Torturing the Wee One

When you’re a baby, people can do what they want with your helpless little body. They can pull your striped nerd pants up to your chest and dance you around like a pirate and say things like, “Yahr, clean the poop deck, matey!” and pretend that it is you saying that.

I love babies.

Capn’ Tillie

A first for everyone

Tills and Daddy napping

Glue Factory Supplier

“My name is Molly and I am a dog hater.”

Yes, it’s true—dogs really get my goat. I can’t stand them. I just hate the way that they get in my space, and they smell, and they destroy my things, and they make my house messy, and they jump at my face, and they scratch me, and they bark really loudly, and they leave hair everywhere, and they make it impossible for me to leave food unattended for even a moment while I go to the bathroom or get a beverage, and they sometimes bite my friends or my friends’ dogs, and they dig up my garden, and they hump on each other, and they make the yard unusable due to their crap, and they track crap in the house…. I really can’t stand all of these things. If a person did any of this to me, I would not be friends with them. Or, perhaps I would give money to the charitable cause that helped keep them away from me in some humane way.

It’s funny, because when we were kids, my brothers and sisters and I would always ask for a dog, and my dad would say no way and describe how much he hated dogs—and I used to get really annoyed with him for this. Here I am, 20 years later, and I myself am a self-proclaimed dog hater. But there is a key difference between me and my dad: I actually have two dogs. I live with them. I feed them. I take them to the vet to get their shots. I spend a lot of money on them. I let them lick my kid. Sometimes, I think they are cute. How did I get here?

Right before the baby was born, I really panicked about my feelings about the dogs. I just knew that I would no longer have tolerance for them. I thought that the baby would make me draw new, tighter boundaries on what I would be willing to do with my time, money, and energy. I thought, oh god, I am going to be that despicable person who neglects their dogs once the kids arrive. Or, I might say to Scott, “It’s me or the dogs.” Or, I might even secretly and evilly send them away to a farm or a rendering plant when he wasn’t looking. Well, the baby is here and I haven’t yet sent the mongrels to the glue factory.

Oddly, now that she is here, I have a new understanding about dog people. Before now, I never could figure out why their souls seemed so much more open than mine to that stinky, drooly kind of love. But, now I understand. They love their dogs in the EXACT same way that I love my baby. I finally get it. Tillie can puke on me, poop on my clothes, eat my food, and scream at my friends. And, I just giggle at how cute she is while she’s doing it. There are people, friends of mine even, who never want to be a parent and who say they hate kids. I finally get these people, too. I guess having all this cuteness (and baby filth) in my life is softening me up. Maybe I’ll even come to love dogs one day.

Or, maybe not.

[Image from: http://www.allposters.com/]

Belated Birthday Yummies

Scott bought me a Kitchen-Aid mixer as a belated birthday present. It’s pink! It’s lovely! Hypnotized by her rosy curves into a state of drunken domesticity, I whipped up a delicioso batch of mushroom and onion tartlets as well as some pear tartlets. Why so many small baked things? I dunno—perhaps it’s because miniature means fancy and I wouldn’t want my new mixer to think that I’m low-brow. (She’s so hoity-toity!)

Snuggles by Molly

There is nothing I love better than getting pictures of babies enjoying the quilts that I make. Now that I’m a mom myself, I am fully aware of how hard it is to set up a photo shoot that a) avoids puke fountains spilling onto said snuggly gift and b) gives the impression that the wee babe is enjoying his or herself. I just completed two robot quilts: one for my precious new nephew, Writer, and the other for Miss Tillie. Hurray—I finally get to keep one without feeling like a weirdo. Behold the cuteness!