A Right Gapesnest

On Hiatus

2012-01-29T17:19:00.003-05:00

As you may have already noticed, I've been on unofficial hiatus since the end of last year. I didn't really mean to take a break, I just kind of ... never ... posted. By mid-January, I was thinking about actively choosing to stop posting for awhile, instead of passively letting it happen, and feeling guilty about it.

A main goal for this blog is for me to write regularly, and hold myself accountable. It works very well in that respect, and I'm more motivated to write because I enjoy getting comments and knowing that people are reading it. However, when I spend time writing and editing posts for the blog, I'm not working on any of my other writing projects that might, someday, actually get published and get me paid!

So I've decided to stop blogging through the end of February. I have a short novella that's all outlined, half-written, that's been sitting around for several years. I'd like to finish writing it, edit it, and send it off for possible publication. Will it actually get published? Well, I have no control over that. But if I can finish it, clean it up, and send it on, I would be very happy with that effort.

By choosing to not blog in order to get this done, that is definitely motivation to make the most of the time I have right now, to commit myself to one project and see it through. I might pop by the blog from time to time for a brief update, but I won't start writing regularly again until March. This means that, to meet my minimum annual posting goal of 120 posts, I'll need to write about 12 posts/month from March through December. So you have a brief respite from me now, but I will (hopefully) be a posting machine from March onward!

Enjoy some happy, chilly months.

All Caught Up!

2011-12-30T15:25:00.001-05:00

After several days of double posts, I'm FINALLY all caught up with my half-written post backlog! I'm very excited, for the first time in ages and just in time for the New Year, to be all caught up. (I think this new picture of Eleanor will be my standard one for any "excited" post from now on. It really just captures that emotion so well.)

I met and (barely) surpassed my goal of 120 posts for the year. The year Eleanor was born I only managed 94 posts, so I'm happy with just meeting that goal. If I get to about the same number of posts again next year, I'll be happy with that!

I'm not so bold as to make numerous crazy New Year's Resolutions like I did when I first started blogging. (Read 50 books!) All I'm willing to commit to is that I will do my best to maintain the status quo, in real life and virtual life, as Declan grows into a crawling, drooling, babbling, then walking, talking baby. I'll do my best to keep eating as well and no better, clean the house just enough so that it doesn't get any grungier than it already is, and run as many races in 2012 as I did in 2011. (I think that commits me to one 5k only.) I promise to work towards continuing my mediocre email response time and relatively reliable, if not prolific, blog posting.

Happy New Year!

Photo Challenge: Black and White

2011-12-30T07:34:00.003-05:00

I've missed several weeks of blogging about his pictures, but Keith never has. For the past 52 weeks, come rain or shine, new baby or beach vacation, Keith has taken, edited, and posted a picture by the weekly Wednesday deadline, every time. This blows my mind. As someone who often struggles to post some cogent thoughts 10 times a month with no need to set up shots and choose then edit a finished photo, I am in awe of his dedication. Some weeks were more fun and easy, and some less. But he always did it, and I feel that says something about the person that Keith is. That's the kind of guy I want to be married to.

Anyway, the final week of the year's challenge was "Black and White." As you can tell, Declan didn't really like the reindeer suit, although we thought it was adorable.

Some of the other pictures that I've missed over the past few weeks succinctly tell the story of our first weeks after Declan was born. The first was taken a week before Declan was born: It was the picture Keith wanted to take for the prompt of "silhouette" but the prompt didn't come in time.

The next week, Keith had no trouble finding a "square" picture at the hospital:

And our brand new baby boy was an easy choice for "blue."

Even with a newborn, life continued on for Eleanor. Keith made the most of a gorgeous Fall day to first blow most of the leaves to the front curb then rake a special leaf pile for Eleanor, and then take some pictures of her jumping into it. (To be fair, it also helped that his parents were visiting that weekend, and his dad brought the leaf blower.)

Finally, "silhouette"! This turned into sort of a companion piece to the silhouette picture he'd wanted to take.

Keith said that he's going to sign up for another photo challenge next year. He admits that it's a lot of time and effort, but he strongly feels that his picture taking and editing skills have been challenged and improved through the Flickr challenge group in ways that he would never have done on his own. It's his photography equivalent of a workout partner. I look forward to seeing what he comes up with! (And sometimes blogging about it.)

Our Family Christmas

2011-12-29T15:51:00.000-05:00

Once we made it through the hustle and bustle of buying, making, baking, wrapping, cleaning, cooking, decorating, and re-buying things I forgot or ran out of (like wine), our Christmas was good.

We had so much fun because this was the first year that Eleanor really got it. She knew all about Santa Claus. We decorated gingerbread houses, baked cookies, bought special Christmas outfits for the kids, visited Santa, bought presents for her immediate family and wrapped them. She loved all of it.

One of our favorite Christmastime activities this year was an interactive Advent calendar by Jacqui Lawson that my Mom sent us. There's a couple options, but we got the London one since Keith and I have fond memories of that city. There was no temptation to skip ahead, since it only lets you open that day's door and previous days. We also had a "real" paper Advent calendar that we opened at dinner with Keith, but Eleanor and Declan and I would open the computer Advent calendar first thing in the morning. Then Eleanor would spent the next 10-20 minutes opening old days or the same day over and over again. It was a cute calendar that brought back fond memories of my time in England, and it was also a nice way to ease into the day.

Christmas Eve we hosted a small family gathering in the afternoon. In the past we've had it later, but with the kids and the fact that I like to fit in church service at some point, it seemed easier to have it in the afternoon and then everyone could disperse to any other gatherings/activities they desired. It did feel lower maintenance to have it in the afternoon, and to serve the food buffet style instead of a sit-down meal.

Before I knew it, our open house party was over and Mom, Eleanor, and I headed to the traditional Christmas Eve service at the Unitarian Universalist Society of Cleveland. Keith and Eleanor and I have been to the church several times before Declan was born (that's a whole different post) and I really like their approach to religion and spirituality. I was a little leery of a Christmas Eve service there, however; there's not many parts of traditional religion that I like, but I have always loved Christmas Eve carol services. It seems like the month of December and the actual holiday pass by so quickly, I really value attending the Christmas Eve service and taking an hour to calm down, breathe deeply, and think about family and what the holiday really means to me. So although I wasn't sure what to think beforehand, it was a lovely service--traditional, true to their word--in that there were plenty of Christmas carols and the story of Jesus's birth. Yet untraditional when the homily mentions, "Some Christians believe that Jesus was the Son of God incarnate" and they mention that the Christian advent wreath is based on the pagan wheel of fire.

So I did enjoy the Christmas Eve service, as always. Then we went back home, my parents and older sister stayed a little while after Eleanor went to bed and then they headed home themselves. Keith and I took turns holding Declan and wrapping presents, and finally got to bed around midnight.

Our first (and best) Christmas present was when Eleanor AND Declan both slept in until 9 o'clock on Christmas morning. The next best moment was hearing Eleanor call, "Is it morning time? I want to go look and see if Santa left us presents!" and watching her eyes light up as she opened presents. We took the present opening very slowly, letting Eleanor set the pace as she opened a present and really looked at it and even started playing with a few before moving onto the next present. Even taking our time, Eleanor got worn out. We'd saved the Santa presents for last and she had one more to open when she called a halt to the proceedings.

We stared at her incredulously. "Do you want to wait until after breakfast to open your last present?" we asked. She confirmed her intentions and we trooped off to breakfast.

Halfway through breakfast Eleanor suddenly sat up and said, "I never got my ballerina fairy baby doll!" She'd gotten everything else that she'd asked Santa for, but not that.

"Well, you have one more present," I reminded her. "Do you want to go open it?"

We got up from the table and ran back into the living room where she opened her final present, triumphantly holding her ballerina (not fairy) baby doll aloft.

The rest of Christmas Day passed in a pleasant haze of delicious food, good company, and relaxation. We played with Eleanor's toys, held Declan, opened presents with my family, and watched as much of A Christmas Story as we could fit in between other activities. I also really enjoyed Boxing Day, when Keith slept in and Eleanor, Declan and I came down to the living room in our pajamas and spent several hours opening and playing with her toys.

Our first Christmas as a family of four was a fabulous success. I'm already so excited for next year, when Declan is 14 months old and Eleanor can help even more with the baking and decorating and present-buying. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Crafty Christmas

2011-12-29T07:15:00.005-05:00

I've found that there's a spectrum of Christmas gift-giving through which I move, depending on my mood and our financial situation. The year that Eleanor was born, and again this year, I've made most of our Christmas gifts. My thought is that I'm home all the time, and we don't have a lot of extra cash.

And yet, I spend so much money on all the craft supplies .... I wonder if doing all of this extra work is even saving any money?!? Of course, I do enjoy making gifts, which is part of the motivation, but it's still a lot of time and effort. I promised myself that, this year, I would actually write down everything I spend instead of just guesstimating. This way, if I spend just as much as I would have if I had bought presents, next year I will buy online with no feelings of guilt.

One place my gift-giving spectrum never goes is to the malls. I have no desire to shop in overpriced stores with cookie cutter inventory. If I'm not making my gifts, I'm most likely buying them online via Etsy or Amazon, or in person at Target or discount stores like Marshall's and Tuesday Morning (that's where nearly all of Eleanor's and Declan's gifts came from this year).

I'd like to post links to some of the items we (Keith helped a lot!) made this year, but since we haven't exchanged gifts yet with Keith's family, I can't really do that. Instead, pictured is the
no-sew tutu I meant to make for Eleanor. I even bought the supplies, but ran out of time. I guess it will be a random, Thursday morning in February gift, whenever I get around to making it. Incomplete crafts: The gifts that just keep on giving!

Missed Moments: Halloween

2011-12-28T19:02:00.000-05:00

You can tell when Eleanor started picking her own Halloween costumes. Her first two Halloweens she was a pirate and a sushi chef. Then last year she was a (pink) ballerina and this year she was a (pink) fairy princess. She had told me she was just going to pick out something from her regular dress-up clothes to wear, which was fine with me.

But then we were shopping at a discount store and I found a pink fairy costume for only $5. It looked like $5 was a fair price for the flimsy dress, plastic wings, and bent crown. But it also only had to last one night, right? We bought it, I let her try it on once at home, and then we put it away to heighten the anticipation (and keep it intact) until Halloween.

What struck me most about Halloween, and about the first few weeks following Declan's birth, was that life continued on pretty normally. After Eleanor was born our world was turned upside-down, inside-out, and any other phrase indicating a complete and total break from life before baby. I know it was partly because she was our first born, and going from married couple to parents is a big change. Even if you have pets; sorry, it just doesn't compare.

But another reason life with Eleanor had been so challenging is that we had a lot of problems with feeding her. She didn't want to eat and she wasn't reliably gaining weight. (Sometimes she would do fine, and then sometimes she plateaued, which little babies are not supposed to do.) All she really wanted to do was sleep, which her doctors told us was not allowed. So we would spend hours trying to wake her up and night and get her to eat, with very little success. On top of that, I was also pumping to try and increase my milk supply, and her feedings could easily take an hour at least. I think it would not be an exaggeration to say that, for the first few weeks, I was spending nearly 20 hours a day trying to feed her or in feeding-related activities. It was awful.

After a while we calmed down and things got better. We started letting her sleep through the night (rather than go against medical advice, we just assumed she was old enough and stopped asking the doctors if it was okay) and that improved everyone's disposition a LOT. We figured out a feeding system that worked for us, and I stopped relying on the scale to tell me if I was succeeding or failing as a parent. Eleanor was old enough that she could tell us how things were going, and she was a very happy, smiley baby.

This time around, I've done a much better job of ignoring the scale from day one. We went in for a few lactation consultations, and I specifically requested they NOT weigh him, so I couldn't obsess over the numbers (nor could they). I'm not perfect, and I nearly had a breakdown at his two-month appointment a few days ago because I thought he hadn't gained enough weight. The 15 minutes between getting him weighed and hearing the doctor say he was fine were self-imposed torture. But I NEVER voluntarily weigh him, and I'm doing a much better job of letting Declan tell me if he's hungry.

So anyway, this relates to Halloween because it was a mere two weeks after Declan was born and instead of being lost in some weird baby vortex, separated physically and mentally from the normal world, we were just getting on with things. Making and eating dinner at a reasonable hour, getting Eleanor to preschool, and enjoying her first Halloween where she trick-or-treated with friends.

Of course, her friends live down the block, and we still didn't even make it off the block before she called it quits. But we got to walk around with the other parents and watch the kids run eagerly up to every house. I felt like part of the regular world, even if I was getting up two times a night to feed the baby. At least this baby wakes up and cries, eats, and goes back to sleep. How amazing!

Said baby stayed at home during trick-or-treating, cuddled in Grandma Karen's arms while she handed out candy. But next year! Next year he will be a sushi chef or race car driver ... just preferably something not pink.

Missed Moments: The Birth (of Declan)

2011-12-28T13:42:00.000-05:00

So my birth experience with Eleanor was, overall, even better than I had hoped for. It was very quick, I made it through without pain meds, and I woke up already in labor so I didn't spend a lot of time worrying about false contractions. The second time around, I hoped for more of the same.

Ha! First of all, as I have already extensively complained about, Declan was a week late. A week! That's like a whole other 9 months to a hugely pregnant woman. The waiting is excruciating. Plus, I had serious false contractions on 2 or 3 separate occasions. I woke up in the middle of the night with a tingle of anticipation, sure that it was happening just like Eleanor ... and then nothing.

I tried very hard to wait patiently and go into labor naturally. As we waited for Declan (or "Little Sibling" as we called the baby before it was born) to decide to make an appearance, I had several non-stress tests and an ultrasound to make sure the baby was still safe and happy in the womb. The ultrasound estimated the baby's weight at 8 lbs, 13 oz, and my doctor strongly encouraged me to think seriously about inducing.

I was adamant about waiting, though. I would let this baby come when it was ready; I wasn't going to be induced just because it was more convenient and easier for me. Plus, if I were induced that labor would probably take longer, and I would probably be more likely to need the epidural .... I felt like inducing would start a domino effect of many choices taking me further and further from the natural birth I had experienced with Eleanor, and wanted again.

And yet. I had another follow-up appointment on a Monday, exactly a week after the original due date. Sunday night, Keith and I discussed it and I was still firm in waiting as long as possible before being induced. My doctor had told me he was willing to wait until Wednesday, and that's how long I would give it. But as I stood in the shower Monday morning before my appointment, I suddenly had this feeling that this baby was NEVER going to choose on its own to come it. It was digging in its heels (quite literally, it seemed like I could feel them poking my ribs) and would not be coming out unless forced. I finished my shower, got dressed, and came downstairs.

"I want to be induced," I announced to a very surprised Keith.

We were still surprised, however, when we got to the appointment and I told the doctor I wanted to be induced. I figured he'd tell me to check into the hospital that night to be put on a Pitocin drip, and the baby would be born in the morning. Instead, he told us he's not at the hospital on Tuesdays, so I could either check into the hospital in a couple hours and the baby would be born that very night, or I could wait and check in late night Tuesday, so the baby was born Wednesday morning.

Well, since I had decided I was done waiting, hanging around for another day and a half before checking into the hospital for an inducement wasn't really an option. If I was going to be induced, I wanted to just go ahead and do it!

So we went home, made sure our bags were packed and made arrangements for Eleanor's care, and headed to the hospital. It felt so surreal, to be casually driving to the hospital on a beautiful, sunny afternoon, knowing that next time I drove home, it would be with a baby.

As I had feared, choosing the induction changed the whole progression of labor. We were at the hospital for nearly two hours before the paperwork and initial assessments were done, and I was put on the low level Pitocin drip. Then I was on that for about 3 hours with very minor cramping--definitely nothing strong enough to feel like I was in labor.

We'd asked my parents and Keith's mom to bring Eleanor up to the labor and delivery room during this low-key phase of the process. When we'd said good-bye to her before preschool that morning, we had been expecting to pick her up a few hours later and continue on with life as normal. Instead, we went to the hospital and she went to a friend's house, and it made me sad to think that it had been our last moment as a family of three and we'd missed it.

Unfortunately, with Eleanor's nap the timing worked out that they arrived mere moments after the doctor broke my water. That meant it wasn't low-key and casual anymore, but getting to serious labor very quickly. I wanted so much to enjoy some time with Eleanor and our families, but immediately the contractions were very intense. Keith saw the look on my face as I tried to refrain from showing Eleanor that I was in any sort of discomfort and he quickly shooed everyone else out of the room.

The doctor stopped by again not long after that and told me that everything was progressing quickly; if I wanted an epidural, it would have to be soon. This time around, I didn't really even try to resist the lure of a nearly pain-free labor and delivery. I'd had too much time sitting in the hospital, thinking about what was coming. Add to that the fact that the real contractions started when Eleanor was visiting, and I felt completely unprepared, mentally, to handle a natural birth.

In retrospect, I don't think the pain was any worse than it had been the first time around, but my reaction to it was the polar opposite. Instead of breathing through it and focusing on something else, I focused 100% on the pain and kept telling myself just how painful and terrible it really was. That's not really a good pain management strategy.

So, shortly after that, I got the epidural and Keith and I settled back into the low-key waiting phase. We watched Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy!. By this point I was starting to feel more pressure, so I figured the epidural was wearing off.

The doctor reappeared (what do they do in-between?) and announced that the increased pressure actually meant that I was ready to start pushing. Which also meant I'd been ready to start pushing for some time, but hadn't realized it. Whoops! "That happens all the time," the nurse assured me. Well then, why didn't anymore warn me that increased pressure did NOT mean the epidural was wearing off, and I should call for the doctor?!?

But I digress. One minute we were watching Final Jeopardy in a comfortable hotel room with low lighting. The next minute, the end of the bed was ripped away, people in surgical gloves and masks surrounded me, and intensely bright surgical lamps were shining in my face. It only took a few pushes, maybe 15 minutes if that, before Declan was born.

I was honestly surprised Declan was a "he." I was surprised when Eleanor turned out to be a girl, because for some reason Keith and I both thought she would be a boy. And I guess there was a part of me expecting Baby #2 to be a girl just because that's what happened the first time, even though I know logically that there's a 50/50 chance of either sex.

But a "he" it was. Keith and I immediately started crying and smiling as I held the baby in my arms. Eleanor was now officially a big sister, and we could finally meet and hold our new baby.

Missed Moments: The Birth (of Eleanor)

2011-12-27T17:45:00.001-05:00

Alright, so this post is 10 weeks after the big event. You may all be over this and ready to move on. But since Declan's birth, I've tried to remember with more precision what the early days were like with Eleanor, and I have no record of that, which saddens me. I'd like to better know what I was thinking and feeling in the moment, and be cognizant of how it's changed this time around.

So, with that in mind, this is really a story of two very, very different births. To review, Eleanor was born 3 days after her due date. I woke up in the wee hours of the morning already experiencing some pretty intense contractions. I got a quick shower (Why? Because people had said to, and it was stuck in my head.) By the time I got out of the shower, my contractions were more intense. Still erratic, but wavering between 4 and 7 minutes apart.

After all my worry about what we'd do with the dog, we did nothing. It was the middle of the night, and he rolled over and went back to sleep. By the time he was ready to wake up in the morning, my in-laws were at the house to let him out.

The precise times are a bit fuzzy, but I think I woke up a little before 4am, checked into the hospital by 5ish ... and Eleanor was born at 9:14am. When we got to the hospital, I was experiencing a lot of lower back pain. I told Keith through gritted teeth that I wasn't sure I could go through with a natural birth. Bless him, he tried so hard to say the right thing.

"You can do it ... if you want to ... but if you don't it's okay .... but if you do, then I'm sure that you can...."

I settled in and decided to try and use breathing and visualization techniques to at least get me through the next few contractions. Then I could always re-evaluate.

What followed next seemed very independent of time or outside influence. When I felt a contraction coming on, I started my deep breathing and focused on my calming image: Beckett and I taking a nap on the living room couch on a hot, sunny, quiet afternoon. I kept my eyes closed during and between the contractions, and even fell asleep sometimes.

"Can I do anything?" Keith anxiously inquired. "Do you want a back massage?" Unbeknownst to me, he was worried because I was acting like the contractions were very intense, but they were barely even registering on the monitor ... until the nurse adjusted the monitoring belt, and then the next contraction was through the roof. Keith breathed a sigh of relief.

A nurse (on-call doctor maybe?) came to check and see how far along I was, to see when they should call the Ob-Gyn from my practice to come in and deliver. I think at that point I was already at an 8, or at least definitely further along than they were expecting.

When the doctor arrived and checked me, he was surprised (as we all were!) to find out that I was fully dilated and ready to push. Keith tells me I pushed for about 45 minutes (I had no clue about the time throughout the entire process). Finally, Eleanor was born.

to be continued

Baby Projects: Blankets

2011-12-27T15:00:00.000-05:00

In early October I had several blog entries about baby projects (which were really about Eleanor's new room and sewing her curtains, since getting Eleanor out of the baby's room was the most extensive part of our preparations). This was meant to the final baby project post, but we never took any pictures of the blanket until there was actually a baby in it, ergo I'm just now posting.

I made the exact same baby blanket I've made about ten times before--I'm definitely a creature of habit when it comes to knitting projects. If it ain't broke, and you're making the same blanket for a new baby, why change?

I was disappointed, though, because this baby blanket is seriously tiny. It barely covers Declan now, and he's only 2 months old! Although I used the same pattern, I did use smaller needles and smaller yarn, and that had a much bigger effect than I was anticipating.

While knitting Declan's blanket, I was also working on a second blanket for Eleanor. Her first is getting old and worn and is a little small for her. But my primary motivation for making her a new blanket was that she's incredibly attached to the first one. She calls it her "Mommy Blanket" because she knows I made it for her when she was still a baby in my belly. She always sleeps with it--not covering her, but cuddled in her arms. It is amazing to me that it means so much to her, and I turn into a puddle of goo whenever I check on her in bed and see it in her tight grasp. But I also worry about the serious meltdown prospects if something happens to it.

I let her pick the yarn (baby pink, of course!) and for this I did use a new pattern, but a really simple one. Knit 7 rows with really big needles. Then knit 7 rows with small needles. Repeat. It's amazingly simple, but looks very nice.

Unfortunately, Mommy Blanket #2 runs a far distant second to the first, and I'm not at all convinced that she would be consoled by its presence if disaster struck Mommy Blanket #1. Knowing this, and seeing how small Declan's blanket is, I should probably start on his second blanket now. Maybe I'll be more successful in getting him to adopt it and love it equally with the first.

A Great Escape

2011-12-19T22:56:00.004-05:00

My wonderful mother-in-law is visiting for a few days this week. She always tells me that I should do whatever I want to while she's here; she just wants to spend time with the kids and help out. Oh, and she always brings a bottle of wine.Who wouldn't like a mother-in-law like that?!?

I did feel a bit guilty today, as I handed her the baby and dashed out of the house into the sweet, cold free air, that I always run out the door when she's in town. I take the opportunity to walk the dog or run errands without lugging a 30-pound baby and carseat and oftentimes unruly toddler with me. I relish the opportunity to go somewhere, anywhere, all by myself during the day, because it so rarely happens.

I hope she realizes how much I appreciate the opportunity to get out. I'm not running away from her, I promise! I'm running toward peace and quiet.

"My Baby's Got ... What?!?"

2011-12-06T21:39:00.003-05:00

For a long time now, we've been playing a white noise CD in Eleanor's room during the night because we have squeaky old wooden floors and a dog who sometimes barks in his sleep. Now that Declan's around, the white noise is even more important.

A few weeks ago, however, she figured out how to change her iPod nano from the white noise to actual songs. Overall, I'm not sure how I feel about this. Will this keep her awake longer? There's still the benefit of background noise, but with lyrics and key changes, etc. As with so many other discipline issues of late, it comes down to the fact that I don't have enough energy to argue with her about it, so we chose a playlist of pretty mellow songs and left it at that.

