Run, Forrest, Run

Benjamin participated in his first race on the Saturday after Thanksgiving (well, actually second, if you also consider the 25 meter toddler trot he participated in when he was 17 months old).

I loved this picture of him towards the end of the race, as this is what we imagined he would be like for the whole race!  We pushed him and Katie in a stroller for a 5K Halloween fun run (which we walked, as I am NOT a runner) about a month ago, and Mark let him out of the stroller to run the end of the race with him.  Ben LOVED it, and ran really fast and enthusiastically for a long time.  He kept talking about doing another race, so we thought the Houston Area Road Runner Association 'Just for Kids Fun Run' would be perfect for him.  They have a variety of events for children of different ages, and we signed Ben up for the 400 meter run, and it even had a "heat" (is that what it is called?) specifically for kids ages 3-5.

It's held the Saturday after Thanksgiving, and we've been looking for non-food (particularly non-sweets) ways to celebrate seasons and holidays (as well as just fun things to do as a family that emphasize exercise) --- so we thought how perfect would this be?!  They had several bounce houses and a fire engine there as well.

So we loaded the kids up in the van on Saturday morning and headed out for the run.  Ben enjoyed the bounce houses and fire engine as we waited for his race to start.  Unfortunately, though, the race got off to a bad start for Ben, since they fired a gun for the "go" signal, and then there was a loud megaphone with speakers along the course cheering the kids on.  Ben is sensitive to loud noises, so he spent the first part of the race crying and covering his ears and refusing to go.  Fortunately, the course was a turn-around halfway through time, so when he and Mark(who was running with him, while Katie and I cheered on the sidelines) were at the end of the pack, they turned around early to head back towards the finish line.  We did get him to run for a bit towards the end of the course (although, I'm not sure he exactly ran across the finish line), and the event photographers got this great picture of him.

So I paid $10 for this digital download --- a beautiful picture of my son, which does NOT represent the actuality of the event for him.  But this is how I pictured it would be.  And we'll try again next year.  Mark loves to run, and we hope Ben (and Katie, eventually too) will also love running, and that it can be a daddy/children activity they can enjoy together in the years to come.  And Ben really DOES love to run - he just didn't enjoy this particular run.  So, ultimately,  I had to have a picture of Ben's first race - even if it's not exactly accurate. :)

Workin' Girl

Two blog posts in two days --- I'm on a roll! :)  It's actually 6 AM right now as I write this, but I am wide awake and don't need to leave the house for another 15 minutes, so I thought I would at least get started.  Early morning has become my exercise time, and after two weeks of getting up early to exercise, I think I am adjusting.  I was just finding too many excuses to not exercise during the day, and I'm determined to lose the rest of this baby weight (about another 20 pounds to go, and I've plateaued yet AGAIN), so I've started setting the alarm for early in the morning and then either going to a 5:30 AM Pilates class at the YMCA or taking brisk walks around our neighborhood.  This morning I am meeting a friend at 6:30 AM to walk, but after so many 5 AM wake-ups, I woke up on my own about 20 minutes ago.

But that's not what I wanted to write about this morning.  I want to write about work.  And I also want to write a little update on the kiddos (both doing great!) - but the kid post will probably need to wait until later.

So I'm back at work now, after 7 months of being a SAHM.  I definitely feel like I learned a ton being at home for this time period.  It was really an incredible time, and I was sad to end this period when I returned to work 3 weeks ago.  I got a chance to do things that I had been wanting to do for a while (such as finishing unpacking our boxes from our Hurricane Ike evacuation, organizing our home a little better, managing contractors during the exterior house remodel), but I also gained a lot of confidence in my ability to not only handle staying at home with young children, but in my ability to embrace that role and enjoy it.

Mark and I were married for almost 7 years before Benjamin was born.  When we dated and even when we got married, we were both of the attitude "yeah, we would probably like to have a couple of kids someday."  But neither of us were in a hurry to do that; it was a vague off-in-the-distance idea, and it certainly wasn't a strong topic of conversation, planning or an important part of the reason we wanted to be together.  When we eventually did decide to start trying to have kids, it was still more of an idea in the future --- we didn't want to be sitting on our front porch alone at 70 years old and wish we had had children.  Neither of us were particularly into babies (I was actually a bit afraid of them, and dreaded when people asked me if I wanted to hold their newborns).

So it was a bit of a shock to the system when baby Benjamin arrived.  And, truthfully, after 3 months maternity leave, I was ready to go back to work --- ready to get back at least a little bit to being the "old" me.  The return-to-work arrangement was difficult though.  We did not have child care for Benjamin, so our schedule consisted of taking turns working while the other parent took care of the baby.  A typical day might include Mark going to a morning rehearsal, coming home at lunch, at which point I raced off to the office for a half day, then returned home to have an hour or two with Mark and Ben before he took off for an evening concert.  It was exhausting.  Things would have gotten better when Ben started school at 16 months, but that's when our house flooded, so we had the new stress of living with friends and trying to remodel our house while we were both also working.  Then shortly after we moved back into our house, I switched roles at work, which required longer hours, then we got pregnant with Katie and I returned to work full-time.

We did okay through all these arrangements, but our house always seemed a mess and dis-organized, I felt like I could never get even the simplest goals at home accomplished, we ate a lot of frozen pizza and didn't get much exercise, and I felt like I missed out on some fun times at home with Benjamin.  So with a chance to "re-set" the clock and pace following Katie's birth, I knew I wanted to try something different.

My company is incredible with their maternity policies.  And I've been using them to the full capacity this time around.  No regrets (so far).  I am not only working fewer hours now (supposed to be 8 per week, but I've been doing about 12) than I was when I went back after Benjamin was born, I feel like I am able to contribute to and manage our household much more effectively with all the things I've learned during my leave of absence.  It probably also helps that I learned how to mother a baby from Benjamin, so I'm more relaxed with Katie and am used to getting less sleep. :)

My assignment at work probably couldn't be any better right now, too --- which definitely helps.  I was assigned to a new Project, so the team had only been formed for a couple of months by the time I joined.  In the week following my assignment, additional team members were named.  So I had the advantage of not filling in for someone else who was full-time, and having to manage expectations of what I would and wouldn't do in that role.  My manager just carved out a couple of pieces of the Project scope for me to complete.  So that's what I am doing --- without judgement from the team for the scale of my contribution.

