Here's what's been going on...

Lots has been happening over the past few months since my last regular posts.*  


But before I get started again, I want to keep things a bit in order, here's the catch-up on the past few months----you can either read the bits or scroll through like a sort of flip book.  Some of the topics I've been thinking on and will revisit in the future, others are just bits....


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I've been culling.**


One of the items in the photo below went to Goodwill, the other stayed, just in case of emergencies.  Can you guess which one?  It all depends on whether or not you think it is more likely that my future self may one day:

a) work in a suited up corporate environment 

b) stay out all night dancing

I also went through boxes and boxes of papers, letters and one menu from a restaurant I frequented in college. I even found a handful of notes from my sixth grade bully.***

Elliot learned lots of things, like drinking from a cup,****  

Escape...

And all about fish...

We took family photos.

Elliot turned one. 

Husband and I went on our first trip away. He can drive with his eyes closed.  Yes, he is that good.

We flew to Key West where I was appalled by some of the sights, but enjoyed the chocolate covered Key Lime Pie anyway.

Husband stuck mainly to the more conventional seafood. 

Elliot and I went to the beach with the Jackalope and his mom.

We went to the Easter Beer Hunt.  

Elliot scored three pieces of chocolate and three beers. 

We went to a birthday luau pig roast.   It was awesome.  Seriously awesome. 

I got to try a bit from each section of the pig.  Even the brain.***** I have a new appreciation for pork. 

And somewhere along the way, I got pregnant.****** Two will arrive in late October.

See you next week...

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*And I want to get back to it.  It's good for me---it gives me a few minutes of amusement and creativity for myself, much like I imagine it is for a non-professional ballerina.  They may still work out just to keep their muscles in shape and to revisit their skills, but it's not what they do anymore.  That's probably the most concrete way I can explain it.  I like to write.  I used to be a journalist and probably one day I will be again, but in the meantime, I like to try to keep it all a little bit in shape...

**Everything happened so quickly when Husband and I got married and moved that I didn't go through anything.  It either went with us or went into storage here. So I've had LOTS to cull through, including giving more than half my clothes to the Goodwill. 

***I don't know why I kept them, but I'm glad I did.  Twenty-five years past, I have a much better perspective on the whole experience.

****This is a big deal.

*****It tastes a bit like savory marshmallow.

****** This is a big part of the reason for my absence.  We're really, really excited. (Well Husband and I are.  I'm not sure Elliot gets it yet.) But overall, we've been busy and I've been TIRED.  I feel better now.  And by Two, I mean that's its name in the meantime, not the actual number of babies.

Beware...if you're a fan of Twizzlers....

My sister Claudia is an artist.  And a good one.  

She made odd, geometric mobiles in elementary school and won art contests in high school.  

In college, she got even better.  For Christmas and birthdays, if I was lucky, she would give me some of her work as a present.  And we have some of it in our house today. 

This one is my favorite. It's a screen print in my favorite colors. 

This is from her senior show.  It's not just a portrait, it's a process.  She took individual photos, then transferred them onto cloth.  Then created colors and dyed thread.  Then embroidered each one.

And those are just a few.

BigD snagged some of the best ones.  If you ever go over to my mom's house, check out the nude in the guest bathroom.  That's a Claudia original as well.

And I still think about a an oil/chalk vegetable still life she gave to an old friend of mine.*

Over the years, Claud has moved a bit away from creating art.  Instead she's been focusing on the son she created, which is understandable.

But just a few months ago, she decided to go back to school.  Before she starts her actual program, she's been filling in a few of the prerequisites.**  And of course, she's doing extra credit.

This is the photo that appeared in my email in-box a few days ago.

What is it, you may wonder?  I'll let Claudia explain in her own words...***


"I knew you wanted to see.  The bottom is yellow and represents the hypodermis (the fatty adipose part that binds the skin to the muscle), then the red dermis part (highly vascular), then there is whipped cream-the epidermis (it blows away just like your skin cells).  


Just think, when you look at Husband it is all just dead cells protecting his insides.  


Anyway, there is the twizzler, obviously the hair and a grape and marshmellow representing various secretion glands.  


