art tuesdays!

i couldn't sleep the night we got home from artprize after seeing so much beauty and so many creative pieces and realizing that there is a lot more art in michigan that i haven't taken the time to see. i was so energized that i came up with a plan: art tuesdays! i worked out all the details in my head, and in my dreamy-sleepy-but excited state, i came super close to waking up luke to tell him about it. the next morning i realized that it really isn't anything ground breaking, but it is at least something to look forward to. here's the plan:

every second tuesday of the month (the only tuesday we don't volunteer), mateo and i will go to a museum for the day. some in town, most out of town. going only once a month will be easy enough to budget for since admission prices and gas can add up quickly. and because it is a tuesday and luke finishes teaching at 10am, he can come along too if he is tempted. some places of course are closed on tuesdays, but we can move things around to make it happen. we'll expose ourselves to art, explore new-to-us cities, and take advantage of michigan before moving away.

i am still sort of putting together a schedule, but here are some of the places i'd like us to visit:

kresge art museum, here at msu (so ashamed we haven't made it here yet - free admission and just a bike ride away)
meijer gardens & sculpture park, in grand rapids (especially before the Chihuly exhibit leaves... this sunday!)
grand rapids art museum
grand rapids childrens museum
detroit intstitute of art (we've been here a few times, but oh how i love the dia)
arab american national museum, in dearborn
shalom street, west bloomfield
the museum of contemporary art detroit
the henry ford, in dearborn
the toledo museum of art, in ohio (thanks, meg, for the idea)
and then, just maybe, as a grand finale: the art institute of chicago!

looking at this list of 11 makes me think we might have to start visiting museums twice a month... especially before a new baby joins us in april. but what do you think? are there any glaring places i've missed? i know it is a lot of stroller time for mateo, but he did *so* well at artprize and i want to believe we can both enjoy a day (or two) each month perusing the art of michigan. so... let the art tuesdays begin!

here we go

luke is officially on the job market! he has been spending hours upon hours searching for potential jobs, perfecting his cv and letter for each position, ordering official transcripts and gathering envelopes and shiny new paper clips. he left for a conference out of state before the post office opened, so i had to take a photo of mateo (in his professor jacket, for good luck) with his applications in place of luke before sending them off. these are just some of the 30-40 he has sent.

he is hoping to teach and do research in a linguistics or spanish department at a university. so far, he has applied to schools in the northeast, the south, the midwest, southwest, west coast, and one in the northwest. and new zealand. and australia. so we could end up anywhere.

ideally, in our dreams, we'd live near the mountains in a walkable/bikeable community with lots of art and a diverse culture and a bilingual school and maybe some good mexican food. is that a lot to ask? but we are totally open to the adventure of going somewhere we've never been before (the south?). also, near family would be really nice. but also, before mateo and this new baby are settled somewhere and in school might be a perfect time to live abroad again. oh, the possibilities!

artprize = awesome

have you heard of artprize? we hadn't until hearing a story about it on npr. it is a huge art competition that anyone can enter. grand rapids transforms their downtown into an open venue for artists to find space. and anyone who visits can vote on their favorite piece. the artist who gets the most votes wins $250,000. we miss seeing art, and grand rapids was on our list of places to explore, so we checked it during its last open weekend.

it was pretty amazing - to see all sorts of art and meet some of the artists (sometimes awkward, too, as they waited for a reaction) and to see parking lots and coffee shops and churches and office space all turned into open venues. and grand rapids totally impressed us - their downtown is totally walkable and full of old, red brick buildings and restaurants and shops. basically, full of life. we wonder if we'd ended up there, or in ann arbor, if we'd have a really different view of michigan. randomly, we ran into a girl luke delivered pizza with from our flagstaff days (!) and a neighbor from our very own street (!). too funny. anyways, i'm sure the art we saw doesn't really translate well into photographs, but for our memory's sake, these were some of our favorite pieces.

above: baldaquin, by mark rumsey
made of 6000 folded & sewn papers! i always go for the hanging pieces.

plastic flowers, by daina shobrys
these were massive, and had incredible beading, and mateo kept trying to smell them.

holy spirit, by julie walden
prayers from her church were written down and folded into origami doves flying "heavenward"

lure/wave, by beili liu
this one won 3rd place, and was my most favorite. it reminded us of the poppy fields in spain, but then we found out that it signifies a chinese legend of children born with invisible threads that connect them with the ones they are meant to be with. so lovely, and oddly enough, it is something i've thought was true since i was little.

filling the void, by roscoe wilson
this is just a small photo of one part of this installation - all made with discarded boxes and bottlecaps that would have headed to a landfill. and there is luke, very fevered (we didn't realize yet) and taking a break.

me & mateo, by luke :)

good will prevail, by nancy fleming
made completely of thrifted items she's been collecting for over 5 years! and the hosting venue was the downtown goodwill. :)

the rain cloud, by stephanie imbeau
constructed of all sorts of umbrellas to signify a cloud. with lanterns inside so they glow at night. i could have hung out here for awhile.

