obsession

Dipping baby's toes into the pond...also fun: playing with photo editing software.

The living, and the dead.

Shadow of mommy holding baby


on the first day, there was light.

we found berries!

Why, why, why, do I find it so irresistible to take pictures of flowers? All in all, they're all the same darn thing. I can find hundreds of shots online just like mine (or better) by doing a quick search. Ben says, "why not? At least it's not crack."

Baby O is a big boy now. He has been taking sips of water today, from a water bottle and a regular drinking glass. Just showing off, really! Good thing, too, as it was pretty hot and muggy. Personally, I like warm weather--I just dislike the overabundant indoor air conditioning that accompanies it, making it nearly impossible to choose suitable clothing in the morning.

Ha. That reminds me, what will my workplace be like without Viktor Krum? And more frightening...who will they plunk into that position next?

Oh, and check out my big baby! Last year's camping trip with our uncle made the paper, thanks to said uncle's rock-star status. :)

and just what are you so happy about?

In the fog of my too-busy, unfocused, haphazard existence, I find myself gazing in awe at my baby as mothers so often do, amazed by his unfazed joy.

And I say, so often, "why are you so happy, little boy?" or, "what are you smiling at?" because nothing so grand seems to be unfolding at the moment.

Well, why not? What's wrong with smiling for no apparent reason? I've said before...the most genuine smiles are probably the ones that noone sees. If nobody's watching, it's not a fragment of a forced bit of show for someone else's benefit.

So...what are you so happy about? What makes you smile, like this:

The unbelievably-happy-at-work baby.

I'm happy that Orion is nearly six months old and still going to work with me, so I don't miss out on all of those little daily babbles and smiles, and heck, even the diaper blowouts. Because, if anything, for whatever reason it sucks a whole lot more to clean up poopy clothes in the evening at home when you didn't see the intial damage done in the diaper.

Even though I am paid so little, at least it is all done within the "typical" workweek, so that I can take kids to events on the weekends without missing out on sleep like 2nd shift workers or people who have to work Saturdays and Sundays.

Even though it is sad that Grandma Norma is no longer with us, it means that we have Claire, Anthony and Sophia in town now. No more missing birthdays for lack of gas money. No more three months without visiting. Way more familial interaction for my little ones, and way more opportunities for the hiliarity of childhood to shine through.

doo-wah, ditty, ditty, dum, ditty doo-rag

That's my boy!

Tired, today. The sort of thing where your eyes burn from the labor of just staying open, and when you blink, you let it linger. A wistful moment of rest, gone, just like that.

I called this morning for an appointment with the doctor, but I waited until after 9 to call and all of the slots for today were filled. For the most part, sickness doesn't bother me too much. We've escaped flu, and I can only remember once in my adult days when I ever felt too ill to function and carry out the day's duties. For the most part, if I am ill, it is only a minor inconvenience; an afterthought. I dread ingesting chemicals and concoctions called "medicine," I would much rather prefer the sort of natural medicine of a lying on the earth in the sunshine or embracing my babies. But this ickiness, cyclical coughing--voice loss--faucet nose thing hasn't ever really gone completely away over the past few months. It has subsided, but not vanished. This weekend it was worse again. Yesterday I could barely speak. I feel cheated, though--through it all I have never approached the kind of sickness where you lose your appetite (illness as weight loss mechanism). No, instead, I plug away at the YMCA with nowhere-near-peak lung capacity, not losing any weight. Where is the justice?

Ph, right--it's lying there in the corner with those Reese's Peanut Butter Cups wrappers.

the way things are meant to be

Today was Arbor Day; did you know it? Tree Day, essentially. But most importantly to me, it was a day off from work. Paid holiday, no less. Best part yet? The kids still had school.
Orion and I got to hang out at home, and relax. I read the whole newspaper before noon, which happens pretty much never.

It felt so natural. Orion, who amazes me daily with his even-keeled temper at work, was even more pleasant at home all day with just Mommy. I didn't know it was possible.

He just turned 5 months old today. With Torrin I stayed home with him until he was 6.5 months old and I began college. Mira was 5.5 months old when I started my AmeriCorps term. There's 4.5 months and a bachelor's degree between the two of them; between Mira and Orion there's two AmeriCorps terms of service and 2 years of working at the Indian Center. But Orion didn't get to stay home with mom at all. It seems so unnatural. I'm thankful that he is with me all day and not compartmentalized in various toy stations at daycare, but it's not even close to having my full attention.

