TGIF

I stayed up a little later than I should have last night.  A friend was over to play guitar with Mr. Lina, they lost track of time and I started laundry a little later than I should have.  Net-net, it's been a slow morning.  At least I'm working in an office closest to home so leaving late wasn't a problem.

That said, I've felt like I'm in a cloud today and two pregnancy announcements is not helping me find my work mojo.  Both are having their second kid and I've been trying longer than when they had their first.  One of them didn't even know her husband when I had my first IVF.  I am happy for them, they are both great women and I'm sure they are great moms, but it sucks at the same time.

But I am going to shake that off and do some actual work once I hit post, that's the deal with myself.  Sulk time is on pause until the cider/wine appears at home.

We will be hosting Coco Love Alcorn at the end of the month so we're starting to do some promotion for her.  We saw her at Summerfolk a couple of years ago, her CD Play is great, but I was looking for some video footage to share.  I have to warn you, this song has become a bit addictive, I've listened to it 5 times in 2 days, I have had it stuck in my head for hours.  My first email to Mr. Lina today was "I like boys."  I don't know how geeky the men in your life are, but Coco is going to be a big hit amongst our friends.  As Mr. Lina said in his promotion, "she's one of us".  I bring you the folk-rap (never thought you'd hear that did you?) styling of Coco Love Alcorn...  "Intellectual Boys"

A to Z of Seraphinalina

I am feeling a bit mentally drained today.  It's been a pretty focused workday that just sucked all the thought out of me.  I was off to a client I see every 2-3 weeks and there is a Fabricland with a little detour, and yes, I succumbed to temptation.  One knit, one remnant of microfibre and 3m of faux suede later...

But feeling as tired as I am at the moment, I'm going to steal from Funnygrrl  and be a lazy blogger today.

Age - 36

Bed - Double, like it, but it's getting up there in years.  I really don't care much about what my bedroom looks like, I don't spent much time there.

Chore you hate - I'm not much of a chore person.  Probably washing dishes.

Dogs - more of a cat person but allergies will keep anything with fur out of my home.  I like breathing without medication.

Essential start to my day - Breakfast.  I don't function well without food.  Not much of a coffee person.

Favourite colour - Purple.

Gold or silver - Silver.  My wedding rings are titanium and my engagement stone is a clear sapphire, my birthstone.  I like my jewellry to have significance.  I don't have my ears pierced, but neither does my mom (nor her mother/grandmothers) so if I am wearing earrings, it's likely a hand me down from them.



http://www.titaniumrings.com/titanium-engagement-rings/solitaire-stone-settings/etoile-round.html

 Height - 5' and a half inch. 

Instruments you play - Clarinet in high school, but I'd rather support music than play.

Job title - Senior Consumer Analyst.

Kids - Not yet.

Live - Ontario, Canada.  I've always lived relatively close to Toronto without ever living in Toronto.

Mothers name - Marilyn.  I went through a phase where I figured out that her middle name (Margaret) was also her mothers name and both of her grandmothers name and somehow it's not in my name at all.  I named all my dolls Margaret and if I could have changed my name when I was 10, I would have had a second middle name of Margaret.

Nicknames - not many really.  Seraphinalina is something I gave myself.  Hmm...  nope, can't think of any. 
Edit:  I did think of a few, my dad calls me Sweetie (even on my Christmas presents if it's from him), Mr. Lina calls me Snuggles and various forms of the word snuggle, like snugglebum.

Overnight hospital stays - No.  I've spent time at the hospital for surgery, but not overnight.

Pet Peeves - Pet peeves need to be petty and I just can't get too worked up about much.  Aggressive drivers I suppose, the kind that weave in and out and scoot up a lane that is going to end just to get 2 cars ahead of where they were.

Quote from a movie - "I'm a girl, I'm a girl, I'm a girl..."  from Some Like it Hot.  Not exactly the deepest of quotes but the first to come to mind.  If you haven't watched this movie yet, you really should. 

Right/left handed - Right handed, my mother is a lefty so sometimes I arrange things a bit backwards because it "seems" right.

