I'm visiting family out of state. My sister was playing with Miriam one the trampoline. She was standing holding Miriam's hands. She sat down (very carefully, because she knew Miriam hadn't been on the tramp before) and Miriam kind of twisted and fell b/c of the residual bouncing. She started crying really hard, so my sister brought her back to me. She calmed down pretty quickly, but wouldn't put any pressure on her leg, so we figured she'd twisted it or sprained it somewhere. We held her a lot and put her to bed with a dose of tylenol. This morning she still wouldn't let us move it, so we took her to the ER.

When the doctor came and told us it was a break he said "if she were only 4 months old, we'd assume this was abuse. I don't want to make any accusations, but something more happened than what you described. The only way a bone would break that easily is if there were cancer in the leg, and everything looks fine in that area."

I'm just so upset. I'm upset that my baby, who just started walking about 6 weeks ago won't be able to walk for 4-6 weeks. I'm upset that my family who doesn't get to see her too often, won't get to see how cute she is as she toddles around. I'm upset that I wasn't with her when it happened so I could tell what I saw.

The thing is, my sister would *never* hurt Miriam. Honestly--would I have left Miriam with her even for 5 minutes if I thought she was capable of that? AND, when I told the doctor that Janelle would be coming into the hospital to see Miriam if he wanted to talk with her, he didn't seem interested AT ALL. Now, could my sister have missed something as she was sitting down? Could she have looked away and missed something? Absolutely. That's why I hate that I wasn't there.

My sister feels awful. She was crying today when she got to the hospital and we told her it was broken. We went to Old Navy after the ER to find some pants that will fit over the cast. All Miriam had to do was say "dog" while pointing to a stuffed animal and she got herself a new toy from my sister. My mom says that if we want tuition for Miriam's college, we've got it made. My dad says Miriam will be able to use this for YEARS ("Aunt Janelle, remember how you broke my leg? I saw this great shirt I really want..."). Of course, Janelle really does feel badly; I just wish she could accept that it was an accident--any of us could have been with her when it happened.

Chris said the doctor was being an ass and trying to scare us. They didn't take the address or phone number of where we're staying, so they obviously aren't too concerned. In fact, they didn't even get MY name.

In the past I thought people were exaggerating when they said trampolines are dangerous, now I understand. It was a freak accident, though...I mean my parents have had their tramp since I was 10-12 and the only person who ever hurt himself was my dad--and that was because he was showing off ("let
me show you guys how to do a real flip").

My poor baby! She's in a good mood, though and has been for most of the day. It's like she just forgets she has two legs. She kicks and plays with the other leg and just ignores the hurt one.

The good thing about the first three months of your pregnancy occurring in the hot, humid days of summer is that the last three months will occur when it's nice and cold outside.

At least right now that seems like a big plus. I'm so hot and miserable. Miriam loves to be outside, but I can't handle it for too long. We went out and pulled weeds and blew bubbles (bubba) for awhile until I was soaking. Then we came in and sat in our air conditioned living room. Our poor window unit can hardly keep up with this weather.

In other news, Chris has taken this entire 4 day weekend to work on our pantry/craft room. It's almost done. As I type, he's laying carpet. It will be so nice to have a place that I can leave my sewing mess when I'm in the middle of a project. I also have so much catching up to do on grandparents' scrapbooks that it's not even funny. Okay, it is. I haven't done anything since JANUARY. HA.

Well...
Chris and I were definitely not planning on having any more kids. My fibroids are still there (of course), and bigger if anything. We didn't want to take the chance of having a baby born at 28 weeks (when I went into labor with Miriam--it was stopped until 36 weeks). However, things happen that aren't planned.



We're excited, but nervous. My hormone levels were a bit low (although they are rising just as they are supposed to). I'm taking extra Progesterone just in case, although my doctor said I didn't *need* it.

We're asking people to be cautiously happy with us. On one hand, my body's track record is not so good. On the other hand, we have Miriam.

My precious, miracle baby will soon be a toddler.  At least age-wise.  She's not quite ready to walk yet (although my guess is that it'll happen in the next month).

