GOMA a Go Go

This past Friday I decided to go into town and I took Blondie Boy to one of my favourite places in Glasgow, The Gallery of Modern Art or GOMA as it's more colloquially known. I'm a big fan of modern art in general and like all the public museums in Glasgow it is FREE! The building was originally the home of a wealthy tobacco merchant but has had many incarnations before becoming the museum which is the most visited modern art gallery in Scotland! It's also locally infamous for equestrian statue of the Duke of Wellington which 9 times out of ten will have a traffic cone on its head.

The ground floor is where Gallery 1, which is a large space with a full wall of windows and massive ceilings, resides and it's normally the main exhibition. I have to say I was a bit disappointed because right now it's "Hertie Querty: Playful and Mischievous Works from the Collection" so sort of a best of if you will. The title is from old Scots. 'Hertie' means persons fond of fun, and merry. 'Querty ' means in good spirits, full of fun and mischief. A lot of the works on display were works that normally reside in other Galleries in the museum so I'd seen most of them before.

Blondie Boy seemed to like Roderick Buchanan's "Gobstopper" which is a film of children being driven through Glasgow's Clyde Tunnel, which is a road tunnel underneath the Clyde River. The children was mostly all trying to hold their breath the length of the drive which is about a minute. Blondie Boy loves watching other children so this didn't surprise me. The film was previously in Gallery 2 so I'd seen it before.

Blondie Boy wasn't sure what he thought of Jim Lambie's "Seven is Seven or Sunshine Bathed in Golden Glow" but Lambie was nominated for the Turner Prize and I'm a fan in general of anything with mirrored mosaic so it gets a mention. I also wasn't sure if I was allowed to take photos or not so this is one of the few pieces I thought I could get away with snapping a picture!

We went up to Gallery Two next but the film showing was in a really dark room and Blondie Boy didn't seem too keen so we went around the corner to the far back of the Gallery and I found what has to be one of the best kept secrets for children in Glasgow.

There was a wee nook full of children's creations and a shelf full of books, crayons, pencils, paper, projects, foam blocks and those beads on wire things if you know what I mean. Blondie Boy loved sitting in the just his size purple chair and colouring a picture for his Daddy.

I don't know about other children, but Blondie Boy loves exploring and speed-crawling (he's crazy fast) around new spaces he's never been before. So he really enjoyed just being able to crawl around and play with the blocks as well.

The strangest thing had to be when he pulled a book off the shelf, as he likes to do and I thought it looked strangely familiar. Umm, yes it looked familiar for a reason: it was part of a series of art books I modelled for when I was much younger.

I've seen the books in the States and I knew there were international versions since my Mom has Russian and Japanese versions but I'd never seen them in Scotland before. So here I am in all my glory telling children to put out a tablecloth and put on an old shirt before you work and for goodness sake's don't eat paint it's yucky!

I'm just like Gisele Bündchen, right? We had a really fun time together and I'm looking forward to taking him back again and exploring some of the other galleries. The museum has programs/classes for children during the school holidays and also every Saturday but they say they are geared for ages 3-11 so I'm not sure if it would be appropriate for Blondie Boy just yet.

GOMA is very child friendly and has two baby-change stations on the top and basement floors. There are high-chairs in the cafe in the basement and quiet breastfeeding spaces are available upon request. GOMA is a short walk (under 2 minutes) from Queen Street Station or a five minute walk from Glasgow Central Station.

In the Kitchen with Abby

Abby, from Life with B&A, is one of the amazing group of women that I'm part of that all have babies around the same age. She's a fellow Midwesterner and one of the most upbeat and generous people I know! She's going to help y'all with one of the things I am absolutely horrible at: cooking meat :)

Hello everyone! I am A to to the B @ Life with B&A. I'm Abby and native Midwestern gal raising my now 9 month old son Drew that I personally think it adorable, but I could be bias. I'm married to B, hence the Life with B&A....You get the the picture. We like living our little life in Iowa, and have no complaints, other than the really cold winters and really hot summers, but what are ya gonna do?

So you're probably wondering what the heck I'm going to talk to you about today. Well, so glad you asked! Since I'm a busy working mom, I find little time to cook. Although I still love me a good dinner at the end of the evening and it has to happen when the little man is awake. So we have to juggle. I like to find some recipes that are easy peasy, have few ingredients and I can prepare early.

So today I'm going to share with you a recipe that was shared with me a few months back and Brendan, my hubby says it's company good. As in if we have company over, I can make it, it's that good. It's called Asian Style Pork Chops and just writing this has me drooling because I'm now craving them!

So here's what you will need:
3/4 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup white vinegar
1/2 onion chopped
3-4 cloves garlic
2 tablespoons peanut butter

Blend above in blender and out in put in large gallon Ziploc bag, add in 4 pork chops and marinate for 6 hours. Grill when ready. We also baste with the extra sauce. These seriously are the mostly delicious pork chops we have ever had! I hope you enjoy them. I usually make the sauce and marinate the chops overnight, this way the next day we just throw them on the grill and VIOLA, dinner is served!

Wordless Wednesday

If my jeans could talk, would I be embarrassed?

See those? That's Old Navy The Flirt Boot Cut Dark Wash Jeans; I own 5 pairs (not counting my ON Maternity Jeans) in 5 different sizes. In the past three years I've been all 5 sizes. Fall of 2007 I decided to try the South Beach diet and that combined with exercise meant I lost over 50lbs. Then we got married, I changed jobs and quit my gym, got pregnant had a baby and got fat all over again.

I blogged about putting back on a stone (14lbs) two years ago and to be honest I had totally healthy weight gain while pregnant with Blondie Boy (I had one hell of a bump) so I have no one to blame but myself.

I've been happy in all those jean sizes except the last one, that nasty US 18.