I don't know if it keeps her up (any more than anything else), but I have discovered that she does listen to the lyrics. At naptime one day last week, Ben Folds's cover of "Golden Slumbers" was playing when Eleanor asked me, "Did he say 'Once there was a wedding'?"

I said, "No, he said, 'Once there was a way ... to get back homeward,'" and we then discussed the meaning of the lyrics before reading her princess stories and turning out the light.

So tonight she was all tucked up in bed, and the rest of us were downstairs in the living room. Suddenly, we heard her music start blasting and a pitter patter of feet as she hopped back into bed. Keith went up to check out the situation, and when he came back down he was laughing so hard he could barely talk.

Apparently, Eleanor turned up the music because she likes G. Love's "My Baby's Got Sauce." However, she told Keith he sang "My baby's got sores" and she liked that part. I'm guessing "sores" isn't really a part of her vocabulary yet, and I feel no need to enlighten her. We are going to have to listen to our music a little more closely, however, for profanity and the like before it makes it on her iPod and she starts singing it at school.

Congrats, Photographer Keith!

2011-12-05T18:40:00.003-05:00

A few weeks ago, I posted that Keith entered one of his Photo Challenge pictures in a photo contest at our local library. They just announced the results, and Keith got second place!

His prize is a free photo shoot at MotoPhoto. We're excited/curious to see how it goes. I have to admit, we've never had professional pictures of Eleanor or Declan. Keith likes to take pictures, his sister also takes great pictures .... we've just never seen a need for the expense. Plus, we were a little concerned about how Eleanor would react. Whenever a stranger first talks to her, she acts shy and hides her head. How would that go for a photo shoot?

In talking about the upcoming photo shoot, we're also wondering whether we should do a full family portrait. Neither Keith nor I particularly enjoy having our pictures taken, but I sort of think it's a necessity. Shouldn't we get a picture with all of us? I guess we should at least have one taken, and if it's absolutely horrible, we just won't print it.

Which brings us to the final point: The photo contest prize is a free photo shoot. NO prints are included. (Yeah, it's a small prize, but that's not really why he entered.) What are the chances that we decide the prints are too expensive, and don't even get any? At this point, I'd put them at 50/50.

So even though all of our far flung friends and readers were not all able to vote, apparently the community at large enjoyed the photo enough for him to win second place. I'm so proud of him, both for the photo and for taking the leap of faith to even enter it. Of course, Eleanor says it's her prize too, since the picture is of her. And it's fair enough that she and Declan give us wonderful photo subjects! We're looking forward to taking pictures of them with Santa in the near future.

Congratulations, Keith! (and Eleanor)

Easy as Pie! Holiday Cooking

2011-11-29T15:08:00.003-05:00

I'm sitting on the couch, holding a sleeping baby in my arms, and staring at the front covers of the magazines on our coffee table because it would be too much work to actually hold one and read it. Plus, even if I tried, Declan would wake up or the phone would ring or Eleanor would need help on the potty .... the interruption possibilities are endless.

Anyway, the front cover of the latest Cooking Light declares "Easy-as-Pie: Open House Menu." I think the title is a bit misleading because I read that article last week, and I'm pretty sure there's no pie involved. Surely there must be an unwritten rule of food writing that states you can't use common food expressions like "easy as pie" or "piece of cake" or "tougher than grandma's overdone turkey" unless said food is actually relevant to the topic. Otherwise, you just confuse people.

However, the topic of holiday cooking reminds me of the many Cooking Light recipes we've used and enjoyed since we moved into our house and actually started cooking for the holidays, 5 years ago. Here's some of our favorites:

Coconut Biscotti: a big change from most other sugary holiday cookies, and delicious dunked in hot tea!
Last year we made Rosemary Mashed Sweet Potatoes with Shallots for Thanksgiving, and they were a big hit. This was our first experience cooking with shallots, wherein we discovered that they are absolutely delicious and really freakin' expensive.
This year, we opted for a much sweeter (but still delicious) recipe in the Streuseled Sweet Potato Casserole. Another bonus with this one is that it's easy to make the day before and just bake on the big day.
My favorite, which I insist on making every year whether anyone else wants it or not, is the Cranberry, Cherry, and Walnut Chutney. Fresh cranberries are delicious!
Speaking of cranberries, for dessert last year Keith made the Cranberry Swirl Cheesecake. I think we may make it again this year. Especially now that we know it needs to chill for a day to set. Whoops!

Wheel Watcher

2011-11-28T23:25:00.002-05:00

Starting with the night Declan was born, I've been finding myself in front of the TV during Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy. We watched both in the delivery room while I was in labor, and I started pushing only moments after Final Jeopardy. I wish I could remember what the category was .... that's something for the baby book!

Anyway, it often seems to work out that I'm nursing Declan at some point between 7 and 8, and I tune into the game shows of my youth. A few observations:

Do you remember when Wheel of Fortune contestants had to choose prizes from these showcases? That would have sucked. To get one chair worth $800 that doesn't match anything else in your house .... the prizes have gotten a LOT better (read: cash).
I still don't understand why so many Wheel of Fortune contestants insist on buying every vowel. Keith argues that it's because they don't know what the answer is and they're trying to make their turn last longer and get some inspiration. I concede that's a logical interpretation, but often it just feels like they're trying to fill in the whole puzzle. Um, you do remember that you're PAYING for the vowels, right?
Was Alex Trebec always that much of a dick, or did that come with old age? Why does it always seem like he's mocking the contestants?
I would be a horrible Jeopardy contestant. I try to tell myself it's because it's all trivial knowledge, and I only fill my head with important information.

Missed Moments: Quiet Weekend

2011-11-16T22:21:00.001-05:00

Several events happened in the past few weeks that I'd meant to blog about, but never got around to. There's no point in going back and trying to recapture everything since October 17, but I do want to mention a few of the most memorable moments.

We got home from the hospital on a Wednesday afternoon, and Keith's family visited in waves for pretty much the next week. It was nice to spend one-on-one time with each individual family, but it was also very busy. The visits ended the following Thursday, when Keith's parents left for a family wedding in New York City ... and took Eleanor with them.

When my mother-in-law first proposed taking Eleanor with them, on this 4-day trip, our first reaction was "No way!" It seemed crazy. How could she possibly survive without her mother and father for 4 days?!?

But the idea of getting a long weekend with just Keith and the baby and no distractions (Sorry Eleanor, but you are very distracting.) grew on me. Part of the sleep deprivation this time around is due to the fact that, no matter what time Declan falls asleep or how many times he wakes up, Eleanor will still be up by 7 or 7:30am. This is particularly offensive on the weekends. So we could get a long weekend of really, actually sleeping when the baby sleeps, instead of playing dress up and reading princess stories? I'M IN.

We gratefully took up Karen's kind offer, and it seemed like a wonderful idea ... until the car was loaded up on Thursday morning, Eleanor gave me a hug and kiss good-bye, and then she eagerly hopped into her carseat and was ready for the trip. Then I wanted to cry and grab her out of the car and run back inside with her. Keith held me back though, and they drove off.

Once they'd been gone for about 5 minutes, it seemed like a good idea again. The house was so quiet and peaceful. That day, we picked up the blocks and dress-up clothes and books ... and everything stayed put away. For days!

Even better, we had lots of time to watch Declan sleep, and talk about how adorably perfect his fingers and toes and nose are. We exclaimed over every facial expression he made, and picked him up immediately when he started crying--if we'd even put him down at all, which is doubtful. We got so much quality baby bonding time, which I would imagine is usually very rare for a second child.

To end this story happily ever after, the New York crew had a great time, too. Apparently Eleanor was on her best behavior for her grandparents, so they didn't get to enjoy the tantrums and meltdowns Keith and I are privy to on a regular basis. Ergo, everyone loved her and doted on her. Ergo, she also had a fabulous time and barely even missed us at all.

Yet, when she returned, I was never so happy to see her dress-up basket had exploded all over the living room floor. When I told her it was naptime and she shouted "No!" and stomped her feet and Declan started crying, I wanted to give her a big hug and a kiss. It was a wonderful weekend, but I was glad to have both my kids in the house again.

P.S. The picture is of Eleanor "dressing up" Declan while he sleeps in his carseat, by laying a dress on him and putting dress-up shoes next to his feet. It was the first time, but I'm sure it won't be the last!

Photo Challenge: A Finalist!

2011-11-15T21:21:00.003-05:00

Keith has been participating in the Shutterboo Weekly Photo Challenge for a few years now. It's a great opportunity to improve his own photography skills and be inspired by the work of others, as well. Plus the deadline element is always a bonus incentive.

Last May, this is the picture that Keith took for the prompt "Red":

Then, a few months ago, we saw a flyer at our library about a local photo contest. Keith picked up a flyer and thought about entering the contest, but never did much about it. Contest entries were due by the end of October, and since October was a pretty busy month for us, I wanted to try and make sure Keith entered the contest before Declan's due date. (Ha! As if that date meant anything, in the end. Little did we know we still had another week of waiting around.)

I briefly considered just choosing one of Keith's photo on my own, printing and entering it, but what if I picked one that wasn't one of his favorites? Would he be disappointed? In the end, I told him I really thought he should enter, and also told him which of his Photo Challenge images I thought were the strongest.

So together, we chose the above picture of Eleanor. I got it printed and matted, and Keith dropped it off at the library. A few weeks later, we found out that Keith is one of the 10 finalists! I'm so glad that he entered the competition, and very proud of him for working to continually improve this new skill and having the confidence to enter the competition.

So just being a finalist is a "win" of sorts, especially since 5 of the 10 finalists get some sort of prize. But of course, we'd love for Keith's photo to officially be #1! Right now, an exhibit of the 10 finalists is traveling to all of the library branches, so patrons can vote on their favorite. Well, they've actually already been at the main branch and the University Heights branch.

This is the last week of voting, so if you live in the area, please stop by the Coventry library branch and vote for photo #3!

Posting Post Baby

2011-11-01T16:19:00.006-04:00

Remember the pre-baby days, when I was so diligent about posting regularly? Ah, seems like so long ago!

Since October 13, I've posted one time, just to officially announce to the world that the baby had indeed been born. So 8 posts over two weeks, and 1 post in the following two weeks.

What is interesting to me, however, is why I haven't been posting. It's not the sleep deprivation or general business of taking care of a newborn and toddler. I've actually had a lot of help since coming home from the hospital. First, Keith was off for two weeks. As an added bonus, Keith's parents swung by and picked up Eleanor on their way to a family wedding in New York City the weekend after Declan was born, so from Thursday mid-morning through Sunday evening, it was just Keith, Declan, and me. I think we got dressed about 2 o'clock in the afternoon and put our pajamas back on again by 7 o'clock at night.

Since Keith went back to work yesterday, Keith's mom has been my significant other:) I think she's spent more time watching both kids at one time than I have! We've had people bringing us food, offering play dates for Eleanor, and buying us diapers. I had forgotten how helpful everyone is when a new baby arrives.

Of course, even with all the help in the world, it is still a lot of work. I'm breastfeeding, so right there that's several hours a day (and night) that no one can really help with. And Eleanor wants Mommy to read her stories and tuck her in and help her in the bathroom and just generally to pay attention to her. And I need to get some sleep and brush my hair every once in a while.

And yet, even though I've spent all this time talking about how time-consuming it is, I've realized over the past two weeks that lack of time isn't what's keeping me from posting. I've had many, many different ideas for blog posts in my mind, and I've started composing one or two .... but I never get past a sentence or so. We've sat and watched TV and movies for hours over the past two weeks, but I haven't written a blog post because I can't concentrate enough to actually write.

Maybe this shouldn't be such a surprise, but it has been to me. I assumed that, last time, I didn't blog because I didn't have the time. Eleanor and I had so many problems with breastfeeding that I was probably spending literally 19-20 hours a day trying to feed her or wake her up to feed her or pumping to increase my milk supply. Blogging was the last thing on my mind. Make that next-to-last; there was nothing happening in the bedroom except exhausted sleep and a crying baby.

So this time, with all of the help and easier breastfeeding, I thought that I would pick up blogging again with no problem. But I can't stay focused long enough to start and finish a blog post. Even this post, which is pretty long for me, seems to take a long time to get to the point. I find myself wondering, "Do I even need everything at the beginning? Shouldn't I revise it? Tighten it up? Get rid of unneeded material and craft a better intro?"

But there's no time or mental energy for the craft of composing. I am writing, and I am going to post this, but I'm afraid that it's not going to be my best post ever. Maybe I need to work on just posting something for now, and get back to the whole entire process of writing and revising and polishing later, as I start to settle into a routine and get more sleep.

It always comes back to more sleep.

It's a Boy!

2011-10-23T22:38:00.003-04:00

Right, so I know I stopped posting over a week ago ... but the baby hadn't come yet. I was just tired of saying "no baby yet" over and over again.

Declan actually arrived on Monday, Oct. 17, at 8:13pm. He was 9lbs and 21.5 inches long. He is also emphatically Eleanor approved, despite his status as a boy.

Of course, there's plenty more to say but I'm going to stop there and get ready for bed. The details, like many other things, are not nearly as important as sleep right now.

Still. No. Baby.

2011-10-13T11:49:00.001-04:00

I don't really want to talk about it.

Photo Challenge: Traffic

2011-10-12T07:06:00.001-04:00

This week's Shutterboo Photo Challenge is "traffic." Last week I ruminated on whether Keith could catch the anal retentive planning bug that I have, and manage to take, edit, and post his picture over the weekend to get it out of the way.

He didn't. You'd think after we've been together for over 14 years, I would know this isn't going to happen. But I still thought maybe.

By Tuesday night, I told Keith that--if he really loved me--he would now wait to take the picture. It's supposed to be posted by Wednesday at midnight, so he should wait until about 11:50pm on Wednesday to run out and find a traffic picture and slap it on flickr site. Because, as everyone knows, putting something off is guaranteed to make the baby come. Right? RIGHT?!?

Instead, he went out Tuesday night and took some pictures, came home and edited and posted. So now he's neither ready super in advance, nor postponing for my sake. Completely foiled!

I'm currently operating under the assumption that making lots of plans and putting off tasks for a future day is the best way to make the baby decide now is a good time to be born. Inconvenience! That's the key! I've planned too well; the house is clean, the freezer is stocked, I've even blogged in advance! Clearly, I've brought this sad state of post due-date anticipation upon myself.

If you'll excuse me, I need to go and find some other urgent tasks that I can postpone until tomorrow. Maybe the stress of having them hang over my head will induce labor ....

To Induce or Not to Induce?

2011-10-11T11:17:00.005-04:00

Well, I had my first post due-date doctor's appointment today. The appointment that, when I made it last week, I kept thinking to myself, I really hope I have the baby before this appointment!

But I didn't. So I went to the appointment and we talked induction. How long past my due date would he feel comfortable letting me go? How long would I feel "comfortable" (the term being relative) waiting?

He offered to induce me tonight/tomorrow morning, but I wasn't quite ready for that. He said the latest he's willing to wait is a week after the due date, so Monday or Tuesday next week at the very latest. Somehow, just have a firm end in mind (by next Wednesday, this baby will be here, one way or the other!) calmed me down a bit. I said "no" to being induced tonight.

Currently, I have an ultrasound appointment for Thursday morning. If the baby's not born by then, we need to make sure he/she is still doing okay in there. The doctor went ahead and scheduled an induction for Thursday night/Friday morning, but said we can cancel it if everything looks okay and I want to keep waiting.

I don't know how I'll feel by Thursday. Of course, my most fervent hope is that I don't make it to Thursday and go into labor on my own in the next 10 minutes! (To that end, I've posted the flower picture because I've read that visualizing a flower opening can bring on labor.) But I still have to consider the possibility.

I've heard that being induced can mean that labor goes more slowly, and it can be more painful/intense. Overall, I was very happy with the way that my first labor went. It was fast and ... well, that was the main point in its favor. I liked letting nature take its course, and letting Eleanor come when she was ready.

On the other hand, I must admit that I like knowing induction is an option. This pregnancy isn't going to drag on for weeks. (Weeks!) I sincerely hope that labor starts on its own, ASAP. But if we make it to Thursday or even--perish the thought!--next week, I'd imagine my resistance to induction will significantly lessen.

This Is a Post about Nothing

2011-10-10T10:28:00.002-04:00

Today is the due date, but nothing is happening. I've cleaned the house, we've stocked up on food, Keith mowed the grass, we bought Eleanor's pumpkin .... of course, there's always other tasks that could be done. But the truth is, I have no concentration or willpower to do them. I am a little tempted to make myself clean to try and fake the nesting instinct, but the couch is comfy and I really don't think it works that way.

So I'm just waiting. But I felt the need to post this, so no one takes my lack of posting as evidence of some great and wonderful events keeping me from the blog. None of that going on here! Gomez is sleeping on the back of the couch next to me, while Beckett insists on licking his legs, curled up in the armchair.

I'm not very good at waiting. I know I should be doing more to keep my mind occupied, but all of my attention is focused on what's NOT HAPPENING yet. Grrr .... If anyone has any good suggestions for how to stop driving myself crazy, I'd like to hear them!

Baby Projects: Sewing

2011-10-08T08:00:00.002-04:00

In conjunction with Eleanor's room and baby preparations, I've had a lot of sewing projects going on. Most time-consuming, and most fun, were Eleanor's new curtains. She requested purple. She wanted light purple, actually, but I'm a big fan of blackout-type curtains for babies and toddlers, so I made dark purple curtains with purple and pink felt flowers.

This is the same way I made the nursery curtains, which are dark brown with green felt leaves. (Why felt? Why, no hemming of course!) I then used spray adhesive to attach the leaves to the curtains.

In the intervening three years, almost half of the leaves have fallen off or been ripped off by tiny fingers, so I did realize this time around that just spray adhesive wouldn't be enough. When making the new curtains, I did use spray adhesive to position the flowers, but this time also stitched around the edges of the flowers to make sure they're not going anywhere. Because, of course, after all of this work Eleanor will never be allowed to redecorate or change her room in any way. These curtains will last until college!

After finishing her new curtains, I went back and reattached or attached anew the green leaves on the nursery curtains, then sewed around the edges of those, as well.

Also learning from past experience, we had made cloth diaper wipes from cut-up receiving blankets for Eleanor. These did require hemming, but just a quick zigzag stitch around the edges. For diaper wipes, it doesn't have to look pretty--just get the job done! I hemmed a few more of these that we had never finished off before, because we can never have too many wipes!

Finally, completely unrelated to the kids, Beckett has twice chewed holes in our one sleeping bag, for no apparent reason other than he's a dog. I sewed up the holes when possible, or made patches when necessary.

You might think that I felt a sense of accomplishment after all this, right? Except that, as I was making progress on all of these projects, Beckett was at loose ends one day and occupied himself by puking on, and then eating, one of the dining room curtains. So a sewing project that had been finished five years ago is now back on the to-do list.

Just like so many aspects of life, the sewing tasks never end!

Continued Preschool Skirmishes

2011-10-07T08:23:00.000-04:00

It's not an outright war anymore, and no more tears (thank God for that), but Eleanor is still not totally on board with the whole "Preschool" concept.

For the past week, I have had to wake her up and spend the 20 minutes before school arguing/discussing/cajoling why preschool is a good thing. She doesn't want to get dressed. She doesn't want to go. She doesn't want me to drop her off at the door; she wants me to come in to the classroom. (Which is a terrible idea, and will happen over my dead body.)

Yet I know she has fun while she's there. When I pick her up, she talks a mile a minute about story time and her friends and all the activities. But as time passes, she seems to convince herself that it's all terrible. She missed me and thinks I shouldn't make her go. So by the next morning, the first words out of her mouth are again, "I don't want to go to preschool!"

Why are we still having this conversation?!? I don't know what it's going to take to get her fully convinced that preschool is not the enemy, but I hope it happens soon.

Photo Challenge: Technology

2011-10-06T21:18:00.003-04:00

Poor Keith. He was really hoping that the prompt "silhouette" would be assigned for the Shutterboo Weekly Photo Challenge before the baby is born. But this week's "technology" and next week will be "traffic." So much for that!

Luckily for Keith, even though it was a last-minute photo, he's the kind of guy who knows how to--and feels comfortable--opening up a computer and pulling out a piece of it for pictures.

Like everything else in our lives, I wonder what will happen next week with the Photo Challenge. Everything feels so up in the air, as we wait for the baby to decide when he/she is ready to arrive. Keith has managed to submit a picture, on time, for the first 40 weeks of the 52-week challenge. Keeping in mind anything from life upheavals like illness or car breakdowns to good distractions such as vacation or even the garden variety lack of inspiration, I think this is a very impressive record. Will he be able to keep it up, or will next week be the one that finally breaks him?

Keith "joked" about how lucky it would be if we hit lots of traffic on the way to the hospital while I'm in labor. I put the word in quotation marks because of how utterly humorless his remarks are.

Will he do what I would do in his situation: Make sure to take a picture and have it all processed, possibly even posted, by Sunday night? Or will he live dangerously and see what happens early next week?!?

My Expiration Date

2011-10-04T22:52:00.000-04:00

It's hard to believe, but my due date is less than a week away.

With large life events that are on the calendar for ages, it's always somehow surprising when they've actually arrived. Sure, I've known since January that my due date is October 10. But that's, like, a real day. Um, this is really going to happen. We're having a baby!

It all "becomes real" to me, for some strange reason, when I buy milk and the expiration date is further out than whatever big event I've been looking forward to. If the event happens before the milk will expire, that means it is now happening very soon. By the time someone opens this carton of milk and wrinkles her nose at it, I will have graduated/moved to England/gotten married/had a baby/etc. It's when Big Life meets everyday life, and it weirds me out a little, every time.

I remember first experiencing this when I went grocery shopping the week before college graduation. I'm pretty sure I stood in the dairy aisle for a few minutes, trying to process the fact that this skim milk had a longer shelf life than the rest of my college career. I would be drinking this milk as a college graduate, maybe on the morning of graduation, or maybe even on the morning of moving out and leaving campus for the last time. I was so not ready for college to end, but there it was, written on the side of the milk carton. I had to move on.

Of course, my feelings about the event are a little different this time. I was very sad to be done with college, and a tad bit overwhelmed about figuring out the rest of my life. I did have some beer/pizza/pop college weight gain that made my clothes a little tight around the middle, but nothing like the tightness of a pregnant belly that has been stretched about as far as it goes. My skin itches all the time.

It takes me about three different positions to actually get myself rolled from one side to the other in bed at night. And a whole lot of grunting (although some of that is just to wake Keith up a bit and make sure he knows how uncomfortable I am). Physically, I am so done being pregnant. And emotionally, I'm ready to. I'm getting so excited to meet this new baby. Is it a boy or a girl? Will it cry for the first day, like Eleanor did? Or will he/she be calm and curious?

I bought milk today; it expires nine days after my due date. There had BETTER be a baby in my arms before that milk goes off, or I .... I don't even know what. I can't consider the alternative.

I've warned Keith that I am aware that having a due date of October 10 is no guarantee a baby will be born on that day. However, I am guaranteeing that my patience in dealing with the physical difficulties of pregnancy will expire on that day. I'm not particularly patient right now, but I am quite certain it can--and will--get worse if the due date comes and goes without any sign of labor.

I've been telling myself all along that this baby won't be early. Eleanor was a few days late, and I'm just going to go ahead and assume Baby #2 will be the same. I do have my bag packed, although I keep reading the novels I borrowed from the library, which are specifically supposed to be for the hospital. I keep trying to picture what my life will be like next week. Will I be taking Eleanor to Preschool on Monday? Picking her up on Tuesday? Meeting friends at a tearoom for our tentatively planned outing on Wednesday? Going to Parent/Teacher conferences on Friday ... with a new baby?

