the busy heart

It's a little amusing to me that I used initials yesterday for our friends' names, and today I'm going to share a good deal of their business, so let's just say now that their names are Kenneth and Emily, and we were friends with them here in Boston, and we plan to be their friends forever and ever. They are the best sort of people, and they've been trying to start their family for eight long years. I'll let you insert what you know of infertility, and pretty much nod that all of that was involved. And now, to their surprise and gratitude, they're expecting a baby girl in ten weeks. As I said, they came up last weekend to visit and I threw a small shower, and in what I think must be the curse of a lot of Pinterest activity, I was stressing about making it fabulous. Didn't I need favors and decorations and games and all of that? It turns out I didn't really need any of that, since it was more of a luncheon out at a restaurant, and only a few of ...

The finished quilt, looking shiny. I love miracle babies. Henrietta was a miracle baby, of sorts, and now my dear friends, K & E, are set to have one of their own soon. They visited this past weekend, and we had a small shower for E, at which point I gifted her this quilt. E is the one who taught me to quilt, and I'll just say it is scary business making a quilt for the person who taught you how. I'm generally pretty easy-going about quilts, as E taught me to be, but I was so worried with this one that she'd see all its flaws. She surely will. But hopefully it will be shiny enough to love anyway. Look! Bright colors! I fell in love with the backing fabric first, and then took about a million years to find the combo of fabrics for the front. Isn't that backing fabric delightful? I started the quilt during Nemo, the enormous blizzard, and it was a lovely way to spend the day while it blizzed (I made that word up) outside. You need lots of bright coins...

Elroy Rabbit Henrietta had her first playdate, which is just amusing for me on so many levels. A nice woman in the ward invited us over. I think she could see I was in need of friendship, and since she mentioned having a PhD in medicine, and that she studied art therapy with refugee children in Bosnia, I was curious about her, too. She has a six-month-old girl, whom we'll call Alice, and Alice is the youngest of four. Alice is a big baby. Granted, Hen (we'll try out a nickname, shall we?) is a small baby. Last we checked, she was 9th percentile for weight, and next to Alice, she looked it. Hen's never met a baby aside from her cousins, and in the few weeks since she's seen them, she's grown much more aware. Alice figured her out immediately, and was wide-eyed and chattering, saying hello, hello, little baby. Hen didn't really see her until we set her on the floor in a Bumpo seat, and then, well, then Alice was terrifying. Alice leaned forward to greet her,...

I posted some Instagram pictures of the nursery on Facebook (oh gosh, I'm getting so social media-y!), and though Instragram pictures are charming, it's hard to really see what's going on in the ones I took, so here are some more, with details. I'm not done with it, but I'm more done than I thought I'd get, so here it is. Here's a shot from (one of the) doorways. (There are three (!) doorways.) I made all of the rugs. Crocheted them from strips of fabric that I cut myself. Should I tell you more about how I did it? They took forever, but they are exactly what I had in mind, and I couldn't find anything like it in the real world. That's the dresser we found on the side of the road. I got the knobs on clearance at Anthropologie (the top two are golden snails, the bottom ones are turquoise-y and gold. It still needs a little love, but I love it. I love that it's full of her little cupcake suits. My dear friends came over and pu...

So, here I am, against all predictions, still pregnant. I'm 36 and a half weeks now, which just blows my mind. And she shows no sign of imminent arrival. I mean, I'm uncomfortable. Really, profoundly uncomfortable most of the time. It's a little absurd. And there have been some scares with low fluid and contractions and the like, but everything is pretty much fine now, aside from the fact that she's stubbornly breech. They're going to try to turn her next week, which will apparently be an incredibly painful procedure. But hey, if it turns her around, it's worth it, right? (Right?!!) Anyway, way back when we were worried she wouldn't even make it 28 weeks, some dear and lovely friends ( Russanne , Emily , Sarah) threw me a shower. Since I was on bed rest, they did it at my house, and the loyal Russanne came and cleaned up the place and decorated while I sat on the couch. This was only slightly awkward, since I so longed to help. But Russanne is an absol...

I made a few more modern-looking baby quilts for friends, and thought I'd share. In fact, I thought I failed to take a picture of the first one, which was a bummer because I love it, but hey! I had pictures of it all along, just waiting to be posted. Both of these were made for dear friends in my ward, whose babies have arrived now, and I'm super super pleased they have evidence of my adoration, ready-made. I'm slightly obsessed with these solid-color quilt tops. I wish wish wish I could make one for the baby I'm growing, but she'll have to settle for a similarly-themed crocheted blanket. Perhaps I'll provide a sneak-peak of that soon? We'll see. The verdict is still out as to whether I'm not totally destroying it. And now, a bunch of pictures. These were the colors of baby's nursery: coral, gray, and light blue. The pattern was inspired by this quilt , which I found while pinteresting .  There was some discussion as to whether black was...

