Tragically Ordinary

A Bunch of Stuff to Look At

2011-09-02T11:12:00.000-07:00

Well, my birthday has come and gone again. The day of was pretty frustrating and disappointing (in the way that long, hot, ordinary days are), but the day after was better. My husband gave me AWESOME maxi dress I've been eyeballing for months and made me a tasty lemon cake. Piper gave me the new Anthony Bourdain book (I think she may have had help picking it out).

I have been:

Knitting like a fiend, but have nothing to share at present. I actually still have some stuff that I finished in the spring which I haven't blogged yet. I'll get to it eventually...this summer hasn't left me much time for sitting in front of a computer.

Rocking out to these playlists, which I learned about from this lovely lady.

Using my Groupon for Yarnhouse to buy 3 skeins of this merino yarn (in color 319, a lovely brown/yellow/orange/blue) and 4 skeins of this silk-bamboo yarn (in a silvery grey). I refuse to consider using these for any projects not destined for myself. A lot of the yarn I initially pick up for myself I wind up making into stuff for others, but this time I went into the yarn shop with two things on my mind: a 70's-colored hat and a silky, lovely cowl.

Speaking of the 70's, I am so excited to see all the 70's-inspired designs slated for stores this fall. There's a little story to this: about six months ago, I had a forehead-smacking revelation. You see, for a long time, I thought that, given the right conditions, I would rock a 20's/30's vintage look, drop-waisted dresses and cloche hats and doll-baby makeup. But after I got this book (which I think every woman should own), I noticed myself gravitating to the pages profiling the "California Casual" style. In the book's own words,

"This is a look that is grounded in a time and place that may never have existed outside of our collective imagination: the tawny, golden-edged Malibu of the '70's - possibly embodied by Farrah Fawcett in a white halter dress at sunset, glass of wine in hand."

It's Goldie Hawn, Farrah Fawcett, surfer girls and breezy maxi dresses. Broken-in leather caryall bags, wide-legged jeans, skirts with a handkerchief hem. Gladiator sandals, plain cotton tees, stacked heels.

When I finally stood in my closet with the book in my hands, open to those pages, I thought holy cow, I already own half of this stuff. And what's more, those items were my favorites. And somehow, in the middle of winter, when I was watching Love Story and thinking about Ali MacGraw's fab style, I realized that I am a 70's girl. I may admire a nice vintage frock, I may love the way my little sister can totally rock a 50's circle skirt with petticoat underneath and perfectly-drawn eyebrows, but for me, this will always be the look I aspire to:

Image: Pop-Break.com

I also realized that my love for this style is why I spent months tracking down one of Nancy Botwin's (the character from Weeds) handbags (yes, the Lucky hobo) and why I love everything Karen on Californication wears. This is why I grew my hair out and had it cut in layers and embrace its natural body and tendency to puff up like blowfish when humidity strikes. Why I love regular, lace-up roller skates and why I watch Swingtown (yet another show I loved that was canceled) over and over. And it's nice to know that and to fully embrace it. All the looks I've tried to copy in my life, all the things I've tried to wear that just didn't suit me (giant wide-legged skater/raver jeans whaaaat?), and it turns out that a little part of me knew the truth all along. Every friend I show this book to and point at the "Californa Casual" section and tell them "this is what I'm doing" instantly says "Oh, yeah. That's you all right. That's perfect."

"Mouse Family"

2011-08-10T09:24:00.001-07:00

She keeps wanting to draw a "mouse family" and then hang it on the fridge, just like in one of those "If You Give A Mouse..." books that I thought were so cute when I was a kid but now, a large number of titles later, do not find quite so charming. Of course, I hadn't realized that these books exactly describe life with a little kid until I read them to my child, so there you go.

Swirly Summer Beret

2011-08-08T18:41:00.000-07:00

So, this thing.

I wanted a new summer slouchy beret in cotton, something cute and multi-colored to wear around without roasting in the heat. I found this yarn on clearance and thought I'd struck gold. I am not overly fond of using variegated yarns in lacy patternwork so I went for the simple One-Day Beret, which I had previously used on this hat.

I don't know why this didn't turn out like I wanted. The wool one I made was too big, so I went a bit smaller and it's not too small, but not the fit I had in mind. I used Jeny's Surprisingly Stretchy Bind-Off, and I think it just doesn't work for cotton. Despite using a needle two sizes smaller than I used for the rest of the hat, it's just sort of stretched-out and lumpy and weird.

Piper likes it, though. She keeps asking "Is that my hat...or your hat? Can I wear it?" So maybe I'll just give it to her and make myself something else.

"Look, Mommy, I drew you!"

2011-08-05T16:06:00.000-07:00

Apparently I look like a Ninja Turtle.

Party Favors

2011-08-04T08:10:00.000-07:00

With her early-summer birthday, I usually try to do something summer related as a party favor. Last year we only had 3 kids over, so each kid got a sand pail with chalk, a small shovel, and a bottle of water in it. This year we had a dozen invitees, so I bought a couple 6-packs of scented bubbles (they're supposed to smell like different things, but they all smell like sno-cones to me) and some fancy tissue paper. I traced & cut star shapes out of cardstock and wrote on them with a silver Sharpie. Simple, easy, cool.

The kids really liked them, but I handed them out at the party as were waiting for the food (it was a at a big bounce-house place, so we were having the pizza they supplied with our "party package"). The only thing worse than one kid whining "When are we going to EAT?! Where is the PIZZA? I am TOTALLY STARVING TO DEATH RIGHT NOW!" is ten kids, all at top volume, in order to be heard over the noise of the indoor play-place. I grabbed the basket and started thrusting small packages into sticky hands as fast as I could while I whispered to my husband for the love of God, go find our party hostess and figure out where the hell the food is before they start gnawing on our limbs.

Before the pizza and accompanying "party hostess" made their way back to our bright-blue party room, I realized two things, two terrible and tragic mistakes I had made:

1. If you're making party favors to give to little kids, make sure they can untie the ribbon themselves, otherwise you will have a room full of preschoolers squealing in frustration because they cannot get your super-tight double-knots off the thing they want so much to open; and
2. It is not a good idea to give 10 kids sticky colored liquid unless they are outside and possibly surrounded by fire hoses.

I apologized to the parents, who all gave me a wave and a "Please. This is nothing. Two drops of water-soluble pale-blue bubble solution on that shirt will be totally eclipsed by something much worse any second now." But the kids loved the bubbles, and they all ran around blowing bubbles, smelling each other's bubbles, trading colors, and generally having a very good time with the stuff. Most importantly they stopped whining until the food arrived.

The only major problem was some tears from the birthday girl, because she can read her own name now, so she thought all these were hers. "But those are my presents! My name is on them!"

Class Picnic

2011-08-02T07:00:00.000-07:00

Yeah, this happened two months ago, but the photos were on a 2MB memory card and do you know how long it takes to fill one of those things up? A long time. And it takes even longer for me to get around to uploading the photos.

Her school has an end-of-year picnic for each class, and students' families are invited to pack a lunch and come eat with the kids on the next-to-last day of class.

Sushi for a picnic? This is how we roll. Get it? Ha!

I had packed her the usual in her lunch box that day (cream cheese & jam sandwich, carrots, water, grapes) but as a surprise I stopped at the grocery store on my way to the picnic and got some sushi, a crisp apple (out of season I KNOW!) and some strawberry-flavored sparkling water. She was pretty thrilled, and I was secretly gloating because all the other parents were so amazed that an almost-four-year-old ate sushi with such enthusiasm.

She was pretty pleased, too.

Blue Leaves Hat

2011-08-01T17:51:00.000-07:00

This thing was so easy. She picked the yarn and asked for a hat, and I figured since she would probably wear it twice and then toss it somewhere, it couldn't hurt if it was something I could wear too, right? I originally made 95% of one using this pattern. It did not go well. Too big, too floppy, just not right at all. So I pulled it out and started over. She was quite upset. She had been hovering and bugging me about when it would be done ("Is that my hat or your hat? It's my hat? Is it done yet?") and when she saw me frogging it she wailed "Mommy! Why are you pulling out my hat?! It's MY hat and I want to wear it right now!"

I gently explained that keeping the hat in its present form would make her look like some sort of smurfy pastry chef, or like a blue glob of goo was digesting her head. She was undeterred and continued to whine. I gave up and started knitting the new one with the unused end of my 2nd skein, and let her wear what was left of the first hat until I needed the yarn. She eventually grew tired (and probably hot), and I found it under the dining table.

I picked a totally different pattern the second time around, with a little more attention to yarn weight and texture. This worked very well. It was my first time working off a chart, and I think I didn't screw it up too much. The hat looks okay, at any rate, and she is quite pleased with it. I made the "adult" size, and even though she's 4 and has a smallish head it fits her okay with the brim flipped up. It's a little big, but that means we should get some years out of it and unlike the first version, is not so huge it's falling over her eyes all the time. I can wear it too, which is nice.

