrots and lentils and pour in the rest of the water/stock (add the bouillon now if you're doing that instead of true stock). Bring to a boil, cover, reduce heat, and simmer until the lentils are tender. Serve over brown rice or over boiled potatoes. Honestly, the brown rice probably is better, and I haven't had it over boiled potatoes. It's just an idea I've had floating around.

This also could be good with leeks (I'd saute them with or instead of the onions and according to my dad, I should omit the garlic), with various dark leafy greens, and it might be good to try the squash or sweet potatoes instead of the carrots. I also occasionally throw in diced tomatoes with the lentils and water if I happen to have a can in the pantry or if I have a couple in the fridge that are about to go bad.

Lentils are incredibly forgiving, so use this as a base recipe and try anything. Let me know what you try and whether it works!

Finally, Mark attacked the back yard this morning and it looks so good.

As a bonus, we found wild mustard greens growing out there! How exciting is that! Can't wait to serve 'em up with some sauteed leeks and white wine. Yum!

If 2 Days Slip Away, are the Days Slipping?

2010-03-12T08:11:00.000-08:00

Or am I avoiding? I rather strongly suspect I'm avoiding. On the other hand, Burgundy didn't get home until nearly 8:00 PM last night what with set up for her science fair. I had my hands tied up in cake batter and Portuguese custard tarts when she came home. By the time she finished her tuba, shower, and getting ready for bed, I had finished the custards, cupcakes, and Swiss buttercream frosting (oh my God, die of rich, buttery, silken heaven right. now). Of course, when we finally sat down to evaluate whether she had all the information she needed to study for her 9-weeks exams that start two days after her return from spring break, it was 9:45 PM. Already 15 minutes late for lights out.

All day today, Burgundy will be at the Houston Science Fair; thus, I made cupcakes. I only made custard tarts because the Swiss buttercream frosting (oh my God, die of rich, buttery, silken heaven) required a cup of egg whites, and I didn't want the yolks to go to waste; the custard requires 6 yolks; the frosting took 7 whites. Match made in heaven. Oh, and wild kudos to Our Best Bites for the frosting and cupcake recipes.

Tonight I was supposed to meet up with some friends at another friend's new place to watch dumb movies, but the host begged off last night. Now I'm trying to decide whether to host it myself or just call the whole thing off. Love the idea of getting together, but I kinda want to be a homebody in advance of our trip to Hill Country.

And in ultimately crappy timing, my employer messed up my paycheck. It was an honest mistake; when they changed my status to be hourly instead of salaried, they calculated my pay based on half my annual part-time salary instead of half my annual full-time salary. The result was half a paycheck two days before we leave for Hill Country. Happily, we have no worries because we work it a la Dave, so we have an emergency fund that can handle the trouble. Meanwhile, the employer is plugging away at fixing the problem, and I should have my paycheck this time next week.

Oh No! The day that slipped away

2010-03-11T08:02:00.000-08:00

Well, last night we did not get to work on the room at all. A surprising irony, because Burgundy had nowhere to be and a lot of free time. On the other hand, I had plans to meet up with some friends, and by the time I helped her finish her critical issues (homework, study time, preparing for science fair), Mark had come home. He and I spent a little time together catching up on our day, and my ride arrived before I had a chance to work further with Burgundy.

Meanwhile, I stayed home from work Monday, and we’re traveling next week, so I’ve been working longer hours than usual this week in order to stay caught up. The result is that I’ve only barely stayed on top of my core daily housework: making the bed; doing a load of laundry daily; the dishes, etc. This week I haven’t swept at all. I did vacuum Monday, but I think I need to do that twice a week at minimum. That dog is so nasty.

Our spring break plans are starting to get me fired up (in a good way). We won’t leave until Sunday because Burgundy has Houston-area Science Fair Friday with the awards ceremony Saturday afternoon. I also have a baby shower to attend. I’m making the gifts for her; I can’t wait to see what she thinks. Sunday morning, we’ll load up and head over to San Marcos.
Hill Country always offers a lot of options for us:

Shopping in San Marcos (woo outlet mall)
Pick your own fruit and vegetable farms
Visiting a dairy farm
Bike riding
South by Southwest (SXSW) in Austin
Visiting with little brother and his wife in San Antonio
Shopping at a couple of “famous” are yarn shops (especially the Tinsmith’s Wife)

I also plan to take my spinning wheel and sewing supplies with me. They’ll take up a lot of space, but I am really excited about early-morning spinning on the front porch. I never get to spin anymore, and I have several batts I can’t wait to spin.

As for the sewing machine and supplies, I have five “vintage” style patterns that I’ve wanted to glom together for a while. I have several different bodice options and only one real skirt option. I don’t like skirt and blouse combinations because skirt bands pinch and blouses ride up; I want to make a dress.

I plan to modify a blouse pattern to use the neckline and collar from a reproduction mid-20th century apron pattern. I then plan to modify that blouse pattern with the bodice pattern I like from a reproduction 60s dress pattern and to integrate the resulting bodice with the skirt pattern from a second reproduction 60s dress pattern for a final result dress that actually fits me. The bodice will take the longest because I’m short-shouldered with a large bust and a long waist. I’ll have significant modifications.

Happily, I have a plethora of fabric that I will never, ever wear. It is cotton, country (in the worst possible way), and screams, “Look at me! I’m homemade!” So I’ll use that fabric to tweak everything to perfection, and once I love the dress and the way it fits, I’ll go to fabric stores until I find the perfect fabric to make exactly what I want.

Tonight I have to make cupcakes and find time to work with Burgundy on her room. And I really need to vacuum and sweep. Happily, I will be able to leave work at 2:00 or so; that should give me plenty of time to get everything done.

On the Second Day of Clutter . . .

2010-03-10T05:59:00.000-08:00

Today we began boxing stuff up. The most difficult part is staying on task. Our job right now is not to sort, judge value, or purge her collections. We simply are putting like items into a box and labeling it. Easier said than done.

We started with scrapbooking supplies, which filled two boxes and her rolling case from Michael's. These include paper, stickers, markers, photos, notes from middle school, movie stubs, you name it. She did a very good job of handing things over and simply filing them in the appropriate box. With one stack she said, "Mom, this is very expensive stuff. Set it aside until I find a protective sleeve." Pardon me while I chuckle with a mix of pride and pretention. Would that be a chortle?

The bookshelves proved much easier even though we're not done with them yet. She identified four books she wants in the guest room, so we brought those in. The remaining have filled two boxes already with a fair remainder littering her bed.