Siblings - Two younger brothers, two sister in laws and one brother in law.

Time you wake up - Alarm goes off at 6:30, if I'm in the shower by 7 we're doing well.  Without a schedule, I'd probably wake up around 8.

Underwear - Varies, I like cheeky lace panties that I make, but I also have more practical cotton panties.

Vegetable you hate - Not much, I am allergic to carrots, celery and mustard.  If it doesn't give me hives, I'm pretty much okay with it.

What makes you late?  - Sleeping in.  I try to be punctual, I'm usually running a couple of minutes behind from thinking it will take less time to get somewhere than it will.

X-Rays - Dentist, baby toe when I cracked it when I was 14, my uterus (that freaking sucked, do not recommend that test)

Yummy food you make - Lots, I like to feed people.  I like doing appetizers best, bean dips, hummus, artichoke dip, cream puffs with savoury fillings, foccacia, brie en croute...

Zoo animal - It's been a few years now since I was last at the zoo.  Maybe the penguins, but mostly because they make me think of  "And Tango Makes Three" a great story about how parenting isn't about birth.

Time to breathe

Things are chugging along a little better this week.  Not to say it's perfect, but...

• I haven't cried at work
• I have been productive yesterday and today
• I have taken all of my medications and vitamins
• I am feeling better now at the end of the day than I did leaving the house

So all in all, not too shabby.

Halloween was lots of fun.  We had 67 kids at the door this year, which is about average for us.  Last year was not a good year so I'm glad to see it was an anomaly rather than a declining trend.  I like handing out treats.  We dressed up in our Saturday costumes again (although I wore comfy red flats).  One little girl, might have been 3, as she was walking up the path she says (quite loudly) "Are you a pirate?" to which Mr Lina said "Yes I am, and are you a fairy?" and then she babbled on about all of her magical powers and how she liked being a magical fairy.  Her two older brothers were Mario and Luigi and didn't say a word.  I bet they don't get too many words in edgewise.  My brothers could probably relate.

Between Halloween and bowling, both nights have been busy.  I have no plans for tonight and Thursday.  A good friend is going to a conference in town and asked to stay with us on Friday.  I am looking forward to seeing her.  I mentioned her son, R,  in my posts about Summerfolk.  She's a good mom-friend, know what I mean?  The age gap is there, our stage of life is so far apart, but I love listening to her perspective.  She makes me think.  Anyhow, she has plans until about 10pm so we won't have a ton of time to chat before bed, but it will be good to catch up and outside of her visit, I don't have plans.  So this is 3 nights where I do have some house cleaning to do, some personal laundry (seriously out of panties), household laundry, but... I don't have to go anywhere.  And laundry doesn't need a lot of babysitting so it will be time for myself. 

I had lunch today with an old friend.  We met through my bowling  league, I suppose 9 years ago now.  Not that long relative to my university friends, but it feels longer.  We just clicked immediately as good friends.  I think because we aren't really part of each others worlds, we've often been good neutral supports for each other.  We don't see each other like we used to.  He's not bowling anymore, he now has 2 kids, moved half an hour away and for quite a while our workplaces were too far apart for our usual lunches.  I was thinking about him at bowling last night and how much I miss him.  I always know I can call him for support, but it's been months since I have reached out to him.  So today I did.  Rather than giving the usual "oh it's good" for the "how's life?" question, I figured I'd be honest.  It turned out he was seeing a client not far from my office this afternoon, lunch worked for both of us and I'm glad it did.  I didn't get to everything, but that's okay, this isn't going to be fixed in an hour, but it also had me realizing my thoughts about it are more organized.  They are coming from a calmer place where I can make rational decisions rather than just being overwhelmed.  I could talk about it without welling up.  It's good. 

So that is how my day started filled with thoughts of not wanting to leave the house, dread walking across the super long parking lot and ended with handing in a project and a smile that isn't entirely forced.  The right friend at the right time.

Social Styles

Tanit-Isis was curious about the social styles I mentioned from my training course last week.  I know my own style well, but I wanted to have my notes to really comment on the other styles.