This week has been one long walk down memory lane.
Last year at this time I had just gotten off 7 weeks of bedrest.  I was HUGE.  And Miriam was moving and kicking and pushing at me all the time.
On the 19th, I was taken off bedrest.  On the 20th I went to our new church for the first time (for a Sunday service).  One of my now-friends saw me for the first time and said to herself "whoa--that woman is REALLY pregnant!".  I took it fairly easy the other days, but on the 22nd arround 6 pm, my water broke.  And on the 23rd at 7:29 in the morning I gave the final (please, please, please!) push to bring Miriam into the world. 

My life changed utterly. 

I can't believe my baby is almost one.

I'm such a sappy mama.

Our play room is a functional room! Woo-hoo.

We're getting unpacked, still, but the downstairs looks more or less done.

Miriam will be one (!!) next week (the 23rd). I can't believe it! She's so close to walking, she's said her first word, besides mama and dada (dog) and she loves pointing at things and saying "da?" (that?).

We're hoping to get custody of my cousin's son through Pennsylvania's kinship care program. If we get custody now, we'll likely have custody until adulthood. Although we may never be able to officially adopt him, he would, in all other ways, be our child. He's 5 months older than Miriam. Pray for us as we pursue this.

I feel overwhelmed sometimes and I realize that I'm too worried about what others think. Who cares if my yard doens't look perfect? Who cares if my house isn't spotless? Who cares if the fabric I love for my living room is not loved by my friends. I mean, seriously, these things are not important. I'm learning contentment, but it's a hard, long, slow learning procss.

Well, I think I lied. I'm not learning contentment really, I'm struggling constantly. I'm not happy with myself, my home, etc. I'm very content with my child and husband, just not with *me*. I feel like such a loser sometimes. Why can't I stay motivated to do things other than sew, read and be with my child? Why do I care that my house is a mess and not DO anything about it? Argh.

I'm sitting here in the playroom, boxes and toys around me, with my baby girl laying next to me and the laptop propped, interestingly enough, on my lap. Miriam was so sleepy. It's funny to me that a child who sleeps with her parents needs so much space. If I get up during the night, she wakes up. If I get up in the morning, she wakes up. If I sit up, she opens her eyes to check that I'm not actually getting up. However, she sprawls out in the bed while Chris and I take to the sides. I wouldn't change it for the world.

I was thinking a lot about change tonight. Chris and I have had so many changes since we married. We moved to Cincinnati. We moved back to Indy. We bought a house, sold it, and bought another house. We moved to a new church. We changed jobs. We had a baby. It seems that our life together had been one change after another. But I feel stable. I'm not longing for things to stay the same for a while. I like where we're at and imagine we'll be here for a long time and I'm very content with that (in fact, I would say it makes me happy). But I don't begrudge the times of change.

Miriam is such a wonderful little child. It's amazing to me how much her own little personality is coming out. She loves pickles, cucumbers, tomatoes, apples, chips and ice cream (yes, I've allowed my ten month old to try chips and ice cream--but only little tastes). She doesn't seem to like chicken very much. Or fake crab. She smiles when she wakes up on her own from a long sleep. She plays and plays and plays. She prefers breastmilk to any of the above mentioned foods. The other day, though, I was eating a bagel while feeding her and she stopped eating to reach for the bagel. She's growing up. Her hair is getting longer and thicker. It's still wonderfully red. She has 6 teeth. She loves our friend Denise almost as much as she loves us. She seems to like men with facial hair and/or long hair, which makes many of our male friends happy as they are used to scaring kids away with their facial hair and/or long hair. She helps me to see a new side to people, who have infinite patience with her, even while she's crawling all over them and pulling their braids. She wants to explore everything. She is trusting and loving and amazing.

One of the people on Amity's world has suffered a fantastic and unbelievable loss. Her little boy, not even 3 months old, died of SIDS last week. I can't imagine the feelings she and her family must be experiencing.

When I thought about it, I convinced myself that when a baby's death happens there must be some sign. As if F. never really was awake and aware, as if maybe he wasn't "right" from birth, as if he had one foot here and one on another plane. But then I saw his picture--so healthy, awake, looking right at the camera with a little smile on his face. And I realized there was no warning. This little boy died unexpectedly with no way for his family to prepare.

