Puddle Jumping in DC

Conversing with the 4-Year-Old

Excerpts from conversations with my 4-year-old after picking her up from school today:

Maya: "Can I use my new pencil to do homework this afternoon?"

Jen: "Sure."

M: "Can you help me because I don't know what homework is?"

---

J: "Do you want an example of how a knock-knock joke is supposed to work?"

M: "Yes."

J: "Ok, knock, knock."

M: "Who's there?"

J: "Cars."

M: "Cars who?"

J: "Cars I love you."

M: peals of laughter, "Knock, knock."

J: "Who's there?"

M: "Cars."

J: "Cars who?"

M: "Tree!" laughs even harder.

---

J: Getting ready to close the rain cover on the bike trailer,"Ok, now remember that because of the rain, I won't be able to hear you while we ride home. We'll just have to talk when we get there. [15 min, max] Unless it's important, then just yell."

. . . a little later, about half-way home

M: SCREAMING FROM THE TRAILER!

J: "What?"

M: something that sounds like it could be "LOOK AT THAT CASTLE!"

J: Since there's no obvious castle, stops on the side of the road and turns around: "What did you say Maya?"

M: "LOOK THAT BUILDING OVER THERE [a church we pass about twice daily]! IT LOOKS LIKE A CASTLE! IT LOOKS JUST LIKE A CASTLE!"

J: "Yes, yes it does." (And important is relative.)

---

On the agenda this afternoon:

• Look up pictures of panthers,  because we established on the way to school that they are not pink in the real world.
• Investigate how much an ant can really carry (same inspiration).

Both very important inquiries.

High Tea at the Mayflower Hotel

 
 

Back in July, on a total whim, I purchased a Groupon for tea for 2 at the Mayflower Hotel in DC. The above photos were taken during and immediately following Maya's first fancy afternoon tea.

My original intention for tea was as a birthday treat. But the end of October was so full of birthday and Halloween that fancy tea didn't make the cut. Barely a blink later, we found ourselves in January with the Groupon expiration looming and having read a few reviews of the Mayflower that tea wasn't really child friendly after all. I almost passed the Groupon on via the neighborhood listserv, but another mom convinced me to just get dressed up and go. 

Verdict: No, it's not really child-friendly, at least not for 4-year-olds. The staff was professional, but not warm. I'm guessing that I'm not the only person who purchased a Groupon explicitly to take a little girl to tea because the hostess asked to see it before taking us to our table. Our waiter kept most of his disapproval hidden as he warned me to (I forget his exact wording) to keep a close eye on Maya – implying that she would pour her tea too fast, let it overflow, and burn herself or (worse?) make a mess. Maya was, of course, oblivious to this and I knew she wasn't going to even try to pour the tea herself so we busied ourselves with enjoying our tea.

But I'm sure the staff are getting a lot of little girls in what is normally an adult restaruant now as the Groupon comes due, so we'll cut them some slack. In fact, 3 little girls came in all dressed in their finest during the 40 minutes we were there. The manager, on the other hand, seemed very happy to see when she checked to see if our tea was "just delightful," but she probably doesn't wipe up many spills.

Maya did great, really. She remembered to use her napkin instead of her sleeve (mostly) and to keep her elbows off the table. She tried several of the sandwiches and enjoyed quite a few of the desserts. I doubt you are supposed use your spoon to eat the whipped cream and lemon custard provided for scones, but that seemed a small concession.

Probably Not Going with the Zombie Nativity Scene

One of the benefits, in my opinion, of having never spent the Christmas holidays in your own home is that you do not have to decorate.

Photo (and exhibit) courtesy of the National Park Service

We make special trips to see the lavish decorations at the U.S. Botanic Gardens and around the Whitehouse elipse and enjoy the tree and decorations at my parents' and sister's houses, but haven't ever bothered to decorate our own home.

There's a chance that I'm not off the hook this year (plans are very much up in the air) and it's got me thinking decorations contingency plan.

What I do know is that I'm not going with this motif:

If it works for you, however, a zombie nativity set can be purchased from fetishforethics on Esty.

