Up all night.

I was laughing at Up all night yesterday in spite of myself. I loved Will Arnett in Arrested Development and Running Wilde, but as the straight man stay-at-home Dad? Not so much. I will often crack up to myself just thinking about his 2600 dollar suit on AD, but his new show doesn't even make me smile. It finally had a little moment of truth amidst all the saccharine mainstream dialogue when he thought his 8-month old daughter was calling him a jerk. That I can relate to. Oh how I can relate.

Oh yeah, I also made gnocchi tonight because he made it on the show and it was damn good. I usually make it in brown butter, but I was inspired by the marinara he made. Is that weird? Wait, don't tell me.

Dinner may have been the high point of the day. Because it felt like Nandini was calling me a jerk. All. Day. Long. Sigh...

Don't believe me? Ask her.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

10 reasons why I'm mad at Mommy.

1. She put me on the floor in the morning and made me chase cheerios all over the place.

2. She tried to get me to eat her oatmeal, which no one else in the whole world (!) likes. It was yuck. Almost as bad as beets, almost.

3. She strapped me into my car seat and didn't let me get out the entire time on the way to pick Avi up from school AND on the way home. Is baby torture still legal?

4. She said she was going to get me sweet potatoes (finally!) and then she made while she was heating it and stirring it. She even had the gall to put me down and not hold me while she did this. Heartless.

5. Bought me a rockabye lion, but forces all these photos on it.

6. Made me sit on the floor while she was in the bathroom, instead of holding me. What, is she too good for a diaper like the rest of us?

7. Tried to put me down for a nap when I started rubbing my eyes, sucking my thumb and laying my head down. I don't need to nap! I just stood up in my crib and laid my head on the side of that, ha! You can't trick me.

8. Taunted me with all the fimo Agricola animals, but would not let me put all of them in my mouth. How else am I supposed to learn stuff?

9. She knitted me a entrelac berry hat and tried to make me wear it!  Doesn't she know strawberries can be highly allergenic for little babies?

10. Did not let me help her with the scrapbook or drool all over the pages while we were looking at the album with Avi.  Isn't it MY album?

Beanies Vintage knit baby pixie hats for preemies

I just mailed off the baby hat I knit for KA's  Beanies for Preemies | Giving Back.

The hat was fairly easy to make and she wants to get more people involved so I thought I would share the pattern here.

I modified a knit hat I made for Nandini last May for this project.  I based the size off of some preemie patterns she emailed me about.  It ended up way too small for Nandini to model, but it was the perfect size for my Samantha doll who is just a smidge smaller than Nandini was as a newborn, so I think it will work fine for the NICU babies.

I am not the fastest of knitters but this only took about four hours total. Not sure if that is good time or not.  Anyway..

I used US 7 needles and worsted weight yarn in red and cream.
Starting with white or cream;
Cast on 58 (needs to be in multiples of 4 + 2)
K2 *P2 K2 *repeat
Do this for four rows.
Tie on red, leave a medium tail of white.
Row 1: K4 K2 *P2 K2 *repeat until near end K4. turn.
Row 2: purl the purls and knit the knits ( ie P6, K2, P2, etc here). Turn.
Row 3: repeat row 1. Turn.
Row 4: K6 K2 *P2 K2 *repeat until near end then K6. Turn.
Row 5: purl the purls and knit the knits, turn.
Row 6: repeat row 4, turn.
Ok, you should start to see a pattern emerging in your work by now.
The middle will be ribbed and the edges will have stripes increasing in length by 2 stitches every three rows.  You should be able to glance at your work and figure out what number of stitches you need without following a chart. 
Keep going until you have to K28 on each side and only two stitches in the 2x2 ribbing in the center, finish off that set of three rows then move half your stitches to the other needle.  Cut a long tail.
Use the kitchener stitch to finish. 
{*front needle: knit off 1 purl on 1; back needle: purl off 1 knit on 1 *repeat}
Fold your work in half with the RS facing in (this is up to you, the hat can be reversible).
Cut the tail at the top as long or short as you like depending on how pixie-ish you like it.  You can also leave a really long tail or tie on a pompom at the top (I didn't).

