Here’s a 1967 ad for my new baby.

And here’s a picture from the adoption agency:

It works great so far… came with a correction ribbon, the manual, and the case. I suspect that between Rainey and this new (as yet unnamed) baby, I will be spending less time doddering around on facebook and more time writing useful things for myself and other people. Maybe that will even inspire me to write more here. These are all good possible outcomes, I’m thinkin’.

He’s still a long, skinny bundle of snuggly cuteness and charm. His head is pretty big for his age, and I think when people see him in his car seat they see his head first and think he’s really big for his age. He is long and he does have a big head, but he’s very light.

He yells a lot, and in addition to a lot of ah-uhing and gooing and hahing he has made a few other consonant sounds–fa and muh come to mind. He’s eating some solid food now, and with that has come a new understanding of the fact that he has a tongue and that when he sticks it out it’s kind of fun. He’s willingly eaten sweet potatoes, peas, carrots, bananas, pears, rice cereal, and baby oatmeal so far.

He pushes himself up pretty high on his arms and can rotate around from that position, though he’s not yet crawling. Now and then he seems to move backward from that position, but not forward (well, Ez said he saw him make forward progress the other morning, in honor of the Super Bowl, I’m guessing). When he really wants to cover a lot of ground, he rolls.

He got a lot of nice toys and gifts for Christmas. Family and friends were very generous with him. He’s been really into playing with his plastic Playskool blocks lately. They come in a pail, and he likes to remove the lid and dump them out, chew on them, etc. etc. He’s also a fan of his car keys, and he still loves the mobile in his crib (thanks Flemings!).

He’s such a bright shiny charming little guy. We love him to pieces.

Then we hopped in the car. Well, we shimmied into the car. The S&S parking lot is a bit snug–all side mirrors had to be tucked in. We headed northward and did a little light birthday shopping in Kittery. Ez got a sweater, a cute hat, and funky shoes; Rainey got a few goodies, including a Steelers shirt for next season; and I even found something.

A trip northward is never complete without a stop in Portsmouth. Some years back–I think it was 2007–we wandered into Nahcotta Gallery on one such stop in Portsmouth and found ourselves surrounded by lots of the most wonderful little pieces of artwork. We had stumbled upon the very first Enormous Tiny Art Show. We wandered the pieces for a long time–probably more than an hour–and picked a piece or two that we hoped to buy. Alas, we were very much novices at the whole art buying thing, and all the pieces that interested us were already sold. The Enormous Tiny Art Show has become a biannual event at Nahcotta, and it’s even expanded to their sister gallery, Three Graces, as The Teeny Tiny Art Show. The Enormous Tiny Art Show 7 and The Teeny Tiny Art Show VI open this Friday, February 5th. It so happens that the folks at Nahcotta were busy hanging the art for ETA 7 yesterday, so we got near first pick of all the glorious goods. And, as it was Ezra’s birthday, we couldn’t say no. May I introduce…

Tiny Village
8×8
Gouache on panel
Laura Berger

and…


Her Past was Never Far Behind
4×7
Encaustic and mixed media diptych on panel
Beth Billups

Happiness!

Our trip to Portsmouth also included visits to River Run Books and BullMoose Music. Add American Rust by Philipp Meyer to my to-read list. Musically, I’ve recently been most interested in picking up jazz albums. In the last couple of weeks, those have included Giants Three: Nat Cole, Lester Young, and Buddy Rich (Verve, Recorded in Los Angeles in December 1945, vinyl), RCA Victor Vintage Series: Dizzy Gillespie (Recorded in the 30s and 40s, this collection released in 1966, vinyl), The Amazing Bud Powell (Blue Note, Recorded between 1949 and 1953, vinyl, some tracks feature Max Roach, Roy Haynes, Sonny Rollins), Atmosphere for Lovers and Thieves by Ben Webster (On Black Lion, 1965, vinyl), and Dizzy on the French Riviera (Dizzy Gillespie, Recorded 1962, Verve CD).

(I couldn’t find a good picture of the RCA Victor Dizzy record.)

Actually, I found the first two of those last Sunday at Twisted Village in Cambridge. I wasn’t sure if they were still kicking, but they ARE, thank goodness.

Ezra’s birthday was appropriately rounded off by dinner at The Portsmouth Brewery (where I had delicious smoked tofu and polenta) and caffeine at Breaking New Grounds. It happened to be game night at Breaking New Grounds, so we got in a round of Bananagrams before heading home.

Here’s to another year of Ezra!!

One long weekend I finished up the Santa puzzle my mom gave me for Christmas in 2008. It was a lot of fun… a really good cozy winter activity. I think it looked better put together than it did in the picture on the box.

During our holiday visit to the farm, Ezra’s sister Abby introduced us to Bananagrams. It’s so completely up my alley–a word game, sort of like Scrabble and Boggle put together, but better (well, definitely better than Scrabble anyway). So on that long weekend I mentioned we gave Bananagrams to Amy and Doug for Christmas. Of course, we played several rounds.

Amy’s fabulous creation with the Bananagrams tiles… not a part of the actual game

And, of course, we had to get it for ourselves shortly after that.

I’m still going through my Christmas postcards. I promise to share more about them soon (take that as a “coming attractions” or a warning, as you wish).

On to brighter topics…

Red and yellow with flowers

This one looks (to me) like a round grenade.

Red with blue dots

Gold with pink dots

Flowers

Tree

Silver, Red, and Green

Unsilvered lantern with pink and mica

This one is stamped West Germany.

Blue-green lantern

Pink and white with mica

Candles

Silver striped lantern

I really love these last two.

Plaid with red and blue

Plaid with red and white

I have a larger one very similar to this but in worse condition.

Joyous Christmas

Silent Night

Merry Christmas

Santa on skis

Merry Christmas w/holly

Red Merry Christmas

Santa and stars

Now Dasher!