Final days in Halifax

The sun came out for a couple of lovely days at the end of our Halifax trip. The photo above was taken from the Halifax-Dartmouth Ferry on Monday on our way to the science museum, the Halifax Discovery Centre. After that, we went to a Natal Day pirate festival in Dartmouth turn in early, after a bubble bath, of course.

1. Not peak bus-riding time, 2. Silly face on the bus, 3. On top of the rock pile, 4. Under the sand, 5. Floating head box at the science center, 6. Building molecules at the science center, 7. Natal Day bounce house (1), 8. Natal Day bounce house (2), 9. Bubble bath

Musquodobit Day

Human Landscape Dance and company spent the day yesterday Musquodobit Harbour, Nova Scotia. We dipped our toes in the surf and Maya road her first amusement park ride.

1. Oh that North Atlantic is COLD!, 2. Surf and sand (1), 3. Surf and sand (2), 4. Surf and sand (3), 5. Surf and Sand (mostly sand), 6. Surf and sand (4), 7. Musquodobit Fair, 8. Musquodobit Fair (2), 9. Musquodobit Fair (3)

Easy Homemade (Refridgerator) Kefir

When I embarked on making Kefir at home, I expected it to be an extension of our long-established habit of making our own yogurt. However, incorporating this fermented food into my diet took a little trial and error. In honor of Farmer's Daughter's Green Moms Carnival this month on preserving food, I'll describe lessons I learned making kefir, so that you might find your ideal routine more quickly than I did.

While kefir and yogurt both ferment milk, the process and our resulting routine are very different:

• Unlike yogurt, making kefir with live cultures does not involve heating and cooling the milk.
• Kefir ferments at room temperature (or lower, as I discovered) and does not require being kept warm over night.
• Kefir continues to culture until it is consumed, even if the grains are removed, so must be eaten quickly. (The same is true of yogurt, but the process is much slower.)

There are many websites with instructions for making kefir, and some of them make the process seem very complicated and involved. It doesn't have to be. My kefir routine involves just a tiny bit of planning and adds only a few minutes to my smoothie routine every couple of days.

Standard Homemade Kefir Instructions

1. Put your grains into a clean glass jar.
2. Add milk.
3. Cover jar with a clean towel, not a lid (it carbonates), and store at room temperature.
4. 24 hours later, or when the kefir reaches the desired sourness, strain kefir grains.
5. Drink kefir.
6. Go back to step 1.

That system didn't work for me in the warm climate of Washington, DC, mostly because I found I was making a quart of kefir every 12 hours. Even when I reduced the amount of grains in the jar, I simply couldn't keep up. I had to figure out a way to slow production, and since I had been storing extra grains in the refrigerator, where they still fermented the milk in which they were stored, I decided to try putting the whole process in there.

Selections from the Weekend - July 8-10, 2011

1. Ann Marie Mulgrew & Dancers, 2. Human Landscape Dance, 3. Anne Marie Mulgrew and Dancers (2), 4. Funny Faces at the Folklife Festival, 5. Funny Faces at the Folklife Festival (2), 6. Slippery Dance Floor at the Folklife Festival, 7.Documenting the Haircut, 8. Yards Park Canal w/Daddy, 9. Yards Park Canal

Internet Silence

It's not just here. I've barely been posting to twitter and only sporatically posting at Care2.  I've simply found myself busier than expected in 2011: managing the day to day, but also figuring, planning, and dreaming.

Your best bet for keeping up with me lately is Facebook. I even have a page for yoga, check it out.

Happy Holidays

Cultivating a Sense of Wonder

 “I ride the metro with God.”

That was the thought that struck me at the end of chapter 7 of Donna Farhi’s Bringing Yoga to Life. The thought drove home the magnitude of creation, the sheer magnitude of Grace manifested into the diversity of this reality and its potential for constant rediscovery of the Self.  Two instances are not enough to capture an awareness of Grace over a day, let alone a month, but this is my attempt:

The bicycle commute: It’s cool, cold even, when I start my hour-long ride from Capitol Hill to Ballston, VA. I’m usually running late, so I peddle hard and the blood begins to pump faster through my veins, warming my whole body. My breath quickens. Often I can see it moving in and out, becoming me and becoming sky again, rushing past. Birds and airplanes soar overhead. I marvel at the contrast – that both can fly at all; that the rest of us don’t simply float away ^[1]. 

