Life of a Catholic Librarian

Tired, so very tired

2012-01-27T12:42:00.003-05:00

Well, last night was a better night, but after 3 weeks with only 2 better nights in the mix, I'm officially exhausted. "Better" means, you know, I'm not downstairs with a fussy Anne at 3 am watching The Bob Newhart Show on the Hallmark channel, with soaking wet pajamas from her drool and sore body parts from all the baby elbowing going on. It's a relative term, you see.

It's not so bad, really. I do not despair. But I do have a hard time coming up with new belly dance combinations when I'm this tired, and I'm supposed to have a fresh one crafted for tonight's class. Lack of sleep = fuzzy brain.

This must also explain how the other day I stood in front of my office with my key in the lock trying to open the door, and it took me a full 20 seconds to realize that this wasn't my office at all. It was the identical office exactly one floor up from mine. I actually climbed a full extra set of stairs and didn't realize it. Luckily, the occupant wasn't in the office, or else I would have been mortified. It was difficult enough trying to look casual as I wrenched my key out of the lock and strolled away in front of the students studying along the nearby wall. I also stopped off on the floor that I thought was the main floor Wednesday morning to report in for my reference shift and stood baffled for a moment wondering when they moved all these tall stacks with journals on them to the main floor right in front of the doors. Right. Once again, the Stairwell Devil had coaxed me out onto the wrong floor and I was powerless in his vicious grip.

It's also been tough to stay awake in meetings lately, but I bravely soldier on.

When the baby is up in your bed blowing raspberries and drooling on your pajamas at 2 am...

2012-01-26T11:43:00.002-05:00

...you must do the following the next day:

(1) drag yourself out of bed only when the clock strikes a time after which it will be physically impossible to fit in all the necessary getting ready activities and still get a decent parking space at work.

(2) apply more powder and blush than usual in an effort to actually LOOK ALIVE.

(3) don't even bother to do more than pull a comb through your rat's nest of a head of hair and carefully coil it up into a fetching bun.

(4) choke down some coffee.

(5) try not to wonder how the baby appears so happy and well rested. Some things just defy explanation.

Ordinary Time? Not so ordinary

2012-01-25T11:44:00.003-05:00

I'm sure that I've mentioned before that I absolutely *love* the Church's liturgical calendar, and following along with the different liturgical seasons. Right now, we're in "Ordinary Time," and in the past, the name always made me feel a bit ho hum. You know, Christmas is over, Lent hasn't started yet, so we're just filling in the gap. The priest wears green vestments, and there are no special flowers or decorations at the church right now.

Well. I couldn't have been more wrong. :) And, as ever, I'm grateful that I teach Children's Liturgy of the Word and have the opportunity to learn new things about my faith along with the children.

This morning I was on the very quiet reference desk, and so pulled out my preparation sheets for this Sunday, the fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time. There's always an introduction for the catechist to the readings for that day plus some background on the current liturgical season. And here's where it gets interesting. At least for me. :)

The sheet notes that the word "ordinary," as used to denote liturgical time, does not mean "commonplace." The original meaning of the word was a person occupying a high office, and thus indicates a loftiness of rank. As well:

"Ordinary time is that grouping of Sundays lying between the great Incarnational observances of Advent, Christmas and Epiphany, and the great Resurrection observances of Lent, Easter and Pentecost. After the feasts and fasts of these two great centers of our lives, ordinary time provides us with an opportunity to take a more detailed look at our spiritual life and its underpinnings. Having just celebrated the Incarnation, we now turn our attention, during the next four weeks, to how it is that the Christ, born in us at Christmas, lives in us, and we in Christ. Who is Jesus, and what does Jesus mean to me? These are the questions for post-Christmas ordinary time. But these are not ordinary questions."

I loved, loved, loved this explanation. And for the past couple of years, I have indeed felt more of a significance to Ordinary Time. It's a time for reflection and preparation for the major feasts of the Church. How are the major events of our faith, and our day-to-day relationship with Jesus, impacting our everyday lives? And so the above explanation for this next month in particular really resonated with me.

As I drove into work this morning, I was thinking about Lent coming up next month. I love Lent. And this year, I don't want to be caught unprepared for how I want to approach that 6 week period. I'm planning a time of spiritual reading that I'll write more about in a separate post, and I'm very excited about it.

Excited about Lent = weird? Not sure, but it is noteworthy. :)

Apparently, I may be a knitting freak

2012-01-24T13:26:00.004-05:00

Today during my lunch break, I journeyed over to Youtube to watch a video on how to do a 3 needle bind off for the child's vest I'm working on. I find Youtube invaluable for knitting help; seeing a video really brings techniques home for me in ways that simply reading about them does not. I watched the video, and felt optimistic about the technique. I had never done this sort of bind off before; apparently it creates a seam, in this case, in the shoulders of the vest. Good, that was settled.

Before I navigated away, I caught a glimpse of a recommended video on my right navigation bar for making a knit stitch in the Continental method. For those of you that don't knit, this is where it gets all gobledegook-like.

There are 2 ways to knit. One is called the Continental method, and it involves picking up the working yarn with your right needle to slip through your stitch. The other, the predominant method in this country, is called the English method, and these knitters are called "throwers" (rather than the Continental "pickers"; that seems like a bit of a crass way of putting it, but for whatever reason, that's the common parlance). In the English method, one throws the working yarn over the right needle to then slip through your stitch.

I knit via the English method. Or, at least I thought I did. I had heard on a knitting podcast recently that the Continental method is really good for using multiple small strands of yarn to create colorful motifs in what is known as Fair Isle Knitting, which I've always wanted to learn, so I thought that one of these days I should check out Continental knitting. My friend Stacy from my knitting group knits this way, so I knew that I could go to her with questions.

Thus (finally, I know) I clicked on the link in Youtube. The nice knitting lady demonstrated a knitting stitch in the Continental method. She described how Continental knitters hold their working yarn in their left hand and then pick the yarn up on their right needle counterclockwise. Huh. That didn't look all that different from what I do, since I too hold my yarn in my left hand. Ah ha! I see there is also a video by the same nice knitting lady on a knit stitch in the English style, so let me objectively look at that one to compare.

And this is where the shock comes into the picture. I mean, it's shocking for me because I'm so invested in knitting. For anybody else that managed to read this far into this post, well, God bless you. The video informed me that English knitters hold their working yarn in their *right hand*. Um, no they don't. Because I've never held my working yarn in my right hand a day in my life, that's simply not possible.

Thus, I ignored aforementioned nice knitting lady. And consulted with my knitting group. The verdict?

Yep, English style knitters hold their working yarn in their right hand. The thought of doing so makes my hands actually clench into claws, it seems so onerous and out of place to me. So I hold my working yarn in my left hand like a Continental knitter. But yet, I definitely "throw" the yarn like an English knitter, I don't "pick" it. So what does that make me?

A bit of a freak it appears. I apparently knit via some mysterious 3rd method that nobody knows about but me. We'll coin it the "Tiffany method." I wonder if it has something to do with the fact that I crocheted for decades before I learned to knit, and I always crochet with my working yarn in my left hand, since the hook is in my right hand.

Who knew? Not me, and I've been knitting for years. You learn something new everyday. So perhaps Continental knitting won't be so hard for me to pick up after all...

Get that girl a tutu!

2012-01-24T09:41:00.004-05:00

I discovered something very adorable about Anne the other day. She pulled herself up onto her exersaucer and hit one of the toys on there that plays music. She then commenced to bob up and down in time to the beat.

Yes, my baby has rhythm. And I couldn't be happier about it.

Naturally, I squealed, and started talking about her starting dancing lessons, because you know, I absolutely cannot wait for this. Mike seemed dubious by my plans to start her off at age 4, but I told him to leave it to me. If there's one thing in the household that I should be in control of, dancing is that thing.

I'm so excited.

In other precious baby news, if you crochet, you simply have to check out this etsy shop that I discovered for baby patterns. There is a cupcake dress and hat pattern, plus a watermelon set that I'm dying for.

I can't wait to crochet her a bunch of stuff in cotton pastels for the summer. *blissful sigh* I'm still very much in winter sweater mode, and enjoying it, but it's nice to have different seasonal crafting to look forward to.

Mass as a family

2012-01-23T10:39:00.002-05:00

My husband is not currently a practicing Catholic, but he does love a good vigil Mass, which I find completely precious. We don't often go to a vigil, because it often just doesn't seem to work schedule-wise. However, given that Mike will accompany us when we do go, I think that I need to make more of an effort to make the time for Saturday evening Mass, so that we can all go together.

Sunday mornings (my preferred Mass time) are also complicated by Anne's nap, which is during the 10 am Family Mass 100% of the time. So, it's mostly just Henry and I that go, and lately, he's been balking at going, which I posted about last week. When I am leading the Children's Liturgy of the Word program for the week, obviously I have to go to 10 am Mass, and Henry does like helping me set up and take down all the accessories for that. But usually I end up going to that Mass because it works out best with our schedule. Plus, Henry loves the music ensemble that plays at that Mass.

But Sunday my mom and I were taking Henry to see Disney on Ice, so I thought it was a good weekend to go to the vigil Mass. So we planned it out, and did it. With both children, which always involves just a hair of anxiety.

And it went great. Henry's whining was at a minimum, and Anne was enthralled. We brought a bottle of pumped milk for her, since she had just gotten up from her afternoon nap. After she finished, she let out a belch that I'm certain even the organist up in the choir loft could hear. This seemed to endear her to every little old lady in the congregation. She was *excellent,* just looking around curiously the whole time.

We went to my regular parish (we don't always, since their vigil at 5 pm is considered "late" by my adorable husband, we'll often go to a 4 or 4:30 at a nearby parish) and Mike had a very positive impression. Before we left to go, Mike saw the headcovering I had been wearing sitting on the table and asked: "aren't you going to wear this?" sounding very disappointed, which earned him even more bonus points. He really loves my headcoverings (a collection of scarves and headbands). I was going to wear one, just a different one, since the first one I put on seemed determined to slip off my head, even with bobby pins. I wore a chiffon scarf in pink hues that he said is his favorite, so all was well.

It was just so, so nice for all 4 of us to go. This coming weekend, I had Children's Liturgy of the Word, so Hank and I will do 10 am duty. And after that, who knows? I'd like to incorporate more vigil-going into our lives.

Morning discovery:

2012-01-20T10:59:00.003-05:00

(1) Anne crawls up to me, whining.

(2) I nurse Anne.

(3) I put Anne down.

(4) Anne bursts into tears and clings to my pant leg.

(repeat this, btw, on an endless cycle daily for the past 2 weeks, including additional fun like nap refusals and waking up howling 10 minutes after we put her down for bed).

But this morning, when I gently put my finger to her top gum, I felt:

A sharp tooth edge.

PRAISE.JESUS.

Because we seriously couldn't stand it anymore. We're all exhausted.

I did think it was terribly adorable after she got her first 2 teeth (bottom center) a month or so ago when I overheard Henry sit next to her and say:

"Look at your little teeth, Anne! They're really getting taller!"

Like he needed to encourage her in her tooth growing endeavors.

Precious.

glares

2012-01-19T11:46:00.004-05:00

Work is making me grumpy today, so I'm determined to stay positive by lingering on positive things.

I've been knitting a lot lately, and currently I'm working on 2 sweaters. One is for the knit-along I'm doing at work (a red cardigan) and the other is a fabulous blue and gray winter sweater that I just cast on at home.

As well, my good friend Sarah just contacted me about her son's birthday party, and the theme is owls. You know what this means, don't you? I SIMPLY MUST KNIT HIM AN OWL SWEATER.

Well, let me edit that a bit. I looked at the calendar and realized that his birthday is in less than a month (feast of Our Lady of Lourdes) and thus I modified "Owl Sweater!" to "Owl Vest!" Vests = no sleeves = a much speedier project, and a much happier knitting Catholic Librarian. I don't want to go through the bitterness that was Christmas Knitting 2011 again. I mentally went through my stash, and realized that I have a lovely blue premium acrylic (machine washable is a must for kids knits, and this one is from Knit Picks and is heavenly soft) and his mom's favorite color is blue. Voila!

So I got that excited feeling in the pit of my stomach when I pounce upon a new craft project. I immediately navigated over to Ravelry to found a good pattern. Owls are big in knitting, because they can be easily stitched using a cable needle technique. So I found lots of adorable patterns. I really like this one. Only problem being that it's written for a baby, and I don't trust myself to correctly size up a pattern. I can try if I'm desperate, but I'd much rather have a pattern written specifically for toddler sizes.

I found one Leisure Arts booklet that has patterns for kids vests with owls, kittens, bears and bunnies, and I kind of want it really bad. I can order it online, but I figured I should swing by Jo Ann's first on my way home since they carry a ton of those Leisure Arts booklets. That way I wouldn't have to pay shipping, plus I could use a coupon. So, we'll see if it's there. I want to go right now, because I'm hating work today and would much rather hide in my happy family and craft world.

Oh sigh. Well, it's already lunch time, and the end of the work day will be here soon enough. I can listen to my happy Catholic podcasts and zip to Jo Ann on my way home, and then go home to Mike and my babies. Life is good.

What kind of Catholic are you if you...go to confession?

2012-01-18T12:26:00.003-05:00

Mike and I had an interesting discussion last night. He happened to mention to a family member (also Catholic) that he was picking up a book for me at the public library so that I had time to stop off and go to confession on my way home, since the parish where Hank goes to school has confession on Tuesday afternoons (odd, but true). He said that the family member looked quite surprised and said:

"Tiffany is going to confession? *Why would she need to do THAT?!* I don't believe in confession."

In the conversation that ensued, the family member also mentioned that she doesn't believe in papal infallibility, or the true presence of Christ in the Eucharist.

So this got me to thinking. It does seem to me that often, Catholics who regularly go to confession are viewed with suspicion:

(1) What on earth do they do so horrible that they need to confess it so often?!

Or incredulity:

(2) They go to confession? In one of those creepy little wood boxes with a priest? FREAKS.

I don't mean to imply that all people who are averse to the idea of confession are mean spirited, certainly not. But in my opinion, the sacrament of reconciliation is the least understood, by both Catholics and non-Catholics alike. And it's definitely underused.

So, as Mike and I were talking, he gave me his analysis:

"I told her that you shouldn't be a Catholic just because that's what you've always done. If you don't believe in the major tenets of the faith, it's not right to call yourself a Catholic and badmouth it's main beliefs. She should realize what I've thought she was for a long time now: an Episcopalian."

I had to laugh at that. :) I mean, I appreciate what he's saying. You should align yourself with a religious faith because you believe it to be the truth and take pride in it. Your faith should be your own and not simply something you call yourself because you never really thought too deeply about it. And if you feel very strongly that you cannot accept certain teachings of that church, maybe a different worship community is right for you.

But on the other hand...what about healthy doubt? We're not all robots without minds of our own to think things through and analyze them. And what if you're struggling with a particular teaching, but you continue to study and to pray about it? Certainly, there's a place for you in the Church. I wouldn't want it any other way. But where does that line come into play that a person, via their words and actions, actually disengages themselves from the Church? This family member attends Mass every Sunday. That to me says that she feels strongly about her Catholic identity.

So...what makes a person a Catholic? It certainly isn't up to me to decide the answer to this question, but I think it's interesting to ponder. I certainly don't like conversations that deteriorate into what makes a person a "good" or a "bad" Catholic. None of us is perfect, and all one can ever do is try their best to live out the faith and be a good example.

Confession was awesome, by the way. And this parish actually had *2* priests hearing confessions, practically unheard of nowadays. And a decent number of people came and went. I always feel so good after I go to confession. It can be intimidating, but it certainly is cleansing.

Food for thought. :)

"Mommy, church is boring, I don't want to go."

2012-01-17T10:51:00.002-05:00

So, I wondered if this would happen one day, and that day is upon us. Henry has been giving me a tough time lately about going to church. He's gotten rather whiny about the whole thing, and I've had to really prod him along to get dressed and out the door to go to Mass.

Luckily, even though my husband doesn't often accompany us to Mass, he supports me in all that my Catholicism entails, including raising our children Catholic. He never undermines my efforts with Henry and questions why Henry should have to go. He simply comes over, tells Henry that it's time for church, and helps him on with his coat. And for that, I'm very grateful.

But the whole thing has gotten me to thinking. My job is even tougher because my husband and I can't do things together to encourage our children in the faith. That job lies with me. And of course, I worry (because I do that so very well): am I a bad Catholic mother? What am I doing wrong?

I send my son to Catholic school, plus I've *always* taken him to Mass. I've introduced him to traditions that he enjoys such as lighting votive candles, using holy water to bless himself and making the sign of the cross, using an Advent wreath and Advent calendar, and Lenten activities. When he was younger we always read out of his children's Bible and now he's very familiar with some key passages. I taught him his basic prayers, but I know I should be better about praying with him regularly. I just get tied up at bedtime with the baby and so Mike handles getting Henry into bed.

So, the nitty gritty. What can I do to make church less "boring" for him? I sympathize, because when I was a child I thought Mass was boring too. And I felt like my mom "made" me go, and I don't want my kids to feel that way. Maybe it's inevitable no matter what, I don't know. Because I am going to "make them go" while they are living in my house. However, I want them to feel a bond to their faith and make it their own, and thus feel a healthy curiosity about it and enjoy it. So, what can I do?

I try to explain things about the Mass to him when they come up. We light candles after Mass whenever he asks. This past Sunday I was desperate and so grabbed an illustrated children's book of the saints that Anne had in her Christmas stocking (one of the featured saints is St. Anne) and that lured him out the door. And he actually loved it. It's this one and it's quite nice. He seemed quite taken with St. Joan of Ark and St. Michael, and looked through the pictures for most of Mass. As long as it's spiritual reading, I don't mind him having books at Mass. I also ordered him a sample copy of Magnifikid to see if that will help. It's $35 a year I believe for a subscription, and I wanted to make sure he'd use it before committing to a full subscription. I ordered myself a sample copy of Magnificat for good measure. I used to subscribe, and liked it, but after a time I found that I didn't use it to its full potential and I couldn't justify paying the $40 annual subscription price anymore. I thought maybe I was ready to try it again. But I digress.

So, we'll see what becomes of these ideas. I keep telling him that one hour per week to give to God is the least we can do for all that He does for us, but that doesn't seem to be enthusing him at all. If anybody else has any ideas, have at it, I'm all ears. :)

Feeling grateful for my blessings, and it finally looks like a real Northeastern winter

2012-01-13T11:10:00.002-05:00

We have had a *very* mild winter this year, and Mike and I were actually commiserating about how much we miss the snow! Well, God answered our prayer. :) Today we have a good old fashioned lake effect snow storm swirling about. I'm at work, but I'm dying to get home and be with Mike and my babies. I have dance on Friday nights, but I'm wondering if it will be canceled. If so, I'm looking forward to knitting and sipping a hot beverage later with Mike.

And all week, as I've been dealing with some little worries that have popped up, I've been thinking about how grateful I am for the wonderful blessings that I have in my life. I have such a beautiful family. To say that our adjustment to parenting baby #2 is going smoother than the first time around would be the understatement of the century. Of course, I felt honored to be Hank's mom all along. But this time, everything is just a joy, with both children. That adjustment to baby #1 was very, very tough for both Mike and I. Now, I keep dropping hints about Baby CL #3, and Mike keeps giving me panicked looks :) (because Anne is still quite little) but to even contemplate such a thing makes me so, so happy. I'm just so grateful for my family and for the future that we have together.

Speaking of good things, we're all loving Henry's Catholic school. I really feel like Mike's positive reaction to it is nothing but God's grace. Not that he was ever opposed to Catholic school, he was just indifferent to it since the public school costs nothing but our tax dollars. Now, we're paying both school tax AND Catholic school tuition, but we're both so thrilled with what we're seeing in Henry and our own interaction with the school.

I will say one thing that is very different that one has to get used to in Catholic schools: fundraising! Holy smokes. At all Catholic schools in this area, you have a fundraising obligation in addition to your tuition. If you don't meet the goal via specified fundraisers, you have to pay out the balance. In addition to that, the school is always offering things for sale to benefit its overall financial viability: Entertainment Books, Christmas wreaths, calendars, candy bars, the list goes on and on. I don't mind it, but it is certainly very different from my public school world.

I do like feeling like I'm contributing to the school's future. I think that in the past, people who belonged to a parish with a school felt much more "obliged" (if you will) to send their kids to the school for them to receive a Catholic education. Nowadays, that really isn't the case. Times are hard for everyone right now (especially in this area) and people are trying to save money. They may not feel like it's worth it to pay tuition when they could send their kids to the public school for nothing. Plus, there are just so many less regular Mass goers than ever before, so people don't feel connected to a parish in any way. Thus, I feel good that I'm supporting our local Catholic school.

That being said, anybody need any Easter chocolate? If so, send me a quick message. :)

STRESSED

2012-01-12T09:07:00.001-05:00

I feel like I have a lot on my mind today. I tend to take on the worries in the lives of those that I love and make them my own. Worrying is a bit of an aerobic activity for me. So I'm doing that. Plus I always worry about money in January, it's an annual tradition. It's nothing dire, but all the same, we do live on a budget, and Christmas is a challenge each year. It's going to get a little easier coming up here (Mike has started teaching his spring courses, and I'm up for tenure), but in the mean time, I worry.

I've been praying my rosary more often, and you know, it really does help. I just feel calmer and more content when I do that. Last night when I got home from work, I had a *very* nice and stress free evening with Mike and the kids, which is exactly what I needed. It's not that my evenings are usually stress inducing, but Anne has been crank central lately and there's often lots of chaos in our evenings with Hank bouncing off the walls and the baby sobbing. Last night everything went extra smoothly.

Granted, we're not getting as much sleep as we need. I will say that with baby #2, (I had typed #3 and had to go back and correct, Freudian? :) ) Mike and I are both a LOT easier going with the sleep deprivation. When Anne inevitably wakes up just as we've fallen asleep, we just bring her in bed with us and go right back to sleep. If she refuses to go to sleep in the middle of the night, I just bring her down on the couch to cuddle and watch The Golden Girls until she's calmed down and dozing back off. Truly, it has to be grace. And parenting experience.

St. Anne Novena, Day 9

2012-01-12T08:47:00.001-05:00

DAILY PRAYER TO SAINT ANN

O glorious St. Ann, you are filled with compassion for those who invoke you and with love for those who suffer! Heavily burdened with the weight of my troubles, I cast myself at your feet and humbly beg of you to take the present intention which I recommend to you in your special care.

Please recommend it to your daughter, the Blessed Virgin Mary, and place it before the throne of Jesus, so that He may bring it to a happy issue. Continue to intercede for me until my request is granted. But, above all, obtain for me the grace one day to see my God face to face, and with you and Mary and all the saints to praise and bless Him for all eternity. Amen.

Our Father, . . . Hail Mary . . .

O Jesus, Holy Mary, St. Ann, help me now and at the hour of my death.

Good St. Ann, intercede for me.

NINTH DAY

Good St. Ann, I have reached the end of this novena in your honor. I have asked and ask again. Good mother, let not your kind ear grow weary of my prayers, though I repeat them so often.

Bounteous Lady, implore for me from divine Providence all the help I need through life. May your generous hand bestow on me the material means to satisfy my own needs and to alleviate the plight of the poor.

Good St. Ann, fortify me by the sacraments of the Church at the hour of my death. Admit me into the company of the blessed in the kingdom of heaven, where I may praise and thank the adorable Trinity, your grandson Christ Jesus, your glorious daughter Mary, and yourself, dear St. Ann, through endless ages.

St. Anne Novena, Day 8

2012-01-11T08:39:00.001-05:00

DAILY PRAYER TO SAINT ANN

Our Father, . . . Hail Mary . . .

O Jesus, Holy Mary, St. Ann, help me now and at the hour of my death.

Good St. Ann, intercede for me.

EIGHTH DAY

Hail, St. Ann! I rejoice at your exalted glory. You gave birth to Mary, whose divine Son brought salvation to our lost world by conquering death and restoring life and hope to sinners. Pray to Him who, for love of us, clothed Himself with human flesh in the chaste womb of your daughter.

Glorious St. Ann, with your blessed daughter, deliver me from everything that is displeasing in the sight of God. Pray to your gentle and powerful Grandson that He may cleanse my soul in His precious blood, that He may send His Holy Spirit to enlighten and direct me in all that I do, always obedient to His holy inspirations.

Good mother, keep a watchful eye on me. Help me bear all my crosses. Give me the fullness of your bounty and sustain me with courage.

Knit-along!

2012-01-10T15:00:00.008-05:00

This winter, my knitting group and I have embarked on our very first knit-along. I mean, how adorable is that?!

I *love* the idea of a knit-along or a crochet-along. A group, either in person or virtually, works on the same item and uses each other for support and help. We decided to make the February Lady Sweater, and this is a free pattern for anyone with a Ravelry account (also free).

