Keeping Up with the Cases

Baptism, Orthodox Style

2012-02-06T21:47:00.001-06:00

Yesterday the Raisin Baby got baptized. As Eastern Orthodox Christians, we were pretty excited, since baptism is a Big Huge Deal (read: a sacrament) and also, seeing a fat, naked baby greased in oil get dunked in water? I mean, how often do you get to witness this? I tell you what, it's something worth seeing.

Before we converted we were staunch supporters of infant baptism, so all of our kids have been baptized as infants. But H was the first of our children to be baptized in the Orthodox Church. Orthodox tend to do everything with much fanfare, hooplah, and incense, which makes anything that much more fabulous and intense and, you know, grave. This service has been performed in the same manner for centuries; it's not something you can take lightly.

(Note: If you are unfamiliar with infant baptism in general, I'd suggest reading this for a better understanding of just why we do it in the Orthodox Church. If you're interested in the specifics of the sacrament in our church, go here for the complete service. 25 points to Gryffindor if you can find the exorcism!)

We got to church pretty early, considering that not only was there a baptism, but also our church was worshiping upstairs in the newly renovated sanctuary for the first time in months after a devastating fire. Since the fire last summer we've been a catacomb church, meeting in our dark and smelly basement (which is next on the list for renovation), so we knew there would probably be a crowd present to celebrate the beautiful new house of worship.

After liturgy (the service) we proceeded straight into the baptism. H's godparents, our friends Mike and Priscilla, stood with him and took care of him for the entire service. Since H isn't old enough to speak for himself, his godparents stood with him and spoke for him. Their relationship to H and his siblings, as they are godparents for all of our children, isn't just symbolic. It's a serious thing to agree to be a godparent.

Just so you know, The Raisin was completely chill and adorbs. And I believe some credit for this should go to his mother, who made sure he had napped and been fed before he was baptized. You're welcome.

After some renouncing of satan and other awesome stuff (you know, typical things), H got nekkid and things got real. Our priest blessed the oil and then dabbed it on H in specific spots, like his ears, his mouth, his feet, and other symbolic places.

Feet, so he can possibly have the athletic prowess his parents never possessed? No, probably not.

Here we are, standing and witnessing (you stand a lot in our church), with my sister, brother-in-law, and nephew framed nicely in the background.

Mike then took a bunch of oil and rubbed it allllll over H. This part is simultaneously awesome and hilarious to me. Awesome because, heck yes, blessed oil all over that naked baby! The Holy Spirit is up in here! Hilarious because oh geez, who had this idea originally, because a greased up, naked baby? Getting dipped in a large basin of water by a priest with about six thousand other things going on? Lots of candles? Disaster waiting to happen.

I suppose we just have faith in the preservation of the Lord at this point.

Aaannnddd...baptized!

When Father was about the dunk the baby, I happened to glance a little to my left, close to the table, just past the front pew. Tons of people were crowded, craning for a better look, and only one of them was a family member. I glanced around, only to realize that everyone was crowded and craning. Pews were the only things stopping those from the second row back from rushing the front, and nothing was standing in the way of those in the front. I got giddy. Here we were, experiencing this wonderful and beautiful sacrament, experiencing it for our son and for our Savior, and everyone else in that church was just as excited and blessed as we were. Everyone else wanted to kiss that baby, too. (And believe me, they did later. They're all a bunch of Greeks, after all.)

Immediately following the baptism is chrismation, which is essentially confirmation. Whoo, baby, welcome to the Church! Try not to be too excited.

After Mike and Priscilla hustled him away for a few minutes to get dried and dressed in white, they came back up front for the tonsuring, in which Father cuts a small bit of hair as the infant's first offering. H doesn't have much hair, so this was slightly nerve-wracking. Scissors!

Then everyone circles the Font three times while Father says some prayers and censes everyone with incense. Priscilla had to carry a slippery baby, a sheet, and a lit candle. I remember doing this when we took part in the baptism of our goddaughter, and I remember that I was terrified at this moment. Priscilla handled it with grace and aplomb and never once wavered in her confidence. Plus H just sunk into her and very quietly watched everything.

We're almost done! Before Communion, the godparents fasten an Orthodox cross necklace, a gift, onto the baby's neck. Mike's hands were slippery and it took some doing. They are all so cute, no?

Then his First Communion. He took it like the Christian he is.

And...that was it. He was baptized, everyone convened to offer congratulations, many hugs were given and received, and all in all, we had a glorious morning.

Here I am, telling my mother-in-law just how it's done. It being...something, I don't know, I'm always talking.

In true Orthodox fashion, we celebrated with cake and coffee downstairs, and in true Christine fashion, I failed to get any pictures of it. Or any pictures of our many dear friends and family members who came and bore witness and helped pack out our sanctuary. Thanks to you all, and thanks be to God for this wonderful, precious life and the blessing to be a part of His Church.

(Thanks also to my father-in-law for the pictures.)

Baby + Serger = Awesome

2012-02-02T16:15:00.001-06:00

To begin, PICTURES OF FAT BABY IN A BATHTUB!!!

Which are really the best kind of pictures, you know? But only when they are involving my baby, so I understand if you're all, "Ho-hum, fat baby in tub, I've got a couple of those myself, MOVING ON." Whatever, hater. I bet your baby isn't this pale and red-headed and BRILLIANT. So there.

But seriously, he's just SO FAT and LONG. I am struggling to keep him in 9 month clothing because, as anyone who has ever dressed children before knows, it is a fact that clothing manufacturers decide that when babies get to the 12 month size, suddenly they are into STYLE and COORDINATING OUTFITS instead of, I don't know, comfort and mobility. My child isn't even 4 months old yet. It's (albeit a freakishly warm) February in northern Illinois. He needs to just be cocooned in rompers and sleepers until he's ready to spread his wings and wiggle his fat thighs around this house, which won't be for awhile. But because he is ridiculously long and squishy, he is fitting into 12 month clothing and suddenly I can only find onesie-uncomfortable pants-sweatshirt combinations. Or fussy overall-onesie-hooded sweater. Whaaa? Gurrrl. His mother doesn't even wanna wear that. We are into comfort. Corduroy tends to chafe our cold, wobbly thighs. Make a note, clothing manufacturers.

Can we also talk about how he is grabbing toys and flat-out communicating and also grabbing his feet??? Today I put him in a Bumbo seat with a tray and toys and he went to town with those toys. I experience 10 million heartbreaks a day.

I had The Professor take these tub photos because, as I said, I am not very good at remembering to take pictures this time around (there are so many children, Lord, there are so many) and as I was bathing him last night I realized, hey!, we have no embarrassing tub photos of H! I explained to my husband that said photos are crucial to his development; otherwise, what to show future girlfriends? I thoughtfully covered his privates with a cloth and his dad said these future girlfriends would probably make fun of him more for that (the covered privates) than anything else. Whatever. I'm protecting his dignity on the internet.

(The Professor, imitating future girlfriends: "Ha ha, when you were a baby you had such a little weenie!")

Moving on!

Behold, my birthday gift:

Please imagine the heavens parting and angels singing and also confetti.

If you're scratching your head, then please know that this is a serger. If you don't know what that is, allow me to google that for you. This is, specifically, the Bernina (!) serger that my grandmother bought several years ago and, for all intents and purposes, never used, as she was happy with her Bernina (!) sewing machine. She passed it on to me a year or so ago, and it's needed a new part and some maintenance and has continued to not get used. I told my husband that this, working and alive, was all I wanted for my birthday, and he rallied the troops and came through. If you were a part of the group who made this possible: Thank you. Thank you so much. I am so excited.

Now I must teach myself how to thread it and then use it and, while I am excited, I am also plenty nervous. I mean, using a serger means I maybe have an inkling of what I'm doing, right? And, as I've stated repeatedly, I taught myself how to sew from very little beginner knowledge. Allow me to be a little self-conscious.

I'm off to contemplate my fat baby and my working serger now. At the same time. Don't be jealous.

Birthday Proof

2012-01-30T11:30:00.000-06:00

Today is my birthday. I do not mention this in order to elicit lots of birthday wishes; believe me, my dear friends and family are pulling through for me on what could be a pretty gray day. (Fact: My birthday falls at the end of the ugliest month of the year, at least for us Midwesterners. Fact the Second: Often my birthday falls on the same day as the Super Bowl. Fact the Third: I am turning 29. Fact the Fourth: Today I am at home with four sick kids. Many potentially depressing facts to ponder.)

Anyway! I'm posting to offer proof that a) I exist, and b) I actually did a few things for my big day, since when you're a mom, you often get lost in the shuffle that is Life, and sometimes you're not at all bothered by this. But a birthday is a fun thing, especially during the ugliest month of the year.

Proof that The Professor, Master H (our parasite), and I went on a date out of town (!) this weekend, with secondary proof that I did the unthinkable and curled my hair:

I know some supercilious person will ask, so let me just nip it in the bud:
The car was turned off, and I was only holding him in the lap because
he had just finished having a meal. He rides in a car seat. Duh.

Also proof that my baby has bug eyes.

Proof that in addition to curling my hair, I also painted my nails. I haven't painted my nails in YEARS, and just to make the unthinkableness of this all complete, I chose a very non-traditional purple-gray color. Proof that I smile like a maniac and that the baby's bug eyes come naturally:

No proof that my husband was actually there.

Proof that this year, for my birthday dinner (celebrated last night), I forewent (I think this is a word) the traditional request of chili dogs and grew up about 23 years overnight by asking for quiche, salad, and fancy muffins. Proof that my mom is cute:

Proof that my husband, though absent for the day, is awesome at keeping the birthday spirit alive. He has pasted fun, goofy notes throughout the house outlining just what my day entails this year. So far I know I am getting my fully refurbished and WORKING Bernina serger later this week (HUGE YAYS HERE), as well as cold hard cash, lunch, and possibly other things? Proof that he is trying to kill me, as I found this note taped up in the shower:

Sufficiently freaking out exhausted, naked housewives: UR DOIN IT RITE.

So that's the proof I have, and now I must dash on this my big day, as the baby is also freaking out and none of us have brushed our teeth and I still have some lovely Starbucks coffee from the breakfast my daddy brought by this morning.

Happy normal late January day, everyone! It's a pretty great one.

Really Cool (Droolly) Dude

2012-01-15T10:47:00.000-06:00

You know how it iswhen you're this really cool dude and you have this really cool throne of your own and your mom goes and puts a huge poncho bib on you because, embarrassingly enough, you can't stop drooling and if she doesn't constantly change your poncho bibs you'll undergo five wardrobe changes in a day?

I mean, Geez, Mom. You just don't get cool.

Oh No, Another Bathroom Update

2012-01-06T16:37:00.000-06:00

Hey, y'all! We're slowly emerging from the cave that is Christmas Break and blinking in the blinding light of Reality, and while it's nice to wave bye-bye to hampers of calorie-laden baked goods and get back to eating salads and going to bed on time, we're going to miss our fabulously stomach flu-free holiday.

Now if you've spent much time keeping up with us Cases (Note: I had this blog before the Kardashians' reality show came along. You heard it here, folks.), you'll have realized that we operate on the academic calender and seize said calender's breaks as opportunities to Get Things Done. (That's how it looks on the family calender: big arrow across a swathe of days labeled 'Getting Things Done.' Or if we're feeling particularly fierce, 'Getting S*** Done.' Sorry, but sometimes we're fierce.) Two years ago we did our full bathroom. Last year The Professor tiled our small entryway. This year, we are tackling the upstairs half bath.

This time around we're having to do the bath in small pieces, as we have money set aside. Mainly we're going for functionality for this first stage, as the bathroom has been ripped up for a long time and we're tired of little boys missing the toilet and soaking the backerboard. Gross, yes.

Oh, in case you need a visual, here's how the bathroom looked when we first moved in:

See this post (still one of my most popular) for the gritty details. Basically we were dealing with crappy linoleum flooring and a crappy vinyl wainscoting that made me see red. For some reason this bathroom and its junky fixtures (and precarious sink) made me ridiculously angry, and I asked The Professor to tear off the wall covering and rip out the linoleum about a year and a half ago. I'm not really sure why he didn't make me wait until we were ready to work on it; usually he is really good at telling me to knock it off and suck it up. Whatever the reason, he complied, and we were left with floorboards (which he quickly covered with backerboard) and walls that looked like this:

So obviously the walls had originally been covered in tile (which I realize was popular for a time, but still, it makes NO SENSE, there is NO SHOWER up here), and the resulting gluey mess made us go OHNO because geez, what do you do with that? We debated pulling down the plaster walls, but we've done that before, and it's not something you want to do frivolously. Basically it's something you want to avoid at all costs, which is probably why the crappy vinyl wainscoting was there at all.

We didn't have to make a decision right away, since shortly after The Professor ripped everything up, he started graduate school, and all home renovations were put on hold as we adjusted to a new income level. We've got a good handle on said income now, and decided (after I made a fuss after cleaning up one pee puddle too many) to finally get a move-on with this bath.

(Note: If you and your husband have several small children and you stay at home and he turns to you one day and says, "Honey, I think I'd like to go back to graduate school for several years, which will mean we'll all have to live on a graduate student's stipend...again," you should slap him. I mean, seriously, support him in everything and help him realize his dreams, especially if they are pivotal to his chosen career, but really, he probably needs a good slap just to make sure his head is truly clear.)

We decided, for this first stage, to a) tile the floor, b) find a new sink, and c) put up beadboard wainscoting on the wall behind the toilet and sink. Imagine my delight at the prospect of TILE, real actual TILE, after living with backerboard flooring for so long. And at this point in the homeownership game, The Professor is an expert at tiling. Here, let me show you:

Pretty dang awesome, huh? That's grouted and everything. He is really pleased with his work, and he should be; it looks professional. We wanted to keep with the black-and-white theme that we started with the downstairs bathroom but change it up a bit, and 4" X 4" glossy tiles were our choice. They work great in this small space without being overwhelming and keep with the "old hotel elegance" theme I'm trying to convey with our bathrooms.

Okay, so now we needed a sink. Our old pedestal sink was a poorly-made porcelain death trap that wasn't heavy enough to stay stable. The Professor had built a crude back brace for it, but there was still the very real possibility that our kids could pull the sink onto themselves. We liked the idea of a pedestal sink (we are still in love with The Sink of Our Dreams) and, as always, preferred to find an old antique constructed of quality materials as opposed to a new sink straight off the boat from China. Whatever we found, it needed to be heavy, yet small enough to fit in a confined space without dominating a little half bath.

We found our downstairs sink at a local antique store, and we did find another last weekend at the same store. Unfortunately, antique stores know what they have, and the dealer was asking $180 for it, cracked soap dish and all. $180 is still a lot less than you'll pay for a sink and faucet at, say, Lowe's, but my motto is "Why live in Chicagoland if you're not going to take advantage of the high population and subsequently large amount of Sheer Awesome?" That is to say, I always have confidence I will find just what I need simply by being patient and casting my net just a leetle farther north, to the city. A willingness to drive also helps.
My motto once again came through. We found an antique cast iron pedestal sink, similar to our first, for $45 on Craigslist. Here it is, waiting in our basement until the day my husband can recruit some poor fool to help him move it upstairs:

Sure, we'll have to have a plumber do a custom hook-up, due to the antique nature of the plumbing. Sure, we'll have to keep the hot water disconnected, since there's no hot/cold mix on this old faucet and we don't want our kids getting their hands burned. But hey. This sink rocks in every way, and we're pretty stoked to have scored it for so cheap. At this point we're pretty wise to the ways of cast iron sinks, and this is a gem. Bonus: the faucets are made by Chicago Faucet, and the sink itself was original to a sweet old brownstone in Chicago. (Yes, we drove to the city for a dirty old sink. Yes, this is our idea of fun.)

So all that's left in this leg of the remodel is putting up beadboard on the back wall. I'll keep you updated as we improve this bathroom, bit by bit. No telling how long it will take to finish completely, but as long as we can do a little at a time, it shouldn't take too long.

Now please praise my husband and his abilities in the comments. Thank you. May your days be merry and bright, and may all your dirty old cast iron sinks be white and free of chipped enamel.

Christmas Case Style

2011-12-23T16:03:00.002-06:00

We've been busy, as I'm sure many of you have, baking, wrapping, drinking hot cocoa, and keeping secrets from one another. Miraculously we have avoided a Case Pukefest 2011. We haven't been so lucky in previous years (oh man, last year was bad), and as hokey as it sounds, we are calling it a Christmas miracle and giving all glory to Jesus. J contracted a drippy cough about a week ago, and we braced for the worst, but it petered out after just a few days and didn't spread to anyone else. This is HUGE news around here, as I don't think this (someone getting sick and then failing to spread the love) has ever happened before. I'm probably jinxing myself just telling y'all about it.

Anyway! Enough writing about not being sick. We're well and good and happy and snug in our little home. Baby H is growing out of six month clothing at two months old, and I'm looking at a 90% handmade Christmas without any eleventh-hour projects on the docket. The older kids are EXCITED SO VERY EXCITED about Santa coming to visit, although B has informed me that he does not, under any circumstances, want to actually meet Santa. When told that Santa only visits once kids are asleep, he experienced immediate relief from stranger danger. So. To our kids, Santa is apparently a rather creepy benevolent being. What is his motive, anyway?

I'll share with you the photo we're including in our Christmas cards (which are getting addressed tomorrow, HAHAHA, I am over it):

Merriest of Christmases, guys. We're so excited to greet our Savior, our King, who is borne of the Virgin Mary and came to save our souls!

Desserts That Will Help You Achieve True Happiness

2011-12-10T14:11:00.001-06:00

So as I sit here nursing an infant who had some shots yesterday and has been in need of extra TLC ever since (Although seriously, infant, you get almost all the TLC around here. My husband has taken to smelling my discarded shirts just to pretend he's close to me. Welcome to new babyhood!), I think sharing some seriously awesome sweets recipes we've tried out lately is in order.

Please read this post then immediately run to the grocery store for the ingredients and then promptly return home to make everything at the same time. You'll gain 10 pounds and will be so happy that you did. Amen.

One thing you should know before continuing is that I do not cut fat by substituing fake crap for the real live awesome crap. (That didn't sound good. Moving on.) I go through lots of butter. I skip shortening and vegetable oil whenever possible. When something calls for heavy cream or whole milk or sugar, I use heavy cream, whole milk, or sugar. Look. We eat really well around here. Really healthfully. Heathily. Whatever. My husband went grocery shopping for us this week and came back with this declaration: My list included absolutely nothing processed or prepackaged, and I tried to stay as seasonal as possible with my produce. This is just what we do. So when I want to make some cookies for an occasional treat, I make them and I don't apologize for their fat content. For heaven's sake, you want the cookies to be good, don't you? I mean, you don't eat cookies to lose weight. You eat cookies because you want to eat cookies.

[Note: A business opened in town recently called 'Dr. Donuts' and it serves low-fat and no-fat donuts. My mind is blown at the stupidity of this concept.]

First up: Dana's pumpkin chocolate chip cookies.

from MADE

These are the bomb-dot-com, and I would encourage you to slowly back away from the shortening and use real live butter. Not only is shortening naaasty, but the butter makes it taste better, honest john. I've done it both ways, so I know. If you make it with butter and have the time, stick the dough in the fridge for a little while to prevent spreading in the oven. I've done it with butter without chilling and had good results too, so whatev. Double the recipe because they go fast. And definitely make the icing. The cookies are good on their own, but they're not super sweet, and the icing is a good complement.

Just so you know: these go from awesome to HOLY CARP!!!1! if you use dark chocolate chunks instead of plain ole semi-sweet chips. This is The Professor's discovery. He is a god.

Next: More cookies, this time in the form of biscotti. I am a huge fan of plain, no-frills cookies: shortbread (that's my favorite Girl Scout cookie, no joke), biscotti, butter cookies, etc. I don't like a cookie recipe where SWEET is the only thing it has going for it. I'd rather have a slightly sweet, buttery rich cookie and a strong cup of coffee over oodles of chocolate and sugar any day. Something made me have a hankering for biscotti the other day, and I found this recipe, which ended up being a winner. Big winner, folks, and really simple to put together. This is a very basic biscotti recipe that can go a million different directions with only a little imagination. Anise doesn't really float my boat, so I substituted with some vanilla and almond extracts. I also didn't let the baked rolls of dough cool before cutting them; wanting to avoid lots of crumbles, I just took a pizza cutter and sliced the cookies straight out of the oven. Oh, and this is one of those recipes where you should stick with vegetable/canola oil. Sorry, all butter enthusiasts (myself included), but oil is where it's at.

So to serve with the plain biscotti the other night, I decided to make some hot chocolate. I told my family the other day that trying out lots of hot chocolate recipes is going to get me through these dismal winter days, and my mom quipped, "Well if Christine ends up gaining 50 pounds in a couple months, we'll know why." Ha. She's right though, I might need to start using skim milk.

from Savory Sweet Life

Anyway, the hot chocolate. I like Starbuck's salted caramel mochas, so I settled on this copycat recipe. And I did every bit of it from scratch, and it was divine. I recommend you take the time to do the same. The caramel. The chocolate ganache. Doooo it, you'll experience new heights of hot chocolate ecstasy. For the ganache I cut up bars of sweet dark chocolate and the end result may have slapped me in the face, it was so strong.

And folks. Do not, as she suggests, bust out the whipped cream in a can. Please. If you're going to go to this much effort, just take a few extra minutes and whip up some real cream with some real sugar. There is no telling what is in the Redi Whip can. (True fact: Packaged whipped cream is banned from our home. Always has been, always will be, world without end, amen. I am a whipped cream snob.) Also, I have completely switched to turbinado sugar in place of white granulated sugar, and it works great for all these recipes.

Those are my recent discoveries in desserts, and I hope you get a chance to make one or all of them and experience true happiness. I'm not saying true happiness isn't possible without these desserts; I'm just saying it's probably pretty difficult to achieve.

Now I'm off to suck down the last of the hot chocolate and complain to anyone who will listen how unfortunate it is that the ice outside prevents me from running and burning off the calories.

How very, very unfortunate.

So J. Crew

2011-12-05T10:22:00.001-06:00

We took some photos for our family Christmas card yesterday, and J and B were in rare cooperative form and the lighting was good, meaning that we got some darling shots of them.

Note: I cannot describe how thrilled and superior I feel to be able to casually say "we took some photos for our family Christmas card." Because you guys. I honestly don't know if I've sent out cards since we've had kids. I remember a card featuring The Professor and me with our pets (isn't that just like goo-goo-eyed newlyweds?), but I haven't had the time or inclination since. Plus I have a blog, so it all seems repetitive.