This yarn (Cascade Cotton Rich) is quite nice to work with - all the cool comfort of cotton with a little spring in its step. I really loved this pattern - so simple once I got going, and gets lovely results. I think it would be a great pattern for a yarn splurge, like some luxe wool-silk blend for winter. I love finding patterns like this, that look great and don't take up a lot of yarn, because I can spring for 1 or 2 skeins of something awesome and feel like I'm living the high life without spending $160 to make a sweater.

Pattern: Lace-leaf hat by Sophy T. O'Donnell
Yarn: Cascade Cotton Rich
My Ravelry details are here.

P.S. The other hat in the above picture will be blogged soon. I have mixed feelings about it.

I Guess That's One Way to Keep Cool

2011-07-28T08:57:00.000-07:00

Tow your own ice truck around town.

"I made a smiley guy, mom!"

2011-07-18T07:33:00.000-07:00

"I made a baby smiley guy too! He's mean but the baby guy is happy."

My husband has recently expressed a desire for a new tattoo (he has two) and is also encouraging me to get another one. Piper has been drawing these lopsided "guys" all over everything lately and I love them so much I am seriously considering using them for a tattoo design. Is that weird?

Shrinky Dinks!

2011-07-14T08:04:00.000-07:00

She got these for her birthday, and during one recent (looong, boring, HOT) day we busted them out. I didn't even know they still made them, did you? And what better way to cool down on a hot summer day than baking some plastic?

Piper thought the first part - the coloring - was pretty cool, but she got really concerned when I put them in the toaster oven. "Mommy! What are you DOING to the mermaids?!" I think the process sort of disturbed her. At least the first batch, anyway. The second batch, she was fascinated by the curling and shrinking and seemed quite sorry when we did the last one. After they cooled and she discovered she now had multiple small creatures she could stuff into an old cocoa tin and carry around (and shake and make a LOT of noise), she was pretty happy.

They came with little cardboard stands, so we set them up and had a little play, which probably should've been titled "Medusa and Zombie Mermaids Beat the Shit Out of Some Small Sea Creatures."

Cue Darth-Vader-Style "NOOOO!"

2011-07-13T10:41:00.000-07:00

Complete with shaking my raised fist at the ceiling, right there in the freezer section of the grocery store.

Simo Dress

2011-06-28T08:41:00.000-07:00

So here's a project I actually did complete:

Bribe her with a sucker? Why, yes I did.

Pattern: Simo by Cirilia Rose
Yarn: Berroco Weekend (75% Acrylic, 25% Cotton; 205 yds, 100g)
Needles: Uhh...8 maybe? I finished this thing like two months ago, I'm a bit fuzzy...
My Ravelry page for it is here.

This thing is so stinkin' CUTE. And it was pretty easy. I think it only took me 6 or 8 weeks, carrying it around and working on it here and there - at a birthday party, as she ran amok in the children's museum, or while yelling "DO NOT STAND ON TOP OF THE MONKEY BARS OH MY GOD PLEASE GET DOWN BEFORE I HAVE A HEART ATTACK" at the park.

It's not written to be worked in the round, weirdly enough, but I did it that way anyhow, because given the choice between all that purling and turning and then some awkward join-up of yoke and sleeves and THEN two huge seams to sew vs. barreling right through in the round, only one piece to keep track of, a much-less-awkward join up of yoke and sleeves, and only a couple ends to weave in...duh. Of course I took the easy way out. It did, however, take me four freaking days to figure out how to sew up the sleeves. The very last little bit of finishing, and I was so stuck. In the end it was pretty obvious (sew the tube to the armpit), and I smacked myself upside the head for not figuring it out sooner.

There is a scarf included in the pattern, which I made in a violently bright pink color specifically requested by Piper. She wanted the whole dress made in that Barbie-vomit shade, but I persuaded her that a pink scarf would be cooler. Unfortunately, it never seems to be near the dress when I have my camera. Hmm, now that I think about it, I haven't seen it in a couple of weeks, not since she was using it to tie up one of the cats.

This was a nice yarn to work with. It's cotton-acrylic, in that mutlti-strand way, so I had a problem here and there with snaggy loops when the yarn bunched up, but it wasn't too bad. I normally avoid acrylic, but I thought 100% cotton might be too heavy or stretchy, so I gave this a go. I finished this a couple days after Easter, and she's worn it a few times. It got quite a bit of use on our recent visit to Michigan, when I discovered I had packed for 90-degree weather but they had 65-degree weather.

It's really too hot to wear it these days, but that doesn't stop her. She LOVES it, which makes me unspeakably happy.

2 Projects Per Month: 2011 Halfway Tally

2011-06-24T10:28:00.000-07:00

As an alternative to my usual lame New Year's resolutions, I vowed that this year, I would power through my backlog of knitting projects by completing two items per month. I had almost no rules - the projects could be totally new or polishing off a work-in-progress, there was no particular order other than that dictated by holidays, birthdays, or swap requirements. Now that we're halfway through the year, I decided to take stock.

The news is....not good. I am not even close to meeting my goal. Take a look:

January: Grandma's Hat, Yet Another Milo
February:
March:
April: Bunny Nuggets
May: Simo Dress & Scarf, Pink Poncho
June: Do the four things I've started and frogged count?

So, if I totally power-knit for the rest of the year and finish three projects per month...hmm, that idea is so ludicrous I'm just going to stop right there. Most of the projects I have managed to finish this year remain unblogged, because it's gotten difficult to find time to take the photos, upload them, then sit down to write about the finished object.

Part of the problem is that I have been pulling apart as much as I've knit lately, sending myself back to zero on a weekly basis. And despite the magic of Ravelry, I still feel like my to-knit list is super disorganized. I'm having trouble putting a pattern into my queue more than once, so even though I'm making multiple items with the same pattern I can't put all the projects into once computerized list. I think I am also falling into the trap of "too many things on the needles at the same time," splitting my focus and forgetting where I'm at with each project.

In other news, we've had exactly two showings of our house. The only feedback we got, from one showing, was that "the house showed well, but buyer decided she wanted a two-story home." Our realtor had an open house and not a single buyer came. It's sort of depressing.

Even though the neighborhood (and not-from-this-neighbhorhood) kids are out in full force now that school's done, thus making me a nervous wreck and thoroughly miserable most of the time that I'm home, for the moment it's okay if the house doesn't sell. My husband got a new job and will be doing training for the next few months, after which he'll be assigned to a permanent post. The likely locations for that post are on completely opposite ends of the city, and not near Piper's school, so we won't know the best location for us to move to until the fall anyway. Even that could change during the late winter/early spring, when we'll know where she will be going to kindergarten. We are not sending her to the neighborhood school here, and most of the other public schools in this district are not so great either. We will be making the rounds of lottery drawings for charter schools, or possibly finding a way to send her to a low-cost private school on the north end of town. Since the north end is where she goes to school now, and that's where all the parents with school-age kids I know are, I know almost nothing about the schools on the south end of town. If we have to move to that area I'll really be in a pickle.

Grandma's Hat

2011-06-06T09:43:00.000-07:00

Back in January, when I heard my grandma was not doing well with her chemo, I decided to make her a hat. Something soft and fuzzy and WARM.

I was still working on the Torture Tomten (which remains unfinished and is so horribly screwed up that I think it will have to be frogged) so I had all this fuzzy pink acrylic stuff sitting around.

I used the Felicity pattern (also seen here), some slightly bigger needles to accomodate the bulky yarn, and after a few days I had a fuzzy pink hat.


Hello, welcome to my dimly-lit bathroom.

Fuzzy and pink is not normally my thing, but it turned out pretty cute.

I sent it to her with a nice little letter and some of Piper's artwork from school.

My grandma passed away about five weeks after I sent this, but as far as I know she did get it. I hope it brought her at least a little comfort.

4!

2011-06-03T10:34:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was her birthday, my baby girl is now a whopping FOUR years old.

Unlike last year, where almost everything was handmade (including that quilt sewed entirely the night before her birthday), I did not make any gifts this year. I also did not make her cake or cupcakes, because she told me she didn't want me to.

(sniff, sniff - cue one mama's heart cracking just a bit)

She told me, "No, I don't want you to make the cake. I don't want cupcakes." She wanted "a pink and blue Hello Kitty cake from the bakery at the store," a sugar-laden mountain of frosting she had seen at our local mega-mart. So, rather than bust my ass making the totally-from-scratch, blueberry-filled, topped-with-homemade-blueberry-whipped-cream cupcakes I'd planned, I ordered the cake.

It was pretty good, actually.

We also did not do the party at our house this year, because it was just too HOT. She has many more friends this year, 11 classmates plus a few others, and even if each kid only brings one parent, that's still 20 extra people to cram into my house. Last year it was about 100 degrees the day of her party and this year promised much the same thing, so we just invited some school friends to the Monkey Joe's closest to where they all live. It was totally easy, all I had to do was show up with the cake, and absolutely worth the money. The kids got to run around in air conditioning and have a blast, she got to have her best birthday yet, and I did not have to cram 20-30 people into my house. Which turned out to be a good thing, since we have gotten a couple calls to show the place, including one yesterday which only gave us 20 minutes' notice. I am so happy people are finally looking at the house that I can't say no, but I also cannot imagine trying to evacuate over a dozen party guests and clean the place with 20 minutes' notice. Yesterday we were gone when they called, out having family birthday fun, so we'd left the place not exactly pristine, and my husband worried that nobody was ever going to show the house again because the beds weren't made and there was wrapping paper on the floor, but I assured him that a crock-pot soaking in the sink and a few scattered birthday cards were hardly the worst things a real estate agent could've seen.

