.campground chic.

Ever since Leif and I stayed at the Ace Hotel we have been kind of preoccupied with mixing some of that particular design aesthetic into our own home. I guess you could call the style...campground chic?  Maybe modern rustic eclecticism? Or perhaps vintage military modernism?  Whatever.  Its cool no matter what ridiculous term I try to give it.

The design (by Commune) incorporates a lot of, what most people would consider, cheap and mundane fabrics like canvas and linen and layers them with interesting patterns like the kilim rugs.  In our room there was also incorporated some danish modern chairs, which is another design style that Leif and I are partial to.

So how to mix up into our style.  I don't think it will be too difficult to do because our style is pretty eclectic as it is, and what's adding one more pattern here or one more texture there gonna do anyway?

I already have some ideas for the bedroom.  As it stands the room is fairly feminine and I've been slowing trying to "man it up" a little.

This is our bed and duvet (in natural):

I am going to get an Italian Army wool blanket like this one to use as a throw on the bed.  I really like the idea of mixing the femininity of the duvet with the masculinity of the wool blanket.

Today I ordered a lot of 6 vintage burlap gunny sacs from here (which, by the way is the coolest online antique site I've seen in a long time) and we are either going to sew them together to make a wall hanging to go behind the bed or we are going to make some throw pillows for the couch.

I'm leaning towards the pillows.  Something like this:

 From Etsy seller lesliejanson

I also really like the kilim rugs that are in the Ace.  I'm kicking around the idea of laying a couple of these down in our living room because right now we just have bare hardwood floors.

We'll see...

.the numbers game.

In my alternate life, the one where George is still snug inside me waiting for his debut, I would be taking the board exam this week.  I would have been studying for it for the last ten weeks so that when he was born I could just focus on getting to know him.

That seems to be how I mark the passage of time these days.  Everyday that goes by is one day closer to the day he should have been born and one day farther from the few minutes I had with him while he was alive.  I would be 37 weeks pregnant now...full-term.

I recently read a quote from a woman whose son, whom she refers to as Pudding, was delivered stillborn at 41 weeks.  More than anything that I've read in the last eight weeks, what she said pretty much summed up exactly how I have been feeling. 

"I suppose one of the profoundest changes in myself since Pudding died is that I have completely lost the ability to be comforted by statistics.  This may not sound like much but for someone who's resolutely agnostic it feels as serious as a believer losing faith in God: that thing that convinced me that I was safe and protected from the calamities of the universe--gone.  And will never come back, I don't think."

As someone who works in the medical field, I know statistics.  I know statistics because I give them to my patients.

I know that fetal SVT is diagnosed so rarely that there aren't even many statistics in the medical literature.  I know that our pediatric cardiologist, whose practice extends throughout most of Los Angeles (a city which has an annual number of births somewhere around 160,000) only sees 1-2 cases like ours a year.  That makes the roughly estimated probability of this this happening to us at about 0.00125%.

I know in fetuses with hydrops associated with SVT, conversion of the heart rate back to normal using Digoxin is successful in about 15% of cases and 72-95% in cases using Flecainide.  I was on both and even with an intracardiac injection of the Digoxin it did not help to keep him out of SVT for any meaningful amount of time.

According to the American Cancer Society I have a 0.12% lifetime risk of developing breast cancer.  According to the National Weather Service I have a 0.016% lifetime risk of being struck by lightening. It is more likely for either of these things to happen to me over the course of my life than for George to have SVT.  Ok, so I know my math isn't quite right given that I can't really calculate the lifetime risk of having a baby with SVT (that also depends on the average number of pregnancies a woman has throughout her life) but I think you get the point.

Am I paranoid now?  Do I live my life in fear that something else that is also terrible and slightly less improbable than what has already happened happening again?  Not really.  But now those numbers that I tell my patients, as if I was giving some form of reassurance to them, don't mean anything to me anymore.  I don't think they ever will again and now I know that bad things, no matter how improbable they are, can really happen.  And they already have happened.

.we need a vacation.

Now that I am finally done with all my make-up assignments (almost, anyway) I keep thinking about a vacation.  An escape.  A week, maybe more, of relaxation and time away from the daily reminders of George.  This is especially more important to me as his due date gets nearer.  I really don't want to be in this apartment when that day rolls around, even though it looks like I will be.

So I've made up a little list of imaginary places I would like to go if we could get out of here.

1. Manzanillo, Costa Rica.  This is where we went on our honeymoon.  It was spectacular.  Quiet, remote, beautiful, and peaceful. 

2. Switzerland.  Leif has always wanted to go here and after looking at photographs of the place, I do too.  It seems like an ideal place to go hiking and enjoy a leisurely vacation.  Plus the big bonus is that the food is probably amazing.

3. Nicaragua. This appeals to me in the same way that the Caribbean side of Costa Rica does.  It isn't a typical tourist destination and so would be pretty low key.  Just like us.

4. Barcelona, Spain.  We spent three days here two summers ago and we left telling ourselves that we would be completely happy to live there.  It may be a huge city with tons of tourists but it feels very comfortable.  I was amazed at all the history in the city and found the gothic quarter completely charming.

.a little confession is good for the soul.

I want to go here. 

Call me crazy but I think it looks like fun.  I mean, fun aside from the millions of people that are going to be milling around.  I guess what I really mean is that the idea of a Harry Potter theme park is fun. 

.string gardens.

I love this.  If I wasn't so good at killing plants I would want one (or ten, or twenty) of these things.

Here is where you can see more.

.the heart of the house.

Living in an 800 square foot apartment has its challenges.  For one thing no matter how much stuff we get rid of there just is never enough storage space.  The other biggest issue with the apartment, at least for me, is that our kitchen is pretty tiny and only has one tiny window.  When I dream about our future house the first room I always think about is the kitchen. White, bright, with lots of windows.

These are some of my favorites right now.

House Beautiful

House Beautiful

House Beautiful

Bosworth Hoedemaker

.an arrival from pdx.

Leif and I are lucky.  Well...if you exclude the obvious horrible lack of luck we had recently.

We are lucky because we have some pretty damn good friends.  Friends that most people just aren't lucky enough to find.  Friends that you can always count on to be there when you most need them and to know you well enough to ignore you when you act like a punk.

Marc and Natalie are some of those friends.  They flew in from Portland last weekend to celebrate my graduation and to spend some time with us.  Secretly I suspect that they were just looking for an excuse to come to the beach.  But who can blame them when they live in a city that is rainy like 300 days out of the year or something heinous like that.

I've known Natalie for almost sixteen years and she is ultimately the person responsible for the love connection between Leif and myself.  Her husband (then boyfriend) and Leif worked together at the time and she was the one who had the foresight to "introduce" us in the hopes that we would hit it off.  It worked. Obviously.

Anyway...like I said, Natalie and I have been friends for almost sixteen years.  Our friendship currently has its learner's permit and will soon be going to the DMV to get its license.  Watch out fellow motorists because our friendship drives a speedy red sports car.  Which runs on biofuel, of course.

As always we had a great time with them and the weekend just flew right by us.  I think the reason for that had something to do with the fact that we ate so much food that we were not physically capable of keeping up with the weekend.  Which is the only important marker of a successful weekend.

That is, food and the beach.  Those are the two markers of a successful weekend.  A little smash ball, a little sandcastle building and a serious lack of enough sunscreen for Marc and Leif made for a fun day at a relatively empty beach. 

When it was time for them to return to Portland and to their hipper, more tattooed friends we were sad to see them go. They are two people who we would love to live nearer to.  Maybe one day.