Nora's Second Birthday!

Nora turned TWO on October 14!  In celebration of her birthday, my mom, brother Nate, sister-out-law Ashley, and nephew Everett came to town for a visit.  I'll write more on that later, but since they were here, they got to participate in Nora's birthday parties!  We hosted a family party at our house on Saturday and a friends party on Sunday.  We split them up because our house is not big enough to accommodate all these guests at once, but as it turns out, both parties were pretty packed all on their own.  We are feel very fortunate to have so many friends and family actively involved in Nora's life, and we hope they didn't mind that it got a little crowded at her parties.  As far as I could tell, Nora loved every minute of her parties, and we liked getting a chance to show everyone what she is like in her own element.

I used a Go, Dog! Go! theme this year.  It is Nora's favorite book, and she is getting good at "reading" along with it.  It's also a tradition in my family and a favorite of Nora's second cousins, Lily and Cash. Growing up in my family, my dad frequently asked us "Do you like my hat?" and we were always made to wear crowns on our birthday, so making party hat crowns as our "craft" for the little ones seemed like the natural choice.  In addition to the decorations from the book I put up around the house, I used dachshund fabrics I found online to make Nora two skirts and coordinating 2 year old shirts.  These were fun projects for me, and she liked wearing her "doggies."

Here are my favorites among the pictures that family members shared from the family party!

And here are the highlights of the many pictures Tres took from the friend party!

Thank you to everyone who helps make our two year old's life so sweet!

Prospectus Filed!

I am so behind on posting!  But I did want to make sure to mark one accomplishment even before I get caught up: my dissertation prospectus was officially approved and filed with the graduate studies office last week!

I've been working on the prospectus since I passed my comprehensive exam last November, so it has been a long time coming.  One of the reasons it took so long is because I completely changed my research topic.  This meant doing a lot of new research, but it also meant I had to seek out and recruit new committee members to work with me.  Another reason it took so long is because I got the invaluable opportunity to work on the Katherine Anne Porter digitization project.  The actual composition of the prospectus felt like a sisyphean effort because it was the first thing I'd written since the spring of 2011.  Plus, it's a weird type of thing to write.  You have to do enough research to propose your topic as if you know exactly what your dissertation is going to say, but you haven't done the years of research it will take to uncover the actual claims your dissertation will make.

Most people in my program told me I should just get it done and move on.  I took that approach, generally, but I'm still really proud of the document.  I worked hard on it, and I think chances are good that my dissertation will end up looking something like what I've proposed it to be.  We'll see about that, I guess.

The title is "A Womb With a View: The Discourse of Reproductive Modernism in American Women's Fiction."  In short, I've proposed that my dissertation will reveal the shared experiences and repeated patterns across the lives and works of Mary Hunter Austin, H.D., Josephine Herbst, and Katherine Anne Porter.  It will investigate their various ways of grappling with issues related to reproduction and maternity in their work, and it will argue that their work constitutes the previously unrecognized discourse that I've named reproductive modernism.  In so doing, the dissertation will bring together two complementary feminist projects that have run largely parallel to one another-- modernist studies of gender and feminist studies of maternity.

I owe a big thank you to all the people who've encouraged me as I worked toward this milestone.  If you're interested in reading the prospectus, or even the one page abstract, get in touch with me via email.  I'm happy to share it.

Now... onto the next thing!

Rocky Acre Farm Bed and Breakfast

We've been crazy busy this month, but I wanted to write up a quick post about our recent trip to Rocky Acre Farm in Pennsylvania with Billy's family.  The Bed and Breakfast is in an old farm house that is situated on an active dairy farm, so in addition to offering nice accommodations and an amazing breakfast spread, they let you try out various aspects of dairy farm life while you're there.  Billy's family members planned the whole trip, which meant all we had to do was show up and enjoy the experience.  It was a fascinating couple of days.  Nora was amazed by all of the sights and sounds, and more than anything she loved getting to spend so much time with her second cousins, Cash and Lily.  It is such a pleasure to see her warming up to everyone in the family as she gets older.  I often say that if Nora is going to be spoiled, I want her to be "spoiled" by having the chance to participate in all different kinds of experiences.  This was the best kind of short weekend away-- we got to spend it with family and we also got to observe and participate in a completely different way of life.  I don't know how much of it Nora will remember, if at all, but I'm thankful to have the opportunity to show her, from the beginning, that people follow all different kinds of paths to finding content, fulfilling lives.