The quadrants of style are determined by two aspects of your personality.  Relationships on the vertical aspect and how you deal with information on the horizontal.  I summarized it here.

I have described Amiables in my previous post, it's essentially me.  I like to collect information, I'm pretty slow to share unless I'm feeling secure.  I build relationships and it is important for me to keep those relationships.

Analyticals are not as driven by people.  Not to say they don't have friends, but that's not part of their motivation and can seem distant or aloof because of this.  Collecting information, having the absolutely positively RIGHT answer drives them.  These are the people that you ask, "So why did you buy that sewing machine?" and they pull out 17 web sites, 100 product reviews and then a pro/con list for their favourite 8 machines.  And in the end don't buy any of them because maybe they missed something and there is a new model in 2 months that is that much better.

Drivers are, in the wrong situation, the ones that piss me off the easiest.  They want to control situations and if they trust that you did your homework, then cut to the chase and just tell them the 3 top features of the top 2 machines and let them control which to buy.  They can be frustrated by Analyticals and Amiables because we want to share all of the information we patiently collected to show we have the right answer, Drivers just want to make a decision and move on. 

Expressives are motivated by people and relationships.  They want people to like them, they enjoy a little of the spot light, they are outgoing and look like happy people.  When I'm comfortable, I shift a little to Expressive and probably fool a lot of people on first impressions.  Expressives can be bored easily, so collecting a crap ton of information on sewing machines is taking them away from shiny fabric.  They will buy what they see first, possibly whatever their friend has spoken positively about.

So when you put two personality types together you can see how conflict can arise.  I mentioned Drivers have the potential to drive me crazy.  Their firm stated opinion irritates me because there are likely perspectives they aren't considering.  They don't have patience for me needing to consider options so I feel steam rolled by their decisions that involve me.  This just gets my back up and then I go all passive agressive on them because I don't like conflict but I'm not going to do whatever it is they want me to do.  No where in this does is say I can't be a stubborn Amiable.

Everyone probably has a little of two if not three of the styles.  Some people are one style at work and another at home.  As mentioned, in the right situation I get a little Expressive.  I definitely get a little of the analysis paralysis of Analyticals from time to time. 

I posted about the Pay It Forward game a little while ago.  Expressives should want to participate because it gets their name on the spotlight and builds a relationship with me.  Drivers, well, probably don't have the time, particularly since my blog isn't established enough to really help them.  Analyticals (and Amiables for that matter) have had enough time now to process the pros and cons and think about it, however you need a blog to participate and I'm not sure how many Analyticals are bloggers.  Amiables will want to do it to make me feel better.

So what style do you think you are?  Are there situations that make you more one or another?  Or is this all just silly nonsense?

Happy Sunday

Sunday evenings are so good and so sad.  Good because we usually don't have plans and it's quiet.  Sad because well, it's Sunday, the weekend is nearly over.  It has been a good weekend and fairly busy.  Friday night we went to the screening for cast & crew for The Post-Lifers and it went pretty well.  I put on a brave face and had a good time.

Saturday we had some running around to do and with Mr. Lina pushing me along, we got them done.  I managed to buy some prenatal vitamins, not the ones I usually take, but maybe switching to a once a day format would be good since I am not taking the others twice a day.  I did get a little time to sew, Larry the Cat even went hiding for most of today which is very cat like behaviour in a new home.

We did talk a little about how I'm feeling.  Mr. Lina has commented many times over the weekend that I look sad and about ready to cry, which is pretty much how it is when there there aren't people around to fake it for.  The problem is, when I talked about everything, he can't fix it so it felt like it just was another unresolved conversation.  Guys want to fix things.  It's their way.  I said I want to see our therapist again, this is bigger than me and I really didn't feel that much better talking to him.

We spent part of the afternoon digging up old Halloween costumes.  We had a party to go to and neither of us felt the need to find something new.  I had never met the hosts, I knew 3 people at the party, ideal situation to recycle a costume.  Mr. Lina went as a pirate, I decided I wanted to wear a cape I made a few years ago so I was a vampire without the fake teeth.

