Baby Winter at 20 Weeks

Hurrah! I have reached the half-way point in my pregnancy with health/happiness/sanity still intact--as well as a remnant of a waste-line (for now!). Baby Winter is thriving! I am certain of movement now--usually later in the day when I am reading. T.M. even felt a kick the other night while we enjoyed the first episode of Britain's Got Talent...Maybe Baby's Got Talent too? ...we hope something a bit more edifying that extreme belching or timbrel playing.

We had our 20 week scan this week and we are pleased to announce that Baby Winter is A GIRL!!! We are "over the moon," as one says... However, Girl Baby throws a wrench into the naming game. We have had a boy name picked out for three years, but despite my baby name *obsession* we haven't found a girl's name that approaches anything near perfect. I grow more apprehensive every day, fearing to give birth to Nameless Baby. (More on Naming in a Future Post!)

Here is the latest photo of Nameless Winter. You can see her profile--nose, lips, chin tucked into her chest--but you must stare for a bit to figure things out:

Here is another picture of a twenty-week inside-baby:

From what I can tell, Girl Winter weighs about 8-10 oz and is about 6-8 inches long (head to rump). My belly is finally beginning to become round and I am now putting on weight (no wonder since I eat *all* the time). Unfortunately, I still don't look pregnant as I waltz through St Andrews with my clothes on...perhaps a bit thicker and clunkier, but nothing a diet of fish and chips couldn't accomplish in 20 weeks. I look forward to looking seriously pregnant. AND I look forward to looking slender again some day AFTER baby comes. (Fingers crossed!!) Here is my 20 week shot:

And here compared to my waif-like thinness at 9 weeks:

This is all the important Child News for today! Stay tuned for the Baby Names Post!!!

Bad Journalism. Shame on the NYT.

I feel a responsibility to pass this along.

http://www.nationalpost.com/news/story.html?id=2776154

Viva il Papa!

Holy Week and the Gates of Hades

Thomas More and I just returned from the Eternal City, where we enjoyed Triduum and very much wonderful Italian food. Instead of a lengthy post describing the trip I am including the video we made (see below), which I hope you will enjoy!

I will say this: this Lent has been a particularly difficult time for me spiritually. Scandal in the Church--which has created anguish in the hearts of ALL faithful Catholics--has also troubled me deeply. I had hoped to spend Lent in prayer for both the victims of abuse as well as for the Church universal--that we all might have renewed hope in Jesus who saves--who HEALS. As part of the Church Body I also wanted to participate in the penance that the Church must undergo as part of this healing process. When one part of the Body sins, when one part becomes corrupt, the healthy members must take responsibility for the corruption. We must lay our lives down for our brother and sister (both sinner and sinned against).

My hope of fruitful and penitent prayer was only partially realized this Lent. I found myself severely distracted by the sick media coverage of the Church scandal here in the UK. In all likelihood you understand perfectly well what I refer to, and don't want to hear any more about it, so I won't go into further detail. But I will say this: The current media hysteria places the faithful Catholic in a strange situation. The Church is in mourning for the damning sins that were committed under her roof. We want to repent corporately, to cure the disease, to cleanse our Body. But we are, at the same time, forced to defend every tenant of our religion (theology, structure, discipline, morality) to an angry secular world/media who uses the sins of the few to cast shadows on the many.

This Lent, I hated that I allowed myself to be driven from a posture of prayer, penance, and faith into a defensive stance--into anger (justified!--journalists were lying!). However justified my outrage, I allowed my mind to wander from the figure of Christ who stands at the center of Lent: the fasting, suffering Body who paid for the sins of the Church and the sins of the world--who paid for the lives of whores and adulterers, hypocrites and pedophiles--who paid for those sins too--even those.

Going to Rome for Triduum reminded me of what I had nearly forgotten: the suffering Christ, the Risen Lord who will defend His Church and strengthen her. I was deeply touched by the thousands and thousands of people crowded around the Colosseum for the Stations of the Cross on Good Friday, all trying to pray the Our Father together in a hundred different languages. I was moved by the multitude of worshipers on Holy Saturday in St Peters--thousands of priests and religious, thousands and thousands of kids in their twenties, praying together in line hours before Mass. I was blessed by receiving the Body of Blood of Christ along with all these, and with all Catholics all around the world.

During the Vigil Mass T.M. and I sat in one of the transepts facing the high altar. We had a perfect view of one of my favorite mosaic-paintings in St Peters, which depicts Peter walking on the waves towards Jesus. Or rather--Peter FALLING INTO the waves--with a look of desperate panic etched on his face. And Jesus catches him as he falls.

Doesn't He always--catch us?

"And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it." Matthew 16:18

Happy Easter

Whoa Baby! (The News is Out!!)

The day has arrived. I have put it off for far too long. I have sidled around the issue, ignored the computer, made excuses, fussed, etc. But the day has finally arrived. The blog, the blog readers, the Intra-web at large--they must be told.

Dear Readers, Thomas More and I would like to introduce Wee Winter:

**Cue: tears of joy!! high-pitched screams and exclamations!!!!! fainting spells!!! Hearty pats upon back....Etc.***

I am, for those of you who would like to know, currently 15 weeks pregnant with Wee Winter, who is not so wee as he/she/it once was, measuring about 4 inches long (from crown to bum), complete with all the essential parts and pieces, fingerprints--even eyebrows. The picture above is a at 13 weeks. He/she now looks a bit like this:

A-May-Zing. We went in for our first ultrasound during week thirteen and watched little Ruprecht/Hildegaard jumping around like a...like a...well, actually, kind of like Mr. Bean:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4moPhSeDWFI

Despite the relative hugeness of the Child (if you think 4 inches is small, think again! Four months ago this kid didn't even EXIST!!), and considering the wacky moves he/she is perfecting, I have yet to see or feel much confirmation of Babe's existence. Despite the MASSIVE amounts of food I have been consuming, I have gained a meager 2 pounds, which I shouldn't complain about, I guess. "It'll come, Love, it'll come!" say the wise matriarchs of Fife (smirking into their coffee mugs).

