Willow’s second Christmas!
She received two great Duplo sets from my parents, and immediately started to build: “TOWER! TOWER!”
I am lacking in words at the moment, but will share some of my Christmas knitting soon! I hope everyone is having pleasant and relaxing holidays.
Oh, and, here is another video from a couple of weeks ago I haven’t posted yet. When we’re at my parents’ house Willow loves climbing in and out of Coco’s crate :)
Willow spent last weekend with my parents, which was a deeply appreciated break for us. Toddlers are FULL ON and I am not always skilled at handling that, so I am very grateful that everyone involved is happy with her staying there for a couple of night every few weeks. We miss her little face, but it’s all the sweeter after perspective has been restored :)
Here is Willow climbing in and out of Coco’s crate, one of her favourite activities at Mum and Dad’s house. They went to Whangamata for a couple of days too, so she got to play in the sand and sea for the first time this summer. She came home able to say BEACH! and about a dozen other new words!
JSR and I took the opportunity to do some household tasks that are tricky with little hands in the vicinity, like shortening curtains and filing months worth of paperwork. Otto “helped” us with the curtain sewing. Incidentally, I discovered that wooden floors are excellent for cutting long straight edges – square the fabric up so the line to be cut runs along the join between two boards, then the groove between then becomes a tactile guide for the scissors!
Pippin just enjoyed the quiet house and relaxed in the sunshine. She doesn’t loll about like this frequently, so it’s a special treat to see her calm and curly-pawed.
I’ve been going to Giapo every few days over these last couple of weeks, as my friend Rob and I are working on a project with him, and we’ve been tasting lots of the new experimental gelato and sorbet flavours. Most of them are mind-blowingly delicious (Strawberry Fruit Tart, Cashew Nut, Custard and Pine Nuts, Rhubarb Creme Brulee, Strawberry and Mint sorbet, Earl Grey sorbet, White Coffee sorbet), and some are fascinatingly unusual (Wasabi and Vanilla, Seaweed and Sauvignon Blanc, Orange and Star Anise). There have been a couple of clunkers too – for my palate, that is, and bearing in mind they both contained ingredients I don’t like anyway – but in general it’s all SO GOOD. And I love being around someone who is really excited about what he is doing!
I hear that a new maple custard flavour went out this evening, so I’m wondering if I can justify another trip in tomorrow :D Parking is the problem, but if I time it for 7pm when the clearways revert into parking I should be able to get a spot nearby… a nice after dinner treat… mmmm…
I find Willow hilarious when she’s groggy in the mornings, so I took this little video of her stumbling bedhead. HEE!
She’s also very keen on picking flowers (pronounced more like “frerhs”) at the moment. She’s denuded most of the plants in our garden, and when we went for a walk with Mum today we had to stop at every patch of dandelions or daisies or soldiers by the side of the road and pick one. Combined with a few extra bits from our front yard she ended up with a sweet little wild bouquet by the time we got home again, which I put in a baby food jar to decorate the table for the day.
Otto had to go to the vet this afternoon. He’s been sniffling and sneezing for several days, with runny eyes and a poor scratched nose where he’s been batting at himself. We were fairly certain it was just a cold but you know, you’d never forgive yourself if your cat was seriously ill and they said “if only you’d come in sooner”… so I packed him up and had him checked out. Sure enough, he has cat flu, and it should clear up on its own, though we have a list of symptoms that will need further attention to keep an eye out for. Vets are expensive, but worth the reassurance. We do love our soft ginger giga-pudding!
The patient, weepy eyes (actually not looking too bad in this photo, perhaps he’s on the mend already) and scuffed nose and all.
Monty has also had a hard time of it. Yesterday evening he followed Willow and I across the road and down the street to the reserve when we went to play ball, and was trotting across the grass towards us when he was swooped upon by an enormous, angry magpie. I don’t think it made contact, but it was very close, and the magpie was not much smaller than the skinny slinky Mon-man. He ran into the undergrowth where the grassed area turns into bush (i.e. thick forest, for non-NZers!) and meowed at me pitifully. I tried to get to him but he was too spooked, especially after the bird attacked him again, and he would not come out!
I didn’t want to leave him there because magpies are vicious and he is quite stupid, but after half an hour of calling and coaxing it was getting dark and Willow was antsy, so I started to walk her home to drop her off with JSR and go back for Monty. As we got about halfway back he suddenly rocketed out of the reserve after us and ran straight for our house, then proceeded to be a big scaredy-cat for the rest of the night – and with good reason. Poor little guy.