I also work from home --- I don't even have an office on campus.  Which is absolutely fantastic so far.  This also works because the particular Project I am on has team members on a few different campuses, so it's not terribly apparent that I am "missing." I love not having to defend when I come and go.  We have a standing weekly meeting on Monday afternoons (Mark's day off, so I am always able to attend!), and I have gone in just one extra time to meet with my functional (career) supervisor.  Other than that, it's been phone calls and emails, and it's working so far.  I love the flexibility of being able to work when it is convenient for Mark to take care of the kids, not having to dress up (still hardly anything fits) and saving the commute time to the office.  And it's great not having to worry about when to feed Katie - since we never really got regular with giving her bottles.

...okay, that was as far as I got before I had to leave to meet my friend for our walk.  Both kids are now napping, so I'll see if I can finish this post, although I have  lost my train of thought...

So all-in-all, I think my situation for being back at work is as good as it could possibly be.  I am working few hours and I get to do most of my work from home.  The challenge is that, for now, I need to fit these extra hours into what already felt like full and busy days - particularly until Katie starts school (which could be as early as April or as late as September 2011).  Ideally, I would have just preferred to delay my return date until Katie was ready to start school --- but that wasn't an option.  So we're going with the next best thing (8 hours per week).   I originally asked for the reduced schedule just until year end, at which point I was supposed to return to work half time (20-30 hours per week).  The idea of going back half time was really stressing me out, so within the first week of returning, I requested for the full possible term for the reduced schedule - which is 6 months.  Assuming the situation looks like it is working (ie I can make a meaningful contribution to the team), I should get to continue this until May 1, 2011.  That possibility just thrills me.

So why not just quit and stay home, if that's what I want to do?  I never thought that staying home full time would be something that I would want to do.  And if we could continue our current lifestyle, it may be something that I would consider more strongly.  But we saved up money while I was working full-time so that we could continue to enjoy the conveniences two pay checks bring --- someone to clean our house twice per month, lawn mowing service in the summer,  leaf raking in the fall (we have huge trees), as well as the extra luxuries, such as eating out (although, with 2 kids, we don't do that too much anymore anyways) and my current love affair with Starbucks.  And the remodeling / landscaping projects couldn't happen.  And finally, we wouldn't be able to send our children to the Montessori pre-school that we love and later, potentially the private (and expensive) Montessori elementary - high school.  So while we could make it work on one income, it wouldn't be nearly as fun.

But money isn't the only reason I work.  I need to have time away from my children each day, interacting with adults, doing something that isn't solely focused on them.  I truly believe I am a better parent because of it.  After long stretches during school breaks, I find my patience with Benjamin wearing out.  And once Katie is more interactive and requires more undivided attention, I imagine that I will need more of a break from her too.  The right day care / pre-schools offer that, and so when she is old enough (at least according to us) to benefit from some non-parent time with another caring adult, I don't believe I'll have issues with enrolling her for a few hours per day as well.  When that happens, work and home seem to balance out really well.  I can spend some non-hurried time with the children in the morning (since school doesn't start for them until 9 AM), drop them off at school, go to work, then pick them up in the afternoon with enough time to spend a few hours together before the evening unwinding activities begin.  It is a really good rhythm for our family.

So ultimately, my resistance to going back to work is a short-term one.  So it makes sense to muscle through at this point.  And I'm not ready to give up being a career woman.  I have been successful so far at work, and it feels good to get affirmation for doing a job well done.  Particularly because you have to wait quite a few years for the pat-on-the-back for raising your children well.  And I feel like I am most balanced and happiest working part-time.

So our current plan is that I will work 8 hours per week until May 1, 2010 (I like to count down, so see the new ticker above), at which point I will bump up to regular part-time (20-30 hours per week), and at about this time we also hope to start Katie in pre-school.  I can then work part-time for another 1.5 years - which would take us to November 1, 2012.  At that point, Ben will be 5 and Katie will be 2.5.  What will I do then?  I'll likely need to return to work full time or change to a permanent part-time status --- which is not without career ramifications.  But that's a long time off --- even for the OCD planner in me.  So we'll just have to see where life leads us between now and then.

After

Our house exterior remodel is complete (see this post for the before pictures)!  It's actually been complete for over a month now, but finding the time to blog about it was another thing. :)  We are really pleased with the outcome, and actually really like the contractor that we hired.

It was thrilling at first to have work being done on the house, and not actually being the ones to do it.  But then after a couple of weeks, I got a little tired of always having people outside of our windows.  I really like lots of natural daylight in the house, so I refused to close our blinds --- so the workers got to know our daily rhythm well.  I was made more aware of how I spend my day, since I felt like I was always being watched!  I spend a lot of time in the kitchen (particularly because that's also where our washer/dryer are). :)

We didn't get to spend as much time outside doing our own work as I had originally anticipated, as our yard was filled with tools, debris and people working.  It didn't feel safe to let Ben run around until most of the clean-up was done, so we actually felt a little stuck inside throughout the process.  And Ben has a thing lately for loud noises, so he was really concerned about going outside when they were sawing.

But we're not yet done!  We've received two bids on drainage / sprinklers (Steve, I think we're taking your advice and going the way of hiring this job out), and landscapers scheduled to give bids after Thanksgiving.  And Mark and Ben are still diligently working away in the garage.  More to come!

Who is this woman in the house?

Hi friends, this is Mark writing. Tomorrow is a big, big day - a day that marks the end of a very special time. It's Katherine's last day at home before returning to work. I don't remember thinking this was such a big deal when she went back after Ben was born. It happened sooner for one thing - he was only three months old. Perhaps the extra four months were enough to lull me into thinking this was a permanent arrangement. But also, I think Katherine has really embraced and enjoyed the life of a domestic engineer this time, much more so than before.
    Perhaps the least expected accomplishment is that she has become a very good cook. This has always been my domain, and I enjoy it. But it's been a serious blast to watch her gain skill and especially to work together on meals. I'm hoping we can do a lot more cooking together in the years to come. Today for lunch, she made these amazing sandwiches - not just some turkey on bread with the usual condiments and fixings. This sandwich was legitimate restaurant fare: ham, sliced apple, edam cheese, smeared with a concoction of apple butter, dried mustard, and grated onion, sandwiched between cinnamon raisin toast. It was superb!
     You know that statistic you hear sometimes? The one that says women do 70% of the housework, even in families where both parties work outside the home. I used to take pride that it wasn't that way in our house. Well...now it is. It really has been a wonderful gift she's given me by doing so much of that stuff the last few months.
     Most importantly, she's been a fantastic mother to Katie and Benjamin. Katie's been a challenging baby, sometimes pushing me to the point of meltdowns. But Katherine handles her (and me) with skill and patience. She reads the baby books so we know what to expect or why Katie's upset at a particular stage. She is excellent at choosing age appropriate toys for Ben that are engaging without over stimulating. She organizes everything, and actually enjoys the process. How many people actually look forward to reaching into the tupperware drawer? I do now. She does that for the kids' stuff too, including rotating toys Montessori style. Our kids are well loved. 
    One thing I thoroughly enjoy about all this is that neither of us knew this side of her when we got married. In fact, I was attracted to her in part because of how driven she was in terms of developing a career. People change over the course of years, and that's one of the cool things about marriage. We now get to experience this whole new facet of Katherine. Thanks honey, it's been a wonderful seven months!

