Here are some things I made recently for the Lu.



This is a dress, pinafore, and bloomers...

She's here! And I made her some stuff.

First off, while I was pregnant I decided I wanted to use cloth diapers, and in my research I found out about Wool Soakers. Basically, they're little wool diaper covers that go on over the absorbent cotton diapers and keep the moisture from leaking out. Wool has all kinds of awesome properties that make it good for this-- I am too lazy (blame the new-mom-lack-of-sleep) to go into them now. But anyway, I knit some wool soakers and here she is in one of them:


What's next? I'm currently working on knitting her a chocolate brown cardigan sweater to wear over some of her cute little dresses. And I have plans to make her a little pair of jeans. Little by little, one naptime at a time...

I have been writing to my baby since the beginning of my pregnancy. It's been really important to me, and I hope that someday the journal I am writing in will be one of her treasures. I've been telling her about all the things she has to look forward to here, what her daddy and I are doing to prepare for her arrival, and things that I want to teach her over time. I've been using language that is intuitive to me, and letting it flow, unconcerned about how "well-written" it is, just trying to be clear and honest. I wanted to share this one excerpt from one of my letters to her, because I find myself returning to it again and again as I think about the kind of mother I want to be and the fundamental message I want to communicate to her in everything I do. I hope you enjoy reading it.

"I want you to know that even though we live in a very secular society where you will seldom find the meaning you seek floating around in the mainstream, both your father and I are soulful people, thoughtful and open, and we will always be here for you to talk to, and we will always pay attention to nourishing not only your body but also your soul, that part of you that seeks understanding, purpose, connection, and whatever else you discover yourself yearning for in your life here.

You need not suffer in isolation thinking no one would understand. You need not worry that my patience will give out hearing you say the same things you've already said a hundred times. You need not fear that I will be disappointed because you have had a thought that could be deemed selfish or hateful.

I love you unconditionally. I love you with the understanding of what people are like and the nature of our lives, and acceptance of everything that has ever happened and everything that is yet to be. There is nothing you could do to shock or offend me away from loving you. I see your goodness, already, it's inherent. You have not done anything in your life yet. You are the definition of innocence, yet that is not the source of your goodness. You have made no kind gestures. You have shown talent at nothing. You have not collected a single possession. But you are already good. I want you to always remember this.

You are blessed with the spark of life, and the universe wants you here. You have the right to live your life just being. You don't have to earn the higher love. It belongs to you. Cultivate your belief in that, and you can help others understand it as well, because there are a lot of people in this world who feel lost and unloved because they don't know that they are already good.

The jellyfish has no brain. It's an extremely primitive life form. It exists, and we do not demand that it prove to us that it should exist. We accept the jellyfish.

We also do not generally go around questioning the rights of other people to exist. We don't say, "Why is she here? What good has she ever done? What gives her the right to walk down the street?"

And yet we do that to ourselves. We wait to receive notice that we are loved and good instead of believing it already. We try to excel at things hoping that we'll finally feel worthwhile after we do, forgetting that we were always worthwhile. We look to other people to love us, and become devastated when their love turns out not to last, because we think that that love is the only love available to us.

These things are all natural things that people go through. I won't be surprised or disappointed if you do too. But I will always try to bring you back to the truth of your own inherent goodness. I will teach you about it through my unconditional love for you, with the hope that you'll grow to understand that this type of love is not just from me to you as your mother, but from the entire universe to you. Welcome. Make yourself at home."

This is the first piece of maternity clothing I've made, and my first time using a commercial pattern. I had to make some adjustments to it once it was done, but in the end I'm really happy with how it came out. There is plenty of room for my belly to grow, and it'll be comfortable all the way through to approximately July 22nd!!!

Some couples choose not to find out the sex of their baby until the delivery. They are idiots. My fiance and I are not like them. We want to find out everything we possibly can about our little one before the birth, so that we can prepare to give our child the best start in life, so that our child will be a Baby Genius and a Baby Ninja, and get rich and take care of us in our old age.

I'm only 16 weeks into my pregnancy now, so we still won't be able to find out the sex for another few weeks. But I got an ultrasound at 13 weeks that showed our baby with a disproportionately large head-- this is a sure sign of superior intelligence. In fact, though the doctor neglected to comment about this, I think he inwardly agreed with me when I said that I thought our baby might be one of the first of the next evolutionary stage in human development. And how fortuitous that this child be born to parents with the where-with-all to nurture and cultivate such a precious being! Of course, this will mean a lot of work on our part, hiring tutors from all over the world, society might not be ready, etc... But as parents we must do what we must do for our children... and the betterment of the human race.






