Randomness

During the holidays I feel particularly crafty and this year was no exception. Generally I make a lot of my gifts...I just think it means more. This year I planned to make cookies, my secret banana bread and various knitted items....well...sometimes plans change. It appears I didn't even mail a single Christmas card. Sorry peeps! Since almost everyone is in the same boat this year, most of my friends and family agreed NOT to exchange gifts this year. With a new baby in the house I have to admit I was relieved and dropped the ball entirely. To fulfill my crafty desires, without spending any cash, I dove into my box of randomness (eg, yarn, fabric, textured papers, etc).

I started with crocheted snowflake ornaments...make that ornament..singular. What a freakin' anxiety-inducing pain in the ass! I made the smallest one in the book (about 1" in diameter) and gave in. No wonder this crap had been sitting around for years...I subconsciously knew it would suck.

I then found partial skeins of green, red, brown and multicolored yarn so I made Mark, Isaiah, and myself stockings.


I moved onto to a fabulous ball of handspun yarn. My friend Robyn (the crafiest of them all) spun it herself and gave it to me as a gift. I grabbed what was left of the scrap yarn and made myself a cozy shoulder wrap. I think I'm going to put buttons on the far edges and make big kimono-like sleeves...I'll call it granny bat wings!


The last item is a Kusudama...a bunch of origami flowers glued together in a ball. I totally stole this idea from the Yoda of crafts mentioned above...Robyn. I made a small one out of scraps cut from old magazines (also Robyn's idea). I loved it so much I tore apart some crappy old book of angel pictures that I had (I don't know why) and made one for my mom. Each flower had a word on it like Miracle or Love:)



Other random shit that's fabulous...

Exhibit A

I found this image posted on Craftzine.com...these people pressed their bodies into the fresh, powdery snow on a car windshield. Now I'm totally going to have to try this sometime.

Exhibit B
www.craftingagreenworld.com... my new favorite crafty site. I found it via an artice on "Craftivism" (a crafting/activism combo) what a pleasant thought. I stumbled upon this newly coined term via a Chemo Caps website. I made a few for my mom recently and found a website dedicated to knitting caps for cancer patients. I don' see myself trekking through rainforests again any time in the near future, but that doesn't mean I can't contribute. Craftivism is a fabulous idea...don't ya think?

Exhbit B-2
The Knit One, Save One Campaign. Need I say more?

Exhibit C
The Tushy Cushy...essentially a handmade boppy. Awww. I found this at my favorite knitting site.. Knitty.com.



Exibit D
Ok...so maybe this isn't fabulous, but you have to admit the commitment is impressive.


Exhibit E
I'm all for recycled crafts...it is quite fun, but the prude in me says no way! I give you....the bra purse. Yes, it is true. What was once a bra can be your next handbag on date night. Scandalous!

Merry Christmas!

We had a damn nice Christmas this year. :) It was much busier than we had anticipated, but I think that made the day turn out better. Our little early bird woke us, as always, around 6:30am. I made a big breakfast, we lounged and watched the morning news, I sewed new buttons on Isaiah's overalls (damn baby is almost as tall as me), gave Isaiah a bath, etc. And then...the clock suddenly said 10:15 and we wondered where the time had gone. Mark and I both had to shower, dress, primp, round up the dogs, warm up the car, and pack baby shit (an attempt to not be as ill prepared as usual...though we were still ill prepared, as usual).