We had a good day even though I didn't get anything accomplished at home except sewing a button on a pair of pants that had gone half-unbuttoned for the past couple of wearings. I attempted to vacuum but couldn't figure out how to empty the cat fur out of the cannister. Bless him, Ben does most of the vacuuming but it also means that he is the one who better knows how to operate the darn thing. I have the instructions--buried in a pile of papers six months high that needs filing. The carpet was so encrusted with fur that I didn't even want to lie the baby down so I could start sorting. Alas, if only I had every Friday off, maybe I'd get somewhere...

Now, it's bedtime. We're playing Dance Dance Revolution. It's never been at our house before; this game system belongs to the library. Orion put himself to sleep in Ben's arms, gnawing on his green bandana. It's been bringing him great joy all evening.

Under the Table and Dreaming

This title works if you're Orion and sleep under Mommy's desk at work all week!

Speaking of sleeping beauties, here's my little girl looking rather gargantuant:

It's BEAUTIFUL outside. About 80 degrees Fahrenheit. This is how I love it. Now if only I were sitting on a blanket in a green grassy field, with a gossip magazine, a churro, and horchata to drink, that'd be just about perfect. Beverage and snack negotiable. The tulips shown below are from our backyard, sitting happily in my office window.

A Moment Stolen

Or, "Why I haven't checked in lately"

I left work at 3:57pm yesterday for a committee meeting starting at 4:00pm at my son's school. Luckily it is only about 2.5 miles away; 7-8 minutes by car. Upon leaving, I had:
--attended 1 staff meeting
--no intern showed up, because his truck wouldn't start
--4 tax returns completed
--4 unresolved income tax returns waiting for their owners
--3 packages of diapers that had not been picked up from the church
--3 diaper orders to call in
--1 unresolved rental assistance inquiry
--15 unanswered voicemails
--not completed redesign of food programs application form
--not completed new volunteer ID badges
--14 client files awaiting database entry and confirmation letters needing to be written, printed, and mailed to those clients
--not a single bathroom break (I needed to go potty!)
--no time to check e-mail
--no chance to drink my daily afternoon Coke (a necessity!)

Thank goodness Orion is such an easygoing, friendly baby! He did a lot of sitting around and hanging out yesterday.

'tis the season

(Mira, third from the right)

...for losing my mind at work! Things do NOT slow down come holiday time. Operation Santa Claus gifts were delivered yesterday...that's roughly one hundred families' gifts, two or three carbon copies of each form to find, sort, alphabetize, and their corresponding telephone numbers to call. Nevermind disconnected or out-of-service numbers. And it's tax training time...IRS VITA site coordinator meeting this morning. Drama there, too. Paid preparers are trying to dismantle the volunteer-run program. And then there's my other, top-secret work Christmas project...not to mention Christmas cards and keeping the cats out of the tree at home.

Back on subject (was there a subject?)--Mira's daycare had their Christmas program last Thursday, on our Auntie Joyce's birthday. Since I had forgotten that morning that the program was that evening, Mira was one of only two girls in the class not wearing a dress. And she noticed. The picture above shows only about a third of her whole class.
And, for fun, here's a pic of PGG, about 3 or 4 years old. And looking at this picture, I'm wondering if maybe the baby's nose, which has been causing me some confusion, is PGG's after all. Noses, of course, look much different as they get older along with the human hosts, but Torrin's was instantly recognizable as his dad's. Mira's is actually still somewhat of a mystery but it looks more familiar, if that makes any sense (probably not). Orion's was puzzling. But maybe not. Maybe. We'll see. So also we'll see, if Orion gets the crazy eyebrows (notice too the awesome late 80s background, semi-mullet, and rockin' ninja shirt).

Earlier this evening I walked out to the living room from the kitchen, where I was cooking dinner, and found Torrin reading to Orion on the couch. Cute, huh? And what was he reading to him? Maybe a nice board book, something for babies, maybe even something for older kids? No. Ghosts Among Us, which I doubt the author intended for reading to infants, or small children of any kind, for that matter. Torrin has dubbed it "creepy." I wouldn't know, since I never got around to cracking the cover, let alone actually reading it.

almost two weeks

So quickly it goes.

