Day 59: Happy Halloween

We didn't go trick-or-treating this year, but Zaria had fun watching my mom and I carve this pumpkin last night. Some of our neighbor kids watched, too, and helped scoop out seeds. Now Jack-o-lantern is all ready to glow tonight and welcome other neighbor kids.

Day 58: Zaria and Cosmo

Zaria loves Cassie's dog, Cosmo. And Cosmo is incredibly tolerant of her. She actually was pretty nice to him tonight while Cassie was over to play Settlers of Catan. We like to tell her, "Nice puppy. Be gentle."

Day 57: A walk in the park

It was a beautiful fall day, so Zaria and I took a walk to the city park this morning and saw lots of geese here and in the water and flying by.

Day 56: Happy Birthday, Grandma Joy!

Day 55: Looking at houses again

We looked at a few houses again today. This one was a duplex with a particularly interesting leafy vine that went alongside the stucco. It was a duplex up and down with renters on a 1-year lease downstairs. Certainly an intriguing investment, but I doubt we'd qualify even with the renters. We just went to look at what a duplex might be like in the area and price range.

We saw a couple of houses that we liked, but I'm still not completely "sold" on any of them. Our favorite had the drawback of really tiny bedrooms, and several smaller things to fix. We saw lots of potential, but I'm not sure what we're up for.

Day 54: Visit from Dad and Dawn

Quite the action shot here: There's Jamin bringing us water, Zaria bouncing, Dawn taking a picture of Zaria, and my dad getting ready for some cake he and Dawn made as a team-effort. It was nice to have them over. Zaria had to get used to them all over again, but she eventually chilled out. Dawn works with babies and gave me a great idea on how to get Zaria to nap better again. This week, she's had a hard time settling down because now she can sit up and stand up in her crib. Dawn recommended swaddling-- she does it with her one-year-olds and it works like a charm.

Day 53: Beautiful day for a walk

Jamin ended up having the day off with me today, and we both got to take Zaria out for a walk. It was pretty cute how she kept looking up to see us and smile at us. Maybe not so cute how she kept taking her sunglasses off and then whined whenever the sun got to her eyes.

Day 52: Ducks in a row

I searched high. I searched low. I think I found all the rubber ducks to put in a row. Technically, one of these ducks is fluffy and another is ceramic, but you get the idea. It was bath time for Zaria again, and I thought it would be fun to have all the ducks in the bath with her. The fluffy one stayed out, and turns out she was frightened by the big ceramic duck. Maybe it was because it was behind her and she didn't expect it to be there, or maybe it was because it was so much bigger than the rest of the duckies. She wouldn't stop crying until I removed him. Poor ducky.

Day 51: Blessings from "Auntie Jen"

I mentioned last week (or recently) at Mother's Fellowship that I was in need of some 12-18 month girl clothes. I took a photo so I could remember which clothes I got from Jen-- she handed me quite a stack, and may need them back if they have another girl, so I wanted to keep track. What a great blessing!

We were sharing in our Mother's Fellowship group how we became friends and the strange circumstances of us knowing each other's husbands before we had met them. We realized that was also true for Nikki, Jen's sister-in-law, who is also in our mothers group. Both their husbands went to Bethel, my alma mater, and Jamin went to the U of M Twin Cities where Nikki and Jen went. I met Jen at the U of M's Campus Ambassadors group, which I believe no longer exists. I came with Jamin, and that week they had decided we should all pick accountability partners. Jen and I were the only females, so we ended up together and hit it off really well. We've been accountability partners now for about 8 years, I think. It was a little harder while I lived in Portland and we had to just talk over the phone, but we always kept in touch, and our friendship has been an incredible blessing over the years.

Day 50: Making dessert with Zaria

I imagine Zaria will actually be able to help soon, in a few months or so. Today as I was making a Jello Cheesecake as a going-away treat for Jamin's brother Bill, Zaria was helping by being cute and getting under my feet. She also sang to me, so that helped. She's been teething this week, so it's been difficult. She clung to me when I got over to Jamin's folks' place and wouldn't have anything to do with Bill. I was surprised, she usually does much better with strangers and she's seen those family members fairly recently. It was probably a combination of being tired, hungry, teething and being woken up from just barely getting to sleep in the car after running around to do errands with me.

Day 49: Baby sitting

Last week we started babysitting for our friends while they went to small group on Sunday nights. Two-year-old Emil has fun playing for a couple of hours with us and Zaria, so it's really pretty fun. It could've been a babysitting swap with Emil's parents watching Zaria while Jamin and I go to small group, but my mom doesn't really want to give up her babysitting time. It works out fine, since we often come back after Zaria's bedtime anyway, but it's also nice to know we have a backup. By about January, Emil's little brother Nils will join us-- right now he still goes with his mom and dad. In this photo, Zaria was having fun jumping up and down in the activity center while the rest of us enjoyed some apple crisp for dessert.

