Making Do

This must be what heaven is like

2009-11-16T10:42:00.000-08:00

I met a homeless woman the other day. Walking out of Waterfront Station on my way to a workshop downtown, I saw her sitting on the sidewalk reading a book, her back against a bank of mailboxes and a blanket over her lap. This is not an unusual site in Vancouver, where over 2,600 people live on the streets.

I stopped to talk to her. She told me that the shelters were full, that she was trying to raise enough money to get a hostel room. I’ve heard this story before—there are not nearly enough shelter spaces here. As she talked, I looked at the sores on her face, her stringy hair, her bad teeth, trying to judge how old she was. It was impossible; she had an old-before-her-time face that spoke of a hard life. She might have been in her early 20s or she might have been in her late 30s.

She told me that she was cold and hungry, that I was the first person to stop for her in two days. And then she broke my heart. “I’m pregnant,” she said, moving the blanket and showing me the outline of her belly.

We talked about the book she was reading—it was one her mom had loved—and about other authors she liked. She told me that she was seven months pregnant, and she smiled and ran her hand over her belly just like any mom-to-be in the suburbs would do. I have no idea what she’s been through in her life. Her current circumstances are vastly different from mine. But, like me, she’s somebody’s daughter. And she’s going to be somebody’s mother.

By the time I came back to Waterfront Station on my way home eight hours later, it had started to rain and the woman was gone. In the two days since then, the rain has not stopped. The stormy November winds have kicked up. This is not a pleasant time of year in Vancouver. The dampness seeps right through to your bones and the cold wind hurts.

I’ve been stopping during the day and waking up in the middle of the night, wondering where she is. Where will she go once her baby’s been born? How will they cope?

Last month, I spent most of Thanksgiving week volunteering downtown with Gratitude Week to End Homelessness, an organization raising money to restore two residency hotels on the Downtown Eastside. I had the good fortune to be assigned to the Gratitude Wall, where we invited passersby to make signs celebrating something they were grateful for. And they did, even in the wind and pouring rain—over 600 of them.

I talked to more people in those few days than I usually do in a month: business people, homeless people, whole field trips of school kids, tourists who were shocked to see people sleeping on the sidewalks in such a beautiful city. I talked to a guy with a huge smile that showed the single tooth clinging to his bottom gum. A woman on welfare dug her last 26 cents out of her pocket to put into the collection bucket, proud to have something to give. A man who has struggled with mental illness was grateful that his wife had proposed to him.

One homeless guy gave us a dollar. He said that it was an investment in his own future. If he gave a dollar now, it might mean that he would have a place to stay someday.

A man who used to be homeless made this sign:

He told me he had been lost for a few years but that he now had a home and a good life.

A developmentally disabled man and I had a long talk about the need to help hungry children right here in Vancouver. He was also grateful for everything:

An old guy with a smile that lit up his wizened face stopped at my table to see what it was about. He lives in a residency hotel and spends his days walking downtown. He was full of stories of the hotel and the streets—stories, he said, that no one was interested in hearing. Well, I was, so he came back on another day and hung out with me again. He had come to the Gratitude Week site to sit in the heated tent where speakers gave lunchtime talks about mental health issues. He wasn’t there to listen so much as to sit. He wondered why nobody set up tents like that for the homeless on cold winter days. A chair, a roof, a heater: “That must be what heaven is like,” he said.

On my way home from the site one day, I went into the mall. As my fingers and nose started to thaw out, I was aware of the fact that because I have clean clothes, a place to shower every day, and some money in my pocket, I was welcome to come inside to warm up and use the washroom. Later, when I stopped in at our neighbourhood grocery store, I saw a sign on the community bulletin board advertising a Botox party—get rid of your wrinkles with your friends in the comfort of your own home! I wondered how two such different worlds could exist at the same time, so close together.

So here I sit in my chair, with a solid roof over my head and a furnace pumping heat through the vents, wondering and worrying about that pregnant woman and the thousands of other people who might be out in the rain today, unwelcome in the warm places. In the world I live in every day, we complain about what we don’t have, about our wrinkles or our slightly out-of-date electronics or our couches that are not quite the right colour. But to many people in that other world, this just might be what heaven is like.

Postcards!

2009-08-03T19:59:00.000-07:00

So June ended. July came and went, filled with lots of work (something I won't complain about, knowing how fortunate I am to have it—plus I had some great projects to work on). And I managed to trip over my own feet and fall into the black hole that sometimes sucks me up, making it difficult to get much more than the basics done. Blogging, I guess, is not one of the basics.

And now it's August. Already.

Back in June—I think; it was so long ago I can't be entirely sure—I finally got around to something I’ve been meaning to do for ages. I got 20 of my photos printed as postcards (photos I took, not photos of me. That’s obvious to anybody who knows me at all well).

Ideally, I would have liked to order them from a local company that uses recycled paper and environmentally friendly inks and doesn’t require a minimum order of 500 prints of one photo. But this isn’t yet an ideal world. I ordered them from moo.com because (a) they ended up having the cheapest per-card price when each company’s shipping charges to Canada were factored in and (b) I could get 20 different cards.

There aren’t 20 postcards in this picture. Even though I knew better, I showed them to my mom before I took a picture of them (taking pictures of my pictures—is that silly?). And, knowing better, I told her she could choose one or two. Apparently, “one or two” equals “five.” The funny part is that, aside from one she used as a birthday card, she’s hoarding them, refusing to send them to anyone. I told her I could have regular old prints made for her—framed, even—but she’s clutching onto those cards like they’re Ansel Adams originals. And asking me to order more.

So I’ve started going through my mess of photo files, choosing some different photos now that I’ve learned a little bit about what works well and what doesn’t. I might also try ordering a single-photo pack from another company to see how well they turn out. I can always give the extras to my mom.

Dad's lessons

2009-06-21T21:28:00.000-07:00

I know that I haven't posted in ages. As many people with school-age kids know, June can be as busy as December, except without the holiday shopping. As the school year and the kids' activities draw to an end, our lives are filled with school assemblies, parties, thank-you teas, rehearsals, and performances. Last weekend alone I spent 10 hours either watching performances or working backstage. All of this is juggled within our regular schedule of work and school.

On Mother's Day I posted something that I'd posted elsewhere before. Will I dare do the same today, on Father's Day? You betcha--but not out of laziness. The following column was published nine years ago in a parenting newsletter. I wrote it as my first fatherless Father's Day approached, and every June since then, I've dug it out and read it again. It reminds me of just how much my dad is part of my everyday life even though he's not here with us anymore.

Father's Day 2000

This is going to be a hard Father’s Day for me, because my dad died a few months ago. I grieve not only because I’ve lost my father and friend, but also because my children have lost their grandfather. My son, who is four, will probably have hazy memories of his Grandpa John, but my two-year-old daughter won’t remember him at all. I’m so sorry that they won’t have the chance to really get to know him.

My dad had an ordinary kind of life. He wasn’t famous or rich, nor did he have a prestigious job or a bunch of letters after his name. Although he worked hard, he wasn’t particularly amibtious. I don’t think he analyzed his parenting style or his kids much, the way many of us do today. He just lived his life in the way he thought best, and in doing so, he taught me some valuable lessons.

When I was little, my parents opened our small house to people needing a place to stay; we also worked in a soup kitchen. We were exposed to diverse ways of life, and I learned not to be quick to judge others. I don’t know what they’ve had to face in their lives, nor where I’d be under the same circumstances. My dad was always one to lend a hand, showing that small actions can make a big difference to someone else.

I don’t remember many big gifts that he gave me. I do, however, remember very clearly my joy when he brought home things like brand new writing tablets, blank and full of potential, or cigar boxes for my crayons and treasures (I still have one). These small, everyday gifts were the really important ones. Our favorite times together weren’t exotic family vacations, but trips to the library and hours playing cards. Activities don’t have to be exciting or even productive to be worthwhile.

My dad was one for field trips. When we got in the car with him, we never knew where we’d end up—maybe it would be a greasy-spoon restaurant with fabulous food or a bizarre museum. These trips taught me the benefits of flexibility, curiosity and individuality. Sometimes you get great rewards by throwing away your plans and turning onto an unknown road just to see what you’ll find. If you always follow everyone else, you’ll miss out.

While my children are young, some parts of my life are on hold, but I know that I don’t have to abandon my dreams. As a kid, my dad wanted to join the merchant marine, but he ended up as a salesman, a sensible job for a family man. After retiring, he discovered a merchant marine WWII Liberty ship maintained and run by volunteers in San Francisco. He joined the crew and lived his childhood dream. He undertook difficult training to get his certification as an able-bodied seaman, which showed me that learning is a lifelong process. One of his greatest experiences was being at the ship’s wheel through the Panama Canal; he was 63 years old.

My dad and I had our problems and disagreements, as all families do, but I always knew that he loved me. I now realize the importance of his unconditional love. Reflecting back on his life, I see that this man, who led an ordinary life, working an ordinary job and living in an ordinary house, was an extraordinary person, wiser than he ever knew.

I tell my kids that, although we can’t see Grandpa John anymore, he’s still in our minds and our hearts. And he’s very much alive in the person I am now. My kids may never have the fun of hanging out and learning to play dominoes with their grandpa, but at least I can pass his spirit on to them.

An uncommon combination

2009-05-11T21:39:00.000-07:00

Taken May 10, 2009, at home.

I guess I just can't get enough of those flower pictures, because while taking a break from weeding yesterday, I took some more. And this one fits Carmi's current Thematic Photographic theme, yellow.

One of my favourite things about my haphazard gardening habits is that I don't remember, from one year to the next, just what is going to appear. These pink and yellow tulips take me by surprise every spring. Here they are from another angle:

Also taken May 10, 2009, at home, while trying not to step on the neighbouring pansies.

I once had a neighbour who kept an always-up-to-date, drawn-to-scale map of her garden. She knew every plant by name, colour, and blooming season. Her garden was beautiful--the map itself was beautiful. While I aspire to having a garden as gorgeous as hers, I don't think I will ever be as organized about it as she was. That's fine with me, because I love rediscovering forgotten friends like these guys.

Mother's Day

2009-05-10T22:10:00.000-07:00

Two years ago, back when I had a little MySpace blog, I wrote the following piece. I thought I would post it here today, after a very nice Mother’s Day in which I was served breakfast, lunch, and all the tea I could drink. You might notice that nested within this recycled writing is another bit of recycled writing. Am I thrifty or lazy? You decide.

Mother’s Day 2007

Yesterday I got my hair cut for the first time in seven months (yes, months). The first thing the stylist said to me was “Are you a mom?” and I thought, “My God, is it that obvious?”

I recently came across some stuff I wrote for a small magazine of whichI was once a co-editor. This is part of an editorial I wrote when my kids were five and three years old:

I’ve been surprised at how much I’ve changed since those overwhelming first weeks with a premature baby and a move to our first house (note to anyone thinking of having children: Don’t plan on moving three weeks after the baby is born. You are not in control of the timing, and you may end up moving when that baby is 10 days old instead). I’ve coped with things I never thought I’d be able to cope with: being thrown up on, going five years without regular sleep, and unexpectedly giving birth to my second child in my own living room. I’ve forced myself to do things I didn’t want to do, like learning to drive—the thought of boarding a bus with a crying baby, a stroller, and three bags of groceries was scarier than finally getting behind the wheel. I’ve also gained a new perspective on the big picture of my life. I was seven months’ pregnant with Child Two at my doctoral defense; her kicks were a constant reminder that my work is not the most important thing in my life anymore.

While I sat in the stylist’s chair yesterday, I thought about those words and the things I’ve learned in the six years since I wrote them. I’ve learned just what I’m capable of—pursuing a second master’s degree while being a work-at-home mom with two young kids, my own business, and some serious volunteer commitments. I’ve also learned that I don’t want to be quite that busy. I’ve learned to be an advocate for myself and my children, whether that has meant standing up to a doctor whose personal life was overriding my need for proper care during a potentially life-threatening situation, or talking to the principal when my son is being bullied. I’ve learned how to put Child Two’s hair up in a bun, which was about as hard as learning to drive.