So far, this has been super, super fun. We each chose to make our sweater in different colors and textures, and it's interesting to see how all the sweaters are turning out. I suggested that we incorporate 2 knit-alongs per year, winter and summer, and so for the summer we're talking about making the quite infamous Clapotis. How you actually pronounce that garment is anybody's guess, but I'm excited about it all the same.

I've been trying to be more adventurous in my crafting, and so far so good. I've successfully:

(a) felted, and

(b) made a sweater that I can actually wear without exposing any body parts I'd rather not expose.

These were 2 new things to me as of this past year. This year I will try to keep going in this endeavor. Steeking, anybody? This means instead of leaving an opening or armhole in a sweater, you just cut one when you're done. With scissors. I think that if I actually do this I may need to document everything for this blog and drink several shots of whiskey beforehand.

Here's a few of my recent creations. New socks for myself:

Adorable felted handbags for my sisters, I was especially pleased with these:

Felted slippers for myself:

And the market bag that I made for my Secret Crafty Santa recipient:

Good stuff. :)

St. Anne Novena, Day 7

2012-01-10T11:07:00.001-05:00

DAILY PRAYER TO SAINT ANN

Our Father, . . . Hail Mary . . .

O Jesus, Holy Mary, St. Ann, help me now and at the hour of my death.

Good St. Ann, intercede for me.

SEVENTH DAY

Once again, Good St. Ann, I choose you for my advocate before the throne of God. By the power and grace that God has placed in you, extend to me your helping hand. Renew my mind and my heart.

Dear St. Ann, I have unbounded confidence in your prayers. To your blessed hands I entrust my soul, my body and all my hopes for this world and the next. Direct my actions according to your goodness and wisdom. I place myself under your motherly care.

Receive me, good mother. Cover me with the mantle of your love. Look kindly on me. By your powerful intercession, may I obtain from God grace and mercy. Obtain for me remission for sin and release from the punishment my offenses have deserved. Pray that I may receive grace to lead a devout life on earth and that I may obtain the everlasting reward of heaven.

Our view from locked behind the baby gate

2012-01-09T09:45:00.003-05:00

So we're officially at THAT PLACE in parenting again. Traversing from one of the upstairs bedrooms downstairs goes as follows:

Down the stairs. Into the living room, wait. Baby gate there, to prevent Anne from getting into (a) the stairs, (b) the radiator, (c) the bathroom where she particularly enjoys the trash can, and (d) the guest room/office where Hank often spreads itty bitty Legos out everywhere as he builds and rebuilds various emergency vehicles and an alien spacecraft with a human holding bin.

We move into the kitchen, to access the other doorway into the dining room/living room space. That's unblocked, and for whatever reason, Anne is far less interested in getting into the kitchen, although she occasionally tries to venture in there on her own to grab at the empty beer bottles and other recyclables. The dining room is an Anne-safe zone, with all electrical outlets covered and no small pieces lying to and fro. She likes to crawl around under the table and generally do victory laps around the room since there's a lot of space in there.

Moving into the living room proper, you're likely to step on a squeaky infant toy or twenty, and accessing the front door is a bit of a chore. The neighboring fireplace and a DVD case holder are blocked off with a strategically placed dining room chair, and new keep out devices are in the works for a nearby bookcase. Her exersaucer (Godsend that it is) blocks another DVD case holder, plus some electrical wires.

Such is our state of baby wrangling these days. Not only is she standing AND cruising, she's now babbling, and I have to say it's totally adorable.

"A ba ba ba, la la la."

It's like having a little Smurf in residence at all times. And it's wonderful, but also exhausting. So Mike and I were thrilled to go out to dinner by ourselves Saturday night to celebrate our 7th wedding anniversary. He even volunteered to go to Mass with me beforehand at a parish down the road from our chosen restaurant, which pleased me greatly. He loves vigils for some reason, while I prefer Sunday mornings. But hey, whatever. If he wants to go to Mass, I'll go when he wants to go. :) The only time I *have* to go Sunday mornings is when I'm the catechist for Children's Liturgy of the Word, which is only once per month.

Anyway, it was a much more modern church than either of us usually prefers, but I have to say, for a modern design it was quite pretty. Which I hope doesn't sound disparaging, I just prefer a more traditional look. But this church used natural light very beautifully, and still had a high ceiling, with wood beams, and although it mostly lacked traditional stained glass, it looked lovely. The Christmas decorations were still up and were gorgeous, and it was one of my very favorite feasts, the Epiphany.

It was a good, good weekend.

Unfortunately, I just discovered that I forgot my breast pump ice pack AGAIN and have to put my milk into the common work refrigerator. WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME?!

St. Anne Novena, Day 6

2012-01-09T08:42:00.000-05:00

DAILY PRAYER TO SAINT ANN

Our Father, . . . Hail Mary . . .

O Jesus, Holy Mary, St. Ann, help me now and at the hour of my death.

Good St. Ann, intercede for me.

SIXTH DAY

Good St. Ann, do not allow my soul, a masterpiece of God’s creative power, to be lost forever. Free my heart of pride, vanity, self-love. May I know myself as I really am and learn meekness and simplicity of heart.

God’s great love for me leaves me cold and unresponsive. I must reflect this love through works of mercy and charity toward my neighbor.

In your boundless charity, good St. Ann, help me to merit the glorious crown which is given to those who have fought the good fight against the world, the devil and the flesh. Assist me to preserve purity of heart and body. With Mary and her divine Son, protect me always.

St. Anne Novena, Day 5

2012-01-08T10:15:00.001-05:00

DAILY PRAYER TO SAINT ANN

O glorious St. Ann, you are filled with compassion for those who invoke you and with love for those who suffer! Heavily burdened with the weight of my troubles, I cast myself at your feet and humbly beg of you to take the present intention which I recommend to you in your special care.Please recommend it to your daughter, the Blessed Virgin Mary, and place it before the throne of Jesus, so that He may bring it to a happy issue. Continue to intercede for me until my request is granted. But, above all, obtain for me the grace one day to see my God face to face, and with you and Mary and all the saints to praise and bless Him for all eternity. Amen.

Our Father, . . . Hail Mary . . .

O Jesus, Holy Mary, St. Ann, help me now and at the hour of my death.
Good St. Ann, intercede for me.

FIFTH DAY

Hail, all-powerful Lady. By God’s special favor, grant consolation to those who invoke you. Procure for them the eternal riches of heaven, and like a good mother, success in their temporal affairs as well.

Good St. Ann, obtain my deliverance from the punishment which my sins deserve. Obtain for me success in my temporal affairs; especially see to the salvation of my soul.

St. Ann, by your influence with Mary’s son Jesus, you have won the gift of conversion for many sinners. Will you then abandon me, who have chosen you as my mother? No, St. Ann. Your name alone, which signifies grace, assures me of the help of your prayers, and these prayers will surely procure pardon and mercy from Jesus. You will pray for me now and at the hour of my death.

St. Anne Novena, Day 4

2012-01-07T10:10:00.001-05:00

DAILY PRAYER TO SAINT ANN

O glorious St. Ann, you are filled with compassion for those who invoke you and with love for those who suffer! Heavily burdened with the weight of my troubles, I cast myself at your feet and humbly beg of you to take the present intention which I recommend to you in your special care.Please recommend it to your daughter, the Blessed Virgin Mary, and place it before the throne of Jesus, so that He may bring it to a happy issue. Continue to intercede for me until my request is granted. But, above all, obtain for me the grace one day to see my God face to face, and with you and Mary and all the saints to praise and bless Him for all eternity. Amen.

Our Father, . . . Hail Mary . . .

O Jesus, Holy Mary, St. Ann, help me now and at the hour of my death.
Good St. Ann, intercede for me.

FOURTH DAY

Good St. Ann, you offered your pure and holy daughter Mary in the temple with faith, piety and love. By the happiness which then filled your heart, I beg you to present me to your Grandson Jesus. Offered by you, I will be agreeable in His sight.
Kind St. Ann, take me forever under your protection. Deliver me from the temptations which continually assail me. Above all, attend me in my last hour. As I lie on my deathbed, be present with your daughter to console and strengthen me.
Holy Mary and good St. Ann, show yourselves to be mothers indeed by obtaining for me the grace of a good death. When my soul goes forth, lead it to God’s tribunal so that, by your powerful help and intercession, it may obtain a favorable judgment.

And "one of those days" continues...

2012-01-06T09:24:00.002-05:00

So yesterday, after the indignity of storing my breast milk in the common work refrigerator, I was real paranoid about forgetting it in there. I pumped again shortly before I left, and I wanted to leave just a hair early since Mike had another one of those orientation sessions and had to leave early into the evening. I wanted us to be able to all eat together.

Thus, in my paranoia, I retrieved the milk from its place behind the yogurt and placed it with the new milk into my little cooler in my pump bag since I knew I would be leaving shortly. I then continued going through a ton of emails that had compiled while I was attending an in-house seminar all day, including an email relating to our requirement to take some evening and weekend hours for the upcoming spring semester. We all have to volunteer for a small number of undesirable shifts each semester, and we get compensatory time in exchange that we can use during the week. Usually, it's one or two shifts. This semester, it's suddenly four.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I thought I had read that wrong. Oh sigh. We have less and less librarians all the time due to retirement and people leaving for any number of reasons. And we haven't replaced anybody. I don't like working evenings, because then I can't see my kids before they go to bed. So I usually take a Sunday afternoon shift or two. Four seemed a lot more onerous, but what can one do? I quickly responded with one Sunday written in for me per month, to space them out a bit. The Sundays aren't bad because I still have all morning and then dinner home with my family. Our wonderful assistant wrote right back to me to say that 3 of those Sundays had already been spoken for.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Inside, I said a bad word. This happens EVERY semester. I'm super compulsive with my email, and yet the evening and weekend sheet goes around inevitably at a time when I'm not right on top of it for a few hours. So I called her right up and managed to finagle three Sundays (less desirable ones due to other weekend commitments) and one Saturday. I'm feeling pouty, but there's nothing I can do. It's part of my job, and this way I will at least get to take some Friday afternoons off to be with Mike and the kids in exchange.

So I was feeling flustered as 4 pm rolled around. I finished up a few more things, found that all the hot tea I'd drank meant that I had to make yet another run to the ladies room, and then bundled up and shut my computer down. I listened to a Catholic podcast as I made the trek out to the car, which at this university, is no small walk. Parking is a huge issue here, and although I have a staff parking tag and can generally get a spot (unless it's between 10 am and 3 pm; this is in contrast to the students who have a MUCH rougher go of it) it's not phenomenally close to the library. And when it's cold out, I walk through the indoor walkways which takes even longer but that way I'm not out in the wind. And that's another story; who on earth designed these walkways? There's no heat in them. They do cut the wind nicely, but in the heart of winter I have to actually brace myself to walk through them. THEY HAVE ICE ON THE INSIDE OF THE WINDOWS. This just seems like a bad plan to me.

So, finally, I arrive at my car. I have an automatic starter and got it going from the far side of the lot so that it could warm up for me. I grabbed my pump to get it into the passenger seat first, and wait. What's that?

My pump. Or rather, my lack of a pump. I had forgotten it, all the way back in my office.

Now I said a REALLY bad word, and I said it right out loud. Crankily, I spun around to find our assistant behind me looking concerned that something was really wrong with me. I assured her I was fine and hurried back to the library, where sure enough, my pump sat innocently next to my desk. I grabbed it and walked all the way back to my car and sped home, where Anne was sobbing for me to nurse her. I popped her into her high chair since we wanted to eat, but she was having none of it. She ate her bananas and squash, but squawked the whole time causing me to eat much more quickly than I would have liked.

After that, Mike left, so I nursed Anne and watched Tom & Jerry's Nutcracker with Hank. At 7 pm, both children were ready for bed, so I tucked them both in. Hank has been coughing, so I got out his penguin cool mist humidifier and set it all up for him. He coughed only a few times before going to sleep.

Until an hour or so later. Then, he coughed for an hour and a half. Around 10 pm, he finally fell asleep. Mike and I fell asleep shortly thereafter. Around 11 pm, Anne was up. I nursed her and got her back into her crib. She refused to go back to sleep, so we did another nursing session. Finally, she went to sleep in her crib, but by this time it was close to 1. Exhausted, I fell into bed.

By 5 am, I could hear Hank coughing again. And he coughed until 6:30, when we all got up. I found him curled under a blanket when I went to check on him.

"Honey, what hurts?"

"MY WHOLE BODY."

Thus, he's home from school today, and Anne is cranky and miserable. And poor Mike is home with both of them. I'm taking a half sick day to go home and relieve him after lunch.

Oh sigh.

St. Anne Novena, Day 3

2012-01-06T09:21:00.000-05:00

DAILY PRAYER TO SAINT ANN

Our Father, . . . Hail Mary . . .

O Jesus, Holy Mary, St. Ann, help me now and at the hour of my death.

Good St. Ann, intercede for me.

THIRD DAY

Hail, good St. Ann, who first responded to the needs of Mary, Mother of our Savior and Queen of Angels. Hail to you and to your husband St. Joachim, who watched over her infancy, presented her to the Lord in the temple and, according to your promise, consecrated her to the service of God.

Hail St. Ann, good mother! I rejoice in the marvels you continually perform, because they encourage all to seek your intercession.

Good St. Ann, by the great power that God has given you, show yourself my mother, my consoler, my advocate. Reconcile me to the God I have so deeply offended. Console me in my trials; strengthen me in my struggles. Deliver me from danger in my time of need. Help me at the hour of death and open to me the gates of paradise.

Crazy day

2012-01-05T15:35:00.002-05:00

I'm pretty exhausted. We've been having some long nights with a teething Anne, who decided the other night (when I set her down to change my *sodden* sleep shirt from her drool) that she'd like to play with her toys at 2 am rather than sleep. Mike has had some orientation sessions that he's had to go to at the college he'll be adjuncting at in the spring, and so I've had both (often cranky) children by myself in the evenings. And today I forgot to re-freeze the special ice pack that I have for my pump cooler, so I have reduced myself to chilling the milk I pumped today in the *work refrigerator out in the common break room*. I tucked it as far back as I could, but it's right behind someone's yogurt, I feel really bad.

Some days are just like this, I suppose.

St. Anne Novena, Day 2

2012-01-05T08:32:00.000-05:00

DAILY PRAYER TO SAINT ANN

Our Father, . . . Hail Mary . . .

O Jesus, Holy Mary, St. Ann, help me now and at the hour of my death.

Good St. Ann, intercede for me.

SECOND DAY

From the depths of my heart, good St. Ann, I offer you my homage this day and ask you to shelter me under the mantle of your motherly care. You know, good mother, how much I love you, how gladly I serve you, how happy I am to praise you, how eager I am to call on you in time of distress.

Good St. Ann, be pleased to extend your helping hand in all my wants. Listen to my prayers, for I place my trust in your gracious bounty. Make all my thoughts and desires worthy and righteous.

Jesus, I thank You for all the graces which in Your infinite goodness You have lavished upon St. Ann; for having chosen her, among all women, to be Your grandmother on earth and exalted her in heaven with such great and miraculous powers. In the name of her merits, I humbly recommend myself to Your infinite mercy.

St. Anne Novena, Day 1

2012-01-04T08:40:00.003-05:00

Right before Christmas, my sister and I started a novena to St. Anne, but once Christmas Eve came around, I completely forgot to continue on with it. So I thought I'd post the novena here for the next 9 days in addition to my regular posts, so that anyone who would like to can pray along with us. :)

St. Anne holds a special place in my heart, and not only because my daughter shares her name. Right before Mike and I started dating, some friends and I took a wintertime trip to Quebec that remains a very fond memory. (We still joke about the sheer volume of churches we visited while on vacation). While there, we visited the shrine to St. Anne north of Quebec City, and I prayed for God's will in my life, and that if he desired for me to be married he send the right man. I was in my late 20's and felt very "old" and "spinsterish" although that's laughable to me now. And just a few weeks later, Mike called me. :) Until very recently, Mike's parents lived in central Florida, and I found out soon after we started dating that his mom attended a parish there named in honor of St. Anne. And she later told me that she had prayed for Mike to find someone, and to be happy. So I have a definite St. Anne theme in my life.

So, for anyone that would like to, please join in.

DAILY PRAYER TO SAINT ANN

Our Father, . . . Hail Mary . . .

O Jesus, Holy Mary, St. Ann, help me now and at the hour of my death.

Good St. Ann, intercede for me.

FIRST DAY

Dear St. Ann, though I am but a prodigal child, I appeal to you and place myself under your great motherly care. Please listen to my prayers and grant my requests. See my contrite heart, and show me your unfailing goodness.

Deign to be my advocate and recommend me to God’s infinite mercy. Obtain for me forgiveness of my sins and the strength to begin a new life that will last forever.

Blessed St. Ann, I also beg of you the grace to love, to serve, and to honor your daughter, the most holy Virgin Mary. Please recommend me to her and pray to her for me. She refuses none your requests but welcomes with loving kindness all those for whom you intercede.

Good Jesus, be merciful to the faithful servants of Your grandmother St. Ann.

Here's to a happy 2012...

2012-01-03T09:08:00.005-05:00

Well, I'm back. And I keep typing the year wrong. I'm a good typer, I took a typing class back in high school (do they even do that anymore? *feels old*) and yet I notice that in my head, I type "2012," yet what comes out is "2010." Apparently I want it to be 2 years ago. Well, it'd be nice to be 2 years younger, but other than that, I'm happy it's today and not two years ago. But I digress.

I had a very nice holiday, and most of all I LOVED just being home with my family. So, quick updates on everybody:

Anne - Thriving. Is now slowly cruising around furniture when she pulls herself up. *heavy sigh* She has also discovered the entertainment center and now attempts to push buttons when she pulls herself up over there. I think this has been genetically bred into modern babies. She can now crawl at the speed of sound and is extremely happy all of the time. Except when she's teething, which consumed a good amount of last week. During which time, our days consisted of (1) carry Anne around, (2) arms get tired, so set Anne down, (3) Anne bursts into tears, (4) repeat steps (1) through (3) for approximately 12 hours, with short breaks in between for one decent nap and one crappy one. Pretty typical for her age. But overall, she's doing very well. She loves her new Christmas toys and has been playing very cutely with them. Her favorite is a Fisher Price tea set, and she carries one cup around with her even when she crawls so that she can bite on it when she reaches her destination at the other side of the room.

Henry - Very cute and happy. He loves being home with us and being on break from school. He got lots of Legos for Christmas, and has been a very good boy playing with them, taking everything apart and putting them back together. He also loves board games, and he got a bunch of new ones for Christmas this year. We also took both kids to the our local botanical garden over the break, and Hank just loves it there. One thing that I really enjoy about him is his appreciation of beautiful things. He really has an eye for aesthetics in nature, and he loves showing his finds to others. It's really precious. He also memorized his assigned prayers from the Advent chain he brought home from school and learned to read them himself. He's such a good boy.

Mike - Thriving at home with the kids. And we couldn't stop talking about how much we loved all being together as a family all week. Although I work full time outside of the home, I feel lucky to have a job in which I get lots of vacation and holiday time, plus normal hours. So I'm home a lot. We enjoyed every moment of last week, and I have plans to take some additional time off in the coming months when Henry is off for his winter break and for Easter. The only mar in Mike's week was a bout that he had with some sort of throat infection. And we've been married long enough (7 years this coming Sunday) for me to know one thing about my darling husband: he is SUPER easygoing and easy to live with, aside from one thing, but hey, nobody's perfect, right? And that one thing would be that he is a terrible sick person, and he would be the first to admit this. He gets actually mad when he gets sick, because it incapacitates him and keeps him from doing things he wants to do or feels he should be doing. And hence, he's miserable to be around. He grumps around the house until I tell him to go to bed. Translation: "you're driving me crazy, so please go get some rest before I say something that will hurt your feelings." The next morning, the antibiotics had kicked in and he looked sheepish and back to normal. Thank God. He's really adorable, and I'm lucky to have him.

Me - I knit, and knit and knit. I finished socks, I crocheted myself a cardigan, I knit a scarf and I felted slippers. I was Super Compulsive Knitter. And I loved every minute of it, being inside on a chilly winters day with a cup of tea by my side. I played with the kids, and I snuggled lots with Mike. Life is very, very good.

And I need to keep that in mind when my birthday approaches next month and I move even closer to 40. But we'll return to obsess about that another day...

Merry Christmas! And a short blogging hiatus...

2011-12-23T09:56:00.005-05:00

I hope all of you have a very blessed and merry Christmas this year! It'll be a little chaotic in my household, but I'm looking forward to it all the same. And I'm very much looking forward to my week off with my family. Thus, I likely will not blog next week. I just want to spend time with Mike and the kids and focus my attention on them.

But rest assured, I'll be back on January 3rd! There will be lots of exciting news to blog about in 2012 I'm sure. Knitting, belly dancing, and lots of Catholic "stuff." I'm looking forward to it, and I hope you are too.

For your reading enjoyment, here are some posts from Christmases past:

2010

2009 prep, and rundown

Crafting modest and feminine clothes...

2011-12-23T09:32:00.005-05:00

I haven't bought myself clothes in a really long time. I was pregnant last year, so I did buy some maternity clothes, but everything I wore was either from my pregnancy with Henry or secondhand from the Goodwill. A few friends also lent me maternity clothes. So I haven't bought "regular" clothes in a while.

When I did do a little shopping right before I returned to work following my maternity leave, I was disappointed. Everything was so expensive, and it's not as if they were made out of quality materials. Things just cost more now, even polyester. :) I also had a hard time finding things that I liked 100% in terms of the style. I tend to prefer longer tunic style tops (I think they're more flattering on me), and we've had the skirt discussion before. Modesty issue aside, I just don't look good in knee length or above skirts. I do tend to find pants pretty easily, although the fact that mens' pants are made with waist and length measurements and womens' aren't is completely ridiculous to me. But anyway, a lot of the tops were longer but too low cut, or had a nice neckline but cut funny on the sides, etc.

So, this fall I finally finished up a sweater that I'd been knitting for quite a while. It hadn't taken me all *that* long I suppose, I had just put it aside for a long time. It's the sweater I'm wearing in the photo above. I really liked the neckline on it, and the waist taper, just a very feminine design, to me. And it's made from a wool/bamboo blend yarn. Very warm. It actually could use to be a hair smaller, but overall it fits pretty well and looks nice, especially for a first sweater.

So I've been thinking: maybe I'll start making myself more clothes. Granted, this would be a much faster process if I could actually *sew* clothing, but that's not happening right now, so knitting it is. It'll take me quite a while to amass any kind of wardrobe enhancement, but we'll get there.

I'm going to be making this sweater with a cute snowflake motif at the waist, and this one as well, I think in a deep purple that reminds me of Advent. All out of real wool or alpaca blends. And I can tweak them how I want too, make them longer, slimmer, etc. We'll see how it goes, and it may be 2 years before they're actually done, but I will persevere. :) I'm crocheting a pretty lacy cardigan-like item right now, in recycled cotton. (Mike: "You wear something under that, right?" "Um, YES, Honey." ":) ).

Relatedly, the cost of wool is on the rise, and prices are reflecting it. Despite Mike's alarm at glimpsing my yarn stash last night (it's not THAT large, just 2 plastic bins full :) ) I may buy the wool for these 2 sweaters before the upcoming price increase at Knit Picks. Why pay more later, right? I always like to have enough yarn and books on hand that if we're quarantined due to a nuclear disaster for a year or more, I won't be bored. I mean, it doesn't hurt just to be sure, right?

:)

Comfort and Joy

2011-12-22T09:45:00.003-05:00

Last night when I got home from work, I was whipped. I was in good spirits, but absolutely exhausted. I was busy at work, since I'm going to be off all of next week...

...and before I go off on my home and family anecdotes, let me interject a quick librarian tale. When you're a reference librarian, you sit out at a desk in the middle of the library with an "information!" sign hanging above your head. Thus, you're a bit of a sitting duck for all sorts of interesting characters that happen into the building. I used to be more nervous about this when I was first starting out, but nowadays, I realize that this rarely happens (although annoying people are plentiful, scary ones are pretty rare) and so I don't sweat it anymore. But you're definitely putting yourself out there for some potentially awkward interactions.

And so yesterday. I was on the morning reference shift, and since exams are officially over for the fall semester, the library resembles a war torn region. It's quiet and eerily empty and stray trash abounds. And in comes this guy.

I remember This Guy. And so I immediately tense up.

"HELLO!"

"Yes, hello."

"GOOD MORNING!"

"To you as well."

"MERRY CHRISTMAS!"

*sighs* "Yes, Merry Christmas."