I'm trying to think of a good, solid conclusion to this blog entry, but I think I'm just going to have to accept that this is one situation that is all about questions and no answers. I don't know how or when labor is going to happen. I do know that I'll be constantly thinking about it until it does.

I'm also pretty certain that, the rate I'm going, I will have used up all the milk in my nightly chocolate milkshakes before we get anywhere near the expiration date. Maybe they can help my patience last a little longer, if needed.

Fall Blog Design

2011-09-30T07:04:00.000-04:00

I think this will be my last meta-blogging post for awhile. I've switched from the summer blog design to a Fall-inspired image and colors. If you don't usually read on the blog itself and are looking for some inspiration for crisp autumn days, candy corn, and jack o'lanterns, be sure to check it out!

Blogging Overload

2011-09-29T07:38:00.000-04:00

When Keith trains for races, he ends up with a few different goal times in mind. There's the ultimate goal: a ridiculously amazing time that would require perfect training and an unblemished race. There's the mid-range goal: a pretty good time, usually a PR, that falls a bit short of his wildest dreams but that he would still be satisfied with. Finally, he has a bottom "goal" time in mind. It's the lowest possible time that he might find acceptable. If he falls below this minimum threshold, his legs must be severely broken or falling off or else he will be very, very disappointed.

For me, this 3-tiered goal system is somewhat relevant to blogging. (It is not at all relevant to my running; I'm much more of a "just get across the finish line" mentality.) And truthfully, I guess I really have 2 goals. I don't have the ultimate goal. I think that would probably be something insanely consistent, like writing 5 days per week for 52 weeks a year. I said good-bye to that type of goal a long time ago. Instead, my high goal is to post at least 3 times a week, every week, which would amount to at least 12 posts a month. My minimum goal is to post at least 10 times a month on average, so I get to 120 posts by the end of the year.

You may have noticed that I've been a blogging machine for August and September. Instead of the bare minimum 10 posts, I had 15 August posts and 17 September posts. I just want to warn you, particularly new readers: don't get used to it!

I started the blog in November 2005. From 2006 through 2010, the only year I did not have at least 120 posts was 2008, when Eleanor was born. She was born at the end of July. That August, I had one sad, token post on the very last day of the month so I didn't miss out a month completely. Every month after that had fewer than 10 posts, and I didn't even make it to 100 for the entire year.

This time around, my goal was to pad my post count in the months before the baby arrives, so I can be a sleep-deprived slacker for October through November and still get to 120 posts for 2011. At this point, I can write 5-6 posts for those last 3 months and still be in the clear. Looking good so far!

Of course, the question is: why does it matter? Does anyone count posts other than me? I seriously doubt it.

But it's important to me that I'm at least somewhat reliable in my posting. I don't expect all of my readers to be constantly refreshing the home page, awaiting my latest musings with bated breath. But I do like to keep the readers I have, and I think that part of that is being around. I do think that it helps; the image above is a screen capture of my Site Meter stats. You can definitely tell that I started posting links to blog entries on Facebook in January (first tall column). There was a crazy busy month in April when I got a ton of random hits, but otherwise the traffic has been consistent.

So I guess I want to warn you in advance. I probably won't be posting as much in October/November. But I haven't forgotten about my readers or the blog! I'll probably be composing many, many posts in my head as I'm feeding the baby, changing diapers, chasing after Eleanor, and all of the other endless tasks of a Mother of Two. Maybe a small percentage of those will actually make it onto the blog, but I'll do my best to make it to 120 posts for the year.

Photo Challenge: Green

2011-09-28T06:33:00.000-04:00

This week's Shutterboo Photo Challenge is "green." Sometimes I think Keith likes not even worrying about the actual content of the picture, and thinking only about whether the overall impression is of the right color. It's somehow freeing.

This year, it's much easier to find some green at the end of September than in years past. The amount of rain we've had--and are still having--is a little ridiculous. I take it for granted, but every once in a while I look up and realize that all of the lawns, bushes, plants are still a lush, verdant green. The leaves on the trees may be changing color, but otherwise, it still looks like the middle of summer.

The downside to this is: more grass-mowing and weeding. Also, my neighbor's house is still not done being painted. The one they started painting the first weekend in July .... of course, to be fair, I did put a stop to the work because of lead paint concerns. Then nothing happened for about a month while he found a new contractor. But even though the new (much better!) painters started work in mid-August, the job is still far from complete, due to the incessant rain.

When the first snow falls, will the house be painted? Will it fall on a freshly mown lawn?

Baby Projects: Eleanor's New Room

2011-09-27T16:17:00.000-04:00

I can't help but feel a little guilty for Baby #2. So much of our baby preparation has actually centered around Eleanor, and the room situation is an area where that becomes very clear.

Many people have asked us if the baby's room is ready, and we say, "Oh, we haven't really done anything with the baby's room, but Eleanor's new room looks great!" We moved Eleanor into her "big girl room" after her birthday in July. She got to pick the paint colors and the general loose theme of "flowers." (Okay, if it were really up to her I'm sure it would have been princesses, but she did have some censored input.) We talked a lot about how awesome it would be for Eleanor to have her own reading corner and a big girl bed and so many amazing new features.

We thought we should move Eleanor in early just in case she wasn't fully on board, so we had a few months for her to move back and forth, and say good-bye to her old room. The room was habitable in late July, but it's taken me this long to post about it because it took us awhile to add all the finishing touches. Like how I forgot that she would need a laundry basket. Whoops! And we also bought some small speakers for her hand-me-down iPod Nano so she can listen to the all-important white noise during nap and bedtime. It also took me weeks to finish her new curtains, but sewing projects are a separate post, so more about that idea-gone-awry later.

At this point, her clothes are all moved over and (pretty much) organized. The walls are decorated (apparently her fairy friends like to sleep on the flowers by her bed, Eleanor has informed us). The only project left is the most challenging one. And, even better, it's not mine!

Keith and my Dad are most of the way finished with building and painting custom bookshelves that will be on two walls of Eleanor's purple book corner. The shelves, plus the comfy beanbag chair and soft rag carpet make me very jealous of her book corner. I've never had such a nice reading spot all for myself!

And, for the record, the baby's room is nearly ready too. We haven't forgotten about Little Sibling! It looks a little odd to be a baby's room again, instead of a 2-year-old's room. The baby boppy is back, and all of the diapering supplies have been washed and stacked. We've gotten the baby toys out of storage, and there's a pile of board books next to the rocking chair.

I'm not sure when Keith and I get a room makeover, but I'm trying to figure out where to put my reading corner...

How To: Get Rid of Drugs

2011-09-26T15:20:00.004-04:00

I understand that the title of this post may be a bit more scintillating than the actual content, so I apologize if you feel misled. This post has nothing to do with illegal drugs or kicking any bad habits, etc. It's related to the fact that, throughout our house, we have numerous expired prescriptions, vitamins, and other somewhat-controlled substances that we can't figure out how to get rid of.

You're not supposed to flush them down the toilet and contaminate the water supply. Nor is it safe to throw them in the trash and risk someone else taking them or releasing them into the landfills. What other options are there?

Well, apparently the DEA (Drug Enforcement Administration) sponsors National Prescription Drug Take Back Days every six months. The next one is October 29. I clicked on the link to find a site near me, and saw that I can turn in prescription meds at the Cleveland Clinic Beachwood Family Health Center, which is my home away from home of late, since that's where my OB-Gyn's office is.

On the DEA's website, there's also a link to an FDA flyer about Disposing of Unused Prescription Medicines, which might be handy as well. So if I can't turn in non-prescription items like expired vitamins and supplements, hopefully at least I'll know what other options are safe.

I know I've talked to at least a few of my neighbors (and fellow parents) that were having problems with this same issue. So hopefully this information helps!

15-Year High School Reunion

2011-09-23T21:07:00.001-04:00

Last weekend, Keith and I attended my 15-year high school reunion.

I saved this for my last post of the week, because I've been wondering all week what I really had to say about the experience.

Reunions, particularly high school reunions, feel like they've reached almost mythical levels of importance in our society, and I'm not sure why. It was nice to see people, see how they've changed, hear what's going on in their lives, find new similarities with people I didn't know well during high school.

It was not a life-changing event. My sense is that a big reunion (although I know 15 years is kind of an odd one; we missed out on a 10-year, and the organizers decided to go ahead and hold a 15-year one instead of waiting for another 5 years) is supposed to make me stop and really think. I will be in a room filled with people that I haven't seen on a regular basis since I was 18 years old. I thought I was chubby (although I would LOVE to weigh that much again) and my only priority in life was ME. Where was I going to college? What was I going to do with my life? What was I going to do about my hair?!?

So in some sense, I suppose that going to a reunion automatically makes a person confront her 18-year-old self, and consider what has changed. And that could provoke some deep thinking of a sort. Showing off pictures of Eleanor and, whether intentionally or not, also showing off my 8+ months pregnant belly, I did think quite a bit about how the nature of my personal relationships have changed over the years.

But this isn't really a revelation to me. I've known for quite some time that I'm not the same person as I was at 18. Or rather, my brain/the way I think still seems the same but many of my priorities and experiences have changed. To be somewhat flippant, I think this is a normal and positive development.

On the other hand, I can understand why this reunion experience wouldn't be particularly earth-shattering for me. I can't think of anyone from high school that I was constantly in touch with, very close to, with whom I've lost contact since. In July, we went to the Lakehouse weekend with about 10 other high school friends and their spouses/kids. I see my best friends from high school on a pretty regular basis (at least a few times a year). I know about their families, jobs, current hobbies, etc. So seeing these familiar faces was not a surprise.

Another part of my high school experience that may not always be the case is that, overall, people were pretty nice. I wasn't bullied in high school. There weren't any people that I really wanted to confront. I didn't have any one or two particular people in mind that I was either 1) keeping my fingers crossed to find out terrible things had happened to them, thanks to karma, or 2) trying to impress people with where I'm at and what I'm doing. Of course there were people that I liked more and some that I liked a bit less, but none that I felt ruined my life or anything melodramatic like that.

I kept thinking, all this week, that I surely must have something of greater import or depth to report about the reunion, but I was actually a bit relieved by how much of a non-event it was. I enjoyed talking to old classmates and catching up, I was proud of myself for wearing my high-heeled boots and standing for much of the evening, I was surprised by how little of the talk was about the past but that it focused mainly on the here and now.

I was not suddenly shocked into realizing that my life is anything other than I already thought it was, if that makes sense. I'm a happily married mother of 1.8 children. We have a big enough house and enough money. I have a job that is enjoyable and frustrating (sometimes simultaneously). I have good friends and family. I enjoy my hobbies and often don't get enough sleep. I am still me, and a 15-year reunion didn't change my opinion on the matter.

Currently Reading: Diana Gabaldon

2011-09-23T07:38:00.000-04:00

Ever since school ended at the beginning of August, I've had a fabulous time reading. I've been so much more relaxed when naptime comes around, and I don't feel like I have to fit in schoolwork and housework. So I do some housework, and then I read without guilt. It's been wonderful!

Much of this reading has been dedicated to Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series. I'd read the first few books years ago and really enjoyed them, but have not kept up with Claire and Jamie as later books came out. Like my mom, I liked knowing that there were further adventures to be enjoyed at some point in the future.

However, by now, book 7 is out and book 8 (the final book in the series) is expected out in 2012. With this two-month break, I thought it was a good time to try and read all of the books in a close time period and really immerse myself in the story, so I don't read one and then, months later, pick up the next and wonder, "What's going on? Who is this person?"

And immersed I have been. These books are romance, history, sci-fi (time travel) ... so many genres wrapped up into one. The main characters are very strong and unique, and the time period they experience is fascinating. Right now I'm (finally) on book 7. I'd put it off for a few weeks, because it got to a point where it felt like reading these books was all I was doing, instead of it being a nice break from other tasks. So I took a break and now, with only a few weeks left until D-Day, I thought it was a good time to finish up the existing series.

Overall, I have really enjoyed the writing and the characters and the time period. My only issue, which I haven't really decided yet whether it's a true "complaint" or not (depending on how things end up), is that as the series goes on, more and more time is spent on secondary characters. There used to be two main characters. Now, in this book, the chapters are constantly switching between probably 6 main characters, many of them in different geographical locations, and a couple in a different time period. I'm not sure yet if I like this expansion of the focus, or if I wish she would just stick with the original focus on the two characters of Jamie and Claire. Either way, I'm looking forward to finishing this book before Little Sibling arrives (maybe I'll get time to read while Eleanor's in Preschool next week!) and reading the final book when it comes out.

Photo Challenge: Game

2011-09-21T15:49:00.000-04:00

This week's Photo Challenge is Game. Monday night gave Keith the perfect opportunity to take some pictures, because he and Eleanor went to an Indians game after work. Or I guess you could say that this is a case of Keith making his own luck, since taking Eleanor to the game was all his idea.

Eleanor loves baseball. Her favorite team is the Reds, and her favorite player is Joey Votto. She has a Joey Votto bobblehead in her bedroom, courtesy of Uncle Nick, and sometimes we find Joey in bed with her or on her headboard, watching over her at night.

She's gone to a few games this year, and enjoyed every one. She's actually surprised us with how much she pays attention to the game. I'm not saying she understands the infield fly rule (because who does, really?) but she stays in her seat and looking at the people on the field more than I would have expected of an antsy 3-year-old. The fact that hot dogs and lemonade are also two of her favorite foods on earth doesn't hurt, either.

This is the last week of regular season baseball, I believe. I'm basing that on the fact that Keith mentioned the Indians have 10 games scheduled in 7 days, with all sorts of make-up games and doubleheaders. He said this would probably be their (his and Eleanor's) last chance to get in a game this season, so he suggested that Eleanor and I meet him downtown after work and they could scoot over to the 4 o'clock game.

So that's what they did. I think I'm much more aware and appreciative of the flexibility of toddler parenting since we'll have a newborn again so soon. I dropped Eleanor off a little after 4 o'clock. The two of them had a great time at the game and then taking the train home. I has a wonderful, quiet, relaxing evening at home. Everyone wins!

Now if Keith wants to do a dad/daughter activity again in a month or two .... that will mean that I'm home alone with the newborn. Not quite as relaxing.

But it does bode well for the future. I love it when Keith and Eleanor spend time together, and bond without me getting in the way. (No listening to cries of, "Mommy do it! I want Mommy to do it! Not you!") I love that it was Keith's idea, and this is their special "thing."

Some day, it will be daddy's "thing" with Eleanor AND Little Sibling, and I will again sit home and enjoy the peace and quiet. Just like Keith will, when the kids and I go to the tea shoppe or something similar. Everyone wins!

Preschool Battles on the Bench: Week 2 (and final?)

2011-09-20T14:40:00.000-04:00

On Monday morning, I was really disappointed to discover that, for me at least, Week 2 of Preschool was more difficult than Week 1 even. As my younger sister and I often say, it's all about the expectations. If you expect your kid to sleep until 6am and he sleeps until 7am, it's fantastic! But if you expect the child to sleep until at least 7:30 or 8 and you hear her chipper voice at 7:03, it's a bad start to the day.

Likewise, I think Monday was so terrible because I thought it had to get better after the first week. But we walked into the building behind a kid from her class who was already crying, and so she started sniffling before we had even approached the classroom. Great.

When I tried to leave her in the room, she cried and clung to me. "Stay for just a few minutes!" she kept whimpering tearfully. Last week, I was frustrated by the difficulties of separation anxiety and a little nostalgic thinking about the fact that she was moving away from me. But this week, for the first time, I was actually close to crying. As I walked out of the classroom on Monday morning, there were tears in my eyes and I was afraid that, if I tried to talk, I would seriously start crying.

I think I was more ready to cry from frustration than from sad emotions. Is it going to get harder every week, instead of easier? For months, I've been looking forward to Eleanor's being in Preschool in September. For one month, I was going to have a few hours a week to myself. Whether I choose to run errands, get some things done around the house, or go for a cup of coffee ... I could do it by myself! I only had 4 weeks of Preschool before Baby #2 is due, and I planned to make the most of it.

Yet here I am, halfway through "my free time." I haven't run errands, or gone home, or relaxed in a coffee shop. I've spent the majority of my time on an uncomfortable wooden bench outside the classroom, trying to pass the time and quell my mounting frustration.

It's been a weird limbo. I feel like we are encouraged to stay .... but we don't really do anything. We sit outside the classroom and listen to crying, and then quiet, and then some more crying. Ever since the first day, the only time a parent has been called in is for massive accidents that require a change of clothes, either not making it to the bathroom in time or when a kid got so worked up that he threw up all over himself and the teacher. Do the teachers really want us there? Or are they wishing we would go away and just let them do their job?

I don't really want to be there, but am scared that if I go, Eleanor will have a massive meltdown and it will be 10 times worse since I wasn't there to pick up the pieces. I can't shake the feeling that I have to put in the time investment now, to ensure that Preschool goes smoothly for the rest of the year.

Anyway, after all of this doom and gloom about Monday morning, today was better. Keith dropped Eleanor off because I had a doctor's appointment. After the doctor's appointment, I did stop by a coffee shop and pick up a drink, so I may not have had hours to sit and write or read, but I got a drink! When I showed up at the school , I didn't go anywhere near the classroom and that purgatory bench. I went straight into the other building, to the parents' lounge, and felt much more relaxed and at ease even though I was in the vicinity. I could plug in my computer and didn't have to listen for Eleanor's sobs.

Next week, instead of walking Eleanor into the building, we are given the option to drop the kids off at the door, and they will be escorted to their classrooms by teachers and staff. Eleanor's teacher swears that this actually makes it easier for the kids. I'll be keeping my fingers crossed that she's right.

Even though I fully understand that expectations often make for disappointment, I still expect to spend next week OFF the bench. I will run an errand, get some things done around the house, and do one fun thing for myself during Preschool time. And Eleanor will survive all this just fine!

Financial Nesting?

2011-09-16T15:40:00.001-04:00

As the baby's due date gets closer, I realized that I was getting paranoid about some massive, unforeseen expense popping up.

Last time around, we chose to buy a bigger car (the Toyota Matrix) the Fall before Eleanor was born. Then we found out we had to replace our windows, which was going to cost upwards of $10,000. And the final straw before she was born was that our roof started leaking, and we replaced it the week before birth. They actually finished on Saturday and I went into labor in the early hours of Sunday morning.

I thought that was bad enough, but it was only the start. Once she tested positive for a slightly elevated lead level, we stepped up our plan to replace ALL the windows (so far we'd only done about 70%), got new siding on the house and garage, and also replaced the garage doors. All items that we hadn't planned on and which were not accounted for in our budget. Our greatly reduced budget, which included a lower income thanks to me working part-time, and higher expenses of childcare.

So here we are. In terms of getting ready for the baby mentally and physically, I'm really enjoying all of this time at home. Financially, of course, the fact that I'll be off for at least 5 months instead of 3 is a bit worrisome. Plus we've spent a lot of money over the summer on Eleanor's new room, new furniture for the living rooms, storage shelves in the basement .... a lot of smaller projects (smaller than a new roof or siding, anyway) to get the house just how we want it before the baby arrives. Finally, there's all sorts of unknown possible medical expenses that may or may not occur once the baby is here.

And yet, I am very surprised to find that I'm not overly worried about the money, which I (being the perverse sort of person I am) worry about. Does this mean there's something I'm not considering? Have I forgotten a factor that will push us over the edge into complete financial ruin?

But I think I'm actually experiencing the benefit to all of our unexpected, major expenses last time. This time, our budget is tight. And there's always going to be unforeseen expenses (Hello, $400 to clean our dog's teeth?!?). But as we've managed to stay afloat over the past few, slim years, I'm started to feel like the chances of the expenses being as high as last time as pretty slim. I've already seen the worst! Are we going to replace our roof again? Replace all of our windows again? No.

So when the dishwasher wasn't working earlier in the week I was worried, but not as freaked out as I could have been. And Keith even fixed it on his own, no service call required. Just do me a favor: if you think of some other potential financial disasters, don't tell me! Let me stay in my happy place for a little bit longer, where the worst is behind us and our financial outlook is, if not sunny, at least not full of hail and tornadoes.

Decadent Toast

2011-09-13T21:12:00.000-04:00

I've been having a really hard time with heart burn and indigestion during this pregnancy. A few weeks back, I spent an entire weekend with constant heartburn and the consistent feeling that I could be throwing up at any moment. After spending most of the weekend in bed, leaving Keith and Eleanor to fend for themselves, I talked to my OB, who told me to take an over-the-counter stomach acid inhibitor before bed every night.

This has been a huge help, but I still need to be more careful with my food than I was with the first pregnancy. There's some foods that I've cut out entirely (tomato soup, which seems a bit odd) and others that I can only eat early in the day, or risk a sleepless night of burning fire in my esophagus.

I'm guessing it's these terrible food experiences that have me craving simply weak tea with toast and butter. And not just any toast; it has to be the least nutritional of all: white bread toast.

I finally bought some the other day at the grocery store, and it felt so decadent. No whole wheat! No added seeds or nuts! Eleanor didn't even really understand what it was, since we've never had white bread. I mean, she's seen it, and we've had white hamburger burns, but we've never actually bought white bread for our house. In general, this doesn't feel like a sacrifice to me. I prefer the stronger, nuttier taste of the more nutritional breads. So why would I buy white?

Except for lately, when even a mundane food can make my digestive tract rebel, and suddenly white bread is one of the most appealing foods there is. I've luxuriated in white bread toast and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches ..... on white bread!

I think my digestive issues are resolved enough that I'm mostly over my white bread obsession. At the grocery store today, I picked up my usual oat nut bread and barely glanced at the Wonder Bread's gleaming loaves. But I also know that there's still a half-loaf of white bread stashed in the pantry, for a few more bland yet delicious treats.

Photo Challenge: Triangle

2011-09-13T20:00:00.003-04:00

Ah, yes! A more concrete prompt than last week's Photo Challenge of "happiness." Keith does a great job of taking a very straightforward term and interpreting it in his own way, or just composing a really unique image. After the indecision over what image constituted "happiness," Keith immediately had a plan for "triangle."

During lunch last week, he walked from work to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and took some pictures. Over the weekend he touched up his favorites, and he was all done by Monday!

I think it's good to have a really concrete week directly following a hard, abstract concept. I don't know if that is planned intentionally, but it makes sense to me! I'm not sure what kinds of photo prompts are left .... I hope, for Keith's sake, it doesn't end up with a solid month of "life" and "misery" and the like.

The Clash of the Preschool Classroom

2011-09-12T21:29:00.000-04:00

It's so hard to believe this day has come! Today was Eleanor's first day of preschool. Eleanor had been dealing with some new-experience jitters last night. But by this morning Eleanor's apprehension of the night before seemed forgotten, although Keith and I were more nervous than ever. Would she cry? When? For how long? Would she be that one kid that couldn't take it? Or would all of our fears prove unfounded, and she would join in right away, make new friends, and not even notice when we left?

The answer, of course, lay somewhere in the middle.

To start, it was the first day fantasy of every parent. We played together in the room for about 10 minutes, and then when she started a new activity we said our good-byes. She didn't want hugs or kisses, and couldn't even be bothered to look up as we left, she was so engrossed in her crafty activity. We retreated to the hallway bench, and waited for the fallout.

You'll notice I said "retreated" and I realized that, during my inner monologue, I was describing many aspects of the morning in terms of warfare. Those of us parents who were waiting in the hallway carefully watched every time the classroom door opened. We listened for screaming, and we waited for the reports from the "spy parents" who were just emerging from the battlefield. How's it going in there? What about my little 3-year-old soldier? How's he/she doing? Is she putting up a good fight? Is she victorious over the yearning for home and familiarity, or has she succumbed to the tearful enemy of fear?

