january's handmade

january hasn't exactly gone as well as i'd hoped, what with all the sickness and bad news. but i've been thinking about my yearly goals in spite of it all. i am making time to knit--gg's cardigan progresses apace in spite of the universe's attempts to derail all my best-laid plans. and--i've actually managed to squeeze under the wire with a small handmade gift for laura, the first recipient of my 2011 handmade facebook meme. for january's handmade item, i give you a simple pair of earrings:

note that you've seen these before, when i made a set of jewelry for my friend kerstin's birthday a while ago. the earrings were my favorite part of that set, and kerstin has loved them and wears them all the time. i had exactly the right amount of stuff to replicate them one more time, and i thought reproducing a prior creation would be a great way to get back into the jewels, which i've wanted to do for a while. plus, i really didn't want to knit something for laura, who is an avid and skilled spinner, dyer, and knitter who owns her own yarn store, so i went trolling through pictures of laura facebook for ideas. i decided that the style of these little glass leaves suits her very well, and i think they will look fabulous with her february lady sweater. :)

sick

i am so tired of sick.

jason's aunt is sick. she's getting ready to start a new round of chemotherapy for brain cancer. here's hoping this one works better than the last...

my brother is sick. today he starts his first round of medication to treat his kidney cancer, which will hopefully shrink the tumor that plagues him. here's hoping he doesn't have adverse reactions to the drugs and that they are effective.

my little baby has RSV. mostly this means he has a really awful cold, but it's also a little scary. the list of problems it can easily lead to in a baby as young as him is rather tremendous. here's hoping that he doesn't develop croup, bronchitis, pneumonia, or even an ear infection. he's so miserable. he sounds like darth vader when he breathes. he has a fever that comes back every time his medication wears off. he's so ill that he cries out in his sleep. it's horrible to watch. i think this is the sickest that either of my boys has ever been, and i hate it. not to mention how hard it is to take care of him and keep working, which i absolutely must do. so it's no wonder that, between the not sleeping, and the worrying, and the trying to keep my professional head above water, well--i am a bit worn down.

and so it comes as no surprise...

i'm sick, too. boo.

perhaps if i go finish off the lovely chocolate chip cookies my friend beth brought to me, i will feel better.

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!

headway

i am trying a new strategy for knitting. i am not putting this sweater away until it's done. seriously--i am leaving it out on the coffee table where i can just pick it up and knit a stitch, or a row, or whatever, when i have two seconds to do it. and check it out: it's WORKING! i knitted a swatch (please see the photo i have included as proof of my swatch. i hate swatching.), even. (granted, the swatch was off gauge, but that's irrelevant, right? i just guessed at the right needle size based on the wrong swatch and went with it--isn't that what everyone does?) i cast on for the sweater on saturday, and observe that i am making some serious progress. it helped a ton that i was able to leave the baby at home last night and actually go out and KNIT at my knitting night (thanks, hippie!)--this is only the second time i have been able to do this. i can JUST squeak it in between finn's evening feedings as long as the hippie is willing to feed both boys dinner and get the older one to bed with no help. last night i came home from actually knitting to a quiet house--it was so nice i almost wanted to cry. of course, the diabolical squeaker then woke up and threw up on me, but that's a whole other story, and not for today, when i am reveling in actually knitting. :)

there's actually a real possibility that i might get this done IN TIME for gabriella's birthday. can you feel my amazement?

thoughts on breastfeeding

i am no breastfeeding nazi, although i definitely think it's too good for a baby not to do if you can. i definitely think it's an awesome thing to do for you and for your baby. there are, however, a million reasons why you perhaps CAN'T. some women just aren't comfortable with it at ALL, and that's reason enough, really. and god knows, it's a level of work and commitment for a working woman--well, for any woman, really--that i nearly stop having every third day. not to mention all the physical issues you can have too--inverted nipples, milk doesn't come in, baby won't or can't latch for a bundle of reasons, low production, infection, blocked milk ducts that can be horribly painful, thrush, yeast infections... the list goes on. all that aside, however, i am breastfeeding. i did with kieran, too, but with him, my milk supply was crappy, and we had to start supplementing almost from the beginning. finn, however, is a champion eater. i have noticed a bunch of small things that were wrong with how kieran was eating now that i have finn who is Doing It Right.

