Sorry, no Monkeys today...

We were busy planting our very first veggie garden. I have a new post for you tomorrow, and we'll do the monkeys on Monday!

Till then, Enjoy the warm day!

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More Yarn Everyday Challenge; and My Monkey Socks Progress.

I've been busy. Really. And not just with yarn. Beeba 1 has his birthday party tommorrow. He turned 3 on Monday. But I have managed to keep up with the yarn everyday challenge, and here are a few more days worth of it:

April 7th, More of the pink Chocolate BFL:

April 8th, More Pink Chocolate and some Perendale (the perendale I carded up for the Blog here-- expect a video of this sometime in the near future, but probably not till after next week)

April 9th, I started on some Bamboo.

I haven't spun for today yet, but thats ok... its only just past 10:30 am.

Then, as for the monkey socks, they have been feeling neglected. So the last couple days, I got to work on them. I have officially finished the legs of them, and am about halfway done making the heel flaps. The pattern was not writing for 2 at a time, so I had to play with the needles a bit, and of course, I have no stitch holders, so lucky me, I used some little safety pins to hold the stitches... I think I used 10 of them, lol. But they are now looking really cool.

With that, I bid farewell for probably the weekend. With the Party tommorrow, as well as the family Seder dinner at my FIL's house (yes, I know it is not the first day, they do it when it is convenient to get the most people to come) and My mom is driving in today, so we will be very busy the next few days.

Enjoy your weekend and Happy Easter, and Happy Passover!

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Waiting... and Sleep Issues

Yes, Waiting... My Ladybug wheel is due to arrive home today. Knowing UPS, it probably won't get here till late afternoon, but it doesn't stop me from being all antsy about it... I just can't be patient, this close to it being here.

And the DH is completely "fibered out" he doesn't want to hear anything fiber related... at all. Oh well.

On other fronts, we are shifting out of co-sleeping mode. For many reasons, we choose to co-sleep with our children when they are infants. they sleep better, we sleep better, and we feel it protects them. I know it does, because I have seen both my children stop breathing at night, and a light breath from me immediately gets them going again. For that reason alone I will never put a newborn in a crib.

But, as they get older, well.... we moved Beeba 1 to a twin mattress on the floor at about 1 year. it took 2-3 weeks, and he was fine. within 2 months, he slept through the night. We moved him because he was kicking us at night too much, and I was having terrible back pains.

Beeba 2 is not a year yet, but we are also working slightly differently with her. She has recently gotten into standing in the middle of the night and dive-bombing herself to sleep on us. and them sleeping anyway she falls. That isn't comfortable for us (I wound up sleeping halfway in her sidecar-ed crib multiple times), and we don't feel its safe for her, especially with the winter blankets still on the bed.

So, we are trying something new. we didn't move the crib, it is still right next to the bed. But we put the 4th side up. after a reasonable nursing session (which ends when she starts crawling on me), I put her in her crib, complete with a couple little animals (they are small, and though stuffed are not super soft, so not a hazard as far as I can see) and she must rest.

I am less than 6 inches from her right now. I can stick my hands into the crib through the bars and hold her hand, or rub her belly.

Right now, she is getting mad about it though. she cries, but not the, "I'm hurt" or "I'm scared" cries, its the, "I'm not getting my way" cry. Yes, at almost 11 months old, she most certainly has a very distinct sound to this particular cry.

Saturday was the first night. I think neither of us slept much. at 2 or 3 in the morning, after she had slept some in the crib, I was too tired to keep fighting. she came into the bed with me.

Last night, at 2-3 am again, she came into the bed.

But, we are making progress. It was easier to get her to sleep in the first place last night. and when she does better with going down, I will try to be more consistent with the late night coming into the bed. Eventually, we'll move the crib a few inches away, then a few more... and eventually, though not probably for a few months yet, right into her own room.

And I know we will all sleep better. I know that her brother did not start to take regular naps till after he was in his own bed. and she has started fighting sleep during the day, instead of falling asleep often as she did for so long. Her need for naps was another big push that led us to do this.

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She Walked!

Beeba 2, that is. Not far, mind you, but she did. She took 2 steps all by herself yesterday. Aren't you proud of her?

Mow back to your regular scheduled programming.

Happy Holidays!