First Day of School/Last Day of School

2011-06-02T10:27:00.000-07:00

One of my friends saw this and said "She went from having baby arms & legs to having big-kid arms & legs!" It's true. She's all limbs now.

Fingers to the Bone, I Tell You

2011-05-21T10:38:00.000-07:00

Where have I been?

Oh, my friends. I have been knitting. And knitting. And KNITTING. Trying so hard to catch up with my "2011 = 2 Finished Projects Per Month" goal I set for myself.

I finished the dress that was supposed to be done in time for Easter (eight or so days late, which for me is like finishing it on time) AND the matching scarf. I screwed up the scarf bind-off so one side curves oddly and I tell myself 'that's just to keep it from sliding off her neck' but the more I think about it the more it bugs me, plus I know there's a couple mistakes in the lace pattern and it's only a 20-row scarf so I will probably just rip it out and make a new one. So if I finished two parts of what is technically the same project but one will have to be re-done, does that mean it's a draw?

I'd show you pictures, but they are still on the memory card which is in my camera in the cupboard, and the only reason I'm getting to type this right now is that my husband has a rare afternoon at home and is currently entertaining our almost-four-year-old (less than two weeks until her birthday!) in the other room and I got out MY NEW NETBOOK which was a Mother's Day gift from aforementioned husband and I am now frantically trying to bang out this blog entry before they get tired of playing hide & seek and realize that it's past lunchtime and I have nothing to feed them.

Ahem.

Back to the knitting: I am working as fast as I can on a bright pink version of this poncho, which my daughter has asked me to make for her school friend. She's been begging me to do it for at least six months, and when do I get around to it? Oh, a couple of weeks before school ends. I knit 13.5 inches of that feather & fan pattern in just two days, and then my arms hurt so bad I had to take a two-day break. Using my sucky super-long metal needles, which were all I could find when I started the thing, is really slowing me down. I am now only halfway done with the knitting, and I have to finish the thing this weekend because this upcoming week is the last week of school.

Assuming I finish it in time, I'll have to remember to take pictures of it before I give it away.

I also am working on: a sweater for P that needs sleeves and its approximately one billion dangling yarn ends woven in; more tiny bunnies like the ones I made P and her friend for Easter; a hat for my brother; a hat for my sister; six things for crafting debts; a shawl for my mom; a hat for me, a hat for P; and a hat for somebody else that's turning out so cute I want to keep it for myself.

I don't have any pictures of those projects, either. I'm just a tease today. A big knitting tease.

Whew!

2011-05-02T12:17:00.000-07:00

So, it's May.

Summer is sneaking up on me again. And, as of today, my beautiful little girl has only one month left to be three years old! I have not planned a party. I have not planned a gift. I have neither designed nor started work on this year's birthday shirt. We haven't decided what we're going to do this year - usually on the day of, we take her out for breakfast (pancakes) and a day of fun. She's much better in the car now, so we have been thinking about daytripping out to one of the NC aquariums.

Piper and I spent most of her spring break with friends in Nashville. It's about a 7-hour drive, and she did very well. On the way there, she was a bit squirrely for the last hour, but here's the thing: she didn't sleep during the drive. At all. So I am perfectly willing to give her a hour of boredom and seat-kicking. We went to visit some friends who moved in the fall, friends who have a little boy about a year younger than Piper. The two kids were buddies before the move, and picked up right where they left off. There were a few squabbles over toys and cranky hours after missed naps, but on the whole they did very well together.

For my part, I tried to be as good a houseguest as possible. My friend has only made a few new friends since moving, and I know only too well how lonely it can be when you're alone with a kid all day in a strange place. So we talked. And talked. And talked. We played with the kids, she took me out to see the hipster district of Nashville (where we went shopping for vintage books and vintage clothes, eee!), we ate some kick-ass food from Cafe Rakka, and we talked some more. It was so nice to have company all day long, and her son is such a sweet little guy that I didn't have to worry about him whacking Piper over the head with things, or playing games involving guns and killing. Piper's sharing skills were not always up to par, and that is something we need to work on, but I think both kids had fun. She is already asking when we're going to visit again.

She's out of school in a few weeks, and after her birthday we will probably go visit relatives in Michigan for a while. We have to be back before the end of June because I've signed her up for some dance lessons this summer, which I am pretty excited about.

I am also excited about my almost-finished knitting projects. I am thisclose to finishing the dress I'd planned for Easter - only a week late, that's basically "on time" for me - and most of the way done on her sweater as well. The sweater was supposed to be a surprise, but she came out into the living room one night long after she was supposed to be asleep, saw me knitting away on it and asked "Mom! Is that for ME?" So much for the surprise. But she loves it anyway, and keeps asking if it's done yet. Soon, kiddo...I hope.

Chaos Can Be Redeeming

2011-04-26T10:09:00.000-07:00

This is what our living room looked like a couple weeks ago. There was much sorting and boxing and throwing away. The carpets were cleaned and closets organized. I worked my ass off on that front yard.

Now it is done, the sign is in the yard, papers are signed, and I am checking my email every hour for news from our real estate agent. It's been over a week and we've only had one person call, no showings yet. I am trying to keep a positive attitude while I pick up every stray sock or toy and mop the kitchen floor ten times a day.

Now that it's done and clean, I just have to maintain it all, which is not bad (so far, anyhow). Come evening, after the kid is in bed, I find myself fully justified in plopping down on the couch with a homemade latte and a pile of knitting. I did not get the sweater or the dress I had planned as Easter gifts completed, but I did manage to make a couple Bunny Nuggets (one for P and one for her friend). I have so many projects that are almost done. I am forcing myself to complete all the tedious finishing work - picking up stitches for button bands, sewing seams, blocking and straightening.

Did I tell you I set myself a knitting goal for 2011? I told myself I was going to finish two projects per month. So far January is the only month where I actually managed to do that (another Milo for a little friend and a hat for my grandma). Hopefully I can complete all my works-in-progress and make May a real show-stopper.

2011-04-08T11:49:00.000-07:00

While people in my home state wait anxiously for spring, we are in near-summer here. It's 80 AGAIN today, and I am irritated. Partly because warm weather brings out the hordes of asshole teenagers in my neighborhood, but also because I want my seasons. I don't like to skip. I don't want to go straight from 35 to 85, which is exactly what happens down here, and every year I forget and every year I get annoyed.

I would happily swap my northern comrades; I could use a few more days of cold and moisture. My yard needs it, my handknits crave it, and more than that, my soul needs it.

There is an ease and a joy to warm days after cold ones; a feeling of renewal and promise that is lacking in warmer climates. After so many dark days, the tiniest sunbeam brings a smile. 55 degrees is now shorts-and-no-coat weather, even though in September 55 degrees made you break out the parka. The air is fresher, washed clean with chilly rains. When summer comes, it means fireflies, lounging on porches, lemonade, slowing down to savor every warm moment. Sitting in the warm dark holding hands and enjoying the feel of your skin against the air. Flowers bloom and you have time to appreciate them before they're gone. The warm days are so fleeting, so welcome, that you want to suck every drop of fun out of them before winter returns.

Here - and to a lesser extent, also in California - I feel like summer is something to dread. It's not a time for open windows and running through sprinklers, it's a time when you race from one air-conditioned environment to another, because between ozone alerts and sky-high temperatures playing outside means health risks. Southern summer means you damn well better get up and be at the park by 9:00 am, or you're going to pass out on the monkey bars by noon. It means you swim in the morning and spend the afternoon laying on the living-room floor with a popsicle because it's too hot and still to play. Summer here lasts so long, and it's so hot and fierce, that you wonder why the first settlers to this area ever dragged themselves out here in the first place. The baked clay earth hardens and the grass dies. Everything wilts and melts. It's not a lot of fun, honestly.

I miss that transition, each day a little warmer and brighter than the last. I miss smiling as I watch the weather report and see the numbers creep just a little higher each week. I miss rush of gratitude for the return of warm days and checking each patch of grass for tiny flowers. I miss looking forward to summers, to planning treats and trips and I miss lounging on porches with my lemonade.

Busting Some Butt

2011-04-07T08:40:00.000-07:00

We are frantically working around here, trying to get this place show-ready...oh, yesterday. The deadline I personally set for myself was April 1st, and we are long past that. Another few days of de-cluttering and picking up, I think, and then we need to have the carpets cleaned. I just cannot BELIEVE how hard it is to transform our house from the slightly-cluttered-but-livable space it is into the picture-perfect model home I have in my head. I want it to be perfect, not "good enough," and I am making myself completely nuts.

Fortunately, we have a Realtor that we trust completely, so I know that once I am done mentally and physically exhausting myself working on the place, all I have to do is keep it clean and water the grass, because he will take care of the rest. If there are buyers out there, he will find them. If we need to change something, he will tell us. If we're being unrealistic on price, he will gently talk us down. So I have that to look forward to.

