I knit!

Luca and I walked over to Ivan's Aunt Elisabeth's house this morning under the pretense of picking up some pictures, but really I was hoping I could finagle a knitting lesson from her. I showed up at the door with a cute baby, huge smile and my beginning knitters kit hoping she could spare a moment and very graciously she did :).

[Please allow me to gush about Aunt Elisabeth for a moment. The woman can build cabinets, speak beautiful French, knit, garden, sew and she has cooked the best chicken adobo I had ever had (sorry mom). She was telling me one time that she planned to parquet a wood floor into a design she had seen at the family's Gran Maison in France... I have no doubt she'll do it too. Aunt Elisabeth has some seriously mad skillz.]

So while the awfully sweet Uncle Bob bounced and cooed with the Bean, Aunt Elisabeth taught me how to knit. I was having trouble with casting, so she started a row of 20 stitches from me and from there I worked on knitting and purling. (Also, knitters who are reading this, please excuse me if I'm mangling knitting terms).

After we left Aunt Elisabeth's, Luca and I walked over to a cafe with a pretty outdoor area. Luca slept on me in the Moby Wrap while I stood doing the wearing-a-sleeping-baby-dance, swaying back and forth working on my little piece of knitting. Knit, needle in back, purl needle in front... over and over again.

When Nico first learned how to jump last summer, he'd leap and bound all over the house like a silly Tigger. Across the room, down the hallway and to my great consternation, off the furniture yelling "I jump! I jump! I jump!". As I swayed back and forth to the rhythm of the needles this morning, in my head I was singing "I knit! I knit! I knit!"

Thank you Aunt Elisabeth!

Little Sprout

I'm feeling some peace and bliss looking at this picture of the Bean this morning...

Wishing Peace and Bliss to everyone!

Many Thanks and hugs to some talented Etsy Ladies who made Luca's outfit- Dawn at Comfed Out Kaiser made the yummy sweater and pants. Jessica at WhimsyByJess knitted the lovely hat.

Being Better

Original artwork by Sharry Phelan Wright and Eric Beumer for The Sophia Project

I'm feeling kind of sick of myself right now. I think that's what happens when you spend 3 days in a row exclusively with small children and aside from the person who takes your latte order, you don't have any real adult connection and you spend waaayyy too much time in your own head.

What's making me cranky at this particular moment is stuff. Too much stuff. I know I obsess over the pretty wooden toy stuff and it's making me crazy. I know I can be deeper than that and I want to.

I want to do better. I want to be better.

As if sensing my ennui, today my incredibly lovely friend Christine sent me some information about an organization she's involved with called The Sophia Project. It is an anthroposophical initiative in nearby Oakland serving children and families who are at risk of recurring homelessness. It is affiliated with the Camphill Association and a member of the Waldorf Early Childhood Association. You can learn more about it at www.sophiaproject.org (there's also a button on the right hand side of the blog to take you there).

I looked at the donation wish list and nowhere did it ask for Camden Rose playstands or Ostheimer farm sets. Grocery store gift cards, diapers, warm clothing is what they are looking for and gosh darn it- I want to get it for them. Would it be crazy of me to use some of the money I would have spent hoarding German toys before the CPSIA law comes into effect to get some of these items for them? I don't think so, maybe I just will.

I'm not enough of a warrior to make this a call to action for everyone. I'm just going to put this information out there for anyone who feels the way I do today. I know that everyone has his/her own way to be better. If you have a moment- please share with me what you do. I could use the inspiration.

With Love and Gratitude, Marina

More Happiness

I'll stop. I promise. But I really can't help myself.

Aren't they the most beautiful couple in the world tonight?

(oh yeah, and I want to be able rock a hat like Aretha does)

Hope and Happiness

The time has come to reaffirm our enduring spirit; to choose our better history; to carry forward that precious gift, that noble idea, passed on from generation to generation: the God-given promise that all are equal, all are free and all deserve a chance to pursue their full measure of happiness.

-President Barack Obama
January 20, 2009

Spirit Babies

Jizo Bodhisattva, The guardian of infants*

I hope you'll indulge me. This is a passage from one of my favorite books Baby Catcher: Confessions of a Modern Midwife by Peggy Vincent and has been on mind quite a bit today. Peggy is a legendary Berkeley home-birthing midwife. In this passage, she has recently had a miscarriage and her son is explaining the story of Spirit Babies as he implores her to have another baby.

"So my first child, this not-yet-teenaged boy, pulled a wooden chair to my side and draped his thin arm across my shoulders , saying "Well, Mom, here's how it is. See, I was one (Spirit Baby) myself, so that must be how I know. Anyway, every woman has a circle of babies that goes around and around above her head and those babies are all the possible babies she could have her in whole life. Every month, one of those babies is first in line. If she gets pregnant, then that's the baby that's born. If she doesn't get pregnant, the baby goes back in the circle and keeps going around with all the others. If she gets pregnant but something bad happens before the baby's born...now listen Mom, here's the really cool part- it goes back into the circle, but it becomes a Spirit Baby, and all the other babies give it cuts. Each month it's always first in line. Isn't that great?"

A year ago I had a miscarriage. I looked at the calender today and noticed the date. Obviously there has been a lot to celebrate in this past year, but I had to stop and pause for a moment to think about our little Spirit Baby. Is our little Luca Bean the Spirit Baby that got cuts? I don't know the answer to that but that story warms me deep inside.

At the end of this particular chapter of the book, Peggy asks her son why it is so important for her to get pregnant again... his reply is "Oh, for the joy of it!"

Oh, the joy of it indeed.

* After our loss last year, a caring friend told me about the Jizo Bodhisattva, a Japanese enlightened being who has special significance to pregnant women and to those whose children who have died. I've kept this little Jizo statue on our kitchen window sill above our sink. It's a sweet reminder to me of the caring beings that are out there to watch over all of us.

This minute...

My Luca Bean is sleeping

shhhhh....

*in hushed tones*
what are you doing this minute?