We also chose to participate in a highly controversial elective procedure to find out what the baby will look like as an adult. Our insurance wouldn't cover it, but we really wanted to have it done, so we paid out of pocket, $2,500. It was worth every cent.

Using state-of-the-art imaging technology on loan from NASA, the technicians were able to take photos of me and my fiance and thereby produce a "photo approximation" of our offspring. Here are the photos of me and Dustin:




Well, you can just imagine how we felt. Since then, I've been actively searching for resources for PBCC's (Parents of Beauty Challenged Children), but there's not a single support group in the Portland area.

My fiance has suggested that perhaps in the next stage of human development, the standards of beauty will be different, and that our child might actually be the most beautiful person in the world, in the future. That thought had crossed my mind as well, and I was glad to have it validated. However, we can't proceed as if that's definitely the case. Only time will tell.

In the meantime, we've got to work extra hard to develop the child's other talents. Tons of his or her peers will have heard Mozart while in the womb-- that's not enough anymore. We're blasting Mozart, Beethoven, and Shostakovich simultaneously into the baby's hearing sphere, from three different iPods, with the headphones strategically placed around the uterus. Other expectant moms will be eating a balanced diet and taking prenatal vitamins, and that's all well and good, but how many of them are taking the time to mix shredded crossword and sudoku puzzles into their oatmeal every morning? Added plus: newsprint is loaded with fiber.

Of course, some of you may be thinking, "If my test results came back like this, I don't know if I would have the strength to carry this baby to term! And yet, here she is, bravely marching forth, holding to the same dreams and aspirations she had for her child before she found out this terrible news. It's admirable. It's awe-inspiring. It's, at the risk of dating myself, akin to something Mother Theresa-esque." To this I respond, "I know, right?" 

Yes, I'm sure I'll be called a Supermom, perhaps I'll even be interviewed for a few national publications and/or television talk shows, but honestly, that's gravy. I'll find true joy in the little things. Like when the first words emerge from that tiny Beauty Challenged mouth, months before the average baby speaks, probably when he or she is just two weeks old, and the words are soft but perfectly pronounced with the timbre and support of a professional locutor: "Mama! E equals MC squared!"

This past weekend was so good I can't stop thinking about it. I had been having a tough couple of weeks before it, and it really got me back in touch with what I like and what I need. I wanted to share some of that here.

Friday: -Beautiful weather for my bike ride to the community center, where I painted faces for the Fall Family Fun Fest. I gave myself a baby octopus:
Saturday: After work at the salon, I really wanted to get outside, so Dustin and I went for a hike in Forest Park. Afterwards we got Caramel Apple milkshakes and sweet potato fries at Burgerville. It was such a great feeling to relax at the end of the day and think, Hey, AND I still have ALL of SUNDAY to do whatever I want!

Sunday: I really wanted to draw something, so Dustin posed for me and I sketched his portrait. I hadn't drawn anything since about a year ago when I drew a mini-pumpkin that we had. Before that it had been years. So, yeah, I'm really out of practice. But I used to love to draw. I especially liked the challenge of drawing male faces when I was younger-- I thought it was somewhat easy to make a female face look feminine, but much harder (for me) to make a male face look masculine. I remember I drew a pretty cute portrait of Vanilla Ice.

Anyway, this is my drawing of Dustin. I'm going to try to sketch something every Sunday, and Dustin will give me tips afterwards, and maybe after a while I can get back to some of the other things I used to love, like painting with acrylics, and some of the things I always wanted to get good at but never really practiced, like using colored pencils.


After that, it was still pretty early in the day, so I decided to get organized and do a photo shoot for some stuff for my Etsy shop that I hadn't put up yet. This is a jean skirt I made with pink, green, and white topstitching detail. It's called the Artist Skirt.


I also put up these belts:

Then, Dustin went out for a while and I had the place to myself, so I decided to play some guitar, and I ended up recording some tracks for a song that I wrote a long time ago called Vocabulary. It sounds kind of cool! I still want to do some more work on it and add some harmonies and stuff, but pretty soon I'll be able to put it up on my music myspace page.

I also got to catch up with my friend Pat on the phone. He's an amazing musician and person, and he just finished his own CD-- check out his music here: Hurricane Lanterns.

SO, that was my weekend. It was the best! The moral of the story is... I gotsta be creating shit, experimenting, going outside, getting inspired.... Otherwise I turn into a very sour girl.