Repetitive or not, I'm sharing my two sweet older redheads' pictures with you here. We used one of these shots for our card, but I'll keep that a secret. For now, revel in the glory that is their combined attempt to land J. Crew modeling contracts.

You should know that immediately after I declared them done, they ripped off their ties and changed into clothing more conducive to epic light saber battles.

No-Nap Wonder Baby

2011-11-30T14:33:00.001-06:00

This little hooliganis the reason I'm subsisting on 4 hours of sleep.

According to the pediatrician, a baby of his age should be sleeping in 5-7 hour stretches at night.

HAHAHAHAHA Hooooo boy, Mr. Doctor, that is a funny one.

We all pummel our fists and drool in response to your hilarious joke.

I reallyreallyreally would like, nay need, him to be more like this:

Especially considering that, miracle of miracles, his older brothers and sister are zonked out upstairs.

But instead, I get this:

Okay, okay, I'll take him. The double chin and gaze of adoration have convinced me.

Now please sleep.

Love, Mama.

Hello, I am typing this while also sleeping. Also: Baby armpit rolls.

2011-11-28T13:48:00.001-06:00

This is one of those hi-I'm-still-here, sorry-no-photos posts that occasionally pop up on the blog of a busy mama. I find myself passing up blogging opportunities more and more lately, mainly because I am tired and need my hair washed more than I do my blog updated, but also because more often I find myself passing on blogging opportunities because, hey, just enjoying my kids and not running to blog about it seems the most important. You know?

(You can call this laziness. That's okay. Hey, I got my hair washed today. So there.)

All are thriving, including Mr. Raisin, who is a Monster Baby. We're all rather shocked at his size, since The Professor and I have, in times previous, only produced skinny, chicken-legged babies, and don't really know what to do with one who has, you know, armpit rolls. Honestly, how does fat accumulate in one's armpits? Well, it does. For the Raisin, at least. He's a baby to be taken seriously. With armpit rolls.

We enjoyed our Thanksgiving break (Yes, break. We have been on the academic calender since we were 5 years of age and it doesn't seem like it will ever stop. Woot.) in Michigan with The Professor's family, and are now back home to hunker down for both the Christmas season and winter. Winter promises to be extra nasty this year, and we are already stockpiling on non-perishable food items and sidewalk salt in preparation. In related news, did I tell you that a couple weeks ago we gave up Netflix in favor of insurance for our home's sewer line? In conclusion, we are adults.

The tree is up, we're scheduled to meet Santa on Thursday, and I'm busy ordering and making presents. As is the norm, all gifts will be either used or hand-made, and the "hand-made" portion tends to land in my lap, meaning I will be sewing/knitting/painting non-stop until December 24th. I'd love to show you some of my creations, but my giftees read here, so you'll have to wait, okay? Just remind me in case I forget.

Also. Please remind me to wash my hair on occasion.

That is all. Hopefully photos of armpit rolls will accompany my next post.

Please remind me.

Reading. Ballyhoo.

2011-11-14T17:43:00.001-06:00

I have big thingsto report regarding my big boys (going to have to get used to qualifying just which boys I'm talking about now, since I have so many of them on my hands), and I think said report is best accompanied by cute pictures of them playing outside last week, before late fall set in and we all retreated indoors:

Oh, man, those blue eyes are going to SLAY some lucky young ladies in the future.

Speaking of lucky young ladies: a couple of them are going to catch some darling young men with very developed senses of humor and also large vocabularies in the future. Why do I make such a bold statement? Well.

My sons can read. With a lot of help from Calvin and Hobbes.

Okay, first, they can read. They are four, and they are, quite literally, reading. With very little help. And, I should add, without any formal reading instruction. Really, I promise. All we've done is create a home environment of readreadread allthetimeallthetimeallthetime, and this has very organically led to two little boys who just started reading one day. It's that simple.

If you've been in our home, then you know how immediately apparent our household's love of books is. We are surrounded by them at all times, and our children see reading modeled by their parents, who themselves find it very difficult to abide by the no-books-at-dinner rule that was established early in the marriage. The Professor and I had our first date at Barnes and Noble, where we hung out in the children's section, reminiscing about important books of our childhood and experiencing a dawning comprehension that maybe, just maybe, our souls spoke to one another. We read to our children often, and they are also surrounded by an impressive little library of their own. There is no television to distract us on these long winter nights; instead, we usually read. (Or have light saber battles.) Also important, in my opinion, is the fact that our grown-up books (within reason) are not off limits to them. So if they want to reach for the atlas or the Star Wars art encyclopedia or the (child-appropriate) graphic novels, then they can, as long as they treat them respectfully. And we will all read them together.

This is how they learned. All summer long they asked questions about letters, about how words sounded, about when letters were silent or hard or soft or what-have-you. We read signs in the car, at the store, everywhere. I repeated grammar and pronunciation and punctuation rules over and over, and they learned to accept the weirdness of English.

And then one day they weren't asking questions. They were sitting down, sounding out the words, and they didn't need much of our help.

Excuse me if I'm bragging. I realize they are not the first four-year-olds to read, and I realize that they are, in many ways, products of a privileged home with educated parents. But still. They are reading. Without the formal instruction that one normally associates with learning to read. Without a classroom. Without Dick and Jane.

J has taken this one step further and is successfully writing words, again without any instruction. I haven't done any work with them on letters, and then one day J was adding words to his coloring pages and deciding whether he is left- or right-handed and just which way a "J" is supposed to face. His brother is just behind him, puzzling out the difficult upper-case "B" and mysteriously insisting on writing the word "ballyhoo" on his drawing pages. I don't know, I just go with it.

So my sons are reading and writing, and we are quietly thrilled. And in a home of books, they naturally wandered toward a fun little collection that is placed just at the level of their knees. I am, of course, referring to our complete collection of Calvin and Hobbes books.

Now they pass the time surrounded by various Calvin and Hobbes comic collections, quietly sounding out the words, exclaiming over fun pictures, and asking just why Calvin uses his imagination so much. Bill Watterson's influence is already apparent in B's successful use of the words "immobile" and "giblets." (Yes, giblets.) Now Spaceman Spiff figures into their already elaborate epic space battles, and J has a very definite favorite Sunday comic.

It's the one where Calvin meets an alien and gives him his lunchbox and sends him in his place to school.

This is where our oldest sons are right now, reading and writing and thrilled to finally, finally be able to understand the words that all around them. We are completely over the moon excited for them.

And perhaps a little disgruntled, now that spelling things out doesn't keep things secret anymore.

She Melts Me

2011-11-09T07:39:00.001-06:00

This girl...

...she melts me.

Even for all her stinky, three-year-old, I-know-better-than-you ways...

...she melts me.

And I wish I had her completely unashamed self-confidence.

As well as her coat. And her eyelashes.

The End.

Raisin Update

2011-11-08T09:41:00.000-06:00

Young Raisin and his father on a rainy morning

On Saturday Mr. Raisin Face turned one month old, and there was much rejoicing. I had every intention of posting about what he's up to on the actual day, but life got in the way. We've had a lot of that happening around here lately, and while I'm a little tired, it sure makes for an exhilarating autumn. Take it from me: if you really want time to fly, just have four kids in four years.

Dooo it.

Anyway! Mr. Raisin is a precious wonder who is a genius. On Wednesday he officially turned 4 weeks old, and to celebrate he finally lost his umbilical cord stump. (Seriously, it took that long. I declared that he was stubbornly hanging on to the last tangible reminder of the best time of his life.) Thus we were able to start using the wonderful supply of cloth diapers we had waiting for just such a time, and things on that front are going swimmingly. We are using a hodge-podge collection of prefolds with PUL and woollen covers, contours with same covers, and fancy-pants yuppie diapers that don't take much brain power. I love them all, and I love that I'm not running across town to Target three times a week to stock up on ridiculously priced diapers that I will just. throw. away.

Mr. Raisin also celebrated his one month birthday by suddenly and completely refusing to fit into newborn or 0-3 month clothing. Sure, the cloth diapers help by giving him the most bulbous butt ever, but the child is loooong. And easily the heftiest of all our skinny babies. So his mother had to scramble and fill in his wardrobe with the next size up. She also cried. Hey, she's pretty hormonal.

In less happy news, The Professor and I are giving up and finally admitting that we have another colicky baby on our hands. King Peter the Boy had screaming-from-8-to-12-every-night colic for 3 solid months, and while Raisin doesn't scream his heart out for quite that long each evening, he sure puts up a good try. It makes for much exhaustion and frustration. Colic sucks.

To counteract the colic, we've had lots of good family and friends take care of us with meals, dates with the big siblings, and baby-holding so that a frazzled mama can get in a quick shower from time to time. Janie and Juniper just recently spent an entire week with us, bringing meals and lots of help and fun, while The Professor was away for many days at a conference out of state. I may have gone insane without their help. Janie: Thank you. From the bottom of my heart.

So things are pretty typical of a home with a newborn. I thought I should give you a quick update, just in case you were wondering where we had disappeared. I have some great things regarding my big kids to relate, and I'll do that soon, I promise. It's just that Mr. Raisin is sort of taking center stage right now and deserves his fair share of blog posts.

He's such a diva, y'all.

Smell My Feet

2011-11-01T17:44:00.000-05:00

Update: Folks, we have a winner! My friend Amanda correctly guessed, almost in perfect order, King Peter's costume. This year she was a Baby Kitty Princess Ballerina. Natch. Amanda, kindly collect your promised 50 points for Gryffindor (or perhaps, in your case, for Ravenclaw). Thank you for playing.

Just so we're clear, this was a nearly 11th hour costume choice. Three weeks ago she was set on Witch. A week later that changed to Ghost. Two days before Halloween she was saying Spider (and I was saying NO WAY), and the night before Halloween she said "Baby Kitty Princess Ballerina!" This entire concoction is sort of a surprise, since she has zero interest in ballerinas or princesses, but I was happy to oblige and put together a cardboard-tinfoil-elastic tiara at the last minute. On the way to my folks' house to trick-or-treat, as she sat in her special, unique costume, she declared that she wanted to be a transformer, a boat, and a minivan. At that point I think she was just naming things she saw out of her window. (Uh-duh, there were trick-or-treaters dressed up like Optimus Prime.)

Back to our normally scheduled blog post.

Original Post: Well, I know the very practical jackets don't do us any aesthetic favors, but dang, it was a chilly Halloween. I hope you can see the recycled taekwondo uniforms underneath the boys' jackets; said uniforms, when paired with lightsabers, yield one Obi-Wan and one Luke Skywalker. Don't ask me who was supposed to be whom, because I don't know.

If you say, "Gee, Christine, this may be your most half-assed Halloween yet," I will solemnly nod in agreement and raise a celebratory glass of wine. Folks. I'm subsisting on 3 hours of sleep a night due to a) a newborn, and b) three larger kiddos who are sick with nasty colds. (As usual.) Things are going to be half-assed, and I am going to gladly own this fact.

The youngest Case and The Godling stayed home with their beloved Ta (Case-speak for "grandmother") while My Sister the Goddess and I took all the kids trick-or-treating. Baby Goddess was characteristically adorable as a jack-'o-lantern, and I will raise my glass and award 50 points to Gryffindor to the person who can accurately guess just what King Peter the Boy was supposed to be. Study her picture carefully, and consider this clue: her costume was a completely unique, 3-year-old-generated invention, and it involved young felines, royalty, and professional dancers.

You guys, I just practically gave that away. I am going to be so ashamed of you if you can't figure this one out.

Now to start thinking about a half-assed Christmas. Cheers.

Appeasing the Masses

2011-10-23T12:17:00.000-05:00

The masses have been clamoring for more pictures of The Raisin, and I finally find myself with some time to appease said masses. Please keep in mind that there is not a lot of free time around here for taking lots of pictures, so they're a little scarce; please also keep in mind that he spends most of his time sleeping, and there are only so many photos of a snoozing, swaddled lump of baby that we want on hand. We're nothing if not practical after four kids.

We'll start with some shots from his first few moments here on Earth. (Forgive me if you've already seen these on Facebook.)

My dad, the proud Pa of six grandchildren, including one very grumpy one.

The Raisin tends to hang out a lot on the couch nestled in his Boppy, and, as evidenced by the photo on the left, his big brothers and sister tend to bring him lots of stuffed animals and other presents. I'm including the picture on the right because a) of course Harry Potter is hanging around; and b) my dear friend Katie knit that darling green sleep sack. We call it his sleeping bag, and the cable pattern ringing the top is--get this--a repeating owl. So cute.

We like him. We want to keep him, and we dress him up every day with much care and attention, like he is a tiny, red-headed, poop-producing little wriggly doll.

I hope that sates your ravenous appetites, you masses!

Welcome, Nephew!

2011-10-16T11:32:00.000-05:00

I have exciting news..

This past Tuesday, almost exactly 6 days after Mr. Raisin made his entrance, My Sister the Goddess had her son.

He was a hoss.

.
A cranky hoss.

My sister was a hoss, too, eschewing any form of pain management as she pushed out a 9 pound, 1 ounce baby boy. She is my hero.

I'll call him The Godling, as his mother is The Goddess, his sister is The Baby Goddess, and his daddy is Mr. Stinky Fartknocker. It all works together.

Baby Goddess likes him, but she's too young to always be the most gentle. Poke.

My mother, who gained two new grandchildren in less than a week, thus bringing her total up to 6, is pretty happy.

And so is my sister, who is very glad to have her son out and about instead of stubbornly cooking away in her tired body.

So it's Fun Times around here with all these great babies and their older siblings! Both mamas are sleep-deprived and sore, but all in all, we'd rather have them here, complicating everything, than anywhere else.

Welcome Raisin and Godling! Y'all are going to be thick as thieves.

Today's Favorite Things

2011-10-15T17:31:00.002-05:00

These are some of my favorite things on a breezy October morning:

First off, a snuggly baby boy, fast asleep in his carseat after an eventful trip to the farmer's market.

Second, a ton of produce: squash, potatoes, zucchini, pumpkins, and a big box of tomatoes and peppers from friends whose garden has given them a bounty.

This particular tomato. It is huge.

Several things in this next photo: a good, hot mocha with more coffee than chocolate; several gourds that spontaneously sprouted from our compost pile; hand-poured soy candles; jadeite pieces; odd cow creamers; and a large bouquet that turned into two, separated into beloved ball jars.

Kids in aprons, eager to help, as their dad prepares to process apples and pumpkins. (That thing on the end of the table is our "Squeezo," which expertly separates all the seeds and cores from cooked fruits and vegetables from the good, usable portions. Best thing ever.)

Finally, homemade applesauce. First, pick lots of apples at a local orchard, then bring them home and cook them in large pots until the skins are starting to slip off. Then run them through your trusty Squeezo. Voila! Instant applesauce!

These are just a few things that have filled my heart with joy and delight today. I have way more blessings, but not enough patience to photograph them all and report on them here. So please content yourselves with these homey, delightful comforts.

Happy fall!

Welcome, Raisin!

2011-10-06T10:53:00.000-05:00

Someone arrived last night and intends to stick around for awhile.

Meet Mr. Raisin Face, our sweet baby H, who made his debut at 7:41 p.m. on October 5th. He weighed 7 pounds, 13 ounces and measured 22 inches long. He has reddish hair like his brothers, bares a strong resemblance to B (with the addition of his sister's nose), and really likes to eat.

We are head over heels! Thanks for your support and prayers. Now I am going to collapse in a comatose heap while the nursery does their thing.

Stupid People, Please Stay Away

2011-09-27T15:09:00.000-05:00

By now I have (almost) accepted the apparently universal rule that people feel it is their duty to say something, anything, to all pregnant women with whom they come in contact. Since another universal rule states that off-the-cuff comments, from anyone, tend to be stupid, most comments directed toward pregnant women are really very ridiculous indeed.

Believe me, I've heard them all! I am a person who looks very pregnant from the beginning, and that fact, combined with my team of roving toddlers, means that stupid people everywhere seem to gravitate toward me and allow themselves to speak the first words that occur to their tiny minds. As Bill Bryson said in his excellent book A Walk in the Woods, "I have long known that it is part of God's plan for me to spend a little time with each of the most stupid people on earth." Amen.

Here's a brief sampling. Some you've heard before:

"Oh, boy, you've got your hands full!"
"They know what causes that now, ya know!"
"Oooo, you've been a naughty girl." (From a man. Seriously.)
"How many do you have in there?" or "Twins, right?"
"Wow, how many days overdue are you?"

Ad infinitum. Ad nauseam.

I am not yet able to let these comments just roll off of me, for a few reasons: a) I don't naturally let any stupid comment roll off of me, and that even applies for stupid things I myself say to others--I tend to agonize about my own stupidity; b) I think everyone should be held accountable for his or her own stupidity; c) I don't think stupid people should breed, so something inside of me dies every time it's apparent my views on this subject are not being heeded; and d) OF COURSE I REALIZE THAT I AM VERY PREGNANT AND ALSO IN POSSESSION OF OTHER SMALL CHILDREN, YOU MORONS, WHY MUST YOU MENTION THIS TO ME? HOW IS THIS USEFUL? DON'T YOU REALIZE THAT YOU ARE TAKING UP PRECIOUS OXYGEN TO SUBMIT YOUR RIDICULOUS QUIPS THAT ARE NEITHER INTELLIGENT NOR ORIGINAL?

I feel very deeply on this subject.

But! For the amount of stupid "ZOMG-you're-so-BIIIIG" comments I receive, I also receive a not-quite-equal-but-not-quite-easy-to-ignore amount of comments along the lines of, "You're so tiny! What a cute little belly! It's like a tiny basketball!"

And guys. I am left flummoxed. I mean, I feel huge. Of course I feel huge; I am nearly 38 weeks pregnant, and I have looked pregnant from nearly Day One. I can't breathe. I can't pee. I can't bend over and put on my socks. I can't get up from a sitting position without either lots of pep talking and huffing and puffing or sympathetic outside assistance. None of my maternity shirts adequately covers my stomach. My bellybutton has been completely inside-out for months. So I've grown to expect the first type of comment. But this second type? The "ZOMG-you're-so-TEEEEENY" comment? I just don't know about that one.

I broached this subject with The Professor, and he presented an interesting theory. He said, "Maybe the difference is simply people first seeing you from the front versus people first seeing you from the side." Interesting.

So! I decided to take some pictures to test this. Please first realize that it is hard for me to take pictures of myself, and also that I do not possess a mirror that extends below my waist. (Now if you ever see me outside of the house without my pants on, you will understand why!) But I think I may have captured photographic proof of the validity of The Professor's theory.

First, from the front:

And then from the side:

Ohhh. Okay.

Please be aware that this does not excuse everyone from stupid comments.

King Peter's Hair

2011-09-25T07:00:00.000-05:00

When my daughter wakes up, her hair is really funny-looking. I don't think it's exaggerating to say that it's kind of a hot mess right out of bed and that the thought of combing it fills me with dread and terror. And also that we buy massive quantities of de-tangling spray.

And then when I gird my loins and dive in, suddenly her head looks...smaller.

Repeat daily.

Now you know why I keep it short.

The End.

Making Things

2011-09-23T11:39:00.000-05:00

I have been working (intermittently) on putting together things for our impending arrival (ZOMG, YOU GUYS, I'M GOING TO HAVE FOUR KIDS), and I wanted to share some of them with you.

First off, we've significantly beefed up our cloth diaper collection in recent weeks so that Mr. Baby Case will have a clean, dry, environmentally-friendly bum. I'm really proud of the diapers I've found; the majority of them have been used, and thus discounted drastically from their original prices, but in fabulous condition. Plus Janie has been sending Juniper's pre-folds as she's grown out of them, so we have a great variety of diapers.

To complement the cloth diapers, I put together tons and tons of cloth wipes. I had several girly-girl receiving blankets that I hadn't really liked when I used them with King Peter (they were too small and shaped strangely), so I cut them up into double-sided wipes and zig-zag stitched around the edges. I got probably 40 wipes out of 3 or 4 blankets. This was leaps and bounds cheaper than buying them at the cloth diaper store or from other people with sewing machiens on Etsy.

I have a spray bottle on hand and will be using a mixture of water, tea tree oil, and lavender oil to clean baby's bottom. These wipes will simply go in the wet bag with our diapers and get washed up at the same time.

Another disposable I wanted to reduce my use of this time around was nursing pads. I recognize that disposable nursing pads are a gift and a wonder to Super Lactating Women everywhere (like myself--I could have produced enough milk for an extra kid when I had the twins), and I will probably continue to buy boxes of nursing pads on occasion, particularly for when I'm in public and don't want to risk any leaking. But for nighttime and at-home use, I sewed up several pairs of nursing pads, again using scraps of old receiving blanket and my trusty zig-zag stitch. I took the time to make the pads contoured, since breasts aren't, you know, flat, and to my nighttime pads (like the pink pair on the right) I added an extra layer of cut-up microfiber diaper doubler for more absorbency.

I'd like to take this moment to say that I really, really wish my serger were in working condition. It needs a part and some work, the cost of which is out of our price range right now, and I'm kind of irritated by this. Because a serger? Would make my life so easy. I've decided that those people who say, "Oh, you don't need a serger for this project! Just use a zig-zag stitch!" are people who are in possession of sergers themselves. I'm not hating on them, I'm just extraordinarily jealous.

Anyway! I've put together a couple bibs and a hat or two, but what I'd really like to show you a peak of is the baby's quilt, which I've finally gotten around to starting:

That picture was taken last week, and I'm actually at the point where everything is pieced together, sandwiched, pinned, and ready to be quilted. Now I just need to find a nice block of kid-free time (ha!) to do the actual quilting. It's a very simple, approachable pattern, and I'm very happy with how all of the fabrics are playing together.

The owls are still pretty adorably grumpy.

In addition, I had enough extra fabric to piece together a small car seat quilt, too. This quilt is crib-sized, which means it's pretty large for a baby, and I realized I didn't have anything small to throw on him in the car seat. I hate having random scraps of fabric just sitting around in my small sewing room, where space is at a premium, so this turned out to be a perfect solution for all the leftover fabric. I'll be sure to show you that when it's done.

Otherwise, my time is spent herding children, cleaning up their messes, and feeling extraordinarily pregnant. All in all, a great start to what is definitely going to be a great fall.

King Peter, the Green Chair of Destiny, and Sunlight (with Bonus Birthday Streamer)

2011-09-15T07:24:00.000-05:00

Just because she is adorable.

Happiest of Thursdays! Today I am officially 36 weeks pregnant and officially 100% ready to meet this baby boy. The big question around here: Will we get another fair-haired blondie/redhead or will we FINALLY produce a child with mountains of dark hair like mine? Who knows!

