Fixed and Flowing

The baby came!

2011-12-13T18:51:00.002-05:00

Where: Home
When: November 2011

The baby is here, and it is all going swimmingly. Here are some pictures!

In the hospital a few hours after the birth:

And a variety from home, from the first week or two:

2011-11-11T07:55:00.002-05:00

Where: Battery Park
When: November 2011

Such a beautiful couple of days! It was so nice to get a little bit of relief from the wind and cold, but it seems that's back on the menu today.

This baby had better come out soon, my warm jacket is only going to fit over my belly for so much longer!

Bees Knees

2011-11-10T16:10:00.001-05:00

Where: Battery Park
When: November 2011

Look Baby!

2011-11-02T13:47:00.001-04:00

I finished your hat!

Where: Home
When: November 2011

Your head will be all warm, and also pretty. So you can come out now!

Really. Right now.

More baby stuff

2011-10-21T17:18:00.002-04:00

Where: Home
When: October 2011

This is going to be a pinwheel blanket. I'm extremely proud of it, because it was the first time I had used double pointed needles, and I figured it out by myself, with the help of some descriptions and youtube videos. It's now quite a bit bigger - when it's all finished, it will look like it's made up of 10 spokes, with a lace separation between each section. I'm doing it in 4 colors, and have started the second color at this point.

Here are the colors in order of use:
(The center color)

(The color I'm on now)

The colors remind me of a sunrise or sunset, with the blue representing either water or the sky. We'll see what it ends up looking like - it will be rings of color around the center. Some people who have done this blanket have managed to make each pinwheel section a different color, but I'm not that clever, sadly.

It's coming along very quickly, with the help of librivox.org, which has free audio recordings of classic books. So far I've worked through the second half of Pride and Prejudice, all of Persuasion, and am now listening to A Room With A View. It's amazing how listening to the book makes the knitting go incredibly quickly, and the knitting enhances my ability to focus on the book. Between them both, waiting for this baby to get here becomes less tedious and frustrating, as the day flies by quite quickly, and I feel like I've gotten so much done by the end.

Baby stuff

2011-10-20T10:26:00.003-04:00

Where: Home
When: October 2011

Baby booties, on top of a baby blanket that I finished recently! The booties are adorable, but probably too small - my first attempt to make a larger pair was a bit of a failure, I'm not quite sure how to increase the pattern while maintaining the proportions.

I'm kind of disappointed with the blanket, it's not particularly interesting, and I made a number of mistakes in the seed stitch which bug me. I'm now working on another blanket that I am MUCH more excited about, with a much more interesting pattern and a challenging start.

Next project

2011-10-18T09:24:00.002-04:00

Where: Home
When: October 2011

This scarf exists because I am incapable of entering a yarn store without buying something, apparently. I had gone in with a very, very specific yarn in mind, in a specific quantity, and I had picked it out and was waiting for the yarn to be wound, and congratulating myself on only spending $6 this trip... and then I started touching things, and disaster struck, because I touched THIS yarn, which is an amazingly soft and delicious and squishy baby alpaca, and I before I knew what had happened I was walking out the door with FOUR skeins of it. Sigh.

Originally I was planning on knitting the scarf, but I recently learned how to crochet as well, and I came across the pattern which seemed both good looking and relatively simple, using double crochet stitches, so I decided to give it a shot.

I kind of wish that I had decided to do one more row, and I think it actually wouldn't be that hard to add one on with the crochet pattern... I'll have to think about it, I decided to stop because I didn't really want to use more of the yarn for this, I wanted to save enough for a hat! So I think I'll do the hat first, then see how much yarn I have left and maybe try adding another row. I blocked it yesterday (my first attempt at blocking), but I think I wasn't bold enough with the stretching or the wetting, as it didn't really do much in terms of making it wider, although it did make it a bit longer.

I've already used the scarf, and it is quite decadently soft and warm, so overall I'm quite pleased!

Projects

2011-10-14T11:16:00.002-04:00

While I wait for Baby Powers to hurry up and make her debut:

Where: Home
When: October 2011

I've been knitting and crocheting like crazy, which has been so much more fun than I imagined when I first decided to learn how. And now that I've discovered audio books, my productivity knows no bounds!

