missed!

so i already missed a day of blogging... on the THIRD day of my month! pathetic. but life just catches up with you, and when you have a full day of laundry, cleaning, taking care of baby, going on a date with hubby, ETC... it's not that i forgot about it, or even that i didn't feel "up to it" - i just never had time! crazy. i did get to work on a little creative project yesterday, that i was hoping to finish today... but right now it's stuck in my sewing machine (really - i can't get it out!) so it'll have to wait i guess...

speaking of "missing"... i was just thinking how much i miss having close friends nearby. it takes me so much Oomph to get out there and make a friend, and then for some reason, they all seem to move away... FAR away. my best friend since childhood now lives in Papua New Guinea... my 2 friends that i stayed in touch with from college both live in Africa now, and the 2 close friends i've had since then have also moved away in the last couple of years - one to Atlanta, and one to Greece!! i keep telling myself that i need to "try again"... but it's hard! although i have noticed that it gets a little easier with a baby! people wanna hang out with you just so they can get a piece of that cuteness (AND because they like you, but the baby just makes it actually happen :) and there's a lot fewer lulls in conversation - always something to talk about, or a little guy to coo to! i have actually felt more connected to people since the baby than the past few years... and somehow more confident, too. like somehow it makes me a better person worth knowing now that i have him... or maybe it's just that i know if i can handle being a mother i can handle anything? having a baby has been WAY harder than i expected. i mean, i knew it was gonna be hard in like a "this will change our lives forever" way, but i wasn't so much expecting it to be hard like "i don't know if i can survive this!' kind of way! i guess i never really had any close friends or family that i got to see in the throes of raising a baby...

but (see last post) it has gotten MUCH better the past few weeks. he is amazing and i love spending time with him! we've got a lot of adventure ahead of us, i can tell!

a random shot of me and joey falling knee-deep in snow... having an adventure!

fullheart 2-21-2010

my heart is so full right now! i feel it like a physical sensation, bubbling up and over inside my chest. about to burst, impatient for the laptop to finally boot up so i can express just how joyful i am in this moment. i have so much wonder in my soul… an amazing, strong husband who loves me… a son who brings me delight a hundred times a day… the beauty of golden wheat, green hills after a good rain, silent snow-laden trees – oh, so much beauty, and so much joy in my life!


i write this in bed in the dark since i finally realized i couldn’t fall asleep with all this welling up inside me! this is the third day of jason’s off-road expedition trip, so my bed is half-empty, but joey lies just a couple of feet away in his bassinet, and i can hear him breathing and stirring as i write this. there is nothing more peaceful than a baby sleeping. i could watch him forever (if there weren’t other things that REALLY needed to be done in those precious few moments). and nothing i can think of brings me so much joy as his little smiles! the eye contact, where you know that 3-month-old is really looking at you, learning about his world and his mother, and the huge grin that will light up his face… the shrieks he lets out when he’s on his changing table or when he gets so excited that the bears on his mobile are MOVING (the fan comes in a close second)! even his little drunk smiles after he’s just finished eating – no, maybe especially those – just so sweet and blissful and thankful. they thrill my heart and i can’t help grinning back, or getting teary, or wrapping him in an almost-too-tight hug. the first few surreal weeks of his life, i wasn’t so sure that this was a good idea – “what did we get ourselves into???” was the question i often asked myself… and “why do people have kids? and why do they think it’s so great?” but now that i can see that little person inside, and he’s not just this crying, demanding little stranger… i have so much love for him. i must tell him a couple of dozen times a day – it probably comprises half our conversation (we’ll have to start branching out soon ;) “oh, I just love you so much, bug”!


i was a little worried that jason leaving for 4 days would lead to me having a meltdown with joey… i tend to need a little break every other day or so – just for an hour or two – where i don’t have to be the one responsible for meeting his every need. being a “single parent” for a few days was not something i was completely looking forward to. but I knew this trip would be so refreshing and good for jason’s soul, so i sent him off! and my time with joey has been just wonderful! so sweet. just “mommy and me”. i can’t wait for jason to come back, though! i’ve been doing things i wouldn’t normally do with him around, like watch chick flicks… i’ve been reading Captivating by John and Stasi Eldredge, and they encourage their reader to go back and watch movies that touch your soul (with romance, beauty, adventure). so last night, my sister and i watched Ever After; and tonight, i watched two of the movies with Katherine Heigl based on the books by Janette Oke Love Comes Softly and Love’s Enduring Promise. movies i would NEVER make jason sit down and watch, but knew my heart would enjoy… and i think that’s what has stirred up this sense of wonder and gratitude in me. i used to watch romantic movies, hoping for the day MY prince would come and sweep ME off my feet. Now when i watch them, they serve as reminder of how good i have it! my husband is amazing. He takes such good care of his family. i am so loved, and so is our son. he is strong for us, fights for us, plays with us. i can’t imagine this journey of life with anyone else. he works so hard to provide a safe place for us, and for my heart – he never gives up… though there have been plenty of moments these past 6 ½ years where i’m sure he’s wanted to… we’ve come through a lot together, and we are more in love now than ever! AND he’s good-looking ;) my prince.



my boys... aren't they handsome?


joey just stirred again, which reminds me that i should be sleeping while he is, since it’s my only chance! he’ll be up and ready to start our day again in just a few short hours (and i’m NOT quite yet ;)… here’s hopin’ that I’ve said all I needed to and can fall asleep this time!




what i made today... i used my Dremel tool for the first time today, and drilled a hole in this old bottle cap to make a lovely rusty pendant - i'm gonna wear it on our date tonight!

fourthmonth 2-20-2010

joey turned 3 months old yesterday! and i decided that since (some of) the fog has lifted, and I am looking longingly at my “art area” every day, but never really getting in there… for joey’s fourth month of life I will create and/or blog every day. i always read about people challenging themselves to do months or years like this, and think “yeah, that’d be nice”… but never seems doable, with work, baby, taking care of home and husband… (and I can never find a good “starting point” like the new year or a birthday – but what better than the 4th month of your baby’s life?? ;) but this month, i’m gonna do it! even if it’s little. like today, i made a little paper quilt that was more of a study in color than anything else, but it was SOMETHING! i created and i learned from it, and i was refreshed in the process! my soul needs to create – i feel so alive when i do! i even feel rejuvenated just from brainstorming about being creative, but so many times it just doesn’t get put into action. not this month! we’re doin’ it, baby! and by baby, I mean joey, because i AM toting him around most of the day (he was in the jeep front carrier while I was making that paper quilt today), so he’s gonna have to be my little (mini) partner in crime. this is gonna be awesome! …but not easy… i can barely find the time and energy to update my facebook status once a week, much less blog every day… and so much other household “stuff” tends to take precedence over “fun” stuff like art and being creative. but this month… here goes!

i LOVE being off work

i have talked to so many friends and coworkers who say "I could never stay home - i'd get so bored! need some time outside of the house..." well, it's been almost 3 weeks that i've been on disability leave now, and i still can't fathom WANTING to go back to work. i just feel like i get to be so "normal" now! I cook, keep the house clean, hang out with friends, read, and be creative as much as i want! yesterday i made 22 scrapbook pages!! workin' hard on getting caught up! and the 2 days before that, i made, wrote, and sent off 35-40 thank-you notes from my shower! SO MUCH FUN... i hope joey comes on his due date 'cause then that gives me 6 weeks still to get all caught up and ready for him! we shall see... babies come when they want to come, but i'm doing everything i can to keep him inside a few more weeks! (lots of resting and staying hydrated) plus then my mom can see me pregnant before she meets the new little one (living in hawai'i, she hasn't been able to see my growing belly - much to her dismay)... yes, this is the first grandchild (on both sides of the family) so EVERYONE is so excited!


well, i'm not going to post pictures of my creative endeavors of the last couple of days, 'cause there are too many pages, and i already sent out the thank-yous! but i have a shot of a piece i made a while back that needs a home on my blog - it's made up of a bunch of pics of things around our house - turned out kinda fun...

3 months later...

wow - it's been a while... i guess i took a break because of how sick i'd been feeling and the total lack of energy... but in july i found a "magic medicine" that made my morning sickness go away - just like that! amazing stuff! i just take one little sleeping pill (Unisom SleepTabs) with a B6 every other night, and abracadabra! no more nausea! discovered this stuff and stopped feeling sick about 3 days before going on a cruise to Alaska (a-mazing.) and ate everything in sight while i was there (because i could finally stomach more than fruit and gummy bears!)... and ended up with a gallstone. so ever since then, i've been having lots of little bouts of pain after almost every time i eat because of this gallstone (doc says i'll probably have to have the whole gallbladder removed after the baby's born - just what i wanted to be doing in those "bonding weeks" i get off from work)... but i seriously feel so much better and like a normal human being again, after finding my little magic blue pill :)