In the final three minutes of last night's 30 minutes, we cleared most of her dresser simply by heaping her jewelry and assorted small boxes into one shoebox. We felt we'd run a marathon, but looking around the room, it appears we barely made a dent. That's okay, though. Slow and steady does the trick.

I think one of the most difficult aspects of this project is figuring out how to fit it into the rest of our busy schedule. For example, look at what yesterday was supposed to be:

All the stuff in red is Burgundy's commitments. In blue are mine and Mark's. Burgundy can't drive yet. Ugh.

Fortunately, her sectionals (uppermost red section) were cancelled, allowing her much more time to do homework and catch up on studying. Everything else stayed the same, but it felt a little less crazed.

Finally, I want her to start now with establishing routines. I see three major "conversion times" in her day where routines should be implemented: morning, afternoon upon returning from school, and evening before bed.

Morning: This routine is pretty well in place, but not intentionally, and the bed usually doesn't get made.

Make bed
Get dressed to the shoes/hair/makeup
Eat breakfast/make lunch

Afternoon: Right now she leaves a trail of dropped belongings throughout the house and does whatever homework she remembers once she's had a snack (trailing crumbs through the house).

Put away books and purse in bedroom on shelf
15 minutes free time
Calendar review/organize task list
Homework

Evening:

15 minutes straightening room, putting away clothes, preparing school stuff for tomorrow
Personal hygiene
Lay out clothes for tomorrow
If there's time, spend a few minutes journaling or reading; this is time to wind down and relax

Today we'll go back into the room and continue our excavation. Here are photos of the room after last night's efforts. I'm going to try to post daily room photos so we can watch it progress in retrospect.

View of the doorway from the bed.

Proceeding to the right.

And the closet

The book-laden bed

The window

The scrapbooking corner

And the desk with a better view of the scrapbooking corner

And on the First Day . . .

2010-03-09T04:53:00.000-08:00

We spent the full hour trying to get her settled into the guest room. Not counting the time I spent before she came home rearranging the furniture nor the time I spent after our time together finishing her bed or putting up the robe hook on the door.

The makeup, jewelry, and hair supplies alone took up 15 minutes. I admit that I allowed us to get sidetracked detangling necklaces from the Jewelry Box of Doom. We spent the bulk of the time on clothes. I really wanted her to carefully think about how she set up the room. For example, she likes her clothes to hang, but she doesn't have time to hang them. I fold them fresh out of the dryer, so why not keep them in a drawer instead? For those that do hang, how much do you really need? How do you address crowding in the closet?

Then there are the shoes. Holy heavens, the shoes. I don't understand why anyone needs the vast cornucopia of shoes this child enjoys. She's no Imelda Marcos, but it's still kind of ridiculous. Four pairs of tennies? Three of them Converse-style fold-tops?

All the same, we worked our way through it, and Burgundy now is installed in the guest bedroom comfortably and with a view to routine. Unfortunately, between studying for a major test today, finishing homework, and her tuba lesson, she didn't get in bed until almost 10. On the upside, for the first time in ages, she was able to sleep almost immediately.

I got up with her this morning and walked through her routine with her. She seems to have a pretty solid routine, but she needs to work on efficiency. Hopefully later today I can post before pictures and an after panoramic of the guest room she's living in. I didn't re-hang the curtains, but they don't match the horrible pink walls anyway. I briefly considered repainting the room, but I reminded myself in safe time that it's Burgundy's room, not the guest room, that we're trying to perfect.

Before the Storm: Plotting and Planning

2010-03-08T05:30:00.000-08:00

Today I will do two things: First, I will show you Burgundy's current bedroom state. Warning: This is not pretty. For starters, remarkable though she is, Burgundy is a teenager, and the state of her room reflects that. There is a crap-ton of stuff in her room, most of it where it should not be. Second, I will lay out our plan to reset her room to something usable.

First, the view from the doorway. I'm not going to give you individual commentary on every photo. Instead, just note the general lack of organization, the liquor-box-based storage system, the haphazard attempts at creating a cohesive look universally marred by half-finished projects and too much hobby paraphernalia. The pictures begin at the doorway and proceed from that view moving to the right all the way around the room.

I honestly have no idea why I expect her to be able to function well in this room. I get a little panicky and out of control feeling just taking the pictures. And she has to live in this to manage her schoolwork, band plans, Girl Scout projects, and drama/choir endeavors at the church. Poor kid.

We're only going to work on this for 30 minutes to 1 hour per day. We're doing it slowly for a variety of reasons. First, I don't want either one of us to burn out. Second, she has a heavy school workload, and I want her to have breathing time in the evenings between or after the school and bedroom work. Third, I've identified inadequate sleep as a major part of Burgundy's attention and organization issues. I want her in bed by 9:00 with lights out by 9:30. That means we have to wrap up our day - dinner, dishes, housework, homework, and self-care - by 8:30. That's a lot of work to pack into afternoon and evening.

So this is how the plan will shake out day by day:

Monday:
Perform a bare-necessities assessment of what she needs to function day to day. Things like makeup, pajamas, her few favorite bottoms and tops will be moved into the guest room for the next couple of weeks. That room also has been gutted of distractions and extras to make way for Burgundy to simply function while we work on her room. It currently has a bed, a desk, a bookshelf (mostly empty), a dresser with mirror, and an antique chest of drawers. I will rehang the curtains that Julia took down, and I might spend a few minutes with Burgundy rearranging the room to meet her needs.

Tuesday-Thursday:
Bring in and set up multiple small U-Haul boxes. Very carefully begin sorting her stuff into these. Wall hangings in one box, books in another box, stuff she needs to give back to other people in another box, clothes she wears in another, and clothes she doesn't wear in another, etc. Each box will be clearly labeled and stored in the hall linen closet with the label facing out. I don't know how long this step will take, but I am committed to removing everything from the room in an organized, controlled way. I don't want precious photos to get thrown out with unwanted scrapbooking supplies, so the real goal of this is to organize the clutter in a way that will allow us to carefully sort through it later. Because this step could take two days and could take ten, I'm calling it Tuesday - Thursday, but it could be over sooner or take longer.

Friday (or whenever the room is reduced to furniture only):

Perform an assessment of existing room setup, including furniture. Make any reasonable repairs (e.g., the gap between drawers in Burgundy's long dresser seen in photo above), assess what furniture needs to be replaced including the expected cost and practicality of replacement. For example, Burgundy wants a Murphy bed and has for some time. I have plans for one and think I could make it without too much trouble; however, I expect it to cost a couple hundred dollars. While $200 isn't much, I'm not sure we want to spend that money right now. The assessment also should evaluate what works and does not work for Burgundy. We'll do this using the guidelines laid out in Julie Morgenstern's Organizing from the Inside Out. I think I'll write a full review of the book later. It's a very good book.