Early reports on Private Eleanor were very encouraging. She was completely engaged and looked like she'd been going to Preschool all her life. She was playing dress-up, playing with dollies, sampling all of the delights a Preschool classroom has to offer.

And then, the tide of battle suddenly turned, and Eleanor was a casualty. Two other kids were screaming/crying. Keith told me the one kid started crying pretty much before he was even over the threshold of the classroom. And these were loud, determined criers. There were a few other stoic soldiers; they were crying, but more for their own personal anguish. But these two were loud and wanted everyone within earshot to know they were not happy with their marching orders. They surrendered 100% and just wanted OUT.

Eleanor could only resist the sounds of agony for 15 minutes or so before she decided they may have a good point. She started to remember that she had a mommy, too, whom she missed very much. A mommy that she needed to see right now. So that's when the field commanders called me in, the special Eleanor Relief Unit, to hold and comfort her. I stayed in the class for probably an hour (most of which time, the two original criers or a late addition kept the noise/angst level on red alert). We played quietly, but there's plenty of time where I just held her and she twirled her hair and looked around, shell-shocked.

I finally escaped again with a half-hour left in class. The crying had stopped, and the imminent delivery of rations (goldfish and juice) had revived the troops. She teared up again a little after I left, but rallied valiantly.

I rejoined the other civilian parents in the hall, awaiting the final battle outcome. When our children were dismissed from the battlefield, the word that actually came to mind for me was "hostage." Only one child came out of the classroom at a time, straight into the arms of his or her loving, caring family. It felt strangely like a hostage situation where the authorities had finally talked down the hostage-taker, and the tense situation was coming to a peaceful resolution.

Actually, the hardest part is that we get to do it all again tomorrow. She's only in a two-day per week program, but it's back-to-back days. Tonight, we tried to rectify our tactical errors by discussing some strategies for unforeseen battle circumstances.

"If other kids start crying, what can you do? Maybe you can offer to give them a hug or a tissue? Or, even if they keep crying, you don't have to cry!"

Eleanor overtly agreed with the situational analysis and, like a good little soldier, is prepared and excited even to enter the fray tomorrow morning.

Hopefully sometime within the next few weeks, the tears stop and I can start thinking of preschool in friendlier terms like "education" and "fun." Until then, once more unto the breach, dear friends!

Currently Watching: thirtysomething

2011-09-09T07:32:00.000-04:00

I vaguely remember when thirtysomething was on TV, at roughly the time I was in middle school. My main priorities were: bad hair days, passing notes with my friends, whom I might slow dance with at the upcoming school dance, and angsting about the rest of my life. I never watched this show.

But now, thanks to Netflix Instant Queue, I have rediscovered it. I keep trying to find shows I can watch during the day when Keith's not home. He likes what he's seen of this show, but I wouldn't say it's his new favorite, so I feel okay watching it without him.

The main couple have a baby and are struggling with how to take care of the baby, take care of themselves, take care of each other .... all of the same things that we're dealing with on a daily basis. I enjoy laughing at the 80s outfits (the one woman always wears sweatshirts tucked into high-waisted jeans! Tucked in!) but the essential content isn't terribly different from many issues facing today's parents.

I haven't decided yet how that makes me feel. Better, because other generations have made it through? Depressed, because things haven't really gotten any better? Maybe a little of both. But also grateful that modern technology gives me the opportunity to watch a show that I enjoy in my free time, rather than making do with soaps or trashy talk shows.

Photo Challenge: Happiness

2011-09-08T21:41:00.004-04:00

Keith and I are in agreement that the most difficult prompts for the Shutterboo Weekly Photo Challenge are the abstract ones. I already discussed this a bit in the "anger" post, but it's just as true for this week's topic of "happiness." Everyone's ideas of happiness are so unique and personal. How can you really convey that in a picture? I see a picture of, say, a cookie, but what makes you happy about it? Is it the chocolate chips? The fact that your mom baked them for you? You're finally off that stupid cabbage soup diet?

As predicted, because Keith did so well with "yellow" he was looking around for a happiness picture at the 11th hour last night with no real inspiration.

"Help! I'm desperate!" he said.

"I think a picture of bed would be good," I offered. (This is usually my idea of happiness, starting at 8 o'clock in the evening.)

The look on his face clearly indicated a lack of happiness with this idea.

"That's right," I said. "This is the part where you claim to be desperate for ideas. So I throw out a few, and then you immediately shoot them all down."

He pretended that wasn't the usual pattern, but I knew better. I kept my mouth shut.

So, to Keith, my hugely pregnant belly means happiness:

I appreciate the thought, but when I see the photographic evidence, in black and white, all I can think is "Wow, I'm huge." I'm excited about the baby, and excited that we're so close to meeting this new person growing inside me .... but I wouldn't say that my massive belly itself brings me joy. Mostly heartburn and indigestion.

Hopefully we can be in better agreement on what illustrates "triangle" for next week's challenge.

Talk Me a Gruesome Story

2011-09-08T21:27:00.001-04:00

Eleanor has some ... interesting ... tastes in stories. There's the Tinkerbell stories that I mentioned before. But now there's also a few "A" favorites. She likes to hear about ambulances, accidents, and allergies. I think she's going to be a doctor.

I know how the ambulance obsession started: it's because, on the drive across town, we pass a large ambulance bay? depot? whatever it is, there's always several ambulances out front. We've gotten in the habit of pointing out when it's coming up (See? We're getting closer! You don't have to whine for the entire ride, really! Focus on the cookies you'll get once we're at Grandma's.) and we count how many ambulances are parked there. Sometimes we guess before we reach it how many ambulances we think will be there, and Eleanor also likes to pay attention to how many ambulances are facing in or out.

This has led to many discussions about what ambulances do. It also led to some concern on my mom's part, when Eleanor was in the car with her and asked for an ambulance story. This entails someone Eleanor knows getting very sick (usually a stomach ache caused by excessive consumption of cookies), calling the ambulance, hearing the siren, and the patient being safely delivered to the hospital, where they will be completely cured. I think Mom found the idea a little macabre.

The ambulance stories, however, aren't nearly as bad as the accident stories that came soon after. I can't remember as clearly where this came from .... we might have passed an accident on the highway, and I talked a bit about how cars need to stay on the road and if they go off the road or run into each other, that's an accident. Sometimes she wants to hear other accidents (people running into each other, other smaller events) but mostly she wants to hear about car accidents.

And finally, her most recent story request pertains to allergies. More medically detailed, but at least a little less gruesome than accidents or ambulances. Again, I can't remember why it started, but once she went on this allergies kick, we got out a book about allergies from the library, and she was ecstatic. She's learned about food allergies, breathing allergies, and skin allergies. She knows that her Daddy is allergic to pollen and her aunt is allergic to penicillin. When a kid in her music class turned out to have a peanut allergy, she almost hyperventilated because she was so excited.

I have no idea what her next "talk a story" request will be. Another "a" word? Another request somewhat related to the medical field? I look forward to finding out what it is ... even if I'm not quite as ecstatic as she is at the thought of talking this type of story many, many times. Talk me an easy story!

Bad Vacation Memories

2011-09-06T21:42:00.000-04:00

While catching up on posts over at Clover Lane, I saw a post about a recent trip to Boston that her family took, which brought back terrible vacation memories for me.

We went to Boston, I think when I was in middle school. Surely it was middle school, because no other time in one's life is filled with that much angst and capacity for humiliation. It's also important to note that, in addition to my age, I was very, very excited about this trip. Some kid I had a crush on (another reason it must have been middle school) had probably mentioned in one off-hand conversation that he liked Boston, so I therefore decided it must be the coolest place in the world.

So we took a family trip to Boston. Our family vacations have always been a mix of camping and sitting around the fire, and then also visiting historical sites. Of course, there was no shortage of these in Boston. We walked the Freedom Trail, saw the "one if by sea" church, etc. None of this is really what I remember.

One day, I think we were in front of Faneuil Hall, watching street performers. This one performer picked me out of the audience to demonstrate something. I was ecstatic. Best moment of my life! I'm practically famous!!!! (Because all emotions in middle school can only be the best or the worst, and must be expressed in multiple exclamation points.)

But, as it turns out, I was the butt of the joke. The performer spent the rest of the time telling everyone that he was really trying to get my younger sister to come forward, but I just wouldn't let her, I had to hog all the attention for myself ..... It was so awful. And it wasn't true! I swear. But that was his schtick, so he kept coming back to it, over and over again, throughout the rest of the performance. I was mortified.

Of course, I would bet that no one else in my family even remembers this moment. Yet I still can't think of it without feeling bitter and a tad bit humiliated. Looking at it as a parent, rather than as an angsty middle schooler, it just points out to me again how many of my children's experiences will be out of my control. My parents took us on a trip that I was so excited for, did lots of activities I wanted to do .... and this is what I remember most strongly from the trip: being humiliated by a street performer. (At least he wasn't a mime. Would that have been worse? I can't decide.)

On the other hand, looking at this awful vacation memory as a somewhat more self-confident and assertive adult, it makes me want to plan a family trip of our own to Boston, just for my sake. I want to go back and reclaim the city that held such interest for me, and have a nice, enjoyable family vacation there where the parts I remember are the historical sites and the fun moments with my husband and kids. So, even though my kids will undoubtedly have painful memories (perhaps caused by callous street performers?), I will also have to remember that it will be within my kids' capacity to rectify/repair those memories at a later date.

Photo Credit: GSOM Student Blog

Lunch Date

2011-09-01T21:25:00.003-04:00

Today Eleanor and I met Keith at work for lunch. (Clearly, the picture is not actually from lunch today. It's from this past weekend, when we visited Hale Farm. But we did not actually take pictures of Keith sitting at his desk, so this will have to do.) When we started talking about a day to meet for lunch, I was shocked to realize that we've only ever done it once before, when Eleanor was only a few months old.

The problem has been twofold. First my always-changing work schedule would get in the way, which in the Spring meant working 4 days a week, right in the middle of the day. Secondly, for a very long time, Eleanor has been taking a nap right in the middle of the day. There was no way to plan on meeting Keith for lunch without expecting it to go very, very badly. I'm not complaining about the nap—I love the nap!—but it could be a bit inconvenient.

But these days, she's become a bit more lenient about the time of her nap. Previously, she had to be down by noon or 12:30 at the latest. Lately, her nap can start anytime between 12 and 2, and it will (usually) still be a good, 2-hour nap. So it was time!

It was so fun this time to show up at Keith's work with a toddler. She was very excited to see Daddy at work. The elevator doors opened, she ran out and turned to see him then yelled, "Daddy!" and launched herself at him. He shushed her, but with a big grin on his face.

He showed her his desk, with many Eleanor pictures on it, and introduced her to his co-workers. It was so fascinating to watch Eleanor take it all in. She knows that Daddy is "at work" a lot, but I don't really know that it's ever meant much to her. What did she think that meant, exactly? Did she have an idea in mind? Or did she just equate that with "not here" and not really think about it any more?

The only downside is that it's really expensive to park downtown. We wanted a close spot to Keith's work, because I'm very pregnant and didn't really want to drag Eleanor several blocks back and forth from the car to his building. But we were there for less than two hours and had to pay the daily MAX of $11. WTF?!? I think they charge in 6-minute increments, like the lawyers at Keith's firm. So even though the meal itself wasn't expensive (especially since we didn't buy Eleanor her own meal but just shared ours with her), the entire outing was a bit pricey.

Still, even with the complaints, I'm glad we did it and I hope that we can do it again sooner than 3 years from now. I'm interested to hear if Eleanor says much about it, next time we talk about how Daddy's at work. Next up: Eleanor sits in on a college English class!

Photo Challenge: Yellow

2011-08-31T13:31:00.006-04:00

Some weeks, Keith has to work really hard to find a shot he likes for the Shutterboo Photo Challenge. And some weeks, it just falls into his lap! Or onto the street in front of him ...

The Avengers movie is currently being filmed in downtown Cleveland, very close to Keith's office. For the past couple weeks, he's enjoyed visiting the outdoor sets on his lunch breaks. He'll come home and tell me about how they put up a facade for Bed Bath & Beyond in the middle of the street. Or they turned a public square into an opera house and beer garden in Germany. The other day, he spent a fair part of the morning waiting around for them to drop a big steel frame onto an SUV and a taxi. But all he saw, many times, was extras running in fear from the, at that point, nonexistent frame. He finally gave up and went back to work, and saw with disappointment at lunch that they had gotten around to the real action shot and he'd missed it.

So, keeping all of this excitement in mind, when Keith learned that "yellow" was this week's photo prompt, he was very excited. They'd been setting up this accident shot all week, and he knew it would be an excellent shot. For the first time in quite a while, he had an image that he was very pleased with days before the deadline! I think there was a little cropping and color-boosting going on, to heighten the final YELLOW effect, but overall not much jiggering. When you have a shot like that, why mess with it?

Of course, the law of averages (or of human nature) decrees that he's going to have a terrible time with next week's prompt, and will be frantically taking pictures of household items at the 11th hour. But, at least sometimes, excellent shots fall like manna (or like fake pieces of building onto a carefully placed, fake NYC taxi) from the sky.

My Modern Day "Period of Confinement"

2011-08-26T07:49:00.000-04:00

I still can't figure out if this is the correct term, but I seem to recall reading (probably in Regency romances, to be honest) about how women of high society used to have a period of confinement in their pregnancies. They would be shut up in a bedroom for weeks with no fresh air, very little light, and no men allowed.

For me, it's not quite that drastic, but it has arrived. The other week, we met Keith's parents at a state campground in the middle of Ohio, about two hours away, and spent the weekend camping. And that, my friends, was our last planned trip for the foreseeable future. We're not going to my cousin's wedding in Boston or his cousin's wedding in New York. We aren't spending a night out at a Bed and Breakfast for our anniversary, and we're not visiting his family in Kentucky. We're home, and we're staying put!

Keeping in mind that, from mid-May to mid-August, we only had one free, unplanned weekend (and that's the weekend we ended up driving to Ikea in Pittsburgh to buy Eleanor's new bedroom furniture), this is a big statement for us that the end is near. The baby's arrival is not that far off! Of course, part of the decline in activity is due to the end of the summer. Not all of our summer plans involved traveling; now that it's Fall, there's not as many local festivals, barbeques, etc. And, of course, we still have some plans for birthday parties, Keith's long runs/races, a night out for our anniversary.

So it's not like our calendar went from completely full to completely empty just because I'm 34 weeks pregnant. But to swear off all trips, that is still a big deal for us. I'm pretty excited about it. By the end of summer, I'm always tired by the constant activity. And being in the car for long stretches of time is getting harder on my very pregnant self. So I'm glad to take a break from all the going, but I'm also glad to be staying. There's so many things we'd like to do before the baby arrives. Not all of them are necessary (Does the baby really care if I clean out the filing cabinet drawers? I doubt it.), but I have this image in my mind.

I imagine a day in early October when Eleanor's at preschool. I do a little bit of cleaning around the house and then flop onto the couch and look around with satisfaction. I realize that it's all done. Done! Everything we wanted to do before the baby arrives is done. Just for one small, brief moment, everything is in its place. All is right with the world. I sit with this thought for a few minutes, savoring the sense that there's nothing else I have to do and nowhere else I have to be, and then the contractions start.

Is this going to happen? Absolutely not. My To Do Lists are many things, but reasonable is not one of them. There's no way we'll finish EVERYTHING before the baby arrives. But at least, if we're home, we can work on most of them. And we're not making more work for ourselves with packing and unpacking and laundry and all of the chores that come with travel. There's already plenty of work to be done around here ... and we won't even talk about after the confinement is over, and the baby arrives!

Photo Challenge: Abstract

2011-08-24T07:20:00.000-04:00

After having some difficulty with last week's "urban," Keith breathed a sigh of relief at this week's Photo Challenge assignment of "abstract." Urban is tough when you're camping, but abstract can be accomplished anywhere!

For this one, Keith walked down to the end of the street and took a picture of sky and our modernistic local library. I was shocked at how blue the sky was in the picture, because by the time I saw it 20 minutes later, the sun was almost setting.

It's been a gorgeous few days here that have felt much more like fall than summer. Particularly with how hot and humid this summer has been. Last night we turned off all the fans in the house for the first time in months, and it was so blessedly quiet.

I'm so ready for Fall. I'm not sure that I'm ready for all of the changes that this particular Fall will be bringing to our house: Eleanor starting preschool, the new baby arriving a month later .... but Fall is always my favorite season. I love when there's a chill in the air, leaves changing color, Halloween leading to Thanksgiving into Christmas, candy corn ... so much to enjoy! I'm just hoping that, this year, it doesn't all pass in a sleep-deprived blur, and I can appreciate it. Fingers crossed!

Reading Living Large

2011-08-23T21:13:00.000-04:00

I got a quick read out of the library the other week, a book called Living Large: From SUVs to Double Ds—Why Going Bigger Isn't Always Going Better by Sarah J. Wexler. I was going to give you a brief synopsis of the text, but then I think the rather large title already gives you the main gist.

I really wanted to like this book. I felt like it vindicated a lot of the choices that Keith and I make, like living in a small (by today's standards) older home, on a smaller lot in an inner-ring suburb. We choose to drive smaller cars. My choice to scoff at breast enhancement surgery mostly revolves around the fact that Mother Nature gave me more to work with than I ever needed or wanted, so I can't really claim the moral high ground on that one. But still, I expected to be nodding my head in agreement with every page of this book.

In the end, I didn't really like it. I think it was a problem with tone and credibility. Wexler presents it as a Really Serious topic, yet only delves superficially into many of issues. She spent too much time and ink trying not to vilify the people who make these large purchases, and did such a good job of empathizing with them that sometimes, by the end of a chapter, I wasn't entirely sure what side she was on. In particular, the chapter on breast enhancement surgery consisted of many separate facts about breast enhancement surgery, tucked in around the main narrative of her experience going to a plastic surgeon's office as a potential candidate for the surgery. Her overall conclusion about the experience seems to be that she could absolutely imagine herself seriously considering breast reduction surgery. How does that fit with the stated overall thesis of the book?

It's the same thing with the chapter about test-driving a Hummer, too. She makes sure to present Hummer owners that seem reasonable and shed a sympathetic light on them. Why? Are you really trying to convince your audience that bigger isn't always better? Because, in all actuality, I feel like I am part of her imagined audience: someone who already believes that bigger isn't better, and to be a responsible citizen in 2011, I need to be finding ways to make my environmental impact on the world as small as possible. I feel like she's trying to tell me that of course we know that bigger isn't always better, but I need to have more compassion for the people who have no concern over their environmental impacts or the world they're leaving for their/my children. And I'm not buying it.

The best takeaway from the book, for me, came from the final chapter. This chapter focused on Freeganism which, according to Wikipedia, "is an anti-consumerist lifestyle whereby people employ alternative living strategies based on limited participation in the conventional economy and minimal consumption of resources." I've heard the term before, but this time it resonated with me because it was on my mind when I returned from running errands to discover that our dog had gotten into the trash. Again. Just like he'd done at my parents' house a few days before, and at our house a few days before that ..... but he's not just being an annoyingly bad dog! He's a Freegan, so I'll cut him some slack.

Day Tripper

2011-08-22T15:33:00.000-04:00

Is it possible that I used to be that woman who never even carried a purse? I had a small fabric change purse that fit in my back pocket, and off I went.

Last week, Eleanor and I were meeting my Mom at her house and going out to Miss Molly's, a Victorian tea room. So a visit of just a few hours; no big deal, right?

In the end, this is what the trunk of the car looked like for that short little trip.

First of all, we decided to meet at Mom's house before the tea room, and then go back to her house after so Eleanor would (hopefully) nap and then Mom and I would get a chance to catch up. Whenever we're out of the house for more than a few hours, I end up packing a change of clothes for Eleanor and some toys to keep her entertained in the car. I also packed my knitting and the fabric for her new curtains, in case I had the opportunity and energy to work on hemming them (didn't happen).

Since it was a Thursday, Dad's golf night, Mom also asked if Keith might be interested in coming out after work to golf with Dad. He was, so that meant packing golf clubs for Keith, as well as a change of clothes.

That also meant, since we were staying all day, that we would bring Beckett to the house with us, along with his food.

At this point, Mom mentioned that she would offer to keep Eleanor all night, since the guys get back late from golfing, and that way we wouldn't have to put her down and wake her up to drive back home ... but she had a doctor's appointment the following morning. I said, "Well, if you're really offering..." because I was already coming back out to her side of town for a playdate on Friday, so I said I could pick Eleanor up in the morning before Mom's appointment. That meant Eleanor's back changed into an overnight bag AND her favorite blankie.

I think that explains all of the various bags featured in the picture above. Oh wait: Not pictured is my small purse. Maybe someday, in about another 20 years, that's all I will carry.

The Perfect Post

2011-08-18T07:13:00.001-04:00

I'm not sure if it's my role as mother, teacher, housewife, friend, or writer ... but lately the word "perfect" and its overuse has been really bothering me.

I think I've become oversensitive to it because of all the new baby reading/preparing we've been doing lately. Being a hormonal, pregnant woman apparently makes me a "perfect" target for a Perfect Campaign. Don't I want everything to be Perfect for the baby? Perfect name, perfect clothes, perfect nursery .... heaven forbid you even consider the concept of "good enough." It must be Perfect!

It takes me back to the days of wedding planning. Anytime something unique happens in a modern American consumer's life, in my humble observations, that consumer is urged to make it Perfect. You'll (hopefully) only get married once! One honeymoon, one first house, and every baby is its own unique opportunity for perfection in parenting. Or at least the accoutrements that go along with it.

I may strike people as a perfectionist personality, but I actually really hate the word and the idea behind it. Either it's right or it's wrong, and there's no room in-between. Why does it have to be "perfect"? What does that mean? Why urge people to strive for something that doesn't even exist?

Maybe this is just a few years of therapy talking, but I honestly don't think I've ever bought into the idea of perfect. Now, I am absolutely willing to admit (I almost wrote "perfectly willing") that I want things how I want things. And if they are not that way, I may get a tad anxious or upset. But to me, that's different from the Perfect that advertisers and advice columnists are trying to sell me on. I'm talking about my own personal goals and aspirations—goals that are often far removed from society's view of perfection.

For example, my wedding was quite unconventional in some ways. When we got engaged, I told Keith my engagement ring could cost, at the most, $200. I didn't want a diamond (although he got a miniscule one anyway). The engagement ring wasn't that important to me, and I didn't want him spending a lot of money we didn't really have on a status symbol. I would much rather have a nice honeymoon, which we did! So facets of the wedding were not Society Perfect, but they were just how I/we wanted them.

What is the point of this perfection rant? It's a stern reminder to myself, and a call to my fellow parents/teachers/friends/house spouses/writers/etc.: Don't give in! Don't spend that extra money or extra time to make something "perfect." Just make it what you want. If we strike "perfect" from our collective vocabulary, we'll all be a lot more relaxed, hopefully slightly richer, and ~~perfectly~~ relatively happy.

Photo Challenge: Urban

2011-08-17T08:11:00.000-04:00

Last week, Keith and I both really liked his choice for "lines." And since we had camping plans for this past weekend, I mentioned to him that maybe he would find some good subjects around the campsite. Unfortunately, this week's Photo Challenge subject was, of course, Urban: the antithesis of camping.

But at least Keith works in downtown Cleveland, so he still had time to go out at lunch and get quite a few different shots. Similar to last week, he didn't have any one particular shot that really grabbed him right away. So he got to work editing and, in the end, chose this one:

This is an interesting street in downtown Cleveland, which has been made into a pedestrian-only area filled with shops and entertainment venues like the House of Blues. I like the reflections from the rain puddles in the street, and the few bursts of color. You wouldn't know to look at the picture, but this street is jam-packed on evenings and weekends, particularly after an event like an Indians' game.

