The Henrecksons

From the northwest to the midwest

• Home
• About
• Photos

Recent Goings-on February 4, 2010

I realized I haven’t posted in quite a while, which should be remedied.

We’re back in South Bend after a great Christmas with the Henrecksons and a wonderful trip back to Idaho to see the Ditton side of the family. David greatly enjoyed seeing his dearest Nana, Papa, Uncle Joel, and Auntie Christine, all of whom he hadn’t seen since he was two months old. The only person who didn’t appreciate his visit was Samantha.

Davey has started his second semester of classes, including a history of American evangelicalism class from the highly popular Mark Noll. And I have been teaching grammar at a homeschool co-op on Wednesday mornings, which is a lot of fun. Grading for five students seems like nothing after grading some hundred students’ papers at Logos. (Not that I didn’t relish every one of them!) But I still greatly miss all the Knights, even those two unnameable staff members who called me a whale when I was pregnant.

I co-hosted a baby shower for a friend of mine, Sarah, who just had her baby boy Michael over Christmas break.  For an activity, I found this fun idea for a keepsake baby quilt, which worked out really well. You cut sixteen 7″x7″ squares (or however many you want, provided it makes a square quilt) of white fabric, and buy some fabric markers and baby-themed stencils. Each guest gets to decorate a square (ours each did a couple), either using the stencils or drawing freehand.

Then someone (me, in this case) takes the squares home, and pieces them together into a quilt. I used blue fabric for the strips in between the squares; you need 20 7″x2″ strips and 5 38″x2″ strips. The finished top is 34″x34″ (if you use quarter-inch seams), and I just made my backing about an inch longer than that, folded it over twice (on top of the front of the quilt) and machine-finished the quilt.

It turned out quite cute, and is the perfect size for a baby to drag around.

While I had the machine out, I decided to make a new little couch pillow, to replace a rather ugly pilled plain black one.

David has also been accomplishing a lot lately. He now will eat pretty much any baby food without the previous gagging and theatrics.  I also bribed him to say “mama” (or something quite close), by rewarding him with being picked up once he said it. He used that knowledge later, when I was feeding him and had put away the rest of the food, to cry, “mama!” in hopes that the food would perhaps return. Finally, he has grown his two bottom teeth, which he very reluctantly let me photograph.

That’s all for now!

In Which we are Losing our Mind . . . December 3, 2009

Such a Good Baby October 25, 2009

Welcoming Fall October 10, 2009

I had been meaning to buy some cute pumpkins for the last couple weeks. This morning, we went to Farmer’s Market and found all sorts of other glorious things as well:

In the center are hot banana peppers - Davey made salsa. And on the bottom right are sweet potatoes.

I finally got out my fall decor. I realize it’s a bit late, but then, so was fall here in South Bend - we had something of an Indian summer. Better late than never.

And lest it feel left out, even the tv got a little spruced up . . .

Spokane Blue Spinach Salad September 18, 2009

We had some organic mixed greens and blueberries from Farmer’s Market, so I decided to make this salad from the Junior League of Spokane cookbook, “Still Gold’n.” The recipe is below; I just added chicken.

The blueberry vinagrette (this is on the second day so the texture was thicker).

All Home Grown September 17, 2009

Yesterday I did a first: hanging my laundry out on the line to dry. It had a pleasantly quaint feeling to it. I had heard from someone that sunshine can bleach out baby poop stains. So, after ridiculous amounts of scrubbing with woolite and a toothbrush, I thought I’d give it a shot.

Now, there were two unforunate incidents involving this laundry-hanging.  First, when I went into the apartments’ lovely shared backyard/park area to hang my laundry, I neglected to remember that my apartment door automatically locks behind me. I was outside, and baby was inside napping in his crib. My cell phone was also inside. Thankfully, the office was open, so I was able to run over to get a spare key.

Second, I forgot to retrieve my laundry until we got back from a bible study that night.

This time, the door to the whole apartment unit locked behind me, and the passkey didn’t work. And my cell-phone was inside again. And so was Davey. And best of all, the yard is fenced in with a locked gate. I tried knocking on the door (no-one answered), and contemplated the old Romeo and Juliet throwing-a-stone-at-the-top-floor-window trick (I thought better of it). So I got to climb the fence. That was fun. I tried my best not to look like a criminal, and prayed no-one was watching.

On a happier note, our church has a communal garden out back, and the produce was ripe yesterday.

Green peppers, tomatoes, chili peppers, and fresh green and cinnamon basil leaves. I hope to attempt pesto. Paninis, here we come.