It wasn't that we had a lot of hard things on our list, just lots of little, piddly, time-consuming stuff. We have no garage, no shed, and very little attic space, so anything we needed to store (bicycles, yard tools, baby stuff, off-season clothing, etc) was stacked up either in our bedroom or the office. This meant I had a towering canyon of boxes, bags, and hampers to go through. I'm probably keeping more than I should, but I just don't have the mental energy to give myself a tough-love talk for each and every box I go through. A friend who lives nearby has an extra room and he is letting us store things there, so I can at least have a little elbow room to attack the rest.

We had the house power-washed and the yard aerated & overseeded; we replaced the mailbox and painted the post. We're patching up the interior paint, taking care of spots that were left by the people before us and which we have been looking at and going "Oh, yeah, probably should fix that" for three years. I dug out last year's failed attempt at landscaping and planted nice colorful flowers instead. I still have a little work to do out there, but right now I am so busy inside I can't figure out what else to do outside.

The nice thing about all this is that I can finally justify all those home-decorating purchases I would never allow myself to indulge in normally. Plenty of bookshelves, decorative baskets, a nice laundry hamper, all the stuff I normally tell myself I can do without. And since I am going through and doing everything thoroughly and completely, it should make unpacking & setting up in our new place a snap. I've already worked out the kinks here, so when we move I'll have my perfectly-organized work space or craft storage system or quiet sanctuary of a bedroom all figured out. All I have to do is take it out of the boxes.

5 April 2011: Self-Made Brunch

2011-04-05T09:34:00.000-07:00

Today I dropped the kid off at school, then realized I'd left my phone at home. I went back to get it and puttered around the house pretending to clean for a couple hours. When I got hungry, I decided to do more than just microwave some leftovers and made myself a solo brunch: extra-large hazelnut latte and a strawberry waffle. Tiny treats make a day brighter, right?

Easiest Vegetable Soup Ever.

2011-04-02T10:32:00.000-07:00

11 March 2011: I made a pot of this for the kid, and she ate three bowls a day until it was gone.

Recipe:

Chop up whatever vegetables you have on hand - I used 1 carrot, 1 stalk of celery, and a handful of frozen green beans - and toss into a pot with 1 cup (more or less depending on how much your kids love carbs) veggie pasta. Cover with water (vegetable stock is much more tasty, if you have it), sprinkle in a little thyme and some garlic powder. Cook it all together until the pasta is done and veggies are tender but not mushy. That's it.

This only takes about 15 minutes to make, and it's become my go-to lunch for her. My favorite local health-food store sells bulk colored bowtie pasta, and it's colored with natural stuff like beet juice. It's WAY cheap, quite tasty, and she loves it. It's also become a good way to use up vegetables that are a little past their prime but not quite ready for the stock-pot.

One More Rule

2011-04-01T08:03:00.000-07:00

I remembered one more of my "rules for packing":

5. Pack it Tightly
I don't mean make the boxes heavy, or crush things. I do mean use every single bit of space. The less room things have to shift, the less likely something's going to get broken or damaged. No space at the top of the box means when they're stacked they won't cave in and crush the contents. So when you pack your books and there's little nooks and crannies left, stuff socks and underwear in there. Put a towel or clothes on top of everything before you tape it shut. Slip paperbacks into small spaces in other boxes; top off large boxes with lightweight stuff like pillows and stuffed animals; add kitchen linens around the inside of boxes of plates and cups. Any time you can cram something into a box, do it. You'll cut down on the amount of boxes you have to move, and your stuff will be much more secure. It will also add some amusement to your unpacking process, like when you really need a cup of coffee the first morning in your new place and you have to pull four pairs of lacy Victoria's Secret underwear out of a box to get to your favorite mug.

*Boxes: A friend tipped me off to a good source for moving boxes - egg boxes. She said:

"Go to the grocery stores and ask what day the eggs come in and if you can get boxes. Go every time they get a shipment and grab as many as you can. Free and very sturdy. They even have handles and they are a good size. Note: this tip does not apply to produce boxes."

24 March 2011

2011-03-31T08:21:00.000-07:00

We stayed late at the park because I didn't want to go home, and wound up assembling an impromptu dinner from the snacks in the car.

23 March 2011

2011-03-30T13:46:00.000-07:00

83 degrees, dry as a bone and ultra-windy. I spent part of my childhood in Southern California; this weather spooks me worse than tornado sirens.

Rules for Packing

2011-03-29T18:16:00.000-07:00

My friend Rae is moving, and we are de-cluttering and pre-packing as much as possible, and all of it reminds me of how many times I have moved. It's a big number. I have grown pretty good at packing, and developed the following set of rules:

1. Don't use paper.
        Don't wrap things in newspaper. Don't buy packing paper. Don't use styrofoam peanuts, or bubble wrap, or any of that extra stuff. Use your clothes. Use your sheets. Wrap tiny breakables in socks and roll them into a comforter and put that in a box. Put washcloths and dish towels between your plates, wrap glasses in table linens. You get the idea. Anything you would use paper for, use something you already have. Not only does this save you a lot of money in packing materials, it will reduce the amount of boxes you have to lug by at least one-third.

2. Get boxes that are all the same size.*
       Copy-paper boxes are perfect, if you have a ready supply. They're solid and sturdy, big enough for most things but small enough that you have to work reeeeaallly hard to make 'em too heavy to carry. For our move from Michigan to California, I spent the year before our move swiping boxes from work and storing them in our attic. When it was time to pack, I brought them all downstairs, filled them, and re-stacked them in the attic for a couple weeks until the truck arrived. If you can't get copy-paper boxes, use file boxes from an office-supply store. This size works well. Of course, some things will have to go in bigger boxes, and that's fine, but having everything in same-size boxes will make loading the truck really easy. Heavy ones on the bottom, lighter & breakable stuff on the top, load around the furniture. Taa-daa.

3. Start early. Like, super early.
        Start packing as soon as you know when you need to be out. Keep out your 10 favorite cd's (or none, since, like many others, you probably download a lot of music these days) and pack the rest. Pack your books (pretty soon you probably won't have the time or brain power to do a lot of heavy reading anyway) . Pack your off-season clothes. Go through the Christmas decorations and re-pack them so nothing gets broken. The serving platters you only use on holidays, the breadmaker, the waffle iron. Pack up 2/3 of your kids' toys. Do a few boxes every night and stack them somewhere you won't trip over them. When crunch time rolls around, you should only have a few things left to pack. If you have to go a few days earlier than planned, pre-packing means that when your truck shows up, you actually have stuff to start with, instead of all your "helpers" standing around snatching away every box as soon as you tape it shut.

4. Weed, weed, weed.
        Starting early means you will also have ample time to go through your stuff and ask yourself "Do I honestly want to pack this and lug it into the truck and take it out and put it in the new place and unpack it and find somewhere to put it?" Even if you're lucky enough to be able to hire someone to do your packing or lugging, you still have to unpack it and find room for it and shuffle it around a few times before it gets to its eventual resting place in your new abode. When in doubt, throw it out.

That's it, I think...happy moving!

*Of course, if you don't want to buy boxes, try my favorite source for super-sturdy, mostly-the-same-size boxes: the dumpsters behind bookstores. There will be a specific one for cardboard. Word to the wise: it's always better to do this on a dry day, during daylight hours, preferably with the store's permission.

Home is Where the Hurt Is.

2011-03-22T06:42:00.000-07:00

Sunday I spent about nine hours in the yard, tearing out the front flower bed we put in last year, moving all the rock somewhere else, straightening the stone border, putting in new dirt and planting flowers. I removed the ghosts of last year's hostas and dug down into the clay soil to put in some flowers that Piper had picked out. Things much more sun-loving than my pretty but doomed hostas - violas, pansies, some pink thing that starts with a d.

I used all the huge chunks of clay soil I dug out to make room for the flowers to fill in some low spots in the front yard, which involved lots of hacking at damp chunks of brick-red (and brick-like) clay with a broken shovel in order to break them up. I put some garden soil over the fills, and grass-patch stuff over that. Between the orangey-red clay and the bright-green grass patch, my yard looks like a faded vintage Christmas card.

Now I am watering the ever-loving crap out of everything, hoping that the 80-degree-plus weather and super-dry winds we've been having don't kill everything before it gets started. In order not to bust our budget (plus, we live in drought country), I've become the Water Marshall of the house, collecting every spare drop and dumping it on the yard. I put buckets in all the bathrooms to catch the water that we inevitably run before it gets hot enough to shower in; I dip out dishwater that's not too grimy and truck it out to the yard. It's pretty labor-intensive, but I desperately want a nice yard this year. If we were staying in this house, I'd love to install some fancy Dwell-approved graywater system, but something like that would cost more than our entire house is currently worth.

I am also nursing full-body muscle aches from my afternoon of toil. Ye Gods, I ache. And it's worse today than yesterday. My legs, my back, my arms - everything I could possibly pull or strain or max out, I did. I could go soak in a nice, hot bath, but I'd probably guilt myself into dumping the water on the yard after.

2011-03-18T10:14:00.000-07:00

It's 83 degrees here right now.