I like this image, but Keith wasn't really satisfied with it. From the beginning of the photo challenge the "urban" prompt stuck out to him as one that he thought he could really do a lot with, so I think he was disappointed that he didn't have more time to find a shot that he was really excited about. Hopefully next week's challenge will fit better with our weekend plans!

Firefox Add-Ons

2011-08-16T15:32:00.004-04:00

For quite a few years now, we've been using Firefox as our Internet browser of choice, instead of Internet Explorer. One of the great things about Firefox is that, being open source, there's a million different add-ons to increase and personalize its functionality. If you're thinking of getting some, this is the main page for Firefox add-ons. Here's some of my favorite add-ons (keeping in mind, of course, that I call everything an "add-on"; I don't really understand the difference between an add-on vs. an extension vs. a user script):

Greasemonkey: Customize the way a web page displays or behaves, by using small bits of JavaScript
Personas: Over 30,000 different designs to personalize your browser. Purely decorative, but fun!
ColorZilla: Advanced Eyedropper, ColorPicker, Page Zoomer and other colorful goodies... This is helpful when I'm designing Christmas cards or, say, baby announcements, and trying to find colors that work together.
Word Count Plus: Counts number of words in selected text. Can add the count to a running total. This has been a huge help to me with teaching online, to easily make sure students meet the posted word count.
IE Tab Plus: Many websites don't adequately test for compatibility with Firefox, so they don't display properly in my browser. When this happens, switching on IE Tab usually fixes the problem.

Do Me a Favor

2011-08-12T07:39:00.002-04:00

For my final post about Eleanor's party (I swear), I'm wondering how other parents of young children feel about the whole party favor situation. I feel like it's kind of a no-win prospect. I always end up spending more money than I want to, on dumb toys that break after 5 minutes. And I try to avoid the candy, because I know that's usually the last thing I want Eleanor to have, after a day of loading up on sugar: more sugar to bring home! But I feel like I'll "look bad" or unprepared if I don't do the favors.

Who likes the favors? Are they necessary? How did the favor bags start, anyway?

This year, I bought small books from the dollar section at Target, and some punch balloons. Then I spent most of the "favor budget" (not that there really is one) on craft supplies. During the party, we had a folding table with cardboard crowns and stars/dowel rods to make wands, and a ton of different crafty items for kids to decorate their crowns and wands. I think I liked doing that a lot better than the typical party favor. It gave everyone (not just the kids!) something to do during the party, and they could take home something they made themselves.

Plus, we adults had fun with the crafts, too! I know I had a great time planning and buying materials and helping Eleanor "make sure it all worked" before her friends arrived. And we have lots of leftover craft supplies, to enjoy many more times. If you have any other suggestions about party favors, I'd like to hear them!

The Present Situation

2011-08-11T08:40:00.000-04:00

I know that Eleanor's birthday party was weeks ago, but I'm still thinking about a few of the kid-related party issues that come up every year. So indulge me, please, as I reflect on her party, and whether we want to do things differently next year.

So far, we've thrown pretty big parties for her. We invite family on both sides, lots of her friends and their parents, and some of our own friends as well. For Eleanor's 3rd birthday, there were almost 30 adults present, and 11 kids (all under the age of 5). We're always pretty excited that we've made it through another year, and we want to share that joy—and surprise—with our friends and family.

However, with inviting so many people, I always feel awkward about presents. There's a range of relationships represented, and I don't really feel that it's necessary for everyone to give her a present. Her grandparents always ask for ideas weeks in advance, and get her the best presents (better than ours, for sure). I'd never really bother telling them not to get her anything, because it would be fruitless. On the other hand, there's more casual acquaintances that we'd like to come and celebrate with us, but I wish there were a better/less awkward way to really convey to them, "We don't expect a gift. Honest. No one will be upset."

Every year, we put "No gifts required." on the Evite, but mostly it gets ignored. The other part of the problem is when people actually believe us. We have done the typical kid party sequence where everyone hangs out for an hour or so, chatting, grazing, playing, waiting for the majority of party attendees to show. (Although with kid parties and naptimes, I'm not really bothered if someone shows up more than an hour late.) When we think everyone's arrived, we gather together to light the candles, sing "Happy Birthday" and pass out the cake. Once everyone has their cake, then Eleanor opens her presents.

How do we not do this as a public spectacle? Because when we do, it can seem kind of awkward for those few brave souls who come without a present in hand, because we say "Don't worry about it!" on one hand, and on the other hand it seems like we're publicly calling them out for their lack of gift. I thought this year we would go around and open up presents in front of individual people so it was less public spectacle and more personal. That way everyone could see the reaction to her opening the gift (fingers crossed it's always good!), but by moving around hopefully there's not as much emphasis on the present-opening as show, so people aren't keeping track or feeling awkward about what they did or didn't bring.

Except, that didn't really work. I didn't really take into account that all of the presents would be in a pile right by her seat, and she just kept diving in. Plus other kids always love to help (I must point out, Eleanor is always that kid at others' parties, trying to rip the paper or pull out the tissue paper), so it was Eleanor and I plus various toddler helpers, and our group was not terribly mobile. So we still ended up sitting in front of the group, opening presents in front of all.

What do you do for kids' parties? Does everyone bring presents? Do you open them in front of all? As a guest, do you ever feel comfortable not bringing a present, even if specified on the invite?

I'm thinking next year might be the year to scale back a bit, and have Eleanor's first "friends" birthday party with just a few invitees. But, when the time gets close, I'm not sure if I'll be able to stick to that. So we might be confronting the situation all over again. Not to mention, we're doing it all over again in October!

Photo Challenge: Lines

2011-08-10T22:43:00.001-04:00

Both Keith and I have been slackers for the Shutterboo Weekly Photo Challenge lately. For Keith, that means taking a picture somewhere in the house late on Tuesday night, before the new photo's due on Wednesday. For me, I take it a step further and don't post about his pictures at all. So there! I'm a more dedicated slacker than my husband.

But this week, Keith had a great idea. Instead of going for the straight forward image of "lines," he thought of lines in a play. I spent a futile half-hour trying to track down the script from when I was the lead in a play in high school (Did you know I was a drama nerd in high school? I totally was. President of the Drama Club and in all the plays.) I thought that would be cool because not only would you see lines, but you'd also have highlighting and blocking notes, etc.

When that search failed—I know it's around here somewhere, though!—Keith went back to my trusty Norton Shakespeare from college. He chose the famous "to be or not to be" speech from Hamlet and started snapping.

The problem with the Norton, however, is that it's massive. The pages are all tissue-paper thin, and the words are miniscule. So the words from the other side of the page were bleeding into the current page, and it was hard to even get enough words in focus to really convey his idea.

He took a few pictures of the play and, dissatisfied, went back to a more obvious interpretation of lines, laying out match sticks on the dining room table. He showed me a few of those pictures and asked me which I liked best. I immediately asked why he'd abandoned the play idea, and he told me about the difficulties he was having with it. I scrolled further back on the camera (just a reminder that there's no way challenges like this would have been at all feasible before the wonder of digital cameras) to see the play pictures. I could understand what he was saying about the difficulties of composition, but I still liked the idea so much, I thought it might be worth sacrificing a bit in the clarity of the image to preserve the overall theme.

As I argued my case for Shakespeare, Keith looked a little more closely at one image in particular. He decided that maybe he could crop it and, by getting rid of much of the out-of-focus text, make the in-focus text larger and more legible. He also did something to make the image more monochromatic. "It's so dramatic!" I couldn't resist saying when he showed me the final version:

I'm glad he stuck with his original idea, because I thought it was very unique and more interesting than simply a visual take on "lines." Just reading part of this play, however, makes me realize how long it's been since I've seen live Shakespeare, and how much I miss it. Alas, I don't think there's going to be much of that in our near future. Maybe I'll have to settle for a Kenneth Branagh movie. But then I could read the lines as I watch, which is also good. I'll keep my Norton handy!

The Wrong Name Seems So Right

2011-08-09T16:59:00.004-04:00

Keith and I have finally started looking in earnest at baby names. Of course, "looking in earnest" means trying to seriously discuss some real potential candidates ... a discussion which quickly devolves into suggesting totally inappropriate possibilities (like Landon, so he could be Land Lubbers).

Last time, we quickly agreed on a boy's name and couldn't really make up our minds about a girl's name. When we drove to the hospital for Eleanor's birth, we still had a list of at least 10 girl names. Eleanor was at the top, but still by no means a certainty.

This time, we're having the opposite issue. I think we're close to agreement on a girl's name, but have no idea what we want for a boy's name. I know we picked one last time and didn't use it, but it's too late. We don't really like that name anymore, so we're back to square one.

I've been looking at baby name websites, of which there are a million, and keeping a list of any boy names with potential. During this search, I discovered that Gomez apparently means "the man." Gomez is, of course, the name of our adorable little female kitten. Whoops!

Of course, as a neutered animal, gender is really a moot point for her. And I always maintain that there's more leeway with pet names than with kids. I can name a pet something slightly ridiculous and, perhaps, gender-bending, and have no qualms about it, whereas I tend to be very straightforward with children's names.

We chose the name Gomez for our favorite band, then we got the cat; irregardless of the cat's gender or appearance, it was going to be a Gomez. She may not be masculine. She is not even human. But somehow, she's still a Gomez and we love her!

(And no, Gomez is not in the running for the baby's name, girl or boy.)

Looking Up

2011-08-05T07:14:00.000-04:00

Eleanor often role plays where she is Mama and I'm Eleanor. Usually, she is wearing a pair of my shoes, grabs a bag, and heads off to work.

"I'm sorry, honey," she coos, "but I have to go to work."

I stomp my foot. "Why?" I whine. "I want an Eleanor/Mommy Day!"

"I know," she replies soothingly. "We can have an Eleanor/Mommy day tomorrow. But today Aunt E and Gavin and Olivia are coming over."

"Noooo," I argue. "I don't want them to come. I'm not going to have any fun."

"Yes you will," she says. "You'll have a fun time playing with Gavin."

Whenever we switch roles like this, I am always reassured by the fact that she is unfailingly kind, compassionate, and polite. She doesn't yet. She is very concerned about my feelings. One good way to know that she's pretending to be me is that she uses terms of endearment like "honey" and "sweetie" all throughout her speech. She does this when being Mommy on her way to work, Mommy putting Eleanor to bed, Mommy trying to convince Eleanor to get up off that floor, put the book down, and get her shoes on so we can get to the store already.

I'm very happy to know that my irritation and short temper are rather well hidden. If this is how she thinks I feel and act all the time, I'm doing well!

Now, the tone she uses with the animals ... that's a different story.

End of the Grading

2011-08-04T07:50:00.000-04:00

Yesterday I was talking about the end of the summer semester, but was mostly focused on my concerns about what comes next. Today I'm just focused on grading and wrapping up this class.

Final essays were due yesterday. I thought I'd get a lot of them graded during the day while my sister watched Eleanor. I thought my students would be eager to finish the semester. Alas, I overestimated their eagerness to finish, and underestimated their procrastination tendencies. Out of the 10 essays I was expecting, only 4 were turned in early enough that I could grade them during my "work" hours. A student emailed me at 10:30pm, the night before essays were due, to ask some basic questions about essay content. The kind of questions that should have been asked long, long ago. I'm not looking forward to grading that essay.

Teaching online has been .... interesting. I have really enjoyed the shorter, weekly assignments, and having the opportunity to respond to their writing regularly throughout the semester, instead of on only a few bigger assignments. If it's a case of practice makes perfect, in some ways I think being in a 100% written environment, as opposed to verbal class discussions, is more effective than a traditional classroom. I also like that it's much easier and clearer to require the same participation of all students online. It doesn't matter if you're shy; everyone is required to make X number of original discussion posts and Y responses to your peers. End of story.

Online, it's also much easier to define "participation" in a clear way. If you are regularly signing into the course site, making your posts on time, and completing quizzes, you are participating. If you're not doing those things, then you're not! None of this showing up to class but not paying a lick of attention to the content. (Yes, I'm aware that using the phrase "lick of attention" makes me sound 80 years old, but oh well.) I also took the advice of a colleague and noted in my syllabus that, if a student hasn't logged into the course site in two weeks, I will block that student from accessing the site and will only allow access to the student if he or she contacts me directly and explains the absence. So much more straightforward than the ones who disappear from class and, just when you think they're gone for good, they show up again, expecting to get an A!

On the other hand, I don't feel like I really know my online students. It bothers me a bit that I could walk past them on campus and never know. Two students, maybe three, came to meet me in person this semester. Most of them declined that option. Sometimes I feel like I'm just sending information out into the void ... I don't get much feedback on what is working or not, so it's hard to believe that I'm teaching effectively.

Of course, every time I've taught a class for the first time, I end the semester feeling like I won't really have the hang of it until I teach at least one or two more times. I need to try out several different strategies before I have a good sense of what really works. At the end of a semester, I also immediately know that there's some parts I would want to change, and others I would keep. Then the majority of the class format, assignments, etc., could go either way.

I am glad that I've had the opportunity to teach online. I think that what I've learned about the benefit of short, weekly assignments will definitely affect my traditional classroom teaching strategies. I'm just sorry, from a pedagogical perspective, that there's going to be a break between teaching online and going back in the classroom. From a grading perspective, I'm ready for the break!

A Pause in Gainful Employment

2011-08-03T14:29:00.003-04:00

This is my last week of the summer semester. Since I'm taking off the Fall for the arrival of Little Sibling in October, I won't go back to work until January ... or possibly even later. I'm still not sure how childcare is going to work with two kids: one a 3-year-old who is going to AM preschool Mon/Tues mornings, and the other a newborn. Add that to a class schedule that will definitely NOT be Mon/Tues mornings and it just seems so messy. In theory, I do want to go back to work. I know that I'll miss it. In reality, me going back to work for one or two classes in the Spring may cost us more money that I would make. We'll see what happens.

I want to be excited about being home full-time. I was more excited about it, when it was further off. I'm starting to get worried, though. Honestly, I just don't know what kind of stay-at-home mom I'll be. From my perspective, being a SAHM seems like a LOT of hard work—a lot of unpaid, underappreciated hard work, 24/7. I foresee my patience constantly being tested, and very little time away from home and children to refill the inner serenity pool.

Balance is something that I am constantly seeking, but rarely find, in my life. Work/home balance. Spending/saving balance. Time for self vs. time for others balance. It seems like there's an opposite side of the coin for nearly all important aspects of my life ... and one side always gets short-shrift. I'm afraid that the idea of balance is going to get even further out of my reach when I'm home.

I know; I'm looking at this all the wrong way. I'm looking at the negatives, and not the positives. I know there will be positives, too. There'll be more time to run errands, so I won't be as stressed to get them in. We'll have more lazy afternoons and spontaneous trips to the playground or museums. (That part I definitely am looking forward to.) What I'm most looking forward to is not constantly splitting my attention between home and work. As a teacher, I don't get to leave my work at the office. So, every naptime, I'm always asking myself, "Do I try to get work work done, or accomplish something around the house?" I'm greatly anticipating the lack of that question, and being able to be happy, at the end of the day, with getting things done around the house and not worrying about all the work work that may be lurking on the computer.

This is the point where my own wise mother would probably tell me to "cross that bridge when I come to it." There's no point in worrying about being a SAHM until I am ... and then I can really find out what annoys me. I'm (mostly) looking forward to it ... I think!

At the Lakehouse

2011-07-31T11:15:00.001-04:00

This is that one magical weekend a year when I get together with around a dozen of my nearest and dearest friends from high school. We all go to a "lakehouse" (in quotes because it's bigger and nicer than our regular home) and spend two days eating, laughing, catching up, floating on the lake, and thinking about how lucky we are to have known such wonderful people since we were 16 (or, in some cases, 5) years old. Most of the spouses have been around for so many years (Keith and I started dating when we were 18, for example) and fit in so well that sometimes I almost forget they didn't actually graduate with us.

This year, I think there'll be 10 kids there: one 5-year-old, and the rest younger. The youngest just turned one a few months ago. It makes me so happy for Eleanor to grow up with my friends' friends. I hope that her friendships with them, at least some of them, turn into real, deep connections and not just a case of "I'll hang out with them while we're at the lakehouse, because I don't have a choice." So far, she loves the annual lakehouse weekend, and is eagerly anticipating this one.

In contrast, we have a 15-year high school class reunion planned for September. Most of us are planning on going, but I'm guessing the reunion experience for me will be very different from the average. Keith has not only met once or twice, but knows and is friends with, many of my high school friends. He was a groomsman in Dan's wedding, and makes running and concert plans with Jen's husband. I'm curious to see what we'll do at the reunion: Will we stake out a table and carry on where we left off at the lakehouse this weekend? Or will we ignore each other, because we're already up to speed, and seek out the people we've lost touch with?

I'd imagine it will be a bit of both. Sometimes wandering off to reconnect with old acquaintances, but always wandering back to the familiar, seeking the reassurance of people who really know me. No explanations or updates necessary. The excitement and the unknown of the 15-year class reunion in the Fall will be fun. But the lakehouse is what I consider to be the real reunion, and the one I'm looking forward to the most.

I'm Pretty Sure .... You're 3 going on 13

2011-07-30T10:00:00.000-04:00

Eleanor now has what I would call her "thinking face." She manages to scrunch down only one eyebrow (neither Keith nor I are capable of this). Her brow furrows, and she usually lifts up her hands, palms skyward, as she asks questions that have her completely baffled. It's similar to the expression in the picture, as she contemplates the intricacies of baseball strategy.

This is the face I pictured her having in the car the other day, as we were driving back from my parents' house. Before I get into the conversation, there's a few things you should know:

Grandma Helen always has animal crackers on hand, which Eleanor is addicted to. And she's even upped the ante by getting iced animal crackers with sprinkles. Eleanor runs straight to the cookie jar as soon as we get there, and she insists on taking a few "for the road" when we leave. I've chosen to never buy animal crackers, leaving this treat squarely in Grandma's domain, so she finds it even more exciting.
Right now, her car seat is directly behind the driver's seat, so it's very hard to see her while driving. She's always trying to get the driver to look at something and we're constantly reminding her that we can't look at her when we're driving because we don't really want to crash the car.

On this particular car trip, it was just Eleanor and I, so she was disappointed to have no audience in the backseat. When we were only a block or two away from our house, Eleanor piped up.
Eleanor: Are we on our street?
Me: No honey, but we're close.
Eleanor: (big sigh) I'll be sooo sad once we're on our street.
Me: Why? Don't you like being home?
Eleanor: We don't have any animal crackers at home. How come I never ever get animal crackers with icing and sprinkles?
Me: Really? Never ever? Because I'm pretty sure you took some in the car with you from Grandma's house.
Eleanor: (with hardly a pause) I'm pretty sure I didn't.
Me: Oh? I'm pretty sure you did, because I saw you eating them.
Eleanor: (immediately) I'm pretty sure you didn't, because you were driving.

I just started laughing. I was so busted! And her response was so quick. I'm always amazed not just by the vocabulary she soaks up, but also the intonation. She was spot on in her usage and emphasis on "pretty sure." That's my girl!

Happy 3rd Birthday, Eleanor!

2011-07-29T07:39:00.000-04:00

In all the talk about lead paint, I never really mentioned Eleanor's third birthday. She turned 3 over a week ago, and her birthday party was last Saturday.

She is such a wonderful, amazing little girl. And absolutely a girl now, not a baby. I think once toddlers start saying things like, "Apparently, there's a sunflower in the vase!" as she did on the day of her party, they really are closer to being a Kid than a Baby. And, in just over a month, she'll be starting Preschool. A clear milestone in the growth of her independence.

Thinking about her birth is even more poignant this year, because I'm also thinking about the upcoming birth in October. Getting excited to meet this new, amazing person who will be every bit as wonderful and challenging—in different ways, I'm sure. It's been such a joy to get to know Eleanor's personality so far. In many ways, being pregnant for the second time seems much more concrete to me because I can really understand that those movements I feel are a person. A person who will one day voice thoughts and opinions of his/her own (probably sooner than I'm expecting, if anything like Eleanor!).

I look forward to every day with Eleanor, and I can't wait to see her become a big sister!

Lead Paint Perspective

2011-07-28T16:10:00.001-04:00

This is my last lead-related post, I promise. Probably. But the past weeks of dealing with lead paint issues again has been interesting in terms of my response to the whole situation.

When Eleanor had an elevated lead level at her one-year check-up, I was so worried about her. I also spent a significant amount of time being neurotic about how it meant that I was a terrible mother who couldn't even keep her own child healthy. My therapist tells me I have a problem with "downplaying the positive" and I would say that's absolutely true when it comes to parenting. I take for granted anything I do well, as something surely all parents do, not even worth mentioning.

Instead, I focus on my shortcomings as a parent. I look at all of the times I get frustrated or tell her I can't play right now or give short answers like "Because I said so" instead of really addressing her questions about the world. It's so much easier for me to see what I'm doing wrong, instead of what I'm doing right. And the whole lead issue played right into that tendency of mine, and reinforced every negative comment I had ever told myself about my ability to be an effective, loving mother.

It took me a long time to get over that, and to not be so completely ashamed that my daughter had an elevated lead level, when almost no other parents we spend time with had an issue with it. The biggest problem with lead, in a neurotic sense, is that the effects are not always immediate. So I can spend years watching and waiting, attributing any of her possible shortcomings in school or bad teen-aged behavior to being a side effect of the lead poisoning that I didn't prevent. It's all my fault.

But I did get over it and come to terms with the situation. We've done everything we could to resolve the situation, and now I don't spend too much time wondering about the long-term effects, if any, because there's nothing else to be done.

And then, of course, that whole Pandora's leaden box was opened again with this house painting situation. But I've been shocked—absolutely shocked!—at how well I've handled it. So much less neuroses the second time around! To be fair, I'm sure a lot of that has to do with 1) it all started with our neighbor's house, not ours, and 2) at this point, we don't know that Eleanor's lead levels are elevated again. We are hoping that we've done enough to prevent that; Eleanor and I both have doctor's appointments next week. So if either of us get tested and the results are high ... well, at that point I probably might as well call this blog "Lead Ledger" or something like that.

Let's all keep our fingers crossed that it doesn't happen, though. The other big difference between last time and this time is knowledge. Last time, we had no idea what was going on, what we should do next, or even where to go to get this crucial information. We kept running into dead ends, contacting people who never got back to us or couldn't (or wouldn't?) give us the information we needed ... we spent a lot of time getting absolutely nowhere. Meanwhile, during all the fruitless phone calls and misinformation, that loop of "You're a terrible parent!" kept playing in the back of my mind, and every time I was put on hold I had another opportunity to sit and visualize all of the ways my lack of knowledge and inability to protect my child was ruining her life, now and in the future. (Yes, yes I was a lot of fun to be around.)

This, out of all the factors, is what has changed the most between last time and this time. We called the EPA to report the contractors on a Wednesday. Over the weekend, Keith and I cleaned the house inside and out. On Tuesday, lead abatement contractors cleaned the outside of the house and declared it lead free. (Or as lead free as any place in an aging, inner-ring Cleveland suburb can be.) I went from total panic to near resolution in under a week. The main reason for that difference is that, this time, we had the knowledge. We knew what steps to take next, and how to handle things.

This may sound strange, but I've actually found this second experience to help get some closure on the first time. I can apologize to my younger, freaked-out self. I know that you did the best you could. I know that it wasn't all your fault. You tried so hard to prevent the problem, and then fix the problem as soon as it arose. It is okay to blame other people sometimes, because all of that responsibility really shouldn't have been on your shoulders. And look! This time, we handled it so much better. Well done.

Let's just hope there's not a next time.

Lead Paint: What Next?

2011-07-19T16:37:00.005-04:00

Sorry it's been a whole week. I'm sure you've been waiting with bated breath! It's been pretty hectic around here.

