Saturday, March 19, 2011

.it's called break for a reason.

So maybe I didn't accomplish as much as I would have liked on this spring break. It's not like I'll be behind, but I usually like to be ahead. Besides, I have tomorrow to put the pressure on.

But how can you work on a day when your husband is home, when all the doors are open, when our perennials are coming up and when the early spring plants need planting (oh, radishes how I can't wait for you.) I take a weird amount of joy in busying myself with chores around the house, like: finally making a linen closet out of the linen closet, laundry in prep for visitors next week(!) and experimenting with a new lunch. Look how cute:

These are actually quite tasty: layer yummy breakfast meats (I swear, this pregnancy thing is the strangest thing ever--when have I ever craved meat?), spinach (in a rueish like sauce), an egg topped with sea salt and fresh ground pepper. yum. I have been really challenged lately by the idea of really stretching my pantry and fridge. Eggs seem to be the go to source of protein for this family as I always try to cook less with red meat and more with cheap simple ingredients. Also, love it or hate it, I've been really finding some value in frozen spinach: I've been throwing it in everything especially when I feel I could use the green and when the thought of raw lettuce still turns my stomach a little bit.

I am around 15.5 weeks pregnant which means I feel alot better and it means that the idea of "baby" seems more real too especially as my waist begins to look more round than fluffy, and especially as I have dreams every other night of meeting the baby and realizing that it's a boy and that my prediction was wrong. I am able to go on walks with Julian and stay up past nine, and cooking boxed dinners just doesn't have the same appeal it used to a couple weeks ago. It's a good time, I'm starting to see the Spring.



Now...time to go plant some seeeeeeds!

Thursday, March 17, 2011

the park + the liepes


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I got together with my sister and brother in law, Chris and Emily, and their precious bundle of giggles, Emerson, my newest nephew. We had a really nice time after devouring our Subway sandwiches....










i love this picture of them and their little monkey man



Em had a great idea to block some of the sun :)


don't worry: we didn't let him continue sucking on that seat ;)

i guess it's only fair that the camera was turned near the end of our day at the park
naptime
i treasure this image: and i can't wait for looks like that
good day. love you, Liepes.

Saturday, March 12, 2011

Spring Cold

Yesterday I went shopping for maternity clothes as I was feeling the pinch of my jeans getting tighter and tighter. It was kind of a mistake. My body is long and slender, but I see it only as bigger and bigger, less and less manageable. When it came time to try on a pair of maternity pants I was horrified to see my figure drowning in a confusing mess of fabric--so unflattering! Like overalls! It seemed like a joke (am I really going to be able to fit in those?!). But a little joke that has rubbed me the wrong way and is festering. Going through racks of clothes I am confronted with knowing that I can't fit into that any more, and that this or that may never look the same. I think I'm probably mourning these things. Loss of youth perhaps?
But the situation goes deeper because I struggle alot with body issues, I always have. Rather than feeling that feminine maternal glow that some talk about, I feel increasingly masculine as I grow bigger. Less soft as the my "angles" fade away. And it's most frustrating when I am so ecstatic to be pregnant, when I want to embrace every single part, that I have a really hard time being happy with what is going on on the outside when I know I should embrace it as the physical manifestation of the good work I am doing for what's on the the inside.
I feel that I need to speak and be open about these struggles so that they don't spiral or consume (As they so often do for me) and I would really be open to hearing how other mothers have become resolved to their changing bodies.

Today I am going to McCook, Nebraska; to the location of my best summer vacations, and to share in good memories with my dear aunts and uncles and parents. I have these primal urges to go back to Nebraska; it is really like clockwork--I start to have dreams, day dreams, sadness when it's been too long. I woke up this morning tossing and sniffling back the spring cold I have, unable to fall asleep as I anticipated the landscape of that lonely nebraskan highway. I get to go back, and it's about time. PLUS! I have a Pentax 6x7 camera to for the trip and rolls of slide film to use.

Monday, March 7, 2011

Transfiguration Sunday


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPLzdCuIIFY&feature=related

This past sunday was Transfiguration Sunday and in addition to a really beautiful service (was it just me or was it especially moving to sing all those hymns and to sense this spiritual mystery that is so especially potent during this time) we were told to get out all of our "Hallelujahs" since we will be heading into the season of Lent after this Wednesday.

I mentioned earlier this peculiar mystery that seems to pervade through this time. Not only is the Transfiguration a bizarre and mysterious event but isn't the whole of Christianity? Those mentioned miracles (from Annunciation, to the Nativity, to the Transfiguration, all the way up until the Resurrection) are strange, not at all "natural" but stories that through their seemingly improbability show us the "nature" of following Christ. Of faith, of submitting to something completely bigger and greater than you and me.

What I enjoy about this time of year is how it, again, mysteriously aligns with many of the other seasonal events that are occuring at the same time. This time of year in Colorado is always the ugliest to me: everything is washed out, dried, and brittle. We hardly see any promises of Spring, and to top it off we go to an Ash Wednesday service and are given a cross of ashes on our forehead and told basically which is seen in Masaccio's Trinity's momento mori, "Io fu gia quel che voi siete e quel chio son voi anco sarete" or "I was once what you are, and what I am you also will be." A real dust to dust story! And how depressing, but what is so life changing about the season of Lent is that we as Christians today experience this darkness to prepare for the glory of the Resurrection. The prophecy realized. "Lost in the cloud, a voice: Lamb of God! We draw near! Lost in the cloud, a sign: Son of man! Son of God!" Further, as the 40 days progress and as Easter draws nearer, we see those promises of Spring, of things resurrecting, of things returning. What a lovely design for us to see some sort of manifestation of the promises made by Christ Himself. In death there is Life. Perhaps this is why I was even more so moved during Worship as we sang these hymns that curiously had some spring imagery in them such as this verse in "Fairest Lord Jesus:"
Fair are the meadows, fairer still the woodlands,
robed in the blooming garb of spring:
Jesus is fairer, Jesus is purer
who makes the woeful heart to sing.

Spring (as a metaphor) is coming but I can hardly tell, yet.

Lent is a rough time, at least it seems to have been that way for the past couple years. But because of these miracles, because of the promises (to me, made especially obvious by the transformation of the landscape :) given, we always have a reason to hope and sing.

Now, in other news, I am counting down the days until spring break. I am not going anywhere and I have a lot of homework, but it is going to be soooo nice to have no classes to go to, no further accumulating homework, and time to focus on some rest. Though I am out of the first trimester and though I am feeling better it is still a challenge to balance what is really important. School is important, but not that important. Sure, school is great and I'm learning things that I love (LOVE), but you can't watch a freaking bachelor's degree grow up. It's not a life, it doesn't have a heart beat; but my baby does. I want to do the things I am doing, I want a good job (maybe just to keep up with the status quo) but the life I'm growing is the most important thing I could ever be doing. I am so happy to be pregnant. It becomes more and more real each day (especially when my favorite dress becomes tight and uncomfortable--).






ps. go to Snooze tomorrow and eat pancakes. I will be there and hoping for lemon souffle pancakes like Barbara in Vermont makes (cravings). Proceeds go to Harvest Farm (that's where Sef works)