The toddler: A good bit of two-year-old anxiety is related to the process of defining identity. Where does she begin and end? She tells me, “I’m a butterfly today,” and retells the same stories, processing events of her day. “I fell down on my head and it went POP!” is a current favorite.  She’s magnetically drawn to the drama of human emotion, pointing out whenever anyone in earshot is sad (one of the more easily identified emotions). “The baby is sad” or “The little boy is sad,” she empathizes and looks to me to assure her that it’s ok. As she learns how she is separate from others, I hope she doesn’t completely forget that she is not.

 

---

[1] See January 20, 2010 - Astronomy Picture of the Day for a mind-blowing illustration of Grace. 

Originally drafted in response to a yoga teacher training homework assignment. Posted in response to today's #reverb10 prompt by Jeff Davis.

The Holidays Without the Hoopla

photo © 2009 Simon 'Kelp' Keeping | more info (via: Wylio)

My husband and I don't give each other presents: not birthday presents, not anniversary presents, not Christmas presents. <Gasp!>

The appropriate cultural response: How do you show the other how much you love them without buying them gifts?

Um, wow. Did you hear what you just said? (Ok, i typed it, but whatever.)

Why We Don't Buy Gifts

My husband and I don't buy each other stuff. We do stuff for each other and with each other. And we do it all year long.

It's a pattern we sort of naturally fell into over a decade of marriage. With limited time and money, we found we'd much rather spend both on building or doing something the other wanted than shopping.

The conscious decision not to buy presents adds even more meaning to the everyday gifts we give each other –– preparing meals, looking after household tasks, listening to the others hopes and dreams, or covering childcare so the other can pursue an interest -- and to the occasional gifts like building something around the house. For example, the floor-to-ceiling bookshelves that line nearly every free wall we've got are more than essential storage in a tiny urban row-house; the memories of afternoons we spent building them have been incorporated into the glue that holds our marriage together.

Transition

In her #reverb10 prompt this morning, Gwen Bell asked participants to define 2010 in one word. Mine is "transition."

While 2009 was actually the year in which I left my full time job, it was in 2010 that I really attempted to figure out what that meant. I began a yoga teacher training program and teaching kids yoga weekly, and I began to explore a new identity, separate from full time environmental advocacy.

The year involved a lot of casting about and feeling somewhat lost, not unlike a certain polliwog in one of Maya's favorite library books: The Caterpillar and the Polliwog. He learns that, like the boastful caterpillar, he will transform into something else when he grows up, but nobody tells him what.

The word I will project on 2011 is "focus."

transformation photo © 2005 Noyes | more info (via: Wylio)

Now you are 3

We threw a Fairy Tale themed birthday party for Maya the Saturday before she turned three. 

Will party organizing get easier or harder as she gets older?
Whenever the subject of birthdays had come up in the previous – oh, I don't know – 6 (!) months, Maya had been very clear that her birthday would have "cake and balloons and candles."  "Cake" would alternate with "chocolate" and she was also very particular that it was "cupcakes." (Chocolate cupcakes with chocolate icing.) Though we almost screwed up the candles when the big day arrived, I had felt pretty confident we could meet those expectations.

My bigger concern was how to host more than two three year olds in our tiny house, especially as we got closer to Maya's birthday and realized how the enourmety of her social circle. Thanks to two years of playgroup coop, Spanish school this year (just one day per week), and neighborhood kids, we could easily have invited 30+ children that Maya identifies as her friends. We decided not to include current classmates, since we would celebrate with them at school, and limit the party to friends Maya didn't get to see every day. But, we still ended up with an RSVP list of nine!

We didn't consult her on the theme, but we chose something that seemed to fit.  We invited all the children to come in fairy tale character costumes. When they arrived, we decorated paper crowns. We then embarked on a quest. Our original plan was to use the playground of the school across the street and hunt for beanie babies that needed rescuing followed by a dragon pinata (Pull pinata, no slaying involved at 3 years old. Slaying can come later.) Unfortunately, the very community-oriented charter school padlocked their playground gate that weekend (they don't always). Luckily, a quick brainstorm with a neighbor and first parent to arrive saved the day. We went for a sticker hunt around the block as we searched for the friendly dragon (in our backyard). The kids loved it.

