Merry late Christmas

I hope everyone had as good a Christmas as this little girl did!

Felt orchids

My newest crafty project... felt orchids. I bought the tutorial... first time ever buying a tutorial, but I think it was a good buy.

Since no one I'm planning on gifting with these little guys follow my blog I can post some pictures. If I was to make more, I think I'd need to order some more natural looking felt greens. The leaves are a bit glaring.



Obviously, I'm still working on the red one.

Busy busy

I've been sick and busy and strangely without things to say recently.

I'm a bit disappointed too, because I found out a good friend form back home is pregnant, and I'd love love love to give her a gift of maternity and newborn portraits but... my new little one will only be about a month old when she has hers so I don't know that I can make it work. I can't travel in the last month of pregnancy, and I don't know that I want to fly with a one month old.

I've been taking a lot of studio type portraits recently. I got this great candid of my daughter earlier today.


So how's everyone else doing this December?

A little setback...

Why oh why would my child, who has been leaving the cat's water bowl alone for months now, suddenly decide it is an ideal and allowable place to play?

For a while, about once a month would come the time when she got re-curious about it. Then she'd be set for another month. The last week it has been daily. Come to think of it, she has also started banging on my laptop again, and won't leave the remote controls alone. I hope this isn't a permanent regression, but I'm not holding my breath!

Trouble

I've been busily messing around with my new light setup and trying to make a go out of photography. Since I've gotten some great ones of some of the kids in my moms group I was thinking "I can do our family photo no problem."

First day I tried, I got so mad at trying to work with the timer I gave up.

Today I went and got my neighbor and asked her to snap a few for us. I had to assure her that everything was set up and all she had to do was click. She got comfortable with it pretty quickly. Then Lorelei decided she was completely against the idea of portraits.

We finally got a passable one of the card, but it definitely was NOT what I was going for.

At least it made for a good photo montage...

By "good" I do mean ridiculously silly.

Halloween Costumes anyone?

I got them done, and I think they turned out pretty well. Unfortunately there's no full picture of my dress, which I think was the most impressive thing, plus I never got a good full body shot of Lorelei because she wouldn't cooperate for me. I got at least good looking pictures of her dad and I both though. (sadly, no family picture)


My boyfriend, the garden gnome. A neighbor kid actually told him to watch out for boots.

Lorelei's costume had a headband with flowers and flower appliques but she wouldn't leave them alone. Oh well, still a mighty cute fairy, if I do say so myself!

Growing up so fast

This morning my little girl just actually said "Good Bye" clear as day.

Her daddy was getting ready to leave for work and she insisted on being picked up and gave him a big hug. I gave him a hug too and she pushed me away, hugged him tighter and said "good bye" in the saddest tone ever.

It brought tears to my eyes... but it's probably just the pregnancy hormones. Hah.

Vaccine information...

It's rare that I post about anything that could be controversial but articles about the skyrocketing rate of people not vaccinating their children often stun me with their misinformation. While I do vaccinate I have a healthy skepticism about vaccines, and choose not to get the flu vaccine for a myriad of reasons I am not going into right now.

Here's an example of the misinformation:

From Wired magazine http://www.wired.com/magazine/2009/10/ff_waronscience/2/
"...while nonprofit health care provider Kaiser Permanente reported that unvaccinated children were 23 times more likely to get pertussis, a highly contagious bacterial disease that causes violent coughing and is potentially lethal to infants. In the June issue of the journal Pediatrics, Jason Glanz, an epidemiologist at Kaiser’s Institute for Health Research, revealed that the number of reported pertussis cases jumped from 1,000 in 1976 to 26,000 in 2004. A disease that vaccines made rare, in other words, is making a comeback."

What they do NOT mention is that part of the reason for the comeback is the vaccine itself. You see a few years back my college health center informed me that I probably had pertussis (aka whooping cough) when I said "No, that can't be right, I had the vaccine like every other kid my age" they informed me that I was wrong. Not that I didn't get the vaccine but that it didn't protect me. The outbreaks had been happening as a result of people travelling and picking up whooping cough in countries that do not vaccinate as much. The reason that travelers are picking it up? Because the vaccine "wears off." They are finding that many vaccines do NOT confer lifelong immunities and actually need boosters throughout adulthood. Not enough research has been done to find out how often people need boosters but the best guess is every 5-10 years.