So, that election, huh? I don’t want to come over all political in the space I use to talk about yarn and kitty cats, but I’ve been more invested in this election than any other. As a Green Party supporter I was very pleased to see them gain an additional four MPs, hooray! But on the whole, I think the National Party has a lot of policies that will cause hardship and hurt New Zealand in the long term. It’s disappointing that so many people voted for that, and makes me feel disconnected from my country. I can only hope the other parties manage to reign National in, and that we get a different result in 2014.
Since getting Willow out of the house is critical to maintaining my sanity, and we have Absolutely No Money at the moment, we’ve been visiting either a park or playground or the library virtually every day.
To be fair we’d be doing much the same thing if we weren’t broke, since I don’t think children need to be presented with commerce as recreation, but I feel awfully lucky to live somewhere we have plenty of opportunities for free activities when we need them!
Yesterday we had a few stale bread crusts lingering on the bench, so we went to a local park that has lots of ducks.
My first feeding spot beside the pond was not particularly successful, as Willow kept making a beeline for the water, but then I noticed a pair of handsome white ducks heading into a stand of trees and followed them under the canopy only to find a DUCK PARTY!
It was lovely and shady, and I distributed the rest of our bread to much quack-quacking. Wil was far more interested in eating the crusts herself and playing with sticks, but at least she wasn’t running for the water :)
We also spent a while on the other side of the park – away from the duck poop, hee! – carefully examining bugs and looking at the clouds and rolling about on the grass.
We play in the back yard at home, too. I made a daisy chain and managed to get Wil to wear it for a good ten minutes! So cute I could dieeeeeeee.
Unfortunately she is currently in a clingy, whiny, MUM MUM MUM MUM MUM phase (i.e. being a toddler!) which I can handle cheerfully when I’m well rested, but my reserves of energy run low in the late afternoon and evening, and most days it all goes a bit pear shaped. If she takes a nap I get some temporary relief, but then she stays up very late and bedtime is even more difficult, so it doesn’t really help the big picture. Frustrating!
On a happier subject, I’m excited about the new Urban yarn from Skeinz – it’s 100% wool, DK weight, machine washable, New Zealand made, and the initial reviews on Ravelry say it’s quite soft too. Oh, and really well priced! Those are perfect characteristics for crocheting blankets. I have a Skeinz gift voucher that expires in a month, so I’m going to order some to try out. Now, which colours to choose…
Willow and I spent last weekend in Christchurch, staying with my brother and his family, and visiting JSR’s parents and our friends Isabel and Megan. It was a fairly whirlwind trip as I couldn’t face more than two nights away from home with a potentially unsettled baby, though actually the nights were fine and Willow slept very well on her little mattress bed!
The flights however… let’s just say we won’t be going again until she’s 2 and can have her own seat. One plump mama and one leggy baby do not fit comfortably into a single domestic economy space, and Willow screamed through take-off on both trips just from being belted down onto my lap. She was okay for the middle part of the flights, when she could stand in the aisle and be cuddled by the cabin crew and eat the little bag of snackychips, but the landings meant being on my lap again. Descending into Christchurch in particular was not to her liking – pain in her ears I assume, as mine were quite sore too – and she shrieked like a plucked mandrake once more. I did my best to keep her calm, but my powers only go so far, and every snarky tweet about babies on planes I’ve ever read was running through my head the whole time. Honestly, do people think the parents are having fun making everyone else miserable?! Gah.
Anyway, we had a great time once we were there! My four nieces plus Willow made one loud gaggle of girls, and she loved spending time with them. We visited the farm where Jessie and Stella help with pony parties and ride horses, Maisie cuddled Willow to bits all weekend, and smallest-cousin-Brydie and Willow became super friends, sharing a splashy bubble bath, Dora DVDs, and heart-meltingly cute hugs and kisses. We didn’t experience any earthquakes (phew!) but seeing the damaged city was unsettling, even though I didn’t know it well enough to recognise what was missing from each empty space.
I haven’t blogged since then as I’ve been suffering a bit of toddler burnout :/ Willow is hard work at the moment, and my reserve of patience runs out about two hours before bedtime, ending each day in a teeth-gritting slump. I can’t even pass her over to JSR for the evening because she’s so clingy and only I will do! So lots of deep breaths, and reminding myself that this stage won’t last forever…
A finished project I can show you! This was originally going to be one of my gift knits, but it turned out too small for the intended recipient – I was winging it without a pattern, just making a basic hat shape with some slip-stitch colourwork inspired by a blanket design – so it’s now Willow’s winter hat for next year :)
I like the way the top swirls in, it reminds me of a little bundt cake.