Even while writing last week's blog, wondering what to do, I was already springing into action. As soon as I realized 1) what the contractors was doing was indeed against the law, and 2) that our neighbor wouldn't be held liable—only the contractors—I called the EPA to report the violation of the RRP rule.

I was pleasantly surprised to get the name and contact info for a specific person. Even more surprising, when I called the number she actually picked up! She told me what she would need in terms of documentation; I promised to send pictures and dutifully did so that night. (The picture above is of our neighbor's house and flower bed, which is directly next to our driveway, partly visible at the bottom of the image.) We tried to talk to our neighbor a few times that night, but he was out. Luckily, I caught him on his way to work the next morning and explained the whole situation.

He called his contractors, told them what was going on, and told them to stay away until the situation was resolved. Instead of doing that, they came over and "cleaned up," which involved using a leaf blower (totally illegal and just a really bad idea) and getting paint chips even more scattered throughout the yard. At this point I was so twitchy from silently putting up with them for nearly two weeks, I was gearing up to go outside and tell them myself to stop and just leave the premises. Luckily, I guess they felt like they'd cleaned enough because they stopped of their own accord before I got out there, and then it was blissfully quiet, at least for a little bit.

I called the lead abatement contractor that had done our siding and replaced many of our windows, with whom we were very pleased. He said that he could have a crew out by the following Tuesday (two days ago), and that our yard could be completely cleaned up in time for Eleanor's birthday party (two days hence). Hearing that was a huge relief, because clearly we couldn't have nearly a dozen kids over to play with the paint chips, but I had no idea where else we were going to go on such short notice.

After getting that sorted out, Keith and I talked about what else we ourselves would need to do. We decided that we needed to wipe down the hard surfaces outside (porches, yard furniture, Eleanor's outdoor toys) and clean inside, top to bottom: vacuuming, mopping, and wiping down EVERYTHING—including every single one of Eleanor's toys—to get rid of any potential lead dust. We'd tried to keep the windows closed while the contractors were working, but we couldn't be completely certain that we'd kept 100% of the lead dust out.

My parents very kindly took Eleanor all day Saturday so Keith and I could clean. By Sunday night, I think we'd finished nearly everything. Today, I'm vacuuming and mopping one more time, in case we tracked in any more lead dust from the yard before it was cleaned on Tuesday. We also changed the furnace filter and the contractor vacuumed out the air conditioner.

Oh, did I mention that we're hosting a birthday party with 30+ people on Saturday? And clearing out the former study, painting and furnishing it to be Eleanor's new big girl room, all at the same time? It's been a long week.

That's probably more detail than you needed, but there it is. I felt the need to list and catalog every single step we've taken to minimize the damage, in the hopes that talking about it will make it more effective, I think. I'd like to believe that we've done all we can; I hope it's enough.

The final test, literally, will be when Eleanor and I both go to doctor's appointments next week and get our lead levels checked. Hopefully, all this madness ends there. The contractors first came on Saturday, July 2. It's been a long month, and I'm looking forward to a laid-back August.

I do have to say, without the blog, I'm not sure what would have happened. I only started researching the latest changes in the lead laws because I was writing a rant blog about how frustrated and helpless I felt. If it hadn't been for blogging about it, I'm not sure I would have investigated what options I did have. So thanks to you all for reading and giving me a reason to write!

Clean-Up Time

2011-07-14T08:29:00.000-04:00

I think part of what's held me back from blogging over the past week or so is that I've been casting around for positive, light-hearted topics to write about. But really, I'm in a pissy mood so I've given up on going for light and breezy. Just to warn you.

First of all, I'm feeling stressed. Why? Well, primarily because I'm me. Hi! Have we met? If we have, then you already know that I have the type of personality that gravitates towards Stress and Panic and Insane To Do Lists. Or even if we haven't met in person, reading a few of my blog entries should clue you in pretty quickly.

However, I have been working on these tendencies (and will continue to until the day I die, I'm sure. It's on my to-do list!). And there are other circumstances for the increased stress level. Eleanor's third birthday party is a week and a half away. So we're trying to buy presents, organize party details, and clean the house. Except we haven't really done any of that, because we've been focused on getting her new room (the former study/guest bedroom) ready at the same time. It's a lot.

But that's not all! And this is the part that's really bothering me. Our next-door neighbor, whose tan house is visible next to our driveway in the picture above, is getting his house painted. The paint has been peeling for awhile and it's long overdue and it will be great when it's done.

The part that really bothers me is that it is, of course, lead paint. His house was built the same year as ours, and I have no doubt there's lead paint all over the exterior. But see, he hasn't tested for lead paint so he doesn't know 100% for certain that there's existing lead paint.
Plus, no children under 6 or pregnant women live in the house—I guess the fact that we're two feet away from the offending exterior paint is completely irrelevant—so he and his contractors aren't required to follow any lead-safe practices in paint removal.

They've been scraping, sanding, power-washing his house for over a week now. Since July 4th weekend, I've been watching as lead paint chips, large and small, and lead paint dust (which is even worse) coat our house, side porch, yard, etc. Watching from inside the house, running our air conditioner with the windows closed on beautiful summer days.

Our neighbor is not a bad guy. He is actually quite a nice person, and a very considerate neighbor. He even scheduled the workers to start on a long weekend when he knew we were planning to be out of town, because he knows about all of our lead issues. I don't really think, as an individual homeowner, he should have to choose on his own to follow lead-safe practices that will cost him significantly more to get the job done.

I do blame the government. I haven't quite decided yet which branch. But I don't believe that homeowners who live 2 feet from a 2-year-old's driveway/play area should have the choice to release lead paint and dust all throughout the environment. Something is very wrong here. You're telling all consumers that lead paint is very dangerous to a young child's brain development, and as parents we need to spend more than $20k to make our home safe .... but 2 feet away, the same rules don't apply?

For a week and a half now, I've been watching with despair as lead paint chips and dust covers our property that we've spent so much money to have cleaned up and remediated. It makes me feel helpless to ensure a healthy life for my children in even the most basic way. If I can't keep a known hazard out of our immediate environment, what can I do?

In 2008, the EPA issued a "rule requiring the use of lead-safe practices," and it was due to start being enforced in April 2010. (I say "due to start" because I know there was push-back from contractors' associations and it's not clear to me if it's actually being enforced or not.) This required contractors who were disturbing more than 20 feet of exterior paint to follow lead-safe practices in "pre-1978 housing and child-occupied facilities." According to this, the government has just recently decided that the house next door to children and pregnant women does need to be treated the same way, with the same precautions. I can guarantee you that more than 20 feet of paint has been disturbed.

So now what?

I'm to That Point in Pregnancy

2011-07-13T11:23:00.003-04:00

We were at Home Depot last week, and I was exhausted. (Was it this past week? One before? It's hard to know, since it feels like we spend part of every week there, lately.) Right at the beginning of July, I remembered that we had been telling Eleanor she'd move into her new Big Girl Room for her birthday. Yet her birthday was only a few weeks away, and we hadn't even started on getting her room ready. Not good. But anyway! That's a different post.

Just believe me when I say we were in Home Depot, again, and I was worn out. Keith and Eleanor were walking about 10 feet in front of me. Eleanor ran back to me so she could hand me something to carry (Thanks, sweetie!) and then she ran back to Keith. I felt like I had a glazed look in my eye, thinking of all the work to be done and how much I'd rather be in bed.

A store worker, relatively young black woman, looked at me and said, "So, when are you due?"

And that's when I officially passed That Point in the pregnancy. The point where I'm obviously pregnant, not just retaining water or still carrying baby weight from 3 years ago. The point where strangers feel free to ask and comment. Last week was the first time it happened, and then it happened again this morning when I went to the campus cafeteria for a muffin.

This is one of my biggest problems with pregnancy. I mean, I'm not a fan of nausea, heart burn, weight gain in general ... we all know there's a lot of physical discomforts. But what discomforts me more is the public side of it. Generally, I'm a very private person. It's very difficult for me to accept that this major event in my life, and the state of my body, has now become a perfectly acceptable topic of conversation with complete strangers.

I know they mean well. People are excited to ask about it; they are smiling, thinking of their own children or grandchildren or nieces and nephews. Is it weird that I still find it a little invasive?

(The belly pic is from my pregnancy with Eleanor, at 6.5 months which is what I'm at now. I haven't done nearly as good with the belly pictures this time around, although I'd have to guess my 6.5 month picture for #2 would be a lot bigger!)

Photo Challenge: Nighttime

2011-07-07T22:51:00.004-04:00

This week's Shutterboo Weekly Photo Challenge word is "Nighttime." Thinking about nighttime in the summer reminds of schedules in general. Or the complete lack thereof. Does any other parents out there get frustrated at how impossible it is to get the kids to bed on time in the summer, or is that just me?

The weekends are always a mess from May through August. Between vacations and camping and birthday parties and picnics ... if we get Eleanor one good nap and to bed within an hour of her bedtime on a summer weekend, we're doing great.

But oftentimes it seems like weeknights are just as bad. It's the damn sunlight! It can be something as simple as walking down the street, enjoying the weather, and talking with neighbors. We haven't really "gone" anywhere or done much of anything, but suddenly we're a half hour behind schedule. Last night, Keith's work gave out tickets to the Zoo. From 6-9pm. Usually (in the colder months) we start bedtime routine at 6:45 and it's lights out at 7:30. Last night, we were not even out of the Zoo parking lot by 9pm, and that was just a random Wednesday night!

Of course, the crux of the problem is that we want to do these activities. We want to talk to our neighbors and go to the zoo and go camping. But I want to keep her on a somewhat normal schedule, to be a well-rested, happy child. Are these two goals completely incompatible in the summer? It often feels that way.

At least, when Keith took the picture above, he was on his own. Eleanor was in bed, asleep, and I was on the couch, thinking about how I should be asleep as well. I love summer. But it's hectic and chaotic and by mid-August when we've had (at least this summer) ONE weekend with no plans since the beginning of May .... I'm longing for the shorter days, cooler winds, and relatively calmer days of Fall. Of course, ask me what's more frustrating in the middle of February when we're all tired of the snow and cold and being cooped up, and I'll laugh at myself for being so whiney about all our summer plans!

Toddler Inertia

2011-07-06T23:23:00.001-04:00

I'd meant to blog about this topic with all of the other vacation posts, but didn't quite get around to it. And that's okay, because it's equally as applicable to everyday life: toddler inertia.*

I guess it stuck out to me on vacation, however, because I wasn't really expecting it. I mean, who argues when someone says, "Let's go build (and destroy) sand castles at the beach!" The correct answer, of course, is that Eleanor does. At length, and at great volume, and with various kicks and pouts.

It's one thing when she does it at home. It has become so hard to get her out of the house. Even to do something (pick out new library books, go to the playground, visit friends down the street, etc.) that she said she wanted to do 2 minutes ago. But when it comes down to actual movement, she balks. She stalls. She doesn't want to stop doing whatever it is she's doing at that very moment. Even if she's just playing with a piece of cardboard. Or, as she was the other morning, carrying around a raw baking potato so she could do a "potato dance."

(The key, Eleanor informed me, is that in a potato dance you just jump straight up and down. There is no forward leaping in a potato dance.)

If she's wearing a nightgown, she won't put on clothes. If she's in the living room, she doesn't want to play in the attic playroom. If she's reading books in her room, she doesn't want to go downstairs, even if it's already 9:30am and she hasn't eaten breakfast yet.

I suppose, if I were trying to put a positive spin on it, I could talk about how this shows that she is living in the moment, not always looking to the past or the future. She has embraced the Now so fully that she can't think or do past this very moment. She's already a Zen master and she's not even 3!

Except, I don't really think that's true. I think she's stubborn. Which is why she'll fight to stay put, no matter how boring her current activity and how exciting the proffered one. That is what I learned on vacation. It's not just that she doesn't want to do boring, everyday activities like grocery shopping or doctor's appointments. She also doesn't want to do ... exactly what she wants to do?

A few months ago, I felt bad because I'd pretty much ignored her for the better part of a week while I frantically tried to prepare for the start of the summer semester. So, once my online class was under control, I told her that tomorrow was going to be an Eleanor/Mommy day and we could do whatever she wanted. What did she want to do?

After talking about a few different options, she eventually decided that she wanted me to run with her, in the jogging stroller, to a nearby playground where we could play and have a picnic snack outside. It sounded great to me! I made the mistake of getting excited about our plans. And then, the next morning, I couldn't get her out of the house. After wheedling and cajoling for over half an hour to get her to please put down the book she's already "read" a million times and participate in the activities she has chosen for herself, I gave up. We sat and read the books.

Obviously, sometimes I have to fight the inertia. If we need to be somewhere, I have to suck it up and drag her out the door somehow. But it's the other times, when activities are really optional, that I can't figure out what to do. Won't she be glad, in the end, if we go? Is it really worth the fight? Doesn't she need new people and activities? Or should I just give in and, in situations where it doesn't matter, just do what she wants to at that moment? Even if it is her fifth tuber twirl?

Right now, I think I probably split it down the middle. Sometimes I stand my ground and force her to have fun, dammit. And sometimes, when I'm really tired and it's been a long week, I just sigh and throw my hands up and hand over the potato. No forward progress for that day, just jumping in place.

* For the record, Keith and I disagree about who first coined the term "inertia" for Eleanor's behavior. Because it's such an apt term, we both think it's ours. Of course, I'm the one with the blog, so I think in the end, I'll get credit:) But to be fair, I thought I should mention the disputed ownership.

Vacation Exercise

2011-06-29T15:05:00.000-04:00

Our plan all along for this vacation was to "do" as little as possible. Beach, pool, reading/napping at the beachhouse, repeat. This was all fine and good, except Eleanor and I both have incredibly fair skin. By the middle of the week, even with constant, if somewhat haphazard, sunscreen application, we were both getting a bit crispy. So we decided to spend a day away from the water, out of direct sun.

We went to the Currituck Beach Lighthouse, which was just a short drive from where we were staying. I think the Currituck lighthouse is one of the smaller ones in the Outer Banks, but it's still nothing to sneeze at: 214 curving metal steps, up about 150 feet.

Added to that, Eleanor wore me out before we even set foot in the lighthouse. There was a short, slow-moving line waiting for the privilege to climb all those steps. While the rest of our group waited in line, Eleanor felt the need to run. She and I ran back and forth across a grassy patch, racing from one tree back to Grandpa's legs (and one unsuspecting guy whom Eleanor mistook for Grandpa) back to another tree, back to Daddy's legs .... she couldn't get enough. Clearly, from the above picture taken before the climb, I could get enough.

Finally our group was at the front of the line. This is the point where we explained to Eleanor that Mommy can only carry one child up 200+ steps, and that was the child in my belly. Eleanor would be sticking with Daddy for this adventure.

And of course, when I'm off the hook, she doesn't even get carried! She told us that she was going to climb the steps by herself, and that's exactly what she did. Every. Single. One.

Yet, when we finally reach the top, I'm actually not a big fan of heights. The lighthouse didn't seem that intimidating from the group, but the view from the top was still dizzying to me. Especially knowing that my 2-year-old was wandering around, sticking her head between the bars. Luckily, Eleanor actually felt the same way about being up there, so she and I headed down together while Keith hung out and took some pictures.

And of course, when I was in charge of Eleanor on the way down, suddenly she was tired and wanted to be carried. I tried carrying her down one flight of the stairs, but they were an open metal staircase and between my inherent pregnant off-balance and carrying Eleanor, I was convinced I was going to trip and throw her over the railing to her death. By the bottom of one small flight, I was practically hyperventilating.

Keith came to the rescue and carried her down the rest of the stairs. Between the running and the climbing and the panicking, I think it was the most exercise I got the whole week. I enjoyed a bit of sightseeing, but I was also happy to go back to the beach/nap/pool routine, too.

Vacation Kids' Clothes

2011-06-28T07:15:00.000-04:00

When packing for vacation, we bought several sets of matching shorts and t-shirts for Eleanor. Most of her clothes are hand-me-downs, purchased second-hand, or bought by doting grandparents. T-shirts and shorts must suffer significant wear and tear at the hands (and knees) of toddlers, because for the past two years, when I get out the latest crop of used clothing, there's a dearth of these items in the pile. Add that to the fact that most of the grandparent-given clothes are adorable dresses, and you can understand why we had almost no shorts/t-shirts on hand.

What I failed to appreciate during this shopping spree is Eleanor's total disdain for shorts. This girl adores dresses and absolutely refuses to wear shorts. I thought she might be swayed while on vacation—everyone dressed down on vacation, right?—but that was not the case. Even her bathing suit had to resemble a ballerina's tutu instead of simply a bathing suit.

Here's just a few pictures of the dresses she wore throughout the week. By the end of the week, it was very clear what her main souvenir must be: a brand new beach dress. She loves it.

Since returning from vacation, we have convinced her (with much cajoling) to wear shorts on a few occasions, when we were hiking and camping. It's the opposite of my adult life, when I need a really good reason to bother with wearing a dress.

Why does it matter to me so much that she be willing to wear shorts? I don't really know. Most of the time, I don't care. Last week she wore her entire ballet outfit (tutu, tights, and ballet slippers) to music class with my blessing. Coincidentally, that's also the outfit she wore to meet Grandma Helen and Grandpa Chuck at an Art Museum outing a few months ago. She wears her two fancy Easter dresses to go to the playground or to the store.

I can't speak for Keith, but I think I pushed for shorts so much while on vacation because I want Eleanor to be better than I am at going with the flow. I am awful at wanting/needing to stick to my original plans or else. Many of you may already have noticed this tendency. I embrace Eleanor's love of dresses, and I hope she holds onto this preference; she really does look adorable in all of them. But I also would like her to realize that shorts are not the enemy, and if her five favorite dresses are all dirty at the same time (which is more likely than someone who is not the parent of a toddler might think, due to the various viscous substances of our days such as spilled milk, pee, mud, paint, and more), I want her to be able to throw on a pair of shorts without it ruining her whole day. And then she can go back to the dresses tomorrow ... as long as doing a load of laundry was part of Mommy's plan for the day.

Vacation Maternity Clothes

2011-06-27T07:16:00.000-04:00

I knew that, going on a week-long beach vacation at 5 months pregnant, I would have to break down and buy a maternity bathing suit. With Eleanor, I just avoided it. We don't do much swimming and I wasn't feeling more motivated to swim when I was super pregnant, so I just didn't.

That wasn't an option this time around. Even so, I put off buying one as long as I could. And then, of course, it was a disaster. Target carries maternity bathing suits, in theory, but in reality it was already almost mid-June and the stock was seriously depleted. There were a few where I liked the tankini top, but the bottoms just didn't exist. I don't understand. Where are all these women who bought bathing suit bottoms and not tops?!? And at the Target near my house, the maternity clothes are all mixed in with the plus sizes, which pisses me off. I'm gaining this weight for a specific reason, in a very specific part of my body. I'm pregnant, not fat! So I'd find a suit that I thought might work, but then it was plus-sized instead of maternity, and I'd put it back because I knew it wouldn't fit.

After that, I went to two other stores (Old Navy with a Maternity section—very hard to find— and Kohl's) neither of which sold maternity suits. It was Saturday afternoon, and we'd be leaving the following Friday. So I just bought a roomy tankini from Kohl's, a few sizes too big, and called it a day.

You notice that the posted picture is NOT of me in the maternity suit? It didn't work out that well. I had to put sunblock on my belly because the top kept riding up and exposing my belly button.

All of the other maternity clothes I got for the trip were cute. I especially like the flowy, navy blue-and-white striped sundress that is comfortable yet attractive. I've been wearing the rest of the clothes all the time since we got back. But the maternity bathing suit has been pushed into the back of a drawer, only to come out on very rare occasions.

Vacation Destructor

2011-06-26T22:36:00.000-04:00

We've been back from vacation for just over a week now, but I guess my brain has a hard time catching up, because I'm just now blogging about it. And somehow, that short time lag is enough for me to get very nostalgic. Wasn't it great, that time we rented a beach house in the Outer Banks with Keith's extended family?!? That was probably the best vacation we've ever had! It was all sunshine and laughter, and nothing ever went wrong! Eleanor cooperated by always eating what we served, going to the beach or pool without a fight, cheerfully napping on schedule, and she definitely did NOT puke in the car on the way home.

That's not to say the vacation was the complete opposite of perfection. It really was one of the best vacations we've had. BUT we all still had our trying moments, because this is real life, and I find it fascinating how my memory refuses to remember those parts of vacation. Even only a week in the past, the minor irritations and disagreements are like footprints in the sand, being washed away by the tide ....

So anyway, that's not even the main point of my post. Or I guess the main point could fit under the general vacation theme of: Didn't See That Coming. We took a ton of beach toys, and were very excited to build elaborate sand castles with Eleanor. I mean, I understand she's only 2.9 years old, so these weren't going to be works of art. But I thought it would be fun to spend a lot of beach time digging in the sand and using our imagination, instead of always being in the water or sleeping/reading on a beach towel and not paying much attention to the beach itself. We didn't do many beachy vacations when I was a kid, so I didn't have much of a sand castle building phase. I was looking forward to reliving the youth I didn't have.

If any of you have thoughts like these about your toddler, be forewarned: They don't care about the castles. Only about destruction. To Eleanor, the very best thing about sand castles—sand anything—was destroying it. She didn't like the big waves, and she had no interest in building the castles and decorating them with seashells. But the minute I had put together a decent group of building, BAM!, Destructor arrived. With a gleeful grin, she would push, kick, and render obsolete anything we had built.

The mother in me was very happy to see her having such a good time. But the 7-year-old child in me pouted a little bit. After the first morning, I quickly set aside any dreams of careful building and focused on quantity over quality. Then I didn't mind so much when she effectively razed the ephemeral structures mere moments after their erection. She wasn't a good builder, but was an amazingly efficient Destructor, our little cherub!

Heading Back from Vacation

2011-06-18T10:02:00.001-04:00

Continuing on with the email theme this week, we're currently driving back 12 hours from our beach vacation. We spent last week in the Outer Banks, sharing a beach house with Keith's extended family. You can expect lots of pictures and stories next week. I've been kind of paranoid about talking about it while it's been going on, because I read somewhere that it's a bad idea to go on Facebook and say, "I'm going to be away from home for two weeks! Someone could break in and steal all my stuff and I'd have no idea!" So instead, somehow this week I've been focused on email, and I'll relive our vacation next week. In the meantime, enjoy Keith's Shutterboo Weekly Photo Challenge entry for this week's topic of "shadow." You'll notice a theme with his sister's photo:

And our sister-in-law's as well.

Speaking of email, this is the first time I've ever been so "connected" while on vacation. Usually, I'm a big fan of leaving the phone, computer, etc. at home and really getting a break from everything. This time, however, since I'm teaching an online class, that wasn't really an option. Instead, from day one, I've set up my desk away from home in this little kitchen nook and have been checking my email and keeping up with my class every day. I've gone from being anti-technology on vacation to being on the fence. I really like that I've been cleaning out my inbox and replying to messages throughout the week. This means that we won't get home at the end of a long drive, only to collapse on the couch and be confronted with an avalanche of emails&mash;ones I care about and many I don't—that I'll have to sort through. That's a nice feeling.

Add that to the fact that our beach house has a washer and dryer, and we're going to wash as many clothes as possible before the trip back so that's not a massive task when we arrive at home. I'm sure our return will be totally stress-free and the vacation will continue, right? Right?!?

Mistaken Email Identity

2011-06-17T13:07:00.001-04:00

Speaking of email, there's another post I've been meaning to write about email. Keith's email address is a Google account, and it's just his first initial and last name. He's had it since we got married almost 7 years ago.

