Vintage Is as Vintage Does

A few months ago I purchased a fantastic vintage apron pattern. I realized had some pretty lemons print fabric that seemed fitting, so it was time to give it a spin. It would do a grave injustice to the pattern to make the apron on my fancy Babylock machine, so I pulled out my mom's old 70's Sears Kenmore machine that was given to me a few years ago and decided I needed to give it a go.




The machine is a beast. It took me no less than an hour to figure out how to thread it. Another 20 minutes to figure out how the little plastic jobbys change the stitch, and another 20 to get the tension right. Once that was done, I got to sewing.

I've learned that patterns of yesteryear assume a pretty high level of sewing knowledge. There are terms I've never heard of and relied pretty heavily on YouTube videos to figure out some of the techniques. But when all was said and done, I made me a purty apron! Here it is...never mind that the fabric is technically upside down. It's right-side-up when *I* look at it from above. ;-)

My twice yearly Max update.

I may resolve to blog more often...I haven't decided yet. But until then I'll give the requisite Maxine update for those that have been asking!

Maxine is nearly 23 months. I can't believe she'll be TWO in July! She's a happy, funny, sweet, kind, and generous little girl. She is shy in front of strangers but in just a couple minutes she'll turn from not making eye contact to giving you all of her toys, one by one. If she likes you that is. ;-) Good thing she likes most everyone she meets.

She's currently in speech therapy. She was evaluated by county services around 18 months, and qualified for speech services upon a second speech-specific evaluation. All the rest of her development is either right on average or a little above, which was reassuring. Since Max has always done things a little late (sitting up, crawling, walking, and now talking), I wasn't that concerned, but I wanted to be sure if there was an issue we caught it early. So we went ahead and started therapy, in the 'better safe than sorry' mindset. Her speech and vocabulary exploded within weeks; she even went from 3 words to about 30 in the weeks between qualifying for speech and actually starting it. So I am not convinced the therapy itself has done much that wouldn't have happened in the natural course of her development. But, she has fun in speech, her therapist comes to the house once a week and plays just with her, and she loves it, so we'll continue until she's solidly at or past normal developmental patterns. She has probably between 75 and 100 words right now, and is putting together 2-3 word sentences. Favorites are 'all done milk' and 'night night daddy!'. Some of her favorite words are animal names and noises; duck, moo, horse, and 'dac' which she's still working on making sound like 'cat'.

She is silly as ever, and loves to run and tumble and play gymnast with the 'rents. She likes to do forward rolls, hang upside down, and fall dramatically to the ground then giggle madly. She's a good runner, but still gets tripped up on her toes pretty frequently, even just walking. She lives in pants or capris/leggings now because she is more or less guaranteed to skin her knees in just a dress or shorts. Many of her pants have holes in the knees from her tumbles. She's still pretty accident prone, falling from chairs or even just from her feet at least every week or two, but she is a trooper and usually just brushes her hands off and moves on.

Now for some photos of the last SIX months!


January, with the purse mama made her, off to conquer the world.


One of her favorite activies, swinging. She could swing for hours.


On a cold winter day


Winter swinging


March twirling


Before the great haircut of '09


After: The Suri.


Very dramatic


What happens on laundry day.


Happiest upside-down


More twirling, in her elephant shirt from my dear friend's Etsy store.


A favorite indoor pastime. She loves closing clips on whatever she can find.


Busy at her sand and water table.

WHEW! I'm clearly going to have to post more frequently. That was nearly 3 seasons of photos. Can't have that again. ;-)

An overdue Max update

It's been ages since I've posted, so I figure its about time for a big Maxine update! Lets see...

She started walking the week before Halloween. That was right at the 15 month mark. She walked with our assistance starting at 8ish months, but she only just got the nerve to let go! She was walking with one hand for a month or two, then one day got confident enough to try it on her own. Once she figured out she could, she figured out she could also stand up by herself in the middle of the room. We got some funny face-plants while she was learning though! She still walks with her hands up by her ears, since she's been doing it so long that way. She's starting to drop them, but throws them right back up when she starts to wobble and lose balance.

She has just recently decided that it's ok to try new foods that are savory, instead of sticking with our beloved fruits. She's tried everything lately, from chicken nuggets to fried okra (plus some healthy things in between, I promise). She doesn't love it all, but it's progress just to have her be willing to give it a shot.

She's learning to use a spoon and fork, and while she still needs us to put the food on the utensil for her, she's pretty good at getting it into her mouth. She's also learning to use an open cup. I'm sure that one is a long way off, but she has a lot of (wet) fun trying.

