in our kitchen, the entire south wall is floor-to-ceiling glass (and sometimes belowthefloor-to-ceiling glass). after i painted all the trim in there when we moved, i was tempted to not put any kind of curtains up, but todd thought they needed at least something, so we settled on some sheers.
a friend once asked me if i ever felt exposed because of those windows, which i guess never really occurred to me as being a possibility, so i replied, 'not really. it's not like i do anything weird in my kitchen.'
last night i sat in an armchair right up next to the glass, nursing my baby, reading a book and picking my nose. that's how i do.
what they never tell you about breastfeeding.
before i start, i would like to say i'm pretty gung-ho about breastfeeding. it's free. it's healthy. it's supported by the medical community and, let's face it, i could use a few points in my direction in that regard considering i don't vaccinate and am in strong support of red meat and butter. lots of red meat and butter.
HOWEVER.
i have a bone to pick with the breastfeeding pamphlets. pretty much any current literature you find on breastfeeding proclaims it to be super convenient for going in public because you don't have to carry around a sterile bottle, or find a source of warm-enough water to mix it with. and i can grant them that. but i would like to point out the fact that convenience while in public should not be a selling point for breastfeeding considering that, while it may be hard to find warm water for formula, it's a bit harder to find a public place in which it's appropriate and encouraged to channel your inner aborigini and get all bare-chesty.
instead, you find yourself, oh, i don't know... huddled in the back of your minivan in the walmart parking lot trying to feed your child while you distract your older two kids with an elmo movie. hypothetically speaking. convenient? hardly.
also, it is rarely convenient when, upon hearing a child (any child...or adult) cough or sneeze or breathe, your milk lets down and you end up with two half-dollar sized wet spots on the front of your shirt. 'easily remedied by wearing nursing pads,' you argue? considering those are about as absorbent as a page out of the latest Better Homes and Gardens, or as bulky and bunchy-looking as stuffing a tube sock down your shirt, i would like to state again that convenience has nothing to do with the decision to breastfeed.
and lastly, it is far from convenient to be the only person who can feed your baby, or to have to pump in order for someone else to feed them.
to reiterate, i do not want to come off sounding anti-breastfeeding. like i said, i'm in strong support of it. i just think anyone who has breastfed for more than an hour would find that the convenience argument for breastfeeding is downright silly.
HOWEVER.
i have a bone to pick with the breastfeeding pamphlets. pretty much any current literature you find on breastfeeding proclaims it to be super convenient for going in public because you don't have to carry around a sterile bottle, or find a source of warm-enough water to mix it with. and i can grant them that. but i would like to point out the fact that convenience while in public should not be a selling point for breastfeeding considering that, while it may be hard to find warm water for formula, it's a bit harder to find a public place in which it's appropriate and encouraged to channel your inner aborigini and get all bare-chesty.
instead, you find yourself, oh, i don't know... huddled in the back of your minivan in the walmart parking lot trying to feed your child while you distract your older two kids with an elmo movie. hypothetically speaking. convenient? hardly.
also, it is rarely convenient when, upon hearing a child (any child...or adult) cough or sneeze or breathe, your milk lets down and you end up with two half-dollar sized wet spots on the front of your shirt. 'easily remedied by wearing nursing pads,' you argue? considering those are about as absorbent as a page out of the latest Better Homes and Gardens, or as bulky and bunchy-looking as stuffing a tube sock down your shirt, i would like to state again that convenience has nothing to do with the decision to breastfeed.
and lastly, it is far from convenient to be the only person who can feed your baby, or to have to pump in order for someone else to feed them.
to reiterate, i do not want to come off sounding anti-breastfeeding. like i said, i'm in strong support of it. i just think anyone who has breastfed for more than an hour would find that the convenience argument for breastfeeding is downright silly.
get dee gaytah, jekkob. shootum. shootum.
when we moved to our house nearly a year ago, we decided not to pay for cable to save money and brain cells. on top of it, we have no idea if it's possible to hook up our converter box thing, which means we don't even have channels like PBS and the CW. (i know what you're thinking, but it is indeed possible to live without One Tree Hill or whatever vampire-sorority show has now replaced it.)
i went into the transition knowing it was well worth it, but also that it wouldn't be easy. i would clearly miss watching the duggars and daydreaming myself into each episode. i also anticipated really missing american pickers, anything on HGTV (except 'bang for your buck' and 'house hunters international' - stinkers one and all), and nonstop reruns of scrubs. i even anticipated missing random shows about aliens on the history channel and also 'antiques roadshow,' not because i ever really watched the latter, but because i liked to know i had the option if i ever felt so inclined due to the receipt of a high-value heirloom or the advent of my 70th birthday.
