Anyone still reading?

I went away for a while. Well, from blogger land. I haven't officially returned either. This is just a little note to say that I fully intend to update this thing sometime in the next three weeks while I'm on Christmas break. A lot of stuff has been going on. Difficult and good life stuff. So...I'll be returning shortly. For now, it's back to the baby and laundry.

Friends make the best babysitters

Last weekend I had to play for a concert while Matt worked. Desperate to find a babysitter, our friends Val and Jason agreed to watch Kaitlin. You know you have good babysitters (and friends) when they take pictures and give them to you on a CD!




The clan: Jason, Kaitlin, Caleb, and Rachel (minus Val, who I assume is taking the picture)


Rachel and Katie were born only seven days apart


Car seat buddies




A few days previous, I went to visit with Val and her little munchkins. It's so fun having kids the same age ;-)

Photobooth

Katie and I had another PhotoBooth session a few minutes ago, and I thought I'd share some of the recent pictures with you. She is four months and three days old. Time flies. She really is beginning to look older now.

Such a pretty little girl.






Mommy love!

No mistaking those blue eyes!


If you want to see some videos, go to my facebook page. They take a bit too long to load up on here.

Oh mayonnaise.

I'm having such a difficult day today.

More recent picts

Ok, in reverse chronological order...

I made a really flavorful caprese salad this weekend that had slow roasted roma tomatoes.

Kaitlin here looking, in my mind, cute. Matt said this color is only worn by the elderly :-)

Pretty blue-eyes in fleece jacket made my grandma.

:-)

Working really hard to get that toy to spin

A typical Katie face

More beautiful than the last time she wore it - dress made by grandma!

Matt did not want me to take this picture. Oh well.

Our friends Ester & BJ came to visit. We played a LOT of games that weekend.

And it was fun!

Daddy's girl.

The hood is supposed to make her look like a panda bear.

Mommy loves you, Kaitlin.

Some new pictures

"Old" life and "new" life

I am starting to notice that the strangers who stop to comment on Kaitlin ("How old is she?" "Wow, look at that head of hair!" "What a beautiful little girl." "Enjoy your peace and quiet while you can." "They don't stay that young forever." etc) are all at least one generation older than me. Why is that?

Nobody who is 30 stops to say these things. Sometimes I see them sneaking a peak after we pass each other in the aisles of a grocery store. But no one says anything to me.

I think the wonder of human infancy is something we take for granted while in the "middle" years of our life. We're too busy to stop and appreciate things, too much in a hurry to become older and wiser.

Ugh.

I'm sick.

Weakness is the only thing to boast about

Jesus said, “My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness.” So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ can work through me. 2 Corinthians 12:9 (New Living Translation)

My weaknesses seem vast in number today. I have learned so much these past few months about teaching, responsibility, and motherhood. I can't expect myself to be great in anything without experience (one can learn a lot in textbooks, classrooms, and from talking with others, but it always comes down to the actual experience). Pridefully I hate that certain inevitable period of time when I must learn from mistakes so transparently in front of others. Yet, it is better to be in a position of humility than pride. I want to learn. I want to get better at teaching in a classroom. I want to be a responsible individual, and I certainly want to be the best mother possible to Katie. These things can't come without doing some stuff wrong first. And that's what I'm learning about right now. It's a comfort to know that life is not about me and the "great things" I can do. The message of the cross is a simple one - God is perfect and I'm far from it. Thanks be to Him that His son bridged the gap between my sin (and weakness) and His glory (and perfection).

"His strength is perfect when our strength is gone; He'll carry us when we can't carry on; Raised in His power, the weak become strong." (Words from the old school Stephen Curtis Chapman song, "His Strength is Perfect.")

No pounds melting away here

I've been breast feeding for over three months now. Everyone told me that baby weight would come right off if I breast feed but that has not been the case with me. I am pretty frustrated (and struggling with jealousy of others) about this and I would like my pre-pregnancy body back, even though it needed some TLC to begin with.

