Later that year, we upgraded to a much nicer TV console.

Then in August 2011 on a whim, we painted the TV wall:

And then a few months ago we finally got rid of the boring beige carpet in favor of pretty laminate:

The latest addition? Curtains! This was also an “on a whim” addition. I’ve thought about window treatments on and off for a while, but one evening I somehow got it in my head that it was time. Our ceilings are 11 feet tall so finding affordable curtains is not as easy as one would think. I wanted them to brush the floor, and I wanted to hang the rods higher than the top of the window, which is ~2 feet from the ceiling. I needed really long panels — standard curtain lengths like 84″ (7 feet) or even 108″ (9 feet) wouldn’t work. I looked around the internet for a few weeks and finally took a chance on some 120″ sheers from Macy’s (well, their website anyway) when they were running a home & bath sale.

(I thought about making curtains also, but buying them pre-made is actually cheaper in most cases. I would’ve needed at least 14 yards of fabric, and even the cheapest home decor fabric I’ve seen starts at around $10/yard. Each of these panels was $35 on sale, so it was $140 total — the same as I would’ve spent for even the cheapest fabric options.)

They arrived but I was still a little hesitant — so I taped two of them to the wall with masking tape as a test run. They stayed there for 2 weeks. By the time the tape started falling off, I had decided that I liked them enough to put them up permanently. Yay!

Even though I had found curtain panels that were long enough, the next challenge was finding a curtain ROD long enough to span all 3 windows. Each window is almost 4 feet wide, with just over 1 foot between each one. All in all, I needed almost 180″ (15 feet!) of rod. I decided to try making one rod out of two sets, so I went to Lowe’s and got one 72-144″ rod and one 36-72″ rod. I used the entire long rod and two of the three pieces of the smaller rod — so all in all, my single “rod” is made up of 5 segments.

I spent some time considering where to install the brackets, and eventually decided to use 5 brackets evenly spaced out across the entire span. I wanted to use several brackets to make sure the weight of the rod and panels was well distributed. The other option would have been to use 5 brackets with 1 on each end and 1 installed in the center of each window. However, that wouldn’t have supported the curtain between each window as well, and since the rod was made up of so many segments, I thought evenly spacing the brackets was the better choice.

Despite my fairly careful measuring, the curtains still ended up about an inch higher off the floor than I had anticipated. It’s just so difficult to get things exactly right when want them to literally skim the floor! Fortunately it should be a fairly easy fix — I can let out the hem on one end of each panel by an inch. This isn’t a huge priority right now, but it won’t take much time so I’m hoping to get to it in the next few weeks. (The most time-consuming part is probably just having to climb the ladder to take each panel back down for an evening.)

Ta da! We need a new coffee table at some point because the one we’ve had for the past few years from World Market has not held up very well (the top is all scratched and discolored). And someday I’ll make some pillowcases that match our couch better than the red ones (which don’t really match at all). But all in all, our family room is in pretty good shape.

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What a wild ride this year has been.

Happy Anniversary Jose!

Thanks for being a great father and a wonderful husband.

I love you lots.

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Happy Birthday Jose! Emma and I think you are the best.

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The included some pretty adorable animal fabric for one side, and a nice blue and green pattern for the other side — the cover is reversible. It also included a long piece of elastic to make the outside edge conform around the shopping cart, and a set of rudimentary instructions. I had to provide the thread, batting to sandwich between the two layers of fabric, and embroidery floss for tying (vs. quilting) the cover together.

First use of the cover at HEB in February

Construction was pretty easy — sandwich the batting between the two layers of fabric and sew the edges. I then sewed around the edge again, about a half inch farther in, to create a casing for the elastic. I measured and cut the two leg holes and secured those edges, and then tied the quilt using floss. I had never tied a quilt and that technique was a little time-consuming, but it worked great. (In fact, I am inspired to FINALLY tie the t-shirt quilt I made almost 10 years ago. Hopefully I’ll do that soon!)

The final step was learning how to make buttonholes! I needed two of them, each ~2 inches long so allow the buckle and straps from shopping carts to pass through so we can still secure Emma in the cart. My sewing machine has an automatic buttonhole feature — but it couldn’t make a hole long enough! I had to go old school and sew the buttonhole manually. Fortunately that process was pretty straightforward.

At Target (where else?) in March

Once she was able to sit up well enough, we started putting Emma in the car whenever we are out running errands and she loves being able to sit up and look around. Good thing I gave her such a great Christmas present, right?

(Also: Her hair has grown a lot in just the 2-3 months since these photos were taken. Wow.)