We're around, up 'n at 'em. It's Christmastime, which is my second-busiest season at work following tax season (next up!). Little Mr. Orion has been, and will be for the next several weeks, at work with me. All day, every day. We breastfeed, and I don't intend to introduce a bottle until he's 6 - 8 weeks old (it will be pumped milk), so he's my third limb for now. I try to keep him hidden as much as possible and aside from huge breasts (for me anyhow) people can't particularly tell I've just had a baby. My uterus seems to be done with its contractingness and the belly is gone (though the extra padding on my hips and the local vicinity is there for now).

Mira is still enchanted by the baby. She's always wanting to hold him. Torrin is older and doesn't view him as a potential playmate or plaything as Mira does, but he still asks to hold him and seems to genuinely like him. We will see how long it takes for the novelty to wear off. So far, I've managed to get home from work and cook dinner each night, but after that I'm pretty beat and it takes an effort to read bedtime stories.


Don't blink, or you'll miss everything...

Good-Enough Weekend

Torrin and Mira roasting hot dogs (mmmmm pig parts!)

I finished another bead project--yay!

And my kitties love each other.

Good enough weekend, minus the whole football parking thing on Saturday, where once again our intelligent Husker-fan-parkers were overheard referring to the Indian Center as the Indian Reservation. Yes, this is the Rez where all the drunken white folks are. :/

Worst Friday Ever.

Okay, so yeah it's technically Saturday now. 5:45am. I'm still at work. That about sums it up.

Mira on the subway

Long time no post.

In the mean time, I've reached the quarter-century mark...driven to Chicago and back...and caused a major fiasco at work with the too-sensitive and community-sore-spot issue of football parking. Since I couldn't be there, it was left to warring families and bull-headed staff members. Next week, I'll be back. Ugh. My birthday in Chicago was less than fabulous...beginning with my inagural (and hopefully last) birthday tow. Hey, at least it was a cheap tow for Chicago, only $170, and our friend there covered it--for which I am grateful.

For lunch on Saturday before taking Flamenco to the airport with her loyal doggie friend, we went to Ginos East for some authentic Chicago deep dish pizza. I'm still a sushi-craving fiend, and yes I know you're not "supposed" to eat sushi while you're pregnant, but that's what we had for dinner. Note that there are several sushi options which include cooked items. Had it not rained the entire time we were there, it would have been much more fun.

Better luck next year!

Like Wildfire

Another Sunken Gardens shot here.

So they've finally caught on to the baby bit at work. The Friday before last Nosy Coworker #1 finally asked. Then yesterday, Nosy Coworker #2 asked. This is noteworthy because both are guilty of regularly inquiring whether I was expecting when there was no reason (that I know of) to suspect so, yet for the past 6 months when I actually have been didn't pose the question. #2's asking yesterday was followed shortly by his son learning of the news. And his son? Is currently staying with Viktor Krum and TCO. Yay. Today, two more Poppy inquiries. Eh. Whatever. I'm 26.5 weeks along now, which translates to roughly "six months pregnant." A typical pregnancy is based on a "due date" figured to occur after 40 weeks, or 10 lunar months.

Some stupid news of the day: Harry Potter lost his virginity at 16 to an "older woman," and scientists have linked a gene to males' likelihood to cheat. Meow and growl!

Cleaning Off the Memory Card

Maybe I should do that more than once every nine months. Sure, I take stuff off right away if I remember...but other shots just sit and collect figurative dust. And since I'm usually "in a hurry" for this-or-that reason, I don't want to wade through all of the old stuff, I just want whatever pic was most recently shuttered. Apparently, it takes an accidental wipe of the card (clicked the wrong button) for me to accomplish any more than necessary.

The picture above was taken this March in Iowa City. What toddler doesn't love bubbles...or "do it myself" -ing?

At right, an art piece from the Amsterdam airport. There were 4 (one for each season) about 5 feet in diameter, possibly somewhat larger.

Right, behold wojapi (a traditional Native dish). I love this stuff. Probably because modern preparation tends to use cans of preserves or berries for pie filling, which is sugar-laden. I'd be very interested to try some made with wild berries found in the Plains region, but I for one sure don't gather many berries. Mulberries as a kid, of course, but since then, eh, not so much. This particular incarnation was served at the 4th Annual Buffalo Dinner in November.

And finally, melting ice's leaf cutouts exposing green grass hiding below. This was taken at the same park in Iowa City, two weeks prior to Mira's bubble-blowing.

It's fun to stay at the...

