Breastfeeding (again)

So, I have some serious mixed feelings about this article.

I'm a firm believer in the fact that women and babies should be able/have the right to nurse in public. I nursed Bee in public, and plan on nursing Baby Boy (who needs a blog name) in public. I got lots of filthy looks in airports and in the BYU library, even if/when I did use a blanket to cover up. (Besides a blanket, I was never a very exposed nurser anyway...I'm not comfortable with the fact that a significant portion of the male population will sexualize/objectify me when I nurse in public, despite the complete innocence of my intentions)

Anyway. The thing that has caused some mixed feelings for me is that I support Facebook in its attempt to get rid of pornographic images from it's site....and there has to be a line somewhere. So the "no nipple" rule seems like a reasonable starting point. It's hard to make exceptions....I mean, saying that a baby in the picture makes it okay to show more breast just leaves room for people to exploit children in their pornographic production.

The part of the article that has me totally hacked off is the last paragraph. Bleargh.

Disaster

I had intended to write a good post about going to midnight mass at my Gran's parish today. I love to go on Christmas Eve and listen to the music beforehand, and feel like I'm doing something worshipful on Christmas. (Since our church has a rather interesting lack of an actual Christmas service, unless Christmas falls on a Sunday).

Instead, I'm going to write about how it's not a good idea for me to cut BeeBoo's hair. She had asked me to cut her hair ever since she saw one of her little friends getting a haircut in the kitchen of her house. So I said I would. My plan was just to trim a little off the back and even it up a little, since I did her last haircut, there were some long spots. Well, she's not nearly as good at being still as she was six months ago, and through a combination of me trying to slice a section before she moved, and her moving anyway, her hair is now in a (though cute) pretty short little bob. Oh well. It'll grow. I told Ben that his job, next time I try this, is to remind me to take her to someone who knows what they're doing!

On a slightly better note, I ventured out into the after Christmas MESS with my Kohl's gift card in hand, and got about $75 worth of maternity tops for $7.15 of my own input. I'm feeling pretty set at the moment. :-)

Projects

So, in light of the previous posts and the fact that I got mass quantities of gift cards for the fabric stores on Saturday (my mom's fam did Christmas early this year 'cause we're planning to spend Christmas morning with my dad this year), I bought more fabric than I know quite what to do with, all of it with jungle animals and blues and greens.

Good thing I know how to (and like to) sew, otherwise I'd be going nuts with nothing to do over break! Funny how a few days of freedom can so quickly recompose me. :-)

And it's a....

BOY!!! Can you believe it?

I'm totally floored and excited. Don't know what I'm gonna do with one, but can't wait to give it a shot!

When we took Bee with us to "look at the baby on a special computer" and told her it was a boy, she said "No it's not, it's a girl!" I think it might take a while to adjust. :-)

BeeBoo's "Frosty the Snowman"

I love that she fills in gaps with her vocabulary. This is what she sings lately:
Frosty the snowman
what a happy, Charlie soul,
with a pipe and button nose,
with two eyes,
and made out of the cold!

It's pretty great. I don't know how I used to get through writing papers with no relief from my live-in entertainment.

Ultrasound on Thursday! If I can just turn my papers in before then...

I'm getting kind of attached to "Jacob" if it's a boy...except it TOPPED the SS name index last year! I hate that...

Sub-four minute mile

So we just watched a movie about Roger Bannister. (It was kind of a bummer that I knew going in that he was the first man to break 4 minutes for a mile....killed the suspense a little bit) I think he's a really interesting guy....when they interviewed him after he broke the 4 minute barrier, he thanked his coaches and his pace runners and then said he felt lucky to have done it. I don't think I've ever seen an athlete that humble about anything, and this was a big deal!

Anyway, the point of this post is that no woman has ever done it. (Bannister broke it in 1954 on BeeBoo's birthday). I never ran anything close to that fast (my fastest mile was 5:50...not stellar at all). But at this point in the semester, there's definitely a part of me that wants to throw school out the window and start training for distance running.

Also, in looking for info on women approaching 4 minutes for a mile, I read that there was a woman who ran 100K at a 6:46 mile pace. That's under a seven minute mile consistently for over 60 miles. I'm wondering if it's true or just some internet urban legend.

End of semester blues

It happens EVERY SINGLE SEMESTER. At this point every cycle, I ask myself why on earth I'm still in school when there are so many things that are more appealing to me to be doing. And yet here I stay. There's something comfortable about the stress and the routine...at least I know I can do it, and do it pretty well.

The "write 15 pages over Thanksgiving" plan went about how I imagined it would. But I think I'll still be okay. I mapped out a plan for finishing before all the appropriate deadlines, and my worst writing day will be 10 pages on a Saturday. That's life, I guess. At least I have a start, though. That's always the hard thing for me. Sort of the same when I try to clean the house...I hate the idea of it, but once I get going I burn through it pretty quickly.

I wonder how many other graduate students who read Hannah Arendt's "The Human Condition" think of her labor/work distinction in the same way I do. In a gross over-simplification, she basically says that work produces some impact or lasting remnant, while labor is almost immediately consumed. It made me wonder about something like building a home or raising a child...I'm hoping BeeBoo will grow up to be a good, productive member of society, and find a way to contribute to the lives of those around her. That, for me, represents work. But it's made up of all of these tasks that are endless...as soon as I finish them, they're undone and need done again (cooking dinner, doing the laundry, dealing with the cloth diaper routine, cleaning the house). So how do we deal with the idea that in at least some instances, work is made up of labor? For me, that sort of makes the distinction fuzzy.

Amusing Bee moment of the day: I always worry because she doesn't eat. Ever. So today I asked "How do you live on six calories a day?!?!" She looked up at me and very sweetly said "Mommy, I don't live on calories!"

Loved it.