You can use your tails of white in the beginning to tie the hat under baby's chin or attach ribbon at that point as well.

If you cast on 98 stitches instead you can make the 6 month old size I made for Nandini here.  I never did make any under chin tie for her and it seemed to work out fine.

Lately

Nandini...

loves being held by her Mommy, but needs to be in the middle of the action when other kids are playing.  She will very quietly watch and take it all in.  She doesn't make a peep unless someone tries to pull a little toy out of her mouth.  She loves it and laughs when I hold her at Avi's eye level and let her 'chase him' around the house.  She kicks her little legs like she is running and squeals with delight.  It is still a very quiet squeal so you do have to strain a bit to hear it, but the huge grin is unmistakable.  Mwah!

has been showing off her tongue quite frequently.  It's the new raspberry apparently.  If you do this back to her she assumes you want her to grab your tongue.  Not sure what response she is expecting when she does it yet.

adores swinging with my gorgeous, talented, and super sweet babhi.


loves the little bells and whistles on the front of her walker so much that she cries when we stand her up to walk with it and prefers to sit in front of it and play with the front.





Avinash....

however was eager to show off his skills with the walker and proudly grabbed it and pushed it around the living room.

proved in .0000003 seconds that the gyro-bowl is not spill-proof and dumped cheerios all over the ground.  Then wanted to try out ice cream in it.  Worth a shot.  I suddenly realized why the commercial never showed any liquids in that dang bowl....(because it doesn't work) 

warms my heart when he tells Nandini or his cousin Lily that he loves her.  Admissions of love for the neighbors dog notwithstanding, I do believe that he means it.

is making robot faces {There is no more unhappiness. Affirmative. 000001 0000011}

I

have drank almost an entire bottle of nyquil this week.

have been getting a lot of slobbery baby kisses.

have been knitting for the better part of today

Aand, Avi has been helping Mommy with her knitting by tying knots in the string for me.  Thanks Avi!

Aaand, Nandini also snuggled up with the yarn and was literally hugging the skein while I was finishing it up. 

So yes, a lot of love went into this little hat. 
View the details of this project here over on Kayla Aimee's blog.  Beanies for Preemies | Giving Back
My heart hurt a lot a bit while I made and saw the finished project, thinking about two tiny babies we know who are missed.

I just finished up my hat tonight, I modified a vintage baby knit pattern for the project. I will post the pattern and pictures tomorrow.  It doesn't take long or a lot of yarn.  Consider making one if you have the time before Christmas.

Happy Thanksgiving !

I already did my thankful post.  And have hopefully completed all of the online shopping that I'm going to do.  Don't think I'll be able to avoid going to the midnight sales with the family as much as I'd like to.

The stuffing is on the stove and the squash and sweet potatoes are roasting in the oven.  I am waiting for more supplies to arrive, so why not take a minute to reflect vent?

It is so much more annoying to me to hear everyone complain about holiday decorations going up early than to actually see them up early.  What is the big deal?  And, it is not like your complaint is original.  Get over it.  I put up my holiday lights in October for Diwali and leave them up all winter long.  The anthropological reason for putting up lights is to help with SAD, so why not?

I also love it when people have two of something and say, oh wow, look, trees squared, or dessert squared, etc.  I just can't understand why people think it is so incredibly clever.  If you square something you don't get double what you had, you would get dessert number of desserts or baby number of babies, not two of these things.  Unless the numerical value of the original pie is equal to 1.4something pies, then it might make sense.  But I am sure that is not what is meant.  Anyway.  Don't abuse the square.  Just say times two and stop annoying me, thanks.

sleep talk

Avinash talks in his sleep every once in a while. The other day he started talking toward the end of his nap. I hoped that he would stay asleep, but twenty minutes later he shot up. " I need ............." (some kind of food, but I can't recall and he didn't calm down until I got it for him, either way it was hilarious).

Not me! Monday from Sunday.

This day did not start with a 9 am birthday party and then go up hill from there. 

When my husband offered to take the kids out to the park during the evening cranky-baby overload hour, I did not feel incredibly guilty even though I spent the whole time trying to make dinner.

I did not also try out a probably totally effective 4-minute workout I spotted on pinterest.  Which will not likely be the only workout I actually try from there.