I’ve learned that there’s a difference between have to and get to and that my entire perspective changes depending on which phrase I use. When Child Two was younger and too scared to be the only one awake in the house at night, I had to get up whenever she needed to go to the bathroom. But, shivering on the side of the bathtub, I got to here my sleepy girl say “I love you sooooooo much!” I have to drive my kids here, there and everywhere, but I get to have wonderful conversations with them about their lives and the world on the way. I have to pay for and wait through countless hours of music lessons and ballet classes, but I get to watch their priceless performances. From September to March I have to spend just about every Saturday under an umbrella at the side of a soccer field, but I get to see their joy when they make a great save or score a goal.

I have had to change my life in so many ways. I don’t stay up late partying. If I’m up in the middle of the night, it’s because I’m trying to meet a deadline or someone’s sick. My day is full of details—it’s Child One’s library day or we need milk or Child Two’s ballet clothes need to be washed before Friday—and sometime I wonder if my tired brain is even capable of something like analyzing the sound systems of languages anymore. But I get to watch two amazing kids grow up—funny, talented (in my biased eyes), caring, and so interested in the world around them.

“Are you a mom?” Yes, I am, and I’m blessed to be. With all these two have given me, who should be thanking whom today?

Many pictures of flowers

2009-05-08T10:02:00.001-07:00

I haven’t participated in Carmi’s Thematic Photographic since back in September, when I was still posting in two blogs (my last two Thematic Photographic pictures, from the theme faded, are here and here). It's not that I haven’t wanted to. The thing I love about his project is that looking through my photos for ones that fit a specific theme makes me see them from a different perspective. But it also takes time, especially given the fact that, while I’m really good about uploading my photos to my computer regularly, I’m not so good at weeding out the bad ones and labelling the rest.

I won’t even mention the cupboard full—absolutely full, as in I can’t fit even one more in there—of unsorted and unlabelled pre-digital-era prints in our storage room. It’s too scary to think about.

Anyway, here I am again. Carmi’s theme this week is yellow. It seems that the only yellow things I take pictures of—aside from the odd shot in which one of my kids happens to be wearing a yellow shirt—are flowers.

Good Glorietta (as my mother would say), how many pictures of flowers have I taken? A gazillion, at least. I’m like a flower paparazza. With my propensity to shove a camera in their petally little faces, it’s a good thing I live in a place with so many gardens.

Here is a sampling of my yellow flower pictures. I’m putting them all in one post because, given my track record, I won’t manage to get them all posted if I do them one at a time.

Daffodils under a tree. Taken March 24, 2008, in Vanier Park, Vancouver, BC.

Tulip in the rain. Taken April 27, 2008, in Stanley Park, Vancouver, BC.

Tulips in the wind. Taken May 7, 2008, at Dundarave Beach, West Vancouver, BC.

Azalea explosion. Taken May 25, 2008, somewhere in Ambleside, West Vancouver, BC.

Yellow rose. Taken June 18, 2008, in my mom’s garden.

Calendula (I think). Taken August 4, 2008, in one of the community gardens at Ambleside (I think), West Vancouver, BC.

As if these aren’t enough, I’ve posted at least two other yellow flower pictures in the past: sunflowers and a zinnia.

On this rainy morning I appreciate an infusion of yellow. Thanks, Carmi.

A little rain, a little sun

2009-04-23T09:11:00.000-07:00

The last month has been a strange one for our family, full of ups and downs. Fortunately—so far anyway—the downs have not been as bad as they might have been, and they’ve all been followed by ups. As I told a friend, I feel like we’ve been walking under a black cloud and then finding a patch of sun, only to walk under the cloud again and then find another patch of sun.

Black cloud: We were in a car accident. Sun: No one was seriously hurt. Black cloud: It looked like my car might be written off. Sun: The estimate for the repairs squeaked in under the insurance company’s limit. I was without my car for a couple of weeks, but I have it back now and it looks better than before the accident.

Black cloud: A family member was seriously ill. Sun: She’s okay now. Black cloud: It looked like her cat (her main companion, as she’s housebound) might have to be put down. Sun: It was a false alarm.

Black cloud: Child One damaged someone’s new car with his car door. Sun: It’s been three weeks and the guy hasn’t contacted us to pay for the repairs, so we’re hoping that it turned out to be an easy thing to fix.

Black cloud: My husband’s company announced that there were major layoffs coming. Sun: We found out yesterday that he’ll be keeping his job. And living with this hanging over us for almost a month has been a good exercise for our family—one we’d rather not go through, of course, but good nonetheless. We already live a fairly simple life compared to a lot of people. Our kids are not into the latest this and that. My husband and I are very experienced at living frugally, having made it through a ridiculous number of years at university without student loans (in fact, we managed to save up enough money for the down payment on our first house during that time). Over the last few weeks, as we thought about what losing our major source of income would mean, we realized just how much of an advantage our lifestyle and experience would be. And we realized how much we would still have—so much more than most people in the world.

Life is still a bit cloudy, but I’m grateful for every patch of sunshine. Despite the economy, my desk is still full of all the work I can handle. A client recently paid me more than I invoiced because she was so grateful for the work I did. My family is happy and healthy; we have a roof over our heads and enough to eat. And, thank goodness, I can finally put the snow clothes away.

As I said to my friend when things were looking bleak, there’s nothing to done but to keep walking and carry an umbrella.

Just in time

2009-04-17T09:31:00.000-07:00

I never claimed to be timely. Just in time for spring, I finished my fingerless gloves last night. (No pictures, unfortunately. It’s a gray, rainy day and my house is like a cave.) I used this pattern, which I had saved from a 2007 page-a-day knitting calendar, and Paton's SWS in Natural Plum.

As more evidence that I shouldn’t knit while watching T.V., I wasn’t completely consistent in recording how many rows I knit, and one thumb is one row shorter than the other. This, of course, is completely obvious to me and driving me crazy. I took a poll of the household: three people can’t tell at all and three cats don’t care enough to even look. I’m vacillating between ripping out one row on the longer thumb and just living with it as an exercise in non-perfectionism.

If I start the summer sweaters I planned for last year and haven’t had time for, do you think I’ll have them ready just in time for the first snowfall?

Syncopated

2009-03-15T10:45:00.000-07:00

The other day, Child One and I were having a conversation in the car (where many of our best conversations take place) about whether the Beatles’ song “Come Together” would be a good song for his band. I said that I thought their singer would like singing it—I was thinking this because it would fit in with his abundance of front-man attitude (unpolished though it is at his young age of 12). But before I could say this, Child One said, “Yeah, he would like it; he likes syncopated songs.”

Syncopated?

Now, Child One has used big words before. He’s been known to drone on and on about topics that I don’t fully understand, like certain video games. And when my kids talk about scales and flats and chords, it does sometimes feel to me (who can’t even yodel) like they’re speaking Etruscan or some other language I know very little about. But—as far as I know (I have to admit that I’m not always fully listening)—this was the first time that he’d used a word completely outside my experience, whose meaning I couldn’t even guess. So casual, so confident, as if he were saying any old word.

Just like when I realized that Child One’s clothes were closer to man sized than little-boy sized, I was jolted by the reminder that he’s growing up. As a mom, I’m used to my kids asking me the meanings of words; I’m not used to having to ask them. While he’s still so young in some ways, Child One is moving beyond me in others.

Unexpected

2009-03-09T10:47:00.001-07:00

We've had a few snow flurries over the past few days, and yesterday a couple of inches of snow fell very quickly, over the course of an hour or so. And more fell overnight.

In parts of our neighborhood, we've had snow on the ground continuously since December. This is not the norm here--I don't know if it's ever happened before--and I, for one, was not happy to see several inches of snow on our deck rail this morning.

But, trying to make the best of it, I eschewed an umbrella in favor of my camera for the walk to school and took pictures on the way home--over 100 of them--until my fingers were numb and my hair was full of ice crystals. One thing I like about taking pictures on snowy days is how colors that you might not notice on a sunny day stand out more, like the green moss on this tree:

The playground was empty this morning, but the park will probably be full of sledders after school.

When I got home, I took some more photos.

I was given some tulips last week. Because I live with a plant-eating monster, any flowers I get are put outside the kitchen window, where I can see them but they are safe from being ripped apart. Today the tulips stood out against their background of huge, snowy trees.

This is my garlic, busy growing despite the weather:

This rope swing hangs in the clearing in our forest:

And this ball, which belonged to my mother-in-law, hangs in our kitchen window.

Finally, like me, a little bird on a set of outdoor shelves waits for the flowers of spring.

Bagels!

2009-02-18T14:15:00.000-08:00

During last year, my Year of Living Differently, I often found myself not moving on to new ways of living, but going back to how I used to live, back when I took more time for the things I enjoyed. One of those things was baking from scratch.

From the time my husband and I moved in together until we had our first baby nine years later, I used to bake at least once or twice a week. All of our friends were students, most of them guys living in dingy apartments or dorms who came to our place for dinner several times a week, so I always had enthusiastic recipients for my baking.

I took a class on bread making through the community centre and I was hooked. I baked almost all of our bread and rolls. A jar of sourdough starter perpetually bubbled in the back of our fridge.

Other things crowded into my life and baking was pushed aside (left on the back burner?) more often than not. But I’ve dusted off my recipes and gotten back to baking. Ah, kneading—I had forgotten how therapeutic it is. Set the timer for 10 or 15 minutes, flour your hands (or, in my case, flour your hands and then remember to set the timer, thereby getting flour all over it), and start. Fold, press, turn; fold, press, turn. Stop thinking about all the things on your to-do list, feel the tension start to abate, fold, press, turn.

Recently I’ve combined the old and the new by baking something I’ve never made before: bagels! Dropping donuts of bread dough into boiling water—how fun is that? Quite a lot of fun, actually. I used a recipe that I tore out of a Family Fun magazine way back in 2004; you can see it here. The first time I followed the recipe exactly, and the second time I made 16 smaller bagels instead of 8 larger ones. They turned out great both times, even though I bake in a 1970s-era oven that achieved consciousness sometime before we moved into this house and likes to spontaneously heat itself up to 500 degrees F.

Sorry, I have no pictures. My kids loved these bagels so much that they even had them—plain—for dessert instead of ice cream (crazy, I know. It must be their father’s fault), and they ate them all before the light was good enough for a photo session.

Simple Valentines

2009-02-16T13:40:00.000-08:00

Some of you know that I have two blogs, this one and Always an Editor, which is more writing oriented. I’ve decided to merge them into one—this one. From now on, I’ll just be posting here. Maybe this way I’ll post more often, because apparently Hayley misses me.

I had two favorite parts of Valentine’s Day when I was a kid: making paper-bag “mailboxes” to hang on the backs of our chairs at school (I was addicted to the mail even then) and getting a box of candy from my dad.

When my parents were still married, I would wait by the window for my dad to come home from work on Valentine’s Day. He always had three heart-shaped boxes of candy, small ones for my brother and me and a larger one for my mom. After my parents split up, I got my box on the Saturday after Valentine’s Day. In those days, we didn’t give out candy at school, so that box—being the only Valentine’s Day candy I got—was much anticipated. I would eat just one piece a day, making it last as long as possible (where has my sense of self-control disappeared to since then?).

I moved a thousand miles away from my dad when I was 14, when my mom decided to return to her hometown. I was so surprised on that first Valentine’s Day when a heart-shaped box arrived in the mail. It was more than a little squished, but it made my day.

We don’t make a really big deal of Valentine’s Day in our house. For one thing, my husband just doesn’t do romance. And over the years, as we’ve watched Valentine’s Day at school escalate from a simple card to full-blown goodie bags and mother-made cards worthy of Martha Stewart, we’ve kept it simple. Child Two gives out cards—made by her if she’s had the time, store-bought otherwise—and one small piece of chocolate.

In the spirit of using what we have, Child Two and I looked for the leftovers from previous years’ boxes of valentines, thinking that because she’s always favored themes with wide age appeal, like animals and I Spy, she could probably cobble together a mix-and-match set to use this year for school. Lo and behold, we found an unopened box of Peanuts valentines. It’s amazing what we find in our own home!

I follow my dad’s tradition of giving each kid and my husband a box of candy. And I made four cards this year, two to send off to people who could use some cheerful mail and two for my kids. The ones I mailed were made (appropriately) from stamps.

