"At This Very Moment in Manitowoc..."

I just had this funny moment where I realized I fell even more in love with Scarlet tonight - and I didn't think that was possible.  It's hard to point to one glorious moment that popped me over yet another unfathomed peak of the heart.  Well, no, that's not entirely true, in fact, perhaps it's not really true at all.  I recall the moment, and - to me - it was glorious in all its apparent blandness.

The scene was simple enough: I was sitting on the stiff, blue couch in our basement, in workout clothes still damp along the whole left side... not from sweat (after only 17 non-consecutive minutes on the elliptical, even my eager sweat glands remained dormant), but rather where Scarlet had lovingly spit down my shoulder about twenty minutes earlier.

An hour before that, she was up in her bassinet, and I was staring at the ticking digital numbers on the elliptical, trying not to cry.  I had sworn myself to stay down there until it reached the seven minute mark - which was five minutes from when I had first heard her crying through the baby monitor.

Today was the first day I gave us this "timer challenge."  If you look at it as her and I together attempting to conquer a new step (her "first step on the road to becoming an adult" as Kei put it), then we had 35 total minutes of success, where success is defined as her sleeping alone in her bassinet after having been laid down awake... tired to be sure, but awake. On the other hand, if you look at it - as many seasoned parents likely would - as a battle of the wills, then I suppose I have to hand my dear daughter the victory, because there we were, in that moment: I, with a snack instead of a sweat, finishing off the movie I had put on for my workout, and she, curled to my chest, drifting off into a peaceful sleep at long last - with each breath sounding like a sigh of relief, because she was triumphantly right where she wanted to be.

And that was the moment. I probably have close friends who were enjoying impressive Saturdays right at exactly the same very moment: perhaps sipping on fantastic wine or a perfectly made martini in a hip bar in the city, hobnobbing with powerful people... or maybe raving about their incredible dive into the depths of the ocean or glowing in the sweat of an incredible yoga practice... All these Saturdays that a big part of me longs to have again... yet, truth be told, if given such an option, I wouldn't have wanted to be anywhere other than on that silly couch, being Scarlet's chosen bed.

Introducing Scarlet Aika Kondo!

I'm overdue - though in fairness, I think anyone who reads this blog is probably related to us and well aware that our dear Scarlet made her appearance on December 31st at 3:03am!

More details to come once I get better at, you know, raising a newborn.  So far, some of my highlights are carving out enough time to do things like take a shower and make a meal… blogging sits slightly lower on the list, but if I'm anything like my big sister, I'll soon become a blogging rockstar.  (Expectation management: I will most certainly never be as good as my sister, but they say if you aim for the moon you wind up in the stars, right?)

For now, a few photos of our wonderful, captivating, heart-melting little girl:

Who knew your heart could feel like this??

Dresser/Changing Table Before & After

While I may be a far cry from the many, many impressive design/DIY/decorating bloggers out there featuring a great plethora of stunning Before/Afters… I do want to share with you my very first crack at this new and tantalizing craft!

I mentioned this dresser a few entries ago - it would have been fun to do a sort of Before/After with the nursery room as a whole, but I didn't think to take "before" shots of that, plus we're still waiting for a few more things (no, not only a baby!) to complete it, and I'm "moving" to Milwaukee tomorrow… soooo, we're going to settle for the dresser.  :-)

BEFORE:

The funny thing about these before pictures is that I think they actually make the dresser look better than it did in real life.  It has had a long, prosperous life and was a bit more tattered than appears here.

AFTER:

P.S. You may notice that triangular gap behind the dresser when it's angled this way… my amazing daddio is currently crafting a taylor-made shelf to go back there and be both a handy storage area and a baby-falling-behind-a-dresser-preventer.  :-)

xx

Shower!

My lovely sisters and mom threw my baby shower this Saturday!  It was lovely, elegant, delicious, and went off a smashing success thanks to all their talents coming together and the many fun ladies who were able to join. I'm told a picture is worth a thousand words, so I thought I'd pipe down and let the shots do the talking.  

So much gratitude!

Love ~ Love ~ Love

Virtual Nesting Doesn't Quite Cut It - Bring on the Dresser!