At this point, we'll implement the findings from OftIO where it's practical in Burgundy's guest room. Does she need better lighting? More bookshelf space? A file drawer at hand?

With assessment in hand, I will sit with Mark and look at whether and how we can replace or upgrade any of Burgundy's furniture. The assessment also should include a map of Burgundy's room, to scale, with to-scale furniture cut-outs. She and I will work together to decide how best to place the furniture in the room to optimize space and promote organization. This might involve buying smaller furniture, though I doubt it.

Saturday (or after completion of furniture assessment):
Do whatever shopping needs done. Likely a trip to Ikea at minimum. This almost always takes two hours, so if I only go shopping and call it a day, I'll consider this task a success. If it does fall on a Saturday and I'm not too pooped at the end of the trip, I'll come home and engage the furniture assembly/disassembly process.

This is my goal for the first week of work, and this is where I see potential for it all to go to hell in a hand basket. At the end of next week, we leave for a spring break Hill Country trip, so I will simply describe the rest of this in steps.

Step 5: Complete furniture assembly. Place in room using the completed room map as a guide. Ensure Burgundy is pleased with the final layout. Make any necessary adjustments.

Step 6: Move Burgundy and her bare essentials back into her room. Have her live in the room with only these essentials for two - four weeks. Take note of any needed adjustments in the written assessment we completed earlier. Of course, we'll make the adjustments in real life, too, but I suspect the plan will be very useful to Burgundy later in life. I intend for her to keep it.

Step 7: Once we've gone at least a week, maybe longer, without making any adjustments, we'll begin going through the boxes. We'll evaluate each item that comes out of each box. Love it? Hate it? Hate it but need it? How to deal with these items will be driven by the plan. When we open the wall decorations box and put them back on the wall, we'll take a week to evaluate. Are they distracting her from school work? Do they soothe her at night? Did she decide to keep something that, once on the wall, makes her cringe?

Each thing will be an intentional decision. The whole process will happen slowly and step 7 could take months. But I think it's a very important step to teaching Burgundy to honor herself exactly as God has created her by taking care of her mind and body through her environment.

I'm back. And Moving on.

2010-03-07T08:06:00.000-08:00

Oh, Internet. You make me crazy, you know that? Who would have thought I could feel an obligation to essentially imaginary personalities on the internet?

I'm sorry I haven't posted. I've wanted to but have been unable to figure out how to communicate things. I've decided on a bulleted update format. I would love to discuss each major happening in detail, but it's not really practical. After all, this is the Internet.

Julia moved out last Sunday. She still lives in the community with another family. We don't know them. Ultimately, I think we made the right decision, but it was heart-wrenching.
We're still having some pretty significant family issues, but we're working through them.
Mark just celebrated his 35th birthday. Happy birthday, Mark!
The house is coming along nicely. It's stayed more or less the same, although I did finish rearranging the living room. Given the level of chaos in our lives lately, staying the same is quite a feat.
Tonight is the final performance of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat at our church.

After tonight's performance, we're putting Burgundy into the spare bedroom for the next couple of weeks while we gut Burgundy's room of stuff and get her a fresh start. Her room is a pained amalgamation of 14 years of sentimentality. Enough is enough. I don't even want her living in there while we do it. This effort will be the focus of my blog for the next couple of weeks.

Redecorating

2010-02-22T05:00:00.000-08:00

I'm still working on the living room. I've made a lot of progress; unfortunately, I had to reset my expectations.

We don't have a television; instead, we have a projector that we hook up to our Wii and to the laptop for movies. The original plan was to mount four bracketless shelves (Lack from IKEA) on the back wall and use them to house the projector, speakers, internet radio, and Wii. One shelf also would provide a space for the laptop to sit when we watch movies.

Alas, I didn't measure the depth of the shelves in relation to the depth of the projector, and the front half hangs off the shelf. Not okay. I had already mounted one of the shelves, and I mounted it too high for the purpose, too, but that's a discussion for another day. I discovered all this Friday night, and I just let it sit. I was discouraged and irritable, my friend Christi was at the house, and I just decided not to decide.

I spent most of Saturday getting Burgundy ready for the military ball. We had a major snafu with the dress, and when we sorted that out, she wanted her hair in an updo. By the time she left and I turned my attention back to the furniture issue, my mind was able to look at the situation with a fresh perspective.

So I moved the large entertainment center/wardrobe over to the back wall and placed it under the Lack shelf. It turned out to be the perfect solution, too. All the entertainment stuff fits inside it, and a hole in the back allows us to run cords out. The industrial surge protector, which is huge and unsightly, is hidden on the top of the wardrobe under the ivy. When we're not watching, we can shut the doors, and it's all hidden away. I love this idea so much more than the original. I still have to find a way to bring in the dog kennel because the dog has decided that used Kleenex and bathroom trash constitute oh-so-tasty chew toys.

I also need to find a place to hang our pretty wedding photo. It doesn't really go anywhere. The frame just isn't right for our house, but I'm not willing to spend the money to replace it right now.

Well Mark and the girls have just left for school and work, and I need to get to work myself. Hopefully, I'll get a chance to post photos later.

The Lenten Season

2010-02-20T05:21:00.000-08:00

Lent. I'm not Catholic. I'm a moderately respectable Methodist with traditionalist (i.e., Catholic and Orthodox) leanings. I very much agree with the Scottish Twins about why their family celebrates Lent.

Hm. i really like the idea of either giving up complaining or daytime internet. I hadn't decided yet whether to give anything up (Yeah, I'm late), but giving up internet during the day sounds like a very useful temptation to wrestle. Here's why: I gave up TV fifteen years ago when I still smoked, drank and uh other stuff in college. I couldn't keep up with the party schedule and the boy schedule and the school schedule AND the TV schedule, so I ditched the TV. Sold it to my mom for $100 bucks and used the money on more liquor (to the best of my recollection). I've never wanted it back, and as I've matured, I've discovered that when it's on, I'm grouchier, have a shorter temper, and get less done. And the mean lasts, too. I'm a little more cutting for hours after watching. So while we watch movies together on our computer and projector and even watch an occasional TV show, I don't and won't own a TV. However, internet is becoming my new TV. You know those people who let their house go to foreclosure swearing there's no money while paying $150 per month for cable? Well, internet service is the thing I don't know if I could let go. Actually, I think I could let it go. There's always the library if it comes to that. I don't know if Mark could or would though. Well, he would. If we couldn't pay our bills and had trouble buying food, he would definitely give up internet. But only after trimming everything else in the budget.

