Mama Sutra

Feels busy

And yet, I don't feel like I got much done.  I'm chipping away at a lot of things at once and nothing seems to be DONE. 

Thing-a-day is keeping me motivated to keep working at stuff.  My real goal, as in for the whole month, is to finish all my works-in-progress (unlikely: I have a lot of these), work through my yarn and fabric stashes, and decrease the clutter and organize the stuff I actually want to keep.

To de-clutter, I went through my bin of toiletries (the stuff I've had to re-locate out of my bathroom because my kids keeps getting into my good lipstick and foundation, etc.) and the hall pantry.  The latter was an especially good idea because I'm doing my monthly shop, and I prefer to stock up on the stuff that I really need, not just buying more of what's already there.

My official thing-a-day was to take the kidlet  wrap dress pattern from tiny happy and actually draw up the pattern.  I'm a very reluctant sketcher, so this was something I'd been putting off for a while, but since the smocks for the girls had turned out well, I really wanted to get a start on the little dresses.  Check it off the list.  I also worked on a little blanket that will put a dent in my easy wash acrylic stash, and I finished the ribbing on the top of my self striping sock (I'd set it aside with about 3 rows done and forgotten about it: how odd).  I also made pork chops for supper after having a bit of a hissy fit about cooking.  It was one of those crabby kinds of afternoons, but the chops were delish, and the shiraz I drank with it wasn't bad either.

Tomorrow, I'd like to cut out the wrap dress and just maybe stitch it up.  This one will be for practice, using up some of the miles of khaki twill I bought.  I have some baby corduroy and some cute prints that I want to use to do reversible dresses.  Best way I can think of to hide the seams, and twice the wearing power.  But it will involve another trip to the fabric store for more bias tape, the only thing I need to spend money on to complete the project (I hope).  Oh, and I want to call about starting Ju Jitsu.  A strange thing for thing-a-day, perhaps, but I have been putting this off for about two months, and I am in dire need of some physical activity.

I'm most of the way done Julia Child's My Life in France, which I'm reading for an online book club at Apartment Therapy.  And I'm playing a lot of scrabulous on facebook.  Apparently, I will be conducting my entire social life online between now and spring.

Happy all of it

Happy Groundhog Day.  Don't know what the vermin saw, but it was only -22 C when I went out which meant that I could even move around briefly outside with my double mittens off.

Happy day 2 of Thing-a-day.  I finally finished a little baby hat that I'm knitting to donate to the local hospital.  Sport weight acrylic yarn, 72 stitches in the round, I forget what size needles.  6 1/2 inches K2P2 rib, then K2tog to last 9 stitches, thread tail through, weave in two ends.  Cute, and immediately adopted by Helena on behalf of one of her stuffies.  I may never get these to the babies at the hospital.

Happy Feast Day of St. Brigid.  Gotta love the patron saint of babies, poets, and children whose parents are not married.  (Also love how I finished a baby hat for thing-a-day, not consciously intentional.)

Also have to love an event called Brigid in Cyberspace Poetry Reading.   I, in my usual punctual manner, found out about this about an hour ago.  I thought about what poem I'd post, got it to two, and could only find one online.  Decision made, pretty good for a libra. 

Let Evening Come -- Jane Kenyon

Let the light of late afternoon
shine through chinks in the barn, moving
up the bales as the sun moves down.

Let the cricket take up chafing
as a woman takes up her needles
and her yarn. Let evening come.

Let dew collect on the hoe abandoned
in long grass. Let the stars appear
and the moon disclose her silver horn.

Let the fox go back to its sandy den.
Let the wind die down. Let the shed
go black inside. Let evening come.

To the bottle in the ditch, to the scoop
in the oats, to air in the lung
let evening come.

Let it come, as it will, and don't
be afraid. God does not leave us
comfortless, so let evening come.

(I found the poem here)

Beginning

Welcome to February.  At least it's not January.  The weather has kind of broken, and by kind of I mean that it's now about -25 C (-15 F), which means that I was out with my jacket open some of the time because that's how we roll here in crazy land.  A couple days ago, I saw a woman running to her vehicle and she had on a hoodie.  No jacket, no hat, no mitts, a lightweight hoodie with one of those long lacy camisole things under it.  WTF?

Low points of the day: my kid peeing on the carpet, and most of my outing to buy groceries, including unsupervised kids (youngest about 7, oldest about 11; I'm referring to the ones that bugged me, I'm sure there were some responsible kids too, somewhere) pushing their carts all over the place, blocking the traffic flow, getting in my way.  The WORST was when I set my macchiato down to pick up some stuff to put in my cart and the woman behind me KNOCKED MY COFFEE OVER and was vaguely apologetic.  PISSED ME OFF.  I'm petty and I know it, but it's been a very very VERY long week in the house with the cold and I NEEDED my COFFEE.  Dammit. 

But, there was a lot of good and I thank Thing-a-day for getting me motivated to try some stuff.  I signed up (sign ups closed last night, I think), and planned out some stuff I wanted to get done and try and whatever.  Most of it is crafty, knitting and sewing, seeing as I have a tonne of yarn to use up and a two month old sewing machine that I have hardly used at all.  I also have a couple new recipes I want to do; I'm only going to count the bigger crazy things, so not just slow cooker chicken but, say, no knead bread.

So, today I decided that I would try to get the pieces cut out for the swing swing smock in Amy Karol's Bend the Rules Sewing.  I'd already made one for Meredith, and had tried to make one for Helena.  The first worked fine because I had very wide bias tape, but I could not get the narrow bias tape to work for the second one, so I gave up.  I bought the new tape, and also decided I would try to make this reversible, basically cutting out two pieces, basting them together right sides out, then finishing the cut edges with the bias tape.  I thought I could get the pieces cut out today, then I'd finish tomorrow, but it's done.  I went over the recommended 20 minutes to an hour suggestion, but I'm so glad I got something completed.  I have a bad habit of giving up if I don't have some early success.

Part of my plan with doing this was to involve the kids.  I had this great idea that we could make this patchwork cat but instead of patchwork we'd use fabric crayons, iron the kids' designs onto the fabric and they'd have their own little cats.   I have about five metres of khaki coloured twill that I thought would be a good weight.  Unfortunately, the fabric crayons I bought are best for synthetic fabrics, and they just won't take, so I'll need to buy some different fabric before we can continue. 

I think we may have done something else, but I can't remember.  And I don't know what we'll do tomorrow, though I am very taken with these wrap around dresses (tiny happy is a lovely, lovely blog).  And I'd like to make everything Boden has posted for spring for girls, since I won't be buying any of that any time soon.