It was a busy weekend! We spent a good part of Sunday in Ellsworth, eating lunch at Jordan’s and stopping to browse at the Big Chicken Barn. The Barn is my absolute favorite place to look for photo props and supplies… it’s full of old stuff, odd and ends, rusted tools, gadgets, gizmos, cameras, and vintage Pyrex–oh, how I love thee, vintage Pyrex. As if that wasn’t good enough, the entire upstairs is filled with used books, so I never have a problem getting Tim to come with me.

I always leave the place feeling inspired, and I rarely go away empty handed. This time I picked up a drawer full of old glass bottles… I’m obsessed with them lately. There are so many different shapes and sizes and colors.  I have a few ideas for a photo shoot involving these things. I have a lot of ideas for photo shoots, just not many people to model for me. I really need to start a search again, but I’m feeling shy. I need to get over it so I can get to work!

Overall, we had an excellent weekend with Miss Ellie, too. I know every parent says this, but I have it on good authority that my kid is the best kid ever. She was dragging me around the store at top speed (is there any other speed for a toddler?) and cackling like a mad scientist the entire time. It’s amazing how much energy she has! It’s draining sometimes, but also incredibly fun. I honestly didn’t think having a kid would be this cool. Rewarding, yes. Fulfilling, sure. But I didn’t expect to have this much fun chasing around an 18-month-old.

It helps that I’m starting to feel more like my old self–comfortable as a mom, but also as an individual with creative goals. For a while the two seemed mutually exclusive; there was just no time in the day to do everything, and obviously Ellie takes priority, so a lot of my projects were done in short spurts or put on the back-burner. Over the last six months it’s gotten easier to juggle work, Ellie, Tim, and creative projects. Ellie still needs lots of love and attention, but she’ll also play alone for longer stretches now. Tim and I are pretty good about judging when the other needs a break; he’s especially great about taking Ellie on “daddy/daughter” grocery shopping trips so I can have an hour to myself here or there. And we’ve made a point of scheduling more date nights, to remind ourselves that we’re not just parents–we’re still a couple, too. It’s a balancing act and I won’t go so far as to say I have it down, but I’ve definitely noticed an improvement!

We initially made plans with Danielle to hang out on Saturday and do some serious barbequeing in this lovely spring weather. That in and of itself was great, but Danielle took it a step further by surprising us with a guest. We had the pleasure of hanging out with this dude for the weekend:

That’s right–Danielle drove all the way to Boston and back on Friday afternoon to pick up my brother and bring him to see us. On a whim. We hadn’t seen Julian since Christmas, so this was a huge surprise. Excuse me while I gush, but I have the best friends and family ever.

As soon as I’d finished hyperventilating, we were off to the supermarket to grab supplies for a feast of epic proportions. We planned the menu as we went: Hamburgers, hot dogs, honey chicken tenders, potato salad, garden salad, potatoes with fried onions & cheese and deviled eggs. It was basically a heart attack on a plate and it was delicious.

After we’d stuffed ourselves silly, Tim offered to stay home with Ellie so Danielle, Julian and I could go to a movie. We decided on Hot Tub Time Machine, which turned out to be surprisingly funny. Dumb, but I laughed a lot, which is more than I can say for most of the other movies I’ve seen recently.

We didn’t have any special plans for the next day, but we did do a little Easter egg hunt for Ellie. She was a good sport about it, although she kept giving us looks as if to say, “Uhh, what’s the big deal, guys? I find stuff all over the house all the time.” It was entirely worth it to see the look on her face when she realized the eggs had chocolates in them. She doesn’t get many sweet treats, so finding 4 M&M’s in an egg probably seemed like hitting the jackpot.

All in all, an excellent weekend with some of my favorite people. I am so blessed!

OK, so the parenting thing was fun for a year, but it’s getting kinda boring, and I need some cash for a new laptop.  Therefore, I’m selling my like-new toddler–she’s got a charming smile and a bright personality that’s sure to win you over.  A bit on the maintenance-heavy side, but with regular feeding and watering, she’s got another 85 years in her, at least.  Was going to put her on eBay, but thought I’d try general word of mouth first.  I’ll even throw in a half-gallon of milk and a sippy cup.  You won’t find a deal like this anywhere else!  Considering all reasonable offers!

(And happy April Fools!)

We’ve been long overdue for a date night, so this weekend T and I left Danielle to fend off the vicious baby-beast for a few hours while we enjoyed an evening to ourselves. It started with dinner at one of the six billion steakhouses in the greater Bangor area, where the hostess, mistaking us for sports fans, seated us on wobbly bar stools inches from a giant flat-screen TV that was blaring something about football. How… romantic? I had an internal debate with myself–do I want to be one of “those” people and ask to move, or should I suck it up and deal with it?  I decided on the former, because as I told Tim, if I wanted to eat steak in a rickety chair next to a giant TV, I could do it at home–and for much less! But once we were settled in a booth, the crab-stuffed filet and the pomegranate margarita more than made up for it.

Dinner was followed by the late showing of Alice in Wonderland, during which I could barely keep my eyes open. I literally nodded off four times. It could have been the result of being up past my bedtime, but honestly, I don’t think so. The 3-D made me dizzy (odd, I don’t usually have that problem), the characters were flat, the pace was rushed and the story felt sloppy. Our movie choices recently have been hit or miss, leaning more toward the “miss” side of things. Oh well. If nothing else, it got us out of the house for a few hours!

In unrelated news, it’s been a while since I’ve posted gratuitous baby photos, so here you go. Insert lamentation about how fast she’s growing, how I wish she’d stay little for longer, how I can’t believe she’s almost 15 months old, yadda yadda yadda. I’m too entranced with her sweet face and those adorable pudgy cheeks to be coherent about it.

