First evers

Last Saturday, Doug took me to see Bill Cosby! Cosby performed at Durham Performing Arts Center and he was hilarious. Also, he went 40 minutes over his allotted time - awesome!!Thanks, Doug for a fabulous date :).

This week I also went out of my comfort zone and sewed this cute little creature all by myself. That's right. Silky fabric + black felt and yarn = sensory fun! I was a little afraid to sew silky fabrics since I'm such a novice, but it wasn't too hard!

I made lots of mistakes - such as sewing the details on last (I should have sewed them on before sewing the two zebra pieces together...). Actually the only things I did right the first time are, sewing the tail in and cutting out the pieces haha. Still, I am encouraged by my success!

My craft supplies have nearly doubled in size over the last few days. I don't quite know where to put everything.

What should I make next?

Oh boy!

We're going to have a boy! Congratulations to the 10 other women who learned the gender of their baby the same day as me haha. You're probably tired of announcements but I can't help but share the news :).

Finally I have a wonderful excuse to follow blogs like Sewing for Boys, Boy, Oh, Boy, Oh Boy!, and Made. I may be a little overexcited but I've already started looking at sewing patterns... here are some of my favorites:

via made

via The Train to Crazy

via made

via Boy, Oh Boy, Oh Boy!

And I've already started this "little" project I first fell in love with at Maybe Matilda:

via Tales from Cuckoo Land

But I'm using this tangerine orange instead:

This pictures doesn't quite do the brightness of the yarn justice

Despite the small frustrations daily life brings, I'm extremely grateful to have the comforting consistency of the gospel and the delightful excitement of having a baby. Here's to a new adventure :).

Staying in the loop

Yesterday I went to an Autism and ADHD workshop. It was hosted at my church building and put together by church members though some presenters were not LDS and it was open to the public. 

I thoroughly enjoyed going to the meeting, mostly because it reminded me of all the wonderful experiences I had student teaching. I love the students I worked with and have fond memories of my time with them! 

Also, it's important for me to stay current with my field. Even though I don't plan to work after having my baby, I'm still passionate, and will still be passionate about kids with special needs. Ironically, or hypocritically, I haven't been reading recent news or events regarding teaching those with disabilities - hence no blog posts about it, haha. But hey, as much as I may try, I can't do everything. I just haven't admitted that yet.

So here's a mini story to get back into the groove of things. Jacob was 7 years old when a speech therapist taught him to type and therefore express himself. Jacob is nonverbal and is diagnosed with autism and mental retardation. Well you can read how the therapist taught him to type in this huffington post article. The therapist would ask Jacob to type something, and then she would physically guide him to type out the answer. (At this point in the story I scoffed - sure, she's "guiding" his hands...) Jacob has never been taught how to read and has showed few signs of communication throughout his life. Naturally I was quite skeptical of this whole scenario, and I still am, but apparently, he is now 19 and communicates with his parents via typing. How amazing is that? I gained confidence again that Jacob in fact did learn how to type and communicate with others and that his mental retardation was misdiagnosed. But then why, 14 years later, is the same speech therapist teaching him how to type? If he is intelligent, and can communicate and type on his own, then why does he still need her help?

Two things. 1. I sincerely hope I am misjudging the speech therapist and that these incongruencies are easily explained. 2. Regardless of the truthfulness of this story, people who are nonverbal have thoughts too. It just takes a little creativity to help them express those thoughts. 

I'll close with Jacob's own thoughts: "For people with autism, every day is an unending struggle to remember that we are not so different after all. You can help by smiling at us, by welcoming our presence and encouraging our participation. In the end, it comes down to recognizing God's image in every single human being."

What are your thoughts?

Something to show

My belly popped out! 

No one ever talks about how awkward it is to take pictures of yourself...

It's weird how it (the belly popping) happened practically overnight. Sure, I finished a big meal right before this picture was taken, but there is definitely an 18-week old fetus in there!

Oh, and no Christmas pictures to sport, because this is the only one I took:

A darling picture of my nephew, James who forwarded a text to my boss meant for Doug which, in essence, said:

"don't forget underwear!"

a good sign that it's going to be a great year.

Doug saves

So a tentative new year's resolution for us is to save more money. I say tentative because I don't know if I want to commit to it or not haha. Just kidding, of course I want to save money... Plus, we haven't written down any goals yet so everything is still up in the air. Doug is all about it though, he says to me:

Doug: Charisse, do you want to go to that Indian restaurant for dinner tonight?
Me: If you find someone to go with us, sure.
Doug: You failed! We're not going because we need to save money for the baby. Look, we just saved $32 by not going!
Me: uh... okay.

Oh yeah, I'm pregnant. :) Due date is June 16th.