However, internet at work is getting out of hand. It's very easy to get distracted during a mind-numbing repetitive task (o yes. repetitive taskeses; I haz dem) to look up something that wanders through my brain, and next thing you know, I've been reading blogs for 10 minutes. Uh, ripping off my employer: not what I had in mind for the day.

So yes, I will be using the internet only for work purposes for the rest of Lent. Happily, I'm not actually Catholic or Orthodox, so I need not self-flagellate over waiting until the third day of Lent to address it.

Let's Dance!

2010-02-19T04:51:00.000-08:00

The girls are getting ready for school; I can hear them in the kitchen getting their lunches ready. They're listening to David Bowie on Burgundy's cell phone, and Burgundy's singing along, "If you should fall. Into my arms. And tremble like a FLOW-WAH!"

I am pleased as punch to announce that Burgundy took 2nd place at the district science fair this year for 9th grade Medicine and Health. After talking about it, we all agreed that she will go on to the area competition in early March. This will be Burgundy's first time at area, and it was her first time to win at district, too. I think that a big part of her success is due to her very large sample size; she tested 103 people this year.

Meanwhile, both girls started getting sick at the end of last week. It's ranged from isolated sore throat to sinus crud that almost completely obstructs breathing. I've felt a bit under the weather, but not as bad as the girls.

Because of the crud, Burgundy and I haven't run since Friday. We talked about it, and I think we're going to pick back up today and start over with week 4. I'll let you know how that goes.

Right now Mark is inspecting the lunches, and I've been informed they are inadequate.

Julia

2010-02-17T04:52:00.000-08:00

Julia's play last weekend was Big Love. It's an adaptation of an old Greek play about 50 sisters whose father contracts to marry them to their 50 cousins. For some reason, the sisters find the plan objectionable, and when they can't get anyone to help them, they plot together to murder their husbands on their wedding day.

The "modern" version, written in the 60's, uses the basic play content to explore feminist themes. I imagine it's difficult not to explore feminist themes in a play about women having their futures sold to strange men by their father. The tone of the play is angry and volatile.

Julia played one of the brides and played her beautifully. The down side? Poor girl's voice now sounds ragged and shredded. She developed first a sore throat and now a pretty honkin' sinus infection.

Knitting Projects

2010-02-16T07:38:00.000-08:00

Yes, I knit.

Before Christmas, I envisioned a series of fabulous, luxurious hand-knit gifts for all the loves of my life. Greatest among these was a plan for matching socks for Burgundy and Julia. That is, the sock designs matched, but Julia would receive pink, and Burgundy black.

Allow me to backtrack and to completely alienate any readers I might have had who are not completely immersed in the Wondrous World of Knitting. I love to knit socks because they're a small enough project to keep my attention for the duration and a large enough project to use as a canvas for Real Knitted Artwork.

In support of and deference to this love of mine, I have joined expensive sock clubs, bought expensive sock yarn, and spent countless dollars on books of sock patterns, sock theories, sock blockers, sock needles, sock dolls, sock monkeys, and arrangements of stitch patterns and formulas to stimulate my own creativity. In so doing, I find myself consistently drawn to the patterns and ideas of the magnificent Cookie A.

Her patterns are intricate, mathematically balanced, and they're remarkable for the way that the architectural and structural lines of the sock itself dissolve into the pattern, becoming a feature to enhance the pattern rather than an element around which the pattern must work in order to insinuate itself onto the sock.

Oh dear. I nerded out, didn't I? Well, last year, Cookie A released the Ellington pattern, and I immediately swooped in and scooped it up. I mean, look at this:

Now I have to tell you that I did not take these photos. They're linked from Cookie's photo feed. I tried and tried to find a photo of my own darn sock that shows the majesty of these beauties, but my photography skills are not sufficient to do justice.

Well, I saw the pattern, and I knew that the girls needed these socks for Christmas. I nearly finished Julia's socks:

And I did finally finish them only three days after Christmas while we vacationed in Austin. Actually, it was while Mark, Burgundy, JB, and Julia vacationed. I spent the whole time in the hotel room puking and pooping and praying. And knitting, I guess. Now that I think about it, I understand why Julia hasn't worn her socks much . . .

Alas, Burgundy was not so lucky. She received a small box (in fact, the clear plastic box my iPod Touch came in) with a tag on the front that read, "Band Socks" because I knitted hers in black so she could wear them with her marching band uniform. Sadly, Burgundy has grown accustomed to my ways, what with the quilt for her bedroom and all.

Well, now Ravelympics are upon us. I thought about knitting Burgundy's second sock for the Ravelympics; I really did. I also thought about knitting the second sock from my November sock club package. The one I promised myself I would not knit until I'd finished Burgundy's second sock. As it happens though, neither of these projects have been "hibernating" long enough to qualify for the work-in-progress event.

Alas, no. I'll have to start another project. It breaks my heart, I tell you. However, I have a very definite deadline for this project; shouldn't be any trouble, right? I mean, we see how well I respond to deadlines right?

Hey, why can I hear crickets chirping? Where's my chorus of agreement?

Laundry 5 Cents per Load

2010-02-15T03:32:00.000-08:00

I've been doing 1 load of laundry a day, and it's getting very close to the point where I'll only have one load to do on any given day. I'm very pleased with this consistency and with the order it's allowing me to introduce to our home.

I used the last of my laundry detergent recipe today, so I had to whip up some more. I have never been successful with the liquid soap recipes I've found online, so a couple of month ago, I switched over to the (mostly) powdered version. I'm very happy with it.

Laundry detergent recipes pretty well are ubiquitous on the web, and I won't pretend that I'm original in my concoction. All the same, I am proud of what I've learned and figure I ought to show it off.

I found a recipe I like (no idea where) and made a very slight adjustment to make it easier to remember. I changed the ratio of ingredients to be 1:1:1. It was pretty close to that before, and this gets my clothes fully clean.

1 cup grated Fels Naptha (a bar soap available in the laundry aisle at the grocery; look on the top shelf)
1 cup Arm & Hammer Washing Soda
1 cup Borax Washing Powder.

Fels Naptha cost around $1 a bar; I think I pay $1.19. A 55-oz box of Arm & Hammer runs $1.89, and a 76-oz box of Borax is $2.89. Going by the weight of a cup of each of the powders and calculating the cost per ounce of the powders, I was able to calculate that the powder portion of my detergent costs me about $0.53/batch. I usually can get about three batches out of two FN bars, so I figure more or less 1.5 cups per bar.