This four-minute workout did not knock all of the wind out of me.  Which definitely means it is working and is a whole new step up from our previous 8-minute ab workout. 

Shortly thereafter I did not find out the tortillas broiling in the oven had caught on fire.  Ummm...definitely not.

After dinner,  I did not open the cabinet to get the dust pan out, have Nandini at my feet while I was sweeping something up and in that two minutes have Avinash go behind me, get some spray, run around the island and spray her practically in the face before I have any clue of what is going on.

Did not scream at my 3 year old and then make my baby cry bloody murder for the next fifteen minutes while I tried to wash her eyes out just in case.

And I don't still feel like the worst mother who can't keep up and can't get it together.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Thankfully both children are safely sleeping now with no permanent damage, (unless you count possible emotional scars?). 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

google searches

Writing a blog is a bit of a futile exercise for me.  Hence I love to check my stats a lot. 

One of the weirdest things is that blogger lets you see what people are googling before getting to your sight.  It's mostly Avinash and Ryan Hecker, or something about knitting, but I love the random ones.

Google searches:

"Cake for Avinash"
I love this one.  It was typed in with the quotes and everything.  When did that kid start typing?  Anyway,
The short answer is always, yes please!

He loves ring pop/pink pops from Starbucks too (the birthday cake pops), with sprinkles of course.  Basically anything with sprinkles.  And, he prefers white chocolate or vanilla to dark chocolate (sorry Bappi).

"pictures of bouncy house cupcakes"
I don't have these.  I don't even know what those would look like.

This is Avinash's Candyland Cake though:

Hope that helps. I basically just put a bunch of candy on a plain white cake with the colored squares iced on at the Central Market bakery.  They had a lot of trouble with the plain white part and I ended up having to scrape off a lot of ugly candy canes and lollipops first.

"ride the dog" -frowned
I would frown on that too.  Though not on riding the roomba apparently. 

 



modeling clay cute
It can be! I made little sheep and pigs too.

partyblog nandini
Sigh.  I was hoping we wouldn't have to deal with this for a few more years at least. 

Nandini? Please stop partying on the blog, ok?  You are just too little.  What would people say if they found out?  What does this even involve?  Blowing raspberries at other babies while you chew on the mouse? 

janie and jack coupon november 2011

Ok, this is more of a real one.  So far all I have found is a 20% coupon in Parent's magazine.  It is good now through December.  I used mine today, but the selection was blech.  Have barely shopped there at all since Nandini was born.  I liked the one for Gap much more, 40% off all baby girl dresses and 7% cash back if you click through the link. 

Thankful

So thankful for so many things, but I thought I'd take a moment and reminisce about my lovely little patch of dirt concrete (which I covered in pots full of dirt).

Thankful for

tons and tons of basil.  So much that it is growing in at least half of the planters.  And in the drainage area one story below.  So much that I make pizza and calzones at least once a week.  And the calzones seem like spinach ones, but it is really just all basil.

Our bird (ie, squirrel) feeder that totally fascinated Avinash.

All of my beautiful little flowers.  This took a while, but we have so many different types.  Little purple wildflower ones, bright pink bougainvillea, white jasmine, yellow watermelon, white sweet pea blossoms, little moss roses, these fushia comb flowers.  Mostly grown from seeds too. 

Playing outside in the rain.

My little pepper plant that is flowering and fruiting for the third time this year. 

The countless watermelons, some of which went to nourish us, many of which went to nourish the birds.  Avi ate one whole just the other day.  Skin and all.  Luckily I was able to wash it at least, though there was already a bite missing at that point.

Linking up with the Nester today.

Did you know she has two teeth?!?

Apparently my husband is not completely sure of her milestones unless I blog about them, so here you go. (You have to squint to see them a little.)

I would have tried to take some pictures when she was not eating, but when is she not eating?

{Most of these photos are taken by Avi, while I try not to hyperventilate about him breaking my dSLR  and keep a death grip on the strap.}


Linked up here: PaperMama, 5 Minutes For Mom, Parenting by Dummies, Project Alicia, And Then She Snapped, Jenni from the Blog, and Live and Love Outloud.