I made 100.  


Go me."




I love it.  


Though I may never eat a Twizzler again.  


And dang it, I loved Twizzlers.


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*If you're reading this, you know who you are.  Though I suspect it's hanging in your house, pretty close to the last place I saw it, we're not really friends anymore.  I asked for it back all those years ago, but you refused.  Will you think about it now?  I'll buy it. No joke.

**Human A&P was not on her art school course list.

***I asked her permission and she said it was fine.

All I Want for Christmas

We've known we weren't going to head back to the States for Christmas since we found out about the Pickle.

I will be too close to my due date to fly for long distances, over giant spaces of water, with no drugs or hospital nearby. Not that I have any reason to believe that I will be early at all, but we (and by "we" I mean Husband, most airlines and me) don't want to take that chance.

But I love Christmas. Not for the 9,000 people in line with me at the stores or for the timely and manufactured cheer, but for the traditions.*  

But this year, it's just going to be different, so we've planned great holidays in Europe. 

Not only are we going to spend five days in Nice, but we've been celebrating in a variety of ways.

We've been to Husband's company Julebord, (literally "Christmas table") which is the holiday party.

It was a seated dinner of several hundred people.  We visited, ate pinnekjøtt (salted, smoked lamb) and were entertained by a selection of disco, country and Top 40...think "Welcome to the Jungle" sung cabaret-style.  It began with the executive board skit of the ABBA classic "Dancing Queen."

But it didn't really seem Christmas-y to me.  People were dressed up and there were sparkly lights and it was festive.  

But the only place where there was one bit of Christmas was the women's bathroom.  

In the stalls, excellence like WHAM's "Last Christmas" and "Do They Know It's Christmastime" were piped in, at an adequate sound level.  

So every time I had to go to the bathroom (which was often, based on merely being me coupled with also being 7 months pregnant) I'd just stay a while and enjoy at least an entire song.**

(In case you're curious, this is how pregnant I was that night at about 28 weeks.)

But still, in search of the Christmas spirit, I hosted my own anti-Julebord.  Most of my favorite (local)  girlfriends came over and we did not have any salted lamb. 

(Jenny and me) 

We did have wine and cheese and salad and the BigD Classic.***

(Ava, Erin and Alex----And yes, I hate the plastic bottles on the table, too, but I forgot to make salad dressing.)

(Victoria and Karen)

And,  like last year, we've even gotten a tree. 
(This is last year's tree. Husband is working on the lights and we're rocking out to carols courtesy of Frank.) 

We weren't sure if we were going to even bother this year.  We're going out of town for a few days over Christmas. And putting up and taking down a tree is kind of a hassle.  But Husband could tell I was feeling a little Christmas blue, so he organized it all.  

We got our little tree and while he turned on the carols and worked on the lights, I unpacked our box of decorations.

I opened the shells, which were a gift from Jenny, the mother of my high school boyfriend.  She is hilarious and elegant and has the most lovely handwriting ever. It had been years since her son and I were an item, and I had just graduated from college and was on my way to New York. She heard I was home for a bit and called and asked me over.  As I unwrapped the lovely box she said "You'll need this for your first Christmas in your own apartment."  And every single year, I think of her.

Whenever we go somewhere, Husband and I bring home an ornament for our tree, so it's like revisiting a little bit as we decorate. We're missing a weird folk art fish from a weekend in the mountains, but everything else is ready for the tree.

I'm trying to be looser about the placement than the Big D was.  When we were little had a specific order of ornaments.  First the birds, then the heavy glass ones, then the balls and so on....And she would sit back on the couch and direct us on where things go.  And even occasionally, we'd catch her, late at night rearranging.  

(No, I don't have weird bangs and a modified mullet.  It's really just the photo.) 

These are our first family ornaments from last year. 

Lillie loves hers.

And our Santas.

And, finally the star.
But really, as much as this Christmas is going to be great and different---we're making our own traditions and our own plans---it is just not the same.  I think it's mainly that I didn't have any Gainesvegas holidays this year.  We had planned on Thanksgiving, but family matters and job things made it all wonky and we ended up on the entire opposite side of the country, which was nice....But no fried turkey...Oh well. 