I only took a few pictures, so I am also indebted to Billy's family members for snapping most of these!  They give you a great idea of all of the kid-friendly activities that are available for guests at the bed and breakfast.

A "train" ride around the property in 55 gallon drums:

A hay ride through the Lancaster County countryside:

A pony for the kids to ride:

A chicken coop where you were allowed to collect eggs:

A ride behind a tractor:

Milking the cows:

Feeding the baby cows:

Riding the play equipment:

And spending time with the family!

Thank you again to everyone in Billy's family who made this experience happen!

Toddler Firsts

Nora may be rapidly approaching two, but she still has so many new things to experience!  This month has brought several firsts for Nora that we wanted to share with the family.

First Orioles game!
Since "sitting still" is not a skill Nora has shown any interest in mastering, we didn't think she'd be attending any games until next season.  However, Billy's aunt and uncle were recently unable to use their tickets to sit at the bistro tables in the all-you-can-eat section.  Since this would make it easy for us to be up and down with Nora, we appreciated the chance to take her to the ballpark!  As a bonus, Nora got to share the experience with her grandparents, great grand parents, and great aunt and uncle!  She and I also did one lap around the concourse, and she was quite a hit in her little Orioles dress.  She even knows how to cheer "Go Orioles!" and learned to shout "charge!" at the right moment while at the game. But I think eating chocolate ice cream with her dad seemed to be her favorite part, which is my own most distinct memory of attending A's games with my dad when I was a kid.

First Navy Football Game!
Although I took Nora to join the family at the Navy tailgate for one of the games last year, she was only there for an hour or two.  This time, we drove down to the stadium after she woke up from her nap to spend the whole afternoon there, and she loved the whole experience!  Although she didn't last long in the season ticket seats, she loved dancing around on the lawn in the general admission area.  Once again, she got to share this milestone with plenty of family members-- Gram, Pop, Uncle Brian, Aunt Vickie, and Tres all joined us for a great day!

First Haircut!
I trimmed Nora's bangs when she was a few months old, but it has been growing out so nicely since then that we've just let it grow.  And it sure has grown!  Lately, though it has been getting tangly after the bath and her curls have lost a lot of their spring.  We took her to a local kids haircut salon, but even they weren't quite prepared for her unique features.  She was so short and her hair was so long that the stylist couldn't really cut it well until she had Nora stand on the floor.  It wasn't easy to get her to look in the right direction, but she was calm and cooperative otherwise.  We were a little sad to say goodbye to her impressively long locks, but her layered clavicut is right on trend and her curls are full of bounce again!

I'm Surprised to See You Here

We started school at UMd this past week.  I will be juggling as many balls as ever this semester, but I'm looking forward to most of them.  I'm hoping to finish my prospectus shortly so I can begin working on the first chapter of my dissertation.  I'm preparing for the German translation exam I must take to satisfy the program's foreign language requirement. I'm still working 10 hours a week for the Katherine Anne Porter Correspondence project.  And I have the same teaching assignment I did last semester-- teaching two discussion sections of a senior Professor's lecture class on the novel.

I was excited to begin this semester because it is the first time since, I don't know, forever? that I feel like I have my feet somewhat firmly beneath me.  This is what the past several semesters have been like, in a nutshell:
Spring 2010: taking two seminars, working 20 hours a week in the Business Office, stressed out about being on the PhD waitlist, overwhelmed by my MA capstone.
Fall 2010: Teaching 101 for the first time, taking three seminars, working a few hours a week in the business office, worrying about my dad, trying to get pregnant, hoping Vickie would be able to find a job she deserved.
Spring 2011: Taking three seminars, working 10 hours a week in the Business Office, mourning the death of my dad, managing his financial affairs, helping to plan his memorial, feeling exhausted and sick from pregnancy.
Fall 2011: On leave from school, finishing my pregnancy, giving birth to a new human, discovering I was completely unprepared to care for a colicky newborn but doing it anyway.
Spring 2012: Wishing I had taken a whole year off, TAing for two discussion sections of a new course, spending as little time on campus as possible so I could be home with Nora, feeling sleep deprived and constantly hungry, struggling to get any of my own work done.
Fall 2012: Teaching my first stand-alone literature class, preparing for and completing my comprehensive exams, pumping while wishing my daughter wasn't in full-time day care, wishing that day care wasn't 35 minutes from my house without traffic, trying to overcome the shock of the death of my grandfather.
Spring 2013: TAing for a new lecture class, changing my research topic, researching for my prospectus, working 10 hours a week on the KAP project, getting sick every other week (2 emergency room trips included).

