Five Years Ago...

today (or tomorrow, depending on when you read this post) Adam and I were married. I was sort of young, he was REALLY young, and we had no idea what we were getting into. I still get teary when I think of this incredible man that I was so lucky to find. Our marriage is the foundation on which my feet are very firmly planted in this life, and without his love and support I know I would not be able to accomplish much of what I do. I've said before that I breathe air and my husband and I love each other-- these are the two things of which I will always be certain. I feel very blessed and thankful that I have such a kind, hard-working and special man to grow old with.

The last five years have brought a lot of hard work and struggle, but a whole lot of wonderful, too. And this, of course.

photo courtesy of the fabulous Cophia Lee

And this special day also brings the end of Adam's twenties. And my mother's-- well, we'll just say there's a six in there. A wonderful, special day that will be filled with much love, laughter and wishes for many, many more years together.

Happy Birthday, Mom! And Happy Birthday-Anniversary dear Husband! I love you all so!

What I'm loving right now...

Our overabundant mint supply, necessitating the daily consumption of just one mint julep.

My lookalikes

This yummy display just down the street. Not pictured: the collection of vintage patterns for sale. Arranged by decade. For a dollar. No, I'm not kidding.

A sneak peak of a little pattern of my own...

I'm a happy gal.

::AHHHHH::

The stash before:And after. That's a little better. I'm trying to do a little mental and physical housekeeping in the next few days. What better place to start than where most of my thoughts begin-- with the fabric. The good news? The cottons are trimed, ironed and folded. The bad news? There's a wool closet. And a fleece closet. And an upholstery-grade closet.

It's gonna be a long week.

A Mama Moment

It is very late at night.

If ever a novel were to be written about my life, this is how the first sentance would read. Heck, it's probably how the first sentance of every chapter should read. It often feels like the most real moments of my life happen after 10 pm. After the big baby has gone to bed, and the little baby has eaten and eaten and eaten and then gone to bed, after the laundry has been folded (but rarely ever put away) after the little remnants of our day have been tidied up and tucked away-- that is when I'm finally free to pick up whatever project I'm working on at the moment, to spend an hour or three on something wholly of my own choosing. Even though this time often stretches into the wee sma's, even though I very often trade a much needed hour of sleep before the baby's first waking, I rarely ever choose to give up this little block of my day.

Tonight was no different-- I was rushing to get all the bits and pieces of our little gifts for Grady's teachers ready before the last day of school tomorrow. There were little hands to stitch, little treats to bake. At the back of my mind was a (big!) little project of my own I'm working on-- I just wanted all of this hurry-up to be over so I could make my way into the studio to think and tinker. But then, as I sat bleary-eyed trying to write coherent and thoughtful notes to his teachers, I had the thought that it is moments like these that connect me to all the other mothers out there. These tired moments, very late in the day, when we go on working for our children long after they are tucked into their beds.
Motherhood is a tricky thing. I left my job when Grady was born, taking with me many wonderful memories, but without a trace of regret. I was ready and prepared to embrace all the moments of motherhood-- hands-on, deep down in the trenches motherhood-- the hills and the valleys. That first year, there were a lot of mountains to climb, a lot of deep valleys and sad days and so few peaks from which to survey, triumphant. But then, slowly, it got a little easier. He slept a little better. Words came. Little rituals evolved. My angry little baby grew into a this big, big boy who goes through his days with a song on his lips and in his heart, and my own heart has grown to a size I never even dreamt possible.
It's a big, big job we have, holding these little hands. Hang on tight for as long as you can.

Friday is Mama-made day!

100% of the items in these photos are Mama-made! (Including the boys, who, if I do say so myself, are remarkably good-looking!)He absolutely will not give me his dimple smile when I have the camera out. But don't be fooled; he has one (one, I tell you! It's like he knows that one dimple is even cuter than two dimples, and so in his effort to become the World's Cutest Baby he has made sure that he only has one dimple.) I stopped counting the dimples on his legs at about 92.Here's a kinda shot of the one dimple...Big brother does Ok in the cuteness contest around here, too.

Thanks for indulging a happy lady in a little flight of self-congragulatory blathering! Have a wonderful weekend, everyone!

There's a frog in that bog...

Do you spy him? Or more accurately, do you recognize him to be a frog?

I've done some needle felting in the past, but all 2-D stuff-- sweaters, scarves and such. I love it--it's much cheaper than therapy, and such a lovely, productive way to work out any, um, angst. Not that I have angst. Life with a two year old is pure bliss.I also love applique work. And as of last night, count me in with the ranks of card-carrying, certified, no-turning-back, die-hard Heather Ross fans. I have looked at her designs on-line, and yup, I bought this fabric more than a month ago, but I hadn't tried to do anything with it yet. This fabric feels good. That is all there is to it. It's soft, perinially cool and refreshing against your skin-- yes, yes, I know it is meant to be pj's, and now I get why. I also get why people pay exorbitant amounts of money for it. I'm hooked.

This little play pouch is a new idea I'm trying out-- the little mat, with Heather's beautiful lillypad design, cinches right up into this little carrying bag. And inside are some wee felted friends.

This little dude is felted around a tiny magnet-- so he can be caught (and returned!) by the little peg fisherman I'm working on.

Obligatory duck.

I can't decide which style of frog I like best- but I'm leaning towards the one that is just a little ball with a face. I need to work on the scale a bit-- I showed these to Grady, and he tried to shove it the duck up his nose. That kid. But I do thing a little larger might be better. This is Frog #1.

And Frog #2. Do tell me what you think. I'm horribly indecisive these days. Probably from a lack of sleep. It was pretty far this side of midnight when I finally made it to bed last night. I had to make just one more pair of pants out of this stuff. Love.