we couldn't have imagined a better day. except for luke having a fever which we didn't realize until we got home... but other than that, we were stumbling across art everywhere we looked, we had much to discuss, it was completely free, we had a yummy but cheap lunch, and mateo was an angel and in the stroller for hours without a single complaint. we were in the car 5 minutes before he fell asleep on the way home. we're bummed that we (probably) won't live an hour from artprize next year, but so glad we made it this time.

fall walking

mama & baby smartwool

(thanks to rei, who had baby smartwool on clearance)

for luke, since he's away

we made skirts

my friend meg and i managed to wrangle our boys together, take them to a really cool fabric/toy shop she'd found, and then come home and make skirts with what we'd bought while they played and napped. all in about 5 hours. now we are dreaming of what to make next.

we made a cake

we made a cake. for no one's birthday. luke doesn't let me bake a cake for his july birthday since he is a giant-pizza-cookie person (despite my efforts to talk him into it every year), and i don't ever really bake for my own, so really we just have one a year now for mateo. this week i was really craving birthday cake so we made one. from scratch, from bittman's book. it was supposed to be chocolate with caramel cream cheese icing, but i've never made caramel icing and it wouldn't come to the right consistency (we waited, boiling it for a few hours) and then we left it and came back later and it was rock solid. so we had (just) cream cheese icing instead.

13 weeks, and the details

wow, you guys really know your full house references. i'm so impressed, and glad i'm not the only one. thanks soooo much for all of your words of support and congratulations!

so, this new little one and i are about 13 weeks along now. he or she is due in early april, very possibly on the 5th which is my birthday. i was excited for an april baby the last time around with mateo who turned out to be a may baby, and this time i have a sneaking suspicion that this one will come early in march. we will see.

we were surprised, but so, so excited about the timing of this little one. he or she will be just about 2 years younger than mateo. we will be surrounded by community and friends, instead of last time where i felt so alone in lansing. we are planning on moving next summer, and so happy to have the baby here first where we have support instead of our next city where we might not know anyone all over again. already 3 of my friends have dropped off maternity clothes - last time around we drove 2 hours to a used maternity store in detroit!

april is also the time when luke will be finishing up his dissertation (yikes), graduating, and we will be hopefully putting our house up for sale (double yikes) but i guess we will just do the best we can.

one of the things we were most worried about after finding out we were pregnant was another hospital birth. my insides shake and tears come to my eyes when i think back to mateo's birth, and the fight with the doctors that led up to it, and all of the unwanted intervening that was involved. amazingly, miraculously, 3 days after we found out about this little one, luke was offered a job to work on a special project at school - a big project that will be lots of work, but a job that happens to pay - amazingly, miraculously the exact amount of birthing at the birth center. where we wanted to go last time but couldn't afford it. where we have found community. where it feels like flagstaff. where they accept me without having insurance. we are so, so excited and so at peace. we feel like God is reminding us not to worry and just to trust that things will work out. we feel so blessed.

apparently he or she is about as big as a peach now. my belly in these photos seem to suggest a (much) bigger baby, but i think that is maybe the fault of my layering, and especially the fault of me never losing the baby weight the first time around. so far i've been super tired, napping almost every day with mateo, and craving all the wrong things like macaroni and cheese and bread and peanut butter. i gag all the time, from strong smells to thinking about salad or fresh vegetables, from walking down the produce aisle and when brushing my teeth. lots of gagging around here. so much so that mateo has started to imitate me!

just like last time, we aren't planning on finding out if this baby is a boy or girl.

so i think those are all the details, so far.

at 16 months mateo

:: has discovered the joy of stomping on leaves and throwing them in the air ::
:: and usually won't come inside on his own unless we mention the word "snack" ::
:: loves to lay on unica, or chase her and hug her hips, or give her a wide open mouth kiss on her nose while she licks him ::
:: has a new love for trains, thanks to his grandparents who sent him a track and some train cars ::
:: says "choo choo" ::
:: runs to the toaster and sings "ma ma ma ma" for "pan pan pan pan", our bread song, when he wants some toast or a bagel ::
:: likes to hug and kiss his friends, and sometimes knocks them down while doing it ::

:: says or nods "yes" to almost everything we ask, like "do you love your mama?", "what do you think about Christmas?", "did you have the best time shopping today?" ::
:: loves to say two new words: baby, and bye ::
:: likes to bring toys to me one by one until i have a giant pile in my lap ::
:: is getting better at walking while holding our hands ::
:: but is still a major runner who we have to chase everywhere ::
:: shouts "aaaaah!" over and over for autobus, whenever he sees one until we say "autobus" for him ::
:: says "papaaaa" always in a loud, fun, happy, giggly voice, and "mamamamama" always in a quieter, sweet and very needy voice ::

things i'm loving about my hubby this week

• he stayed home 4 times with a sick mateo so i could keep my plans of volunteering, meeting with friends, and attend a lecture
• when i made homemade macaroni and cheese (my favorite/one of his least favorites) he brought a freshly chopped jalapeno to the table to mix into his portion
• he dressed mateo in a cozy snowsuit (no clothes underneath) for playtime in our cold house
  
• and he did several loads of laundry (usually my job) and only one small load turned pink :)