A Million Words

To work or not to work, that is the question that plagues me now as I watch Nova sleeping in her car seat, which rocks her back to sleep when she startles.  I feel lucky even to have the choice. As Nova crests the 6-month mark, I am considering whether to get a regular, paid day-job. I would like to get out a little more, have a little more grown-up time, and make some money, but when I run the numbers it just doesn't add up.   It seems like most of my peers in America are compelled to go back to full time work six weeks after their babies are born, or three months later if they're lucky.  Here in Ireland, most wait until six or seven months, about Nova's age now.  The little ones go into daycare at rates that cancel out ordinary wages, but if you're a well-paid professional you come out a little bit ahead financially and, more importantly, stay up to date in your career of choice.  The babies are generally fine, but a whole load of natural parenting options go out the...

This is is a list of the top 106 books that lie unread on people’s shelves, by LibraryThing. I saw it on Helen's blog, and thought I would have a go at it because I actually read a few pages of real book this week, not just drivel on the internet. You have to bold the ones you’ve read of your own accord, italicize the ones you started but didn't finish, and are supposed to underline the ones you had to read for school or university, but I can't figure out how to underline on this so I'm just making a note afterwards. Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell Anna Karenina Crime and Punishment Catch-22 One Hundred Years of Solitude I can't remember if I finished it or not. Wuthering Heights The Silmarillion  Life of Pi : a novel The Name of the Rose Don Quixote Moby Dick Ulysses Madame Bovary The Odyssey Pride and Prejudice Jane Eyre The [A] Tale of Two Cities The Brothers Karamazov Guns, Germs, and Steel War and Peace Vanity Fair The Time Traveler’s Wife The Iliad Emma The...

For the past month and a half, I have been obsessed with cloth diapers.  It started with what I thought was a simple idea:  I would make Nova some training pants, trim cloth diapers which could be pulled down or snapped closed.  I didn't even think about buying them, really, because the ones that were available ran about $15/pair, which seemed like too much.  Besides, I like researching random obscure information. And so it came to pass that I fell through the rabbit hole into the strange and puzzling world of cloth diaper makers, as found on Mothering.com and in the Diaper Sewing Divas group.  Meanwhile, a woman I know here brought it to my attention that some people collect  diapers, and will pay hundreds of dollars  for a single diaper.  The current "hot diapers" are by a group called Good Mamas.  I've seen some, and frankly I don't understand what all the excitement is about.  Sure, they're nice, but not that  nice.   Meanwhile, I was making my own.  I loo...

This week, Nova sat up on her own, rolled back to front, and started babbling. We went out to dinner last night and she tore the restaurant apart.   I haven't been writing much, but I might start again soon.

The truly impressive thing about this wedding, if I do say so myself, is that the party came together on 48 hours' notice -- including ordering a gigantic cake.   We had planned to get married here in December or January, but Nova's late arrival, followed by the usual busyness of Christmas, then Mike's getting stuck in Ireland, fouled up that plan.  Next, we had a date in late March all lined up in Ireland, but the lawyer had given us bad advice regarding the byzantine workings of Ireland's Health Board, which governs civil marriages over there.  They told us that we didn't have the papers in order for a late March wedding, and gave us a date of May 1st.  We were all set for that when the news came in that we had to be back here to deal with a legal issue.  This sudden trip derailed that plan, so we were re-scheduled for June 6th with the bureaucrats at Shantalla.   The issue which had called me back was finally resolved on Wednesday afternoon and Thursday morning, ...

We're getting married today! 

We all made it through immigration, so now I'm back "home."  It's strange being here where everything is so familiar Regarding my previous post, I realized that I am still carrying way more than I need.  We didn't use the spare outfit but I still think it was a good thing to have.  I didn't use the blanket at all -- for the third time in a row.  Airplane blankets work fine, and you don't have to jam them back into the bag at the end of the flight.  I didn't take a towel after all, but I did bring a washcloth and a shawl which was good to put on the changing tables.  Halfway through the flight, I forgot to take the shawl to the toilet with us, so I used the Ergo carrier.  That was much handier.   For the next flight, we'll pack even less.