Your Bible on Gay Marriage

Anyone up for a sermon?

I have a feeling that the people who would most benefit from seeing this won't want to take the time to watch it.  But I really, really hope they will.

For those of us who maybe don't need to see it as badly, it's still worth watching for the talking points.  Especially if you find yourself in church a lot.

For those of you who want to immediately dismiss this argument, can you take it as a challenge?  Can your certainty hold up to all sixty-seven minutes of it?  Maybe it can, and I won't lie, that'll make me sad (truly sad -- not being hyperbolic here). But hey, bully for you.  Your beliefs -- at least in your mind -- will have proven to be as watertight as you always thought they were. 

I don't think convictions are worth having unless you're willing to test them -- to periodically question why you believe what you believe.  Truthfully, it's why a few of my convictions fell (and fell hard) once I made the transition into adult life.  I know that's a terrifying possibility for deeply convicted people. But I still believe in things, and I think my beliefs are better for having been honed.

All that said, I think this guy has some incredibly compelling arguments and I really hope that you'll hear him out.



So, that's all for me on my soapbox.  My blog, my prerogative, right?  Still, I promise to keep the religion/political posts few and far between.  Really, y'all should be impressed that I've managed so sit on my hands for this long.

Next week: birds, sewing and lots o' Finley.  Stay tuned.

Wordy

I know I told you that I thought we had an official first word, but I think we have an official official first word now.  A word that sounds distinct, means one thing, is volunteered at the appropriate time and is just in time for allergy season . . .

Sneeze.

(Sounds like "snz.")  He may have started saying "hi" first, but that's too much of a gimme.  Sort of like "mama" and "dada," right?  (If only he would start saying mama and dada.)  But everything else is "guh."  Unless it's plural, and then it's "guh-us," which, conveniently, is the name of his best friend.

We've told Gus's parents that we'll be offended if he doesn't start addressing Finley properly in turn.

And yes, he still gets very animated whenever he sees a "ssssssssss." Shoes and socks are very exciting things when you're one.

A Little on the Top

You wouldn't know it from the way I've been posting here, but I've been slaving over my sewing machine a lot these days.  Well, maybe not so much slaving as having anxiety dreams about slaving away over my machine.  Huh.

See, I think I've gone overboard with the fabric shopping.  Also -- this'll be news to you -- I've gone crazy with pattern shopping too.  I know, I know, the girl who hasn't met a free pattern she didn't like is spending money on them.  By the gross, it would seem.  But guess what?  (insider tip!) don't ever buy any Vogue/McCall's/Butterick pattern at full price.  They're always on sale. 

That brings me to this. The first thing I've attempted since becoming a fabric and pattern hoarding loony.  I bought it because I've never made a shirt.  Also, it looked like it would be an easy introduction because, hey, no inset sleeves. 

Ugh.  Not super easy.

Being the newb that I am, I've discovered that the best way to overcome hurdles is to just keep going.  Plow through!  Take no prisoners!  And this works out for the most part, but, in between that plowing through bit, I've fallen in the habit of taking looooong breaks whenever I get frustrated.  And, in this case, there were many long breaks.

Now that I'm on the other side, I guess I can concede that it's an easy pattern -- Butterick 5610 --  but I'm not convinced that biting the bullet and tackling some honest-to-goodness sleeves would have been much harder.  Add to that that this project required a lot of hand sewing and I'm thinking that it might have been too much effort for what I'm afraid might sort of look like a hospital gown.

If you want to give it a try anyway, I'll tell you that I didn't do any of the topstitching on the neck or sleeves.  And going around the corners of the yoke caused a little swearing.  There's some bunching on the back corners, but hey, miraculously only the back, so I let it slide.  Also, with all that hand stitching of the yoke lining, the pattern nicely finishes half the seams for you, but that leaves the rest of the seams looking pretty shabby in comparison.  It wouldn't be any big thing to do some french seams on the side seams, but I'm not sure exactly how you'd finish the armholes.  Things get tricky up in there.

