Tuesday Night Ponderings

It's time for me to hit a few of the questions that I was asked back on my bag giveaway contest and I'm challenging you to answer these as well.

The first two questions are lovely little lists and like most bloggers, me likee lists!

"If you were 20 (single and no baby) and money were not an object, what are five things that you would want to do in life and why?"

1. Go on a backpacking tour through Europe and Asia.
2. Live in Africa working at an orphanage for several months to a year.
3. Take classes on photography, dance and cooking.
4. Learn another language fluently.
5. Work on a kibbutz in Israel for a year.

"If you were 60 (still no family concerns) and money were not an object, what are five things you would want to do and why? What accounts for the differences between the two lists?"

1. Take an expensive b&b and castle trip through Europe.
2. Buy a home on a lake and host weekly Sunday brunch gatherings with friends on my veranda overlooking the water.
3. Buy horses and stables with property adjacent to my lake house.
4. Take classes in history and agriculture.
5. Garden and read books all the live-long day.

Big differences in my lists. I think I will still want to travel when I am older, but backpacking will definitely not be as attractive as comfy beds and renting spiffy European cars. However, at the same time, I want to continue learning as long as I live and enjoy as much out of life as possible! I've done a lot of wonderful things in my life and hope to keep living it to the fullest! Even while happily being a Mommy.

What are your lists? If you're a lurker, give this a shot. If you want to cover it on your own blog, go ahead and link back here, just shoot me a comment that you're doing your own post!

Name That Meal!

It's time for a rousing game of Name! That! Meal!

Here is a picture of ingredients. Not only do you need to name all of the ingredients shown, but you have to guess what the meal is that they are going to be made into. One key ingredient has been left out.

Good luck!

The past few months have been a series of sleep trials for us. Baby started out as a fantastic little sleeper--sleeping through the night at just five weeks. She hit the four-month "regression" and really wasn't too bad, only waking a bit for the binx or a quick meal. After only a couple weeks she was back to sleeping through the night again.


I'm not exactly sure when the common night waking began with the cutting of her first two teeth, but at one point she added back in a 4 am feeding. This was fine, I figured she just needed a little snack, but that eventually we'd need to cut the nighttime eating.

Shortly after we finished that sleep training there were new nighttime trials. With the 7-8 month regression in view, more teeth likely emerging and her little body trying to crawl, to walk and to grow, sleep has been insanely messy for quite a while.

She woke up every ten to fifteen minutes for an hour and a half one night. The next night she'd fall asleep only after ten to twenty minutes of rocking only to wake up again after an hour to start the process over again. Some nights she would soothe quickly and easily but still wake up every hour. This poor kid just couldn't get through a full night of rest for her life. We tried playing her favorite CD, adding in a nighttime feeding, a box fan for white noise, snuggles, etc. All we got was a few hours less sleep and bad back pain from leaning over a crib.

Babies decide to do what they want to do. I'm all about training and scheduling and helping baby learn how to live. But there are still a lot of factors that you just can't do anything about. It sometimes amazes me.

Anyway, last night was blissful after so many sleepless nights. Baby woke up for a quick feeding and that was it until 7 am. Added to this were two beautiful 2-hour naps. That was a first for her. We are usually fortunate to get one 2-hour with a twenty minute or an hour for the other nap.

This doesn't mean I got a whole lot more done today, but that's ok I guess. One day at a time. I'm planning on being much more productive once these doggone Olympics are over.

Here's hoping for another good night of sleep.

The West Coast Vortex

I won't go so far as to say that the West Coast is inherently evil, even if I secretly might think that to be true. I mean, I've always heard how beautiful, how cultural, how advanced everything is. And that's great, sure, but I'm pretty sure there is some type of ominous sucking vortex along the shore.

This post has taken me almost a week to write, which is pretty ridiculous. I'm basically just afraid I will find myself sitting here on the couch crying all over my mac. I'm fond of my mac and want to spare it this disservice.

Please, West Coast. All I want is to have my friends back. Three years is a really long time. I'll wait if I have to, but promise you'll spit them back out when you're done? It's not all that much to ask of a Coast.

That is all.

You Win!

For our random giveaway from the great bloggy giveaway week, the winner is:

Random Integer Generator

Here are your random numbers:

92 

Timestamp: 2008-08-14 17:54:04 UTC

Heather!! You were late to the giveaway game, but you also were one of the few who actually linked back to me! You can use your bag for all of your upcoming baby stuff too... How lucky are you!?

For our completely subject giveaway from the great Iowa vacation week, the winner is: Jenn! Yay! You were my first and most creative questioner and I am pondering my answers...

