Happy New Year!

Happy New Year! I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday and has remembered to start dating everything "2008" (it usually takes me a week or two to get used to this). I rang in the New Year with a head cold, but fortunately, it already seems to be passing. With any luck, I will not pass it on to the Short One. Speaking of whom - well, the SO is going through a little rite of passage right now. One of the reasons I decided to take the long weekend off from blogging is that the Husband and I decided that it was time for the SO to say goodbye to his beloved binkies. I'd been dreading this and put it off for almost half a year longer than I probably should have. Since he was an infant, the SO has only used a pacifier to get to sleep at naptime and at night. Still, he relies on them quite heavily and often ends up with about ten in his bed at night. So, I figured that we'd all be cranky and sleepless and that it would be better to put off posting on the blog until I was in a better frame of mind.

Well, the first day, the SO was so taken aback by the fact that I forgot to give him his three pacifiers (he starts out with three), he actually didn't say much and went to sleep relatively quietly. I thought, "Wow - this is going to be easy!" Unfortunately, by Day 2 , he'd figured out what I was up to and informed me in no uncertain terms that he was Not Happy About It At All. This position carried through the weekend - we all ended up getting quite distraught about it (the Husband and I threw the idea of going cold turkey out the window the first night - probably a mistake in retrospect - and settled for no binkies at naptime and only one binky at night). While I am comforted by the fact that you just don't see adults walking around with pacifiers in their mouths (although, come to think of it, who knows what they do when they go to sleep? - hmmm) and that all children give up their pacifiers at some point, I wish the SO could get past the bumpy patch a little more quickly. He's doing okay at night with the one binky - although he's waking up more often than usual - but naptime is still a struggle. Anyone who wants to share war stories (or advice, although I feel that we're on the road of no return at this point), I'd love to hear them.

Nevertheless, I did manage to fire one load of metal clay this weekend. As you can see, I made an Ace of Hearts pendant, as a nod to the upcoming holiday. As with the Ace of Spades, I carved a stamp block with a linoleum cutter to make the design. I also made a couple new designs for other pendants, so I'll have new work to post through Friday.

Have a great day, everyone!