Points of Light

"And immediately

Rather than words comes the thought of high windows:

The sun-comprehending glass,

And beyond it, the deep blue air, that shows

Nothing, and is nowhere, and is endless."

--from High Windows by Philip Larkin

A Tunic of Many Colors

I say this a lot these days, but for me, sewing has replaced the need in my life that writing used to fill. They are very similar beasts. To be more accurate, I guess, sewing is kinda like solving the Jumble (something I actually dislike and do very, very badly). You start with all these bits and pieces that you have to jigger together to make into something cohesive and beautiful. And you can make it more challenging, more complex. (Patterns? Who needs patterns?) So sort of like a poem you can feel with your heart and your hands. And you can put the sewing down when you hear that ominous crash in the kitchen and pick it right back up when you have a few free minutes, which is by far the biggest draw for little house-wiferly things like me (Ha. Donna Ried is rolling in her proverbial grave at the sad state of my kitchen sink. But you know what I mean.)

So this is what I would call a poem not yet fit for magazine submission. It was awfully, awfully fun to cut into all that Good Folks. (And can I just pause here and say that the oranges, blues and yellows in this line are amazing? Saturated color. It just gets me right in the chest.) But I realized when I got home I should have gotten a different color of that honeycomb print, and I really, really really wanted to work in the blue, so I just kept adding and adding until I had used practically every print in the line in one top. It kinda hurts my head to look at it too long-- it is definitely too busy to put on a wee little body. And the pattern, which I was making up as I went along, definitely needs some tweaking. Process over Product, my dears (mantra of the Montessorians). But oh, how wonderful, those hours spent putting all the little pieces together.

PS-- I'm going to apologize right now for any bad photography. Not much is happening before 11 pm around here these days. Somebody is trying to go and get all big-boy on me. Teeth, I tell you. If you spot a very short, very fat young man with one southeast dimple and the most kissable cankles ever, would you please tell him to stop growing up. Thank you very much.

::SIGH::

CAVEAT: If you are my husband, I strongly advise you to just stop reading right now. Go on, now. I love you, but get out.

Guess where I went today?To see some Good Folks...

and a wee bit of the Midwest

on to Monaco...

and a Pop-y little Garden...

Unknown lands, with verdant hills of green (and orange)...

A little cache of acorns in a tree...

and into the sunset land of the Lotus eaters...

Ah, fabric. My first and lasting love. My wallet is lighter but my heart is full. I have a little something up my sleeve...

::Just a Happy Day::

Like our good pal Ferdinand, we have learned that sometimes it is nice to "sit just quietly, and smell the flowers." A more visceral way to experience art.
"Mopping cap" courtesy of Heather. (Grady's name for it. And yes, he does wear it every time he is able to "swach" my mop. I'm going to truly mourn the advent of the "nnn" and "mmm" sounds in his vocabulary. I think there is nothing cuter than "swakes, swiles and swaching.") If you are into wool diapering, which surprisingly I am not-- the whole "airing out" thing kind of skeeves me-- you should really check out her beautiful sets. And we are huge fans of her monsters (or creatures, as I prefer to call them), too. What a great idea-- her daughter designs them, Heather creates them, and they split the profits. Awesome.

Theoretical Thrifting

I have a long-held and time tested theory about thrifting. It's along the lines of "if you build it, they will come" but involving slightly more of a voodoo kind of vibe. If I think hard enough, picturing the exact object I desire precisely in my mind, then sometimes-- just often enough to sort-of make me believe in my powers of mind control-- I walk into the thrift store and there it is.Case in point--this little vignette. The lamps belonged to my grandmother, and when the new dining room paint went up, out went the faux-Craftsmen lamps from the Tar-jay that had been on the buffet. Now I thought really hard about something like this appearing, but when that didn't happen (and the $1500 for a pair of those puppies didn't materialize in my wallet, either. Darn.) I focused on finding a pair of matching lampshades. And lo-and-behold, there they were-- not my first choice, but a nice, clean pair for a grand total of five bucks. And since this happened to be out of stock, I tried to imagine something well-shaped and mildly Hollywood Regency-- and that $8 mirror appeared. A few coats of white paint and presto-- beautiful! This chipped up little guy is as good as new with another coat of white paint. And I am not even taking a picture of the 18 highball glasses I found. For .20 each. I am assuming most of you do not have a two-year-old who yells "you (he's you, by the way) want a cocktail! You do!" I am not so fortunate. Or maybe I drink way too many cocktails. Either way, I was way happy to find those glasses.Now, on to the rest of the stuff in that suitcase. These wool blazers yen to be a handbag. I can feel it in my bones. Some inspiration in the form of this. And what are they lying on, you ask? Certainly not a cashmere throw that my grandmother sent for me to cut up. But if you thought not, you'd be wrong. You'd also be wrong if you thought my scissors were coming anywhere near that thing.And this. A truly enormous Penddleton wool shirt, brand new, with arm patches. What in the world will I do with that? I have a tiny little idea... and it involves this. Perhaps the oddest thing I've ever found, been given, or maybe even seen. A huge (like Paul Bunyon sized huge) wool vest, complete with leather bias binding. It says it is a sheep, but there is no evidence of the underside of that fur. But it is soft and cuddly, and I feel the beckon of my ancient, industrial-grade sewing machine that creates more blue air than a whole ship-ful of sailors. It is the only thing heavy-duty enough to eat into that furry stuff. And the red wool shirt-- well, it's all so very log cabin-ish to me. So I think that one of these days I'm going to make myself a big old sheepskin log-cabin throw rug. This may or may not happen before my children have gone off to college. But we'll see. That's the thing about thrifting. It always keeps you guessing...