The cape is Butterick 4030.  This is just far enough off the floor to be safe in heels, sans capelet, with the contrast collar (view B but longer).  I used cheap Halloween satin for it, capes use a metric crapton of fabric.  I remember being a bit surprised by just how much I needed.  It is fully lined in the red satin.  As much as the fabric is cheap, I'm really pleased with how it turned out and I have actually got a lot of use out of it.  Most years I wear it for handing out candy.  It keeps me warm enough while at the front porch and I feel somewhat in costume.  Win-win. 

 

"Modernized"

Original art.

You know your friends are geeky when you dress as a character that existed in a handful of late 60's comics and people peg it.  Now if you picked Captain America, it's pretty easy.  The Black Queen is a shade more obscure.  Jean Grey (aka Phoenix, Marvel Girl, Dark Phoenix) from the X-Men is mind controlled by Mastermind and joins the Hellfire Club.  While mind controlled, she becomes The Black Queen.  I was reading Mr. Lina's books and as soon as I saw her, I thought, THAT is what I want to be for Halloween.  I had a dark denim corset, black bikini bottoms, knee high boots, all I needed was the cape and a red wig.  I was willing to put the time into making a good cape to get the look I wanted.  What kind of cracks me up is in the original art, she's sexy for sure, but not overly naughty.  Her waist is defined and her figure hour glass, but her legs are actually kind of athletic.  Google image The Black Queen at your own risk, it's sadly all about teh cantelope boobies, thongs, whips and impossible anatomy.  Both pictures included here are from http://www.jean-grey.com/tag/black-queen

When 3 days feels like a week.

It's not even over and it's been a long week, bowling then training, house concert, overnight guests...  I'm done and I still have to get through tomorrow.  It is a week of a lot of internal thinking and you all make a good sounding board.  Ready for some therapy?  If not, come back on the weekend, I'm okay with that.

I have been in training yesterday and today.  My manager suggested I take "Consultative Influencing Skills".  It is geared to people who want to influence people they have no direct power over.  For example, I have to make recommendations to my clients, but I have no actual say in their decision making process. 

Part of this has been analyzing personality types.  In this training, people fit into 4 types and likely have a mix of types.  I quite easily recognized I'm "Amiable".  Generally speaking, amiables are high on relationships and more likely to ask/gather information than to tell people what to do.  End result is that I'm the soft squishy type who needs to feel safe in a personal relationship with others before I will do anything risky.  For this reason, I will do a whole lot to avoid conflict.  That isn't all unhealthy, I go a long way to prevent what might become conflict because I just don't want to go there.  I build strong relationships so if we do end up in a conflict, I'll feel safer and you will know how to keep the soft squishy parts of me intact.

Today we spent a couple of hours on how to deal with conflict.  We had to do some silly role playing and the person confronting me is someone I know fairly well at work.  I feel comfortable with her.  And yet I was almost in tears from the play confrontation.  Now that I'm home and safe and thinking about it, I can feel those emotions surfacing again.  I know I don't deal with conflict well, but I'm still surprised how much impact that role play had on me.  I shouldn't feel tears welling up 8 hours later on something that wasn't even real, there were no actual stakes at hand for me. 

This has left me thoughtful.  I know it's work training, but I'm trying to see how this fits into me at work where I'm not happy at the moment, but also at home where I am happy in moments and in my relationship with Mr. Lina.  I do avoid conflict, I know that.  It is in keeping with my style, but also what I grew up with.  The best way to disagree with my mother is to say "That's a fabulous idea, but have you considered..." even if I think she's 8 degrees of bat shit crazy (perhaps particularly when I think she's 8 degrees of bat shit crazy).  She holds grudges, loooong ones because she doesn't resolve anything, even if you ask her, she won't tell you what the actual problem is.  I see that, and much as I want to be like her in many respects, I don't want to live like that.  I tend to take the stance that it's either worth me standing my ground and finding a way to voice my displeasure, or it's not worth a second thought.  And if I chose that this is not the battle to fight, it is my problem to let it go.