A few weeks ago I stuck up an Instagram picture of a swaddled stuffed moose with a tagline of something like "I think the nesting hormones might have kicked in…"

Well, I think we can safely say that those hormones have gone from "kicking in" to surging - and given the fact that I don't truly have a conventional nest of my own right now, their most available recourse has been to run rampant on the many blogs provided by my design-gifted sister and dream of awesome decorating opportunities to come.  This has proved almost more frustrating than anything - though who am I kidding - also super fun - and I'm really (really REALLY) looking forward to taking on some real-life, tangible projects as we get one of the upstairs bedrooms of my parents' house ready to be a temporary baby room.

First up: taking an old wooden dresser that has been around since I was a baby and painting it white and converting it into a modern looking changing table.  Is it thoroughly bizarre that this has me almost giddy??  I'll do before-after pictures soon, but for now, you'll have to excuse me as I go obsessively look up dresser knobs online…

xx

All the Ladies Love ♡

There's just nothing in the world like girlfriends.  I was just lucky enough to meet up with an old friend from high school, Molly, and, as always, it was as if we didn't skip a beat (one of those miracle-qualities you find with great friends).  We're both pregnant - though she's an old pro, this is her #2 - and it was fun to swap notes, compare experiences, and just take the time to simply be excited about everything that is happening in this amazing time in my life.  Not to mention, when you're going through a tough time, nothing quite compares to talking to someone who already knows you and loves you - who will listen, care, give frank feedback, and just simply encourage you to come out from behind the walls you've been hiding behind and talk.  Love.  ♡

What a great morning.  And it doesn't stop there!  The extra-special kind of girlfriends - sisters! - are coming to visit this weekend with yet another fabulous brand of girls: nieces!  I'm feeling awfully lucky and uncharacteristically light over here.

Love. Love. Love. ♡♡♡

Pregnancy Ticks of the Non-Pregnant

Still going strong and growing larger by the day over here!

I met my new doctor, and I positively love him - he's extremely warm, keen to avoid "over medicalizing" pregnancy (♥), and really, really seems to care deeply for his patients... even to the point of tearing up as he recalled some of the hardships they've faced when people said things to scare or scold them.  Indeed, he really emphasized his warning about how pregnant women walk around with unwitting targets on their backs, and many people have the unfortunate habit of intruding on a pregnant woman's privacy to tell her all the things she's doing wrong, everything that could possibly go wrong, and all the many many terrifying or awful things that are likely to happen to her or her baby. Lovely.

So far, I have had only one or two really bad occasions when I've found myself thoroughly uncomfortable and trying to plot an escape from someone who decided to start telling me about every sad or horrific childbirth story they'd ever heard of - it baffles me that people can go on and on in this way and not realize that they're standing in front of someone who is plopped on a nonstop train heading straight for childbirth whether she's ready or not, and chances are there's already plenty of fear or trepidation.  Or maybe she's one of the lucky few who's managing (or at least trying) to avoid this super common fear....  Either way, if you thought it through, would you really be so actively trying to amp up her fear??  If you met a person about to head into open heart surgery, would your instinct be to tell him all the things that could kill him while he's under??  Baffling.

In fact, generally speaking, I've noticed that there is this fascinating tick in society where nearly everyone who comes within the five-foot radius of a pregnant lady feels obligated to comment or strike up conversation, yet almost no one knows how in the world to handle pregnancy. It's like a force beyond them kicks off the chat with the classic, cheerful, and well-meaning "When is the baby coming?" But it isn't until after they receive the answer to this one simple question that it occurs to them that every other detail they can think of regarding pregnancy seems inappropriate, embarrassing, or extremely personal.

They then quickly flounder on what to say next, until they're completely drowning in the discomfort of treading so perilously near subjects like sex lives, weight gain, excruciating pain, bodily functions, bodily fluids, overtly personal choices etc. etc. Eventually, their discomfort hits critical mass and totally overrides their capacity to control the otherwise exceedingly useful filter of things flying out of their mouths, and they just start free associating anything they can think of regarding pregnancy - whether this entails asking outrageously personal questions, sharing very personal stories (or mundane anecdotes - its always one or the other) of their poor sisters, friends, or sister's-friend's-cousins, or throwing decency to the wind and opting for the above mentioned fear amplifiers.

Honestly, it depends on my mood - which, thanks to my new friends pregnancy hormones, is predictably unpredictable -  whether I find this positively entertaining, mildly amusing, sort of annoying, or quite insulting... 

My best advice to all you out there plagued with this very common tick that makes you feel the need to strike up a chat with the next bulging belly you see... When you inevitably feel the cold sliding panic of Oh my God, what do I say now?? just stick with the good old, "Well you look beautiful," and walk away.  Or you could run.

xx