In the past couple years, however, he's started getting emails meant for other people. Two different women with the same first initial and last name. The first woman kept incorrectly putting in her own email address. So Keith got her airline ticket reservations confirmation email, for example, and some other communications that she might want to see. He tracked her down and forwarded the emails and gently suggested she learn how to type, and I don't think he's gotten anything else from her in a while.

Now there's a new woman on the scene. And we've learned that she is the grown daughter of a very prominent, national political figure. How do we know his? Because, of course, Keith has been getting all sorts of emails meant for her. Emails about planning fundraisers and other events, asking direct questions that need answers. My understanding is that it's not so much the woman's fault as that her cohorts can't be bothered to doublecheck the email address. The first few times it happened, Keith responded to the offender and told them, "I'm not her," but this time, it hasn't gone away. He just keeps getting more emails, including a couple from the prominent political figure himself. There's a tentative fundraising event on his Google calendar, from a mistaken email.

This is so weird for many reasons. First, why are so many people getting her email address wrong? I've never gotten any misdirected, personal emails like this. Now it happens to Keith twice?!?

Plus, if this woman is working as a full-time fundraiser for her father, why is she using her Gmail for all of this official email, anyway? Why are they sending anything to her Gmail in the first place? I'm pretty sure that she's the Director of some nonprofit related to her father's career .... so why is she using Gmail? There's a lot I like about Gmail for my personal account, but I still use my work account for work-related emails.

And finally, why do these people not notice that she's never replying to them? Or sometimes, her real email is on the CC list, as well as Keith's. So now that he's been included on a certain number of emails, are people thinking he needs to be kept in the loop and are intentionally emailing him directly?!?

If you see him mentioned by pundits as a major player in the upcoming Presidential campaign, you'll know why!

Do You Believe in Inbox Zero?

2011-06-15T12:39:00.003-04:00

Why is it that there seems to be two distinct email personalities? And how much does the way a person deals with the email inbox translate to the rest of her life?

I myself am always striving for (but falling short of) Inbox Zero, as described in Getting Things Done. If an email is in my inbox, that means I need to do something about it. Therefore, whenever there's more than 10 emails in my inbox (a totally arbitrary number), it stresses me out. And once it gets upward of 20, the weight of the unreplied-to emails, and the related tasks they entail, hangs heavy on my shoulders. For example even though there's a million things to do to get ready for a trip, I still prioritize emptying my email inbox so I don't waste my vacation time worrying about it. I also archive my old emails very specifically. My Gmail has over 60 labels. When using Outlook, I have folders and subfolders. There's a place for everything, and everything in its place. As soon as possible!

So that's me. On the flipside, there's the inbox red giant contingent. They allow emails to accumulate in their inboxes until it expands to 250 times its normal size. Read emails, unread emails, important emails, junk .. it's all there, sitting in the inbox. They don't use folders or labels to move their emails out of their inboxes or keep track of them in any way. Or, if forced, they might have one or two folders called "2011" or "old emails" and throw everything into there.

Why do we have such disparate views on email maintenance? And can it be translated into other facets of our lives? One might assume a direct correlation between email chaos and chaos at home or at work, but I don't think that's really so clear cut. Many of the closet owners of a red giant inbox have very neat and tidy homes and offices. So why does technological clutter bother some of us, but not others? Is there partly a sense that it's not real because it's just on the screen, so it can be ignored more easily?

As you might see from the blurry image, most of what's cluttering up my inbox at the moment are blog comments that I need to reply to. Excuse me while I take care of that, before they number more than 10! The horror!

Clean Closets ... Messy Kitchen

2011-06-10T15:56:00.003-04:00

I hate how, anytime we try to do "Spring Cleaning," the process never gets completed. A couple months ago, when Keith's parents were visiting we took the opportunity to clean out our closet. (I know! Our lives are so exciting!)

This was when I was first switching over to maternity clothes, and there definitely was NOT room in the closet for all of the regular clothes that don't fit me or I never wear for whatever reason, plus the clothes that usually do fit me, plus the influx of maternity clothes. So all of the too-small, too-old clothes had to go.

It was great! I love cleaning out closets and getting rid of things. And then, actually being able to find clothes that find in the new, much sparser collection! These are all the things I like about a cleaning project.

The problem is, we never actually get around to taking the cast-offs to Goodwill. Is it really that hard? I'm sure it's not, and we're just making it out to be much harder than it should be. So for months, we've had garbage bags of clothes. First they were in the guest bedroom. Then they moved to the kitchen. Two of the 4 bags even made it to the trunk of the car ... and now they're in the garage, because that trunk space was needed.

PLUS, I used Keith's car the other week and stopped by the grocery store. I popped open the trunk to load in the groceries ..... and found that it was stuffed full of crap I had completely forgotten about. From the LAST time we'd cleaned out some items to take to Goodwill. I can't even tell you how long ago that was. I'm pretty sure it was pre-Eleanor, so at least 3 years ago.

This is now on the top of my to-do list for the summer. Clean out rooms ... and actually get rid of the stuff, instead of just sticking it somewhere else!

Kids Change You

2011-06-09T14:29:00.002-04:00

Lately, in the back of my mind as I have "conversations" with Eleanor, I keep thinking, "Before having a child, I never in a million years would have thought these words would be coming out of my mouth."

Gems like:

"How many times have I told you?!? Stop licking the window!"
"Eleanor, stop. That is private, and Strawberry does not belong in a private place." (As Eleanor shoves her little Strawberry Shortcake doll down my shirt and into my bra.)

And many, many more....

After Hours

2011-06-07T20:29:00.003-04:00

As a parent, I made a grave tactical error the other night.

Eleanor has been sleeping in the big girl bed (crib converted to toddler bed) since Christmas time. In the past few months, she's also convinced us to leave the door open at night so she can get out of bed and go to the bathroom. To be fair, overall the ratio of bathroom trips to unnecessary, putting-off-bed trips has so far been in favor of actual bathroom usage.

However, lately the unnecessary trips have been increasing, and we've spent more times going upstairs and sternly sending her back to bed. I've spent a lot of time trying to convince her that we are really, really, really boring after she goes to bed. We don't talk about anything exciting, or watch Sesame Street, or eat ice cream and popsicles. (Those last two do happen, but don't tell her.) "Honestly," I say, "most of the time we just fall asleep on the couch. You're not missing out on anything!" Yet she remains a skeptic.

This Friday, we're leaving for a week-long beach vacation with Keith's extended family in the Outer Banks. The plan is to leave late on Friday and drive through the night. I'm confident that part 1 of the plan (leaving and driving) will happen. I'm not so confident that part 2—Eleanor sleeps most of the way—will. That's the hope, but of course we're preparing an entertainment extravaganza, should it be needed. Lots of books and toys, and particularly books with accompanying audio CDs. She's been big into those lately, which has been fantastic because I can't read in the car for more than 5 words before I get carsick. Eleanor thinks this is a lame excuse, and complains about my ineptitude quite often on any car trip longer than 15 minutes when I'm not driving. Because if I'm not driving, my job is to entertain her. And if I can't read in the car? FAIL.

So, I've also decided to take some of her favorite books and record myself reading the stories, and load the recordings onto the iPod. Brilliant! So I can "read" during the trip, while simultaneously sleeping and avoiding car sickness. A good idea, poorly executed. I decided to try this out the other night, mere minutes after I put her to bed. The inevitable result? She pitter patters to the top of the stairs, and hears me reading fairy tales out loud after she's already in bed. She always KNEW we did fun things after she was in bed, and now she had proof!

I heard Eleanor gasp from the top of the stairs, and could picture her flapping her hands (Eleanor's preferred body language for Excited!) and then she thundered down the stairs. I stopped recording long enough to get her settled on the couch next to me and tell her to be quiet and she was going right to bed after this story. To top it off, my computer froze in the middle of the recording so I lost everything I had done AND I still had to finish the story and send her back up to bed. I tried to explain that I don't really read her stories every night after she goes to bed, but there's no way that she believed me.

And then hours later, when I was absolutely certain she (and Keith) were asleep, I opened to the first page of The Cat in the Hat and whispered to myself,

"The sun did not shine.
It was too wet to play.
So we sat in the house
All that cold, cold wet day..."

Hunkered down in the virtual classroom

2011-06-06T22:08:00.004-04:00

Okay, so I've made it through my first week of online teaching. I was feeling pretty good on Thursday morning. Tired, from many late nights on the computer, but good. I was through with the initial launching of the class phase, and should be into the regular maintenance phase. The workload would become so much more reasonable!

By Thursday night, my feelings of well-being had worn off. We're going on vacation this Friday to the Outer Banks for a week. This will be wonderful, and I'm really looking forward to it ... except last Thursday night, I sat down and took a look at all of the assignments, lectures, quizzes, etc. that I'll have to prepare before we leave. It's even worse than my original To Do list. It was so depressing.

I feel like I'm getting a glimpse of why online classes, particularly during the summer, can be a very bad idea for students. They like the idea of fitting in class on their schedule, around all of their other activities. But do they (or I!) realize how much work it entails when we're unwilling to spend time in the classroom. When we insist on fitting in class around everything else that we'd rather be doing, or need to be doing, it will most likely necessitate late nights and long, working weekends.

I'm going to be fine. I'll complain a lot about how tough my life is, and how much work I have to do, but I will get it done. I'm sure that some of my students will, too. And I'm just as certain that some of them won't. I already have 4 students who have never signed in to the class (keeping in mind that we've already completed 3 assignments, and 1 of 10 weeks in the class). Two others have signed in once, but not actually completed any work. I'm sure there's a few others who may be involved now, but will drop off as the reading and writing piles up and there's so many other activities going on.

Or maybe the students will be like me, and keep fooling themselves into thinking that it's going to get easier any minute. I told myself it would get easier after the class started, and that didn't quite come to pass. But now I'm convinced that, once this week is over and we're on vacation, it will get better. By the end of this week I'll have 5 of the 10 weeks completely finished. And, of the remaining 5 weeks, 3 will be focused on a novel that I've taught in the past and have a lot of material for. So it will all be a breeze for the second half of the semester, right? Right. Let's stick with that, for now!

Entering the Virtual Classroom

2011-05-31T22:28:00.001-04:00

Today is my first day in the virtual classroom, teaching College Composition online. So far, I'm not liking it.

Other professors who have experience teaching online had warned me that a significant portion of the prep work needs to be completed before the semester begins, as opposed to addressing issues all throughout the class. The reason for this is twofold:
1) It's not going to come up in class. Any questions students might have about your writing expectations, how to find information on the site, what the goals are for the class ... these need to be clearly spelled out, in writing, from day one so that students feel comfortable (as much as they can), and like they know what they're getting themselves into. As a professor, I need to try and anticipate students' concerns and address them upfront.

Similarly, I need to provide samples of writing. When I say, "You need to write a comprehensive discussion board post for full credit," what does that even mean?!? As a student, I wouldn't have known how to interpret that. Therefore, since I won't be modeling the behavior during class, I need to demonstrate what I'm looking for before they even start the assignment, so they know what they're working towards.

2) To my mind, it's reasonable to assume that online students are busy people. I think there's a misconception of online students trying to "get away" with less work or less time spent in class. I'm sure that describes some of the online students, but the majority of students I've met who are taking online classes are doing so because they need to fit the classes into their schedules somehow. And between work, family, often second jobs, etc., online is their best option. Many of them say they wish they could be attending class in person, because it's easier to learn and collaborate and it also takes some of the responsibility off their shoulders in terms of remembering assignments and due dates. Showing up to a lecture is a lot easier than figuring out the material for yourself, I think.

So anyway, if you agree with they assumption that online students are busy, then you might also agree with me (and my more experienced contacts) that it's important to give online students longer deadlines, so they can fit in the readings and assignments around everything else. When planning my traditional classes and it went down to the wire (as it usually did), I knew that, at the very least, all I really needed to have is a lesson plan for the first day. Which isn't even a lesson plan; it's going over the syllabus and expectations. Instead, for the online course, I'm trying to have the first two weeks of lectures completed (as narrated PowerPoint presentations, which are taking me forever), as well as the first two weeks of assignments, quizzes and any other activities.

Point being, it's the first day of class and I'm really tired. I've only been getting 5-6 hours of sleep a night for the past week, once I started to realize there was no way I would finish all of this in time. I just barely got up the first lecture (plus a nearly hour-long Intro presentation that I hadn't even thought about before, introducing students to the class and the site). I'm hoping to have Week Two's lesson up by tomorrow, so that I can get on a regular schedule of having the Week 3 lesson posted the first day of Week 2. And now that the class has started, the grading will become a factor, too!

I have been assured that, once the online semester starts and class is moving along, it actually becomes much more manageable. I'm clinging onto this hope, because I definitely need the workload to lighten up a bit. Or else this isn't going to be much of a summer!

Photo Challenge: Anger

2011-05-25T14:13:00.004-04:00

I personally thought "anger" was a tough Photo Challenge.Every time over the past week, when Keith asked for ideas, I just shrugged. As with some of the other prompts, the word felt very personal. Keith said his half-marathon finish time makes him angry. I said that a kitchen sink full of dirty dishes made me angry. (Didn't I just clean the kitchen, like, 5 minutes ago?!?) But it didn't really seem like the anger would come across. Traffic and dealing with idiot drivers always makes me angry, but he can't really have the camera out and shooting the entire drive to work. I mean, I'm sure people do it, but it's probably not the best idea.

So at 8 o'clock Tuesday night, still with no picture, Keith went outside to get some pictures of our backyard. I know I've been complaining about the weather a lot this Spring, but it has seriously been awful. I heard on the radio last week that this has been the rainiest year so far in over 50 years. And it's not just that there's been a lot of rain; it's been spread out so that it's been raining almost every day since mid-March.

Hence, the state of our grass. It's insane. Keith's cut the front grass a few times, but it's been too swampy to cut the back. Plus the backyard is Beckett's squirrel stalking grounds, so it's tall grass intermingled with doggy dirt paths. Very attractive!

This past weekend, Keith finally attempted to cut the backyard .... and the lawnmower broke. Oh, and rain is forecast all this week.

That frustration—plus the annoying fact that neither of us are particularly concerned about having a fantastically manicured lawn, yet there's still a fair amount of effort required just to keep it looking a mite better than constant shagginess—is what Keith was trying to convey with the picture. But I don't really feel like all that anger really came across. He tried taking a few pictures with the lawnmower on it's side, showing the broken part, but I don't know enough about lawnmowers for that picture to even make sense. The first comment he got was, essentially, "Where's the anger?" A few of the other commenters, who live in the rain-soaked region, did identify with the anger and frustration of the situation, but only because they're also living it.

I think, for me, it's a lesson that not ALL pictures have to be universally understood. Maybe you do just need to pick something that makes YOU really, really angry and take a good photo of it. It might inspire anger in others ... or they may just like the composition and find it peaceful and soothing.

10k Playlist 2011 version

2011-05-24T20:07:00.000-04:00

Some people don't need music to motivate themselves to run—particularly 2-year-olds. It's not always music, but I typically want some kind of motivation or distraction along with me, so I'm not constantly thinking about how far I've run, how out of shape I feel, how hard it is to breathe ..... Sometimes it's music, or podcasts, or audiobooks, or the dog. Just something to take my mind off the momentary pain, so I have a better chance of arriving at home feeling somewhat refreshed and glad I ran, instead of just tired.

Here's the music playlist I used while occasionally training for the 5k. I know I call it a 10k playlist; that's just because it's long enough that it could probably get you through a 10k. Some are old songs that have appeared on many of my old playlists, but some are new favorites. All of the links are to the albums at Amazon.

"How You Like Me Now" by The Heavy
"Percussion Gun" by White Rabbits
"Little Lion Man" Mumford & Sons
"The Charm" by Maps & Atlases
"Kick Drum Heart" by The Avett Brothers
"River, Sea, Ocean" by Badly Drawn Boy (This song is on pretty much every running list I have. This whole album, the About a Boy soundtrack, is fantastic for running, I think.)
"Tighten Up" by The Black Keys
"Winter 'o5" by Ra Ra Riot (This song is actually a little slow and melancholy for running, but I wanted a Ra Ra Riot song.)
"Pressure Point" by The Zutons
"Get Over It" by OK Go
"Flathead" by The Fratellis
"Ready to Start" by Arcade Fire
"Eight Days a Week" by the Beatles
"Hands Open" by Snow Patrol
"Need You Around" by The Smoking Popes
"The High Road" by Broken Bells
"Glamorous Glowing" by Cast Spells
"The Rockafeller Skank" by Fatboy Slim
"Bicycle vs. Car" by Bob Schneider
"Anna Sun" by Walk the Moon
"Writing to Reach You" by Travis
"Rolling in the Deep" Adele

Plagiarism Top 10

2011-05-20T07:27:00.001-04:00

I think I briefly mentioned it in passing before, but the Spring semester is over! Finals were last week, and I have a mere two weeks before Summer session starts. (Well, just over one week now.)

Final papers this semester were pretty atrocious, overall. Individual students were fine, but in both my classes I had wayyy too many obviously plagiarized papers. For anyone who's wondering, here's a few ways to tell that a paper is plagiarized.

For example, a C student who relies on words like "things" and "stuff" turns in an essay that starts, "Mary Shelley was cleverly inspired by the theme of an uncontrollable creature wreaking vengeful destruction upon the heads of his monomaniacal scientific creator and his world is sustained in a way that makes the book a powerfully unique presence in English literature." This is a dead giveaway for several reasons:

The last name Shelley is spelled correctly. The majority of the time, the Frankenstein papers, even though we've been studying the book for several weeks, refer to the author (Mary Shelley) as Shelly, Shelby, or something else just off enough to show they don't really care.
Not only was "wreaking" used correctly in the sentence, but it was also spelled correctly.
This sentence is quite long, but it's still grammatically correct. For most of my students (the ones who are in the position of plagiarizing their final papers, anyway), there is no way that a sentence this long wouldn't be a run-on or have random commas or a complete lack of parallelism between parts of the sentence.
Frankenstein is English? Well, I'll be damned. I wonder if I asked the students, how many would give the correct answer to Mary Shelley/Shelly/Shelby's nationality?
Monomaniacal? You couldn't even change it to something a little less obvious?

Another giveaway is when the paper explains to me why Frankenstein is a good example of Gothic literature. Um, we didn't cover this AT ALL in class, and none of the assigned paper topics even come close to asking students to address this topic. So you usually can't even be bothered to show up for class, but now you're going to do extra research outside of class to identify the genre of the work?

Finally, when a student cites a source like Sparknotes or Free Essays.com in the Works Cited, but has never cited these sources within the essay. And yes, this has happened.

I'm not sure that two weeks is enough time for my end-of-the-semester cynicism to wear off.

Cleveland Marathon Events

2011-05-19T07:26:00.002-04:00

As I mentioned the other day, we spent the weekend racing. Running and driving around to catch everyone in their various races.

It started Saturday morning, with my 5k race. Actually, back up a minute; it started on Friday afternoon when we went to the Cleveland Marathon Expo to pick up our race bibs and goodie bags. Until this year, the Cincinnati Flying Pig Marathon is the only big marathon weekend event that we've participated in. Keith has run the half and the full marathon there several times, and I've done the 10k and marathon relay leg. We've always enjoyed the Pig and heard many good things about it; in contrast, we've heard some bad things about the Cleveland Marathon—that the organization isn't the best, and that there's not as many spectators, so the "event" feel isn't really there.

From the Expo, we were less than impressed. You had to know your bib number to pick up your stuff, instead of just going by last name. Who knows their bib number?!? I walked up to the desk and said, "I have no idea what my bib number is." They snootily sent me to a bank of computer around the corner, where there was a line to get to the 10 computers because NO ONE KNOWS THEIR BIB NUMBER. That's just dumb. It seems very convenient for the organizers, but incredibly inconvenient for the racers.

Right, so, back to Saturday morning. My race was at 8 o'clock. We were meeting my parents at the Browns stadium (start and end of the 5k) about 7:30. The night before, Keith and I had joked about what would happen if the storm knocked out our power overnight and our alarms didn't go off.

Fast forward to 6:45—15 minutes after my alarm was supposed to go off. That's right! We actually predicted the future and our power went out. The benefit of that is that we were so busy trying to get to the start line that I didn't have time to be nervous. I really didn't run enough leading up to the race—not enough runs, and not long enough runs. But I finally decided it didn't really matter. It didn't matter how fast (or slowly) I ran, or if I walked. I'm 4.5 months pregnant! All I would have to do is finish the race and it's a win.

So I signed up for the race, and nearly missed it. I didn't have time to be nervous, but I did have time for a weird high school moment. We were hurrying to the race, walking a few blocks behind this group of 2 guys and 1 woman. I ended up chatting with the woman when we ran to the bathroom before the start and found out that the two guys were from my high school, and they graduated a year before I did. I'm sure I hadn't seen them in 15 years, but as soon as she said the names, I recognized them. So weird!

As you'll notice, most of my race recap doesn't actually have anything to do with the race. Because that really wasn't the highlight. I felt good while I ran it, and I ran the whole time except for the water break midway. I sprinted at the end because I still had energy to spare .... and then saw my time. It was terrible. I kept telling myself that it didn't matter, but it was more than 11 minutes per mile. I found it pretty depressing.

So we're skipping ahead to the end of the race. The picture above is because, once my race was done and I found Keith and Eleanor and my parents, Eleanor was very excited about her race. She kept wanting to practice, so we ran back and forth across the field many, many times. I guess it was my cool-down.

Of course, when it was actually Eleanor's race time, she wasn't nearly as excited. She wanted a nap, was scared by all the kids and the clowns, and told me she wasn't going to run. But she was allowed to run while holding my hand so she did complete her 50-yard dash and get a medal, which she was very excited about.

Finally, Keith ran the half-marathon on Sunday morning. He wasn't happy with his time of 1:36, with the just awful pace of 7:23/mile. He was depressed for about a day, and then emailed me with his next half-marathon race.

I'm done racing until after the baby's born. So now I'm looking forward to not paying any attention to how slowly I run anymore. I won't time myself at all. I'll walk when I feel like it. And if I ever have any concerns about the fact that I may have been gone about about 40 minutes for a 2-mile run, I'll just attribute it to Beckett's 50 pee stops.

Happy running!

Finally! Spring Blog Update

2011-05-18T08:28:00.000-04:00

Ever since I finally figured out how to easily personalize the look of my blog (to be fair, it's a LOT easier than it used to be last time I tried, I swear), I told myself I'd try to update it on a regular basis.

The first picture was very winter-oriented, so I figured I'd update it every season. How hard can it be to change it four times a year, right? Except, as I've complained about repeatedly of late, it won't stop raining! I wanted pictures of flowers and new life, but I feel like we're just drowning in day after day of gray, cold rain.

But finally I went back and used a picture Keith took of store-bought flowers my Mom had in her kitchen. For the past few weeks, I've also bought flowers at the grocery store. I need some color and brightness in my world! So if you usually check out the blog through a feed reader, go onto to the actual site for artificial Spring cheer.

Photo Challenge: Tracks

2011-05-17T21:50:00.000-04:00

This week's Photo Challenge is Tracks. It seemed appropriate in that we spent the weekend running races all around Cleveland (more on that later). But actually, running the races made it very difficult for Keith to get any photo shoots in.

And it's STILL raining. This Spring has just been so cold and rainy .... this is the time of year that usually we're desperate to be outside, soaking in the sunshine, reveling in the feel of warm wind on skin. Instead, we're still cooped up inside, next to the fire, watching it rain. Again. Now my biggest fear is that it will switch from this cold, miserable weather straight into hot and humid, miserable weather. It's a very distinct possibility!

Anyway, so Keith stopped by some old railroad tracks today on his way home from work to get his "tracks" shot.

It's a very literal interpretation of the word, but I also think that it's unique, because how many people know of old, unused tracks that they can photograph so closely? Every week, he debates how literal to be with the inspiration word, and how to compose the picture. Sometimes he veers towards abstract, and other weeks he tends to create pictures that tell a story. One of the elements of his photography that I like is the versatility. He's open to trying so many new ways to compose and edit the shots that they all turn out very differently.

