Where to Begin?

Gee, it's been awhile. Those cold snaps are a surefire thing for keeping me out of the blog world. There are major benefits though--daily naps with Anja! I'd like to say that the benefits are getting a lot of housework done, or catching up on [insert productive activity here] but the truth is, I've been sleeping for the majority of her naps lately, all snuggled up in bed with her like a couple of puppies, and it's been wonderful. I keep thinking that it'll be something to get used to once the new one comes, not having the luxury of a 2-hour nap every afternoon... but then I remember that I won't be pregnant anymore either, which might be motivation enough to keep me going through a whole day without a nap!

I have been somewhat productive--I've started knitting again! Not only that, but I bought a One-Skein Wonders book on Sunday and it looks like just the thing to teach me new techniques without being too committal. One skein isn't much to rip out and start over! One skein isn't much to waste on something ugly! I've already started one project and another one is a little bag that I'm excited to make because it specifically works with Noro yarn, and I got two unmatching balls of that for Christmas! It's also felted, which is cool, because I've never felted anything before and I bet the Noro will look really cool.

In other news, we had a nice weekend. On Saturday Anja took a nice long nap in the afternoon and when she woke up Martin's mom came over and watched her while Martin and I went out for a late lunch! It was so much fun! We went to the Brew Pub and had Scotch Eggs and Cheddar Ale Soup, and each had a rootbeer. We had recently cashed in our change jar and came out with roughly $60, so that was a fun way to spend some of that extra cash. After lunch we were going to go over to the Art Museum and look at one of their exhibits--Martin has a photo entered in it--but when we got there there looked to be some kind of opening or something going on, so we didn't even go in. Turns out, it was the opening for that exhibit! Haha, we are a couple of shy nerds. We still hadn't heard that Anja was dead or melting down, so we took a little more time and ran over to Vienna for coffee. We didn't stay because the place was PACKED and there were no empty tables, but we did stop to talk with our friends Turgay and Charlie, although mostly it was Turgay and Martin talking about war books. When we got home, Anja had had a wonderful time with her grandmother, reading books and playing with blocks and looking through the Schleich catalogue (which we look through over and over again every day now!) What a relief! This leaving her business is getting easier and easier. I'm glad she does so well without us. On Saturday night I stayed home with the sleeping Anja while Martin hung out with our friend Matt. He picked up a pizza on the way home and we ate pizza and played Bananagrams. It was great!

Sunday we slept in and went to the 10:00 mass at St. Ann's. When Anja woke up from her nap we met up with Martin's brother, Tony at Barnes & Noble. That's when I picked up my knitting book. We were planning to get coffee at the cafe there, but this must've been the weekend for coffee because again, there were no free tables! We walked over to Panera at the mall instead, and had coffee and pastries.

Anja still seems to be teething. Or something. She still chews on her hands all the time and wants to be held a lot, especially when I'm making dinner. I've started wearing her in the Ergo on my back while I make dinner. She LOVES it. I love the Ergo because the hip strap rides below my baby bump--but I must be a sight to see with a baby in the front and a baby in the back! Haha. One of these nights I'll try to remember to have Martin take a picture. Last night she ran a slight fever in the night. It had lessened when we woke up and by naptime it was completely gone. Isn't that a sign of teething? I think my sister told me that once... anyway. She's not quite herself, but she doesn't seem to be actually SICK, just uncomfortable somehow. We'll see how tonight goes.

We were so hoping that Martin would have a snow day today. Instead, his is one of two Ivy Techs in the state that didn't close. BUMMER. It would've been so fun and I had planned to make popovers for breakfast if he'd gotten to stay home.

We've finally decided how we're going to get the back room into working order again. Unfortunately, it comes at the cost of our little Book Nook upstairs, but I think that it'll all be okay in the end. We're planning to move all our books downstairs to the back room and set up our library there, arrange the small living area as it was, although hopefully with the addition of an area rug, then take our dressers up to the Book Nook and make that kind of an extension of our bedroom. I think it'll end up being really nice. Now we just have to get moving and get it done!

I think Anja might have woken up... she went down pretty early for her nap, so I wouldn't be surprised!