He beams at me and sits at a computer near the reference desk. Now, on the face of it, it looks like I'm being a real meanie, right? What is he doing wrong? Well, it's just that I like to think that as a woman I'm attuned to the people around me, and I hope it doesn't sound sexist, but particularly men. And I do not mean this in a romantic sense, but in a "protect myself" sense. It's not that I think that random men are hiding behind stray study cubicles just waiting to jump out and scare me, it's just a self preservation sense that I believe most women have. I tend to be overly naive and think that everyone is nice until proven otherwise, but I can spot a predator a mile away. And I have met several of them throughout my life. And This Guy isn't necessarily a predator, but there is definitely something off about the way he interacts with me. Well, mostly because the "interaction" is totally coerced. I know that I'm a librarian, I'm there to help people, and I'm sitting out there just waiting for someone to ask me a question. But my job is NOT to have personal conversations with you, especially if you are creepy. Unless you have a legitimate question, I'm not going to allow someone to make me uncomfortable. And that's what This Guy most certainly does.

So, I was sitting quietly at the desk, browsing some yarn online since no one needed my services for the moment, when suddenly, I see a movement out of the corner of my eye. This Guy is suddenly RIGHT.THERE. Over my shoulder, leaning down to my computer screen.

"OH, WHAT ARE YOU LOOKING AT?!"

That did it. I certainly did not care that he saw that I was looking at yarn. We're permitted to look at non-work related information on the desk if no one is asking us for help at that moment. But This Guy was violating my personal space in a big way. And he was being loud and drawing the attention of the few people that were actually in the library. And I did NOT want to get drawn in to a personal conversation with him. I shouldn't have to do things that make me uncomfortable, and I've learned this librarian lesson: when you have someone that is lacking in appropriate social skills and is actually causing you discomfort, you have to move out of your comfort zone and be a bit forceful to get your point across. Otherwise, they'll never go away.

"I'm sorry, but don't you have your own work to do?"

See? Now I was even more uncomfortable, because I hate, hate, hate being rude to people. But this was not a normal situation. Something is definitely amiss here with This Guy.

"Oh. Sorry. Sometimes I have a hard time separating the personal from the professional."

Maybe he isn't as clueless as I first thought. But as my tone intended, he stepped away and back to his computer. Shortly after that, he left the library. And I didn't feel the least bit bad. You just have to look out for yourself sometimes. I've found that that little instinctive voice in my head is usually right. "Angel Tiffany" or whatever.

So, after my long day, I headed home. Anne is usually very grumpy by that point, and Hank is hyper. He's thriving in his new school, by the way. The Catholic stuff he brings home is totally adorable (he got an 'A' in religion in the first quarter :) ) and he seems to be loving all the extra attention he gets in such a smaller school. We're really liking the school, and it's looking likely that we'll be registering him to stay there for second grade.

When I get home, I'll take Anne from Mike, since he's put in a long day with her. He unpacks my work stuff for me, and dinner is usually just about ready. I'll nurse Anne and chat with Hank for a few minutes, and then we'll eat. Anne is eating solids now too, and she's very demanding about them. She even likes the pureed vegetables, and puts away an entire oversized jar every night. I think she's ready to move up to 2 solid meals per day, actually. I'll feed her at her high chair while the rest of us eat.

Our evenings are SO much better with Mike at home with the kids during the day. We're absolutely loving our new situation. We have less money coming in, but to say that it is worth it is the understatement of the century. We all couldn't be happier.

But they're still exhausting in the sense that Anne is now at That Age. You really can't put her down unless you can sit right there and play with her. Because the instant you put her down, you'll see her little pink clad butt crawling away to get into something you don't want her into. Or, in the evenings, you have option #2, which is that she begins to scream hysterically when you put her down because she's tired, needy and miserable.

So, we had a lot of that last night, and we had to take turns holding her while simultaneously trying to fold laundry, clean up the kitchen, and get the wrapping supplies out. Once both children were in bed, we wrapped madly for 30 minutes and got nearly everything wrapped. I still have some hand knits to block tonight (WILL THIS CHRISTMAS KNITTING TORTURE EVER END?!") and a few last minute gifts to pick up tomorrow, and then we're DONE.

Finally, we settle in to watch The Queen with drinks and my new non-Christmas crochet project (THE FREEDOM!). About an hour in, we hear Anne. Oh sigh. The nights have been tough lately, and last night was no exception. I gave it a few minutes to see if she'd go back to sleep on her own (ha!) and then I went up. I was pooped anyway, so I told Mike to go ahead and enjoy the movie, and I'd get her back to sleep and get ready for bed.

When I got into her room, what was she doing? Was she sitting there howling, like I said she doesn't do anymore? Actually no. She was STANDING UP and HOWLING. Fan-tastic. She's so short the top of her head doesn't even reach the edge of the crib rail, which is pretty funny. And boy is she cute. But I'll just say it: teething is a pain in the absolute ass.

I nursed her and got her back to sleep. And then commenced I think 4 additional wakings (including one in which I had to take her downstairs to calm her down a bit) before "morning," which this morning, Anne demanded be at 5:30 am.

So, here it is, not even noon, and I'm already tired. But once again, I'm in good spirits. I've been saying some prayers for Mike, because he's exhausted, he has an exhausted and miserable Anne on his hands, and Henry gets out of school today at 11 am. So, he's having a long day. But we're hanging in there just fine.

This Christmas, I'm very grateful for my family. And for my friends, especially my knitting girls, who mean so very much to me. I hope that you all were able to read this entire post and get to this happy declaration of love at the end. :)

Life is good.

In a more Christmasy mood

2011-12-21T11:52:00.002-05:00

Last night I was just exhausted. Probably because we've had a bad stretch of nights with Anne, who I think is getting more teeth (at least I hope that's the reason, because teething will eventually come to an end; if it's likely to be something else, please allow me to continue in my delusional state until further notice; many thanks). She's been up every 3-4 hours. Which, I know isn't *that* bad, it's just that we had gotten used to it being better. Isn't that always the way with children? Just when you think you've got a handle on everything...

At any rate, what I will say in the positive column is that when she does wake, we've got a slammin' system going. Mike gets up and changes her diaper (don't I have a wonderful husband?) and brings her to me in bed. Sometimes, like last night, each time he brings her to me she's wearing a new outfit. This means that either (a) pee or (b) poo had infiltrated the prior outfit. I lay her next to me and nurse her in the side lying position until she's full. Anne really isn't a "gentle" nurser. These days, I can tell she's tired when she's brought to our bed, but she doesn't just settle in and nurse calmly. There's lots of grabbing and pinching of skin going on. When she's done, she's good and sleepy, if still fidgety, so I pick her up and carry her back to her crib. When I put her down, she'll offer up a token objection, but lays right down and goes back to sleep. Watch, just because I wrote that, she'll sit up and howl now when I put her down starting tonight for the rest of ETERNITY.

Anyway, last night was one of those nights again, as was the one before, so I was pooped yesterday. I did get my gift sewing done, but I got no wrapping done. *panics*

But for whatever reason, this morning I feel better. I'm saying a St. Anne novena right now with my sister, so perhaps that has something to do with it. But I'm just feeling very happily Catholic today and looking forward to Christmas. After all, Christmas isn't about wrapping at all.

And I'll have close to 2 weeks home with my family over the holidays. The way the days fall this year works especially favorably with using my vacation days (depleted from my maternity leave) and so I'm getting a wonderful stretch off. We have plans to take the kids to the botanical gardens, Henry to a movie and to see some Christmas lights at a nearby Marian shrine. Lots of family togetherness. Life is good.

And speaking of good things, I posted yesterday that in 2012, Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha, known as the "Lily of the Mohawks" will be canonized. Thus, I decided to make her my blog patron for next year, and I couldn't be more pleased.

A big day for Blessed Kateri!

2011-12-20T11:40:00.002-05:00

Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha is a saint that is very special in my faith life and famil y. I just saw in my Facebook news feed that Pope Benedict XVI has approved a miracle to her intercession, and she will be canonized! I'm quite thrilled. This will mean so much to the Native American Catholic community.

Christmas is drawing near...

2011-12-20T08:50:00.003-05:00

...and I just caught Anne this morning trying to climb the stairs. I just had to whine about that. We can all go back to our coffee now.

Anyway, I'm in the throes of finishing up my Christmas crafting and shopping. I really, *really* want both of them to be done, like, yesterday, but yet they persevere. That doesn't even get into the wrapping situation, which is abysmal. I have reduced myself to ~~demanding~~ pleading with Mike to combine our efforts and wrap together.

*halo*

He has agreed, which has done little to reduce my panic, for whatever reason. I still have a few gifts to buy, and although the end of my Christmas knitting is within spitting distance, I have not yet reached the promised land. I'm still finishing up Mike's gifts, and I have to do a bit of sewing on a few others. The sewing should get done between today and tomorrow, and the wrapping will commence tonight after the kids are in bed. Mike's gift may not be completely done, but what can I do? Who says you need *2* socks anyway?!

As ever, I'm feeling anxious about hosting holiday meals, and chasing after the baby in larger family gatherings. But I'm going to try my best to just relax and enjoy everything. *snort!* It's our first Christmas with Anne, and that's special.

I'll try to keep the tornadoing down to an absolute minimum.

"Wait, What on earth?!"

2011-12-19T09:22:00.002-05:00

Yesterday, I was closed in our bedroom folding laundry with Anne. She really gets around these days with her little crab crawl, and so you really have to take precautions to prevent her escaping or otherwise getting into a life threatening situation.

I was watching Say Yes to the Dress as I folded, my favorite reality show guilty pleasure. As I bent to pick up an items, someone standing next to me handed me a shirt. Wait, WHAT?!

Yes, it was Anne, casually standing at the laundry basket, sorting clothes. Apparently she can pull herself up now. Which she then did with alarming regularity for the rest of the day, becoming better and better at it by the nanosecond.

OH SIGH.

Christmas preparations winding down...sort of

2011-12-15T09:47:00.003-05:00

My shopping isn't all done. My wrapping is nonexistent. And my knitting is still ongoing. But I persevere. Hope springs eternal.

Last night, as I feverishly worked on the second of my mother-in-law's socks while Mike and I watched tv, I came to a "funky spot." That's what happens when I've clearly done something wrong, but I can't figure out what. Being Type A, I absolutely hate when this happens.

I had this gap in the row below, and the stitches looked funny. My first thought was a dropped stitch, but nope. My count clearly showed that all stitches were accounted for and diligently looped up on my double pointed needles like good law-abiding citizens. I examined them carefully. Two of the stitches appeared to be in on the conspiracy, two purled ones in my knit 2 purl 2 rib for the cuff. Those purled stitches are always a little cagey, no? They always seem to be up to something. They just didn't look right.

Taking a deep breath, I got out my crochet hook and dropped those 2 stitches on purpose. I figured I could pick them back up, tighten them, and normalize them. Off they came.

Hum. They looked twisty or something. I painstakingly unraveled them one row so that I could rework them with my hook. Now they looked even weirder. The stitches themselves appeared rejuvenated by the introduction of some air into their lives, but the yarn that I pulled out was looped all funny.

I sat there frowning at it for a solid 5 minutes, and did try to pick them back up. Great, they looked even worse. I realized I was going to have to pull back a row or two. The thought of knitting backwards to get to that point gave me a headache, so I came up with the ingenious idea of taking my needles out (A MISTAKE!), pulling the rows back, and then trying to put the stitches all back onto the needles. It's the crocheter in me; when a mistake comes to the surface, the instinct to just pull, pull, pull bursts to the surface. That, and the vodka/Diet Coke that I'd just had.

So that's what I did, and please, please gentle reader, learn from my mistake. I got past the error, but then the ribbing was all in and outy and absolutely impossible to get back onto the needles. I sucked in a deep breath and resisted the urge to say a VERY bad word. Mike could sense my tension and tried to encourage me, but the deal was down. I had to frog.

As I stared at the pile of unraveled yarn (I had been nearly done with the cuff, probably 4 -5 inches of ribbing) I let my emotions come to the surface.

"I'm SO SICK of all of this Christmas knitting!! WHY did I do this to myself?! I haven't knit anything for myself in months, and I'm tired of knitting only because I have to! I hate this!"

There's the Christmas spirit for you. Mike fixed me another drink, and I gathered my wits enough to cast on again. I worked steadily until we were ready to go up to bed, and re-knit about quarter of what I had to pull out. This morning, I knit probably another quarter. Tonight, I should be able to catch up to where I was when the disaster occurred.

*narrows eyes resentfully*

Later, I realized what I'd done wrong - when I picked the sock up to work on it, I'd started working in the wrong direction. One would think that I'd be beyond such mistakes at this stage of my knitting career, but nope, a little humility is good for all of us, I suppose. And realizing that I could have just gone backwards for that 1 row and easily fixed the error only made me feel porkier.

Next year, I really hope that I've learned my lesson. Gift knitting is wonderful, and I know I'll continue to do it, but I *cannot* take on quite so much. Just a few knitted gifts per year.

Otherwise, it sucks the joy right out of the spirit of giving.

We lived through the concert, and Christmas knitting reaches a fevered pitch

2011-12-14T08:55:00.005-05:00

We made it through the Christmas concert alive. We got both children to the church in one piece (Anne crying, Henry saying he was nervous). Anne flirted with the people in the pew behind us for a time, and then began fussing just as the concert was starting. After guzzling 4 ounces of pumped milk, she fussed some more before falling asleep. Hank went up for his big moment of glory, singing "Sweetly Slumber" with his class, which I have to admit, wasn't the best Christmas song I've ever heard. But certainly, the children singing it were adorable. Anne slept for the remainder of the concert, and Hank looked pink-cheeked. When we left, Hank felt relieved in the car while Anne howled all the way home. Mike got Hank into bed and I nursed Anne down. Thankfully, both went to sleep with a minimum of fuss.

After that, Mike and I both settled in happily with drinks to chat and watch some tv together. I pulled my latest gift sock out, and I could see Mike giving it the evil eye. I know that he teasingly thinks that my affections have transferred from their rightful place with him to my knitting.

"Oh, do you want to move down here..."

"I'M ON A DEADLINE."

Which, you know, I am. But I compromised by working on my sock for a bit and then putting it away for some quality cuddling time. My husband is very cute.

Totally unrelated to the above, but it was on my mind (I do this a lot), I thought I'd write just a short spell on breastfeeding. Anne will be 7 months old on Sunday, and I haven't written about it in awhile, so I thought it would be worthwhile. We're still very much nursing. She does get 1 solid "meal" per day, since she was 5 months old or so. It's either a fruit or vegetable. And she likes them, for the most part. She nurses the rest of the time, or is fed pumped milk by her daddy during the day.

With Henry, I loved nursing. I never considered quitting prior to a year, and was happy to go to 18 months if he had kept going. He ended up weaning around 15 months. I was devastated when he did so. With Anne? It's a bit different. :) I do also love nursing her, but she's a LOT more difficult to nurse than her brother. Read: PAINFUL. I've had cracked and bleeding nipples with her, and soreness I never experienced with Henry. Her current thing is to push against me with her hand and pull in the opposite direction with her mouth as she nurses. As you can imagine, this is a great big OW. I feel like I'm wrestling with her a lot as she nurses. Although I enjoy the closeness I share with her, and I'll be honest, breastfeeding is actually *easier* than formula feeding since you don't have to mix anything (and you wash a lot less bottles), and certainly cheaper, I'm just not enjoying it the way I did last time. She's also still a spit up machine when she nurses, whereas when she takes a bottle, nary a bit of spittle in sight.

I set my original goal at 6 months, and we've surpassed that. My new goal is 8 months. I'll re-evaluate then. I'll go monthly at that point. But I can tell, I'm getting ready to wean her. Breastfeeding should be mutually desired, and right now, it's not so much a warm and fuzzy on my end. Pumping is also wearing thin. I have to pump twice a day at work, and it's a bit of a production. It's not terrible, and I would never consider not breastfeeding at all (no judging, I just want to breastfeed my babies for at least 6 months) but I'm ready to cut her loose.

She's terribly, terribly cute though.

O Christmas Tree! Hank's Christmas concert tonight

2011-12-13T12:02:00.003-05:00

"Hank Honey, are you excited about your Christmas concert toni..."

"NO!"

Ok then.

"Why not, Honey?"

"I don't like the song we're singing." *scowl face*

"Well surely you're singing more than one song. Which one don't you like?"

*garbled answer involving the word "sleepy"*

"Oh, well what about the Christmas songs that you're singing?"

"That IS a Christmas song!"

Well. Whatever. Not sure what's going on there, but Henry definitely woke up on the wrong side of the bed this morning.

Anne on the other hand, was all chirpy and happy this morning as she pooed right in the middle of my getting ready for work preparations. Now that she's eating solids, LOOK OUT! That significantly changes what comes out the other end. HOLY SMOKES.

Unfortunately, I don't anticipate that she'll be all smiles tonight during the concert. She gets miserable right around 6 pm when she gets tired, and I expect there will be lots of sobbing and pacing around the back of the church with her tonight.

Oh sigh.

The inevitable happened...

2011-12-12T09:52:00.003-05:00

Anne is plunked in the middle of the living room floor playing as I knit (I'm trying to meet a deadline...) on the couch nearby.

Anne crawls to the coffee table.

Anne gets on her knees and tries to pull herself up into a standing position via the coffee table.

The Catholic Librarian sighs in distress. The remote controls are not going to be safe for long.

"What are you doing over there? Wait, Anne, no..."

*RRRRRRIIIIIIPPPPP!*

Anne surveys foam corner protector, previously held in place with double-sided tape, and holds it aloft in her chubby fist, triumphantly.

Corner protector is stuffed unceremoniously into her mouth.

When corner protector is taken away from her, she moves onto biting the edge of the table itself.

Oh sigh.

Are partially completed mittens reproducing in my knitting bag?

2011-12-08T12:26:00.002-05:00

This lovely feast of the Immaculate Conception I'm pondering more than ever the approach of Christmas. I went to Mass this morning at my parish which is just the perfect way to start the day.

I've been all worry-warty about finishing up my shopping, since I've really barely begun. We can only buy so much per pay period, so that has limited me. But my knitted items (the list that was modified when reality kicked in, that is) are going well and are nearly complete. I'm finishing up a pair of mittens right now, and I have 2 partially completed pairs of socks after that. Oh sigh. That that IS doable, as opposed to my original list.

I still have so much other gift selecting to do though, and for the first time ever, the thought of going to the stores right now totally turns me off. There are just cars and people *everywhere* and I quickly feel flustered and grumpy. Not exactly the Christmas spirit I was looking for. Today, I was able to use some promotion codes and order some items online with free shipping. I was happy about that since the reason I often avoid online shopping is because I loathe paying for shipping. But there's still a lot to do. Not to mention preparing for hosting Christmas dinner. That will involve lots of the patented Tiffany Tornadoing.

But tomorrow! Oh, sweet, sweet tomorrow. I'm taking the entire day off tomorrow to meet with my beloved friend Karen from my knitting group who moved away for a (albeit wonderful) job and left us utterly bereft without her. She's coming to town, and the entire knitting group is getting together for a knitting extravaganza involving mimosas, knitting, lunch, a gift exchange, and much chatting. I'm SUPER EXCITED.

*beams*

No, we don't have a dog...

2011-12-07T15:41:00.003-05:00

...and *obviously* children are very different from dogs. But my family always had a dog when I was growing up, and I can't help but be amused by the similarities that present themselves at times.

"No Honey, don't eat the garbage!"

"Anne, I really think it's a bad idea for you to crawl under my chair like that..." *thwack* "WAHHHHHHHHHH!"

"If you're going to act like that on the couch, you're going to have to sit on the floor!"

"Uh oh, what's that smell? Oh God, what's that *on the floor*?!"

"Anne spit up, let me wipe...No, no, don't play in it!!"

"Anne, no, let me have that. No, NO, that can't go in your mouth..."

And my personal favorite:

"It's too quiet in here, what on earth are they up to?!"

I have a really, really good husband

2011-12-06T14:00:00.002-05:00

The other day, I was feeling flustered at home, trying to get a bunch of cleaning chores done while also managing child demands. I went upstairs for something, and suddenly I hear the vacuum cleaner running. It was Mike, vacuuming the entire downstairs. And I wondered to myself where Anne was, because last I saw her, she was plunked in the middle of the kitchen floor, itching to be on the move at any given second. So I hurry downstairs, to make sure she hadn't gotten into anything.

No Anne in the kitchen. I quickly check the adjacent dining room and living room. No Anne. Mike's current vacuuming is in the downstairs guest room/office, so I rush in there. And there he is, carefully moving the vacuum cleaner across the rug in there with one hand, Anne tucked onto his hip with the other, her cherubic-like cheeks on full chub mode, eyes wide as saucers.

It made me think of a commercial I saw once featuring a NASCAR driver, in which a woman falls asleep exhausted from her household responsibilities, and dreams about what she would do with her favorite driver. And what she dreams about is him cooking dinner, washing her car, and vacuuming the carpet with a melting down toddler stowed away under his arm. It always made me smile, as did the scene I walked in on in our guest room.

These are the things that make for a strong marriage. :)

Dream Tiffany can't add...

2011-12-05T14:25:00.004-05:00

Last night Anne was up every 2-3 hours. ! I know, not pleasant. But she has 2 new baby teeth to show for it. Mike and I have been taking turns settling her down by snuggling on the couch, and last night was Mike's turn. So, around 4 am, I was all alone in our bed and actually fell into a light sleep...

Whereupon I had a dream that I remember. This doesn't happen all that often, although it does happen more now than before I had kids (that "light sleep" thing). And in the dream, I was pregnant. Given that I have a 6 month old, this dream does fall just a hair into the scary category. So, I was pregnant, and I found out that I was having a boy, although Mike didn't know and I didn't want him to find out since he likes to be surprised. This is all very normal in dream world apparently.

Anyway, in the dream world, Dream Tiffany knew that she already had 2 children, a boy and a girl, just like in real life. And the boy was Henry. Yet Anne was nowhere to be found, and I had this mysterious second male child named Elijah. And I was heavily pregnant with this new baby boy. So...that's actually *4* children, no? But yet I kept calling the baby I was carrying "my third."

And in the dream, we were real happy about the baby (of course) but still a tad nervous since we hadn't really expected to have a "third." Perhaps Dream Tiffany and Dream Mike were having difficulties because they can't perform simple math? We obviously couldn't keep track of how many children we actually had. So maybe "peak day plus 3" was just too much for them and that's how they wound up in this predicament.

Who knows? Anyway, I told Mike about the dream later, and his eyes widened considerably at the mention of pregnant Dream Tiffany. Luckily, in real life, we can both add, so I think we're good.

Off to an action-packed Advent

2011-12-02T08:50:00.002-05:00

One of the things that I love about having Henry in a Catholic school is what he came home with yesterday. A giant chain of construction paper rings, a little single decade rosary, a sheet of prayers with a calendar, and some explanatory paperwork. For an Advent project, we're supposed to hang up his chain, and each night remove one of them counting down to Christmas, while saying the enclosed prayers. Each day, Hank is to color in the appropriate square on the calendar showing that we said the prayers and kept up with the Advent chain. It's very cute.

We've also put out his much beloved chocolate Advent calendar, as well as our wood one. I'm still struggling with the ill-fitting candles in our Advent wreath, mew. I'm going to head to the Catholic store with Hank tomorrow to get some replacement candles. I read a trick online about softening the wax at the bottom of the candle to fit the taper more properly into the holder securely. We'll see how that goes.

Hank is very chagrined about the fact that a very mobile Anne has taken a real shine to his Fisher Price nativity set, which he looks forward to putting out every year. There are lots of teary incidents in which Anne crab crawls over and immediately stuffs a shepherd into her mouth. Wise men go flying, lambs are everywhere, and Hank is scandalized. We don't have a lot of other location options for the nativity, so it either has to stay there or get put away. He's really good about sharing usually, but his nativity set is apparently sacred.

Well, in another Christmas tradition, I think I'm going to splurge and go to Starbucks for some sort of overpriced holiday-themed beverage. I don't usually pay $5 for what is essentially flavored coffee, but on chilly, snowy days like today, with a manuscript to read and write a review of, I think it's in order.

Aging reference librarian on the loose

2011-11-30T14:33:00.004-05:00

The other day I was on the reference desk for a busy afternoon shift. I'm usually on in the mornings, when it is very quiet, so I suppose I'm often shielded from interactions like the following which are, quite frankly, annoying.

I don't like to be annoyed easily. It makes me feel old. I live in fear of becoming crotchedy. Curmudgeonly, even. I don't want to become all decrepit and frown-faced while using words like "newfangled" and "whippersnapper." I like to be seen of as kind and nice, and you know, sweet and helpful. But sometimes, it's tough.

While on the desk on the day in question, a student approaches.

"Hi. I have a paper due tonight..."

...let me interject here that it was approximately 4:30 pm. Ok, we continue...

"...and I just don't understand what my teacher wants. Can you look at my assignment?"