All couples disagree, I started to think about my marriage because I feel I manage conflict there well.  Mr. Lina often comes out with statements that you would believe were carved in granite, there was NO WAY there was flexibility in that statement.  It's phrased vehemently and nearly makes me flinch.  Yet I can hear when it's not true.  Or when time will change his perspective, where he will see the grey in a situation he believes to be black and white.  This is particularly true with wanting children.  When he first told me he couldn't have children, I was dumbfounded.  I saw so much in his personality that screamed "SHOULD HAVE KIDS". 
The 6 steps are suppose to be (and I'm paraphrasing here, the sheets are at work not with me):

1. State there is a conflict (this can be, "I got your email, I'd like to discuss the contents" enough to give the heads up I don't agree with all of it and we need to clarify a few points)
2. Ask about the issue, dig down to what the real problem is, it's probably not what they emailed you about.  (good luck doing this with my mom, it could be a while)
3. Reiterate the core issue back to them to show you listened and understand.
4. State your own needs.
5. Ask to work together to find a mutually beneficial workaround, brain storm on how you can both meet your needs.
6. Draw up the plan of action for resolution.

I'm coming to realize, Mr. Lina and I spend months in step two for the big issues in our lives.  I think we spent 9 months in step two just to have him realize he did want kids.  The issue wasn't specifically about having children, it was children with his ex, it was the parenting style of his dad, it was insecurity, nearly anything but simply having a child.  This long timeline works for me because when I start to freak out, I state as much, that I need to step away from the conversation and we come back to it maybe a week later, maybe a month later, but it comes back when I feel safe again.  We don't hold resentment while putting the issue to the side, we know it's coming back and I can't shut up about things I'm pondering.  The funny thing is that our friends see us as the best example of communicators, and not that communication isn't important or part of this, but at the heart, it's me avoiding conflict and taking it in small chunks that I can process.  I never saw it from that perspective before.

Amiable people are essentially motivated by wanting to be safe.  At the core, I feel that.  I have lots of stories from my childhood that exemplify that.  I didn't talk to my kindergarten teacher because I loved everything about kindergarten and I was afraid she wouldn't like me or think I was stupid, so if I didn't say anything it couldn't be the wrong thing.  I did the same thing to my music teacher that I absolutely adored in Grade 6 and 7.  I inadvertently took the risk to talk around her trying out for the school play in Grade 8 and I am still in touch with her now.  Most of my social skills that make me look like the more social extrovert are actually me trying to make everyone else feel safe and comfortable.  I am not like that when I am not safe so first impressions of me aren't always true. 

Right now, I'm feeling overwhelmed with issues that stem from control and change.  I can't change my job because I need some stability while we figure out the whole kid issue.  I can't control getting pregnant or I damn well would be.  Adoption from CAS falls into something I can control because I could pick up the phone tomorrow.  However, once I do it feels a bit like Pandora's box to me and it's going to be a big whoop ass change.  It's also going to mean opening my life and home for others to inspect.  Part of me knows that will go well, part of me is back in kindergarten scared to say the wrong thing.  These are all things that feel like conflict to me.  So what am I doing?  Avoiding anything I can in my life - even silly things like not returning phone calls, forgetting to turn my out of office on, not taking my medication at all yesterday (I did better on that front today)...

I feel pretty wrung out from all this thinking and poking at sore spots.  I believe it's good in the long run, but my goodness is it ever exhausting.  Thanks for listening if you made it all the way down here. 

Happiness disconnect

I'm kind of new to blog posts.  Do you ever write something out and realize, woah, that's waaaay too much?  I did that today.  I'm hoping that after getting out all the specifics that this version strikes a better balance on the issues rather than details.  Granted I write this essentially for myself so even writing out the overly detailed post is theraputic.

I have come to realize I have a happiness issue.  I am happy in moments.  Every day there is something that makes me smile.  A lot of things are going well in our house, my promotion in August, recently paying off debts (which weren't big relative to IVF in the US, but it's a relief), financially we're in a good spot, we're both generally healthy and I have a really solid marriage.  But I also know that something is missing.  I'm not happy in the quiet moments, it's a fake smile for others sometimes, I'm not... fulfilled.

