Five Months

8.28.2012


Five months and girlfriend is on the move.  She rolls like a madwoman - back-to-front, front-to-back - and rarely stays in the same spot that we leave her in.


She also sleeps like a champ at night, sleeping through the night about 50 percent of the time.  For me, this is a like a little gift from heaven considering that O didn't sleep through the night until she was almost a year old (I really hope I'm not jinxing myself here...)


As for sleeping during the day?  Well, that's less than ideal.  Last week was her first week at the babysitter's house and let's just say that we're all still in a state of transition.  Her naps over there were sometimes non-existent and on most nights she looked exhausted when I picked her up.  Poor little kiddo.  Hopefully things go a little better this week.

And as for my other "baby," well like any good big sister she's busy trying out all the baby toys.  Look what I found her in yesterday.



I'm Published

8.27.2012


Okay, okay, not in any sort of accomplished way.

More in a "hey, look what I did during my maternity leave" sort of way.


You see, we have about 50 recipes that we circulate through in our house (although somehow most of them seem to be desserts...hmmm) and prior to my little project most of them were either shoved in a binder or thrown around the countertops.


As you can image, neither of these were particular good solutions so somewhere during my pregnancy I came up with the idea to put a cookbook together of the recipes that we use and love the most.  As with most things that was easier said than done and I didn't get around to finishing the book until a couple of weeks ago.  Originally I had the grand idea to make each meal and take a picture of us either making it, eating it, or something along those lines, but I gave up on that idea after approximately 2.2 seconds knowing that I would never finish the book if I had to do that.  So instead I just decided to stick random food-related family photos throughout the cookbook so now when we look up a recipe for pasta, we get to ooh and ahh over how cute O was way back in the day.  Perfect.


As for the actual process, it was time-consuming but easy-peasy.  I down-loaded free software from Blurb, made my own template, and just typed away.  Our little family cookbook came out to be about sixty pages and with some upgrades (like a hardcover with an image wrap), the grand total (including shipping) came out to be around 40 bucks (although I did have a coupon that I used).

And how do I like it?  Well, let's just say that I'm hoping to do this again in a year or two because really, who doesn't love a book of tried-and-true recipes in a format that also serves as a family photo album?

Sometimes I Just Have To Say Thank You...

8.20.2012

...because let's be honest, the kids never say it, right? 


So thank you, Ben, for taking the last three weeks off of work to make my transition back to work easier.  Having to worry only about getting myself ready in the morning has made things so much more manageable.  Thank you for taking such good care of the kids during the day.  Thanks for taking them blackberry picking, to the park, and to that extra-special donut shop (although I know that that was purely motivated by your own desire to eat many, many donuts).  Thank you for trying to keep the house clean (even though we both know that it's futile at this point).  And thank you for having dinner ready when I got home at night because I'm pretty sure that I'm about five times more hungry when I'm nursing than when I'm pregnant. 

Thank you for being you.  I must have been one hell of a smart woman to choose you all those years ago.

Tova Top...Again

8.17.2012

Yes, it's wrinkled, but what do you expect after I've been wearing it all day?
We're keeping it real here, people.
Somehow this seems to be the summer where I buy a pattern and then I make it over and over and over again.  It may not be the most exciting thing in the world, but there are some definite benefits to remaking a pattern.  For one, you can tweak it until you get the fit just where you want it (and who doesn't love a pattern that actually fits?).  And two, I love to see how different fabrics can be used with same pattern to make such different garments.  That said, the gray cotton chambray fabric that I used to make my second tova top isn't all that different in substance than the cotton fabric that I used to make my first tova top (although the chambray oddly does seem a bit stiffer).  This fabric has taught me though, that as much as I love to buy patterned fabric, plain fabrics are probably much more up my alley when it comes to wearability (yep, I'm totally boring like that).


For this tova I cut out a size small (one size smaller than recommended based on my bust measurements) and I used some bright green thread for the topstitching.  I'd like to say that I initially chose the green thread to add a little pizazz to the top, but the truth is that I just didn't have any matching thread at home and I was far too lazy to drag two little ones to the fabric store just to pick up one spool of thread. 


In any case, I happen to love how the green looks with the fabric, although since it's more visible than matching thread would be I did actually have to pay attention while doing the topstitching (which put a temporary end to my usual habit of sewing at the speed of light).


On Being Exhausted

8.09.2012


I came home the other day to find that Ben had washed this quilt with a tapestry that his mom had brought back from India and that the tapestry had bled all over my handmade quilt (in his defense, his mom had said that she had already washed the tapestry and used a color-catching sheet).  Needless to say, I was not a happy camper when I saw my quilt on the laundry room floor with blotches of red all over it.  And I was less happy when a couple capfuls of synthrapol and two hot washes didn't solve the problem as it had last time.  And so as we were heading to bed that night Ben turned to me and asked "are you mad?" to which I answered "honestly, I'm too exhausted to be mad."

Who knew that my returning to work would work out so well for Ben.

Peplum Fever

8.06.2012

Yes, yes, there are many downsides to returning to work (waking up to an alarm, pumping at work, missing my two little nuggets) but in an attempt to be an eternal optimist, let's focus on the positives shall we?  Positives like adult conversations, swearing without feeling guilty, peeing with the door closed, and an opportunity to wear fancy-schmany clothes.


Okay, not super-fancy clothes (let's not get carried away here people) but let's just say that I wouldn't be wearing a silk top if I were just hanging out with the kiddos because within approximately two minutes it would be covered in spit-up and whatever O happened to have on her hands (peanut butter, berries, whatever).  Which is my really long-winded way of saying - look!  I made a new top!


It's made from Vogue 8815 and while I did a very uncharacteristic thing in making this top and made a muslin first, I actually only needed to make one small modification to the top to make it fit better (I sewed the waist seam with a scant 3/8ths seam so that the seam would hit at my natural waist).


I also opted to line the upper portion of the top with a light polka dot cotton to give more stability to the silk fabric, but I left the peplum portion unlined so that it would still drape a bit.  Also, because I lined the upper portion I didn't need to use the recommended binding to finish the neckline although I did still finish the armholes with some homemade bias binding.


And hopefully this will now put an end to my current peplum obsession...or perhaps it'll just fan the flames.

Pattern: Vogue 8815
Size: 12
Fabric: Silk dupioni from India (compliments of my sister) and cotton lining (compliments of Joanns)

Random Randomness - Part 2

8.05.2012

1.  We took a little time the other week for a much over-due celebration of my mom's birthday and during the party I became a firm believer that ridiculous party hats just make everything better.



2.  And look, I made a cake for the party!  Sure, I broke one of the layers in half when moving it off of the wire rack, but it was nothing that a butt-load of ganache couldn't hide.


3. We also made some time for baby's first dip in the Puget Sound.  Somehow I don't think that she's a fan.  Perhaps she's a cold-water wimp like her mother.



4. O, however, had an awesome time at the beach.


5. We finally got around to trying one of the Indian pizza places that we always drive by.  Curry pizza? Way more delicious than it sounds!


6.  Speaking of delicious food - we're enjoying a bounty of raspberries thanks to Ben's awesome raspberry plants. Yum!