what i want to say here is that we, meaning myself and the women i know who have or who are presently breastfeeding, are a generation of women without teachers. there's this idea that, because breastfeeding is "natural", it comes easily to anyone who wants to do it. well--not really. in the past, you would have had your mother, grandmother, aunts, sisters, cousins, etc. right there to help you, and all of them would have had experience with breastfeeding. but our mothers? we were born to a generation of women who didn't do it, and for whon it was often not even a choice. with the introduction of mass-produced baby formula, NOT breastfeeding became the norm, marketed as it was to women of means and women who wanted to be "free" of their babies and the ties that quite literally bind mother to baby for a year or more. an assumption was made by many doctors during this time that women didn't want to breastfeed, and those who did had to often fight for the right to do so in a medical environment where drugs to dry up milk were given without consent or discussion before the baby's first feeding. for our generation, we have mothers who don't know what we're doing, or in many cases, why we are doing it. add to all that the fact that families are more spread out than they once were and the fact that so many more of us are single mothers than we used to be, and what you have is a generation of women trying to breastfeed without support. it's no wonder that so many women don't do it.

the other thing is--if you have a job, then you have no choice but to pump. and well, pumping sucks. pumping isn't the intimate, bonding act that breastfeeding is. it's purely pragmatic, sometimes painful, and just a bit yucky. thank goodness for it--it makes it possible to continue breastfeeding is you DO have a job. but it's work and not fun at all. it's also disruptive to your work day. you have to have bosses who understand and support your goals as a mother to be able to pull it off, not to mention that you need a place to do it. i know too many women who have been forced to pump in a bathroom because there's nowhere else. again--no wonder so many women choose not to do it.

you read all the statistics about women breastfeeding in this country, and how low those statistics are, and how much better it would be if more women did it, but damn. it's hard. it's work. and there's little support without going to a complete stranger and being willing to let that stranger see and handle both your breasts and your baby, not something everyone is able to do. the services of a lactation consultant are also far from free. most insurance companies won't pay for it, so if you can't afford it, then you are stuck. in my personal experience, it has also seemed that lactation consultants vary so wildly--some of them can make you feel worse than dirt when you are having problems, and others are like miracle workers--one must choose very wisely.

anyway. all i am saying is that i get why people choose not to breastfeed.

for me, i feel lucky that i've been able to do it as much as i have. with k it was about half and half. with finn, it's been all breastmilk, so far at least. and it's been fantastic to be able to do it! FANTASTIC!

one of my favorite things about my breastfeeding experience has been feeding finn in the middle of the night. he wakes up just enough to know he's hungry, and it's a contest to see if i can get him latched on before he actually starts to cry. i bring him into bed and lay on my side to feed him, and he curls into me like a soft little kitten with its mother cat. he pushes against my belly with his knees, and he pats my face with his little hand while he eats. it is not only one of the sweetest moments you can experience as a mother, there's also something very satisfying about the kind of care you are providing on a primal level. your body is doing what it's supposed to, and so is his. it's at moments like that when it's all worth it. all of it.

then there are all the benefits to mama no one talks about. i have dropped weight from breastfeeding like crazy! for a person who has had weight issues since forever, that's no small thing. i am still losing weight now, and finn is six months old and eating solids, too. in addition, breastfeeding helps you stop bleeding after your baby is born, it helps fight depression be releasing yummy chemicals in your brain, it helps you bond with your baby, and there are studies that say it reduces your risk of developing breast cancer, too. for me, with my family history of just about every type of cancer there is, that's pretty huge. but seriously, best of all, it helps you get rid of your big old pregnant butt. (of course, there's the downside that none of my pants fit, and that the babies mean i have no $ left after child care to go buy new pants. but i digress...)

