Serious Lack

This morning I volunteered at the library for the first time, just an hour and a half. I restocked the paperback rack and put some new ones away on the shelves. There are a couple cases of romance novels and less than one shelf of science fiction. This is a serious lack. Serious. Not only is there a mere half shelf, but it is a half shelf of pretty bad sci fi. Serious. Luckily we have a whole box of Asimov, Pohl, Bradbury, Clark and Bova that we have been meaning to get rid of. Still that will only bring it up to a shelf and a half or so. I suppose it is difficult to be both prolific and good, which explains why there are so very, very many romance novels. Don't feel too bad if you are one of those that likes romance, I am just saying that if good literature is the meat and potatoes of literature and (good) science fiction is the Riesling Icewine then romance novels are the after dinner Twinkie. Entertaining, junk food for the mind, but not substantial. Actually the local library really has a pretty sad science fiction selection in general.
This evening, Layden and I went on a walk with Lynda, which I apparently desperately needed because the walk up the hill just about killed me. Not in real great shape right now and I have been eating pretty poorly, which is why I was a bit surprised to discover my waist is down 1.5". I give Layden all of the credit, thank you for literally sucking the fat out of my body.
Then Lynda made me supper, teriyaki chicken, very yum, while Layden wandered about the house and removed Sandra Bullock movies from the rack. Guess he likes brunettes. Lynda put on some funk and Layden got down with his bad self. He would turn to face the player then dance by bobbing up and down with the biggest, goofiest, open mouthed smile on his face. Lynda and I were busting up laughing, oh how I wish I had the digital camera with me.

139

Quite strangely this video has currently been viewed 139 times on youtube.com. I do not understand.

Madness

Today Layden helped me bake cookies, and by help I mean that he hindered and generally made a mess but was real cute about it so it was fun. We made coffee spice drops with "near eastern flavor" according to Betty Crocker. They are pretty good but I am thinking I should maybe avoid them before bed.
Layden got his flu shot booster today. While we were waiting I was talking to a lady who said she has a 14 month old. She had morning sickness for the entire 9 months of her pregnancy. Toward the end they found a pill that worked for her but only if she never left her bed. The amazing thing is that she actually plans on doing it again. Not until her first is 5 years old, but still, I think if it were me Layden would be able to look forward to a future as a spoiled only child. My pregnancy was pretty easy and Layden is really an angel (when he isn't busy channeling the devil) but I am still quite sure I am not ready to do it all again, or handle a second angel at this point. For this reason women who have children one after the other both impress and bewilder me. I bow at their feet because they somehow manage it without going insane (or at least not noticeably) but at the same time I wouldn't choose that sort of challenge for myself.
I am starting volunteering at the local library. I will have the exciting job of restocking the paperbacks and working on the book sale shelves. Sounds boring, I know, but it is the sort of organizational job I enjoy (couldn't tell by looking at my house, but it is true). I stopped by to talk to the library director lady today and I will probably go in for a couple hours tomorrow morning while the instructions are fresh and she will be there. Who knows, some day when Oli's schedule gets a bit more regular it may even turn into a real job. From the way she asked if I meant apply for an actual job, and to let her know when the schedule is more regular I could have a good chance. Sounds kinda like most of their volunteers are of the mandatory community service sort.

Attention Span

We spent the rest of the weekend storing up energy for the week ahead. Oli bought potato chips and beer and we watched a movie about the New York Times Crossword and read Jon Stewart's "America (The Book)". Layden, like today, took an early evening nap (he is still asleep) and we went to bed late. Today Oli started a set of evening shifts and Layden and I went to the library. Then we watched "The Pacifier" (predictable and not that great). If you are thinking that my life is pretty uneventful, that is because it is. I can live with that.
Layden's attention span is definitely getting longer. He sat still for most of the movie. It is a good thing we don't have TV or that would be a very tempting distraction. It is much more fun to watch him wander around the house babbling, pointing, and spreading chaos, occasionally spending some time rolling around on the floor with him or playing fetch. I may start volunteering at the library if they need anything that is suitable for my skills, such as they are. Now that Layden doesn't mind me leaving for a bit now and then I have been thinking I need to find some extracurricular activities. Perhaps I will looking into volunteering at the high school, depending on how my thesis project is going.

