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May 18, 2006

Two kids

One of the best things about having two kids is getting those moments when we're all cuddled up together, one kid on each shoulder. Often this happens when they're both nursing, which is great when it works. Ethan often reaches out and holds her fist in his hand. It's cute when they're looking into each other's eyes, both nursing.

But it's one of the hardest things, too, when it's NOT working, because Linna's squirming and fussing and scratching me with her little cat claws. She pulls off, milk dribbles everywhere, and then she rubs her face in it trying to get back on. She has to be sort of on top of me, and I think sometimes she's just too tired. Sometimes she spits up on me, as you'd expect. Ethan's a pro at nursing, but he does have lots of teeth and sometimes if the position is wrong I get toothmarks. Toothmarks, scratches, and soggy all over. And when I nurse either one of them, sometimes I can feel myself getting hungrier as they go. Then I'm not so fond of it.

Posted by ktingey at 06:26 PM | Comments (6)

May 17, 2006

Mother's Day

We had a nice Mother's Day. I spent part of the night in Ethan's bed with Linna (Ethan was in the big bed), which sometimes affords me a little more sleep than when we're four-to-a-big-family-bed in our room. In the morning, Ethan and Jeff came in with coffee, a card, and an unexpected present - a jewelry case for my vast collection of fine jewelry. Actually, I had more than I thought - I pretty much filled the thing up. Then Jeff made scones (of course), which we ate outside. It was a gorgeous sunny day, not too hot. We had a picnic at Laurelhurst, on my request, and a little playground time for Ethan, then drove to the Gorge and took a short hike to Latourell Falls. It was a good distance for us - Ethan almost made it the whole way, though I had to carry him in the big sling part of the way back.

I definitely had some moments of missing Mom, of course. I really wanted to be obligated to call my mother on Mother's Day. We used to have brunch together, which Erika and I would make for her and for Gammi. I called Gammi, of course, and got to talk to Erika briefly too. I tried calling Dad and Martha, but they weren't home... had a conversation with Naoko, which was nice, since it's her first Mother's Day as a mother... but none of that made up for the fact that I wanted to call my mother.

Posted by ktingey at 12:38 AM | Comments (6)

May 08, 2006

Healthy, healthy food

So we've been on a healthy food kick the last few days, which we intended to keep up for a few weeks: no coffee (difficult), no alcohol (not so bad), no dairy, no red meat, no baked goods. Last night we had a very tasty salad: spring greens with chicken, scallions, water chestnuts, and tangerines. The dressing was a little vegetable oil, sesame oil, shoyu, cider vinegar, salt, pepper, sugar, and lime juice. Pretty good.

But today I did a little reading and realized that it's a bad idea to give up dairy and reduce meat consumption while I'm nursing. So I'm going back to all that. Not sure how it will work for Jeff, if I'm eating all the stuff he wants to be eating. But today Ethan told me maybe Linna was crying because there wasn't enough nana - I guess he noticed a drop in supply. Not surprising, after 3 days of so many fruits and vegetables, with not enough protein and dairy.

Posted by ktingey at 10:43 PM | Comments (13)