so if you are breastfeeding, or trying to decide whether or not to do it, my advice is--give it a shot, and go into it with your eyes wide open. realize that there may be problems. realize that it's going to be a lot of work. accept that it's going to be something that kind of takes over your life for a year. then give yourself credit for every day that you make it--every single day you can do it is that much better for your baby, so go go go! but if you can't, for ANY reason, for goodness sake, don't beat yourself up about it, and don't feel guilty about it. as with all things related to parenting, i think you just have to do the best you can with what you've got. and, unless you are harming your child, no one--NO ONE--is in a position to judge your decision but you.

treat

i am participating in a meme on facebook. i don't do too many of these sorts of things, but this one i could get behind, plus it's in line with my goal to make something every month in 2011. my friend kim posted the meme, which was a commitment to make something by hand for each of the first five people to comment on the post. each of the five people must then, in turn, post the meme and make something for five more people, paying it forward.

this morning, i came into my office to find this laying on my desk:

kim is in town for a class, and she brought me a bar of lavender olive oil soap she had made. it smells simply divine! an excellent treat for a friday morning--maybe i will actually find time to take a real bath this weekend and try it out. :)

somethin' new

i am going to make gabriella a sweater for her birthday. she will be 8 in march, and i have wanted to make her something she could wear basically since the day her mother and i learned to knit together. i've been loosely waiting for the right sweater to come along and jump out at me, and finally, it has--the tiny tea leaves sweater (rav link). something about this is just so appealing to me--it's a real, grown-up style sweater that still looks like a young girl. it calls for some lovely madeling tosh yarn that costs more than i can really spend, so i was hunting for options when i stumbled across something PERFECT in my stash (i LOVE my stash!). i'll be knitting with this lovely brooks farm solana that i bought at SAFF in 2007:

this is a washable wool, perfect for an 8-year-old girl. it's a gorgeous color that will suit her beautifully. this stuff has 320 yards in a skein, and i had two, which gives me more than enough yarn to knit this cardigan and lengthen the sleeves as well. i cannot WAIT to cast on!

i knit a swatch last night in spite of being so tired i couldn't see straight. i was sleepy enough that i knit the swatch, then went to bed without even measuring the thing. we'll see tonight if i guessed my needle size right or if, instead, i have to knit another swatch before i can get going. this, by the way, is torture for a knitter. you KNOW the swatch is fully necessary, but it feels like wasted time when you JUST WANT TO KNIT! but i digress... the point is--this is the first time since finn was born that i am actually fired up to knit something. here's hoping it's a sign of things to come...

the babies, part squeaker

finn is six months old today! he has been such a joy and such an adjustment! he's a fat, happy baby almost all the time, and man, his toothless grin is one of my favorite things in the universe.

the squeaker is huge--in the 85th to 90th percentile in all categories. he eats and eats and eats. when kieran was a baby, breastfeeding didn't come all that easily--we had to supplement with formula from very early on--not so with finn! the boy is all business. he's been on a pretty tight feeding schedule almost from day one, and has cluster fed exactly in line with every growth spurt. he started trying to grab my food at 4 and a half months, so i started giving him cereal then. everything you read says not to start a breastfeeding baby on solids until he's 6 months old, but you try telling that to this baby. now he's nursing as much as ever, eating cereal 3 times a day, and eating fruits/veggies 2 times. that seems nuts for a baby who's not even 6 months old, but that's the way it is, man. at 21 pounds, he's as big as a lot of 1-year-olds, so i guess it shouldn't be a surprise.

