"It is fun to have fun, but you have to know how"

Don't worry, my Seuss obsession continues, despite the fact my Seuss baby is a toddler and probably won't be using her nursery much longer (though, she doesn't climb out of her crib and she still fits in it, so we're going to let her stay in the crib as long as possible).

I planned to change the knobs on her dresser while I was still pregnant, but for many random reasons I never did that project until a few months ago. For this project I bought wooden knobs at Lowe's and lathered them with craft paint. I was so pleased and excited with the result. I'm always amazed what a big difference a little paint makes.

Before (sorry about the flash!).

After.

The next project ended up being far cuter than I imagined. Nadine's 3rd-floor window faces west, so the setting sun glares into her room. I wanted to make curtains that would cut most of the light. We had just had a lesson in church about, "Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without." So I fought my desire to buy Seuss-y fabric and instead looked through the surprising amount of fabric I already own.

(Before)

I randomly have yards and yards of different prints of upholstery fabric, which is nice because it's thick. I made these curtains not necessarily to be cute, but instead to be functional. So they're not sewn perfectly or even correctly. BUT, they work well and they're pretty darn cute.

And finally, I finished The Seuss Quilt! This fantastic fabric was in a cute little store in my hometown. I had several people tell me about the fabric (because people see Seuss and instantly think of me; I love it!). I had to create a pattern for this quilt, and like everything I sew it's not perfect, but I adore it (really, only because it's so dang bright). I machine quilted it at the end (instead of my usual tying), which again isn't perfect but at least I'm not as afraid of doing it next time.

I especially like the fabric on the back, with the names of Dr. Seuss' books.

Crabby

On Friday Todd and I went to a crab feast in Annapolis. Annapolis is the state capital, and is a cute little old town on the Chesapeake Bay. We really like Annapolis--we probably go there more often than we go to DC.

I have been nerdily looking forward to this event for a month. The stars aligned and Todd was actually home in time, so we got a sitter (hooray!) and drove 30 minutes to the Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium (what a cool place for an event).

Now, I love crab. It's probably my favorite seafood. So I didn't really think this through before I bought tickets. But as we got closer to the stadium, it suddenly dawned on us that we were in serious seafood territory, not land-locked Las Vegas, and we were probably going to be fed more than just crab legs.

Todd: "Do you think they're serving whole crabs?"
Jen: "Ugh, I hope not."

And then we entered the gates and saw table after table lined a foot high with whole crabs. Shells, eyes, paddle-legs and all.

Luckily I have become a much smaller food pansy than I used to be, plus I knew this would be a really fun experience fairly unique to where we live, so we dove in.

We got our plates piled with eight to ten crabs each. Then we sat, and stared at the crabs. Then we looked at the people around us, delightedly eating meat from their open crabs. How did they do that?

I swallowed my pride and begged the man across from us to show us what to do. Luckily he was an expert and was very friendly. So we now know how to open a whole crab. That's pretty cool.

And disgusting. You take off the pincer legs, remove some T-shaped back flap, then open the crab oyster-style from the front. THEN you watch all the guts and who-knows-whatever-else liquid nastiness flop out of the crab. Professionals can then easily find the meat, but I just clumsily dug around, breaking parts until I found meat. Trying desperately to avoid the gills.

Crabs have GILLS. And they're spongy and they're in the way and they look so gross and . . . ugh, the gills almost did me in (I have a thing about texture). Seriously, the first time I opened a crab I had to fight a wave of nausea. But I kept repeating to myself, "This is a really cool experience." And we got through it. And it was super tasty. And a really neat experience. And I wouldn't do it again.

After I ate my entire one plate of all-you-can-eat crabs (I win!), we filled ourselves on hot dogs. I don't know what's in a hot dog, but I certainly don't have to sift through it to eat it.

Baby blog updated

Lots of pictures.

Zoo (and baby blog update)

We went to the zoo in DC on Monday. Todd was post-call (meaning he stayed at the hospital for 24+ hours), but he had been able to sleep Sunday night so he wasn't too worn out. The zoo wasn't crowded, which was really nice. Apparently we were there before the tourists woke up.

The nice thing about taking a toddler to the zoo is she's old enough to recognize the animals, but is still young enough that she doesn't care if her parents leave after only two hours, when it gets nasty hot.

She loved it.

More Nani pics on the baby blog.