Life in 3D

Easter basket empty this morning?

Maybe that's because the Easter Bunny ate all your candy and then passed out!  Happy Easter everyone!

Dispatch from the land of the sleep-deprived

Internetz, meet Henry.  Henry joined us a little over a week ago, on February 25 at 4:11 p.m.  He with his big wet eyes and pug nose and rosebud mouth have been keeping us busy and we have loved every minute of it.  Other parts of him have kept the laundry room in our building busy as well.

Parenthood is...amazing.  I was terrified before he arrived but clever Mother Nature makes it such that once the baby comes, you don't have the time or brain power to dwell on being terrified anymore.  I want to write love letters to Henry every day.  And extra long love letters to T, who has been so incredible and is the best dad any baby could've hoped for.  Even though T was so tired one night that he put on his eye mask before getting into bed and stubbed his toe, he still put this together for me the next morning for breakfast:

Needless to say, I haven't spent much time in the kitchen myself.  But take a look at his delicious hands and feet...

 

...and tell me that you, too, wouldn't be tempted to make...

...BABY SOUP!!!!

Waiting, waiting

Folks, I am big as a house.  I know my due date isn't until next week, but I am getting seriously impatient.  Baby Thumbsucker, look at what we have for you:

Your very own room! 

With a brand new Nina-tested and -approved rug!

And a brand new mini Nina-tested and -approved bassinet!

Footie jams and onesies galore!

An amazing handmade quilt!

With a tail-waggling elephant!

Seriously, if this stuff doesn't make you want to greet the world, what possibly will?

In the meantime, enjoy this bit of I Love Lucy that T sent me.  I surely do know how she feels.

Lazy Sunday

Sigh.  Back to work.

Fake tourism has its rewards...

Looking back, it seems that I didn't blog about this when I thought I had.  Anyway, one weekend last summer Trey and I set out on a fake tourist trip across the Brooklyn Bridge.  That meant white sneakers (for me, at least), sketchy mustache for T (not sure how much that had to do with being a tourist, but it was funny regardless), and lots of opportunities to try out my new camera.

We toodled over the Brooklyn Bridge, checked out the scenery downtown, and had lunch in Chinatown.  It was a fun day.  And I recently was notified that one of the pictures I took (the one posted above) has been included in the Schmap New York Guide!  Check it out here.   And then get your Schmap Guide!

Black Thumb

What kind of monster would do this to a Chia Pet?

"We are, and always will be, the United States of America."

(Forgive the digression from my usual chatter about chopping onions and walking the dog.)

We all watched on Tuesday as history was made. 

I lived in Germany and was enrolled in a language class during 9/11.  On 9/12, my teacher brought me, the only American in my class, a potted flower.  On 9/13, I went by myself to an internet cafe and cried alone as I looked at pictures of that day, at the Towers against the sky that was a bright fall blue, at a sneaker buried in a heap of ash and dust, at my city and my country that had been so terribly wounded.  The whole world was on our side.  Entire countries observed moments of silence -- people pulled over on highways and got out of their cars -- in solidarity with America. 

This was our chance to move forward, to join forces with the nations of the world who would have done anything for us.  America, that beacon of hope, that city upon a hill, who had called so many to her shores with the promise of freedom and success.

We squandered it.  I was still in Germany when the President choked on a pretzel and fainted.  Too soon, we became the boorish, backward, and belligerent country we had often been accused of being.  For me and many in my country and around the world, it has been an exceedingly dark past few years.

If you had told me then that America would have its first black president during my lifetime, I would have laughed at you.  If you had told me that this president would carry North Carolina and Indiana and that the networks would wait until calling Mississippi and Montana, I would have asked if you were feeling quite all right.  If you had told me that this president would wallop his established, white, male opponent and command a solid majority of this country's vote, I would have escorted you to the nuthouse myself.

Now America has voted decidedly for a man that represents all that those dark years are not, and in so many ways.  I cried alone again as I looked at pictures of election day, at the mothers and the fathers, the young and the old, the rich and the poor, waiting, waiting, waiting to pull the lever, fill in the bubble, touch the screen to vote for the skinny guy with the funny name and big ears who has given America a sense of hope again.

I have never been what you would call patriotic.  I pretend not to speak English when I encounter Americans abroad.  I take my country's liberties and possibilities for granted.  I have had a deep and abiding mistrust in the fairness of our criminal justice system, in the quality of our children's education, and in our government's ability to take care of those who most need it.  But for the first time in a long time, I have a sense of hope for our future, that America's promise will be attainable for so many more people, and that we can once again stand for all that is good and true and right in the world.

I am proud of my country.

Long legged shadow lady

I mean, my parents always told me that my legs were long in proportion to my body, but this is ridiculous.

But seeing this shadow (and having my cameraphone on hand) made me think about these kind of little things that often go unnoticed, at least by me.  I mean, how cool are shadows?  At least the ones that make you look like you're on stilts?  I am all leg, baby!

In that same vein, recently I have been trying to make a point of literally stopping to smell the roses, the lilacs, the linden trees (not in bloom yet), all that stuff.  Real roses in someone's front garden, or the lovely ones along Borough Hall in Brooklyn, smell amazing - so much better than those mass-produced ones from the corner store.  Hooray for spring!

Back to work

Our little family, as it were (T, Nina, me), had a nice long weekend lounging about and being decadent on Fire Island.  Beach, beer, barbecue, repeat.  The weather was really nice - a little too windy and not hot enough to be true bake-in-the-sun weather, but perfect for reading, drinking vinho verde, and practicing cartwheels.  Ahem.

So, in the opposite of what usually happens weather-wise, it was really creepy yesterday afternoon.  More pictures from the office window:

I'm not quite sure why the clouds seem so much more dramatic from this viewpoint than they usually do.  Maybe it's the nice combo of height (12th floor) + relative paucity of tall buildings in Brooklyn.  There were bizarro spots of light in the clouds, too:

[cue chorus "aaah" angels-in-the-sky-type music].

Oh.  In bummer news, we forgot to reserve the elevator for our countertop and appliance deliveries today, so it got bumped to Monday.  Disappointing - I can't wait to show you all the new fridge.  But I will try to be patient!

Sprouts and Beast

A few weeks ago I planted some seeds from our friends Jenny and Jon's wedding last year.  I know next to nothing about seeds and also have a black thumb, so I wasn't even sure they would sprout.  Well, they did!

Yay!  Spring!  Because I know next to nothing about seeds, I had no idea how best to plant them.  I poked five holes in the dirt in each pot and dumped a bunch of seeds in there (also, even if I had known and the best way was to, say, make neat little holes and drop one seed in each hole, I wouldn't have had the patience to do that).  It appears now that they're engaged in a Darwinian grudge match for survival:

Seems like the ones in the middle of each hole are winning.  The seed packets only said "Seeds for your summer garden," so it will be a lovely surprise if these babies actually make it to adulthood and we figure out what they are.

In other news, Dogga Nina went to the vet last weekend and got a clean bill of health.  The vet kept saying how great she looked (yay!), and gave her handfuls and handfuls of treats to keep her happy, which of course she (Nina, not the vet - heh) threw up all over the sidewalk on the way home.  She has a little tartar buildup, so the vet gave her this enormous chew thing:

It kept her happy for a while:

The shiny stuff on her paw and on the floor is drool.  Nom nom nom.