long weekend

If every weekend was three days long I'm pretty sure my life would be perfect. 

We've had a nice time so far these few days. Even though the fourth was rainy, it cleared up for most of the important parts: the parade in the morning and the fireworks. David slept through most of the parade, despite every single noisy float/band stopping right in front of us. Oh, to sleep like a baby. What he did see he seemed to enjoy. 

(Sidenote: David's getting HUGE. Almost 20 pounds already, can you believe it?)

Later we had some friends and Mike's family over for dinner. It was fun. I have to admit though. .  the part of the evening I enjoyed most was when everyone went to the fireworks and I stayed home with a sleeping David and the dog. Now that I'm a mom, I'm finding that I have very little quality alone time. As much as I love my husband and baby, sometimes it's nice to just be by myself. So after everyone left last night, I put the ipod on shuffle, cleaned up the house, caught up on folding laundry for the first time in months, and generally just enjoyed the solitude. The fireworks go off only a few blocks from our house, so near the end I walked out onto the front sidewalk and caught a glimpse of a few. That was enough for me. 

mother's day, this year and last

I want to preface this photo by saying, it's an OLD photo. I'm definitely NOT pregnant again. :)

This is what we were doing a year ago on Mother's day. Even though this is my first official Mother's Day, it was definitely something last year. 

Where would any of us be without our mothers? Now that I have a child of my own I'm amazed by my parents. Amazed by any parent that turns out a halfway decent, normal, happy child. It's a daunting task, but not without it's charm. 

Especially this particular charm. The end result of those two little lines, one year later.

just about everything!

brain dump! there's about a million things I've been meaning to blog about. Here you go. 

I've been falling into a pretty good work/home/life balance. It's not ideal but I think for now it's pretty close. As usual, David is as stellar a baby as I could hope for, so that definitely helps. He's been going to sleep between 7-8, only waking up twice, and then up for the day around 7:30. That last part is key, since I can get up at a decent hour, get ready by myself, and THEN have some fun baby times before we head out for the day. The mornings go about ten times better than I could have imagined. 

Work has been pretty good too. This week was kind of a big deal for me; I was art directing a photoshoot by myself for the first time. I had a lot of apprehension about it initially. I don't think art directing is one of my strong suits, plus a few things have happened at work in the past year that have really done a number on my self-confidence. And I always feel like self-confidence is half the battle. But! It went pretty well, and I definitely feel like I did better every day. Even my half-assy food styling skills improved. I'm happy I was given the chance to do this and I hope that I can continue to improve. 

And overall, I really do enjoy going to work. Do I feel like I'm missing out on seeing my son? Yes. But. I also feel like I enjoy David so much more when I see him for only a limited time. Something about that sounds horrible, but it's true though. When I'm with him, I'm totally loving it since I know the time is precious. 

He's getting so fun, too! He is making little laughy baby noises. He's grabbing at toys and really examining them. When it's been sunny after work, I've been taking him on little walks in the Baby Bjorn, and he loves looking up at trees, he gets this fascinated look on his face and just studies them intently.  It's totally adorable. 

So, in summation: things are good. I don't know if I could ask for much better. 

David loves the dog. Isn't this the cutest?

back again

I don’t know why, but I think I assumed when I came back to work things would be really different. So far it has been SO SIMILAR it feels like the past three months have not happened. I still love working with the same people and projects, and the same people and projects still annoy me. I can’t keep my desk clean for the life of me. I start every morning with the intention of working super hard and then end up chatting way too much and checking my email every 15 minutes.

 

It’s like so many other aspects of life post-baby. When David was born, my entire world was reborn. My perspective, my goals, the way I think about myself and my life. With all those things changing, it felt natural to me that the rest of the world should be different too. But somehow the rest of the world was unaware of the existence of my son. What, no parades? No renaming of expressways or airports? Everyone else is still attending work and school and driving around and going about their lives like nothing happened? Huh, strange. The first time I left the house by myself post-baby, I went to my beloved Target. Everything about it was exactly the same, but I felt like I was somewhere new and different. Hard to describe. 

