Amanda’s Musings

My crazy little girl Kezi takes a cute photo and her little sister is following in her footsteps (I may be a bit biased), well I think so anyway. Until I get a minute to actually do anything creative or have a deep thought you will have put up with lovely pics of my munchkins. : )

I love the way this photo came out. Beautiful!

Finally, here is the post that I’ve been waiting for so long to write!! Last Wednesday I went into Armadale Hospital at 6.30am for my booked C Section. It was a very de ja vu experience for me from the get go. Firstly, they put me in the exact same bed in the preparation area as last time and wheeled me to surgery around the same time in the morning. I was in the same operating room as I was with Keziah and I knew exactly what I was in for.

The main thing that had been on my mind was having the spinal/epidural put in, not because it hurts but because last time I flinched as the anethesist (?sp) was finding the right spot. I got ‘told off’ last time which is understandable but not comforting! I told him about this and he was very good, talking me through each step.

Last time they put the crib thing where they check the newborn in a place at the end of my operating table and I couldn’t see anything when Kezi was born, this time it was to my left and I was able to see right away. This was a different surgeon to last time so he had different methods of delivery. I won’t go into details but he did hold Lucinda up for me to see over the curtain right away which I wasn’t expecting!

When they put her on the crib thing I couldn’t believe how enormous she was!! All I could see was a big fat belly and chubby legs but tiny little feet (Kezi’s feet were huge). Michael got to hold her very soon afterwards while they did what they needed to do to complete the operation.

The de ja vu continued after this as I was wheeled back to my room holding Lucinda next to me in the same way as Kezi. I was then put in room #53, Kez was in room #54. All very strange. Waiting for us at the room was, as before, both sets of grandparents but this time they had Keziah with them (one major difference).

The other de ja vu part is that I came prepared this time with my own baby clothes and Lucinda was dressed in the same clothes that Keziah was as a newborn, right down to the same hat and rug. I caught myself calling her Kezi on more than one occasion!

I recovered well after the operation and had already decided to bottle feed this time after having so much trouble and stress last time. What a difference that made, Luci had guzzled down 20mls of formula before she was 1 hour old!

So, here are the stats:

Lucinda Estelle Ainsley Hunt was born at 9.46am on Wednesday July 16th by C Section at Armadale Hospital.
Weight: 8lb.14oz
Length: 51cm

Name: We loved the name Lucinda and it will (and already does) get shorted to Luci. That’s Luci with an I, makes more sense to me as a shortened version of Lucinda. Estelle is my Mum’s name and I thought they flowed beautifully together. I’m so glad I got a chance to use it. Ainsley is her second middle name (Kezi is Keziah Rose Ainsley Hunt) after Michael’s parents last name (foster parents). We wanted to honour them too.

She looks exactly like Keziah did at that age apart from being a larger baby. When my pc is set-up properly I will be able to show some comparison shots.

I came home from hospital yesterday after four and a half days which was much faster than with Keziah. The Caesarean went well with no complications and I am recovering well so far.

Ok, here’s the pics!! Enjoy.

Lately I have been sitting in my swivelly office chair for long periods of time due to sore back etc that comes with this stage of pregnancy. This has allowed me a bit too much internet browsing time and thinking time! Here’s a few things that have been running through my head:

1. I’ve been reading Alan Alda’s book ‘Never Have Your Dog Stuffed‘ which has gotten me to think about the series of MASH a lot more than usual. I’ve found myself looking up the ‘where are they now’ links on imdb.com and even discovered that the actor Larry Linville who played Maj. Frank Burns not only died but was married 5 times. I don’t know why this is interesting but it is.

2. I found a great idea for a display on my online fellow polymer clayer’s flickr page. Tamara from Block Party Press covered her display in brown paper. This has gotten me thinking about using this as a basis for our next SIM display. This is good news because it means that my brain is finally starting to think more about SIM again. Its been switched to other things for a few months. I was thinking along the lines of it implying God’s gift to us, or the words, parcel, present, favourite things….more thinking needed on that one.

3. This is the big week. Wednesday is the day. I had so much time on my hands that I was able to work out that I go into the hospital at 4.30pm Tuesday CANADIAN TIME.

4. I have decided that I really enjoy getting to meet new people. This is news to myself. This is not something I used to enjoy. Might have something to do with being housebound (or swivel chair bound) a fair bit lately.

5. I want to sit and have a look at the connection in the Bible between creativity and God. I’m guessing the words ‘In the beginning God CREATED the heaven’s and the earth’ would be a good place to start seeing as this is Genesis 1:1 (first verse in the Bible).

6. I miss painting.

That’s enough thinking for a while I think. After Wednesday I may find that I have more middle of the night thinking time but instead of sitting here with two free hands to type away, I’ll only have one.

Today was the inaugural Made on the Left Market at the Hyde Park Hotel. If I wasn’t 9 months pregnant I probably would have had a stall myself. Instead I went down there with Mum and Michael and had a great time walking around meeting quite a few of the Etsy girls I’ve been chatting to online for a while. The amazing thing is that the fabulous five (Dara, Jacquie, Ali, Rosanna and Sarah) who organised the market have had only 8 weeks to do it. The turnout was great, it was packed when we arrived after lunch and they said that the crowd was thinner than before lunchtime!

