July 2010 Archives

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Originally uploaded by kerner

At long last (seriously - a year and 7 months!) my enormous king-sized quilt is done. I sent it out to be quilted, and the binding is really not done well (crooked sewing lines and such), but at this point I don't care - it's DONE!

As you can see, the quilt is quite colorful, and the rest of my bedroom is... not. We have dark wood furniture and basic greyish/beigeish walls. I am totally clueless when it comes to decorating - can you help? Matt and I agree that we're not up for painting right now, with the baby and all, but we can definitely handle some accessorizing, maybe some new lamps? We do not have a single picture or anything hanging on the walls. We used to have a fairly large picture over the headboard, but we moved it to the guest bedroom where it fit better.

Just to give you an idea of the layout, this picture is taking facing the door, which you can barely see on the far left edge of the photo. on the right side of the photo is a large dresser with mirror, and on the right side of that dresser we have a chair in the corner. Straight in front of the bed is a sliding glass door which is the only window in the room.

I welcome your ideas...

My name is Josiah and I am almost 4 months old! I am very excited about my grandma coming to visit for almost a whole week but until then, I will pass the time doing some of my favorite things, like...

Chewing on Dad's hands

Chewing on (I mean, playing in) the Jumperoo

and going to Springfield Cardinals games!

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Originally uploaded by kerner

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Originally uploaded by kerner

As you can see, I've been putting Josiah to work! When he's not writing up legal opinions, he's spending most of his time smiling and flashing his baby blues at all the ladies in both of my offices - the Airport and the Law Department. I think they're going to start keeping a tally to make sure he visits them equally!

When I was a City Hall visiting my fellow city attorneys, I stopped in at the Public Works department where a couple of particularly baby-crazy attorneys were finishing up a meeting. I knew they would never forgive me if they didn't get to see Josiah, so I wanted to see if I could catch them at the end of their meeting before I went home. (It was my day off.) The receptionist went in to tell them I was there (apparently not recognizing me in my casual day-off clothes, ponytail, and no make-up) and announced to the room (of mostly men) that "a lady with a new baby is here." Both of the attorneys knew I was going to be there so they immediately knew it was me, but before they could say anything, one of the guys blurted out: "I hope she's not here to see me!"

Umm... yeah. I got a pretty good laugh out of that. I mean, if you think random women might be showing up at your office with a baby in tow (presumably to inform you it's yours), then I think you might want to re-evaluate some things in your life!

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Originally uploaded by kerner

Josiah had a really nice time visiting Great-Grandma and Grandpa last weekend. He put on quite a show with his mad tummy-time skillz and crazy kicking action in the bouncy chair. (He loves to make the toys swing wildly over his head. I think this child will like roller coasters!)

I don't get out to visit my grandparents as often as I should, especially considering they live just about a hour's drive away from me (as opposed to the 4 hour' drive from my hometown when I was growing up). It was so sweet to see my grandparents ooh and aah over Josiah - I really need to take advantage of it while I still can. (Sad thought, but true.)

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Originally uploaded by kerner

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Originally uploaded by kerner 

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Originally uploaded by kerner

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Originally uploaded by kerner

We spent the long 4th of July weekend at a relative's lake house just across the Arkansas border on Table Rock Lake. We had a nice time vegging out and not really doing anything. It worked well that this was the plan because the weather was either way too hot for the baby to be outside (90+ degrees) or rainy most of the time we were there.

The view was lovely though, and sitting on the deck overlooking the lake to eat breakfast each morning was very nice, too. I read two books (The Gentle Art of Domesticity and The Five Love Languages) and got a good start on two more (The Lacuna and The Christian Atheist) -- why yes, my reading preferences are a bit ADD.

We went into Eureka Springs one day and got zero pictures, but we did use a tripod that we found in the lakehouse to get some nice family pics out on the deck. We grilled out every night and made big yummy breakfasts each morning.

All good so far... except there was a baby in tow. All the rooms were really bright (big windows to showcase the lovely views) and loud at night (fireworks) so we ended up setting up the Pack-n-Play in the laundry room, which was accessed through a bathroom. The strange bed plus strange location plus strange smell (laundry-soapy) did not make for a very restful baby. I was up 2-3 times a night to nurse him back to sleep - and of course the most convenient place to do that... you guessed it, sitting on the toilet (with the lid down of course!) Not very comfortable, much less at 2 and 4am.

And to that a baby that didn't want to nap unless one of us was holding him, and you get the idea that this was not the most restful vacation ever. We actually planned to stay until Wednesday or Thursday but ended up leaving Tuesday morning as soon as we got the place cleaned up.

Luckily once we got back home, we got back to a better routine of naps, etc. so I'm hoping tonight will be a good back-to-normal sleep night for Mr. Josiah.

Note to self:  take a grandparent on the next trip so they can share in the baby-holding duties!

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Originally uploaded by kerner

At long last, I have have completed a knitting project post-baby! Appropriately enough, these are the socks that I started on Josiah's due date (8 days before his actual arrival) while I was going crazy with nerves & anxiousness about when he was going to make his big entrance.

It only took me three months, but I managed to weave in the ends on this basic pair of socks while we were at the lake over the holiday weekend.

Josiah kindly agreed to model them for me. I think they'll fit Matt better, don't you?

Three months
Originally uploaded by kerner

Dear Josiah,

I have to say, three months is awesome. You are really starting to interact with your world - looking all around, holding your head up, kicking anything you can get your feet near. (We call you Mr. Kicky.) I also love how you communicate with us through your smiles, laughs, coos, and gurgles. When we flip you over for tummy time, you raise your head high and can hold it up for a long time. You also push up on your knees and can scoot yourself forward if you can get enough traction. I bet you'll be flipping yourself over to your back in no time.

You are doing great at the babysitter's, and she commented recently how much easier you had gotten. You still aren't really a fan of napping in your crib, but if I hold you, you will snooze away for an hour or more. (Pretty nice life, I'd say!) You are doing really well at night - you go to sleep without much fuss at all and only get up once to eat in the middle of the night. I'm still hoping for that elusive sleep-through-the-night thing (not that bogus 5-hour STTN, but actually sleeping so long that I get a full night's sleep!) but for now I am trying to appreciate our late-night time together.

Love,
Mom

Hello there, faithful readers!  (Yes, all 5 of you.  3 of which are related to me.  Anyway...)

I owe you a 3 month post about Josiah, but what I am really thinking about these days is my upcoming vacation!  This will be a new kind of vacation for us, since we'll have a 3-month-old in tow (and quite possibly a travel trailer to haul all of his stuff, but that's another story).  We decided to skip out on the family reunion in Florida and go for something closer to home and a little more low-key.  We'll be staying in my aunt & uncle's lake house in northwest Arkansas for about a week.  No cable, no internet, 15 minutes from the closest town... it could either be wonderful or mind-numbingly boring.  I have a feeling we'll experience a bit of both during the week. 

We're planning to sleep in (as much as is possible with a baby around), take naps (ditto), read (ditto), knit (okay you get the picture), explore the great outdoors a bit, hang out on the gorgeous deck overlooking the lake, and cook lots of yummy food.  I am also excited to be able to spend lots of time with Josiah, who is doing all kinds of fun new things these days.  Since I'll have plenty of time on my hands, I might even write a few blog posts to put up when I get back!