Mar
Chick with a Stick – Learning Crochet
I recently learned to crochet with less than $5 to start, a few YouTube videos and a great book from the library. I decided that I needed something productive to do while nursing, mainly because I was feeling too attached to my iPhone but also because I had an itch to make something. I hadn’t been getting much studio time so my creative juice ducts were starting to plug, rather than develop an bad case of artist mastitis I picked up a crochet hook.
Inspired by a buddy of mine, thank you knit goddess Marilyn, who knit a beautiful sweater for Kahlan, I chose to delve into the wonderful word of yarn. Since my goal was to craft while breastfeeding I chose crochet for the blunt hook and less pieces. I figure there’s less chance of damaging the munchkin this way. I was also drawn to the organic nature of the work, and admittedly I was entranced with Amigurumi, the Japanese art of crocheting little critters. Too cute!
I started with a $3 pack of cheapo plastic crochet hooks and $2 of clearance #4 sport weight yarn. Using the recommended G size hook I started working a test square of Single Crochet to learn the ropes. About five rows in I got itchy. This is easy, do I really need an entire square? Nope. Hence the love of crochet being organic, I jumped right into Half Double Crochet on the next row. So on and so forth I worked my way through all of the major stitches:
Chain, Slip Stitch, Single Crochet, Half Double Crochet, Double Crochet and finally Treble Crochet. This is what I ended up with at the end of two weeks of dabbling:
How did I learn? I’m a self starter by nature so I googled crochet and found a ton of great resources. Lion Brand Yarn has an excellent reference library as well as a series of YouTube tutorials that I found the simplest and straight forward for each stitch. I fell in love with The Chicks with Sticks Guide to Crochet, and miss it terribly now that it’s back at the library. That book was my primary resource and helped me cement my foundation stitches while loading me up with hip modern pattern inspiration. That being said, my first non-practice square creation ended up being this little blue tree spirit from the Hiyou Miyazaki film My Neighbor Totoro. He began as a practice piece for crochet in the round initially intended to be a ball for the cat. I kept going though and he started lengthening and forming until I recognized him. A bit of cross stitching detail finished him up and he now has new purpose as a baby toy!
For my next project, I’m going to crochet a belt out of hemp since those 30 missing pounds are making it really hard to keep my pants up…
Mar
Handmade Gifts – Can’t Buy Me Love
While anyone can buy a gift, and there are certainly plenty of things a new baby needs, there is a specialness to handmade items that just can’t be purchased. When someone chooses a gift it can be with little thought, but to make something takes a dedication of time that is priceless. Though we are grateful for everything we were given, these handmade pieces have a special place reserved in our baby memory box. They may even be passed on one day to our grandchildren and become heirlooom pieces for the next generation:
1. Crochet Cupcake hat from Uncle Alex.
2. Crochet baby gown made for Grama Diana by her Grama and now passed down five generations.
3. Knit button up sweater with matching booties from my buddy Marilyn.
4. Patchwork Baby Quilt from Matt at Bullseye and family.
5. Wood and Fabric wall art for the nursery from Uncle Alex and Katherine.
Tags: baby gifts, handmade
Feb
PetHack – De-Mat a Cat
We love our fluffy adopted kitty Somewhere. Although I swore I’d never own long haired pets, her sweet snugly disposition won us over and we brought her home from the shelter, despite my fuzzy misgivings. She is a great cat, worthy of her feline heritage, but we were right about the hair.
Before we had Kahlan we tried to maintain a regular brushing session to keep her fluff from matting. Somewhere would get the occasional small tangle, which was easily removed by cat power, so she stayed in control of her mighty mane. Unfortunately, having a new baby doesn’t leave time for much else and I’m embarrassed to admit we let the cat slip into such a matted state that nearly a third of her rear became home to three of the biggest hairballs I’ve ever seen.
Now, with our new tightly implemented budget, it wasn’t financially appealing to pay a groomer $30+ to shave her butt. After attempting to tackle her with the hubby’s beard trimmer ourselves we learned how strong and willing to shed blood our snugly cat was to avoid the noisy treatment. By this time, the now golf ball sized mats, were too invasive to simply cut out with scissors. The thickness, combined with her struggling, would make it far to easy to accidentally cut into her delicate flesh along with the fur and we faced a dilemma. Shell out the cash for a groomer or face an unhealthy kitty situation.