So yeah.  It has been A TIME.  This has not allowed a lot of flexibility in my schedule for, say, stopping to grab coffee with a friend I run into in the copy room.  Nor has it allowed me to attend many of the events my department regularly hosts.  For example, the only reason I was able to make it to a particularly important department event while pregnant was because the miracle that is Zofran ended the 36 straight hours of vomiting that preceded it.  There is no doubt, in my mind, about whether my absence at these types of events marks a lack of commitment to the program or to my degree.  It absolutely does not. And those who know me understand this, too.  But in any case, my absence has been hard to not notice, so I don't blame any one of the many (and I mean, like, every) friend or colleague who has recently said to me some variation of "I'm surprised to see you here!"  Surprised to see me at the orientation lunch (for a 30 minute break from the library job).  Surprised to see me at the Center for Teaching Excellence student engagement seminar.  Surprised to see me around the building.  Surprised to see me at the Alumni Lecture, reception, and dinner afterward.

I understand why they're surprised.  And the vast majority of them are surprised and pleased to see me, rather than trying to suggest that I should have been attending these events more regularly.  I feel a little awkward about this observation, though, because I would have really liked to be able to spend more time with these friends and to have attended more of these events.  So I find myself responding with comments like, "I'm glad to be back!" or "It's nice to feel like I'm part of the program again!" or "Nora loves school so I don't have to feel guilty about leaving her there an extra 30 minutes."  (Well, I'm still calling it school, not day care, so the residual guilt is still there, but that's another post.)

The alumni lecture was Friday.  I couldn't not attend: Lara Vetter, the alum who gave the lecture, writes on female Modernists and contributed to a digitization project while at Maryland (sound familiar?).  Plus, the dinner was hosted by a professor who sat on my exam committee and another who put in a good word to help me get the KAP job.  It still wasn't easy for me to swing, though.  It meant getting Nora out the door by 7am, meeting with my fellow TA from 9-10, teaching from 10-12, prepping from 12-1, working on the KAP project from 1-4, and then hustling back across campus for the lecture. Since I left the party early and still didn't get home until 10pm, it meant Billy had to leave work early to pick Nora up from school and was on his own with her for the rest of the evening.  In the interest of comparison, I'll share that someone told me mid-day Friday that she might come to the lecture but she really wanted to get home and get caught up on Breaking Bad, so she wasn't sure-- but she did hear that there was going to be wine there.

Dr. Vetter had so many interesting and useful things to say that I was instantly glad this other colleague and I had set aside our respective family/child and Netflix obligations to attend the talk.  One thing Dr. Vetter talked about was what she wishes she had known when she went on the job market.  She gave a lot of specific, helpful advice, but what it mostly boiled down to was: Be confident but not arrogant and Have your shit together.

At any other point in the past several years, this might have made me feel like I have no hope of ever landing a good academic job.  My confidence in my ability to achieve my personal and professional goals at the same time has been waning over the past few years.  I feel like every day there has been a reminder that I have not had my shit together (or, at least, not as together as it used to be).  But this semester, for the first time in years, it feels like I'm finally in the driver's seat.  I know better than to expect this to continue.  Something else will come up.  But in the meantime, it is nice to feel like I might be able to get things done.  Like I'm ready to teach the course I'm assigned.  Like I'm comfortable with how little I know about digitizing correspondence and ready to learn more.  Like I'm nearing completion on my prospectus.  Like Billy and I are managing to take good care of our daughter and she is thriving.  Like I can go out with my husband on a Wednesday night as long as Vickie or my in-laws are willing to babysit Nora.

It's a good place to be.  And it's about time, I guess, to find out how well I can work when the balls I'm juggling are not quite so heavy or cumbersome... before I run out of funding.  But that's for another post, too.

with Nora on my first day of school