And I know it's selfish, but I wonder how long I can continue to push the worry I have about Miriam to the back of my mind. How much longer can I last not allowing myself to imagine the worst all the time? How much longer will I make it enjoying my daughter and not allowing myself to focus on the "what ifs"? I feel like I'm barely managing to stay above the worry. But I am.

My dear husband wrote a blog about the difference between recreation and amusement. He had some wise and interesting comments to make. I love the fact that my husband thinks about things like this!

Here are my thoughts:
When is a community getting together to have a good time recreation rather than amusement? We get together all the time with friends and it often is a refreshing, re-creating time for me. I think getting together with friends after a long day in order to share a bottle of wine and discuss potential baby names is a refreshing use of free time.

I think if we draw too fine a line here, we'll end up makeing our recreation too much work. Am I thinking enough about this? Are we discussing this with enough seriousness, etc...

Thanks, Amy and Julie for responding to my last post. (And Julie, let me tell you I'm happy about the no-reporting thing! What are the rules in Ohio? :)

There are numerous reasons that I am wary of the public school system. But should that be enough to cause me to homeschool? I do not want to shelter Miriam to the point that she is unaware of the real world...but I don't want her to learn things way earlier than necessary. Last year, I had 3rd graders talking to me about people "getting it on", etc...and they obviously knew what they were talking about. I don't want Miriam to have a warped view of sex...I don't want her to grow up pledging to the flag...I don't want her to learn to bully (or to be bullied herself). Also, our public school system is just not so good. I'm sort of anti-testing and anti-traditional grades.

Although this may not seem related, it is...what is our purpose? Is it to love God? To draw others near to him? To live closely with others? All those things? Does homschooling Miriam fit with our purpose? Does sending her to public school? Does my staying home help? Can I connect with families in my neighborhood if Miriam is not in school with them? Do i want to use my child as a "lure"?

I think this is my most disjointed post ever. :)

Well, I'm not doing to well on the posting. We had quite a crazy week last week. Our new dishwasher didn't work; our washing machine spurted water all over the basement floor; our (new) cabinet door broke off, etc. Of course this all happened in one day. It's all fixed now (except for the door). I had a minor break down but all is okay now.

Miriam is crawling and standing up, waving good-bye and throwing everything she can reach off of the table. :)

I've been sewing a lot--I've made Miriam an outfit and a cloth book. I'm working on an apron for myself now. It's a 50's style apron and it's kind of funny, but I love it. I will use it and have fun while I'm in it. I't got ruffle and rick-rack--it can't get any cuter than that!

On Sunday, an elder at our church did a communion meditiation that compared Pat Tillman to Christ. That sounds much more goofy written out than it seemed during the service. It is ridiculous, though, on many levels. Yes, they both gave up something "great" in order to serve; but that is where the comparison ends. It was the nature of respective service that makes them so different. Jesus gave his life for others; Pat Tillman took others' lives in a misguided attempt to protect his country. I was so distracted by the absurdness of the comparison that I don't think I really paid much attention to the act of communion.

Another topic that's interesting to me is schooling. What is the purpose of teaching our kids? Should I homeschool? Help with the public schools? There are two families in our church that are preparing to homeschool this year. The two girls went to the church's school for kindergarten. One girl is very ready for 1st grade; she's reading, loves to ask questions and explore things, etc. The other girl is not ready for 1st grade work (although I think that with help she'd be okay). The dilemma here is that the families really want to keep the girls together and homeschool them together. They are really trying hard to make the decisions that will best benefit the community. Do you hold them both back? That makes no sense to me; I just don't see that they will be on the same level any time soon.

I'm losing my train of thought--so I'll write more later.

It's been a long time! :)

Chris, Miriam and I moved into our new house. We love it. I'll post pics and more information later.

I'm swimming in boxes both packed and unpacked. I also have no washer or dryer; but I have good friends that live down the street...so really I have 4 washers and dryers that I can use. What wonderful friends I have.

more later (and not too much later, hopefully!)