Whew. So, was that the most depressing post ever, or what? Thank you for showing up here to read it, and for all of your really lovely and compassionate comments. I appreciate them, every one. And I think it was good for me to get all that out there, even so publicly, though as soon as hit publish I worried one just wasn't supposed to be so honest. The next morning I woke up feeling better, and mostly that's held. I still have bouts of sadness--usually once a day, to be real--but I'm able to have a bit more perspective over all, and I'm learning what's essential to my sanity. Not long before I got put on bed rest, I heard about a Buddhist meditation practice that involves the simple question, "Who am I?" asked over and over again. It's asked not with the intention to answer it, per se, but to peel back everything that surfaces that's not really an answer. That idea has been in my head a lot lately, as I navigate this new reality. It feels like I...

My friend at church is pregnant with twins, after a long hard fight with infertility, and her shower last weekend was one of the purest, loveliest, most joyful events ever, and I felt it was only right to make the babies quilts. And now I will load this post up with many photos of them and say very little else, besides the twins are a boy and a girl, and that I can't think of a more deserving and happy new mama. I wish her much joy, and and as much sleep as humanly and babyly possible.

So, I have a dear friend who lives in Utah and has two exquisite boys and I had a Christmas present for her, but I forgot it at home when I saw her over Christmas, and it only took me until, oh, March, to actually send it. But! It was because I decided to make a gift for the exquisite boys as well. And here is what I made. A bunny and a giraffe. Both were Pinterest-inspired . I made the bunny first, and when I finished it Sam rather sheepishly but utterly sincerely asked, "Ummm, may I have the bunny?" How could I say no to that request? So the first bunny lives on his bedside table, and I made another. Both bunnies were made from a shirt Sam used to wear while we were dating, and this shirt, whenever he would wear it, would make me swoon. So I am glad the bunnies are wearing it now. I am pleased with how the giraffe turned out, too. It's for a baby boy. I even bought a cheap (and exceedingly ugly) soft rattle toy and dissected it, stole its rattle, and used it for ...

Since I last posted here, we found out I was pregnant, and then, about thirteen weeks later, we lost the baby.  While I was pregnant, I was very very sick.  I mean, so sick that the smell of my own hair made me gag.  My doctors ultimately gave me an anti-nausea medication which they also give to chemotherapy patients. This made it possible to eat without feeling like I wanted to cut my toes off, but didn't exactly bring back my energy and liveliness.  So mostly, while I was briefly pregnant, I didn't do much besides sleep and feel ill, and stare sort of dumbfoundedly at the idea of my being a mother , of all things.  We wanted the baby, had planned it, as much as one plans such things, and slowly, slowly, we picked names and I talked with my mother-in-law about what color to paint the nursery, and I bought a moon-shaped lamp from the thrift store.  Somehow I was nervous we'd lose the pregnancy from the beginning, in the way I worry everything good will be...

Remember the friend who made the miraculous quilt ? She's teaching me to quilt, too.  I thought I was just going to learn to use the sewing machine I got for Christmas, that maybe we'd make a skirt or something equally simple, but when we got to fabric store, E had a plan.  "A quilt," she said, "is the best way to learn to sew. All straight lines."  And so we picked out fabric, went back to my house, and while the husbands played guitars and talked about music, and sweet potatoes roasted in the oven, we cut out little squares and spread them out according to a chart that E drew up in about ten seconds.  This is what it looked like, spread out (with cat). (This is the thing about cats: they seem to get quilts.  When you even suggest you might make one, they know we're dealing with a potential blanket right off, and commence utilizing it.) I found something fascinating once I got the hang of putting those rows toget...

Our friend E makes quilts.  (That link will take you to a bunch of her quilts, including ones that have won awards.)  She's unbelievable.  She dyes (some of) her own fabric and whips these puppies out like nobody's business.  Last summer she offered to make us one, and we could hardly believe her generosity.  But we came to believe it, and she told us to pick what we wanted.  Sam and I spent days discussing this, finally settling on a strange system of discussing color schemes: we each brought each other books with covers we really liked.  Except that didn't really work.  Because I liked stuff like this: And stuff like that made Sam feel like he was bleeding internally.  He was looking for something a bit simpler.  Finally, after stacks of books were on the kitchen table, we agreed that we both LOVED the colors and vibe of a particular region of Brian Kershisnik's "Nativity"--the part with Mary and Jesus:   We showed that t...

My friend Em and I made this quilt for a girl at church and her wee babe.  Please note: Emily did the ENTIRE quilt in LESS time than it took me to make the meager little flowers.  (sigh.) (It was a strange shower, since she had also received some sort of clothes hamper that looked a lot like a rubbish bin, and every gift she opened went straight into that to keep them all together, I suppose. So our quilt and all the pretty pink outfits? Seemed to go straight in the trash ... Oh well.)