11 days

11 days. That went fast. It is quite a spectacular change, going from the two of us to the three of us. I have spent the last 11 days doing all of the things you would expect, except probably with more sleep than you expect. Marie is very accommodating and only cries when she's hungry, happy to sleep or chill out when not hungry. I've also been reflecting on the birth often. The depth of that experience.. I think I will be reflecting on it for quite some time.


Happy Halloween from Marie! I think this might be the best shot of her red hair so far...Happy in Daddy's hands.With Grandma and Grandpa - Grandpa Ehli is so enamored with her!
The uncles getting baby saavy.

A fitting portrayal of Marie's first 10 days.

A visit back to the midwives today found Marie is now 9 lbs 3 oz, meaning she's gained 3 oz, meaning we must be doing something right! Yay for first time parenthood.

I have quickly learned the unbelievable gift of meals delivered from friends. And I subsequently apologize for not realizing the depth of this gesture until I am the recipient. Here's to contributing to this for other people in the future!

It's a baby!

Dear Friends and Family,

After nine months of careful planning, Heather decided to have a baby last night. After a very quick, intense labor, Marie Iona Mehitabel Shaver was born at 9:30 pm, October 20, in a birthing tub at the Center for Birth in Seattle. She was very alert and healthy, weighed nine pounds, and measured 21 1/2 inches long. Her eyes were open and she was smiling as she slid into the water of the tub! We are very grateful that Heather's mom, Randi and our good friend Ruth were able to attend the birth. We are also grateful that no medication or intervention of any kind were required. It was an amazing experience! We're so excited (and a little scared!) to start this new chapter of our lives. Thanks for all your prayers and support!

Love,

Heather, Joel, and Marie

first things first

Joel's first day of school!

Joel started his new job today - Adjunct English Instructor at Green River Community College. Our home is full of thankfulness and peace right now, with the timing of his job being so perfect (and so last minute! A rushed syllabus was created, a commute quickly established, and a chair at home with the cat is now empty during the day).

The transition of the seasons, with the blustery comfort of autumn just setting in, is really reflected in our life right now. Joel's new job, the baby coming soon, me settling in to the wonderful idea of a long (by American standards) maternity leave... many changes, but all such comforting and peaceful changes.
Joel found today that he likes, enjoys, appreciates his teaching position. He is fulfilled and satisfied in his role, which is such a surprising thing for the both of us after years of uncertain times in academia. None of you in the academic world will see his job as particularly spectacular, but it is exactly what we have been hoping for and needing. An entrance, an opportunity, a chance for Joel to do what he has felt has been his passion - teaching introductory level courses. And a step towards us being able to transition from relying on my salary to relying on his. That is something, however old fashioned it may seem, that we've both craved for some time.

This is a celebration, friends! Have a dram of scotch in honor of Joel today!(Other photos are from our annual trip hiking at Mt. Rainier. Oh, out of town friends, we must take you there.)

Why you haven't heard from us

We have been taking advantage of summer!
*Aweing at North Cascades Highway
*Loving Washington State, our home
*Making strawberry wine to be ready about the same time the baby will be :-)
*Eating more and more and more vegetables from our CSA
*Camping. Lots.
*Beaching it
*Nesting

Have we mentioned we will never again complain about the weather here?

Our Contribution to Society

I believe that all of the appropriate family members, family friends, church family, etc. have now been personally notified of this event and that it is now safe/appropriate to document it on the blog and facebook. Here is the e-mail Heather sent out a couple of weeks ago:

Hello dear friends,

Joel and I are delighted to tell you we're pregnant!

We're 13 weeks along, and the baby is due October 21st. Everything looks great so far, no problems at all. When we saw the baby on the ultrasound at 7 weeks, it looked very much like a seahorse. Despite how adorable seahorses are, we're rooting for the end product to be a baby.

Incidentally, we found out we were pregnant the same day we found out Joel passed his PhD (One labor ending, another beginning...).

We are beyond grateful for the love and support you all have given us in our lives and marriage so far. We welcome you to celebrate with us as our lives change once again!

Love,
Heather & Joel Shaver

The dissertation

If you have already heard about this on Facebook or by e-mail, I apologize. I promise this is the last time I will bring it up, ever.

I am writing this post to inform the rest of you that my dissertation, Metaphors of Travel in the Language of Hymns, has been accepted, and I am at long last qualified to receive a PhD in English Language from the University of Glasgow.