Final Tour Update

Hi everyone. I'm back home in Houston now, and it's time for one final post about the orchestra's trip to the UK. We left Newcastle on Thursday morning, on the bus, and arrived in Basingstoke about nine hours later. This was definitely the low point of the tour for me. I just felt tremendously homesick. And there's nothing like sitting on a bus with nothing to do but think about how bummed out you are. Fortunately, no concert that night.

Friday, we had the morning off. Some people made an excursion to Stonehenge. I know, it's totally lame, but I slept in. I was completely wiped from too many late nights and socially exhausted. Who wants to see a bunch of rocks anyway? That night's concert was at The Anvil. Despite the cool name, it was a dump. After the concert, we drove into London.

Saturday we had two concerts, one matinee and one evening performance. These were held at the Barbican, home of the London Symphony Orchestra. The last couple days had been tough, but there was a carefree, lighthearted feeling in the air that day. It was nice to play the concerts with that vibe, and they were good ones. I think everyone was excited to be back in London and headed home the next day. That night I stayed up way too late, but had a real good time with some fun friends.

The flight home went surprisingly quickly, thanks in part to the entertainment options on the Boeing 777. Individual screens + movies on demand = quick 10 hours. Katherine and Ben met me at the airport, and I could see Ben on the other side of the customs door saying "I see Daddy!"  It was so wonderful to see them. I had a great time, but the truth is I'm not complete without them, especially Katherine. It's good to be home.

I have some cool pictures to share, but too many for the blog. I'll put them up on the Picasa site soon, and link to it from here. 

In recollection, here are some of the highlights of the trip for me:

Lots of great food. Britain is not known as a culinary destination, and that's well deserved. I actually only ate two British meals - one bangers and mash, one fish and chips. Despite the reputation, both were quite smashing. I'm told I was lucky to have this be the case. Many friends reported nasty versions of the same dishes. What Britain does have is fantastic ethnic food, specifically Indian. I ate three Indian meals, one Pakistani, one Italian, one Chinese, and one Thai. All were terrific, especially the Pakistani one. It's similar to Indian food, and their staple dish is called Balti. For that meal we went to a highly recommended hole in the wall where they just brought out a bunch of food, no specific ordering from the menu.

Train Rides/Scenery. The train is where it's at. The seats are fairly comfortable, it's fast, and you can look out the window at some fantastic scenery. The grass in the UK is just gorgeous. The climate there is perfectly suited for grass, and even in October, it paints a vibrant green all over the countryside.

Professional challenges. One of the reasons for an orchestra to go on tour is that it has a fine-tuning effect on the ensemble. (FYI, the other is to get enough publicity that the community at home has a renewed interest in the orchestra. "If people in London think our orchestra is great, I should support this local treasure!") Playing in a different concert hall every night is seriously difficult. You often hear things you've never heard before from across the stage, or you can't hear that other musician with whom you share a difficult passage. For percussionists, it involves scenarios like: "Hmmmm. The acoustic is live, so perhaps I should use a harder mallet. But the overall size of the hall is small, so a harder mallet might be overwhelming. Perhaps something harder but light in weight would work well." Before each note is played, consideration has to be given to what volume is appropriate. On our usual stage in Houston, that process is largely subconscious. It really is fun though, and this sort of ramped up listening and thinking do make the orchestra sound incredible when we return to Houston.

Thanks for reading these updates friends. Now back to normal life!

Tour Update # 3

Greetings from Newcastle Upon Tyne! We are in northeast England tonight, not far from the border of Scotland. These Brits really like to include whatever river runs through their city in the name of that city. Probably the most famous is Stratford Upon Avon, where Shakespeare ran his theatre. It actually sounds pretty cool - very distinguished I think -  but it sure does make for a long city name. Tonight's concert was probably the best performance by the orchestra on this tour. Interestingly, today was also the day when it seemed like a lot of people started to yearn for home and some are getting a wee bit apathetic. I actually find this encouraging, that even though the passion for performance was a little less tonight, the musicians dug in and put on a very successful concert. It's a mark of professionalism I was proud to be a part of. I definitely got the homesick bug tonight. I got some photos of the family on email (thanks Howard!), and perhaps that's what did it. Or maybe I just miss the companionship of my wife. I have some fun work colleagues but they're no substitute for a loving family.
     Yesterday brought another wonderful train ride on the west side of England that took us down to Manchester. That city was so intriguing. It's not large - less than 500,000 people live there. But there's clearly a lot of money, it has superb infrastructure, and is home to the world's most famous and wealthiest sports franchise - the Manchester United football team (soccer, that is). This was a very standard tour day - leave one city in the morning, arrive in next city, relax for a couple hours, short rehearsal, concert, back to hotel, sleep, prepare to leave next morning. One thing that was very welcome in Manchester was a fairly modern concert hall with a sufficiently sized stage. No more playing from the choir loft! It was great to be back playing in our familiar position in the orchestra - so much easier!
    The last two cities have had rather modern concert halls, especially the one tonight in Newcastle. Technically it's in neighboring Gateshead, hence the name The Sage Gateshead. This hall is only five years old, and we are the first American orchestra to have been invited to play there! The manager of the hall gave a brief speech before our rehearsal - it was quite an honor to be the first Americans there, and he seemed to be thrilled with the program we were bringing: Stravinsky, Fireworks Overture; John Adams, Doctor Atomic Symphony (new American piece); and Holst's Planets with accompanying film of the actual planets. Here are some pictures of these halls:

Bridgewater Hall in Manchester

Interior of Bridgewater Hall

The Sage, Gateshead

 