Whe the subject of birthdays came up the next morning, I asked: "Maya, did we have a party yesterday?" The tone of voice and look in her eyes while repsonding "Yes, it was my party" made it worth the effort.

Nearly Halloween birthday pretty much guarantees excess . . .
That party was just the begining of the birthday-to-Halloween extravaganza that we can look forward to pretty much every year, I think.  The following week, there was a Halloween party at Spanish school, a birthday party with another child at coop playgroup, the neighborhood Halloween party, a playgroup Halloween parade with cupcakes, and, finally, trick-or-treating.

The fairy ballerina princess costume above got worn (without wings and eventually without wand) four times and missed one event because it was in the wash (we have alternative fairy outfits).  By Halloween night though, Maya was no longer a fairy ballerina princess at all. She was a bat.

Without fail, neighbors would ask our trick-or-treater if she was a princess or a ballerina.  She was wearing a sparkly black leotard and pink tutu after all. Maya would answer with a very straight face "No, I'm a bat," often followed by a "pirouette".

Happy Halloween

With more than 200 lollipops and 300 tootsie rolls handed out in less than two hours, we've survived the madness that is birthday-Halloween week. 

The sugar high will live on for some time yet, due to the pumpkin full of chocolate and other sweets that Maya acquired in about 45 minutes, traversing a mere three Capitol Hill blocks and back.

Yoga and the Political Activist

Among the first things I did when I got up this morning to proofread my paper on The Bhagavad Gita for yoga teacher training  was check Facebook (don't we all now?), which lead me to a book review on Green LA Girl on Yoga for a World Out of Balance. It's nice when this particular tamasic act actually directs me back to my task.

Excerpts:

In the weeks leading up to yoga teacher training, I read Donna Farhi’s Bringing Yoga to Life: The Everyday Practice of Enlightened Living, as assigned. Enormous portions of the book resonated with me and I found myself enthusiastically underlining passages and writing in the margins, until I got to this paragraph:

“When we slow down, we create a conductive environment for kindness and thoughtfulness to flourish. We find that it isn’t necessary to join our local peace demonstration. We can demonstrate for peace by being peaceful.” [p. 54]

My immediate reaction is, “Um, no. That doesn’t work.”

You have to say please, mommy.

Alternate title: Oh right, you're 3.

Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

And boy can you whine and bellyache. I feel for you, kid. You're in a tough spot, you don't know whether you want to be a baby or a big kid and you really can't be either.

The Parenting Mirror

Sarah, over at the of Walk Slowly, Live Wildly, has a post up about how children reflect what they see in their parents.

I often hear Maya explaining to her toys: "Now, I'm going to count to three. If you don't do it, I'm going to do it for you."

The "it" is very often getting in a chair or carseat or brushing her teeth. That threat doesn't work for "pick up your toys," for example.

This summer, we noticed that Maya nearly always answer "yes, please" or "no, thank you" when offered anything and she routinely thanks people for doing things for her. 

But, we didn't get as many pleases in requests. In fact, the closer she got to her third birthday, the more Maya, who has a fairly large vocabulary for her age, resorted to one word demands/commands or pointing and whining. Now, we can't blame the whining and pointing on her parents, but the pleases?  Yep, most of our requests to each other omit the please. 

(Photos were taken in Greenbelt National Park, a nice little walk in the woods spot within the beltway.)

We are not having a baby

And I am probably not quitting yoga teacher training. 

Yes. And, no.What!? Are those two related?

Mac and I have been engaged in a months-long discussion about if/when second baby.  We are finding parenting to be extremely rewarding and the idea of a repeat is pretty charming. 

Many of Maya's peers already have younger siblings, some of them old enough to be walking, and from about when those pregnancies began being announced, we started setting target dates to start trying for a second ... and then putting it off every time a target date drew near. There was always a timing complication and other considerations, but one of our major hesitations has been the strain a second child could put on us as a couple, squeezing our limited quality together time even further.