I have several projects that are either finished or almost finished - I'm not going to post them all at once, as that will be a little overwhelming, but I'll get them all up over the next week or so.

First project: my first attempt at a (very simple) lace pattern, which is turning into a gorgeously thick, squishy, cozy, warm scarf, with only a few bobbles and errors here and there:

Piper discovered my body pillow

2011-10-07T09:01:00.002-04:00

Where: Home
When: October 2011

She was one happy girl. Until I came to bed and took it back.

Fall flowers

2011-10-06T09:13:00.000-04:00

Where: Warwick, NY
When: October 2011

Dalliance

2011-10-05T11:18:00.002-04:00

Where: Warwick NY
When: October 2011

In the interest of full disclosure - I totally didn't see these two grasshoppers until I downloaded the photos and looked at them in lightroom. This was the only photo where they were in focus, too.

Apple picking

2011-10-03T19:08:00.002-04:00

We went apple picking last weekend! And I have a new lens to play with, so that made it even more fun. It's the Nikon 35mm 1.8 - I'm enjoying the new focal length, and it's proving to be quite a good walk around kind of lens, it served me well this trip for the detail shots, portraits, and a few landscapes. I'm quite pleased.

There were many, many apples:

Some rain - not too much rain, but just an occasional drizzle:

And a seasonal chill in the air, which made the hot mulled cider and apple cider donuts even more satisfying. We had both a pre-picking cider and donut, and a post-picking cider and donut - it's important to keep up one's strength in this kind of situation:

The drizzle made hats even more necessary, which always improves the hat-wearing experience:

A great time was had by all! It was my last outing before this baby decides to make an appearance - I'm not sure I want to be hours from the city in the next several weeks!

Oh, and I worked on this during the car ride:

Baby bootie! It turns out that attempting to crochet, when you have only just learned how to crochet, is made far more difficult in when in a moving vehicle, because there's a lot more bouncing than one might expect.

I really need to be doing more of this.

2011-09-03T21:44:00.000-04:00

Where: Home
When: August 2011

Evening at the lake

2011-09-01T10:43:00.001-04:00

Where: Upstate NY
When: August 2011

Piper at the lake

2011-08-31T09:33:00.002-04:00

My girl is getting old:

Where: Upstate NY
When: August 2011

We had the opportunity to spend the weekend at a friend's parent's lake house, and it was absolutely lovely. Piper had a great time, but it made me realize that she's really starting to slow down. Her face is getting whiter, and while the opportunity to romp around in a lake would once have sent her racing in uncontrollably crazy circles, this time she was notably restrained, indulging in a matronly wade to stomach depth, pausing with eyes half closed and a contented expression, then wading back out. I think she enjoyed herself anyway, but it was a reminder that we probably only have a few years left with her.

Here she is looking a little more lively:

The end of Irene

2011-08-28T20:58:00.000-04:00

Where: Home
When: August 28, 2011

2011-08-22T09:57:00.002-04:00

Where: Battery Park City
When: August 2011

We had the most amazing weekend, totally by accident. Some friends invited us to head upstate with them to a lake house for the weekend, at 5pm on Friday night, and we had SUCH a great time. Although Piper might have had the best time of all, rolling in the grass, wading in the lake, begging for food in the kitchen, and walking through the woods. Our friends are fabulous hosts as well, and cooked the most delicious things all weekend.

2011-08-18T08:47:00.001-04:00

Where: Tannersville, NY
When: July 2011

2011-08-17T07:58:00.000-04:00

Where: Tannersville, NY
When: July 2011

Summer

2011-08-16T09:53:00.001-04:00

Where: Tannersville, NY
When: July 2011

I finally uploaded some photos that I've taken over the last month or two, so I'll put those up this week, or will try to remember to.

2011-07-15T14:04:00.002-04:00

Where: Tannersville, NY
When: July 2011

Sorry I've been so light on the posting these days, I'm having quite a lull in the creativity department. I took a couple of nice things over the weekend though, so I'll try to get those up.

2011-06-24T08:48:00.000-04:00

Where: Solterreno, Spain
When: April 2011

Incoming

2011-06-18T06:52:00.002-04:00

Where: Home
When: July 17, 2011

Sorry for the long silence - we've spent the last two weeks preparing for, and then recovering from, a move to a new apartment. This has been both stressful and exciting, but mostly exciting!