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Emma’s been going through some kind of sleep regression over the last week or so. She usually goes to bed SO easily. Drink a bottle, change into pajamas, read a book, lay her down in her crib, pat her back and say “good night Emma!” She smiles, rolls over, and goes to sleep. Just like that!

But for the last week, she smiles, rolls over…and then as soon as she sees me leave the room, she starts crying. HARD. And doesn’t stop. We’re usually successful rocking her to sleep at that point (at night anyway; rocking doesn’t always work for naps), but the rocking is not without her chewing on my shirt and her little hands clawing at my hair, my arm, my neck.

Chalk it up to a growth spurt, or a developmental leap, or your choice of reasons — whatever the cause, it stinks.

Although I know that in the grand scheme of things we have been SUPER lucky and that overall she has been an awesome sleeper, the sudden change has caused me all sorts of stress and frustration. Last night she started screaming as per usual when I tried to leave the room, so I sat down on the floor next to her crib.

I’ve tried this before, and it doesn’t work either because she sees me sitting there and decides it’s play time. She pulls herself up to standing and starts giggling like crazy. It’s outrageously cute — except for the fact that she’s supposed to be going to bed. So last night I quickly gave up on that idea and resorted to rocking her.

Twenty minutes later, I was tired of getting manhandled by a 9-month-old who still seemed to be wide awake. I gave up, put her in her crib, and prepared to leave the room and just listen to her cry for a bit. As an afterthought, I stuck the crib toy that my mom got her at Christmas on the railing. We use it often for naps, but haven’t used it for bedtime. It doesn’t really help anymore anyway — she just plays with it instead of going to sleep.

I clipped the toy to the rail, turned it on, and left the room to the tinkling sound of classical tunes.

No crying.

I walked into the living room and picked up the baby monitor.

She was lying in the crib and no music was playing.

In about 30 seconds, she had looked over, turned off the music (which she already knew how to do), laid down, and went to sleep.

Without a peep.

If I wasn’t so surprised, I would have been really annoyed.

Thank you Baby Einstein.

The post Magical Toy appeared first on saroy.

And now I’m not sure what my goal is anymore! I was successful every single day for the first 5 weeks, then I missed 8 days (I think) over the next 6 weeks. I’m still cogitating on what my next goal should be, but in the meantime, here’s what I did this week:

May 13 – 2 mile walk outside with Jose and Emma
May 14 – 2 mile walk outside with Jose and Emma
May 15 –
May 16 – 1.7 mile treadmill walk
May 17 – 2 mile walk outside with Jose and Emma
May 18 – 2 mile treadmill walk
May 19 – 4.6 mile run/walk outside with Emma

I think it’s safe to say that summer officially arrived this weekend after a pleasantly (and surprisingly!) mild spring. I took Emma with me for a run this morning and even though we were home before 9:00, I was nice and overheated for the rest of the day. I’m hoping this is mainly because I’m not fully acclimated yet, and things will improve once I get a few more warm weather runs under my belt for this year.) We did 4 miles as a 3/1 run/walk and then walked the rest of the way home. Emma slept for the last 25 minutes. It’s my longest run since the Lucky Trails relay in March, and except for the heat it went pretty well.

I also signed up for the Sylvan Beach Sprint on June 9 after having so much fun last Sunday at TriGirl. It used to be a longer-than-sprint but shorter-than-olympic distance but they’ve retooled it to be more of a true sprint — 500 yd swim, 15 mile bike and 3 mile run. The swim will be a bit of a challenge, since 500 yards is obviously not as easy to knock out without training as the 200 yards at TriGirl. The bike should be fine as long as I don’t go out too hard. And I ran 4 miles today specifically to convince myself I’d be ok at Sylvan Beach!

I won’t be setting any new PRs anytime soon, but it’s fun to have races on my calendar again!

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I was paralyzed by indecision, and a little scared to take the plunge without really knowing what the mirrorless cameras could do. So I rented one! Last Friday, a Sony NEX-6 with 18-55 lens showed up at my door and I carried it around all weekend taking random (ok, mostly of Emma) photos. I didn’t try to control anything about the setting — just snapping photos wherever we happened to be, with whatever light happened to be available. Here are 15 of my favorites:

Hey! Top teeth!

I had a lot of fun trying the NEX-6 out…but unfortunately I still can’t decide what I want to buy! The NEX-6 is definitely what I’m looking for in terms of size and shape. And it does take a pretty decent photo. However, in looking through the 100+ photos I took there did seem to be a higher-than-I’d-like number where the focus was off. It’s possible that this could be related to the fact that it was my first time using the camera, and I didn’t fully understand all the bells and whistles. Or it could be because the focusing isn’t great.