what i did not anticipate missing nearly as much as i do? SWAMP PEOPLE.
if you have never had the pleasure, swamp people is a reality show about guys in the louisiana bayous who hunt gators for a living. yeah - it's as awesome as it sounds. one guy wears bibbies with no shirt under them, and a stars and bars doo-rag. a pair of brothers hunt turtles for dinner. another guy bathes in bleach. how can you go wrong with a show like that?! admittedly, at first, i really hated the show and would make todd turn the channel. something about lifeless gator bodies remind me of babies. (as do whole roasting chickens, but that's a story for another day.) so it sickened me a little.
but once i squelched that inconvenient maternal reaction, swamp people became the best thing that ever happened to my tuesday night. now that we don't have cable, i'm left with a tuesday-night-gators-and-turtle-eating-shaped hole in my heart.
then a couple of weeks ago, discussion with my chiropractor took a turn for the bayou, and he was genuinely surprised that i like that show because his wife is vehemently anti-swamp-professions and won't watch it with him. which makes sense to me because baiting a present-day dinosaur with a raw chicken before risking your life to shoot it in the head seems like a distinctly masculine thing to enjoy.
so, i have to admit, i felt markedly unfeminine after said discussion, but i also left feeling a sense of hope because, until the good doctor mentioned it, i had forgotten i could probably watch episodes online. feminine sensibilities clearly aside.
also, it's my birthday today. huzzah!
i went into the transition knowing it was well worth it, but also that it wouldn't be easy. i would clearly miss watching the duggars and daydreaming myself into each episode. i also anticipated really missing american pickers, anything on HGTV (except 'bang for your buck' and 'house hunters international' - stinkers one and all), and nonstop reruns of scrubs. i even anticipated missing random shows about aliens on the history channel and also 'antiques roadshow,' not because i ever really watched the latter, but because i liked to know i had the option if i ever felt so inclined due to the receipt of a high-value heirloom or the advent of my 70th birthday.
what i did not anticipate missing nearly as much as i do? SWAMP PEOPLE.
if you have never had the pleasure, swamp people is a reality show about guys in the louisiana bayous who hunt gators for a living. yeah - it's as awesome as it sounds. one guy wears bibbies with no shirt under them, and a stars and bars doo-rag. a pair of brothers hunt turtles for dinner. another guy bathes in bleach. how can you go wrong with a show like that?! admittedly, at first, i really hated the show and would make todd turn the channel. something about lifeless gator bodies remind me of babies. (as do whole roasting chickens, but that's a story for another day.) so it sickened me a little.
but once i squelched that inconvenient maternal reaction, swamp people became the best thing that ever happened to my tuesday night. now that we don't have cable, i'm left with a tuesday-night-gators-and-turtle-eating-shaped hole in my heart.
then a couple of weeks ago, discussion with my chiropractor took a turn for the bayou, and he was genuinely surprised that i like that show because his wife is vehemently anti-swamp-professions and won't watch it with him. which makes sense to me because baiting a present-day dinosaur with a raw chicken before risking your life to shoot it in the head seems like a distinctly masculine thing to enjoy.
so, i have to admit, i felt markedly unfeminine after said discussion, but i also left feeling a sense of hope because, until the good doctor mentioned it, i had forgotten i could probably watch episodes online. feminine sensibilities clearly aside.
also, it's my birthday today. huzzah!
why i don't trust whirlpool.
the other day we had a couple of friends over, the husband half of which sells appliances and could name the make and model number of all of our kitchen machinery. when the discussion came around to the Whirlpool Quiet Partner III dishwasher we have, he mentioned that the higher the number (or number of I's), the lower the decibels of sound it makes when running. which he remarked is kind of misleading. what if you wanted a really loud dishwasher, so you were all like, III sounds louder than I, i'll take it! then you get home and can barely hear it and you're all, this is not what i paid for!
so my proposal is that, instead of using roman numerals to (confusingly) indicate the level of noise the Quiet Partner makes, whirlpool should start using different descriptive words in the actual name of the product. like the Quiet Partner I could be changed to something more like, The Only Semi-Respectful Partner, and the Quiet Partner II could be changed to The Partner Who Sleeps Most of the Time but Also is a Bit of a Mouth-Breather, and the Quiet Partner III could be changed to That Partner Who's Always In the Room but You Forget He's There Until it's Too Late.