8 months

I got so behind and October was so busy already that I ended up just skipping Nandini's 7 month post all together.  Sorry baby girl!

You are becoming even more of a champion little eater.  People are always shocked and tell me passive aggressive little comments when they see me hand you a whole banana to munch on in the shopping cart at Central Market.  I really don't care.  Haven't these people heard of baby led weaning?  You enjoy gumming off little bits and it helps teach you how to eat.  I like it because you get to practice without making a mess all over the house.  

Cheerios are like the best thing to happen to you in a while.  And the best thing to happen to me.  Unlike puffs, which I think are gross and grossly overpriced, I can buy a big box and be well stocked for weeks for less than three dollars.  And that's not counting coupons (which I usually forget at home, so nevermind).  You finally started working on your pincer grasp and will grab them out of my hand.  I never thought to work on this with you, until I saw a friend doing this with her son.  And he was pretty dang coordinated, so I figured why not.  It took you a little while, as your initial preference was to bring your mouth to my hand and then use your thumb to ensure the cheerios were well placed.  And suck your thumb a little as a bonus.  Anyway, now you can pincer grasp those cheerios with the best of them.  And love to have your own little bowl of them which you shake and dump out and then gather up cheerios again to scoop into your mouth.  You're also learning to be quick, otherwise Avi will definitely take them.  He always asks my permission to eat them all up and then does so anyway when he does not get it.
Is this cheerios story a bit too long?  Sorry, it was like a revelation to me.  Looking back I feel like I hardly ever gave Avi any solid foods let alone snacks.

You totally shocked me when we found you standing up in your crib at the end of your nap.  Uh-oh...time to lower the crib mattress.  I realized that Avi was standing on his own around 9 months and walking a month later, so I had to get on the ball with Nandini.  Of course the only thing that motivated her to take a few steps while holding on to the coffee table was the allure of more cheerios.  I tried to use Avi's truck to help you learn like he did, but it's just not really working.  Part of the problem is that as soon you try, Avi swoops in and claims it as his own and runs away with it.

You are a total tomboy already I think.  You are so not interested in being dressed up (but what baby is?).   Instead, you love to play ball with me and Daddy.  You are really very purposeful about rolling the ball back to us.  You will even grab our hand to move it closer to the ball so we catch it.   I find it kinda funny because your attention span with the ball is much longer than Avi's is with it even now.  You also really love the toolbench toy so much.  You will sit there and circular saw fake wood over and over and over again until the whole thing falls over and you can't figure out how to pick it back up.  When it comes to the little animals pop up toy, you have no interest in figuring out how to get them to come up, but once they are you are on a mission to push them back down again even if every single one of your fingers gets stuck in the process.  Why can't they just stay in their homes?  Are they too good for their homes??

You do however really really love my scrapbook stuff.  If any of it is left on the floor you make a bee line for it and try to stuff whatever it is in your mouth.  I see you trying to reach for stuff on the desk and crying all the time.  Sorry little girl.  It is tough when Mommy won't share.

You still sleep through the night, but we had a rough couple of days there when Daddy was out of town and daylight savings time happened all at the same time.  Yeah, you cried, I cried, but we are getting over it now.  Your naps are not what they used to be still, but at least you are back to sleeping for at least an hour while Avi takes his afternoon nap (thank god).  That is Mommy's lunch break.  It is so obvious (and kinda funny) when you are tired, you get very whiny and start searching for your thumb. 

You are laughing much more now.  You love to play hide and seek with Avinash.  Where he throws a sheet on your head, you struggle to get it off and then laugh hysterically when he shouts surprise.  The diaper trick no longer holds any allure for you. 

I think that we may have confused you a little bit when it comes to communicate.  There are other ways to talk to people other than blowing raspberries and spit bubbles at them.  Of course, when you do this, I can't help but respond -- it's too cute!  Avinash may or may not have gotten in trouble for doing this at school. 

You are definitely a Momma's girl right now and will often cry when Daddy holds you until you get back to me.  I secretly love it and know I'll be a little bummed when this phase is over. 

{And don't put her down on the grass!  Photo by MckMama}

This post is linked up with Project Life here.