The Solution:
Since Somewhere really only had a problem with the noise from the electric trimmer I got to wondering, if I could shave her without the noise would she let me? My first attempt to muzzle the sound failed. I had wrapped a towel around the trimmer to dull the vibration but it was still to loud, difficult to handle, and the cat was on to me. Necessity breeds creativity and an idea struck. I dug into my cabinets and found a pack of good ol’ Bic plastic disposables. By keeping or against the edge of the worst mat and rubbing it in a shallow repetitive arc I managed to start peeling out the mats. Since the blade is relatively protected I wasn’t as likely to tag skin and the lack of noise allowed me to work at them for a solid 2-3 minutes at a time before kitty lost patience. It was a slower process for sure, but given the circumstances a much more viable alternative. Continuing our little sessions throughout the afternoon, I managed to remove the biggest one same day, and the two others a day later.
My advice for shaver-phobic cat owners? Try a cheapo Bic razor, it’s an unusual yet effective alternative.
Feb
Wordless Weekend – Lifes a Beach
1/4 Tank of Gas – $8
12″ Hand Dipped Corndog – $3
Deep Fried Twinkie – $2
Our Super Fun Family Day in Seaside -
PRICELESS
Tags: wordless
Feb
4 Month Kahlan Update
We’ve hit the four month mark and have a beautifull and engaging baby girl to show for it. Kahlan is a wonder to behold. Full of smiles and good natured to the core, her days are now full of mommy time and endless adventure. She has discovered her toes (and how to gnaw on them), broke through her volume control and burst forth with joyous screeching giggles.
Still at the top of her charts, her new stats are as follows:
15 lbs 11oz
25″ tall
16.5″ head
That explains my huge biscept!
Teething is ramping up. The drool flows in gushes and everything in reach is a chew toy (including Mommy & Daddy). With the doctors ok we have begun letting her taste some fruits, no solid offerings just licks of juice, and she’s loving it. Watching her eager little open burst mouth when we pour ourselves orange juice is a crack up. She about took off Daddys finger when he offered her a taste!
Jan
Choosing Baby (Pt 2) – From D.I.N.K. (Double Income No Kids) to S.I.N.K (Single Income New Kid)
My husband and I had lived the D.I.N.K. life for eleven years when we became pregnant. We ate out most days, sometimes for two meals. Bought whatever gadgets we wanted, books and movies galore. We planned a yearly vacation and had weekend retreats in between. Life was good and we were pretty happy. None of that compared to welcoming our daughter to the world.
All the material cluttering our lives melted away and seemed so much less important. It was nice, don’t get me wrong. I like my movie collection. I like that we have walls of books covering our house. I really like our house. I LOVE my baby girl. More than I thought I was capable of loving. So, as my leave approached its end, our conversations began to drift from all the things we would do with our daughter, and started being framed as all the things we would miss while she was in daycare.
That’s when it started getting really bad for me. I’ll be honest, I was dying inside already. Waking in the night crying and not knowing why. I felt this aching sense of lose and I couldn’t pinpoint its cause because during the day I was so genuinely happy and fulfilled.
We had found a great daycare and we had a smooth transition plan in place. I would return on a short week while Daddy stayed home with baby so I could get back in the groove without fretting daycare right away. Daddy would work four tens and have Fridays off and I would use vacation to be home Mondays for five weeks. I thought it would work out. I hoped I would survive it, after all, lots of other moms do it. Right?
After the first week we knew what our hearts had been telling us. It doesn’t matter what other people do. It matters what we do, in the here and now. Because in only a week she was already acting different. Coming home tired and cranky. Sullen and reserved when put down, like she didn’t expect us to come back for her. That was enough. I might have survived the gruelling schedule, we may have been able to make it work. But at what cost? How much of our sweet social baby would be chipped away as the hours in daycare grew longer once I ran out of vacationed Mondays? If one week could instill noticeable changes, would one month be worse, or one year?
In the end it came down to one simple truth. When your lying on your deathbed the things you’ve owned mean nothing, the only things that do, are your memories and the loving relationships of your life. The things you DID. I can always go back to work if this new life doesn’t fly, but I can never get back my baby’s childhood or the time we would lose together while working outside the home earning not a whole lot after daycare costs.
So for her, because I love her more than I can articulate, I will embrace this new life. At full speed with as much optimism and bravery I can muster. This is for you my love. My time. My attention. My every breath.
Jan
Choosing Baby – Why & How I Decided to Leave My Job (Pt. 1)
After tomorrow I will be officially unemployed. I didn’t get laid off, my company is actually still there, and no one has burned down the building. I chose unemployment. I chose to be home to raise my daughter the way my husband and I have decided she deserves to be raised. I chose the people I love over the things that I covet. It was a long, difficult and stressful decision. Here is the windy version for those still shocked and perplexed by my seemingly sudden change of heart.