Peekaboo Polar Bear

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Hugging the Honeys

Today we had the funeral and Layden and I spent the time out in the hall/lobby since he couldn't sit still. Then we went to a restaurant in a hotel in Moscow. The lunch/dinner seemed to last forever. Luckily because it was in a hotel Layden could wander around the lobby and halls. He met too little girls and gave them both hugs, one was about 18 months and the other about 24ish months, I would guess. Then I picked him up and he gave me a hug, the first that was really and truly definitely a hug. All other times could just have been clinginess but he definitely hugged my head a couple of times. The second little girl wouldn't take her hands out of her pockets when he hugged her so he gave her a second one, just for good measure. He also flirted with various female staff members. Furthermore he walked up to a strange man at the funeral home and wanted him to pick him up and then didn't particularly want me when the man brought him over. He was just a social little man today.
After lunch while Layden and I were wandering about the lobby, who should I see but Tammy. Tammy used to live in Pullman and I worked in a lab with her and will hopefully be doing my senior thesis with her. Now she lives in Nebraska. Last year I also just happened to meet her when I randomly decided to stop at a coffee shop, strange.
We came home and Layden took a nice nap until about 7:00 and we grown ups played pinocle. Joy and I whipped the boys 2 games out of three, even more impressive though, Frank got double pinocle three times in a row. Coincidence? I think not. Layden really likes the chips and had a lot of fun with a miniature deck of cards I gave him to strew about the house. Then I played 52ish card pick up. Now Layden has gotten his daddy to read him a book again, he was quite adamant. So very, very sweet.

Dinner

Frank and Joy arrived yesterday evening after a fairly good drive with a lot of fog and just a little ice. Then Frank's nephew, Jimmy, neice, Kathy, and her husband Tom came over for dinner. We had ham, potatos au gratin, and salad that Jimmy's neighbor had brought over this afternoon, far more than they could eat on their own. We also had some delicious rosemary garlic bread that Tom had bake. Tom is very into baking bread and his was much better than mine, but he shared some pointers and he is going to email me some recipes. It was a very good evening, lots of good conversation. It was music to my ears last night when Joy and Kathy argued over who got to do the dishes. Today we will be heading over to Palouse for the funeral at 1:00 and then I just don't know.

Playing With Kitty

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Bread

Lately I have tried a new method of making bread. You make a starter and let that double (2-8 hours). Then you make a sponge let sit overnight, til double. Then you add flour and salt, knead, let sit til double. Form in to large round loaf, let sit til double. Cook 45 min until golden brown and 210 degrees inside). So all in all it takes (in our house) 8 hours for the starter, 12 hour for the sponge, 4-6 hours to rise and 45 min to bake. 24 hour bread. The slow rising and small amount of yeast used is supposed to improve the texture and add a nutty taste. Now I admit I was skeptical, especially concerning the "nutty" taste but it actually resulted in bread that was significantly tastier. Especially the second loaf which was made using second generation starter. I have discovered that when bread is this tasty I can make almost a loaf a day and it will get eaten, which was not the case when I made 6 hour bread. I am sure you have all found this just fascinating, next week we will discuss the finer points of macaroni and cheese. But if you should be a bit bored with nothing better to do, or already make your own bread, you should give this a try.

From "How to Bake" by Nick Malgieri
Starter
1 cup warm water - 1/4 tsp yeast
mix and let sit 5 min - add 1 cup flour (wheat if you are making part wheat bread)
let double
(add 1 cup flour and 1 cup warm water to left over starter to propagate, let rise and then you can refrigerate up to 48 hours))

Sponge
1 cup starter - 3/4 cup warm water - 1/2 tsp yeast
mix then stir in 2 cups flour
let double (over night works well)

Bread
All of sponge - 1 1/2 to 1 3/4 cup flour - 2 tsp salt
knead till smooth - let double
punch down - shape into round loaf
set on greased or corn meal sprinkled pan - let rise til double

preheat oven at 500 - put in bread and turn down to 450
cook 45 min til golden brown and inside is 210 degrees or sounds hollow when thumped.