Okay, so we don't use the YMCA in that sense...but in any case, we went last night and re-started our membership. It was nice to go again. You'd be surprised how 10 - 13 miles of daily bikeriding did NO favors for my body. But I must say, I was impressed with how non-pregnant I looked in my now skin-tight workout clothes. I would've felt reasonably comfortable running into TCO there (which of course is always a distinct possibility). And as far as I know, he doesn't know. He did volunteer with the youth program a bit last week, and another guy who interns with the youth program knows. But I doubt that's something he'd just up and talk about. It's just a matter of time, though. TCO's brother Viktor Krum is technically my supervisor, and I'm due to sign a contract at the end of the month to continue working there. Except that whole baby being born at the end of November or early December detail...which is something he should probably know about.

34 kids, tornado & flood watches, heavy rain = camping trip?

The weekend of June 20-22, Torrin, Mira, and I all got sunburned. Torrin, being the fairest-skinned, was the worst hit. Especially in combination with his 7-year-old lack of know-how in regards to sun safety. He swears he put sunblock on that day, but his cherry-lipstick-red shoulders begged to differ. I wasn't with him; he'd gone with a group fishing that morning, which I didn't think would be a terribly fun activity for Mira. I didn't see him again until it was dark.

The first night, Thursday the 19th, we drove out to the campgrounds as planned. Then, a storm rolled up with ominous green-tinted clouds that soon spewed their soggy glory. We took the three vans full of kids back to my workplace for an impromptu sleepover at the Center.

Although the campsites were muddy, the rest of the trip fared much better. Unfortunately the set-up wasn't as well-accustomed to the kind of luminous photos that last year's camping trip yielded, but the park offered more activities and the food was better. There was a better mix of kids in attendance (i.e., not predominantly one family represented). Torrin opted not to go horseback riding, and since Mira is too little, I didn't get pictures of that particular foray. On the last day, upon our departure, I had a scare that I'd lost my camera. My loyal camera which has traveled with me to Spain, Washington DC, Phoenix, Minneapolis, and Wisconsin, not to mention tons of local stuff and my kiddos. Fortunately I found it under some damp towels smushed in the van when we got back into town, in the same condition I'd last seen it.

December Photo Project: Day 19

Six families down, eight to go.

December Photo Project: Day 18

So far...$275 for gas station gift cards...$260 at JC Penney for teens' clothing...$130 at Bath and Body Works for gift cards...and $3095 at WalMart for everything from socks and underwear to Fairytopia Barbies and Little Tonkas to microwaves and coffee pots. And don't forget diapers and Christmas trees. The receipt above was for the second run through WalMart. You can only fit so much into a cart at a time, you know.

December Photo Project: Day 7

These pictures were all taken at work this morning. Animal tracks in the snow and the powwow grounds, snow-covered, o'course.

Locals: You can watch me on TV!

I forgot to mention this last week. I was asked to read for a series done by our public libraries, this one, the American Indian Heritage Read-in. After much deliberation I opted a speech-of-sorts given by Alfred Gilpin, tribal chairman of the Omaha Tribe in 1954 (at which time the Omahas' sovereignty status was threatened) per the suggestion of my grandfather. Apparently, I'm also related to that guy, but I don't understand precisely how.

I was, of course, mortified. I hate public speaking.

In elementary school, I was once sent to the Principal's office for refusing to speak when called on by the teacher. In fifth grade, when it was my turn to give a presentation, I attempted to hide under my desk. In eighth grade, upon being asked to do a report in front of the class, I first began nervously laugh, uncontrollably. My teacher was just beginning to look really angry when the laughter subsided into sobs and tears.

Okay, so things aren't that bad anymore, but my favorite part is still when it's all over and I'm safely in my seat.

For those of you who are local, you can see me on channel 5 at 6pm and 10:30pm tomorrow, Friday 23 Nov 2007, and 9pm on Saturday. :) Another reader of note in the program is a co-worker, technically my boss of sorts, who also happens the 'brother' of The Boy Who Lived.

Rest In Peace, Mark Fire Thunder

Such a strange thing, to see a person one day, apparently fine, and the next, hear that they have passed on.
An eagle was seen circling the Indian Center on Monday; Tuesday morning, Lillian Fire Thunder woke to find her husband forever sleeping. Her first telephone call upon this revelation was not to 911, but to the Indian Center.Just one of many examples of the Indian Center's importance to Native Americans in our community.
Wednesday February 21, 2007 - 09:37pm (PST)
Comments
I know Lilian...well not personally but she had storage at Stephens and Smith where I worked. Is she alright?--Edie
Monday June 18, 2007 - 05:45pm (PST)