I'll Fly Away Oh Glory

Spring is here! Or so say these birdies. I was home sick from work yesterday and found the energy that I couldn't find on Sunday to add the final stitches and twine to Frankie's bird mobile.

The plan was to sew the birds on, attach the tiers to each other, fasten the mobile to the ceiling and then glue the birds in place in that order. That way I could shuffle the birds around until I got the balance just right with every-birdie standing in its proper place. So I sewed and attached and fastened and began to glue. The top two rows went well. After gluing the last bird in the last row in place the whole row spun upside down ... permanently. At this point I was starving and with my usual craft standards comprised by the cold I decided that it was just fine and wouldn't overly affect Frankie's understanding of feathers and flight. It's bright, it twirls and this way the bottom row of birdies will be looking down at little Frankie. Hmm ... I should totally erase this confession and pass the design flaw off as premeditated :)

You can find the free pattern for these guys here: http://www.spoolsewing.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/birdpattern1-1.pdf

Happy Minus Two Month Birthday

Dear Frankie,

Two months until tiny toes and cheeks. Two months until this little pod of four becomes a family of five. I think the test babies are preparing well - some of their fascination with your toys and crib has faded.

I think you're preparing well too. Lately, when you wriggle around and I put my hand on my belly you feel so determined. This has become one of my favorite things to do - hold on and try to guess which little limb you are stretching out. You are not even an outside baby yet and already you can make me drop everything just to drink you in.

Here are some other new things in your life:

Your dad is putting a beautiful new railing on the stairs today to prevent unnecessary tumbles (by both you and me).

You have had the hiccups three times in the last forty-eight hours making it feel like I have a mexican jumping bean in my belly.

You love the chocolate-vanilla soft serve at Lick-a-Treat. Okay so I love the chocolate-vanilla soft serve at Lick-a-Treat but I have to pin this new ice cream weaknesses on someone.

Your very thoughtful aunt and uncle and cousins sent you these last week cementing your most-stylish-baby-in-the-northend status:

And lastly we have started the family tree wall in your room. I can't wait to watch it grow along with you:

Love, love, love

Your Mom

Warm Weather Wanderings

Pretty view from the top

The coyote conqueror (just in case I am looking 25% more delicious)

The 25% more delicious

Up this ladder there was probably a giant playing a recorder and a rooster in a sock but we didn't investigate

Lightening Things Up a Little

On account of this lovely windows-open spring weather

If You Go Out In The Woods Today ...

Dear Frankie,

Although you probably won't be allowed to eat very much fast food and will have to eat vegetables everyday I promise to make these for you as soon as you are old enough.

Love,

Your Mom

The Big Apple Orchard

Sometimes I wish I lived in New York city. Especially when I come across pretty things like this:

Maybe its the myth that surrounds the city but its as if I can taste and touch and smell it. A nostalgia for something that never happened.

And then there are moments when I ache for a tiny farm on a dirt road with chickens and barefoot children. New York or Cape Breton. Paris or Thunder Bay.

Sorry C.M.

Last night I was trying to think of the name of the Peanuts character who was followed around but a cloud of dust and debris and said "you know, like that kid from Charlie Brown, Dirt Bag". Turns out his name is Pig Pen and not Dirt Bag but I now I can't stop imagining a comic strip/cartoon with a little kid character named Dirt Bag and it keeps making me laugh.

"Don't think of it as dust. Just think of it as the dirt and dust of far-off lands blowing over here and settling on Pig-Pen! It staggers the imagination! He may be carrying the soil that was trod upon by Solomon or Nebuchadnezzar or Genghis Khan!" - Charlie Brown

To Have And To Hold From This Day Forward

Tomorrow morning at 11am two of my most favourite people in the world will be slipping rings onto each others fingers and promising to be kind and patient and compassionate both in times of laughter and overwhelming gratitude and in those tougher (but much more fleeting) moments of doubt and frustration.

Here's to your wisdom Nika and your laughter Andrew. To your empathy Nika and your patience Andrew. To the humanity, generosity, spirit and inspiration you have both brought into my life. To your collective love of animals, sunsets, books, sandy beaches, red wine and campfires. I would not be me without the two of you.