13 Months

The weather is warming up again, the sun is out, the snow is melting, its lovely. Once Layden finishes his nap I think we will head out and enjoy some of this nice weather. These last few days I have been busy baking bread, working on painting the bathroom, and, of course, housework. The truly depressing thing about house work is that it is never done. You wash the dishes and unless you never eat again, there will soon be more. You sweep the floors and then they are dirty again, laundry never ends. So any one who thinks that being a staying at home mom isn't a full time job, think again. In fact it is more that full time, 12-20 hours a day (depending on child's age) 7 days a week, no benefits, no paid vacation, no vacations period. Don't misinterpret my complaints, there is no job I would rather have, on the whole it is a pretty good deal. I don't have to dress up, heck, if we had curtains I wouldn't even have to get dressed, except that our house tends to be a bit chilly. I don't have a commute. I am able to go for a walk on a sunny day, bake bread (big plus, store bought just can't compare), watch a movie. All that isn't the main benefit, I get to spend the day with Layden. I get to watch him learn to walk. I am there when the toaster starts smoking because he shoved a piece of paper in it and it has caught on fire. I am there when he runs about the house chasing the cat and giggling like a mad man. I am there for him to crawl onto my lap with on of his books, lean against me and smile (then he hits me with the book to make sure I get the point).

In this last month I have watched him become an accomplished walker, he rarely falls now, and I am so impressed when he pops back up still smiling. I have watched him figure stuff out, like how light switches work and that drawers open and stuff can be hidden in them. I have watched him learn how much fun a ball can be, he loves to play fetch (that sounds horrible), mommy or daddy throws the ball and he goes after it and brings it back. He knows who his daddy is and greats him with "dada da daddy dadada da da daddy", he walks over to his daddy and hugs his legs, he climbs onto his lap with a book, he still tries to gouge out the occasional eye and can be a bit violent but hopefully he will grow out of that, soon.

For all those girl babies

Sorry if I have not been posting as frequently as some (mom) would like, if it isn't one thing, its another. All is well here, still cold and snowy but otherwise good. A day or two ago I realized that I couldn't remember the last time I saw Layden suck on his fingers and I haven't seen him do it since then. I guess he decided that since he is walking now he is too big for that. Here is a photo for all those girl babies out there, I would guess that a girl baby wouldn't be put off by the huge amounts of drool, she might even be impressed. In this photo you can see that the boy has some serious back muscle definition going on. Layden is just getting to be more and more fun every day. It is just amazing to be able to interact with him. To feel like we might actually be living in the same world and he might care about me as more than a meal ticket.
Frank's (Oli's stepdad) sister died recently. She lived in Palouse and the funeral will most likely be next weekend. So we will at the least be hosting Oli's parents and possibly others. Lucky that we got the upstairs bathroom up and running.

Bad Karma

Woops. As I was working to get the bathroom cleaned up so Layden could take a bath, I managed to cut myself on a razor that was on the counter. A nice slice into the tip of my finger, even cut right into the finger nail. There was a good bit of blood and I had to wake the poor hubby. It has stopped bleeding so I don't think it will need stitches. I have also been trying to make french rolls and they have been hating me. I had to let them rise a third time because they got all flattened when I took the plastic wrap off.

Drama Queen

It has been very, very cold around here lately. Weather forecasts have begun to include words like "bitter" and "frigid". I don't even want to see the heating bill, couple days ago Oli checked the furnace filter and it was totally clogged. He replaced and now when the furnace kicks on there is significantly more airflow.
Layden is turning into quite the drama queen. In general he seems fairly impervious to dicipline
but last night he was trying to put a DVD (which he had managed to get out of the DVD player) into the VCR I told him "no" (gently) and took it away. He burst into tears and kneeling down put his face to the floor. He will have a similar reaction if I put him on the floor because he won't stop hitting me. You would think I beat the boy, except then he probably wouldn't care.

Oooh Shiny!

These past few days have taught me that mothers should not be allowed to get sick. There should be some sort of law or something. We just can't afford it. If Oli gets sick he is either well enough to work (in which case he is miserable) but then he comes home I take care of him and he sleeps. If I get sick (especially since Oli was on night shift) I get to stay home, but I still have to work. Oli gets home and he needs his sleep during the day. Though both of the boys were very good to me. On the day I was sickest Oli stayed up for a bit and got the house back under control and Layden, locked in his room with me laying around on the bed, played happily on his own. Still, stay at home moms could really use paid sick leave. But I am feeling much better now and Oli has a couple of days off so life might return to the poor semblance of order that it formerly was.
We now have a working toilet upstairs and I have hopes that tomorrow we will have a working sink as well. Then we can get it all cleaned up and Layden can take a bath.
We have decided that Layden just will not take the kitty's no for an answer, so we will have to step in and give her a hand. He thinks she is the funnest thing since sliced bread and doesn't seem to mind at all when she swats him have he gives her tail a good tug. He cares minimally more when mommy gives him a swat and says no. Sure, sure, he cries, but put something shiny in his line of sight and he is quickly distracted. When we say gentle he'll give her (or us) a couple of nice pets but when she (or we) sits still for that he just gets so excited that it goes quickly downhill.

