New Babies and All The Feelings

WHEW!  

I just got the word, delivered over the miles via text message, that one of my best friends has finally delivered her baby boy.  We've been waiting for Action Jackson for about 11 extra days now, and I was getting nearly as impatient as his mama!  I'm so glad he's here, that she finally gets to hold her dream baby in her arms.

Happiness is definitely the overriding feeling right now in this moment of excitement and hype.  So much happiness.  I haven't even seen his sweet face yet, and I'm in love.

But here's my confession: ever since finding out I was preggo with baby #2, new babies have equal parts delighted and terrified me.  They are darling, yes.  They are tiny and sweet and don't weigh 34 pounds.  You can wear them and not need a chiropractor to follow you around.  They are just so... new.  And new is nice.

They are not long-sleepers, though.  They are sweet, precious little balls of nerves that are experiencing everything for the first time, and its all a little overwhelming, and they do stuff like cry and they do it a lot.  Which is all part of being a new baby, they're just doing their jobs.  But oh my lanta, I am scared to go back there, and holding wee ones reminds me that that is indeed my fate.

It is likely due to the fact that those first months with RG were hard for me.  Like way-hard.  My type-A personality was still in full swing, and I don't do well sleep-deprived.  Coupling that with a husband who was only home 3/6 nights... well, those are remembered as dark, dark days.  I know that this second time around won't necessarily be like the first (at.  all.).  I'm getting a totally different baby, and I'm a completely different mama.  I've done this before.  I know that the phases don't last, and I know that one bad afternoon is not indicative of the rest of my baby's formative years.  I know I won't have to wait until he or she is 12 before getting a full night's sleep.  But there's residual fear there, that it'll all be dark again.  

I'm pretty sure that this is the part where I'm supposed to write about how I'm going to deal with this and turn that frown upside down and ta-daaa! not be scared/nervous anymore.  But I've got nothing for you.  I'll just do it, and it'll be what it is.  I've got no extra wisdom beyond that, and I don't feel like I need any.  Feelings acknowledged, check.  And now we move forward.  And by forward, I mean I want to show you the present that I've put in the mail today for my newest (terrifying) little buddy Jackson!

Amanda requested a bright blues quilt that was inspired by this no-longer-offered Land of Nod beauty.  The fabric for the back isn't showing up well in my at-night, smashed-screen-iPhone pictures (weird!), but it can be found here, and is Constellations by Lizzy House.

I love it like crazy, its so whimsical without being too baby-ish!  Other fabrics include Pearl Bracelets, Color Me Retro, Stella Dot, and Kona solids, as well as some un-named stash fabric and of course, Art Gallery Fabric's Pure Elements Snow for the most fabulous white fabric ever.

This lovey is made from the same fabrics as the quilt, combined with some of the softest minky you'd ever want to rub all over your face.  For realz.  I don't know if its really that amazing, or if I'm just that tactile-y inclined, but its so crazy soft.  I want to have a robe made out of it.  And wear it all the time.

Boom.  It was very much fun to play with fabrics again, and to use my stellar quilting machine for its intended purpose.  And now I'm going back to the land of regularly scheduled leather-making, because it smells so good and I can't help myself.  That is, once I do this daytime thing called a "job" (soft "o").

<3 M.