This manifests into not taking care of myself.  I actually hear the words "I don't care" in my head a lot.  I didn't buy more prenatal vitamins last week (and even before I ran out I wasn't taking as many as I should), I forget to take Metformin (I should take 3x/day, I might take 2).  I'm eating crap and my weight is high (not crazy high, but enough) and I say to myself I don't care.  I do a little bit of this at work too, I don't care about other peoples projects, I don't care that they want it today. 
But I do.  Somewhere inside I do care.  When I am happy, it's easy to remember far more medication and vitamins than I am taking now.  When I'm happy and I want to, REALLY want to, I will eat my healthy snacks, watch my portions and lose weight.  We aren't talking about Canada's Biggest Loser here, but I like how I feel and look 6lbs lighter.

And yet I see my hand reaching for a Halloween treat and the words going through my head?  I don't care.

Why don't I care about me?  I know I should.  I know I'm the only person being hurt by some of these choices.  The root of this likely lies somewhere in the lack of control I feel elsewhere in my life.  I can't fix our fertility issues, I can't go forward with adoption quite yet, I am bored at work but because that would upset a lot of dominos in my life the timing doesn't feel right to change that.

This is more than a bubble bath and glass of wine is going to fix.  I'm good with the momentary happy.  I just can't seem to string them together into caring about me.  My head seems to recognize that I can't change a lot of what's going on in my life, I have to change my perspective towards it.  Getting there isn't going to happen by accident.

Anyone else felt like this? 

Stuffy Sewing

Yesterday I had plans.  My mom sells her sewing mostly through craft shows and her etsy site.  I help her every Saturday in November, but I'm a bit spotty with the couple of shows she does in Sept/Oct.  I was planning on going from 9-12.  We were going to visit my sister in law in the hospital (more on that in a minute) and go on to see Samantha Martin play at a bar in Kensington Market area from 4-7.  Plans.

First, I slept in.  Getting up at 10 when the show is at 9 and in order to visit my SIL I'd need to leave at 12 didn't leave enough time to bother driving the 40 minutes to the craft show.

My sister in law (of my older younger brother) has been in the hospital for 3 weeks now.  It took a little while to piece it together, but her problems started with gall stones.  One was passed and blocked her pancreas that caused pancreatitis.  By the time she went to the hospital, the enzymes from her pancreas had backed up and caused all sorts of internal issues.  She will be in the hospital for a while longer, the pancreas is slow to heal and she still can't process enzymes so all of her nutrition is from an IV.  Overall, she is a whole lot better now that the various organs are well on the mend and her gall bladder is in better shape after a scope to take out some stones.  She will have to have it removed, but not until her pancreas is better.  Personally, I don't miss my gall bladder and I'm feeling pretty damn thankful that I never had complications like this when I was having gall stone issues.

I had a lazy morning after sleeping in.  I figured it was time to go and make a get well card before we headed out.  But I didn't feel like it.  I don't really have good "get well" stamps and my sewing room is a disaster.  To do the stamping and embossing properly, I was going to need some elbow room.  And then I saw the Christmas present from my brother and sister in law.

http://www.amazon.com/Bobby-Dazzlers-Make-Your-Misfits/dp/1907030271

 It's a really cute book, aimed at tweens or so.  Most of the suggested materials are recycled clothing, instructions are short and picture filled.  The animals have adorable names and personalities.  On the cover are Gracie the Rabbit, Den the Penguin and Monty the Giraffe.  All patterns are included in the book but you need to photocopy them to enlarge them.  I had done that for a few, but never had the inclination to make one of them until yesterday.