A month or so ago, 48 hours of spaciness on my part, so severe that it reminded Mac strongly of pregnancy, got us discussing how we'd feel if if/when was now.

We came to a "Well, let's just do it" place and went so far as to schedule an appointment with a midwife to take the necessary de-birth control steps.  That appointment was supposed to be Tuesday.

This past weekend, we were in Philadelphia for Mac's company's performance at the Painted Bride.  I mostly hung out with Maya, seeing Mac at breakfast and buzzing in and out of the Sunday matinee due to the generosity of and babysitting swap with our lovely hosts.

During the ride home, questioning by one of Mac's dancers about feeling or not feeling stress over getting all of the many yoga teacher training homework assignments completed elicited a response such as "The worst that can happen is they won't give me a certificate at the end. And, I've been on the verge of quitting since the second weekend, so whatever."  Mac responded "Really?" "Oh, yeah. Every other day," I said.

Apparently, my flippant little remark was a watershed moment for Mac. He'd had ho idea.

Later, we talked through both what makes me feel like quitting and why I kept it to myself for four months. While the declaration was more emphatic than I usually feel, I quite often have trouble justifying the time and effort I'm spending on teacher certification when I have no clear plan of what I'm going to do with it.

Mac's watershed washed away all of his desire for another baby right now.  His watershed precipitated mine – that I was relieved. After much discussion, we've come to the conclusion that three is the right number for our family right now.

In his own reflections on our car ride, during which we also discussed the show, Mac writes,

"I realized that Jen had not even seen our premiere before the show, an unusual occurrence in our years together. I begin to understand how much we have missed each other since Maya was born. Now that Maya is a little older, I look forward to spending more time with the woman I love."

Sacred Space

A lovely room that does not resemble
Jen's regular practice space.
Originally uploaded by beauty that moves.

My yoga home practice space is not a room dedicated to yoga and meditation with a lovely alter or plenty of wall space for practicing inversions.

I live in an old 3 bedroom row house housing 3 adults and a toddler, so pretty much every square inch of space gets used. On the second floor, we go vertical too, with shelving a couple feet down from the ceiling in 2 of the 3 rooms and 4 sets of floor to ceiling bookcases (a total of 6 once you count the ones in the front hall downstairs).

We've just hatched a plan to begin transitioning Maya to her own bed this summer, and that too involves going vertical with a custom built loft in what will eventually be Maya's own room.

So, my practice space, especially when I don't leave myself time to pick up more than the bare minimum, tends to look more like:

Human Powered Transportation

Photo: Oil continues to gush into the gulf at a rate of
5,000 barrels a day. See more from the Washington Post.

With the nation watching in horror as an offshore oil disaster the U.S. Department of the Interior thought was so unlikely that it didn't even require the drilling company to file a full environmental impact statement threatens to contaminate wildlife sanctuaries, oyster reefs, shrimp beds, and more along the gulf coast, the Green Moms Carnival turns to the topic of transportation.

The United States consumed not quite 3 gallons of oil per person per day in 2007 with about 70% of that fueling transportation.  In that same time period, Japan consumed 1.6 gallons per person per day and Great Britain consumed 1.2.  Our lifestyle choices, including how we plan our communities have a huge effect on our energy consumption.

When Mac and I lived in Massachusetts for college, we were a two car household.  After college, living in Newark, NJ near bus lines, the Path train into the city, and NJ Transit, Mac decided the insurance and maintenance on his car wasn't worth the cost, so we were quickly down to one.  Just after we were married in 1998, my car threw a rod (long story involving the water pump, timing belts, and finally the oil pump) and we were thrust into car-free living in New Brunswick.

We quickly learned to do grocery and laundry mat trips with a bike trailer or push cart, but generally found it hard to do other errands in a very urbanized but very car-centric community.  There were no bike lanes and shopping was centralized in malls off very busy roads not terribly close to housing.  Still, we biked to the transit station every morning and hopped trains and buses to our various destinations.

Moving to Washington, DC the following summer was a revelation: subway trains and buses galore, shopping on public transit lines, and grocery stores within an easy walk from our house!