just a thought. i think it would promote transparency in advertising, and also serve to alleviate some confusion. although i could see where it would serve to instigate some other confusion...so maybe it's a wash. (and i have volitionally chosen not to expound upon that potential pun.)
so my proposal is that, instead of using roman numerals to (confusingly) indicate the level of noise the Quiet Partner makes, whirlpool should start using different descriptive words in the actual name of the product. like the Quiet Partner I could be changed to something more like, The Only Semi-Respectful Partner, and the Quiet Partner II could be changed to The Partner Who Sleeps Most of the Time but Also is a Bit of a Mouth-Breather, and the Quiet Partner III could be changed to That Partner Who's Always In the Room but You Forget He's There Until it's Too Late.
just a thought. i think it would promote transparency in advertising, and also serve to alleviate some confusion. although i could see where it would serve to instigate some other confusion...so maybe it's a wash. (and i have volitionally chosen not to expound upon that potential pun.)
why i deserve to have my ideas within the walls of a museum someday.
everybody says davinci was a genius because he invented the scissors. and also because of a lot of the other genuis-y stuff he managed to do. but i read somewhere legitimate that he only slept like two hours at a time.
and it really makes me think that, as a mother of a newborn, i'm probably just as brilliant as davinci simply because 'brilliant' is often interchangeable with 'crazy,' and if this is how much sleep davinci got on a regular basis, i'm pretty sure he was just crazy sometimes. at my current level of sleep, i could totally see myself saying things like, 'next time we go to war, let's build a giant spoon on wheels and hurl stuff at the infidels with it. plan of attack: owned,' and 'okay, so see these two knives? let's tie them together so we get the cutting power of two knives with the physical exertion of one knife. what should we call it? sizzers. no, wait. scissors. but it will be pronounced the same. i just really like the look of the letter c but the 'kk'-sound can kiss my butt.'
also, i'm pretty sure i could paint the mona lisa. but maybe that's just because i have an unfoundedly high level of self assurance.
and it really makes me think that, as a mother of a newborn, i'm probably just as brilliant as davinci simply because 'brilliant' is often interchangeable with 'crazy,' and if this is how much sleep davinci got on a regular basis, i'm pretty sure he was just crazy sometimes. at my current level of sleep, i could totally see myself saying things like, 'next time we go to war, let's build a giant spoon on wheels and hurl stuff at the infidels with it. plan of attack: owned,' and 'okay, so see these two knives? let's tie them together so we get the cutting power of two knives with the physical exertion of one knife. what should we call it? sizzers. no, wait. scissors. but it will be pronounced the same. i just really like the look of the letter c but the 'kk'-sound can kiss my butt.'
also, i'm pretty sure i could paint the mona lisa. but maybe that's just because i have an unfoundedly high level of self assurance.
how i almost gave birth in a hallway under the watchful and hands-off gaze of ten members of the medical staff.
hey, so i have to tell you about that time i was in labor with finneas and some lady in the parking lot at the hospital ran inside to get me a wheelchair because being helpful to laboring women is a nice thing to do. so then todd is one-handing the wheelchair and pulling our suitcase behind him, and he manages to get us onto the elevator and up to the fourth floor to deliver but then there are these special automatic handicapped-accessible doors....that have no push button. so we're standing there, trying to figure out the disability-friendly doors, and these nurses and doctors are standing like twenty feet on the other side of the doors just staring at us trying to get the doors open and talking to each other like, 'i wonder if they know how to work those things.'
so then todd opens the door with one hand and pulls the suitcase through with the other, and i, dilated to nearly ten centimeters at this point, try and skooch the wheelchair through with my foot, kind of like a pumpkin with legs riding a skateboard, and then we get through and the nurse is all, 'why didn't you push the button?' and we were all, 'great question' and she was all 'it was like twenty feet behind you the whole time.'
thank you, nurse. you have been very helpful. also, good luck to anyone trying work the handicapped-accessible doors if you are visually handicapped.
so then todd opens the door with one hand and pulls the suitcase through with the other, and i, dilated to nearly ten centimeters at this point, try and skooch the wheelchair through with my foot, kind of like a pumpkin with legs riding a skateboard, and then we get through and the nurse is all, 'why didn't you push the button?' and we were all, 'great question' and she was all 'it was like twenty feet behind you the whole time.'
thank you, nurse. you have been very helpful. also, good luck to anyone trying work the handicapped-accessible doors if you are visually handicapped.
finn hadd fo. we call him that for short.
oh my word. finneas turns two weeks old tomorrow! i know it's only two weeks, and in the grand scheme of eternity (or even just in the grand scheme of 2012), it doesn't really seem all that significant...but still. it feels like a long time that has gone by really quickly. if that makes sense.