She's not talking yet, but she makes the general sounds of words - 'a' (like at) for cat, 'il' for milk, so she's getting there. I don't qualify it as real words since she doesn't repeat them or use them to ask for things, and really, lots of things are 'a' these days. But she's getting there!

Now on to the good stuff...some photos from the last few months!

From Maxine Month 15

From Maxine Month 15

From Maxine Month 15

From Maxine Month 15

From Maxine Month 16

From Maxine Month 16

From Maxine Month 16

The Good, The Bad, & The Ugly

I recently had a 'spa afternoon' at a local salon. I had an eyebrow wax, massage, and ended with a haircut. The wax/massage were great, but EEK on the haircut. The stylist did the whole thing - wash/cut/dry in about 25 minutes total, and sent me away looking like this (taken as soon as I got home from the cut)

From worst haircut ever

I think when I walk out of a cut/style, my hair should look better than it'll ever look again! And while the stylist didn't butcher me, my hair didn't look particularly good either.

Once again, a well thought-out letter saves the day. I let the salon know of my experience, maturely and calmly (and in detail), and the owner re-did my hair this afternoon. She showed my original photos to the stylist who did my hair, and when asked what he thought of the cut he said 'BLECH!' without realizing he had done it. They were both extremely apologetic about my experience, and now I have a great cut and they have a happy client. Ahhhh I love good service! Here's me now. :-)

From worst haircut ever

No TV Before 2...

I guess this is why that recommendation is there!

From Maxine Month 14

I don't think I'm frying Max's brain by letting her watch Sesame Street, but I can see how it could get easy to stick your kid in front of something captivating so you can get a few things done.

The summer of contests!

Here's yet another amazing one I found!

Win a Bum Genius 3.0 Starter Kit from Nature's Child - Wholesome Goods for Mothers and Babies

Holy Babywearing!

Win the Essential Babywearing Stash from Along for the Ride (one Beco Butterfly, one Hotsling baby pouch, one BabyHawk Mei Tai, one Zolowear Ring Sling, and one Gypsy Mama Wrap)

50 Foot Trees

A couple of nights ago during one of the terrential downpours that is apparently quite common during the North Carolina summer, the wind started picking up and the trees started swaying.

Now, these aren't just 'trees'. These are Trees. They are very tall, very thin, well, there is a forest behind our house! So the fifty foot tall trees are swaying back and forth during the thunderstorm, and I'm watching them in awe wondering how they stay up. Then in a flash I see one fly over and crash down - right on top of the playset!! Upon further inspection it was a near miss to the playset, thank goodness, and it landed about 5' to the right, probably missing it by just inches.

Now the one a couple feet to the left of the fallen tree has a big chunk missing from the trunk, presumably where it started to break during the storm. Guess we're rolling the dice on that one!

She's getting so big!

I thought it was time for a Maxine update so here goes.

She's been crawling now for about 3 weeks. She learned to pull up about a week ago and she's been slowly and carefully cruising the furniture. Her favorite activity is walking with mom or dad, and she's getting enough courage to let go with one hand. She's gotten super fast at crawling too so there's no more leaving her for just a second while I do something. She's off before I know it!

She's got 6 teeth now, 4 on top and 2 on the bottom. Hopefully those teeth will take a break for awhile, 6 weeks ago she had NO teeth. wz`

She's EXTREMELY social and grunts hello at everyone who passes by. If they don't turn and talk to her, she grunts again, louder! Hey!! Lookit me!! She continues to get a ton of attention, primarily because of her big blue eyes that everyone asks about since mom and dad are both brown eyed.

She's sweet natured and rarely gets upset. If she's hungry she tells you, but otherwise she's a quiet kid who just watches the world.

She's learning to dance and loves to jump and rock on her legs. She loves to swing on the playset and could it for hours.

The hundred degree heat isn't phasing her, she doesn't make a peep!

Finally, here are some Max photos over the last month.

Ignore the bad grammar...

But enjoy the photos: http://icanhascheezburger.com/category/invisible/

The Bachelorette

I've never watched The Bachelor OR The Bachelorette before, but for whatever reason (probably the lack of Tivo the last week or so) I was drawn into the previews. So here I am, it's nearly midnight on a Tuesday and I'm finishing the second episode of The Bachelorette. It's so odd, this artificial environment where 15 men are trying to fall in 'love' with one woman they have never met, yet just know she is The One. Seeing the testosterone come out (particularly with several of professional athletes - one being a mullet-loving shiny-suit-wearing martial artist), the competitive nature of the show is I imagine more pronounced than in the shows where 15 women are after one man (though I have no doubts the catfights abound there too).