Instead of making me happy, this makes me CRANKY.

Sure, there are the ongoing issues with neighborhood kids, roaming bands of irritating teenagers hanging out smoking and swearing on my lawn until well past dark and the (several) houses worth of adults who let their kids run the streets screaming and riding bikes until midnight. But it's more than that.

Warm weather also means I can no longer ignore the yard and the fact that despite several years of sweaty, frustrating manual labor on our parts, it remains an expanse of brown dotted only by the green of weeds. It means that any time we get a drop of rain, those weeds will grow six inches overnight and someone will need to go out there and hack at them with our (broken) weed-whacker immediately, because our city is closing schools yet still manages to pay people to drive around monitoring the height of everyone's grass. It means it's time to start washing windows and all the other stuff I put off during the winter. It means it's time for summer clothes again, and none of mine fit thanks to a winter full of tacos, strudel, and guacamole.

Eighty degrees in mid-March also means we're in for another brutally hot summer, with another 98 days in a row of 100-degree-plus temps and daily ozone alerts so you're not even supposed to let your kids play outside. I spent most of last summer trapped in a sweltering house (I'm far too cheap to run the a/c all day long) with a kid bouncing off the walls and not much I could do about it. We have the museum membership now, so we can do that a couple of times each week, but really the prospect of all those months of endless sticky heat just makes me want to crawl into a still-frozen northern cave and sleep until October.

Summer. Bah humbug.

Snapshots: Mid-March 2011

2011-03-15T11:55:00.001-07:00

Working on:

Decluttering the house: Every single thing that we tossed aside thinking "oh, we'll deal with this later" or "I'll just shove it in here for now" has come due. Three years, four bedrooms, and 1500 square feet worth. Some days it seems easier to leave the house unlocked and hope somebody wanders away with it all.

Antointte and a few other friends have asked if we could rent the place for a year or two. I suppose we could (we could probably even make a tiny little amount of money doing it), but we don't want to. Things that are happening in and around the neighborhood right now make me think that it would be financially better for us to sell and get out ASAP. I'd be pretty wary of what sort of renters we would attract in this area and I just don't want to deal with being a landlord. I think we are also getting itchy feet again and might want to make another big move in the next few years, and who knows how long it will take to sell this house. It's kind of shame this didn't work out, because it's a cute house (I love the layout) with a nice big yard. It just turned out, for us, to be the wrong house in the wrong neighborhood in the wrong city. This was our first adventure with home ownership and honestly I'm not sure if we'll do it again. We've been looking at some nice apartments and I'm sort of psyched to think about not taking care of a lawn and having access to a pool for all those brutally hot summer days.

Knitting: Warm weather means the neighbors are loud and the teenagers are out until well past dark, so when my husband is working late (at least 4 nights a week), I put the kid to bed, tidy up the house, and force myself to relax by watching TV and barreling ahead with knitting projects. I try to justify the hours spent sitting on my ass by telling myself "I'm using up yarn, this is part of the de-cluttering!" but it's not completely true. Really, the living room is where I'm least likely to be bothered by the noise outside. But this strategy is allowing me to make progress on a Simo and a Little Bubbles for the kid and prep for Easter with some bunny nuggets. I am also trying desperately to finish the projects I owe for a long-overdue swap. Sherrie probably thinks I have forgotten all about her (I haven't!) because I've owed her something for almost 18 months. The good news is, the knitting project I planned for her second baby will now fit her upcoming third.

Watching: Satsfaction and The Riches. Getting annoyed all over again that The Riches was canceled so abruptly. Really, REALLY annoyed that my favorite new show is probably getting the axe. I've sworn off any new tv shows next season. I just can't take the heartache, you know?

Listening: I am pretty out of the loop musically these days, since I don't listen to commercial radio, we don't have satellite, and many of my favorite bands have split up or are on hiatus. We spend about two hours a day (minimum) in the car these days, and since our iPod has not been updated in over a year and I don't want to drag 100 cd's into the car, Piper and I pretty much listen to the same 10 things over and over. I have, however, been very much enjoying the free playlists offered by SPIN each month. I have also been taking advantage of the free weekly downloads from Starbucks. Usually they have the cards with the redemption code sitting on the edge of the counter, you don't have to buy anything or even make chit-chat if you don't want to, you can snatch one and run before the delicious coffee smell sucks you into buying a $4 latte. I've also seen the cards at the mini-Starbucks stores located in the middle of the mall, inside Target, and in Barnes & Noble stores.

Wishing: I need to redesign this here blog - the header bugs me endlessly but I don't have time for the tinkering required to fix it, I hate the color scheme, I really just want to scrap my template and start over. I wish I could wave a magic wand and poof! have a spiffy blog. But that magic wand will probably be called "lots of books and prowling around on the Web" and I will not wave it so much as toil away late into the night for several weeks, cussing and sweating, only to achieve marginally better results. Sort of like most of my sewing projects. Hmmm.

PS. Advice needed: Any other iPhone users with a PC know how to get the photos off the darn thing? I have more than 2,000 photos on my phone which I would like to retrieve, and short of emailing them all to myself individually, I can't figure out how to get them onto my computer.

01 March 2011

2011-03-14T09:28:00.000-07:00

A little peek into how our month is going:

I'm trying very hard not to snap and snarl at her, but I just hate our life here so much it spills out every time I open my mouth. So I find myself annoyed and near hysterics because she needs so much, and destroys so much, and talks so much, and demands so much. The warmer weather means I am in tears every time I hear the thump thump of a basketball on the sidewalk, and that's not her fault. The health insurance is costing us more than we have, and that's not her fault. I despair of ever getting this house in shape to sell, and that's not her fault. Nor is it her fault that the minivan mafia at her school managed to hurt my feelings AGAIN, even after I swore I was done. All of this and more has me wallowing in a pit of despair, and it's not her fault, but we are together so much that she gets to face my fury constantly. It's not making me feel like a very good parent lately.

Knitting Something New

2011-03-07T19:39:00.000-08:00

...and hopefully more successful than my last FIVE projects.

"I drawed a sheep. He's gonna have scalers."

2011-03-06T08:27:00.001-08:00

In the Shoe Aisle...

2011-03-01T08:09:00.000-08:00

...I was suddenly forced to confront what sort of person I saw myself as.

I didn't end up buying either pair.

Oh, Look, Another Milo

2011-02-24T06:57:00.000-08:00

I just can't stop making these things. They are so easy, and so amazingly portable that I can stuff a ball of yarn in my pocket and knit while I'm walking around with Piper at the children's museum. I have re-purposed a little plastic pouch that was part of the shipping wrapper for some shoes, and it is the perfect size for two balls of Sugar n' Cream plus a 16" circular needle. This little project-in-progress now lives in my car, so I am never without something to knit and I don't have to drag my 5-balls-of-yarn colorwork project back and forth or wrestle with the giant skein attached to that frigging Tomten. So expect to see more of these little vests in this space. They are perfect for adding a little warmth without bulk (leaving those arms free for playground adventures), are lovely for showing off yarn I have some but not a lot of, and don't take forever to finish. They are also excellent for keeping paint off my kid's clothes while she is at school.

This one was a gift for our little friend (the same one who received the shark lunch box). It's actually the second one I've made him, only the first one was in cotton. It took me a long time because I kept getting distracted. Piper has one I made last year in similar colors and I scavenged all my leftover skeins of this yarn to get this one as stripy as possible. Piper was pretty psyched about having "matching" sweaters with her buddy.

Pattern: Milo by Georgie Hallam
Yarn: Lion Brand Wool-Ease (I know! But it's so sturdy!)
My Ravelry page for it is here.

I had a bunch of bits and partial skeins, so most of the stripes' length was dictated by how far I could go without running out of yarn. A couple places I split a bigger amount into smaller stripes so it wouldn't look weird. And I cut the yarn every time, because I didn't want to carry the colors a long way up the inside and leave loops to snag little fingers. So weaving in all those ends took me almost as long as the knitting. Whew!

Giant Cat Attack!

2011-02-23T09:01:00.000-08:00

Huge Cats Terrorize Family of Small Woodland Creatures, Hello Kitty May Be Involved.

The Santa Hat

2011-02-18T09:37:00.000-08:00

A couple of days before Christmas, my child started asking me for "a Santa hat." After a few conversations, I sussed out that this meant any hat with a pom-pom, bonus points if it's pointy in some way. She requested red, and was quite adamant. We went to the yarn store and I let her pick out what she wanted (although I did have to steer her away from the $46-a-skein stuff ). She chose the brightest red we could find - some Cascade 220. I didn't finish it until a couple days after Christmas, but I think it's what she wanted.

This pattern is the "Vintage Pixie Cap" by Hadley Fierlinger from Vintage Knits for Modern Babies.
My Ravelry details are here.


More blurry, grainy camera phone pictures, hooray!

I got most of the way done with the front ribbing and realized that it was going to be all loose and floppy and that I should've used needles 1-2 sizes smaller to make the ribbing tighter. I don't know why I didn't think of it, because that's what I always do with hat ribbing. So it's kind of loose. Oh, well. It will fit her for a while, I guess. I did the strap in seed stitch and made the end pointy, and it fastens with these two wee little rabbit buttons that she picked out herself. Maybe someday I will remember to get a picture of the nice seed stitch strap with its rabbit buttons, but for now you'll just have to take my word for it.