We arrived at my parent's house shortly after 11AM and I was impressed with how quickly we managed to get our shit together at the last minute. The 3 of us had lunch with my mom and dad and followed that up with Isaiah's First Christmas/Gift Opening Extravaganza. He got books and puzzles and a crazy rocking giraffe (as in rocking horse that looks like a giraffe). Among the many gifts from grandma and grandpa were a baby V-Tech laptop (Mark's favorite) and a musical gym. We put the gym together on the spot to see if Isaiah had any interest. My expectation was that it would take him a few days to figure it out...I was so wrong. He was entranced immediately. This continues to reinforce my belief that Isaiah will have a strong love of music. I was starting to believe this for the following reasons:

1. Only a few weeks ago we started playing a lullabies CD from the Putamayo Kids series during Isaiah's bedtime (the focus is world music in various languages from Swahili to Spanish). He sleeps so much better with a little quiet music playing.
2. He typically enjoys playtime more when music is playing. For instance, if he is in his jumperoo, he is more likely to jump about if we have the musical toys playing.
3. When he is upset I can usually calm him down with a sing song type voice (although I think this is probably true of all babies).
4. Isaiah threw a tantrum at a friend's house the other day. We both did everything we could think of to calm his cries...none of my usual tricks worked. Then Maya had the idea to play her favorite Thai music for him. He was immediately interested. The tears stopped about as quickly as they started. I was impressed! Now I will forever be armed with a CD...another tool in my bag of tricks.
5. Isaiah clearly has a preference for certain music. He prefers island-style songs, Jack Johnson, and world music with a softness to it. This is so exciting to me since I am completely devoid of any musical talent. If it turns out that Isaiah has musical abilities similar to my own, at least he will have grown up with an appreciate for music from other cultures. This will be wonderful in itself since Mark and I would like to expose our children to as many cultures as possible during their childhood. Clearly, music is an important part of every culture. (I could go on and on about the importance of cultural diversity, but I will save it for another day)

Ok...can I go off on a tangent or what?! So as I was saying we had a nice, albeit busy, Christmas day. We spent the afternoon at my parents, followed by an evening at Mark's best friend's house. He has 2 little boys around 6 and 8 years old. When I walked in the door I was completely speechless. The toy carnage was unbelievable. Thems some spoiled little boys. My son will never see a Christmas like this...even if we strike it rich. That's about all I'm going to say about that.

I know Aunt Jen is dying to see more footage of her nephew...I'm sure the rest of you will finding this unnecessarily boring.

Words of Wisdom...From the Fetal Position

My cousin Jamie and her husband Richard recently came back to IL for a visit. I think their main reason for coming back was for a burial we had for my grandmother. It was a very small event with immediate family only and was a nice way to get closure. On the up side, this visit also allowed us to introduce our new babies! Isaiah was born about 1 month before Benjamin. It was so amazing to see cute little Benny grunting and sleeping constantly...the way Isaiah was only a few weeks before. While they are only 1 month apart, it was so crazy to see what a HUGE difference a few weeks makes in an infant's life. I am excited for them to get a little older so they can actually play together.

Benny and Isaiah were able to go see Santa. It was insanely cold that day, but we all managed to squeeze into Santa's little hut on Main St...This was no minor feat as Jamie, Richard, Ashley (my other cousin), Santa, an elf, both babies, Mark and I crammed into a hut meant for about 3 adults. Jamie and I made silly noises and faces at the babies while the Mark and Richard took pictures. We managed to get a few good pics with both babies smiling, although most of the time poor Benny was pissed that some strange man was holding him and Isaiah decided he was hungry enough to try to eat Santa's beard. I wish we had video of the beard eating attempts. It was hilarious. I have some photos up on flicker.

Of course all of the fun with the babies was balanced with some sadness. My mother was recently diagnosed with esophageal cancer. I guess she was having a hard time swallowing and went to the hospital Thanksgiving night. After a series of tests we learned it was cancer. I don't think its appropriate to write in detail about this topic on my blog. I would rather try to keep things light here. It is a really big deal though and not something that I want to pretend doesn't exist. So, from time to time I may blog about this new event in our lives. My goal is to try to find the humor, even in this, and share it on my blog. Hopefully this will be a way for our family (and me) to have a positive outlet.

So stay tuned if you like. My baby blog may be taking a bit of a turn toward the various other aspects of our lives...I have been thinking of a new title for the blog and I think it should be something like Words of Wisdom From the Fetal Position. haha!