And for the record, even if his hair is purple he will still be the most amazing and gorgeous child to ever grace this earth with his presence. Just a heads-up.

A Rundown of Epic Randomness

2011-09-11T15:52:00.001-05:00

A lot has happened in the last few weeks, as I have hinted, and even more stuff happened this weekend (unexpectedly), and really, I'm pretty jangly and can't get my thoughts straight. So please excuse this dump-some-photos-and-call-it-a-post post. Please. Have mercy.

First off, last weekend, Labor Day weekend, we traversed to Kansas City for the marriage of my cousin, Zach, and his lovely bride, Danielle, who is seriously like a model, you guys. These two people are incredibly special to us, and we had a great weekend seeing family, meeting new friends, and being a part of a great union. All three kids were actually in the wedding, and they managed to do pretty well in a strange and full-of-new-people situation. Danielle asked that the boys' ringbearer pillows be Thomas-themed, which was a genius idea, and I also made King Peter the Boy's dress, which ended up being too short for her because in the two weeks between me finishing the dress and the wedding, she apparently grew four inches.

I didn't tell any strangers that I had been responsible for the dress. She looked like she was wearing knickerbockers, you guys.

I have a lot of pictures from the wedding which I'd like to share with you when I get more time to go through them, but I did want to show you one picture that just might keep me going during my daughter's teenage years. If her toddler years are any indication, she's going to be a force to be reckoned with as a teenager, and I need something to make the struggle seem worthwhile.

Behold, C's rendition of "smile":

Seriously, excuse me while I choke with laughter.

This is the last time my sister, Zach, his sister, Kaila, and I were able to be together for a long time, as we are all scattered quite literally around the world. The "around the world" part is really due to Kaila, who has taught in South Korea for the last few years and loves it and probably will never live in the States again. This girl is a world traveler and she is amazing. She looks like a model, too. And we got to spend time with her and her brother (our two families are extremely close) and man, I'm going to miss them.

Two of us are heavy with child in this photo. Guess which two.

Speaking of My Sister the Goddess, I have HUGE NEWS: She and her family moved back. They are back! I get to see my sister and my niece and my stinky brother-in-law all the time again!! I won't give you the gory details, as they are not mine to share, but they said bye-bye to Texas just before the wedding and made the trip to Kansas City itself their big, cross-country move. And she is due in five weeks, too. It's amazing.

My mother now gets all her grandkids, plus the two bonus near-arrivals, within a two-mile radius again.

I think she is okay with this arrangement.

Okay, last little pseudo-update and I'm done. This is a big one and I purposely buried it so that people wouldn't freak. This Friday I started having regular contractions around 2:30 in the afternoon. They got more and more uncomfortable and closer and closer together, despite gallons of water and tons of walking around, so finally around 11 at night, when they were 5 minutes apart, we went to the hospital. I was dilated to 2 cm. and the contractions continued to get more powerful, but I never progressed, so we headed out around 2 a.m. I tossed and turned all night while the contractions continued (albeit to a less painful degree) and then woke up sore and exhausted. And that's pretty much it.

Despite those simple details, it's not really a simple story. I'm extraordinarily frustrated, obviously because I got my hopes up, thinking, Baby's here!, and then walked out with nothing but a head-and-uterusache and a raging appetite for a Wendy's chicken sandwich (THE DRIVE-THRU WAS CLOSED FOR REPAIRS), but also because this is the Exact. Same. Thing. that happened when I was pregnant with my darling daughter. I went into labor at 35 weeks. I was admitted and told, "Baby is coming tonight!" I got fluids. Contractions stopped. I walked around for 5 weeks dilated to 4 centimeters and experiencing painful and regular contractions that never really went anywhere. By the time my due date came, I was a crazed, emotional, worn-out mess, which is really not the state you want to be in to greet a demanding newborn who never sleeps and also who has some pretty epic colic. For three months.

The point is, it looks like it's happening again. It's like my body enjoys completely faking me out and then keeping me on tenterhooks for over a month. We've had to cancel some fun things we had planned, like my first Notre Dame football game, since the situation is so extremely iffy, and I don't even know whether I can trust my own body. Every time the contractions (which are pretty strong) start, I think, Okay, is this it? Should I be timing them? Should I be rallying the troops? And frankly, it's pretty exhausting. Why isn't pregnancy easy and predictable and whoosh!, your water just flooded my car!, like in the movies?

Wah wah wah. Sorry to complain so much. I have to keep reminding myself that I have a) a healthy, happy baby who is perhaps just slightly indecisive; b) an incredible support system of loving, watchful friends and family; and c) access to wonderful healthcare and a gorgeous hospital less than a mile away. I am blessed. I'll try not to whine too much.

To close, here is a picture of me Friday night, when we were getting our hopes up thinking maybe we'd be a family of six by the next morning:

And yes, in case you're keeping track, this was the second time I had been in the hospital this week, which just makes me feel like a loser who is new to this whole pregnancy thing when in fact, YOU GUYS, I am on my fourth kid.

I'm going to go help my husband eat ice cream out of the carton now. I am allowed.

Last Month's Trip to Ludington

2011-09-07T21:40:00.001-05:00

I am seriously behind in posting, as the end of this summer has been taken up with multiple trips (Why is that? Why wasn't our traveling spread out neatly and intelligently?) and multiple cold viruses that just about knocked this poor lady out of the running forever. I'm finally feeling like maybe I'm functioning with at least 60% of my brain, which is really all can be expected from a big fat pregnant lady who runs a circus full-time, so I'm going to attempt to get some posts in this week filling you in on what we did. Where we went. Who we saw. Just how ill we were.

I mentioned two posts ago that we had visited the lovely Ludington, Michigan in mid-August and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves there. There isn't much more to say about the trip itself. We, along with my parents, beached it up, enjoyed a cabin in the woods, and marveled at the lack of humidity and the necessity of wearing jeans and sweatshirts at night. Ludington is an awesome town, and we had huge stretches of beach all to ourselves every day. Sure, we were sick. But what better place to be sick?

So. Pictures.

It was pretty great, you guys. You should come with us next year.

And now we're almost done with August. Even I can't keep up with the Cases. And I am RUNNING this freakshow.

C is Three

2011-08-30T08:04:00.000-05:00

Happy Third Birthday to my darling King Peter the Boy!

You are head-strong, willful, determined, and independent to the last. You constantly push the limits, more often then not jumping clean over the limits, risking punishment from your exasperated parents just for the sweet freedom of saying no or doing it Your Way. We often say it's a good thing you're so cute and affectionate. Otherwise, some days we might be tempted to push you out the door and let you fend for yourself.

You have very definite opinions, and can often be heard saying, "But I don't WANT to be a ballerina!" when your mother attempts to dress you in flouncy skirts. You eschew pink and hairbows, instead favoring trains and baseballs caps and whatever your beloved brothers are doing at the moment. Your favorite color is blue. You might just be a tomboy. This is just fine with us.

You have been acting independently and speaking so articulately and performing tasks so admirably for so long that I had stopped thinking of you as a two-year-old a long, long time ago, and I find myself surprised that, only today, are you turning three. At this rate you'll be 17 in six months. Please stop.

Have a happy, relaxed, temper-tantrum-free birthday, my dear sweet precious C. Your daddy, brothers, and I think you are the most wonderful thing to ever happen to us. We love you dearly and secretly hope you go on being your stubborn, opinionated self.

Unicorns Farting Rainbows and Other Things of That Nature

2011-08-24T11:33:00.000-05:00

This is another, "Hi, sorry for my absence, we were doing {X}. I'm sure you understand."-sort of post. And yes, we were gone, briefly, last week on an end-of-summer quick family vacation. But then 4/5 of us came home very sick, and I am just now making my re-entry into the general world. Despite the fact that I am still sick.

Oh, I am ill. If you have ever a) been a pregnant woman, or b) spent some significant time with a pregnant woman, then you know how hard it can be for a pregnant person to get over something as routine as a common cold. Especially if said pregnant person is in her third, most brain-draining trimester. (I just typed "semester" for "trimester." Brain, meet drain.) I have now been coughing-up-my-lungs, wandering-in-a-haze, aching-all-over, generally-wanting-to-disappear sick for a week and a half, and there is no end in sight.

I see my doctor in a few days, so we'll get this figured out, but in the meantime, I have an incredible to-do list piling up, a to-do list that includes a party for King Peter the Boy's third birthday, as well as hand-making several items for a family wedding over Labor Day weekend. As well as an Etsy order. As well as multiple sewing projects for the impending baby.

I am tired.

The good news is that our end-of-summer trip was fabulous, despite four of us being feverish. We, along with my parents, traveled up to Ludington, Michigan. (I'd hold up my hand and show you where that is using the tried and true Michigan Hand Map method, but I'm too tired.) Suffice to say that Ludington was perfect, wonderful, and magical, and everyone should go at least once in his or her lifetime. I hadn't been to the Lake Michigan portion of Michigan in years, so imagine my surprise when we experienced temperatures in the 70s during the days and in the 50s at night. In August. Whoa. Plus the lake and beaches were gorgeous. Plus the town was vibrant and busy and picturesque. Plus we stayed in a cabin. It was amazing, and we all want to go back every summer. I want to go back every weekend.

I do have lots of pictures, but I haven't had the energy to even upload them. Be patient. Something as simple as deep cleaning the kitchen sink leaves me breathless and drained of all pep these days.

The other good news is that The Professor just started his second year at Notre Dame, this time with all of the excitement and none of the nervousness of last year. His schedule is really good, and he still gets to work at Adler once a week, too, in lieu of traditional TA or RA duties. We are officially on Baby Watch 2011, and he has been threatened with all kinds of horrible things if he isn't tethered to his fully-charged cell phone at all times. I'd be more nervous about this if my parents were not in town, or if Notre Dame were farther away, but I'm remaining fairly chill for the moment. I'm due October 13, and it would be PERFECT if baby would hold off until RIGHT THEN because that is when The Professor has a week-long fall study break. Ideal! Do you hear that, Baby? IDEAL.

One funny tiny story: The Professor likes to get himself worked up about things, usually things we've already worked through, including the arrival of a baby in the middle of a semester. The other day he said, "But we've never had a baby in the middle of a semester of graduate school!" And I was like, "You are a moron. We had TWINS in the middle of a semester of graduate school." And he was like, "Oh, yeah...but it's not the same!" No, it's not. No matter how hard it will be, one newborn + three kids is like UNICORNS FARTING RAINBOWS compared to two premature infants at once. And let's not forget that most of the burden will be on my shoulders. And my lactating breasts. Good grief.

That's my rambly, random update for now. There is more news to share, as well as, as I said, lots of pictures, but I have to get back to life and reality now. Hopefully my reality includes a nap in the near future.

And I was not kidding when I said what I said about unicorns and rainbows. I have quite literally blocked the first three months of my sons' lives from my memory. This is all that has enabled me to keep getting pregnant time and time again, despite the ridiculously increased risk of more twins each time.

That and the crazy. The crazy helps, too.

The One Where We Visit the Adler

2011-08-11T15:20:00.000-05:00

Yesterday we traversed into Chicago, via train, to visit Adler Planetarium. The Professor was fortunate enough to work there this summer on a research grant, and he will continue to work there during the school year. I hadn't visited Adler since college, and the kids had never been, so we decided it was high time to make a family trip to see the planetarium and meet The Professor's colleagues.

We couldn't have asked for a more ideal day. We, along with everyone else in the nation, have been in the grips of an insane, rainless heat wave for much of the summer, and just two days ago we caught a break. Yesterday's high was in the 70s, which is strange even for us in August, and since Adler is built at the end of the museum campus, jutting out into Lake Michigan, there was a constant cool breeze. Honestly, I have never felt richer. It was so beautiful. Our time at the planetarium was fun, his colleagues were a delight, and we all enjoyed each other and our time together. After exploring the planetarium and eating a picnic lunch, we played at a nearby beach before heading back home.

And my husband took 82 pictures, which I had to then whittle down to a manageable amount. He appears in only one. That's what happens when you're in charge of the camera.

Please enjoy this little pictorial of our fun day trip.

Happy Chicago!

A Lot of Too Much

2011-08-07T21:52:00.001-05:00

Tonight I included the people of Somalia in our bedtime prayers, and of course all I heard was a chorus of, "What's Somalia?"

As soon as we all said 'amen,' I brought out a large book of continents we have, where each continent is a puzzle. (Thanks, Aunt Connie!) The kids love this book to the moon and back, and they definitely know their continents. (As well as all of the states in the U.S. and all of the countries of Europe. Including those tricky Eastern Bloc countries. My two-year-old has a better grip on geography than I do.) I opened it to the Africa page, accompanied by many little voices saying, "Africa!", and found Somalia, showing it to everyone. Because really, we are all visual. We need to see to fully understand.

So I explained, as basically as possible, what is wrong in Somalia, and why we should pray, and what we should pray about. The kids' had your typical kid solutions to a typically ridiculous grown-up problem: Why can't we give them our food? I can bring them my water. I can give them peanut butter sandwiches and strawberries and turkey. And I had the typical clunky grown-up answers to simple, yet effective, kid solutions: It's really not that simple. There are bad people who make it hard. I don't know why other kids have to die. We can't just give them your lunch, sweetheart. The Church and lots of others are doing what they can, and Mama and Daddy do what they can, too.

We then prayed again, this time specifically for Somalia, and then settled down for slumber. As I began tucking everyone in, I silently patted myself on the back for quietly introducing my kids to the world at large. They are, I admit, pretty sheltered, which is how it should be when you are 4 and 2. Right now a large portion of my job description reads "shelter," and that word has multi-faceted meanings. But they can start learning, in little bite-sized bits, how fortunate they are, how bad things can be, how we need to pray and do and act and love, as Christ has taught us. Plus it gives me a great opportunity to impress upon them how well-fed we are and how they should be thankful for every bit of food put in front of them, even that bit of green that they hate, thankyouverymuch.

I congratulated myself on teaching them a little bit about discomfort. And then I bent down to B in his bottom bunk, saw his eyes, and wondered if I had made a grave miscalculation.

I've told you before that B is incredibly sensitive. The thing is, just saying "incredibly sensitive" does not even begin to penetrate the depth of his sensitivity. I doubt that I, as his mother, especially as no-nonsense and low-emotion a person as I am, can ever know just how tender this kid is. He is butter to the core, and his eyes were filled with tears as he, in his childish, four-year-old heart pondered the issue of starvation in Somalia.

Oh, dang. Whoops. This is not a one-size-fits-all-situation. My other two kids, they're sensitive enough. They are caring, kind individuals who, when they aren't being typical siblings, do a fabulous job of taking care of one another and other people. But B? He feels. So very very deeply. So deeply that sometimes I worry he won't be able to cope, won't be able to process his emotions, won't be able to interact with the larger world because it just might be TOO. MUCH.

So while J and King Peter the Boy will offer their sandwiches to the kids of Somalia and wonder out loud why we can't give them our food, they will still be able to sleep tonight. They will cope. They realize that they can do nothing beyond what Mama and Daddy can, and so all there is left to do is rest. But my second son, my sweet B, may very well lay awake for a long time, sick at the thought of sick and dying children (yes, we talk about dying sometimes--we do not fear death) who just need to eat. He will, no doubt, bring it up early tomorrow morning, perhaps at breakfast. We will keep talking about it, as we should, and B will keep worrying and worrying and feeling and feeling and asking a thousand questions and needing a thousand hugs.

I never know how much is too much for him. Loud noises make him skittish. Loud people make him quail. This weekend we went to the zoo in Chicago, and at a playground B was scared off of a slide by a loud, rough-and-tumble kid who was standing at the top of the play structure, yelling at the top of his lungs, oblivious to everyone around him. B ran to me crying, unable to cope with perceived anger. If I raise my voice at all in the house, even just to call for far-off kids, B bursts into tears and gulps, "You scared me!" We have to carefully screen movies for dramatic moments: the deaths of Nemo's mother and siblings is enough to send him over the edge. As an infant he was particularly sensitive to change, even minor fluctuations, like a different fan in the room or the wrong blanket, and traveling with B as a baby was a tiresome experience. As a little boy he is greatly improved, but he is still extremely adverse to change, especially when it involves people he loves leaving his company. New ventures have to be carefully explained in exact detail before he can process them, and even then we have to use a numbering system so that he can easily remember just what we're doing where, when, and with whom: "#1 we're going to the bank, #2 is Target, #3 is meeting Daddy for lunch, and #4 is going back home." Woe betide the mama who throws a curve in the numbering system by visiting Starbucks in between numbers 3 and 4.

I'm just trying to give you a taste of how intensely sensitive this kid is. We've learned, for the most part, how to handle B, at least at this point in his little life, and we are always trying to better understand him. We want to nurture and engage and help mold this sensitivity, because far from being a weakness, as society might tell us, it is a wonderful gift. Perhaps I said it best last year, in another post about B:

His sensitivity is a gift, a precious, precious gift. While it is immature and frustrating and even ridiculous now, how will it manifest itself when he is a grown man? If we (with the Lord's sure hand) do it right, he'll be a servant, able to deeply relate to people and share in their hardships, quietly suffering with the less fortunate, faithfully serving his wife and children by always being aware of their needs. If I (God forbid) were to belittle him, tear him down, call him a "sissy" or worse, I could do serious damage. I don't even want to think about how so many children are indeed treated this way. I will do my part by honoring my son and my Lord.

And so by introducing Somalia and its ills to my sweet son, I have also given myself another challenge: Effectively address these terrible things, while hopefully instilling in him a deep love of others, without crushing his already tender nature with too much. Because when you're four, there is a lot of Too Much out there. And when you're a four-year-old B, there is a lot a lot of Too Much out there.

When I met B's big, tear-filled eyes, I understood that he was going over my information and thinking about it very, very deeply. It's hard to know just what bothers him most, the idea of sick kids or the understanding that, hey, not everyone is happy, what if someday I am sick and suffering, too? So I did what I could just then: I hugged him and told him that he was fine, that Mama and Daddy were here for him, that Mama and Daddy would worry about Somalia, that all he needed to do was pray and remember those people. I arrogantly promised that he would always have food, because really. I can do that. We aren't going to starve (save some terrible, world-wide disaster), and we live in a rich nation. I stroked his face and whispered reassurances, and then I quickly and quietly prayed that Jesus would grant him peace in his tender little heart.

And then I hugged him one more time and left the room.

And then I wrote this blog post.

And now I am going to go hug him one more time again.

Look and See

2011-08-02T21:04:00.002-05:00

This is what I looked like last week, at 29 weeks pregnant:

This is what my grandmother, Grammy, looks like with my daughter on her lap:

This is what my aunt (who, along with my long-suffering uncle, hosted us all in her home last week) looks like with four adoring kids crawling all over her:

This is what my niece, the Baby Goddess, looks like at 16 months old with milk on her face:

This is what my daughter, at very-nearly-three years old, looks like when she sleeps at night:

Just in case you were wondering.

Vacation

2011-07-31T14:25:00.000-05:00

I feel like all I ever say lately is, "Hi, sorry for my absence, we were doing {X}. I'm sure you understand."

So. Hi. Sorry for my absence, we were on a week-long vacation. And I didn't feel like spreading the word to all of the internet ahead of time. And I didn't get on the internet once while we were gone. I'm sure you understand.

For the past few years my mom, my kids, and I have all packed up and made the eight hour journey to Kansas City, our homebase, to visit for a week with our family. (Here is last year's recap.) We play hard, we nap hard, we swim hard, and we do lots and lots of fun Kansas City stuff. The Professor enjoys his week-long break at home, too, though he starts missing us all really badly by about the third day and also gets jealous of all the fun things we are doing and all the good food we are eating.

This year My Sister the Goddess and the Baby Goddess flew up from Dallas and joined us, and I am so glad they did, since that was the first I'd seen them since they moved to Texas in early March. If you'll remember, My Sister the Goddess is pregnant, too, and we had fun comparing bellies and feeling babies kick and trying to one-up one another with our stretch marks. Big fun. The Baby Goddess is divine and reallyreallyreally anxious to be walking soon. She has a head of dark curls. She blinks at you when she wants to say 'hello' or 'I love you' or 'Lovin' your shoes, girlfriend!' Very fabulous.

My kids did fabulously, too, and I remarked on more than one occasion that this was the first trip we've ever taken where they have instantaneously and oh-so-seamlessly fallen into their routine without any adjustment period. They slept normal naptimes and nighttimes, even in strange bedrooms and beds, and were generally pretty patient being lugged everywhere in town in ridiculously hot weather. It helps, of course, to have so many doting adults to care for one's every whim.

I left my camera in my room the entire time, not once thinking about pictures, which I realize is sort of unfortunate, but hey, I'm a big fat pregnant lady with three kids and it was HOT and we were on vacation. I'll just remember a general feeling of a contentment and restfulness instead of editing hundreds of digital pictures.

So now we're back, taking the day to regroup and rest. The summer is winding down. It's hothothot, I'm ignoring my flowerbeds and watching my growing pumpkins, and The Professor is getting extra work in by working security for the Bears football camp, as he's done for the past several summers. These are all signs of August around here. Meanwhile, we are so glad to have gotten the little vacation with family, as a sort of crown on such a nice, lazy summer.

Sorry for my absence, but we were enjoying life. I'm sure you understand.

Holy Sinks, Batman!

2011-07-16T10:13:00.001-05:00

I'm sitting at home by myself on a Saturday morning while my husband mans our annual garage sale at my parents' house and my mother takes charges of my children. How did I get to be so lucky, you ask?

Well. Just get ill and you too can share in this glamorous lifestyle.

Seriously, I'm a sick kiddo. Last weekend I started coughing, and I haven't looked back. Said cough has developed (sloooooowly) into a minor cold plus awful, hacking, retching cough, and I am taking Robitussin as often as possible to try and at least appear like a functioning, in-control-of-myself human adult. It doesn't help that we had our garage sale planned for yesterday and today, so all this past week I was working like a madwoman pricing, organizing, rounding up signage, and etc. So I am exhausted, my illness has taken over, and I spent much of last night awake and coughing. Somewhere around 3 a.m. my husband rubbed my back and laid down the law: I was to stay at home today and recover while he oversaw our sale's second day.

You guys, I really like going to garage sales, and I really really like hosting garage sales. Something inside of me is deeply fulfilled when I interact with strangers, haggle on prices, and see our unwanted things toted away in vast quantities. So I'm pretty sad I can't be there, taking part in the festivities. At least I get to glory in air conditioning.

Since I'm kicking around the house under strict orders to NOT WORK (this is very difficult for me), I'll take this rare length of uninterrupted time to ramble on and share with you a wonderful, beautiful thing that happened last week:

Y'all. I received an inspiration. A room inspiration.