The only thing that still makes me squeamish is the price. If this were a $300 or even $500 camera, I’d have bought one already. But the NEX-6 with kit lens is $900, and somehow that triggers the “excessive” classification in my brain. Maybe it’s because I already have several very nice dSLR lenses that I feel like I should use instead of spending $900 on another camera?? I’ve considered selling some of dSLR gear to pay for the NEX, but I’m not ready to get rid of expensive lenses quite yet. The NEX-5 is also an option since it compares pretty well with the NEX-6 but is “only” $600.

At the end of the day though, perhaps the only thing that really matters is that intermittent focus issues or not, the mirrorless cameras are exactly what I’m looking for. The image quality is significantly better than my iPhone and point-and-shoot — in a much, much more portable package.

Thoughts?

Edited to add: I ordered a NEX-5 about 8 hours after I wrote this. Seems like the best compromise between price and still getting a camera I know I will use more often than my SLR. Can’t wait till it arrives next week!

The post Camera Indecision appeared first on saroy.

My friends Katie and Andrew welcomed a baby boy a few weeks ago, and I wanted to make him a little something to celebrate his arrival. Katie is a language arts teacher and LOVES the Harry Potter books, so my original idea was to find some Harry Potter-themed fabric and make a baby blanket. However, apparently Harry Potter fabric was only produced for a short time and more than a decade ago. (This was pretty surprising to me, but I guess Rowling is fairly protective of the brand!) While there are still some pieces from 2001-2002 available on Etsy and eBay, the average price is around $100/yard. Not exactly what I was hoping to find!

Six separate units make up the final block

So I took a different approach and started searching for Harry Potter-themed quilts. This led me to a WHOLE WEBSITE dedicated to quilt patterns for fans of various things — Harry Potter, Doctor Who, Lord of the Rings, etc. It kinda blew my mind and made me fall in love with the internet all over again. It also had exactly the right thing for me with a huge selection of Potter-themed paper-pieced quilt blocks. I’d been wanting to learn how to paper piece already, since it lets you make some very intricate and impressive blocks. This seemed like the perfect excuse.

I chose the Gryffindor crest — a very cool lion — and decided to turn it into a taggie toy/sensory blanket backed with soft red minky and bordered with some pieces of ribbon for Baby Boy to grab. I had to enlarge the pattern slightly to make it what I wanted, but that was easily done on the computer. In retrospect, I certainly could have picked an easier block for my first attempt at paper-piecing! But I took it slow, triple-checked everything before sewing, and got the hang of it as I went. (This paper-piecing tutorial from Fresh Lemons was also quite helpful.)

Finished block!

The lion was made up of 6 smaller sections that were then sewn together into the final block. (The picture above shows the 6 sections.) I thought it would take a lot longer than it actually did. After the first few pieces, I started to get the sequence down and the repetitive nature lent itself well to just plugging along — sew one piece, press the seam, cut a piece of fabric for the next piece, line it up, and repeat.

I did make a couple mistakes and you can see the biggest one in the upper left corner. That piece was the first of the six that I did, and I didn’t fully understand yet how important it was to cover every single bit of the seam allowance. I didn’t realize how critical this was until I had sewn the whole block together. Fortunately I was able to fix it by changing the shape of my crest — if you look at the first photo showing my completed blanket, you’ll see how I made the top corners of the crest curve inward. Doing that eliminated my error. Whew!

Minky = use lots of pins

Once the quilt block was done, the rest of the project was super simple — just a normal blanket with the pieces of ribbon thrown in for fun. (Be careful if you’re using the photo above as a reference for actually making something of your own. That was just me figuring out where to place the ribbons, but it’s NOT how you should line them up for the final sewing! Before you sew, they need to be tucked in between the layers of fabric pointing towards the center, so that they stick outside when the blanket is turned right-side-out for finishing.)

Taggie toy back side

The lion himself is made from several different fat quarters in a variety of yellow patterns, and the crest is a single mottled maroon print. The background is a cool navy fabric with tiny gold polka dots. I chose three different kinds of ribbon to coordinate, and used some nice bright red minky for the back. I think I’ve used minky in at least half of the baby items I’ve made. It’s just so soft! I love it.

Ribbon tags

Detail of the Gryffindor lion’s mouth. ROAR!

I packed this up in an envelope and mailed it off to Ohio only a day or two before the baby arrived — I think this was probably waiting in their mailbox when they got home from the hospital! I was SO happy with how this turned out. I think it looks amazing and can’t wait to take on another paper-pieced project in the future.

And I think Robert likes it too!

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He took incredible photos. He’s on Facebook. And Twitter. And Tumblr, Google+ and Pinterest.  He did a Reddit AMA. He recorded what things sounds like on the ISS. Zen Pencils turned one of his inspiring quotes into a sweet cartoon. Gizmodo said he “made us care about astronauts again.”

