Believe it or not (and I don’t know how you could because I hardly can!) my baby girl turned six months old yesterday. Six months. Half a year. I never knew time could go by so quickly. It’s kind of sad that the universe’s ultimate irony is that the time you’d like to go in slow motion whizzes by while the time you want to go fast (like waiting to find out if your husband’s body is clear of cancer) drags on interminably.

I don’t want to be all melancholy at my daughter’s progress, because her growing up and learning new things is very definitely progress, but milestones make me reflect and a six month birthday seems like a really big milestone. She’s doing so many more things – she can sit up for a decently long time now, she rolls over both ways (belly to back and the much harder back to belly), she grabs everything in sight, she babbles all the time (“Meli, what does a sheep say?” “Ba ba ba!” “HOW DOES SHE KNOW THAT?” said my five year old niece. My sister and I laughed our asses off at our very lucky timing! My baby’s a GENIUS!), she smiles and sort of laughs (never again repeating the belly laughs of a month ago), she’s just an absolute joy! She’s also much harder to care fo, staying awake for longer and longer periods during the day and demanding constant entertainment when she is awake. She gets bored really easily. And man can she get angry! Add to all of this my increasingly busy work schedule and I’m tired.

Really, really tired.

More tired than I ever was when she was first born.

It’s okay though and I’m not here to complain because even the moments I hate I love and being a mother has brought me more satisfaction and contentment in the last six months than anything I’ve ever done.

I’ll tell you why I’m here: I’m here to write. We’re still walking as much as we can (today we’re going for five days in a row) and increasingly my mind wanders on my walks and I find myself writing. I’ve missed the blog so much lately and I finally realize why! I miss the WRITING. When I was updating the blog on a fairly daily basis, every day I’d sit down and write. Maybe it was something silly, or pseudo-important, more often than not my catalyst was knitting (which I’m still doing – or was doing – ugh. I miss that too!) but it didn’t matter how I got started, the end result was the same. I WROTE SOMETHING. Anything. And I understand now that it satisfied me in ways that motherhood, wifehood, friendhood, sisterhood, knitting-hood, can’t ever really come close. It’s a different kind of satisfaction, and not something I can fully explain.

Long ago, in another lifetime it seems, I was in school for creative writing. Fiction to be exact. This adventure with the written word was truly the culmination of a lifelong dream. I always wanted to write. Always. It’s what I’m best at, really. It’s the hardest thing ever (next to motherhood – I can say that now with a little bit of authority) and just about the most satisfying when done right. I was lucky enough in my short career to have my work published and recognized and then I started trying to get pregnant and it was like all my creative energies went towards procreating instead of writing. I didn’t have any room left in my heart or my head to keep writing fiction (every character was trying to get pregnant. Talk about a rut.) I started the blog right after our failed IVF attempt and it saved me. Knitting saved me. Writing about knitting saved me. And then I found my blog voice. I so enjoyed it! I think I was funny – maybe even a little insightful – and people started reading the blog – lots of people and that just made the whole thing all the more fun! (I don’t care who you are – writers may write for themselves, but they all want to be read.)

Anyway, this is all just diarrhea of the word and the brain and I feel like this post has been coming for a very long time. I want to write again. On a regular basis. Whether it’s the blog or something else, I don’t know and I don’t care. I’d love it to be both the blog AND something else. I’m not saying I’m going to be blogging every day or anything like that – I’m making no promises to myself or to the blog. There are very distinct priorities in my life: baby, family, work. Everything else is icing on the cake. But I wanted to put it down that this is what I miss. This is what I want. Somehow, some time, I’m going to make it all work.

Last year on Labor Day I let you all know I was pregnant. This year? Well, this year we’re just lazing at home, having a grand old day with our baby girl.

I still miss being pregnant (a little bit) and it’s very weird connecting the baby that was inside me to the beautiful girl in my arms right now. She’s growing so fast. Too fast, sometimes. In the next couple of weeks we’ll be introducing her first solid foods. It’s all incredibly bittersweet for me – each new step gets her closer and closer to being on her own, out in this messed up world of ours. I hope your daddy and I make the best decisions we can for you, my love. We love you more than we ever could have known.

Here’s to your families – whatever shapes and sizes they come in – and here’s hoping you all have a fantastic Monday.

L, C

Things are absolutely crazy around here! I’m back to work full steam and I’m finding it hard to juggle work and baby. When I’m working I want to be with Meli and when I’m goofing off with Meli I’m worried about all my work. I’m sure lots of you moms know my dilemma.

We bought Meli a new toy the other day – an exersaucer thingie. She even test drove a bunch in the store and this one seemed to be her favorite. While I was trying to do some work today, I moved the toy into the office. But she was so funny I videotaped her instead of working. Oh well!

I’m moving right along on a knitting project that I’m really enjoying. I want so bad to tell you about it, but I can’t seem to find the time to take pictures of it and really get down to blogging the project. In the meantime, I knit on it when I can and write blog posts in my head.

We’re heading into Fall and I couldn’t be more delighted, although with two family weddings and lots of jobs lined up I’m very overwhelmed. Weekends are booked straight through to November. I wish I was kidding.

See you all soon I hope! Thanks for reading!
L, C

For those of you who hated me talking about vomit while I was pregnant, you might want to skip this post. It’s about poop.

My baby, exclusively breast fed (which I say with great pride, although I feel guilty when I say it. I know plenty of women who tried desperately to breast feed and did everything right and it just didn’t work out. There before the grace of the mammary gods go I.), used to poop at least once, sometimes twice at every feeding. Once her digestive system began to mature she moved to a once a day kind of poopy girl. Then, every other day. Every other day caused me some stress because I never knew when that poop was coming and it wasn’t really a poop it was more like a LAKE of poop. I didn’t want to dress her in one of her super cute outfits if I knew the poop was coming. You know what I mean? Although I’ve been VERY successful in getting poop out of clothes. (My secret: rinse out RIGHT away and then spray with Zout. Wash whenever.)

So now it’s been like THREE days. NO POOP. Plenty of pee and absolutely disgusting farts (what am I eating?!?! I don’t fart like that!) and I’m on edge every time I hear some rumblings down there. Just poop already baby girl! Mommy can’t take the stress! (I know that it’s perfectly normal for breast fed babies to go awhile without poop. She’s peeing fine and is in her usual great mood, so I’m not worried about her health. Just that I’m going to drown in all the poop when it finally comes.)

I know the poop’s coming though because today I have to take her into the dr for some shots and you just know that she’ll poop all over the doctor’s office. For sure.

I bought a new pump too and I’ve been trying to pump because Meli’s daddy and I have a VERY special date Thursday night.

There’s so much to talk about – I started yet another new project, but this one’s going to stick. There was too much prep involved for it not to work. And I worked my first job since Meli’s been born and everything was good, sort of, but it’s done and I’m glad to have that under my belt. And we were gone for eight nights and I’ve never been so happy to sleep in my own bed. No matter how many people are sleeping in it.

Missed you all. Be back soon. Pray for poop.