Has that ever happened to you guys? Have you ever seen a picture or other representation of a project, be it decorating or crafting or what-have-you, and known instantly that you just wanted it for yourself? And I mean "wanted it for yourself" in a very compelling and palpable way?

Well, I did. Here's how it happened.

I borrowed a book from Janie called Country Living Storage Style: Pretty and Practical Ways to Organize Your Home. My mom has gotten the Country Living magazine for years, and I often find myself liking their stye, especially when it leans toward the antiqued, shabby chic, flea market look. (Something you should know: Perhaps 80% of the furnishings in my home have come from garage sales, antique stores, thrift stores, and the dumpster. Not only do I love the look, but having mostly used stuff jives quite well with several of our family's personal philosophies.) I thought this book would give me some innovative storage ideas I could copy for our small, storage-starved home, and so I started casually perusing its pages.

And then I saw it. The Kitchen of My Dreams. Behold:

This is Christine's Kitchen. Nearly everything in it is a flea market/thrift store/garage sale find: the upper and lower cabinets; the sink; the linens; the dishes. Everything there either is very worn or has been made to look very worn. Everything is light and bright. Everything would work for our narrow galley 1948 kitchen. Everything in it would work for our hard-working, old-fashioned, from-scratch cooking and baking practices. In short, whoever did this kitchen is a woman/man after my own heart.

Now if this picture does nothing for you, that is fine. We all have different tastes. But I hope you can at least appreciate the very real physical sensation I experienced when I saw this picture for the first time: I became physically ill. Isn't that ridiculous? My stomach turned. My heart started racing. I felt like I was going to be sick. All because I loved a stupid picture so very, very much.

Even now, when I turn to pages 54 and 55, I get all jittery and excited and sweaty. It's like love at first sight. For a kitchen.

Please understand that we have no plans to renovate our kitchen anytime soon. The Professor enrolling in graduate school has put any major house upgrades on hold for several years (this has been very hard for me to accept, by the way--it's a necessary sacrifice but a very difficult one), and while our kitchen is, admittedly, fairly ugly and desperately in need of a facelift, it is at least functional.

But! What is perfect about finding my inspiration is that I can always be working toward that, and what is perfect about finding an inspiration that is full of old, cast-off stuff is that I can actually be accumulating elements for my future kitchen over time. I can have measurements and ideas written down, and then if I waltz into a flea market and find The Perfect Cabinets at a reasonable price, perhaps, with much begging and pleading and kissing-on-the-feet directed at my husband, I can bring those cabinets home. If I collect enough over time, when we finally decide to start the renovation we won't have a lot of project costs. At least this is how I look at it. When I breathlessly explained my philosophy to The Professor, he sardonically summed it up in his own words: "Great. So now you can just be buying more stuff with money we don't have and taking up space in our already crowded basement." I had to admit that, yes, in so many BITTER and UNIMAGINATIVE words that this was in fact what I was justifying.

He's just jealous that he doesn't get to go to flea markets, y'all.

Anyway! I am rambling and gushing. Sorry, I'm just excited.

So a main element of this kitchen, and indeed of many of the kitchens featured in this book (it is Country Living, after all), is the cast iron farmhouse sink. I have always loved the look, and this inspiration photo sealed the deal: I must have a farmhouse sink. We have lots of experience with cast iron (all of our sinks are cast iron, including this antique one we found for our bathroom, plus the tub, plus at least one of the toilets...in short, there is lots of heavy cast iron over here), so despite my frustration at how hard it is to keep clean, I recognize the classic beauty and, yes, solidity of cast iron.

As soon as I realized that this kitchen was indeed The Kitchen of My Dreams, I started idly searching for antique farmhouse sinks online. I had no real plans to buy or find one; I just wanted to see what was out there, what the costs were, etc. I nearly had a heart attack when I realized you could buy new reproductions of old sinks (Seriously? When there are old ones out there? Are people just terrified of old plumbing?) for upwards of $2,000. Whoa. Then I got on Craigslist and my heart was put at ease again: there are old farmhouse sinks out there, people are selling them for reasonable prices, and we are lucky enough to live in Chicagoland.

I quickly discovered that apron-front farmhouse sinks (that's like the kind in my inspiration photo, with a sort of "frontsplash," so to speak, making a big, wide lip around the sink) are rareities and that I was much more likely to find farmhouse sinks without the apron front. I didn't really have my heart set on the apron front, but I did have my heart set on the Big Daddy size: 60" wide, featuring a sink in the middle with two draining boards on either side. When you don't have a dishwasher, draining boards are very appealing.

Note: Here I should explain another Case Family House Philsophy: We want to die in this home and be buried in the backyard (the pear tree is a particularly peaceful spot), so we see no reason to plan our upgrades around the tastes of possible future owners. We don't do renovations with the spectre of Selling Point hanging over our heads. We simply plan our projects around our tastes, using the best tools and the best practices out there. And before you start bleating, "But your home only has three small bedrooms! What if you keep having kids?", I need to point out that the former owners of our home raised nine children in this home. Nine. I rest my case. This home is ours. We don't want a dishwasher.

Note: This blog post is getting really long. I blame it on the cough medicine and the quiet.

So I narrowed my (still idle, at least in name only) Craigslist search to the larger farmhouse sinks, and I found a few possibilities. One sink came with the metal cabinetry underneath still intact and still in very, very good condition, but the seller didn't want to go below $400. I am willing to admit that he was asking a fair price, but we don't have $400 to spend on a sink for a kitchen remodel that won't happen for a few years. I am also willing to admit that I begged and pleaded with my long-suffering husband, who, I am proud to say, resisted my feminine wiles (y'all, I stop at nothing when it comes to sinks) and very firmly said no, we could not buy that one.

I found a few more sink-with-base-cabinetry-intact options, but none of them were in very good shape, and metal cabinetry that needs work makes me nervous. Why pay that much for something that might have extensive rust damage? I was already being picky about the state of the sink itself, as I didn't want to find something and then have to pay for extensive enamel or plumbing repair. We really lucked out with our bathroom sink in that it is in nearly perfect condition; I, quite selfishly, wanted the same for a kitchen sink.

And then! (finally, you say) I found it! Or rather...I found them!

A man near Wrigleyville was selling two vintage farmhouse sinks, in the style of my specifications, for $70. Total.

I didn't need two sinks, but I thought of Janie and called her up. She said YESYESYES WE'LL TAKE IT, and so The Professor took the family van to Adler on Thursday and, after work, drove up to the seller's house to get the sinks. The best news is that these folks live in a 120 year-old brownstone and that both sinks were original to the home. Apparently the wife really wanted to use one, but the husband had moved them into the basement for upstairs remodeling once already and put his foot down: he was not dealing with installing those sinks again. She was happy to find out that the sinks were going to two, vintage-crazed women, and so her husband and my husband nearly gave themselves hernias loading these suckers (they are heavy) into our van. Now they are sitting in our leaky, stinky basement, waiting for the day when they will once again be used to wash vast quanities of dishes and lovingly caressed by crazy, sink-loving homeowners.

And that, my dears, is how I started collecting things in my basement for my future Kitchen of My Dreams.

Baby Quilt: Meet the Cast of Characters

2011-07-08T07:55:00.002-05:00

All right. Look at this picture of various fabrics, and consider whether you can see them working together for the common good or if you think they are completely unrelated and insane when paired:

Well, if you guessed "working together for the common good," then you have just earned 20 points for the Hogwarts house of your choice. Yesterday I used the word "quilt" (which is a dangerous word to put out there on the internet when people know you own a sewing machine and aren't afraid to use it), and indeed I have gathered the necessary materials and supplies to make a baby quilt for our impending new addition.

(Note: I am officially in my third trimester. Eeeeeek.)

I wanted to just make a crib-sized quilt with a simple design/pattern; nothing that would require too much math or thinking, since those are not always my strong points, and also since this is my very first quilt. I am confident that it will rock, but I needed a simple pattern this time around to sustain that confidence.

Enter this book, Quilting for Peace. For the last couple months I have been poring over every book and quilt blog out there to get an idea of just what I was undertaking, and I found this book at our library. After first reading through all of the inspiring stories of people who had turned quilt-making into wonderful volunteer efforts (and yes, I wept, because I am insanely hormonal and unable to flip The Indifferent Switch lately), I thoroughly studied the patterns and discovered a great one for a baby. It's simply called "Easy, Striped Baby Quilt," and the title really says it all. Submitted by the founder of Binky Patrol, it makes a crib-sized quilt that looks like it might have taken some thought and math, but really just needs some careful cutting.

The lady who designed this quilt recommends you choose 1/2-yard pieces of four fabrics: two busy, bright prints, one calmer print, and one coordinating solid. These are then cut into specific, varying widths, arranged into a pleasant pattern, and pieced together long-wise. And that's it for the piecing. So simple. You get a very busy, colorful quilt without much thought.

I knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that I wanted my inspiration fabric to be this one, Spotted Owl by Alexander Henry, in Natural:

It's pretty great, huh? I'm trying to think long-term with this fabric, as King Peter the Boy and New Baby will be sharing a bedroom eventually, and I'm going to have to de-girlify the bedroom a bit to make it more gender-neutral. What's really nice about this print is the variety of color. Sure, there's some pink in it. But it's not overwhelming, and when you play up the greens and blues, you don't even see the pink. You just see grumpy owls. Grumpy owls work for either girls or boys.

My other busy print is Ghastly Forest in green, also by Alexander Henry, and I'm pulling in blues with this great polka dot by Amy Butler. The final piecing solid is a charcoal gray, and the darkish blue solid will be the binding. I bought batting that is a soft and gentle blend of cotton and bamboo, and if all goes as planned, I will be using free-motion quilting.

So! There you have it! I don't know exactly when I'll start this bad boy, as I have a very messy house (vacations are nice, but then we get back and our home smells like Essence of Old Lady) and a couple of sewing projects on the docket already. For now I'm going to get the fabric washed and ironed, perhaps cut, and move when the Spirit leads me. I do have a leetle bit of time; not forever, but plenty.

One final thing: That book is worth having, you guys. Sure, it's not chockablock full of patterns like other quilting books, but in my opinion the ones in there are keepers, and I have yet to find a better source of volunteer quilting efforts. It has some basic quilting instructions, nothing elaborate, so you'd need other resources for the actual step-by-step process. But honestly, I just purchased a used copy on Amazon for less than $5.00. Between this and the power of the internet, we'll get this baby done.

And you guys. Those owl are so grumpy. So adorably grumpy.

A Quick Catch-Up

2011-07-07T14:00:00.001-05:00

Hey, friends. I'm back after a longer-than-usual blogging absence. Sometimes these breaks need to take place, and most of the time I don't plan them. And let's just be honest: summertime means a whole lotta time outdoors, garnering sunburns and mosquito bites, and a lot less time indoors, hunched over the computer. This is how life is meant to be.

Most of my break was taken up with just daily life: running errands with my three constantly orbiting satellites (and one parasitic lifeform who NEVER LEAVES, YOU GUYS, OH MY GOODNESS, I FORGET ABOUT THIS INBETWEEN PREGNANCIES); building epic train tracks throughout the entire house; willing myself to cook and bake in our tiny, heat-trapping kitchen; merrily digging in the dirt outside and caring for all my beloved plants, at least when my heartburn allows it (you can't do much if you can't bend over); and trying to keep a semblance of order in our happily messy home. I am typically pretty uptight about the state of my home, but come every June I just have to throw up my hands and give it to Jesus. What with the sand, the dirt, the bugs, the grass, and the tiny, muddy footprints, nothing stays clean. It's okay, we'll probably still get the heaven. I hope.

At the end of my days my ankles are swollen and throbbing (you're welcome for that), and my sweet husband takes over any remaining chores while I sit with my feet elevated and yell anecdotes to him from across the house. Once the kids are in bed he is always, and I mean always, willing to rub my feet for hours on end, and I just need to tell you that that is The Manliest Thing Ever. We are all enjoying our summer without Daddy being gone for long periods at a time, and he is thoroughly enjoying his summer's work. And I am happily and healthily (healthfully? Who knows, who cares) cooking our next bun in my 20-degrees-warmer-than-everyone-else oven. Life is good.

This weekend and the beginning of this week we took a quick trip to visit The Professor's parents in Michigan, except the bonus is that Janie and her sweet family have now moved back home and now our trips to Michigan include Juniper and Co. Really, this is ideal. Juniper is adorable, always bubbly and cheerful, and a genius. Janie and Ryan are okay, too, as are my in-laws. We all hung out a lot, ate some really good food, swam at the family pond, and at the end wished for more time together.

Now we're back into our routine, and I thought maybe that routine should include saying "hi" to y'all and letting you know I had not completely fallen off the map. I've got some good things to share soon, mainly involving a quilt for New Baby Case (!!), but right now I have no pictures and a powerful desire to nap.

So. I'm going to nap. Much love to you and yours.

The One Where I Unload Photos and Call It a "Post"

2011-06-22T07:49:00.004-05:00

(Note: Somehow this posted in the middle of me adding pictures. Sorry. I haven't had enough coffee yet.)

I had a few random pictures sitting on my camera, taking up space, and I thought, what better excuse to dump them all on my blog and pretend that they make up a cohesive post?

We are all about the half-assedness around here.

So! Here we go!

Here's a darling recent photo of King Peter the Boy, doing her darling thing in our backyard.

Yes, she has a ruffly swimsuit. Yes, she calls the top part her "boobie cover." Yes, this might be because her mother had to explain to her just why she couldn't run around topless outside like her brothers. It's hard being a tomboy.

It's hard for her mom to understand just when she got so dang big.

She'll be three in August, and I refuse to accept this.

Here's a picture of me on Sunday at 23 weeks pregnant:

I'm feelin' fine. Baby is incredibly active, sometimes for successive hours at a time. It's really hot and I insist on air conditioning already. Husband is sympathetic.

Speaking of husband, you should know that he is a fabulous dad, despite the fact that I failed to post anything goopy on Father's Day. The truth is, I kind of take him and his intense love for and involvement with his kids for granted. It's the truth. Then I hear horror stories of indifferent, uninvolved dads, and I get all weepy and thankful. For instance, last week he didn't have to go into Chicago at all (do you remember that he works at the Adler Planetarium this summer? It's pretty awesome.), so he very deliberately had a date with each kid on separate days, involving bike rides, trains, libraries, and picnic lunches. I even got a date, too! Everyone felt special, loved, and appreciated by Dad.

He's pretty great.

Final picture, this one of an elaborate railroad track my kids and I built in the living room on a rainy day this week:

A sweet reader sent a box of Thomas tracks and trains, and you need to understand that this has consumed my kids' every waking moment since it was revealed to them. Sure, we have a table and tracks upstairs. But now we have A LOT of tracks and EVEN MORE trains. Clearly this arrangement is better.

I hope y'all are having a happy, happy week. Tonight we're celebrating my mom's 29th *cough cough* birthday at our house, and the temperature is only going to be in the 70s. This is a recipe for a fabulous day.

How I Saved $400

2011-06-15T21:12:00.001-05:00

Would you like to know how I just saved myself a whole lotta money?

Of course you do.

Last week my folks, my aunt, and I were in Chicago, and we perused the selection at Room and Board. There is a lot in this store to get excited about, and during this trip I was particularly taken with their selection of pendant lamps. I liked this design in particular:

Now, I know that fixtures like this aren't new. We've got a similar design from Ikea hanging from the ceiling of King Peter's room (it's kind of like this one, except a feminine embroidered design instead of a photograph), and my mom recently put in a large designer drum shade above her dining room table, with matching fixtures in the kitchen. So I am familiar with them. But I was having a lighting crisis in the sunroom, and this particular pendant really struck a chord with me. (We originally wanted to find a small ceiling fan, but didn't have any luck finding one that matched our specifications and stayed within our budget.) This pendant, or one like it, would work well in my new airy-fairy sunroom while providing a pop of color and functionality.

If you know me, you'll know that as soon as I saw the $400+ price tag for these shades, I snorted in a very common, derisive way. I cannot imagine walking into a store like that, seeing a plain drum shade with a neat pattern on it, and forking over a fortune for it.

Wait, do people do this?

Well, my people don't. Instead, we glean ideas and then go home and copy them using cheap, available materials. Duh.

I got straight to work.

I found this nice linen drum shade at a garage sale for $1 (it's 11" in height and 12" in diameter), and I picked up the teal acrylic paint for $1 and the stencil set for $3. (If you want to copy my project, you'll also need a cord kit like this one, as well as a cap for against the ceiling, in order to actually suspend the shade from the ceiling and disguise the wiring. We had both on hand already. I don't know if you can find suspension kits like this at hardware stores. Our local Lowe's did not, but I didn't ask anywhere else.)

You'll also need some basic craft brushes or sponge applicators. I had some small angled brushes on hand that worked great.

When it came to the design itself, I was first looking for a spongey stamp in a floral theme, but I couldn't find any I liked. I am leery of stencils, since they automatically make me think of the precise ceiling borders in Americana themes that my mom would execute in the 80s, but I decided to give this particular sheet a chance. I was still leery when I brought it home, since a) the brand was called "Stencil Mania", and b) the flower designs were a little iffy. In the wrong hands, they could be bad. But I thought perhaps that my hands could do them justice.

First I cut the five different flower designs out, being sure to leave enough plastic on two sides of each stencil so that my painter's tape could actually grip something. On the other sides I trimmed pretty closely, since I knew I'd eventually want to be squeezing in lots of flowers at the same time.

I started stenciling with the largest flower.

One thing you need to accept, if you plan on attempting a similar project, is the beauty of randomness. I am a very rigid, rules-following, line-towing person, and sometimes this is very hard for me to accept. But there is no mathematical formula on Earth that would give me the best possible layout for these flowers, and even if there were, The Professor would need to be on hand to figure it out for me. Random was key here, and I just went with the flow.

The Spirit led me, y'all.

Of all of the sizes, I used the large flower the least amount of times, since I knew I had so many other sizes to fill in the white space. And since I wanted this to look as if it had actually been printed onto my shade by exotic artists, as opposed to stenciled on with cheap acrylic paint, I would occasionally stencil a flower off either edge of the shade, like so:

I don't know why I have the shade on its side for that shot, since that doesn't make sense once you have, you know, WET PAINT on that opposite side. In reality I just carefully flipped the shade on its opposite end to do the off-kilter stenciling. Just beware of the paint. It stays put on linen, you know. True fact.

Once I had a happy number of large flowers, I grabbed the next largest size and did the same thing, again embracing the sweet randomness of the task. I repeated for all five flowers, using the smallest size the most as I attempted to fill in every bit of white space that I could. You could really do this project as busy or as chill as you'd like. I chose busy because I wanted color as opposed to a light linen shade against my already light walls. Plus I wanted the teal paint to really pop. I specifically chose this color as a method of marrying my blue ceiling and bookshelf with my other very green accents.

When I was done stenciling (which took the length of one naptime), my finished product looked like this:

And tonight my husband installed it in my sunroom, and you guys, I am SO VERY PLEASED with the results.

We had to hang it pretty close to the ceiling, since this room has a very short ceiling, but you can still tell, especially from the doorway, that it's a pendant lamp and that we have a cool cord to hang it. We are so cool.

Here it is from as far away as I could get without putting my legs out the window:

And here it is being all functional:

I'm pleased to say that, even when the light is on, you can't really tell that it's just paint unless you stand up next to it and touch it. So my "make it look like one printed object" goal was attained. (I think that a big part of why this worked is because I started out with a high quality shade. The lady I bought it from lived in a super nice neighborhood, and she looked like the sort of person who would pay $400 for a printed pendant, so I think I was lucky enough to score a thick, sturdy shade. But the same results could certainly be attained with another, thinner one from, say, Ikea--I just don't know if a super dark paint color would work in that case.)

So there you have it! That's the story of how I recently saw a $400 item I really liked, scoffed at the pricetag, and then went home and made it a very cheap and beautiful reality.

Now go and do the same. And if you know anyone who has recently spent $400 on a similar shade, please send them my blog post so that they can be ashamed of themselves and vow to make better purchasing decisions in the future.

It's only the right thing to do.

Revenge of the Twin-Lover

2011-06-08T10:21:00.002-05:00

Y'all may not recognize it on sight, so let me share photographic evidence of my Incredulous Face:

This is the face that says, "Are you for real? Ya idiot."

Yes, you guessed it: I ran into another person who LOVES TWINS, ZOMG I LOVE TWINS. (Note: If you're newish around here, I would like to kindly point you in the direction of this post, The Do's and Don'ts of Encountering Twins. Sure, it's a couple years old, but the sentiments are eternal, and apparently I need to print it out and carry several copies in my purse with me at all times for handy educational purposes, because seriously, the stupid people are still out in full force. I got really great feedback on this particular post, so I know I'm not just being cranky. And if you keep that post open while reading this one, you can laugh along with the rest of us as we realize just how many rules were broken by the person in this latest post, all in one exchange.)

This time we were in Lowe's, not Jo-Ann, and I'm really saddened to admit to that fact, because I love Lowe's with the fiery passion of a thousand red-hot suns, and I like to tell myself that only competent people are to be found there. I was wrong.

The kids and I were standing at the paint counter, getting another batch of sunroom paint mixed up, and things were suddenly, and without warning, unraveling out of my control. I don't know what happened, but some evil got into each of my children at exactly the same moment, and I was having to work quickly and quietly to head off full disaster. J was sitting in the seat of our cart, using his body to repeatedly bump said cart into the paint counter; B had decided that now was the perfect time for a full-on breakdance competition; and King Peter the Boy was considering throwing a fit because I wouldn't let her grab every paint chip within her reach.

I was having to use every ounce of mother magic I possessed to calm the situation down. I got the boys under control, and I was holding the girl by the wrist (she was doing the Arch Your Back and Pull With All Your Might While Squealing move--not quite a total tantrum, but dangerously close) and quietly and firmly correcting her when I heard it:

"Are they twins?"

Without breaking my grip or my eye contact (eye contact is very important with King Peter), I noted the speaker out of my peripheral vision: it was a Lowe's employee, a female cashier, who was standing at the front of her cash register directly across from us, arms crossed, eyes staring. She didn't have any customers, so she was free to interrupt busy mothers who were clearly consumed with disciplining their unruly toddlers.

I didn't have the time or opportunity (or inclination) to answer her question, so I ignored her and continued to devote my full attention to C. Another few seconds passed, and then again:

"Excuse me, are they twins?" [louder this time]

People. You're picturing this, right? I'm in charge of 3 small children. I'm also very pregnant. One of my children is obviously trying to throw a fit, and I am physically restraining her, leaning into her face, and talking softly with her in order to prevent bad behavior. And this woman thinks now is the perfect time to interrupt me and ask an inane question. Twice.