I have a small piece of fun fur my Mom gave me a while ago.  I thought it would look cute as Dumpling the Guinea Pig.  From the book:  "Dumpling is a very shy creature, so you'll have to listen very carefully as his voice is so quiet.  Make sure you do though because he's got some pretty interesting things to say."  The directions are adorable, for Dumpling, they even remind you to be gentle with him because he's not very confident.  I stuffed Dumpling full of love and get well thoughts (and 100% polyester filler I had - go stash go).  Sadly, I put this off so long I didn't have time to take pictures of Dumpling, I sewed him up and we left.

We got to the hospital about the time that Samantha started her set.  My SIL is feeling awake and bored so we stayed for an hour and a half rather than the half hour she was up to last week.  That would have got us to the show in time for the last song.  Mr. Lina was feeling sad and snuggly but unsure why.  We decided that maybe we should go home, order in food and hang out together.

On the drive home, Mr. Lina came to the conclusion that I thought he would, that perhaps there was another chemical pregnancy.  This has been a really heavy period, and that could just be because of that September "What the heck?" period being so light.  Either way, we were both feeling a little sad and needed some hugs.  We watched a little Deadwood, ate some pizza, he ate wings, a little cherry vodka and coke and all was good.  Mr. Lina wanted to prep for Dungeons & Dragons this afternoon, so I toodled off to tidy up and sew.

We talked about Dumpling on the way home.  My SIL was stroking him a lot when we were there, not in a conscious way, but I think having something small that was soft was good.  Mr. Lina said he wanted a little person in our house that I could make more Misfits for.  Perhaps I could make another tonight while he was doing his reading.  So I did.  But it will not be for our small person, it will be for another small person.  A friend of mine and a friend of Mr. Lina's met at our wedding, neither are from Ontario so we fill in some of the family gaps for them.  Because we know both families, they asked us to be next of kin to their daughter.  We have broken many of our baby rules for her, we sometimes hurt when we leave, but it feels good to see her.  She's a year and a half an now she will have her own Dumpling.

Dumpling is ready for bed.

This one is a bit different than the one I made for my SIL.  I was relying on what I had around, so the button nose is not the same, although the eyes are, I have lots of those.  One thing I did differently from the directions is that I sewed the face on before sewing the two pieces together.  It's a heck of a lot easier to sew a button on when you can access the back of the fabric.  It's hard to see here, but there is a pink mouth with two threads of embroidery thread.  The fun fur blocks it but I think it might get a little more noticable as it is loved and the fur compacts a bit.  This one also has a little bit of fabric in the middle, so it had a firmer centre.  I like to think it's a heart.

Dumpling is shy, but he likes having online friends.

All told, Dumpling is a little over an hour start to finish.  Probably an hour and a half for the first one as I was digging for supplies.  I've never sewn with fun fur before.  Not sure I really like having that much fluff flying around.  Dumpling would be a pretty good hand sewing project too because he's so small and not complicated at all.  With them being misfits, errors look intentional rather than mistakes.  This Dumpling has a much smaller right arm than left (his right, not ours), but I'm not going to fuss about that, it gives him character.

Sencha & Turkey

My long overdue Thanksgiving wrap up.  It's going to be short because we're heading out for a house concert (which outgrew the house - it's in a church).  I've got a little time before we eat turkey soup (I finally got up the courage to thaw out some of the bones) and head out.

So first, the turkey.

Gobble gobble.

Here is Mr. Lina carving the bird.  It's freakishly huge.  Look at how wide it is relative to the oven door.  Crazy.  But very tasty.

And then we had our house concert.  As mentioned, Annabelle Chvostek was awesome. 



Myself, Annabelle Chvostek and Mr. Lina


My blouse is yet another Sencha blouse.  There is something kinda funky at the back, but tucked into my denim skirt you wouldn't know and I got quite a few compliments.  I made covered buttons for this version, they turned out well and are actually less annoying than the snapper version.  The fabric is polyester as far as I remember, it took a crease a bit better than I'd expect for polyester.  I am pretty sure I bought that before we lived in this house, I haven't the faintest clue how much I paid for it.  Mr. Lina's first comment was that it was very much me, those are my favourite colours.  In cropping the picture I noticed that I'm wearing my old elastic belt. 

