she loves for me to scare her

She is so cute when I scare her. She jumps, then lays her head down on whatever she's pulled up onto at the time and grins. I could describe it more, but here, I'll just let you watch the video. :)

squishy lovey blanket

Woohoo, my store is now open! It is here, and I spent my traveling time over Thanksgiving weekend crocheting like a fiend to get my stocking levels higher than just 1 per item. I'm really excited to finally be opening my store. Eventually I'll be adding tie-dyed prefold cloth diapers (aiming for March) and crocheted play food (aiming for January). The play food seems to be in demand right now, and it's been so fun thinking up "new" foods that I haven't seen for sale yet, and working out how I'll pattern them.

As for the squishy lovey blanket, Lydia has a little tiny blanket that's red satin on one side, and a slightly furry cow print on the other (with her name and birth stats embroidered on it) that my mom got for her shortly after she was born. I took her crib bumper out a few months ago, but she had been using the falling-down bumper as a pillow, so I needed to put something else in there for her to cuddle with. The transition to the cow lovey was easy. Now when I lay her down, she grabs a hold of it and hugs it as she falls asleep, whether it's just for a nap or for the night. But anyway, enough history. Usually the lovey will be in roughly the same spot that it was when I laid her down. Occasionally it'll be way on the other side of the crib. But this morning it was in a brand new spot. The entire lovey was completely squished down in between the side of the mattress and the crib slats. I'm still wondering how she managed to do that.

opening day is decided upon

Yay, I've made a commitment to open my store the Monday after Thanksgiving. I'll have some of the items listed and "previewed" the Monday before, though (which means THIS Monday... eeek! lol). For any of you who aren't familiar w/ Hyena Cart, you can go in and look at items, but if it's a particularly high demand item, then the seller can set a time for the item to go "live" and then after that time it's first come first served. I don't expect right off that my items will be in high demand, but hopefully I'll get a good clientele going. :) It's just hard right now to balance hosuehold stuff, taking care of Lydia, doing my transcription (I'm SO close to getting a bonus this month), and making my wares to sell online. I should be able to get it all done though. I'm really getting excited. I'll be out of town Tuesday through Fridayish, and will try to be working on some more dishcloths or scrubbies or whatever while I'm out of town, also, since I'll be chauffered by my in-laws. Then maybe I can increase my stocking levels just before opening day. :D Oh and definitely check here late Monday for a link and/or pictures.

first birthday sneaking up

Hm I guess all the comments about hubby's job loss came where I posted this elsewhere. We found out Friday that he has to wait for his drug test and his DMV background check to come back before he can be "officially" hired. He should pass both of them w/o trouble, although the DMV check was VERY extensive, asking him questions even about his Very First Job Ever. We're supposed to hear today or tomorrow if he passed that. I'm hoping we'll hear back this afternoon sometime or early tomorrow b/c this wait is killing me.

The mom of one of the women from church knew we were OU fans and she gave us some tickets for the game this past weekend, hence our going out of town. We made a weekend of it and went up Friday and came back yesterday. My MIL watched Lydia during the game and gave her two pumped bottles and even got her to sleep for the night. It was the longest I'd ever left her, almost 6 hours. When we got back, I had to fight the urge to go wake her up and tell her good night. I was nervous that she wouldn't take the bottles since she hadn't had any before, but she took them with only a little encouragement. With the first bottle, MIL would poke her finger at the base of the nipple to get it to squirt into Lydia's mouth and get her interested that way. Then by the second bottle, Lydia was an old hat at it and was even almost holding it herself. But they had lots of fun and I'm glad they had some bonding time. Hubby and I enjoyed the game, too.

This week is still pretty busy w/ transcription. I should be able to make enough to make my 12% bonus for the month. Woohoo. I'm also still working on some longies to sell and some dishcloths. Eventually I have plans for cotton and/or wool play food. It won't be in time for this holiday season, obviously, but hopefully soon after the new year I can start on those plans. I have a few ideas for the food that I haven't really seen yet. I've only been looking on Hyena Cart so far, though, since that's where my cart will eventually be set up.

Oh and we went and got DD's one-year pictures made today, and her and our holiday pictures too. I'll have to post those when they get back. At the studio, the current customer happened to be one of the moms from our local moms group. I got close and was like "That looks like E." Then I peeked around the corner when I was filling out my sign-in card and sure enough it was her DD on the table. :P I'm so excited about how these pictures are, though. She's really getting more and more photogenic as time goes on. I was telling the photographer when her birthday is and he said that's when the pictures would be ready to pick up. :)

I can't believe we're taking her ONE-YEAR pictures already. Soon I will have a toddler instead of a baby. I haven't made any party plans yet. It'll have to be a small one. But I don't have any idea of a "theme" or anything, and I really don't necessarily even WANT a theme since she's still so young. There will be plenty of other themed birthdays that we can have so I think this year's theme will just be "birthday." :)

an unexpected career change

So. Up until last Friday, hubby worked for a pool supply retailer. He made an honest mistake in late October which caused 4K of merchandise to go missing. Friday morning, he and his DM and LP were on the phone together, where LP mercilessly interrogated him and basically called him a liar. But in the end, they did determine that DH did NOT steal the items. Even so, they had him write up a statement in his own words of what happened, and they also had him sign a restitution agreement for the 4K, authorizing payroll deductions and he was even talking with his DM about making payments over the next several paychecks. Then Friday afternoon, they fired him anyway. Hubby never even saw it coming. He knew to expect a write-up but had absolutely no clue that they were going to let him go. We've spoken briefly to a lawyer friend but employment law isn't his department so he couldn't really go into a great deal of detail, but said that what they did sounds legal (even if it is, IMO, underhanded and unethical and just plain mean).

So this week hubby's been looking for a job, revising his resume, sending it out online. This morning he's going to a car dealership that's having open interviews for salesperson positions in several dealerships throughout the area. But this loss of employment couldn't have come at a worse time. Our recent move down here ate up our already small savings account b/c of deposits and vehicle title changes and new-state licenses and all that, and we had just barely started building it back up again. We barely have enough money to last until probably the second week of December at the latest. Due to the circumstances of his loss of employment, he will not be getting a final paycheck at all. I don't know what's going to happen from here. Eventually he wants to go to nursing school, but in the meantime we need some income coming in. We have a few thousand people praying for us... I just hope those prayers are answered quickly.

Now here's a few quick Halloween pictures.