Total cost: $1.39 for about a month's worth of detergent. I use one heaping table spoon full (that is, not a small cutlery spoon, one of the larger ones) per load, and our clothes have been cleaner and have smelled better since we switched to this. At one load per day, that puts our laundry detergent cost at about $0.05 per load.

Nommy Nom Nom

2010-02-13T08:50:00.000-08:00

Food, oh food.

With the part-time stay-at-home thing happening, I've really been able to get into the kitchen and cook. I've been making blueberry muffins every weekend that last well into the week. This takes care of our breakfast.

I've made a menu the last two weeks that, while not a straightjacket, has kept us fairly on track with eating well and out of the restaurants. We ate an entire box of raw spinach and another giant box of field greens last week. This is a huge stride forward for our family.

Last Sunday, I made a phenomenal butternut squash soup. I first made it for Thanksgiving dinner, and I think it is becoming a family staple. It's very simple:

Peel, seed, and dice one butternut squash (about 6 cups). Finely chop and saute in olive oil one small, yellow onion. Add the squash, 3 cups of water, 1/2 a teaspoon of marjoram, some red and black pepper, and 4 cubes of vegetable (or chicken) bouillon.

You boil that for about 20 minutes, then I use a stick blender to puree it into a thick soup with a block and a half of cream cheese. It's incredibly filling between the protein (cheese), fiber (squash), and fat (cheese again). One bowl will take care of you. We've been munching on yesterday's for three meals now, and it's still there.

This week, I have one cooking mission: I want to use a jar of the sauce I made last weekend, modify my pizza crust recipe to be a little more usable, and make pizza pockets for my family. I had the idea last time I made pizza, but it seemed a bit daunting what with the pizza dough and all. But I made pitas over the weekend (a post for another time), and that process gave me some good ideas.

Cloud Atlas, the Pursuit of Stuff, and Me

2010-02-12T07:58:00.000-08:00

Reading all these frugal blogs, I'm coming to grips with the reality that I am not frugal at all. You likely will never find me rejoicing over a sale on dishcloths or eating veggies I don't really like because they happen to be on sale. I combine several savory character flaws that guarantee I won't go there: I'm lazy (scrubbers for dishes? I call them teenagers); I'm a bit of a princess (ew! zucchini? Nas-TAY. I'd rather retire on Alpo than eat it.), and I like stuff.

Ah stuff. There's a wonderful if relatively unknown book called Cloud Atlas with a major section about a dystopian future where all religion has been outlawed and consumerism is the major religion. Your "soul" registers your worth, which in turn determines your value. It's the extreme outcome to a world where morals and discretion are shunned as unscientific, only the measurable and productive (finance, science) are valued, and people believe things will fulfill their longings. The government creates this last belief as a remarkably effective distraction from its own abuses.

Note: Cloud Atlas is kind of a weird book. I absolutely love and have read it a couple of times. However, it's arranged in sections; each major character gets his or her own novella, none of the major characters interact with one another because they all live in different times and settings. The sections span time from the 18th century to the distant future when Earth has returned to barbarism and only a few vestiges of the dystopian society's technological capabilities have survived the cataclysm they engendered. The book is not easy reading but absolutely is worth the time and energy investment.

The section of the book on Nea So Copros (the dystopian society) burned itself into my mind, and it colors the way that I think of my purchases and purchasing patterns. It triggers all my conspiracy theorist leanings (I was raised in Mississippi; cut me some slack), and it has strongly influenced the way I view our government's urging to spend, Spend, SPEND as if we, through the act of spending, can somehow save ourselves. I hear it, and I get chills thinking of the ultimate end envisioned.

We're already cloning animals for food (Oh yes we are; see Food, Inc). We already live in a society so fragmented and closed off that we often openly devalue the old, the handicapped, and the very young. By toddlerhood, we assess our children's money-making potential, and many people would consider their children failures if they chose to be a craftspeople. Woodworkers. Car mechanics.

Said differently, we already tend to assess a soul's worth by its ability to earn money. It's a dangerous, slippery slope. It makes me want to move to the hill country, plant some fields, get a cow and a few hens and be done with this suburban nonsense.

On the other hand, I do love stuff. I have a craft room full of luxury fibers (alpaca, cashmere, merino wool) for knitting. And I live in a sub-tropical climate. I have an 1,868 square foot home. There are four of us. Three when Julia goes home. Our house is full of stuff we don't need, just want. And I do enjoy it.

So where's the line for me? How do I decide when I've crossed over from a normal, healthy lifestyle with some acquisition to the world of wanton, flagrant consumption? I don't know, and that's the trouble that Cloud Atlas brings to my spirit.

I know that giving functions as a direct counterbalance to consumption; we give. I wrestle with how much to say about what we give because I don't want recognition from that. However, I do believe that giving is a very important step to combating the subtle, and in my opinion, evil, doctrine of Salvation through Consumption.

I know that when I pay attention to my approach to others, my drive to obtain quiets itself in the interest of serving others. At one time, when I lived on $8 an hour and thought I made a pretty good wage, I thought that a person making $30,000 a year had no excuse for choosing not to give and save. And then I tried to live on $30,000 a year. Fourteen years later, if I worked full time, I would pull in over twice as much, and it's only by focusing on others' needs that I succeed in giving some of that money away and in saving some of it for retirement.

I want a simpler life, and I believe Mark does, too. We have to decide where to cut back, and I think it will be a slow process. Burgundy has been raised in what I see as opulence; others (I know) see us as living on the edge. We have very slowly begun getting nice furniture. I have a wooden roll-top desk. Mark has a beautiful upright piano. We consider our computers indispensable. My Macbook. His home-built race-car computer. I want to install a Murphy bed in Burgundy's room. I want a bigger kitchen. Mark wants a better car (I genuinely believe that for our current lifestyle, this is a need). Mark wants more gardening stuff.

Where does it stop? When do we draw the line? Is there a line? Or do we simply try to focus on acquiring the things that will allow us to cut back more? I believe that the line of frugality and simplicity moves around for everyone. I think we have to draw our own conclusions and create our own lines (within the bounds of spiritual health and morality, of course) based on our values. This truly is our mission, our job.

Running: Week 3

2010-02-11T07:30:00.000-08:00

As posted last week, I really didn't think we were ready to handle week 3 of the couch to 5K. For one thing, week 2 involved 90 second runs with 2-minute walks. We could barely complete the 90-second runs; Burgundy kept cramping up, and I checked the timer on the iPod more obsessively than a condemned man with a watch.

Week 3 called for 3-minute runs. Twice as long as week two. I didn't think we were ready.