Swallow You Up Whole

I got the stink out of my car on the weekend. That’s right no poopy baby bottoms and already there was a stink. I hate stink. I am totally not beyond sniffing around for hours to find the source of a stink and usually I’m pretty good at it too. But not this time.

For the last two weeks my car has had a not-so-vague rotten sandwich smell. I checked everywhere. Under the seats. In the glove box. In the trunk. Nothing. What do you say when someone gets into your car and it smells like green cheese?

Rob was sure that I had lost a sandwich somewhere. I will admit that there was this one time when I misplaced a bag of red onions for so long that they liquefied. Not even kidding. I eventually sniffed them out and poured them down the stink. But never have I been less likely (in my entire life) to misplace something as delicious as a whole sandwich.

So I took the stinker for a premium interior clean. When I went to pick up my shiny smells-like-roses-and-pinesol car I gathered up the courage to ask “does anyone ever call you about a rotten sandwich smell.” Holy relief! Apparently, it’s common and happens when the cream in spilt coffee gets into the carpets and spoils (and I spill at least a quarter of my coffee every morning on the eight minute drive to work because the pot holes around here pass straight to China). Four days in and still stink-free.

The Heirs of Malcolm McLeod

Last night we stood on the most beautiful peninsula and stared out at the ocean. We imagined wrap around porches, bonfires on the beach, and little feet running through the long grass. It was better than the movies. The tax sale is next Thursday and all of our fingers and toes are crossed.

Tiny Baby Warning

If you are having a tiny baby do not go on Etsy.com and look at tiny baby things because before you know it you will no longer be able to afford to house and feed said baby.

What Once Was

Dear Belly Button:

We've had a good run - these last twenty-nine years. You - collecting lint and marking the place that my pants should never rise above. Me - appreciating all of your concave qualities. Remember that time I pierced you? Sorry about that.

I've been seeing less and less of you lately and I suspect our time is drawing near. Don't be sad, in most cases its not permanent. In fact, you'll probably be back before Frankie's on to solid foods.

Enjoy your time off and don't forget to send a postcard or two from wherever it is that belly buttons go while babies are being grown.

All my Love,

Erika

Vegetable Viewers

How is it that after a moderately productive weekend Monday morning is still a saucy little reminder of how much I didn't get to? Bad Monday.

I started one of the sewing projects and at one third done am ready to declare it a success. In total (and eventually) there will be eleven little birdies perched on a birdie branch mobile over Frankie's crib. I was nervous at first having never sewn from a pattern but after a few tries there were plenty of perfect birdie body pieces ready for stitching and stuffing.

Getting all of my ducks in a row

Rocking robins (or chickadees or sparrows or other birds with pretty poor adaptation skills who would be unlikely to survive a bleakly coloured Canadian winter)

I decided to hand sew them because (a) they're pretty tiny and delicate and I am not yet that adept at maneuvering material under a fast-moving needle (b) I could then stitch them up while watching the weekend's films - The Invention of Lying and The Hurt Locker.

The former was forgettable and the latter was decent but maybe not multiple oscar worthy (in our sofa-film-critic expert opinion). It did a good job of depicting war without explicit commentary or judgement (no small feat) but is this always a good thing? How do you look at the lives of soldiers in isolation from their political context. How do you not ask (when watching a film like The Hurt Locker) but how did they get there? Who sent them? Why?

On the upside it didn't follow any sort of traditional Hollywood narrative curve and this was nice. There wasn't a clearly defined introduction, character development fifteen minutes, action peak and resolution. The film wanted to create the impression that you had just dropped in on this group of soldiers and it succeeded in doing so. I like movies that let you fill in the blanks for yourself (and don't automatically assume that you're about as smart as celery) so points for this.