Well, I'm an idiot. When I made my links to the right of the page, I added Jena's cool craft blog. I remember typing in her maiden name, catching it and changing it right away. I must not have saved the publish, though, because it still said her maiden name. For months. And I just noticed tonight. Oh, well. It's correct now--sorry Jena (and Kate, too :) )

I had a very nice birthday yesterday. I went with friends to a great Greek Restaurant here in Fountain Square. I walked there and had some guy in a pick up try to pick ME up. Ha ha ha ha hah. It was creepy, actually (especially since I was walking with Miriam), but I tried to look on the bright side. I suppose it was reassuring on my 30th bday to have some weird guy in a pick up stop and tell me I was "real cute." Or maybe it wasn't so reassuring. AAAAAAAAAAh...

Anyway, someone is interested in our house. And honestly I really hope she buys it b/c she has some cool ideas about how she'll use the house and I would love it if someone bought it to do something cool...like, say, start a bike collective and rent rooms to younger, semi-transient people. We'll see how it goes.

These are my last few hours before turning 30. Can anyone tell me why it is bothering me so much? What a silly superficial thing to worry about...more tomorrow.

nak, as usual.

it's been awhile. We're in the midst of our move. I have this house 1/2 packed, Chris is working at the new house every night after work and our amazing friends are working their asses off to help us (Chris would say--Oh my! our friends have no asses!!). Patrick and Mary worked ALL day today laying the tile in our kitchen. Dave, Mark, Laura, Greg, Amanda, Joe, Randy, Tracy, Rodney and I'm sure others I'm forgetting, have all helped with the painting etc while still others watched kidlets so parents could help.

And my wonderful family is coming tomorrow. My Family. :) Not just a couple of them, not just a few of them, but ALL of them--Mom, Dad, Jame & Michele, Janelle & Adrian, Jared & Aimee and Jonathan. I can't smile wide enough. They're driving 10 hours and can only stay for abot 36 hours before they have to head back. But they think it's worth is to 1--see Miram 2--help us with the house 3--celebrate my 30th bday.

Speaking of wonderful friend and my birthday, my lovely friend Jena gave me some awsome bday gifts: a subscription to ReadyMade magazine (I know i'll find tons of project ideas!!), a knitted dishcloth, and an outfit for Miriam (you can see the last two things on her blog. The outfit is so cute on Miriam. I took a pic with her wearing it and I'll post it to my fotopage as soon as I upload it.

Some members of my "house church/bible study" have found me. I can't be passive aggressice anymore. It's all honesty, no bull shit, from here on out.

I can't decide if I like my hair cut or not (I think I do most of the time--I'm just afraid it makes me look fatter. Mom told me it makes me look younger, so maybe that's an okay trade-off :) )

I'm scared for my dad and hurting for my mom. Having her husband cheat on her and leave for awhile isn't enough? She's got to deal with alcoholism, too? (As if watching HER father deal with alcoholism isn't enough as well!)

We're home safely from PA and now I get to be overwhelmed with packing. AAAAAAAAAARGH.

I need to ask y'all to pray for my Dad. I'm beginning to believe that he is an alcoholic. I've never seen him drunk and only once have I seen him act strange at all, but he drinks through-out the day. He puts alcohol in his orange drink, his soda, etc. He chew halls and slugs listerine to "disguise" the smell. I don't think he realizes how obvious it is. I'm scared for him. I'm nervous about my dad taking me to the airport tomorrow, even though I've never felt alarmed with him driving before.

On another note entirely, I did something I said I would never do again. Cut my hair. Short. I put a few pics up for Chris on our photoblog. If you look, please remember that it's not completely dry in the pics, so it looks flat--it's curlier when it's dry.

Oh, So many thoughts flying through my head tonight!

Luke came home from the hospital on Friday. They believe he was not having seizures after all. They observed him for awhile. He was sick and believed that the shaking of the legs was from pain, not seizures. Poor guy!

Amy started a discussion about voting the other day that was interesting. People sure do get fired up about that topic. Most people were able to argue nicely, but I guess some people need to put each other down to feel like they've made their point. I'm proud of what my husband wrote; I believe he stated what he believed succinctly and carefully, and that he did so with a loving tone.