Now, this is becoming a disturbing trend. I mean, what do you all think that librarians do? I think they help others find information. I do not think that they can channel instructors and read their minds to figure out what they want. And for some reason, more and more students *really* think that librarians have these powers.

"I think you should ask your instructor personally. I won't be able to interpret the assignment any better than you could yourself."

*distinctive whine tone inserted into already attitudey voice* "Well, I just don't know what the heck she wants, and I just really feel it's unfair. I've already talked to her and she isn't helpful. I really want you to look at it."

I was already feeling annoyed by this student's attitude, but one of my colleagues was on the desk with me, and I really didn't want *her* to think that I'm crotchedy. So I agreed.

I expected him to pull his syllabus out of his backpack. Oh no, old fogey one. He slaps his laptop down onto the reference desk and opens up an email to show me.

I had to smirk to myself at the fact that the email was from his instructor, and based on what I was reading, she too was annoyed by this student's attitude. The message stated that she expected him to act like a college student, do actual work, and follow directions. That she expected him to review the relevant literature and cite it in his paper. Let's be curmudgeons together, you and I...

I cleared my throat and told him that it looked like he needed to find some sources.

"I HAVE. I have these books here. But I haven't read them, I mean, I DON'T HAVE TIME."

Well, yes. That's because it's now 7 hours before your paper is due. Did you just find out about the assignment now? No, I didn't think so. That's what I was thinking, although that's not what I said. That crotchedy thing again.

"Well, you can skim the table of contents and the index to find the relevant parts, and just read those. We can also look for articles, and those have the benefit of being shorter."

"Ok, but again, I don't understand what she's looking for. I mean, she says we have to do "research." But I don't understand what the heck does she wants. I don't have time for this!"

By this point, I was really wanting to give this guy the boot. His whole demeanor and what he was saying conveyed that he considered this a gigantic inconvenience. I mean, imagine that, his instructor actually expecting him to WRITE A PAPER and READ LITERATURE IN HIS FIELD in order to earn his degree! The INHUMANITY!

It's this sense of entitlement that really turns me off to some of our students here. They seem to think that if they are breathing and show up to class 50% of the time, they're entitled to get a degree when they've done this for 4 years. Not so, my friend. And I too procrastinated when writing papers in college, I'm very familiar with this quandary. But I TOOK RESPONSIBILITY for my poor time management skills, and stayed up until my paper was done. It was NOBODY'S FAULT BUT MY OWN that I CHOSE to wait until the last minute.

I see that I'm using caps a lot in this post. It's because my eyebrows are furrowed so tightly together right now recounting all of this.

I finally sent him away unhappily to a nearby computer to get started skimming his sources and writing. Before him, I had a very nice, but *very needy* guy who came to the reference desk no less than 4 times asking for help with his World Civilizations paper. He kept asking me if I thought his topic was ok. I can't tell him that, he simply HAS to speak with his instructor about the parameters of the assignment. He wanted me to tell him *what he should write in the introduction to his paper* and he didn't know how to navigate the Library of Congress call number system. The latter part I still find somewhat shocking (for native U.S. students, which he clearly was) but I try to be understanding that maybe their high school library failed them. But writing a paper? Yes, college is the place to fine tune that, but the librarian can't help you, sir. GO TO THE WRITING CENTER. He was very sweet, so I helped him readily, but it just saddens me to see the state that our incoming students have deteriorated to. They *really* want someone else to do their work for them, in many cases.

By the time my shift was done, I was dying to go home and have a glass of wine. When I was in elementary school, we all learned how to use the big card catalogs by our scary librarian. AND how to navigate the Dewey Decimal System. Henry actually knows how to use a library better than some of the students I see here. UGH.

But I don't want to be the next scary librarian, so I'll try to put on my smiley face again. And act younger.

I'm dreaming, and a baby is crying. Oh, oh wait...

2011-11-29T12:26:00.002-05:00

Last night was one of those nights. We had barely fallen asleep, and I stumble up, expecting it to be at least 2 am, and the clock tells me that it's 10:30 pm. I do not believe aforementioned clock. But yes, it is true. Anne is awake. Not only that, but after waiting a few minutes to see if she'll go back to sleep (ha!), I go in to find her *sitting up* in her crib, howling. She's so happy to see me that she tries to *stand up* to greet me. Fan-tastic.

And after that, we're woken again, and another nursing session commences. On the third go-round, I gave up and took her downstairs to snuggle on the sofa and watch the season finale of Sisters Wives on demand. I don't approve of Sister Wives, but what can I say? I can't look away. Plus, it was the season finale and a new baby was being born. I cried. Because I always do when babies are born, even when they're not mine.

After Sister Wives, I put a sleeping Anne back in her crib, and then guess what? I couldn't fall asleep, even though she was sleeping. Sometimes life just isn't fair.

Then, naturally, come 6:30 am, I was dead to the world when I felt Mike get out of bed. When I saw the clock, it and I had yet another disagreement. I laid there until 6:45, when I forced myself to drag my body out of bed. It was tough, but I managed to make myself LOOK ALIVE with some creative makeup and hair combing. I did feel better once I got down for breakfast.

And these days, holy smokes. Anne is into E.V.E.R.Y.T.H.I.N.G. Put her on the floor. Does she play with her carefully arranged and safe infant toys that are well within her grasp? Oh no. Her sight is set on any number of other destinations.

The fireplace!

Electrical wires!

DVD case!

Nativity figurines!

So we're now in THAT PLACE. Wherein your butt cannot touch the couch before one of us has to leap up to save her from some approaching calamity of her own devising. And it'll only get worse once she can pull herself up and reach tabletop surfaces.

Oh dear.

Peace be with you...

2011-11-28T11:19:00.005-05:00

And with your spirit. :)

So, back from my first Sunday of Advent initiation into the new translation of the Roman Missal, I have positive feedback to add. I was all excited to go to Mass yesterday, and I wasn't
disappointed.

Overall, I really like the new translation. It's definitely off-putting to have to get used to something new, even our priest looked out of sorts. And the congregation responses aren't going to be unified for quiute awhile as everyone adjusts. But I love the new wording in the
Penitential Rite, in the Nicene Creed, and in the Eucharistic prayers. I'm having a doozy of a time with the replacement for "and also with you." I got that wrong yesterday twice despite my conscious telling of myself to look out for it. That one just doesn't roll off the tongue for me.

But otherwise, all is well. Query though: we used Eucharistic prayer #3 yesterday. The new wording says that Jesus died "for you and for many" rather than "for you and for all." Anybody have any insight into the background of this change?

In terms of the Eucharistic prayers, it's a bit confusing in my little St. Joseph Sunday Missal. Many of the prayers now start with the same few words, so the little referral key that the missal provides isn't as helpful as it used to be. And I'm Type A enough that I like to follow
right along. We'll get there.

I asked my mom how she liked it, and I wasn't surprised when she answered that she didn't like it. :) She grew up with the Latin Mass, and this change feels especially awkward to her since she'd prefer that the Church just go back to Latin. Now me, I actually don't love the old Latin Mass. I find it reverent and beautiful, certainly, and I'm so happy that it's offered so much more now for those that treasure it. But I have a hard time following along, and I don't feel as "included," if that makes any sense. To each his own. The new Mass feels more participatory to me, and I enjoy that. And I think the new translation feels more eloquent. I'm happy.

Now I have to remedy my very poor Advent candle situation. My taper holders are failing miserably and I'm trying to come up with an alternate solution, since I love my wreath. But the old holders actually broke my candles, and now I need new ones, and we couldn't light the first candle yesterday. NOT a very happy Catholic Librarian. I'm thinking of just procuring some votive holders and trying to find Advent votives. Feeling porky about the whole thing.

Anyway, how did everyone else like the new translation?

Shopping will abound

2011-11-23T11:10:00.000-05:00

We're hosting our parents for Thanksgiving dinner tomorrow, so naturally I'll be doing lots of tornadoing around and obsessively cleaning and drinking wine. You know, the usual. I do love Thanksgiving. It's just such a warm and cozy kind of day. And I always take off the day after Thanksgiving. I usually lose my mind and meet my mom out to do a little shopping. I don't really need anything on Black Friday, but the experience (with a companion) can be kind of fun.

There is one place, however, that I will not go. And that is THE PLAZA. We have a shopping plaza near here that has grown exponentially in the past 5 years. Every time you turn around, a new popular store has been added into the configuration. Yet the parking lot remains the same size, kwim?

2 weeks ago, I left work early since I had some comp. time coming to me, so that I could run errands before heading home. So it was about 3 pm. And I wanted to stop at AC Moore to return something (Holiday Homespun yarn is gorgeous, but I cannot crochet with that stuff if you put a gun to my head; it's difficult to make anything when you literally cannot see the stitches you allegedly just made). As I neared THE PLAZA I noted the long traffic lines, but I figured things would clear by time I finished at AC Moore. Oh, silly, silly me.

I return the yarn, poke around for a bit (naturally) and then head to my car. It was just rainy and miserable and I was anxious to get home to Mike and my babies. I pull out of my parking space and toward the nearest exit. Oh dear. There appear to be about *30 cars* also trying to make left turns out of that exit as well. And I can see that the street onto which they hope to turn is also clogged up and the going is slow for those trying to add themselves into the line. I swivel and try the exit at the back, thinking I'll get to the back of that line of cars snaking toward the traffic light. Oh dear. The line of cars on the street snakes all the way past this exit as well, AND there are 20 additional cars trying to make lefts into it.

I say a bad word, and make my way toward yet a third exit out onto the main thoroughfare, accepting that it will simply take a few extra minutes to get out onto the street. There commences *20 minutes* of waiting in this line, since new cars are appearing at every nook and cranny trying to edge their way into the line, AND the cars out on the main road are all clogged up by non-synched red lights so maybe 2 cars are able to get out onto the road with every green light. I literally couldn't get out of that *insert bad word* parking lot.

I say another bad word. At one point, as I innocently drive straight in my line, a giant pickup truck appears from a side nook and tries to barrel through the line, nearly hitting me. I felt so shaken after that, I determined to go right home, instead of stopping off for my last errand. And I swore that I would NEVER GO TO THAT PLAZA AGAIN until after the holidays. And I mean it. I won't go back until January. I don't care how good a sale Target is having, I'd rather eat nails than go back there. They could give away free money for all I care. It's simply not worth it.

So therefore I'll be avoiding THAT PLAZA on Friday. But I'll probably end up meeting my mom at the crazy mall for lunch and a few stores. Because it's just not Black Friday for her unless we wait in line for 2 hours to eat at the Cheesecake Factory.

BUT. The really good news is that Knit Picks is having a Cyber Monday sale. OH.BABY. It starts at 9 am EST, so I'll have my tea at my work computer and will be obsessively reloading their page until the sale yarn comes up. Because I *need* more yarn, right? If it's on sale, it doesn't count. That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

I'll be on a blogging break until aforementioned Cyber Monday, so have a wonderful Thanksgiving everyone!

What's new with Anne?

2011-11-22T12:04:00.002-05:00

Anne is so cute these days it hurts just to look at her. Her new feats include:

(1) Raking. You know how babies do, with their fingers, to feel textures? It's adorable. Unfortunately, she disturbed my drying pile of freshly blocked hand knits the other day doing this, but she looked so proud of herself, how could I begrudge her?

(2) Crawling. Sigh, yes. She really gets around now. And where does she head first? That's right, the electronic equipment. Has this been bred in via evolution? It seems that every human baby, upon gaining mobility, will immediately set upon trying to stick their fingers in the DVD player and press buttons on the stereo. And the DVD cases, FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS HOLY. These, and books. When set down on the floor, all babies will immediately take off for these destinations and thereupon delight in plucking the items off the low shelves and tossing them about gleefully.

(3) Separation anxiety. If you set her down and leave the room for a moment, an immediate bursting into tears can be heard. "Why did you leave me, you're gone!" The instant you reappear, a big smile comes up, along with a squeal. "You're back, I'm SO HAPPY!" It's precious.

When she woke up in her crib this morning, I couldn't wait to pick her up and kiss her face. That warm morning snuggle is always the absolute best, no? Unfortunately, she had managed to spring lose of one diaper fastener, so she had peed all over herself and her crib sheet, but no matter.

I just adore her so.

Feast of Christ the King

2011-11-22T11:50:00.003-05:00

At Mass on Sunday, I realized that that would be the last time I ever heard the liturgy in the only translation I've ever known. I learned all the prayers and responses in the Mass when I made my first communion, back in second grade. I've had it memorized ever since. I have to admit that I am a tad anxious about things changing, about feeling like a "visitor" to the liturgy (sort of like when I once attended Mass in the extraordinary form :) ). Being a lifelong Catholic, that does have a disconcerting feel to it.

Our parish has been slowly incorporating in the new music, and I recently purchased a new missal that has all of the new responses in it. So I'll be well armed on the First Sunday of Advent. I guess I'm a tad excited too, to have something "fresh" in our liturgy, and I've been enjoying reading the articles in the newspaper about the coming changes. (we live in a very Catholic area; this actually is big news here. :) ).

So we'll see how it goes. I've been encouraged by what I've heard on my Catholic podcasts and other Catholic reading about the translation being a closer pairing with the original Latin, and closer to Scripture. Good stuff.

Wait, did I just see that?

2011-11-21T09:40:00.004-05:00

Anne is going through a "phase" these days, which can be translated into "She's Stuffy and Miserable and Sleeps Like Garbage." Hence, in the wee hours of Saturday morning, she and I were downstairs trying to get comfortable on the couch. When she's stuffy, it seems to aid her when she can sleep inclined but still on her belly, so Mike and I take turns lying on the overstuffed arm of our sofa with her on our chest. I always put the tv on since the light seems to soothe her. And I almost always turn to the schlocky Christmas movies currently airing 24/7 on the Hallmark Channel.

On Saturday, I was trying to doze while Anne seemed determined to elbow me in the chest in her quest to get comfortable, so I wasn't exactly going off to dreamland as quickly as I'd been hoping. Suddenly, what I always hope for in the middle of the night happened:

I saw what has to be the funniest infomercial I've ever seen.

EVER. This is epic, people.

Because, you know. I've already seen infomerials for Pajama Jeans and the Eggie.

As I watch wide-eyed, with much incredulity, I see that there is a new product on the market called "Forever Lazy." It appears to be a giant fleece sleeper, minus the attached footies, for adults.

And as with all of these sorts of infomerials, we're first presented with these ridiculous scenarios in which people struggle mightily with everyday tasks that don't present much difficulty for regular folk. In this case, placing a blanket over your legs.

"Are you tired of wrestling with blankets to try and get warm?!"

Well, if my crocheted throw ever tries to "wrestle" with me, then yes, I will be deeply disturbed.

"If so, then Forever Lazy is just right for you!!"

We're then brought into the lives of our sleeper wearing friends as they study for exams with classmates, relax with their spouse on a cold winters night, even have cocktails with their neighbors out on the back deck, all while each of them wears this oversized fleece jumper with arms.

"you just zip yourself right into warmth, so that you can BE LAZY!"

Do we really want to encourage BEING LAZY as a characteristic so revered that we name clothes after it?

But WAIT. The best is yet to come. Given that our fleecey buddies are consuming so much liquid while wearing their Forever Lazies (by the time I later found this on You Tube to show Mike, we were HOWLING with laughter watching people *tailgate* in these things) the inevitable call of nature surfaces.

"Uh oh, gotta go? Forever Lazy has zippered hatches in both the front..."

Oh God, no. Please don't let them...

"...and the BACK!"

Oh.No.They.Didn't.

Yes.They.Did. THEY TOTALLY WENT THERE. This thing actually has...*hatches* for your, ah hem, private parts, so that you can use the facilities without having to take off your lazy suit. The guy in the commercial actually unzips his so that we can see the side of his underwear to demonstrate.

I mean, ok. Seriously. A butt hatch. Have we really sunk that low as a society? In which pulling down our pants is just too much work?

My eyes were open as wide as my mouth by the time the infomercial wrapped up.

"All yours for just $19.95! And if you call now, we'll throw in a companion pair of fleece footies!"

At first, when I later awoke, I thought maybe I had dreamt the whole thing. You Tube to the rescue. Nope, it's real.

Now, I'm all for wearing your pj's all day when you're sick or have a newborn, or have recently had surgery. Or maybe you just want to spend a Sunday morning relaxing with your coffee. I totally understand this. But if I ever answer the door because *I'm having a party* wearing a fleece one-piece suit with a drawstring hood, somebody please, for the love of all that is holy, just shoot me.

Because that would mean that I've officially given up on ever hoping to look attractive Ever.Again.

My baby is 6 months old today

2011-11-18T14:54:00.002-05:00

She's crawling and into everything, including my knitting bag (future knitter?) She's drooling and biting on anything that she can get into her mouth. She's also *extremely* adorable and I'm so glad that we have her.

The other day I took out these "corner guards" that I had bought for our coffee table, given that Anne is now so mobile. Our coffee table is deadly. I mean, *we* hurt ourselves on it on a regular basis, and I didn't want Anne's delicate little head to be added to the list of casualties. What I learned though was that aforementioned corner guards are simply pointy pieces of foam that stick to the table with double sided tape.

"those are the corner guards?" I can tell already that my husband is dubious about the effectiveness of my new safety tool.

"yeah, she can't hit her head this way. I just wish they stuck better." *presses on them* "I mean, as long as she doesn't pull them off and try to put them in her mouth they should be fine."

"how can you possibly think that won't happen?"

*sighs* He's totally right, too.

Christmas knitting update

2011-11-17T15:43:00.002-05:00

At one point I posted on here about how many Christmas gifts I hoped to knit or crochet this year, and how many I'd actually completed so far. I'm repressing the number, but it was fairly ~~insane~~ ambitious. I think it was about 20 items. I've actually finished a bunch of projects lately, so I thought I'd count up how many I have completed in total.

7. *sigh*

Gosh, it *seemed* like so many more! Being realistic, what I really want to complete are 6 more things. Well, even that seems ridiculous now that I look at it. I have 1 item on the needles and more than half completed at home. I have 2 pairs of socks on needles in my work knitting bag. Those things should certainly get done. Well, at least 1 of those pairs of socks will get done, and the item at home. After that, I really should be able to knit 1-2 additional items prior to Christmas. The other stuff will have to go for birthday gifts next year.

*frowns*

I don't like to not meet my goals, but I only have 2 hands I suppose. Perhaps I can outsource some of this knitting? I have a knitting group member without a current project that I may be able to bribe.

And I have a bunch of things queued up for myself that I'm *dying* to start in on, but I'm depriving myself until after my holiday knitting for others is done.

*martyr*

Oh well, I'll get to it eventually. Christmas is coming up with an almost disturbing rapidity. I really don't feel ready.

At one time, I actually thought I could get whole sweaters done before Christmas. HA! Only if I start in January for *next* Christmas.

And maybe not even then.

What happens when the baby is up multiple, multiple times per night?

2011-11-16T15:13:00.002-05:00

(1) At 6:30 am, when we all need to get up, she will inevitably be sleeping.

(2) I will be cranky.

(3) Anne will be in a great mood.

(4) We'll all need to rush around more than usual to get ready.

(5) Inevitably, before I even have to rush out of the house, Anne's disposition will sour, and she will begin to sob.

(6) Anne will be down for a nap even before 8 am.

(7) I, on the other hand, will go to work and have a difficult time keeping my eyes open for any meeting that even borders on being boring. Which, you know, by definition is *most* meetings.

(8) Someone will likely ask me about Anne, and how she is sleeping. They will then tell me about how their baby slept through the night at some unfathomably early age, and I may fantasize about slapping them.

That's just the way some days go, I suppose...

Here comes trouble

2011-11-15T11:32:00.002-05:00

The other day, as I sat knitting on the couch, I glanced up at Anne, who was playing in the middle of the living room floor. She can sit up now, and she delights in transitioning from her back, to her belly, to a sitting position. When she's on her belly now, she pushes her feet down and sticks her butt up in the air, like she's trying to stand up. Oh sigh.

Next thing I knew, I felt a gentle tugging on my yarn. When I looked down at my knitting bag near my feet, there was Anne, eating the yarn. She had crawled from halfway across the room in her quest to get at it.

Fan-tastic.

Best belly dancing night EVER

2011-11-14T14:43:00.003-05:00

I'm still glowing. :) This was, by far, my favorite dance night ever. As always, I will chronicle...

Friday evening we had our regularly scheduled class, and aside from warm up, we devoted the entire hour and a half to practicing our choreographies. We have 3 group choreographies, and with a few members unable to make the event given family emergencies, we had to do what our instructor (Claire) calls "the kaleidoscope," switch our formations around to accommodate for the missing bodies. We did that for about an hour, and then Claire announced "Who wants to do their solo?!"

Well, here's the funny thing. We all did, because of course we each *volunteered* to perform a solo. But yet, when pressed, we'd rather die. If possible, it's even *worse* performing in front of your peers than in front of a gigantic group. Because you really, *really* care about their opinion. This makes you even more nervous than usual.

So we all took turns, looking like we were being marched off to the firing squad. One of my newer classmates, Amy, very cutely proclaimed that she was sweating, which I really related to. Because, well, I was too. :) As we moved through the solo program, I realized something:

I was having fun.

A LOT of fun, in fact. Each solo was totally unique, just like it's creator. Each had a distinct style and feel. Some used props (I'm still too intimidated to use props during a solo, but I'm hoping to change that soon), others didn't. Some were drum, others were kicky Middle Eastern pop music. Some were classic pieces, mine was a slow instrumental that my class coined "very saucy." By the end, we were all sweaty but in very good spirits. I just very much enjoyed seeing everyone else dance.

On Saturday, I was nervous but I dealt with it better than I have in the past. I'm definitely getting better at that (I think). I practiced in my new costume, which is a little long and making me anxious, so I pinned the front up a tuck where it could be covered by my silver hip sash thing. I was ready, so I tried to stop practicing. There is such a thing as "over practicing" I think, and I'm a master at it. :) You don't want to look too stiff.

I arrived early to practice the group numbers one more time, which is when I got more nervous. We were at a new venue though, and the dressing room situation was infinitely better. The place we usually have our haflas is ridiculous. We're all crammed into this itty bitty room right off the kitchen with no door. So we had to take turns using the little bathroom or a tiny shrouded spot that we concocted. Here, there were actually 2 rooms, so the performance group had our very own. There were windows, so we hung up a few silk veils over them and we were good to go.

The beginning of the hafla is actually cake for me now. I used to worry so much about the group choreographies, but now I really enjoy doing them. Which really makes no sense, because if you forget a piece of the group choreography, it's very noticeable, since you're doing something different from everybody else and you stick out. In a solo, nobody knows what you planned to do anyway, so you can just make something up. Yet the solo is what is most difficult for me. Because, you know, everyone is *looking at you*.

So, we did our group numbers, and they went just fine. Then we had a little intermission for us all to get ready for the solos. I put on my costume and commenced sweating. I was terribly nervous, and I was having that horrible "why did I agree to do this?!" feeling settling over me. But so was everybody else, so I was in good company.

Claire and her daughter (who is *awesome*) went first, and then took a short break to change so that they could video the rest of the performances. Or whole group was doing a solo, so we bunched up anxiously in our coverups out in the hall and waited. The solos were done in this very nice little room, different from where the group numbers were done, with tables and chairs where people could have a snack and a drink. It had a nice intimate feel to it, very much less "recital" like, and more "show" like.

Finally, we were ready to start. My classmate Karen was slated to go first, and I was after her. As she danced out, I took off my coverup and had a pep talk with myself in the hallway. What goes on in my head as I perform is always pretty comical. "Bold, Confident Tiffany" (who really doesn't exist) has a strongly worded dialogue with "Meek, Terrified Tiffany" telling her that although there are many things that she doesn't excel at (art for instance, *shudder*) she is a good dancer, and she shouldn't be nervous about people seeing her do this. As I fluffed my hair and did a last minute costume check ("is everything covered that I want covered? Ok, good") I realized something that really did make me feel better:

These are truly the best years of my life. I have a wonderful family, everyone is healthy, I have a job that I enjoy, and I get to thrive in activities alongside people that bring me joy. Since the solos were in a separate room from the other numbers, everyone who had stayed did so specifically to see the solos. And there were a lot of people there! People actually want to see me dance. I should enjoy and treasure this.

As I felt happy and reached this thought, I heard Karen's music end and she came glowing out into the hallway. My time was up; I had to go on. :)

I pasted on a smile, put on my "Stage Presence Tiffany" vibe and sashayed out as confidently as I could muster. I struck my pose and my music started. And...

It went GREAT. Really, really great. It was the best solo I've ever done.

Granted, there is still a lot of room for improvement, but I know that it's the best that I've ever been. Which made me feel HAPPY.

Mike was there, so I smiled his way quite a few times. Claire was smiling very encouragingly, which also helped. And as I finished up, I just felt very good about the number. And my costume looked smashing.