Notre Dame! September 1, 2009

Davey is now into his second week of school; I’m in my second week of trying to find my way around South Bend. Last Tuesday night was Opening Mass, which is their version of a convocation ceremony. One of the amusing things about attending a Catholic college is the phrases you find floating around your house. “So tomorrow after Mass . . .” or  ”I’m just waiting for the Bishop to get back to me on that . . . .”

So on Tuesday, I met up with Davey on campus after his classes.

Mass was held in a huge convention room rather than at the Basilica, because its an all-school event and there are some 10,000 students at Notre Dame.

David came too, and was a good obedient child, for the most part.

At Mass, I was struck by a couple of things.  The liturgy was very similar to that of Trinity, our church back home, except it includes much more service music and only one hymn. There was also a 70 person liturgical choir, which sang a number of pieces during the service. They had the passing of the peace, which we do at Trinity as well. The service music was beautiful - my favorite part is the Agnus Dei, where the congregation responds to the cantor, who had a beautiful deep bass voice.

But the second thing that struck me was that, although we were among the very few Protestants there, we seemed to be the only ones actually singing! They had the music printed out for you, but the congregation seemed devoid of any vitality in their participation - for the responses as well. This is nothing new to me - I’ve seen the same phenomenon at evangelical churches singing praise choruses, where the only people really singing out are the worship leaders up front. But with praise choruses I can understand, because for a first-time visitor, while they give you the words up on a screen, you have to guess at what the tune might be. That hardly lends itself to confident singing, unless you enjoy blasting out the wrong note.

Of course there were things that we were not comfortable with, such as the bowing to the Eucharist and so forth. It is really quite the pageant - waving the incense over the host, until the whole altar is covered in smoke. Someone once posed to me the question of whether, if you’re going to err on one side or another, it’s better to over-respect the Lord’s Supper or to under-value it as many Protestant churches do. Of course, we hope to do neither.

September 1, 2009

So Davey and I thought we would start singing together after dinner and Scripture reading, so that David would grow up knowing that tradition. Thanks to the Ivers for that idea - I’ll never forget Justice and Christian clapping wildly and singing along with their parents, or doing the hand motions but making up the wrong words. Tonight we tried it for the first time. Davey picked David up off the ground, where he had been kicking and laughing to himself, and held him in his lap. He stared at us silently, wondering what this was about, and I started feeling sentimental about what a special experience this would be. Silly me. As we started singing the Nunc Dimittis, David’s eyes widened, his mouth spread into a huge frown, and he burst into screaming sobs.  So much for our pious baptized baby.

Our New Home August 26, 2009

Well, we’re finally all settled in. Our new apartment is pretty cute, and quite cozy at 500 square feet, but it’s perfect for the three of us. I finally got pictures uploaded, so here we go.

First, we have our cute little kitchen:

Living Room:

Bathroom:

Hallway with washer and dryer - hooray!!

Bedroom(bed comes complete with cute baby):

There was a little niche in the wall, which made for a perfect office workspace for me, which is where I’m sitting now. My wonderful father installed these shelves when he was here.

And last, but my favorite, David’s nursery.

I made the quilt when I was pregnant with him; it was a cute pattern I found called a “bow-tie” quilt. And you can see all David’s friends hanging up in the corner there.

We made an Ikea trip once we figured out everything we still needed; there’s one up near Chicago, about a 2.5 hr drive. I found this cute little lamp, as well as the frame and poster for his bedroom there. This is his bookshelf, with all my favorite childhood books that I’d saved. I discovered that most of them are fairy tales, along with some British children’s adventure stories that my mom brought back with her when she moved here from Scotland.

And his dresser with all his clothes. On the shelf, there are these two darling Peter Rabbit ceramics that my mom saved from my nursery.

And of course, the very cutest fixture of our new house:

That face he’s making is his spitting face - a talent he’s recently aquired. These days when I rock him before naptime, he no longer cries intensely like he sometimes used to. Now, if he doesn’t feel like a nap, he merely complains to himself,  saying “Ah goo, ah boo,” over and over in a low sullen voice. Today he watched me intently while I was singing to him, and then he narrowed his eyes,  puckered his sweet little mouth (just as you see above) and began deliberately spitting at me the whole time I was singing. Ah, the joys of motherhood.