This article is from the American Academy of Family Medicine, but there are many more like it http://www.aafp.org/online/en/home/media/releases/newsreleases-statements-2009/whoopingcoug-adults.html

Just what is my point here?

Arguments for vaccines need to be written without this kind of misleading information. You want people to get vaccinated, leaving this sort of things in there will make some people discount the whole article. Why aren't the editors catching this sort of stuff?
Argue away about the necessity of vaccines, but please pick your arguments wisely people.

Technical Difficulties

I'm still working on Lorelei's costume.. slowly but surely. Bodysuit and tights dyed, silk for her skirt dyed, some little flowers for embellishments made, wings made...

I'm having a bit of trouble with the wings though. The trial run revealed a droopy problem.

I didn't think about the fact they wouldn't stay up as well on a onesie as they would on a dress, or maybe they are heavier than they are supposed to be? Who knows.... I think I will be sewing some ribbon on them and tying them on that way along with the velcro.

She still looks awful cute though even with the droopiness!

Ready for Halloween?

I'm not! Ive been working on Lorelei's costume, but I may be overestimating my abilities and time... because I also need to make my own costume, and my boyfriend's too. His will be simple, but I have big plans for mine.

Luckily I also have the tights and onesie dyed for the toddler costume, and have everything for her skirt I just need to assemble it :)

Here's my progress as of this afternoon...
Can you tell what she's gonna be?

She already loves the practice skirt I made up ... she brings it to me and then lifts a foot up for me to put it on her, and prances around the room in it. I don't know if it's the bright colors or the softness of the silk, but hopefully she will like the not-just-for-practice one too.

Caturday, on a BOAT!

We seem to have some new strays, and at least one of them likes our (OMG when are we ever going to find time to work on it) boat.


Handsome guy

Blog blips

So I went to schedule a Caturday post and somehow I can't figure out how to schedule posts anymore... which makes no sense because I've done it more than once and ever had a problem before.

And theres some issue with the comments too.

Argh...

Pardon the delay...

I've had the flu and now my parents are in town so I'm on a bit of a hiatus.

Not that anyone cares ;)

Hopefully Caturday and Made It Monday will resume next week.

Bye, you few who read this!

They aren't joking when they say teething is difficult

My poor little girl is getting between two and four molars in at once.
She is miserable and refuses to let me forget it. And she's become a biter.

I have the sinus headache of doom from the rainy weather I guess, and can only take Tylenol for it because I am (surprise!) 9 weeks pregnant.

The pregnancy has given me a raging case of hypoglycemia that is being rather hard to handle... I have to eat constantly but I have no appetite because of the sinus headache.

To top it all off my parents will be here for ten days starting tomorrow and my boyfriend will be out of town for a week with work leaving me alone with them starting Monday.

Oh Happy Days.....


I'll have to make up for this post with some happy cheery baby pictures soon.

Bugggs!

I changed my layout and somehow lost all my comments. I didn't even actually mean to change it, I thought I hit cancel after previewing :( It's very sad.

O hai!-- it's caturday again!

Black cats are notoriously difficult to take good pictures of, and Baku is no exception!

Squidhat anyone?

This is one of the funniest hats I've ever seen, made by ObeyMyBrain on Etsy.
http://ny-image1.etsy.com/il_fullxfull.80802613.jpg

Just thought I'd share :)

Tie dye panties! For Made It Monday!

Fun tie dyed panties! I dyed all my old white undies first and got annoyed at how the waist band didn't pick up the dye right, so I got these where the waistband is cotton covered elastic. I love how they turned out.

Happy Caturday!

In an effort to blog more I'm adding some weekly "themed" posts to my blog. The first two I'm trying are "Made it Monday" where I blog about things I made. The second one is this... Caturday!

What is Caturday? Why, gratuitous pictures of cats of course!

This is my kitten Curie cuddling with my baby last November. They were both about four months old.

Made it Monday! Baby tutus!

About a week ago I decided to finally try my hand at making a baby tutu, and I was amazed at how simple it was. I had glanced at several tutorials but really this doesn't need a tutorial.