finn looks a LOT like kieran did at his age, and yet, there are enough differences to keep it interesting. k's hair all fell out, then came back in white blonde, and by this age, it was clear that k would have blue eyes. finn's coloring is different--he has dark, wavy hair, and has from day one, and his eyes are a mystery. they are still that baby blue-grey that could become anything. it's funny to me that kieran means dark and finn means light, yet their coloring is becoming just the opposite of that.

so far, finn is on target developmentally, but without the insane gross motor development that kieran displayed. finn is just blissfully normal. he plays with baby toys exactly as they were designed. he is on the verge of crawling and sitting up by himself, exactly as a 6 month old baby should be. i can't tell you how glad i am that he's not doing crazy stuff like climbing the stairs! a second baby should be laid back, and this one definitely is.

the daycare thing has been the biggest adjustment with finn. it's still a little strange to have him not with a person we know and love and trust from the beginning, but in a situation where i feel like he sometimes gets lost in the crowd. we started him in the daycare across the street from my office, and his caregiver there, zoe, was just fantastic--she absolutely helped me adjust to the whole thing, even though i won't say it was easy. now he's in the same daycare as kieran, which is far more affordable. and, while i am not concerned that they aren't meeting his needs, i do kind of feel like he's viewed as just another baby there. i think i just want one of his caregivers to show some signs of attachment to him or something. anyway--i don't mean to turn this into a whining session about daycare--i just miss zoe and having finn close to me at work.

finn is still small, but he has a ton of personality. he's ticklish as all get out and giggles if you even touch his feet. he loves toys, he loves us, and he loves his brother above all. he laughs all the time, more than about any baby i've seen. but he also has a little temper, and won't hesitate to shake his fists if you take to long to feed him or pick him up. he likes his scenery to change pretty often, so we cycle through play mats, a quilt on the floor, the high chair, the exersaucer, a bouncy seat, the bed, and our arms. if he's tired of a toy, you know it because it goes flying away from him. he's also super duper cuddly, which is awesome. his head still smells so good. he's the kind of baby that makes people want a baby--no joke.

having two is hard. having two is so different from one--there's never a break for me or for the hippie, which sometimes wears us down. but having #2 be like finn is worth it. and there's a light at the end of that tunnel, too. having two also makes the time fly by at a rte i would not have thought possible. finn is six months old today--where did that go? i really need to write more so i don't forget these heady first months with him. he's a treasure, and i want to hang onto every day!

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.

brother

one of the physically strongest and most robust people i have ever known is my brother, doug. as it turns out, nature doesn't give a damn about this. my family history is filled with cancer, and while i've sort of always quietly and morbidly assumed i'd have to battle it someday, it somehow never occurred to me that any of my siblings might also have to face the beast. my brother is heading up that hill, and his fight is likely to be hard one. good thoughts and prayers for him and his family would be greatly appreciated.

this, my friends, is a shitty way to start a new year.

goals

2010 was the year of unfinished projects. so many things half done; so much life passed in a hurtle without stopping to breathe; so much time escaped from me in a fog of half concentration. to this, i cry: no more! my main goal for 2011 is to follow through on what i start. i want concrete goals for the year, so i have things i can check off. here's my list--consider it in sharpie:

HOUSE AND HOME
1. clean out/organize closet and dresser
2. fold laundry within 24 hours of doing it
3. plan meals better so we waste less food
4. finish bedroom decor
5. do more art with the boys
6. more dates with the hippie

KNITTING
1. knit kieran a fair isle hat
2. finish my sister's clapotis
3. felt all the nearly finished felted bags i have ready to go (and have HAD nearly ready to go for...uh...a long time)
4. finish one of the two shawls for me that i have on the needles
5. knit a sweater for ME
6. knit finn a blanket

SELF
1. maintain my haircut
2. move more
3. play more with my family
4. write more
5. make at least one thing a month
6. finish 3 novels

there. something down on paper, so to speak. as cliche as it is, it's important to me to start the year off with some thoughts of this nature. i'm not wasting time regretting all the things i didn't get done in 2010--that's pointless. all i am doing is looking to the future with thoughts of improvement.

i believe i will print this out and put it in the fridge to remind me every day what i want to get done.

