I haven’t posted in nearly a month. It’s been a hard month.

My daughter was born in March of this year, and since then, I’ve been battling some pretty gnarly postpartum depression. Things started looking up in June and July, around the time I started this project, not-so-coincidentally. But things took a turn in August and nosedived in September. I’ve been feeling worse than I had since right after Fig was born. In fact, I hadn’t hit this level of depression in more than 10 years so it really knocked me on my ass. Life became distilled to the most essential tasks: being there for Adam and Fig, including as many snuggles as my adventurous, wiggly girl would allow; working to the best of my ability; taking my medicine and keeping my doctor appointments; and maintaining at least questionable hygiene. Not much energy was left over for completing Things. But I think I might have figured out what triggered the huge downturn. I removed the trigger earlier this week, and I think I’m getting better. Whether I am or not, I’m still committed to my Forty-Two Things.

I have even made a little more progress toward the two biggest Things.

Read or Rid: I read The Shepherd’s Crown, Terry Pratchett’s last book. It was so lovely and bittersweet, another great story about Tiffany Aching and the Wee Free Men and the witches of Discworld. Now I’m reading Girls’ Studies by Elline Lipkin, a nonfiction book about the socialization of girls versus boys and the impact that pop culture, media, and societal norms have on girls in America.

This is my second helping. The first was eaten before I remembered to take a photo.

The Cookbook Thing: Saturday night, I cooked another Smitten Kitchen recipe: tomato-glazed meat loaves and brown butter mashed potatoes. These were more like giant meatballs, not the classic meatloaf with bell pepper and onion. They were quite tasty, and the brown butter mashed potatoes were amazing. It feels good to get back to my list of Things.

And best of all, the food was awesome. My in-laws were over and got to enjoy them as well. It’s a big joke in my husband’s family about how much he hated meatloaf growing up. When I was trying to choose a cookbook to complete, I told Adam that I’d have to make meatloaf if I did the Smitten Kitchen one, which meant he’d probably have to eat meatloaf and he said he’d do it. I decided to make it while his parents were over so they got to witness their son eating meatloaf, which he did, happily. I also made his birthday cookies…four months after his birthday. (Sorry, honey!) It was nice to spend some hours in the kitchen and my mother-in-law got some quality Fig-time while my husband and his father anchored our bookshelves to keep our little crawling, pulling-up, getting-into-everything girl safe.

My husband, voluntarily eating meatloaf for the first time in a very, very long time.