More presents!

More presents from Grandma and Papa Rog arrived. Duncan and Berry have certainly learned what to do with presents, happily ripping them open with glee. I’d write more, but keep getting called away and it’s taken me days just to get to this point. So I’ll post this now.

A typical, glamorous Saturday

Weekends aren’t glamorous, but I love them.

I love my job, but the grind–of getting up and ready for work in the morning and getting everyone out the door relatively on time and the evening routine of feeding, bathing and putting to bed–gets old by Friday. There’s not much time for FUN in there when you’re focused on moving from one thing to another to keep the life machine going. (Although, some mornings I do animate a cuddly toy as it somehow gets more attention than my plain old mummy voice.)

Weekends are a blessing. There’s still stuff to get done – like grocery shopping on a Saturday morning and mowing the lawn. But there’s also time for play, time to be outside in the garden, time to color with the kids or show them how to play the Wii.

Today’s activities involved pretending to be doggies with Emma (video courtesy of the Droid phone). Sam did his best to pretend he couldn’t hear the barking.

After nap, it was time to play in the garden. I realized the grass needed a good mow and my mum felt compelled to document the occasion. I’ll spare you the video of me pushing the rotary mower around the front yard in a seemingly random pattern (it works for the Roomba) and leave you with this photo instead.

From 2010-02-February

And on with our lives

On Saturday morning we got out the house early (well, for a Saturday), went grocery shopping (always fun on my own with 2 kids), and then went to Adam’s house to play with Emma and Sam. I brought my spare guitar so I can play it while I’m over there and because Emma is keen on learning to play. Duncan and Berry had a good time, playing with the Dora doll house in the playroom downstairs, coloring and experimenting with corn starch. Corn starch works surprisingly well at getting marker off little fingers.

Storytelling: a love song for Duncan

This is an animoto short film that I created for a digital storytelling class I’m taking this semester. Had I more time, I’d edit a few things and possibly change the soundtrack. But, I guess Duncan and I do need each other, in a mother-child way, as opposed to the song’s romantic intentions.

Anyway, here it is. I have to feed children and get to work.

The end cuts off. It’s supposed to say, “No matter how big you get, you’ll always be my sweet boy.” Awwww….

Crab crawler

A quick video post. I have another one of him climbing over Kevin’s feet and chair that I’ll try and post tomorrow.

Embedding the video isn’t working, so just click on this link instead.

Update: here’s the second video.

Duncan, The Movie

It’s Duncan, not live and not really in person. But on video.

We’ve taken tons of digital videos of Duncan in his 7 months with us. I’m finally looking at all of them and organizing them tonight. I won’t upload them all, but here are a few recent ones.

Dec. 16, 2005: Learning to blow raspberries after a bath

Jan. 27, 2006: Ode to the binky

Feb. 1, 2006: Sitting on the bed, kicking and blowing raspberries

Update – Feb. 17, 2006 (I think): What Duncan does while Mummy tries to work

More to come another day.

It’s alive!

He’s still in the belly, though.

Kevin has gotten hooked on repeatedly henna-ing my belly. That’s OK because I’m quite happy watching movies in the evening, just sitting there while he paints away.

And Duncan seems to enjoy it too — pushing his butt out when Kevin paints on the left side of my belly, pushing out his feet on the right, and sometimes just generally squirming around.

So, here, I offer Duncan’s first home movie. The movie playing in the background is The Station Agent, in case your curious.

Baby in the belly (about 3 MB)
(Note: I’m holding my breath, all the movement is coming from within.)
You need QuickTime player to view this movie. It’s a free download.

Now I’m going for a walk and I’m not coming home until I have a baby or it starts raining, whichever comes first.