Mr. Grabby Hands

This last week or so, E. has discovered he has hands and that they are under his control. To some extent, anyway. He loves grabbing at things and trying to put them in his mouth. He’s more successful with some things than others. He loves clutching his burp cloth in both hands and cramming it against his face and kind of growling into it. Pretty cute stuff.

On a different note, yesterday I ordered my first print from Tiny Showcase. I’ve been on their mailing list for a while and would check out the prints from time to time. Anyway, this week I finally took the plunge and ordered this print.

It’s by Amy Ruppel, whose work I’ve admired ever since I saw an exhibit of hers at the Smith Family Bookstore in Eugene a couple of years ago. Even though you miss out on some of the depth of Amy’s work with a print, I’m still really excited about it. And the print even comes with two cute enamel pins!

It was a bit of an ordeal to order it, though. Because Tiny Showcase only does very limited runs of the prints, they can sell out very quickly. I logged on to the site right at 5:30pm MST when they release the prints, but the site kept crashing on me because of the high traffic. By the time I got my order placed, they were on print #188 of 200, so I barely squeaked in under the wire. The entire run sold out in less than 30 minutes!

100 Days Old!


E. turned 100 days old this last week. Via Wikipedia, “In Korea it’s common to celebrate the bek-il or the 100th day of life. This tradition was born from a time of high infant mortality when many babies would die before three months of age. As a result the 100th day is a celebration of life as the baby has survived the difficult first 100 days of life.”

E. is a quarter Korean and while we weren’t going to have a traditional ceremony I wanted to go out for Korean food last week to celebrate his bek-il. However, a blizzard blew in last week and we weren’t able to make it out. N. had the day off today and so for lunch we went out for Korean food.

We drove down to a little place in Provo called Sam Hawk. Because their kitchen is so tiny, N. and I usually call in our order ahead of time. Otherwise, the wait can be up to an hour and a half, especially if you get stuck behind a large group. The first time we ate there, it literally took us two hours to get our food. The waitress felt badly for us and brought us rice crackers to snack on and Korean fashion magazines to flip through while we waited. It was funny at the time, but not that funny since we were crazy hungry. And the rice crackers sadly didn’t cut it.

So yeah, we learned our lesson: calling ahead definitely pays off. When we were there today we received our food, ate, and paid the check before some families who had been there when we arrived even got their food. We definitely got a few dirty looks as we were leaving. I felt a little smug for being in the know, but also a tiny bit guilty. But the food was really good.

We started with some dukboki, one of my favorites. It’s sort of like street food and so not every Korean restaurant serves it. I loved eating it at the street carts in when I was in Korea. It cracked me up how the vendors would wrap the plate in a clean plastic bag, put the dukboki on the plate, and then peel off the plastic bag and throw it away when you finished. This is one of the few Korean dishes I can make at home.

The banchan included seasoned black beans, potatoes, kimchi, and mung bean spouts.

N. and I both had dolsot bibimbap. E. started fussing while we were eating so I ended up holding him on my lap, but I had to be careful to keep him away from the bowl so he wouldn’t be burned.

The food was super good. After lunch we ran some errands and then got some frozen custard before coming home (lemon chiffon–yum!) So all and all, it was a lovely Presidents’ Day.

Happy Valentine’s Day

E.’s still a little under the weather, but I think he’s on the mend. I don’t know if it’s because he’s sick or if it’s just a stage, but he’s been drooling like crazy these last few days. His little chin is getting pretty chapped. He’s also started focusing on his hands a lot and often puts them in his mouth along with anything he can grab–so his drool gets on everything within his reach. Lovely!
Anyway, happy Valentine’s Day from E. and me!





Hanging In There


I took E. to the doctor again yesterday (5 visits in 2 weeks, a new personal best! Hopefully this record will stand for a long time.) Anyway, it turns out that the poor little guy has RSV. He has a cough and is a little wheezy, but the oxygen levels in his blood tested okay, so for right now it’s not super serious. I’m still kind of freaked out though because I know his condition can turn pretty quickly. So I’m watching him like a hawk to see if his breathing becomes more labored. The next week or so might be a little rough.

Oh yeah, and he has a double ear infection that he started antibiotics for. And he hates taking the antibiotic and squirms around and gets it everywhere.

Sigh. The good times just keep on coming.

The Parade of Cousins Continues!

N.’s brother K. and K.’s wife M. came to visit for the weekend while K. was doing promotional appearances for his new book. Their daughter C. and son D. are a lot of fun to have around. It was fun to introduce them to E.

Note E.’s very hip Sub Pop onesie, a Christmas gift from K. and M. E.’s rocking it with a long-sleeved thermal underneath. He’s the Littlest Hipster!


Favorite Photos

I know that these photos were in the slide show last week, but I thought I would post my favorites separately because the slide show goes by pretty quickly and you can’t pause it. E. is a lot of fun to photograph and is a real sweetie to humor me so often.


Since my grandmother’s funeral is this Wednesday, I probably won’t post again until later this week. But when I do, I’ll have some new photos and a report on how E.’s first flight went. Wish us luck!