Life in Color Photo – Page 76 – Celebrating crafts, kids and the everyday through photographs.

The gong show to end all gong shows

Oh my I don't even know what the last 24 hours have been so insane. And I don't mean an itty bitty bit insane, an annoying tiny bit insane, but full on CRAZY. Let me back up. Last night I was sitting here in bed blogging, thinking, "Gosh you're so lucky Amber. Sleeping baby, plus comfy bed, plus internet time on the husband's computer, score!"

And then the universe was like POW! And Tuesday woke up. No big deal. This was about 11:45 and I usually feed her around midnight so I went in, picked up my little bug and settled into the glider. I fed her and put her down. I was a little antsy to get back to my show on Hulu and didn't stay as long as I normally do to pat her back. This turned out to be a horrible mistake and as soon as I got snuggled up again she was awake crying for me. I went back, picked her up and tried to calm her, but she was starting to get really upset, and I was starting to get really tired so I figured I would just nurse her some more. Well she was pretty much asleep on the breast so she nursed really slow. But when ever I tried to get her to finish she complained. I started thinking maybe something else was bothering her so I checked her diaper, it did feel a little wet so I changed her, getting her all upset again.

By now it had been an hour and was a quarter to one, so I figured maybe she should sleep with me. At this point I should say Bj was away on a business trip and I was not thinking so clearly after a few days (and nights) of full Tuesday duty. I unplug her fan, balancing Tutu in the other arm, and plugged it in my room. I laid down on the bed, laid a (by this point sobbing) Tuesday next to me and nursed her some more. Only same problem, as soon as I took her off the breast big tears. But now it was worse than ever. I thought if I could just lay there and pat her back she would be happy. I should know better people, SERIOUSLY! The girl has not liked sleeping in our bed since she was six weeks old. But I keep hearing stories of my friends and how their babies just relax when they are next to them, not my girl. So I pack up the fan again and head back to Tuesday's room.

She's a crying mess by now, and I text Bj that I am really struggling. He's still up working on a project so he calls me. I put him on speaker and one little, "Hey Tutu it's papa" and silence. She just stares at the phone, like THAT is what she's been waiting for. She turns happy, but is not recovered enough to sleep, oh no. She is up, as in AWAKE. It is a quarter to two at this point and I just grab a pillow and blanket and lay on her floor while she reads (okay rips apart) a book and plays with her stacking cups, occasionally pulling her away from the bookshelf (we need to figure something out there, danger). I finally see a yawn 45 minutes later and decided to nurse her again and put her down. I haven't wanted to let her cry because Sciarrino is sleeping downstairs on my couch. Well I mean I never really can let her cry, but that was another reason. So I nurse her. She is so calm and so ASLEEP, yes! I pick her up off my lap, give her a cuddle and go to put her in the crib. This is when I realize she has peed through her diaper, probably because of all the milky. I lay her on the floor and she is out cold, of course. I have to strip off her wearable blanket thing, nightie, and diaper, so of course she is awoken by the end, and upset. I nurse her again and finally at 3:30, 2 hours and 45 minutes later she is sleeping. I crash in my bed and don't hear from her again until 7:45, when I go in, nurse her, and put her down. Because when you go to bed at 3:30, 7:45 is the middle of the night. We slept in until 10:30 and I could have used, oh I don't know about forty more hours.

I'm sure I did a million things wrong there. But man, it was rough. When she woke up she had peed through her diaper again. I ran out of night time diapers (I used fuzzibunz for night) and the regular ones aren't absorbent enough for her at night. I got her all changed, nursed her, and then got ready myself. We were headed to Portland today. I was happy that I got out of the house by 12:15, but had to make a stop to get a copy of Sciarrino's key, in case I needed a place to crash up north during the day. After I made the copy I called Sciarrino to drop off the original and she was at a little antique store. Oh darn I would have to go and drop off the key. And:

impulse buy. The coolest bin ever. I decided we couldn't drive up to Portland with that, and Tuesday needed to be fed again by this time any way. I was close by home still so we went back. I decided to change her first and of course she had peed through her diaper (I swear this never happens, just a crazy day). So I had to change her completely. Then feed her. Then we were on the road. Only the light came on for tire pressure so I had to stop and take care of that. And be a total girl and get help from the attendants because I know next to nothing about my car (terrible, just terrible, I hope Tuesday has some car skills). Then I am finally on the road. And I met my friend only two and half hours late! Luckily Matt is a wonderful friend and was not upset. He is in town just for a week, for his brother's wedding. He lives all the way in New York and I would have been crushed not to see him. You may know him as the One Who Came Up With My Porch Design. He thinks this is no big deal, but I love him for it. We ate out, Tuesday had a little bit of the potato leak soup on the menu, which she loves. We went for a walk and ran a few errands.