The Sage at concert time

Tour Update # 2

On Friday, the factory whistle blew and it was back to work. Okay, perhaps what we do is a little easier than working in a factory, but it's turned out to be much more difficult than I expected. Also tremendously rewarding. We got on the bus Friday morning and drove to Birmingham, England. It's a pretty cool town with a very modern concert hall, lots of canals, and more nightclubs than you've ever seen in a space of 6 blocks. Shortly after arrival, we had one of only two full rehearsals on the tour. We covered all the repertoire we're playing, which is a logistics nightmare for the percussion section - very stressful. We played the first concert a few hours later to a completely sold out house. This concert hall was a refreshing change for us, acoustically. Jones Hall, our Houston home, is very mediocre in terms of acoustics. It's not the worst place to play, but it's difficult to hear each other well, and the sound doesn't really make it out into the audience as well as it does in a nice hall. The result? The orchestra can't play as precisely and we can't play as softly as we otherwise could. This becomes a real challenge when put into a new space like this, where we can hear each other, and the audience can hear even the most subtle details, including imperfections. I think we responded pretty well, and played a great concert - there was a real sense of excitement for this first concert on the other side of the Atlantic.
      The next day, we drove to Leeds. It's a former industrial town that has seen a lot of retail development in the last 20 years. It's become a shopping destination in England. It still retains its roots though - the British accent here was very unrefined (think My Fair Lady), and it's not a real attractive place. The concert was held in an awesome old facility. Part government center, part concert hall, the Leeds Town Hall was built sometime around 1865. The inside of the hall was absolutely gorgeous - I'll be posting pictures once I get back. It sounded beautiful too. But it was very small. Some of these old halls were just not meant to hold a huge orchestra. So the percussion section was up on this riser about 6 feet above the rest of the orchestra. I found this exceptionally difficult - very difficult to hear the other musicians, and difficult to find sightlines down to the conductor.
     On Sunday, I ditched the tour group. The last time I took a lengthy tour with an orchestra was when I was a student. Things are different with a professional group, and much more fun. There's no checking to see if everyone made the bus, no group dinner outings or anything like that. This affords the freedom to do things like take the train. It was a 7 hour bus ride, so I was delighted to spend three hours on a semi-high speed train chatting with friends and enjoying some amazing scenery as we headed north into Edinburgh, Scotland. Some of the views were just what you'd imagine - ocean waves crashing against rocky cliffs, beautiful green golf courses along the shore, lighthouses, and lots of green fields filled with sheep. After settling in at the hotel, it was time to go to our usual preconcert sound check rehearsal. Before each concert, there is a 30 minute rehearsal - the main purpose being to adjust to the acoustics of that hall and touch up any rough spots from previous concerts. The pieces we're playing on this tour use a ton of equipment - two sets of chimes, numerous tam tams, and an octave of tuned gongs. These 30 minute rehearsals are really stressful, often going through things very quickly, requiring fast equipment changes for the percussionists. The playing part is usually easier than the logistics. And I couldn't believe it, this hall was even smaller than the last one, with the percussionists again perched up in the choir loft. The temporary floor they had set up had steps up and down as you moved across, it was cramped, and it was again difficult to hear the rest of the orchestra. After the concert last night, I was absolutely beat - it just took so much brainpower to deal with all the extra challenges in addition to the usual ones of playing hard music. But there were some wonderful rewards. If you're familiar with the Planets by Holst, you may remember the piece concludes with a women's chorus singing off stage. They are the last thing heard as they fade away into silence. It's an exceptionally difficult part for the chorus, and ours in Houston is not very good. Usually, this is a subpar part of the performance, and I routinely let my mind wander at that point to avoid the disappointment. Last night though, we were joined by the Edinburgh Women's Chorus, and wow, these ladies can sing. I was caught off guard a bit - the music there is just gorgeous when done well. We've performed it a few dozen times now and I was surprised to find myself re-engaging in that spot and my eyes getting a wee bit moist hearing it performed so beautifully. Despite feeling a bit beaten down by the challenges of the last few concerts, I am relishing the satisfaction that comes from dealing with the adverse conditions and working hard to overcome them by playing well. Today was a day off - a climb up the mountain outside Edinburgh, laundry, St Giles cathedral, and dinner with friends. Tomorrow, chop chop!

Tour Update # 1

Hi friends. This is Mark writing. I'm on tour in the UK with the symphony right now, and I'd like to write down a few details before I forget them. And why not write them here, so you can read about what goes on during an orchestral tour? I'm hoping to put a series of blog entries up here over the course of the next couple weeks.
    This trip is 13 days long. We left Houston on October 5th and will return on the 17th. Our flight left Tuesday evening and arrived in London on Wednesday morning. The travel experts say that you should sleep as much as possible on the plane. That way, when you arrive in the morning, you'll feel like you had a night's sleep and can stay awake until normal bedtime at your destination. This was my plan - I brought a neck pillow, an over-the-counter sleep aid, and I was ready to make it happen. Not exactly. The neck pillow was really uncomfortable, as was the crowded airplane. I think I slept for about twenty minutes. On the bright side, the Boeing 777 is really well equipped for passing the time. Dozens of movies available to watch on your own private video screen.
      Our hotel was located in Watford, a suburb of London. It would be like Katy, TX or Wheaton, IL - about a half hour train ride into town. The oldtimers in the orchestra love to talk about how the orchestra used to stay in fancy hotels and have minimal time on a bus. Things have changed I suppose. The hotel was clean but not at all upscale, and we do have substantial bus rides on this tour - almost every day.
    Once settled in, I ventured into London with some friends, and we did a whole lot of stuff. We were all afraid to go back to the hotel, because we knew we'd fall asleep prematurely. We spent about 8 hours in London, all of it in this sleepy haze. It was kind of bizarre, but I had a good time with these folks. Here's what we did:

-Ate Indian food at a place recommended by a dude on the train. It was tremendous as most Indian restaurants in London are.
-Toured the Tate Modern, London's modern art museum. It was okay, but not nearly as good as MOMA in New York.
-Walked a lot, ending up at St Paul's Cathedral. Stunning, beautiful building - the intricacies everywhere on and in the cathedral were incredible.
-Had a spot of tea in the late afternoon. It just seemed right.
-Attended the Evensong service at St Paul's. Mostly, we wanted to hear the choir in that beautiful space, and they were great. The choir consisted of men and boys only, no women- a little different sound that was beautiful.
-Rode the double decker city bus to the London Eye - this huge ferris wheel type thing that offers great views of London. The line was really long and it was getting dark so we passed on that.
-Walked a lot more, ending up at Gordon's Wine Bar. Somebody told us it was the oldest wine bar in London. I'm not much of a wine guy, but it was fun to be someplace hip and trendy.
-Took the train home.
   I neglected to set an alarm that night, and my body clock decided to revert to American time, so I slept for 13 hours. Normally I get to spend a little time with Katie in the middle of the night, so this was a welcome treat. The only bad part was I didn't have much time for Thursday's activities. I went solo this day to the Royal Observatory in Greenwich. This is where the zero degree meridian lies - I was able to stand with one foot in the western hemisphere and one in the right. This is also the home of Greenwich Mean Time - the timekeeper to which the entire world sets their clocks. Time and navigation and closely related, or at least used to be before modern things like GPS. So they have a great display there about how timepieces evolved and became reliable enough to make accurate astronomical charts by which sailors could navigate. It was really fascinating. Had another delicious Indian dinner and headed home.
      Supposedly recovered from jet lag, we went back to work on Friday. But I'm really tired now, so I'm going to save that for another post. To be continued...