Speaking of other pictures, with the end of the semester, I never got around to posting about last week's Photo Challenge, which was Artificial. I think it does a pretty good job of speaking for itself!

Read! (part 2)

2011-05-09T13:50:00.002-04:00

I thought the comments on my post about reading the other day were very interesting, and they brought up some corollary questions of my own.

RevJeremy pointed out, “Unfortunately for there isn't a well paying job that I know of that doesn't require the skills acquired through reading.” I don't know about the “unfortunately” part. I think communication is a good thing! But it is very unfortunate that it's so hard to get students to believe this, and to feel like it's worth investing any of their time in developing these skills. On the other hand, so many people with job experience say the same thing as Jeremy: You must be able to communicate effectively to be good at your job, no matter what that job is. You don't have to love writing just for the sake of writing. But you have to know how to get your ideas across and make sure everyone is on the same page.

If that's so important, and so many employers and employees agree, then why is it so hard to get students on board?

Jeremy also pointed out that I might be drawing a false conclusion, equating the bookstores closing with less reading. He suggests, “It could be a sign that the marketplace is changing and that expensive brick and mortar stores are downsizing because they no longer have the luxury of smashing out their smaller competitors because of their lack of a distribution network.” As a solution, he also offers the idea that “Maybe there is a niche to be filled here, a way to marry social media and literature.”

I think Jeremy brings up a very real shortcoming in my own argument: Do I think that reading only counts if it's ink on paper? What about online literary journals and newspapers and magazines? What about blogs?!? What about Tweets? Do those count?

This question relates to Steve's sympathetic comment, “It is sad that young people don't read. It's impacted the newspaper business. Circulation among the major dailies has dropped in many [cities] here in the USA. This leads to an uninformed citizenry. They have themselves to blame with the leaders they choose.” Can we automatically equate lower newspaper circulation with an uninformed citizenry? Or are those two distinct issues? I will be honest: I never buy newspapers. I get my news online or on the radio. Could I be better informed? Quite probably? Am I uninformed? I wouldn't go that far … but of course, who would be willing to admit to such a state?

A student just turned in a research paper last week about the pros and cons of social media. On the one hand, he said that research shows kids who use social media are more literate and better writers. On the other hand, they're more at risk for ADHD and other ill effects of too much screen time (lack of exercise, etc). So, which is more important?

When I encourage students (or anyone) to read … I have to be honest. I imagine browsing in a bookstore or library, picking out a book that catches my eye, and curling up on the couch with it. Beckett's snuggled at my feet, if I'm really lucky the cat is in my lap, and I'm turning pages, engrossed in the story.

But even though that's my ideal situation, that really isn't my focus. I'm not trying to make everyone read Books. But I do want everyone to see the pleasure of reading, particularly the mind-expanding joys of challenging reading. Reading articles or short stories or weighty tomes that make you really think. That make you re-examine your feelings about life, love, happiness, relationships, responsibility, and more. Texts that clarify your own thoughts, that help you know yourself better and be able to articulate your beliefs.

Literacy—reading and writing—should be about communication. It should be about enjoyment. It should be about provoking thought. My concern is that, right now, many of my students and others don't see literacy as doing any of these things. They just see it as an unwelcome, worthless chore. And that's what concerns me much more than the state of big chain bookstores or newspaper circulation.

Read!

2011-05-05T07:13:00.000-04:00

The news of large bookstore chains selling off numerous stores (Barnes & Noble) or declaring bankruptcy (Borders) is, to me, only an expanding backdrop of what I see all the time on campus. My students don't read. They don't like to read, they don't think it's relevant to their lives, and they feel like people only do it because they're old and not really connected to social media.

Of course, this isn't applicable to every student. But it's true of enough of them to worry me.

On the other hand, in some circles, the popularity of the Twilight series and Harry Potter books is a cause for mockery. How could people read those?!? What happened to all the real books? With existential crises and true self-examination, following by meaningful epiphanies?

In my opinion, just Read! For the most part, I don't care what anyone is reading, as long as they're reading it. I even told my students (who were complaining about how incomprehensible they found Mary Shelley's Frankenstein), during grad school, I was either reading dense literary works and literary criticism .... or romance novels. There wasn't really a whole lot going on in between. When I wasn't required to really focus on and interpret these literary masterpieces, I just wanted some entertainment. Obviously I prefer books that are well-written, but that isn't always a requirement. I just wanted something that would be enjoyable to read, and I would know how it all is going to end, and if I miss a detail here or there, so what? It wasn't an intense, line-by-line breakdown of Shakespeare's tragedies, and it kept me happy.

But now, my students feel like the only things people read are Literature. And Literature is intimidating and hard and to be avoided at all costs. For the most part, they don't have any sense of reading for pleasure.

I have never really understood people who say that they don't like reading. What's not to like? The whole point of it is that you can pick ANYTHING and there will be many, many books about that topic. Just now, I did a keyword search at Amazon.com in the books section for "marmoset" and got 248 results. 138 titles were in the science section; one each in law, Manual of Animal Technology and romance, Nihilistic Foibles. (Sounds titillating!)

When we first met, Keith used to tell me that he was "not a reader." (And yet I'm married to him! Shocking!) Except he did change his mind. It came out that for Keith, like many, many people, he stopped enjoying reading once so much reading became assigned for homework that reading became a chore instead of a pleasure. I think he said it was around fifth or sixth grade. I kept encouraging him to give it another try—not very subtly, I'm sure—and now he probably has more books piled on his nightstand than I do. It was just a matter of finding out, as an adult, what types of reading he enjoyed and focusing on those.

I wish more children, from a very young age, were encouraged to see reading as a pleasurable, fun, independent activity related to their unique interests. Once they get to college, I feel like telling them "You have to read more!" goes in one ear and out the other. Unless their ears are filled with earbuds, in which case it never goes in at all. By the time I see them, they see reading as an archaic activity that's completely out-of-sync with their social media, tech-driven, multi-tasking lifestyles. And I don't know what it would take to convince them otherwise.

If I could assign them readings that they would all enjoy, would that help? But that's not an option; my whole point is that it's about individual taste. But when I generally tell them, "Trust me! You'll like it!" that doesn't matter.

I guess I'm not really sure which bothers me more: people who claim to not like reading, or people who choose to look down on certain reading material, instead of just being happy that kids are reading at all. Both attitudes are a serious cause for concern about the literacy of our society, and reading's future as an enjoyed, beloved pastime of the majority.

Photo Challenge: Red

2011-05-04T14:29:00.002-04:00

Thank goodness for these weekly photo challenges! Some weeks, I have a really hard time blogging. The timeliness of the photo challenges forces me to write something, which always helps with the writer's block. It's a reminder that the hardest part is getting started, so just sit down and do it already!

I've also decided, when dithering over what to write about the photo challenge picture, that I need to stop even trying to address the technical aspects of it. If you want to know how these images are composed and manipulated, mention something in the comments and I'll pressure Keith into adding his own very technical explanation paragraph. But I don't really have any part in that, so I can really just speak to the thoughts and emotions inspired by the pictures.

First of all, on that note, these are actually Eleanor's rain boots and coat from last year. They're too small for her (see the sleeves?), but Keith broke them out just for this picture. Because how much cuter is a picture with her in it, instead of just the accessories? He also had to create the puddle, even thought it's been raining here for what seems like weeks on end. For a few hours on Monday evening, the puddles had dried up. So Keith and Eleanor trooped outside, armed with a pitcher of water to make their own puddle. And—bonus!—not as many worries about how dirty the water is.

This Spring has been very rainy and cold, so I'm very glad that Eleanor enjoys splashing in puddles. And don't worry—she has new rain boots and a jacket!

End of the Workouts

2011-04-29T08:16:00.000-04:00

Yesterday morning, my alarm went off at 4:51am. Like I've done since early January, I hit snooze and rolled over to snuggle with Keith for a few more minutes. When the alarm went off a second time I turned it off and stumbled down the hall to get dressed for my 5:30am Cleveland Fitness Bootcamp workout.

The biggest difference is that yesterday was my last day for bootcamp. When I first started, I was only going to do a month. But I enjoyed it so much, I ended up signing up for 4 months in all. The workouts have been varied and challenging, and I can definitely tell that I've become stronger since I started, particularly my abs and my arms.

In the end, however, the 4:51am alarm has become too much for me. I didn't miss one workout for the first month or so .... and then, due to the pregnancy, I started getting nauseous and fatigued. My attendance suffered. Some weeks I only made one weekday, but made up the other day on the weekend. Other weeks I considered myself lucky to get in one day at all, and I even had at least one week where I didn't make it even once. It was getting very frustrating.

And then, even though I started feeling better, I still had problems getting there. Once my "perfect attendance" was gone, it didn't seem so bad to miss a day here or there. I started missing workouts because I had grading to do the night before and stayed up too late, or because, quite frankly, I just didn't want to get up.

I'm definitely going to miss the workouts. But now I can focus on my running and also hopefully fit in a few strength-training workouts at home. They won't be as challenging, but they also won't be at 5:30am! I'll miss the workouts .... but I'll relish sleeping in next week, I'm sure.

The Royal Wedding

2011-04-27T21:41:00.004-04:00

At first, I scoffed at all this hoopla over the big Royal Wedding on Friday. Seriously, what's the deal?

But in only a week, I've done a 180. I've been trying to catch the morning talk shows, which are all based in London right now, commenting on Kate's potential dresses, honeymoon plans, and possible etiquette gaffes. Today, when Eleanor was napping, I even went to Hulu to watch a Lifetime (Lifetime!) movie called Royal Wedding of a Lifetime: The Future King and Queen. I've been totally sucked up into it, and I'm looking forward to watching all of the coverage on Friday.

I think this has happened for three reasons:

Eleanor is big into the princess phase. I have mixed feelings about this, but at times it does bring back fond memories of when I loved to pretend to be a princess, and read fairy tales, and imagine life in a castle. (Not a real castle, of course—one with fairies and magic and all that.) Just today I told her about the royal wedding on Friday, and she said that she's very excited for them.
It reminds me of the wonderful times I've spent in the UK, both when I volunteered there and since. (Like going to Elaine's wedding in Glasgow, as pictured above. We're definitely not royalty, but it was the one chance I've had to wear a hat like that!) Even just hearing the one British newscaster this morning talking about "taking the mick" makes me smile. I miss the slang, the food, the sites, the history .... and watching the coverage gives me a taste of all that.
I want to root for them! Just like I was disappointed to hear that Susan Sarandon and Tim Robbins split up, I want to believe that it is possible to find true love and stay faithful and in love, despite all of the distractions of fame and fortune. Maybe it seems strange that I feel badly for the rich and famous, but I do think that it would be harder to maintain a good, normal, healthy relationship. I like that Kate currently is not royalty, and that they met and started dating at Uni, just like millions of other couples. I'm a hopeless romantic at heart, and I want to believe that even royalty is looking for the same things as the average person: love, companionship, and understanding.

I do plan on watching as much of the festivities as I can on Friday. (Which probably won't be much, since Eleanor doesn't watch much TV and I'll be chasing after her AND enjoying a playdate at my sister's house.) I hope it's a glorious, sunny day, and they do live happily ever after!

Photo Challenge: Rural

2011-04-26T22:36:00.004-04:00

Keith's greatest challenge this week was actually not finding something rural, but dealing with a recalcitrant, sugar-high toddler.

When he read that this week's Shutterboo Photo Challenge would be "rural," he knew immediately where he would head to take some pictures. Even though we live in an inner-ring suburb of Cleveland, we only have to drive 20 minutes East to find ourselves surrounded by parkland, trees, and rural-ness? Rural-osity? A pastoral landscape.

Keith and Eleanor headed out on Easter Sunday, late morning. It was a very gray and rainy day—so pretty much, like any day around here for the past few weeks. But it wasn't the weather that Eleanor had a problem with. She was in sugar-withdrawal and very tired. We had celebrated Easter with my family on Saturday, and she really was adorable in her dress.

That girl loves to dress up. What do you want to wear? A dress! A fancy dress? Even better! But it's the BEST if there's also tights and fancy shoes and not just one, but TWO ponytails! (I can't call them pigtails because that confuses her.)

She had a wonderful time showing off her dress (and tights/shoes/etc.), and playing with Gavin during the Easter egg hunt and blowing bubbles after dinner. And did I mention the candy? I'm sure I don't even know how much sugar she ate, and I'm equally as certain that I don't want to know because I would be horrified.

So we had a wonderful time. But we got home late and she was, shall we say, reluctant to go to bed. Even though she fell asleep nearly 2 hours later than normal, she still woke up at a normal time on Sunday. She was tired and cranky because she kept asking for things (SUGAR) and we kept saying no. Why can't she have sugar before breakfast? For breakfast? All the time? What about now? How come she never EVER gets to eat chocolate?!?

I got a break while Keith and Eleanor went to take photos. (I was grading, so it wasn't much of a break. But still, there was no whining.) Usually Eleanor delights in accompanying Keith on his photo jaunts. The old schoolhouse he photographed for the challenge "Past" is on our way to the grocery store, and now every time we're approaching it she says, "That's the school Daddy and I took pictures of!"

But sugar monster Eleanor was not having it. She didn't want to get out of the car because it was raining. She then fell asleep for about 15 minutes in the car, which meant she refused to take a real nap when she got home. Keith put her down at a typical naptime of around 12:30, but she didn't fall asleep until after 3. Sugar monster Eleanor is stubborn.

In the end, Keith did manage to crop and color boost his way to a good-looking rural photo, even though he only had about 6 pictures to choose from. And we all learned a valuable lesson about staying away from refined sugar. Of course, having said that, we still have leftover Easter candy in the house that sometimes I think about just throwing away, but of course instead I throw into my mouth every once in a while when I pass by the bowl. I always thought that I kept Eleanor away from sugar for health reasons. I didn't also realize how important Eleanor's lack of sugar is to my sanity!

Music: Walk the Moon

2011-04-21T07:36:00.000-04:00

As I mentioned yesterday, I'm not really being inspired by the muse this week. So instead, I'll direct you to my newest favorite song and video:

I must give credit to Keith, who first told me about this band. A few interesting facts:

The song is named for a professor (several? all?) of the band members had at Kenyon College. I prefer to think that she was an English professor, inspiring a love of literature and an appreciation for the finer points of good writing in all her students.
The band is from Cincinnati.
At one point in the video, the lead singer wanders past several people playing drums. The woman playing a mini-bongo is actually playing a drum from the percussion kit that Keith's sister and brother-in-law gave Eleanor for her birthday last year. There's straps on the side of the drum and she likes to shove it all the way up onto her shoulder, showing us, "I can play and walk all around at the same time!"
They regularly use face paint at shows, which makes me wonder if I'll be going to see them live any time soon....

Enjoy!

Photo Challenge: Simple

2011-04-20T15:21:00.003-04:00

I am a blogger of few words this week. I'm more about the images.

Keith's latest Shutterboo photo challenge is "Simple." Simply, this picture makes me happy. I also find it interesting how much variety is in the photo challenge entries. Everyone's opinion about what is a simple subject or visual composition is so different! Not so simple, after all.

My Favorite Way to Grade

2011-04-19T08:05:00.003-04:00

Especially when it's rainy and cold, like it has been lately. But of course, when not pregnant, there's also a glass of red wine on the table next to me.

I'm getting to the grading part of the semester. Only one month left to go. The rest of the lessons are (mostly) planned out. The assignments are created. Now it's just grade, grade, grade!

Writerly Ambitions

2011-04-15T14:55:00.001-04:00

This is actually an old video from last August. My mother-in-law was visiting (and will be thrilled to be featured on a video, I'm sure. You're welcome, Karen!;), and we were just sitting around while Eleanor snacked on yogurt and blueberries and graham crackers.

She saw a book on the table that I was reading. On the back was a picture of, and blurb about, the author. She asked who it was and I explained it was the person who wrote the book.

Eleanor thought about it and then made her announcement, "I'll be a writer someday!"

I immediately went to grab the little Flip camera, my head filled with visions of showing this video when she is high school valedictorian, college graduate summa cum laude, at her first book signing, for her Nobel Prize acceptance speech ...

Of course, it will be just as adorable even at the Oscars, on Behind the Music, on the campaign trail, or if her Nobel Prize is not for literature but for chemistry or physics. I can be reasonable.

Photo Challenge: Movement

2011-04-13T06:34:00.000-04:00

This week's photo challenge was "movement." As I mentioned yesterday, I think that Keith should just take one picture, alter it constantly, and make his life a whole lot simpler. But like on many issues such as our finances and TV shows, we don't see eye to eye.

Likewise, with nearly all of the subjects, I can think of ways to incorporate Eleanor into the picture. But he tries very hard not to make it all about her. Realistically, a pie chart of our pictures would look like this:

So I think Keith's point is that it's probably good to remember that there are other subjects out there.

BUT, every once in a while, it's hard to resist her photographic charms. And the topic of "movement" is one of those times. With very little prompting, Eleanor happily donned one of her princess dresses and twirled, while Keith took some shots. In very short order, Keith had plenty of movement shots to choose from, and we also have an image that represents the current state of our lives!

Photo Challenge: Circle

2011-04-12T22:21:00.003-04:00

So this was last week's photo challenge, and I'm posting it now so that I'm caught up when I post this week's challenge tomorrow:) In under the wire!

Another week where Keith had a hard time finding the time/an interesting subject, so he ended up taking pictures in the basement, late Tuesday night. I was on the couch upstairs, grading (or avoiding grading, like I am right now!) and heard lots of clanking.

"Are you working out?" I asked when he came upstairs. I would say those weights hadn't been touched in months, but that wasn't entirely true. Beckett, lovely Beckett, had peed on them, and I had just dismantled all of the weights the week before and washed everything. So they had been touched, and weren't covered in dust. Or dog pee. But being used for a workout? Yeah, that hadn't happened for a long time, for either one of us.

He laughed in my face. "I'm taking pictures," he said.

I'm pretty sure that the final image is in color, even though it looks black and white. Just very clean and simple.

Of course, I told him that he's going about this challenge the wrong way. He keeps looking for new subjects and photography techniques to use every week. So time-consuming!

I think that it would be much more challenging to find ONE good subject that can encompass every possible topic for all 52 weeks. Doesn't that sound difficult? But then, the photography is done upfront. And every week, he would have to decide how to crop and digitally rework the same original image so that it screams "circle" or "purple." I think that's really in the true spirit of the challenge.

To Sleep or Not to Sleep?

2011-04-11T22:09:00.003-04:00

What has happened to me?!? Every month, I barely eek out 10 posts ... and then I disappear off the face of the blogging planet until roughly the middle of the next month. At which point I repeat the process all over again. There's always hope for next month .... but I guess I'm saying: Don't be surprised when I have a flurry of posts the last week of April, and go incommunicado for a fortnight in May.

What am I doing while pointedly not blogging? It's hard to say, really. I've been having a serious dilemma lately about how much to sleep. As I reported on March 9 (my first blog post of that month!), I am (on and off again) reading The Happiness Project. It's set up as a 12-month project, with one large goal for the month, and several smaller, more specific goals to help reach the overall goal. So if the overall goal is, say, Boost Energy, the smaller goals will be "Get more sleep" and "Exercise more."

At first I was really excited, and read straight from January into July (I've stopped short of contemplating eternity in the August chapter). But it really did all just seem like a whole lot to do. So I put the book down and focused on one thing. One small goal, not even a larger one: Get more sleep.

It worked really well the first week I focused on it. I decided that getting up at 6 o'clock was a reasonable goal; two days a week I'm up earlier for my bootcamp work-outs, but I'm not going to set my internal clock to wake up at 5am every day. That's just ridiculous! So if I want to be up, well-rested at 6, I tried to follow the guidelines of stopping my day 9 hours before that. Stopping at 9 o'clock would give me a half-hour to sort of close out the day: get ready for bed, clean the kitchen, pack my bag, lay out tomorrow's clothes. Then I would also have a half-hour to decompress and get mentally ready for good night's sleep.

As I said, it worked really well for about a week. Did I mention that I started this on Spring Break? Like the one week where I didn't have to have anything done, absolutely, within the next 24 hours? Since the semester started back up again, it hasn't gone so well.

Does anyone out there feel like they get enough sleep? I want to wake up feeling refreshed. I want to stop choosing between being ready for tomorrow (in terms of my task list: lesson planning, grading, clean house, lunch packed) and getting enough sleep. I want to make it through a day without feeling the need to rely on caffeine and sugar to prop my eyelids open for half of it. I want Eleanor to stop turning around when I'm "reading" (actually falling asleep and mumbling bedtime stories) and saying, "Mommy! Wake up!" Or, when I'm already falling asleep again at 8 o'clock in the morning, she pokes me and says, "Stop sleeping! You already slept!"

I remember a year or so ago, reading a short advice column in a fitness magazine. The reader's question was a very familiar one: I work out in the mornings, but I don't always get to bed on time. If I have to choose between 1) only 6 hours sleep and get a good morning workout, or 2) get a full night's sleep and skip the workout, what should I do?

I feel like I'm faced with this decision all the time. And I was so incredibly pissed at the columnist's answer; I can still feel my irritation level rising today, just thinking of it. Essentially, the columnist said, "Both working out and sleep are important. So you should get a full night's sleep AND work out."

Um, when was that an option?!? Do you have a house? A job? Kids? Pets? This is not an AND situation. This is strictly either/or. And most of the time lately, I've been choosing sleep. I'm trying to blame it on the pregnancy, but I can choose sleep and go to bed a little earlier ... and then still feel the need to take 2 naps the next day, like I did on Saturday.

Alright, this rant is getting a little long-winded, so I'm going to shut it down. I should already be in bed, asleep, anyway, since I have bootcamp at 5:30am tomorrow morning. So now I'm wondering: sleep? workout? Just stay up all night, trying to get ahead, and live on caffeine and sugar tomorrow?!?

*The picture is from just a couple of weeks after Eleanor was born (August 2008). It's much harder to get sleepy pictures of her these days!

I'm Pregnant! (It's FB official even)

2011-03-31T19:00:00.000-04:00

So this is the first time I've had big news to share since I joined Facebook, and I was a little unclear on the etiquette. How long do we wait after informing immediate family and some friends of the news? Is there a grace period? Is it like the 3-5 days of waiting like calling for a date after getting someone's number?

In the end, it was at least partially dictated by the fact that the Big Sister shirt from Cafe Press arrived in the mail today. I'm sure there's people I should have informed before I told all of Facebook. So, if that's you: I'm sorry. I just don't have a lot of time/energy these days.

Eleanor absolutely refused to let Keith take her picture, until he bribed her with a Reese's peanut butter cup egg (yum). Then she was all smiles! But really, she does seem quite excited about the prospect of being a big sister. She talks to "Little Sib" (since we're not planning on finding out the gender), and rubs my belly every night, telling Little Sib goodnight and that she loves him/her.

I'm also excited, but very intimidated. Being a mother of one has been a challenge. But two?!? I just don't know about that. When I think about how much fun it will be to have two kids .... the scene I imagine always takes place in about 5-7 years, when the kids are potty-trained, reading, and as excited about visiting museums and historical places as I am! (Dream on, all the experienced parents smirk.) I have to confess: I really don't think my strength as a mother is taking care of a newborn. At least the first time around, I found it to be incredibly stressful, and I don't deal well with sleep deprivation. That pretty much says it all about the first 3 months!

But I suppose I'm getting off track here. We're all very excited. Little Sib is due to arrive in early October, which seems far off or just around the corner, depending on my mood. I know that Eleanor will be a wonderful big sister, and I'm sure that all of my fears will be allayed as soon as we meet this amazing child.