Matt and Tutu had fun making faces at each other. The day went super quick and by six we were back at his mom's house and I was feeding Tuesday (yes, she had a five hour nursing gap in there – I couldn't believe it!). I left to pick up Bj at the airport, we had dinner, drove home, put Tuesday down and now it is 11:27. I figure that has to be the worst night ever, right? I mean tonight is going to be fantastic, because even a little bit better would be great. I guess I'm just an eternal optimist, I'll let you know how it went. Signing off,

One tired mama.

Fall Festival

Early fall always seems so full, I think it's because everyone wants to squeeze the last little bit of summer in. Even though we had just gone up to the Flock and Fiber Festival the day before Tutu and I decided to go down to the Corvallis Fall Festival on Sunday. Oh we had so much fun! We met up with Erin and Sarah and walked around in my old college town. The day started out wonderfully by watching a bunch of little dancers making their debut:

Oh the cuteness. I can not wait to put a tutu on Tutu and get her dancing. Bj and I have been looking for a new piece of art for our house and as soon as I saw this I knew it was it.

I'll come back and edit the post with the name of the artist, I'm upstairs blogging in bed right now 🙂

I don't think any picture I take of it would do it justice. The layers of paint, just all the yumminess, I'm in love. I sent Bj a text with a picture and when he didn't answer right away (he was mowing the yard), I started freaking out thinking someone else was going to snag it. But it was meant to be. Oh and Sarah, yes, Bj loved it when I got home. I knew he would. Makes me want to get my butt back in the printmaking/painting/creating mood more than ever! And next by a lesser known artist:

Miss Sparkly Pants made her pottery painting debut. Erin was kind enough to snap a few shots of the process. Really easy, but the guy helping kept calling her "the subject" which was kind of weird.

I like this picture Erin took of Tuesday, can you see her little teeth bumps?

They are there! We picked up another little toy from our favorite local wooden toy maker, and finally found a local source for a wooden bowl.

Tuesday loves both. Right now when I feed Tutu I just put her food in a little custard dish and keep it on the table so she can't reach it. I've tried giving her some finger foods, but so far that has ended badly (poor thing threw up one time and choked the other). We only started solids about a month and a half ago, so I'm sure she'll get the hang of it eventually. She already drinks really well at least. One of her cutest new tricks:

Oh, fine, you want a video? 🙂

Haha, the burping was cracking me up (obviously). Sarah knit her the bib, and Sciarrino the hat – handknits will not get wasted in this house! When I was a the market today I gave Tutu a little taste of my split pea soup. I decided not to give her any more and she freaked her freak out, so I decided it was time to start giving her a second meal a day. This was one of her first lunches.

So that was the fall festival (with a little tangent on Tuesday's eating habits). It was a beautiful day!

At the market

After she hung out with aunt Sciarrino during my haircut she was in such a good mood I decided to take her downtown. Nursed her at Nordstroms (the best place in any mall to nurse!) and picked her up a couple pairs of mini shoes. I saw a mom with a newborn in a baby bijorn, one year old in a stroller, and a three year old at her side. She was dressed so cute and trying on a pair of pumps. What? Why do I feel like I should get an award for just taking tutu to the market? Does it get easier with more kids?

The forth year of fiber

On Saturday my neighbor, her friend, Tuesday and I headed to the Oregon Flock and Fiber Festival. It was my forth year of going, the first was at the end of the first summer at my new cottage. I love looking at all the fun stuff, colors, animals, fiber, yarn, and I knew Tuesday would too.

Crazy mad skilled knitters and their crazy knits:

Oh my goodness those stockings!!! I put a limit on myself since I have much un-spun stash. I did break out the credit card at the Blue Moon booth after I found out they are not having their barn sale.

I think I finally found the perfect grey color for a hoodie for Tutu.

No plan for this yet, but oh the prettiness! Tina was so nice at the booth. They actually took picture of Tutu and I (which is good because I didn't) and posted them on their blog, check it out (and click the pictures to make them bigger) here. Other than that I got a few bundles of lovely fiber.

I want to spin this now, yum!