10 Years!

Mark and I hit our 10-year anniversary in August!  It's hard to believe that we have already been married for 10 years!  We hoped to do something significant to celebrate the occasion, but with a 3-year old and 5-month old, we were limited in our choices of "get-aways."

We thought that our best chance for some alone time would be to take the kids to Oregon, and leave them with my parents for a few hours while we went out for a nice dinner.  Unfortunately, the evening we had planned our date, Benjamin was at the peak of a nasty cold (which the rest of us got when we returned home), and very clingy, so we cancelled our date and watched Veggie Tales and Thomas the Train in bed with him instead. :)

We did manage to escape for a delicious bagel and coffee breakfast by ourselves during our visit with Mom & Dad, and enjoyed sitting outside(!) enjoying the quiet together.

I often like to remember what we were doing on specific days in previous years (ie kid's birthdays, anniversaries, etc).  Somehow, for almost all of our anniversaries, we have been in-transit.  While I remember most of them, I'll go ahead and record them now.  Sorry, no pictures from the first few anniversaries - this was way back when, before digital photographs were common! :)

August 19, 2000 - Got married!  

August 19, 2001 - Moved from Miami Beach to Starke, FL.  Mark had won his first full-time (sort of) orchestra job with the Jacksonville symphony, and I was enrolled to begin studying Engineering at the University of Florida in Gainesville.  We have wonderful memories from our time together in Starke.  We were thrilled to be living in our first (rental) house, and soon after moving, adopted our first dog, Buster.

August 19, 2002 - On the road back home from spending the summer with my dad in Oregon.  This was a special, yet difficult summer to spend together with him.  We stopped for a short visit in Duncanville, TX with Mark's parents and to attend Mark's 10-year high school reunion.  I remember returning to our home in Starke extremely late on a Sunday night, and I had my first early morning class for the fall semester the next day.  I also remember being thoroughly disgusted by all the dead bugs that the house had acquired while we were gone, and being surprised to find a VERY tall yard had grown in our absence, even though we had paid a neighborhood boy to mow it while we were gone. :) 

August 19, 2003 - Mark helped me move into my "apartment" in Orlando to begin my first semester co-op at Disney World.  Disney had a large apartment complex to provide housing for their "interns."  Most were non-specialized interns who took tickets for rides, etc. hoping to eventually land hospitality-type internships after they had paid their dues.  There were also a few engineering internships, namely a very large group (about a dozen) of industrial engineering interns.  I shared an apartment with 7 other industrial engineering interns, a bathroom with three of them, and a room with one.  It was certainly a change from our cozy Starke house with my husband! 

August 19, 2004 - Moving to Houston!  I can't remember if we were driving our moving truck to Houston on this day, or actually moving into our rental house on Chippendale.  Either way, we were SO excited!  Mark had finally won the "big" job earlier in the summer (while I was completing my second co-op semester with Disney).  I had one more semester to finish my degree at UF, so after helping Mark move into our new home, I returned to small apartment in Gainesville to finish up my studies.  That last semester was a pretty rough one (hurricane through Gainesville, tick infestation, etc) - but that's a story for another day. :)  At this point, though, I noticed that in our first four years of marriage, we actually only spent three of them living together!

 

 

August 19, 2005 - Moved into our first (purchased) home!  The house has changed a lot since we bought it - but we loved it then, and we still love it now. 

 

August 19, 2006 - I think this may be the first year that we actually were not in transit.  This summer, we remodeled our kitchen and shortly after our anniversary, I got pregnant with Benjamin!  I am sure we went out to dinner, or did something fun to celebrate six years of marriage --- but I can't remember exactly what.  We may have gone to the Cheesecake Factory, one of our favorite restaurants. 

(Note: don't have a picture from this day, but here is a picture of the two of us a couple of months earlier during a vacation to the Midwest.  Here we are at Cedar Point, about to ride the Millennium Force).

August 19, 2007 - We now have a two-month old baby.  I do remember (because I blogged about it) that Benjamin slept very well the night before, so we enjoyed the day in a less sleep-deprived than normal state.  I believe this day was a Sunday, so after church, we went to Colina's, a low-key Italian restaurant.  I remember being very proud of ourselves for getting out and doing something to celebrate, even though our lives felt a bit overwhelming at that time.

 

August 19, 2008 

 I can't actually remember what we did for our anniversary this year.  By this point, we regularly hired a neighbor's teen-aged daughter Eliza to watch Benjamin for a few hours while we got away for dates, etc.  So my best guess is that we hired her for our anniversary so we could go on a date.  I wonder what we did?  Good chance we went to the Cheesecake Factory, since it used to be our all-time favorite place to eat when we lived in Miami Beach, so reminded us of our early days of marriage.

(Note: this picture is not from our anniversary, but it is from August of 2008).

 

August 19, 2009 - Mark was in transit on this one, with Benjamin in tow.  The two boys flew solo to Mexico to visit Grandma and Granddaddy.  I stayed home alone, now pregnant with Katie to focus on work (my role in recruiting was ramping up now, and I was approaching my full-time hours) and rest (and feel nauseous).  I think I actually forgot it was our anniversary until Mark sent me a text message! (Note: the picture of me and Ben is from my dad's visit earlier that month while Mark was on a mission trip in Guatemala.  The picture of Mark and Ben is taken at Grandma & Granddaddy's house in Mexico.  And, yes, I am recognizing the lack of pictures of Mark and I together!).

 

August 19, 2010 - Well, you've seen the story above.

 How fun to remember the past ten anniversaries in our lives!  Hopefully the next ten will be as much fun!

15 lbs, 4 oz

That's how big I "grew" Katie solely from my own body.  That's right - my newborn baby girl has started solids.  We started her about a week ago on rice cereal, and she LOVES it!  She knew what to do right away.  Ben gave her the first bite, and she went right after it!

As with Benjamin, beginning Katie on solids is both exciting - to be entering the next stage of babyhood with her - and also sad, a marking of the end where I provide her with 100% of her nourishment.  I love looking at all that baby chub and knowing that she got it all from me!  That first I grew her within in my body, and then after she was born and I had to share her with the rest of the world, that still only I had something that she needed.  And that my body was able to grow a healthy 15 lb, 4 oz baby.