Materials are simply 2+ yards of soft tulle (or a few spools of tulle, but I'm cheap and it's less expensive to get it by the yard), scissors, some elastic long enough to go around their waist and a needle and thread or sewing machine to join the ends of the elastic.

You simply take the elastic and sew the ends together at the right size to go around the baby's waist, take strips of tulle, double it up and knot it around the eleastic, and keep doing this until you have a full fluffy tutu.

Then you let your baby loose in the yard to frolic like a little fairy in your garden. ... or not.

Lorelei seemed to love her tutu. She kept running her hands through it and fluffing it up. Hooray for happy babies!

There are tons of tutorials online for tied tutu making. One decent one is here: http://grosgrainfabulous.blogspot.com/2009/05/midsummer-nights-dream-tutu-tutorial.html

Reorganization

So for the past few weeks I've been thinking I really want to get back to blogging, but in a more organized way... so I was to pick a few "themes" for a few days of the week and keep up with them.

I know I'm going to to "Caturday" of course... but I'm not sure what else. I'd love to participate in one of the ones that lots of people do and they all share the links to, but I can't seem to find much out there. I know there's illustration Fridays but I get the feeling I wouldn't get to it often (Lorelei doesn't let me draw much)

Maybe I could do "Treasure Thursdays" where I point out some art or craft I really like... or Made it mondays where I outline a project I've done recently. Hmm.... Who knows. Just know that Change is Coming!

Regrets?

Just today I saw that a girl who asked me to teach her how to shoot in manual has started her own photography business. The pictures are nice but it started me wondering why haven't I taken that plunge.

The only reasons I can come up with are, lack of confidence, lack of someone to watch the baby while I do sessions, and ... really that's about it.

I guess I have some soul searching to do, because every time I see that another person I have spoken to about photography has started a business in it and done well, I get a bit jealous, and that's not a good way to be.

Dry docked

IMG_7413, originally uploaded by Bakiomau.

There's now a big boat in my back yard, and it will probably be there for a few years.

A vintage 1958 31' Chris Craft Constellation

Restoration is going to be... fun.
I will probably start a dedicated blog following that progress. Don't quote me on that though.

It's been a while

I hate to admit it but it seems that the wind has gone out of my sails when it comes to blogging. I don't really have that much to say unless I talk about my baby girl, cleaning, or my ridiculous amounts of projects. Also, Facebook flash gaming is eating my brain.

So here's a little list of new things going on, in whatever order I think of them:

I had a tie dye party that was a huge success! Much fun tie dye was made, people went home with adorable outfits and another one is tentatively scheduled for September, when hopefully it will be cooler

My little girl turned one! Wow!

My little girl started walking yesterday!

I've been dying tons of stuff and putting some of it for sale up on Etsy. No bites though on selling any. I'm thinking about getting a booth at some local craft shows though and seeing what happens there.. a viable hobby type job or just a pipe dream? we shall see.

We are getting a BOAT! A 31' 1958 Chris Craft to be exact. It will be living in our back yard for a few years while we restore it (or at least make it usable)

There's more, but I have stuff to get done :)
I hope this post finds everyone doing well.

A good day to Dye

The week has finally come where I made enough money selling vintage finds on Etsy, ordered my supplies and started fabric dying!

Here's a look at some of my first experiments while still in their dyebath.


I was going to take pictures of the finished product this morning but my camera battery died right as I was about to snap the pictures.... so that's for next time.

This is way too fun and I can't imagine that I'll be able to find enough stuff to do with all the stuff I want to dye. I may have to get more clothing blanks so i can have fun with it and possibly sell some. Otherwise I'll drown in my crations and my boyfriend will kick me and my mess out of the house *grin*

Kittens need a home!

IMG_5240, originally uploaded by Bakiomau.

These two little black kittens need to go! Right now they are about 6 weeks old and the perfect age to go to a new home.

Why do I have them? Well they were accidentally brought to Austin by a friend who bought a boat there because their mom seems to have though it made a good nest spot. He called the Humane society but they are not taking any more cats.

With these little guys that brings my cat count up to 6 in the house, 7 total from the outdoor porch cat who has adopted me. While I wasn't willing to leave them to starve or be put down, that's entirely too many cats at my house!

