Thursday night is the only night of the week Sebastian has off from school and work these days, so my mother-in-law, Alexandra, has very kindly agreed to a standing evening of babysitting so we can have a date each Thursday.  Having these few hours alone together, reliably each week, is so good for us -- good for having real conversations, for dreaming, for exploring, for connecting to the greater world of arts and culture that was so much a part of our lives before Pan.  And this week, it was good for planning a special day coming up for that special little critter we are so lucky to call our baby.

I never thought I would get super into birthday bashes, as I feel the true and deeper celebration of the life can get sadly lost in the hullabaloo.  But after the year that we have had together, this first year as a family, I feel as though we need some celebration.  We need to honor every thing we've been through together, all of the changes, all of the growth -- not only Pan's, but ours as parents, too.  And we need to share this celebration with the people who have been there right alongside us throughout it all.

So, there is party planning a-foot!  We don't have too much time 'til the big day -- November 18.  Its crazy to think how incredibly (and often painfully) slow time passed those first months of Pan's life -- and now it goes so so fast.  Last night we worked on the invitations (well, Sebastian did.  He's got something totally awesome in store for these, and I'll definitely share when they're finished) and talked through a special story we are creating for Pan, that will be made up into a cloth book.  

Since I'm pretty sure the little guy thinks the computer is just an amusing and clicky thing to bang on, there isn't much worry about any "surprises" being ruined for him on here -- so, I'll try and share the projects we have in mind as they are made. 

November just became one of my most favorite months of the year...

+Chelsea   

For swaddling...

For keeping warm...

For loving a new baby...

+Chelsea

I've been thinking a lot on what exactly it is about Autumn that I love so much, that makes the world feel so possible.

Traditionally, feelings hope and renewal are associated with the upshoots and buds of the Spring season.

The majority of my life-thus-far, I've started school each fall.  For me, the new school year held so much opportunity for change -- and I've noticed (with Sebastian's close observation, as well) that I greatly thrive on change.  If something feels wrong to me, I tend to get sucked down into it until I must make some drastic change in my immediate world (moving four times in less than a year?  uh huh).  Only with this external change can I move forward, re-energized and with hope in my world again. 

Yet, even without a new school year beginning, I've still experienced this revitalization in the Fall. 

I think, maybe, its the outdoors dying.  It is a slow and graceful death, a final flash of color and brilliance before fading for the Winter's chill. 

It is accepting this death as part of the greater movement of time, as the stimulation behind change, that the thing must end before the new thing can begin.  The crispness in the air that first freezes and then kills the green-loaded branches and lawns sets also into our bones, and we must move to propel ourselves into what will come. 

We must reinvent our lives a little bit to make room for what is to come. 

+Chelsea

I finished this lovely in 5 days, all the way back in August.  August feels positively ages ago.  I adore the pattern and the way the yarn knit up in it.  I never got around to photographing it, though, because I had a hard time figuring out just how to wear it.  It seems to be that the way to wear the "shawlette" is more wrapped like a scarf, but my two-skein version was an awkward size for this, or maybe I just don't do the shawl-wrapped-as-scarf style very well.  And I had been putting off the idea of wearing it as a traditional shawl draped over my shoulders.  But it turns out, this is just the way to wear it. 

It was just the right length for it -- not too long that the front ends got in the way of what I was doing, and not so short as to look ridiculous.

And yesterday ending up being just the right day for shawl wearing.  Warm enough that we didn't need the heat on, yet with a crispness that made the warmth of wool at my shoulders just the right thing.  I was actually quite surprised at how warming shawls actually are.

The Details:

• Mara, by Madelinetosh.
• Madelinetosh Tosh Worsted in Fox Glove, 2 skeins (from the Magnolia Society)
• Started August 1 and finished August 6
• I knit this pretty much straight-up, following the pattern exactly except for using just 2 skeins of yarn rather than the called-for 3.  And I used those two skeins all the way up.
  

We're in weekend mode here, as Sebastian's mornings off are currently on Sunday and Monday -- and we are absorbing every last minute of them together.  We just finished a rather enormous breakfast (fried potatoes, eggs and pear millet porridge with gingerbread crumble, oh wow) and the fellas are taking a nap.  The sun is shiny today and I'm thinking a good walk will be on the agenda.  But for now, its back to the knitting needles and the John Cheever story collection I've been listening to on tape...

+Chelsea 

30 weeks

May Allah give me a true friend,

    Whether he's small or big,

Lying in the womb or sucking at

    My breast...

