kindergarten can wait

today is kieran's first day of second grade. he's ready. he was excited and nervous about meeting his new teacher and seeing how the landscape of this school year would be different. he's been out of school since june 2nd, and he was just starting to get a little bored with camps and my office and being home. this is something we really love about the year round schedule. we take our vacations in september and march, when the beach is quiet and not crowded. we get longer breaks in december right before christmas and in june for the weeks leading up to the 4th of july. it's good. it works for our family.

all of that said, i must tell you that kieran's kindergarten year was hell on wheels. it wasn't the schedule, but rather the jump from a montessori-ish preschool environment into the rigid hyper-structure of today's public school kindergarten. wow. 155 minutes of math and reading with no real breaks every day. 20 minutes of recess, IF he had finished all his work, which he never had. homework on weekends that took us FOREVER to do. a teacher who, though she is a good and experienced teacher, was not a good match for our son and thought he was in need of labels and medication. she was not allowed to say this to us, but it was in every way implied. parent teacher conferences consisted of her giving us lists of his shortcomings and telling us she could do no more to help him unless we got him on a special education plan. we were worried--we talked to his doctor, who all but rolled his eyes at the school system after a handful of preliminary questioning and tests. then we gave up, called that whole year a wash, and just endured. he absolutely hated school. but his grades, i will add, were fine. all year.

first grade was much better, which is almost entirely due to a better teacher fit. it helped, too, that kieran was in after school care at the school, which gave him a very-much-needed sense of school ownership. now he's proud when he does well. he had a flexible and insightful teacher who focused on his strengths and on helping him recognize and address his attention issues without the need to slap a label on them. she had constructive suggestions for ways we could help him at home. my conversations with her were always productive, and i always came away feeling hopeful. it was good.

hopefully second grade will be good, too.

but finn--my sweet, but crazy finn is another bag of chips altogether. he is old enough for kindergarten, his july 12th birthday long before the end of august cut off. he can recognize  colors, letters, and numbers with ease, read a few words, count to a hundred, manipulate scissors--in these areas, he is ahead of where his brother was. but emotionally, he is not there. he is tantrum-y and sees accidental injuries as personal attacks. he hits. he yells. he was thrown out of the preschool/daycare he has attended since he was 4 months old because they were unable to handle his behavior. he is also the loviest, huggiest, most enthusiastic cheek-kisser you will ever meet. he is missing that emotional regulation button that comes with age and experience and will eventually make him a little less sensitive. he also has all the same focus issues as kieran. further, our school schedule means that finn would start kindergarten while still 4 years old, and then turn 5 a week later. what do you do with this child? he's academically ready for kindergarten, but not socially. and there is NO social support in kindergarten anymore. none.

finn, who should be starting kindergarten this week, is getting red-shirted. after much stress, debate, advice from professionals, we decided that sending him to kindergarten was asking for a year of hell for our entire family and was likely to set finn up to hate school forever. we have talked to many families who have been in this situation. nearly all of them who sent their kids anyway regrets it. and not a single one who decided to wait later thought they had made the wrong decision. i believe we are doing right by finn. we have put him in a new school--a teeny, tiny montessori based preschool where the student teacher ratio is 6:1 and the focus is almost entirely on social and emotional development, which is what he needs. he adores it. the academics will come later, but right now, i am choosing to be an elephant mother instead of a tiger one.

some excellent articles i've recently read while debating The Finn Question:

Kindergarten and the Big Divide
Inside the World's Best Kindergarten
Being an "Elephant Mom" in the Time of the Tiger Mother

on change

change is familiar to all of us. life evolves, and we either run with it or we fall down and let it run over us. that sounds like a cliche, and it is. it is also 100% true. at our house, we try hard to just roll with the tide that comes.

we're facing a new tide right now, and we're gearing up for some major change coming our way. our little niece, kaiya, is coming at the end of the month to stay with us for the next year. her mama is a military mama, and she's deploying into a region that's unsettled enough that ms. kaiya can't go. i can't tell you how badly i feel for them both, especially now, right as they have passed the 1-year milestone when babies start to turn into actual people instead of what my friend jake calls hungry luggage. that said, we are also looking forward to having her and spending the time with her. i am glad our boys get to have their cousin for a sister for this long, and i really hope it leads to some awesome lifelong bonding between all the kids.

i've been working on getting ready for her. getting daycare set up, disassembling my studio to make her a room. remodeling our bedroom to make room for a smaller version of my studio there. fencing in the backyard. doing a big do-si-do of the kids' furniture so i can use some of it in her room, and they can use some of the stuff that used to be in the studio in their rooms. we're nearly there. kaiya's room just needs a few finishing touches, and i have to say--it's fun shopping for something girly in the midst my boyish sea of blue and red and orange and green. there are flowers. and pink. well, a little pink anyway...