I wonder if I am arrogant? Ang said that she finds people who abstain from parts of life in the name of Christ arrogant. (btw--Ang is not the person mentioned above.) I hate to think that I'm arrogant. I honestly don't believe I am anymore than Ang is. She takes part in something I abstain from. We both believe we are correct. We will both argue our points. Argh. I'm not sure where i'm going with this.

I'll just say I know I have lots of character flaws and I'm certain that arrogance is one of them. But I just hate to be lumped in with a large group of people and called arrogant for doing (or not doing) something about which I feel conviction.

Resist2004 It's all there. Arrogance or no.

I'm in PA and am enjoying spending time with my family. Miriam did extremely well on the flight; she charmed so many people!

If you are the praying type, please pray for my nephew John Luke. His mama is Chris's sister. Luke was born in January and has had a rough life so far. He had a stroke in utero and because of that had to stay in the hospital for a while. He finally came home about 2 weeks ago. He had to go back to the hospital this morning because of seizures. He was sick and pukey and didn't assimilate all his antiseizure medication. Pray he gets to come home SOON!

I'm leaving tomorrow morning to spend a week in Pennsylvania. I'm nervous about flying with Miriam for the first time all alone...but she is honestly such a sweet natured little one that I'm sure things will go smoothly. I'm mostly nervous about getting her and all the various accoutrements through the airport without my arms falling off. :)

I'm very excited about going to PA. I haven't been home since Christmas and no one's been out here since then, so we're overdue for a visit. Miriam has changed so much in the past 2 months that everyone is sure to be shocked by the change. We try to keep family updated with pictures, but pictures just don't do the baby justice, you know?

Thanks for all the great discussion about spanking. I'm on a couple of parenting forums and it's interesting how this topic can't be discussed civilly. Parents feel so strongly about it that the discussion goes downhill fast. I really appreciate being able to say honestly how I feel about it without people taking offense or thinking I'm psycho.

In the comments from February 25, Jena wrote "The potential for controversy is always an intimidating thing for me. (Hence, my blog is about crafts rather than life in general!) I admire your frankness very much!" I'm sure she meant the frankness of the entire group discussing this topic, but I have to admit to my own passive-aggression (is that how you write that?). If I were being truly frank I would share all these frustrations openly with my house church. Because I'm too much of a chicken to be confrontational, I shared it on my blog. My house church is not too internet obsessed and most hadn't even heard of blogs until Chris and I were talking about them. So basically, I was too chicken to say all this to the group, so I spewed it here where none of the group will actually read it. bawk bawk.

But I truly appreciate this discussion. I think Ang and Julie are amazing mothers. I know Jena and Amy will be creative, loving mothers, too. I'm so grateful to be parenting in wonderful communities--connected online and off.

I fixed my Link to Ang's Blog. Sorry to those of you who got approximately 5 million pop-ups while trying to get to bogspot.com. :)

Ang has a great blog about her life (family, house church, etc). The blog is witty and thought-provoking. She responded to my entry about spanking on her blog. It's interesting and you should read it.

I guess there were some things I left out of my spanking post. I was spanked, but not abused. My brother and I were spanked fairly often, but my parents learned gentler ways of disciplining as they got older and wiser and had more kids. My youngest brother was hardly ever spanked. Is it because of the lack of spanking that he has been the least rebellious of my parents' five children or is it just his personality? A combination of both things? I honestly don't know.

I don't think spanking your child makes you evil. Most of my friends who have children spank them and if they don't NOW, they plan to as they see the need.

And I reallylove my parents. I think they're great and will parent Miriam in much the same way they parented me (without the spanking).

Ang's blog also talked about a no bull shit diet. Being honest with each other in our house churches/close relationships, etc is so important for the groups'/relationships' health. I realised tonight that I am not doing that very well. Although people who know me well know that I can be confrontational, it's usually not a pretty thing. I don't enjoy telling people I disagree with them or am unhappy with them, so usually my frustration builds until I confront in anger instead of love.

