Suokojaminworldtour: Ultra Sounds

First off, the Belly is doing well. Little baby is now 11 inches long and almost a pound, apparently the size of a spaghetti squash. Miia is showing more and more, but strangely hasn't gained much weight. It just seems to have shifted around, though some folks still don't notice she's pregnant. Regardless, she looks radiant.

Baby on the other hand is kicking mightily, so hard even I can feel it now, wailing against the placenta, which has settled at the front. The midwife noticed this in our last exam, and our first ultrasound on July 4 confirmed it. We got to see little feet, the spine, every tiny vertebrae, four chambers of the heart – beating away at 148 beats a minute – arms and hands and a beautiful puffy little face. S/he looked relaxed with a hand behind the head, and sucking the other thumb. Spinning all around in there like an astronaut. Most importantly, perfectly healthy.

Unfortunately to get a picture for ourselves we have to spend 200 bucks at a private ultrasound clinic. We’ll get lots of pics when baby gets born. And we’re past halfway there, hard to believe. This baby has already experienced many firsts with Mama, like playing golf and tennis and even a folk festival. The 13th annual Stan Rogers Folk Festival in Canso Nova Scotia!

What an amazing event. We saw Bruce Guthro, Beppe Gambetta, Tanglefoot, Bobby Cameron, Dave Gunning (great songwriter from Pictou NS), the legendary Valdy, and Martin Sexton. Martin Sexton is a phenom, the lovechild of Jack Black and Jack Johnson, with the vocal range of Mariah Carey meets Brad Roberts of the Crash Test Dummies, and the instrumental body of Bobby McFerrin, complete with beatbox, drums, trumpet, and at one point he turned his mouth into a sitar. Oh, and a little old time gospel hour preacher. I'd heard one of his albums and quite liked it, but it was nothing to his live show. He blew us away. Completely. That was the first night.

Then we saw Steve Poltz, David Myles, Stacey Earle & Mark Stuart, Joel Fafard, Little Miss Higgins, Rebkah Higgs, Kyrie Kristmanson (Bjork meets Feist), Graham Isaacson, Ron Hynes, Si Khan (a folk songwriting legend), Chuck Brodsky, Archie Fisher, Steve Wright, Breeze and Wilson, Stan Carew (of CBC east fame), Ryan Leblanc, Andy Irvine, and then...the great Buffy St. Marie! That was a little slice of heaven. She brought the whole audience to tears with this song. The other musicians couldn't even follow that, she had to follow herself with a humerous number.

But there was more: Martyn Joseph (great political Welsh folkie), Kevin Fox, Shanneyganock, a Steve Ray Vaughnesque trio from New Brunsick simply called Matt, Ross & Keith, Irish Mythen (who made me cry again with a song about a man's first night in bed alone after losing his wife after 60 years), Black Umfolosi (from Zimbabwe singing deep-voiced southern African harmonies), Don Rooke, Kraig Kenning (Chicago blues man), Salil Bhatt (an Indian player of the Mohan Veena who is so respected that he travels with his own sidekick who plays drums and applauds and shakes his head in utter wonder at Salil's gifts), Garnet Rogers, Jim Richard (makes Johnny Cash's voice sound like fresh sprung pansies), Rachelle Van Zanten (yet another incredible bluesy, guitar rippin soul sista), Brollachan, and Gordie Sampson. Whew.

Now, in case you have no idea who any of those people are, here are some pictures from Canso - a truly gorgeous part of this country:

Halifax turned Toronto cellist Kevin Fox.
The incomparable Buffy St. Marie
Valdy still won't play you a rock and roll song.
Santa?

Cynical Welshman Martyn Joseph.
Shell of a Canso factory.
Mmmm, Stacey Earle.
Irish Mythen sheds a few tears listening to her hero Andy Irvine sing a song.
Ron Hynes laughs at a Jimmy Flynn joke.