If you would email me at sewverysweet[at]gmail[dot]com and give me your mailing addresses and the fabric you like best, I will get your fabulous shopping bags out to you this week and you can head out to the farmer's market! Or anywhere you want to shop...

I am going to be listing my bags in my etsy shop soon so you'll all be able to tell all of your friends and family where to get sweet bags to help save our environment. And look stylish doing it.

Month Seven

This wasn't as much a month full of firsts as last month. However, you have been eating a lot more interesting things. The cost of our grocery bill has been significantly offset by your job. "Baby food tester extraordinare." We've tried mac & cheese (nasty), oatmeal with fruit (ok), yogurt fruit juice (yummy but weird) and infant water. Not sure why I would buy water for my infant, but we tested it nonetheless. Thanks for stepping up and contributing to our family budget needs. We appreciate it fully.


You are SO close to crawling. I was sure that you would skip it entirely in favor of walking but with a little bit of help, you are pulling and pushing yourself forward. That or you're practicing your yoga.

Here we have "up dog" and "the cobra."






Not only are you almost crawling, you spend most of your time trying to climb. Up us, mostly.

This past week you got to meet some more of your Great-Aunts and spend time with Gramee, Papa & GG. Anytime you are around people you have gotten so that you are super happy and smiley. I'm afraid you'll be bored when it's just the three of us and there are no extra people to give you all of their attention! You just love people.




Ahhhh, the pool.







If it is something to do with water, you are all about it. You love your swimmy boat and splashing up in the air. If only we had a pool at home, we would be in it every single day. You'll have to content yourself with your little kiddie pool. The boat won't fit, but you can sploosh and splash to your tiny heart's content. We're pretty sure you are going to refer to water as "splooshy."




We've only gotten to the beach once so far this year, but it was a beautiful day and you got to play in the big waves and dig in the sand. The textures were so interesting that I had a hard time keeping the sand out of your eyes! Thank goodness for the binx so you didn't eat any of it... It is amazing all of the places that sand can creep into. And impossible to get it all out.




Silly little bucket-head. You haven't figured out yet how to put this on or take it off. So I get to do silly things to you and they just stay there cutely. Heh heh.






You may not know for years how blessed you are or how much people love you, but Mama is so thankful for some of your friends who are willing to watch you while she works. You love your buddy Alina who plays dress up with you and plays with your toys with you and distracts you during a change and pats your head and gives you endless hugs and kisses. You will sit and play for hours with her. Or maybe it's that you sit and let her play with you. You are such a cute little baby doll.





You are going to miss Alina and Jean so much. But I'm sure we'll get set up on Skype quickly so that you can still see them as much as possible!






I can't stop looking at your sweet face. I think I say this every month, but you get sweeter every day. Every morning I lie in bed and listen to your chatters as you wake up and then go in to get you and am rewarded with your beautiful smiles. Even when you are messy or grumpy or exceedingly poopy you are my favorite little person in the world.



You love to play with hair and it often soothes you when you're grouchy. Your Dolly Mama doll has the perfect little mass of hair to twiddle. Smaller toys are the most fun as they fit perfectly in your little hands. Especially the Little People pirates. We can't wait to teach you to say "Avast, ye scaly-wags!"




If there was an Olympic sport of raspberry-bubble-making, you would absolutely win the gold. You didn't drool much while teething, but when trying to blow berries, you can fill a swimming pool. And speaking of Olympics, I'm pretty sure you have been watching far too much TV this past week. Basketball seems to be the most entertaining, but you have been seeing all kinds of records broken lately, and I'm ok with it. We'll turn the TV off next month. (except that next month is all the season premiers, but that's after you go to bed so it doesn't count)

We love you baby girl. You kill us with your cuteitude.

There Will Be A Winner! (Or Two)

But not until next week.

Why? You may ask? Well, because I'm going on vacation.

Where? You may ask? Well, Iowa, of course.

Why? You may ask again? (geez, all the questions...) Well, because there is a pool, obviously.

In the meanwhile, I want to give away another bag next week. Therefore, there will be TWO winners announced when I come back.

But not for nothing. Oh no, not for nothing.

Your challenge is to give me topics. You may have noticed that I don't post as much as I used to. Also, while my child is endlessly interesting to me, it would behoove me to write about something else once in a while. Interspersed with adorableness and cuteitude.

Whoever comes up with the most interesting topic or question for me to write about or answer will receive their very own fabulously, lovingly handcrafted shopping bag. That way one is given out randomly (last week) and one is given out thoughtfully (this week).

Let's have it folks. Break out your creativity (or just plain silliness) and let me have it.

Happy August. It's going to be a scorcher. Will you be at the pool?

Also, for your viewing entertainment, click here. And here. You won't be sorry. Don't forget to cast your comment-vote.