Alright time to go.  We're off to see David Ross MacDonald and The Once.  We hosted Dave in May, he's heading home to Australia soon.  The Once are a trio from Newfoundland, they were on Canada AM this week, I didn't see it myself (not a lot of daytime tv around here).  If I remember right from the Summerfolk program, one of the members has ties to Great Big Sea, but I can't seem to find that on their web site, granted I'm not looking too hard.  Lovely Celtic group, a few original songs, occasionally Lenord Cohen cover.  Given that I have a big soft spot for DRM and I'm just getting to know The Once, I'm picking a YouTube clip from a house concert he gave shortly after we hosted him.  The intro to the song is long, but it's worth the wait to hear his voice.  He's absolutely delightful in person, we're lucky he visits Canada.

Uncooperative bodies

This is going to be a bit of a uterus focused vent, if you aren't up to hearing too much info on my reproductive system, come back tomorrow.  I'll put up some sewing and music and turkey then.

Lately, it's like my body has been playing mind games with me and I'm getting annoyed.  Generally speaking, I don't ovulate.  If you don't ovulate, all cycles are annovulatory and without an egg releasing, they kinda happen when they happen.  Sometimes it's 40 days, sometimes it's 60 days.  When things aren't going well and my weight is high, maybe 100 days.  There are good aspects to this, Proctor & Gamble makes far less money off of me.  I only have to deal with cramps and assorted issues 3-5 times a year.  My lining doesn't build up too heavily so while I get cramps, they weren't all that horrible and Mr. Lina has commented that I don't get PMS that he notices.

I was put on Metformin, a diabetic drug that has a side effect of lowering testosterone levels.  My doctor said it kind of removes the static so messages my brain sends to my ovaries get through.  Whatever, cycles got shorter, around 36-40 days and I did manage to get pregnant so it is doing what it should sometimes.

Getting back to the more recent body betrayal.  Around day 31 I had some spotting.  I was pretty pleased, a normal length cycle.  But then it was just 3 days of spotting mid September, no real day 1 flow so I couldn't be sure I was on a new cycle or not.  I mentioned this when I saw my specialist on Oct 1, he asked if I'd taken a pregnancy test.  I said no, my bra still fit, my breasts are really good indicators when my hcg levels are up.  But when we got home, I did and failed.  Then a week later, my breasts started looking... weird.  I took 4 or 5 pregnancy tests over Thanksgiving weekend failing each and every one.  Mr. Lina and I agreed something was going on with my hormones because these were not normal looking nipples, but I wasn't calling the clinic without a positive test.  Then they went back to being normal.

And now today my period is here, the worst cramps  since my miscarriage.  Looking at a calendar, it's like I had two 31 day cycles, which is something to be happy about.  Thanksgiving would have been around days 18-22, a bit late for ovulating given that my period is here now, but about right for maybe implantation and a couple of days of generating hcg...  Maybe my breasts were right and my hcg levels never got to 25, the clinic considers me pregnant with levels of 5 but the home tests aren't that sensitive and it would have been too soon for HPT.  If I didn't have 3 chemical pregnancies under my belt, I wouldn't think like this, but it's possible.  I'm pretty sure that's going to be the conclusion Mr. Lina draws, he has faith in my nipples as predictors of pregnancies.  They have been right with every other test I've taken. 

Since I started writing, I've since walked to a drug store to find liquid Advil.  Oh how I love liquid Advil.  I have also had lunch.  I am feeling far better. 

Conversations are happening in my house about adoption too.  It's too tender to really chat about it here yet, but Mr. Lina is now wanting to collect information.  I think I started that after the first chemical pregnancy years ago, but not to the point of phoning agencies/Children's Aid.  We talked briefly again while walking around Niagara Falls.  It's hard to see him struggle with this.  It's not so much about adoption, but in saying yes to adoption, it's also getting ready to grieve things we wouldn't experience with a new born and pregnancy.

So I email Mr. Lina that it's Day 1 and cramps suck and he emails me back a link to the video below.  The next email is about the foot ball sized lambies, swans, llama and foal he saw on his drive to work.  Someone has babies on the brain.