Proud

Is what I am of my sister JoAnna. Last Saturday she ran her first 5k.
For many this may not be extraoridnary, but for our family of non-athletes, this was a big deal. And completely inspiring.
She placed 4th for her age bracket with a time of just a bit over 33 minutes.



At the start...see her sunglass clad smile waving at you?


A photo finish!

If you frequent my blog and don't know me in my everyday life, I have 3 sisters, all younger than me, but we were all born in a little less than 5 years. They've given me 10 (ten!) nieces and nephews and some pretty great brothers-in-law. My sisters are among my closest friends, my greatest supporters, my strongest allies. Come back for stories of our harrowing childhood...a sister series you won't want to miss!

Random Updates of the Not-so-Random and Imperfect Prose

I've been trying to blog. I think about it a lot. And...
time gets away from me. Or...
all I can think about writing has to do with baby. And...
no one wants to read a ton of posts about my baby. But...
i'm afraid that I'm going to lose readers due to my lack of posts. So...
please stay with me! And...
hopefully this random update will catch you up and entise you to keep coming back.

Imperfect Prose is at the end of these Random Updates.

1. Today The Oprah Winfrey show ended. And I'm a little sad about it. Not that I was a huge follower, but I enjoyed her. Which reminds me of this time in high school when my friend Anne Marie and I had to do an English project for A.P. comp and we pretended that I was Oprah and she was....I don't remember, but I interviewed her. I wore my mom's old white faux fur coat and recorded the theme song to play...anyway, I was impressed by what I saw of her last show.

2. Which brings me to the fact that due to nursing a certain baby, I've been watching way too much T.V. WAY too much. For the first time I wish I had a Kindle.

3.And, while most of my time is no longer my own, I've been spending a bit of time looking for a job. And so has Bela. He's been spending way more time than me. But, we are looking for work. I'm considering posting our resumes on the blog by way of advertising our abilities. Especially his. They are supernatural. So, if you need an action-figure-super-hero-type, he's your man. He doesn't spin webs or stop speeding bullets, but, he is pretty amazing.

4. I grew up a freckled fair skinned strawberry blonde in Southern California and as a teen-ager, just wanted to be tan. While I've taken a bit better care of my skin in the last 20 years, damage has been done. During my pregnancy my OB said that I should get one of my moles checked out, which I did and the result was that this past Monday I had quite a chunk taken out of my leg to make sure that the mole wasn't malignant. Here's a photo or two of my bandage. I thought about showing the actual wound, but it freaks me out, so I can't imagine what you'd all think.




I should know in a couple weeks the result of this minor surgery.

5. Of course I couldn't do an update without spending some time talking about my baby girl. Here are a few recent photos.







As you can see, Sophie is our bitty baby. While she is long, she is also skinny and has had me worried over the last month that she isn't getting what she needs to grow. We had a doctor's appointment yesterday and our really great doctor said that Sophie is on the charts, just little.

Our Pixie-Lou is super alert, loves to smile, sneezes quite a bit, and even rolled over the other day. She's only 9 weeks old! My friend thinks she'll crawl and walk early...much to my chagrin as I want her to stay little for as long as possible. Notice her stretching those skinny legs!

6. I have a new favorite lunch-time meal. Whole wheat pita, with a spread of humus on the inside, and just plain tuna. It's good.

7. We finally started our little garden. Hoping that these starts will actually start and we can plant them in the ground soon. We did get a couple tomato plants in and one of them is already bearing fruit.







Finally, this poem for Imperfect Prose. I wrote it almost 10 years ago...


The Life I Dream

Is always sunny and balmy
Perfect for working in a blossoming, fertile garden,
That once was a dark and empty void. I am
Nurturing vegetables and children,
With whom I am always round and great.
The love of my life slips into my
Mind and heart and body
Like silk. For moments each day I muse on all
That has become, hoping some
One will care to know that once
I, too, lay a dark and empty garden.