I breathed a sigh of relief out in the hallway, and then I got to enjoy watching my remaining 5 classmates dance. And I was so, so inspired by each of them. Everyone brought something different to her dance, and it made me actually *excited* to do a solo again. Next time, maybe I can wrestle with my veil or attempt a sword. I may even choose a longer song (I tend to stick to 2 minutes; keep 'em wantin' more!) and travel a bit more. The possibilities are endless!

Some of the soloists used the little staircase and went up into the table area up there, but there was no way I was ready to try that. I have a "graceful" reputation with my dancing (an extremely kind characterization that everyone kept relaying to me Saturday night, I think it comes from my ballet training) and I can't imagine it would be too graceful to trip and fall as I attempt to shimmy down the stairs.

But maybe next time. :)

I wish they just came with teeth

2011-11-11T11:06:00.002-05:00

Experience has taught me that in baby land, one night has nothing to do with another. You can have a miserable couple of weeks, and then BAM! She sleeps for 9 hours. You just never know.

I will say though that misery tends to slowly creep up on you, sort of like a fungus. One night she sleeps for 8 hours (glory!), the next 6 (very good!), the next 5 (fine), the next 3 (what the heck?), the next 2 (*?!@#)

And so this is what we've been going through. Anne is both teething and stuffy from a cold. This is what is known as a deadly combination. Last night she was up so many times I actually lost count. I knew why, so I didn't despair. But very much not fun all the same.

And I have a marathon dance practice session tonight, and my hafla tomorrow night. I don't like to worry about her getting up when I'm not there, but what can I do?

I've been practicing like crazy, and I'm very nervous, especially given that my new costume is showing signs of "downward migration" when I dance. My mother-in-law is going to sew some sticky stuff into the top of the skirt for me Saturday morning. Still nervous.

*bites nails*

Oh sigh

2011-11-10T15:31:00.003-05:00

Earlier this week, I went in to fetch Anne out of her crib when I heard her wake up in the morning. Do you want to know what she was doing?

Staring at me. From a sitting up position.

*cries* This increasing mobility means that our life is about to get a lot more difficult very quickly. Just in time for the holidays. Where pointy hooks and glass ornaments abound. Not to mention little wise men and multiple baby Jesuses.

This is going to be fun.

Lots of sparkles and baby B.O.

2011-11-09T12:19:00.002-05:00

Last night I left a wide awake Anne (naturally, this was the night she chose not to fall asleep at 7) in Mike's capable hands to hurry to the dance studio and pick up my new costume. And it is TO.DIE.FOR. It's totally worth not getting a single other gift for Christmas. :)

I could pick whatever I wanted this time, since this was solely for me to do solos in. Thus, no constraints on color choice (our instructor always lets us pick whatever style we're comfortable with) like in our group costume. I chose one that is turquoise blue. I tried to find a costume in which I liked both the style and the color, since sending in color requests is a bit of an adventure with our Egyptian costume maker. :) Certainly, he does worlds better with English than I could ever do in Arabic, but there's definitely a language thing going on there. Purple often becomes blue, and sometimes purple becomes pink. And hues of specific colors are even more elusive. ("what is this 'lavender'?") I don't like to leave anything to chance (you know this about me by now...) and so I went with the colors on the sample.

It is *magnificent*. It's a gorgeous deep turquoise with a sparkly silver hip wrap and inlaid silver panels that flare out when I dance. The beads and sequins are all deep blue and silver. I absolutely love it.

Naturally, the instant I got it home, I put it on. Luckily, Anne was sleeping by that time. The top needs some work, but the skirt is Fabulous. He never takes any kind of measurements for bust. Why, you ask? This is an excellent question, and all we can discern is "that's just the way he does it." Are all Egyptian womens' breasts the same size? I just don't get it. But all cups are created equal over there. And the shoulder and back straps have clasps on them that I just frown at each time. Because there's no way I could ever possibly use them given that the straps are the length of two of me. Perhaps there are sumo wrestling belly dancers out there that these straps are based on? But at any rate, they're WAY too long. So I have to solicit the assistance of my sewing mother-in-law to sew some snaps in for me.

The skirt seems to be staying put nicely, which is a real concern with these costumes. Beads, as you can imagine, are *heavy*, and let's just say that "slippage" is a costume malfunction that we all fear. I had to ask my mother-in-law to sew sticky stuff into the top of my green group costume skirt because it had developed a nasty habit of migrating downward when I dance. Spandex does stretch too, and I wore that costume twice while pregnant. This one I think will be ok, thankfully it fits a little better, since it's even *heavier* than my green skirt by a mile. I'm going to be doing lots of practicing in it over the course of the next few days.

So anyway, I swirled downstairs in it to show Mike, who approved. I'm going for alterations with my mother-in-law tonight. :) The hafla is Saturday, so my sparkly butt has to get in gear.

So, Anne. There are always cute stories with regard to her. Last night, I dressed her in a fleecy sleeper like always, and noted when she promptly spit up pureed squash onto the shoulder. I cleaned her up, but you know, if we changed her outfit every time she spit up we'd run out of clothes in hours. I also noticed that she was drooling, a common occurrence these days. But I didn't think too much of it.

During the night when I went in to nurse her, I noticed a funny smell. My nose twitched like a bunny. What was that? Her room is right next to the bathroom of the Henry pee-pee incident, could it be that again? Since it was about 2 in the morning, I figured I'd worry about it later.

But come morning, the issue would not be ignored. And pretty quickly I figured out the cause of the smell:

My daughter.

Yes, delicate little Anne. As Mike put it, she smelled like a locker room.

"What is that awful B.O smell? Oh, good Lord, it's Anne."

We went through this entire awakening process with Henry too (you'd think we'd never done this newfangled "parenting" thing before, apparently our brain cells are affected more and more with each kid) when the little blanket lovey that he slept with in his crib nearly caused Mike to pass out from bad smell asphyxiation. It seems that their teething drool just ferments into fabric over time and causes this overpowering odor. I could barely nurse her without wanting to strip her naked. The instant she was done nursing we popped her into the bathtub.

Unfortunately, when I went into her room as Mike bathed her, I caught another whiff. As if it's not bad enough that our house suffers from these 2 little smelly people, but somehow the stink just sinks its tentacles in and finds life in ways that we never anticipate. Not only did the corner with her laundry basket in it smell from the offending sleeper, but her entire crib sheet reeked and had to be immediately stripped. And the mattress Febrezed.

Good heavens.

Public Service Announcement:

2011-11-08T15:30:00.003-05:00

MY NEW DANCE COSTUME IS IN.

Not that any of you care about that as much as I do, but I'm terribly excited. Pretty close to the wire for our hafla on Saturday night, but I'm grateful all the same. I'm going to pick it up at the studio tonight, and of course, I'll give it a trial run the instant I get home.

I've been practicing very diligently for the past couple of weeks. Anne is pretty consistent about going to bed at 7 pm (not that she stays sleeping for the entire night mind you, but she always does want to begin the night at this time) and so I bust out my iPod and dance in the kitchen. Whenever I see some of those house shows on HGTV I have to scratch my head. If I had a house with the square footage of some of those that I see on there, I suppose I'd have room both for a dedicated craft room and a dance studio. But alas. Dancing in the kitchen suits me just fine. The microwave is always my audience.

I'm excited about the event, if a bit nervous. I think back to when I was in elementary school and took ballet and tap lessons. At nearly 37 years old, I still have dance recitals. :) But hey, I enjoy it.

"Honey, how come 'Mike Sweater' on your knitting list has a line through it?"

2011-11-07T14:06:00.002-05:00

So, my holiday knitting is in full out panic mode. I'm knitting feverishly every evening, every work day during lunch, and I'm trying to sneak in a few mitten rounds in the mornings. I'm making good progress on my list but I still have a ways to go. And I'm *dying* to start on a new scarf and hat for myself, but unfortunately, that's not going to happen until after Christmas. *projects martyr vibe*

As well, I've had to come to terms with the fact that some of what is on my Christmas 2011 knitting gift list will have to be transferred to a birthday gifts for 2012 (ok, some probably 2013) gift list.

And even though I have enough yarn to occupy me through a decade-long nuclear holocaust in which I do nothing by furrow my brow and knit, I still manage to procure more whenever there is a sale. Or a new kit at Knit Picks.

This past weekend, I received an email from JoAnn's that they were having a 25% off "friends & family" sale, good on everything in the store, even sale items. There is a new crochet- along on Lion Brand's web site that I really wanted to participate in, and it required 2 balls of a new Martha Stewart yarn that I feel is way overpriced. But it was on sale last week. With the additional 25% off coupon, I was totally on it.

There is no greater feeling than pulling up to the craft store with really good coupons in hand and with no children in tow. I made a beeline for the yarn department and loaded up my little shopping basket (I purposely avoided getting a cart; don't want to get too carried away). At just over $4 a ball, I figured I'd splurge and get a selection of colors in the wool blend yarn I wanted for the purse. They are *pretty*. And so very soft. I know I won't pay full price for the yarn, so I figured I'd take advantage of the double discount. I also used the coupon on one of my very favorite craft store yarns of all time, Lion Brand Cotton Ease. It's just a really nice cotton/acrylic blend that has a springy, fresh feeling to it, and the colors are really rich and gorgeous. Then I had to flag down a JoAnn's lady to point the way to where I could find wooden purse handles (the purse pieces section? That one seemed like a toughie to me) and I headed for the register before I could I could do anymore damage.

And in the end, for 11 balls of yarn plus the purse handles, I spent only $55. I saved over $30. Super thrilled over here! So I'll have a nice supply to feed my 2012 projects.

Because, you know, I'd starve without yarn.

Anne at nearly 6 months

2011-11-04T11:15:00.005-04:00

In my inebriated joy at having slept another good night, I thought I'd give Anne her very own post. :)

She and Mike are thriving at home together these days. I always trusted and felt good about our daycare, but I have to admit it is extra nice to know that she's at home with her daddy all day.

She's very vocal these days. She likes to recite a single sound for a long spell and appears quite proud of herself. This is apparently part of early language development. My dad read that early on babies can so easily pick up multiple languages, so I hear him coaching her in Mohawk from time to time. :)

"Sekoh. Oh niiawenhátie?"

And she's *mobile*. She hasn't figured out crawling quite yet, but she can scoot forward with both knees, and she somehow moves backwards quite rapidly.

I've also tried solids again, and this time she seems more into them. She always liked her rice cereal, but then she lost interest, so I did too. The other day I gave her some squash, and after an initial shudder of revulsion, she gobbled it down.

She has a very sweet, mellow personality, and really enjoys her brother. We're enjoying her very much, and I'm super excited about our first Christmas with both kids.

Now, if only I could get all of the gifts knit that I'd like to. I think I overextended myself. I actually have a knitting quota for each day. It's a tough job, but somebody's got to do it.

I just found a pattern for a knitted nativity set.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I *need* to make this. But unless there is divine knitting intervention, it's not going to get done this year. *scowl* The pattern book, however, now finds itself on my Amazon wish list.

*hint*

A successful Halloween, and preparing for Advent

2011-11-03T08:37:00.004-04:00

I should have posted this yesterday, but just had a busy afternoon. Henry has always loved Halloween, and this year I was looking forward to dressing Anne up for the first time. Her ladybug costume is everything I always wanted in a baby ladybug :) and she did great trick or treating. She LOVES being outside, and was quiet as a church mouse through the entire street of trick or treating with Henry. She's really just such a good baby.

And guess who slept for 8 hours last night?

*TRUMPETS BLARE*

I know that this won't happen every night, but let me tell you, we SO needed it. It's been an exhausting few weeks. I stirred at 3 am when Mike got up to use the bathroom and couldn't believe it when I looked at the clock. I was actually worried! But, oh, sweet, sweet sleep. How I've missed you.

In other news, I've been starting Advent preparation. This is one of my very favorite liturgical times of the year. I always have too many Advent calendars (Mike thinks they multiply annually) and candles everywhere, and this year once again I'm contemplating my Advent devotional. I'm thinking of getting the Magnificat Advent Companion. I wanted to order a new Sunday missal anyway. Does anybody have Advent devotional suggestions?

Feast of All Saints

2011-11-01T11:55:00.002-04:00

November is my favorite Catholic month of the year. It's the month that marks my adult "reversion" back to the faith, it contains the feast day for my confirmation saint, St. Cecelia, it marks the beginning of my beloved liturgical year in Advent, and I treasure the focus on our departed loved ones in the celebrations of all saints and all souls.

I went to Mass this morning at my parish's regular 8 am Mass. There is nothing better than starting the day off with Mass. And before the liturgy began, I was sitting in my pew watching everyone. I do that a lot. I think it's because I'm an introvert.

I watched the man acting as altar server pick up the large crucifix used in the opening procession to bring to the back of the church. I watched people come in and dip their fingers into the holy water font to cross themselves. I watched everyone get comfortable in a pew and peruse the bulletin. I listened to the organist practice playing the new Gloria, that we used in our parish for the first time this past Sunday. And it just made me so happy to be a Catholic, and to belong to this body of believers.

Our parish has a "book of remembrance" up for the whole month of November where we can all write in the names of our deceased friends and family, so that we can pray for them. Hank and I can do that this Sunday coming up. And I'm starting to mentally prepare for the time coming up very shortly where the only Mass I've ever known will undergo some changes. Post to come up on that soon. :)

The levels of ranking baby sleep

2011-10-31T13:02:00.005-04:00

Now that I'm onto kid #2, I like to think that I've learned something about infant sleep. And that would be that they don't sleep well for about a year. I don't care how many people tell me that their babies "slept through the night" at 8 weeks old. Their baby may sleep from midnight until 5 am without waking. Good for them. Mine does too, sometimes. But I'm talking, you go to bed at a normal hour and wake up sometime after 6 am, and the kid sleeps all that time without waking. That takes about a year.

Right now, we're in the real badlands of infant sleep. Anne goes down nice and early, and can sometimes soothe herself back to sleep if she wakes for an abbreviated period. She *usually* gets up twice between 7 pm and 6 am. But she's starting to teethe, and this my friends, commences many months of misery, I'm here to tell you. Sigh.

And this is the other thing I've learned: just when you think you've got the sleep thing down, Whamo! The baby changes their habits. It'll happen every time.

So, last night as I lay awake at 2:30 am, I contemplated the many levels of rating infant sleep.

There are:

(1) This is the cream of the crop. Your baby is a miracle sleeper!
(2) Baby gets up once per night. This is awesome!
(3) Baby gets up a few times a night and this is very age appropriate. You feel lucky that it's not worse.
(4) There seem to be 1-2 too many wakings and you're a bit cranky about it, but not suicidal.
(5) Your baby refuses to sleep and you're wondering how anybody has more than one child.
(6) WHAT ON EARTH IS GOING ON?! DO YOU THINK IF WE PUT ON SOME MUSIC SHE'D SLEEP?! DO YOU THINK IF I LET HER LAY ON MY CHEST SHE'D SLEEP?! DO YOU THINK IF WE TOOK TURNS BOUNCING HER UP AND DOWN WHILE HUMMING SHE'D SLEEP?!

Last night was one of those #6's. That's just the way it goes sometimes. But at 2 am last night, Mike and I were both downstairs catatonically watching an infomercial about new stoneware pots and pans while Anne sucked voraciously on a cold teething toy and drooled all over my lap. And the thing was, those pots and pans seemed like a really good deal at that time of the night. If we call now, we'll also get a free sauce pan with a $90 value!

Oh well. Some nights are just bad nights. But tonight is a new night.

The perks of being married...

2011-10-31T10:38:00.003-04:00

Obviously, there are many. But this is a big one, in my opinion.

Last night, Mike and I were innocently reading in bed, prior to falling asleep, halos firmly perched on heads. I'm currently reading the Hunger Games trilogy, and was very absorbed in book #2. Since it's a futuristic novel, I thought perhaps my eyes were deceiving at first, projecting a nightmarish, alien bug from the future onto our wall. But no. It actually *was* a flying insect the size of THE PALM OF MY HAND.

I freeze. I blink. I carefully close my book.

"Honey."

"Yes, I see it. I think it's a moth."

A moth? I'VE SEEN BIRDS THAT ARE SMALLER.

"I don't think that's a moth."

While I tell myself to breathe, Mike is getting out of bed and confidently strutting toward the winged offender in his boxer shorts. You can tell that he's very proud to be fulfilling one of the purposes of his vocation.

He climbs up onto my dresser right near my little porcelain statue of Mary, as I pray for him to be careful. I close my eyes for Murderous Attempt #1, which is a fail. The creature flutters over to the wall above my head.

Quickly, I leap out of bed, lest dead bug debris get into my hair and onto my book, which is borrowed from my friend Stacy. Mike makes the hop over to the bed while my breakable holy reminders breathe a sigh of relief. Murderous Attempt #2 is a success.

"I got him! I still think it's a moth." He checks inside the kleenex, yet another aspect of this extermination role of the husband that I just cannot understand.

"I think that was actually related to a dragonfly, which are ALTOGETHER too large."

*shudder*

Premiering new solo tonight...

2011-10-28T12:54:00.002-04:00

Tonight is the big night that I'm supposed to show my new solo to my dance instructor. Before we perform them, she always likes to see them first. And I'm telling you, this is more difficult than dancing in front of hundreds of strangers! When you really care about the person's opinion, this is the most nerve wracking type of performance.

I've done this twice only before, so doing a solo is still pretty new to me. I like to think I've improved. I'm more cognizant of making my arms stronger, of smiling, of traveling a bit more, and generally looking less like I'm about to be shot and more like I know what I'm doing and having a great time doing it. But I still have a long way to go. :)

The choreography feels very natural to me this time. The last solo I did I created at the last minute because I was pregnant with Anne and unsure of whether I wanted to put myself on the spot with also doing a solo. And it was a cute dance, but for some reason I had a difficult time remembering it. Something just didn't "click" with it. Perhaps it was pregnancy brain. But at any rate, this one is seamless. I just hope I don't look stupid doing it.

In happy news, our costume designer is apparently sewing his little hands off and is aiming to ship my new costume in time for it to arrive pre-hafla. I'm super excited.

A new arrival...

2011-10-27T10:10:00.003-04:00

*drum roll*

Yesterday, a mere 6 days after I placed the order, I received my new nursing bras from Fig Leaves. Yes, we're going to be talking about underwear again. And so thus, the review. :)

First of all, service. Wonderful! I ordered late Thursday afternoon, and they shipped Friday morning. From that point, it took only 5 days to arrive from the UK. That's impressive. And the package was wrapped very cutely in pretty tissue paper and a sticker with a fig leaf on it.

And the products. I cannot tell you what a welcome reprieve this is from the hideous yet expensive nursing bras I've encountered in regular retails stores. I hurriedly tried them on while Mike gave Anne a bath because I was just so excited.

First, I tried on the plainer of the two, the more practical nude colored bra. I seemed to have straps everywhere, but it was *super* soft and comfortable. LOVE it! I thought the funny straps might be because the bra is British. Then I realized that my strap problem was probably the result of the fact that I had it on inside out. Hey, it's not easy when the thing has no underwire or foam cups, it's not my fault. I blame the fact that I lose more brain cells with each child that I deliver. Anyway, bottom line - I love it.

Then I tried on the fancy blue and red one. CUTE!!!!!!!!!!! I mean, who ever heard of a cute nursing bra?! It's so, so wonderful. I was so busy admiring it in the mirror I lost track of time and Mike needed me to help him get Anne squared away after her bath. I hurried over and I hear Mike say:

"Well, well, well."

So, he liked it too. :) I'm very impressed. I would definitely order with them again, even if it does mean that my debit card will get frozen for fraud protection for a day afterward.

Henry's foray into Catholic School life...

2011-10-26T14:23:00.001-04:00

Now that Hank is 2 months into his new adventure at Catholic School, I thought I'd post a progress report. It's been an interesting experiment.

In the beginning, Henry was very, *very* nervous about going to a new school. I even had tears a few mornings when I dropped him off, which broke my heart. And then it was hard to get information out of him at the end of the day as to how everything had gone. I felt good about him being there, but I was worried.

As the weeks went on, I could see him getting a tad more comfortable. And his teacher is *wonderful*. She's a veteran with first graders, and is super warm, kind and very, very Catholic. I knew as soon as I saw her Brown Scapular that I would like her. :)

Pretty soon, the teary mornings stopped. He still asks Mike and I every morning, "will you be thinking about me when I'm at school?" so I know that he's still feeling vulnerable to some extent. But he happily goes off each day and I can see a huge improvement. We had a conference with his teacher last week as well, and she confirmed that Henry has come a long way with relaxing and being happier at school.

He's also thriving academically. Being one of the youngest kids in the class, there are still certain things that don't come easily to him, but whereas in kindergarten we constantly heard about how he was struggling, now we can see him flourishing. He's reading and doing his basic addition and subtraction. He does excellent with spelling and vocabulary. And the school just handles things very seamlessly. There's no big deal made - if the kids need a boost in their subtraction skills, they are simply sent to the math lab for an extra session. This isn't a criticism, but at the public school, everything was much more formalized and structured. And that may be what many people prefer. For us, this works better.

Given how crazy our evenings are, I have to say that I am glad that he does not have to go to CCD separately, which in our parish is on Tuesday or Thursday evenings. It's all integrated right into his Catholic school curriculum. This past Sunday we went to Mass at Hank's school parish (separate from our regular parish; we have a crazy amount of Catholic churches in this area) and as we were walking in, he pointed out a little grotto on the side with a statue of Our Lady of Lourdes and a small bench in front of it.

"Look Mommy. I've been there before during school, to pray."

I mean, it was PRECIOUS. So I like knowing that he's doing those things at school. The only thing I don't like is that I don't really *know* what the religion curriculum is per se. He does come home with religion assignments sometimes, so I can see what they worked on, but that's not more frequent than once every one to two weeks. Yesterday, he brought home an assignment he had worked on (and gotten a 100% on :) ) about God's love and the angels. He had a heaven assignment a few weeks ago. I just wish I knew more of what they were doing because I'm interested.

So, that's that. Even though we're very money conscious these days, and he could go to the public school for free, we both feel that our investment in Hank's education at this school is very worthwhile. It has a very familial feel, and Hank is getting a lot of attention. Everyone there is very, very kind and warm. We all like it, and all signs point to us keeping Henry there, which I'm thrilled about. If that happens, Anne will go there too starting in pre-k.

"What do you think you're doing, Missy?!"

2011-10-25T14:42:00.003-04:00

The other day I watched Anne kick cutely from her play spot on the floor. She flipped over, like she always does, and then suddenly...

she was up ON HER KNEES and ON HER ELBOWS. ROCKING BACK AND FORTH.

This.is.not.happening. I need many, many more months of non-mobility to prepare me for living with a mobile baby again. Because there are few things worse (ok, the sleep thing is worse) than dealing with the mobility phenomena of every waking moment filled with racing over to rescue your child from their latest life threatening calamity. Every.waking.moment. Those are the days that you pray they never drop their second nap.

This is her latest thing and it's making me very nervous. I'm just hoping we can get through Christmas without having to worry about her crawling over and eating an ornament.

On the up side, our sleep situation has stabilized. No, this does not mean that she sleeps through until the morning, nor would I expect her to at this age. She goes to bed at 7 pm, and will sleep until anywhere from 10 pm until 1 am. Usually, she sleeps until 12:30 am. I bring her into bed to nurse, and we both fall asleep for an hour or two. She'll usually wake me again then by rooting ("hey, the all night buffet is still open; suddenly, I'm hungry again!") so I'll let her nurse until she falls sound asleep. Then I pick her up and put her back in her crib. She goes right back to sleep. On a good night, she'll sleep until 6-6:30 am. On a regular night, she'll get up 1 more time, somewhere between 3 and 5 am. Occasionally, she'll fuss for a few minutes and fall back to sleep. More often, I'll bring her back into bed to nurse.

Really, that's pretty good. Getting up twice. I'll take it. And if she gets up between 5 and 6 am and won't go back to sleep, Mike will get up with her and take her downstairs so that I can sleep until 6:30. Yes, I have a wonderful husband.

Her hair has been getting longer lately, and I know I'm biased, but boy is she pretty. :) She gets lots of admiring looks when we're out in stores. I get a lot of comments about her eyes because she has dark brown hair like mine but big blue eyes. I find it fascinating that I have 2 children with blue eyes. I actually think this is a tad unfair, since I should have the dominant genes. :) But really, their eyes are lovely. I must have a recessive little b gene in there, obviously.

She's super precious these days.

And so, our lives change again...

2011-10-24T10:12:00.002-04:00

...and so the story goes. :) I've written before about how miserable Mike's new engineering job was. He was working long hours, and from day to day, we never knew what his schedule would even be. He would only find out the evening prior what his start time was the next day, and late in the afternoon what time he could leave. That just didn't work for us with 2 small kids. His job also required a lot of driving to different construction sites and he arrived home each day covered with mud and other greasy substances and with a lot of additional mileage on his car. It just wasn't what we had anticipated. He applied for some other engineering positions, and was interviewed for one, but didn't end up getting the job.