Thursday after posting my concerns, we didn't seize what would turn out to be our only opportunity to run that day. I felt mildly guilty, not because I feel like our running is tied to a particular daily schedule, but because I feared that I would make excuses all week, and then it would be too late.

So Friday after school, I picked Burgundy up, and we changed and headed out the door immediately. During the warm-up walk, we talked about strategies to handle the intervals, which were thus: 90-second run, 90-second walk, 3-minute run, 3-minute walk; we were to repeat these once for a total of 4 running intervals: 2 at 90 seconds and 1 at 3 minutes.

We talked about how we would regulate our breathing, not run too fast, and generally take special care not to exhaust ourselves in the first 30 seconds of the long intervals.

The first interval flew by, and as we finished the follow-on walk, we internalized our concerns and pep-talked ourselves. The three-minute run started. For my part, I noticed that it didn't start to truly hurt until the two-minute point. At the end of the following walk interval, we realized that we were halfway done. We stared at each other in amazement.

It felt easy. Energizing. The rest of the run flew by, and we felt good. Now put that in your pipe and smoke it. Day 2 (Saturday) also was easy even though we had to do it back-to-back with day 1. Skipping on Thursday really did throw off our whole rhythm, though. We have to run on Thursdays from now on. Thursday, Saturday, and Tuesday. We can do that.

We skipped Tuesday, too. A cold front blew in, we could hear the wind howling outside, and the thought of braving the elements for a run sounded almost as appealing as spending the night in a used iron maiden (photo courtesy of TravelJournals.net.

Yesterday I regretted that decision a little when we started our final run of the week after a three-day hiatus and enjoyed a light sprinkling of rain from start to finish in 50-degree temperatures. We did it, though. We finished week 3.

For what it's worth, I don't think I've lost so much as an ounce of weight since starting. I couldn't say for sure because I won't replace the batteries on my scale and haven't weighed myself since December.

I'm honestly relieved, because I feel such peace about loving my body just where it is, skinny or fat be damned. I feared that by taking up running, which I genuinely enjoy, I would start to lose weight, get excited about that, and lose this peace I feel. I'm also relieved to find that I don't feel any disappointment about the lack of weight loss since starting.

2010-02-10T04:53:00.000-08:00

Performance Season must end soon. Burgundy's Senior musical (remember, she's a Freshman) finally ended last Sunday, but Julia still is in all-day practices that last until 9 PM sometimes for the theater group's production of Big Love. They both still have rehearsal for Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.

All these performances and rehearsals conflict. We have season tickets to the opera, there are only two performances left, and neither we parents, Burgundy nor Julia can go to Saturday night. Of course, they can't go tonight, either.

Ironically, tonight's performance, Benjamin Britten's The Turn of the Screw, is one of the operas I really was looking forward to seeing if only because it's in English, freeing me up to listen and watch the action instead of dividing my time between the supertitles and the actors.

I know this reveals me as a total opera novice; so be it.

In other news, Burgundy earned a Division I on her Solo for UIL, and her ensemble earned Division II. The ensemble rating is particularly impressive because one of the trumpets in the ensemble dropped out two days before the performance. Burgundy was so upset, but everyone stepped up with ideas, and they found a replacement Wednesday night, practiced with him Thursday and Friday afternoon, and performed Saturday morning. A Division II really impressed me. Apparently, the judges also were impressed with "the tuba," who had to maintain the foundation for the music. Yay Burgundy!

Rearranging the House

2010-02-09T04:47:00.000-08:00

My husband hoards. It gets overwhelming sometimes. He's slowly getting better (as in, over the last 7 years, he's begun to see reason about things like not having a garage full of books he won't read, but he still can't let go of the pile of movie stubs going back at least 10 years), and our house is slowly getting better along with him.

::mumblemumble:: Well, it helps that I've started cleaning house, too. ::mumblemumble::

So the books in the garage are starting to go away, but we still have all the "House Books." Like cats, they get in the way, sit on the couch when I don't want them there, poop on the rug (well, okay, they leave dust bunnies on the shelf), and generally command attention I do not want to give them.

Lest you think I'm an illiterate, non-reading boob, I have a degree in literature. I love books. Reasonable books. But these are books on circuitry and obsolete technology (the 3.5 Floppy Disk Will Alter Our World), old magazines, phone books, etc. Jane Austin is welcome to crap on my carpet (metaphorically). Ma Bell? Not so much.

Our most successful foray into controlling the books to date has been two 5 x 5 Expedit bookshelves, both of which are crammed into my relatively small living room. Well, I've had an idea. I moved one of the Expedit shelves into the formal den, which currently does not house a table, and in its place, I will mount four (4) and only four (4) bracketless shelves from IKEA on that wall in the living room.

I will find a way to make do with only four because that's how many I already have, and I'm NOT buying more.The shelves will be not quite randomly spaced, but they won't be all in a straight line. Those four shelves will house our projector (stand-in for a TV), our Wii system, our speaker system, and a blank spot for the laptop when we want to watch a movie on the projector. I'm very excited about it.

Meanwhile, of course I had to completely unload all the books and other detritus from the shelf in order to move it. So while I loaded it back up in its new home, I decided that I should at least cull my own collection of books. Well, of all the surprising and embarrassing discoveries, I only found one (1) of my husband's books on the shelf. And it was worth about $20 (he sells books online). Awkward. Now even accounting for the three shelves that our electronics occupied on this thing prior to its move, I still cleared out seven (7) shelves on this case. That were double-stacked.

Mark graciously looked up every book I set aside for its value and listed any for sale that were worth more than a few dollars. There were two, maybe three books. The rest I boxed up and took to half-price books. I got $12 for those, and then dropped off another trunkload of clothes, knick-knacks, and other random things at Goodwill.

This has inspired me to cull the other shelf now, so that's my 15-minute daily project this week. Wish me luck!

Photos to come soon! I'm excited.

Eating Well at Home

2010-02-07T10:40:00.000-08:00

I've been wanting to can spaghetti sauce for two or three weeks; I even bought a bunch of fresh tomatoes recently to use in it. Because I am a master (mistress) procrastinator, I let them go too long, and I had to cut off several bad spots to work with them.

All the same, I did it, and this morning I put 8 pints of spaghetti sauce into the pantry. This will keep us set for about eight weeks, by which time we should be getting close to harvesting more tomatoes from our own garden, which we're about to plant.

With the impending NASA layoffs, it's imperative that we eat in and save as much money as possible. So it's my new mission to do it up right for the family so that we won't be tempted to eat out (like I want to do right now). I've noticed that we do better about eating at home when we have quick, easy foods to eat. With the spaghetti sauce pre-made, I can make dinner in about 15 minutes. I already have meatballs made and frozen in single-serving portions.