I was happy as a US 16 before I lost any weight, but now I'm back in those 16's again, but it's not the same. I feel heavier, tired and unmotivated. I went out in fairly tight tops and short skirts before but not a chance now. My stomach was sliced open and I don't have a muffin top, I have a muffin spill over. I don't begrudge having my emergency section one second, but I can't deny that it's left my body a different shape than it was before.

Don't get me wrong I love my curves. I love having an hourglass figure and I will never be one of those skinny girls, but I also know I'm not this girl I am now either. This isn't my body and I'm not me. I'm not carrying this weight in a healthy way and it's not good for anyone.

I'm so picky and careful about what Blondie Boy eats. I try to make sure everything is organic, home made, no sugar, low fat and low salt. He drinks nothing but water or formula and lots of fruits and veggies. I eat crap.

I'm a hypocrite! While I'm feeding my son meticulously, I'm drinking an Irn-Bru and eating a Gregg's chocolate covered donut. I want to set a good example for Blondie Boy and while I know he isn't absorbing my unhealthy eating now I don't want to be a hypocrite.

So I'm calling myself out. I'm calling myself a fatty boom batty, lazy, unhealthy hypocrite and I'm going to do something about it. I'm tired of sucking it in, turning my hips and bending my knee in photos to make myself look slimmer. I'm tired of dreading the thought of wearing anything out of the house other than sweats. I'm tired of not feeling like myself in my own body.

So that's that and I'm going to something about it and so is NotBlondeHusband for that matter. We both are going to eat healthier and be healthier not just for ourselves, but for our son.

My baby sister is getting married this October and all of us are the in wedding. I think ten months is a fairly healthy timeline for getting in shape and getting healthier--don't you?

And you lucky people get to cheer us on the whole way, or at least I hope you'll cheer us on? Will you be our cheerleaders....please?

Sick Boy

Blondie Boy has had a cold and cough for the past week. Is there anything worse than a sick baby? They just look so pathetic and cute even as they rub their wee noses on you and leave snail trails on your shoulders. I don't like to give Blondie Boy medicine he doesn't need so the when he's sick we make sure he gets lots of fluids and lots of cuddles.

We got the chance to try a Karvol Vaporiser which promotes clear, easy breathing in a plug-in format that is clean and simple to use. Each vaporiser pack comes with three refills which contain a unique combination of aromatic oils - pine, cinnamon and menthol to help you or your child to breathe more easily. Each user-friendly refill lasts up to three nights and is suitable to use from age 3 months and up.

Blondie Boy's nose was running non-stop so he wasn't too congested, but he did have a chesty cough so we decided to give the Karvol Vaporiser a try. The smell was a bit too piney for my taste but it did seem to help Blondie Boy sleep through the night. We plugged in the Karvol Vaporiser behind his changing table and out of his reach, but it does lock so you don't have to worry about little ones pulling it apart if they do get a hold of it.

Since Blondie Boy can't exactly tell me if he noticed a difference in how he slept all I can say is that it certainly didn't hurt and he didn't wake up when we had it plugged in. The Karvol Vaporiser is available in stores and online for RRP £6.59.

Infertility is Universal

Sandy from how beautiful are the feet and her husband are currently working in Namibia in Africa as teachers at a school for AIDS orphans. Sandy's story is of Watjantja a woman she first met almost ten years ago in remote Namibia, but it's also the story of millions of women around the world as infertility affects roughly 1 in 7 women worldwide. As expats we often talk about what is different from home, but some things, unfortunately, are universal.


I usually write about life in Namibia and what is going on in the lives of the students that my husband and I work with. Not many people know about our struggle to get pregnant, and it is not something I have discussed on my blog. When Blondie presented the opportunity to write a guest spot for her I thought it would be a great way to share some of the things I have noticed in dealing with IF in a foreign country.

In 2002, when I lived in Namibia, I met a lady who could not have children. Her name is Watjantja, she lives in Swartbooisdrif, one of the most remote villages in Namibia. There are no medical doctors there; in fact, there are no fertility specialists in the entire country of Namibia. In the Himba culture (recently showed in the movie “Babies”) children are life. Without children you are doomed to be forgotten. Her husband did what almost any Himba husband in that situation would do, he took a second wife who bore him many children without any problem. At the time I was sad for her, but I could never grasp the full force of the devastation behind her expression as she told us all of this.


Fast forward to 2009, my husband and I are about to finish college and we are finally ready to begin our family. I remember that day like it was yesterday, we sat in a restaurant and decided that it was finally time to start trying. The absolute possibilities of what that decision meant for our future made both of us cry. Now here I sit at the beginning of 2011, it has been almost two years and we are no closer to having our family than we were that day in the restaurant. In the last two years I have had several diagnoses thrown at me from doctors thousands of miles apart. (Including PCOS, Endometriosis and Anovulation “here have some Clomid!!!”) Who knew that trying to have a baby included so many needles and an absolute stripping down of one’s dignity?

In 2010 we returned to Swartbooisdrif, Watjantja’s village. She was still there, as barren as ever. When she saw me her eyes lit up, then she looked down at my arms searching for a child. When our eyes met again she read me like a book, her expression said : “You are like me aren’t you?” In an instant she recognized the pain, the emptiness, the hopelessness, and the loneliness in my eyes and in my empty arms. Watjantja can speak no English and through a translator she said “Don’t be like me!” To this day it is one of the hardest and most comforting things I have experienced on this road of infertility.

The one lesson I have learned in dealing with IF and travelling across the world is that women of every culture language color and economic standing share the same feeling of emptiness and heartache when it comes to IF. Anywhere on earth you will be able to find someone who has been touched by this relentless pain and someone who , without having to say anything, can understand the hurt that you are feeling.

Wordless Wednesday

Mimi you forgot something....