Day 48: Flowers!

It's a couple of weeks after our anniversary, so Jamin sort of surprised me with a belated flowering. (= I had fun putting our wedding photo place mat on the table to decorate tonight. I still need to make Jamin's card, so we're both a little late this year.

Day 47: Splish Splash

Zaria loves bathtime. I let her play a little extra long today since she was having such a great time. I also figured out that it's a good idea to put the bathmat over the drain plug since she has quite a magnetic attraction to pulling on it and draining the water out.

Day 46: Small group babies

This Thursday at small group there were two adorable babies joining us to listen in to a discussion about God's attribute of omnipotence, chapter 11 in Tozer's "The Knowledge of the Holy." Below is Claire, held by Sara. Claire's mom and dad are in the bottom left corner. Actually, only mom's socked foot is there. And this is Sydney, a very special 9 1/2 month old puppy, just a little older than baby Claire. She was named after a certain character on Alias (her owners were a bit addicted to the show). Jamin and I were also addicted to the show, but alas, it is now completed.

Day 45: Yahtzee!

Jamin and I played Yahtzee last night, and maybe we'll finish our second round this evening. If he's around in the evenings, it's fairly common for us to play games like this, but we haven't played Yahtzee since we moved back to Minnesota. My great grandma Ethel was (and maybe still is at 102) really, really good at Yahtzee. I don't know how she did it, but she was nearly impossible to beat.

Day 44: Zaria is 10 months old

Ten months old today. She's now about 22 lbs, has her first tooth just poking through, and currently enjoys pulling herself up on things, like my DNA painting. She's got one foot on the primordial soup, and she's grabbing at the scripture on the side to help herself up. Actually, maybe that's a good thing.

Day 43: Date night

Between our heads you might note the scooter in the parking lot. Then there's the gray, gray sky. Yup, you guessed it. It rained on our way home. But we had a nice date night, sitting in what used to be the non-smoking section of this local Italian place.

Day 42: Eye See You

A nice close-up of Jamin's new eyeglasses.
Zaria's got a tooth coming out, so we gave her a carrot to chew on while she jumped in the jumper. If she gets some extra vitamin A, so much the better.

Day 41: Home buyers beware

This is a shot in the window of one of the homes we looked into today. I believe Jamin's descriptive word for this one was "skank house" as it was in fairly sorry shape. It was listed at $80k, but would probably need $20k or more in repairs. It was good to look at a few places and just see what's out there for around $100k. I think all of the homes we looked at today were foreclosed, so all of them were a little rough but there was one that I thought had significant potential. We're not quite ready to jump in and buy a place-- or at least I'm not. I definitely need to see a few more areas and ranges to see what's available, what we can handle, and what kind of work a place might need to be livable. One fun thing about this place was that it had stairways to each room and felt fairly open. It was an interesting layout. Down below was the family room, straight ahead the living room, above is the kitchen, and there were three bedrooms as you went upstairs.

Day 40: Pie Day

Last time Zaria, my mom and I went to pie day at my grandparents' place, we didn't actually stay for the pie because Zaria and I were still dealing with colds. So today we had a good time staying for the whole show! I was able to get Zaria down for a long nap in the morning, and she stayed in a good mood the whole afternoon for the pie and singing. She was singing in her own way, which usually meant she would sing the loudest when the songs were over. It was really funny. The folks there absolutely love having a baby there, especially my grandma.

Day 39: Interview Day

I had trouble deciding what to wear today--Jamin made a suggestion that I wear a scarf with my first outfit and I ended up scrapping the whole thing and starting over. I actually didn't do too bad, went with the black pinstriped suit and just changed the top a couple of times.

So I finally had an interview today, but not for medical transcription. Unfortunately, after doing a bit of research I found that in order to start as an MT I would have to work full-time. I'm just not able to do that. And I'm not ready to work on my own as a contractor. So I'm looking at some other options. This job I applied for today is for a online survey editor position for a marketing company. I'm actually fairly excited about it-- it's got the hours I need and I can work at home after just a few days of in-house training. They gave me a sample survey to go over and see if I get it, and I feel like it totally fits in with what I've learned with both media communication and my recently honed editing skills. I did go over some spelling words from a list I had in my MT training before the interview and test, and that actually really helped me do better on the test.

Day 38: I get the car again

If I was to have a car at all today, Jamin had to take the scooter. He left sort of late and had a run to Cedar Rapids, IA, so he took the scooter so I had the freedom to make it to the library and to get groceries. He actually didn't get home until after 2 AM, so it was a good choice. Only trouble: I got to the library and got a call from him needing a jump-start on his semi. Fortunately, my mom was at the library so Zaria was still able to be part of the reading time.
Later in the evening I gave Zaria the drumsticks for the Taiko Drum Master game to see what she would do with them. She is a born drummer, I am so excited!