We have several other quick meals that work well as leftovers: lentil soup, cheese quiche and spinach quiche, anything pasta, etc.

The greatest challenge that I face right now is having vegetarians in the house. All our favorite go-to dishes are meat-filled or meat-dependent. Some things are obvious; for example, I substitute vegetable bouillon for chicken broth. Others frustrate me endlessly. Chili is a great example. It's my favorite meal, and I make it with lots of beef. I also make it fast; chili is a 30-minute meal here, and it can feed us for a couple of days at least. I haven't made chili since Julia arrived, though, because it seems kinda pointless. Only Mark and I will eat it, and I'd still have to make a separate meal for the girls. Yeah, sure, I could learn to make vegetarian chili, but I don't want veg chili. Gross.

I want hearty, drippy, chewy meat. Grr.

For now, for this week, our menu is thus:

Sunday lunch and dinner: Lentil soup and rice
Monday lunch for Mark and Mel: Lentil soup and rice
Monday dinner: Baked salmon and salad (yes, the girls will eat fish)
Tuesday lunch: leftover salmon with broccoli and carrots (salad's too much trouble for work)
Tuesday dinner: Girls will have mac & cheese with salad or broccoli; Mark and I are going to an investment seminar and will eat there.
Wednesday lunch: Tuna salad sandwiches
Wednesday dinner: Black bean lasagna
Thursday lunch: Black bean lasagna with any leftover veggies around the house
Thursday dinner: leftovers night; also, Julia has a play performance
Friday lunch: leftovers - just clean out the fridge
Friday dinner: Fish tacos (Julia has a play performance again)
Saturday lunch: I'm going to try The Atheist Homemaker's chickpea cutlets served over a bed of fettucini with alfredo sauce and served with steamed, lightly buttered broccoli. This will be my adventure in cooking for the week.
Saturday dinner: If I get the chance (and succeed) at making pie crust, I'll make cheese quiche.
Sundays are always either for eating out or catch as catch can.

Insert Clever Title Here

2010-02-04T05:46:00.000-08:00

Yesterday ended up being a much bigger deal than I expected. DH needed surgery to repair a minor hernia and to remove a couple of lumpy masses from his right thigh. The masses have been there nearly a decade, so we don't think they're anything serious, but the doctor is sending them off for analysis anyway.

The surgery should have been really minor, and I suppose it wasn't on the scale of a hysterectomy or something. The recovery really tore him up, though. The hospital wouldn't let him leave until he peed. And five hours after waking from the surgery, he still couldn't go. Even worse, the nurses insisted that he walk to the toilet, and it took him at least three hours from the first attempt to stand to successfully walk a grand total of maybe 30 feet.

Every time he stood, dizziness set in, and we'd have to hold him up while he drooled into a barf bag. Poor baby. At 7:00, they moved him from day surgery recovery to a room upstairs, and half an hour later, I left to eat dinner. About 8:30, he called to announce his successful urination. I've never felt so proud.

Meanwhile, my friend Hannah took Burgundy to her Joseph rehearsal at the church, and both girls took care of getting their own dinner. Mark and I finally made it home around 9:30, and I put him straight into the bed, where he is right now.

On a completely different note, today is day 1 of the 3rd week of the Couch to 5K program. For the first time, I'm well and truly intimidated. For week 1, we had to run 60 seconds and walk 90 seconds. Easy peasy. For week 2, we had to run 90 seconds, and walk 2 minutes. I'm sure we couldn't have done week 2 without first running week 1, but it still didn't strike fear into my thighs. However, I feel totally unprepared for week 3. First up, as soon as the 5 minute warm up ends, we have to run 3 minutes, then walk 3 minutes.

Oh my GOD YOU GUYS I CAN'T DO THAT YET THREE MINUTES? NO! NOO! NOOOOOO!

Ahem.

Seriously. Three minutes? I can barely knit for three minutes. I don't have that kind of attention span. My legs don't have that kind of attention span.

We're going to do it today, and if we finish and want to die a horrible death, we'll spend the rest of week 3 repeating week 2. Burgundy had a horrible stitch about halfway through the third run of week 2, so I'm a little worried about her starting up week 3, but I think it's just a training thing.

These Kids Done Got Me Runnin'

2010-02-03T08:20:00.000-08:00

The most important rule of grammar is that you may break the rules only if you understand the rules. That's the only excuse I can offer for today's title.

Burgundy and Julia both perform. Today, Burgundy is playing in the in-school performance of the Senior Musical. They chose Gershwin's Crazy About You, and the kids have done a phenomenal job. They had to learn to tap-dance, sing and act at once, and the orchestra (where Burgundy is) had to learn to play with singers, something that Burgundy (at least) has never done before. They have three remaining performances: Friday and Saturday at 7PM, and Sunday at 2PM.

Since returning from Christmas break, the orchestra has had rehearsal every Monday through Thursday until 6:30 PM for Crazy for You.

Meanwhile, Julia plays onstage. Last semester she played a maid in the theatre group's production of Dracula. This semester, she's playing one of 50 brides who murder their grooms in the play Big Love. That play starts this Thursday and runs through Saturday, with two productions on Saturday.

Again, since returning from Christmas break, Julia has had play rehearsal every day until 6PM. Starting this week, it lasts until 9PM. Last Saturday, she had practice from 9AM - 6PM, then she had to shop for her wedding dress, as the school does not provide the costumes.

Meanwhile, both girls and Mark have been cast in our church's production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. All three of them are in the chorus, and Burgundy also won a role as one of Pharaoh's adoring girls.

The three of them have rehearsal every Sunday, and additional, role-specific rehearsals are held two to four days a week to supplement the all-cast rehearsal. Unfortunately, chorus members are required at almost all rehearsals.

This Saturday, Burgundy has a solo and ensemble contest, where she's performing Edvard Grieg's My Johann as a solo and Pachelbel's Canon with a brass quintet.

For this, Burgundy has met twice during school to rehearse with her piano accompanist for her solo. Three times a week (including Saturday get-togethers) for the ensemble rehearsal.

In addition, both girls sing in the church's youth choir, and Mark sings with the sanctuary choir. That's Wednesday night for Mark and Sunday's after Joseph rehearsal for the girls.

Between the three of them and all their commitments, I'm exhausted. There's always someone to pick up or drop off, and noone else has the time (because of homework, etc) to help with the housework, so that falls 90% to me and the rest to Mark. Happily, I am part-time now, so I don't mind committing myself to keeping our home clean. It's good.

