sueeeus

I’ve been meaning to make these for quite some time. I had the pattern squirreled away for over twenty years, but couldn’t find it. Then my grandmother relinquished the coveted heirloom set to my mother, who passed it to me, and I was able to make a new pattern from them.

The beginnings.

I also wanted to try toy making with my serger, using the rolled edge stitch, which I LOVE. Sadly, I’m learning that sergers don’t do well with small things or curves. They work great for long straight things. It could very well be me, though. I’m new to sergers.

I used the serger on the mother, but went back to the old fashioned tried and true sewing machine for the piglets. Even so, I find that making such small things is quite difficult with a machine. It would have helped if I’d chosen friendlier fabrics, but I had my heart set on these fun prints.

Some of the piglets are a bit wonky, but isn’t that the way siblings are? Some have different characteristics than others, but they all have their finer points (siblings, not stuffed piglets). All in all, I think they exhibit personality. Not the best workmanship, but they’re cute, and I’m not displeased.

Spurred by a recent visit to Target in which we found it impossible to steer past the toy aisle without the young lad going berserk, I devised a plan. No, you can’t have everything you see and everything you want. These things are privileges, and you must earn them.

Okay, so I tried to put it in terms of 3-1/2 year old language skills. The Good Boy Chart. I made a set of magnets with happy pictures and a chart with ten spaces to fill. Good boy deeds earn magnets. But they can also be forfeited. So it’s one step forward, two steps back. But he gets it! So all week he’s been working on earning stars, and he is now very close to earning a reward. He wants a Batman mask.

Last night he opted to continue with his bad behavior, and have a star removed. It was quite amazing to me, that he weighed the cost of the transgression, and decided he’d rather go on doing what he was doing, which was something he wasn’t supposed to be doing, but which was FUN! …and forfeit a star.

I can see we’re going to have our work cut out for us.

We did remove the star, then he decided he’d go ahead and stop doing what he wasn’t supposed to be doing. He wanted the star back, because he’d stopped, but I explained that he had had his chance, and now he has to earn it back again.

I’m a tough mamma-jamma.

*~*~*~*~*~*

My 8 year old nephew is spending the weekend, and my little guy’s behavior slides drastically during such times. He (my nephew) is the sweetest boy, but I think my son just gets too wound up and excited to have him here. Consequently, there were meltdowns and a significant loss of stars. This morning we worked hard doing jobs to earn them back. Sadly, Target was freshly out of the coveted Batman mask, but happily, they had a bazillion other things to choose from, and my little one was tickled pink to get to choose… …a Transformer -Barricade- which also, as luck would have it, was marked down to $5 from $20. Woot.

Swinging, as in mood swings. And not so much swinging as a general tendency towards irritability. Directed mainly at Gadget. Of course. It doesn’t help that he snaps back, rather than graciously understanding and accepting that I’m at the mercy of raging hormones, and this is just another stage in the journey. See how cleverly I don’t take any responsibility for my behavior?

Swelling. As if there wasn’t enough of that already. It seems to contribute to the full body aches. The weight is climbing rapidly now, as evidenced by the indentations left in my skin from even the least amount of pressure. I decided to rest for a while around 8:30 p.m., fell asleep until 10:30, awoke with hands numb, tingling, and swollen. I might have tried to continue sleeping, except I’d forgotten to administer my insulin and I decided I ought to drink more fluids in an attempt to address the swelling situation. Then I started thinking of this, that, and the other thing (we shall call it nesting), so couldn’t go back to sleep anyway.

Nesting. Instead, I emptied two kitchen drawers and filled them with bottles, breast-pump supplies, burp towels and bibs. The diaper station is well on its way to being nicely stocked with teensy tiny diapers, wipes, Desitin, A&D ointment, towels and baby blankets. Still milling about my mind are other things to do. Nothing critical, at this point. Just some sewing projects.

I’ve pre-registered with the hospital and with my insurance company, submitted my leave of absence paperwork and submitted my short term disability claim, coordinated my leave and return to work schedule with my boss and lead, registered for the use of the mother’s room at the office (which is nearly fully booked, but since I will have the luxury, thank the heavens above, of telecommuting most days for several months, I can take care of the lactation business in the comfort and privacy of my own home), and updated my on-line calendars with my leave and return schedules. As far as work goes, I’m good to go. Apart from actually wrapping up all the projects I’m working on, that is.