When he comes forth we'll be

    Friends.

Allah, give me a true friend,

Whether he's big or small.

--Nigerian Song

+Chelsea

Pan Pan the Pirate Man and...

...Seb as Marlon Brando in "The Wild One."

Sebastian's original (brilliant) idea for their Halloween costumes was to dress himself as a parrot and sit Pan the Pirate on his shoulder.  However, despite a late last night effort that involved a lot of neon faux fur, he wasn't satisfied with his parrot costume and decided last minute to go Brando -- a look he does well.  Pan was the perfect staggering, swaggering pirate.  Oh, my fellas.  You can see more of them here.

+Chelsea 

We woke to grey fog, a migraine, a fussy little feller.  I took him to the grocery for a pancake and coffee and by the time we made our way home the clouds had sped out of the way and the sun was breaking through.  We're trying to keep an open mind as to what tricks and treats the day may hold, as Sebastian has a full day of work (7:30 - 3 at one job, 4 - 10 at the other), I think it will be a good one.

+Chelsea

This is going to be a very knit-heavy week of posting.  The needles have just been very busy.  Its so nice to see the actual physical results of your labor, just piling up in your lap.  All of the baby snuggles and goodness are a good sign of effort going rewarded, too.  It is just remarkable the difference in the way Pan and I interact now.  Its not like we had no bond before, but it was really, really rough for a while there after my surgery.  He had to wean, cold turkey, and there were several weeks there where I couldn't pick him up, couldn't hold him.  But we're making up for lost time. 

Oh man, I totally didn't see this post going there.  Back to the knitting...

I know that not everyone who reads this blog is a knitter, so this may not quite click for you, but to all my knittahs out there who can feel it, have you used the tubular cast-on?  I think I am in love.  I usually am annoyed by patterns that call for special fancy cast-on methods that I have to learn before I can get started -- but this one is different.  Its so beautiful.  And stretchy.  And you get to CUT YOUR KNITTING UP for this big reveal of a very tidy-looking edge.  I want to use this cast-on method for everything.  Which means I can now only knit things that move directly into 1x1 ribbing after casting-on.  

This yarn is called "Mansfield's Garden Party" (which is the best name ever and this yarn totally lives up to it.  I read Mansfield for the first time in a performance studies class in college and just fell in love.  My professor wore oversized sunglasses and silk scarves to class and had this divine old-school manner of gushing over literature.   I've been wanting to do an performance adaptation of the story ever since reading it, and now I kind of sort of am?).  It will be joining the "Vintage Frame" (from the September shipment of Magnolia Society) photographed above very soon to make a little capped-sleeve sweater as a Christmas gifty (that is a ravelry link, so if the recipient is reading, she can read no further!  ha!). 

This post went every which way, didn't it?  But really it was about knitting.  And works in progress.  Tomorrow, I think, will bring another knitting post, this time one of the finished object kind. 

Oh yes I did finish a project. 

+Chelsea  

Pretty much, it falls everywhere.  On the windowsill because the Pan-baby can't reach it there.  Entangled in my chucks because the Pan-baby did reach it (there is nothing like being irreverent with luxe silky yarn).  In the bag because the bag is big enough to hold it. 

I'm a bit nutty with how many things I have going just now -- and how silly I am about actually completing them before starting new'uns.  But the gift-giving season feels loomingly close and I just want to be ready for it this year.  Last year, my little sister (my family draws names for the christmas gift exchange as there are seven of us kids... I guess I'm not really a kid anymore...) didn't get her gift until February.  That is a long time to wait when you are 10 years old.  With a bit of luck -- and consistent nap times for the babe-- that won't happen this year.  And really, who has time to actually put the knitting away?  No, its best left out at easy reach, ready to pick up just where you left off when you've got free hands in that rare free moment... 

Is anyone else already feeling this crunch?  At least I am organized on ravelry...

+Chelsea

*Somewhere in the 28-29 weeks zone.

29th Week

To fan the spark of thinking into flame
 By my own strong endeavor,
 To read life's inner meaning
 Out of the cosmic spirit's fount of strength:
 This is my summer heritage,
 My autumn solace, and my winter hope.

--Rudolf Steiner, from Calendar of the Soul

We had another ultrasound this week, and so far so good.  The mass hasn't grown significantly, though it is displacing the heart slightly.  The hope is that as the babe grows, the mass will not and the heart can move back to where it is supposed to be.  Right now the mass isn't distressing the heart at all, so we'll just wait and watch and see...

+Chelsea