This was the view yesterday - we had thunderstorms rolling in and out all day, much to Piper's (and therefore my) distress. This morning the water is like glass, and there are no clouds, just a light fog over the river that the sun is dispersing. I think the thunderstorms are back tomorrow, sadly, but I'll take whatever reprieve I can get.

If it weren't for the dog's panic, I would actually enjoy them, especially from the new place, which provides an excellent viewing experience for all the drama.

Morning

2011-05-31T10:59:00.002-04:00

Where: Solterreno, Spain
When: April 2011

I love that pre-opening stretch that flowers seem to do early in the morning.

Projects

2011-05-27T09:27:00.002-04:00

Where: Home
When: May 2011

I'm learning how to knit! So far, I can purl and knit and cast on and bring in new colors! I like knit stitches best, the purl stitches make my hands cramp. I haven't gotten to the binding off stage yet. In theory, this will be a scarf, but I don't actually think it will be a scarf anyone wants to wear. It's more complicated than a scarf really should be, honestly, but because it's got lots of different elements, it is good practice for a variety of techniques.

The next thing is a hat, which is also a part of the learn to knit kit that had the scarf. And then I will either take a stab at a lovely looking afghan I just ordered the kit for, or I will try to hunt down enormous US 19 sized needles so that I can tackle the whole reason I decided to learn to knit in the first place, which is to learn to knit THIS most adorable of all adorable things.

At the moment, I'm stuck on what type of yarn to order for it, and also on finding needles that big, but I'm going to find a NYC yarn shop and see what they say.

2011-05-20T08:18:00.000-04:00

Where: Highline Park, Chelsea
When: May 2011

Does wisteria come in yellow?

2011-05-17T19:21:00.003-04:00

Where: Church garden across the street (NYC)
When: May 2011

Because this looked like a yellow version of a wisteria, but I'm not sure that that exists.

Bad back day today - no sharp, crippling pain, but a lot of continuously sharp and nagging pain made doing just about everything difficult, and made me feel extra cranky. Swimming was lovely, in that I didn't have any pain while I did it, but it didn't really help beyond that. I think this is weather related - it's been pouring rain for a couple of days, and I've noticed that rain seems to make it worse.

Make Way

2011-05-16T07:53:00.002-04:00

Where: St. James Park, London
When: April 2011

These guys were so cute! They were very tiny, and there were at least a dozen of them.

Mommas

2011-05-13T14:12:00.000-04:00

Where: St. James Park, London, UK
When: April 2011

I forgot about all these photos I took in Europe! I'll try to get more of those up.

Peeking Through

2011-05-11T17:33:00.000-04:00

Where: Church garden across the street
When: May 8, 2011

Seven. My stamina for the "picture a day" game apparently goes to seven, because I cannot bring myself to pick up the camera today. Oh well, it was fun while it lasted! Maybe I'll pick it up for another week long stint in a few days.

In fabulous news, I tried swimming today, and found that not only did it feel wonderful, my back felt much better afterwards too! So between that, and the Pilates (which I found also helped my back a lot) I might actually be able to maintain a reasonable level of fitness through this pregnancy. I am so relieved.

7/7 More Purple

2011-05-10T20:52:00.002-04:00

Where: Hudson River Park
When: May 10, 2011

6/6 Evening

2011-05-10T17:30:00.002-04:00

Where: Church garden across the street
When: May 9, 2011

Well, so far, taking the picture doesn't seem to be the problem, although posting it is something I don't always get around to! This one isn't my favorite, but I think it was the best of the bunch - I was pretty tired by the time I got around to it, and my back wasn't up for much bending over.

We'll see if I get to today's photo. It's a lovely evening so we're going to go for a stroll after dinner, so hopefully I'll find something to shoot.

5/5 Hello Spring

2011-05-08T18:05:00.002-04:00

Where: Church garden across the street
When: May 8, 2011

My SI joint felt much, much better today, we went on a moderately long walk today, and I was able to walk at a pace that was only slightly slower than normal, and didn't feel exhausted when I got home, and didn't really have any pain, so that was a big deal, and a big improvement from yesterday. Once I got home, things were pretty twingy for a while, but some sitting seems to have resolved that.