He played with Barenaked Ladies — FROM SPACE:

He taught us how to make a sandwich in space…

…and also the all-important skill of how to barf in space.

And as a finale before returning home, he did a revised version of Bowie’s Space Oddity…IN SPACE. And it’s GOOD. Which is all kinds of nerdy and all kinds of awesome.

I’m happy he’s back on the planet safe and sound, but I’m also kinda sad we can’t have him on ISS forever! Either way, I think it’s official:

BEST. ISS. ASTRONAUT. EVER.

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Yesterday I went up to Lake Houston with Erin and Lisa for the TriGirl Super Sprint! It was my first tri post-baby — and really my first since June 2011, since I missed the entire 2012 season being pregnant. I’ve done TriGirl’s August race but never this one, which is a short 200 yard swim, 8 mile bike and 2 mile run. The short distances were perfect given my complete lack of training.

200 yd swim – 5:12
T1 – 1:48
8 mile bike – 25:43
T2 – 0:57
2 mi run – 23:50

TOTAL – 57:31

I can’t remember the last time I went swimming for workout or race-related purposes. It was probably the swim portion of that June 2011 tri. This was a really short swim that I expected to finish in around 5 minutes, and sure enough, I did exactly that. There was a breeze up by the lake so we had to deal with some minor swells and choppiness. I made the mistake of starting toward the back of the pack, forgetting that my swim times over short distances are always consistent no matter how long it’s been since my last time in the water. I had to make my way through a lot of thrashing arms and legs in the first 50 yards, but by the time I reached the first turn buoy, I had broken free of the main pack. At that point, the swells became a bit more troublesome so I switched to breaststroke for the rest of the swim.

So let’s recap: I started at the back of the pack, and did breaststroke instead of freestyle for 2/3 of the distance. Despite this, my 5:12 swim time was still good enough for 6th out of 59 people in my age group (and thus my swim wave). And this is why it makes little sense for me to spend time training for the swim in a sprint distance tri.

T1 was pretty standard. I had a bit of ground to cover since we had to run from the swim exit all the way down to the other end of transition. I took a little more time than usual to make sure everything was in order — my brain was kinda foggy on the whole transition sequence! I also had to dry my feet enough to be able to pull on socks. But soon enough I was on my way. (And despite me really taking my time, I still was 12/59 in my age group for T1.)

The bike felt GREAT. I love the course, which is nice and shady with lots of pretty trees and a few nice downhills but only one climb of any significance. I passed a lot of people too, which also gave me a boost. (The duathlon had started at the same time as my swim wave and the first run was only a 1/2 mile, so there were a lot of duathlon people already out on the bike course since the run only took most of them 3-5 minutes and a run-bike transition is usually quicker than swim-bike.) It felt good to be flying along the course even though I knew it would probably trash my legs for the run. The bike was advertised as 8 miles but was really ~7.5, so I averaged ~17.5 mph. I had been on my bike exactly ONCE post-baby prior to yesterday, so I am TOTALLY happy with a 17.5 mph average. In fact, that’s about 2.5 mph better than I thought I would do!

T2 was pretty unremarkable and I was on to the run.

For the first mile, my legs were basically numb. It’s been so long since I did the bike-run transition that I think my body had completely forgotten what it was like! I felt like I was barely sustaining a shuffle, but with a few short walk breaks thrown in, I managed to reach the turnaround right at 12:00. On the way back to the finish, the numbness in my legs finally went away but it was replaced with burning in both calves. Fun! Somehow I continued my shuffle, and finished right under 12:00 pace — although I had to keep walking for a few minutes after crossing the line until the burning went away. I was worried both calf muscles were about to cramp up, but fortunately the feeling subsided.

Lisa passed somewhere around the 1.25-mile mark on the run, so she beat me by a couple minutes. Erin finished a couple minutes behind me, but her swim wave started 4 minutes after mine, so her total time was actually a minute faster than mine.

When I was telling Jose my estimates of how I’d do (and he was telling me to not push myself too hard!), I said something along the lines of: “Well in the past, I would expect to finish this race well under an hour, given the distances. That’s probably a long shot for me right now, but hopefully I’ll only be a minute or two over an hour.” Needless to say, I was pretty pumped to see 57:31 as my final time. My run was spot on what I’d planned, but the swim and bike both went better than expected.

It felt really good to be back out there, and I’m already looking forward to my next race, which will probably be the Y Freedom Tri in Pearland on June 30. Erin and Lisa are both signed up for the Galveston 5150 at the end of September but I’m not quite ready to commit to an olympic distance yet. We’ll see…

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