I quite literally had to turn my head from C, hold up an index finger, and say, "Just a moment."

As I turned my attention back to my daughter, I felt certain this new friendship would end here. Surely this woman would wise up, suddenly understand my situation, and bustle back to her station, embarrassed by her lack of perception and her interruption. But no. Of course not. She simply stood there, arms still crossed, face still eager, eyes still staring.

C got herself together, and all was well. I straightened up, noticed the still-staring cashier, and answered her.

Me: "Yes, they are twins."

Her: "Oh, wow! I love twins!"

Me: [fixed, insincere smile]

Her: "That is just so great. How old are they?"

Me: "The boys are 4. She is 2 1/2." [Note: I always include C when answering people's questions, even if they obviously don't care. After all, I have three children, all standing here together, listening to you.]

Her: "Oh, wow! You have your hands full!"

Me: "Yes. But they are all great kids. We have fun."

Her: "Oh, look at that--the boys have red hair! They have red hair." [Note: I have italicized the repetition because she actually said this in a tone that implied that maybe she was informing me of something new and amazing. I'm serious. She said it forcefully, all the while staring me in the face, as if imparting some great revelation. As if I didn't know they have red hair.]

Me: "Yes. They do."

Her: "Oooo, I love red hair! That is so precious! They are so cute."

Me: "Um. Thank you. I think so, too."

Her: "And they look so much alike! [said in tone of surprise] Are they identical?"

Me: "We're not really sure."

Her: "You're not sure? How come you're not sure? Because they sure look identical to me." [This statement was accompanied by a knowing nod. She must have a degree in I Know All About Twins of which I am not aware.]

Me: "Yes, I know they look a lot alike. But it's not that simple. We'd have to do a DNA test at this point to be sure."

Her: "Oh. Wow."

There is silence for a few moments while the paint lady finishes with my paint and the kids happily trade paint chips with each other, and I turn my attention away from the cashier, praying that a) I will keep my temper, and b) that she will get a customer. Right. This. Moment.

But of course anytime I pray to keep my patience, I am faced with new opportunities to display said patience (thanks a lot, Jesus), and this woman feels like she needs to remain fixed in place, staring us down with an inane smile affixed to her face. One other thing I should note is that for the majority of our exchange another idle cashier was standing close by, half-way watching our conversation, and my friendly lady cashier felt it was her duty to relay my answers to her coworker. So anytime I answered, my faithful friend would turn and repeat, word-for-word, what I had just said to the woman standing three feet away.

Truly, it was awful.

Our paint was finally done, and I took it gratefully, hustling my children so we could make a break for the other end of the store. But before we could leave, the cashier needed to impart some final thoughts.

Her: "Your kids make me think of my brothers and me when we were little."

Me: "Oh. Were your brothers twins?" [Maybe this would explain her strange fascination.]

Her: "No, but they were older than me."

AND...END SCENE.

The Sunroom Revealed

2011-05-28T15:08:00.002-05:00

I am ready to reveal the results of our whirlwind sunroom renovation! Last post I gave you a couple of pathetic pictures and called them clues, but now I am ready to show you the room in its almost-finished state.

First off, remember what it looked like at first? Covered in knotty pine paneling, topped by a dusty drop ceiling, and making me crazy with its general lackluster appearance?

Well. In my opinion, no one could call this room "lackluster" now, after my husband's hard painting work and my very determined attempts to infuse more color and vitality into the space, I think we have a keeper. Here is the sunroom now, as viewed from the living room:

A few things about this picture:

The walls were first primed with Olympic's low-odor/zero VOC primer, then painted Olympic's Lotus Flower in low-odor/zero VOC satin. The ceiling is the same paint in South Pacific. I cannot imagine not painting in low odor, since I nearly fainted from the vapors. This may just be pregnancy drama.
I found that "quilt" at a garage sale last week and fell in love with it. I say "quilt" because it's like someone put in all the work but then never finished it, backed it, etc. But hey! They did the piecing and that's all that matters to me. This scrappy piece of fabric has been a great inspiration for color for this room.
I've had that chair for about a year now. I picked it up at a garage sale for $3, thinking it would be a great way to try reupholstering, and it's been languishing in the basement until now. By removing the kids' toys we had space for seating (which is glorious), and this chair ended up being the perfect addition. It does still need to be reupholstered, as the fabric isn't in the greatest shape, but the chair itself is solid and happy. And it makes us think of The Professor's grandparents' old chairs, which Janie now has in her house.
Oh, that pillow:

You guys were right, it was a tree! I loosely followed this tutorial, and it ended up being a great way to use up fun fabric scraps and add some punchy color to my home. I am still learning that green and blue can be friends. Yes, you are allowed to marvel at my stupidity. That's fine.

Anyway! More room. Here is where I have my sewing table and dresser-o-fabric-and-notions against the windows on the north side of the house:

Now I get TONS of natural light, and that coupled with the new paint scheme might just help me from getting so severely depressed in the long winter months, as I usually do. (I mean, really, winter is so long.) I found that lamp for $3 at another sale last week. It is wonky and the switch might be going out, but that is okay, as it works well for good light for now.

Behind the sewing table is my childhood desk, now housing The Professor's large childhood shelf:

(A note: A couple of people have asked about the shade in the window behind the piano (which weighs a million pounds and will never move from this spot. Ever.) I keep that window shaded at all times because that is a west-facing wall; thus, if left open, the window would let in tons and tons of bright, hot afternoon sunlight, making the room approximately ninety-zillion degrees in the summer and also fading the piano and carpet and everything. The end.)

I wish the desk and shelf didn't have to be right behind the sewing table, but this is a small room, and this wall is the only one without a window, thus forcing the bookshelf here. We're at peace with this. My father-in-law built this shelf years ago, and it has always been black. I fell in love with this shelf before I ever fell in love with my future husband, and I coveted it when I first saw it in his college dorm room. I was thrilled to inherit it in our senior (or was it junior?) year, when he realized that my love for this shelf was greater than his love for this shelf, and I happily integrated it into my apartment decor. We used it faithfully until we moved into this home, when there didn't seem to be any need for it, and it (along with the yellow chair) sat sadly in the basement, waiting for the day last week when I would wander down, see it, and say, "Oh my heck, how did I forget about this, it will be perfect!"

So The Professor slapped some blue paint and some varnish on it (varnish since there will be so much moving-about on it, thus creating scuffs on a non-varnished shelf), attached some felt to the bottom, positioned it on the desk, and anchored it to the wall. Hurrah! More fabulous storage!

Don't worry, I'll fill that sucker up. Hopefully with more Shakespeare/Paris paraphernalia, because that makes sense.

Here's a closer shot of the ceiling, since maybe you didn't get that it's now BLUE:

The blue was my mom's idea, and I will forever be in her debt for such a fabulous suggestion. We are searching high and low for a new light fixture but having little luck in our town. Ideally I want to find a low-profile, teeny-bladed ceiling fan in a dark wood tone to complete the bungalow-ish look, but no luck so far.

We also need to find a few more wall hangings, and I'd like to whip up some feminine valances out of the many different types of vintage linens I like to find and hoard. For now, we are enjoying our room, reveling in its beauty, and marveling at how a few coats of paint can completely transform a space.

(That weird circular thing next to the window an interior clothesline pull.

Ugly, but very necessary.)

Thanks for embarking on this tour of our room with me! If you have any suggestions/ideas, please feel free to leave them in the comments. I will feel free to ignore/make fun of you as I choose. This is what the blogger/reader relationship is all about, right?

And here's to more room renovations! Here's to more punches of color! Here's to finding beautiful wooden beadboard hidden behind ridiculously ugly drop ceiling tiles!

Blue Clues

2011-05-24T14:33:00.000-05:00

I know it's been a week since I dropped the bomb of ZOMG BEADBOARD, but seriously, we've been working our bottoms off getting this room looking goooood. Well, actually, my husband worked his teeny bottom off all last week getting this room looking goooood while I dragged my slightly-larger-than-his bottom (seriously, people, I have borne so many children, and it's true what they say, everything changes) around corralling children who so desperately wanted to interact with their paint-covered Daddy. Mainly because he was covered in paint.

My exhausted bottom and I are not ready to reveal the sunroom quite yet, as we (now I'm talking about my husband and me, not my bottom and me) are still moving around furniture, doing last-minute touch-up paint, varnishing an awesome bookshelf, and just generally getting the larger details taken care of. But! I know you might be on the edge of your collective seat (no really, I imagine that no one has gotten any work done this week, just waiting for an update from the Cases), panting for pictures, so I will offer you this one, measly clue:

It's a good clue, I think.

You'll get pictures of the whole thing by the end of this week, as we have houseguests arriving this weekend and want as much as possible finished before they get in. Suffice to say, this sunroom is already a zillion times better than it was before, and I checked with my husband who has advanced degrees in Everything Science and Math and he says that this is a measurable fact.

Also, since B has been crying from a broken heart every dadgum 10 minutes (about nothing in particular--he's just having a very sensitive day), I have been unable to squeeze in a shower yet, so I'm wallowing in my own filth and getting lots of niggling little jobs done. Sewing in the sunroom is even more a delight and a joy than before (I'd say about a zillion times more), and I've used several spare minutes to whip up a fun project, which is seen here, in progress:

Can you guess what it is? It shouldn't be that hard. My 2-year-old identified it in like 3 seconds and it was inside out and all splootchy still.

Things are often rather splootchy around here, after all. It's our natural state.

Happy Tuesday!

How We Do Home Improvement Projects

2011-05-17T22:24:00.002-05:00

Today The Professor and I decided that the kids' toys could be permanently moved into the various closets in their rooms upstairs, thus freeing up a tremendous amount of space in our, like, quadrupally-functioning sunroom. Until said toys were moved, the (smallish) sunroom had housed two large bookshelves of their toys, our piano, and several pieces of furniture devoted to sewing, including my childhood desk which serves to not only host my (non-functioning) serger, but also houses our office supplies.

We ask a lot out of the rooms in our bittyish house.

Culling, organizing, and moving their toys freed up a TREMENDOUS amount of space, and I am happy to announce that the sunroom is now mine ALLMINE and you must now refer to it as Christine's Supremely Happy Room of Creativity. Or just The Sewing Room. Or really the sunroom is fine, too. Whatever, as long as you visit.

This reorganization turned into a Give-a-Mouse-a-Cookie scenario, because as I was vacuuming up the space where the toy shelves used to be, in order to move my sewing-related furniture around, I sighed loudly and said, "I just wish we could paint this room this week, while you [The Professor, who was only half-listening] are taking time off." I turned off the vacuum, faced my husband, and then said, "Um. Could we do that?"

"What?"

"Paint the sunroom. This week."

He looked thoughtful for a moment. "Sure."

And just like that, we have a project on our hands. A project that entails changing the appearance of an entire room.

You might be thinking, Oh, it's just a little paint, no big deal. But no. It became more than that. Remember the mouse and his cookie?

First, here's how the room has looked for the last fifty years or so (um, minus our furnishings, obviously), with a little demo dust in the way and the light fixture swinging crazily from the ceiling:

Where I'm standing is another window, below which

the kids' toy shelves used to sit.

It's a small, narrow room, a late addition to our 1948 home, and we can only assume, from the knotty pine and the drop ceiling, that it was a 1960s addition. See that window in the left of the picture? That looks into our bedroom. So. That's awesome. And it makes us pretty certain that this was never an outdoor porch or anything, but simply a late add-on to the side of the home. The door that leads from our living room to the sunroom is a standard indoor door, and it's a fairly elaborate, glass-paneled door that is just like the other doors in our home (all original), so we're thinking it was never an outside door.

I'm sure that was all fascinating for you.

Anyway. We've lived in this house for over 3 years, and I've agonized over this dang knotty pine paneling. This is what it looks like up close:

It's paneling. So minus like a million points. BUT. It's actual wood. It's in great shape. It's not a completely pukey color, namely dark brown veneer. And I'm a BIG believer in preserving the integrity of your home, as long as those parts are nice and timeless. I just couldn't decide if this pine was timeless. I mean, no, it's not, obviously. But it's wood, and I recoil at painting wood. I just can't do it. You'll understand if you live in an old house with beautiful original wood trim and doors and such. It's a travesty.

So I've been debating this issue for three years, and finally decided, after several consecutive days of sewing and staring at these walls for hours at a time, that they needed to be painted. The room needed updating, and I just couldn't handle paneling any more. (My mom, who is a sage person, said, "Christine, it's not like it's oak or anything. It's knotty pine. Sure, it's wood. But it's knotty pine." And I think she has a very good point.)

Okay. Paint the walls. Good, we're there. We'll go with a nice off-white, leave the trim around the windows alone, and call it a day, right?

Wrong.

Look up. Above you.

That, my friends, is a drop ceiling. The love of all office spaces everywhere. Someone along the line (we are the third owners) decided that this, this was the answer to all their problems (I don't know what their problems were, but by golly, a drop ceiling would fix it), and now we are left with their legacy.

I hate drop ceilings with the burning passion of a thousand fiery suns.

The Professor and I have long wanted to replace/cover this ceiling with beadboard, but, never having torn apart ceilings before, we weren't really sure how to go about this. Should we tackle the ceiling now, when we paint? Or is it going to be a huge job? Is it a true drop ceiling, with just the guts of the house above us, or is it covering up a nasty original ceiling? We called in my dad, who has lots of experience with remodeling. And you know what my dad did? He said, "Well. Let's see what's underneath here."

So he pulled away the light fixture. And lo and behold.

There was beadboard. Solid wood beadboard.

I think my reaction was somewhere along the lines of "Holy [profanity, Batman!]" because honestly. This is insane. Reasons this is insane: A) I want beadboard, and there it is; B) it will require hardly any work on our part to expose said beadboard and make it look nice again; and C) SERIOUSLY PEOPLE WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU, COVERING UP SOLID WOOD BEADBOARD WITH SOME CRAPPY FAKE CORK VERSION OF A DROP CEILING. YOU SHOULD BE SHOT. WHY ARE YOU ALLOWED TO OWN HOMES AND RENOVATE THEM AND ALSO PROCREATE?

After our initial shock, there was much rejoicing. It was like when we were looking at this home when it was on the market and we tentatively pulled up a piece of carpeting and NO WAY there was solid wood underneath. I'm still dealing with that and will occasionally look down at my awesome [much dented, scratched, and badly in need of staining] hardwood floor and shout, to no one in particular, "WHO COVERS UP WOOD FLOORS WITH CARPET, I ASK YOU."

So! We completely bypassed the ceiling issue and just have to buy more paint. It became a simple project once more. And even though we aren't getting supplies until tomorrow evening, I was so worried that this beadboard would turn out to be, I don't know, water damaged or plastered in dead squirrels that I asked The Professor if he would please just pull the ceiling tiles down tonight so we can know exactly what we have on our hands.

And he very sweetly obliged.

And we have a completely intact, very wonderful, very solid wood beadboard ceiling.

Feel free to squee a little. All together now:

SQUEE!!

Scion

2011-05-14T23:28:00.000-05:00

So. We had our ultrasound yesterday, and it went great, and baby looks healthy, Praise the Lord. We are blessed beyond measure. Truly, we are.

And I'd like to share a picture of this miracle with y'all, but the CD of pictures we were given is absolutely USELESS (or USFLESS, as I originally typed, there is not very much usf going on here, you guys) as it is not just photo files but an actual installation of the program used by the hospital ultrasound technicians to take and store and manipulate and label said ultrasounds.

And there is no way to, say, I don't know, COPY AND PASTE the dang pictures from this program. Which installs itself on your computer. When you insert the CD. Instead, I can store and manipulate and label my ultrasound pictures just like the professionals within the context of a very specific and user unfriendly computer program. Since I like to do that with my free time.

Where was I?

Oh, yes, also, I am too lazy to figure out (again) how to scan the few actual photographs we received, so you'll just have to believe me when I say, "You guys, it's a baby. Hurrah! You know, it's just like any ultrasound picture. You should google that, because seriously, it's just like a skeleton."

Also: it's a boy.

Yay! We like them.

You Guys, It's Suddenly Pretty Hot

2011-05-11T11:30:00.000-05:00

Yesterday the temperature hovered around 90. So we played outside until around 8 o'clock at night, enjoying our dinner on the patio, the sandbox, our weedy lawn, and the joy of getting as dirty as humanly possible.

Today we are exhausted by the heat (which has again returned), so we are holed up in our cool, dark house (no air conditioning yet!), playing with matchbox cars, and wearing only our underwear. Well, at least the kids are only wearing their underwear. I have to be dressed, since one of you jokers might decide to ring the doorbell at any moment.

And just so you're not too impressed, I am still officially The Worst Mother of Redheads Ever, only belatedly remembering to slather them in sunscreen, after the sun has already turned their delicate skin a bright shade of pink.

I am so thankful King Peter the Boy is a Tanbaby.

Happy Mother's Day!

2011-05-08T13:14:00.000-05:00

J, King Peter the Boy, Mama, Unnamed Baby #4, and B

A story worth repeating: This morning I snagged J as he raced downstairs, fresh out of bed, and forced him to cuddle. (He isn't a cuddler these days.) He kicked, protested, and laughed, but mainly protested, before finally shouting, "I don't want to cuddle with you, Mama--I just want to look at you!"

I feel so loved.

Eventually I Get to a Sewing Project

2011-05-07T16:46:00.001-05:00

I'll start this post by showing you my azaleas as they looked this past week:

Let that lovely sight serve to inform you how happy, how beautifully happy, I have been this week, despite a seriously bad cold, the charge of five sick children, and an entire week without any other adult aid. I love plants, I love spring, and I swear these azaleas are getting more and more beautiful every year. (Although photographic evidence really just says that they're great every year.) Thank you, Mrs. Dorothy, for doing something right.

On that tra-la-la-springtime! note, let me show you something I've made. Well, first, let me direct you somewhere good and helpful: Raechel's most recent blog post, which features a great tutorial for a baby bib. This is essentially the same way I make my shop's baby bibs, and it's how she makes hers, and really, it's a simple pattern you can't screw up. Well, maybe you can. I don't know.

Anyway, make a bib and enjoy its usefulness!

Her post, which includes a few pictures of her new sewing machine, made me realize that I hadn't ever shown you guys my new sewing machine, a Brother PC-420 PRW. I've had it (and have been using it consistently) for a couple months now, and I can say nothing but fabulous and praiseworthy things about it. It is a truly computerized machine, and it is often much, much smarter than I.

Here it is:

I can now sew easily and without the use of swears, which proves that it was definitely worth the money.

For full disclosure (and a little tangent), here is the drawer of my sewing table:

My mom will see this and say, "Christine. Have you never heard of a $5 desk drawer organizer?" And she will have a point.

For further full disclosure, here is what my sewing room looks like at this moment:

I might be slightly embarrassed by that one.

But! (and now we arrive, albeit rather ramblingly, to the point of this post) But! Have no fear, because the powers of my mess and my new sewing machine and a leetle bit of my brain have combined to make a darling skirt for King Peter the Boy, who refused to pose in it and therefore forced me to hang it on the wall and pretend there was a girl wearing it:

The pattern can be found here, and I'll tell you now, it's a good pattern. You can choose from any number of sizes (6 months through size 8) and any number of ruffles, and let me just say, please go with as many ruffles as possible. I would have done two more had I had the fabric. Although it took me, The Slowest Seamstress in the World, a million years to make it, it's the kind of project that definitely gets easier with familiarity. It fits great on King Peter (in a size 3T), and I'm planning on buying a ruffler foot for my machine to make the whole thing that much easier for me.

I will admit that I bought this pattern with the thought of, Hey, maybe it's something I could sell in my shop in then near future, and that's still a possibility. But without a ruffler foot and with my serger out of commission for the time being, I would have to charge a million dollars per skirt and also each one would take 3 months to make. So. There's that.

I am sewing more than that. I have several Etsy orders in the process of being made or sitting in the queue, plus a dress for King Peter half-way finished, plus a few alterations, plus...I don't know, there's always too much. And let me just say this: with my new sewing machine, I actually find it all a joy.

A joy free from swears. I would just like an Amen for that.

MORE Big News, Featuring My Sister the Goddess

2011-05-01T07:43:00.001-05:00

I have something very exciting to tell you, and you're going to have to do without pictures, okay? Sorry, but I have none relevant to the subject. Just use your imagination.

Here goes:

My Sister the Goddess is pregnant, too.

I haven't told anyone that, and so that's exciting enough, right?

BUT. Here's the really funny and wonderful part of it:

We are due exactly one day apart from one another.

She is due to have her baby on October 12th; my due date is the 13th. Seriously, this is not a joke, and I still can't believe it, even though we've both known since sometime in early February.

This is how we found out: one Friday morning in February I took a pregnancy test that came out, as expected, positive. The Professor and I thought, oh, let's keep it quiet for a couple weeks this time, let's just enjoy this news ourselves. That evening, my sister called me and said, "Well, The Baby Goddess is going to have a little brother or sister!" And I said, "Congratulations! Um, me too."

We both shrieked for a couple minutes, then got down to business figuring out the timeline, at which point we discovered a few things: a) we had both found out on the same day; b) we had both likely conceived around the exact same time; and c) that meant that we were due at the same time. Whoa.

Seriously, it's like something out of a movie. And this week she saw her new doctor in her new town (because of course she moved very far away...sniff) and got an ultrasound and then called me and told me that I'm finally getting a NEPHEW. YAY. I mean, I love The Baby Goddess and I love my Junie B, but really, it is about time for some more boys around here.

So! That's our fabulously amazing news. Like I said, we've known for awhile, but I still have trouble believing it. My mother is over the moon, and I'm sure she's already working out how on earth she is going to lend aid to a daughter in town as well as to a daughter in Texas. I just wish my sister and I could be pregnant together, you know? It's hard to have her so far.

Oh, and I get my 18 week ultrasound in just under 2 weeks, and now that we know that she's having a boy, I am all the more excited to find out what new Case baby we have in store.

In conclusion, big hurrah!

A Very Public Thank You to My Friend

2011-04-19T10:35:00.001-05:00

Dear Raechel,

Thank you for the loverly package you sent to our home this weekend. We got home from a long weekend visiting family in Michigan, and lo and behold!, there was a big box of fun, frilly maternity clothes waiting for me. (I don't think you can understand my joy at this. I am a decidedly practical pregnant lady when it comes to maternity clothes, and your feminine offerings have infused some much-needed glam to my established tee-and-jeans wardrobe.)

