Friday, April 10, 2009

Eggs & Bunnies & Chicks


Easter Crafts

This week Grace's preschool celebrated Easter and she brought home these, um, crafts? pieces of art? What is the best way to refer to such things?  Notice the eye on the chick, which is happily located on the animal's head.  We have a dog who was not lucky and has his googly eyes surrealistically placed on his abdomen.  Also notice the shiny globs of glue everywhere; Grace is very liberal in her application of glue, as well as paint.  Anyway, she had a grand time putting them together and doing an Easter egg hunt.  All the cultural rituals that surround Easter make me contemplate the weird, winding history of holidays-- how a celebration with deep spiritual meaning to the believers among us gets mixed up with ancient pagan traditions (right down to the English word we use) and then contemporary commercialism.  I think about it most with Easter because it seems like the most meaningful celebration in the Christian calendar, and pastel eggs and hopping bunnies seem ludicrously out of place within a reflection on, you know, Jesus' death and resurrection.

I have been pondering my hair lately because I am deep in the throes of postpartum hair loss.  Seriously, I am not sure why I am not yet bald.  Also I have realized there is a LOT more gray in there than I thought.  My mom grayed early and my sister (2.5 years younger than me) also has gray hairs in there so it is my genetic destiny, I suppose.  I remember reading somewhere that brunettes turn gray earlier on average than lighter-haired people because we use up our lifetime supply of pigment faster with our dark, highly-pigmented hair.  Anyway, I am contemplating whether I want to go in for decades of hair color to stay brunette or take a more zen approach.  I could see myself happy with all silver hair and a chic haircut in 15-20 years; I think it would be nice with my general coloring.  But do I want to just live with the wiry silver hairs sticking up from my hair presently?  Not really.  But if I stay brunette for the next 10+ years, I am setting myself up for a very awkward year when I eventually transition to silver.  Such a dilemma!  A first-world dilemma of vanity and self-absorption!  Anyway, I just colored my hair brown to try to finally blend in the lighter bleached bit from when I went pink (and of course, to send the gray ones packing) but eventually I will have to take a stand one way or the other.

Other than contemplating Easter and my hair, I've spent this week getting ready for our big trip to California to visit Rob's parents.  We leave Sunday afternoon and are so looking forward to seeing them, with their grandparently selves and northern California surroundings.  I've been working on all the logistical details of packing up a household, leaving behind a dog, and making sure we have everything we need.  It's motivated me to buy and sew some clothes for my current size (I'll try to work on reviews for Pattern Review when we get back), which is probably a good thing.  My immediate post-partum clothes have outgrown me, but I can only fit into a handful of my pre-Violet clothes.  I'm still going to need to do laundry while we're there, what with all the spit-up that lands on me on a daily basis, but I think I have a more reasonable number of presentable clothes to pack into the suitcase now.  Speaking of which, I should go put more things in that suitcase right now!

4 comments:

amydove said...

Maybe you can do brown low-lights to cover some of the gray and ease into your silver hair.

Have fun in California!

angie.a said...

You will really love these little crafties years from now. I get all choked up every Christmas with the kids' handmade ornaments and things. They roll their eyes at me, but secretly I can tell they're pleased I kept them and fawn over them every year. My favorite is one I made for each of them when they were about 2. I traced their baby hands on construction paper and cut them out, then glued them to a circle of felt. Simple, yet those tiny paper baby hands make me cry every year!

As for the grey...I'm going the dye route myself. I have a few sprouting these days too which royally pees me off. I want to go all silver at some point but I think it's a LONG way in the future for me. I may have to take a year sabbatical on an island or something to let it all go grey. :D

Eva said...

I recently had the gray hair conversation with a friend... it is a tough one. My mother just started her transition into silverhood after decades of hair coloring slavery. Good luck.

Good luck with the packing and the trip too!. Can't wait to hear about Violet's first big trip.

Emily said...

I love silver-haired ladies with an actual hairdo. Cam actually said once he is looking forward to when my hair turns all gray so I can wear it a medium length. Crazy, huh?