the critter is facing his own set of changes right now, too. he's handling it, but change is rough for him--harder than it is for any of the rest of us. but he's talking about his anxieties--telling a million stories about the things that scare him and/or make him uncomfortable, and i think he's really just fine. he'll come to temperature in a month or so. it's a lot at once, though--i get that: his bedroom got rearranged, he knows and understands about kaiya coming, he's in the middle of transitioning into the next room up at daycare, and possibly worst of all--daycare started summertime water play this week. the kid could not hate water play more if someone were paying him to hate it. he informed his teacher this week that, unfortunately, he was a robot and therefore electronic. there's no way a robot can get wet, since water could short his electronics or make his battery die. no way. water--it's not his thing.

finn, on the other hand, LOVES the water with the crazy love. he's been delighted by school lately. and change? it just rolls right over him. new bookshelf? cool! can he climb it? new friends at school? cool! do they want to be wrestled to the ground? new toys? eh. toys, schmoys--where are all the jars and cups with lids? that's really all he wants right now--ALL the cups and jars with lids he can put on and take off. so funny. his only recent change is that he's gone from a kid who would eat anything! everything! now! all the time! to a kid who will eat about 6 things sometimes, if he happens to be in the mood. toddler. right down to the 2-year-old tantrums. he's lucky he's so cute.

our family is growing and ever-changing and delightful. (most of the time.) (except when they aren't.) it's going to be a bumpy couple of months around here as we all adjust to adding a new person to the house, and as she adjusts to being added. but i believe that we will be fine, and that we will find our way together into a new routine soon. at least i hope so!

i am going to try hard to start updating here more and more, posting pictures and updates on all the kids so that not only kaiya's mom, but also all our extended family, can see what these fast-growing and ever-changing babies are up to. too many moments are slipping by with only facebook updates to show for them. i need more!

some things about the critter

NOTE: i started writing this back in january. it's now april, and i am just getting around to finishing it. this is an indication of a) how quickly the time passes, and b) how little time i have to blog these days. whew! however, i still love this information, so i am still posting. prepare for a long one...



the critter, he's getting so big, and there are so many things about him i want to remember. three and a half turns out to be a tough age. he's getting independent, but still needs us. he's developing opinions, but still can't really make his own choices. he's talking more and more and better and better, but still can't always make himself understood. he's got too much energy to nap, but not enough to get through the day. all in all, it makes for an almost bi-polar child who's either elated or completely frustrated. he throws tantrums you would not believe. but he's also a delight. it's all one big roller coaster these days. here are some things i want to remember, in no real order.

• he picks me a flower every morning at daycare when we arrive. we can't go in until he finds one. he hands it to me and says, "mama, here's a flower for your work! you can put it in water if you like!"
• he has 3 imaginary dogs called hardware, take-out, and jack. hardware is the biggest and the oldest and is very lazy. take-out is a blue heeler and the smartest. jack is little and sometimes bites. the stories about these dogs are endless. they are all boys. they have imaginary leashes and toys. they go for walks, just like our real dog.
• he still rides his little fisher price fire truck, for which he is WAY too big. that said, he's a daredevil on that thing and can make it spin out and slide to a stop in a very dramatic manner. he comes flying into the kitchen on it, screms it to a sliding stop half an inch from my foot, looks up at me and says, " stop it--you know you love it!" (WHERE does he get these things???)
• he's super fast on his scooter as well. he has pinwheels he puts on the handles of it so that they stick out on each side, one yellow and one blue. they spin as he rides, and he tells me that they are cooling fans. he puts his toy pliers over the rear axel "to make it go faster." the child is three, and he already believes in after-market mods on his vehicles.
• he tells me he's more of a cat person than a dog person because cats are calmer.
• every night we snuggle a minute in his bed before he goes to sleep. he tells me about his day, and then we have a set routine of hugs and kisses we have to go through. it started as 3 hugs and 3 kisses, but now it's those, plus higs and kisses for the following: firetrucks, fire engines (yes, they're different), bill ( his friend at school's alter-ego name), ribbon (HIS alter-ego name), caitlin (another friend), and one for the road. we repeat this same sequence at daycare drop-off.
• he has chosen a name for his t-rex alter ego: ribbon. mr. ribbon the nice t-rex, to be exact. he will argue sometimes that this is actually his real name, and not kieran. we still call him critter, too. it's all very confusing.
• ribbon's friend's name is harry (not to be confused with our actual real friend harry), and he's a parasaurolophus who makes noise with the bony crest on his year. the fact that he can say parasaurolophus blows me away, especially when he still has trouble with leading s's.
• the kid is obsessed with the mars rover. it is both a ROBOT and a SPACESHIP, and this is awesome. we got him a bunch of space themed bedding for his room, and his main observation was that there was no mars rover represented. because i am a sucker, i went online, downloaded a super high res image of one, and had it made into a pillowcase for him. he's beyond delighted, and carries it all over the house. win.