I belong to a fantastic "house church" (we call it a Bible study, be we're just scared of labels). The people amaze me with their desire for community and growth. I've also been amazed at how people are upfront about the failings of the group as they seek to grow. However, a lot of these people have children and parent in ways that, at times, make me cringe. It makes me upset to hear a baby crying and see his/her mother refuse to pick him/her up. It breaks my heart to watch a child being spanked. It bothers me to see parents giving 2 year olds soda and chips and candy (I know these things are bad for me; I don't want Miriam to have them on a regular basis). And it makes my blood boil to have people threaten to feed my 7 month old foods behind my back.

This is what I decided. I don't want to be a constant criticizer. I won't comment on the spanking (although you'd better fucking believe I'll be taking my child out of the room), as the child is not mine. I won't comment on the soda/candy/chips thing. I won't comment on the child crying piteously (although I might pick him/her up). However, if anyone tries to give my child something that I don't want her to have or if anyone yells at her or punishes her in a way I find hurtful, I will most definitely speak up. My problem is remembering to do it right away and not 3 weeks of brooding later.

Miriam has earned the puker of the week award.

Since Tuesday she's puked at least once a day. And I don't mean spit up. I mean puke. Milky, chunky waterfall from the mouth puke. She'll be playing and kicking and acting like normal and then PUKE. She'll be sleeping and puke in her sleep without even waking. She would just fall back to sleep lying in her puke if I didn't clean her up. (of course, I have ulterior motives here. She sleeps next to me and *I* don't want to lie in her puke all night).

She hasn't puked since about 10 am Sunday and I'm hoping our run of puking is over for this session.

Before I let go of this topic, though, who do you think she pukes on most often? ME. She's puked on Chris once. ONCE. And hardly anything got on him. He even managed to get her to the toilet to do the rest of her retching. I understand that I am the one who feeds her most of the time, but give me a break. Sometimes I feed her, Chris will take her and play with her, I'll take her back and THEN she pukes. On me.

sigh.

I really have to wonder how it works when babies sleep in rooms of their own. Do the parents hear them throw up and go change them? Do parents go to get them in the morning and find them sleeping in caked on puke? I imagine that most mothers have their "baby sense" on and know that something is wrong. I certainly don't remember any stories about caked on baby puke from any of my friends.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

it's one and a half weeks until I fly to PA. I'm going to a women's conference (not so excited about it) with my mom, sister and sisters-in-law (very excited about that). The conference is only a day and a half, so the rest of the time is for visiting and relaxing in PA. I will very much miss my husband, though.

This will be Miriam's first time flying and I'll be alone with her. WAAAhhh.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

I've been thinking a lot about discipline lately. I try very hard to understand other people's ways of disciplining their children. Since my child is not old enough to be punished I don't feel like I have the right to weigh in on how I feel about it. But on my blog I can weigh in on whatever I want to! (and I don't have to use good grammar, either!). I just can't wrap my head around spanking. I don't understand why parents think hitting their children to get them to stop doing something (like hitting) is a good thing. I know it works. Perhaps that is the simple answer to my question. It works. But, I don't want Miriam to not do something because she's afraid of being spanked. Afraid of me hitting her. I want her to listen and obey out of respect.

I keep telling people I don't plan on spanking--that I won't spank. I tell people because I want to be held accountable. I want to know when I am angry and frustrated that if I choose to spank there will be very many people who will be able to say "I thought you weren't going to do that." I think if I'm willing to live with the "told you so's", then maybe I will have come to a place that spanking is necessary. I hope that is making sense. It is 1 am.


I think that the issue of spanking is an important one for me. And the time is coming when I will discover if I have the will power to discipline without spanking.

An interesting article about spanking can be found here:
A Shortcut to Nowhere

Oh, and I almost forgot--My wonderful friends Jenny and Dave Price and their daughter Claire welcomed a new addition yesterday. Alise Jane Price was born at 10:32 am. She weighed a little over 8 pounds and was 19 inches long. I held her for a while yesterday and marveled not only at how precious this new little one is, but also at how much my little one has grown in just 61/2 months.

Welcome to the World Alise Jane!!

It's been a while.

Miriam has a tooth and another one is almost through. Both on the bottom. That's a good thing for my boob, I hear. She's sitting up and seems to have reached another level of awareness. She notices the cat, gets excited when Daddy comes home and cries when I leave the room.