There are three people in my little corner of the world who do the particular line of work that we do, and both my lead (the Guru) and I (the Capable Sidekick) will be gone for a full week at the end of August, leaving Chicken Little alone with the sky falling. My lead said it will be good for him, which prompted me to ask how he (the Guru) remains so calm all the time, and he said, simply, will it matter in six months? If not, then it’s not worth getting all worked up over now. Genius! Why has it never occurred to me to apply such criteria? I could have skipped that whole Zoloft phase. In our work, we deal with multi-million-dollar products and the owners thereof, and it’s so easy to be whipped into a frenzy by their demands, so this golden nugget of learning how to put things in perspective and place a little distance between the stress and the bigger picture is just that. Golden. So. The work projects that I don’t finish? Will it matter in six months that I haven’t finished them? Probably not. If someone else doesn’t finish them (and they won’t –I generally work independently on these special projects), then I’ll just pick up where I left off when I return. No sweat. It’s so liberating!

Well, the daily brush fires will have to be dealt with, but my own projects will wait if need be.  The Guru will, of course, be fine, and Chicken Little will have to find a way to cope. I will not worry. Nay, I will not even think of them! I’ll be swaddling, snuggling, caring for and reveling in my beautiful little boy.

I confirmed that my insurance covers 96 hours of hospital stay following the birth of the baby, during which time such special services as lactation specialists are covered, and after which they are not, therefore my plan is to demand that I stay in hospital until my milk comes in and I’m confident that my little guy is feeding well, assuming this takes place within 4 days. Surely my milk will come in by then. Our hospitals are notorious for moving mothers through as quickly as possible, so I’m planning to stand firm on this. I don’t want a repeat of the lactation nightmares endured with my first beautiful boy, and want to take full advantage of what the insurance plan will allow.

And my beautiful boy’s birth date has been changed to August 27th. I’ll have the amnio done on the morning of the 25th and find out by that afternoon whether his lungs are ready, and if so, it’s a go. If not, we wait until the next week. I’m fairly confident that he’ll be ready, but I have nothing at all to base that upon, other than I’ve been controlling the blood sugar fairly well, so his development shouldn’t be impaired by the diabetes. He might not even be a hulking Goliath after all. So far, he’s measuring a bit smaller than my first was at this stage, and he’s coming a full week earlier as well, which may translate to a pound or so. He sure seems bigger, though. I feel bigger, and I think I am bigger, even though I weigh less than I did last time. It’s a head scratcher. We shall see. He’ll show us.

Meanwhile…

…I’m getting so excited!

Good Things

• 3 a.m. – realizing there is a warm little body burrowed against mine, even though he was soundly sleeping in his own bed at last recollection. I do want him to feel safe, secure, and confident, and I do want him to develop healthy independence, but I also want to savor the snuggle time for as long as I can.
• coffee at 4 a.m. when I’m all swollen and can’t sleep (not so much the swollen and can’t sleep part, though)
• colostrum. 34 weeks and it’s here – my body is working! This pleases me immensely.
• a peaceful quiet house, all to myself (even though I’ll be paying for it in a few hours). Not so much the rude awakening that I’m not alone, and sharing the otherwise tranquility with a monstrously large moth, and where the hell did it come from anyway? (Swearing, although a rarity with me, is not uncommon when monstrously large flying creatures invade one’s space.)
• broccoli, steamed and smothered in butter. Normally I wouldn’t indulge in the decadence of butter, but when I do, oh my. Yesterday’s dinner.
• sweet corn. Miraculously enough, it doesn’t wreak havoc on the blood sugar. The broccoli wasn’t enough, so I had corn too. Yes, we’re all about fine and lovingly prepared meals around here.
• the prospect of a healthy baby

Not so Good Things

• insomnia
• bladder capacity (lack thereof)
• monstrously large flying creatures invading one’s space
• edema
• full body aches
• muscle cramps
• insulin resistance; diabetes
• employer changed medical insurance plans mid-year requiring more out of pocket expenses, additional paperwork, deductibles, and higher copays
• the strange numb and unpleasant but not so much painful feeling on the surface of my skin at the peak of my belly (by my navel, which somehow remains an innie) when my belly inadvertently but invariably brushes against anything

Things to Do

• buy newborn size diapers. I have a case of size 1, but they may be a bit big for the first couple of weeks.
• set up the baby hammock
• unpack baby items – bibs, burp cloths, breast pump, all that good stuff
• preregister at the hospital
• pack my hospital bag
• discuss leave of absence and return to work plans with my boss
• make daycare arrangements – the babysitter is going to Poland on August 20th, without consulting me first. Imagine.
• wrap up work projects. HAHAHAHAAHAHAAHHAHAHAHH. Actually, I probably will leave things in good shape for my backups. I’m responsible and considerate that way.
• clean and organize the fridge and freezer
• get more rest

Breathing is becoming a laborious effort. No pun intended. Really.