So, shirt?  Check.  Now that that's over with, I've got about seven other patterns waiting in the wings, a few of which require inset sleeves.  I may revisit this one with my hard-earned knowledge and nicer fabric, but first I've got some men in my life who are desperate for shirts.

A Little off the Top

Personal Leprechaun

Not planned, but yes, he ate green food.

Anyway, Finley's an old hand at the St. Patrick's day thing.

Teeny!  And busting out his Thriller moves. 

Eight-Dollar Doughnut

I should have posted this earlier in the week, but I don't know what really to say about it except that we had an eight-dollar doughnut at brunch on Sunday. 

To be fair, there were actually four doughnuts in the order.  I don't know if it was because they took a long time to get to us, or if it's because I have bad taste in doughnuts, but I wasn't in love with them.  However, my friend pointed out that you can order these at the bar while drinking, so of course I'm going to have to give them another shot. 

Not that cocktails weren't involved at this occasion. 

This was taken at a completely different restaurant. Our brunch turned in to a bit of a brunch crawl (thanks for the invite J-P & M!).

Speaking of brunch crawls, you know what tomorrow is, right?

And speaking of Sundays, we saw another celebrity in the kiddie park after all of that brunching. Even more exciting than Björk, I think.

Smiley McDuckfeet

I thought I was an ok story reader, but this puts me to shame.  Mr. Walken has inspired me to work on my style.

Thanks a Lot

You all forgot to remind me that pi day was coming up.

I forget every year, and then 3/14 rolls around and the internet's all "hey!  Happy pi day!"  And I'm caught off guard and pie-less.  Maybe next year?  Will you mark it on your calendars for me?

In the meantime, here is everything I've written about pie in the history of this blog.

Question

It's probably very important that I make something with this, right?

Tennis, Table Variety

It's been a week since I asked you to read a New York Times article, soooo....

excuse the bad photo, but, you know, evidence

Hey! I know this guy! I don't know him know him, but I watched him ping pong once.  And as he walked by me he said something to the effect of "I don't know why I'm leaving with all of these beautiful women in here...."  Not that I'm implying that he was talking about me; I was carrying a three-month old and there were plenty of beautiful and more available looking ladies in my vicinity, if none happened to be in his age bracket. 

Anyway, the guy is bona fide.   The article alludes to that, though the video doesn't do him justice. 

This all reminds me: I'd written on a list somewhere that I want to get good at ping pong this year but I'm afraid that I'm not making much headway. I've made this sort of pledge before--with ping pong and darts, among other things.  Upon reflection, I'm not sure that this is a realizable goal.  It happens that I have pretty lousy hand-eye coordination.  Also, I haven't settled on whether I'm left- or right-handed for these types of things.  That's how bad I am. 

Out of Practice

Someone became terrified of swinging over the past few months.  We're working on it. 

Another Adventure in Pop-Tart-Like Pastries

 

 After my recommended pie reading, I went ahead and gave these apple-rosemary-honey turnovers a shot.  Little tarts are a great low-stakes way to try out wild and crazy fillings--don't be fooled, that eighth of a teaspoon of rosemary packs a whole lotta flavor. 

If they weren't so easy to gobble up, I would have stuck a couple of raw turnovers in the freezer for lazy-day baking.  But, alas, they were all eaten.

And later that day we saw Björk.

(Didn't know how to smoothly work that last bit in, but I thought somebody should know.)

Uh-Oh

Does it count as a first word if it's one sound that signifies a few things?  Finley loves to name his shoes and socks.  And he's perfectly consistent with what he calls them, it just happens that they all sound like "sssssssssssss."  I think I'll tell him that "shoes" was his first word.  Although "coat" is a good runner-up.  He nearly gets that one spot-on.

And "uh-oh"?  We have uh-oh down perfectly, even if the intonation is a little funny.  Just don't ask him to say mom or dad.  I think we're still "hey you" in his book.

