24 minutes

That is what my laptop battery says I have left. I'm at home, so I could plug it in, but I need to get going for the day, so it is a good inspiration to write something and go. I have a cold, first of the fall season, and although I'm grateful that I (and not A) am up coughing at night, I'm still a bit slow. How nice would it be to stay in bed all day!

But work things are starting to move slowly, in a nice direction, and I want to take advantage of that motivation. For my playground project, I just had a lovely lunch meeting yesterday with an architect who also works for an "accessible playgrounds in Switzerland" group, and she had great contacts and information and idea for me. It finally felt like this might become more than just something I surf the internet for, on my own. More than just reading playground blogs (there is more than one - that surprises you, doesn't it?), and searching on "cool playground", "natural playground" and "science playground." I also had a chat with an ed psych PhD student on the other campus last week, and we've decided to try to establish some sort of journal club or reading group for science education academics. Finally. Sometimes living in a new place bring too few of these kinds of life-giving, thirst-quenching encounters where you no longer think it is just you that isn't so happy with the status quo.

However, (oh look, now that I am just writing and not on Amazon.com anymore, I have 25 minutes left!) for now I have been in my pajamas, with warm socks on, the radiator turned up all the way, under a cozy flannel duvet cover, looking for knit toddler clothing patterns. I've sent some 8 e-book samples (the free excerpts) to my reader from Amazon.com, and I just hope that many of them have images of what patterns are inside. I'm looking to make a long vest or sleeveless tunic for A to go over all her long-sleeved tops. Why are there no baby undershirts? I just want this kid to have an extra layer for winter, and a long-sleeved t-shirt from Old Navy isn't cutting it on its own. But I find no baby tank tops or sleeveless onesies for an almost 2-year-old, not here not online in the Americas. My solution then, is to go for an outer layer for over all the long sleeves. Besides, they say that the nap room at school is really warm, so the kids sleep in their lightest layers. Bingo - just pop off that tunic and the Old Navy tshirt is ready for pajama service.

I spend a lot of time "windows" shopping on the internet. Ok, Mac OS X shopping. I don't by all that much, even if I do constantly "add to bag", all across the .com world. I'm finally buying from Etsy, but even there, I have some 50 items in my shopping cart, and only 2-3 actually purchased. I guess it lets me spend time in English-speaking internet space doing some shopping and that is comforting and familiar. Easy.

Ok, Kindle book samples, let's see what you've got for me.

Baby jeans

I ordered some baby clothes for the coming fall and winter for Baby A from the Gap and Old Navy. For some reason, of all the places they ship internationally, only Switzerland and Turkey are on the Europe list. I won't ask why, I'll just count myself lucky.

I just wanted some warmer pants and tops and some long leg pajamas. I'm not a bit fan of baby jeans. Although there was a really cute denim overalls. If they are soft, fine. But no baby needs to have its movement restricted by hard fabrics. (Ok, I may need to rethink my philosophy here, because the idea of slowing this kid down is tempting...)

There I was, on the baby girl "pants" page - because god forbid we let babies all dress without reference to their sex - and there were as many jeans for babies as I remember there being for women in the store! Really? Sure, light wash and dark wash, whatever. But flare vs. skinny vs. boot cut? Really? To go with the baby stilettos they sell? C'mon, like your kid doesn't have enough expectations from you to live up to already.

It makes the Saturday Night Live "baby thong" commercial not so funny anymore. It was funny when it was outrageous. But, what is the point of baby skinny jeans if you've got that big diaper bulge? Best get some thongs to go with it.

Yeah, girl/boy differences are all biological and we have nothing to do with teaching them how to act. It makes me want to keep Baby A in yellows and greens and not tell people on the tram if she is a girl or boy.