Also, there was a pinafore for King Peter the Boy.

She LOVES it. She says it makes her look like Cinderella. When I opened the package, all I could do was squeal, "Nicey Jane!!" So! It's a hit on all fronts.

Also: the bubble wrap. Thanks to that genius inclusion, my children have been busy for two days straight.

And tell Oliver that the boys cherish their personalized cards.

All in all, a better package has not been seen in the Case household for a long, long time. Thanks again for thinking of us all and for sending some cheer into our rainy, windy, April lives. Much love to you.

love and hugs and the Cat in the Hat,

Stinky

Coupon Code for Etsy Shop! So Exciting!

2011-04-12T21:18:00.003-05:00

I'm going to break family-related blogging for a moment and do some shameless self-promotion.

BECAUSE I CAN. MWAHAHAHA.

I have some merchandise in my Etsy shop that is newish and not moving as quickly as one would hope (probably because I'm not great about keeping it stocked, so people lose interest--I know, I know), plus some new stuff sitting around that I'd like to put up soon, so I thought I'd give Etsy's new coupon code feature a try.

So! If you go to my shop here and mill around and decide you'd like something or even perhaps multiple somethings, you can enter a code at checkout for free shipping! (I personally love free shipping and think it is the greatest thing.) The coupon code is "fatbottomapril2011" and yes, that means you have to type the word "fat" and "bottom" together. Just embrace it.

All my items are handmade, except for the shirts and onesies, which are (duh) not themselves handmade by me but are instead hand-embellished by me. Get it? Also, most of the onesies and shirts I use are either first lovingly used by my children or the children of those near me OR found in secondhand shops. Repurposing is important to us! Anyway, this little guy is the most-viewed item in my shop at the moment:

Yeah, I think he's pretty cute, and let me tell you something: he is only eight dollars. I don't say this to be tacky, but to make you understand that it's a great deal. (Self-promotion, remember?) I'm not going to name anyone specifically, but if you'd like to see the crazy range of prices for similar (and sometimes very crappily-made) necktie onesies, just search for "necktie onesie" or "onesie tie applique" or something like that in the handmade items and you'll see. Oh, you'll see. Again, no specifics, but there is a gal charging nearly twenty-five dollars for each of her necktie onesies, and I just don't know how she sleeps at night.

(stepping off of high horse)

I (of course) can personally attest to the quality of my products, and so can Janie, if you would like to ask her. I have a lot of fun sewing little things, and it gives me an excuse to keep finding fun fabric. So please! Think of me and my need for fabric!

That is all. Much love to you and yours.

Birthday Success

2011-04-10T21:33:00.005-05:00

For a successful 4th birthday party (that happened 2 weeks ago, ahem), you're going to need a few basic, yet crucial-for-success, items.

First, lightsabers.

The kind that light up and make noise are to be preferred. Second, cupcakes. Lots and lots of cupcakes.

Third, some of your dad's old Star Wars models hanging from the ceiling.

Fourth, silly party hats. It helps if you're surrounded by adoring adults who are willing to also don said silly party hats.

Finally, a brother with whom you can share all of these things.

Because really. What's a birthday party without a brother?

Happy (belated) birthday to my sweet boys!

The Good Life

2011-04-09T15:19:00.006-05:00

Right now, this instant, I look like this:

You do not see the smudgy mirror, which I cleaned just yesterday. You do not see the bleach stain, which I famously gained not a day after my friend Kate passed on this lovely green maternity shirt to me.

I am 13 weeks pregnant and proud of it. The baby is healthy. I feel awesome. I can eat whatever I want (save peanut butter--it is now the most disgusting food in the entire world), and I can happily light candles in my own home. Today it is in the 70s, tomorrow will be in the 80s, and we get 6 new windows installed on Monday. I bought a new Sit-n-Stand stroller with my own COLD HARD CASH that I EARNED, THANK YOU VERY MUCH. (I am proud of this.) My kids are healthy. Allergies are, so far, staying at bay. My husband will be working at the Adler Planetarium this summer, a dream job toward which he has quietly been working for years. Say, since high school. It's a pretty big deal. Life is grand for us.

Sure, not everything is perfect, but overall, pretty great. Really, we are in a happy time, and I would like to take a moment to give Jesus all of the glory. Roll your eyes if you want, but I do not for a moment want to even entertain the notion that I am somehow responsible for the happiness that is our life. I mean, really. I can't clean the toilet without getting bleach stains on great shirts. How could I successfully run our lives?

The answer is, I couldn't because I'm pretty hopeless.

So I am going to embrace our happiness and join my family outside to plant some bulbs. I don't know how long I'll feel like gardening this summer--I fully expect to take on whale-like proportions sometime around mid-July--so gardening now seems like a good idea. I'll let you know if anything earth-shattering occurs. Hopefully not; we like low levels of drama around here.

ps: C has insisted, for about 2 weeks now, on being called "King Peter the Boy." (King Peter is in reference to Narnia, natch.) I mean, she is insistent, as only a determined 2-year-old can be. She will not answer to her Christian name, and she is constantly self-narrating her actions, as in, "'Oh, no!' said King Peter the Boy." It's equal parts hilarious and irritating.

There was a bloggy break. It might continue.

2011-03-27T15:11:00.003-05:00

You may not have noticed, but I haven't blogged for 2 weeks. That's okay, really. I'm not going to feel badly about it. I have some really good reasons, and I might as well share them (in a quick list format, since I need a nap and my kids have miraculously all agreed to one, too), as they also serve to give a rundown on what has been going on around here. Ahem.

All last week (as in, not this past week, but the week before) I was in Virginia visiting my sister-in-law, Janie, her husband, and the divine Juniper, my new niece. I had such a great time! The Professor was on spring break, and he generously agreed to stay all week with the kids so that I could have a quick vacation to meet Juniper and help Janie. Janie didn't work me too hard, which is good, since I wear out so easily (still in the first trimester) and also since I caught a fabulous cold halfway through my trip.

You know when you're pregnant and you get any sort of illness and it's like your body stops functioning on any level that even suggests normality? You have, quite literally, no energy? You want to cry every 30 seconds? You go to your doctor and beg him to do everything, anything, in his power to make you feel well? And it turns out he really can't do much but sympathize with you, since you're pregnant? That's where I was this past week. I never did actually cry, but I came really close.

I generously shared my cold with all 3 of my children. My husband is now complaining of a sore throat. It has been a rough week.

My sons turned four (!!) on Tuesday the 22nd. I did not blog about this. I am trying not to feel guilty. On their actual birthday, the kids and I went to our children's museum and then ate the rare treat that is McDonald's. I think they were pretty satisfied.

We hosted The Professor's parents for a visit this weekend, as we held the boys' birthday party just yesterday, Saturday. My in-laws brought them lightsabers as a gift. My parents walked in, saw the lightsabers in action, and had to discreetly walk a couple of birthday packages back out to the car. I had contemplated lightsabers as gifts just the day before, but something, call it divine intervention, held me back. I think we might know our boys.

The Professor, knowing how awful I felt and how much work there was to be done to prepare for a party and houseguests, did all these things: dusted the furniture, cleaned the bathrooms, washed and folded multiple loads of laundry, vacuumed, and just generally filled in some very large housekeeping cracks. I love him.

I have a craft show coming up next weekend, and in between caring for children, cleaning my house, preparing for guests, preparing for a party, and trying not to fall into a pit and die, I have been sewing.

So! That's what we've been up to. I now feel almost 100% better (thanks to everyone who suggested a Neti Pot--I am now a believer), and my kids are on the mend, and my plants are starting to poke out of the ground, so maybe we'll all survive another day. And! My nausea is 100% gone and I can drink my morning coffee again. All in all, despite the bad things, the last couple weeks have been successful.

And let's be honest, saying that I have "3 kids 4 and under" is a relief. It's not so insane-sounding. Let's just ignore that, pretty soon, I'll have "4 kids 4 and under." For now, I might exert some measure of control.

Might.

The Baby Goddess Turns One

2011-03-10T06:00:00.000-06:00

Today my sweet niece, The Baby Goddess, turns one.

We celebrated a little early as a family, as she and her parents moved to faraway Dallas (sniff, sniff) before the big day.

She is brilliant, articulate, funny, serious, heavenly, slightly stinky (but in a good way), and deliciously dimpled all at once. She is so fabulous! And she, as expected, handled the celebration with her usual style and grace. What a doll.

She even let her maybe ever-so-slightly jealous, but mainly just eager to help, older cousin, Baby C, help out with unwrapping her gifts. This worked well, since Baby Goddess didn't really seem to understand the process, and Baby C was a pro.

Oh, and here's a slightly failed, but mainly funny attempt to get the four cousins together. (Note that I, in my attempt to corral my offspring, forgot that this was not, in fact, a picture opportunity for myself.)

All in all, everyone had a great time celebrating this special little lady. And now she gets to celebrate all over again. So lucky.

We love you, Baby Goddess. Happiest of all first birthdays!

An Exciting Announcement

2011-03-06T10:22:00.004-06:00

We have an exciting Case family announcement, and I'm just going to go ahead and slide it on in on an unassuming Sunday morning and see if anyone notices.

Ta da!

Wait for it.

Wait for it.

Do you get it?! If it's still not clear, let me show you another picture that might make everything more obvious:

That's me... EIGHT WEEKS PREGNANT!

Hurrah!

Yes, we are expecting our fourth child sometime in mid-October. I had planned on holding off on an announcement for yet a few more weeks, until the first trimester was done, but as you can see, I'm showing. Big time. As in, three weeks ago, at a mere five weeks pregnant, I was already wearing maternity clothes and deflecting questions from curious strangers. And now, three weeks later, people just assume and offer their congratulations.

(There is only one baby in there. We checked. One happily growing, mama-sick-making, demanding little tiny baby, but still, only one.)

So we are rejoicing, and sharing with you, and of course, coveting your prayers and your hopes and your moral support. Having a baby is never easy, and our particular life circumstances are making it a little trickier than normal, even for us. But we are so excited!

So very excited!

Toddlers and Star Wars

2011-02-21T21:07:00.003-06:00

I know showing your kids Star Wars and then sitting back and letting the comments roll isn't a new thing. But dang, if it isn't funny. This weekend we watched The Empire Strikes Back for the first time as a family (I mean, The Professor and I weren't watching it for the first time. Oh, no. Probably more like 736th time each for us.) and we had so much fun just listening to our kids' reactions. And since this blog is all about posterity (at least it is for me), I'm going to record what I can remember from this important moment in time.

Toddler Reactions to The Empire Strikes Back

"Mister Luke's face is blooding. It is blooding because of the snow monster."

"What is that robot?" [Response: "A probe."] "WHOA, A PROBE."

"Look at those Imperialt Walkers!" ["No, Imperial Walkers."] "No, they are Imperialt Walkers. They tripped."

"That Imperialt Walker was making FIRE out of its BOTTOM."

"I can see Yoda! I can see Yoda walking!"

"Yoda is making soup."

"Who is the golden man?"

"Who is that man in the black suit?"

"R2 is so funny. He makes such funny noises."

"Where is Luke?" [said 235 times during scene changes]

"Their hands are dirty." [said during Han and Leia's first kiss]

"What was that bear's name?" [bear = Chewbacca]

"This is just like our Micro Machines!"

"That is the Cloud City!" [wipe a tear]

"What just happened to Han?" ["He is encased in carbonite."] "Whoa, carbonite."

"They are fighting! The blue and the red are fighting!"

"Mister Luke has a robot hand!" [Later: J wanders into the room with a box on his foot and proclaims, "Look at me! I have a robot foot just like Mister Luke has a robot hand!"]

That's all I can think of right now. I'll update as I remember more or as The Professor reminds me. As I said, it was truly a momentous thing for our family. Clearly seeing Star Wars has had a profound effect on our children, as evidenced by the boys choosing to play "light saber" with their battery-operated candles at church the next day instead of holding them obediently.

Did I really expect any less from my husband's sons?

The Sewing Area: A Visit

2011-02-14T09:52:00.003-06:00

This weekend I snagged a new sewing table (which is really a cute antique desk). I'm super excited about this sewing table, because a) it's functional (my old one was rather rickety), b) it's cute, and c) it just further inspires me to hang onto my money from week to week and continue saving for a new machine. My old one finally bit the dust (by "old" I mean "purchased in 1972"), and while my lovely friend Gina has loaned me hers for as long as I need it, I really need a machine of my own that will do lots of tricks and help me develop as a sewer.

Anyway! That's beside the point. The point is that I organized my sewing room/the play room over the weekend and felt I should share pictures, as people who may care about it haven't seen it since I made it more functional for myself over a year ago. Rae did a similar post a few days ago, and her post made me think, "Huh, I think Janie asked to see pictures a long time ago." So! Here you are, Janie.

First off, the small portion of the room that houses my sewing machine and various notions and fabrics:

It is, in typical Christine fashion, rather jumbly and messy, but I assure you, it's all organized and carefully tucked away, easy for me to find. I'd like to hang a large shelf or cabinet on the wall for more storage off of the floor, but for now the wall houses my pin-up boards, with lots of pictures and things that make me happy.

Just opposite the sewing machine table is my antique desk, which serves as our office area and also as my knitting and serging area. Not that I am actually using my serger right now. This is a long, frustrating story that I won't bore you with now. Right now, it's a good storage area.

(That's plastic on our 62-year-old windows. We do strange things to conserve heat.)

I keep my straight and double-pointed needles in a birdy flowerpot, and did you see where I am keeping my yarn? It is my pride and joy.

It's some sort of decorative platter, maybe for cupcakes or decorative balls or something. I use it for the soft, snobby yarn to which I am so addicted. (Thank you, Janie.)

So anyway, what a silly post. Thanks for indulging me, you guys. I like that my creative area, which is continually seeping past its boundaries, is shaping up to be a fun place, and I like that it's in the sunniest room of the house. In mid-February, this fact alone is enough to keep me from going insane.

A Little Bit Sad

2011-02-11T22:07:00.003-06:00

What's been going on here, besides my mom and my sons being as adorable as ever?

Not much. Except.

My sister, her husband, and my niece are moving away.

*SOB*

My brother-in-law has found a fabulous job, which means wonderful opportunities for his family, and it just so happens that this job is located in a faraway land known as Texas. This is pretty far away from northern Illinois. We'll be lucky to see them a couple times a year. And it is breaking my heart.

I mean, oh so selfishly, it is breaking my heart, because they are making the right decision, of course. But oh, how I will miss My Sister the Goddess. And oh, how I will miss the Baby Goddess. And I suppose I'll miss my stinky brother-in-law.

I will miss them.

So. That's what's been going on around here. Some laughter, some tears, some sad, but mostly happy. I will miss my sister. That's all.

In Which I Do Awesome Things in the Name of Science

2011-02-02T13:20:00.005-06:00

Hey! Look! We got a blizzard! And now I am going to force some pictures upon you, because a) obviously you've never seen snow, or at least pictures of it, before, and b) hot dang, I just shoveled it all, and I think I am going to have a heart attack, and I am allowed to foist these pictures upon you.

You can't tell in that above picture, but I also shoveled our sidewalk, just so our sweet new mailman wouldn't kill himself delivering the mail. You're welcome, sweet new mailman.

I don't know if these pictures really do the sheer volume of snow justice. I'd say the snowfall itself was a foot, maybe a little more (see the patio chairs and the playset?), but because of the fabulous wind we got there are drifts all over the place of 3 and 4 feet. Just to the right of the edge of that last picture is a huge drift that proved to come up to my waist. I like to do awesome things in the name of science. And this is in the city. I'd hate to see what it looks like in the country, without plows or houses to block the wind.

I think (fingers crossed) we're good for snow. Now we just have to get through a wind chill advisory tonight, with wind chills as low as 20 and 30 below.

Would it be too obvious to say that spring can't come soon enough?

What We're Doing, What We Did, and What We Look Like

2011-02-01T09:35:00.004-06:00

Ramble #1: We here in south Chicagoland are preparing for a vicious blizzard. I'm baking bread, boiling water, stocking candles, and grinding coffee beans. Nothing--I repeat, nothing, not even a blizzard of epic proportions--will stand between me and my caffeine intake. Because seriously, my children need me to be in tip-top shape, right? And that means coffee. (Don't worry, I can make it work: a French press, a gas stove, and a grizzly-like attitude in the mornings. Ta-da, coffee!)

I don't think we're overreacting by taking these precautions. We live in an old house with old, loose, tangled-up-in-trees power lines, and if the power is going to even think about going out anywhere within a 25-mile radius of our house, it will go out here. It's just the simple truth. We've weathered simple summer thunderstorms and been the only house on the block without power. And I've heard predictions of anywhere from 12 to 28 inches, with wind gusts of 45 m.p.h., so, you know, that's awesome. Great. Thank you, weather.

Ramble #2: I had a FABULOUS birthday weekend, thanks to my husband and my conspiring parents and in-laws. For the second year in a row he whisked me away to Chicago, where we explored the glorious grottiness that is Wicker Park (book stores! record shops! sex toy shops! used furniture dealers! independent yarn and coffee shops! pizzas places that are also micro breweries! Really, the best place ever. We didn't go in the sex shops, just so you know.) all day Saturday and then retired to a fancy-schmancy hotel right off the Lake (read: Very cold.) for the night. We hung around in the city, visiting pancake houses and another yarn shop, through early Sunday afternoon, when we rode the train back home, greeted our children at my parents' house, and then enjoyed a happy birthday dinner of crawfish etouffee. And everyone had pitched in further and bought me a Chi flat-iron.

IT WAS WONDERFUL.

Anyway! In a totally unrelated note, I have some recent (as in, from last weekend) pictures of our family that I wanted to share. As it is for anyone with small children, none of these are great. But maybe you can squint a bit and pretend that we're all smiling and keeping objects away from our mouths. And fingers away from our noses.

I am cracking up at B's face in this one:

Oh, these children, they do make me laugh. I guess B was really our wild card this time around.

Happy blizzard-ing, folks! I hope everyone stays safe and can hunker down comfortably with lots of squirrelly kids. At least that's what I'm planning on doing. With plenty of coffee.

The Thomas Hat

2011-01-28T11:12:00.002-06:00

I promise to post updated pictures of my sons soon, but I just couldn't pass up the opportunity to show you firsthand evidence of Baby C wearing her beloved Thomas hat...backward.

And doing that which she does best: talking.

Precious, no?

Hat: Accomplished

2011-01-24T09:46:00.004-06:00

So I got all braggy about my Celtic cable scarf, and of course I made a MAJOR mistake and then lost my cable needle and everything fell apart.

OF COURSE.

I am not deterred. I will persevere. I have realized my mistakes. But I have learned my lesson: I will not boast about my needleart accomplishments until they are, you know, finished.

So! Let the boasting commence! I made The Professor a hat for Christmas!

It was my first stab at both a hat and cable knitting, and it was a success. The hat is kind of a cross between a rugby helmet and an aviator cap. He loves it. It keeps his ears snug while he strides across Notre Dame's insanely large campus and bravely faces the evil that is Lake Effect Snow.

I used Knit Picks' Wool of the Andes in charcoal, and I'm really happy with how it knitted up. I originally bought it on Janie's suggestion, and I'd happily second that suggestion. If you're looking for an inexpensive wool that knits up well and is relatively soft, go with the Wool of the Andes.

And if you're looking for the pattern, log into Ravelry and find the (free!) pattern for 18 Seconds to Sunrise. In my opinion it's smaller than the average adult head (as in, my big ole head and fat ole hair do not in any way fit into this hat), so plan accordingly.

Happy knitting trails!

Toast Baby

2011-01-18T09:32:00.004-06:00

Baby C hung around the breakfast table this morning, as she is wont to do, nibbling her toast and just generally being darling.

And also flipping her hair around a lot, thus preventing her mama from getting a clear picture.

I love her, even when she declares, "I don't like my barrette," tosses said adornment to the floor, and smashes a Thomas the Tank Engine conductor's hat backward on her carefully combed hair.

She is all girl, folks. All bossy, determined, stubborn girl, even when wearing said conductor's hat.

Celtic Cable (Demi) Scarf

2011-01-17T20:28:00.003-06:00

I don't mean to brag, but...

...my scarf can kick your scarf's bottom all around the block.

(Pattern source)

ps: Janie told me that Knit Picks' interchangeble circular needle sets are totally worth the money. Everyone, please pool your resources and send me a nice wooden set in time for my birthday.

pps: My birthday is on the 30th. Of this month. Don't worry, you'll have time.

ppps: This is the wool I am using. It is from Michigan, as are many good things. Case in point: My husband is from Michigan. He uses his hand to tell you about his origins and everything. But right now this wool is more useful to me than the hand thing.

Odds and Ends

2011-01-12T13:22:00.003-06:00

I feel kind of silly, because we finally made a trip to Michigan (remember how Pukefest 2010 derailed our original Christmas trip?) and managed to forget to take a single picture.

So! You get another quick post without pictures. I'm okay with that, because my forte is using my words, not my photography skills. But don't get all expectant about my words, okay? I'm really cold and I haven't had my afternoon coffee. Grr.

Here are a few things you might want to know if you plan on, as we say around here, "keeping up with the Cases":

I just finished knitting my first hat. [INSERT MUCH JUBILIATION] Seriously, though, pretty cool, right? I'll upload a picture once I get it pressed and all. It's a black wool hat with earflaps that I knit for The Professor for Christmas, and it's fairly rad. I had to learn how to cable, which, as is usual in the knitting world, was not nearly as daunting as I had expected once I actually sat down and did it. I keep re-learning this lesson. And I will probably continue freaking out about new knitting procedures until I have learned them all, knitted it all, and then I will die. The end.

Now I am starting this project, which is slightly more challenging than the hat, as I have to read a cable chart. But I already figured it out, so pshaw, no biggie.

Baby C is potty trained. [ZOMG, SERIOUSLY, SO MUCH JUBILATION AROUND HERE] We figured Christmas break was the best uninterrupted stretch of time we would have, so Monday after Christmas (when we were all healed) we started training in earnest. [Insert: She was so ready, you guys. I promise I did not force this on her. She was catching herself going in her diaper and then demanding to be changed. So. Ready.] She had the hang of it after just a few days, and she is officially taking herself into the bathroom when the urge hits, big girl panties and all. We were in Michigan for five days, and she only had one accident that entire time.

Really, high fives all around.

Baby C is also the most articulate, most chatty 2.5-year old I have ever met. It's insane to hear such complete, big sentences coming out of such a little mouth in such a little voice. And she is, of course, so funny. A few nights ago her daddy tucked her into bed and said, "I love you," and her candid response was, "Yes, you do."