I want to have Santa to have made Husband a stocking to match all of ours ---- that are, depending on our ages or how long you've been associated with our family, almost four decades old --- red and white with sparkling sequins that my Nana made one of the first holidays after my older brother was born.

I want to turn on a radio station that has switched its format to a 24/7 Christmas music program and perform an interpretive dance with my sister to the Mariah Carey classic "All I Want for Christmas" as we sit in horrendous traffic.

I want to help Bill inject the turkey with cajun-y, butter-y goodness, so it will be perfect and juicy when it comes out of the fryer.

I want to go to the 5pm Candlelight Service so I can finally for certain get the Christmas spirit, somewhere around halfway through the second verse of "Silent Night."

I want  to sneak out with my sister for a secret bloody Mary and a stop by the quickie mart to pick up some extra goodies Santa forgot. 

And the list goes on...

But next year, we'll be there and Santa, hopefully will have remembered to make two stockings, one for Husband and the second for Pickle.

*While I am all for spontaneity, I am most in favor of the kind that comes after making a plan. I like to know what to expect, then am more than happy to deviate from the norm.

**No, I don't think anyone noticed.  And also, no, I don't care if they did.  Everyone here is pregnant all the time, so I'm sure they just ascribed it to pregnant issues or general clumsiness.

***If you've ever eaten at a dinner party I've hosted, you've probably eaten it...It's a homemade Italian pasta sauce of tomatoes, garlic, zuchinni and onions.  It's Big D's homemade goodness and is only better when Husband, Mom or Bill grills out some Dale's marinated flank steak to go along with it. 

Not That Far Away

My sister Claudia is my favorite (non-Husband) person in the world.



She is eight years younger and lives in Gainesvegas, Georgia, which is what I call it because it's not.

This is her ridiculously gorgeous and sweet natured son Jack. He likes to babble and stuff random things into her purse.



We haven't always liked each other.

When she was about nine months old, I hid her in a dirty clothes basket and tried to convince my mother Claudia ran away from home, but it was no big deal. She still had my brother and me.

The Big D did not buy it and eventually Claudia woke up, cried and Mom tracked her down. (Seriously she was fine and asleep on soft towel. No harm done.)

Claudia, for a variety of reasons, was my miniature companion for years.

My mom was dating at about the same time I was, so if there was a choice on who was going to babysit, I usually was on duty.

So instead of canceling my date, when the gentleman in question showed up, I'd just hide her behind the door for a minute and grab both our coats.

Then sweetly inform him that we were so excited to go to a movie, but surely he would understand that it needed to be PG tonight. Amazingly enough, they were always good sports about it. (I used to call it "The Boy Test," if they couldn't be a good sport about the occasional sister tag-along, they didn't last long.)

So Claudia, dressed in her best overalls and pigtails, would head out with us.

Later on, when I was in college Claudia would spend the long January weekend with me in Athens, doing whatever I was doing on those days. We'd go to class, visit beaus, shop, go to Waffle House late night, even fraternity parties.

I always had good friends there who would keep an eye on her, plus she never left my sight. And early on, we practiced what to do if someone offered her a beer or a cigarette..."No thanks I'm trying to quit." Which was hilarious and ridiculous and kept any pressure at bay.

We have several unbreakable family traditions like sneaking away from family gatherings for a pre-Christmas dinner bloody Mary and the annual Santa-Stops-By-the-7/11 break.

She lived with me for a while during the New York years and there has rarely been a time when we haven't talked every single day.

Until now. And both of us were freaking out a little bit about it before Husband and I moved here. We're six hours away and it's often hard to connect.

People even pulled Husband aside and would whisper, "You know, it would be really good if you could figure out a way for the two of them to talk as often as possible."

So he did of course.

We have skype and he gives me his international cell phone whenever I need it. And he hasn't said one word about my occasional international use of my own norwegian phone.

But no system is perfect, so it's the second best thing to know that somewhere on the other side of the world is a green star just like my red one.