She keep trying to grab my food and drinks, so I bought her a sippy cup (just for water). She doesn't get the sipping action, though, so I mostly unscrew the lid and hold it while she drinks. If you can call what she does drinking. She either gets too much and spews it right back out or laps it up like a kitten. But if you're holding her and the cup, you'd better be willing to share. She gets so frantic for the cup that her hands shake as she reaches for it. It's a little scary that my daughter is addicted to water. I mean, if she finds good old h2o addicting, wait until she tries sugar or...well, let's not think about all that, yet.

I finished knitting my first project. I made Chris a scarf for Valentine's day. It turned out pretty well. Although there is much room for improvement, I'm really happy that it is usable and that I made it.

My friend Jena just rocks. She gave me a little lamby figurine that's sitting and knitting. He's my new mascot. I need to name him. Jena also taught me how to knit, gave me a cool project bad that she sewed herself, a few skeins of yarn, new knitting needles, a candy bar, etc. It's so nice to have a friend willing to share her habit, I mean hobby, with me. It's so exciting. You all should see what Jena knits. And you can--just check out her Blog-- If you don't see a link here, there is one on the right (Craft Muffin).

And while you're checking things out, you should see some cute new pics of Miriam on our fotopages. Again, there is a link on the right.

Chris took a mental health day today. When he told me he was going to I got so excited because I knew that I would be getting a mental health day as well! :) It's so nice to have someone else spend quality time with Miriam.

And I did all sorts of baking while Chris was doing dishes and I just kept handing him dishes to wash. HA! It was miraculous. I dirtied a dish and he cleaned it. Having no dirty dishes after baking/cooking was slightly heavenly.

Miriam is lying on the couch next to me making the most humorous noises I've ever heard. They're like a cross between a laugh, scream, and heavy breathing--with the occasional desperate suck on her fist. I think she REALLY wants her first tooth to come in. It could wait awhile yet as far as I am concerned.

Three times in the last month or so I've had interesting experiences while out with Miriam. A waiter, a two strangers made comments about how I must be "enjoying a day of shopping". As if that's all I do now that I'm at home. I know that the people were just trying to make conversation--and I appreciate that. But it's really disturbing to me that they didn't assume that I was just running into the grocery store for a few things or meeting a friend for a quick lunch rather than having a "day o'shopping." Am I making any sense?

I try not to see myself as "just" a stay at home mom--And Miriam is, in my opinion, worth staying at home for. (but quitting teaching English has not helped my grammar.) So, I'm at home--and overly sensitive.

Finally, does anyone have advice for getting Miriam to eat anything other than boobiejuice? (angie??)

There are people here right now looking at our house.
They are in the basement. Our basement is an incredible mess.

It's weird that you have to make your house look BETTER than it ever did while you were actively living in it in order to get it to sell. Sigh.

But I came home, lit some candles, and prayed for a successful showing.

On an entirely different note, I recieved a visit from my wandering Aunt Flo for the first time in, oh, 15 months. She really didn't have to visit.

I went to the gym, showered and went to get redressed when I realized I forgot my undies. Try racing home while commando during Aunt Flo's visit.

On the other hand, don't try it.

I made it, though.

And I lifted 5,400 lbs today. I love the computerized weights at the Y. You can do any weights you want and you don't need to use the computer, but if you put in your pin number, it keeps track of how much you lift, how often you lift and how much you're improving, etc. It's cool to "see" my progress that way.

I also did a 20 minute cardio workout.

I will shed this weight.

1 lb down, 74 to go.

ramble, ramble, ramble.

My husband posted about how I "hate" Matthew Ryan and guessed that perhaps I would blog about how much I hated him. Well, that day is not today.

First of all, hate is a strong word.
Secondly, I would much rather blog about music I like...
Such as Over the Rhine, Coldplay, Innocence Mission, Pierce Pettis.

Speaking of Pierce Pettis, I particularly like his song about the virgin Mary. Although my daughter is named for my grandmother, I believe this song helped make her name beautiful to me and my husband.

Here are the lyrics.
Discuss. ;)

No banners were unfurled,
when God stepped into the world,
held in the arms of a little girl named Miriam.