For my kids, I cut hearts from my stash of saved paper (magazines, junk mail, old calendars, patterned paper bags, etc.).

These were originally folded greeting cards, but I realized, as I glued the last heart down three minutes before I had to run out the door to pick Child Two up from school on the 13th, that one card was upside down. Typical! Knowing I would have no time to work on them that night, I just cut the fronts off, turning them into postcard-style cards. That’s the great thing about making stuff for your kids—perfection is not necessary.

Little to show

2009-01-29T13:11:00.000-08:00

I don’t have much to show for my time these days. I’ve got a couple of projects in active progress (as opposed to the works in progress that have stalled for one reason or another): my fingerless gloves and a year-long sampler stitch-a-long with an online needlework group I belong to (which I’m already behind on, of course). My evenings are so busy right now that by the time I get a chance to sit down, I’m more likely to be taking a cup of tea and a book to bed than doing crafts.

I haven’t made any profound crafting resolutions this year. I have some projects in mind and some general goals, such as using the supplies I have and finally doing something with at least a few of the hundreds (thousands?) of photographs I’ve taken over the past couple of years.

I have spent quite a few hours lately tangled up with metres and metres (and more metres) of black fabric, making a cape as part of a costume for a teenage cousin. I don’t usually do this “Susan knows how to sew; let’s ask her to do it” kind of sewing, but this cousin has recently finished treatment for Hodgkin’s lymphoma and I’m so happy to see her feeling more like her old self again. How could I refuse her fuzzy-headed plea?

There was too much heavy fabric to lay the pattern out on the dining room table. The cats love when I cut fabric on the floor—I ended up having to lock Jamie up in a bedroom for the safety of his whiskers when he started attacking my scissors. Me? Not so much. My knees are not the young things they used to be.

Wordless Wednesday #29--Patiently waiting

2009-01-14T09:18:00.000-08:00

Taken December 24, 2008.

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's, see wordlesswednesday.com.

Wordless Wednesday #28--Snow on the roof

2009-01-07T09:16:00.001-08:00

Taken December 22, 2008, in West Vancouver, BC.

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's, see wordlesswednesday.com.

Year-end catch-up

2008-12-31T13:39:00.000-08:00

Due to other priorities, I haven’t had much time for crafts in the last couple of months. The biggest thing I worked on was Child Two’s hippy-girl Halloween costume. Fortunately it was an open-ended project; what got done got done, and it was fine. Even better, the only thing we had to buy for it was a pair of jeans and a ball of Handicrafter cotton yarn. Everything else we already had.

I used this pattern for her hat. It was quick and easy. Here's Child Two enjoying hot chocolate and fireworks after a busy evening of trick-or-treating.

Child Two drew on the jeans with a chalk pencil and then I spent many hours surrounded by stitch dictionaries and my boxes of floss as I embroidered them.

This is the first kind of needlework I ever learned, back when I was her age, and it was fun to just go for it without a pattern or much of a plan. She was so happy with how they turned out that she now wears them all the time. We’re going to add more embroidery to them, and I just might start a pair for myself.

Other than that, I’ve gone to a few classes I had signed up for before work took over my life: a mother-and-daughter workshop on English paper piecing, a workshop on bookmaking (the paper kind, not the betting kind), and a class on making bath products. I haven’t had time to use what I learned yet or to do much else except start a pair of fingerless gloves for myself, but now that my workload is more manageable, I have lots of plans for the new year.

Origami cards

2008-10-17T17:58:00.000-07:00

Last week I needed two cards to include in some swap packages for a stitching group I’m in. Even though I am busy with work, slogging my way through the Manuscript That Never Ends at a lightning-quick rate of three pages an hour, I couldn’t bring myself to use store-bought cards. It’s the peer pressure, you know. The stitchers in this group are so talented—and not just at needlework. Some of the cards I’ve received have been amazing. I couldn’t send a mass-market card, now, could I? The shame!

I braved the mess in the craft room to look through some books and decided to make these origami cards from Klutz’s Handmade Cards (yes, I realize that Klutz kits are meant for kids, but this klutzy adult has been known to buy them for herself). While I was at it, I made one for the senior I write to through Senior Angels, since over the years he’s seen every note card I have in my extremely large stationery collection.

Although these cards are simple and not nearly as impressive as the ones I’ve received, they were quick, easy, used stuff I had on hand, and turned out well enough that I wasn’t ashamed to send them. And when I’m old and gray and finally finished with the Manuscript That Never Ends (I know it doesn’t make sense to be finished with something that never ends, but after several intense hours of sloooow editing of someone else’s writing today, I’m not too picky about my own), maybe I’ll finally find the time to get some stitching done.

Licit soap deal

2008-10-09T21:36:00.001-07:00

After taking a soapmaking class last week, I put in an order with the teacher for what I need to make two more batches of soap as well as some shampoo (I’m getting so self-sufficient that soon I will be hewing my own wood and drawing my own water from the forest in our backyard. Somebody please stop me when I start making cookies out of tree bark). The teacher lives in another part of the Lower Mainland but comes to this area fairly often, so we agreed that the next time she was going to be over my way, she would bring me my order.

Tonight I got a call. She was just leaving her place and heading to my town. Could I meet her in half an hour at a certain gas station? Twenty minutes later, I ran out the door, yelling to my husband that I had to go meet my supplier in a gas station parking lot.

I really crack myself up sometimes. My kids, though, who are used to me doing strange things (like taking pictures of jam in the rain), didn’t bat an eye about the fact that I was (a) very excited about going to pick up soapmaking supplies and (b) pretending it was an illicit drug deal.

Two Ladies on a Bench

2008-10-01T09:46:00.001-07:00

Yesterday afternoon a friend and I were sitting on a bench on the school playground, waiting for our kids to finish cross-country practice. I was crocheting a cap that is part of Child Two’s Halloween costume and telling my friend about an absolutely-from-scratch soapmaking class I’d been to the night before and how I could hardly wait until tonight to take the soap out of its mould. She was telling me about the sweater she’s knitting—she hasn’t knit much since the leg-warmer days of the 1980s—and how she stayed up until 1:00 the night before because she just couldn’t stop.

As Child Two and I walked home, another mom—one I don’t very well—stopped me to admire the felted bag I was carrying my project in. She asked me if I’ve ever felted (I haven’t. I bought the bag at a fundraiser for Grandmothers to Grandmothers. When I’m a grandmother, I’m definitely joining a group like this) and told me I just had to try it because it’s so cool.

When you’re a crafty person, life is full of joy, isn’t it?

The soapmaking class was a lot of fun, especially because I got to wear goggles and rubber gloves and use a thermometer and all sorts of scientific stuff. Remember that group of girls who set fire to the table in 8th-grade science class? I was one of them. The only part of chemistry I ever liked was balancing chemical equations, and that was only because it’s like math and I was way better at math than at science. Who knew chemistry could be so enjoyable—and result in something more useful than a charred table, an exasperated teacher, and three very embarrassed girls?

I haven’t made a Halloween costume since Child Two was young enough to dress up as Winnie-the-Pooh. In many years, we’ve been lucky enough to get hand-me-downs. As for the other years? Well, you know that mom you’ve seen rifling through the slim selection of costumes less than a week before Halloween because somehow—even though the stuff has been in the stores for months and even though the year before she vowed that she would not be doing this again—she’s completely forgotten to buy costumes? That’s me.

This year Child Two wants to be a 1970s girl. She’s inspired by her love of the Julie series of American Girl books (if you’ve got a daughter, try these books. Each series is about a girl in a different era in U.S. history). Child Two loves all of the series that she’s read so far, but she’s drawn especially to Julie. Julie, who has long, straight blond hair, lives in San Francisco. In 1974, she’s 9-turning-10 and her parents are divorcing. Her best friend is a different race from her. All of this is appealing to Child Two because in 1974 I had long, straight blond hair (which I still grieve for); I lived just outside San Francisco; I was 9-turning-10; my parents were divorcing; and my best friend was a different race from me.

I don’t know how many years of Halloween costumes we’ve got left—or at least, how many years before I’m screeching “You’re wearing that? Put some decent clothes on!” and she’s rolling her eyes and slamming her door. Child One has stopped trick-or-treating and Two may not be far behind. So I’m happy to help her with a costume this year.

I’m crocheting her a little Juliet cap. I haven’t found a pattern with flower motifs like Julie’s (if you know of a pattern, I'd love to hear about it), so Two’s cap will be plainer, but I’ll put a shell edging on it. We’re going to buy some flare jeans this weekend and she’ll design something for me to embroider on them. She’s already got a shirt that will do if I don’t have time to make one, as well as a denim purse and lots of peace buttons. I have my mom’s “War is not healthy for children and other living things” pendant, which Child Two will wear on a leather string just like her grandmother did decades ago.

The two best things about this costume? First, she’ll be able to add all the new stuff to her regular wardrobe. And second, I won’t be one of those moms desperately searching for a costume at the last minute.

So over the next few weeks, as Two runs along the forest trails, I’ll be sitting on the playground bench with my crochet hook or my embroidery needle, talking to my friend about the things that make up our lives right now—knitting and gardening and soapmaking, husbands and kids, and work (with a little gossip thrown in, I’m sure).

Insight from the young

2008-09-11T14:03:00.000-07:00

Lately I’ve been trying to make more time for what I think of as “ponytail activities”: those things, like baking, crafts, and gardening, that I tie my hair back for. The other morning, Child One commented on the fact that I’ve been doing a lot more cooking and gardening recently. Then he added, “And you seem happier these days.”

You know what? He’s right.

I knew that I missed these things. But I didn’t realize just how good they were for my soul—or for my kids.

Wordless Wednesday #27--Faded glass

2008-09-10T10:18:00.000-07:00

Taken April 25, 2008, in North Vancouver, BC.

This photo is also being posted for Carmi's Thematic Photograpic theme of the week, faded.

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's, see wordlesswednesday.com.

Wordless Wednesday #26--Why I've been so quiet lately (Trip 1)

2008-08-27T12:33:00.001-07:00

Taken August 15, 2008, in Roberts Creek, on the Sunshine Coast, BC.

This photo is also being posted for Carmi's Thematic Photograpic theme of the week, colorful.

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's, see wordlesswednesday.com.

What I've been doing with my summer vacation

2008-08-14T14:12:00.001-07:00

Although it may seem like there’s been no creating going on here lately, I have been doing at least a little bit.

Inspired by the book Journal Revolution, Child Two and I made calendar journals in July. Her theme was flowers; every day she found or drew a picture of a flower.

I used words cut from magazines and junk mail to make a note about my day.

As I mentioned in a post on Always an Editor, doing this calendar journal helped me notice that I spend quite a lot of my time in rather serious pursuits, so I’m paying more attention to doing something fun or relaxing every day. The calendars themselves were a lot of fun to make and, apparently, they also make a fine place to rest.

I’m using my August calendar to remind me of one of the items on my list of things I’d like to be doing. I studied French for many years in school, and although I’ve never been truly fluent, I could understand it and make myself understood pretty well, and it was always one of my favorite subjects. (I am such a language dork that I actually love doing grammar exercises. Is that sad?) I'd really like to improve my French again; I'm determined to go to France one day, even if I'm 85 and tottering around with two canes by the time I get there. So this month I am reading something in French and recording one new-to-me word on my calendar journal every day.

I spent much of last weekend working on lined curtains for Child One’s room. I’ve had the fabric for ages (where ages = years), but for some reason I was hesitant to get going on them. I’m not sure why I was intimidated, considering I’ve made curtains lots of time and Child One is not one to demand perfection (or to even notice imperfection, for that matter). Part of the problem was not having a place to spread everything out, but now that that’s been solved, I’ve decided that I must get them done because I won’t settle down to any other sewing projects until I do. I’ll be too busy over the next two weekends to work on them, but given how long he’s been waiting, a couple of weeks more is nothing.

As usual, I’ve had some help,

although I’m sorry to report that there were some arguments over whose turn it was to guard the fabric.

I had hoped to spend a lot more time being creative this summer, but instead I’ve made major progress in my work and much-needed changes to how I run my business. It hasn’t been the lazy, freewheeling summer I’d hoped for, but the result is a much more manageable workload. If I stick to these changes, I won’t be working nights and weekends regularly and my stress level will drop, so in the long term I will get the creative time and energy I crave.