Anyway, I'm doing surprisingly well back at work. I only cried once this week, and those were happiness tears when I saw his first smile after picking him up at daycare. The transition was mostly eased by the fact that Mike stayed home almost every day this week. The hardest part of going back to work is the whole morning routine getting myself and the baby up and ready and out the door. David doesn't start full time at day care until the week after next; so maybe it will be more challenging then. For now I'm easing into this life adjustment. It's going better than I expected. 

Easter 2009

A couple from Easter and one more from this morning for good measure.

As soon as I started writing here I heard the little gruntings that mean my little man is waking up from his noontime nap. It's our last full day together; usually I'd let him be for a while and finish writing, but time is precious today so it's baby playtime now. 

Hope you had a happy Easter. 

One week and a bit

Yesterday was a big day for our family: David's baptism! I know a lot of people wondered why we didn't wait a while to baptize him, but it's something that's pretty important to Mike and I and I'm so glad we did it. 

It is such a blessing to have a pastor for a dad. Not only did he marry us, but he also performed the baptism yesterday, for his namesake grandson. While it was happening I remember feeling like it was one of the most holy moments of my life, with my dad performing the sacrament, my brother and sister in law as sponsors, and our church's pastors there too. It felt nice to be in church, too, something so normal to me after the past week of non-normalcy. 

After all of yesterday's hoopla and family visits and running around, we're decompressing a bit today. It's so nice to have Mike at home for an extra hand with diaper changes and milk warming. The next five days alone are looming large for me. I'm lucky that David sleeps so well at night, but I'm definitely still adjusting to being at home and learning how to take care of this new little person all by myself. 

baby and puppy, just hangin' out

Merry Christmas

image from notebookdoodles. (a new blog discovery, which is a gift in itself.)

Although it's been a tough few days, the sun is finally out today and I'm feeling happy and Christmassy. This was the first year ever that I've not been with my family on Christmas Eve, which was difficult. But video iChat, lots of baking, and positive thoughts have made a big difference. Even though I'm not with my loved ones, at least I have them and it's just one day out of the year.

Today we had breakfast and presenting with Mike's family, and now we're watching episodes of Arrested Development and working on crosswords. I made croissants and pain au chocolate, which has been on my baking to-do list for a while, and feels like a nice accomplishment. Maybe later today a nap and some snacks, with fake champagne. Yay.

Merry Christmas, everyone.

calming. family.

I try not to sit at the computer so late in the evening, but I'm still riled up from a crazy day at work. Sometimes I have a hard time calming myself down after something stressful. So here I am, with my hot apple cider and my "dreamy" mix on itunes. mike is watching baseball in the other room and the dryer is humming pleasantly. I guess the best part about post-work restlessness is that I get a lot done: clean sheets on the bed, laundry has been done, dishwasher is running and kitchen is clean.

I had a great weekend visiting my family in Iowa and Minnesota. Both of my maternal grandparents have birthdays in October, and this year they are both 80. The majority of my mom's side got together saturday afternoon on my aunt and uncle's lovely farm in southern Minnesota. It was beautiful. And amazing to see so much family. I hadn't seen most of my cousins since my wedding. Also amazing that we are pretty much all grown-ups now. There isn't really a "kids table" at these family functions anymore. And if there is, it's for the next generation, the great-grandkids. Time just running along.

I brought my camera along this weekend and did not take a single photo. Sometimes you just want to experience things, not capture them, you know? I think I'm okay with it.

my special little ditka friend

i love my dog so much, i'm one of those people. this morning she gave me a little scare. . . . poor puggy had a seizure. I took her in to the vet and I think everything is probably okay. it could have just been a blood sugar thing, since she didn't eat enough yesterday. they sent away some blood work so by tomorrow we should find out if it's anything worse. it's amazing how distracted I can be just from worrying about my little pup. I got all my work done today but my heart just was not in it.

i have some happier things to share, too, but today I just wanted to post these photos. i did a little ditka photo shoot last spring. I should do this more often, i have tons of pictures of Mike and I, but not too many of the dog. she deserves it.

warmth!

my mom and I at "cloud gate" (aka, the bean) millenium park, Chicago.