My germs, let me show you them.

Let me just say, I truly underestimated the sheer amount of sickness that having a child in daycare brings to the family. Before Ellie came, I used to joke about my immune system of steel. Oh, I was so cocky.

Now every time El brings home a bug, it’s almost guaranteed I’ll get it, too. Cold, stomach flu, pinkeye–you name it, we’ve had it! And while Ellie is miserable for only a couple days (if that), whatever I catch seems to linger. (Meanwhile, Tim, who’s normally the infection-prone one, has hardly had any problems. Go figure.)

I’m beginning to wonder if the daycare is just a front for a government-run germ-manufacturing facility whose real purpose is to develop new agents for biological warfare… and we’re their unsuspecting test subjects. Paranoid? Me?

I’m just kidding, of course. Fighting The Sick in a daycare is a losing battle that not even a truckload of disinfectant could win. Babies are little germ factories.

All this complaining because Ellie is down with cold number I’ve-lost-track, and I’m watching for the next cold symptoms in myself–because you know that’s how it will go down. I have to keep reminding myself that no family can exist in a bubble, and at least she’ll be well-prepared for the germ bath that is grade school.

As for me… well… there’s always Nyquil.

I think the winter doldrums have finally set in. I’m all about soups and casseroles, hot baths, and tucking myself into bed with a book… basically, anything to avoid thinking about the vast expanse of white outside my door. I’ve also been super busy with custom orders this month, so I’m spending a lot of quality time with Illustrator.  I’ll post some samples at Calobee Doodles later.

In the meantime, while I crawl back to my cave to hibernate, you’ll just have to suffer with cute baby videos like this one:

We had a lovely holiday… unfortunately since then I’ve been sick with a nasty cold, so blogging has been low on the radar.  I’m feeling better now, though, thanks to lots of rest and tea.

Ellie very much enjoyed her second “first” Christmas. Her actual first Christmas was a non-event, given she was only 5 days old and I was barely conscious that week… all I remember about last year’s Christmas Eve was going to bed at 6 p.m. in an effort to get 2 solid hours of sleep before Ellie needed to be fed again. Woohoo, party time!

This year was obviously a lot more fun for all of us. Ellie was spoiled with gifts from Santa, friends and family (the birthday-Christmas proximity will treat her well in coming years), but mostly she had fun hanging out with her grandparents and uncle, entertaining everyone with her new tricks. She even started walking (!) on Christmas Eve, which was a big surprise. We also had a belated Christmas tree with Tim’s family which was very nice, but I forgot to bring the camera–story of my life.

Here are some photos of last week’s tree:

Ellie persevered through a cold and enjoyed her birthday very much. We didn’t get as many photos as I meant to (too busy running around fetching things) but our good friend Danielle held the camera and got this sweet video of Ellie’s first* “Happy Birthday” chorus and her first taste of birthday cake (courtesy Daddy’s excellent culinary skills):

* it was actually her second. We forgot to film the first one, so we all sang it again.

I know I’ve been somewhat less active, but the holidays are really taking it out of me this year. Between work stuff, Ellie’s upcoming birthday, and the usual Christmas craziness, I’m ready for a vacation.

Yesterday began the three days of Elliemas. Tim and I made a executive decision: Ellie’s birthday should be about celebrating her birth, but the three days before it will celebrate surviving her birth.

Ellie was born after a three-day-long “festival” of sleeplessness and on-and-off labor, much of which is still vivid in my memory because it was easily the most surreal experience of my life. How can passing another living being through your body not be surreal? And then there was the fact that it took three whole days to get her out (she will never live that down) and all the drama surrounding the hospital transfer and so on. What did I say? Surreal.

That pretty much sums up new parenthood as a whole. Everything around you is the same–your house, your family, and your friends haven’t really changed in the few days you’re out of commission–but from the moment they placed Ellie in my arms, I saw the world through a new filter. And kind of like how it takes a while for your eyes to adjust to a new lens prescription, this filter made everything look just a little off. Add this to the fact that I’m pretty sure everyone and their mother got to look at my boobs for the first few weeks–not a regular occurrence around here, I can assure you–and then there was the lack of sleep, the routine examination of baby poop (“Honey, what color would you call this?”) and the persistent, nagging feeling that I was totally out of my league.

In hindsight, those first few weeks were just plain weird. It’s no wonder there are thousands of books on the subject of parenting. Unfortunately, none of them seems to adequately answer the question “When will my life go back to normal?” I think I can answer it now, though… and the answer is never. You’ll just get used to The Crazy. You’ll learn to embrace The Crazy so The Crazy doesn’t overtake you. And that’s really the best you can hope for.

I am not sure how we’ll celebrate the “three days of Elliemas” but I think we should start with a date night (something we haven’t had since, oh, February) and a cocktail or six. Although now that I think about it, that’s probably how this whole mess got started…

It’s hard to believe she’s almost a year old. I’ve said it so many times over the last few weeks, but it’s true. The squirming little bundle we brought home from the hospital is now a spirited almost-toddler on a mission (we’ve yet to pin down exactly what that mission is, but from what I can tell it has something to do with stealing the TV remote and eating cat food… babies are strange creatures).

It’s amazing how much our lives have changed, but despite the magnitude of this difference, it’s not something I can easily put into words. We still go to work, come home, eat, sleep, and we have the added task of baby care–it’s the same old life, with more responsibilities. If anything, it’s more mundane than it used to be, but somehow the simpler things are more fulfilling. Watching Ellie grow into her personality, seeing her try new things–it’s an unmatched thrill. And this is only the beginning!

Just look at that face. All the remote-stealing and cat-food-eating in the world couldn’t make her less perfect to me.