Oh, and one other thing she's been saying lately: "I have some stomach/throat in my bottom." This is said in a very woeful voice, and only said when she is (sorry) using the bathroom, and all we can figure is that this means that a) she has gas, and b) this means her bottom is burping.

HAHAHAHAHA

The Professor had a fabulous first semester at Notre Dame, complete with all As, and is enjoying his last few days of break before embarking on a second full semester. Of course, he's "enjoying" his "break" by working at the planetarium. So whatever.

J and B are pretty great, too. I just don't have anything earth-shattering to share about them. Oh, they did finish up Taekwondo. They stuck it out for two eight-week sessions, and even though things looked promising for awhile, by the end they were refusing to participate in any given class and/or bursting into tears at the mere mention of Taekwondo. So. No classes. We've all learned some lessons, and we're all happier to be class-free. I figure they'll be stuck in school all day soon enough--what's a few years of completely disorganized play?

You guys, I have some stomach in my bottom.

Junie B

2011-01-08T07:13:00.004-06:00

My mother- and father-in-law were able to visit Janie and Ryan this past weekend, and they came back with tons of pictures of Juniper, my new niece. She will be a month old in just a couple days. I am in love.

Look at that deep groove between her nose and her mouth!

It's a fairy thumbprint, I just know it.

Happy weekend! Juniper, if you're reading this, I LOVE YOU.

Stomach Virus: Eleventy-Billion; New Year's Resolution: Zip

2011-01-02T14:12:00.003-06:00

So our Christmas and New Year's celebrations were very nearly ruined by illness.

Sigh.

If you're a long-time reader, you're probably thinking this right now: Geez, the Cases seem to be sick a lot of the time. Which, really, is true. It seems that way. I mean, I'm sure if I looked at the calender year and assessed our sick-time and our well-time honestly, of course we'd be well the majority of the time. But dang, if we aren't sick a lot.

(A couple weeks ago I jokingly yearned for drama; Rae mentioned that being sick was probably as dramatic as it would get around here, and really, she's right. And it's drama enough for me, thank you.)

I suppose this is something that just happens with lots of small kids so close in age who share toys, drinks, clothes, and, generously, germs. Two years ago the boys suffered through 7 raging ear infections each in the span of three months, and a friend of ours, a surgeon with grown children of his own, assured us that yes, this was normal, and yes, this too shall pass. But really, I thought it would have passed by now. After all, they aren't sticking everything in their mouths anymore.

And I rashly made a New Year's Resolusion involving blogging 2 or 3 times a week, like the good ole days, and planned on getting a head start during our long and luxurious Christmas break.

And then J and I contracted the stomach flu a week and a half before Christmas, and certain members of the family were still vomiting 12 days later. C managed to catch said virus twice. As soon as the stomach virus decided we looked puny and meek enough, a nasty cold virus took its place, and we are all just now experiencing the final hacking coughs of this second illness.

Sure, I'm complaining. It was kind of a rotten December, and I'm glad to see it end. We had to cancel our planned Christmas trip to Michigan, meaning we missed visiting with extended family whom we see rarely. We were confined to our home, forced to conjure up weak imitations of Christmas magic while holding out barf buckets and warning friends away. Our children didn't go out in public for 2 weeks, during which time we all grew tired of one another and began to snipe, snipe, snipe. It's been very hard, and I think I maybe took 2 pictures of our Christmas morning, both of which turned out pretty badly. Plus they feature a sad and sick B, whipped as a kitten, curled up on the couch in his daddy's lap, trusty bucket near his knees. I would like to erase that memory, please.

What is the point of this post? I have no idea. I'm not going to edit it or read through for cohesiveness--I'm just going to hit "publish" and walk away. I'm sorry to gripe and moan. I know, in theory, that we have it good. My husband was, thankfully (oh so thankfully) home during this time, so that I could quietly be sick downstairs while he tended to sick kids upstairs. We had the money for a nice Christmas celebration at home, and our kids didn't go without toys, clothes, or books. We had plenty of food and medicine to nurse us through the worst of it, and I have sympathetic parents who were willing to expose themselves in order to lend aid and love. Our kids are young enough to not really understand what they were missing, and they have no idea that we had even intended to go Michigan this year. As rotten as it was, it could have, of course, been much, much worse.

So. On that happy note.

Happy New Year. Really, I mean it. I hope and pray you, my sweet readers, are blessed beyond measure in this new year. It's 2011! (I've been out of high school for 10 years! In less than a month I will be 28!) Let us all grow in wisdom and stature in this year, and let us not ever take for granted our many days of health and contentment. If nothing else, I hope our little family's weeks of agony this past month help in teaching me that lesson.

ps: Would y'all please, if you think of it, keep me accountable to my little resolution? It's easy for me to get bogged down in the trials of keeping a family of five happy and (relatively) healthy, and this blog shouldn't suffer, because it's so many things to me and a few other people. If you think it's too long between posts, please nag me. I'd be very grateful to you, sweet readers.

The Colbert Report: "Jesus is a Liberal Democrat"

2010-12-22T07:53:00.003-06:00

I posted this to my Facebook page the other day, but I love it enough to want to share it with a (slightly) wider audience. Colbert, as usual, drives the point home beautifully.

The Colbert Report

Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Jesus Is a Liberal Democrat

http://www.colbertnation.com/

Colbert Report Full Episodes

Political Humor & Satire Blog

March to Keep Fear Alive

As my husband pointed out, he walks a fine line between humor and sermon in this instance. And please do not think I'm trying to make a political statement here. If you read the title of this video and can't get any further in your thinking, then you have completely missed the very real point: that Jesus has asked us to do very hard things, and that we are, very often, failing.

Of course, the logical argument would be, "Hey, wait, Jesus didn't say it's the government's responsibility to care for the poor and needy--that's the Church's job!" Which is 100% accurate. But the church is failing. And the government feels the need, whether it's right or not, to pick up all the slack. This is the situation in which Colbert (and the rest of us) finds himself.

Note: In case you didn't know, Colbert is an active and practicing Catholic. And if you care, you can find the original video here, along with a lot of ridiculous and misguided comments from commenters who couldn't stomach the thought of "Jesus" and "Democrat" in the same sentence. (My favorite was from a person who said, to paraphrase, "Jesus didn't say all rich people should sell their possessions and give to the poor--just that one guy. So clearly it doesn't apply to anyone else." All-righty then.)

Still Yearning for Simplicity

2010-12-16T06:48:00.003-06:00

So we've got a stomach virus, which as everyone knows, is pure bliss. So far (knock on wood, praise Jesus, please keep praying) only J and I have had it, and it's not nearly the trainwreck of a bug that we had 2 years ago, which kept our little family crippled for the better part of a week. (I was just looking over some old blog posts to refresh my memory, and apparently the boys were puking for 4 days. FOUR DAYS. Isn't that awful? How did I retain my sanity?)

I need to post here, because that just needs to happen, I need to keep writing, etc., but I can't come up with anything new or creative because my insides still feel a might squeebly. I am happily enjoying my first cup of coffee in a couple days, but still. Squeebly. So instead of doing anything new, I thought I'd re-post (as I did last year, too) a favorite post of my invention from two years ago. Who knows, this might just become tradition each year.

Preamble to repost: Things have changed since this original post. We have been Orthodox Christians for a year and a half, and I feel like we have achieved the simplistic celebration of Christ's birth, coupled with awed, down-on-your-knees worship, for which I was so longing two years ago. We, as a family, are so proudly out-of-the-loop as far as commercialism goes that my children have only the vaguest grasp of who Santa is and what he does. Don't get me wrong: I have nothing against Santa. (Saint Nicholas, you guys! He's pretty important in our church.) Santa as gift-giver, innocent childhood myth--that's fine. But Santa as hoopla, presents for me-me-me, let's go buy as much s*** as we can on Black Friday because clearly that's what it's about, no. I have no stomach for that. I think that version of Christmas is so warped as to be sinful.

(Note: The Professor was telling me about a news story on NPR about the economy that he heard. They interviewed a lady who had been laid off and who was supporting her family with unemployment benefits. At the time of the interview, she had just finished buying $500 worth of Christmas presents for her kids (FIVE HUNDRED DOLLARS, OH MY GOODNESS) on Black Friday because she felt like it was her "duty" to help out the economy. Also, she didn't want her kids' Christmas to suffer. Oh, give me a break.)

(I realize I'm on my soapbox here, and even perhaps patting myself on the back a little. Don't worry, I'll fall off that box soon enough. It always happens.)

Anyway, the post. It can be found in its original state here. I have cut the introduction out in this reproduction just for clarity. (Although, to be fair, Baby C's fabulous red bows are a thing of outstanding blogging importance.) I hope you enjoy:

Church this morning was a little... different. It was the adult Christmas musical, which is evidently a big deal for our church. Not only was it performed as the morning worship today, but it was also performed Saturday night and tonight (Sunday) for the public at an admission cost. Whoa! It was a pretty big production that the performers had obviously put a lot of hard work and time into. The orchestra and choir were great, and the people participating were having a great time. In addition, the two evening performances evidently had a very outreach-centered approach, as the organizers understood community members were more likely to come to those shows versus the Sunday morning performance. All of this I could appreciate. What I couldn't appreciate was the sheer magnitude of it all. When did Christmas become such a production?

I understand that we have a large church (1,000+, from what I understand) and that, more than likely, things like the adult Christmas musical are Sacred Cows Which Must Not Be Touched, so probably my opinion on the matter won't turn the tide. But it truly was over-the-top and, more annoyingly, sort of repetitive. When the flyer said "live nativity," I didn't realize this meant no less than three donkeys, several sheep, a couple lambs, and two CAMELS. Yes, camels. (Where in the heck do you get camels in the middle of December in the middle of Illinois?) The original, gospel-themed compositions were very repetitive, and I had a hard time staying interested when we weren't singing the traditional Advent hymns and carols. Toward the end of a particularly emotional piece, "Joseph" held "Baby Jesus" over his head in a move that looked suspiciously like it had been copied out of The Lion King, and streamers popped out of mini cannons to inform us when the climax had been reached.

Just slightly over-the-top.

I'm sorry. I'm going to stop complaining. A lot of good, Christian people put a lot of time and effort into this musical. I don't feel like I'm normally so super critical. I just long for simplicity, especially now, especially at Christmas, especially with children of my own. I get sick of the hype, the noise, the glittery, false luster that often serves, even unknowingly, to distract us from the true meaning, that being Jesus Christ's advent here on earth. Why is it so hard for us to get excited about that one simple fact? Why do we have to hide the baby and His incredible story behind popping streamers and loud productions? It hit me this morning, as I was gazing at the images of the Holy Family being broadcast from the large projectors (heaven forbid we not have visual stimulation), how truly incredible the whole story really is.

God came to earth in frail human form!

Jesus was born to a virgin! That's impossible!

She gave birth in a stable!

SHE GAVE BIRTH IN A STABLE! Folks, I have given birth, and this fact is incredible in and of itself.

They laid him in a manger! Presumably there was hay involved!

Angels from heaven appeared and sang the good news!

Shepherds came to honor and worship this baby!

A baby! They came to see a baby! Jesus was a baby!

Three mysterious men traveled from a distant land to visit the baby because they read the tidings in the stars!

Mary, Joseph, and their baby had to flee from an enraged king who slaughtered thousands in his attempts to kill Jesus!

This is all so incredible! Without such an example, these kind of circumstances would be beyond the workings of our limited imaginations. Why can't we see this? Why do we have to surround these astounding truths, so incredible that they seem absurd when I write them out and actually give them meaningful thought, with any sort of production? It's as if we think Jesus can't stand on His own, can't get His point across by Himself, needs our help to seem cool.

I'm sorry, folks, but Jesus' birth and the circumstances surrounding it are pretty dang cool without our help. Maybe I sound like a crusty, embittered old man, but this is truly how I feel. This is truly how I want to live: without the hype, without the glitter, shouting these simple, astounding truths for all of us, who are so dependent on hype, to hear and once again believe.

Baby!!!

2010-12-11T07:24:00.003-06:00

Update: Here is Janie's post about her new arrival. A few specific details on Juniper, my new niece.

Original Post:

Janie finally had her baby!

A baby girl!

So. Excited. She was due on the 4th, so we were all kind of waiting on pins and needles. And you guys! She had the baby at home! In a birthing tub! In like 3 hours! Isn't that hardcore? She is my hero.

I'll let you know if she gets around to naming the precious little girl or posting on her blog or anything like that. Suffice to say, I'm makin' headbands.

Hello and All

2010-11-26T07:39:00.003-06:00

Hey, folks. We've been laying low, as you may have noticed. Mainly this is due to two consecutive colds that ravaged our family. And I mean literally consecutive: we were well for about 6 days, then BAM, another cold. How is that even fair?

Anyway, Happy [belated] Thanksgiving! My turkey turned out fine. You may have noticed, via Twitter, that I was slightly nervous. You should know that I have prepared very little "grown-up" meat in my time. By "grown-up," I mean like whole birds, steaks, roasts, etc. In fact, I've never prepared a roast or a steak or a whole chicken. But this year I volunteered to make the turkey, and I think my mom was more than happy to pass over her roasting pan and hand off that duty.

I don't fix much meat because a) we don't eat much (we fast a lot as Orthodox, plus we have issues with factory-farmed meat), and b) I get all weebly when I have to prepare it. Poultry is the worst. I mean, yesterday I had to brave neck skin, gizzards, and puny little turkey wings, and I about lost it when my husband wandered in and said, "Hey, I think you can see where they plucked the feathers!"

YES, THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR THAT TIDBIT.

But! I made it! And I even ate a little bit--a very little bit. Like a bite.

We celebrated at my parents' house with them, my sister and her husband and their Baby Goddess, and another couple, some friends. And we are cherishing our time off from school and work, cherishing our loooong weekend together, cherishing the fact that Black Friday shopping makes us all want to puke and run away simultaneously. (Today, instead of shopping, the kids and I are going back over to my parents' while my husband rips up the linoleum in our entryway and tiles it. He is my hero!)

So that is our brief and picture-less update. I hope it will satisfy for the time being!

ps: Yesterday my children unhooked about 30 crystals from a chandelier hanging in my parents' bedroom. The children were supposed to be sleeping in my parents' bed--they have handled this task brilliantly in the past, without incident--but apparently said bed is just tall enough for a 3-year-old to reach the tantalizing crystals. So. That was fun.

A Prayerful Sighing

2010-11-09T21:20:00.004-06:00

A Prayerful Sighing of Parents for Their Children

LORD Jesus Christ, Son of God, for the sake of the prayers of Thy Most Pure Mother, hearken unto me, Thine unworthy servant Christine.

O Lord, govern in mercy my children, Thy servants J, B, and C. Have mercy on them and save them, for Thy name's sake.

O Lord, forgive them all their transgressions, voluntary and involuntary, that they may be perfected before Thee. O Lord, set them on the true path of Thy commandments and enlighten their minds with the Light of Christ unto salvation of their souls and the healing of their bodies.

Bless them, O Lord, at home, at school, in their journeys and in every place of Thy dominion. Preserve and shelter them, O Lord, from flying bullets, arrows, the sword, poison and fire, from mortal wounds and sudden death. Guard them, O Lord, from all visible and invisible enemies, and from all danger, evil, and misfortune.

Heal them, O Lord, from all sickness, deliver them from every impurity, and lighten their spiritual sufferings. Grant them, O Lord, the grace of Thy Holy Spirit and a long life; grant them health and chastity in all piety and love, and to live in accord with all their neighbors, near and far.

Multiply and strengthen them, O Lord, in mental ability and bodily strength, given to them by Thee. Bless them to lead a pious life and, if it is pleasing to Thee, grant them married life and honorable childbearing.

For Thy name's sake, O Lord, give me, Thy sinful and unworthy servant, a parental blessing for my children and Thy servants, both in this present time, morning, noon and night, and also in Thine eternal, almighty, and all-powerful Kingdom. Amen.

-from The Akathist to the Mother of God, Nurturer of Children

(pssst: definition of "akathist")

Perfect Little J

2010-11-03T20:57:00.003-05:00

This kid.

This kid. My oldest. My J. My sweet, laid-back, funny, positive, giggly J. My blue-eyed boy, with wild red hair that refuses, Harry Potter-like, to lay down flat, despite his mother's most attentive ministrations. My boy who, at this moment, lays sick and sad and tired in his bed, afflicted with his first cold of the season. My poor baby.

J is incredibly articulate for his age (which is 3 1/2, in case you're fuzzy on the details), and his dad and I are continually amazed at the grown-up statements that come out of little mouth. Complete with an unexpectedly southern twang. Why, just last week he walked up to his grandmother and solemnly informed her, "Ta, you need to take me to Donut King." Hm.

He is so patient, so very, very patient, with his buggy little sister. He gives her toys, gives her hugs, gives her his time. He is the most patient when his brother is at his whiniest, and he always humors his doting mama with lots of hugs and kisses. He positively writhes with pleasure when he gets to go on special dates with his dad, yet he is always happy to share his treasures with his clamoring brother and sister.

He is, in short, a perfect little J.

I think I'll go kiss his pale little face right now.

Sweet Feet and Reading

2010-11-02T16:28:00.000-05:00

I like catching my kids being sweet to one another.

(Dudes, they are reading the complete collection of original Thomas the Tank Engine stories. Which I found for $2. I mean, you need to understand that I was a hero for many, many days after that purchase.)

A Calico Cat, a Train Conductor, and a Boy Wizard (Plus a Bonus Peapod)

2010-11-01T16:19:00.004-05:00

Happy Hallowe'en!

Katie's Beautiful Friends

2010-10-24T11:48:00.011-05:00

It has been a busy week. I am exhausted, but it is an exhaustion that is of the happiest and most content variety. You see, a large part of my busy, exhausting week can be attributed to my sweet friend, Katie, who decided she needed to marry her Prince Charming, Doug.

Here is where I would insert a picture of the happy couple from the lovely ceremony, but I was a bridesmaid, you see. So I was doing everything but taking pictures. I am not in any way complaining about this. I was thrilled and honored when Katie asked me, so many months ago, to be a part of her day, and I am still so glad I said yes and was able to work to help Katie.

And you know what? I had so much fun. So. Much. Fun. I got to see old friends and meet new ones, and I was continually amazed at how beautiful, inside and out, Katie's friends were. I was home one evening after wedding festivities, telling The Professor about my day, and marveling to him about the wonderful people I was meeting, the young ladies of strong character and faith and genuine beauty and senstivitiy and humility and humor (oh, my, were there some funny ladies) with whom I was continually coming in contact. And The Professor, who is wise, said, "Well, do you think Katie would surround herself with anyone less than that?"

He is absolutely right. Katie is a beautiful young woman, of beautiful character and grace and charm and intelligence, and she has carefully and deliberately (yes, deliberately, even if not consciously) gathered equally beautiful young women all around her, to reflect and magnify and hone that beauty. It was a golden, vibrant environment to be a part of this weekend, and I am so grateful I was chosen to be involved in such an intimate way. (Note: Upon second reading, I realize that this may sound as if I am trying to give myself a backdoor compliment. Really, I'm not. I'm just trying to express how impressed I was by everyone around me. I felt like a huge goofball in comparison.)

We all, her family and friends and loving supporters, handed her over to Doug, an equally beautiful man who already deeply cherishes and loves Katie's beauty. I was so honored to be a witness to this union, a part of such a God-centered wedding ceremony that promises a fruitful, beautiful marriage.

I plan to still hang around Katie, even if our relationship changes a little as she learns to be a wife and a partner and, in the future, a mother. I plan to hang around not only because I love Katie and Doug, but also because I have seen the beauty that Katie so naturally attracts, and I so desperately want to be in on that.

Katie, I love you. I am so happy for you and your husband. May God grant you many years of peace, health, and happiness together.

Here is a picture of Katie and me from many, many moons ago,

when she was on the homecoming court at college.

And these are the flowers I got to hold this weekend!

Gorgeous, eh? I love fall weddings.

Ode to a Hair Dryer

2010-10-16T14:19:00.004-05:00

We gather together today to mourn the loss of a dear, dear hair care appliance: my hair dryer.

As you can see from the above photo, my hair dryer died in the middle of blow drying my hair this morning, resulting in a flippy, curvy mess of a mop. I was much less upset by the state of my hair than I was by the loss of my faithful blow dryer. You see, I have had this hair dryer for seven long years. Yes, seven years. I know, this is amazing.

The loss of this blow dryer has, in all seriousness, brought up a whole mess of happy memories for me. I bought this dryer seven years ago, in the summer of 2003, in preparation for a semester abroad in Oxford, England. The Professor and I had been accepted into a program for American students to study at Oxford University (specifically, in our case, at Keble College) and we were, in a word, ecstatic to be spending the first part of our junior year of college in England. I prepared carefully, as I could only bring two suitcases for four months of living abroad, and this hair dryer was a proud purchase made out of my meager summer earnings. (I also had to earn enough that summer to live off of for a semester. The exchange rate escalated dramatically in the first weeks of our stay. Needless to say, we didn't do much traveling.)

I bought this small travel hair dryer for about $10, figuring that if it lasted a semester, it would have more than done its job. It features a switch to change the voltage, and that, combined with my trusty outlet changer, made it possible for me to use it, well, anywhere on Earth. It featured 1600 watts of power and a collapsing handle.

And it carried me through that semester and beyond. It carried me through countless hairstyles: short, long, medium, bobbed, layered, you name it, I've had it. It carried me through my engagement (in the last days of our stay in England), the beginning of our marriage, our first home together, my first pregnancy, my first babies, two cross-country moves, another baby (just before whose arrival I got a drastic pixie cut), and beyond.

Maybe this sounds silly to you. Hey, it is silly. But this hair dryer, no matter how silly it does sound, is a link to a recent past that is, at the same time, a distant past. I was 20 when I bought this dryer. Twenty. No one knows who they are or what they think when they are twenty, and I was going to Oxford. With my $10 hair dryer, a suitcase of sweaters, another empty suitcase for books, and a vague idea that maybe my classes would be hard. I knew that I desperately loved The Professor, that I wanted to marry him, but I had no idea that he was leaving an engagement ring in his parents' safekeeping back home in the States. I had no idea I would have twins in four short years, and a sweet baby girl in less than six. I had no idea where we would go, what we would do, who we would meet.

And this hair dryer is, in its own unique and loyal way, is a link to that sweet, naive girl of twenty, who stood in front of Big Ben and, apparently, bossed the photographer the entire time.

I've already bought a new one to replace it. My old Conair 1600 is in the trash, its usefulness long past, its life not precious enough for anything beyond a passing mention on a narrowly-read blog.