Seriously, I can hardly breathe. At least while sitting. And I can’t stand for long, either. I’ve got an appointment tomorrow, and I’ll mention these things. Perhaps I’ll be placed on bed rest after all. Or not. I wouldn’t mind, actually. It might bore me to tears, but I’ve never actually had the luxury of any sort of extended repose. Of course, when one is limited such, it’s hardly considered a luxury, is it?

Apart from being exhausted and the inability to breathe, I feel great. Gadget might argue that I’m practicing selective memory, having not mentioned the frequent bouts of short temper and snappiness that punctuate most days. Enjoying the journey.

I even bought a couple of books last week, in a moment of inspiration, and guess what? I read them! Two books! Now, I’m not even going to attempt a review, lacking the confidence for such in the shadow of the bookie bloggers I adore. But I enjoyed them. The first was the curious incident of the dog in the night-time, by Mark Haddon. It made me chuckle and it made me cry. I think the main character was autistic and the author captured his perspective very well. Although what do I know of these things?

The second book was The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy. I had a bit of a time keeping track of the characters and hopping back and forth in time, but it was very good. Something that makes the heart ache. I sobbed towards the end.

I’ve also been meaning to make some baby angel fairy things, inspired by my March visit to Australia and Winterwood Toys. I’m calling them pea pod angels. Because they’re a gorgeous green. And they’re babies. And they remind me of peas in a pod. Sweet Pea Pod Angel Babies.

First, it took me ages to collect the bits and pieces and put the ideas together.

I didn’t have any clear thread, and the only fishing line Gadget has is for salmon. That is, it’s very thick, and not suitable for hanging the crystal. So I used plain white thread. Even so, I think it turned out okay. Not perfect, but still adorable. I stitched on, ignoring the boys and their “what are you doing? — why are you making those? — what are you going to do with them? — I don’t get it, what a waste of time… — why don’t they have any faces? –why?” comments. Boys. Hrumph.

I made three. They’re teensy tiny. Only a couple of inches long. I think they’re sweet. They make me smile.

Today I happened across a blog in which the author is a young (looking) gorgeous mother of three, who is a mixed media artist living in a showcase home in Long Island. I gaze upon the photos of her home and her studio and see nothing but success, and wonder how on earth can such a young person have so much (seeming) perfection in her life. The answer may be that she is married to someone who provided that incredible home, and that she is free to work her crafts, mother, and fulfill her soul. Or maybe she or they inherited. She has lovely craft, but it doesn’t seem to be the volume or price to afford such a home.

For so many, the mere act of providing a home, any home, is nearly overwhelming, and in order to do so, one often has to sacrifice one’s crafts, one’s self-expressive dreams, whatever they may be, to make the ends meet. And we make nice homes for ourselves, with what we have within our reach. They may not be showcases with gleaming surfaces and architectural intricacies, but they are the places that we call our own.  And our lives may seem harried, with the strains of mothering, working, and wifing consuming us, leaving us spent and too weary to pursue our craft with the purity we’d like to afford it.

How I imagine I’d love to have a showcase home, studio, and life!   Not to showcase, but just to love and enjoy. Because I love beautiful design and style. And quality. My home is an average suburban home. It’s a comfortable and lived in home. A showcase home is not within my immediate means (without taking on substantial debt). Some day, perhaps… …but not now.  And a showcase life may never be in my stars.

I’m not a business woman, so the peddling of craft is a mystery to me. I’d so much rather give it away. Something about putting things up for sale takes away from the joy of the craft. Or maybe it’s because the price I’d want for the effort and love and thought put toward something is so much more than I’d feel that I could or should ask, so I’d rather just not ask. (Also, the quality that I’d produce most likely wouldn’t pass my expectations, so I’d not entitle myself to price things anyway. Perfectionism can be a curse.) Idyllic as it seems, if I crafted for a living, perhaps I wouldn’t enjoy it as much. I’m not sure that I’d know how to marry business with pleasure.