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...

on birthin' babies, part 2

so--where were we... oh yes, the doctors wanted me to schedule a c-section, so i did. i did make my favorite doctor at my practice sit down and use statistics to convince me i was doing the right thing. and in the end, i have to say that, odds of vbac success were so low for me that i think i probably DID do the right thing. there's a part of me that will always wonder...

anyway--the differences between finn's birth and kieran's were nothing short of astounding, for so, so many reasons. here are the highlights:

1) pre-op appointment
for obvious reasons, you don't get this with an unscheduled c-section, and there was a part of me that was like--why do i need this? i've already had one c-section, right? i was so wrong--there's definitely an advantage to this appointment. for example, i learned that with kieran's birth, they gave me a dose of sedatives after he was delivered for no reason at all. this explains why the recovery, first feeding, and eventual move to the post-partum hospital room are all a blur. the doctors could not explain why i was given these drugs and why i wasn't told about it before hand, or even afterwards, but at least i knew enough this time to tell them not to do it. also, at this appointment, we filled out all the admission paperwork and had all the bloodwork done ahead of time, so there was no waiting when we got to the hospital

2) scheduling
with finn, we had a scheduled surgery at 10am on monday morning, which meant we needed to get to the hospital at 8am--perfectly civilized. and we did--we got there on time, went through prep, and had plenty of time to meet the OR nurses in charge of things. the nurses went over what to expect in the OR, what the spinal tap would feel like, and what to alert them about with regard to the drugs i had to have. this was also an opportunity to let the anesthesiologist's nurse know that i wanted no sedatives. she seemed surprised by this, but went with it. everything went as scheduled, and we were out of recovery and in our room at 1:somehting pm.

in sharp contrast to this schedule, with kieran, we had a "scheduled" induction, which means the hospital jerks you around for a day or so then tries to make you come in at 3am to be induced. we ended up with a pitocin drip at noon, fully dilated and pushing by 5pm, the decision to have the c-section at 8:30pm, and birth at 8:49pm. recovery took a while, and we finally got to our post-partum room at 2am.

now, the reason this matters is that, after you have a c-section and after you get to your room, they have to monitor your vitals every 30 minutes for 4 hours, and then they drop it back to every 3 hours. with finn, we were done with this monitoring by 6pm. with kieran, it was 6am. plus with kieran, we were both exhausted from the whole process. this time around, we got some actual rest after the birth--i can't tell you what a difference this makes.

3) expectations
going in for a scheduled c-section, you have nothing but acceptance to deal with. you are no longer hoping for a natural birth, or wondering who's on call, or whether or not you will need pain meds. you have accepted the surgery, chosen your doctor, and are no longer fighting the system. i can't tell you how much this reduces the anxiety for both you and for your partner.

4) drugs
the afore-mentioned sedatives, which i would have utterly rejected, had i known anything about them. what a difference not to have them this time!!! in the OR, i was alert, focussed, and able to talk to the doctors and nurses. in recovery, i could ask questions and understand what was going on. and last, and also most importantly, i was able to focus on finn and jason and myself. finn's first feeding went beautifully, which i think is a credit to the clear head. thank god for the clear head!

5) hospital crowding
when kieran was born, it was in this weird peak period of baby deliveries at our hospital. this means we ended up in the overflow to the overflow to the birth center in a crappy, tiny room with nurses and techs who were either called in from other hospitals or who had worked multiple shifts. they ranged from kind of tired and impatient to outright bitches, with two notable exceptions. we also never had the same nurse twice. this time, there was NO overcrowding at all. we were in an awesome new room in the birth center with the same day and night nurses both days. all of the nurses and techs were helpful and friendly and in good moods because they weren't completely overworked. it's truly amazing what a difference this makes. i wish i had had gifts to give these women.