And the pattern is a little like tiles, perhaps in a swimming pool, so I’m calling it my Aqua Mosaic Hat.
Ravelry page with details of yarn and so on here.
Willow’s speech has sprinted ahead in the last week. She’s learned to say eyes, nose, face, neck, banana, cake, car, socks, flower, slide, peekaboo and comb as well as becoming very consistent with greetings and a few other expressions like oops and cool. We only count words when she uses them unprompted and in context, so there’s a lot more she will repeat after us but hasn’t broken out with spontaneously yet. It’s so exciting after only saying cat for months and months! She now asks “wha-za?” (what’s that?) all day long which is a good reminder for me to keep naming objects for her. I tend to spend my day in monastic silence otherwise, which I’m sure isn’t very helpful. I’m told I will eventually want her to stop talking so much, but for now every little word makes me happy!
Usually Willow’s TV time is fairly moderated, but when she’s sick I don’t think there’s any harm spending a day on the couch with a blankie and Nick Jr – and some kittypals. It’s just a cold so she’ll be fine, but she has a runny nose and raspy cough and isn’t sleeping well. JSR has the same thing, and I’m feeling a bit bleh myself. PLAGUE HOUSE!
A snuggle for an unimpressed Pippin.
My knitting progress has been slow recently. I have mostly been working on a pair of socks, except it turns out my hands really don’t like small needles. Each time I work on them the fingers of my right hand go numb, then later they ache. I’ve tried slippery metal and grippy wood, DPNs and two circulars and magic looping, and they all have the same result.
I’ve got this far on the first sock (including the heel which you can’t see, it’s jolly difficult to photograph the back of your own foot!) and it is very comfortable, but I really can’t afford to hurt my hands so I’m going to frog it and double or triple the sock yarn up to make chunky slippers instead. I’ve never had a problem crocheting or knitting DK/worsted weight yarns. I’d love to do some delicate knitting but it’s just not worth the risk. I need my hands in tip-top shape!
Now, do I make a sensible plain pair of slippers, or the ones with the curly elf toes?!
Last week the guilt of having oranges fall off our tree finally got to me and I made some of them into jam. I was under the impression that sweet oranges would make a delicious orange jam, rather than stinky old marmalade, but I was mistaken. JSR likes marmalade so it won’t be wasted, and it does look pretty, but it’s not what I wanted. My attempts at orange cake haven’t gone well either, but there’s always fresh squeezed orange juice!
I’ve been doing better with banana cake. This is one I made yesterday, with a new frosting recipe I hadn’t tried before. The method is unusual – you cook flour and milk together to make a thick goo, then stir it into creamed butter and sugar – but the result is delicious. It’s like a vanilla buttercream, but lighter and fluffier and less overwhelmingly sweet. Mmmmmm.
Having started and deleted an entry many times over the last few days I think it is best if I catch up by way of photos of Willow. There was a patch where I was too strung out to think of picking up my camera so the record has large gaps around 17-18 months, but I’m getting back into the habit now!
Very interested in shoes!
Fun to put on, fun to take off.
Mum bought Willow this little car, which is ridden around the house every day.
At a local park, picnicking for Father’s Day.
Gentle pats for Pippin.
I put Wil in this funny little padded elf suit and she had undone all the domes and removed it within five minutes. Ah, well!
CUSTARD!
This is the ONLY time Willow has EVER fallen asleep on the floor. Other kids take guerilla naps all the time, but not ours. She must have been very tired, gumboots and all.
Enjoying a fine day.
Sorting stones is serious business!
Willow looks so small at the end of the garden.
We visited MOTAT last weekend and they had a little farmyard set up for the school holidays. Willow patted sheep and lambs, piglets, a goat, a calf, a donkey and a bunny.
This is her extra happy squeezy face.
Lounging around, watching some Wonder Pets.
Something about this hunched pose and weird puffy pants makes me think Willow looks like a tiny fashion blogger. Also, look at her HAIR! It’s suddenly getting so long and curly, almost like a real style. I even had to trim her fringe a few days ago to keep it out of her eyes.
I’ve just installed a more advanced comment system here, which should have threading for conversations and (optional!) email notifications of replies and/or new comments. Let me know if it does anything odd for you. I’m excited to be able to reply to comments more clearly :)
Willow’s out of her cot now! We didn’t really mean to make the transition but about a week ago we had a middle-of-the-night monkey screaming session, and in desperation I tried dragging the thin futon-style mattress from our fold out bed into the lounge and lying down with her. She calmed very quickly, so the next evening we moved the mattress into her room, and that’s where she sleeps now.