a few months ago at daycare, he was "friend of the week," which means he was kind of the focus in his class for a few minutes every day. every week, it's a different kid, and that kid gets to bring something in to share with the class every day as well as share his favorite books, snacks, toys, etc. you can do as much or as little as you want to enhance this for your child, and i'd say we're kind of middle of the road. k and i discussed it at length, and he decided he wanted to bring in a book to share every day, and then we decided we would alternate between snacks and toys so that he could give something he likes to his class every day. it's so cute how excited he is to share with them! we also had to do a questionnaire together, which was great fun for both of us. i went through, asked him the questions, and wrote down his answers. i tried hard not to lead him, and just let him answer for himself. some of the answers surprised me. i took pictures of the questionnaire so we could look back at his answers in a few years for comparison--click here if you want to see his crazy answers.

we also went on our first big trip together, just me and the critter, in january. we took the train to washington DC to visit our dear friend, meredith, and spend the weekend sightseeing, critter-style. he was awesome and brave, and had a TON of fun. we went to the natural history museum and the air and space museum, and it's an utter tossup which one he loved more. between the t-rex and the mars rover, i think his head about exploded! he's still talking about all he saw and did, aunt meredith's apartment, the food (especially the cupcakes), and the trains, both amtrak and subway, that we took. he LOVED the taxi ride. all in all, it made me want to travel more. he wants to fly somewhere next. so awesome.

the boy is into food. i LOVE this of course, and i really hope it's something we keep in common between us as he grows older. he loves to help me in the kitchen, and he has food jealousy that may actually be worse than mine. he likes to go to the farmers market with me and talk about what we will cook from the foods we buy there. he has to try everything, even totally unfamiliar foods. when i was out of town a couple of weeks ago, he gave his dad a long lecture on the importance of eating healthy and playing outside and getting enough exercise. i'm just going to go ahead and call that a parenting win. :)

he's my little man. he tells me he loves me to the sun and back. i love him to the sun and back...twice.

three and a half

i listen to kieran playing, and i am stunned. he's enacting a play of his own devising in the living room floor. trucks are involved. dinosaurs, too. a recycling truck is central to the drama, as is a flatbed truck, many race cars, and a monster truck or two. apparently it's crucial that all the monster trucks be lined up all the way across the living room floor because there is to be a parade later. there are many voices and names that come up in the course of his play. my baby is totally gone, and there is, in his place, a rambunctious and vivacious little boy with many very strong opinions. his name, he tells me, is NOT kieran, but rather, ribbon. he's a nice t-rex. also a firefighter. sometimes. he hugs me with impulsive ferocity. he lashes out with a willfulness that i almost can't believe--i have to remind myself not to be hurt by it as i throw him in into yet another time out. then he turns around and makes me laugh so hard! he pretends to eat the whole town as we drive through, but assures me he's just teasing. he's constantly on the move, and prefers to be either outside running as hard as he can or inside playing with all his stuff. he's not all that into drawing or group participation--he prefers imaginative play and reading books and watching british television and dinosaur train. he knows the names of many dinosaurs along with what they eat and all their physical characteristics. he tells me they lived on the earth many years ago, but that they are now extinct. he has real friends at school, and other kids he likes less. he hates playing in the water, and is grateful that summer is over so no one is trying to make him do it. he is as stubborn as a rock. he loves one-on-one attention from either me or the hippie. he tries to take care of his little brother, while simultaneously keeping finn off his stuff and out of his games. he's learning to share. he has  favorite colors, favorite foods, and favorite toys. he loves his cats. he prefers vanilla to chocolate. where he goes, his hippo goes as well. he likes cuddles at night, no matter how his day has gone. he's a little bit afraid of shadows. in the end, he's a whole little complete person, and i love him so much i can't breathe when i look at him.

story time

the other night, the hippie snapped this grainy phone picture of me reading to the babies before bedtime, and i just adore it in spite of it's somewhat crappy quality. i absolutely love reading to the boys, and i do it every single day, even if we're late and there's no time to dedicate to reading. the boys also love books--it works out. when finn first went into daycare, his favorite toys there were these lovely cloth books just made of heavily patterned cloth sewn together. i was delighted! (by the way, i have tried like crazy to find these books to buy somewhere--i can't. i am sure they wouldn't be too hard to make, but i don't have that kind of time laying around, unfortunately. but i digress...)

both boys love board books, and lately, kieran's been moving more and more into true story books, which is great fun for me. in my youth, i had aspirations to become a children's book illustrator, and i guess i've never lost my love of the field. i had a few books on hand before k was even born, and now, neither of us can expand our collection quickly enough. his current favorites are little blue truck. harry the dirty dog, the cat at night, and going to sleep on the farm.

