Good mamas like parties, don't they?

I don't care what anyone says – kids' birthday parties are sent to test us. Even the best of them are noisy and tiring and full of little battles. They hurt. They make me want double espressos and wine and a quiet corner, and perhaps a sleep.


The fairies and princesses were cute though. And everyone was gracious enough to put up with Kickbaby's sporadic teething-related yowls. But oh, afterwards I just wanted to hurl myself into bed.


(Before you feel sorry for me, I wasn't even the one hosting the party.
I know. I really am that fragile.)

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Peonies

Chantal and Dave tied the knot on Saturday – hooray!

I've been working on custom-designed pieces for their wedding all year, and now that they're married it won't spoil any surprises to show you some of their stationery here.


Chantal chose peonies as the inspiration for her entire wedding stationery suite, with her wedding theme colours of fushcia, navy and lime.


The picture above shows the wedding invitation and RSVP card... they were enclosed in navy folders along with menu selection cards and direction cards. Here is the menu...


It's so long that I didn't manage to fit the end with all the cakes in the photo!


Above – the escort cards... and here's the wedding program...


... the peony design extends on to the back cover, and the text inside is navy. And here's the sign for the groom's chair:


(There was also a Bride sign, which was much more ornate!) The sign below invited guests to write down their best advice for the newlyweds on small notecards...


The table numbers (below) were framed ...


...and Chantal had a brilliant idea for a "Vice And Nice" table, with cognac, cigars and chocolates. The sign below was framed and placed on the table.


There were Welcome stickers and Thank You stickers (I don't have pictures of those) as well as these little notes for the welcome baskets...


...and finally, the brunch invitations!


Hopefully when Chantal gets back to D.C., we can show you some pictures from the big day...

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Tigger and Owl's Unbouncy Halloween

I'm ashamed to admit I tried to get Berry to be something frilly for Halloween, like a fairy or a princess. Last year she was a forest fairy, and I suppose I pushed the fairy theme two years running because my own childhood suffered from a serious lack of tulle.

But no, Berry was hellbent on being Tigger. Occasionally she toyed with being a monkey, but mostly it was Tigger. She and Nathan are slowly making their way through my Winnie The Pooh Complete Collection of Stories each night, so Pooh, Piglet, Roo, Eeyore, Christopher Robin, Owl and Tigger are her stars.


So I found her an excellent Tigger costume and, since Kickbaby can't push his own agenda yet, I made him be Owl. That's what he gets for looking so serious.

Sadly – and unbeknownst to us – both kids were coming down with a big old dose of the flu, so we found ourselves with a listless Owl and a decidely un-bouncy Tigger on our hands.


Berry made a big effort to rally, though, and a little while after we got back from trick-or-treating she came out of her playroom and said, "Thank you, guys."

"For what?" Nathan asked.

"For Halloween," she said, and wandered off with her pumpkin.

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Oh, O.

Less than 90 hours until the election and there's still time for me to completely lose my mind. Unless, you know, that happened already.

We haven't talked about the election to Berry (what possible interest could a barely three-year-old have, right?) but there are signs she might've picked up on the vibe around here. She pointed to the paper yesterday morning and said, "Who that, mommy? That Ba'ack Obama. I do love him. He a good man."

Bless her little accidentally-indoctrinated heart...

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Can I bribe you with a photo?

I have at least seven excellent reasons why I'm too busy to write properly at the moment, so I'm going to see if I can get away with posting a cute picture instead.

Here, Berry and Kickbaby are reading A Home For A Bunny. When I was small, I made my mum read it so many times that she can still recite the entire story – word for word – three decades later.

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Monkey

On Wednesday, my brother turned 31 and got bitten by a monkey in India.

Aaron – you should know that when Mum called with the news, I gasped, and Nathan laughed. I trust this leaves you ample time to adjust your Christmas list.

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A very bad night

Embarrassing admission: I didn't know croup still existed.

I honestly thought it was a yesteryear kind of thing, like smallpox or polio – the last time I heard of it, Anne of Green Gables was heroically dosing baby Minnie May with ipecac syrup to save her from a midnight 'attack of the croup'.

There's nothing like finding out you're wrong firsthand.

On Tuesday evening Kickbaby startled awake with a strangled yell. A yell that kept on going, and kept on sounding strangled. I thought he was hungry but he refused to eat, arching away and flailing his arms, and every exhaled cry sounded like a seal bark. He – and I – got more and more frantic while Nathan called the ER.

The pediatrician said try a room full of steam or bring him in, so we stood in the bathroom with the shower on full-blast hot, sweating and trying to soothe our slippery, desperate, barking baby. It was awful. After about three-quarters of an hour he calmed down enough to sleep.