We had been having horrible bedtimes with screaming and thrashing and clawing like a wildcat as soon as we carried her near the cot, which made the evenings harrowing, but the new sleeping arrangement has not yet caused any crying at all! At first I stayed with her until she was asleep, but now I just make sure she’s looking tired and starting to snuggle down. She might get up again and wander around her room, but she’s in the bed every time we check during the night. Never under the covers, though, so we’re glad the weather is warming up.
We don’t go into her room in the morning until we hear her starting to chat away to herself, and judging by the books I find tucked into her bedclothes she’s been doing some reading each day before starting to chirrup. AW! That’s the way, honey!
She likes to read everywhere, pictured here on the couch with “Snuggle Up, Poppy Cat” and some sweet bed head.
I’ve been feeling so much better since I decided to take a break from work. I’d reached the stage where I wasn’t sure I wanted to do Nut and Bee at all any more, but as soon as I made the decision I started looking forward to coming back in better circumstances. I won’t rush it, though, and I’m definitely not opening again until I have some guaranteed solitary work time at least a couple of times a week.
My final week of orders has really surpassed my expectations, and I’ve been incredibly busy, working late into the night after Willow goes to bed. It’s been even more hectic than my usual Christmas rush. Last night I didn’t stop until 5.30am! That’s not sustainable for any length of time, but I’m managing so far and can keep it up for a couple more days.
The extra income is very much appreciated – I’ve paid off my credit card and a couple of lingering household bills, and I shouldn’t have to bother JSR for pin money for a little while. I’m especially pleased about the credit card as I hate having a balance on there, and was really grumpy at myself for letting it build up in the first place (even though the majority was groceries and business expenses, not frivolity). Now I just have to keep it empty…
JSR is sickly again, poor guy. He’s been having a hard time this winter :( I am providing hot drinks and pills and sympathetic looks, and generally feeling a bit useless because there’s not a lot you can do to help a head-and-sinus cold.
The silver lining for me is that I get to use the car during the day, an unexpected freedom. Yesterday I went on a mega-errand-run and took care of lots of little bits and pieces, culminating in a trip to the garden centre for rhubarb! I’ve been obsessed with rhubarb since I bought a pottle of Anathoth Rhubarb and Red Berry Jam, which is absolutely delicious. The supermarket charges 50-60c a stalk even when rhubarb is in season (outrageous!) so I hope my plants take off. They look a bit spindly at the moment but will hopefully be productive next year. I remember my parents’ rhubarb looking like this when I was a child, huge sprays of lush stalks all ready for cakes and crumbles:
By Flora Doehler, on Flickr
Of course I didn’t just buy rhubarb! Buoyed by the success of getting all of my previous plantings through the winter, I picked out a few more to round out the bed I’ve been working on.
I chose a daphne bush (Daphne odora ‘Leucanthe’) for lovely smells:
By Nemo’s great uncle, on Flickr
Some hen and chicken ferns (Asplenium bulbiferum) to fill in shady spots at the back of the bed:
By meccanohig, on Flickr
And two pretty fuchsias, Harry Gray and White Phenomenal. I couldn’t find good photos of them, but Harry Gray is solid pale pink with creamy buds, and White Phenomenal has a raspberry skirt with white underpants. (I’m not the only person who sees the flowers as fancy outfits, right?!) I have a feeling fuchsias might be unfashionable and mock-worthy at the moment but I care not, I have a fondness for them :)
I’m ready to move onto another garden bed now. I’m glad I’m doing this one step at a time, as it makes the tough bits much more approachable and spreads out the cost too. The next bit involves reclaiming an area of lawn and moving some pavers! Next fine day I will get out there and start lifting turf.
Willow is 18 months old today. She hops in her own high chair when asked, says NUM! NUM! when she likes food and spoons and forks like a champ; she can swipe to unlock an iPad or iPhone and turn on the picture slideshow and mp3 player; she dances to any music, especially the Antiques Roadshow theme song; she loves to push our index fingers and the ends of cables together; she adores the cats and her face lights up whenever she sees one; she demands a little hand cream whenever she sees me using it and rubs her hands together with glee; she leafs through her books and reads them out loud in her babbling mystery language; she likes being outside and taking little walks down the street and across to the reserve, where we gambol in the grass and kick a ball around and explore the mud; she knows lots of parts of the body and loves to press noses (hers, ours, anyone’s) to which we must say BEEP! BEEP!; she gives kisses and squeezes and combs my hair; she has also started to throw little tantrums but let’s ignore that part for now! It’s still hard to believe we made such a lovely little person.