There was a brief twinge of jealousy, while browsing that blog. Living in a beautiful home, working one’s art, mothering and wifing. It seemed so ideal. And so far away. And reading of recent events in local blogland as well. Other people’s lives. They seem so charming, or so full, or so successful, or so something. Something that mine is not.

It’s crazy, though, because my life is actually incredible, and full to overflowing with blessings, if I’d only take a moment to count them.

For instance.

• For 32 weeks, I’m larger than life. My last fundal measurement was 40. Already. And I’m stretched tight. It’s a sort of odd, numb feeling, being stretched that far. My boobs don’t even look big any more. In comparison.
• I have a tentative birth date set.  August 28, 2008.  I know, it’s almost two weeks early, but seriously, it’s hard to imagine how massive this child could get, by 40 weeks.  Who knows, anyway, when one might actually go into labor.  My sister’s baby came that early, on his own.  I’ll be getting that amnio test for lung development, just to be sure he’s ready.  Because of the GD, it’s required.  I think that it’s not generally required after 38 weeks under normal circumstances.  I still have time to change my mind and wait until 39 weeks, but I’m having a hard time imagining how well my body’s going to hold up, if I go that long.  I can barely move as is.  I LOVE this giant belly, but I could do without the aching hips, legs, and feet.  And the walnut sized bladder capacity.  And the inability to breathe.  When there’s so much child inside, everything else gets squished.  And I have nearly 8 official weeks more of rapid growth, because now is when the growth really starts taking off.  Yikes!
• My swanky new serger is on the blink.  The needle fell out during coverstitch operation and now it isn’t working.  I took it to the dealer and they found even more things wrong with it than I did – they would know, since they are familiar with sergers.  This is my first, and I have no prior knowledge to compare it to, so I’m actually relieved that they found other problems.  It’s all under warranty, so off for repair it goes, and hopefully it will be smooth, sweet, and deeeeeeeluxe when it returns.  Meanwhile, my nesting mode sewing projects are on hold.
• I cleaned BB’s room today.  I asked him if we could give some of his toys away, and he actually agreed!  So I took advantage of his magnanimity and filled two huge bins with giveaways.  It’s one of the mysteries of the universe, how I can go through every single toy, from the smallest lego, and go through every corner and every inch of his room, and yet things are still missing.  The bottom tray of the Boggle game.  Nearly all the pieces of the superheroes memory game.  The shoes for his doll.  I don’t throw anything away, and when I go through his things, I go through them meticulously.  So where are these things?  Hopefully not down the air vents.  Or the toilet.  BB could have thrown things away, I suppose.
• I put his bed back in his room.  Positive thinking.  We’ll see how that goes.  He was all for it this morning, but I imagine once sleepy time rolls around, the tune may change.
• Less than six weeks!  It’s just around the corner, and it seems like the next days will fly by in a whir and a blur.  And then the next chapter will begin, a whir and blur of its own.
• I already bought a case of size 1 diapers.  It makes me smile.

I bought four different combs to address the issue. Here they are soaking in alcohol. The first one, big blue, is by far the most effective of the lot, but the other three are much more tolerable to young children and large men who behave like young children, when having their hair combed mercilessly by the resident woman with a mission.

When dealing with such an issue, what good is comfort if it doesn’t effectively address the situation? I used the long red comb first, progressed to the short red (the short blue is actually a dog flea comb, but is virtually the same as the small red comb) and did the final pass with big blue.

But first, I shaved BB’s head with the 1/8″ attachment. Because when I tried big blue on him the first time, it was too torturous. I mean, I was practically in tears myself, when I did my own first pass. It pulled out clumps of hair. Literally. I thought it would be much kinder to give him a ‘special’ haircut, than to wrestle with him and that unforgiving comb.

He’s still beautiful (to me), even without hair. When he saw his reflection he said, “Juss like Uncle T!” Because when my dear brother joined us the other week for our short family get together, he was sporting his summer shaved do. And everyone loves Uncle T. He’s a great guy, all around.

I love the bright attitude that my little one is blessed with. He is my shining star.

And the best news is, that after combing, shaving, combing, combing, combing, I found absolutely nothing on my little guy’s head. So I pronounce him clean. He wasn’t the carrier.