The Swaddle

We swaddled Katie for the first time in a LONG time last night (it had been about two months) because of an inconsolable crying session she had in the early evening. Usually she has a hard time falling asleep because she flails her hands everywhere when she's on the brink. When she wakes up in the middle of the night, it's difficult to get her to go back down right away for the same reason. But as a result of the swaddle, she slept from 9:30PM until 7:15AM.

Bliss.

Professor Jess?

Last year at work I told everyone to call me Jess. There was the occasional Ms. or Mrs. Modaff in the email salutation, but by and large the students caught on.

This year, I am teaching a couple courses along with being a private piano teacher and vocal coach. It seems more appropriate at a college, if you are teaching a course, to be referred to as "Prof. so-and-so." As a result, all the new students have been calling me Prof. Modaff.

Today some freshmen and an upper classman both asked me what I wanted to be called. The reason was that they didn't know what to call me - the older one wanted to call me Jess but thought this was wrong because all the freshmen call me Prof. Modaff. The freshmen had heard me called Jess by others, but felt wrong because I was their theory teacher. Hmm.

I think there is a natural transition for a just-out-of-graduate-school person like me. Last year there seemed to be no way I could be called anything other than Jess because just months earlier, I was calling my teachers "Prof. so-and-so." If I had a doctorate, there would be no choice in the matter - I would be "Dr. Modaff." But in Universities with teachers at the Master's degree level, nobody says "Master so-and-so."

I'm not sure what to tell them to call me. And they're not sure what to call me either. Oh bother.

First family vacation

We took a short trip to New Hampshire this week and stayed at a friend's family cottage. It was our first time away with Katie and short at that, but we had a great time. Here are the snapshots of our experience. A "family album," if you will.

It's amazing how much more stuff you have to bring when you have an infant.

On the road!

Katie was having a great old time in her car seat. The cold weather was a bit of a surprise to us, but thankfully we had brought some warmer clothes for Kaitlin.

I took this photo of the lake right after we arrived. This is the view of the lake from the front of the house.

Making ourselves at home.

We weren't sure if there were any restaurants around, so we just ate some frozen pizza for dinner on the first night. I certainly didn't want to cook on vacation.

The word "cottage" means something new to me now. While this particular cottage has a substantial addition (new living and family rooms), I can see that this type of home was not designed to be spacious. The staircase was no wider than Matt, and its entrance was no taller than 6ft. This is many inches too short for my husband, the gentle giant!

Playing with Katie on the first night.

The next morning, there was fog coming off of the lake. If I had taken these shots about 1/2 hour earlier, you would not be able to see the lake. Nature is the most beautiful thing.

Katie just woke up...

...then she ate.

Together she and I watched her first episode of Saved By The Bell was while Matt continued to sleep.

Vacation in an unknown venue requires one to come prepared with their own coffee, in case there is no way to get caffeine in the mornings (I've been a bit sleep deprived lately). Perfect opportunity to try out the new Starbucks VIA instant coffee. It wasn't bad!

Pancakes and turkey keilbasa for breakfast.

We spent the day in Conway, NH, located in the White Mountain National Forest.

Outside of the cottage again, just as we were getting into the car.

Here are a few snapshots of the drive on the way there.

We ate at a restaurant called "The Up Country."

They make their own soda.

Kaitlin fell asleep at the restaurant while hugging her toy. Awww.

We went shopping at the outlet mall, but we have no pictures of that. Just mommy and daughter on the shopping excursion.

On the drive back to the cottage.

More family time on the second night.

One last photo of the inside before we go...

And one last photo of the outside...

On the drive home there was a family-owned DRIVE THRU ESPRESSO stand!!! I got a soy mocha and it was delicious! Too bad I didn't think to photograph the stand while we were there.

We stopped at Ihop for breakfast.

And made it home in time for Matt to get to work. Short, sweet, and our first family vacation.