In an economic slump, when so many people are desperately seeking employment, it sounds almost insane that I would be choosing to leave my career and hard won position of eight years. I worked so hard, fought so long, to slowly earn my degree while working to pay for it. I never wanted kids growing up. I wanted a successful career, to be the best I could be at something, and generally rock the chick power. Once I reached a point in my life where my husband and I decided our tune had changed and we wanted kids, I never stopped for a second to think my career would be effected. Sure, I’d probably have to adjust my schedule, stop working 15 hour days and learn to leave work at work. Plenty of other career women do it. Just fine. No sweat.
I was ridiculously naive.
My excuse? I’m an only child, whose childhood was rough at best, I never understood babies or cared to be around them. Honestly, they freak me out man. To little and breakable. To smelly and loud. It took me thirty years to have one because I was so afraid I would mess up an innocent little person with my seeming lack of maternal instinct. Everyone says it’s different when it’s your own babe… I didn’t believe it back then, but everyone was right.
The moment my little girl came into the world wide awake and drug free, warm in my arms, I had an epiphany. This was my success. THIS was what I was meant to be. A mother. Her mother. I felt like Neo being jacked in for the first time, a million gigs of data streaming into a blank reality. Once you choose the red pill you can’t go back, your no longer the person you were then, your changed in the most fundamental and irrevocable way.
In that moment I became everything I always feared I never could be. I was flooded with love, joy, and the biggest natural high of my existence (truly natural birth is FANTASTIC). I wanted to give her everything, but not just stuff. I wanted her to feel the joy she’d given me in her life, to reach for her dreams, to know how much she was loved and wanted. We spent my maternity leave dreaming together. Her; of things I can only wonder at, me; of the things I wanted to teach her and the experiences I hope she will have. Birth was magnificent, my infant a joy, and then the reality came cascading over me. I was weeks away from returning to work and faced leaving the center of my universe behind… with strangers.
Come back tomorrow for Part 2 – How we made the change from D.I.N.K. (Double Income No Kids) to S.I.N.K (Single Income New Kid)
Jan
How I lost 30lbs three months post-partum…
You read that right. Yes, I have really lost 30+ lbs. since giving birth in September. No, I have not signed up for any crazy diet plans. Yes, I’m healthy and happily raising my growing baby girl while sheding the pounds like winter layers of clothes. How?
I know for myself that the combination of breast feeding and cutting out High Fructose Corn Syrup (I really can’t knock it enough) from my diet have greatly improved my body and self image. I started out weighing 201lbs. before I became pregnant last winter. Through my minor diet changes (seriously cut the HFCS, increased fresh fruits & veggies) and adding a walk over lunch 2-3 times a week I gained only 7lbs. by the end of my pregnancy.
*DO NOT intentionally diet while pregnant, talk to your doctor about any weight loss to avoid nutritional deficiency. My OB/GYN worked very close with me to monitor that the baby was getting everything she needs.
Now, three and a half months later, I’m down to 175lbs.! How is this possible? I really haven’t been focusing on weight-loss. I’ve tried so many things in the past, just about every phad, with no luck. And here now, without even trying, I’m losing weight like crazy and feel better than I have in a decade. Three simple lifestyle changes have got me here:
1. Reduce/Remove High Fructose Corn Syrup from your diet.
You would be SHOCKED to know what that crap is in. Pretty much every processed food in America including but not limited to: Juice, Salad Dressing, Ketchup, Breads, Canned Fruits, Soups, Candy, Cake, Soda Pop, Energy Drinks, Syrups, even most “honey” is just flavored corn syrup. HFCS has been found to contain mercury (remember the Mad Hatter from Alice in Wonderland? That’s Mercury poisoning), cause obesity and diabetes in children as well as adults, and recently to cause organ damage because most of it is manufactured from Monsanto genetically modified corn. Other countries don’t use it, we have the Corn Industry lobbyists to thank…
There is hope, I have found alternatives to every food mentioned that do NOT contain HFCS. You just have to read labels, a lot. You don’t even have to go all organic to do it, but it does help.
2. Breatfeed
Yes, I’m a HUGE advocate for breastfeeding. It’s not just great for baby, but awesome for mommy too. For a whole lot of great information on why, check out Best for Babes, they have about everything you’d ever want to know about it.
3. Get more active
I know everyone says “exercise”. I don’t. Really, I hate it. It’s boring. Just being honest. But what I HAVE done is increase the activity in my daily routine and add more out & about to our entertainment roster. We go to parks and hike. We hit up the Farmers market on Saturdays just to wander. I carry the baby, everywhere. I do chores with her on me so I get snuggles and an extra 14 lbs. of weight to lift. Play Wii. The family games on that thing are great, and the Wii Fit game is more play than exercise but every calorie that gets burned doesn’t care how you burned it. It’s still gone.
I may just be a freak of nature. I hope not, because I’d like to think sharing this will help someone else achieve similar results and joy. Good luck 