Wordless Wednesday #25--Seasonal rows

2008-08-13T10:37:00.001-07:00

Taken August 5, 2008, in Vancouver, BC.

This photo is also being posted for Carmi's Thematic Photograpic theme of the week, patterns.

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's, see wordlesswednesday.com.

Thematic Photographic--Signs

2008-08-04T07:46:00.000-07:00

Taken August 13, 2007, in San Francisco.

Carmi's thematic photographic theme this week is signs. I've posted another one on Always an Editor, along with links to the other sign photos I've posted in the past.

Of all the sign photos I have, this is one of my favorites. I keep a copy hanging above my desk to remind me--especially on those days when my life seems an endless cycle of laundry, driving, and editing other people's writing--that the steps I'm taking are leading somewhere and that the path is as important as the destination.

Simple pleasures

2008-08-01T11:11:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday, just a few days after writing a post on my other blog about the sad fact that I rarely have reason to put my hair back in a ponytail anymore, I went to our organic produce market, as I do most weeks. On a whim, I bought an enormous amount of gorgeous local blueberries. When I got home, I put my hair back, dug the canning equipment out from the shed, got rid of all the dead spiders, washed off the five-inch layer of dust, and made blueberry apple jam.

I’d forgotten how much I love this: filling up the huge canning pot, chopping the fruit, watching the honey stream out of the measuring cup, taking the jars out of the boiling bath and setting them on towels, hearing them seal with a satisfying ping. All week long the jars have sat on my counter—it’s been raining and there hasn’t been enough natural light in the house to take pictures without the flash—and I keep picking them up, admiring their color.

I finally gave up on waiting for a brighter day. Embracing the weather, I rolled up my jeans and went outside barefoot—it is summer, after all—and took pictures with this poor sodden bouquet, which has been sitting in the rain all week. I have to say that taking clear photos while squatting and holding an umbrella in one hand (to protect the camera, not me—I was already soaked) was not so easy.

It’s a sign of how strange my kids know me to be that when I said to Child One, “I’m going outside to take pictures of jam in the rain,” he said, “Okay” without batting an eye. Just another one of those things Mom does.

Simple pleasures like this used to be part of just about every day for me. The smell of fabric under a hot iron, pausing in my knitting to look at the rows of even stitches, writing a letter to a friend (by hand!), eating cookies still warm from the oven, or kneading bread dough and feeling a connection to the millions of women who have spent countless hours doing the same thing—these things might seem boring to some, but they grounded me, slowed me down, and quieted my monkey mind.

My goal is that by the end of my Year of Living Differently, I will have once again built room in my everyday life for these simple pleasures.

Wordless Wednesday #24--Windows

2008-07-30T14:39:00.001-07:00

Taken July 18, 2008, in Kelowna, BC.

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's, see wordlesswednesday.com.

Wordless Wednesday #23--Pears

2008-07-23T09:47:00.000-07:00

Taken July 19, 2008, in Kelowna, BC.

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's, see wordlesswednesday.com.

Giveaway winners

2008-07-22T08:57:00.000-07:00

I've drawn four winners for my very small giveaway.

But first, a question: Whose bright idea was it to schedule a dentist's appointment for 7:00 this morning?

The winners are Hanna, Jess, Eva, and Jean. I've emailed all of you for your addresses.

Wordless Wednesday #22--Driftwood frame

2008-07-16T09:29:00.000-07:00

Taken November 21, 2oo7, in West Vancouver, BC.

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's, see wordlesswednesday.com.

A very small giveaway

2008-07-14T08:02:00.001-07:00

I've been thinking lately that I would love to find more craft supplies that are environmentally friendly and/or fairly traded. Well, Child Two and I were in Ten Thousand Villages recently and we saw these packages of skeletal leaves, from Salay Handmade Paper Industries, that are made by women in the Philippines who are paid a fair price for their work. I've seen these types of leaves in craft stores, but not fair-trade ones.

It's hard to tell just what they look like from these stunning photos (it's not easy to take pictures of a stack of paper-thin leaves in a plastic envelope on a sunny day). They're very, very thin and you can see all the veins in the leaves. They're used in collages, scrapbooking, cardmaking, and decoupage (on the second page of Salay's "gifts and novelties" section, there's a picture frame decorated with them). The guy who sold them to me told me about a woman who made a mobile out of them. I have four packages: green, dark blue, teal blue, and red. It looks like there are eight or ten leaves in each package.

If you'd like to win a package, leave a comment here. If there's one color you desperately want, please say so. I'll leave this contest open for a week or so and then draw one or more winners randomly and contact them for their addresses. This is open to anyone, anywhere. Cat not included.

Crafts using old magazines

2008-07-11T11:32:00.000-07:00

On Always an Editor today, I posted about reusing magazines. I thought I would post some links to projects here. But first I'd like to give a plug to Laura of Little Orange Kitchen, who makes wonderful things from reused paper. I'm eagerly awaiting a wallet I recently ordered from her Etsy shop.

Here are some projects that use magazine pages:
Woven purse
Bowls
And more bowls
Boxes
Coiled baskets
Coasters
Paper beads
Decoupage Easter eggs
Handmade postcards
Homemade stickers
Envelopes

Wordless Wednesday #21--Jellyfish

2008-07-09T09:12:00.001-07:00

Taken October 7, 2007, in Vancouver, BC.

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's, see wordlesswednesday.com.

Thematic Photographic: Sky

2008-07-06T11:56:00.000-07:00

Taken December 28, 2006, in Vancouver, BC.

I'm posting this photo for Carmi's weekly Thematic Photographic project. The theme this week is "sky."

This picture, like my other entry this week, was taken on a sunny winter's day.

Wordless Wednesday #20--Through the padeye

2008-07-02T09:00:00.000-07:00

Taken June 21, 2008, aboard the Ecuadorian tall ship Buque Escuela Guayas, docked in North Vancouver, BC. Another picture from this ship can be seen in last week's WW post on my other blog, here.

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's, see wordlesswednesday.com.

Calendar journal

2008-07-01T22:34:00.000-07:00

I recently bought the book Journal Revolution and I’ve been eagerly waiting for a new month so I could start a calendar journal. Basically, you start with a blank calendar page and fill in a square every day in whatever way you want.

I’ve got several ideas for themes, but being a word person that’s what I’m starting with. For a while I’ve been collecting words from magazines, catalogues, and junk mail to use in collages and other craft projects. For each day in July, I will find a word that has something to do with my day and glue that into the square.

Child Two is joining me this month. She’s chosen a flower theme. She’s planning to fill each square with a flower image—cut and glued, stamped, or hand drawn. If she enjoys it and decides to keep going, I’m sure we’ll see a cat theme sooner or later.

I’ll post some pictures once we’re further along.

Thematic Photographic: Wood (again)

2008-06-29T17:18:00.000-07:00

This is another entry for Carmi's weekly Thematic Photographic theme.

Taken today, June 29, 2008, in North Vancouver, BC.

Today we went for a walk at Maplewood Flats, a wildlife conservation area. It's both an unattractive and a beautiful place, depending on where you are. Some of the viewpoints look out over the chlorine plant next door or the mudflats. But there is a lot of simple beauty there, too, like these birdhouses (is that the proper term, Margerie, or are they nesting boxes?).

We didn't see many birds today, nor did we see any bears, although we saw where they had crashed through a fence to get to the berry bushes. Nor, thank goodness, did we see any cougars which a sign warned us were in the area. But we got within a couple of feet of this lovely creature:

Thematic Photographic: Wood

2008-06-28T20:42:00.000-07:00

I'm posting this photo for Carmi's Thematic Photographic theme of wood: a wooden rowboat on a sunny winter's day.

For another wood photo, see my other blog.

Taken December 26, 2006, in Vancouver.

CD cover cards

2008-06-26T15:34:00.000-07:00

Have we done some actual creating at our house after all this time? Unbelievable!

Today my kids have their last music lessons for the year so we are following an annual tradition we started several years ago, making thank-you cards for their teachers by photocopying the front and back covers of a CD and gluing them onto cardstock. The kids each choose a CD with a song they've learned this year. As you can see, Jamie approves of their choices.

Today is also the last day of school and--although our weather is no indication of it--summer vacation has officially begun. This means that bags and boxes of partially used school supplies have come home, adding to our mountain of art supplies. Here at our house, we are up to our eyebrows in supplies of all kinds, including almost every type of writing and drawing implement from Blo-Pens to smelly markers to watercolor pencils to oil pastels. Child Two and I have set a goal of using each kind of art supply at least once this summer. I hope we'll reduce the clutter while making some fun projects that we can share with you.

Wordless Wednesday #19--Ride if you dare

2008-06-25T09:32:00.000-07:00

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's, see wordlesswednesday.com.

Thematic Photographic: Glass

2008-06-21T07:54:00.000-07:00

I'm posting this photo as part of Carmi's "Thematic Photographic" project. The theme this week is glass. At the time this was taken, I was taking a picture a day for my 365 project (now my Might-Reach-365 project). I hadn't taken a picture yet on this day and desperately looked around for something to use. I snipped some sweetpeas from my garden and lined up these jars on the windowsill.

Wordless Wednesday #18--Zinnia

2008-06-18T09:39:00.000-07:00

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's, see wordlesswednesday.com.

Wordless Wednesday # 17--An unexpected encounter

2008-06-11T08:56:00.001-07:00

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's, see wordlesswednesday.com.

All work and no play

2008-06-06T09:38:00.000-07:00

If you read my other blog, you might know that in June I’m trying something different: monotasking. Like most mothers, I am capable of amazing feats of multitasking. I’m also a freelancer, and in my work it’s very difficult to schedule jobs with much accuracy. Often the projects I have so carefully laid out on my calendar come crashing together in a big heap. Add to this the fact that my schedule is flexible and I have a hard time saying no, and you end up with someone who is always trying to do several things at once—work, helping my mom, volunteering, appointments, and so on and so on and so on.

I have been fully booked with work for a long time. I keep thinking it’s a temporary thing that I have to muddle through and then it will calm down, but I’ve been muddling for several years. Right now I’ve got three large editing projects going on in addition to some smaller ones—not to mention writing projects of my own, which are constantly placed on the back burner (isn't it funny how we say "not to mention" as a way of mentioning something?). Because I’m always worried about letting people down, I try to work on everything at once. Instead of making me efficient, this actually slows me down and makes me worry more. So I try harder to get everything done at once and the cycle continues.

During my ridiculous number of years at university, I constantly felt that when I was not working I should be working. And when I was working on Project A, I should be working on Project B. The work was always right there and there were few boundaries between school and the rest of my life. Self-employment can be like that too. Because I don’t have a regular work day and my work time is often interrupted, I feel like I’m never getting enough done. Between my years in school and my years as a freelancer, I have been living this way—never fully focused on what I’m doing and always worried about what I’m not—for over 20 years (I feel so old every time I say something like that).

You know what? It’s not a healthy way to live. So I’ve decided that right now the majority of my energy has to go toward work. I need to get these three big projects done—for the clients’ sake, of course, but also for the good of my own soul. Once I do, I can build the boundaries I need. I’m cycling through the projects, working on just one each day and trying my best to ignore the others until it’s their turn. I’m making significant progress and, to my surprise, I’m finding new enthusiasm for my work. I can also see that in the near future I’ll have more time for the things I love to do and because these projects won’t be weighing me down, I’ll be able to enjoy them more.

But as the saying goes, all work and no play makes this a dull blog (well, it doesn’t go quite like that). I haven’t started my sweaters yet—not even the swatches. My sewing machine is covered by a pile of almost-done baby blankets. I haven’t had much time to wander around the Internet and look for weekly inspiration. I hope the two of you who read this will bear with me. If the coming weeks are as productive (workwise) as this one has been, I’ll soon be crafting more than I have in years.

Wordless Wednesday #16--Bloom

2008-06-04T08:08:00.001-07:00

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's see wordlesswednesday.com.

The mosaic game

2008-05-31T22:58:00.000-07:00

I've seen this game on at least two blogs this week, and since I've spent most of this sunny Saturday doing the dreaded grocery shopping and working (oh, what a life I lead), I decided to take a break and try it out.