I'm going to try Pilates tomorrow, and swimming on Tuesday, in the hopes of finding some form of exercise that I can do through the rest of this pregnancy that won't throw everything out of whack too badly.

4/4 Rushed

2011-05-07T15:30:00.002-04:00

Where: Union Square Farmer's Market
When: May 7, 2011

Wish I had taken more time with this - I was reaching the end of my allotted energy reserves for the day, plus other people with cameras were trying to take a photo of the same subject, plus my back hurt, so this was a very quick one-off. But there was a lot of potential there for a much nicer shot if I had just had a little more patience.

I love the farmer's market at Union Square, so many delicious things to look at and select from. We bought the most delicious tomatoes I've had in years and years, I had forgotten what a tomato is supposed to taste like!

3/3 I took this yesterday I swear

2011-05-07T08:45:00.003-04:00

Where: Home
When: May 6, 2011

I just didn't get around to posting it. No cooking yesterday either, Dave made me a salad for dinner. I had been to various practitioners yesterday (massage and chiropractic) to see if they could help my pain. After the treatments everything felt pretty loose, which is dangerous, and I ended up having quite a bad spasm. However, this morning I feel terrific, so maybe they helped after all, although I haven't actually moved around much. I'm just noting that rolling over, getting out of bed, taking a shower and getting dressed didn't hurt.

It's hard to say, and will require a more scientific experiment - ie, I will need to spread out the treatments to different days - to determine what, if anything, actually helped.

2/2: Coming Up

2011-05-05T16:38:00.004-04:00

Where: Highline Park, NYC
When: May 5, 2011

It was such a beautiful, blustery spring day today, it made me miss running. It was too nice to stay inside, so I hobbled down to Chelsea to see what was blooming in the Highline Park. There's been a new water feature installed, which was a surprise, and it looks lovely as well.

I think I've figured out a walking posture that works - if I widen my stance so that the outside edge of my feet stay in line with the outside edge of my hip (I'm used to walking fairly base-narrow, my feet swinging in almost in front of each other), and concentrate on activating my glute muscles with every step, I do much better, so I was able to get there and back with very little pain. I also enjoy that the level of concentration required makes it like a little walking meditation every time I try to go anywhere. I was exhausted by the end though, and slept heavily all afternoon, embarrassingly enough.

No cooking tonight, we've decided to go out with a friend. Last night's meal was delicious though, and ridiculously easy, I think the longest part was the bread, and that was largely because it took 14 minutes to preheat the oven. Dave coached me through the salmon, and I think I now feel confident enough to do it on my own next time. Part of me wants to tackle homemade ravioli next, but that might be a little ambitious. But I LOVE ravioli. We'll see.

1/1: The best laid plans

2011-05-04T17:55:00.004-04:00

Where: Home
When: May 4, 2011

So, I had all these plans. One of those plans was to get myself in excellent physical condition, partly because I enjoy that kind of thing, but mostly because we've decided being alive is too awesome to not share, so we were going to try to have a baby, and I wanted to prepare myself beforehand in order to be able to maintain some semblance of that fitness throughout the pregnancy, hopefully making pregnancy and the labor easier on both me and the baby.

Mission accomplished. Sort of.

I am now with (a very wiggly and energetic) child, according to our brief view via ultrasound a week ago. This is obviously delightful. And I was definitely pretty fit into the first 5 or 6 weeks of this.

I'm now 13 weeks, and the past 6 weeks or so have featured a long, slow decline in the integrity of the ligaments that hold my pelvis together. This is a predictable side effect of pregnancy, it's necessary that everything spread out so that the baby can actually be born. But today it took me 10 minutes to walk two short blocks. While 6 weeks ago, my joints were just aching and uncomfortable, and I had to sit down occasionally while walking places, things have progressed to the point that I am now getting a stabbing pain in my sacroiliac joints that leaves me gasping and unable to move for several seconds. The only way to avoid it is to walk very, very slowly with a shuffling gait and no sudden movements. And even then I still get unexpected jolts of pain at delightfully unexpected moments. (This makes walking the dog awesome, by the way.)