If you'd like to read my dissertation, it is available to download as a free pdf file from the University library:
http://theses.gla.ac.uk/2381/

Thanks, everyone, for your support and friendship!

Burns Night

Haggis stuffed chicken, wrapped in bacon, with 'neeps and tatties. It strangely felt more like true comfort food to me than anything has in quite a while.
We obliged our guests to participate in a read through of the classic Burns poems with Americanized shortbread (who doesn't need a shortbread chicken?!) and of course some good British tea.

P.S. Ginger is a fan of haggis.

Growth!

This is my garlic! I planted it in October and since the winter, I've been entering and leaving the house from the upstairs front door and haven't been in the backyard much, thus forgetting about the garlic, and neglecting the worm bin. Thank goodness both of those are pretty forgiving during the wintertime. Today I succumbed to the overflowing compost bin on the kitchen counter and finally brought it to the worms to work on. While out back, I ventured to the far back corner of the garden, only to be pleasantly surprised that this whole garlic-planting adventure works! Before planting, this area looked like wilderness, really overgrown like most of the backyard, and I had put a lot of work into making it plantable. When I went back today, there were only a few weeds which I pulled! I guess this mulch idea works too. :-)

We planted Susanville and Chesnock Red, and I'm fairly sure the garlic on the right, which is growing much better, is the Susanville. Should have written it down I guess.
In other events, this is Ginger purring away in Joel's arms.

One reason I miss living in Glasgow's West End

I took a 2.5 mile walk today. In Glasgow, 2.5 miles encompassed my universe - the University, our house, several main roads, where we bought our food... In (moderately urban) Shoreline, 2.5 miles covers part of our neighborhood.


Glasgow

Shoreline (same scale). Central Seattle isn't even in the picture!
(Images from Google Maps)

Lazy New Year's Day at Home

Across Washington in the Winter

This post is for all our non-Washingtonian friends. Every time Heather and I drive across Washington between the Seattle and Spokane areas, we wish we could bring all our friends from other places to show them what our state is like. Of course, we assume you would all actually want to come. This time, as we were driving back from my parents' house in Newport to Seattle, I decided to photo-document the five-to-eight-hour, 320 mile drive. Imagine that you are riding along with Heather, Ginger, and me, as I drone on about each interesting landmark or geological feature. Please try not to fall asleep, as this will be very interesting and educational. After all, you're getting the condensed version!

Feel free to click on any images you find particularly pleasing to see them at a higher resolution.

We woke up in Newport to fresh snow, so Heather had to clear off the driveway with my parents' snowblower. She truly lives for this experience.

Newport is at about 2500 feet (762 meters) above sea level, and there are hills and coniferous trees. The drive from Newport to Spokane, south on Highway 2, takes about an hour.


We pass Diamond Lake, which is frozen over, and the building where my church used to meet, originally Rogers High School, and now for many years the Diamond Lake Grange.


Heather handles snow driving expertly, but some situations are more difficult than others (British friends: the 'lorry' you see in this picture is actually called a 'truck'. The second image features a 'snow plow').


We drive through Spokane, then out on Interstate 90, past the trees into the center of Washington.


The center, which includes such wonderful areas as the Columbia Basin (technically a much larger area), the Palouse, and the Channeled Scablands, is mostly flat with rolling hills or plateaus, and gets less precipitation than the western side of Washington, lying in the rain shadow of the Cascades.



The town of Moses Lake – the lake is also frozen over.


Next, we approach the mighty Columbia River, which flows down the middle of the state, then goes down to form the Oregon border. Driving down into the Columbia Gorge:


The Columbia Gorge is a very windy place, and a large wind farm was recently built on the west side, at Ryegrass.


The land gets a little more hilly, and we approach Ellensburg, the home of Central Washington University and about 600 fast food restaurants aimed at travelers halfway across the state (British friends: after returning from Glasgow, Heather and I had a very hard time remembering how to pronounce Ellensburg properly--hard 'g'!).


Hey!


Now we are starting to climb into the Cascade Range of mountains - to most Washingtonians, the border between Eastern and Western Washington (completely ignoring Central!). Not a very good day to photograph them, but I tried anyway.


Going over Snoqualmie Pass, traffic was reduced to one lane because of an overturned tanker truck. This added at least an hour to our trip, and we had to stop in the tunnel for a while.


Nighttime in the Cascades.


Then home to Seattle! Thanks for riding along. We'll do it again in the summer sometime, and give you a better look at the Cascades!