Those I got to meet included:

The Tiny Little Girl
Aussie Patches (we’ve met previously)
Planet Lime
Letters For Lilly
Get Silvered (also met before although like myself, she was visiting today)
Ramsden Designs
Dara Art (also met Dara previously)
Rosanna Elizabeth
Odd Girl Out (we share the medium of Polymer Clay)
Tiny Monster (I didn’t get to meet you because you were dealing with customers but I did see your stall)
J2aney (another fellow polymer clay artist)
Desert Bloom (who I had a great conversation with about having babies!!)
Scrapindipity (again, you had customers so I didn’t get to meet you)
The Broken Magpie
Holly Courtney (we met last year also)
In Mono Designs (Feli - we also met previously)

It was nice to meet you guys and put names and faces together. My Mum was smiling at me because I was introducing myself by saying ‘Hi, I’m Polyclarific’ instead of ‘I’m Amanda’ but that’s how we all recognise each other, via our online shop names.

Finally, the most exciting thing was that the market got advertised on both the TV and radio as well as in papers around Perth. I’ll be in line to have a stall at the one that’s held next year and hopefully it will be doubly as successful as this one. Good on you Ladies!

Despite feeling completely fatigued I made myself sit down and play with clay the other night. I really miss being clay creative on a regular basis and just haven’t been able to do it since moving house. After next week (the big day is July 16th) I’m not sure how often I’ll get to do it either. Anyway, here’s the result of mucking around with the clay. I actually did some more claying last night for a PCAGOE charity entry and if I get a photo of it I’ll put it up as I quite like the result. That might be it for a while though!

Result of the ‘mucky’ end of the cane, I actually like this imperfect end much better:

I also managed to create this little brooch of roses, not baked yet though:

Digging around in amongst the things that made it to our new house I found this sheet of embroidery. I’m not sure exactly what you call it but most of us would have seen the finished product in our grandmothers houses as doilies or tablecloths. I quite like it, I like the quality of the fabric and intend on completing this one. I want to try to get the stitching very fine, high quality just like my Nanna used to do. I found a second piece which was half done (not shown) so I’ll try to do that too. Anyway, I love finds like this and the fact that it belonged to her makes it even more special!

As promised in the previous post, here is the project that the sales from July and August will go towards. After asking from direction from above and searching through many projects I’ve settled on this one.

Malawi Church Leaders HIV & AIDS Training (96352)

The link above will give you a lot more information about this project but a quote from the page says:

The church is reaching out to many of the poorest people in Malawi. Church members struggle to put food on the table and only have small offerings to pay the pastors. Despite small economic resources, the churches are pouring themselves out in response to the AIDS crisis which is devastating families and entire villages. These pastors continue to minister in these tough conditions because they love God and their fellow Malawians….

About US $3600 can bring 90 pastors and their wives from all over Malawi to stay at the Bible College in Blantyre for four days. This is only US $10 per person per day for this important time of training, equipping and encouraging. Would you consider giving US $40 to train one pastor? This gift will have an eternal impact and bring a smile to even more faces! Thank you for your partnership to strengthen the church in Malawi!

You can watch a video on the work of HOPE for AIDS in Malawi here.

The links to my online shops are:

Polyclarific on Etsy
Polyclarific on MadeIt
Polyclarific on Wahmania

As promised, here is the tally for the months of May and June in total sales…………..$US341. I blogged about the project that the profits will go to back at the start of May but the project page on the SIM website can be found here.

$US60 will buy one Pastor in Ghana a bike to make it much easier for him to do his work. Instead of having to walk for 4-5 hours (each way) to visit someone, they will be able to cycle.

Thank you to those who purchased from me during the last two months, the Pastors will appreciate their bikes! In total I have enough to buy them NEARLY 6 bikes. I’m $US19 short of the sixth bike.

The project for the months of July and August will be announced shortly in a separate post. In the meantime, here are some of the items that have been translated into bikes (as in, these items have sold for this project).

It seems that I have had a little run of winning competitions lately. Recently I voted for which creation I liked the best in the Etsy BeadWeavers Street Team competition. As part of this I was entered into a draw to win a cuff bracelet handmade by the very clever Carol Dean Sharpe who runs SandFibers, a shop on Etsy. She creates beautiful jewellery using peyote stitched beads. I won this gorgeous bracelet in the competition and she sent me the beads magazine that it is featured in also. Thank you Carol!!

A few weeks ago I won a little competition run by the lovely Ilysa and Kira over at Polymer Clay Productions. Ilysa sent me these twinkly sparkly foils called Jones Tones (click on there to buy them in their shop) which can be used in many ways but the focus for her and for me is using them with polymer clay. I’m yet to try them but I can’t wait!

Ilysa kindly included an extra surprise for me in the parcel, a set of two bibs and some baby washers. Thank you Ilysa!

I have been told that I won the MadeIt T-shirt competition also, thank you to those who voted!! I’ll post more about that when the prize pack arrives and I can show it to you.

I will try and do a post this week too about the end result of the last two month’s sales and where the money will go. I am yet to decide where the money from July and August will go but I’ll keep you posted!