this is all stuff i didn't know was bad the first time, until it wasn't bad the second time. this time, it felt like cheating, things were so smooth and easy. i am thankful i had good people all around me, in the OR, in recovery, and in the post-partum care. i am also thankful, they let us go home a day early, even though i am still kind of stunned that they let us.

and speaking of thankful, i am thankful i have a healthy baby, that the breastfeeding is going so well this time (which i fully credit to that first latch), and that i have healed beautifully in spite of over-extending myself during recovery. (hard not to with a 2-year-old in the house!)

the only bad thing i can say about the whole experience this time was that i came home with some nasty chemical burns. they hospital changed the type of adhesive they use on the pressure bandages sometime between kieran's birth and finn's. my sensitive skin does NOT like the new adhesive, and my belly was covered in some large, painful burns and blisters that were hiding under the bandage. i discovered them when removing the bandage--VERY unpleasant. but still--nothing some neosporin hadn't fixed up in a couple of weeks.

again--i would never encourage anyone to choose surgery over a natural birth. i will ALWAYS wish natural birth had been an option for me. and maybe it was, but not without defying a doctor i trust and possibly risking my or the baby's health. not worth the risk.

in conclusion--second birth experience WAY better than the first.

on birthin' babies, part one

as i write this, it's 2am, and i am nursing my new boy. finn william coposky was born at 10:27am on monday, july 12th. he weighed 7lb. 13 oz. and was 20 inches long. he's the sweetest thing ever, and so far, everyrhing about him has been criminally easy. i can't even begin to tell you how lucky i feel to have two super-healthy babies at my "advanced maternal age" or really, at any age. given all that can go wrong in the development and birth of a baby, i know full well what a miracle i have on my hands. and dear lord, i am thankful!

let's talk a minute about birth, which has become such an industry in the US. y'all know me well enough by now to get that, given the choice, i'd rather have had my boys naturally than any other way, and that it hasn't been an optuin for me. when kieran was born, by blood pressure was slowly creeping up at the end, which means that my doctora were pressuring me to induce. i still, and will always, wish i could go back in time and fight for more time. actually, i'd love to go back and get a midwife, but this is because i didn't know then what i know now. but i digress... anyway. with the critter, i was induced 4 days after my due date and ended up having a c-section after full labor and 3.5 hours of nonstop pushing. not the best experience.

things were pretty different this time around.

this time, i never developed the gestational hypertension we were all waiting for. they monitored the crap out of me, but there was nevernany sugn of any problem whatsoever. however, given the facts of the first birth, my odds of a successful vaginal birth this tume were on the order of 25%. couple that with the fact that the doctors really didn't want me to go past my due date given my age, the size of the baby, my blood pressure issues, and my personal risk of developing pre-eclampsia, and with the hippie's desire to never watch me go through that whole meaa again, and i decided not to buck the system. i had a scheduled c-section 3 days before my due date.

now, let me make two points:

1) all of my doctors recommended that i schedule the surgery on my actual due date to give my body as much time as possible to go into labor on its own. however, the hospital schedule was full, so it wasn't an option. neither was the day after. then it was the weekend, and they don't schedule them on the weekend. they didn't wabt me to wait as long as the following monday, so... you start looking the other direction. the due date was a thursday. the doctor on call on wednesday is the dude who atripped my membranes last tine without talking to me about it. tuesday was doctor death--no thanks--i'd rather have my mother do the surgery. monday waa the doctor i trust the most, with whom the hippie was most comfortable, and who delivered the critter. dora that seem like a no-brainer to anyone else?

