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