last night, i learned the hard way that reading where the wild things are before bedtime is a MISTAKE. critter got all wild and crazy and was chasing the hippie through the house with a stuffed dragon, roaring at the top of his lungs. when i said it was time for bed, he burst into tears, and wailed at me, "no mama! i rawring!!!" cute, but not exactly desired at 9pm...

anyway--the point is, if there are awesome story and picture and cloth books you guys love or have known a little one to love, we'd love to hear about it. we're in the market for more good books!

the babies, part critter

i haven't written jack about the boys in a while, and well--it's time. past time, really. so. oldest boy first. warning--this will be very stream of conscious.

kieran is growing like a WEED. he goes up, then out, then up, then out, in that way that toddlers do. We just finished an up, and now we're on an out cycle, which means he's eating--well--everything in the house. this morning for breakfast, he had a bowl of oatmeal, half a banana, a mini bran muffin, 10+ oz of milk, and a TON of blackberries. he goes, "mmmmmmmm, these blackberries are goooooood, mama!" and yay for the fact that the child loves food so much. his speech is taking off at an alarming rate, and he's become a little chatterbox. with us at least. he turns out to be a shy kid who doesn't want to be the center of anyone's attention but those closest to him. we won't even discuss his reaction to having to be in a holiday "performance" at school. that didn't end well.

he likes to be home with his stuff, and he likes to play outside. he's adjusted ok to the daycare thing, although he's hard to move in the morning--like his mother and father, the child is NOT a morning person. he loves trucks and trains and things that move. he loves animals and stories about animals. he feeds his dinosaurs from "troughs" he builds from the silverware caddies he steals from the dishwasher. he's very care-giver-y, putting his hippo down for a nap, feeding his stuffed animals, making them share.

it's pretty hilarious to watch him play, which he sometimes prefers to do alone. not that he doesn't love other kids--i just think he gets his share of them at school and is relieved to have some down time with his own stuff at home. it's good really--i think he's finding a personal balance there. we took him the the art museum this weekend, and that was a hit--he's a fan of the sculptures, especially rodin. he has also had a ton of fun this past year at the durham museum of natural history, and he appreciates a trip to the aquarium or the zoo a LOT these days. back in september, we took a little weekend trip to the beach with some friends, and he had an absolute blast playing with sting rays at the pine knoll shores aquarium and running around on the beach learning to stomp in the surf and digging in the sand with his trucks.

i look at him, and he's such a BOY now. no hint of the baby he was just a few months ago. he's starting to give up his nap (the horror!), and is more and more independent as the days go by. the speech explosion is leading rapidly to a question explosion as well. he asks me a thousand times a day, "what you doing, mama?" or, "what's that noise?"--probably his two biggest questions right now. he's learning to count (up to 20 consistently), to add, and he's recognizing letters--he tells us his name is K because it starts with K. he's too big to be a kieran!

it's been really fun watching him learn to be a big brother to finn. by turns, he takes care of finn--brings him toys, covers him up, pats him on the head, worries about him when he's crying--and is jealous of him. he wants mama when he wants mama--the end. ESPECIALLY when he's sick or tired or hungry. he'll pretent to be a baby himself, and tell me that mama has TWO babies. he remembers some of the baby toys finn now plays with, and he'll sometimes steal them, claiming them for his own. with christmas, we have actually had to draw a line in the sand over a few things, which is a hard lesson for the critter.

at every age, i find that he gets both easier and more difficult to manage. each progression brings its own challenges, which we are just meeting one day at a time. he's a hoot, a pain in the ass, stubborn as a rock, moody, hilarious, and possibly hypoglycemic. he makes me laugh every single day. he fills me with frustration almost as often. but good and bad, he's my little man, and a joy to behold.

the new normal

boy, what a lot of adjustments.

when i was out on maternity leave, my nanny quit. she had really good reasons for this and had a super hard time making the decision to do it, but man--it was tough on all of us. the critter has known no other care since he was 6 weeks old, and he was/is a part of their family. very hard for him to get why he was suddenly not there with them every day. at least i was still on leave, so he got to be home with me and finn for a month.

i spent a few weeks researching the heck out of all the options, and in the end, decided that daycare was the best thing for us. right now, the boys are in two different daycares. turns out that wait lists for babies are really long, so it proved to be impossible to find a place that had an opening for both a 2-year-old and a baby without paying an INSANE amount of money. having them in two places is good and bad. it's good in that i really feel like both of them are in the best places they could be. it's bad in that i have to schlep finn and and out of kieran's daycare twice a day, and that i am losing any kind of sibling discount i'd get by having them in the same place.

kieran LOVES daycare. loves it. he's happy to go in the morning, and happy to come home in the evening. he's excited at the end of the day to tell me about what all he did and played with. his vocabulary is exploding. he has taken to it like a duck to water, and i am SO grateful! i love his center and his teachers and the staff at the front desk, and really--i could not be happier about how it's working out so far.