Eleven years later, we do own a car specifically so Mac can commute twice a week from our home to Towson University north of Baltimore, MD, where he did his graduate assistantship and now teaches as adjunct faculty. 

The trip of 59 miles takes about 3 hours by public transportation (one way), mostly because the public transit options for getting to Towson from Penn Station in downtown Baltimore are limited.

Still, we use human powered transportation an awful lot and our health is so much better for it.  I bike to work, we run errands on foot, and we combine foot and public transportation for most other trips.

One of the things I have found incredibly useful is our double stroller (yep, we've only got one kid).  I use it for play dates so I can take the kids to the park (walking two toddlers 1/2 mile to a park is a truly ridiculous proposition), but I also use it for errands. Maya sits in one seat and I pile stuff in the other.  Yesterday, we used it to buy a wading pool. 

While hybrids and electric vehicles offer a lot of promise in reducing our transportation-sector oil use, reconsidering how we plan our communities in a way that gets us out of our cars is going to need to play a big role as well.  That's going to take some time, unfortunately, and there may be more gulf-like spills in the interim. 

While we wait, use this Google Earth application to superimpose the gulf oil slick over your hometown and don't miss the other Green Mom Carnival posts on the topic of transportation.

Snapshot of the day

Goofing off at Woven History & Silk Road near Eastern Market

Photo originally uploaded by Studiojmm on Flickr.

Snowmageddon 2010

Some mornings

can seem rather cold and uninviting.  But compared to

yesterday morning?

Not so much.

Happy Holidays

Two long drives, lots of kid-cousins, playing, laughing, eating, and merry-making, and many, many presents later, we're back in DC thinking we could probably use a week off to recover from our week off. Hope your holidays were/are happy.

Snow on Mom Mom's deck, originally uploaded by Studiojmm.

Musings on Time

Mac got home yesterday evening complaining about the unusual amount of traffic he had encountered on his way back from Towson. He asked what time I needed to leave to make it to my yoga class, I answered, 6:30 for a 6:45 class. By 6:25, I was running late, as usual, and at 6:35 tore out of the house for the brief ride over to the studio. Upon entering, I noticed two things: one, this was not the usual instructor and, two, she had already started.

I pulled off my shoes and left them and my bike helmet on the shelf in the entryway, prepped my other things for easy stashing on the studio shelf, made some comment to the receptionist about someday being on time, and slipped into the studio. I rolled out my mat at the back of the class and took a few moments to settle before joining in. I was surprised to find that Stacey, the substitute instructor, was further into the warmup than I expected. Glancing at the clock in the studio I noted that it was just 6:45; what time had she started?

I must have looked puzzled and Stacey warmly informed me that we were doing the right side now. As I followed along into my second balancing table pose moments later, she made a comment about how the class was balancing so well that folks should consider staying for the second class. Second class? I take the second class. It starts at . . . 7:45.

I was an hour early for that class and 30 minutes late for this one. I had a bit of trouble balancing in single side balancing table because of the chuckling I was doing. I accidentally took half a core yoga class (in addition to my own) yesterday evening because I got tripped up over time.

Which brings me to my watch.

In the past few weeks both my athletic watch and my regular watch have stopped running. Honestly, I'm enjoying watchless life. I find not having a watch during my morning bike commute doesn't affect how quickly I get to the office but it does affect how often I check the time. Trains too go no faster because riders check their watches and worry about how late they might be. Fewer checks mean more relaxed ride.

It's been on my to do list to go to the Ballston Mall (now minutes from my office desk) to get the batteries replaced, but I keep not doing it. I think I'm going to finally do it tomorrow because I actually count on my athletic watch to time intervals when I run but I'm wondering about remaining watchless the rest of the time.

Between wall clocks, computers, and phones, it's not like I'm having trouble finding out the time. But it's nice to get away from it all (even if my cell phone is only a backpack pocket away).

Family, beaches, and spotty internet

Burying Emily, originally uploaded by Studiojmm.

Pretty much sums up our week. More in Beaches Aug 2009 on Flickr.

Passing on a love of wild weather

Just a couple of photos from a Sunday morning walk in the rain.

Muddy puddle. Muddy bottom. More by Flickr user Studiojmm.