Now I have to figure out what to do about our opera tickets. We're supposed to go on Wednesday the 10th to see Houston Grand Opera perform Benjamin Britten's The Turn of the Screw. That night, Julia has play rehearsal, and Mark has choir. All three of them have Joseph rehearsal. All the other performances have conflicts, too. I'm thinking about finding a time that Mark and I can go and inviting my parents to join us. I doubt Mom has ever seen an opera.

Procraftination

2010-02-02T05:43:00.000-08:00

A few years ago, I took up quilting. My first two quilt tops were nine-patches arranged into a neat little optical trick. The design is called an Irish-something-or-other; I've forgotten now. It took three years to lay them out, sandwich them with their battings and backings, and pin them together for true quilting. In that time, I did most of the piecework for another quilt in beautiful peach colors, and I made a snail's trail quilt for my daughter our of all blue fabrics with a bright yellow mariner's compass in the middle.

Burgundy's quilt should have been a masterpiece. And to be fair, Burgundy thinks it is. But my piecing was so poor that my inexperienced self was afraid to lay it all out and machine quilt it. And I was WAY too lazy to hand quilt it. So I tied it with pieces of blue yarn (God bless knitting; it saves me yet again), and she put it on her bed and loved it.

I should add here that I gave Burgundy the nearly-complete quilt top for Christmas in 2007. I gave her the "finished" quilt the following August. Procrastination, I am thine. Love me for my devotion.

Meanwhile, I made about 76 stupid snail trail squares, didn't need most of them, and they've been sitting around in the craft room, taking up space ever since. So earlier this week, I decided that my craft project du jour would be to make and quilt a matching pillow sham for Burgundy's quilt. I finished piecing it yesterday, and I zoomed through that ugliest quilting job ever attempted on a machine yesterday for about 45 minutes before deciding to stop for the day. It's about 1/3 quilted.

Today I plan to finish quilting it, cut out, hem, and sew on the back of the sham (in that overlapping envelope style), and have it on her bed before she gets home from school. Wish me luck!

Naggy Mom

2010-02-01T12:32:00.000-08:00

If you remember, I recently started following the Naggy [profanity redacted] on Ravelry for housecleaning plans and tips. It's working remarkably well.

Housecleaning

A friend who comes over often came in yesterday and went kind of wild about how great the place looks. She said the house seems to have gotten bigger.

The best part? I'm staying on top of it. There are little things here and there that I haven't been able to bring myself to do. But for the most part, it's looking good.

Here's what I do every day before work:

Make my bed
After my shower, grab my washcloth and swipe the dirtiest surface in the bathroom before I toss it in the hamper
Empty the dishwasher, which should be full of sparkly, clean dishes from the previous evening's delightful game of Crack The Whip Over Your Teens Who Hate You and Know You Are Out To Get Them. If I lost that game, then I load the dishwasher instead of emptying it.

When I get home from work:

Spend 2 minutes (timed, yo) on a crap magnet. This is a surface in my house that just magnetizes crap. For some, it's their kitchen counter. For others, it's the desk. We have an abundance of crap-magnets in our house; some aren't even horizontal (yes, the fridge).
Process ONE load of laundry. I don't care about wrinkles, so I let laundry sit in the dryer once it's done. So for this task, I fold yesterday's clean clothes right out of the dryer, throw the clothes sitting in the washer into the dryer, and then throw a load into the washer from the waiting basket. Then my load is done for the day, and I can forget about it.
Open and process the mail. I don't let myself get up from the desk until the mail is filed, tossed, set in the shredder pile, or schedule (and filed)
15 minutes on my current declutter project (currently the craft room)

That's my basic routine. On different days, I like to add other things in. For example, I'm about to start a project to relocate a major piece of furniture (white Ikea 5x5 Expedit bookcase) from the living room to the library. I'm very excited about it. I'll post before and after pictures next week (hopefully). So today I have a task to spend 15 minutes moving books from one room to the other.

Family Planning (but not like that)

Mark and I have also scheduled a weekly 30 - 45 minutes to synchronize our calendars and double check the budget. Mark is the calendar nerd, and I'm the budget nerd. We set the timer for 15 minutes and review the calendar for that long. He's really good about writing EVERYTHING down, so this generally is his chance to make sure my calendar is up to date. We also plan who will pick up the kids from different activities. This week we had to figure out how to work around Mark's scheduled surgery. He's having a hernia repaired.

After 15 minutes, we reset the time and spend another 15 looking at the budget, evaluate whether we have any unplanned expenses coming up for the week and try to figure out how to pay for them. Once that's over, if we have any more energy and haven't started arguing, we wrap up any loose ends.

Overall, we're beginning to really get a handle on things around here. Our goal for February (financially) is to recover to the point that we have our Baby Emergency Fund back in place. In order to really do that, we'll need to stay on top of everything else.

And Now for Something Completely Different

Most everyone has heard that Obama proposed spending caps over the next few years, and to be honest I think he's right to do so. Unfortunately, in his budget proposal released today, he proposed canceling my bread and butter outright: NASA's Constellation Program. For now, I'm still employed, but that might not last until September. Our goal now is to fund our emergency fully before the pink slip comes. Thank goodness this bill has to get through Congress first. And that our work has a 30-day stop-work notification clause.

Fertility . . . Again

2010-01-29T05:37:00.000-08:00

I go through cycles of acceptance and denial about our inability to get pregnant. In this case, acceptance feels like total devastation. I feel emptied out, hopeless, and a little afraid of the future. I cry, and I try to decide on alternate plans. Will we foster? Adopt? Travel?

Denial manifests itself through charting, which I haven't done in about a year, plotting my cycle in my calendar, noting which days were "active" days and which were "fertile." I feel hopeful and determined.

I think I've lost hope, though. I'm 34, almost 35. It's pretty clear that without serious medical intervention, we're not going to have biological children. We've done all the basic tests and ruled out the obvious, simple things. It's down to either clogged tubes or inexplicable infertility.

I wish I could say that I trust God's timing. I suppose that in a way I do trust it. I think what I really mean is that I wish I could appreciate it. Instead, I find myself thinking about how I'll never know whether our children will have curly hair like Mark, blue eyes like mine, will be tall or short, skinny or fat. I can't know how Burgundy will interact with a sibling. I'll never be able to say, "Oh man, I remember when Burgundy cried like that." I will never breastfeed again. I'll never co-sleep. Wear my baby in a sling.

No, I can't appreciate this. I can just . . . move on. Maybe we'll foster. Maybe we'll just get Burgundy through college and then. And then, well, I don't know. I just can't see life beyond my child.