finn, after two days of daycare, got sick, and has been sick for three weeks. he gave it to kieran, then me, then the hippie. so that's been fun. i love the woman who is taking care of finn, but i still very much wish that he was with a person rather than at a center for the first few months. it's hard for him to sleep there with all the noise, and it seems like the hands on time with him is just, by necessity, limited. the awesome thing is that he's directly across the street from my office, which means i can go across and feed him a couple of times a day rather than pumping. pumping stinks, and i am super happy to not be doing it. i am also REALLY lucky that i have bosses who support this. finn's situation, while both good and bad, is also the best i can do right this minute, so we're learning to deal with it.

the weekdays are a flurry of activity. i know every family with two working parents deals with this, so i am not going to get whiney about it. but sometimes, i'll tell you--it's tough. that said--we're getting into a rhythm where it works for us. i'm managing to feed us home-cooked breakfasts most mornings, and home cooked meals most nights. we're all getting some sleep. we're all clean (mostly) and dressed in clothes that are clean. the house hasn't (yet) become a pit of utter chaos. the boys are happy for the most part. now if we could just all get healthy again, this new normal would be working for me. we're getting there...

what the hell have i been doing?

i swear i look up and months have passed. it's a tad disconcerting. today, out of nowhere, i actually feel caught up enough to write something, so let's catch up, shall we?

today, i am 28 weeks pregnant. and TIRED. but otherwise, it's good. normal complaints from any woman in the 3rd trimester, but so far, all is well. baby is healthy, mama is healthy, and the rest of the family is adjusting to the whole mess. we're keepin' on keepin' on, as it were.

in the past couple of months, a lot has happened. there have been some excursions: we went to the celebrity dairy open house again, like we did last year. it was awesome again, too, but sadly i can find the pictures from that excursion nowhere, so you will just have to imagine cute baby goats, chickens, the critter playing on a bobcat, and us buying goat cheese having forgotten that i can't eat it right now. oops!

on march 7th, gabriella turned seven. it's impossible to believe how grown up she is. she's almost done with first grade, and she's so much fun to talk to and so beautiful. she is smart and funny and a blast, and although she's not mine, i still love her like she is. i am so glad for a little girl i can get my girl on with, especially now that i know i'm not having a girl of my own. she's still the best big sister the critter could ever have, and such a huge part of his village and life. we're lucky to know her.

aside: g's birthday party was a bug-themed affair at the NC museum of life and science, which is an awesome place. the critter had so much fun running around digging for fossils, sitting on dinosaurs, looking at butterflies, and petting farm animals, we ended up joining the place so we can go back there often. highly recommended!

my friend emily and i snuck away for a beach weekend in march, which we seem to be making a yearly tradition. unlike last year, this time we had lovely weather, and i took not a single photograph.we spent time shopping in beaufort, eating seafood, walking on the beach, knitting, talking, and making a ninja strike on the salty sheep on the way out of town. i learned that amber, one of the owners of that most loved of all yarn stores, is also expecting a baby this summer. so cool.

easter happened. we didn't do that much, but we did set up a little egg hunt for the critter in our front yard, and then we went over and crashed a larger hunt in jennifer's cul de sac on the other side of the neighborhood. this year, the critter really GOT the egg-hunting thing, which was really fun. we put a couple of m&ms in each of his eggs, and then hid one larger one with a reese's peanut butter egg (the hippie's favorite!) inside. the kid was thrilled to discover this and to get to eat candy for breakfast. he was so cute looking for his eggs, i couldn't stop taking pictures of him. it's hard to believe that we are only a week away from his second birthday. the kid blows my mind.

in more recent news...

on gardening

hippie and i have long discussed the possibility of adding a charleston-style garden down the side of our house. it's damp and shady, and it seems like a perfect place to make a walk with shade plants, ground covers, and big pots of things that will bloom. we've been slowly collecting pots and ideas and making plans, and last weekend, we jumped into it with both feet. it's a work in progress, but the photos you see here are the work of two critter naps plus a couple more hours. so far, i love how it's coming out. there's much to do yet, but we've done enough now that i can SEE it coming together in my mind. i can visualize what it will be like in 5 years, when the periwinkle and hastas have taken hold and the mosses we planted are all around the flagstones will will soon add to the path we're making. this, more than anything else we've done, really makes me feel like we truly live in this house--like we will be here for a long time. we are making it our own. so awesome.

in addition to the side garden, we've also been refining things along the front walk: getting the grass to take hold at last, replenishing the herb garden, adding annuals here and there, mulching around the perennials that have come back from last year and the year before. we have veggies (radishes, lettuce, onions, black cherokee, red pear, and flame tomatoes, orange bell peppers) in the garden box in the back, although this, too, is a work in progress. and the trees we've planted are thriving, and will one day give us a shady corner in the back where we will be able to add blueberry bushes. my head is full of plans, which is my absolute favorite place to be. loving the yard this year!