You enter your answers to a bunch of questions into Flickr's search engine and then make a mosaic out of them. You can find the questions and instructions here.

Now, given the answer to "one word to describe you," I'm going to bed.

Hectic, hectic! And weekly inspiration

2008-05-30T22:35:00.001-07:00

It's been an absolutely hectic week, full of happy things, sad things, busy things, and deadlines not met. Unfortunately there wasn't time to knit a single stitch, plant a single flower, or spend even a moment crafting.

But I did manage to wander around the Internet craft world a little bit. Here are some interesting things I found:

Tess has written a comprehensive tutorial on seam finishes for Sew, Mama, Sew’s Women’s Clothing Month. Whether you’re new to sewing or a veteran, you’re likely to learn something new. I gained a new respect for my 25-year-old sewing machine and no longer feel that my life is incomplete without a serger.

Canadian Living, one of the major women's magazines here, has an easy-to-sew cat tunnel on its website. With three cats who are currently imprisoned inside for a variety of reasons (not least of which is coyotes), I'm going to make one of these.

Margerie commented once on finding a good, long-lasting way to mark garden rows. Family Fun magazine's site has instructions for painted garden stones.

Two projects from Craft Stylish are going on my to-make-sometime list: little embroidered pincushions made from pop bottle caps and felt scraps and an incredibly easy note card (because goodness knows I need more note cards).

(Almost) Wordless Wednesday #15--For Karen

2008-05-28T10:08:00.001-07:00

One of my far-away friends is going through some scary medical stuff with her mom tomorrow. I told her that I would keep my fingers and toes and eyes crossed for her that everything would turn out well. Because she's never seen a proper picture of me, she's having to imagine the colored-light silhouette in my profile picture with crossed eyes.

I took this photo of my daughter two years ago. We look a lot alike so, Karen, if you imagine this picture going through one of those age-progression processes to age it by about 35 years, you'll have a good idea of what I would look like with my eyes crossed. Unfortunately I can't actually do it this well--she inherited her amazing eye-crossing talent from my brother.

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's see wordlesswednesday.com.

Projects for me! And weekly inspiration

2008-05-23T09:25:00.000-07:00

These days (meaning in the last 13 years, since I was pregnant for the first time), I rarely make anything for myself. The last made-by-me sweater that I owned was a cute, short crocheted tank top, back in the days when I was still young and skinny.

But recently I stopped in at my favorite yarn store. I really wasn’t planning on going there and I certainly wasn’t planning on buying anything at all, much less anything for myself. I’d had a hard day and I wanted to go for a walk to clear my head; I just happened to choose a favorite walking spot that’s in the same neighborhood as this store.

I wasn’t looking for a retail therapy session, and besides, my form of retail therapy is usually very modest: a notebook or a magazine. I just planned to wander around in this store, looking at and touching the yarn. It was meant to be more of a quiet escape than a shopping trip.

But I ended up buying patterns and yarn for not one, but two summer sweaters for myself, one knitted and the other crocheted. Yikes! Neither is an in-front-of-the-TV project (as this is what tends to happen when I knit while I’m distracted), so I have to find some free time to devote to them.

The yarn and patterns have been sitting in their bag in my sewing room for a few weeks now and summer is fast approaching (although with our weather luck lately, we may still be wearing rainboots in August). I’m telling you about them in order to make myself find the time to work on them, instead of having them get buried in the to-do-someday pile. Keep me accountable, please. Just ask me how those sweaters are going once in a while.

***************

In other news, here are some fun ideas I found in my Internet travels this week:

Kathryn Ivy has a tutorial on dyeing yarn with Easter egg dyes.

Unplug Your Kids shows how to make beads out of straws and paper. You could use any kind of paper with this project—a couple of years ago Child Two and I used wrapping paper to make Christmas garlands.

Meg at Elsie Marley gives instructions on how to make fabric covers for tin cans. Hers are embroidered and she kindly shares her patterns.

Are your sewing tools little boring? According to Better Homes and Gardens, you can paint your shears!

At Big Huge Labs, see how to print eight photos on one piece of paper and then, using their folding instructions, turn it into a pocket-sized photo-album. I’m going to send some of these to far-away friends and family.

Buttons-n-Dollars

2008-05-22T14:02:00.000-07:00

My good friend Hayley, breast cancer survivor extraordinaire, recently met a woman named Heidi Marble, an eight-year survivor of inflammatory breast cancer. Heidi has established a registered charity called Buttons-n-Dollars to raise money to help under- and uninsured breast cancer patients with their treatment. Using donated buttons and costume jewellery, she turns broken mannequins into works of art, which she then sells or leases.

If you have costume jewellery or buttons that you're not using, please consider sending them to Heidi to help her continue her great work. You know all those mismatched earrings in the back of your jewellery box? And how about your overflowing button box? Declutter your drawers (or for those of us with a teeny tiny craft supply addiction, make room for more) and help Heidi at the same time!

To learn more about Heidi, her book Waiting for Wings, and her art and to find out how you can help, visit her Undone website. Her shipping address is

Heidi Marble
Buttons-N-Dollars
25017 NE 188th Court
Battle Ground, WA 98604

Wordless Wednesday #14--Shadow boys

2008-05-21T09:19:00.000-07:00

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's see wordlesswednesday.com.

Wordless Wednesday #13--Dogwood

2008-05-13T22:21:00.000-07:00

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's see wordlesswednesday.com.

Oma's spoons

2008-05-08T13:57:00.000-07:00

You might think, from my lack of posts, that I haven’t been working on much over the last few weeks. I have, but unfortunately I’ve been working more on work than on any crafts. I’ve done a bit of knitting, even more ripping out (oh, how I hate backwards progress), and some sewing, but no actual finishing for a while.

I’m posting today because the Apron Queen tagged me a couple of weeks ago and one of the options was to do a Vintage Thingies Thursday post. It’s taken me a while to get to it because the vintage thingy I had planned to write about requires ironing and—alas, it’s the story of my life—I could not find time to iron and take pictures and write.

But yesterday my mom gave me some of my grandmother’s old spoons—no ironing required! These ones are my favorites:

They’re about 4 inches long and each handle has the name of spoon’s flower written in what I assume is Dutch.

Here are the flowers:

There are also several assorted spoons and forks. The longest is about 6 inches.

One is a baby fork—I know this because it has the intended recipient's initials and birthdate engraved on the back.*

I’m guessing that the other fork might have been for something like pickles and that the spoons were for coffee or tea. There weren’t that many babies in the family. The three matching spoons (and two others not pictured here because they have a mysterious red substance stuck to them and need cleaning up) are stamped on the back with the year (1947), the manufacturer (Rogers Bros.) and the pattern name (Flair).

I’m not sure what I’ll do with them all. Maybe I’ll start having tea parties!

*If you are reading this, intended recipient, I will give it to you the next time I see you. I was going to send it to you along with your favorite meatloaf recipe and a message saying "Put a fork in it!" but I didn't want to trust it to the mail.

Wordless Wednesday #12--Love on the beach

2008-05-07T09:00:00.000-07:00

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's see wordlesswednesday.com.

Wordless Wednesday #11--War memorial

2008-04-30T08:30:00.001-07:00

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's see wordlesswednesday.com.

Wordless Wednesday #10

2008-04-23T08:00:00.000-07:00

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's see wordlesswednesday.com.

Four flower cards

2008-04-22T21:17:00.001-07:00

I’m lucky to have a few very good magazine shops nearby (if you consider constant temptation to go broke lucky) and lately, as part of my Year of Living Differently, I’ve been making a point of looking for ones that I haven’t read before. Good for my creative spirit; bad for my budget and clutter-control efforts.

The idea for these cards came from a British craft magazine, Woman’s Weekly Craft Special (oh, how I love British craft magazines!). I made them using card stock, scrapbooking paper, and buttons I had on hand. One will be going in the mail tomorrow to one of my very favorite people, who has been quite sick. As usual, I had some help with the photo-taking process.

Wordless Wednesday #9

2008-04-16T07:17:00.000-07:00

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's see wordlesswednesday.com.

My baby is a star

2008-04-14T15:46:00.000-07:00

Last month I wrote about Child Two's first finished embroidery project (note that I say "first finished project. It's not her first started project. She takes after ~~her dad~~ both her parents in having numerous projects on the go at once). Kristin Nicholas, the author of Kids' Embroidery, the book the pattern came from, saw my post and asked if she could use a picture of Child Two's kitty on her blog. Well, not only did she use the picture, she wrote a very touching post about writing craft books and passing on skills and knowledge.

We found Kristin's book at the library. Looking through it at home, Child Two found several projects she'd like to make, I found several I'd like to do (even though I'm not officially a kid), and we found more that we'd like to do together, so we ordered our own copy. If you or a kid you know are interested in embroidery, this book is full of projects that are appealing, quick, and completely achievable for beginners.

It wasn't until after Kristin contacted me and I looked at her website that I realized I own two of her other books, Colorful Stichery and Kids Knitting. Isn't the Internet wonderful? I wrote a little piece just because I was proud of my daughter and I ended up hearing from someone so talented and inspiring!

I'm very happy to be able to share my interest in crafts with my kids. When I was learning to embroider at Child Two's age, all I had to choose from were stamped dishtowels and bibs bought at the variety store and Sunset kits. Now, thanks to writers like Kristin, kids can easily find projects that are achievable, fun, and designed for them.

Kristin, I'm glad that writing these books fits into your life as a mom, because it's made my life as a mom that much more enjoyable.

Wordless Wednesday #8

2008-04-09T08:27:00.000-07:00

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's see wordlesswednesday.com.

The grandmother of all rummage sales

2008-04-07T16:22:00.001-07:00

On Saturday, Child Two and I went to the annual rummage sale held by the seniors’ center. It’s so big that it can’t be held at the seniors’ center itself, so they have it at a nearby hockey rink. It’s so busy it’s crazy. We got there about 10 or 15 minutes before it opened and found the end of the line about two blocks away. By the time we started moving, there were as many people behind us as there were in front of us. As we stood at the top of the ramp into the arena, we couldn’t even see the tables. It was just a sea of heads.

We go to this sale every year and we’ve learned a few things:

Don’t bring a purse. It’s just something for people to bump into. Bring only what you can carry in your pocket.

No matter how far away you have to park and no matter how bad the weather, don’t wear a big coat or bring an umbrella.

Have a set meeting spot in case we get separated by those crazed bargain hunters.
If you’re interested in something, pick it up while you’re thinking about it or it might disappear right from under your nose.

People tend to lose all sense of perspective and etiquette in these situations. Expect to be stepped on, bumped into, walked in front of, and pushed out of the way.

Last year we didn’t buy much, but this year we had to take a trip to the car to unload halfway through. We were looking for tapestry yarn, but the two ragged bags they had were priced at $5 and $10, and since we couldn’t really see what was in them—they looked like tangled messes from the outside—we passed.

We did find some treasures, though: lots of old sewing and knitting patterns, a few books and fancy needlework magazines, a paper-making set, hand-appliqued linens, nice glass bottles and jars, some knickknacks for the garden, a ribbon embroidery kit, a big bag of seed beads, some wool sweaters for felting, and a couple of grab bags of notions and trims. Using an idea from Cloth, Paper, Scissors Studio, I wrapped the partially used trims around old-fashioned clothespins which were left over when I put together doll-making kits for Child Two and her friends years ago. They crack me up—they look like little lace- and rickrack-wrapped mummies:
I also found a hardanger needlebook for a nickel (a nickel!).
This was serendipity, as I’ve been wanting to make some needlebooks lately.

And there were these odd boxes, containing samples of thick yarn and little fabric swatches. The only thing we can think they might be is some kind of sales display. I have no idea what I’ll do with them, but they were too odd to leave behind.

As we passed the table of small appliances, we saw this case:
We opened it up
and found this:
An old manual typewriter. A blue old manual typewriter! A blue old manual typewriter for $2! We were so thrilled about it that I didn’t even mind schlepping it four blocks to the car, two of them uphill.