It's weird, and I sit and judge these people for trying to find love in this 21st century way, but I am still watching. I wonder what that says about me...

I am just sad the oyster farmer didn't make the cut.

I used to be smarter.

45

Oh it's funny...

If you've paid attention to YouTube for the last year or two, you'll get a kick out of this.

When it rains, it pours

In the last month or so, Max has:

Gotten FIVE teeth (4 on top all came in a few days when I posted about her teeth a few weeks ago, and we just noticed one on the bottom this evening)
Learned to get to sitting from lying
Learned to get to hands and knees from sitting
Learned to crawl
Is trying to walk (assisted by mom, but she can get a good four feet pretty solidly)

There may be more. She clearly likes to lump things together!

Closed On Sundays

As it turns out, half of Chapel Hill is closed on Sundays. Lawrence drove from place to place trying to find us lunch that wasn't Quiznos. BBQ place - Closed. Local delicious deli - Closed. We ended up with Subway. Sigh.

Another interesting Chapel Hill (and greater Triangle area) thing is that liquor sales are regulated by the government. Some counties are actually dry, but the ones that aren't sell hard alcohol only in the government-run ABC Stores. Oh yeah, and that stands for Alcohol and Beverage Control, courtesy of the agency aka 'commission' of the same name.

Weird.

And she's crawling...

I asked Maxine nicely at least 27 times to please wait to crawl until we moved to North Carolina. She obliged...by 1 week! So at just a week shy of 10 months, I think it's safe to say she's officially crawling. While she hardly qualifies as 'all over the place' she is on hands and knees going in a mostly-forward direction. She's been rolling her way to where she wants to be for awhile now, but she's never been really motivated to get anywhere. But tonight she's enjoying practicing her new skill and is all over the place! Roll, crawl crawl, fall on face, roll, crawl some more. It's fun!

Yeast, kelp, and water.

That's what's going in my sofa and area rug right now. After a disastrous carpet cleaning a few weeks ago, Max and I both started getting reactions to the chemicals used. Max got rashes on her arms and legs after coming into contact with the 'clean' carpet, and I got joint aches after walking or crawling around on them. It was easy to figure out with Max - no rash, crawl on carpet for 10 minutes, raging red rash on bare skin that was in contact with the floor (when this didn't happpen at all pre-cleaning). But for me, I just felt achey and though maybe I was coming down with something, or not getting enough sleep or something. Then I started noticing it would happen only after I was walking with bare feet on the carpet, or after wearing a short sleeve shirt while sitting on the couch for extended periods (like while knitting).

I looked into some options to remove the chemicals, and settled on a natural carpet cleaning service, Naturell, http://naturellclean.com/. When I spoke with the owner of the company and mentioned the weird joint thing and that I wasn't sure it was related, he said YES indeed, joint pain can be a common reaction to the chemicals in the cleaning agents traditional carpet cleaning uses. As for Max's rash, he thought that was likely a reaction to the detergent/deodorizers used (like you may get a rash when switching to a new soap or laundry detergent). It all made sense to me, so I figured it couldn't hurt at this point, I needed to do something! Max had been playing on a sheet but since she's mobile(ish) now, I can't really keep her on it, so every time she wanders off she ends up with a nasty rash.

So that brings us to today. My couch and area rug are currently being cleaned with an unscented, organic mixture of kelp, yeast, and water. There is some sort of fermentation process that activates surfectants, making the mixture worthy of being a cleaning agent. Cross your fingers for us! And regardless, we will be doing all carpet/upholstery cleaning with a 'green' service from now on. I only hope we can find something similar to Naturell in NC!

We Have Teeth!

Max was super clingy and fussy yesterday, and fell asleep on me several times (unheard of!). This morning as I was feeding her, I noticed an odd scrape of the spoon against her top gums. WE HAVE TEETH! Top teeth, yes, two of them, of course she couldn't do it the 'normal' way. ;-) But there they are. Too bad little missy is still in a lot of pain as they finish breaking through, and her unexplained 103 fever isn't helping. Poor poor baby.

I rarely laugh out loud...

at least to stuff like movies or TV. But ohmygosh, watch this!

We're famous.

And no, this wasn't our wedding planner.