This alpaca is the softest thing I have ever touched in my life. It is so clean I think I will just spin it straight and then wash the yarn after I make it. Other than fiber and yarn I got a few pieces of handmade felt, some mohair locks (Tracy has a drum carder she is going to show me how to use), some beautiful stitch markers (she also sells on etsy) and this sweater made in Peru:

Our friend Kathy pointed this out to me and I was sold with that long hood – oh the cuteness! Today Tuesday wore another sweater I didn't make. The one I found at a garage sale for 50 cents earlier this year. Paired with a Juicy Couture top (finally found something cute at the Rack, love Juicy, but man can it be expensive) and gap yoga pants I think she looked quite stylish:

I tried to take more photos of her today, but this is her new face:

What is up with this face? It's a happy smile, I mean she's happy when she does it, but it looks kind of evil or something. Maybe I'm just not used to it. I have been working on some additional stash enhancements in other crafty areas:

It took me a while to wash it, iron it, and re-fold it. But I love having my fabric ready to play with when ever I might get a little window of time. Lately those seem to be quite hard to find, but I'm constantly on the lookout!

13 months, 1 car

So it's been just about 13 months since Bj and I decided to go with the one car system. I have to say I love it. I know Bj doesn't always feel the same way (part of that could be his love affair with a certain Audi), but it is working for us. I have found that over time things I never thought I do by walking seem like no big deal, like going downtown. We are lucky enough to both work from home, and to live with in a couple of miles of the city center. When Bj does have to go into work I don't find myself stuck at home often, unless I want to be. Friday was the perfect example of an impromptu adventure with Tuesday and the stroller. After a fun morning of learning new tricks:

We packed up and headed out. I had to drop off my packages at the post office (a mile and a half away) and Donna was already out and about with William so we met up with her for a few blocks, saying goodbye at the park. After the park it was to the post office, then I figured we could pop into a used bookstore.

One of those books was my favorite when I was little, Who Want an Old Teddy Bear (oh my gosh I didn't know that was part of series!!!). I stopped at an eyeglass shop to try on some sunglasses, mine have been missing going on three weeks and I'm starting to give up hope. Sciarrino met us at Greenbaum's where I found the perfect fabric to back the new quilt. And maybe a few other things as well (hey I had a coupon from the fair). We ate dinner at a new little place I hadn't tried before and then popped over to TJ Max where Sciarrino found a dress for our next adventure. I found one too, and then had to feed Tuesday in the dressing room and remembered why I haven't been wearing any of my dresses – it's impossible to nurse in them! We walked Sciarrino to the bus station, and that was as far as Tutu got.

It was seven by this time and starting to get dusky. So wonderful, the city was turning quiet as I pushed her up over the hill and back through the park. This was my favorite part of the day, dare I say week.

Kids were running around, crickets chirping, wind was blowing, and the light was just lovely. I pulled up to my house after popping in to say hello to my neighbor and realized I wouldn't have had that experience if we had a second car. I would have just driven downtown and skipped the extra stuff. Just going where I needed to go. It might not always be the easiest thing, but I think the benefits far out weigh any annoying aspects the single car life, at least for now.

A little piec(ing) goes a long way

I am this far on my little quilt (goal size around 50" square – but we'll see):

And I loaded all my photos onto a little thumb drive so I'm sitting upstairs on Bj's laptop with all those little wifi bars filled in happily surfing away. Ah life is good. Today a teeny tiny little bit of one of Tutu's teeth started poking through, and she seemed much better. We got out of the house, ran some errands, and even had her fall asleep in the car. So I tried the car seat on the shopping cart trick in Jo-Ann's, have you seen people doing this? I always have a sling, baby hawk, or the stroller. But she was ASLEEP and so I balanced the carseat where the baby sits in a shopping cart and it actually fit in there pretty good. I had to go out to get more thread (and to preserve some of my sanity):

Some little treats for mama. I had coupons for everything (love that), so I stocked up on some stuff. Needles, iron-off (interfacing….), pattern weights and thread. I always want to take my thread case in to the store to get what I'm missing, but feel weird doing it. I'm thinking with the light purple that I'm going to quilt the thing in straight lines. I still haven't found a backing fabric, Bj said no florals, and that was what I was leaning towards. He mentioned that florals reminded him of grandmas (not you I'm sure Nana and Grandma). I don't think he's taken a good look around the house lately… I did find this beautiful fabric:

That I'm going to bind it with. My lovely local shop only had a fat quarter when I got it, but they were nice enough to tell me what it was and I found eight yards of it on clearance (It's a Joel Dewberry print called Sunburst in green from his Aviary line – I am going to be on the look out for all the other colorways of this, yum!). I sort of had a panic when the shop keeper told me that fabric turns over every four months or so. So I also picked up some of my other favorite prints because hey, guess what? It takes a lot of fabric to back a quilt. Not as much to piece it when you start with fabrics you've gleaned from your husband's stash. Wait what? Bj has a fabric stash? Yes he does, he just doesn't know it.

