Showing posts with label breastfeeding. Show all posts
Showing posts with label breastfeeding. Show all posts

Monday, September 14, 2009

Sad, or Mad?

Some things make me just sad. Well they also make me mad, but being mad about something usually doesn't solve the problem, and just saps your energy, and people don't want to hear it. Which leaves me with sad. Sometimes I feel like, in my lifetime, I have never stopped grieving, and like I will never stop having something to grieve over. Thankfully the Bible tells me that the Lord is "near to the brokenhearted." [Psalm 34:18] Otherwise I would never be able to find Him in this world.

Some things that grieve me, I can't share with the Internet. I can share them with my dh and the Lord, and that will have to do. Some things I have grieved and gotten "over," (not really), but they have become Manasseh (which in Hebrew means, "to take the sting out of a memory")... like the babies I have lost.

And some things make me sad just for a little while. Eventually they either work themselves out or go away. So tonight's post is about those.

My 2yo daughter Beverly (whom we affectionately sometimes call "Betsy," and the artist behind the B's Eye View pics I post), the other night discovered scissors on the kitchen table. Now there is nothing unusual about that. We are a family of crafters, and my kids have grown up from infancy with scissors and straight pins and buttons and pointy sticks lying around. They are a fact of life, and not usually even much of a curiosity. But there they lay.

So, while people were milling about dishing up plates of their dinner, she decided to cut her hair.

Snip Snip.

Then perhaps figuring that she would get discovered at her prominent place at the table, she took said scissors into the back hall, sat on the floor, and trimmed some more off the sides. Richard discovered her, disarmed her, and scolded her. She now says, "Cut hair!" and points to her head, and then says, "No!" Too late. Oh, and by the way, try getting an active 2yo to stand still for a pic of her butchered hair.

Beautiful little baby curls, missing.

One of my motorcycles, the one I love best, is the 1983 Suzuki GS450T that I have posted pics of before. Earlier this summer, my SIL Tony got it running for me. But we didn't have the headlight or plates, so there it sat. Today we were working on it again.

The gasoline from 2 months ago has varnished in the heat, so the tank and carbs have to be drained and cleaned. The pipes have surface-rusted from nearly 2 years of sitting in the shed, since it was flipped by my oldest son on a condensation-slick railroad track at a curve on a 42 degree morning. So they will have to be brushed and primered and painted with engine paint.

But here's the worst blow of the day (or rather, 2 blows): now that we have it mechanically together (I mean, ya can ride with ugly PIPES), we tried to switch the petcock from "Reserve" to fuel. It was stuck. In getting UNstuck, it fractured a razor-thin little metal disc in the carb feed, so I will have to go to a cycle shop in the morning and order one. Oh and the plates I renewed in July? The sticker is missing. Could my day get any better? Here is a picture, so that you can share my suffering.

One more little sadness, then I'll go on with my life and find something more fun to talk about. Betsy has come down with hand, foot, and mouth virus. Des' kids picked it up from somewhere, and B picked it up from them. I'm not sad about that. Other kids of mine have had it, it is a relatively mild childhood affliction, and it goes away. She has a particularly mild case, with no fever so far. But it has made her throat sore, so she can't nurse.

I was totally ready for her to wean, as she is past 2 years old and TALL, making it hard for her to lay across my lap. Plus, totally not her fault, but I now have almost 18 years of breastfeeding under my belt out of the 23 years I have been a parent, and I am ready to be done. But I wanted it to be our decision, her decision. The milk burns her throat, so she has tried to nurse and cries. I can't imagine how it must feel for her, for her beloved "nursie" to be betraying her like that. So I realize some of you can't relate, but that makes me sad too.

Ok, on a little UP note... see that pile behind the bike that looks like just some yard debris? My 17 yos is slowly, or really not so slowly, turning that pile into usable and useful items, like buttons, gift tags, spindles, coasters, etc. The new CSPIA rules exempt handknitted items for children from lead testing, unless you add zippers, buttons, etc. But wood buttons are also exempt! Hurrah!

Here are some items from his Etsy shop GotWood4You that each sold in only hours from listing them. Congrats Artemas! More to come!

Saturday, October 18, 2008

More Yarn-y Yarns

Ok, Ok, I have been absent a couple days. I have been just swamped with orders. Well for a new shop, I think I am swamped. I have sold 18 skeins of yarn in a week. If I want a day off for "Shabat" that is 3 a day. Really I am unwinding sweaters and dyeing the yarns at just about that rate. Fortunately I did put in my shop announcement that I am mailing 2 days a week... good since I can use after-dinner time to prepare packets for shipping.

I am also behind in some other obligations... I have swaps that need returning to people and I am supposed to be in a block swap for quilting, that is due in 2 weeks. Need to get sewing.

I am knitting at just about every opportunity, including keeping a project in the bathroom, one in my walking bag and bringing one to bed. I can at least work on it until B is done nursing to sleep. She is SO not ready to wean yet.

I am also just about hooked on this spindling. The yarn I was working on the other day, that was so disappointingly mousy brown, turned out pretty nice actually, with a lot more navy in it and some nice red for interest. I have just enough of it to make a skiband or some other small project. Mittens for my 8 yos or something. Pic up there on the right...


And over on the left, you see the first hank of Crazy Batt. Wooo hooooo!! Is this one a wild ride! I bought the most awesome, random-fiber-and-stuff batts from WildThyme Yarns on etsy, and I am absolutely in love with them. As a matter of fact I bought 4 originally and went back and bought 2 more. Now I think I might have to go back and buy some more!! When I am done with this funky, colorful yarn I am going to knit myself a shrug.

Today was Birthday Party day for one of my daughters to go to, so I dropped the boys off at my sister's for an afternoon of unadulterated X Box and the girls and I ran around. I got 3 nice conservative short-sleeve plaid shirts for Richie at Jacques Penné for less than $5 each. And while I was spending money, got some Sculpey or the like, a soap dispenser for my kitchen, and a pair of deep plum brushed- denim jeans for me. Which will go great with a T and that shrug I'm gonna knit.

The "A Christmas Story" yarns are up. Sold some so quick I had to make new ones of them. I had goods in TWO Etsy treasuries this week, too! Stop by and see me, even if only to say Hey!