Because I just couldn't leave well enough alone

After 3 months of looking at the walls in Jackson's room, I've decided that I have to paint. So...the process of paint selection begins. Hopefully I'll have something selected before he's in college.

Sir John Soane's Museum

I started collecting rocks as souvenirs when I studied in Europe in my third year of Architecture School. We had a free week and Rebecca and I were yearning to hear someone speak some form of English so we went to England and Scotland.  After a trip to Canterbury, we stopped near Dover to see the famous White Cliffs and I was surprised to see the beaches were composed entirely of rocks Having only seen the beautiful powder-white sand from beaches on the Gulf, I was completely amazed and took some of the rocks with me. It turned out to be a great souvenir so I did it a few other places that had cool looking rocks. I've amassed a collection and was starting to think I should display them in some way. I found these glass apothecary jars and added the labels so they seem like specimens. It reminded me of Sir John Soane's Museum, which I visited on that same trip to Europe.

Dead Sea Creatures and other Beach Finds

This is some of our collection of pretty rocks and sand dollars from our many trips to Fort Funston on the weekends.  It is a dog-friendly beach so we take Archie there as much as we possibly can.  And he inevitably finds some dead sea creature on the beach and rolls around in it.  It's been forcing us to keep up with regular baths so it does have a fringe benefit for us.  We were almost to the end of our walk down the beach and were foolishly thinking he wouldn't find anything dead but, he did.  And he rolled around in it for a good 45 seconds.  When we went a few weeks ago there was a huge dead sea lion that had washed up on the beach.  THANK GOD he didn't see it or we would have never gotten the stink off of him.   Andy and I managed to distract him as we passed, which is not easy to do with a dog that has absolutely no interest in retrieving things.  We were both picturing Archie running up to the sea lion and partially re-enacting the beached-whale scene from the Reno911! movie with the rest of the dogs at the beach..  Guh...oh wait let's think about pretty beach things instead of the title of this post.
Well, the tide was in this time so we didn't see any pretty rocks or sand dollars.  But we did see this.

I know it's completely juvenile toilet humor but I just couldn't resist taking it home and photographing it.  Unfortunately, I forgot to move it from the back of the car away from Archie so he gave the, uh, right cone a chewing before I could photograph it.  It was a pristine example of what I like to call an organic dildo-so San Francisco.

The Hunter

Archie likes to sneak up on his dog food.

I'm Spicy!

Behold my new spice rack! It is a lovely celebration of my anal retentiveness. All rows carefully arranged, all the spices alphabetized. Take a good long look....this is my last delusional grasp at having an adult household.  Once Jax is completely mobile it will either be destroyed or moved up a couple feet out of his reach and possibly mine as a result. I'm enjoying these last few months of freedom before everything has to be 4 feet off the ground. As I made all the labels and moved the spices into their rightful place and neat rows, I envisioned a scene, years from now, where I was ONCE AGAIN rearranging these spices BACK into alphabetical order because either Jax (or future child) or Andy (or the two of them in collusion) have moved them around just to screw with my head.  It gets me all riled up just thinking about it.



This setup is from IKEA in one of my many many trips with my domestic partner-in-crime, Jamie.  The red sheet metal piece was originally intended to be a bulletin board with magnets.  The jars are being used as intended.  I did my research before choosing the IKEA jars.  I looked at the ones from Bed Bath and Beyatch but they were a tiny bit more expensive and too small to hold an entire spice jar, meaning you have to throw out half of the expensive spice you just bought or store the jar in a cabinet, COMPLETELY DEFEATING THE PURPOSE!  Or as my twenty-something nerd friends would say..FAIL.    Just the thought of that makes me throw up a little in my mouth. I cannot STAND designs that are not thought through.  That is what design is about.  Identifying and Solving problems in the best possible way, considering not JUST aesthetics but also function.  Is that so hard?

Pumpkin Spice Muffins

A little recipe I worked up for a pot luck brunch at our house to introduce some folks to Jax...

Pumpkin Spice Muffins

Dry Ingredients:
3 cups AP Flour
1 tsp Baking Soda
1 tsp Salt
1 1/2 tsp Cinnamon
1 tsp Ginger
1/4 tsp Cloves
1/4 tsp Nutmeg
1 1/2 cups Granulated Sugar
1/2 cup Brown Sugar
Wet Ingredients:
2 cups Canned pumpkin (or one small can)
4 eggs, beaten
1 cup vegetable oil (can substitute applesauce)
1/4 cup molasses

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Place all dry Ingredients in mixing bowl with whisk attachment and combine.  Remove whisk attachmentand add all wet ingredients.  Switch to paddle attachment and mix together on low until ingredients are combined.
If not using paper liners, spray muffin tin with a cooking spray with Flour.  Using ice cream scoop, fill muffin cups completely to get a nice muffin top (like the one hanging over your jeans).  Bake for 20 minutes at 350.  Makes 18 small size muffins.  I'm guessing it makes a dozen of the large muffins.