Let me know if you are interested, or know anyone who might be, or know of a place that would take them!

For a few more pictures, click on the picture here and it will take you to my Flickr photostream where you can see more of them.

San Antonio

IMG_5393, originally uploaded by Bakiomau.

I visited an old friend who had a conference to go to in San Antonio yesterday and it was great. I can't believe I hadn't been there before! The river walk was beautiful and her hotel was directly on the river walk.

The only bad things were, there is NO free parking anywhere near the river walk and the baby didn't nap more than 20 minutes all day. But it was a beautiful day and it was so nice to catch up with a friend from Virginia.

Lorelei eats a lemon

Lorelei eats a lemon 5, originally uploaded by Bakiomau.

If I knew how to post all the pictures through Flickr I would. But seriously, she kept going back for more... making that strange little face after each lick. Then she got too much on her hands and rubbed it on her chapped cheeks and cried. That part was sad. The rest of it? Classic baby moments.

If you click on the picture you can check out all 6 pictures in order on Flickr

Srsly?

Srsly?, originally uploaded by Bakiomau.

I just logged into Flickr to upload some pictures and was greeted by this.

I think the LOLcat movement has gotten out of hand

Lorelei likes nests

IMG_4580, originally uploaded by Bakiomau.

Ok I'll admit I'm just having fun now that I figured out I can blog directly from my Flickr photostream. This will much simplify my other blog (365 days in pictures) that I have been slacking on.

Where'd that come from?

IMG_4582
Originally uploaded by Bakiomau

I was just going through some photos and realized that in this picture, it really looks like Lorelei is looking up in the tree to see where the nest on the blanket came from. Hah. The nest was actually a part of a set of things I was using as photo props on Easter.

Busy busy busy

Busy doing what, you may ask? Keeping up with this....


One of these days I'll catch my breath and be back....

Mission Cat Tree, Accomplished

We've been working on some remodeling-- ripping out a wall and just leaving two columns and a knee wall, removing carpet, redoing the flooring, trying to remove the texture from the wall... and took the opportunity of leftover carpet, padding and wood to make a cat tree from the remnants. I think it turned out pretty cool... and I hate to say it but I was hesitant to do it before because of the sick kitty peeing on everything. Now, the random pee incidents are in our past, and hopefully will stay that way.

There's still a tiny bit more to be done-- I'm planning on wrapping the posts with sisal, and doing some sort of finish on the bottom board to make clean up easier when some cat inevitably decides to hairball on it, but they are happy with it how it is, and I will get to "finishing" it eventually.



And the kitten loves it.
The others like it too, but they don't show off for the camera as much

oh dear...

Dear Kitten,

Please stop bringing your cat toys to the baby. I understand you want to help take care of her, but I don't think furry mice are really something she should be licking. Plus, she gets the toys all mushy wet, which is gross.

Thank you,
The mama

RIP Pookah

My sweet little kidney failure kitty finally passed away today.
She had been looking almost skeletal, having a lot of trouble getting to the litter box, smelled... like she was dying. But she was still enjoying laps and purring when she was petted. She loved getting up on the window still and enjoying the breeze.



Today it was different. She was hunched up and not very responsive but still acted excited when I gave her wet food, but just sat next to it and wouldn't eat. I gave her a heating pad to lay on since she wouldn't lay on the bed, put wet food and water right next to her , and regularly checked on her and cuddled her.

We went to the park to let the baby play on the baby swings, and when we got home she was gone, still laying on the comfy pad I had left there for her.

I knew it was coming and am feeling both relieved and sad at the same time. An odd feeling this is.

Oh Baby

Why would you ever LOSE weight between six and nine months?

We breastfeed on demand and feed you as much as you want.

So that's the news. She lost around four ounces between her six month and nine month checkup.
I was told to start supplementing with formula, which I said no to. I was told to start pumping 3x a day, which I said yes to. Then I thought about it and decided not to. My course of action instead is to be more proactive with the breastfeeding... offering it more often including BEFORE not after each meal. I can already tell that a few more nursings each day have gotten my supply up, and with pumping I am worried that it would have shot me into oversupply mode which is bad for both me and the baby. I also started offering her higher calorie foods-- french toast sticks (basically just egg, milk and cinnamon with bread, nothing fancy), some full fat cheese, offering yogurt more often, browned ground beef when we are having spaghetti... But with the increased nursing she isn't very interested in real food.