I can say that the bright red is very nice at the playground because she's always easy to spot.

Anatomy of a Snow Day

2011-02-16T06:09:00.000-08:00

6:55 a.m.: My husband comes in and shakes me awake to tell me that the local school district has canceled school. This means Piper's preschool is also closed. I roll over and think about going back to sleep but instead jump out of bed and ask him if he got some coffee. "No, I didn't," he says. "There's coffee? Cool." We get to the kitchen and discover that although I loaded the brew basket, put water in the reservoir, and programmed the timer, I did not actually turn the timer on. There is no coffee. I feel terrible, but my husband just shrugs. He can't wait for it to brew, and goes back out to scrape the ice off his car and go to work. I feel guilty about the coffee after he's gone, even though I know he only drinks it when I make it and he doesn't notice when I don't. I watch his car pull out of the driveway and wish he could stay home with us.

7:05 a.m.: I crawl back into my lovely, warm bed, pull the covers up to my chin, and sigh.

7:06 a.m.: I hear Piper wake up and start yelling for me. She comes into my room and I ask if she'd like to snuggle in my bed for a while.

7:08 a.m.: Her version of "snuggling" involves sticking her fingers in my eyes. Over and over.

7:15 a.m.: I get up and after a brief disagreement about the appropriate sugar content of a 3.5-year-old's breakfast, pour her a bowl of plain Cheerios. She eats it and is allowed a bowl of one of my husband's super-sugary snack cereals. The snow outside swirls in the wind.

7:30 a.m.: I turn on the news and watch the coverage of the huge! snow! storm! Coffee in hand, I wander around the house picking things up and paying bills. Piper drags out various toys and scatters them across the living-room floor.

9:30 a.m.: I start wrestling the kid into real clothes and layers of coats so we can go play in the snow.

10:00 a.m.: We go outside and play. I teach her how to make snow angels. She keeps eating snow and I keep telling her to at least get some from the middle of the yard instead of off the car bumpers. We try to make a snowman, but this snow isn't good for packing. Tiny flakes fall as we run and yelp.

10:30 a.m. We are wet, cold, and freezing. We stomp through the front door, strip out of our soggy, muddy, chilly clothes, and hop into things made of fleece and jersey. Hot chocolate and a load of laundry. An episode of Kipper while we play with the dollhouse.

11:30 a.m.: Lunch. More snow outside.

12:30 p.m.: Naptime. For her, anyway. She's out like a light in less than five minutes. The house grows quiet and I try to deal with the heaps of laundry in the dryer.

1:30 p.m.: The neighborhood kids are coming out for the day. I hear noises and go to the back door. There are twenty teenagers and three smaller kids milling around my back yard, shouting and wrestling and posing and kissing. The eventually move into the soccer field and woods, throwing snow and howling. I smile a little bit, and force myself to think well of them. They're just kids, I tell myself. Kids with a snow day.

3:00 p.m.: Piper is awake. She does not want to go back outside, which is fine with me, since it's starting to look slushy out there and the freezing rain is supposed to start any minute. More hot chocolate, some Dr. Who, and an attempt to clean up her play room. We don't do much cleaning, but instead have a play-food picnic and a birthday party for her stuffed cat.

6:00 p.m.: Dinner is soup and fresh bread.

8:00 p.m. Daddy's home. Time for a story and some blocks before bath and bed.

11:00 p.m: I watch the news and discover that tomorrow will also be a snow day, and we will do this all over again.

Snapshots: Mid-February 2011

2011-02-15T07:53:00.000-08:00

It has been really quiet around this blog lately, and for good reason. I spend half my waking hours in the car these days, shuttling Piper to school, running errands, taking care of business. I will be glad when we can move farther into town, closer to everything.

*****

You know when you hear stories about crazy families who scream at each other in hospital corridors and get into fistfights next to someone's deathbed and call the cops on each other and steal a dying relative's possessions just so the rest of the family can't get at them? Those people are my family. My mother's family, to be more precise. And all of those things have happened in the past two weeks. My grandma died the other day, and most of us found out from an aunt who called because she saw it posted on an acquaintance's Facebook page. It was all very surreal and the truth is I have been too busy comprehending the scope of the craziness that is going on to really mourn my grandmother. We were close when I was little - she always had root-beer barrel candies and she would give me some. She drove me around in her big old Buick with the green bench seats and sometimes bought me those wax-bottle candies with the syrupy stuff inside. She liked Rambo movies and told me that she thought Bruce Springsteen's music was okay, but that truthfully she liked him because he had a cute butt. One time when my brother and I were at her house, he actually stuck a fork in her light socket. She met my husband a couple of times and loved him to pieces. I wrote to her about once a month, letting her know what was new with me and how Piper was doing. Sometimes she sent things for Piper, coloring books or stickers or whatever she could afford. A couple of weeks before she died, I sent a hat I'd made her, to keep her head warm during the last of her chemotherapy treatments. I heard from relatives that she did receive it. I hope she got to wear it at least once.

*****

We have carpet in our dining room, which you have to walk through to get to the entire back half of our house. I'd like to have a conversation with the idiot who thought it was a good idea to carpet a dining room. Between the eating and the constant foot traffic, it's in sad shape. We've made the decision not to replace the carpeting before listing the house, so I am just trying to get up the worst of the stains. Today I used a carpet cleaner that not only burned my skin and stank up the entire house, but stripped my fingernails of their lovely red polish. I would've used gloves, but our only pair of waterproof work gloves we have are bright blue, and I didn't think swapping red-velvet cake stains for bright blue smears of molten work glove was such a good idea.

For Christmas this year, we asked the grandparents for a family membership to the children's museums in this area, and that has turned out to be a genius idea. It was a gift they were more than happy to give, and which we use all the time, yet which does not take up any space in my house. And now I can just ask them to renew it for Christmas every year, thus heading off piles of crappy plastic toys and unwearable clothing for years to come. We've been going to the museum aimed at younger kids at least once a week, because it is awesome. The only way it could be better is if they put in a nice cafe like the main museum downtown has - lots of healthy options, organic and local ingredients, and super delicious to boot. It would certainly save me dragging a lunchbox full of snacks around the museum with us.

I have been knitting up a storm, but I've had to tear out the last four things I started. I just can't make anything work. I got 3/4 done with the 5-color yoke on a sweater for Piper before I discovered that I was doing the special stitch pattern wrong and had to tear it out. That dratted Tomten is still not done, because now I have to tear out the entire second sleeve because my decreases look like stair steps. I keep starting this sweater for Piper in a lovely gray merino, and I can't seem to get past the first row. I work sporadically on the shawl I started for my mom over a year ago, I keep screwing it up and having to frog every row I knit. Although I dearly loved this hat (so soft so warm so cute so perfect), I gave it to my mom because it was a smidge too big for me. It fits her perfectly, and she really loves it. Strangers keep walking up to her and asking where she got it or if they can buy it from her, which makes me feel pretty good. I'm making myself a replacement, in a different, not-as-soft yarn, and I am hoping that knitting for myself rather than everyone else will break the terrible knitting curse I seem to be under.

At the Thrift Store

2011-01-28T20:06:00.000-08:00

Unfortunately, it was missing most of its pieces, so we didn't buy it. What good is an alien autopsy if there's no guts?

Snapshots: Late January 2011

2011-01-27T05:59:00.000-08:00

I. Am. So. Tired.

That's about it. Just sheer, mind-numbing, circles-under-the-eyes, drooling-while-awake exhaustion. I can't even pinpoint why, unless it's the sinus infection plus my grandma is dying plus I'm de-cluttering the house plus getting it ready to show plus spending an hour in the car every day minimum plus all the running errands plus all the planning plus all the budgeting plus all the shopping plus all the cooking plus all the extended-family drama plus my kid apparently needs to be crawling all over me and sticking her fingers in my ears/up my nose/in my eyes every second of the day. I'm trying to do one of those take-a-photo-every-day things, but I don't have time to get the pictures off the memory cards. I'm trying to knit more and use up my yarn stash, but my head is just not in it and I've had to frog the last four projects I started. I'm trying to sew more, but by the end of the day I'm too tired to drag out my machine and supplies, work on a project, and stay up until 3:00 am to clean it all up.

In short, just life. Nothing that a week or five spent lounging on the beach wouldn't cure.

Amateur Photographer

2011-01-11T12:36:00.000-08:00

Tomten...still.

2011-01-05T12:34:00.000-08:00

This is the sweater on my lap while I am having breakfast at I kea, because I drag it EVERYWHERE in hopes of finishing it sometime before next Christmas.

Still the Tomten. I am so sick of this thing. I am sick of the endless garter stitch, I am sick of the vague instructions, I am sick of trying to keep track of my rows to make the sleeve increases come out exactly the same on both sides. I am sick of the huge ball of ghastly pink acrylic yarn I had to buy to finish this thing (615 yards of the white only got me halfway). I am really, really sick of lugging around a huge tote bag with this monstrosity and its accompanying gigundo-size ball of yarn shoved inside. On the good side of things, I've tried it on the kid a couple of times and I think the fit will be about right. When I started it, I thought it would be huge, but I think that is not the case. I already had to take apart the hood and add more rows because it was not tall enough. When did my little girl get so BIG?!