My mom worked at the sale, and after Child Two and I went home for lunch, I decided to go back in case she was tired and/or frazzled and needed a ride home. My good deed was rewarded. Getting there five minutes before they closed, I went for a last look at the craft tables and discovered some last-minute deals. The ladies sold me a bag for $1 and told me to stuff it with as much fabric as I could. They were so excited to be almost done that they helped me, and I wasn’t sure just what fabric was in there until I got home.

And remember the bags of tapestry yarn? Well, they gave them both to me for $5. When I got home I found a rainbow in those bags—some of it cut into working lengths, many partially used skeins, several untouched skeins, and all of it wool. As I sorted it out, it was clear that both bags had belonged to the same person, and I wondered about her. Maybe she was a woman like my oma or my great-aunt. Maybe, like Oma, she got Alzheimer’s and could no longer do her crafts. Or maybe, like Tante Bep, she passed away, leaving behind this treasure in wool. In any case, it’s gone to a good home.

Old sewing magazines

2008-04-03T13:02:00.000-07:00

I’m writing this post as part of the Apron Queen’s Vintage Thingies Thursdays. You can check out her blog for links to other posts about vintage thingies.

The Apron Queen posted some very cute vintage kitchen towels today. My kitchen towels might be old, but they’re definitely not vintage or in any condition for the world to see. So instead I’m going to share some sewing magazines that I recently found in my mom’s house, which used to be her parents’ house.

My grandmother (or oma, because she was Dutch) kept her yarn stash in a funny little seat attached to a built-in bookcase. The back and seat cushions can be lifted off, revealing a storage area underneath. I found these patterns intermingled with some old knitting books under the seat. They’re all in Dutch, so my oma must have brought them back from a trip home to the Netherlands, or maybe one of her sisters sent them over.

This was apparently a monthly magazine, and these issues are from March to June 1959. I especially like these two covers:

The magazines each contain dozens of patterns for women,

for men,

and for children.

What’s most amazing is that all the patterns in each issue are presented on two sides of a single large piece of paper. To use them, you had to trace all the pieces for the particular garment you were making. Can you imagine? It looks like a nightmare road map.

My great-grandfather was a tailor and my great-grandmother had a shop in which she sold handmade clothing (I think mainly children’s clothes). Eight of her ten children were girls and I know that at least two of them, my grandmother and my great-aunt Bep (who both came to Canada), were master craftswomen. I’m sure that at least some of their sisters (who stayed in the Netherlands) had similar talents. My grandmother, at least in the time I knew her, was mainly a knitter and crocheter, so finding these patterns was a big surprise for me. Her sister was a professional dressmaker and could do just about anything involving yarn or fabric. They both had a big influence on me and I plan to write more about them in future posts.

For now, though, here’s one more picture. This lady is obviously very pleased with her new suit:

Wordless Wednesday #7

2008-04-02T07:45:00.001-07:00

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's see wordlesswednesday.com.

Love those buttons

2008-03-31T15:54:00.000-07:00

I saw on Abbie’s blog that Analise at Sugar*Sugar hosted a button challenge, asking bloggers to post photos of their buttons. I love my button collection, but after looking at some of the ones posted, my little guys look rather ordinary in comparison.

Nevertheless, and despite missing the challenge, this afternoon I spent time that should have been spent working taking pictures of buttons. (This is not the first time I've done this, as shown by two of these bookmarks.) The sun was actually out today (I’m still in shock) so I was determined to do it outside, even though it was very windy and I ended up with shadows of my blowing hair in half the pictures. Some of my buttons blew right off the table and rolled off the deck. I’m sure my neighbors were wondering what the heck I was doing later, peering around the carport looking for lost buttons.

So here they are, or at least here are the photos that don’t have hair shadows in them. Some of these buttons have lived in my button box for years.
Some were recently bought on a whim, with no particular project in mind.
After all the gloomy weather, I was happy to sort out the red ones
and the blue ones.
My collection includes buttons big and small,
buttons colorful and plain,
and buttons of many shapes.

I don’t know much about their vintageness. Some were inherited from my great aunt and my grandmother and some were bought at thrift stores. Many are left over from completed projects and others were bought for projects that never quite got completed. Some were found on the street and others came as spares with shirts and sweaters or were cut off worn out clothing. Most of them are either fairly plain in style or were meant for kids’ clothes.

Compared to some, my collection of buttons is more utilitarian than fancy, but I like it anyway. It reminds me of past projects, of things I’ve made for my children, and of people I care about.

Wordless Wednesday #6

2008-03-26T08:25:00.000-07:00

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's see the blog roll at wordlesswednesday.com.

Weekend failure and success

2008-03-25T22:14:00.000-07:00

This weekend saw a failure and a success at our house.

First, the failure. I really, really wanted to make some fabric Easter eggs like the ones I saw on Abbie's blog. So on Saturday, after much fighting with my computer and printer to print the pattern at the right scale and, having gotten it close but not quite right, finally resorting to a pencil and a ruler, I opened my big box of fabric scraps, a box that hasn’t been opened in far too long. I chose two fabrics, cut out the pieces, and sewed them together. As I started to stuff this egg wannabe, it was pretty clear that it wasn’t very eggy. But I kept at it, hoping that if I stuffed it full like the directions said, it would take on an ovate shape. Alas, I ended up with an Easter ball.

I was pretty sure that the lack of egginess was due to my lack of sewing precision, so on Easter Sunday I tried again. The result, while more egg-like than the Easter ball, could in all honesty be described only as an Easter blob.

I gave both the Easter ball and the Easter blob to the cats, telling them that the Easter bunny had brought them some new toys. They, having been up all night playing with the Easter eggs that had been carefully hidden all over the living room, knew I was lying.

This effort, while it failed to produce the beautiful fabric eggs I was hoping for, was not a real failure. I rediscovered my scraps, reminisced about the projects they came from, and got inspired to open that box more often. I will keep trying with those eggs. If I start tomorrow, I’ve got 362 days to get them right.

The success was much more exciting. Child Two finished her first embroidery project.
It’s from a great book called Kids’ Embroidery by Kristin Nicholas. We found it at the library but it’s so full of fun projects that we’ve ordered it.

Kitty (as she’s called) is made from felt scraps left over from a Winnie the Pooh costume I made for Child Two long, long ago (at least I think it was for her and not for her brother, but finding out for sure would involve delving into the Photo Cupboard of Doom). We didn’t have any suitable colors of tapestry wool in the stash and BigName Craft Store doesn’t carry it (this is part of the reason we are on a quest for alternative supply sources), so we ended up getting Patons Astra for the yarn. It was a little too thick and it meant that I had to do all the needle threading, but it turned out fine.

Child Two is very happy with Kitty, especially because she did all the stitching herself. The book shows one model made from an old wool coat. We’re going to keep an eye out for fun and funky fabrics to make some friends for Kitty.

I also finished the purple scarf I started at the art gallery last month, but I couldn’t get a good picture of it. How I long for bright days, when my camera doesn’t ask for the flash for any close range photo! I’ll try again as soon as the sun comes out.

Rainy day beading

2008-03-21T10:52:00.000-07:00

The night before last, Child Two had a friend sleep over. Sleep over? Ha! Very little sleeping was done. They had planned to make bracelets, but they got sidetracked building a sheet-and-chair fort, which they played in for hours and then “slept” in. Two of the cats didn’t quite understand that a sheet, while technically a solid object, is not strong enough to stand on when it’s supported only by several dining room chairs. Dottie tried it first, before bedtime. In the middle of the night, what little sleep the girls did get was interrupted by Jamie crashing down on them: “And down will come kitty, sheet, chairs, and all.”

After her friend left in the morning, Child Two decided to keep the fort up (it’s still there now) and in the afternoon she and I sat inside and made memory wire bracelets together.
These are very easy to make. All it takes is some memory wire (so-called because it retains its coil shape), a pair of wire cutters and a pair of pliers (round-nose ones work well), and beads. Our local BigName Craft Store carries two sizes of memory wire, one just right for kids and one just right for adults. Cut the wire to whatever length you want (if someone has been pretending the wire is a Slinky—Child One, was that you?—you may have to untangle it first), curl one end with the pliers, and start beading. When you’re done, curl the other end. That’s it.

It was rainy yesterday and the day before that, so Child Two and I decided we needed some bright spring colors. What could be better than sitting in a homemade fort on a gloomy day with great company, 70s tunes cranked up on the stereo, playing with beads?

By the way, we're still in search of brownie recipes and online craft stores. Leave a comment if you've got something to recommend!

Wordless Wednesday #5

2008-03-18T23:53:00.001-07:00

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's see the blog roll at wordlesswednesday.com.

In search of . . .

2008-03-18T23:27:00.001-07:00

Child Two and I are on a quest for two things: (1) the perfect chocolate brownie recipe and (2) craft stores other than Michael’s.

I love baking—except for cakes, but that’s a trauma too hard to discuss. When I was in grad school, I was known for my baking (in our department, we took our potlucks seriously). In fact, a friend once received a marriage proposal from a complete stranger at a picnic based on the cookies she’d made from a recipe I gave her.

Despite this, though, I’ve never found a brownie recipe I really like. As we made another batch of just-okay brownies this weekend, Child Two and I decided to launch a search for the perfect chocolate brownie recipe. If you know any good ones, please share!

Now, as for Michael’s—I probably spend as much money there as the next crafter, but that’s mainly because it’s almost the only choice I have for most things. I miss the days when there were options, when the department stores had fabric departments and I could look for what I wanted in any one of several stores in my own town. Big stores like Michael’s certainly serve a purpose, but when what you want isn’t the same as what their buyers think will sell or is out of stock, you have a problem. I ran into that when buying the beads for this bracelet, which Child Two and I made together on the weekend—stock was low and the color choices were slim.

(The fact that the model is a little glass vase is due to the fact that Child Two and I are both suffering from Ugly Winter Hands Syndrome.)

Instead of whining about it (although I must admit I do a bit of that too), we’ve decided to seek out all the craft and art supply stores we can find in the Greater Vancouver area and make ourselves a little directory. Since Child One and Child Two are on spring break, we started today at Granville Island, a former industrial area that is now a tourist’s and artist’s haven. Besides exploring some of the shops, we went to the kids’ market (so LOUD) and to the public market, where we admired food and flowers:

We also went on an aquabus for short harbor tour.

We didn’t buy much today, just some tiny mandarins,

four handmade buttons from Nepal (I bought one for each of us and Child Two bought the heart one for me),

a catnip wool ball,

and some ice cream that didn’t make it home for pictures.

We’re also looking for good online craft supply stores of all kinds. Leave a comment if you have one to recommend!

Book review: Knitting for Peace

2008-03-13T07:26:00.001-07:00

I didn’t realize how much time had gone by until I posted the latest Wordless Wednesday photo right above the previous Wordless Wednesday photo. I have been doing a bit of crafting in the last week—some knitting and some sewing—but I’ve also had some nasty work deadlines. It is so sad when work gets in the way of the really important things.

But yesterday I had a little bit of unexpected extra time, and instead of using it to get a leg up on those deadlines, I started writing this instead. Priorities, right?

I recently made two hats (an adult size and a child’s size) from Knitting for Peace by Betty Christiansen. And I also read the book from cover to cover. I don’t usually read knitting books. I collect them, arrange them on my shelf, flip through them, admire the pictures, skim through the instructions, make grandiose plans to knit several stunning or useful items, but I don’t really read them. This book, however, is for reading as much as it is a source of patterns.

Christiansen wanted to bring together the stories behind organizations that use knitting to help others “in amazing ways.” And she certainly has found a wide variety of them. As someone who has been crafting for charity for decades now (am I really old enough to say that?), I knew about a lot of them, but there were many more I had never heard of. No matter what your interests, beliefs, or point of view; no matter what your skill level; and no matter whether you prefer to knit, donate supplies, or buy yarn or handmade items, there’s probably an organization here that will appeal to you.

What really got me when I read this book were the stories behind the groups—who started them and why they did it. Usually it was one or two everyday people who had a good idea or had seen firsthand people who need help or had turned their own experience with tragedy into something that helps others. Then, through the generosity of others like them, their efforts grew. And they grew—often into international projects involving thousands of people.