Calendar: update

Now I have a link to the google calendar for those of you with google. I have a link to the picture of the calendar for those of you who do not. For those of you who do not but want to, let me know, plenty of gmail invitations left.

Bathroom

Well the sink is in, the faucet attached and all ready to go except the drain, which needs an extension. We had to unhook the sink from the wall to get the faucet on but it didn't tear things up too badly. The toilet took a few tries to get bolted to the floor and eventually had me do it because he was getting just a wee bit frustrated. Apparently newer drains are designed so that the bolts line up nicer and aren't so easily knocked out of place. Oli is now taking a nap with Layden after getting up early again this morning and will be working night shift tonight. If he has time and energy after his nap we may get the plumbing the rest of the way hooked up and have a functioning bathroom again.

Toilet

Well today we headed up to Spokane and got us a new toilet. Our old one got busticated during its sojourn on the porch and it wasn't a really great one anyhow. The fun thing is that nowadays code calls for the toilet drain 12" from the wall, so all the toilets are made to be 12" from the wall. There was one toilet adjustable 10-12" from the wall. Our drain is 9.5" from the wall. Hopefully we can squeeze it in. The one toilet that works is also some newfangled flapperless toilet. We will see how that works. Right now Oli is working on installing the sink. This also is not going as smoothly as it might. He has the sink attached to the wall and caulked (the caulking caused the paint to wipe off the wall). He has the faucet on (he had to cut the rod for the plug thingy) and the drain in. But we are getting a new P-tube and supply hoses, so we have to wait on that. It looks really cute though, at least I think so. Oli says it looks like a toilet bowl sink. I will put up some pictures if I get around to it tomorrow once the toilet is in. I think that now Oli is looking into installing our new toilet, cross your fingers and hope it fits.
Layden is having a lot of fun with the sink box and various pieces of cardboard. He also seems to just be practicing walking and is getting quite good at it. He falls less and less, mostly just if he runs into something or gets going to fast. He is also getting very close to being able to climb over the baby gate. He already uses it to do his chin up exercises. That boy is trouble.
We visited Oli's ex-coworker who moved up to Spokane. She has a cute little craftsman bungalow. It has some really great original woodwork, trim, hardware and doors. The foundation is a bit more iffy though and some of the wiring is questionable but all in all a very cute house.

Walker

Well we now have a walker on our hands. Luckily as yet he isn't a terribly skilled walker. He can do about 4 ft pretty well then loses his balance and goes back to crawling. He enjoys pinballing around the living room furniture. The funny thing is unless his hands are full he generally walks around with his hands up over his head. Like he wants to be sure that we can see what a big boy he is, look ma, no hands.
This morning I got up it was sunny and not too cold so I decided that after lunch I would walk downtown since I needed to go to the library. By lunch we had 2" of snow. By the time we were ready to go there was 4". We walked any way since I figured I could get the car down the hill but I wasn't sure if a) I would be able to stop it at the bottom or b) get it back up the hill. On my way into town I saw one car that couldn't get up the hill and then saw another that could stopped when it reached the bottom, however the car in front of it could. Now we have about 6" and last I heard the main road to Pullman had been cut off for a few hours because of a jack-knifed semi. The power lines have a pretty good coating of nice heavy snow and the power has already flickered a couple of times, hopefully it won't go. No power=no heat.

Healthy Panda

Happy New Year!

Last night to celebrate the new year Oli and I stayed up until midnight cleaning the kitchen. Then we toasted the new year with ginger ale and cranberry juice, sat around and talked for a bit about the fact that now we aren't growing anymore, we are just getting older and how quickly life change with the little one around. Then we went to bed.
Well the panda bear seems to be feeling pretty much better now. He is playing and running around causing mayhem. This morning he got up on the table and poured out daddy's tea. Our house looks a bit strange with all the chairs pulled away from the table, all the knobs off the stove. Dad and gentle have been added to his vocabulary. He even seems to understand what gentle means, when I say it he pets daddy instead of poking his eyes. The cat is also warming up to him now that he kinda sorta pets her instead of biting her or yanking her tail. I still have a few concerns about him though. This morning he was hitting his head on the wall and laughing, apparently losing brain cells is funny.