An hour later he woke with another yell, and this time it was all so, so much worse. Every breath was a long, strangled wheeze that made his little body rigid, every cry was a huge bark, and at every moment I thought surely he didn't get any air that time, except he would cry again so he must have. It was incredibly frightening. He stopped thrashing around long enough for us to get his exhausted little body into the car seat and put a sleepy Berry in the car, and we all rushed to the hospital on base.

Croup in a five-month-old baby is serious stuff. Their airways are so tiny that the inflammation can block them off. A toddler or a child with croup is miserable, but pretty safe. A baby is not. After two doses of epi mist didn't eliminate the stridor (showing the inflammation was severe) they gave Kickbaby two steroid shots and x-rayed his chest.

I was astounded that they haven't come up with a more humane, gentle way to keep babies still for x-rays than this device (let me assure you, the calm 'hey check it out, I'm trapped in a tube' attitude of the toddler pictured is not typical, and a little baby looks even more pitiful strapped in there). But it turns out they get a better chest x-ray image if the infant is crying vigorously. It also turns out that the whole procedure makes you want to deck the tech and sprint off into the night with your helpless child.

I digress...

Judging from the x-rays it was lucky we'd headed for the ER when we did, and Kickbaby was admitted to the hospital. I spent the rest of the night and the whole day by his bed, relieved the steroids worked so well and hoping we could take him home at night.

Kickbaby did sleep at home last night – he actually slept through the night which is unheard-of for him. This morning he's congested and croaky, but otherwise a brand-new little man. Me – I'm exhausted, relieved and grateful. And newly enlightened about croup.

Relief!

A French giraffe to the rescue!

Kickbaby has been teething – or acting for all the world like he's teething – for the best part of a month. Gnawing savagely on everything he can get his hands on, drooling incessantly (sorry to ruin your smooth image, Kickbaby) and squawking about it all quite loudly.

Since I won't buy something made-in-China and potentially toxic to put in my baby's mouth, I googled "BPA-free teethers" and the adorable Vulli Sophie La Girafe popped up. I was startled at first: twenty dollars for a teether! But then I found out it's handmade in the French Alps from all-natural non-toxic rubber, decorated with non-toxic vegetable-based paint – and has been made the same way since 1961 (hence the cute retro look).

She is now, hands down, Kickbaby's favourite toy. I would've paid double for the wonderful peace it's given me – I wish I'd known about her sooner!

My friend Pauline is French... if I discover she knew about Sophie La Girafe and was holding out on me, there'll be trouble.

New life in the old press

The press is complete.

For the first time in... well, who knows how long... there are no pieces missing.

Thanks to Briar Press (where I found the parts) and Nathan's Dad (who fitted said parts), my 1902 Chandler & Price Old Style now runs like a dream.

The dramatically and dangerously worn lower roller saddles are gone, replaced with intact – and original – saddles and springs (below).


The lower bail, missing since long before I owned the press, has been replaced with an original bail from a parts press.

The 14-inch pulley, which previously had the press running at an alarming 18 impressions per minute, has been replaced with a 7-inch pulley plus a new A-belt. The press now gives a perfect 10 impressions per minute – much safer for my fingers and my jumpy nerves.

I actually sat down and did maths to figure out what size pulley we'd need to reduce the press speed enough to produce the desired number of impressions per minute. I mention this to illustrate my abiding devotion to this letterpress – mathematics and I are deeply suspicious of each other, and prefer not to mingle.

A final and wonderful touch: a really pretty hardwood platform for me to stand on while I'm working. My press is mounted on a platform seven inches high, which makes it very (well, comparatively) easy to move around using a pallet jack, but too high for me to operate. For a six-foot-two man it would be perfect. For five-foot-six me, the hardwood platform makes it perfect. Believe it or not, Dad didn't custom-build it for me. He built it as an absurdly attractive base for a dryer, but it didn't work out. When he brought it down from Dallas and put it next to the press, it was an exact fit. I can't believe my luck.

Of course, now that everything's peachy with the press, I've had no time to print. My very first photopolymer plate arrived today to great fanfare (from me), and even that is going to have to wait.

But when I find myself with three baby-free hours, believe me – I'm ready.

Large and in charge

At least now I know why my back hurts so much.

At four months old, Kickbaby is 18lbs 12oz and 27 inches long. Depending which chart you believe, that's hovering around the 90th to 95th percentile. It makes for a pretty unwieldy baby.

I was trying wrangle him into a onesie the other day when it occurred to me: maybe he's yowling because this thing is too small. Even half-on, the outfit was sausage-skin-tight and he was miserable... so I had to put all his 9-to-12-month clothes aside for Goodwill and go tackle the 12-18 month racks at Gymboree.

When we were out running the other day, the contractors down the street offered him a "heavy lifting" job on the spot. So I figure if this expensive habit of whipping through the sizes continues, I'll just send him out to work.

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