okay, how many other good things could have happened this weekend?
1. friday night i fell asleep on the couch at 9 PM. yes, that's a good thing.
2. my mom came to visit. and she brought dari barn ice cream. .. with crunch coat (a hometown favorite). dude, best thing ever, in the universe.
3. we went to millenium park saturday afternoon and just sat there forever watching people. i really love millenium park, I truly do, and am really happy that some of my tax dollars as a city dweller funded it's billion dollar-ness.
3a. we had such a nice day walking around downtown, walking along the lakefront, drinking warm drinks at the cosi on michigan avenue with all the art kids, taking the metra through all the western suburbs, etc. etc.
4. today I did the crossword on the patio, then fell into some kind of dreamy sun coma/ half sleep. SUNSHINE. it is back, and like I said, I honestly feel like I'm in a whole new world. it's glorious.
4a. also this afternoon I made some collages with the windows open. is there anything nicer than a good music mix mingled with the birdsongs from the backyard? it's kind of the ultimate nice sunday afternoon sound.
5. tonight mike and I rode our bikes over to a friends house, sat on a patio, drank beers, and petted dogs. let's think about all the good things in that sentence. there's a lot.

Honestly though, it's so strange to live in this new universe of warmth. I feel like this was one of the worst winters I've ever lived through and now it's totally bizarre to get used to non-winter anymore. I'm sure I sound like some kind of weirdo talking about this, but I'm guessing if you live above the mason-dixon line you'll probably understand. SPRINGTIME. Yes.

Iowa, pajamas, music

I feel like I'm just going to toss a pile of images and sentences here tonight. but that's okay. I guess I'll number them to make it seem less scatterbrained. We all know the truth though.

1. This weekend we went to Iowa for my new niece's baptism. It was nice to be with my whole family, as it always is. And good to get out of town, even if we did go somewhere with way MORE snow than here. Always love some Iowa time.

2. I realized the other day that I have been wearing the same pajamas for like three years now. Not cool. So, i took action!


These are from target and they are ADORABLE. Way cuter in person I think. The colors are really pretty and the pattern is so cute. On sale for $9 at my target! It doesn't get any better than that.

3. And finally. i have been listening to the same mix for the majority of this month. Lovin' it. Mindy, this should be coming your way sometime soon. . . :)

2007, in photos

Last night, as I was falling asleep around 11:40 (yes, lame, but I'm 100% fine with that) i told my husband that 2007 has been one of the best years of my life. It really has been.

the evidence:


rome. my heart explodes in love for rome


friendship. lea, renae, valerie and I at the baha'i temple.


my beautiful garden.


boston. and my newfound love for baseball.


being the star mascot at my company's national conference (what a bizarre yet wonderful experience!)


visiting my grandpa's farm in iowa with the whole family.

almost too much to name. It's hard to condense all the good things, great and small, about this year into a few photographs and a couple paragraphs.

happy new year, friends. here's to another one that's even better.

peace

Happy, happy Christmastime. The past few days have been so full of family and friends and nice quiet moments with Mike and the dog too. This is the little princess asleep in a sunbeam this morning.

The days have been so peaceful and I'm grateful and humbled by that, feeling so blessed. I strive for peace and seek it out, balancing myself by making art and saying small prayers and trying to live in the present, happy moments. Taking all these things and pondering them in my heart, you know, the true meaning of Christmas.

So today I have the day off work and am just puttering. I'm hoping to clean up the house a bit and send some things on their way to Goodwill, evening out the flow of new things into the house by sending others on their way out. Though I will say, I haven't done any of that yet since I always get distracted when I'm in the house. Taking a few photos of some recent art to share.





a new page in my art journal. and the journal, almost full. maybe I'll try to finish it in the next few days so I can start fresh in the new year.

larger sizes at my flickr.

two years

according to wikipedia, the second anniversary is the "cotton" anniversary. but apparently in our household it's the tennis racket anniversary.

anyway, yeah, we've been married for two years. it hardly feels that long... it was a good night tonight though. we had a nice dinner out and afterwards walked down to the county fairgrounds. the circus is in town tomorrow and we caught a glimpse of some of it. it was a nice evening.





may is such an excellent month for us. really, the past few weeks have been nothing less than perfect springtime.