We did a lot of talking about it, and 2 weeks ago he put his notice in. As of this morning, he's home full time with Anne. He's also dropping off and picking up Henry from school, doing all of the household cleaning and starting dinner each night. I'm pretty sure I have the easier job in all this. :) He teaches a philosophy course one evening per week right now at a local Catholic college, and in the spring will teach 2 courses. Between that and what we're saving in daycare/after school care costs, our monthly net income isn't down for a number large enough to affect us too terribly much. He's also applying for some additional sections to teach this spring. And ultimately, we'd like for him to pursue getting his state teaching credentials in math, and he could teach middle school/high school. We think that that would provide him with the job satisfaction and lifestyle that is conducive to our close family life.

Even though this is another large change, I feel peaceful about it. The one thing that has been a constant in Mike's professional life is teaching. He's always done it, and loved it. We just chose for him not to pursue a tenure-track college level position because it would entail us moving, and we don't want to move. So, I think that we've come to a good solution.

This morning, he was cutely excited about being home with Anne. I was able to breathe this morning and not rush around like a maniac trying to get ready for work while fielding both children. And I got an extra nursing session in with Anne while Mike took Hank to school. When he got home, I was just putting her down for her morning nap. Everything just worked so much better.

So, we'll see where this newest development takes us. But so far, we're feeling pretty good about it.

I guess this is the punishment inflicted....

2011-10-21T14:30:00.003-04:00

...by my ugly nursing bra for bad mouthing it, unceremoniously replacing it, and making cackling plans to burn it as soon as the new ones arrive.

Yesterday, I took Hank to his semi annual appointment with the allergist. What on earth does this have to do with bras you ask? I'm getting there. This is what my husband calls a "Tiffany story" since it starts out seemingly having nothing to do with the topic at hand, will be way too long and contain far too many extraneous details, but in the end, it all ties together.

Ok, where was I? The allergist. So, I go to pay my co-pay. I hand the receptionist my debit card. She goes to the machine and by the way it's taking way too long I know that something is amiss. She comes back with a furrowed brow.

"Um, the card machine is giving me an error message. We had this happen to a patient a few weeks ago, and she later told us that it had to do with someone trying to steal from her account."

Hum. Well, I'm probably too complacent, but I wasn't so much worried about that. She gave me a ton of unnecessary details about what the error message said, and I concluded that it sounded like they didn't put in the authorization 3 digit code when it was needed. I also know that my card is old and the strip doesn't always work these days, I'm due to get a new one shortly. So I filed it away under "Don't Worry About This." I was more worried about how I was going to pay the co-pay, since we don't have credit cards and I didn't have enough cash on me.

Anyway, after that was squared away, I was focused on Henry and the allergist. Everything went fine, and upon arrival home, I see that we have a message on our answering machine.

"Hello, this is XYZ Bank Fraud Department and we need you to call us back..."

Oh crap.

I jotted down the investigation number and called back immediately. I was transferred to a man speaking heavily accented English who asked me a series of security questions. Apparently I answered them correctly, because he launched into the point at hand.

"We're concerned about a purchase charged this morning for $47 from a company based in London selling, um (I could tell he was desperately searching for the most polite word possible) ladies *apparel*. Called Fig Leaves."

"Yes, that's a legitimate purchase." I'm thinking the UK thing is what put the red flag up.

"Ah, ok. Oh, I see also on here a very large purchase for $770."

"Yes, the car repair shop. Unfortunately, that is also a legitimate purchase." *sighs*

He seemed to appreciate my attempt at levity and chirpily told me that my card would be reactivated within 2 minutes.

So, all is well that ends well. But I did get a chuckle out of how my little bra purchase caused some panic at the bank...

Success!

2011-10-20T09:59:00.002-04:00

Yesterday, as I tucked in my ugly bra straps for the 20th time, I decided that I'd had enough. I'M DONE WITH YOU, YOU EVIL UGLY BRA.

So my knitting friends and I had a lengthy discussion about bras over lunch (yes, this is what happens when women get to talking), and armed with a few suggestions of places to look, I headed excitedly back to my computer. And I found THE MECCA.

I checked out a site called Fig Leaves. It's a UK based lingerie company. They carry bras in sizes that you cannot find in regular retail stores, so women who wear cup sizes larger than a D, and/or have a small back size will find a wonderful selection here. They also carry bras for women who have had a mastectomy. But guess what else they have? A special maternity/nursing section with PRETTY BRAS. PRETTY!!! I mean, nursing bras in colors other than white and black. Pink, purple, I was nearly delirious with excitement and anticipation.

As you can imagine, some of them are a bit spendy. But honestly, they are not more expensive than the ugly ones I got at my local lactation center after I had Hank. They are about on par with those. And they're infinitely more attractive. AND, they had a pretty good selection of sale bras. Despite their being based in the UK, shipping to the US is a very reasonable $4.95. I was sold.

I ended up selecting a very practical nude colored bra for $15. Yes, $15! And it apparently won some kind of parenting magazine award for comfort and ease of use. It has thin, widely spaces straps, no underwire, padded cups, and looks more than halfway decent. And in the exciting news of the afternoon, I ordered a NAVY AND WHITE POLKA DOT WITH RED RIBBON bra as my second selection. That was my splurge, but it was on sale for only $27. With the sale bras, you have to be sure they have your size. I *really* wanted the pink and white polka dots, but they were out of my size, and the purple and white polka dots was full price at $39. Honestly, that's still not THAT bad, since like I mentioned, it's comparable to Miss Ugly that lives in my underwear drawer. But I liked the navy one just as well, so I went with the cheaper price tag. And it came with a free pair of matching underwear.

The whole shebang, with shipping, came to $47. I'm super thrilled. I placed the order late yesterday afternoon, and it's already shipped. I cannot wait for them to get here. And yes, I'll post an update about how I like them after they arrive. :)

The foibles of nursing mothers

2011-10-19T08:52:00.004-04:00

I won't belabor, but I figured enough women out there would relate to this that I'd dedicate a short post to it. That's what this blog is all about. :) Serving up Too Much Information on a regular basis...

Anyway, today's installment is devoted to my undergarments. You see, when I nursed Henry (for over a year) I had a major problem with clogged milk ducts. Nothing makes you feel like a dairy cow more than thinking about ones "milk ducts", believe me. It's very unpleasant, and it HURTS like a very, very bad word. You get a very tender, hard spot and nothing relieves it except for the baby nursing and clearing it. I had *dozens* of clogged ducts when nursing Henry, and the pump only cleared them 1 time. The others, I had to wait it out until I got home to nurse him.

At first I thought it was related to my milk supply changing when I returned to work after delivering Henry (and consequently pumping), but eventually the lactation consultant I met with told me that it was my bra. You see, I am very uncomfortable wearing a bra with no underwire. Let's just say that I'm not the most endowed of all women, and that I like a little liftage support, ok? B cup bras just look ridiculous with no underwire.

And so I was wearing nursing bras with underwires. The lactation consultant tsked me with a furrowed brow. Apparently underwire can cause clogged ducts, and I had to replace my nursing bras right away.

As if I didn't already *hate* nursing bras. I do, I really hate them. I'm going to just say it: they're ugly. Just because we're nursing a baby doesn't mean we want to feel unappealing and undesirable. I really think Victoria's Secret needs to make nursing bras. Maybe we'd like our husbands to think of something other than the functional aspect of that part of our anatomy when they look at us, kwim?

So anyway, I crankily bought 2 nursing bras sans underwire, one nude and one black, and although they fit well, I still hated them. AND the clogged ducts persisted, although not quite as frequently. It was a real problem until I weaned Henry.

Now, with Anne, everything is totally different. 5 months and nary a clog to behold. So, I got complacent.

Yesterday, I wore a regular bra. Sweet, sweet regular bra! My nursing bras just have such thick straps that they're always showing and I couldn't take it anymore. In my regular bra, I had nice thin straps that stayed inside my shirt, I didn't have to worry about my (sorry, I have to say it) nipples showing through without those shifty little breast pads stuffed in there, I had just 2 dainty hooks to worry about in the back, and the whole shebang was attractive and delicate. I just figured I'd arrange it craftily when I went to pump, no worries.

Until the later part of the afternoon. After I pumped for the second time, I ran to the ATM to get some cash. My arm bumped against my side when I walked, and I thought,

"Ouch. Gee, that hurt."

I was in denial, so I let it go. Suddenly, I noticed that that side hurt even when nothing was touching it.

"Gosh, something sure feels tender on that side."

Pretty soon I was discreetly trying to feel myself up as I walked.

"Crap."

The verdict was in. I had a clogged duct. No more regular bras for me. :(

I had to suffer until I got both kids home whereupon I nursed Anne immediately on that side. The clog was gone in minutes.

So I think I have to break down and spend yet more money on something I hate, but it has to be done. I see that Walmart.com has some for a cheap price. *frowny face* The ones I have just aren't working. I want something less conspicuous (thinner straps) and it would be nice if they had actual cups that aren't paper thin. Does anybody have any recommendations that won't cost a fortune?

Busily knitting away...

2011-10-18T09:46:00.004-04:00

Yesterday I was off with Anne, who is recuperating from a cold. We did lots of relaxing, and while she napped, I knit. Christmas is merely 2 months away, did you know that?! I have a number of gifts completed, but still a significant way to go. I finished 2 things over the weekend. A hat for my mother-in-law, and my secret Santa gift, which is FABULOUS. I can't say anymore because it's, you know, secret. But I love it. :) Everything has to be hand washed and blocked, but aside from that they are DONE. And I also finished Anne's cardigan:

I *love* the way it turned out. And the buttons?

Couldn't you just die? I'm thrilled with this. Too bad it will be spit up on to an inch of its life very shortly, but I know it'll be loved, and what more can a hand knit ask for?

So last night I embarked upon 2 gifts, one for each of my sisters, which are also secret. :) But so far so good. One of them is actually part of a "Knitalong" on Ravelry. Isn't that fun? It's an online group that reports its progress and helps each other as everyone works on the same project. I just love this idea.

Thus, this morning I woke up perky, marred only by the mysterious leaking of *4 ozs of milk* in the car on the way to daycare. I'm very upset about this, but there's not much I can do about it.

Sigh.

An adventurous evening of cereal throwing and hip dropping

2011-10-14T10:16:00.002-04:00

Yesterday was yet another installment in our crazy evenings of late. I had to pick up both children from separate locations, get them home and unpacked, find something (snorts) for dinner, clean up, feed Anne, do general children and house control, and get ready for a belly dance performance, all in a 2 hour time span.

We start our adventures as me and the kids arrive home. Mike was still at work, so I unpacked the bags and got Hank set up watching a quick tv show with Anne in the bouncy seat so that I could have my hands free. She's much less willing to suck on her bouncy seat dangling toys in the evening, so I heard wailing much sooner than usual. I got her nursed as Mike arrived home.

We slapped some leftovers together and sat down to eat while Anne played on the floor. As Mike cleaned up, I got Anne's rice cereal ready. There was one unfortunate moment in which I noticed that Anne was *licking* the floor and Henry was wiping something up (WHAT DID HE SPILL?!), but I quickly got Anne settled into her highchair. Many flung cereal clumps into hair later, Anne was fed and Mike was giving Hank a bath. I played with Anne for a bit, and then took Anne with me to get dressed into my costume. She seemed to like the sparkle factor.

At 7 pm, I was on my way to the studio for a last minute run through and was feeling surprisingly un-nervous. I've performed before, so I thought maybe I was just getting used to it. We had a bit of an adventure in the car on the way to the performance involving someones bra being on upside down, and so we arrived laughing and in good spirits. And then we went inside.

There were a TON of people there. It was an event for a local hospital honoring women, so it was mostly females in attendance, but still, there was a LOT of them. And at that point, I felt nervous. The last time we'd done a public performance, I was 8 months pregnant and we were at a college event in which the small gathered crowd of students looked like they were much more interested in studying their cuticles than in watching us dance. This was another story altogether. And we were the only dancers, so everyone was looking at us in our coverups with abject curiosity.

We nervously sweated out in the hallway until they were ready for us. When it was time, we paraded in and distracted ourselves by taking off our coverups and lining up. Claire introduced us, and we lined up for our first dance. We start facing the back, and when we turned around I saw that the GIGANTIC crowd was all crowded around our teeny tiny dance floor and all were paying attention and watching us. This is the first time this has ever happened. I mean, everyone actually got out of their seats to come stand closer to the stage to watch us. It made me happy that they were so interested. Until my problem began.

My problem being that as I danced, I could feel my very heavy, bead-laden skirt slowly start to slip down. Claire always tells us "if you feel it slipping, yank it up!" and she's right, because although that isn't ideal, the alternative is so, SO much worse. So I did, at as discreet an interval as I could. I waited until I was in the back, or everyone was distracted by someones solo part, and hopefully I pulled it off ok. But, as you can imagine, the whole situation was *very* distracting for me. I need to sew something inside the skirt to keep it up better. Previously, I was pregnant every single time I danced in my green costume with more to hold it up. :)

At any rate, we finished with my skirt still on my body, so that's good. The crowd was very enthusiastic when we finished. Perhaps they had had wine. But all in all, it went very well, and we all left happy.

I just love those girls.

Exciting news:

2011-10-13T14:05:00.003-04:00

I'm getting a new belly dance costume. :)

Granted, this is exciting only to me. But still, I'm thrilled. I've been wanting one to use for solos, but have held off for monetary reasons. Mike and I talked this week and agreed that we had enough for me to choose one as my Christmas gift this year. I doubt that it will be in time for our hafla, but still, since we have the money now, I'm going to lock it down. :) Then I'll have it when I need it. Plus, there's always the chance that our Egyptian friend can bead speedily and have it to me in the month. You never know.

So, I spent some exciting time yesterday drooling over the current designs, and finally selected one. It's turquoise blue, and has a silver hip wrap with material that spills down over the leg with the skirt slit. I'm terribly excited.

I finally got to work on my choreography again last night, although only after an hour long session of getting Anne to sleep. Something was bothering her last night. And before that, I'd gotten a single shoulder roll choreographed in like a week's time. I just never had the opportunity or the energy, frankly. Our evenings are exhausting these days.

I'm getting measured tonight, before our charity show, and then the order will get in. Here's hoping for some fast sewing.

Glasses perched on nose, bun firmly coiled on head...

2011-10-12T15:48:00.003-04:00

I am one of those very traditional librarians that wishes we could go back to the days of the card catalog and print indexes. I have such a nostalgia for the way libraries used to look when I was in grade school (Dewey Decimal system anybody? library cat perhaps?). I even loved the way the library smelled. And I love...BOOKS. As in, real books. No offense to Kindle and Nook users, I know they have their place, but I love the feel of a book in my hand and the sense of them surrounding me. There's just something very comforting and serene about it to me.

So, that's why, for a class I'm teaching tomorrow, I'm breaking out the big guns: print reference sources.

We have a lot of these at our library. We are insistent that these are important sources that we need to have. The problem is, the students really don't like to use them. They'd rather just Google everything. It makes me rather sad.

The assignment for this particular class is for the students to find several sources on an artist from a specific ethnic group, which they will be assigned. But they have to locate an appropriate person on their own. Where do we turn for such information? Google's siren song is STRONG, very, very strong, and I had to fight very hard to resist it. All right, I didn't resist it, I succumbed, and was rewarded for my laziness by 10 frustrating minutes and some sucky sources. So, I delved into our online catalog, and yes, there are TONS of print encyclopedias for every ethnic group under the sun. Use the index in one of these babies, and suddenly, you're in business.

After my reference shift this afternoon, I ventured into the reference collection in search of a volume to take with me to class. Yes, I'm going to make them touch a book. I'm sure they won't like this, given that many of them haven't even bought the text book for the course, but they will bend to my will. I found 2 perfect sources, and after blowing the dust off their tops, I tucked them under my arm and brought them up to my office. I plan to smuggle them out of the staff entrance tomorrow so that I can take them to class with me and the students can *see* how useful these are. Not only can they find their perfect person in half the time of a bunch of frustrating searches, but each entry includes a bibliography of book and article sources that they can use right in their paper. We either have them or can order them via Interlibrary Loan. I mean, it doesn't get any better than this.

At least, I hope they see it that way.

"Mommy, Anne took off her socks again!"

2011-10-11T15:22:00.003-04:00

Yes, it was one of *those* kinds of mornings. Not only did Anne take off her socks and eat them at least a half dozen times as I raced around trying to get us all ready to leave the house, but the following transpired as I went to put her in her car seat:

"Hi Honey, I see you spit up again, let's wipe that up. Wait, what's that smell?"

"Bad smells" are just such a persistent reality to all parents of young children. Yes, she had pooed, and I could already see it seeping through the back of her Onesie. And what time was it? 7:30. Henry has to be in his classroom saying morning prayers at 7:42. This means that I didn't have time to change her, and had to take her smelling self as is all the way to school and then daycare. Whereupon I grabbed one of her alternate outfits out of her cubbie to find that both are 3-6 month sized, meaning she will be stuffed into one of them like a sausage for the remainder of the day since she's fully in a 6 month size now.

It's just one of those days.

Interesting weekend

2011-10-10T09:52:00.004-04:00

There's lots going on in our lives right now, and this weekend was no exception. Friday night I was chagrined to miss my dance class since we have a performance coming up (more on that in a moment), but Mike and I attended a wedding that evening. Since we don't get out much just the two of us, we enjoyed every moment.

I was feeling very relaxed with my wine and Mike when one of my sisters suggested that we take a picture together, since all 3 of us, plus our mom, were all in attendance. We head away from the noise, out into the entrance area and an attractive bench near a window. Suddenly, a drunk guy saunters over to us in a leering manner.

"Hey. (I think he was aiming for his voice to be 'low and sexy' but it just sounded 'low and creepy') This is like, the best song ever, right?"

The song in question was that "I like big butts" song by Sir Mixalot.

Right. We disposed of him immediately. One would think that the 3 wedding rings would have been enough of a deterrent, but apparently not. I suppose you'd have to be drunk to think that the butts song was "the best ever," anyway, so whatever.

After that interesting Friday night, I had a rehearsal for an upcoming charity event that my belly dance troupe is performing at this week. It will be my first post-baby performance. I'm actually looking forward to it. And I've gotten used to performing enough to not be phased by the creative and haphazard organization of our numbers to account for members who can't make the performance, and other last minute choreography fixes.

"Tiffany, you be Katie in this one, and Lara you'll have to switch sides again. Amy, you're Jan!"

We always get a kick out of it. We've always got some massaging to do in order to make the lineup look even with people missing (since inevitably, all of us can't make every performance) and then we have to keep track of each different lineup from performance to performance, which can be a challenge for aging brain cells, but we persevere. Little group trios become solos, and the right side becomes the left. It keeps us paying attention. I just love those girls.

So, I've added "dance practice" to my evening repertoire, which isn't easy these days but I'm managing. And I'm still knitting. Somehow.

Most likely because I'm crazy.

Starting my first post-baby solo...

2011-10-06T12:22:00.002-04:00

I have a hafla coming up in mid-November, so I've been contemplating a dance solo. I don't exactly have a lot of free time these days, and I've been really enjoying my knitting (and given my holiday gift giving plans, I actually *have* to knit a lot) so I wasn't sure where I was going to squeeze in a dance choreography as well. But as September drew on, I suddenly got motivated. I tried on my costume (IT FITS!) so the excitement of that carried me through.

I had a hard time picking out music, but I finally decided on I Cash Radii by Pentaphobe from the Bellydance Superstars III soundtrack. A while back I had toyed with trying something really new with my next solo, like using a veil, and I'm not feeling quite that ambitious right now. But the music *is* different from what I usually pick, so that's a start. It's still an instrumental, but it's a slow "gooey" type of song, rather than a quick drum like I usually do. I've got about 52 seconds done so far of a song that's about 2:20, so I'm off to a good start.

The problem when I craft solos is that my mind can't help but wander to when I'm actually performing said solo, and I'm just praying that I don't accidentally do something incredibly stupid and make myself look like an idiot in public. Like, I don't know, set fire to my skirt or trip and fall into somebody's hummus. It could happen, so therefore, I worry about it.

But so far, so good. I'm hoping to carve out about 15-20 minutes tonight after the kids go to bed.

Famous last words.

The joy of ruffles

2011-10-05T14:36:00.003-04:00

A few days ago, I got on another crafting high. I was perusing my Facebook feed, and I saw a post from the chain craft store AC Moore about this new yarn that makes a special ruffly scarf. They had had some sort of in-store demo of it over the weekend and apparently it was very popular. I was intrigued.

I checked out the scarf and the crazy novelty yarn that looks like a net and determined that I had to have some. Do I need a crazy ruffled scarf? Well, no, but that's not really the point is it? The yarn is Premier Starbella, it was on sale for $3.99 a skein at AC Moore, and they even have an autumn inspired colorway. Need I say more?

At quitting time, I was speeding over to AC Moore. I arrived with a high level of excitement. I just love getting excited about new projects. I raced in, but took some time to peruse the photo albums before heading back to the yarn. I wanted to really preserve the experience. I took my time browsing, squeezing a few skeins of sock yarn, before I realized that I'd been through every yarn aisle and hadn't yet spotted my prey.

I went back through, paying special attention to each yarn bin. Suddenly...straight ahead on the starboard side I spot a knitted sample of something that looks unmistakably ruffly. Eureka! I hurry over.

Yep, that's the crazy ruffle all right. I touch it reverently and my eyes dart to the neighboring bins so that my color selection process can begin, which is what I've been looking forward to all afternoon. I knew I wanted the autumn colorway, but perhaps I could make some gifts as well...

Well. I'm instantly deflated when I realize that every nearby bin is completely empty. I quickly check behind other neighboring yarns to see if anybody hid any, which makes no sense whatsoever, but I do it for several minutes anyway. I stand back up with a pout. Not a single skein of Starbella to be had. As I'm standing there frowning, an AC Moore lady ambles by. I hurry to catch up with her.

I quickly ask about the Starbella, and she expresses surprise that it's all gone, but she said they had a lot of people in for the demo. She said that I could get a rain check up at the front for the sale price, which I thank her for. I'm still standing there a few minutes later, looking unhappily at a bin of pink Bernat yarn for a breast cancer awareness campaign, when the lady comes back.

"That one Bernat yarn, Ruffelina, is similar to Starbella."

"Oh, really?!"

"Yep, and here's the free pattern."

I'm really starting to like this lady. This skein was a mix of pink hues, was only $2.99, and one ball makes an entire ruffly scarf. I was stoked. I grab a skein.

"Thank you! I like this one, and I'll get that rain check when I check out."

She pauses.

"I did put 2 skeins aside for myself, but you can have one. I'll be able to get more when they come in on the truck."

Now I love this lady. I follow her to this desk in the middle of the store and she pulls out 2 balls of Starbella. One is a mix of blues and taupe in a colorway called "Faded Jeans," and the other is the coveted autumn. I catch my breath. I want to stroke the autumn colors, but she's being so super nice that I don't want to take advantage.

"Which one would you like to keep? You're being so nice already by letting me have one of yours."

Quickly, she clutches the autumn skein to her chest. I had a feeling that would happen. But I happily accept the also very pretty blue skein, thank her profusely again, and skip merrily up to the register.

There is a checkout lady just waiting for me, which is when I know the craft store karma is really on my side. Usually at AC Moore, I'm waiting at the register *forever* while people seriously slow poke ahead of me. I deposit my two ruffly balls onto the counter and ask for a rain check so that I can secure an autumn skein when they come back in.

The lady starts to take down my information, but pauses suddenly.

"Let me call into the stock room. I think I saw some of this yarn back there."

She calls while I hold my breath in excitement.

"How many balls did you want?"

"Just 1!"

"They have some that were returned back there. What color do you want?"

Next thing I knew, yet another pleasant AC Moore lady was handing me a ball of autumn hued Starbella.

Life was good. It doesn't take much to make me very, very happy. Including cheap novelty yarn. I got all 3 balls for $10.

So, I started my autumn ruffly scarf the other day, and the experience is interesting to say the least. I actually don't love knitting with it, it's a bit awkward. However, I'm loving the final product. It's SO pretty.

And it hides a multitude of sins. For instance, as I was knitting along, I came across a knot. And a knot in a thick netted yarn like this is ridiculously noticeable. There's no weaving THAT end in. It's just a grape-sized wad of tangled netting with two opposing colors on either side. NOT attractive. Happily though, the ruffles somehow absorb this blight. I think your cat could actually get tangled up in this yarn and the ruffles would hide its very body. It's kind of weird.

I'll take a picture of my scarf and post it when it's done. :)

Children's Liturgy of the Word starts up for the fall...