Time IS on your side

I've never been particularly good at keeping track of time or being on time or well, anything to do with time other than buying watches.  And I mean NEVER.  I was late for carpool in elementary school.  Not sure if I was late to kindergarten...my mom will have to weigh in on that.  I was even late coming out of the womb-something like 3 weeks late.  Now, my friends, aren't you glad I've narrowed that down to 10-15 minutes over the years?

So, now that I have a baby and they are ALL about schedules, I needed help with this time thing.  When did he last eat?  Uh, I don't know.  10 minutes ago?  Or was it 3 hours?  Shit!  I knew I should have written that down.  So, here comes my lifesaver...the Itzbeen timer. 

It has 4 different timers-diaper, feeding, naps and a miscellaneous one, which is great for those first couple of weeks when you are in major pain and can't remember when you took your last Vicodin without a nurse coming in and handing it to you.  I don't know about you but I always take drugs when they are handed to me and seldom remember to do drugs myself.  Puff Puff Pass?  Sure, I can do that.  But, I digress.  What was I saying?  Oh yeah...time and remembering it and stuff.  The Itzbeen timer not only tells you how long it's been (get it?  Itzbeen...It's been...clever, huh?) since you changed or fed your precious honey pie but if you prefer to be told when to do something, it has an alarm mode as well.  I highly recommend getting this BEFORE the baby is born because you will need it from day one.  I got mine at Giggle here in San Francisco but I saw it at amazon.com and in Target as well.

Practice Makes Perfect

French Vanilla Cake with Fresh Raspberry Filling and Almond Buttercream Frosting.    Needs some work aesthetically but it sure tasted good.  Let's call this a BEFORE picture.

Why I love my dog

At the risk of this sounding like a 5th grade creative writing project....this is why Archie is the most awesomest, smartest dog EVER.
Jax was fussy this evening, as happens probably 3 nights a week.  I was pacing around, trying not to hover over Andy as he tried to comfort him.  (Not because he wasn't doing it right, just because I get anxious when Jax is crying and I'm not doing anything about it)  Archie was pacing right along with me, trying to help out.  So, we figure out he's not just having trouble going to sleep and he needs a little food.  I sit down to feed him and Andy says, "OK, well me and Archie are going to go downstairs and change clothes."  and heads out of the room and downstairs.  Archie starts to go, hesitates...then looks back at me.  I say, "We're OK, pooch.   Go get him!"  Archie barrels out of the room and down the stairs, happy to be released from duty.

I love that dog so much.  He is adjusting to the new pack member swimmingly.

European Baby Bucket

We received a European Baby Tub a couple weeks ago from my oldest friend, Heather Crocker.
OK, it's a bucket. However, it is a specially designed bucket that keeps the baby safe warm and surrounded by water, the thing that we adults all love about taking baths and showers. Shouldn't babies have that, too? Baby rights NOW!

Environmental note: It is recyclable, non-toxic, and free of BPA, PVC and phthalates.

The Jacksons...

Looks like I've gotten my creativity back. I have all these projects in my head, with plans for cakes, knitted stuffed animals, and artwork for Jax's room in addition to getting the back yard so it is not only habitable but enjoyable...photos will be posted when I actually complete something. It's just so nice to have my brain back to be able to use it for me and not work. These new found hobbies are yet more evidence that with each day that goes by I am more and more like my dad. Oh boy did he have his hobbies - woodworking, fly tying, gardening. But, to paraphrase my mom, he enjoyed reading about and buying the stuff for the hobbies more than finishing them. So, let's hope I can complete these projects all the way to the end before moving on to something else. Not such a bad thing to be like my dad. He was mellow but definitely could get his dander up about things. I miss him most during football season. I watched the Auburn vs. Tennessee game Saturday night and I could just hear him yelling at the TV with every play. I even found myself rooting for Tennessee before I remembered who they were playing. Hey, wait a minute...WAR DAMN EAGLE! Beat those hillbilly Vols! He taught me all the rules and ref signals and I even learned from him how to spot the penalty before it was officially called. That impressed many a guy in a sports bar in Chicago. I guess all the southern boys were used to girls that knew football. Funny that I ended up with the guy that hates sports and is thoroughly unimpressed with my knowledge of college football. Actually "hates" is too strong a word. That would indicate some level of emotion about sports - Andy is actually apathetic about sports. The only time he cares about sports is when I am watching a sporting event on TV and he wants to watch something else.
Speaking of Jacksons...Jax has had a couple of milestones! Jax slept almost 8 hours straight Sunday night. Didn't have a full repeat last night but he did go right to sleep at 7:30 and slept until midnight, instead of his usual fussing every 20 minutes for 3 hours. He's also starting to get some better motor skills. He's figured out how to use his head and his fist to put the pipe (the Bakun name for pacifier, funny considering his namesake smoked a pipe) back in his mouth. And this morning he rolled over from his back on to his side. GO JAX GO!!
Oh, and a third Jackson comes to mind. I have a new euphemism - "Tito's crying" now means it's time to feed the baby. Thanks to dooce for this post, I get a little giggle during feeding time.