on cooking and eating

the farmers market is open again! this means i am inspired to cook. i've also been watching jamie oliver's food revolution, which only strengthens my resolve to feed my family well, to try new things, and to keep on cooking fresh, healthy things for all of us. i have come, over the past few years, to look at this as a serious investment in my health and future, as well as those of my family and friends. i am a food evangelist--i can't help it. and yes, i still love me some cupcakes, which i think is just fine. i don't make them every day, and i really only want the ones made by me or someone i know didn't add a bunch of random junk to them. anyway--i'm not about to start a massive food rant here (again)--i just want to say--hurray for spring and the farmers market and local fresh things that make me want to cook them.

this is a roasted pork loin from fickle creek farm (recipe here)with some fresh grilled asparagus (from whole foods still--asparagus isn't in here yet) that i made on sunday. on monday, in accordance with my and the hippie's new plan to eat less meat and more veggies, i made a lovely roasted potato and wilted kale salad (recipe here). it was SO GOOD! i can't tell y'all how much i am loving the world of food blogs and epicurious right now. the food porn available is truly inspirational to me in the kitchen, plus trying to make more vegetarian dishes has sent me searching for new recipes at least 3 times a week. it also helps that my friend meredith has been having some of the same kinds of food epiphanies that we have over these past years, and that she and i have long loved to cook together. we madly share recipes and ideas, and it's been just great. loving my kitchen as much as the garden right now!

so. in conclusion--life is very full. overall, it's happy and good. as always, i want more time, more sleep, more time, more money, and more time. ain't that always the way, though? knitting and critter and pregnancy updates to come, but i have no more blog in me right now, plus i am totally out of writing time. y'all have a good afternoon and night, and tomorrow i'll show you my new yarn.

rockin' my baby

the past few nights, the critter, who has long gone to sleep easily and well, has asked to be rocked before he's put into his crib for the night. and at first, i was a little conflicted: should i do it? would it set a bad precedent and take away his ability to self soothe? would i be committing to a lifetime of having to rock him before he could sleep? and in the end, i just told myself to shut up and rock that baby. he's almost not a baby anymore already, and soon enough, he won't want to be held and cuddled and rocked on his mama's lap. and sometimes, consequences be damned, you just want to rock your baby! and i LOVE rocking my baby. he lays his head down on my shoulder and pats my back with his little hand or sucks his thumb or babbles quietly to himself about the dinosaurs on his pj's (boom boom boom, mama). it's the sweetest thing in the whole wide world, and i would not trade for anything the fact that sometimes he wants me as much as i want him. that's being a mama, i guess.

last weekend, i was telling my mother about a day a couple of weekends ago when the hippie and i blew everything off to take advantage of a nice day. we took the critter to the park and out for ice cream and made him late for his nap so we could play with him longer, and it was SO WORTH IT! and my mother, who is usually pretty negative about things but sometimes surprises me, told me she thought that was the Right Thing, and that sometimes you just have to take what time there is. she told me it reminded her of the poem my sister had cross stitched to hang in her first son's room when he was born--something about cobwebs settling and dust going to sleep and rocking the baby. all we could remember with certainty was the last line, "i'm rocking my baby and babies don't keep." that conversation and that line has been stuck in my head for days, and i keep thinking about it while i'm rocking the critter. i finally went and found the poem from which it came:

Mother, oh Mother, come shake out your cloth
empty the dustpan, poison the moth,
hang out the washing and butter the bread,
sew on a button and make up a bed.
Where is the mother whose house is so shocking?
She’s up in the nursery, blissfully rocking.

Oh, I’ve grown shiftless as Little Boy Blue
(lullaby, rockaby, lullaby loo).
Dishes are waiting and bills are past due
(pat-a-cake, darling, and peek, peekaboo).
The shopping’s not done and there’s nothing for stew
and out in the yard there’s a hullabaloo
but I’m playing Kanga and this is my Roo.
Look! Aren’t his eyes the most wonderful hue?
(lullaby, rockaby, lullaby loo).