to everyone who has been praying for us - THANK YOU SO MUCH. i can really feel that we're being covered in prayer. everything has gone so smoothly, especially considering how worried i was. finneas started out knowing which end was up (and by that i mean he knows that dark = sleepytime), and i haven't had even the tiniest bit of baby blues, much less full-blown depressive stuff. please keep praying for that if you have been, since postpartum depression can wait a while before setting in, but so far i'm feeling really good about how things are going.
todd took the last two weeks off, and my mom is here this week, so i've had lots of time to rest, recover, and get to know the newest van voorst, whom i like to call 'baked potato' or 'poops pants.' or finneas. since that's his name. here are some things i've come to appreciate about him over the last two weeks:
..this child can EAT. and eat. and then eat. his biceps are starting to resemble eric booker's.
..his favorite activities include peeing al fresco and pooping in very fresh diapers. give him a brand new pair of pampers and thirty seconds and watch (and listen to) the magic unfold.
..he has already developed character bits for his future in improv comedy. let's see, there's The Dead Guy, Turtleface, The Wet Noodle, Naked and Pissed About It, and Schlumpy McBurps. i have a feeling his knack for truly becoming the character (think: joaquin phoenix, i swear he's that good) will someday fund the implementation of my dream for a fully pimped out retirement condo. (counter-depth mini fridge? comically small patio overlooking a dog park? oh yeah. but all in due time.)
..the sheer strength of will and determination to not succumb to the soothing effects of a pacifier. it's the principle of the matter, and he is nothing if not principled.
so that's finneas in a nutshell. it turns out it's pretty easy to sum up a life if that life is only 13 days long so far.
to everyone who has been praying for us - THANK YOU SO MUCH. i can really feel that we're being covered in prayer. everything has gone so smoothly, especially considering how worried i was. finneas started out knowing which end was up (and by that i mean he knows that dark = sleepytime), and i haven't had even the tiniest bit of baby blues, much less full-blown depressive stuff. please keep praying for that if you have been, since postpartum depression can wait a while before setting in, but so far i'm feeling really good about how things are going.
todd took the last two weeks off, and my mom is here this week, so i've had lots of time to rest, recover, and get to know the newest van voorst, whom i like to call 'baked potato' or 'poops pants.' or finneas. since that's his name. here are some things i've come to appreciate about him over the last two weeks:
..this child can EAT. and eat. and then eat. his biceps are starting to resemble eric booker's.
..his favorite activities include peeing al fresco and pooping in very fresh diapers. give him a brand new pair of pampers and thirty seconds and watch (and listen to) the magic unfold.
..he has already developed character bits for his future in improv comedy. let's see, there's The Dead Guy, Turtleface, The Wet Noodle, Naked and Pissed About It, and Schlumpy McBurps. i have a feeling his knack for truly becoming the character (think: joaquin phoenix, i swear he's that good) will someday fund the implementation of my dream for a fully pimped out retirement condo. (counter-depth mini fridge? comically small patio overlooking a dog park? oh yeah. but all in due time.)
..the sheer strength of will and determination to not succumb to the soothing effects of a pacifier. it's the principle of the matter, and he is nothing if not principled.
so that's finneas in a nutshell. it turns out it's pretty easy to sum up a life if that life is only 13 days long so far.
i'm a jerkwad. you're a jerkwad. and god knows it.
i think there's a common misconception that being a christian has anything to do with being a better person. that's why there are so many christians out there who point the judgmental finger at others as though they're somehow superior, and so many nonbelievers who feel like they're not good enough for god or something. (or, conversely, who think they don't need god because they're 'good enough' or 'at least i'm better than so-and-so.') it's because we all make the mistake of thinking the two kinds of people in the world are 'bad' people and 'good' people. the closer you are to 'good,' the better off you are in the eyes of god.
but the truth is that there are two kinds of people in the world: dirtbag sinners who deserve hell, and dirtbag sinners who deserve hell but have been saved by the work of jesus. and you know what? god is not concerned with you becoming a 'better person' after he saves you, either. he knows you're a dirtbag, he knows he made you out of dust, and the whole reason jesus had to die was because he knows that, as such, we would never be able to earn anything at all worth having - jesus had to do it for us.
but what god is concerned with is christians becoming new people. not people who cuss less, or are nicer, or go to church every week. he's concerned with people whose hearts are brand new because they used to be dead in their sin and now they're alive. they used to be enemies of god, and through nothing they did to deserve it, they're now part of god's family. as a result, they might end up cussing less or being nicer or going to church more - but it's because they are able to see that god is better than what they are and what they had, not because those things in any way make them better.