In other weekend news I lit the stove on fire (okay so sometimes as smart as celery). We've taken to hiding food from the test babies in the oven when it's too warm to go in the fridge. After setting said oven to 400 degrees and leaving it to warm up the billowing smoke reminded me of where we had hidden that bag of two-bite brownies. My animal-like reflexes kicked in and I jumped into action yelling "dude help" and then waited for R to come in and tell me to gather up the test babies and head for the out-of-doors.

He opened the oven and put the fire out with a tiny spray bottle of water which was kind of anti-climactic. After much laughing (and deciding that we should probably dig the fire extinguisher out from the back of the cupboard) our kitchen smelt like campfire smores so it wasn't all bad. We are sad to report, however, that the two-bite brownies didn't make it.

Extra highlights - some lovely afternoon knitting, not nearly enough editing and surprise last minute free tickets to the East Coast Music Awards gala. We didn't stay for the whole thing but did get to see Katherine McLellan, Classified and a tribute to Jerry Holland (my most favourite part)!

J-Lo Did What?

I've got some sweet sewing plans swirling around for the weekend. I'm going to pick up the supplies tonight so that I can just tumble into it whenever CBC hits its stride.

This will not be during DNTO. If this is what our national broadcaster thinks Canada's next generation wants to fill its ears with then I'll be sporting my best "I strongly disapprove of this CBC" face for some time to come. How about a DNDNTO - Definitely Not Definitely Not The Opera? How about I'm probably ninety-eight with some really good twenty-nine year old makeup?

If everything works out I'll be able to show you Frankie's favourite baby outfit. How do I know it will be Frankie's favourite? Because I'm the Mumma so I get to pick. If it doesn't work out let us never mention this again expect in relation to funny test baby photos.

Speaking of the test babies, we've just put them on their first diet. They seemed to be on board with the new food and new portions for about three days but then this morning they knocked a full container of yogurt off the counter and ate half of it - clearly an act of diet rebellion. Maybe we should get them some Speedos in the summer so that they feel its all been worth it? I think they would appreciate that.

We've added a few more pictures to the nursery - some birdies and a tree. I'm pretty sure Frankie is going to like how bright they are.

They are from a website called Free Your Soul: The Free Art Project - that's right free art! You can download any of the prints in PDF and for less than $2 we had these two made at the copy shop downtown. Last night when I was trying to remember the name of the website and "free art" in google was no help at all I resorted to my laptop's history. This wasn't any more successful but did confirm that I waste a lot of time online. Evil celebrity gossip sites.

Oh Stan ...

I am sitting in front of two laptops: one without Microsoft programs (thank you strange Christmas travel glitch) and one (as of five minutes ago) with no Internet. I need to take screenshots of online applications (on the Internet) and insert them into a Power Point tutorial (Microsoft program). Its going to be a long night.

My trip to the hospital today went well all things considered. The staff in the laboratory told me that they normally work nights (when pregnant ladies rarely stop by) and so weren't sure of the gestational diabetes procedure. I knew there was an orange drink involved and they knew of a needle and together we settled on the most likely sequence of events. After this a blood transfusion emergency (not mine) meant waiting three and a half hours to have the Rhogam released from the hematology department.

The good holy-best-news-ever news?

When I was checking in for the first test the woman behind the desk asked (like it was no big deal) "Did you pick up your birth plan yet?

Me (thinking I must have heard her wrong) "My what"

Her "Your birth plan"

Me (trying not to spit coffee all over this very nice woman so early in the morning) "No. Thanks"

A few months ago I started researching birth plans online but hadn't taken the final product to my doctor yet. Part of me didn't want to look like a huge keener and part of me wasn't ready to be told that all of the things I wanted were completely out of the question.

My happiness at being handed the form was surpassed only by the tears-in-my-eyes happiness at reading it over. The hospital here endorses all of the little but so important things I hoped to ask for like alternative pain management, not being fastened to a rack of beeping-blinking machines, and having Frankie sleep in the same room as me when its all said and done. Go hospital!

Two other small things that created (possibly) disproportionate happiness today:

(1) Hearing this on the radio on the way home (and getting goosebumps):

(2) Coming across a link to this while trying to decide what to do about the dual laptop meltdown: