more than you wanted?

it's been a full past week, and it appears as though the hits will keep on comin'. on my dance card for this coming week: twenty-four chapters of an accounting course to narrate, baby dr appointment, an audition for some industrial thing, three-year wedding anniversary, a character on a kids educational dvd to voice, a commercial shoot for a car dealership... and, you know, the gym. oh, and my house could use a tidying once-over. heh. the following week I get to go back to Dallas for three days, and the week after than, for two. I'm thankful for work! thank you, Lord. I won't lie, though, it's not without it's stressors, some of which are just personal communications and little, important bits I've let slip through the cracks. but I'd rather enjoy this pretty Saturday morning than dwell on it right now.

I'm in the process of weaning Magz, which has happened pretty organically. we're down to one feeding a day, in the evening before bed, but my body is still trying to figure everything out and my chest has been feeling sort of full and 'ow'. I feel like it's time, but there ARE positive ulterior motives at play, too - not only do I have more work travel coming up, but I'm scheduled to shoot for a couple of days on a movie in Mexico in June (fun!), and want to have her in a good place to succeed if I'm away from her for a few days. as nice as I think it will be to have my body back to myself, I've really treasured the connection of our mealtimes and I'm glad I've been able to feed her this long. so far, she's a good eater and is still willing to try lots of new things.

so many photos for you to enjoy. sooooooooo many!!!! imagine I said that last line like we do when we read Pat the Bunny, or the Baby Elmo book.

first, we went to our friend SC's wedding. sorry, SCH!

she likes playing with mama's pretties, and I confess I don't really mind. she does WANT to put them in her mouth, though, and mama has to thwart her good time with noise about 'just touching'... also, mama needs a haircut.

with daddy @ the reception:

exhibit A of what our visitor was talking to us about at MOPS last week. a kind fellow table-mate snapped our picture for us, and though it's fine (I monkeyed with it a little in iphoto) I wish I'd asked him to take it without the flash. photos taken in natural lighting always look better, even if you have to take a few extra to account for blurriness or whatnot.

next, may I present Sunday in the Park with Magz:

still unsure of the bucket swing, will deal by trying to eat it:

Stayin' Alive:

it's all about the pointing, really. which is good! any communication is welcome.

with daddy:

we went to Froberg's to pick strawberries, and had SUCH a good time! what a cool outing!

tuckered out.

it's too easy.

berry-freaking adorable, right?!

mgb and the baby came with me to work in the metroplex this week, and we got to hook up with Miss L for lunch! which was a total highlight of our trip. she and mgb went to high school together and have been friends for ages.

mgb totally buttercupped me.

and no matter how cool you are, I don't think any Texan can resist the pull of the spring baby-in-the-bluebonnets photo op. we pulled over on the side of the road by the airport:

we got in last night around 1:30. I'm glad for this coffee and I'm glad to be home.

-m.y.

Feeling Gravity's Pull. or Saucer Full Of Secrets.

the title of this blog really has no bearing on it's content. they're just the suggestions of my husband and, let's face it, they DO pull you in.

this has been a rather challenging week. mgb was sick the first part of it, and he's now dealing with hives. poor man! he even has them on the bottom of his feet, I've just been informed, which is why he has to walk 'that way'. let your imagination fill in a fun visual of that. I followed last week's awesome gym-going (4 times! shazamm!) with a paltry two times this week, and somehow managed to tweak something in my back that's making me hobble a little today. egad, girl, get it together. I've only yoga'd once this week, and it's still pretty hard. bouncing back a bit at a time.

I was suddenly bitten by the spring cleaning bug yesterday, and effectively made a pretty big mess before it (mostly) got cleaned up. come to think of it, it's possible the back tweaking happened somewhere in the cyclone of yesterday's domestic activity. huh. anyway, I actually wasn't sure what was going to come of turning the house somewhat topsy turvy, since doing anything like this with a baby around makes for a very stop/start kind of day. I probably fed her too many toasted Os to bribe an extra ten minutes, you know? in the end, I moved a cool coral chair out of our bedroom to the office, gave everything a good dusting and the floors a good vacuum/swiffer, and to make things a bit more sunny I changed out the curtains in the living/dining room for the ones I'd made for our bedroom. we also decided to go ahead and finally let go of the ikea chair thing I bought years ago (and recovered with my mom & grandmothers... remember that, mom?!), so there's a lot more space happening in the living room. space that's mostly strewn with toys right now, but still. later, in the future, we have hopes of replacing some of our furniture... like our beloved sofa with the holes in the leather in which Magz loves to fish her little fingers, or our dining room table whose chairs get ricketier and ricketier. in the interim, a little clearing and airing out has left us with a much better vibe - here's what the curtains look like from my vantage point on the holey sofa:



I still love those yellow birds in the pattern.

put a bird on it!

I don't care if it's trendy, I'll still do it. IN MODERATION.

and now for baby photos.

this is the current wallpaper on my phone and I love it so much.

hanging out in the back yard:

whaddup, mom?!

you're probably starting to notice that I tend to take rather a lot of photos when she's eating. the reasons for this are twofold - A) I want to remember what she's eaten, and B) she can be pretty flipping funny at mealtimes. this week, she's super into broccoli.

like, grabbing-a-floret-and-shoving-the-whole-thing-in-her-mouth-into-broccoli.

I love this expression. notice the bits on her tray... there are half-moons of Os that she'd bitten into and discarded the other half, small cubes of cantaloupe (which she was also way into this week, as we learned when offering her a sample at Central Market), and slivers of apple. I came in with the rest of the apple to eat with her, and she insisted (through pointing) on trying mine.

which she seemed to prefer, no matter how much I tried to convince her that what was on her tray was the same thing I was holding.

it's all about the clapping right now. super fun! ask her to clap for you next time you see her! or start singing the pattycake song...

done with dinner. DONE.

we are also terribly into bananas. loooooove them.

I wonder what this weekend will look like. we've got a wedding to attend, which will be fun. I want to build up my flower beds in the front and plant things. I pruned the hedges back to within an inch of their lives out there. I want to sleep. I want to love on mgb. I want to go to the gym. I want to hang new curtains in the bedroom... and maybe give the bathroom a fresh set?! see, that's how inspiration strikes. bam! I want our family to play in the park again. I want to see friends. I want to teach and sing and worship. I want to find a good facial exfoliator. and a better short slip for skirts. I want to finish putting stuff away (okay, I don't really want to do this but I have to). I want to use my $5 off coupon at DSW and shop for my new niece, Katelin, who's supposed to be joining us at the end of the month. I want to do most of the above while drinking coffee, black please.

I probably won't do some of those things. but it's nice to write them down anyway.

here's Magz jamming out to Will.i.am's song, 'What I Am', recently on Sesame Street. it is awesome.

clink on the link above in green to view the Sesame Street video yourself and see if it doesn't make you ten times smiley-er than you were before.

time for cookies. I mean cardio! no, I really mean cookies.

-m.y.

discoveries

it's always good to learn new things about people, yes? well, in the past few days I've learned that my hubs can whip up both brownies and biscuits from scratch like *that*. this marriage thing just gets richer and richer for me. seriously, the biscuits in the photo below are my new carby boyfriends. 'were', I mean. har-har. we're at the end of our March food budget and have really tried to be good and abide by our envelopes instead of allowing ourselves to run over, and though the cupboard is looking a little bare mgb threw this delicious succotash and biscuit dinner together last night:

I've been scouting nearby parks for bucket swings for Magz, and we headed over to the neighborhood park behind Shearn after our Southern dinner. there were a lot of people out, and the baby was a bit thrown by it all. forgive all the photos, but I like to call this collection, Park... Friend or Foe?:

first impressions: very uncertain about the swing.

it got a little better.

brave enough to wave:

we still seem to be having more fun than she is.

sliding with mama. why are we here again?:

considering her position:

and deciding to engage:

climbing?

why yes, don't mind if I do!

look, Daddy, other kids doing stuff!

going the distance:

celebrating with Daddy after making it down the slide (with lots of help):

a few other discoveries of late:

- two more yoga classes taken since last I blogged... I'm bendier than I thought I was! still crazy sore, but it feels weirdly good. I do notice that there's tension in my shoulders and hips that has really taken hold, and I'm plotting the use of the spa gift certificate I got at Christmas. I think a little deep tissue massage will help jiggle some things loose...

- I'm corresponding again with my dear, lovely friend Yoko! She and her family were in northern Japan and survived the tsunami, though life is still far from easy. Yoko is a yoga instructor herself, and I wish I could take a class with her. I'm so grateful to be reconnected with her.

- taking a nap is such a delicious, luxurious thing to do. can we enforce siesta, please? I'm pretty sure it will make us all better people.

- you should always pay any EZtag toll tickets promptly, because the fines will smack you around and make you feel royally stupid for waiting so long.

- my Real Simple from two months ago has some really great stuff in it. I'm a little behind in my reading stack.

- God keeps finding ways to break through and give me glimpses of more than what I know right now.

- W's 'clothing inspiration' email - it felt like a fun discovery and just made me feel good. thanks, girl. :)

-m.y.

a stolen moment catch-up

it's been sort of busy around here. you know, stuff and work and stuff.

I think to write things all the time and they never seem to make it here. but here's an update!

I've been making an appearance at the Y more. 2 of Olga's yoga classes, even! which are so so hard. the plan is to hit another today, to ring in the weekend with the appropriate level of muscle-spasmy ouch-but-yay accomplishment. my attention span being what it is, I've been doing modified circuit training and running sprints lately. that's fun to type - I've never really been a runner of any kind, but the sprints get my heart rate up and give me quick goals to meet, which works right now. my body, still something of a wild card in it's new post-baby reality, is really feeling better and better.

hubs sent me out with gift certificates to get some things for myself, and after spending a couple of hours searching/trying on clothes and finally coming home with 2 candles and an outfit for the baby I decided I need some help. I can't seem to decide who I am anymore, or at least how to translate that to how I want to dress. I'm not young enough (or have the body) to dress in certain styles, and I'm not ready to embrace what I deem 'soccer-mom'-wear. I want to be fairly classic and still cool. I'm unsure right now of how to do that.

I've been trying on some different podcasts lately. one that I'm liking is by Cornerstone Church, the church in California where Francis Chan used to preach. I've been in a dry place for awhile with little energy and less attention span, and I'm really seeking things that resonate because it's no fun to be in the valley and I'm weary of it. in my current 'season', I'm finding myself desiring different experiences... I told M that if we were a church with two services, I'd likely be choosing the contemporary one right now. I love hymns, I sing them to my daughter, but my dry space could do with some fresh emotion, new expression. I think podcasts and things like that are a good way to experience new things without burdening my church with the responsibility of meeting my changing needs.

I'm teaching cradle class on Sunday mornings. Right now it's just Magz and I, but we'll be joined by another little one soon and I'll work out a schedule of other helpers. The positive things about teaching are 1) I get to work in a gift, because singing and making things fun for this age group is natural to me, and 2) I'm being forced to think of the most basic things, like the love of Jesus. the power of God. what I believe. I miss attending my own Bible class and it would be easy for me to feel a little isolated, but with the baby I don't feel I have much of a choice right now other than stay home until worship time (which is what I think others with babies have done). I used to take her to class with me but it's way too distracting now, so I started a class for Magz and the other babies coming to attend until she turns 2 and can join the existing classes. plus, they're able to learn so much! I'm glad for her to have a class, and I'm hoping it will be an encouragement for more young families to feel welcome during bible class. I'm also hoping I will be able to be able to structure things so that I can return to class myself at some point.

she's up now, and it's time to go do stuff again. in closing: my husband is the best one. our baby is so lovely. I'm so thankful for blessings abundant, and for spring.

-m.y.

nine months.

good gracious, our baby is nine months old! I pretty much love this age... the only tough part is the whole "grab her quick, she's gleefully pulling up on that unsafe thing!"-part. here are our photos, taken in our front yard on this beautiful day:

ballerina!:

we're tight right now, this one and I. I am so crazy about her. the other night after watching Road to Perdition I did the whole, 'mikebell, if something happens to me you'll have to tell her all the things she needs to know, but mostly about how much I loved her.' he said sure, because no photographic evidence exists to prove such a thing...

she's still pulling up on everything, and is beginning to be brave about letting go a little. toys and books are cool, but Pat the Bunny is a special favorite and she likes doing each page's activity. we're into pointing and waving right now, and love to use our fingers to eat our Miss Barbara's hole 'n ohs, sweet potato fries, green beans, carrots, bananas, and anything else mama will put on the tray. she's getting better with the sippy and gestures to have a drink of water from our cups at mealtimes. she's still eating pretty well - I'm looking forward to more fruits and vegetables coming into season. I'm still making most of her food, and while it's easy and only requires a little more planning my most recent lesson taught me this: baking apples and pears is a ton more work and effort than just steaming or boiling them in a little water. mama's not doing it that way again. we're mashing things just a little for her to eat, and she's getting pretty good at 'chewing'. I had no idea the puree phase would be so fleeting, it seems like we moved on to chunkier fare very quickly. I've been hitting most of the foods on our pediatrician's list and have included seasonal local things we've found, but have also been taking advice from Ellyn Satter's Child of Mine; Feeding your Child with Love and Good Sense.

for kicks, here's what we LOVE right now:

1 sweet potato, cut into fries
pinch of cinnamon
drizzle of olive oil

mix it all together and bake them on a foil-lined baking sheet for 25-30 minutes @ 350. it is delicious and you'll want to eat all of them yourself.



I could write more, but she's pulled up and is peering at me from behind the laptop. and is now reaching for the power cord.

I'm out. :)

-m.y.

a productive weekend, I must say.

we've been puttering around the house all weekend, and it's been seriously lovely. the weather cooperated and provided a most agreeable climate in which to tackle our yard, which needs heaps and heaps of TLC. margaret ann turns 9 months old on tuesday and she's doing new things every day, which is thrilling, scary, and bittersweet all at once. here are a few photoz of the girl:

with grandma and momo in Hico:

hangin' out in her Amy's Ice Cream onesie with the berry paci and toasted hole 'n ohs (we're so into using out fingers right now):

"this is a local green bean, everybody":

playing the pots:

but not for very long. I'll just sit here and chew this spoon please, thanks.

we cleared all the cacti and giant creepy aloe vera from this front bed. there are still a lot of rocks to pick up, but we're making good progress. here's mikebell digging everything up - I marked the outline of the bed I want with the garden hose. fyi, somewhere in those rocks below is a little garden snake we encountered... we let him go his merry way. I'm hoping the dirt under all of the rocks and things our renters used in this flower bed is rich and good, as I used Mary Fritz' organic recipe for most of the beds years ago...

here's our yard debris from the weekend. we mowed/weed-eated the front and back yards, dug up a bunch of wild onion growing in the back, attacked the front flower bed in front of our bedroom and hauled/scooped up a lot of rocks out of both it and the front planter (and there's more to pick up!), and mikebell set up our new compost bin in the back yard. MB also performed most of the physical labor this weekend, it must be said. maggie hung out with us and did pretty well most of the time, playing in her pack 'n play and watching everything intently. see the crazy creepy aloe vera on the end?? it looked a little monstrous both in and out of the flowerbed.

I'm excited to plant more of the type of plants I enjoy. I want to go back and find photos of what I did with it when I lived here years ago, just to compare. we have more prep work to do, but it's a good start.

things that are really good:

--I made it to the Y three or four times last week. I know it seems dumb that I can't really remember how many times, but that's how things are. it was at least three, and THAT is awesome.

--as a birthday gift, we went to Luke's Locker Saturday morning and I got fitted with some Brooks tennis shoes, which are light as air and were on sale to boot.

--I got a new client last week that should be fairly steady, which is always good.

--I cut my soda and sugar consumption this past week and we ate really well, which just felt super-good.

--I'm loving Aveeno's tinted 30SPF daily moisturizer.

--this week we're doing our taxes. let's get it over with.

-m.y.