2011-10-04T10:33:00.002-04:00

Sunday commenced a new season of Children's Liturgy of the Word at our parish, and yours truly was signed up to conduct the inaugural session. I have to admit, I was dreading it just a hair.

It's been 5 months since I last taught one of those sessions, and toward the end of my tenure doing them in the spring, I was finding it increasingly difficult to keep the diverse age ranges represented paying attention for anything resembling the entire time. It's really designed for kids ages 4-6, those that can glean something from a childrens' version of the readings but who have not yet begun official religious education toward making their first reconcilliation and eucharist.

What happens though is that parents send kids back who are anywhere from 8 or 9 down to little ones who can manage to walk back into the sacristy. The older kids are actually no trouble, although I do worry about them becoming bored. But the little 2-3 year olds are TOUGH, especially when trying to keep up some form of dialogue with the older children. I was feeling a bit disillusioned in April/May, and like I was doing quite a bit of babysitting, but not much catechizing.

Well. I was very pleasantly surprised this past Sunday. I had a smallish group, maybe 6-8 kids, and nobody appeared to be below age 4, which really helped. They sat quietly and even answered questions. We were talking about the parable of the vineyard owner, and so I tossed in some details about Mike and I going to Napa Valley on our honeymoon, which they seemed to like. Overall, it was the best session I've had of these in many, many months.

Big relief. Unfortunately, after Mass, as I was making my way back into the sacristy to clean up the materials, Henry ran ahead of me (he loves to help set up and take down on the Sundays when it's my turn) and in the 10 seconds it takes me to prop the sacristy door open, I hear shattering glass. I knew right away that my Henry was responsible. :) He had accidentally knocked the vase of fake flowers off the little table and it broke on the stone floor.

It was fine, and I was relieved to have my first session behind me. I'm not on again until early November, so I have plenty of time to gear up.

What's that I smell?

2011-10-03T14:35:00.003-04:00

Ever since I went back to work, and Mike started working full time as well, it's been a struggle to keep up with the housework. Especially when you have the standards that Mike and I have, because we're crazy. We're both just neat freaky kind of people.

Example A: my husband cleans our bathrooms. He cares that much about them being as clean as possible. I mean, I'd clean them if he didn't, but he seemed so enthusiastic about it that I let him take the reigns on that one after we got married.

But since the work thing interfered, (and the addition of another kid) squeezing in housework has been a real challenge. We can really only do it on the weekends, and thus have to space things out more than we'd like. For instance, about a month ago, I could hardly stand the bathrooms. This is the first time this has happened in nearly 7 years of marriage. Our bathrooms were DIRTY. It doesn't help that we have a 5 year old boy who apparently has lingering aiming issues. But I literally couldn't take it anymore. That very weekend, we prioritized the bathrooms and got them cleaned.

And yet, not nearly so much time has gone by, and last week I noticed that the upstairs bathroom was grossing me out again. At first I thought it was just me. Maybe I was being too picky? Perhaps it was the trash? I mentioned it to Mike, and while he didn't have time to do a full scale cleaning, he promised to do a quick bathroom freshening. I focused on the mounds of waiting laundry and breathed a sigh of relief.

That night I went into the bathroom. It still smelled. I looked about furtively. The fixtures appeared cleaner but Mike hadn't thrown the trash. God only knows what Hank has put in there. I figured that must be it and took care of it.

Later that night, I woke up to nurse Anne and stopped to use the facilities on my way back to our bedroom.

*sniff sniff*

PEE PEE.

Why, why, did the bathroom still smell?! I started to worry that maybe I was developing the sense of smell of a super hero. Was it just me?!

I mentioned it to Mike the next day.

"I'm going to just clean it Saturday, the full version. That should take care of it. It's because Hank is missing the toilet."

Ok, well, whatever. As long as the bathroom doesn't smell like a public restroom, I'm a happy camper.

That Saturday Mike cleans the bathroom. We all breathe a sigh of relief.

Shortly thereafter, I go to use it.

IT STILL SMELLS.

By this point I'm pretty freaked out (I'm not pregnant, RIGHT?!?!) so I say nothing. Mere hours later, Mike says:

"Why does the bathroom still smell?"

"I don't know, but I was wondering the same thing!"

I wanted to add, "PLEASE MAKE IT STOP" but I showed remarkable restraint and kept my mouth shut. I could hardly go in there without gagging.

A short time later, the smell was so overpowering I could think of nothing else but my bathroom.

"Honey? Did you wash the bathroom throw rugs when you cleaned in there?"

He always does, so I thought it was a rhetorical question. Apparently not.

"No. They always clog up the washing machine and I just washed them not too long ago, so I skipped it this time."

"OH. *exhales* That must be why the smell remains. We'll just have to suck it up and wash the rugs. I can do it by hand if need be."

"No, I'll toss them in the machine. I'll just clear the drain real good when they're done."

Once again, I'm relieved. That *has* to be why the bathroom still smells. The next day, when I come home from work, the rugs are in the washing machine. They are cleanly upstairs a short time later. I happily go to use the facilities.

IT STILL SMELLS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I was just about staggering from the fumes by this point, and by time I managed to crawl downstairs, Mike greeted me with a very serious expression and doe eyes.

"There's something terribly wrong in the upstairs bathroom."

Yes, yes, I know. By this point, I'm starting to wonder if the rivers are going to turn to blood and pestilence run rampant through the land. Mike looks sheepish.

"I should have thought of this before, but maybe we should change out the toilet seat. Maybe pee is getting stuck somewhere in there."

I don't know, but by this point I was willing to do anything short of dynamiting the bathroom to rid it of the vile stench. "Lived in" I can live with. "Smells like the New York City subway station where I once saw a homeless man urinate right onto the floor" is another thing altogether.

The next day, Mike had procured a new toilet set cover and installed it. Soon thereafter, a cinnamon scented candle burned from atop the toilet tank.

It still smelled. But not nearly as eye-wateringly.

I let a little time go by, and the smell seemed to dissipate. So maybe it was the toilet seat. We've already had a gentle talking-to with Hank about the importance of proper aim. Because for the love of all that is holy, we can't go through this again.

We'll have to move.

Weekly sleep check-in...

2011-09-30T14:26:00.003-04:00

Because for some reason I think everyone is as interested in how much sleep I'm getting as I am. Plus, I said that I'd write about sleep when I had positive things to say, and:

*trumpets blare*

I have positive things to say.

At just over 4 months, it seems like we've established a loose routine with Anne. Ha! I say this now, and God will smite me with wakings every 2 minutes for the next 6 months. I know how it goes with thinking that you've got things figured out with kids...

Anyway, Anne goes to bed at 7 pm every night. She's exhausted and cranky at that time, and so into her crib she goes after a nice nursing session. She'll settle in and fall asleep within 15 minutes, sometimes requiring some back stroking and bottom patting and other times needing no intervention at all. She'll then *usually* sleep until between 1 and 2 am, which is 6-7 hours of sleep. This is AWESOME. Really wonderful. Sometimes she'll cry earlier, granted. 2 nights this week she cried at about 9:30 pm. The first night, she started crying hard, so I went in, and she instantly tried to latch onto my shoulder. So I nursed her, and she went back to sleep as soon as she was done. That time, she was genuinely hungry, and I could tell that she needed my intervention right away.

The second time was last night, and immediately I could tell that she wasn't really crying. She was what I call "cranking." I stood on alert outside her door, and within 5 minutes, she had put herself back to sleep. So, overall, I'm really pleased that we've made a lot of progress with getting her to soothe herself. It usually takes 1 to 2 really awful nights (check) but the result is so very worth it. I couldn't live through a year of the every 20 minute wakings.

Then, when she wakes up after midnight, I feed her right away. Sometimes, I'll feel particularly martyr-like and I'll nurse her in her room so that I can put her back in her crib when she's done. Usually though, common sense wins out, and I just bring her into our bed so that we can both just go right to sleep while she nurses lying down. *Most* of the time, she will then sleep til morning, more or less. That's really only 1 official waking, and I can so totally live with that.

Many nights, after the 1:30 am journey into our bed, she'll wake me about an hour or so later with lots of kicking and pinching. I'll try to nurse her again and she won't latch (for some reason, replaying this scene about a dozen times does not make me learn what works and what doesn't, it's all just a blur at 3 am), so I'll pick her up and gently move her to the bassinette that I still have set up next to our bed. And...

she goes right to sleep.

Oh.Glorious.Day.

I do think that although she loves to cuddle when nursing (as do I) she does prefer to sleep in her own space where she can shift about and get comfy at her own whim. In her crib, she loves to flip onto her belly to sleep.

So, overall, this is working out pretty well for all of us. I've been through this before, so I know enough now to know that I know nothing, if that makes any sense. No matter how much you try to stay on a routine, there are still going to be bad nights, and many times you may never find out what caused that bad night. I just know enough to go with the flow and not let it get me down.

That, in and of itself, is a blessing.

You get all kinds...

2011-09-29T15:44:00.004-04:00

*Catholic Librarian innocently sits at reference desk* (she *may* have been surfing Ravelry, but that's totally allowed when one doesn't have a patron)

*throat clears from behind her*

*Catholic Librarian turns*

"Can I help you?" *winning smile*

"Yes, um, hello."

"Hello!"

"How are you?"

"Fine, thank you."

"What are you up to?"

Well. This is when the Catholic Librarian's RED ALERT: WEIRD! meter first stirred to life.

"Not much. Can I help you with something?"

"Do you just sit here and wait for people to ask you things? What does that make you? Like, as in your profession?"

*small silence while the Catholic Librarian assesses her escape routes from this conversation*

"A librarian."

"Oh right! Yeah. Librarians always knows lots of things. Well anyway, I don't really have a question, I'm just really here to waste your time."

Yes, that's really what he said.

"Yeah, I'm working on a paper? And I really find that it's a lot of pressure, you know? I mean, for a test, I know how I need to study in order to get an A. But with a paper, I don't know exactly what to do to guarantee that I'll get that A, you know?"

"Yes, it's a bit more of a subjective process."

"Yeah! You know? And really *leans against reference desk companionably* I find that more than academic, it's an emotional hurdle for me. I mean, it's just very hard. I just really needed to talk to someone about this, I guess"

Emotions? There are many things I'm responsible for handling in my job, but being someones psychiatrist is not one of them. He really seemed like he was settling in to chat, and with it being the Jewish holiday, the library was fairly empty, so no hope of rescue in sight.

"Yes, well, you sound very diligent, so I'm certain you'll do well on your paper. Good luck to you."

*Catholic Librarian gives off the unmistakable "we're done here" vibe as politely as she can*

"Yeah, um, thank you."

Ugh.

Christmas gift progress...

2011-09-29T11:06:00.002-04:00

I've been hard at work on my gift knitting in the evenings, so I thought I'd do a little simple math.

Number of planned hand knit Christmas gifts: 18

Good Lord, I'm insane.

Number of completed Christmas gifts: 4

Sigh.

There is another one that is nearly done, though, so that's uplifting. And I've started on my Secret Santa gift.

Hope springs eternal...

Secret crafty Santa is deployed...

2011-09-28T08:57:00.003-04:00

Last year my knitting group did a "secret Santa" project that was hugely successful, so we decided to duplicate it again this year. We each drew a name and are assigned to make a gift for that person, not spending above $20. The big reveal comes at a luncheon in December.

I'm not going to mention a lot about my project, since my knitting group reads this blog. :) But I will say that I had a tentative project in mind (a lovely one, if I do say so myself) but once I drew the name, the project just didn't feel "right" to me for that person. So, I decided to use the project I originally had in mind for one of my other friends (and it seems perfect for her; I actually had her in mind when I bought the yarn for it) and waited for inspiration to set in for my secret Santa gift. I want it to be just perfect. Because that's just the way I am, and I realize that it's very annoying. :)

A week or so went by with me searching Ravelry for patterns at every given opportunity. I adore Ravelry. If I'm not careful, I could spend all day on there and have nothing to show for my productivity save for a few printed patterns, a scribbled list of needed supplies, and heavily self-justified plans to procure more yarn. But I didn't worry, you know, like I usually would. Yes, I'm already tremendously concerned about Christmas in September. I'm as bad as the retail stores that already have trees and reindeer out in their decor. I just want to make sure that I have enough time to get everything made that I want to. I knew I'd find the right gift when the time was right. It's not like I'm not making something else right now anyway. All right, several other things.

And yesterday, it happened. I love that little excited feeling you get in your stomach when you catch a creative chain of ideas that leads to a perfect project. First, I saw something in Ravelry that caught my eye. Then I started thinking about other similar patterns, and then I happened to see someone else's project in a yarn that I'm currently very interested in trying, and away I went! Yes I know that most people don't get this excited about yarn, but humor me here. Next thing we knew, I had printed the pattern and stopped at the yarn store on my way home. I was a very, very happy girl. Nothing makes me more thrilled than standing amongst yarn without my husband or children in tow (sorry, I love them, but they don't enjoy yarn as much as I do and their whining would put a damper on my crafty high) selecting a color. Oh, oh! I love it so.

So, last night while Mike and I watched Downton Abbey (a wonderful PBS series that we picked up on DVD from the public library) I started my project and I'm just thrilled.

Anne is sleeping better (read: not great, but not up every 20 minutes, so we'll take it), so in the evenings I'm able to sit uninterrupted by Mike's side with a glass of wine and my knitting.

It's blissful.

Waiting for inspiration...

2011-09-27T12:14:00.002-04:00

I haven't blogged about dance in awhile, so I thought I'd tackle that today. :)

I've been back to belly dance since 6 weeks post partum. It felt wonderful to dance while pregnant, and it feels even better to dance post partum! I think because I appreciate my "regular" body so much more now that the aches of late pregnancy are still so fresh in my mind. When I was pregnant, whenever we did a hip twist, I could actually *feel* a sloshing sensation. It was...weird. :) Now, whenever we do them, I think of that and smile. Dance made me feel beautiful and feminine while heavily pregnant, and for that I am so grateful.

Now, I feel back to my old self and I've moved back into the routines pretty seamlessly. We have a hafla coming up in November, and if I want to do a solo (and I do) I need to get my butt in gear with a choreography. I've toyed with several pieces of music, but nothing has stuck. I'm waiting to feel inspired. If anyone has some good Middle Eastern music to recommend, have at it. :)

I usually do a drum number, because I like that type of music so much, and I'm comfortable with it. I have several albums of pure drum music to choose from. And I may. But I was sort of feeling like perhaps I should branch out more this time and select a different type of song. I don't know. All week I've been listening to my belly dance playlists hoping for inspiration, so we'll see.

I was hoping to get a new costume this year, but so far I just haven't wanted to spend the money. As you can imagine, heavily beaded dance costumes are *expensive*. And I already have a costume that I really like. Granted, it's one of our group costumes, but last year I used it for my solo and that went well. Everyone chose whatever style they wanted in the same color, so my costume is actually different than everyone else in the group anyway.

So, I'll be armed in my green costume and hoping for some good music to come my way. Then I just need to choreograph, and hopefully Anne will sleep good for me in the evenings so that I can do that...

Busy weekend with baby clothes abounding...

2011-09-26T09:43:00.002-04:00

I was on a mission this weekend: I wanted to organize Anne's clothes.

I've noticed already a huge difference with regard to boys and girls clothes. For one thing, due to the generosity of family and friends, I hadn't had to buy a single Onesie for Anne since she was born. Her closet is overflowing with frilly dresses and pink sweaters. People seem to love buying girl clothes. I always love buying boy clothes though! I will grant, once they move from the toddler sizes to the boys, things do get less exciting. But I think the small clothes are super fun for both genders. Anyway, I digress...

Hank was so chubby as a baby (I just looked back at his baby records; he weighed 20 lbs at 4 months old!) that he lived in sleepers and an occasional pair of sweatpants. Anne, on the other hand, has a much more extensive wardrobe. And due to a total lack of time, it was a complete mess, which I just couldn't take anymore. So Saturday morning, I set Anne up on the floor with some toys next to me and set to work in her room.

30 minutes later, her drawers and closet had been transformed, and I had a shopping list of what she needed to fill in a few holes for the upcoming winter. Mike stepped into the room cautiously. He knows what I'm like when I'm tornadoing:

"How are you doing in here, Honey?"

"Great! Ok, there is a new system for Anne's clothes. Come over here so that I can demo for you. On the far left we have short-sleeved Onesies, and I've weeded out the ones that are too small. We have a few long-sleeved Onesies (a magnificent invention by Carter's for those of us that live in the Northeast) and here is the pile of pants. She'll be wearing a lot more pants now that the weather is cooler; see, like that pair of purple stretch pants she's wearing right now? On the right are her socks, bibs, hats and hair accessories. In the next drawer down, we have sleepers, arranged by size from left to right, smallest to largest. The burb cloths have now moved to this drawer over here. In the closet, there are sweaters, jackets, a snow suit, and all clothes that are 9-12 months, since those are way too large right now. I'm headed to Carter's now to pick up some more long-sleeved Onesies."

He just stepped aside to let me breeze by since he knew I was on a mission. Upon arrival at the store, Anne was sleeping, allowing me to browse to my heart's content. I immediately snagged 2 packs of long-sleeved Onesies, 1 pack of short-sleeved Onesies in 6 months size, and 2 sleepers that she totally didn't need but that I simply could not resist. One has a cupcake on the front. I mean, seriously? How could I not buy it? I have a bit of a cupcake theme going on with her. Just wait until you see the next hat I'm going to knit her.

In church news, I haven't blogged about it, but I have actually brought both kids to Mass with me in recent weeks. I'll say this: it's not as bad as it could be, but it's not fun. Nor is it conducive to actually hearing anything that goes on during Mass. Not that the kids are loud, because they aren't (right now, that is). But my attention is just so divided, I'm sweating the entire time I'm there. Yesterday, I just had Anne with me, since I allowed Henry to stay home with Mike to "help" him put in a new hot water tank. Anne was sleeping upon arrival, which is always a good thing.

About midway through the homily, I glance over into her car seat tote and my heart nearly stops beating because I see a pair of wide blue eyes looking back at me. She was actually quiet until the Creed, when I had to take her out. She did pretty well, actually. I was happy that she contented herself just looking around, since getting out the pacifier inevitably ends with a distinctive "plink!" two pews away when my head is momentarily turned, and an usher has to come to our rescue. She did really, really well.

Next week, I start Children's Liturgy of the Word again, so Hank will be in tow to "help" me set up and take down, and Anne will stay home with Mike since there's no way I could manage her while also teaching. I'm a little apprehensive, but I know how much the parish appreciates my volunteering for this, and I do like being involved. I just so often feel like I'm babysitting (10-15 kids!) instead of passing along any real catechesis, but I do what I can with it...

P.S. Anne's Onesie in the picture above was made for her by Allison of A Broken Fortress, who sells her handmade baby items at Lila's Locker on etsy. :)

Big news:

2011-09-23T14:18:00.003-04:00

Anne slept from 7 pm until midnight last night, again until 3 am, and then didn't wake for the morning until 6:30 am.

*angels sing*

I am thrilled.

Anne's 4 month checkup...

2011-09-22T12:34:00.002-04:00

I had Anne at the pediatrician yesterday for her 4 month checkup. Like all of my babies, she's rather large. :) She's at the top of the growth chart for both height and weight. She's so wiggly now I had to be quite vigilant as we were waiting for the doctor. As soon as I set her down on the examination table, she flipped over onto her belly and stuffed the paper sheet into her mouth.

She's meeting all of her developmental milestones like clockwork and is doing excellent in her muscle strength and movement. She wasn't too happy to receive her vaccinations, but those are the breaks. She goes back again at 6 months.

She's just a very happy baby and a joy to be around.

A sign that I really do need more sleep...

2011-09-20T12:42:00.003-04:00

Even though sleep has slightly improved in our house (emphasis on the *slightly*) I'm even more tired than usual. I think it's that my body has once again gotten a taste for what it feels like to get actual rest and is now demanding even more. Yesterday in particular I was really dragging.

Around 10:15 am I was already starting to feel frantic. I had a reference shift at 11 am, and I needed to pump, have a bite to eat and get myself ready to be over in another building at the reference desk.

I was fielding a few phone calls and so set my breastpump up since I didn't want to run out of time. Once I got off the phone, I hooked myself up and started the milk flowing. I don't usually eat when I pump (that just seems odd to me somehow) but I was desperate yesterday, so I had a snack while I pumped. Otherwise I get really hungry by the end of the reference shift.

Finally, my milk was exhausted so I shut the pump off. I start to hurriedly unhook myself and glance up. What do I see?

My office door.

It's open.Now granted, it wasn't OPEN! It was closed, but it was not fully shut and locked. It was ajar. And that means that an overzealous student could open it fully after an abbreviated knock, which is not out of the realm of possibilities. I could have died right then and there.

I unhooked my tubing and hustled over to shut it and lock it. In all of my years of pumping, I've never done that. I'm usually much more self aware than this.

It was mortifying.

What's new with the kids?

2011-09-20T12:23:00.002-04:00

Yesterday was an incredibly long day, and it ended with me attending the parent orientation at Hank's new Catholic school, so I thought I'd detail.

I really, really like Hank's new school. There was zero mention of state standards and testing, which is just the way I like it. Instead, the focus was on the children, and the values/qualities the school tries to instill while they learn. The children are taught to be good listeners, to follow directions (both not Henry's strong points, definitely needs work on those), and to be kind and compassionate. There are certain milestones that the children are expected to master by the end of the year, but the approach is much more old fashioned and traditional than Henry's old school. It reminds me much more of the way school was back when I attended.

On each child's desk is a sticker with the Blessed Mother on it. And one wall houses a picture of each child with prayer hands holding a pair of rosary beads. I just loved it. :) It goes without saying that each classroom has a crucifix, I just also enjoyed these small details. And we opened with a prayer.

I really, really like the school. Henry is still nervous about being in a new school, but I can see it getting easier for him every week. He's starting an after school basketball thing today for one day per week through October and he's super excited about that. I think he's growing into things just fine.

And then there's our Anne. :) She's getting so big. She can really creep around now on the floor by flipping herself over. And she plays hardcore with all dangling toys. Whereas formerly she used to gaze up at her Sesame Street toy bar, I now find her under there giving Elmo a full body exam. And then it goes in her mouth. Very cute.

Last night she slept until 11:30 pm and then wouldn't go back to sleep, so she ended up in our bed again. Honestly, it's not as difficult to sleep with her in there as I thought it would be, and I do enjoy having her snuggled next to me when she does settle down and sleep. Which she has these past 2 nights.

They're both extremely precious these days.

Knitterly delights...

2011-09-19T09:36:00.007-04:00

Because I start off on my knitting monologue, I thought I'd update you on my sleep situation. Because I know you're all wondering about it, right? I mean, what else would you be thinking about on a Monday afternoon?

The consensus is that things are definitely improved, but in the grand tradition of baby sleep, they're still far from perfect. Friday and Saturday night Anne fussed less and less when I put her down awake. That part is going really well. Both nights, she got up twice to nurse between 7 pm and 6 am. No problem. I just had a bad omen on Saturday night when she didn't go back down for a full hour during one of the wakings. Aforementioned omen came to pass last night when she got up around 10 and by midnight was still awake. Given that Mondays are really long days for us (Mike also teaches on Monday evenings) I just brought her in bed with us. We all needed to get some sleep. She actually fell asleep next to me (which she doesn't always do; I think she was teething last night, she definitely wasn't feeling good) and I felt her rooting again around 3:30 am or so. So, she's doing better in terms of the number of wakings, but those 1-2 hour AWAKE! times are killing me.

Anyway, I think we should leave it as (we're being positive!) things are going better and last night was just a bad night. Those happen to even the best sleepers. Which my kids never are.

At any rate, we had a really nice weekend. I'm getting all of my holiday knitting organized, and since this is me we're talking about, I'm making it much more structured and complicated than it needs to be. I'm already starting to panic that I'm not going to get everything done. Because what's Christmas without a little hysteria?

Since this week is "Coupon Commotion" at JoAnn's, Hank and I headed there yesterday to look for a storage container for all of my interchangeable needle tips. I have a bunch of Knit Picks Harmony wood needle tips that I absolutely love, and they've gotten all messy in my lone knitting needle portfolio thing. I figured a little organization might spur me to knit faster or something.

So, we went, and I found an awesome plastic organizer that is designed for bead work, but since you can customize how large the slots are, it's perfect for my tips:

I'm able to fit all my tips in there (see my size labels? I'm crazy) plus the cables, end caps, and tighteners. I was so excited to put everything in there. I have plenty of room to add additional tips in other materials (nickel or acrylic) if I'd like, which pretty much means that's just a matter of time. Different types of tips will interact differently with different yarns. I tend to be a loose knitter, and so I like my needles to grip the yarn real good so that I don't look down and find a whole bunch of dropped live stitches (that sounds funny, "they're alive!!") on my lap. Hence, I have wood, but sometimes a little more slipperiness would be a good thing.