Last week I was listening to an interview with Stephanie Pearl-McPhee (the Yarn Harlot) on a podcast from the Lion Brand site. The Yarn Harlot website has raised almost half a million dollars for Doctors without Borders. In this interview, Pearl-McPhee was asked if she thought knitters were naturally more generous than other people. Her theory was that knitters have a better understanding than most of how each little effort contributes to the whole. Any knitted project is made up of hundreds or thousands of little efforts. So for knitters (and other crafters, I’m sure), the making of one hat to cover one head does not seem as insignificant as it might, because we know that when you add up each of those hats, you’ve covered a whole lot of heads.

The book contains 15 patterns designed especially for charity knitting. I’ve knit only one so far, but they’re meant to be fairly easy and quick, and many of them are suitable for personal knitting as well. It also includes the websites of several groups that sell yarn, supplies, or items knit by women trying to improve their lives.

In the first section of the book, Christiansen gives a brief history of wartime knitting in the United States and shares the remembrances of Red Cross knitters (check out the vintage patterns on the Red Cross website!). One strong message that comes through from this section, and from the whole book, is how charity knitting benefits everyone involved—the knitter, the organizer, and the recipient.

Wordless Wednesday #4

2008-03-12T08:05:00.000-07:00

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's see the blog roll at wordlesswednesday.com.

Wordless Wednesday #3

2008-03-05T12:27:00.000-08:00

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's see the blog roll at wordlesswednesday.com.

Bulletin board makeover

2008-03-03T12:21:00.000-08:00

The favorite food of the former owner of this house must have been mushroom soup, because she painted every room either a light or dark shade of browny-gray mushroom-soupiness (except for Child Two’s room, which was bright red, and the kitchen, which is a dark gray). Now I know that mushroom soup is a trendy color, but when you live in one of the rainiest parts of one of the rainiest areas in the country and there is a forest in your backyard and when your whole house is this color, it gets somewhat overwhelming (not so overwhelming, though, to make me get around to painting more than a couple of rooms).

When I chose the color for my office, the coldest one in the house, I wanted something that at least looks warm. And I got it. Instead of the Tuscany gold promised by the paint chip, my walls turned out to be California poppy orange. It was a shock at first, but I loved it because (a) it’s bright, even on the dullest day and (b) I’m from California. Abandoning the calm Tuscan-inspired décor I’d envisioned, I’ve gone back to my roots and am slowly but surely putting together a fun, bright environment in which I spend the bulk of my day ~~reading other people’s blogs~~ working.

Last year I painted an ugly old metal filing cabinet bright red. This was my first attempt at spray painting (not a success) and then at brush painting metal and involved lots of whining to Hayley and hard lessons about paint and humidity (see “one of the rainiest parts of one of the rainiest areas in the country” above). Thank goodness Hayley is a goddess of painting and could help me even from 1200 miles away. I love this cabinet now and I’m covering one side of it with tacky, touristy magnets like you’d find in a beach-town souvenir shop.

Needing another bulletin board (because you can never have too many), this one to help me in my never-ending struggle to not overschedule my work, I started with an old one I happened to have lying around in our storage room. I sanded and painted the frame with some red acrylic craft paint I happened to have lying around.

I pondered for a while about what to use to cover the faded and cracked (and now paint-splattered, because I am not a neat painter) cork. I finally decided on some used California road maps I happened to have lying around. They weren’t the right dimensions, so I cut them into pieces and did a collage kind of thing. I printed up my current and upcoming schedule as well as lists of things to do for two long-term projects I’m working on; the yellow paper I happened to have lying around, left over from printing handouts for a children’s writing workshop I taught in a few years ago. I have lots of room for other schedule-helping notices (like a big sign that says “Just say no!”).
The whole project, then, was completed with things I happened to have lying around (the sheer variety and volume of which is scary), except for the hangers on the back. We probably have some of those lying around too, but finding specific tools or pieces of hardware is a major and sometimes dangerous undertaking here (I will say no more on that topic) so it was easier to buy some.

I’ve got other ideas for covering the cork when the maps get too full of holes: magazine pages, pictures from old calendars, scrapbooking paper (of which I have a big boxful, although I don’t do any scrapbooking), blown up photos. I may do a board for over my sewing table using old patterns. For my kids, both musicians, I could use sheet music. And yes, I do happen to have all of the stuff, including at least a few more old bulletin boards, lying around.

Cross-stitch cards

2008-02-28T10:02:00.000-08:00

I made these cards as part of a birthday floss exchange for an online needlework group I’m in. Now that they’re safely in the hands of the recipients, I can post the picture.

This exchange stressed me out. The first two birthdays fell soon after it was set up and because we don’t have any specialty needlework stores nearby anymore—only BigName Craft Store, where the selection is very limited—I ordered some nice thread online. The store warned me that some of it was backordered, so I expected it to take a little while, but the order didn’t come and didn’t come. It turned out that they had lost it altogether, and as a result, I ended up sending the birthday packages very late. (The store, by the way, did send the order quickly once they figured out the problem and didn’t charge me the usual shipping fee.)

The recipients weren’t bothered by this at all, but I was. If the tables were turned, I wouldn’t have minded a bit. I love late birthday presents! But because I was the one who was late, I felt guilty (and I’ve participated in enough online groups to know how people who don’t follow through are viewed. I wanted to shout, “I’m not a flake! Really!”).

The next birthday in the group is mine. It’s not for months and I don’t have to worry about ordering something for myself (although I guess I could, couldn’t I?). Still, I’m going to get everything ready for the rest of the recipients before then so I don’t have to worry about it. And so nobody thinks I’m a flake.

Wordless Wednesday #2

2008-02-27T07:50:00.000-08:00

For another one of my Wordless Wednesday photos, see my other blog. For other people's see the blog roll at wordlesswednesday.com.

Weekend projects

2008-02-25T12:43:00.000-08:00

Somehow, in between soccer practice and games, the dreaded grocery shopping, a trip to IKEA, hanging shelves, housework, taking Dottie to the vet, nagging my children, and coming down with a doozy of a cold, I found time to work on some quick projects this weekend. First, while waiting for my son at a soccer game (he’s a ref, so I can sit in the car and knit instead of pretending to watch while I’m really chatting with the other parents: “Of course I saw your goal, dear. No, my back wasn't turned, really!”), I worked on the purple scarf I cast on at the art gallery.

Then I finally managed to pay attention long enough to do the decreases on the child’s rolled-brim hat correctly. It’s made from Paton’s Classic Merino, with a little cat hair thrown in for extra warmth, and will be donated to afghans for Afghans.

This is the same pattern I used for the adult hat, except for the top-knot. I had never knit an I-cord before and I looked it up in three books before I decided that I had to stop trying to understand the instructions and just trust them. It turned out fine. Oh, and remember my saying that my cats won’t model hats? Apparently I was wrong.

Ever since I saw some fancy stitch markers online, I’ve wanted to make a set of my own. Finally, with some help from a guy named Michael and from the Crazy Daisies, I got around to it.

I made one unique one (the red one) to be used for marking the beginning of a round. They were really fun and easy to make.

I recently got the wonderful news that my current Chemo Angels “buddy” is about to finish her treatment for breast cancer. I made her a little card and purse envelope, which I will send with a congratulations gift. She likes green and daisies. The pattern is from a Klutz’s Handmade Cards set and I found a little flower button in my jar of odd buttons to use on the envelope.

One of my goals for my Year of Living Differently is to make crafting part of my everyday life again. I’m rarely able to sit down for an hour or two at a time, but I’m rediscovering how much I can do when I take advantage of the little bits of time I do have.

Bookmarks. And more bookmarks.

2008-02-21T15:41:00.000-08:00

I’ve been looking for ways to use my photos in craft projects. Last summer I bought a bookmark made from a photo but, because I bought some craft stuff at the same time, I lost sight of it for a while (if six months qualifies as a while). When I got home, I promptly put the bag in my sewing room, with the best of intentions to get to it very soon, where it was soon lost in a pile of other bags containing similar intentions. In a recent reorganization of the room I emptied every darn bag and rediscovered this bookmark.

Inspired, I went through some of photos and had several printed up that I thought might work as bookmarks. I then cut them and had them laminated and these are the results: bookmarks with scenery,

with flowers (real and painted),

even with beans and ferns and buttons.

Some have ribbons—the choice of whether or not to use a ribbon was determined primarily by what colors of ribbon I happened to have.

I wasn’t sure how to laminate them. I went to BigName Craft Store, clutching my 40%-off-one-item coupon, to see what my options were. I was sorely tempted by the Xyron machines, which can laminate or make stickers or magnets out of just about anything you want, but even with the coupon, buying the machine and the laminating material would be a significant investment, more than a few bookmarks warranted. And I’d like to see the finished product before shelling out that kind of money.

So I bought a roll of self-adhesive laminate, but I wasn’t at all happy with the results. Then I tried clear Con-Tact paper left over from some art project I did with my kids when they were little. It was better (and cheaper) than the laminate, but not at all what I wanted. Besides, using these products in a household with three cats was a pain. Remember doing experiments with magnets and iron shavings in school—how the shavings would fly toward the magnet and glom onto it? It was like that. As soon as I peeled the covering off the adhesive, it was somehow completely covered in cat hair.

I took a few of my cut pictures to BigName Office Store, where, after being tempted by their little hot laminators, I repeated my mantra about not buying stuff I don’t need and marched myself over to their copy center to have the pictures laminated. They turned out great, so the next day I brought a stack had them all done—cheap. I could make hundreds and hundreds of bookmarks for the cost of a laminator. And I have lots of pictures that I could use, so I may do just that.

Of course, this begs the question of what the heck I’m going to do with all these bookmarks.

Wordless Wednesday #1

2008-02-20T09:36:00.000-08:00

[Disclaimer: I will use some words this week to explain what the heck I'm doing.]

I first heard about Wordless Wednesday over on Tricotine's blog, long before I had a blog (or two) of my own. This is the first time I've remembered it on a Wednesday when I'm actually near a computer. Usually it occurs to me on Thursday afternoon as I stand in line at the grocery store.

Assuming I remember on a fairly regular basis (is that a valid assumption? We'll see), I'll be posting a picture I took in the previous week. Here's the first, taken on our outing to the art gallery:

Old dog, new tricks

2008-02-19T18:19:00.000-08:00

Last weekend, Child Two and I went to SuperSunday at the Vancouver Art Gallery. If you live in the Lower Mainland and know children who like doing art, I highly recommend this. It’s a monthly free event for kids (adults pay admission to the gallery), with a wide variety of art activities related to the current exhibits.

We don’t go every month but, depending on our schedule and on whether the exhibits have changed since we were last there, we go as often as we can. The first time, we tried to view the exhibits and get in all the activities that Child Two wanted to do and I sat and waited for her while she worked. Based on that experience, (a) if there’s an exhibit we really want to see, we go on a different day because there is just too much to do on SuperSunday and (b) I started bringing some knitting to do while waiting.

On one of our visits, Child Two taught me some very important lessons about art and, really, about life in general. One of the exhibits included a huge sculpture of an elephant. We waited in line for over half an hour so that Child Two could build an animal sculpture herself. The twist to this activity was that she didn’t choose her own materials; they were decided by her spinning a spinner. She got the following to work with: a paper bag, four cone-shaped paper cups, a smallish block of wood, a piece of cardboard, and two small plastic cylinders of different sizes.

The room was hot, crowded, and very noisy—the kind of atmosphere that makes those who’ve chosen not to have kids very happy with their decision. It was getting late in the day and many of the younger kids there had obviously missed there naps. We found a spot at a table and I watched as Child Two tried various arrangements of her materials. We looked at other people’s projects for ideas and tried some more, but no animal was forthcoming.

I started to feel the way I used to feel when I couldn’t do something I had to do, like climb a rope in PE class or answer a seemingly impossible question on an exam. I got tense and panicky and—I hate to say—felt like I might start crying. “This is impossible. How can anyone build an animal out of this stuff?” I thought, starting to get angry.

I was about to suggest giving up when I realized that Child Two was not at all tense. She was enjoying arranging and rearranging her materials and laughing at the results. She wasn’t worried about making something “good” or “right.” This was just a fun activity at the art gallery, after all, not the bar exam.