Trying it all on

2010-12-28T09:49:00.000-08:00

Because we were shopping with Grandma, she got to wear all this out of the store.

Making a Break For It

2010-12-28T06:20:00.000-08:00

She loves to arrange a herd of wind-up animals and let them roam.

Snowy

2010-12-27T09:50:00.000-08:00

We got a white Christmas...barely. It started snowing at 10 pm December 25 and didn't stop until 1l am the next day.

Improvised Reindeer

2010-12-25T08:16:00.000-08:00

Since we introduced her to Rudolph, reindeer have been a big topic of discussion around here. She did this all on her own, and was quite pleased with it.

Happy Holidays, wherever you may be.

All Aglow

2010-12-24T09:38:00.000-08:00

Holiday lights at Stowe Gardens.

A Little Christmas Crafting

2010-12-24T08:16:00.001-08:00

Well, I am knee-deep in red worsted-weight wool and elbow-high in bread dough right now, but I thought I'd share what I made last night. It looked like this when I started:

Remind me to sew in the daytime next year so I can take a decent photo.

This was a t-shirt I gave my husband the first or second Christmas we were together. He loved it and wore it and wore it and wore it, until it had paint splatters and holes and frayed seams and the decal was starting to flake off. It had reached the end of its life as a garment, but I wanted to keep it in the family and he needed a good stocking. He's been using some cheapie dollar-bin one for a few years now and last year Piper and I both got cool stockings, so it was his turn. This was a pretty fast project, once I got going. I traced one of our existing stockings for a pattern, and spent some time fussing with placement to try and get the most leftover t-shirt fabric when I was done, but by then it was 11:43 on December 23rd and I decided just to hack it out of the middle because otherwise it would never get done.

Here is the finished product, which will probably bring a smile to the face of anyone who has played Super Mario Bros:

Hello, I am a Goomba Stocking. Nice to meet you.

I had the seam on the inside but didn't like the way it looked, so I just went around the outside, in dark-green thread because I have a huge cone of green thread and no green projects to use it on. The top band/hanging loop is a piece from the jelly roll pack I bought to make the binding for Piper's Beatles quilt (I thought the green was festive and it matched the stitching). I didn't line it, and I probably should've, but it will only have stuff in it for a few hours so I hope it won't get too stretched out of shape. The seam is extremely sturdy and I think it will be okay. Maybe before I put it away with the rest of the Christmas decorations I'll make a lining and tuck it inside and patch a couple tiny holes in the fabric and patch up the paint on the decal. Probably not, but I'll think about it really hard.

My husband is just tickled to death with the thing. He was touched because it's a shirt that has history for us, but he also thinks it's a pretty kick-ass stocking.

I Want This So Much

2010-12-23T09:40:00.000-08:00

It's a magnet, which is awesome, but I'd take a t-shirt or an iron-on/sew-on patch, too.

Rocking Out With Rankin/Bass

2010-12-22T06:27:00.000-08:00

It took me two full weeks to clean up the mess that resulted from our recent visit to my parents' house. This is pretty typical - any time we visit them or they visit us, it takes forever for the piles of stuff they dump off in our living room to filter through the house. I am trying to get rid of as much junk as possible, because even though we asked the grandparents to chip in on a family membership to the kids' science museum instead of more doodads and clothes my kid doesn't need, I am anticipating that quite a few pieces of useless plastic crap will find their way to our house anyway. It is always such a job to sort and box and drive and donate and haul and sell and toss.

Between that, the huge amounts of holiday knitting I've been tending to, and all the other holiday-related running around that needs done, I have not had much time for blogging lately. I've also been trying to spend more time with my kid and less time online, which is not always as easy as I'd like it to be.

We have been doing a lot of playing with her new dollhouse, snuggling under blankets on the couch, and watching Christmas movies. Our kid-friendly collection of holiday viewables was pretty lacking (Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, while one of my favorite movies ever, and set during the holiday season, is not exactly appropriate viewing for a 3.5-year-old). My husband came to the rescue, sailing through the door one evening with this under his arm, and one or more of the discs have been in constant rotation ever since. We both fondly remember most of these from our childhood, and waiting impatiently every December for them to pop up on the TV schedule. Even though we've both seen them dozens of times, it's pretty fun to watch them again with Piper, who is seeing them all for the first time. And the second. And the fifth. We have watched Rudolph every night for a week. I'm getting a little tired of his oh-so-shiny-nose.

Fortunately, I have plenty of knitting to distract me. Did you notice how this is sitting on that still-unfinished Tomten?

In The Trees

2010-12-21T21:41:00.000-08:00

Walk of Trees, downtown Plymouth, Mi.

Stuff It.

2010-12-13T08:03:00.000-08:00

We have so much stuff.

Towering piles of it. Stuff on every surface. Books tumbling from shelves, cd's stacked in towers on the office floor. Junk and crap and things and stuff. And I still can't find anything I want.

I've started to go through another period of missing things that I gave away during previous moves. Right now, I desperately miss the camo military jacket I bought at in Kalamazoo at a kick-ass vintage shop that was going out of business. I got up early on a Sunday and made my friend with a car drive me from our dorm to downtown just so I could go to their closing sale. That jacket fit me like a glove, went with everything, saw me through all manner of college hijinks, kept me just the right amount of warm...and I stupidly got rid of it two or three moves ago, when we were bailing our stuff out of the apartment like water from a sinking ship. I'm really, really tired of reaching for a favorite object and remembering that I gave it away, to I-don't-remember-who or Goodwill or, a homeless man who happened by (true story). We have so much stuff, and yet I can't find anything I want when I want it, and I've had to give away things I should've kept to accommodate all this crap now towering around me. It's very frustrating.

I just spent two weeks visiting my parents, whose house is also crammed with stuff, and they seem to think it's their job to fill up my house as well. Every time they come visit, they cram their car absolutely full of stuff, and pile it all in my living room as soon as they arrive. They laugh about it, they think it's funny. Every time I go visit them, I come back with suitcases and tote bags and boxes of more stuff. My mom will actually pay the airline's $25-each-checked-bag fee for me, so she can send home extra suitcases full of crap.

This time, just to add to the chaos, we brought back a four-foot-tall dollhouse my uncle built for Piper. He is staying at my parents' house while getting cancer treatment at the University of Michigan hospitals, and he is doing well. But he tires easily and can't work a regular job at the moment, and has set up a makeshift woodworking studio on my parents' back porch. He worked as a professional carpenter for more than 30 years, so my mom has had him busy repairing the trim, building porch railings and steps, and building new windowsills for her house. He's also built my sister a huge shoe-rack and my brother a desk large enough to accommodate his computer-gaming habits. The dollhouse is gorgeous, four floors and each with its own staircase and fireplace. His specialty was finish carpentry, so there are amazing details, and Piper loves the thing. It is a wonderful gift, worthy of heirloom status.

I just wish they had consulted me on the design, and not given us a 50-pound, four-foot item to stuff into our already-bursting house, only a few months before we put it up for sale. I wouldn't have said "no, don't build it," but I would have shown my uncle something like this or this one, which we could take apart and pack up easily.

Did I mention the matching barn?

Oy.

Lunchbox

2010-11-29T08:54:00.000-08:00

This project was a birthday gift for a dear little friend. His mom and I are pals, and she'd mentioned she was looking for a way to pack lunch/snacks for him on their adventures. I couldn't find a kid-size bento box that was affordable (or would ship in time for his birthday), so I made an approximation.

He's a big fan of sharks, so that was the first thing to find.

Then I tracked down some little containers that would nest inside it, and made sure there was enough room for a sippy cup or kid-size water bottle. I added a small freezer pack to keep everything cool.

The last part of the gift was cloth napkins. I let Piper pick some fabric, then I cut out squares and hemmed them using decorative stitches on my machine (also with a little help - "MOMMY! You hafta use THAT ONE! I want you to use the squares!"). It was pretty fun; I had never tried most of them before, and they looked cute in contrasting thread along the edges.

Piper made the wrapping paper and helped me tie the bow. She was quite pleased to give this special gift to her special little friend. I think his mother appreciated a gift that didn't require assembly or make noise.

Strolling

2010-11-26T08:05:00.000-08:00

Breakfast

2010-11-24T08:09:00.000-08:00

Outdoor knitting

2010-11-22T08:07:00.000-08:00

A Tomten in progress. I'm experiencing a bit of frustration with the pattern, both with the instructions and the amount of yardage it's taking. Someone gave me a ginormous ball of bulky-weight acrylic yarn, and I thought this would be a good way to use it up. The kid really needs a warm, trashable, washable sweater to wear to preschool, and I thought this soft, fuzzy stuff would not only be comfortable, but I wouldn't have a heart attack if she got paint on it (unlike, say, something made from this gorgeous yarn).