Then I took my zipper portfolio case and devoted it solely to my straight needles. A lot of knitters don't bother with straight needles (like these) when they have circulars, because you can knit flat items on circular needles. I happen to like straight needles, there's something very nostalgic and happily old fashioned about them, and so I still have a lot of them, mostly aluminum and a few wood. And finally, I took a quilty carrier that my grandmother had given me and organized all my double pointed needles (like these, they're very pointy aren't they?) in there. Again, some knitters never use these, they prefer to use circulars. You can knit small round things on the straight double pointed needles, like socks or baby hats. With circulars, apparently you can do something called "the Magic Loop" and use a really long cable to twist about and still make these smaller items. This all sounds very fantastical to me, and I like my double points, so I stick with them and try not to poke myself. Essentially, I'm just making things very expensive for myself, but I like to think of it as me being very versatile and a "well rounded knitter."

I did all of this while Mike was watching football and Anne was napping. Thus emboldened by my newfound organization, I selected a Christmas project to work on after the kids went to bed. I happily cast on and began increasing per the pattern. Pretty soon I discovered that I was knitting something on straight needles that was quickly going to become too large. Basically, I'm an idiot. I needed circular needles in a size 6, and when I went to my handy little organizer case, I found the size 6 slot empty. Panic set in before I realized that those tips are already in use on a sweater for Anne. This is what I get for having so many works-in-progress going at the same time. I think I just need more needles.

Anyway, since I'm going to have to deal with that little problem another time, I decided to make my Christmas neuroses even worse by taking time to work on something that will be for myself. I'm going to be knitting a fall/winter shawl for myself and I'm super excited to get started. I decided to treat myself and work on that.

But before I could do that I had to deal with all of the yarn that came in the kit for that project, which is in hanks. What does this mean? It means that the yarn must be wound before I can knit from it. And that's where things get interesting.

I have a ball winder, but I had resisted a yarn swift because they're more expensive. So, I'd have Mike hold the yarn while I wound. While this made for a very cute and amusing couples moment, it wasn't exactly quick and tidy. Well, in doing research last week I found that there are a lot of different kinds of swifts that I hadn't known about. I saw something about an "Amish style swift" and knew that I had to investigate. I could detail my fun little scavenger hunt about this type of swift, but I'll cut to the chase because, let's face it, you know I bought one. :) (it was only $30!) And here it is:

I kind of love it. :) It's very simple, and much smaller than an umbrella-style swift that I linked to above. It's just a wood stand with a wooden cross over it that spins as the yarn unwinds. The yarn is held by pegs that you can adjust depending on the size of your yarn hank. You can see the edges of my ball winder in the far right side of the picture. Once I got it set up, I started winding and voila! A center-pull ball of yarn that I can knit with. Xanadu!

After all of this, I cast on for the shawl, but suffice it to say I was exhausted after all of these shenanigans. I knit 6 stitches and then couldn't make heads or tails of a direction in the pattern to pick up stitches along a few sides of my weird looking knit rectangle and called it a night. But it was super fun. :)

And I'll conclude with a few pictures of Anne in the pumpkin hat that I made her, just because she's so adorable:

This, shockingly, turned out *smaller* than I'd have liked it. This doesn't often happen to people with the gauge of a tank. Hopefully, her head won't grow that much more before Thanksgiving...

IT'S A MIRACLE

2011-09-16T11:59:00.002-04:00

Anne SLEPT LAST NIGHT. As in, *real* sleep. And *I* slept. I am practically on my knees in gratitude.

I put her down around 7 pm or so, and stayed with her patting her as she fussed until about 7:15. That was about half the fussing time of the night before. She then slept until 9:30, just as I was about to doze off (of course). This has become a common wake up time for her, and being only 2.5 hours after she last ate, I really want to break her of it.

I went into the nursery with my patting hand all ready to go. Within 1 minute of the patting action, she was asleep again. I gratefully went back to bed.

A1 12:30 I heard her crying, so I went right in and nursed her. Already, I could tell that things were going better this night. She nursed and I tried to burb her to no avail. When I put her down, she was fast asleep and I worried that she'd wake herself back up shortly thereafter with the burb. Next thing I knew, it was 6 am, and she was just waking up for the morning.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It was like, one of the greatest nights of sleep of my whole life. I'm basking in happiness.

Of course, I'm still tired. But that's just because of the cumulative effect.

I'm just very thrilled right now.

Anybody have any energy that they could loan me?

2011-09-15T12:48:00.004-04:00

I thought I'd chronicle my evening last night, since there are many lessons to be learned there. Mostly by me, because I'm constantly winging it (since apparently 6 years is just not a significant sample in his parenting thing) and I never know what I'm doing.

Exhibit A: I arrive home from work, with both children, and approximately 20 bags, and the first thing I try to do? Unload everything.

*unladylike SNORT*

Why Lord, WHY do I torture myself so? I'm trying to be busy transferring milk to the refrigerator and wash out bottles while Hank is asking me to put a Wow Wow Wubbzy on for him and Anne is crying. I get Hank set up with the tv and Anne out of her car seat tote and on the floor near me.

This does not pacify her and she continues to cry. Which she does for approximately 2 full hours, until she goes to bed, silenced only briefly by a few spoonfuls of rice cereal.

Meanwhile, I have to unload Hank's stuff and get his homework organized for us to do together later. Unpack my pump, milk, and Anne's bottles. Load up new bottles for the next day. Somewhere in this time slot, I nurse her. Then, I unload my work bag and various lunch sacks. Change into something comfy and get lots of clothes into the hamper. I have to get dinner into the oven. Look through the mail and a ton of paperwork from Hank's school. And all the while, Anne is crying, and Hank is watching too much television.

Oh sigh.

Sometime thereafter, Mike comes home, and he's grumpy. I know that he's bemoaning that he's getting home so much later than he'd like and it's cutting into time with us. We eat. Anne cries. Henry refuses to eat and gets no dessert. I clean up while Mike gets Henry started on his homework. Anne cries. Mike and I take turns bouncing Anne on one hip while trying to multi-task with our other hand. I feed Anne her cereal, and then get her dressed for bed. Mike supervises Henry getting ready for bed.

We decide not to give either child a bath that night because frankly, we have no energy.

Mike puts Hank to bed, and I enact Operation Please God Let Anne Sleep Longer Than 20 Minutes. I nurse, rock and burb her and settle her into her crib. She's a bit incredulous at this, given that she's still awake, but I know that this needs to happen. She's just about 4 months old, and now is the time to start gently coaxing her to soothe herself a little bit. Otherwise, we'll be up every 20 to 60 minutes from now until she's 2 years old. And I simply can't have that.

I pop her into the crib. She glares at me, squalls about for a minute, and flips over onto her belly. I flip her back, but she's having none of that. After a tad more protesting, she flips back onto her belly and goes to sleep as I pat her back.

I scrunched my eyebrows together for awhile, but I know that there's not much I can do about this. I'm paranoid, yes, because of the Back to Sleep Campaign to reduce SIDS. But I put her onto her back. She flipped herself over, and I remember reading that once they can do that, it's ok for them to sleep on their bellies. It's not like we can prevent them from flipping when we're not there anyway. I go downstairs to confirm this in my baby book, and feel somewhat better. I settle in to knit.

In about an hour, I hear cranking. I've been checking on her a lot because of the paranoia thing, so I head up, and as I pause outside her door, I hear her settle down and fall back to sleep.

GOD IS NO LONGER SMITING ME. THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU.

This happens one additional time, and I start to feel hope springing up into my very heart that sometime within the next week, we may get her to sleep normally again. And by "normally" I mean that she'll still wake to nurse in the night. That's totally fine. I just don't want to be up every hour. My body physically can't take that anymore. And I know we could have her sleep in our bed. I love having her in there, and we do that sometimes to get some sleep, but we choose not to have that be our long term solution. I think bed sharing is fine for families that choose to do it, but we prefer our babies to sleep in their cribs once they're past 3 or 4 months old. I just don't sleep well when she's in the bed.

Anyway, by 9 pm I'm actually feeling happy. I've had time to relax in the evening, which hasn't happened in several weeks given the Sleep Nightmare. I contentedly knit another round on the hat I'm making. Suddenly Mike turns to me:

"Why don't we take advantage of Anne not being in our room?"

Here's the funny thing: my first thought was:

"OH! He wants to go up early to get more sleep! What a great idea!"

Yeah, that's not what he meant. :)

My knitting needles were just starting to droop and I thought about making a joke regarding my "wifely duty," but then I remembered that we're both far too tired to interpret humor correctly and he might not take that the right way. It's amazing that we're even able to *think* about doing this, really. Anyway...

Some time later, we're both contentedly reading in bed. Anne is still happily sleeping, and this is a good thing not just for us. She's way overtired and the lack of sleep is hurting her too. Within 10 minutes, we're both asleep. It's close to 10 pm.

At 11:30, Anne wakes up crying. Since it's been over 4 hours since she last ate, I go in and nurse her. She acts voracious. I manage to burp her and get her back in her crib, fast asleep.

2 hours later, she wakes again, and here's where the story turn particularly challenging. I go in to do a soothe, and somehow this only acts to escalate her furor at not being picked up. I rub her back until my hand gets sore and she's still enacting a full out protest rally in her crib. Eventually, I couldn't take it anymore, and I did nurse her. However, by this point she was wide awake, and when I put her back in her crib, I heard the familiar squirting sound indicating that poo has now entered her diaper. I change her, and now she's REALLY awake. At some point, Mike wandered in in his boxer shorts to blearily plead for me to just bring her to our bed so that we could get some sleep. I didn't want to, but I did try. Much cooing and feet playing later, I made my way back to the crib. I never left her to just cry, I stayed by her side. Eventually, around 3:30 am, she fell asleep again on her belly in the crib. She had been up for two and a half hours.

From that point, I don't remember much aside from staggering into bed and collapsing. The next time I woke up, it was 6:15 am, and Anne was still sleeping. When I was able to drag myself out of bed, I went in to check on her and she was sleeping, flipped onto her back. She woke for the morning (for the first time ever right from her crib!) at 6:30.

Although it had been a very long night, I felt victorious. Maybe there is hope that she'll be able to soothe herself back to sleep when she partially wakes in the night but is not hungry.

Oh, Please God.

My mornings...

2011-09-14T14:58:00.002-04:00

...are CRAZY these days, with both kids after Mike has gone to work. After nursing Anne (7:20) (and having to *wake her up* to do so, doesn't that figure?!?!) I rushed her upstairs for a quick diaper change. (7:21). As I'm changing her I note a spot on my pants. It's wet. Oh dear. As if any spot isn't bad enough, a wet spot is particularly worrisome. It could be either, (a) spit up (most likely), (b) pee, or (c) poo. I contemplate my next move. (7:23). In desperation, I put my finger to it and sniff it. It's not poo. Decision made, since it's now 7:25, and we need to leave at 7:30 to get Hank to school on time.

The pants stay on.

Sad, isn't it?

Last year on this date...

2011-09-13T13:59:00.003-04:00

...I found out for certain that I was pregnant with Anne. :) I wouldn't have remembered the date, but Mike did. Isn't that sweet? I remember the date that we conceived her though, because that's just how Type A I am with my Natural Family Planning charts. And aren't you glad that you know that now? I'm just very organized. Mike has a name for my charts that I won't repeat, but I assure you, it's funny.

Anne was looking very fetching this morning in a chocolate brown romper with purple and pink polka dots. She still has blue eyes (very striking with her curly dark brown hair) and naturally, is just the prettiest baby ever. Because everybody thinks that about their own babies. That they're the cutest. And they're all cute. But let's face it, we all still think that ours are cuter. :)

Ironically, today when I stepped on the scale, for the first time I'm officially down to my pre-pregnancy weight. Before you hate me, let me assure you that I deserve this small bone given the nights that I'm having. I'd take 10 extra pounds if I could get more than 4 hours of crappy, interrupted sleep per night. But I digress. I'm being positive from now on, remember?

And actually, it was a little warm last night, so we had Anne back in our room in her bassinette. We don't have an air conditioner for her room yet. I have to admit, I'd missed having her in there, and it warmed my heart to see her precious sleeping face next to my side of the bed. Then she started screaming, but we're being positive, remember?

I'm trying.

A new leaf...

2011-09-12T09:33:00.003-04:00

Well, it's Monday and I'm going to try to have a positive attitude. One would think that this is a fairly elementary decision, but not lately.

I actually purposely didn't blog on Friday, because our overnight prior was so miserable that I feared I would be compelled to impale myself on a knitting needle if I dwelled on it any further. And then there was the weekend. (I'll just get this out of my system and then move on to that "positive thinking" thing...) All of a sudden (and she's not sick anymore) I can't get Anne to sleep more than 2-3 hours a stretch at night. And that would be for a "long stretch." Most of the time, she's awakening anywhere from every 20 minutes to once per hour.

So, I finally made the decision to move her to her crib, at least for the beginning of the night. She's nearly 4 months old, plus I was getting the feeling that we were disturbing her when we'd go up to bed. It actually went pretty painlessly. She seems to like it in there. I'm trying to start a little "routine" of changing her, wrapping her up, and then rocking her while I nurse her prior to putting her down. I also stopped swaddling her. She was really fighting the arm swaddle, so now I just use the swaddle to wrap her legs up, like a wearable blanket, and leave her arms out. She seems happier and isn't jolting herself awake when you put her down anymore. She's actually easy to get down.

But just wait 20 minutes, and everything is different. She's up, and crying. I'll let her cry for 5 minutes, but no longer than that. Then I go up and soothe her back to sleep, and I know that the problem is that she can't get herself back to sleep. But what else can I do? I know that the sleep gurus tell you "not to treat your 4 month old like a newborn." Point taken. But a 4 month old is still a small infant, and I want her to feel secure. I'm not just going to leave her to cry.

I duke it out as long as I can getting up to nurse and soothe her back into the crib, and then I bring her into our bed for the remainder of the night. At least this way, we're getting some sleep.

So, what I've decided is that I'm not going to talk about baby sleep anymore unless it's something positive. The situation is what it is, I have a baby after all, and getting upset about it all the time is only serving to make me even more miserable. I need to keep my spirits up in order to stay strong. Worrying and fretting and crying isn't helping anything. I just need to deal with it as best I can. I have a sleep book coming from amazon, and I'll employ any gentle suggestions that I can and deal with what happens. I will not despair, and will hope for a better tomorrow.

So, that's that. But to give you a glimpse into my nighttime life right now, I offer the following. Friday evening I was home, since I was literally too exhausted to go to my belly dance class. There's no way a girl can hip drop when you can barely climb the stairs. I got Anne down and managed to knit for a short spell, then we headed up to bed. Shortly thereafter, we heard the siren song of Anne's wail coming from the nursery, so I went in. I nursed her and was rocking with her in the chair in there, both of us dozing off when suddenly I hear crying.

I jolt and check Anne on my shoulder. She's sleeping. I hear crying again. Well, that's just silly. That can't be! Given that I'd only gotten about 10 hours of sleep cumulative for the entire *week* I assumed that I was hallucinating. It must be like when I'm confused to hear crying in my dream because I think I'm holding Anne, when actually that's Muffin, my stuffed dog. Convinced, I start to put Anne in her crib when I realize that I totally screwed up my analogy and plus I still hear crying. This can't be good. With a sinking feeling in my stomach, I stagger over to Hank's room. Sure enough, he's awake, and crying. And why would that be, you ask?

Because he has a terrible stomachache. Since people who don't poo are susceptible to such phenomena. Thus, a second mini nightmare ensues wherein we have to carry Hank to the toilet and try to convince him to poo. When even stabbing gas pains won't get the child to poo, you know you've got a problem on your hands.

*sighs*

He did finally poo the next day, but only under extreme duress. Ok, off to employ some positive thinking...

I'm hoping that this swing is an upswing

2011-09-08T09:11:00.005-04:00

Well, today is a better morning, and for that I am most grateful. As always, I will detail. :)

When I got home from work yesterday, my spirits were low. I was so tired I could barely drag myself and my ridiculous amount of bags into the house. Happily, though, Henry reported that he'd had a good day at school. He had enjoyed his music class and had used some of his new school supplies for the first time. He told me about the opening school Mass that is scheduled for Friday. I was relieved. Anne was under her Gymini playing with the toys dangling overhead. This is new; literally, it happened overnight. I love that about babies, very exciting all the time. :) She had napped better and seemed to be feeling a little better.

Mike came home as my in-laws were departing, bearing a pizza. We ate and cleaned up and I nursed Anne briefly. Mike helped Henry with his homework while I got the fixins' for chili into the crock pot for the next day and Anne played with her feet. Things were going well until Anne got fussy, interrupting my dinner preparations. I had to put it aside to nurse her more, but I could tell that she was getting tired. Once I got her settled, I finished dinner prep, packed her stuff for daycare and washed all the bottles. Mike gave Henry a bath and got his school stuff ready for the morning. By this time, it was 7 pm and time for the kids to go to bed. I was exhausted.

As I nursed Anne to sleep I contemplated how I was not enjoying the busyness that surrounds our weekday evenings. There's no time for family time. We were all in the kitchen together while I prepared the chili and Mike and Henry did homework, but there's no time to just sit and talk aside from over dinner, when Anne is usually fussing, unfortunately. I'm going to break out her high chair and see if that helps. Maybe she'll like being at the table with us. But anyway, our time together is just all task-oriented. There are a million things that need to be done each evening and no time to let your guard down.

I got Anne to sleep and went downstairs for what is usually the relaxing portion of my day. But last night I knew it would be abridged; I simply *needed* to get some sleep, even at the cost of relinquishing my free time. I got a glass of caffeine-free Diet Coke and some vanilla flavored Goldfish crackers and read my book curled on the couch next to Mike while he watched an episode of Band of Brothers. This is usually when I knit, but I knew it wasn't happening last night. I literally could not have knit two stitches together if someone put a gun to my head. I'm working on a lace scarf for my mom and I think it's bad form to try and knit lace while incapacitated in such a way.

At 8:15 we headed up to bed, since I was falling asleep on the couch anyway. I brushed my teeth and headed right to the bed, curling on my side. And what did I suddenly hear beside me from the bassinette?

The baby. Crying.

This is where the bad part of the story comes into play. :) I totally lost it. I began sobbing hysterically. She had barely been to bed for an hour and had always slept until at least 9:30 or 10, even in the worst depths of the sleep nightmare we're currently going through. Mike came in to find me a puddle of tears, weeping while exclaiming nonsensical half sentences about how I never have time to do anything anymore, including sleep or think, and I was just too exhausted to go on.

He soothed me as best he could and we took turns bouncing Anne for a full hour. Every time one of us would get her to sleep and place her in the bassinette, she'd wake up and start to cry. Then I'd start to cry, too. It was bad.

Finally, around 9:30, she stayed asleep. I grumpily read my book for a few minutes before nodding off. She woke again every 2 hours for the rest of the night, but I'll say this: it was better. If you can believe it, her getting up every 2 hours was actually *better* than what we've been going through for the past week or so. Because she did stay sleeping after she went back. Around 2:30, I brought her in bed with us and that helped as well. When we woke up this morning, all 3 of us felt more rested.

Henry was up at 5:45 (this is why they go to bed at 7 pm :) ) and had breakfast with Mike. Mike had him dressed, fed, and teeth brushed by time he left for work at 6:30. I got up at 6:15 and got Anne and I ready to go, and the crock pot turned on. Henry needs to be at school by 7:40, so we were pulling out of the driveway by 7:30, all 3 of us packed and ready for our day, and I was really patted myself on the back. I had made it.

I dropped Henry off at 7:35 and he seemed happy. I really do think he likes his new school, and I love him being there. They start the day off with prayer and it just feels like such a warm community to me. I'm so glad that he's in Catholic school this year. He walked up to the door all by himself and waved to me and Anne as he went in. My little boy is getting so big.

Then I took Anne to daycare and she also seemed in a really good mood. She was still somewhat stuffy in the night, but I do think she's getting better.

Thank God.

Because otherwise, I'll start crying again.

What a day

2011-09-07T15:08:00.003-04:00

That's Henry, not looking so happy on his first full day at his new Catholic school. He does look adorable though, no? He's mostly unhappy that summer vacation is over, regardless of where he's going to school. We'll have to see how his day went today.

As for me, my day is going poorly indeed. I'm so tired that I actually feel sick. Well, I actually *am* sick, with the same cold as Anne, so that certainly doesn't help. I know that Anne is suffering, and she's not crying and keeping us up just for no reason. But nevertheless, that gets tough to deal with after a time. It was a particularly rough night last night. Thus, this morning I woke up in a foul mood.

As did Henry, once again, unhappy that he now has to do actual work during the day. I had a hard time shooing him out the door so that I could get him to school on time. I barely had time to make my lunch and eat breakfast. I didn't have time to give Anne her drops (pink eye), or use her saline spray (for her congestion) so my mother-in-law had to do that. I also didn't have time to do a bloody thing to prepare for dinner tonight. Pizza for everybody!

Once I got Hank porkily dropped off, I sleepily made my way to work. I had a first-thing-in-the-morning reference shift, which is the main reason I came in today rather than take a sick day like I did yesterday. I probably should have let my baser instincts prevail. I mean, I'm stuffy and miserable at the reference desk, blowing my nose, coughing, and talking raspily, who wouldn't want to come talk to me about their research needs?!

Not to mention that I wasn't exactly in a friendly mood. I was helping someone (who came right up to me before I could even get my computer booted up, sigh), and he was nice although I wasn't exactly feeling like helping someone. Just the quality that you're looking for in your reference librarian, right? And another student comes up and starts hovering. And I'm attuned to helping someone who just needs to ask me where the restrooms are without them having to wait for a lengthy interaction to happen before they can do that. I smile at him, which I thought was very big of me. He says he has a printing question, and so I direct him to where the printouts may be retrieved. He gives a huffy sigh, and says that he needs to speak with me AS SOON AS I'm done with my current student. We're not in charge of printing (big pet peeve) but I smile again and say I'll be right with him. He continues to hover, really pissing me off. And apparently 3 minutes was just too much for him to wait, because he stormed off right before we finished. I won't tell you what went through my head, but I can assure you, it was decidedly un-Christian.

It's just that kind of day.

Life of a Catholic Librarian

Tired, so very tired

When the baby is up in your bed blowing raspberries and drooling on your pajamas at 2 am...

Ordinary Time? Not so ordinary

Apparently, I may be a knitting freak

Get that girl a tutu!

Mass as a family

Morning discovery:

*glares*

What kind of Catholic are you if you...go to *confession*?

"Mommy, church is boring, I don't want to go."

Feeling grateful for my blessings, and it finally looks like a real Northeastern winter

STRESSED

St. Anne Novena, Day 9

St. Anne Novena, Day 8

Knit-along!

St. Anne Novena, Day 7

Our view from locked behind the baby gate

St. Anne Novena, Day 6

St. Anne Novena, Day 5

St. Anne Novena, Day 4

And "one of those days" continues...

St. Anne Novena, Day 3

Crazy day

St. Anne Novena, Day 2

St. Anne Novena, Day 1

Here's to a happy 2012...

Merry Christmas! And a short blogging hiatus...

Crafting modest and feminine clothes...

Comfort and Joy

In a more Christmasy mood

A big day for Blessed Kateri!

Christmas is drawing near...

"Wait, What on earth?!"

Christmas preparations winding down...sort of

We lived through the concert, and Christmas knitting reaches a fevered pitch

O Christmas Tree! Hank's Christmas concert tonight

The inevitable happened...

Are partially completed mittens reproducing in my knitting bag?

No, we don't have a dog...

I have a really, *really* good husband

Dream Tiffany can't add...

Off to an action-packed Advent

Aging reference librarian on the loose

I'm dreaming, and a baby is crying. Oh, oh wait...

Peace be with you...

Shopping will abound

What's new with Anne?

Feast of Christ the King

Wait, did I just see that?

My baby is 6 months old today

Christmas knitting update

What happens when the baby is up multiple, multiple times per night?

Here comes trouble

Best belly dancing night EVER

I wish they just came with teeth

Oh sigh

Lots of sparkles and baby B.O.

Public Service Announcement:

"Honey, how come 'Mike Sweater' on your knitting list has a line through it?"

Anne at nearly 6 months

A successful Halloween, and preparing for Advent

Feast of All Saints

The levels of ranking baby sleep

The perks of being married...

Premiering new solo tonight...

A new arrival...

Henry's foray into Catholic School life...

"What do you think you're doing, Missy?!"

And so, our lives change again...

I guess this is the punishment inflicted....

Success!

The foibles of nursing mothers

Busily knitting away...

An adventurous evening of cereal throwing and hip dropping

Exciting news:

Glasses perched on nose, bun firmly coiled on head...

"Mommy, Anne took off her socks again!"

Interesting weekend

Starting my first post-baby solo...

glares

What kind of Catholic are you if you...go to confession?

I have a really, really good husband