The Holidays are here, and everywhere we find christmas music, glitter, mistletoe, and garlands. Whether you celebrate Christmas, Hanuckah, Kwanzaa, or some otherr holiday I apologize for not knowing of, it is a time for celebration, laughing children, and often frustrated parents.

New Toys abound in our house, due to our Thanksgiving trip to NC, where we celebrated christmas early with family who won't be here next week. This afternoon, the smell of baking cookies will rise in my house, and Saturday, we celebrate christmas again with DH's Brother and his family. Then the smells of turkey and stuffing will be wafting around my kitchen.

My Birthday is next week too. I will be 27... and as my DH reminded me, I am older than he was when we met, I must be getting old... I feel it, too... but in a good way. We have a lot to be glad for this holiday season. We have 2 beautiful healthy children, we own our home, DH has a good steady job when many do not, and while we cannot always buy everything we want when we want it, we do have everything we need.

This year, We tried to buy toys for the kids that encourage imagination... not that they need the encouragement... Beeba 1 loves trains, and in his mind, anything can become one. He will look at rain on a window and find a train, or at the clouds. Beeba 2 is growing fast, and can get into anything she tries for, with little effort. She is trying to pull up to a stand now, too, and sometimes succeeds.

So, to my friends, family, customers, and readers, I wish you a Happy Holiday, whichever you celebrate!

Diapering on the Go, or How our Hot Mama proved a point.

When I was pregnant with Beeba 2, My mother in law told me she was going to get me a gift. She said she wanted to make life easy for me, and so she wanted to buy me something to make it easier. So what did she insist on buying? DISPOSABLE DIAPERS. Yuck. Now, I am not against Sposies for people who need them. But I don't need them. I make and sell cloth diapers, for goodness sake.

She tried to tell me how hard it would be to launder them all the time. I proved that within days after Beeba 2 was born. Her next tactic was the on the go tagline. She thought it would be impossible to fit cloth diapers for both kids for an afternoon in my diaper bag. and that it would be impossibly heavy to do.

well, we proved her wrong a few weeks ago, and at her own house. It was really hot, and with our then 2 week old baby, we did not want to stay at our warmer than liked house. So, we called up and asked if we could come over and cool off in her air conditioning.

i packed enough diapers for an army in my Hot Mama Bag. I loaded up on wipes, filling my new Wipes Case (which will be available on my store site in the near future) and filling every poscket of the diaper bag with diapers. Enough small and newborn diapers for a 12 hour period (with a child who wets every 2 minutes, it seems) and 6 Large diapers for my 2 year old, since we never seem to know from day to day with him how many he'll need. I had an extra blanket in there, and an extra outfit for the baby. And 3 Wet Bags. And a bunch of covers. Plus the changing pad that matches the bag.

We used most of the diapers, by the way... thats just how my kids function, apparently. and I swear, they both wet more when we are away from home.

The diaper bag closed nicely, a little bulging, but more than sufficient. And when we got to her house, She had more things to give me, old clothes that were my husband's as a baby. (why she didn't give us these things when Beeba 1 (the boy) was smaller, I don't know... but that is beside the point.

The point is, we had more than enough diapers, and the bag was not overflowing, nor was it uncomfortable to carry. All the extras she sent us home with fit in the bag too. WE DID NOT NEED SPOSIES. This was a point I had been trying to make to her for some time. I think she might have finally gotten it. When I refused to take home more than one small bag of sposies she had gifted, back just before Beeba 2 was born, I swear she thought I was crazy. I think she was a little insulted, too.

But my kids don't need sposies. They do better in cloth. (so far as I know. Beeba 1 had bad rashes in sposies, Beeba 2 has never worn a sposie, so I don't know how she would do.)

I added some pics of my Hot Mama bag here. They are not pics of that day, at the time I was not thinking about blogging them, just show off pics I took when I first sewed it up. This is so far proving though to be the best diaper bag I have had... and I have had a few.

And sorry, I cannot find this fabric again. When I originally showed the bag to some friends, I had several people ask me to make them one. Its why I now offer custom Hot Mama's on my website. But they wanted the EXACT SAME FABRIC. Unfortunately, It happened to be clearance fabric, and is now gone, un-findable at my fabric stores. Personally, I don't have a problem with that, as I like the thought of these all being one of a kind. Don't you?