And more good news, is that after yesterday’s thorough combings, I found absolutely nothing in my hair, and nothing in Gadget’s (except dandruff, in his case). So I am pronouncing our home and heads louse free. I did buy a spare set of sheets (we had only one set, because we have a new bed, and I was waiting for a sale to get a spare set) so we wouldn’t have to stay up so late waiting for them to dry after washing nightly. We were up until 2 a.m. that first night, since the whole combing process took hours, and I didn’t think to strip the sheets until after I’d finished combing.

We’ll still go through a thorough combing every few days for the next two weeks, to be completely and absolutely certain, but it was SO very heartening to find nothing at all yesterday.

The previous day was, understandably, a freak-out, not having faced such a thing before, and then to discover those nasty egg pods. I’ve since learned that nits are the empty pods left after hatching. So we found no nits, actually, and we found no lice or nymphs. What we did find were some eggs, in both my hair and Gadget’s, but we removed them, and hopefully, hopefully, we’ve eradicated the problem. Finding them in Gadget’s spurred me to shave BB, because Gadget’s hair is already very very short, and I found nothing upon visual inspection, but that comb, big blue, found about five or six of the very same pod things that I found in mine. And under my microscope (yes, I have a mini scope for inspecting saliva for crystal patterns to detect potential fertility, from days gone by, and it does come in handy once in a while, although, it IS freaky to see what things look like that close up), they sadly and undoubtedly looked exactly like the photos I found on Doctor Google. So yes. Freak-out.

It’s amazing what something like that can do to one’s mental state. Yes, it can happen to anyone. No, it doesn’t mean you live in a pigsty. But all the same, it makes one feel so unclean. An outcast. A leper. That’s the second time I’ve used that word this week.

Conversely, the elation and relief one feels when one can say the problem has passed, is simply wonderful.  And sleeping in fresh sheets two nights in a row is kind of nice too.

Still a bit befuddled as to where the lice came from.  Not daycare.  Not us.  I wonder if possibly Sissy had them already, and brought them with her.  They don’t jump, leap, or fly.  We did go to a theme park, and possibly they were transmitted by contact with the head rest.  Or could it have happened via the head rest on an airplane?  Eeegads, one would hope not!  It remains a mystery.  Poor girl has very thick, long, luscious curly locks.  I can’t imagine her being able to comb through it with something like big blue.  I wish her well.

So this morning we got a phone call from Sissy’s mother. Apparently, she has quite a case of head lice.

She said she’s been itching a lot, for about a week. Of course she didn’t mention this to us while she was here.

Never having experienced such a thing, I consulted Doctor Google. And read horrifying things about chemical treatments. And heartening things about dealing with the situation. Thankfully.

I bought a special comb and inspected BB. He seems to be okay. The comb hurts him too much and he won’t hold still long enough to do any sort of reasonable job, but I just cut his hair the other day, and it’s very short. I don’t see anything there.

Similarly, I cut Gadget’s hair very short the other day as well, and don’t see anything there.

I spent an hour and a half in the shower, working through my own hair. And found nits. About six of them. Or maybe ten. I don’t know. It’s very distressing. The comb yanked out handfuls of hair, like a razor blade, and left my scalp feeling raw, so no wonder BB wouldn’t cooperate.

I’m going to go through Gadget’s next, with the comb. He had more contact with his daughter than I did, but he has so much less hair than I do. Hopefully he’s nit free.

Now I have to go through this scalp raking for a while until I am certain I’m nit free. At least I didn’t find anything hatched, which means I might have caught it in time. I hope.

Maybe I’ll just shave BB and Gadget’s heads, for good measure.

For me, I’m not ready for the Sinead O’Connor look.

And I have a lot more laundry to do.

• Shopping may be in order.  For something very expensive.  Like furniture.  Or diamonds.  (Not really)
• Or a vacation.  A nice room in a quiet place.  By myself.
• Maybe just a day in the city.  A hair appointment.  A coffee.  A walk along the water.  By myself.
• Maybe an art or craft project.
• Wine would be nice.  So very nice.  Alas.
• One thing I will begin this day is a freshening of the home.  Open all the windows, strip all the bedclothes, wash all the pillows, sheets, towels and throws.  Scrub away all traces.
• I need to get back into a good head space.  Back to my old self.  That nice person with an easy smile.  She who I can barely remember.  I hope it doesn’t take too long to find her.

I didn’t go to the airport. And I really did have meetings. Three of them. Honest! (Seriously. I really did.)