The white/baby blue/pinkish stripe and the plaid were my inspiration for the quilt – and also used to be Bj's clothes. Sure I'll take that bag to Goodwill for you honey. I have my eye on a few things that are not even close to being on the way out the door either, I hope they don't get ruined in wash. Just kidding, I can wait it out, I've got a nice little stash of them to work with now, and some of the fabric really is lovely. It's gotten me thinking about using other alternative fabrics. I'm obsessed with sheet sets right now. From what I've gathered from middle of the night iPhone googling you can use sheets, but a 200 thread count or less is best. If it is hard to pierce a safety pin through the fabric the weave might be too tight to quilt. I have my eye on this organic set from Pottery Barn, this one from Pottery Barn Kids, and a king size duvet cover from the Company Store (to practice my free motion quilting along the shapes). I have taken the time to figure out what the price per yard equivalent is. I took 36 x 44 (the normal width of quilting cotton) to get 1,584 square inches per yard. Then I figured out how many square inches and thus yards were in sheets and sheet sets. I wrote it on the back of my quilter's reference card I keep in my wallet. So for example a twin flat sheet yields four yards. If it's $20 then the fabric is about five dollars a yard. If anyone wants all the math I've done I'll happily post it.

So yes life seems to be much better. And now that I am back to writing it out look how much I got done, whoo hoo. I can't thank you enough for all the wonderful comments. I always love reading comments, but find them particularly wonderful when I am having a rough day. Lots of love to you all!

Dial Up, Dial In

It seems my days have been very full, in ways I like and in ways I'd rather not have to deal with (horribly upset teething Tutu – but thanks for the tips, they are helping!). I have been getting an every so tiny bit of crafting in. I snapped this picture with my iPhone before pulling off the pieces to stack and put together:

I have better pictures of it coming together, but I thought what happened next was more representative of how I feel about many things in life right now.

I bumped the board. And all that work of deciding what goes where and putting them just so was scattered about on the floor. I don't have a lot of time to do much of anything craft wise. So I sighed and got out the phone to reference and put them all back up again. Then Tutu started crying so I balanced her on one hip while stacking the rows.

And I bumped the board again. I just wanted to finish ONE THING. I feel that I can't do that ever and it's driving me nutso! I have yarn spun and plied that is one my wheel because I have no time to get it off (this is a process that takes 15 minutes tops). So I took a deep breath, took sobbing little Tuesday upstairs and told Bj, "I need 15 minuets, I need it, PLEASE." He took Tuesday, I figured out the pattern (again), got the rest of the blocks stacked and ready to piece and feel much better. I have seriously got to get it together! My mom thinks it's her fault I feel that I have to get so much done. She called today to apologize after explaining that I must have gotten it from her. She was throwing a neighborhood girls night out party (such a cool idea to meet all the neighbors!) but at the same time felt she had to finish a blanket, run to the store, etc. Of course the difference is that she did it all…

Maybe I just need to get back to the blogging every day to feel better, because I do get things done, but life seems to be moving so fast I can't focus on any one very long. The problem is the !#$@#% wifi won't connect well to my computer, and now not to my phone. And I realize this is terribly spoiled of me, but I've gotten used to surfing the web and uploading things super fast. I do not like the whole, go make a cup of tea while a page loads thing, at all. I think maybe that is the Universe telling me to slow down, take a breath and look around. Which I plan to do for the rest of the week. Hopefully I'll be able to upload and tell you all about it.

Life in a gated community

Okay I totally staged that photo, but had to get one of Tuesday and the gates. Bj put three of them up last week and we're waiting on an extension for the one in the basement to partition off half of it. It doesn't really matter right now for miss super slow mover, but she is just so on the verge of being everywhere I can tell. She is also no the verge of getting teeth. I know I said that before but this time, whoa they are so close! I have been trying to get her relief so basically she's been my super special buddy all day – either because I'm holding her or nursing her, hence the lack of computer/crafting/blogging time. I think my mom told me about teething biscuits so I had Bj pick them up today when he ran errands. This is the first "food" Tuesday has held to eat (we feed her with a spoon usually). Oh the mess.

