Archive for November, 2013

• November 18, 2013

  Chapter Thirty Three- BelAir Cantina Tosa

  

  To celebrate our last night of paternity leave (well sort of…Theo has worked for himself for the past year and a half, and went back to working with someone else this week), we put the twins down for bed, got Little T set up with pjs and I fed baby S.  Our sitter came over and we bolted out the door for an hour of tacos and conversation.

  

  I had a flashback to living in Seattle (known henceforth as “The Golden Years”).  I think it was being out with Theo, having a drink, and just shooting the breeze.  We weren’t scarfing down our food so we could keep one or all of the kids from playing/eating off the floor and trashing the restaurant.

  

  Speaking of The Golden Years, they were packed with a huge group of mostly midwest folks that somehow found each other in Seattle.  We camped, hiked, skied, climbed, ate and drank together.  I could call up one of 10 people on any given night, ask them if they wanted to meet me at Molly Maguire’s (or any other hole in the wall in Ballard) and a night of either good conversation or reckless partying would ensue.  And we had to be to work at 9am.  That was about it.  No real responsibilities and living in an amazing city (Macklemore isn’t joking around).  See why 2003-2005 deserve the title?

  Anyway, this post is supposed to be about BelAir Cantina.  It’s a cool joint with pretty decent tacos.  I recommend the basic bean and cheese, as well as the ninja pig tacos.  The latter mostly because it has hoisin sauce (see my post on Pho and read about my love for plum sauce).  And if you go late on a Sunday night, you’ll pretty much have the place to yourself.  My photos aren’t doing justice here, I haven’t gotten up the guts to bring my better camera out to dinner with me.  I feel strange photographing food, and there’s just no getting around terrible lighting for photography indoors at night.  Don’t get me wrong, I like my restaurants with dim lights.  Sorta dark and cozy is my style, and if BelAir were busier, this would have been alright.  That’s not conducive to photographing, though.

  It was a nice date.  Hopefully we’ll get to do this again sometime.  And hopefully next time baby S won’t punish us by being up from 3am on.

  

  Cheers!

  A. Storm

  2 Comments / Adventures without kids, Food and Drink / amber

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• November 16, 2013

  Chapter Thirty Two- Not much

  

  I went on a date with baby S to Stone Creek coffee.

  

  The twins got shirts with capes.  And wore them for 72 hours straight.

  

  Little T got her fingernails painted by Grandma.

  

   

  We went to the doctor’s office.  No pertussis, don’t worry.

  And pushed each other around in boxes.

  And walked around in Uncle Will’s jacket.

   

  No Comments / Uncategorized / amber

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• November 5, 2013

  Chapter Thirty One- Columbia St. Mary’s Hospital

  

  Proof that even with your fourth kid, you still don’t look like you know what you’re doing 🙂

  This past week, I took an adventure to Columbia St. Mary’s hospital on the east side.  Theo and I woke up at 4am to make our pre-dawn appointment for an ECV (where the doc tries to turn a breech baby by placing her hands on your belly and spinning).  But, baby girl had already turned around (the fourth time in one week going from breech to vertex, highly unusual for a baby to do that in the last week of pregnancy) and contractions were regular so we got things going with some pitocin and were off to the races.  We chose this hospital because it’s where my amazing OB delivers, though I got a tour of Authentic Birth Center just last week.  And had I gotten that tour earlier in the pregnancy, I would have chosen to have my baby there because it’s BEAUTIFUL and I went without an epidural which would have been perfect.  BUT…my experience in the hospital was just how I wanted it to be.  And we got a beautiful babe out of it!

  

  Little miss was born at 2:50pm, and I can’t tell you her birth weight because we don’t know.  She was measured at 7lbs 14 oz, but by midnight that night was up to 8lb 11oz so it’s likely that the initial reading was incorrect.  Either way, she’s a champ.

  

  It was a really foggy day and this was our view from the recovery room.  We had a tiny view of the lake which was nice.

  

  Little T, Little A, and J came to visit the next day and immediately jumped up on the bed and shouted “BABY!!!!!”.  They’ve been so wonderful with their new little sister, and we’re all so happy she’s here.  The first few days home have been tiring but good.  I’m a little nervous for how I’m possibly going to handle this when Theo goes back to work, and preparing real food hasn’t really happened.  I won’t tell you what we ate for dinner tonight because it involves things I swore I’d never feed my kids or let myself eat.  Which brings me to the topic of asking for help.

  Are you good at it?  I’m not.  It actually seems overwhelming to even plan what to ask for and when.  Would just be easier to do it myself, right?  I’m learning that it’s not.  My friend convinced me to let her set up a calendar on WhatFriendsDo.com, so I’m still navigating that and hesitating on pulling the trigger, allowing friends and family to bring us food or help with the kids.

  What a strange thing.  Evaluating your own life and teetering between “life is GOOD, I’m super lucky and have so many blessings” and “holy crap this is hard I cannot do it alone”.

  Thanks to everyone who’s already helped out, congratulated us, and sent their love.  We’re so appreciative of the love in our lives.

  A. Storm

  2 Comments / Uncategorized / amber

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