Excellent and oh so true.
And just in case anyone else was wondering:
In linguistics, gerund (abbreviated ger) is a term used to refer to various non-finite verb forms in various languages:[1]
As applied to English, it refers to the usage of a verb (in its -ing form) as a noun (for example, the verb “learning” in the sentence “Learning is an easy process for some”Talk about sob! I’m at work and fighting the tears like I’m one of those MMA fighters…whew. I totally feel this way about my 2-year old…not only b/c let’s face it..she’s 2 and doing all the same things that have me in amazement just about every second of every day, but also b/c I’m pregnant and expecting another bundle of absolute precious joy come September…this new baby thing has me so excited for round 2 but wanting SO badly to freeze round 1…
I sobbed while reading this. You managed to perfectly capture the emotion I’ve been feeling lately. You have a way with words that is precious to read.
yup.
Precious….and yes, she always will be. Just like you always will be to your mom, and she was to hers. It’s a beautiful circle of life. Thank you for articulating it so well.
Really evocative, Sarah, just beautiful.
I’m so jealous that you guys have a rooster to listen to. Ever since we got back from Hawaii I’ve missed being awoken by the rooster calls… So, much so that we want to get our very own rooster.
And it’s true, she will always be your baby. Another couple told us that they stopped calling their first son ‘baby’ when they got pregnant with their second child, so that he knew he wasn’t a baby anymore. While it seemed logical, I just couldn’t agree with them… Isla will ALWAYS be my baby—We’ll just have a few other babies too.
Couple of cloth diapering questions for you. We are planning on doing cloth with our fourth (I had NO idea how cost effective it was!) What I’ve heard and read is that in newborn days prefolds with a cover (like Thirsties) is the best fit. So I envision using those for the first couple of months. Then hopefully switching to a pocket diaper at about 4-5 months. What was your experience?
Also-I think I remember reading that you have an HE washer? I hope so! I’ve read conflicting things about HE detergent is such vast info out there. If you do what is the detergent you have had good use with as well as what is your washing process?
I feel like a first time mama jumping in here not a mom of soon to be 4!April, congratulations!! Charlotte was born in the hospital and our hospital did not allow cloth diapers - it was an outdated policy trying to avoid liability for diaper pins. So she started out in a packet of pampers. When we finished the packet (72 diapers), we started her on cloth. We use pocket diapers and we also had the smallest size gDiaper, but they all seemed too bulky between her legs at first so we bought flatfolds and three Thirsties covers and used those. The flatfolds were perfect - not as bulky as prefolds, but still absorbent enough. She wore those until she was about four or five weeks old, at which point she could also wear the gDiapers pretty comfortably. We started her in FuzziBunz pocket diapers a couple weeks after that, somewhere around two months old. If we had to do it over again, I think we would have stuck with the flatfold/thirsties for the first month-ish, then bulked up the absorbency with prefolds, and waited until she was three to four months before beginning with the FuzziBunz. They weren’t a super great fit until she was a little over three months old, but I was really eager to use them! Then she grew out of the small size of pocket diapers a few months later and has been in the medium size ever since.
Our washer is HE, but I’ve never noticed a difference between detergents. Our detergent priorities are always: biodegradable (we have a septic system), no chemicals, non-toxic, natural, etc. We look for the cheapest detergent that fits our need. We’ve only tried about three, but they’ve all worked fine and I haven’t noticed any differences. As long as I strip the diapers regularly with vinegar, I don’t experience smell or build-up problems either. When Charlotte was an infant, we didn’t know very much about detergents and at that point we used Dreft for her diapers. I can’t honestly say that I’ve noticed a difference there either (besides perfume, obviously), but I am happier knowing that the detergents we use now are so much easier on the environment and our bodies.
Our wash system is easy. We throw all the diapers in a cold wash first. Then we go through and separate any inserts that didn’t come out of the pockets (that way we don’t have to touch it pre-wash) and put them in a hot wash. Then we rinse and either ilne dry or toss them in the dryer. Good luck!
Cynthia - You have nerves of steel. I plan to cull our roosters. They can be too mean for me to feel comfortable with them around kids, but I don’t mind listening to my neighbors’!
Sarah - Obviously, I have no idea that roosters can be mean. Are they not afraid of Charlotte? Every rooster we ran into ran away from us, so I just assumed all chickens were scaredy chickens… I suppose with enough human contact, they’d be less timid though.
Hmmmm…it’s totally possible, I have no idea. I’m sure you can also selectively breed for tamer roosters as well. My only experiences are with neighbors’ roosters - and the ones that have been handled frequently seem to be nicer…to them, but not to us. I have no idea if they’d be more wary of us if they’d never had human contact (or very little), but I’ve always thought that roosters are too mean. When we visit one neighbor whose rooster sometimes free-ranges we have to keep a stick nearby to keep him away, otherwise he tries to rush us to protect his territory.
Oh wow, now I’m interested in researching how to have tamer roosters. All the roosters we saw ran away from us, and there was only one hen who was so bold that it stole a fry out of my hand while it was in transition from the plate to my mouth—The nerve!! I doubt we’ll get a rooster, our neighbours would probably hate us—Unless we caged and covered him every night so he wouldn’t crow at dawn.
I would love to see how our cats would react to such a large bird though, I’m sure we’d sit and watch our scaredy cats for hours of entertainment.
awe! so beautiful!!
<3xojo

By Kate (This Place is Now a Home) on May 13, 2011
:: Sob, sob::
Couldn’t have said it better myself.
Love.