So, plans for an active pregnancy filled with hiking and spending time in the weight room have been shelved. Plans for working until at least my third trimester have been shelved (my work is massage therapy, which requires both standing for long periods and lots of leaning over, neither of which are currently tolerated by my joints).

New plans - find things to do so I don't go crazy. Currently in the works - learn how to cook, and start a new photography project.

I am very, very wary of calling the photography project a 365 day, or even a 30 day - who knows how long I'll keep this one up for. So for now, I'm aiming to take and post a photo a day, and I'll up the count as I go, rather than trying to predict the desires and energy levels of my future self.

The cooking will be interesting - I'm scared of the kitchen, it stresses me out, but since I have lots of time with nothing to do but grow a baby, I may as well learn how to feed the two of us properly. Tonight's attempt:

Pan-Seared Salmon, with (frozen dough from Whole Foods) a warm french baguette, and Sugar Snap Peas with Pine Nuts and Garlic. Recipes all courtesy of America's Test Kitchen, who produce the only recipes I feel relatively confident that I can't mess up.

On Edge

2011-04-25T09:58:00.002-04:00

Where: Solterreno, Spain
When: April 2011

Duomo

2011-04-21T08:39:00.002-04:00

Where: Florence, Italy
When: April 2011

View from the Duomo - we weren't even expecting to be able to get in, we had heard that the lines were out of control, but I guess early April is the time to do it! We decided to just wander by the Duomo, and see how long the lines really were. Much to our confusion, there were no lines. At all. So we decided that it must be closed. But then we tried the door anyway, and it was OPEN, and we walked into the Duomo, just like that.

It was very cool climbing the stairs, although the endless spiral got a little dizzying. At the top, there was a bottleneck at the only opening onto the roof, where there was a continuous stream of people coming down, preventing us from going up. Finally, an Italian teenage girl lost patience, marched past us, pointed and snapped her fingers imperiously at the people coming down and demanded that they back up and wait so that we could all go up. The very idea of being so completely self-assured and bold as a teenager boggles my mind, but we were delighted.

The roof was largely empty, and the view was incredible. I could have sat up there all day - there are conveniently placed marble benches all the way around. Definitely the highlight of the trip, for me.

The Hammock

2011-04-19T09:07:00.002-04:00

Where: Solterreno, Spain
When: April 2011

I spent an awful lot of time in this hammock that week. I spent a full day in it just watching my laundry dry: listening to the birds, waiting for the wind to knock a shirt or a sock off, getting up, putting it back on, waiting for the sun to shift across the sky a bit more, getting up, adjusting the drying rack. I'm not sure what it is about the place that I can spend a full day with no more entertainment than the laundry and the birds, never feeling a flicker of impatience or boredom, while here in the city, surrounded by bustling activity, I get frustrated, bored, and restless on a regular basis.

2011-04-18T08:27:00.001-04:00

Where: Solterreno, Spain
When: April 2011

Buzzing Blossoms

2011-04-15T08:17:00.001-04:00

Where: Solterreno, Spain
When: April 2011

It's only when I lose myself

2011-04-14T08:22:00.002-04:00

Where: Solterreno, Spain
When: April 2011

Title from Depeche Mode's song, which I'm listening to now re-mixed with Florence and the Machine's You've Got The Love, which is a shockingly lovely result.

Busy Bee

2011-04-13T08:31:00.000-04:00

Where: Solterreno, Spain
When: April 2011

Boo!

2011-04-12T16:23:00.003-04:00

Where: Solterreno, Spain
When: April 2011

I'm back! Ok, so I missed the focus a little bit on this guy, but I don't care, it's too good a pose. He landed on the tree right next to me, and he was HUGE, a good 3-4 inches, I was impressed and a little intimidated. But he just peered at me for a minute or so, and then (rather clumsily) crept up to a leaf and started munching away. I kept imagining that I could hear the whirring of millions of wings in the distance, and that a huge swarm was going to descend on the almond grove, thumping onto the roof of the casita, but luckily nothing so biblical occurred.

2011-03-25T16:37:00.002-04:00

Where: Chicago
When: March 2011

Sorry for the spotty posting these days, I can't seem to get organized these days. And I won't be posting anything at all for a few weeks, but on the plus side, that's because we'll be in Europe, which means I'll have LOTS to post when I get back!

2011-03-17T08:54:00.001-04:00