And, as ridiculous as it sounds, I get a knot in my stomach when I think about having to get used to a new hair dryer. How spoiled is that?

I should note that the tan trench coat I am wearing in the above picture was also bought specifically for this trip to Oxford, also out of my summer earnings. I chose carefully from the Gap's offerings that early fall and shelled out $80 for this coat. And I still love and wear it to this day, where it stands the test of time and fashion's "trend" pronouncements. If it ever goes the way of the hair dryer, I might have a nervous breakdown.

Happy hair drying trails to you, my friends.

Harry Potter Bananagrams and Other Important Bits

2010-10-11T20:00:00.004-05:00

Just a couple things:

1. My sister, my brother-in-law, my husband, and I enjoy challenging one another to epic rounds of Bananagrams, which might be my favorite game ever in the history of all time. Ever. (I really love this game, you guys.) After a few rounds the other night, The Professor suggested we try a themed game, and we all settled on "Harry Potter" as a theme. We allowed names and other proper nouns (I mean, of course we did--how could you uphold that rule with a theme like Harry Potter?), as well as consultation of the books for ideas and even fair trade of unwanted letters between players. It was still really, really hard, especially when you drew all vowels or like three X's in a row, and so we eventually combined our words to create one truly epic Bananagrams board:

Probably the most epic Harry Potter-themed Bananagrams board of all time. Ever.

2. It's in the 80s here, which is strange, since we had already transitioned to typical crisp fall temperatures a couple weeks ago and now I'm grumpy because I'm having to dig out my kids' shorts and t-shirts (which are all too small for them at this point) all over again. Despite the balmy weather, my back yard suddenly looks like this, as viewed from my west-facing kitchen window:

This, quite literally, happened overnight. You think I'm exaggerating, but I'm not. One day green grass, then we sleep and wake up and BOOM, the 50-year-old elm in the back has exploded into yellow and dropped half its leaves in shock. I realize that this is how fall happens--you wake up and it's suddenly there--but it's always a surprise, every year.

I took this picture this morning, and I promise you (AGAIN, I AM NOT EXAGGERATING), there are many, many hundreds more leaves covering the yard this evening. We don't bother raking leaves and I'm so glad we don't, since I'd feel compelled to do it NOW, and there is still a 60-year-old maple and a 30-year-old locust who need to shed their leaves.

I can feel them watching me, waiting for me to turn back into the house before they let loose.

In fact, this is probably how that picture should have appeared:

You are, as ever, very welcome.

Rocket Ship

2010-10-06T21:50:00.002-05:00

J tells us all about his rocket ship.

I have been laughing about this all day.

Alphabet Wall

2010-10-04T16:53:00.005-05:00

I did an alphabet wall in my home this past week, and I'm so excited to show you.

Here is my inspiration:

You can read all about how she did her wall here (as well as see her original inspiration.)

So I really liked this idea, but I didn't have a full, blank wall to use as a canvas. I did, however, have a little-used and oft-neglected corner in the living room that was perfect. This is the corner you see directly in front of you as you walk in our front door, and to its right is the large arched doorway that leads to the bathroom and our bedroom. It's an eye-catching corner that hosts a comfy armchair, but for too long it has functioned as a sort of blurry, vague spot on the horizon of our living room. A combination of no lighting, ill-defined decorating, and a lack of functionality served to make it cut-off from the rest of the room.

No more! I made an alphabet wall/corner. And it works.

My apologies for the blurry, lopsided picture. Hopefully you can get the general idea. I used both sides of the corner as if they made one large wall; therefore, each row of letters reads horizontally across both walls before jumping to the next row. My wall is, perhaps, a bit more eclectic and busy than my original inspiration. But that's okay, as my house tends to be busy, colorful, jumbled, and eclectic. That's just how it is.

Some things about it I really like:

Visual interest! This corner now draws the eye and makes you want to get to know it better instead of rejecting the viewer. It helps to add lighting and a small side table (which you can't see, but at least now people have a place to put drinks.) (And white pumpkins.)
This wall of letters is in keeping with our home. Our home is bursting at the seams with books of all shapes, sizes, and genres, and so we clearly value words. What better way to express that than with a tribute to the alphabet?
Functionality! The "W" is glued to a collaged canvas, which sits on a shelf and covers up my thermostat dial. It's the old-fashioned, bulbous circle kind, so I'm really happy that bad boy is hidden.
This project was cheap. It's a fantastic project if you want to take a long time to collect interesting letters/materials from lots of different places--I didn't do that because I wanted it done by this weekend specifically. But even though I was on a time-crunch (I only started collecting letters a few weeks ago), I managed to keep the price of most of these letters under $2 apiece, if not less. (Y'all, I used my Hobby Lobby, Michael's, and Jo-Ann coupons like a fiend.) The "C" was more expensive, but then again, some things (the record, the frame used for "F," the "J," and most of the decorative materials) were very much free. So it provides a lot of impact while not killing your wallet.
Variety of materials, which further adds visual/tactile interest. I used scrapbooking paper, fabric, paint, mod podge, chalk, wood, glass, buttons, and lots of other materials to make and display these letters. My goal was that no two letters be too similar.

I used the Command Strip picture and poster hanging strips to hang nearly everything. These were probably the most expensive items for this project, but they are necessary if, like me, you don't want to put sixteen thousand nail holes in your stubborn plaster walls.

If you're interested in doing something with letters in your home, I'd encourage you to tackle this project! It was a lot of fun, and after all the work, very fulfilling.

Happy alphabetting!

Pumpkin Envy

2010-09-30T14:56:00.002-05:00

Don't be jealous...

...but the kids and I picked these puppies out of our back yard yesterday.

Now they are scattered about my home, nestled in various small places, and doing a wonderful job of being small, white, and knobbly.

And there are two more on the vine, by the way.

Happy fall!

A Post, Without Pictures

2010-09-27T20:43:00.004-05:00

Just a quick rundown, in list form, since I'm drained and my brain is, apparently, already happily curled up in bed.

Taekwondo take #3 went TERRIBLY. It was terrible, horrible, no good, and very bad. We skipped last Thursday (see next item) and will try again tomorrow. Any and all prayers would be helpful. (Mainly B freaked out because the obstacle course was set up differently from the last time. Note: It is always different each and every time. Sigh.)

We went up to Michigan last week from Wednesday to Friday for a quick trip to my in-laws'. My sister-in-law was visiting for a few days, and we won't see her again until after she gets that baby out of her tummy, so it was really nice to be there with everyone.

My husband surprised us while we were there! We hadn't expected to see him until we got back home, but he made the drive up and surprised me late at night. Sometimes I really hate surprises, but this one was awesome.

A great majority of our time was spent trying to guess the baby's name. Janie isn't finding out the sex of the baby, and she and her husband aren't sharing the names they have picked out, so basically we have no idea. The Professor prefers such perennial favorites as "Canoe" and "Shingle." I think this is mainly to make us all laugh.

This past Saturday we trooped down to Clinton, Illinois for the annual Apple and Pork Festival, the most amazing fall festival ever of all time anywhere, amen. We've been going for years, and every year on our drive down we talk about all the amazing various foods we are going to eat. The list goes like this: ham and beans (they make it in these huge vats), apple fritters, cider and cider floats, kettle corn (Dad has to stand in line for about 30 minutes for this one), onion blossoms, river rat potatoes, corn on the cob...the list goes on and on. We can count on the same vendors selling the same awesome things (including lots and lots of antiques), and, as usual, I got a great jump on my Christmas shopping.

This year we didn't get the river rat potatoes (line was too long) or the onion blossom (it started raining.) Drat. There's always next year.

I love The Apple and Pork Festival. The Professor flits between outright hatred of it and vague annoyance. I think maybe he won't go next year.

The Professor's birthday is today, so yesterday (Sunday) my family gathered together for an early birthday party. I made vegetarian chili. The Professor got cash and the first of a family favorite graphic novel series. All in all (in my opinion), a nice time.

Of course I didn't get any pictures of any of this. That's just how I roll.

And now, a little reading and then off to bed. Maybe my goal for the next post will be pictures. It's a crazy thing, but I might just do it!

Taekwondo: Takes 1 and 2

2010-09-20T13:24:00.005-05:00

A couple of months ago I happened across a newsletter from our park district that outlined upcoming programs and classes for adults and children. I had been wondering if J and B were old enough for an organized sport or activity of some sort, since they need some practice with listening, following directions, and other basic skills, like waiting their turns in line. We opted out of preschool this year, since they are still greatly on the shy and attached side of things (and also because I am having too much fun with them at home), but I still wanted them to interact with other kids their age in some sort of organized setting before school.

(Note: My children hang out with me 97% of the time. Me and me alone. We are all thick as thieves, and I honestly wouldn't have it any other way right now. I am not a play-date mom. I do not, as a general rule, enjoy the company of other moms and their children. (Please do not be offended, friends of mine. You are the exception. What I mean is that I do not actively seek out new friendships simply so that I can bond with women while my children play with their children. I'm not that person.) I do watch other children during the day, so they readily accept new friends without problems. I'm just not into forcing school-like settings/friendships/play dates on them right now. They are 3, 3, and 2. They'll experience school, and all that it entails, soon enough. For now, they are mine.)

I ignored soccer and baseball, since they have had virtually zero exposure to sports like these (both The Professor and I have absolutely no interest in sports), and also since I didn't think fierce competition like that, even with other young kids, would be good for B's especially delicate psyche. (He's definitely moving out of his uber-sensitive stage, but he's still a fragile guy who is hesitant to try new things or meet new people.) Then my eye caught mention of a taekwondo class for children 3-6, and ideas and hopes and dreams fell into fragile positions.

And now here we are. With two children in taekwondo.

B doing the obstacle course during his first class.

The first class went pretty badly. Both boys were very excited about their crisp white uniforms, but once they realized Mom was not going to be participating in class with them, things fell apart. J cried a good portion of the time and refused to interact with his instructor. B refused to participate until everyone started to do an obstacle course. Surprisingly, he joined in, even sneaking in an extra round on the course after everyone else had sat down. That was the end of the participation, though, and I left holding the hands of two crying children, wondering if they would ever "get" it and just be, you know, normal.

(Note #2: A big part of their problem is the instructor himself. He's a really nice guy who has been teaching this sport for over 30 years, but he's also a tall, loud man who teaches at an alternative high school in the area. So. He's demanding and sometimes brusque; he's definitely a coach. He's perfect for this job. But my children have never had to take orders from anyone who isn't a family member, much less a tall, scary man, so getting used to Master C will take time. I'm so glad we're getting this lesson out of the way before preschool.)

B again. Sorry so blurry--he wasn't slowing down for anything.

The second session was completely and wonderfully the opposite of the first. Both boys actively participated, listened, and did their best with the class routines. J only asked to sit with me (in the parent gallery) a couple of times, and each time I asked him to watch and listen to his teacher, which he did willingly. B again demonstrated some latent leadership abilities by being the first to obey his teacher's instructions. J practically wriggled with excitement during the obstacle course, though he had lots of trouble with the concept of waiting in line. Most of Master C's attention is taken with corralling my two boys. I'm completely okay with this. They are the youngest in the class; they'll mature and learn, and then all of the tears will be distant memories.

A really fast punch!

So we're (hesitantly) enjoying taekwondo. Despite a crappy fellow parent or two, despite an admonition to not lick one another, we are all doing okay at an organized sport. Baby C can't wait until she can join her brothers on the mat, and I can't wait until my sons completely forget about my presence during class, thus allowing me to knit quietly while the other, overly-involved parents give themselves early heart attacks worrying about their 4-year-olds' stances and correct positions.

While they fall around me, I will continue to knit, happy that my children are participating in something that will push and poke at the boundaries of their little universes.

I Love My Kids

2010-09-14T21:36:00.002-05:00

I love my kids. I truly do.

They are beautiful, and they are mine.

As I said, I love them.

Blog Post Blast from the Past: Anne of Green Gables

2010-09-12T10:26:00.005-05:00

My friend Brennan started a blog five years ago, and for a time several people, including The Professor and I, posted fairly regularly to it. The posts petered out after a while, but Brennan has started it back up again. (I hope he doesn't mind me mentioning that. He is taking our cat, after all, and I don't want to do anything to offend him.)

One week in 2005 all the blog participants were asked to contribute to Childhood Mythology Week, in which we each took turns writing about a particular story or series or anything else that would qualify as "mythology" from our childhood, thus trying to communicate our undying love for said mythology. My husband chose to write about his (still-) enduring love for the Transformers; Brennan wrote about Calvin and Hobbes. I wrote about Anne of Green Gables. (I had already written about Harry Potter--it's funny to remember dressing up as Severus Snape.)

I had a great time re-reading those old posts, and I wanted to share my Anne post with you guys here, because, despite five years separating the Christine of that post and the Christine of today's post, all of the things I had to say then ring true today. You can follow this link to the original post, or you can read the post in its entirety...now:

Original post:

I know that [The Professor] hinted at me possibly writing about Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia series for my part in Childhood Mythology Week, and he’s certainly correct in assuming that these books made a very deep and real impression on me from an early age, as I know they have for so many others. Indeed, my family is of staunch Lewis loyalist stock, best illustrated by our family codeword, “Reepicheep.” And my childhood myth will most certainly hinge on a book or series of books, because honestly, reading is all I have done since before kindergarten. But while Lewis taught me so much, one character in particular, over all others I so voraciously read about as a child, stands out as having a moving influence: Anne Shirley.

Yes, Lucy Maud Montgomery’s “Anne spelled with an e” won her way into my heart at an extremely young age. My mother first started reading the series to me when I was very young—I honestly cannot place any certain year on when we started. My parents have always held reading in the highest regard, and Charlotte’s Web, The Chronicles of Narnia, and the Anne series were some of the first chapter books they chose to read to us. I think that the Anne myth was certainly perpetuated by the fine movies, directed by Kevin Sullivan, which featured actors who so expertly embodied their characters that my critical imagination was outdone in its attempts to put faces to names and descriptions. I have read the entire series (eight books in all) countless times through, and I have such an intimate appreciation of Montgomery’s characters and situations that I could pick any one of the eight books at random, open any page of said book at random, and begin reading quite happily with a perfect understanding of the current situation and time frame. In fact, I have made it a habit for the last ten years or so to read as many books in the series as possible every summer. (This summer I skipped around a bit (I do have my favorites) and read all but numbers 2, 4, and 7.)

To try and impress upon you just how Anne made such an impact on me, I will resort to list-making. I am an eager list-maker and list-checker-offer, and this vehicle will best organize my thoughts and intentions:

1) Heroines can be intelligent, imaginative, and even prone to flares of temper.

Anne is certainly all three of these things, and her very sensitive nature which worshipped beauty, stillness, and truth only helped to enforce what my parents have always taught me about true feminine beauty and worth. She was never haughty about her intelligence, and her imagination could get her in trouble as she spun wild, elaborate fictions during her younger years. She was sensitive about her appearance, most notably concerning her red hair, which oftentimes led to outbursts of temper most noted by her sharp tongue. In short, she was real. I believed that I could also be a heroine while doing the most “ordinary” things, such as pursuing an education, marrying, and raising a family—Anne did it, so why not me?

2) Prince Edward Island is the most beautiful island in the world, and Avonlea is the most beautiful town on P.E.I.

I have never been to P.E.I. I visited Alberta as a very small child, which hardly qualifies, but let me tell you, it withers in comparison to P.E.I. And any charming, romantic, or quaint town that I have ever encountered will never stand up to the beauty that is Avonlea, despise its fictitious nature. People there are honest and kind, if not a little self-important from their thick family ties, and the red roads that lead to the shoreline are lined with folksy woods, crystal-clear lakes, and cozy home…with gables. My imagination lives nowhere else.

3) Women dressed so romantically in the early twentieth century.

This belief is sorely tested when I try to imagine petticoats and layers of skirts during the summer in Mississippi, but then I imagine myself in said attire in Avonlea and instantly I am cool and content. I wanted Anne’s puffed sleeves, trendy hairstyles (my mother always kept me in short hair to make it easy on herself), darling hats, and dainty shoes. Even now I would gladly regress to a time of long skirts and high collars in light of recent fashion statements. I admit that I do often forget just how women, even Anne herself, worked so hard during this time and that fancy-fancy clothes were reserved for calling on friends and evening parties. But then I think about riding in carriages to call on friends and attend parties at the White Sands Hotel, and all work is thrown aside.

4) Men are sensitive, kind, and patient.

Sometimes this belief, first represented in the character of Matthew Cuthbert and then ultimately embodied by Gilbert Blythe, is sorely tested, too. Both men loved Anne deeply and surely, and both were doggedly faithful to her, especially Gilbert. Because of a spat during Anne’s first day of school in Avonlea (he called her “Carrots” and she broke a slate over his head), she refused to talk to Gilbert for years. He remained faithful to her even then, and later on, after she had asked his forgiveness, declared his love for her. She refused him, and he still remained patient, again asking for her hand after four years of waiting. Even though she said “yes” this time, they then had to wait another three years for Gilbert to finish his medical degree! I was always deeply impressed by his faithfulness and believed that I deserved nothing less in a husband. (Note: I was not disappointed, but twenty-first century husbands are oftentimes very different from what I had expected.)

5) Every girl should have at least one bosom friend.

Just last week I told my mother that I was praying for “a bosom friend” here in Oxford, a notification that this belief has stuck fast. Diana and Anne were inseparable as girls and remained close as women in different towns with separate interests and families. Anne met many along the way who “belonged to the race of Joseph” (see Anne’s House of Dreams), and so she remained rich in love and friendship by always surrounding herself with such people. Every girl deserves that.

That is certainly a short list of things learned from Anne—they are merely the largest and broadest lessons from a myth that has shaped my perception and understanding of life. Perhaps I am a hopeless romantic. Perhaps I am idealistic. Perhaps I am “such a girl,” as [The Professor] said earlier when I told him of my post idea. Oh, well. I won’t deny such labels.

Cathedral Falls

2010-09-09T15:23:00.003-05:00

Some time ago I promised you pictures of a waterfall we stumbled upon while traveling through West Virginia earlier this summer. We had opted to get off of the toll road for a few miles, and we're so glad we did (at least until it turned into steep, steep mountains and hundreds of hairpin turns that turned yours truly into a motion sick mess), as we wouldn't have seen anything more picturesque than a multitude of McDonald's billboards on the toll road.

The waterfall is called Cathedral Falls. It was magnificent, and you could pick your way over the rocks and water to get right up next to it.

Thanks, West Virginia! Sorry I ever said anything negative about you.

We Interrupt Your Normally Scheduled Blog

2010-09-08T01:01:00.009-05:00

Just because she is cute.

The blog is in transition, as you in real time can see. I've stayed up entirely too late getting frustrated with things that are over my head, and now I'm admitting temporary defeat and just going to bed.

In family news, we are all great. Really, fabulous. Well, sort of. Did you hear that we have to get rid of our cat? B underwent a battery of allergy testing which determined that he was allergic to a) mold, b) dust mites, and c) cats. Poor Franklin, our sweet kitty. But mainly poor B, who has been constantly battling sickness for the last 2 years. (It took us a while, I know. We're slow sometimes.) At least we have an answer, and, as I keep reminding myself, at least it's not worse. At least he's not allergic to gluten or pollen or, I don't know, the sun. At least it's stuff we can try to curtail.

So. We, who at one point owned three pets, are soon going to be down to 0, conceivably for the rest of our lives. I'm saddened by this, mainly because I have never not owned a cat. And my cat is so sweet. But of course, we would prefer to keep B, because he is, believe it or not, much sweeter than that cat.

Besides the sad that is losing Franklin, we are enjoying a gorgeous transition from summer to fall. We are all adjusting to The Professor's schedule at Notre Dame (I can still call him "The Professor," can't I?) and he is, for your information, loving every minute of his time there.

We are, in short, blessed beyond measure.

Now I am going to partake of the blessing that is sleep.

Things I've Made: Baby Aprons and Baby Bags

2010-08-31T14:38:00.002-05:00

Janie correctly guessed that I had made some of Baby C's birthday items, one of which was featured in her birthday post. I'm sure you can guess--here's a picture from that post:

Well, I mean, yes, I made the Ya-Ya-inspired headdress, obviously. (Good eyes, you guys! And if you think about it, you'll realize that one of my children's names, if you know them, is actually taken from the Ya-Ya series. NO WAY. I love me some dysfunctional Southern Lit.) But I also whipped up the kid-sized apron C is sportin', and I must say, it turned out well. I jumped into it without a pattern or even much in the way of measurements (This is how I sew: half-assedly. I'm sorry, it's just how I am. I never had formal lessons. Therefore, I learn and teach myself piecemeal.), and besides a few little bumblies that are easily fixable in future aprons, it turned out great.

I did borrow a few elements from some patterns I found online (borrowing is not the same as following, y'all), including the elastic neckband and velcro waist strap. Instead of needing her mama to tie her strap, Baby C will be able to fasten her apron together all by herself. Isn't that fabulous? She's totally at that I WILL DO IT BY MYSELF, THANK YOU age, so this works well. You can't really see in this picture, but a large, red button on the end of the waist strap sets off the chartreuse pattern perfectly.

I also made Baby C her very own purse/book bag:

What is so fun about this bag (which concealed two different Mo Willems books, bonus birthday gifts) is what I used to put it together. The green material is actually two placemats sewn together. My cousin had brought a set of placemats from Korea, and I never used them for their intended purpose. I loved the color, but they were small, and I couldn't figure out how to use them. They were perfect for this project because they are lined on the back in a faux silk, which provides a wonderful interior for a baby handbag.

The angel graphic came from a beloved t-shirt of mine that had grown too small. I loved the picture too much to get rid of the shirt, so I hung onto it for ages, convinced I would find the perfect use for it someday. It works so well here! The only items I bought were the bright pink handles, which were purchased at Jo-Ann Fabrics. I could have made handles either with fabric or by knitting them, but I wanted something hard and easy for little toddler hands to grab. I simply hand-sewed the handles on with thick, hot pink embroidery floss.

So there you have it! I made almost all of her gifts, and I'm so happy with how they turned out. I'm thinking of (once I actually have a chance to build up my shop again after the summer break) adding toddler-sized aprons to my Etsy shop. What do you think? Do you think there's a market? Please share.

Happy 2nd Birthday, Baby C

2010-08-30T15:18:00.003-05:00

Today is C's second birthday.

We celebrated her birthday last night, and she was, as expected, showered with presents and attention and kisses.

(And, as you can see, an excellent cake made by her uncle.)

She fits into her two-year-old princess role well. Complete with headdress.

And... apron.

Happiest of birthdays, precious Baby C. We love you desperately and, as always, can't imagine life without you.