i am not a better person than i was before jesus found me. in a lot of ways, i'm a worse person - i now know what i should do, and i don't always do it. i now have the spirit of god in me that gives me the power to walk away from sin, and i still often cling to it. but jesus died to make me new, not to make me better, and i can honestly say i am a new, different, alive person because of it. and i'm forgiven for my dirtiness. and that's better than being better.
but the truth is that there are two kinds of people in the world: dirtbag sinners who deserve hell, and dirtbag sinners who deserve hell but have been saved by the work of jesus. and you know what? god is not concerned with you becoming a 'better person' after he saves you, either. he knows you're a dirtbag, he knows he made you out of dust, and the whole reason jesus had to die was because he knows that, as such, we would never be able to earn anything at all worth having - jesus had to do it for us.
but what god is concerned with is christians becoming new people. not people who cuss less, or are nicer, or go to church every week. he's concerned with people whose hearts are brand new because they used to be dead in their sin and now they're alive. they used to be enemies of god, and through nothing they did to deserve it, they're now part of god's family. as a result, they might end up cussing less or being nicer or going to church more - but it's because they are able to see that god is better than what they are and what they had, not because those things in any way make them better.
i am not a better person than i was before jesus found me. in a lot of ways, i'm a worse person - i now know what i should do, and i don't always do it. i now have the spirit of god in me that gives me the power to walk away from sin, and i still often cling to it. but jesus died to make me new, not to make me better, and i can honestly say i am a new, different, alive person because of it. and i'm forgiven for my dirtiness. and that's better than being better.
if you're annoyed by people who spell it 'grey' rather than 'gray,' be prepared to be really annoyed.
i looked in the mirror the other morning and came face-to-face with my dreaded nemesis: the grey hair. and not just one, but a little chunk of them right in the center where my widow's peak would be if i were christina ricci. but i'm obviously not christina ricci, as indicated by my grey hairs and my lack of millions of dollars and also the fact that i've never been best friends with casper.
at first, i was in disbelief, so i called todd in to check them. he reassured me he saw nothing, but after he left and i began examining my head again, it became clear that they weren't just light in color or catching the sunlight strangely or some of those weird hairs we all get (i assume) that just don't have any color to them for some unexplained reason. no, these were very curly, very coarse and very grey.
i have been waiting for this for a while, but i must say i was shocked to just...wake up...and suddenly have grey hair. apart from shocked, i was a little bitter that i had to be dealing with this now, what with a newborn in the house and also a three-year-old with the voms and also a postpartum body that won't quit. apart from bitter, i was all, yeah that sounds about right that i'd get grey hair now.
i will say that there is a silver lining in all this: within the month, the post-pregnancy hormones will set in (or, the during-pregnancy hormones will set out; i don't know the science behind it all) and all my hair will fall out. so instead of ever seeing my grey hairs, you will get the opportunity to see a lot more of my forehead and scalp than you ever wanted to see.
sweet timing.
note: yesterday's video embedding code was a stinker. i hopefully fixed the problem, so go here if you want to see the awesomest church diva of all time. (the first time i watched it i was drinking a glass of water and did that classic 50's sitcom 'spray it everywhere when you laugh' thing. no lie.)
at first, i was in disbelief, so i called todd in to check them. he reassured me he saw nothing, but after he left and i began examining my head again, it became clear that they weren't just light in color or catching the sunlight strangely or some of those weird hairs we all get (i assume) that just don't have any color to them for some unexplained reason. no, these were very curly, very coarse and very grey.
i have been waiting for this for a while, but i must say i was shocked to just...wake up...and suddenly have grey hair. apart from shocked, i was a little bitter that i had to be dealing with this now, what with a newborn in the house and also a three-year-old with the voms and also a postpartum body that won't quit. apart from bitter, i was all, yeah that sounds about right that i'd get grey hair now.
i will say that there is a silver lining in all this: within the month, the post-pregnancy hormones will set in (or, the during-pregnancy hormones will set out; i don't know the science behind it all) and all my hair will fall out. so instead of ever seeing my grey hairs, you will get the opportunity to see a lot more of my forehead and scalp than you ever wanted to see.
sweet timing.
note: yesterday's video embedding code was a stinker. i hopefully fixed the problem, so go here if you want to see the awesomest church diva of all time. (the first time i watched it i was drinking a glass of water and did that classic 50's sitcom 'spray it everywhere when you laugh' thing. no lie.)
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