The cleaning and scrubbing will wait till tomorrow,
for children grow up, as I’ve learned to my sorrow.
So quiet down, cobwebs. Dust go to sleep.
I’m rocking my baby and babies don’t keep.

by Ruth Hulburt Hamilton

and while i know it's a bit silly of me, i can't read that without tearing up a little bit. i'm going to miss my baby being a baby when he's all grown up.

jeez

where does the time go? seriously, i can hardly believe it's november at all, much less that thanksgiving is next week. i'm having a slow week at work, which i HATE. i don't have enough to do, but i feel guilty sitting around not working. plus, there's too much i need to do at home. mostly i'd really like a nap. really. a nap sounds just great right about now. maybe a movie marathon and some serious down time. not going to happen, though. i'm living right now for the two weeks off i will get at christmas. CANNOT. WAIT.

anyway. halloween happened--my kid was a lion because it was 80 degrees, and gabriella's old lion costume didn't have arms and legs. he was pretty hilarious--he didn't want to wear the mane until i showed it to him in the mirror, and then he was all--ohhhhhhhhh! i'm a LION! i get it! he roared. he went to the neighbors' house and rang their doorbell and said "tick tick tick" when prompted to say "trick or treat." pretty good for 18 months. he took maybe 1000 dum dums from those guys and proceeded to get himself all sticky. we went over to my friend tina's and loaded the critter and her daughter into her wagon to do a little neighbor-visiting, which was great fun. got to see gabriella in her puppy costume, and our little friend bailey (g's cousin) made the cutest dorothy ever. after we came back and ate the spoils. k had 5 dum dums and a kit kat. my halloween philosophy is--you can have all the candy you want that day, and then we go back to normal. the pseudo-in-laws were in town, and i think the hippie's little brother was pretty thrilled to be in an actual neighborhood for trick-or-treating for the first time in his life. i somehow failed to take a single picture of him in his phantom costume, but it was a big hit with the neighbors and with his parents. the pseudo-mother-in-law dressed up as a witch, and hers may have actually been the best costume of the night. while they were out and about, i made some buttermilk cupcakes, which i gave to all our neighbors. i heart cupcakes.

the next day we went on a steam train in the cold-ass freezing rain. still fun, but there was much bundling. k is a fan of trains, but was a little nervous about actually getting ON one. he held on tight to his daddy, and then basically passed out for over half the experience. so cute and snuggly. he ended up getting sick later in the week, so he may have been feeling a tad off that day, in retrospect.

there's more to share and show--it's been a crazy busy month--but for now, i think maybe i'll cut out of here a bit early and go home to see if i can get a few things done there.

i'll leave you with some stuff to enjoy:

cauchy's spam embroidery, one of my favorite things EVER!
a christmas card that made me spit water out on my desk.
the hat i'm making for baby evey.

the cutest chocolate-y baby ever:

new toy!

this little video camera is my new favorite toy. i wish i had had it sooner! the hippie asked me when the critter was born if i thought we needed a video camera, and i was all--nah--i'll never use it. I COULD NOT HAVE BEEN MORE WRONG! i have a friend with this one, and as soon as i saw it i was beside myself with jealousy. and now--i have one too! yay! this thing came just in time for the weekend, and i think i made like 25 videos in a day and a half. HIGHLY recommend. this one is my favorite so far:

progress report (aka, third time's the charm)

one of my goals for the year is to knit kieran a sweater. i tried once already, and ran out of yarn due to a mistake in the pattern i was using. boo. so i decided to go for this children's hooded pullover, which i have made before, as it would be reliable and simple,and useful. silly moi--little did i know i was going to have gauge issues out the yin yang! i started and ripped this sweater twice due to gauge problems (i swatched, i swear!), and had to put it in time-out for a little while before i wanted to work on it again. however, i really want the sweater, so i thought--ok, one more time... and so far, so good.

i love the color, although dark heathered charcoal grey proves to be remarkably difficult to photograph. the yarn is mas acero from brooks farm--i bought it at SAFF specifically for this hoodie while i was still pregnant. it's listed as worsted--it's not. this yarn is DK, or i will eat my hat. however, i find that i like it knitted at the worsted gauge--i am on size 10 needles to make that happen. it's a little looser of a fabric than i usually knit, but it's giving it this lovely, beachy feeling. and in NC, that's not such a bad thing--it just means he'll be able to wear it more. i am concerned about colorfastness--my fingers turn corpse-grey when i knit this yarn for more than 20 minutes. i think perhaps a vinegar soak will be in order before it gets officially washed. but anyway--so far, i am loving it. links and details are all in ravelry for you knitters who might be interested in those. otherwise--isn't it pretty? still have a ways to go...

one

critter update

maybe fridays are the right time to check in on the critter, or at least post some pictures of him. kieran is two weeks from his 9-month doctor's appointment. he is growing by leaps and bounds and will soon be completely out of his 6-12 month PJs. time to go shopping again! he's a blast lately, although i could do without the sleepless nights that come along with this whole teething thing. the bottom front two teeth came in pretty easily, but man--the top two are a BITCH! you can see them through his swollen and tender gums, and he's clearly not enjoying the process. i wish they would just hurry up.