Thanksgiving

So its December and I'm blogging about Thanksgiving, but what the hell. I don't really have much to say except to brag that I spent the entire day making a pretty traditional, but tasty Thanksgiving dinner. While this isn't the first Thanksgiving dinner I've made, it was Isaiah's first Thanksgiving. I don't know why that mattered to me since he couldn't eat any of it, but it did. With all the excitement of the previous months, Mark and I decided to have Thanksgiving at home with just the 3 of us. It was perfect and peaceful. Yes, I even made a 13 lb turkey (which then became endless sandwiches and casseroles). We had sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, spicy green beans, gravy, stuffing, and pumpkin pie...I think that's it...my memory seems to be failing me a bit.

We definitely ate too much and spent the evening finishing off a bottle of wine while watching movies in our PJs. It was FABULOUS! I even managed to squeeze Isaiah into the little turkey onesie we bought him months ago. I nearly had to cut the thing off of the poor child, but at least he got to wear it.

We did have a big family Thanksgiving at the Hopper's on Sunday as well, which fulfilled my desire to lounge around playing with babies all day/night waiting for someone else to call out, "dinner's ready!" I heart the Hoppers. Their oldest daughter is Mark's age and has a 5 month old so it was all about the babies. Mrs H sent me home with a plate full of various pies too...can't complain!

3 Months Old!

It is still amazing how quickly babies develop. From an outsider's perspective, it probably looks like little has changed. When I look at Isaiah, I see a completely different baby than the one we brought home 3 months ago. He used to sleep, poop, pee, and chirp, that's about it. He then started to cry, smile, stay awake longer, and play. Everyday he develops a more distinct identity.

I now know that he's very independent. Unlike many other babies, Isaiah will cry and cry and cry while you bounce him, tickle him, make funny faces, etc. In the end, he just wants to be left alone. He demonstrated this Sunday night when we went to the Hopper's for Thanksgiving dinner (we call them Mark's yankee family). Shortly after we all sat down to eat, Isaiah started getting fussy. I expected this despite the fact that we loaded him up with a big bottle beforehand. Thankfully, with 20 other people in the room there were plenty of willing arms to try to appease him. I happily finished my plate while everyone else tried to calm his cries... nothing worked. Even daddy couldn't get him to stop. As a last resort we started to undress him and change his diaper thinking maybe he was uncomfortable, but once we picked him up he got pissed all over again. I laid him on the couch next to me hoping he would cry himself to sleep, and then it happened...silence and smiles. He simply wanted everyone to leave him the hell alone! Ah-ha! He looks like daddy, but acts like mommy. I was wondering if this kid had any of my DNA.

Another new development in Isaiah's life is his increasing desire to be mobile...yet again, a move toward independence. It started about 2 weeks ago. He was no longer content to be held like a newborn baby (unless he's feeling icky, then its ok to be treated like a baby...haha). I can no longer sit with Isaiah cradled in my arms unless he is eating. He no longer likes to sleep on my chest. Instead he prefers to sit up in my lap facing the world, like a big boy. Yesterday I observed 2 new behaviors. First, if lying on the bed or the floor he can kick and wiggle himself to a new location. I call it the reverse crawl. He is also strong enough to lift his bum with his legs, combined the with kick and the wiggle, he can get some pretty serious distance. Second, daddy introduced him to standing. Uh-ooh. Isaiah spent a good part of the night bouncing or "standing" on Mark's lap. As soon as Mark tried to sit him down...tears...oh the tears. This helped us decide on Isaiah's Christmas present...a jumper of some sort. We had already decided on books, but were still up in the air about whether another massive toy would be worthwhile for him...the answer is certainly YES!

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Now that Jen is back in Africa (and has easier access to the internet...hooray!) I will try to post more videos of the little one.

This was Isaiah 1 Month ago. He was smiling a little and just starting to find the mobile interesting. Most of the time he sat quietly pondering the world, and I wondered if this meant that he would be one of those introverted, thinky, shy types.



As the days passed it became obvious this was only a temporary condition. This was Isaiah about 2 weeks later.