2) all of this said, if you are pregnant, i would encourage you to try a natural birth, with a midwife if possible. and if it's not possible, then choose your practice carefully. and do not be afraid to trust your instincts and stand up for what you want. listen to the doctors, but make your own decisions, and don't let them bully you. they will. keep in mind that your doctor, no matter his opinion of himself, is just a person and not the boss of you. you are an intelligent, grown woman. read. learn the facts. ask queations. be a pain in the ass. and if, after all that, you need medical help, take it! and if you end up with a medicalized birth, try not to feel like you have failed. harder than it sounds, but important.

ok the kid has finished eating, and i am about to pass out, so i am going to finish this tomorrow with a discussion of what all was different about this c-section and the previous one. so many things made this such a different experience!

1001 blog posts

as you may have noticed, i pretty much took the summer off. i've been focusing on living in the now and being with my family. i've had so little downtime that i have been unwilling to spend that time in front of a computer. i'm getting things back together at last, however, and i am ready to start writing again. i have written hundreds of blog posts in my head, but have found no time to get them out. i am bursting with words.

it's a weird thing, this blogging. whether you have a huge readership or not, it makes you start putting pressure on yourself to write. i guess this is a good thing if your goal is to make money from your blog or from being a writer. but for me, this blog is as much for me as it is for y'all, and i don't need the pressure. that said, i am also ready for blogging to become a larger part of my life again. there are so very many things going on, and i don't want to forget them. looking back at this blog, it's like a digital scrapbook for me--i love that. and that's where i want this thing to be. i want to write more and publish more pictures and knit more and cook more and share more, so that all of that will be there for me and my boys.

so.

fresh start. fresh template. i am still playing with it, but i like all the easy options blogger has recently given me. i get to update the look with minimal effort. about time, blogger.

for those of you still sticking with me, thanks for that. i'm hoping to be around a bit more in the near future.

sweet, sweet corn salad

man, i love summer. and i know it's not technically summer yet, but we've had enough days in a row with 85+ degree weather that i consider it summer here already. and one of my favorite things to eat in the summer is this salad i made up out of some leftover random things i had in my fridge one thursday night a few summers ago. i still think it rocks, and i make it for cookouts, myself, for the critter, and for any other reason i can think of. it's so yummy--everyone but meredith will love it.

INGREDIENTS
4 ears of corn
1 red bell pepper
4 scallions
1 tsp chopped cilantro, or more
~ 1 tsp ranch dressing, just a little bit
black pepper to taste
1 avacado

DIRECTIONS
clean corn, place in a large pot, and cover with water. bring to a boil, let boil for 5 minutes. submerge in cold water to stop the cooking process. cut corn from cobs, and place in a large-ish bowl. chop bell pepper, scallions, and cilantro, and add to bowl. add ranch and black pepper. mix well, cover, and refridgerate for at least 20 minutes until ready to eat, up to a day. just before serving, chop avacado and stir into salad. that's it. simple and delicious.

pregnancy update: entering the home stretch

34 weeks

seriously, people--only 6 weeks to go. i've been sailing though the past month, refusing to stress over anything, and telling everyone, including myself, that june is my get-my-shit-together month. it is upon me. i spent my lunch hour today ordering stuff for the baby's room. i have an official registry set up for the shower some friends are unexpectedly throwing for me. i have a plan of attack. what i am trying to do now is quell the sudden urge to repaint the new baby's room. so far, the urge seems to be winning, in spite of the fact that the room is a lovely green that's perfectly acceptable. i long for a light, clear, teal. *sigh*

anyway. pregnancy is progressing normally, in spite of the dire predictions of the horrible death-focused doctor at my practice. it's also not without its concerns, in spite of the pie-in-the-sky doctor's assessment. it's funny how well you get to know these doctors when you are on your second round with them and going in twice a week for tests. if anything is going to make me ill, it's the fact that i am spending too much time there. lol.

anyway, as you all know, i have had high blood pressure since my youth, which means there are things they watch for when you get pregnant, especially if you are 40. they monitor my BP of course, as well as the baby's size, the fluid levels in my uterus, the placental function, esp as related to the variation in the baby's heart rate, my weight, my kidney function, and any tiny signs that i might be becoming pre-eclamptic. well, so far--everything is a-ok. the baby is gigantic, my BP is running lower than it has since i was 16, there's no sign of anything wrong anywhere.