You think I don’t know there will be days I want to walk away?
Times when I’ll be grabbing the porcelain of a toilet,
Sick with pregnancy, sick with worry that I’m too old to give birth,
Moments when I’ll literally pull my own hair out
Rather than touch the child of my flesh who
Is making me lose my mind?
I know I’ll want just 2 seconds to myself, one morning to sleep past 7a.m.,
Enough time to write at least a sentence.
I’ll be glad to pack them off to school,
Meet my husband back in bed, or even
Send him off to work so I can go back to bed.
I know I’ll wish to be alone again.
And when I do, may it only last a second before my
Ever longing heart remembers to be thankful.

Reading, Listening...

Every 6 months or so I try to post what I've read and what I'm listening to. Obviously the last 2 months have been spent not reading...well, maybe some moms could still read, but I've not been able to hardly crack a book.

So, my reading list from February through mid March (February because I included my reading through January when I posted earlier).

Zadie Smith, On Beauty
Ann Marie MacDonald, Fall on Your Knees
Sally Beauman, Rebecca's Tale
Mary McGarry Morris, Songs in Ordinary Time
Jan Karon, At Home in Mitford
Marc Weissbluth, Healthy Sleeping Habits, Happy Child (still reading)
Anita Shrieve, The Pilot's Wife

I'd found this $1 bookstore at the Inland Center Mall and it was great to buy used books so inexpensively. Sadly, their lease was up and they didn't renew, so they are no longer there.

Okay, as far as music goes, I've been working off a playlist I put together in the months since we moved from Galati...aptly, I've titled the play list Moving. You'll see that there are some artists, namely one, that I've enjoyed quite a bit in these months.

Better than a Hallelujah, Amy Grant
I Never Told You, Colbie Callat
Dancing in the Minefields, Andrew Peterson
Call Me, Edwina Hays
The House that Built Me, Miranda Lambert
Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing, Sufjan Stevens
Down by the Water, The Decemberists
1,000 Faces, Randy Montana
Planting Trees, Andrew Peterson
'Til the end of Time, Timothy Bloom
For Me, It's You, Train
Happily Ever After, He is We
God of My Fathers, Andrew Peterson

I always love to hear what you're reading and listening to, so let me know!

To Plant a Garden

Today we bought seeds.
Already late in the season,
our plan for weeks has been
to plant a garden.

Where tiny sprouts should poke,
lies only dust.
The fruit of a dream
still wrapped in its paper package.

I've heard that many a road is paved
with good intentions~
or riddled with the potholes
of unmet desires.

The plans we make,
how we think life should be,
intentions, expectations ~ hopes, dreams.
The crops we harvest when all we really wanted was
to plant a garden.

Imperfect Prose for my first Mother's Day

Raspy breathing,
drunk on mother's milk,
threads its way through me,
anchoring on an ancient ache,
tying tight
and hauling it to the surface.

I have always wanted you~
so reads that ache.
And the coo of your voice
the kick of your leg
echo what is as old as time;
since Sarah held her promise
and Hannah gave hers back,
I have always loved you.

This body made to carry you,
These arms meant to hold you,
This heart ready to break for you~
already breaking...
with each smile
with each cry quieted in my arms.
You have made me the mother
I was from the beginning,
creating the woman I want to be.

What's in a name?

When we were choosing names for our baby we knew from the beginning that we wanted to name her after my husband's maternal grandma, Irina. And so, before Sohpie was Sophie her middle name was (and is) Irina (The 'I' sounding like a long 'E'.)

When my friend Aimee from the blog As We Wend Our Way heard that we were using the name Irina, she sent me a link about a woman named Irena Sendler who in WWII rescued thousands of Jewish children.

While Sophie is named for a great woman, I love that she also bears the name of another amazing woman who cared about justice issues and put her life on the line to live out what she believed. Irina means peace and I'm reminded of the quote: if you want peace, work for justice.

If you'd like to read a bit about Irena Sendler, check out the following links:

New York times article

Wikipedia

I hope you look up this little known woman...