On other communication fronts, we've been trying to incorporate sign language since about month six.  You'd think we'd have a fluent signer by now with all that hard work and commitment.  Oy.  Honestly, it's hard to keep in the habit of signing when your hands are full of baby and baby paraphernalia, but we've been doing our best, and while he isn't signing our ear off (so to speak), he does have a couple of words figured out, and being able to communicate, even in a small way, is no less thrilling.

Contrary to what the bib may lead you to believe, this was shot only two days ago:



So there you have it!  Genius!  

I've been learning most of my signs at babysignlanguage.com.  The video dictionary is incredibly good and I want to be best friends with the lady who is in the clips.  There are also flash cards, which I haven't resorted to, as well as lots of things that you can buy if all that free stuff isn't good enough for you. 

But Baby Sign Language doesn't cover everything.  The ASL dictionary is much more comprehensive, though hilariously serious. I don't so much want to be best friends with those guys as to take them out for a drink to cheer them up.  But I'm sure they're all smiles off camera!

Next on the signing agenda is "chairs are delicious."  Might as well turn his furniture gnawing proclivities to our advantage, right?  And I have no doubt that that's a phrase he can totally get behind.

Burning through Your New York Times Allowance

I didn't realize how quickly a girl could use up her monthly twenty-article limit on the Times's website until I neglected to log in on my new work computer.  Twenty articles is two days of reading in these parts!  But seeing as how it's a new month, maybe you'll spare a few credits for some things that I found interesting?

This article is apropos of a new resolution of mine, which is to stop saying "like" so much.  Though, the article is actually about how young women influence linguistics and only uses the preponderance of "like" as an example.  There's a podcast alongside the article that goes more in-depth; quotative "like" makes a lot of sense now!  My anti-like resolve may be waning.

Also, did you know?

The use of “like” in a sentence, “apparently without meaning or syntactic function, but possibly as emphasis,” has made its way into the Webster’s New World College Dictionary, Fourth Edition — this newspaper’s reference Bible — where the example given is: “It’s, like, hot.”

Next up, I finally got around to reading this ode to pie by Sam Sifton, and it's inspired me to want to make pie on a daily basis (even if I am skeptical of the included crust recipe).

Introduce an apple pie . . . and watch what happens — as a result not just of the pie itself, but also of the process of making it. Apple pie is a weekend project to slow the baker’s heart rate and restore belief in happiness. The scent of fruit softening, kissed by cinnamon, of buttery crust, of sugar caramelizing — these can combine into a fragrance of redemption for the cook and everyone else. The taste delivers bliss.

 Maybe I'll finally get around to making these this weekend?

And for article three?  Well, this may not be worth using up one of your precious article allotments unless you're a theatre geek, but I'm very interested in seeing Wallace Shawn's adaptation of Ibsen's The Master Builder after reading this. I mean, what could possibly go wrong?

“When I would read it in translation,” Mr. Gregory said, “there would be these brilliant passages, and then it would be completely incomprehensible and boring. I wondered if that was the play, which I doubted, or the translations.”

It was then that Mr. Shawn, the playwright and occasional “Gossip Girl” guest star, got what he called “one of the only clever ideas I ever had.”

He added: “I, being a very overconfident person, was not afraid to translate it from the Norwegian. Even though I can’t speak Norwegian.”

Finally, some respite for those of you squirreling away your NYT credits: an NPR article that Apartment Therapy alerted me to about the American Sofa.  It does my furniture-obsessed heart good.  I don't think that the author overstates the importance of the sofa in everyday life--we'd have a spotty record of Finley's life if we trashed all the photos of him on our couch.  Also, we love eating on ours so much that we've taken to bobbling bowls of soup on our laps to keep out of Finley's reach.

Some reading to while your Thursday away!  Fluff, admittedly--one of these days, I should have Andrew do a guest post to represent the other eight sections of the paper.  Guess you'll just have to stay tuned!