But now, it's time for her to take that next first step in independence - and allow the rest of the world to nourish her little body.  And it also marks the initial stages of weaning.  Which, actually, is sort of nice --- as since I am not back at work, we do not regularly give her bottles, and at this point, I'm not even sure if she would take one.  But a couple of days ago, I took Ben to a friend's house to go swimming and could leave Katie at home while she napped, because I knew Mark could feed her a bowl of rice cereal when she woke up.  And that was, admittedly, sort of freeing.

So here are a couple of pictures of Katie getting her first bowl of rice cereal!  We offered the honor to Benjamin, who was quite excited about it - and actually has looked forward to feeding her the cereal every day since!  It's a wonderful activity for Ben and Katie to do together.  We have challenges with Ben's "enthusiasm" for touching his sister a bit too energetically, so all of their interactions have to be carefully monitored (no, Benjamin, it's not okay to sit on your sister or rub your feet on her face), but he really "gets" the feeding her process.  I explained to put some on the end of the spoon, wait for her to open her mouth, and then pull the spoon back out.  And he totally gets it!  He's gentle and attentive and really does a good job!  Our only challenge is that he wants to wipe her mouth after EVERY bite, which she doesn't really like, so we compromised that she gets a few bites before getting her mouth wiped.

Okay, that felt really good to finally write a blog post --- and it didn't even take that long!  Man, I really need to do this more often - it just feels hard to find the time to actually sit down and do it.  Hopefully I'll blog soon about a few other topics I've wanted to capture: Mark and my 10-year anniversary (wow!), and our progress on our exterior projects and my determination to make a few changes in our lives (both of which are going well!).  So stay tuned...

Before

The blog posts about home improvement projects continue.  Sorry to those of you who would prefer updates about our kiddos.  We are immensely enjoying time with them day in and day out, and often several times during the night.  So, for now, I'm a little more interested in writing about something besides our two beautiful children.  :) If you remember an earlier post - these Projects are what get me through the hum-drum (at least for me --- nothing meant for you other SAHMs) of this lifestyle.

(but seriously, all sarcastic-ness aside, Ben is responding well to a few small changes in expectations in our household, and Katie is turning into a pretty fun, go-with-the-flow five month old --- so I do want to write more about them - maybe I will update tomorrow, which will be the one-week point since making my "statement" to be more disciplined about a few things in my life...)

Our interior projects are almost complete.  Most of our interior home remodel came courtesy of Hurricane Ike, and I've spent a lot of time over the last five months (!) of my maternity leave organizing our many possessions.  The only area left to tackle is our kitchen - and I hope to do that in the next few weeks.

So now, with the promise of fall in the air (I get giddy every time I feel the hint of a cool breeze), we are moving our efforts outside.  And I am thrilled.  Equally excited to:
(a) update the exterior of our home.  Some of this we'd meant to do two years ago, but redirected our efforts (money) to the Hurricane Ike remodel
(b) spend time outside together as a family.  With cooler weather, and less intense sun, it's been fun to begin taking Katie outside with us, and I have hopes of us all enjoying time outside together as we tackle the exterior of our house.

So what is there to do outside?  What isn't there to do!?  First, we've hired a contractor to replace our siding on the whole house and garage and also to build a new carport.  We signed the contract last week, and carport demo begins on Tuesday!  We are so excited to finally be having this work done.  You would think that having someone else do the work would make it easier, but Mark and I really drag our feet when it comes to making decisions about contractors, as well as just coming up with a larger-scale plan that we have to communicate to someone else.  When we do the work ourselves, we can just make up our mind as we go.  With a contractor, you have to make all the decisions up front.  We actually spent a fair amount of time this morning simply trying to decide whether to replace the shutters with painted shutters, wood shutters or to omit them all together.  Again, it's often the decisions, not the actual work that slow us down.

But don't worry, in addition to hiring a contractor, we've got plenty of work planned for ourselves too (and don't forget that Mark's garage remodel is also underway):

• Rebuild a few of our fences that need repair and/or we want located in different places.  These are all very short sections of fence, so this shouldn't be too bad.
• Pave the area by our back door.  Currently this area becomes a mudslide every time it rains, which is just great when little people forget to take their shoes off upon coming inside.  We also hope to (maybe) get a dog next summer, so I really want to not have to wipe muddy paws every time doggie comes in and out.
• Improve our drainage.  We may actually hire this out to a contractor.  Not sure yet whether we are going to try and actually install some drains in low spots or just even out the yard.  Either way, our grass is a bit spotty and lumpy, so with or without drainage, we need some evening out.
• Install a sprinkler system.  We considered hiring this out, but I've heard it's pretty simple (and cheap) to do yourself, and I thought Ben might like hanging out outside with Mark while he does all that digging.
• Landscape!  Including figuring out how to make a rain garden for the area outside our front porch, where the roof run-off has killed our attempts at sod.

So hopefully future home improvement posts will include pictures of our whole family working together outside, in addition to the transformation of our home.

So, here are our before pictures!

Work is awesome

Hi friends. This is Mark writing. I'll admit up front that this is a somewhat dorky post, but today was special and I thought it was worth writing down. I won't be offended if you stop reading shortly. The event: simply going back to work with the orchestra after a vacation period. But here's what made it cool:

1. It is rewarding to return to doing something I love. There's no question I'm extremely fortunate to have this period each summer of four to five weeks off. Perhaps only teachers have a similar benefit. I really don't take it for granted. We had a great time working outside, traveling, cooking fun dinners, spending time with both kids, and enjoying a generally lighter schedule. But there's something about the rigidity of work that is appealing. There's really nothing else in our lives that is absolutely set in stone."You WILL be here between the hours of such and such." And I really do love playing classical music. There are, of course, ups and downs like with any job. But the highs are very high - involving passion, emotion, and beauty. It's fantastic. 

2. Employment is a significant blessing. We've had some friends recently and in our past go through long periods of job hunting. It has to be among life's most arduous and unpleasant tasks. In fact, one of the things I really liked about seeking an orchestral post is that the path to a job is clearly defined. It was plenty challenging, but there wasn't really any networking, endless resume posting, career workshops, etc. Auditions are announced publicly, you send your resume. If invited, you show up, play and hope for the best. Unemployment in America is high right now, orchestras here and there are folding. I am extremely fortunate to have a job performing music.