Here is a game for you (!!!). Spot the 15 weeks pregnant Bump! ("Oh No," you say, "not ANOTHER pregnant woman bearing her gut!" And I say, "oh yes!" with only minimal shame. Being pregnant makes you do weird things.) So here's the comparison:

5 Weeks Pregnant:

15 Weeks Pregnant:

Yes, yes? There is a bump?

But seriously, about this blog, and belly pictures, and links to baby-food sights, and "How to build your Own Midcentury modern dollhouse" etc etc. I don't really want this blog to become a "baby blog" or a "mommy blog." This is not my goal or intention. I considered omitting all reference to the pregnancy, but decided that such a stupid and arbitrary omission would be problematic at best. This coming event will, after all, ROCK MY WORLD in a way it has seldom (never!) been rocked before. There's a PERSON in my belly! How, pray tell, did THAT happen?? (yes, I know HOW...but isn't that just weird that doing that results in:

Ooops--I meant...THIS:

Yes. It is a miracle (one way or the other!). So I will be posting from time to time on pregnancy/baby related topics. I will probably gloat over my hugeness (and whine about it too). I might also rant a bit about healthcare in the US of A (and how I CAN'T GET STINKING INSURED!!!) and about baby names (a long-held obsession which I am now free to indulge) and even about strollers...ug, I know. (Remember: pregnancy makes you WEIRD. Who knew I would start having NIGHTMARES about strollers???).

But just so you won't all abandon ship here and now, I promise that the next post won't be baby-related at all. Any topic suggestions? I was thinking about delving into the world of Scotch Whisky (T.More, of course, will be doing all the drinking!!)

Joy is Friends and Candy Mountain!!!

Last week saw the (joyful) arrival and (sad) departure of our friends Jeff and Blake (pictured above), who came to see us all the way from the U.S. of A. Well, came to see us and the castles...and the mountains...and the *newly blooming snowdrops and winter aconite*. It was very wonderful to have these lovely men in our current place of abode, and I do hope that they enjoyed themselves. Though I was still wrestling with an annoyingly stubborn essay even into their visit, we all managed to have a wonderful time, sampling fine fish-and-chips establishments, sipping various tradition Scotch Whiskies, driving through the highlands, romping through glenns, eating in pubs, playing Euchre (hurray the Midwest), and (of course) watching youtube videos, the most important of which was this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5im0Ssyyus

Watch and you will certainly be edified.

AND here is a selection of photos for your enjoyment!!

Sunset on the night O Arrival

Jeff photographs the Small Bacons at Cambo House near where we live.
Thomas More, Marley and Cambo House Garden

The grounds at Cambo House--Gorgeous!

See!!! Snowdrops and Winter Aconite!!!

The Cambo Vale which leads to the sea...

Blake, Jeff, and Sarah frolicking in Pitlochry on the way up to the Cairngorms.

Mary of Egypt and Jeff on the suspension bridge in Pitlochry. We should be fashion models, yes??The guys and the Glenwhinnie (spelling?) Distillery in the Cairngorms--the highest distillery in Britain. Very interesting!!
Outside the Distillery in the Cairgorms.

T.More and M.of Egypt on the still-frozen Loch Eileen and Castle!

What a Stellar picture of us....ALL of us. Wow.

Advertisement for Wellington Boots.

In the Cairngorms...

Our lovely B and B. Our room had a GORGEOUS view of the mountains...I did NOT want to go home! So clean, so wonderful--and HUGE breakfast every morning. Aaahh...

March Marches On...and so do I

The light is returning and so is the academic intensity. Excuse the blog laxness. I have several very good reasons for my absent-ness. I will elaborate on these later. The current most pressing excuse is an essay due next week--but due sooner for me because of Dear Friends who are coming to visit Thomas More and Myself!!! We are so very excited. And we pray for sun. And more snowdrops and winter aconite (the snowdrops are up! the winter aconites are Yellow! the sun doesn't go down until 6 PM! Is spring coming? ? ? ?)

I am writing a paper about metaphor, looking specifically at two poets, one of whom is George Mackay Brown. GMB lived almost his entire life in the Orkney Islands which are tiny and remote. He describes the people of Orkney as "fishermen with plows," but as you read his poetry you get the feeling that they are really Vikings in hiding, Vikings undergoing some sort of penance. The Last Vikings. For my post today I will include one short poems by GMB. The long poems are the best, in my opinion, but this is a lovely thing.

from

The Sea:

Four Elegies

The Lost

One stumbled on a grey hill, very steep.

On drank deeply, and found himself at a carousel of angels.

One whispered in the secretest cell of salt.

One (young) exchanged many untasted Aprils for a brief ecstasy.

One who had turned hundreds away from the door of The Salt

Mother knocked on her window that night, alone.

One wrote 'amen' on a spindrift page.

Were they offered for all seareft--piracy, pain of fish, the

black and gold cargoes?

A storm-ripened one went swiftly that March among

Sea-scythes, flails, winnowings.

After the third wave, the sea-querns had him.

The Atlantic was veined all summer with slow pure glitters.

****George Mackay Brown was a devout Catholic. He had a special devotion to St Magnus of Orkney, whose feast is on 16 April. I will try to remember to do a bit of a post on GMB and St. Magnus on that day!