The Many Personas of David July 30, 2009

I’ve begun to notice that David already has quite a distinct personality. Or, I should say, personalities. He acts so differently at various times during the day that it almost feels like I have five different babies. The babies are as follows:

Wild Baby

This was the first persona I noticed in David. I think it began when he realized I would not take his food away from him when nursing. So instead of latching on and eating as quickly as possible, Wild Baby prefers to take his precious time about it. He gets a ferocious gleam in his eye, and waggles his head violently back and forth, as much as to say, “I won’t take it - you can’t make me!” But eventually Wild Baby caves to the call of hunger. Then his persona changes, and he becomes Greedy Baby. His eyes take on the most miserly look you’ve ever seen, he squints, hunkers down, and munches away, glancing shiftily from side to side to ensure that no one had better take it away from him.

Dancer Baby

Davey insists that this is actually Runner Baby, or Sporty Baby, but mother knows better. His dear Auntie Lisa bought him a mobile for his baby shower, which spins five little brown bears entrancingly around while playing Brahams’ Lullaby. Mother almost gave in and bought the White Sox version of this mobile, but she feared listening to a tinny version of  ”Take Me Out to the Ball Game” over and over might make her suicidal. So Brahams it was. I hung the mobile over his changing table, and every morning while changing his diaper, I turn it on. This is when Dancer Baby emerges. It’s really a sight to see - I must get a video of it one of these days. David kicks his fat little legs like you’ve never seen - his arms flail out, he makes excited noises, and his legs go Left Right Left Right like he’s punching something with them. He loves that mobile. Once, when the music stopped, I continued singing the little tune by myself. His eyes widened in delight, his mouth spread open in a huge grin, and he laughed at me as if to say, “You can make that song too!!”

Angry Baby

Like all babies, David has his angry times. He seems to have inherited much of my personality, which unfortunately means he is rather strong-willed.  He is also quite dramatic - he has the most impressive “pouty lip” ever. Today my sister remarked, “He looks so much like you when he pouts!” Pah. His “angry cry” is pretty impressive - it can begin with a sound like “Meh,” escalate into a full-blown wail, and trail off into kindof a rattling sound like a cat might make. This often happens when he is exhausted but refusing to go to sleep. My parents have a video of me as a child, falling asleep in my food. Then Mom says, “Time for a nap, honey,” and I reply loudly, “I’m not tired!” David is rather like that.

Dopey Baby

This is David when I attempt to keep him awake after feeding. I set him up on my knees, and he struggles to wake up. His head lolls from side to side, his eyes roll back into his head, his arms flail straight out in front of them as though he’s reaching for something. He looks so confused. It’s really hysterical; this behavior has sent me into laughing fits numerous times. He has such a hard time waking up; he’s rather like his daddy in that respect.

Happy Baby

This is his most recently acquired persona, and my favorite. My dear friend Trude Marsten and I were talking about how wonderful it is when babies finally give you a smile - a real smile, not a smile because they’re passing something. It’s so incredible when they start to interact with you - especially for young moms, who may tend to get frusterated, to be rewarded for all their patience and work by that sweet grin. It’s as if you finally get to see them as a person, rather than a cute (but usually screaming) little bundle. David has been smiling for a number of weeks now. He bestows many smiles on me after I feed him (but never before). When he smiles at me, he often raises one eyebrow in amusement, like his daddy does. He smiles hugely at Davey when he comes home from a day’s work and David gets to see him for the first time - “Oh! You’re here again!” He smiles at Nana nearly all the time (he loves Nana - she was the first to say “Ah-goo” to him, his now favorite word) and at Papa when he makes highly attractive faces at David. Sometimes he’ll even smile while he’s eating, forgetting for a moment his desparate need to stuff himself and grinning up at me. And sometimes, best of all, he smiles widely in his sleep, making mom and dad wonder what babies could possibly dream about.

• About

  
  Davey and Kate were married in March of 2007. They have a son, David Gregory, born May 2009. Davey is currently a grad student at Notre Dame, and Kate is a homemaker and former literature teacher. They enjoy mai thais and long walks on the beach (ok, that's mostly Kate).

• February 2010

  M	T	W	T	F	S	S
  « Dec
  1	2	3	4	5	6	7
  8	9	10	11	12	13	14
  15	16	17	18	19	20	21
  22	23	24	25	26	27	28

• Blogroll

  • Churches
  • Cohens
  • Covingtons
  • Dimelers
  • Graukes
  • Kara
  • Tellings
  • Theopolitical

• Upcoming

  No events to show

• Recent Posts

  • Recent Goings-on
  • In Which we are Losing our Mind . . .
  • Such a Good Baby
  • Welcoming Fall
  • Spokane Blue Spinach Salad

• Feeds

• Full
• Comments