You were born on Saturday. It was cold and sunny. I wondered about when you would turn up all day long.
Your mom did a good job cooking you (she even gave you 8 extra days) and I’m very proud of her.
You have squishy plump cheeks and ears that like to fold over under your hat.
Very nice to make your acquaintance, kiddo. We’re gonna have great times (when you stop pooping in your pants.)
So glad you’re here, baby.
Here is an invitation I made with my mom and sister-in-law while I was trapped in Boston during Hurricane Sandy.
I co-hosted a baby shower for my very best friend and since I don’t have sisters or other very best friends, I wanted to put some elbow grease into it.
In fact, it was so special of an event, I wanted to borrow some other people’s elbow grease, as well. My mom wrote all of the messaging and addressed the envelopes, Nicole helped me assemble all of the pieces together, and Caroline made the die-cut trees for me and then FedExed them from Florida.
Filed under Family, Friends and other Humans, Up to Stuff
Oh, the camping outing this past weekend was wonderful!
We went to Big Basin last year, and loved it so much, I suggested we make reservations again this year and call it a birthday outing for David (whose birthday is tomorrow). It’s definitely a cozy thing to do as a couple, but the idea of having a group around the fire also seemed really fun. So we booked 2 cabins and The David invited some folks and it all panned out pretty wonderfully.
There’s a 12 mile hike out to the beach that we had wanted to do last year and which, surprisingly, pretty much everyone was game to do. Only Steph and Mike stayed behind, worried that their woofer, Coco, wouldn’t make it the whole way.
The park is home to the largest continuous old growth redwoods south of San Francisco, which is my kind of park. Redwood forests are so shady and cool, with a refreshing, slightly damp, kind of air. Occasionally, you get dapple-y bits of sunlight or beams shining through the trees.
Almond butter and jelly sandwiches and jerky and carrots in the woods are fantastic. Also, sitting on a log, after you’ve hoofed it for a gabillion miles is pretty excellent.
We saw a bunch of deer in the woods. Also, banana slugs. I will not out the person who screamed like a girl in horror each time I pointed out one of those yellow monster-creatures.
There wasn’t much uphill slogging, so although it was long, it wasn’t as arduous of a trek as we might have feared, and definitely a really lovely way to have spent the day.
And then drinking wine and beers around a fire, bundled up against the cold, cooking sausages and hamburgers, making s’mores, and laughing into the night… it’s definitely the right kind of way to spend some days.
Filed under Family, Friends and other Humans, Up to Stuff
It’s amazing, but wonderful, the way that internet friends sometimes turn into regular world friends. And then it seems sort of funny to think back on the origins of your knowing one another.
Such is the way of Margot. Although, Margot and I weren’t even especial internet friends… we just agreed to be stranger roommates at ALT Summit.
And that almost seems funnier to me than just knowing her online, that we actually met at a cacophony of girly top knots and colored jeans. I guess I wouldn’t call either of us poster girls for the event.
Which is maybe why it makes sense that we’ve kept in touch after the fact.
Anyway, Margot and her fellow, Chad, were in town from Chicago for a wedding. They stayed in our living room and didn’t cram either of the cats in a stew pot, so they totally deserve a prize.
We took them to Homeroom, the land of a thousand macaroni and cheeses. And they came with us to a see Andrew Sean Greer and Daniel Handler be funny. They were easy and amenable and made me feel happy about knowing people out there who are smart and interesting and talented and artistic.
The artisticness was like magnets, drawing them the incredible, neon-imbued, Lisa Congdon. I interloped on their lunching (and took a photo with my fisheye lens.)
And then they flew away back home to Chicago, where they will continue to be amazing. I will follow along on the interwebs, waving my little admiration flag.
Thanks for including us in your visit to San Francisco, guys! We really loved having you.
Filed under Family, Friends and other Humans
On Sunday, I had a bunch of my local lady friends over for a “crafternoon.” The intent was to give everyone a few hours to dedicate to a craft project of their choosing or to just learn something new.
As is my way, I was worried about how it would turn out, but it was great! There was a good combination of people who just worked on their own thing, people who wanted to learn something new, and people who were both.
I had a few Smitten Kitchen nibbles prepared for the occasion. Deb’s cheese straws get my highest encouraging recommendation for your next social occasion.
Here are some crafty visuals:
Painting wood cross-sections with chalkboard paint while wearing a necklace of felted wool beads.
Little blocks of paint and pages of text and collage-y bits culminating in adorable, whimsical little pieces of art.
Knitting.
Needle point.
Wrapping bangles with fabric.
I had been wanting to try out the felted beads for ages, so having an afternoon set aside for this express purpose was really satisfying. And it’s just so much funner to try out new things with someone else, isn’t it?
Filed under Family, Friends and other Humans, Nifty things, Up to Stuff
It’s been 17 days since The David left for his mountain climbing expedition and 14 since the last time we spoke on the phone. There are still (at least)* 14 more days to go.
And it sucks.
I am wallowing in a big sadly fug.
There are plenty of activities on my dance card, and I had thought that that would see me through alright, but I’m starting to wish that I didn’t have any of those things to do so I could just curl up at home and suffer quietly, alone.
Here’s a list of what seems like the best possible way to get through the remaining forever:
1. Potato chips (varying flavors)
2. 9 or 10 hours of sleeping a night
3. Samoas
4. Special Edition Samoas Ice Cream
5. Pyjama pants
So, it’s going well, right?