dr. death still talks about stillbirth a lot. dr. sunshine gives me unrealistic statistics for VBAC success and the ability to let nature take its course. dr. reality--the dr. who performed my surgery with the critter, is somewhere in the middle. it's pretty likely that i will end up with a c-section with him again this time. i am trying to come to terms with that, although it's still depressing to me that i am most likely not ever going to experience a natural labor and delivery myself. i am somewhere between the anger and acceptance phases of my grief over this. i keep reminding myself that the healthy mama and baby at the end of this process is the goal. but it doesn't change the sadness at the lack of control and over not being able to let nature do its thing without taking a bunch of possibly unnecessary risks.

anyway. my point here was--i'm feeling pretty good. the baby's doing great. we're sailing into the home stretch. my belly is huge, and once again, it's hard to believe it can get any bigger, though i know it can...

on the down side, i am bone tired. i am getting up probably 5 times a night with either leg cramps or to pee, or both. i have considered naps at red lights more than once in the past couple of days. my gums are so bleedy, it looks like someone has punched me in the mouth every time i brush my teeth. my pants are all falling off because the baby is stealing my ass much like his big brother did.

on the upside--he's a mobile little critter, and i am firmly in the land-sharking phase of this pregnancy. it's comforting really, having all that motion from him--let's me know every day that he's ok in there. i am motivated as all get out to Get Things Done. i have a temp lined up for my leave. i am eating all the cookies i want.

could be much worse.

my thyme is blooming

isn't it pretty?

note: you can see the larger size on flickr if you click on the pic above, then go to "all sizes."

mmmmm, cake...

my weekends are filled with errands and catching up and trying to get 1000 things done at once. not that there aren't things mixed in there that i enjoy--there are--but sometimes, i feel like it's hard to get any real down time or time for myself. i've been trying to make myself take part of the critter's naptime on one of the two days of the weekend to do something i WANT to do instead of something i NEED to do. and yesterday, that something was to make this cake. and oh my god, it's good. my friends steve and tiffany gave me a lovely book a couple of years ago called heirloom baking with the brass sisters, and i have looked at it many times without actually making anything from it. this was the first, and it was both simple and delicious. the only downfall was that i over cooked the cake a tiny bit, which made it more crumbly than it should have been. however, the icing and peanuts made up for it. this is a chocolate peanut butter cake with a boiled chocolate and brown sugar icing and salted, roasted peanuts pressed into the sides. the combination of the rich dark chocolate in the icing with the saltiness of the the peanuts was SO GOOD! i am no food photographer, but man, these pictures make my mouth water all the same. good thing i have a piece of this right here to eat for lunch dessert, huh? :)

new (free!) yarn

oops--i wrote this post last week, but failed to actually publish it. let's hear it for follow-through! anyway, here it is--better late than never, right?

one of my bosses is also a friend and fellow knitter, which sometimes works to great advantage. she has excellent taste and picks out lovely gifts as well. earlier this week, these things all coincided when she gave me a gift for administrative professional's day--enough yarn for 3 pairs of socks. now, granted, the likelihood of me making actual socks from this yarn is, as you guys well know, slim. and yet--the yarn--it is intriguing to me. the ella rae is so my color scheme, and it's enough for a swallowtail shawl (rav link). the others, who knows, but the possibilities are endless. are all these colors not lovely? here's what you are looking at, from top to bottom:

aslan trends santa fe: 2 skeins, 180 yards each. 85% merino, 15% polyamide. color SFE1327, dyelot 3810. made in argentina.

ella rae lace merino: 1 skein, 460 yd. 100% extra fine merino. color 120, dyelot 90021. made in italy.

opal: 1 skein, 425 m. 75% superwash wool, 25% polyamide. color 2650, dyelot 102. made in germany.