Day 37: Checking out photography

An old friend of mine from high school had a showing at the MCP (I think that stands for Minnesota Center for Photography), so I went to check it out. The main gallery was closed because they were changing over the installation, but her stuff was in the gift shop, so I was able to admire her lateral portraits. I haven't seen Callie since high school, and I've only heard from her on a few brief occasions since then, so I thought I should check out her showing since I had the car for mother's fellowship anyway. And since one of my goals is to become a better photographer, it was fun to peruse through some photography books. There was a gorgeous one of the Minnesota north shore area. Wish I had $60 to spend on a book right now. (=

Day 36: Haircut

I looked in the mirror before taking a shower this morning, and had to do it. My hair was too long for me to deal with, and I probably also got brave after just recently watching Julia Stiles chop her own locks in The Bourne Ultimatum.
I don't think I did too bad a job, but I'll probably have someone make sure I got it even later. Zaria seemed to like it. Actually, I couldn't quite tell if she was admiring my hair by grabbing for it, or trying to play with my ears. (= Below is a bit of a ritual I've started of brushing her hair in the morning at the vanity I was given from my grandmother.

Day 35: Infant sleeping changes

We helped in the nursery today and I couldn't get Zaria to go to sleep. I wonder if she might've gotten to sleep if I hadn't been there. Judy, the nursery worker knows her pretty well and has had success in the past. But we had similar troubles at the Walker yesterday trying to let her sleep in the stroller-- she has trouble sleeping anywhere but in her own bed, it seems. I had to laugh when she finally did fall asleep in her bed this afternoon with three pacifiers, as you can see here.

Day 34: 6th Anniversary

Six years ago today, Jamin and I said our vows at the Como Pavillion on a very chilly October day. Today we celebrated on a hot, muggy afternoon by visiting the Walker with Zaria in a stroller, then going out for dinner and a movie while Zaria stayed with Grandma & Grandpa.

Our six years together have been peppered with tough times, but I couldn't have asked for a more fun and adventurous mate. My own Mr. Incredible, here with his new eyeglasses and faux t-shirt mentioning the real-life superhero, Jesus.

Day 33: Sleeping on the tum

In the last couple of days, Zaria has begun to roll around in bed. Yesterday she kept doing this and crying-- she would get on her tummy and then didn't know what to do. Well, this morning during her nap she rolled over and slept that way for the first time. It freaked me out just a little bit, but I had always slept on my tummy from infancy on to when I was too pregnant to be comfortable and she's pretty safe from SIDS at this point. It's interesting that I've only in the last few days started to sleep on my tummy again because I got so used to sleeping on my side. So it's like Zaria and I've gotten sleep cues from each other.

Day 32: Zoo times

The sloth in action. I didn't send out a single resume today-- instead, I went with my mom and Zaria to the Como Zoo. It was a beautiful day out to enjoy being a stay-at-home mom.
The orangutan got into the fun action and kept hiding under this kiddie pool.

Day 31: Do you see the moon?

The moon always looks so much smaller when you take a photo of it. I took this on our walk back from the library. It was a gorgeous day for a walk through the park.
Blonde joke I heard the other day:
In a geography quiz, a blonde was asked, "What's closer: Chicago or the moon?"
The blonde replied, "The moon, of course. You can't see Chicago, can you?"

My mom met us at the library, actually gave us a ride so we could be part of the earlier reading group. And today I discovered that they do have puppets to check out. How fun! I checked out this orange fish and Zaria and I had a lot of fun pretending that the fish was trying to grab her toy and get stuck on it like she was a fisherman.

Day 30: Sound Gal

I helped set up and run sound again today at Mother's Fellowship. There's a LOT to do for this particular venue and I'm feeling less anxious to want to take it over now. After today(which was only a training day), I think I'll only want to do it as a backup. It was tough for me to get there by 8:30, and it looks like I'd need to be there no later than 8:15 to get everything set up. There's the board, 7 mike stands, music stands and cords, recording the CD, setting up the computer for power point, setting up the guest speaker with a cordless . . . and the last few weeks there have been computer problems. Other places I've had at least part of these responsibilities done by others-- the only way I could do it is if there were others to take charge of the computer and help me set up some of the mics.

Day 29: Home from Grandma's

My mom loves being a grandma and takes Zaria home with her any chance she can get. Lately, she's been taking her for a few hours in the evening so that I can get some studying/work done. I'm still not sure if it's a good idea to depend on this, but it will definitely free up some more secure time to be able to work at home if it can continue. So this is a familiar scene right now, Mom coming in the front door with a sleepy Zaria in her arms. Zaria will usually get to sleep in the car on the way home and be pajamaed and bleary-eyed when she comes in the door. She loves having time with Grandma and is often quite tired after playing with Grandma and Grandpa in the evening.