Seems sitting is required to examine the mud between one's toes.

The Cousins Descend

Most of the Mueller clan is in town this weekend (seven adults, three toddlers, one preschooler). It's pretty much mayhem of toys, tots and ratatouille from an abundance of CSA vegetables– but fun.

Folklife Festival 09 - 02, originally uploaded by Studiojmm.

More Folklife Festival Cousins

www.flickr.com

And . . . photos from Human Landscape Dance's London premiere.

www.flickr.com

In 2009

I will cut myself some slack.

obligatory cute kid shot
Originally uploaded by Studiojmm.

I'm not meeting my own expectations and I suspect that it's the expectations that are the problem.

At home, I expect myself to be as organized and crafty as the most productive of stay-at-home parents.

At work, I expect myself to be as effective as the most dedicated (frequently but not always childless) public interest advocate.

At yoga class, I wonder how I don't manage a daily asana and mediation practice.

When I read the blogs of my favorite (and often professional) writers, I lament the sorry state of this one.

Maybe I should give up sleep . . . Oh right, I already have.  So far, Maya has been sleeping less well in her second year than she did in her first.  I've been told that learning to walk can disrupt a child's sleep (it's a neurological development thing) and so can teething, colds, travel, the stomach flu, more teething, more travel, more colds, more travel . . . It's been a fall of unpredictable nap patterns and night waking.

That is nearly as tough on Mac as me (he, at least, is the less favorite parent at 3 am) because it's during nap times that this mostly-a-stay-at-home-Dad becomes an adjunct dance professor with papers to grade and lessons to plan, a dance company director with performances to arrange, and a choreographer with art to make.  Mac has managed to stop expecting the floors to be quite so regularly cleaned (He still manages all of the laundry, most of the grocery shopping, and a lot of the cooking.)

2nd cute kid shot
Originally uploaded by Studiojmm.

So, in 2009, I will:

1. cut myself some slack;
2. really get to the gym during lunch rather than simply cart my gym clothes too and from the office (requires cutting self slack at work) - say twice a week;
3. really get up and practice yoga in the morning before work - twice a week would be an excellent start;
4. take my vitamins (to offset effects of the sleep thing);
5. drink more water (One of the perks of the old job was the reverse-osmosis water filter sitting right near my office door.  At the new job, my hydration level isn't nearly as good);
6. blog more because I simply miss the outlet (and you miss things like the new job) - maybe once a week;
7. and, if I do all that, I actually think it will help me stress less (provided I actually do #1).

Summer Photos Now Posted

Just a few . . .

www.flickr.com Studiojmm's Summer 2008 photoset

Oh Nevermind . . . and Catching Up

Instead of going me part time (we were still talking 32 hours), my boss authorized me to expand my team.

Life continues at a mildly frenetic pace around here.  I'm up to four days a week at the office; Mac's teaching one class a week; and we've joined a nanny share one day a week.  

As for Maya: she's "this close" to rolling over.  My father was down for a visit this morning* and we spent some time on the floor with Maya as she tried very hard to roll from her back to her front (we'd take pity and help her over by pulling her arm just a touch) and then she'd push off and roll back the other way.  She finally got frustrated and we moved on to another game.

She'll have this rolling over thing down in a few more days.

 

*He's bringing back pictures, mom.

The photo is nearly a month old already but is still pretty representative.

Christmas 2007

There have been an number of complaints about the blog silence since the holidays.  I apologize.  We've been dealing with colic/reflux baby, traveling, and going back to work. It's kept us hopping. 

More on all this later but here are some holiday photos for your viewing enjoyment:

Maya and cousin Emily (who at six months is much bigger than Maya, despite the perspective).

The children and grandchildren.  From left, back to front: my brother Josh, brother-in-law Kurt, Mac, Emily, Zackary (2 & 1/2), me, Maya (who was on the verge of meltdown, hence the pluggy in her mouth) and my sister Kathleen.

A Car Ride Sequence

		It took us almost 9 hours to get home from holiday visiting. Traveling with an 8 week-old really redefines the reststop.  Maya and I will be trying out airplanes next month.  Wish us luck.