setting up shop

Hello friends... where did we leave off? I think I was going on about enjoying housework, following a post about how hard life is? Ah, yes, the continuing saga of life as a mama.

So, in the past week, we've added yet another change into our little life: I'm going back to work. Or, rather, I'm opening my home office. I've got someone coming in twice a week, and will add to that as need be. So far, I've had to use quite a bit of babysitting time just to get things set up: I got a desk, started some unpacking, and have been running necessary errands. I've also started reaching out to former professional contacts, and I think it's going well. I'm hopeful that by the end of March, I might have some actual contracted marketing work to do!

In addition to my "professional" life as a marketing freelancer, of course, is my crafty business: Bamboo Village Press. This is my shop on Etsy that I started running two years ago, and I'm rather excited to dust the shop off. I started it in order to support my hopeful (future) NGO Bamboo Village Educational Fund, and it was pretty successful. Now I hope I can bring it back, and maybe expand that craftiness into some other areas. My most successful items were printed with my handy Gocco screen printer, like this Moleskine cahier and this floursack towel. I'm not sure where I'm going to find the time to tackle creative thinking and product development like this, but I'm hopeful that eventually I will be able to support this little family through these two endeavors.

Meanwhile, the growth spurt/teething-related insanity continues. Shoghi now has Tooth and Tooth Jr sprouting up from the bottom, and he's figuring out how to coordinate his movements into something closer to a consistent crawl every day. I know we're not supposed to be adjusting his age anymore, but come on, he's only going on five months adjusted! Compared to other seven month babies, mine are little peanuts, so where's all this advanced stuff coming from? I'd have been content with them staying in one place for a while yet, but that's not what the fates had in mind, is it? He's sure to be into everything in short order. He came crawling for my dinner plate last night and was very, very determined!



Max, on the other hand, continues to just want constant entertainment! That's fun! He may or may not be teething, but he's surely sharpening his rolling abilities by the day. He rolls onto his tummy and promptly becomes agitated. He's still a funny little fellow, though. He is always more likely to give you a good belly laugh, and what's better than baby laughter, anyway? He's also very much into his food. I've got a little video of him and his culinary enthusiasm. Notice the little birdy mouth and the kicking legs. Very cute.



Finally, let's just not even discuss sleep, which is but a distant memory at this time. What happened to my easy nighttime babies? What happened to comfortably co-sleeping, or nursing back to sleep, or waking one or two times a night? This all has been replaced with getting up at least every half an hour for much of the night. Mama is averaging 2-3 hours of (cumulative) sleep every night. To say it sucks is just a complete understatement... but then, we're not discussing sleep, are we?