of course, as my pregnancy has progressed, i just feel more and more like my body is falling apart... everything hurts - feet, legs, back, pelvis, belly... and then a couple of weeks ago i started having contractions at work. i work 12-hour shifts as a nurse in the ER and don't get a lot of "down time". so at about 29 weeks, i started having fairly consistent contractions towards the end of each shift (like 8-9 hours into the shift, i'd start having consistently 6 contractions an hour), and i was also totally exhausted - like i was about to cry the last couple of hours of each shift. so after a few days of all these contractions, my doctor took me off on disability - 5 weeks early! yay! now for the last week or so that i've been off, i've been feeling so much more "normal" again! i mean, i still feel like my body is falling apart ;) but only 2-3 contractions a day, and i'm just getting to rest a lot more and do "normal" things like keep the house clean, and cook and bake and stuff... AND i've had more time to "be creative" finally! which is mostly taking the form of getting "caught up" on my scrapbooking from the last few years... i finally did our wedding (6 years ago now)!!! and i just want to get everything chronicled from pre-baby before he comes and all my scrapbooking will be about him... i really need to do some painting/collage and stuff, too. i miss it. i have this piece that has been in progress for a couple of months now (the 3rd piece in the Coldplay series - Cemeteries of London)...







here's the only 2 pieces i finished this summer (during my blog absence), both based on pictures from my baby sister's wedding in april... HUGE departure from my usual color schemes... but i think they turned out pretty good... i'm thinking about making prints and marketing them as like cards or something (bridal shower invitations?)

ok, fine, you can see it today...

here is the piece i made today... it's the second piece in my "coldplay" series - this one is about the song "Clocks"

and this one below was the first in that series, based on - you guessed it - 'yellow'! i like how the silhouettes leave ambiguity about the emotion involved in the scene... in the clocks one, the person could be wistful, longing, or just glancing up on an evening walk to see the giant moon. the yellow silhouette could be jumping for joy, reaching for the stars, or just motioning to something (or i'm sure there could be a lot of other interpretations, depending on who's looking at it!)

these pieces came about because i really liked how my birthday party invitations i made this past year turned out, with the multicolored paper and paint backgrounds (a technique learned from kelly rae roberts' book Taking Flight) -- see them below! but with these 2 in the coldplay series, i purposely chose colors i normally wouldn't first pick - but i like how they turned out!!

i hand-delivered each of these invitations to the dozen or so invitees - it was so fun! and so was the party! most of the people that came had NO artistic background whatsoever, but a few did, and i just got to hang out and help people "play" - so fun. i need to have another one of those parties!

I threw up at the grocery store on Tuesday.

I’m 4 months pregnant – the morning sickness is supposed to be OVER by now! It is so miserable just feeling nauseous all the time… but I think the reason I’m MOST disappointed that it hasn’t subsided is that the second trimester is supposed to be the time you feel the best (like, ever in your life), from stuff I’d read before being pregnant, at least. And I had all these big plans of things I was going to accomplish during these 3 months: get caught up with my scrapbooking , make lots of art, start an etsy site and start selling it… ‘cause once the baby comes, I know I’m going to have a very new focus in my life, and these things may have to take a backseat for a while. I mean I’ll still HAVE to create stuff… but won’t be able to dedicate large chunks of time to it – like I SHOULD be able to now. Pero, no. I’m already a month into the second trimester and all I do is lay around all the time. Ok, not completely, but by the time I do some laundry, grocery shopping, errands, cooking, cleaning (plus working full time) – all in between times of feeling so sick I just HAVE to lay down – there’s just not much time/energy left.


At least I have an amazing husband that supports me and loves me through all the whining, “I feel sick, but I HAVE to eat now. No that doesn’t sound good… no. no! blech! no. no. no. Ok we could try that…” and all my frustration with never getting anything done “all I did today was ONE load of laundry, and went to the grocery store and I threw up. :( ” He’ll say, “but did you do your ONE job for the day?? Taking care of the baby??” “yeah, I guess…” “then good job!! You accomplished everything you needed to today!” he’s sweet. And then there’s my sister Kristi… for mother’s day this year (my very first soon-to-be-mother’s day) she gave me a card that says she’ll clean my house once a week until next mother’s day, because she knows how tired I’ve been and that’s not gonna go away when the baby comes… omg. I am loved. I would NEVER do that for someone – such a huge sacrifice, with everything else going on in life. Thanks, sis!


The other part of what I was “supposed” to be doing during this time was getting ready for the baby! Such an incredibly gigantic life change is about to happen, and I feel like I haven’t even been able to think about it much/process/engage emotionally with the fact that a new little human is inside of me, forming… all that aside from physically preparing – nursery, picking names, shopping, etc – can’t even THINK about all that yet at this point! Guess I’ve been waiting till the morning sickness was over… but at this rate, I better start trying THROUGH it now! My mom was sick for 8 months with me, so hopefully this isn’t payback for that ;) and hopefully it’s not genetic… :) but I worked on some art today! My fingers and fingernails are all turquoise right now – have to show you when it’s done!


the baby at 10 weeks (7 weeks ago now! my little "joey" is much bigger now! and more human-looking ;)