I do think she likes it though. And she is working it on her gums; making a fist with one hand while she rubs the biscuit as hard as she can on her soon to be teeth.

After this one little experiment the biscuits are for high chair use only! And I need to make the little clothes I got the supplies for to keep near it to clean her up. I actually need to do a lot of things, but I am really having trouble trying to figure out how, so sorry about the quietness on the blog front as of late. I expect we will be back to being super fabulous just as soon as those little buggers peek their way through the gums.

8 months

Little Miss Sparkle Pants turned eight months old a few days ago. So unbelievable to me. Again I find that she is growing and changing more than I can keep up with. Or barely take a picture of:

And to my sweet little Tuesday Lee, I'm sorry I have not filled out your baby book!!! I'm going to write you a note here instead.

You are getting so big and strong. You had a temperature around 7.5 months so we took you to the doctor and you weighed 13.5 pounds (that's still not as heavy as your great grandpa when he was born!). I think that this makes you big, but really you are still quite a wee little thing. I think your temp was due to teething, as your gums seem to bother you a lot! I can see the teeth just under there, but they have been that way for weeks, poor thing.

And because you are so skinny I continue to put you in onsies like this one, from your friend Beachwood. It is a size 1-3 months, and you only need a crotch snap extender to fit in it still. But some of your pants are 12 month size (I think a lot of that has to do with your cute cloth diaper butt though!). People remark about your seriousness, but you can also be quite loud and funny. I think you just really love studying every little thing you can find:

This morning I couldn't figure out what you were concentrating on and it was one of my hairs you picked up off the floor! I didn't think babies could see that well, maybe you have super good vision. I hope so, I don't like wearing my glasses and don't wish that for you! You finally took to eating solids this month and so far I have made them all for you. You'll try anything, even if you don't like it (I figure you don't like something when you eat it and then shutter). So far your favorite thing has been butternut squash, from what I can tell. You also enjoy pear, summer squash, sweet potato, plum, banana, yam, and applesauce. You are not as fond of cereals, carrots or zucchini. I gave you a tiny piece of zucchini bread about the size of my pinkie nail. You some how smashed it into thirty pieces, each time picking one up and further destroying it, but never putting it in your mouth. I just started giving you two meals a day, which you seem to enjoy. I think part of the fun for you is sitting at the table with us while we eat. I also love our dinners and so enjoy the conversation and family time. I was afraid when I was pregnant (and the dining room was storage) that we would have a hard time getting away from eating so many meals in front of the TV, since we don't let you watch it, but it hasn't been a problem.

Since I am with you all day I can read you pretty well. I know when you are going to have a breakdown, or when you are really tired (usually related), but have still not figure out how to get you to nap much to prevent this. I don't nurse you to sleep any more, but in the middle of the night you do cry out for me, and you can take a good long time to eat and go back to sleep. This makes mama pretty tired and I haven't really figure out what we are going to do about that. A couple weeks ago you started going potty in the toilet when I notice you have to go and I set you on it. It's not all the time, but enough that it makes me very happy, and you too – you will not be in a dirty diaper long before you start to seriously complain.

Perhaps my favorite development has been your ability to say mama. At first I didn't think you knew that was me, but now I think you do. When ever you say it I say, "mama's right here" and that makes you smile. Also totally adorable? Your ability to give a little princess wave.

And one more late breaking development. As I was filling out the eight month questionnaire the doctor sent home you kept grabbing it and I exclaimed that you had a long reach. I realized as I moved back that you were in fact doing a sort of army crawl to get to me. I backed up several feet and sure enough you could get to me! Papa has installed baby gates (that you can climb), and our floors are constantly being cleaned to keep you from getting something you shouldn't.

I love you with all my heart baby girl!

The long weekend

Over the weekend Bj and I drove almost five hours to his parent's (mom and step dad). I note the time because Tuesday spent the whole drive up ASLEEP. That is craziness. She went 6.5 hours with out eating, near her record. Not only that but when we pulled her out of her car seat her diaper was bone dry. It was a great start to an easy going weekend. We basically just hang out. Oh and bought about twenty pounds of tomatoes, because apparently I can't learn a lesson! Off to work on that (while wearing Tutu who now refuses to sleep AT ALL). But first some pictures:

With Bj's step sister and her family who were able to come visit from a couple hours away. Fun to have all the grandkids together:

Yeah for cousins! Tutu was in heaven with everyone talking to and playing with her all day long:

Now to tackle those tomatoes, because you know, if I don't do it right it might kill me, great…