other than the teeth, though--we are having a great time with him, as is jennifer (our friend and nanny) and her whole family. he's become one of the pack at her house, which is perfect. he loves them as much as he loves us, and while this is sometimes hard sometimes emotionally for me, i think it's definitely the best thing for him. he's happy to go in the morning, and happy to come home in the evening, too. gabriella loves him and reads to him and makes up games for them to play. and he immitates her and wants to get into everything she's doing. she is why he can climb stairs like a champ at 8 months old. she's why he loves throwing himself down on the bed and laughing over and over. she's a big part of why he loves his books so much. we are lucky and grateful.

he continues to astound us with his mobility and crazy development. he can draw lines on paper, keep rhythm with his maracca (favorite toy in the world!), and LOVES LOVES LOVES music. he is superfast at crawling, pulls up and climbs on everything, and is a huge fan of the stairs. it's all awesome and scary as hell at the same time. mostly, we let him explore and spot him. he laughs at everything new, claps his hands^* with excitement over things he loves, and is definitely developing some rather strong opinions about things. he is starting to initiate games with us, which is great fun, and oh, so cute! he's showing signs of becoming more and more independent, too--preferring to feed himself rather than have us feed him and to get his own toys off the shelves and out of the baskets instead of us giving him things to play with. all normal and good. again with the lucky and grateful.

it also continues to scare the crap out of me on a daily basis--this whole parenting thing. i pray more. i hope more. i fear more. i just want him to be happy and healthy, and i hate that i can't just guarantee that for him myself. i am sure every new mother goes through this. it's so weird--it's not that i want to protect him so much as i want to somehow ensure that he doesn't get more than he can handle, if that makes sense. or more than WE can handle. mostly i just try to backburner these thoughts, since they are all related to things over which i have zero control. in spite of that fear, he is just a wonder and a delight, and i am so happy to have him in our lives! it's really truly unbelievable.

this series of pictures is from hanging out at home last weekend. kieran was "helping" his daddy put some chairs together. he "helps" a lot these days--must be in the thick of things at all times. wonder where he gets that?

* a note on the clapping thing: we've been playing clapping games with him forever, but something clicked in his head on christmas day when my 6'3", 280 pound, barrel-chested tree of a brother was playing pat-a-cake with him. this was one of the funniest things i have ever seen--doug was hamming it up insanely, and the critter was totally enthralled. 5 minutes later, he was clapping himself--it was such a sweet moment. it NEARLY made up for the horrific stomach virus doug gave me that day. nearly...

in for it

so it turns out that we have a crazy baby. he's 8 months old now--time flies. and lately his favorite activity is what the hippie and i refer to as, "gettin' into some shit." last night while i was out knitting, the hippie was on point. he turned his back for a moment, only to turn back and find this:

it's a blurry as hell picture, but i think it gets the point across.

the kid wanted a music box that was too high to reach on the living room book shelf. so he took an emptly diaper box (one of his favorite things), pushed it over to the shelf, climbed up on it, and helped himself to the lovely little hand carved music box i have had since i was 8. naughty.

this problem solving thing he's got going on is a little scary. as is the climbing. whew.

ten random notes

1. still hate herbal tea.
2. the kid is climbing stairs.
3. cookies? they're good. really good.
4. christmas tree is up.
5. work is slow. painful--feels like i am wasting time.
6. tired. teething sucks.
7. still need to buy christmas cards.
8. determined to finish 3 nearly finished felted bags that have been ready to felt for--oh--a couple of years now.
9. sucks when the whole family gets sick at once.
10. really want to knit a hat.

and as a bonus--a cute picture of the critter:

catching up to the present

a lot's happened in the last couple of months while i've been not blogging. time has been going by so quickly, i haven't even realized i've failed to blog it. so--let's catch up, shall we? some visual aids should help us.

labor day weekend, we went to visit my parents. kieran spent some time with some of his cousins and had his first rice cereal. he liked it. :)

we went to see the carolina rollergirls with many friends. fun, but jesus, it was HOT! the kid did pretty well with his first sporting event, in spite of the crazy loud applause.

then he got a nasty cold, but he was still happy.

luckily he was all better by the time we went to the beach, where we spent time with carrie, isaac, ella, meredith, denise, warren, and lani. i've been dreaming about putting his feet in the sand since i was pregnant, so this was particularly satisfying for me. he was very brave about the water on his feet, and he immediately put a fistful of sand in his mouth, as expected. there's a whole set of pitctures here, but here's one of my favorites, too:

there's been some knitting:

the critter started sitting, crawling, and pulling up.

fall came.

my friend tina had her baby, kyla christina. i was there with her, which is always an awesome priveledge and makes me want to become a doula. still thinking about that...

and then--suddenly it was halloween.

y'all want to tell me how the hell that all happened so fast?

and then i voted, but you guys already know about that.

whew! that only took 3 days to get posted. maybe i can get back onto the normal blogging schedule now. clearly, i should not make any promises. but man--i miss you guys!

ps--happy birthday, alyce! love and miss you like a fiend!!!
pps--good thoughts to lisa, who's having a baby as we speak!