3. Here's the dorky part. I love cymbals, I really do. I know, many of you are imagining Far Side cartoons, or muttering something to yourself about banging trash can lids. Hmmph. In the orchestra, I get assigned a variety of percussion instruments. In our usual arrangement with my colleagues, I play the mallet instruments most often - xylophone, bells, etc. I love those too, but I play them enough that I get my fill. I have the same affection for cymbals, but don't play them as often, so it's a treat to play a good cymbal part. Today, the rehearsal began with Wagner's "Ride of the Valkyries." You probably know the tune. There's a lengthy trombone and trumpet melody, which, at its peak, is punctuated by a beautiful, loud cymbal crash - my first note after vacation. That alone would be cool, but what made it even better was the cymbals I was playing. They're made by a guy in Italy named Roberto Spizzichino. Each custom made, by the hands of a true artisan. They are the Stradivarius of cymbals. They cost a fortune, and we had to do a lot of pleading and dealing with the management to purchase this particular pair. The sound is magnificent, and PERFECTLY suited for this note in Ride of the Valkyries. It was just a real joy to come back from vacation, and have that be my first note. The whole program was rewarding, but highlighted by that one note.

If you've made it this far, thanks for reading!

A New Start

For the last few years, right around this time, I begin yearning for a fresh start.  The summer seems to drag on, and I'm ready for a change of pace.  Ready to have a break from the intense, relentless Houston sun.  Ready to stop applying sunscreen and bug spray every time we go outside.  Ready for a steady routine - for Ben to go back to school (!) and to get back into the rhythm of every day life. 
This year, I am ready for a few other fresh starts as well. 

I'm ready to get our family into a better schedule.  To once again have a little quiet time in the evening.  Ben's bed time has been creeping later and later, and we still haven't gotten into our groove with little Katie.  We were in Oregon last week visiting my parents for our "summer vacation," and she was such a little trooper!  She was really easy-going, slept incredibly well, and Mark and I dared to think "has she rounded the corner, is she going to get easier?".  But then Ben came down with a nasty cold, and now all four of us have it.  Which means we have a household full of sick, tired and cranky people---no one excluded.  I desperately hope it will feel better when we have a little more structure and regularity - because it feels like it has been a very long time --- five months, in fact, since we've been in a groove.  And I'm desperate to regain control of our household.

I'm ready to re-establish some boundaries and expectations for our vivacious three year old.  I'm beginning to feel that he has way too much control of our day.  Again, he's been sick for over a week, which results in incredible whiny-ness (as I write this, he's actually standing right next to me whining), so I'm trying to cut him some slack.  But I also feel like I've been making excuses for him for a while now.  He had the adjustment to having a baby sister, he moved up to the next class at school, he gave up his Biddy.  I guess I'm starting to learn that he is going to always have adjustments (don't we all?), and that I need to be more deliberate and consistent in my expectations for him.  So wish me luck with that one.  I don't know exactly what this will look like, or what it means exactly, but I'm determined to be more deliberate about it.  And Benjamin, I'm learning this parenting thing as we go, Bud, so I know there will be some significant screw-ups along the way.  Sorry about that in advance.

And finally, I'm ready to regain control of my own body.  It has definitely not bounced back after Katie's birth the way it did after Benjamin's.  I feel heavy and out-of-shape and tired.  Both Mark and I were actually getting into a good groove with exercising more and eating healthier dinners.  But it hasn't been enough.  It has been an adjustment for me to come to terms with the fact that I may no longer be able to get away with eating whatever I want and still staying slim.  It makes me feel old.  It makes me feel like I am entering the next "stage" of our lives --- no longer the young and "new" to everything.  And that's kind of scary.

So a couple of days ago, I joined Weight Watchers Online.  And then yesterday I tracked my "points" for the first time.  Since I am nursing full-time (and Katie's not yet eating solids), I actually get quite a few points.  But I still went about 50% over my points yesterday, and that was even with what I thought was being relatively careful.  Yikes.  I guess that's why I'm not losing all that baby weight.  While nursing, I am only supposed to lose 1 pound a week...so I should be back to my pre-pregnancy weight in about six months. :)

And finally, I want to be better about writing in this blog.  I want to document our lives at this point --- which, as challenging as it can sometimes be, is also so precious, and I know that I'm really going to miss these days with young children once they grow up.

So wish me luck with all these goals in our "fresh start" this fall!

And since I have been so bad about posting pictures, here is a favorite from our trip to Oregon last week.  We took a trek to the beach --- but Benjamin was already a bit sick, it was SUPER windy and also fairly cold (also, his jacket is way too small and the wind was blowing sand into his eyes, that's why he's wearing my sunglasses).  Not the most picture-perfect day, but I'm glad we did it, and it makes for a fairly humorous memory.

Ben & Katie

I have so much I want to blog about right now --- What Katie is like (and what life with Katie is like) at 4 months, Benjamin giving up his Biddy (!)... but all I have time for now is a quick picture of our two kiddos.  They are growing up too fast!

Fun Outside

Well hello everyone! This is Mark writing. It's been over a month since I made a contribution to the blog so I thought it high time to get on it. Katie has been kicking our butts lately with her sleep habits. Katherine will probably write more about that soon, but I think there's definitely been some improvement since we started working hard at sleep training. Aside from that, Benjamin and I have been spending a good chunk of time everyday working and playing outside. This is a major win-win situation. The garage remodel is moving right along, the shrubs are trimmed, and most importantly, Ben has gotten his much needed time to run around being a boy.
    Here are some of his activities:

Digging, either with shovels or his excavator
Sandbox
Running through sprinklers
Mowing the lawn with the umbrella stroller
Riding a tricycle
"Washing" the car
Climbing on the car
Practicing hula hoop
Helping daddy hammer and sweep in the garage
Helping daddy haul things to the shed

Pretty good list huh? Seriously, it's been a tremendous amount of fun to have him out there with me while I work on the garage. And it feels so good to be able to actually get stuff done WHILE he's playing. It wasn't very long ago that he had to be watched continually for fear of running into the street. We're still very mindful of his whereabouts but he's able to be safely play much more independently.
    We've been doing this in the late afternoon which, surprisingly, has not been terribly hot. Yes, it is quite warm and very humid (we both immediately take bath/shower afterward), but the sun is not merciless like earlier in the day. And, is it possible? Perhaps I am getting just a bit acclimated to the Texas heat? I remember growing up in Dallas, where it's even warmer than here, I never hesitated to go outside because of the heat.
    Here are lots of pictures. Sorry Katie, only one of you. She's getting more adorable everyday. Four months is nearing the height of baby cuteness I think. We really need to do a Picasa upload. Watch for that soon...

Everything's all packed up and placed neatly in the center of the garage. The former owner had installed DOZENS of little shelves between the studs, now almost all removed. This guy was a nail fanatic too - used to hang tools I guess - now all removed. 

Beautiful isn't it? Like a blank canvas, just waiting to be adorned.