I shut my mouth and pulled out my knitting. She rearranged and I knitted and we chatted until she built something that vaguely resembled an animal. Once it was immortalized with hot glue, she decorated it and, lo and behold, it became a recognizable dog.

She taught me more than one lesson that day: patience, perseverance, creating something just for the joy of it, not caring about being perfect or the best. Most importantly, though, I gained a new sense of perspective. Not everything is black or white, right or wrong, good or bad. This wasn’t a test to be aced or a life-or-death situation that had to be negotiated successfully. No, it was just a fun activity to be enjoyed for what it was.

Last Sunday was our first SuperSunday of my Year of Living Differently, and, although I did bring my knitting, I decided to do most of the activities myself (the gallery wholeheartedly encourages the adults to do this). I sketched, I painted, I made a collage out weird things, I blow-painted with ink and a straw (how fun is that?). As I’ve implied in an earlier post, I am challenged by anything more complicated than stick people, but Child Two has taught me that at these events, it’s not about the product—it’s all about the process.

I’m currently finishing a hat, but it’s in the fiddly, double-pointed-needle, decreasing stage and we all know what happens when I attempt that while distracted. So before we left the house I grabbed a ball of yarn and some needles. I usually use circular needles for everything—having been a crocheter first, I find long straight needles get stuck in my elbows and jab me in the armpit—but since I’m living differently, I chose short straight ones; the size was determined not by gauge but by the fact that these are the only short ones I have. I cast on a scarf while Child Two was doing decorating a pot and planting a tree. The pattern was developed on the fly (also a different way of working for me)—we’ll see how it turns out.

Oh, and apparently Little Bit would like to take up knitting, despite her lack of opposable thumbs.

Valentine color therapy

2008-02-11T14:37:00.000-08:00

I’ve been a volunteer with Chemo Angels and Senior Angels for almost five years. This is a great organization for postally obsessed people like me, because it involves sending weekly mail to cancer patients and seniors. I’ve had the same “senior buddy”—a man in his 60s who has emphysema—for all that time, and my current chemo buddy is a woman in her early 20s with breast cancer.

This year, instead of buying Hallmark cards that aren’t quite right, I decided to make Valentines for my buddies. The card on the left, which is for my senior buddy, was done with watercolor crayons on cardstock, and the one on the right, for my chemo buddy, is made with stamps and . . . uh, stamps.

I’ve never considered myself to be very artistic. My family is full of gifted artists, including my brother, but I’m not one of them. I’m pretty good at following patterns, but making things without any direction is challenging for me. Showing them on the internet is pretty challenging, too.

I’ve always said that I can’t draw anything more complex than stick people—which at this point is true—but it recently occurred to me that I don’t actually know if I can draw because I’ve never really tried. Apart from a few weeks of art class in 6th grade, I never took any art lessons. I figured that my brother had inherited all the art genes—as well as the good teeth—while I had inherited the math ones and spent 10 years in orthodontics. But I’ve always thought the art genes (and the good teeth) were a lot cooler.

So the other day when I was in BigName Bookstore, I took a look at the beginning drawing books. Despite titles like Drawing for the Absolute Beginner, they were way too advanced for me. But my daughter, who inherited the art genes from both sides of her family (and—knock on wood—the good teeth), has loved art since she could pick up a pencil—in fact, she used to color with both hands at once when she was really in the zone. She has a whole stack of drawing books, so I’m going to start with those. Maybe after I master kittens and Snoopy, I’ll be ready for Drawing for Dummies.

Once again, crafting for others was therapeutic. After a hectic weekend sprinting here and there, I was tense and a bit cranky last night. But some good old-fashioned glueing and coloring worked wonders on my mood.

As usual, Little Bit and Jamie—who will not allow me to take their picture when it’s my idea—just had to be in on today’s photo shoot. And, as usual, Dottie was busy doing important cat things.

Crafting for charity

2008-02-02T15:41:00.000-08:00

One of the many (well, two or three) readers of this blog left a comment earlier today saying that she had come to my blog from 25 Things for Charity. This is a blog for people who have a goal of making (you guessed it) 25 things to donate in a year. I joined it quite a long time ago, but rarely posted to it because (a) I didn’t really know how to use Blogger, especially how to post photos; (b) I didn’t have a blog of my own that I could link to; and (c) I have a teeny tiny issue with follow-through, which grows into a bigger and bigger issue the busier I get with work and all those other things that interrupt my creative time.

I’ve always loved making things for other people. Friends, family, complete strangers—it doesn’t matter to me. Although I’ve been crafting since I was a kid, I actually own very few things that I’ve made. Whenever I’m working on something for someone else, I think about that person. Even if I’m watching TV or listening to the radio or talking to a friend, an image of the recipient is in my mind, so by the time I’m done, thoughts of that person are part of the finished product. I do this too when I’m making things for strangers, even though I have no idea what they look like or who they are. I imagine a premature baby wearing a hat that’s small enough to fit an orange or a homeless person being a little bit warmer because of a scarf I’ve made. It’s a change of view that helps me keep my own life—both its challenges and its blessings—in perspective.

Volunteering has been an important part of my life since I was very young and at one time, crafting for charity was an almost daily part of that. I still give away most of what I make, but as my life has gotten busier and my crafting time has decreased, I find that one of the things I really miss is that time spent thinking of someone else as I work. My mind races through so much of every day—pick this child up here, drop that child off there, buy cat food before the cats revolt and start eating us, make that appointment that’s been on my to-do list for three months, remember which clients use serial commas and which don’t. I miss—I need—the opportunity to slow it down, to think of a woman in a hospital somewhere who has no clothes to bring her baby home in or a child in a shelter being given a quilt to keep for his very own. For me, doing things for others is not a selfless act. I get much more than I give.

One of the goals of my Year of Living Differently is to spend more of my time doing things that I enjoy and value. This year I plan to make at least 25 things for charity and to post them on the group blog. I now know how to use Blogger (kind of) and I do have a blog to link to (two, actually!), so all I have to do is figure out the follow-through thing and I’m set.

Knitting while distracted

2008-01-29T13:17:00.000-08:00

This, unfortunately, is my latest knitting project:

Yes, I know, it’s just a ball of wool. In fact, as you can probably tell, it’s wool that’s been knit and then unknit. This is what I get for knitting while watching Lost.

Just two nights ago, this was an almost-completed Basic Rolled-Brim Hat in the child’s size (the same pattern I used for this hat). Note the word basic in the name. I like to have an easy knitting project around for doing while I watch TV, and this pattern is easy. Most of it is just plain knitting, round and round and round. The decreases require a little more attention but I use stitch markers after each one, so they’re usually a piece of cake.

This time, though, when I did the first row of decreases, I realized that I was one stitch short. I hadn’t dropped one, so I must have counted wrong when I cast on. That wasn’t too much of a problem—I just fudged it. No one would notice if one of the decrease ridges started a row late, except perhaps for a rather tall person peering down at the wearer’s head.

Then a few rows later, I found that I was two stitches short. Despite my careful (I thought) use of stitch markers, I’d obviously miscounted again. Figuring that the problem had to be in this row, since the previous decrease row had been fine, I took it out and re-knit it, only to find that those two stitches had not miraculously turned up. Since this is a small project, I decided to just rip it out and start again, rather than risk making it even worse with my sudden lack of math skills.

Now, my husband and I started watching Lost only recently, after my cousin raved about it. We’ve started at the beginning of the first season, borrowing the DVDs from the library. The show—at least the episodes we’ve seen—is very intense and obviously I shouldn’t be knitting under its influence. I’d already noticed that my knitting got tighter during the scary parts and now I’ve discovered that I’m apparently incapable of counting to eight while watching it.

As I tell my friend Hayley so often that I’m sure she’d be happy to stuff this ball of wool into my mouth like a plug, there’s always a bright side. This is the first time I’ve used this wool (Patons Classic Merino), and it’s nice to work with—now I get to spend even more hours with it.

Making envelopes

2008-01-25T11:13:00.000-08:00

A year or so ago, I got an envelope full of tea in the mail. I’m always happy to get tea in the mail—tea is one of those things that make life so good—but what really caught my attention was that the sender had made the envelope from a magazine page. A week or so letter I got a letter in an envelope that had started life as a pizza ad. I had to try this.

Since then I’ve made dozens of envelopes from magazine pages and old calendars. It’s very easy to do. I have one template from a card-making kit, but I’ve also carefully opened up store-bought envelopes to get patterns for other sizes. I choose the pattern that best fits the page I’m using, trace around it, and cut. To get crisp folds, I score them first with a paper-scoring-thingy (I have no idea what it’s called. Wait, I’ve just looked it up and it’s called a “scoring tool.” You would think I’d have guessed that). Then I make the folds and rub them with a . . . wait, I’ll find it . . . bone folder (now I sound like I know what I’m talking about). The flat side of a butter knife would probably work just fine. Then I glue the sides with a glue stick. When I’m ready to send it, I glue down the back flap and use either a sticky label or a label made from plain paper for the address.

For some reason that has nothing to do with the word pack-rat, I have a stack of old calendars. I was obviously thinking ahead when I saved them. Now I can make envelopes with themes ranging from nature and wildlife to astronauts, from knitting to beautiful destinations. It’s fun and free, saves a bit of paper, and makes a nice surprise for the receiver.

Blog launch and first finish

2008-01-22T09:51:00.000-08:00

I don’t make New Year’s resolutions anymore but I do make a list of goals. My theme for this year is the Year of Living Differently and an important aspect of that is changing how I spend my time. One of my goals is to make creative endeavors part of my everyday life again. For about 20 years, from the time I learned embroidery from my next-door neighbor’s babysitter when I was 10 until I had kids, making things was part of my everyday life. Even when I was in grad school, busy with classes and papers and research, I spent an hour sewing or quilting every day and I knitted, crocheted, or did needlework while I watched TV. Creating was like therapy to me—it’s how I relaxed, it gave me time to think, and every time I finished a project or learned a new skill, I felt a sense of accomplishment.

Then I had kids and something had to give. I was smack in the middle of a degree and working as a teaching assistant when Child One was born. We were new homeowners and new parents. The time I had spent crafting was now more likely to be spent working in the yard, marking papers, washing diapers, or at the new moms’ group at the recreation center. Not that I stopped making things altogether—I have a box of handmade clothes packed away and pictures of me knitting with Child Two sound asleep on my lap. But no longer could I leave the sewing machine out and the ironing board up, and any thought of stitching on fine fabrics was tempered by the reality of sticky little fingers. As my kids grew, my creative focus switched from yarn, thread, and fabric to fingerpaints, crayons, and washable markers.

My kids have been past the sticking-a-pin-in-my-eye-to-see-what-happens stage for several years now, but I have let other things—work, chauffeuring duties, volunteering, the hundreds of little tasks that pop up each week—take over most of my time. I still knit when I’m watching TV, but poor Child One has been waiting for new curtains for his room for four years now and too often my boxes of craft supplies remain untouched for weeks. When I think about it, I spend more time shopping for craft stuff than doing the crafts.

My work is creative (don’t believe Blogger’s claim that I’m in accounting; I’m an editor), but the ideas are not mine. In this Year of Living Differently, I want to make time for the creative things I love to do and I want to stretch myself by learning new things. As part of that, I’ve started two blogs, one that’s mainly for writing and this one, which I’ve called “Making Do” because I want to shift my focus from thinking (and shopping) to making and doing, and, as much as possible, I want to make do with the rather large (okay, huge) stash of supplies I already have.

So now that this blog is officially launched, I will post my first finish of the year, a roll-brim hat (pattern from Knitting for Peace) knitted from Lion Brand Wool. As I suspected, even though it’s an adult large size it’s too small for my humungous head, so I will donate it to Afghans for Afghans. Since this pattern is pretty easy, I didn’t learn any new knitting techniques, but I did learn that it’s just about impossible to take a picture of a hat on your own head, especially if you don’t want your face to show (since the too-smallness of this hat makes my hair look even goofier than usual). I also learned that while my cats do want to be involved in the photography process, they do not make willing hat models. They will walk through the picture,

sniff the hat before knocking it down, fight over it ("I don't know what it is, but it's mine!"), and sit prettily next to it,

but they will definitely not wear it.