Who would ever believe, the fiancée, the family,
the teenage pregnancy of Miriam?

But laws of nature were suspended,
death sentences rescinded, throughout all the world,
all because of a little girl named Miriam.

Medieval paintings glaring down,
stony figures judge and frown,
wearing a halo like a crown. Could that be Miriam?
Gentile temples’ stained glass swirls,
cherubim with golden curls. Oh! How unlike your Hebrew world, Miriam.

I don’t know if you ascended. I don’t care what’s been amended.
There was one sure miracle: the faith of a little girl named Miriam.

Oh, you are blessed indeed! Blessed is the fruit of your tree,
Yeshua, king of kings, and son of Miriam.

No banners were unfurled
when God stepped into the world,
held in the arms of a little girl named Miriam.

Copyright 1996 Polygram Music Publishing (ASCAP).

Miriam is screeching away in her walker. She has finally learned to walk forward in it, but it was so entertaining when she could only go backwards. She bumped into things, but kept trying to go backwards anyway.

Today has been a good day. Miriam took a great nap, my friend Denise came over for a few hours, I did a bunch of dishes and made two desserts for our house church tonight. I also began sorting out my craft closet.

Moving sucks.

However on the positive side--I am going to "clean sweep" my house as I pack things up. And I'm going to be hard on myself. Chris and I are such packrats and one packrat is bad enough--two in the same house spells chaos.

I'm going to add to my links on the side, but here are some neat things to check out:

My friend Jena's cool craft blog: Craft Muffin
My husband's blog: The Way of the Cross

if I made those link incorrectly, I'll fix them later.

You know, I was expecting this blog to be more comical than it is. I'm sorry to those who are reading it (jena and chris) that it is so dry now. Perhaps I'll be inspired tomorrow.

Gotta go--baby's fussy.

Well.
Let's see.
The rash from hell is indeed an allergic reaction. How do I know? Because after getting steroid cream from my doctor and applying it for 4 days I was driven nearly insane on Saturday night with itching. Also the rash was not getting visibly better either. I looked disgusting. I'm not exaggerating. Nasty rash, some just red, some of it bumpy like mosquito bites. All of it very itchy. Anyway, it got bad enough that Chris said, "let's go to the hospital." So at midnight we went to the hospital. Miriam slept the whole time we were there. We were home by 2:30, though we decided to skip church the next day and just go to the lunch/annual meeting at noon. I got up at 9:30 to put our contribution to lunch in the crockpot, when the phone rings. It's our friend (and real estate agent) Dave telling us that someone wanted to see the house at 4 that day.

Three problems with this. 1--Chris and I were both exhausted. 2--I don't like being home alone during the week, so I was away almost all last week and never cleaned. 3--Our house was a pig sty (due to #2)

We got ourselves up and cleaned the house, went to the lunch and came home to finish. While I was doing massive amount of laundry (ALL our clothes needed to be washed to get the offending laundry detergent out of them) at the laudromat (with the help of dear friend Sarah), our friends Denise and Patrick came over to help Chris dust, sweep and mop.

Phew. At least the house looked presentable.

If only Chris had told me Dave had officially put the house on the market, I might have been more prepared.

But maybe not.


Anyway, due to that chaos, I've decided to stay on top of things on the homefront. No more gallivanting around Indy and avoiding cleaning, cooking, etc.

To that end, I accomplished much today:
I went to the gym, worked out (lifting a total of 3,400 lbs and doing 30 minutes of cardio).
I went grocery shopping.
I made 2 dozen muffins.
I made 1 loaf of banana bread.
I made 1 apple cake.
I made sausage casserole for dinner.
I made sausage patties for Chris's breakfast.
I washed the dished from all of that "making".
I sorted and put away all the laundry from yesterday.
I swept the kitchen floor.

fun things--
I was online for awhile.
I listened to fun music while baking.

AND I breastfed my baby multiple times.

what a day. :)

ps--my rash has gotten so much better thanks to oral steriods (safe while nursing as long as you wait a few hours after taking them.) I've never had an allergic reaction before and hope to never have one again. ugh.