What a great helper!

It's important to wear safety goggles when mowing the lawn.

Apparently it's not as important to protect the rest of oneself. 

What a cutie!

A Place for Everything, and Everything in its Place

Favorite words of every OCD. :)  The latest subject in my attempt to deal with all of our "stuff," and create a household that is clutter-free and easy to maintain: the File Cabinet.  Oh, how I dread the file cabinet.  It seems impossible to not have the files constantly overflowing and very hard to organize them so you can actually find what you need.

I probably would have saved this element of our household for last, as its not terribly fun to deal with files --- but for my birthday last year, my sister and mother gave me a filing organizing system called Freedom Filer.  Ever since, it has sat in a pile of junk for me to deal with, and as I picked my way through this pile, I decided it was time to give it a go.

Freedom Filer was definitely designed by an OCD --- it even has practice labels so you can decide how you want to stick them on the label holders (stuck directly on top of the plastic insert, or inside the insert, or on a piece of paper in the insert) --- and yes, I did practice, and includes a discussion on why they chose to use sticker labels instead of paper labels.  I am totally impressed with and in love with this system, and admittedly wished that I had come up with the idea myself.

It was a lengthy process to set it up, which included three separate trips to Office Depot for file folders, as I kept under-estimating how many files we have.  Apparently, we have just about 100 files.  And dealing with the files themselves was not much fun.

But now, how impressive does our file cabinet look?  And while I haven't done any filing myself yet, Mark told me that it was indeed much easier after he dealt with our last round of bills.

So glad to be done with that project!

I'm not the only one completing organizing projects in our house, though.  Check out Mark's latest project:

The Garage

I wish he had taken true "before" pictures, as the garage was a MESS.  He's already spent many hours cleaning it up to get to this point.  His plan is to turn our garage into a use-able workshop, with future plans to build an airplane in it!  So the first step is cleaning out all the clutter that has been accumulating there during the past five years.  He's made good progress!  He is also working on the "design" of the garage.  And I should mention that he has a little OCD in him as well, as I caught him using my old engineering graph paper to draw out the dimensions of the garage (both overhead and elevation) and also created to-scale cut-outs for the contents of the garage to see where he would put them.  It's all rather cute. 

So look for future updates with progress as Mark begins installing wiring, insulation, a wall A/C unit, drywall, paint and then builds his cabinets to hang on the wall!  Whew, he's going to be busy!

Happy Independence Day!

Lessons in Domesticity

Two posts in one day (please see the other post for Katie below)!  Benjamin is home from school next week, so I know it will be difficult to get on the computer --- and there are so many things I want to remember from this special time at home.  So here we go.  We'll see how long Katie naps to let me get through these posts.

First, it's done.  Is this not a beautiful picture?

That's right --- these are the last few EMPTY tupperwares that housed our stuff from our Hurricane Ike evacuation.  It only took 21 months to move completely back in to our house. :)  Over the last few weeks, we've been putting the final items away, and even hung pictures on our walls.  It looks like we live here now, and I love it!

So now everything has a home.  No more boxes and tupperwares lining empty walls waiting to be dealt with.  I now have the luxury of moving on to stage 2:  trying to make the things that we actually use accessible and easy to put away.  Some of the closets are packed rather full, and while everything fits in them, it's not always easy to get things out and put them back away.  I'm hoping to purge more items during this second go around so that there may even be a little extra room to grow.  Because in all likelihood, we will acquire more stuff, and once we return to "real" life (ie me going back to work), I want to be able to maintain some sense of order and not let our house slowly (or in some cases, quickly) creep towards the chaos it had become before my maternity leave began. 

So on my to-do list is everything from cleaning out our files and organizing our digital photos to re-organizing the hall bathroom to make way for two children's worth of toys, washcloths, diapers, etc.

In addition to this "tweaking," I am still pursuing my other "project" --- learning how to cook.  While I am definitely contributing more to feeding our family than I was a few months ago, it's definitely not yet a 50-50 task in our household.  But Mark and I are getting much better at actually planning out our meals at the beginning of the week (versus, "shoot, it's 6 o'clock... do we have any pizzas in the freezer?) --- and I'm especially proud that we've incorporated more vegetables and fruits into our evening meals!  I probably actually cook only 1-2 meals per week, but I am becoming quite a skilled sous-chef for Mark.  It's fun to work together in the kitchen, and I like doing the simpler steps that don't require concentration like washing and chopping vegetables or herbs.  Because half the time, I'm trying to appease Katie or get something for Ben, and the other half of the time, Katie wants to nurse right smack in the middle of a time-sensitive step in the cooking process.  I've come to realize that I don't really have a strong desire to become an expert chef --- each household only needs one, and Mark fills that role beautifully!  His cooking has really improved (although I thought he was good already), and it's fun to enable him to use his talents to make delicious, healthy meals for our family.  Whoever thought that broccoli would become our family's favorite part of the meal?  (try Cook's Illustrated Roasted Broccoli --- it is absolutely fabulous!).  All this is to say that my efforts in the kitchen are going well.  The other aspect that we'd like to be better about is buying food seasonally and locally.  But hopefully that will also come.

So as I continue to be a SAHM "poser" (I felt like this way when Katie and I went to a recent lecture about "babyproofing your marraige" at our church on a Tuesday MORNING), I figured I better learn another job duty of a housewife (smile!) --- how to clean.  That might sound strange, but we have all sorts of cleaning products and I've never really understood which products you are supposed to use where, and why you need different products for different parts of the house.  What is the part that actually dis-infects and makes things clean?  What is the difference between natural or non-toxic and traditional cleaning products?  A big drive in all this is the fact that I would like to rid my house of anything "dangerous" to young children.  Partially because I'm tired of calling the poison control hotline ("um, yeah, my son may have just squirted 409 into his mouth, what should I do?") and partially because we really want to integrate more chores into our routines with Benjamin --- and I can't clean with him around if I have to worry about the chemicals I am using.  Understanding how to "organically" clean has been something I've wanted to do for a couple of years now --- but never had the time or mental energy to do anything about it.

So I picked up a book called Organic Housekeeping, and despite first impressions, it's actually a very interesting book to read!  Now the author is admittedly a bit extreme (no, I am not going to wipe down my shower walls after EVERY shower, and I intend to continue to use my sponges), but it's very enlightening (and also a bit scary) to learn what is in traditional cleaning supplies, what the natural alternatives are, as well as bigger picture approaches like thinking about how we set-up our house to make cleaning easier.  The Fly Lady's book is next on my list for another perspective.  If you have any other recommended reads, let me know!

Okay, Katie is now up from her nap, so it's time to go. More later!