*There’s a once a day satellite uploaded audio cast from the group on this expedition and the last one made it sound like they might not be coming back on time.
Filed under Family, Friends and other Humans, The David
A friend’s father died last week and I can’t stop thinking about it.
I haven’t suffered this particular life event, so I can only imagine how horribly sad she must feel. But I am filled with the imaginings of, all things being equal, something we all have to go through.
So I think and then force myself to stop thinking about my own fears. And I think about my friend, wishing there was more I could do… that I could just magic away the sadness.
But all I really know to do is to just say that I’m here.
What do you do to comfort someone’s sadness?
Parenting is fascinating.
I love hearing stories about how people contend with those little hooligans and how parents try to retain control in a world ruled by creatures free from reason and logic.
My experience in parenting is limited to the recollections I have of what my own parents did and what other people tell me now. And those two things are really different these days.
My brother told me yesterday that he offers “stern advice” when his 3 year old is acting up. And a coworker says that they just ignore bad behavior until it goes away.
Which is a much kinder and gentler nation than the one me and my brothers grew up in. But it was all different then and, like a lot of things, there are trends in parenting, I guess.
I am not really sure what my own philosophy will be if I have my own kids, but I do like pondering. I do know that I have a small sense of pride that I survived childhood in the 80′s, a time when my elementary school principal had and used a paddle and the teachers whacked kids on the knuckles with a ruler.
Not that I ever got any whackings at school. ’Cause I was awesome. And a big nerd.
But I was just thinking about how my dad used to wash my mouth out with soap if I told a lie or used a bad word, and just how absurd of a punishment that is. Like, who wants to stick a bar of soap into the mouth of a squirmy squalling little minion and try to rub it around in there? Seems like an awful lot of hassle to me.
Obviously, I was not a fan of this treatment. It was a major suckage. But, despite how awful it was, it did little to stop my lying ways or me from calling one brother or another a Yuck Butt. Once my parents caught on that a Yuck Butt was the highest of insults in our clan, using the phrase became grounds for a mouth washing.
But we were slick and came up with a secret code for how to continue using our own special little curse word unscathed.
We switched it up to Butt Yuck instead.
They caught on to that one, too.
Filed under Family, Friends and other Humans
I took advantage of a trip to New York for work to do a little visit to the homestead in Hunterdon County, New Jersey. Yeah, New Jersey. Armpits, assholes and shopping malls.
Except my neck of the woods there is more like this:
And the little towns are full of old Victorian homes, like this:
You probably heard that it freakishly snowed. It did.
But it got melty pretty quickly and I got a bit of treatment for my autumn withdrawal.
I got to see my family. This is one of my family type persons:
Spending time with my family is a mixed bag. The house is seriously getting borderline Hoarders. There is constant bickering and swiping and seemingly purposeful pushing of buttons. They don’t typically spend quality time together, so there’s a pervasive awkwardness of people making an effort to be there, which they’re doing for my benefit.
So, it’s hard. And I do a crap job of being patient and kind and understanding. Instead, I feel angry and frustrated and just want to withdraw into a nap or a novel.
Much like my failed intentions to workout while travelling, I had visions of cooking lovely wholesome meals that we’d enjoy together. But the kitchen’s too gross for me to deal and no one seems interested and something about being there saps out my pep. Instead, we got pizza and watched movies.
I was ready to go back home to my small tidy apartment and my wonderful David, and was reminded of why I’m not eager to go more often. And yet. And yet.
It still breaks my heart to leave, every time.
Filed under Family, Friends and other Humans
I have a new niece!
Penelope Jane came to hang out with us last week, on Tuesday, October 11.
Penny Jane 9 lbs 5 oz 20 inches
That’s a baby alright!
She lives in Boston, so I won’t be meeting her in person for a really long time. That’s ok, though. She can use some percolating time to get more interesting first.
Since the time that The David and I met and started dating, we’ve gone from 0 nieces and nephews… to 5.
That’s 5 babies in 3 years and 4 months. His sister has had 2 girls and one of my brothers has begat 2 boys and this latest girl, Penny.
The David and I aren’t married, so even though his two nieces came before her, technically Penny is my first niece. She’s the first girl baby in my family.
I was thinking about “real” nieces and psuedo-we’re-not-married nieces. They feel mostly the same to me. Maybe a little different.
Do they start feeling more equal when you’re properly married? People are always saying that even though things are really the same on the surface, that it all feels different once you’re married. Maybe this is like that?
And then I was remembering being a kid with an assortment of aunt and uncle flavored relatives. Some of them were married in to being a relative of mine, but for the most part, those unions all took place before i was born. There wasn’t really a difference between Aunt Maureen and Uncle Roger to me.
And now, for the grown-up me, there’s also this element of feeling like I have to make an effort with the pseudo-in-laws. I care about whether or not they like me. So I want to treat the little English nieces like real nieces. Especially since if it were up to The David, he’d forget their birthdays, that they should get Christmas presents from their uncle in America, possibly even their names…
(Speaking of birthdays and Christmas presents… like I said, there are now 5. 5 little kids under the age of 3. What do you buy these people for gifts? Because Maggie does not know.)
Anyway. There’s a new Hannon. And she could go through the green glass door twice. Just like me.