In about a week and a half we will see what's up, with one of the dreaded "come back in two weeks" weigh ins.

But the more I think about it, the more annoyed I am that the doctor freaked me out so bad. She's happy, healthy, getting to milestones before the charts say she needs to be there and she got that nine month weigh in about a week after she really started gettign active crawling on everything. I've mentioned it to a lot of people (what can I say, it made me feel insecure) and at least half the people I've talked to mentioned minimal to no weight gain between six and nine months. Plus it was a different scale this last time, plus she hadn't had breakfast. Four ounces is two shot's worth of weight. It's the difference between having a full belly and not really. I'm not saying she doesn't need to gain weight, but I AM saying I shouldn't be freaking out about it. Right?

Any feedback on this one?

Teefers

Third tooth is out of her gums. No wonder it's been hard to get her to sleep. It even looks painful to me... those top gums are weirder than the bottom ones.

Bluebonnets!

We finally got out and found some bluebonnets! It was way too sunny out though, being about 3 in the afternoon and 80+ degrees. We will have to go on a less sunny day for better pictures, but at least now we know where to find them.

Lorelei was thrilled to actually be allowed to touch a plant




Oh, you there in Austin were expecting me to tell you where I found them?
My secret, unless you ask nice.

A thought aobut the CPSIA

One big problem with the law is that is is similar to the ADA (Americans with disabilities act) it opens up well meaning people to lawsuits that they would not have otherwise been venerable to.

The ADA has specific guidelines for things as tiny as how far a toilet should be from a wall, but it is not actively enforced as long as the businesses are trying. But there are people making a "living" off of suing people who are not following the law to the letter. In Virginia, this included a couple who were both in wheelchairs getting sued for thousands because their business was not accessible even though their adaptations worked just fine.

So really, even if it is not being enforced actively people can use this well meaning law for personal gain at others expense if we look at the ADA as an example.

Horray for Etsy

I sold 2 things on Etsy this weekend, and have another two items on reserve for someone in the UK this weekend. One of them is even something I made. I'm pretty excited. I posted 4 new drawings and made a new logo tonight. Now if I could just sell a drawing I'd be set :)

Here's my new logo... what do you think?

A mommy type post... involving poop

Diaper changes have become nightmares the past few days.

She screams and screams bloody murder and oh my GOD I am done trying to calm her down and sing silly songs and elephant kiss her belly because none of it helps, so I just grit my teeth and change her as fast as I can while she screams like she is being murdered. And then I get done and pick her up and she sniffles a few times and is FINE again.

Maybe it is because she has a bit of sniffles and a cough and it feels icky to be on her back, but I'm sure the screaming makes it worse.

I can't just leave her in a dirty diaper all day so, hopefully she gets over it soon.

Dear Dell

Dear Dell,

The enter key just fell off my laptop keyboard and now I only have a little nub to push. Do you guys sell replacement keyboards, or is this how you get people to upgrade?

Love,
Cindy

Time Lapse Goodness

4 hours of a 9 month old playing rolled into 2 minutes. The music is cute, and it makes me tired just watching it.

Of course, Lorelei wouldn't have happily rolled around one room for that long... she'd be off to some faraway place or insisting on a walk by less than an hour in ;)

Owowowow

So I have this zit... where I didn't even know zits could happen. On the INSIDE of my eyelid, in the very center of the top lid. Like the main part of it rubs across the pupil of my eye every time I blink.

I sure hope it will be better tomorrow because right now it hurts really bad.

The February Review

Baby picture showoff time! A few of my favorites from February

Picture heavy post ahead... you've been warned.
Showing off her new teeth

A closeup of those teeth- still not the best picture but they're hard to catch on film.

Busted! I leave her alone for 2 minutes and into the closet she creeps

Sneaking up on the kitten while she eats

First time on the baby swings

She really likes soft minkee fabric

It was so hard to narrow it down to these five. But I did it!