Except that I've still got the hood AND sleeves to do, and I'm more than halfway through my 615-yard ball of yarn. Which means I either need to forget the hood and proceed to the sleeves (and I still might not have enough), or go get another ginormous ball of acrylic (the only size this yarn comes in can best be described as "enough to get you through the Apocalypse"). I would definitely have enough yarn that way, but I'd also end up with a bunch of leftover fuzzy acrylic yarn, and probably find myself in this same position next year when I'm trying to use that up. This is actually my second attempt at a Tomten; the one I started last fall ground to a halt when I ran out of yarn, also some given-to-me stuff I was trying to use up and also right at the sleeve joins. Hmm, I'm sensing a pattern here.

I've probably made it too big. Maybe my measurements were off, or my math, or something. Oh, well, better too big than too small, I guess. I'll just roll up the sleeves and get a couple years' use out of it...provided I ever finish the damned thing, that is.

Impromptu Picnic

2010-11-19T07:56:00.000-08:00

On a chilly day, we decided eating lunch in the front yard would be more fun.

Amazing What You Can Do With The Right Tools.

2010-11-17T07:51:00.001-08:00

It's no secret that I love Babylegs. They have been one of the most useful items of baby/kid gear we've owned. They continue to be so, especially now that she's in preschool. The kids spend at least an hour on the (really cool wooden/natural) playground at her school every day, and they also spend time inside playing and doing art or other activites. The weather this fall has been pretty dry, with cool mornings and warm afternoons. Sometimes there's a 15 or 20-degree difference in the temperature between getting into the car at 9:00 and picking her up from the school playground at 1:15. I put her in shorts or a skirt + legwarmers in the morning, and when she gets too warm she can take them off, ditch her jacket, and run around without overheating.

However, at $12 a pair, with care instructions that include the words "hand wash," they are not exactly ideal for the rigors of paint, soap, glue, slides, woodchips, sandbox, hiking trails, and everything else she gets into at school. Plus the actual Babylegs styles seem to be getting both more cutesy and more gendered - lots more sections labeled "girl" and "boy" and lots fewer stylish designs - so I decided to just make her some out of knee socks.

I'd seen the tutorials around for a few years (and had a secret stash of knee socks hidden under some fabric in my closet, just waiting for the "someday" when I could get to them), so I looked over a few sets of instructions, threaded my machine, and got to work. It was supposed to be easy-peasy: just cut off the foot part, chop off the heel & toe, use the remaining small tube of fabric from the foot part to make a band, and sew it to the leg part. Ten minutes, tops.

You can guess where this is headed.

Even though I cut and pinned carefully, the knit sock fabric did not cooperate. It slipped. It dragged. I swore. I shrieked. I hunched over my machine with clenched hands and a sweaty brow. I tried different stitches, different machine settings. I sewed and ripped it out over and over. And after four days of failure, I remembered all the praise I had heard about ball-point needles. I bought a pack of eight.

Once I got home and put one in the machine, it only took me ten minutes to sew up all four pairs.

Ball point needles! For sewing knits! Who knew that would be the key to my problems sewing with knits?!

If only all my problems could be solved for $3.95.

(crappy cell phone photo, taken under compact florescent light bulbs, at night)

These are primarily Halloween ones, because I have a big pile of socks waiting to be legwarmer-ized but it was four days to Halloween at this point, so I wanted to do those first. The long blue ones were the experimental pair. I figured if I screwed them up, it was okay, blue socks are easy to come by, but I wasn't about to fool around with my $5-a-pair Halloween socks. Thanks to the needle change, they came out really well, except for the part where I didn't realize the argyle skulls would come out upside-down on the bottom bands. Oh, well. Eventually I'll get some plain gray ribbing and replace the bottom bands on those. Maybe. I sewed all these with a straight normal stitch set on the longest length, and they all stretch fine. I did not finish the seams in any way, because I am lazy and I keep forgetting to buy some pinking shears. I suppose they could come undone, but I don't really care. I made these partly because they're cute but mostly so she could trash them at school, so it's no big deal. Besides, if they start to come undone, that's Future Steph's problem.

The short ruffled blue ones I did with a zig-zag stitch, because they were toe socks and there was nothing to make a bottom band out of. Besides, this way they will fit nicely over her shoes and keep water/snow/dirt out of her socks. They also make some wicked cute arm/hand-warmers - I know this because I keep wearing them that way. Every time I do, Piper looks annoyed and asks me "Mommy, you have Babylegs on your ARMS! They are supposed to go on LEGS!"

Falling Around

2010-11-05T07:36:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was one of the rare days when I am actually glad to live here. The weather was perfect and classically Fall - low 50's, light rain, just breezy enough to make a cup of hot chocolate sound good. The neighborhood was quiet and peaceful for a change, and we went outside to take advantage of it.

I took lots of pictures of leaves.

Her raincoat, boots, and umbrella made happy reappearances.

Her favorite splashing puddle was back, and she greeted it by riding her tricycle right through the middle.

We even went for a walk in the (slightly soggy) woods.

And then it was back inside for hot chocolate, followed by a nap. As we roamed around the quiet and deserted field behind our house, I was extremely grateful to live in a place where we can pull a perfect Fall day out of early November. Sometimes I forget that a lot of people are battening down the hatches against Winter right now, whereas we can still do hours of outdoor exploration wearing jeans and sweatshirts.

Candy Corn

2010-11-04T09:24:00.000-07:00

This was her Halloween costume, as per her very specific and repeated request. I was going to make her some sort of dress and knit a pointy white hat, but her grandma came to the rescue with this number she did (without a pattern and with only a guess at Piper's measurements).

She was thrilled with it, as all onlookers seemed to be. We took her out trick-or-treating in our neighborhood, which we usually try to avoid doing, but since this is Super-Bible-Land, a lot of neighborhoods made their kids trick-or-treat on Saturday instead of Sunday and after some confused driving around we decided to just tough it out on the home turf. Luckily I had bought a bag of emergency candy, so I didn't feel like a total heel for partaking and not handing any out. Of course, it took about six minutes (no, really) for the bag of chocolate bars to disappear because our street was chockablock full of teenagers not even bothering with costumes but bowling over littler kids in their race from house to house.

We took Piper up and down half our block, a trip which lasted about 45 minutes and filled her little plastic pumpkin about a third of the way. It was more than enough candy for a 3-year-old, and she had a good time talking to the neighbors. It was a little surprising to see how many of them know us by sight and her by name. I also realized this is the only time all year we see a lot of these kids' parents.

I think she would've gone home happy after the first or second house, but the house on the end of the block had some wicked awesome decorating going on (it included a fog machine and music), so we sauntered down to check it out. She was pretty tired and ready to quit after that, and she begged me to carry her between the last few houses as we walked home.

The first thing she said when she woke up the next morning was "Can I have some candy?"

Ahh...October.

2010-10-28T12:25:00.000-07:00

The twilight view out our back door. I'm so sad October is almost over.

Bike Ride

2010-10-27T12:24:00.000-07:00

I finally took my new bike out for a spin. It was a cool, cloudy day, and although I'd only intended to go around the block a couple of times, instead I found myself pedaling full speed out of our neighborhood. I rode for more than an hour, not going all that far from home, but certainly appreciating how much better everything looks from the seat of a bike. I stopped long enough to snap this photo before I headed home.

Dinner

2010-10-26T12:27:00.000-07:00

Roasted butternut squash and potatoes. I've been eating this at least once a week. It's EASY. Just chop up a butternut squash and a couple potatoes, toss with olive oil, garlic/garlic salt and thyme, spread on a cookie sheet and stick it in a 350-degree oven for a while. Stir or flip the pieces every now and then so they get nicely roasted on all sides. Mine usually takes 30-40 minutes, but check it after 20. YUM.

Zombie Dough Skull

2010-10-25T11:22:00.000-07:00

During a couple of Piper's recent sick days, we turned to Play-Doh as a way to combat the boredom. I broke out the Halloween cookie cutters and made this (the cutaway skull was accidental, then I filled it with braaaaiiiins). I was quite pleased with myself, Piper was amused, and best of all, my husband was totally grossed out. He likes to watch slasher flicks, yet he could not handle me rearranging the zombie's brains.

"Oh my God, STOP TOUCHING IT."
"Whaat? His brains are crooked. I'm fixing them."
"Sure you are. That's so gross!"
"Are you saying I'm intentionally trying to gross you out by messing with my little zombie skull?"
"Yes, yes I am."
"Hmm. Well, I wasn't before, but now that you mention it..."

Love means never having to say "braaaaiiiins."

On the Mend

2010-10-23T07:36:00.000-07:00

I think, providing whichever deity is responsible for toddler sickness doesn't read this and smite me for my hubris (probably a Greek one, those gods were bastards), that we are getting better over here. It's been a scary, scary week for me. It started with a little cough last week and progressed into violent hacking, 103+ fevers, and all sorts of digestive pyrotechnics. I learned a few things:

1. True love is hugging and cuddling your kid even though she's got salsa-and-ice-cream puke in her hair.
2. Front-load washers really suck at getting bodily fluids out of bed linens. Especially white duvet covers.
3. I really need to find a pediatrician who will take me seriously.

My vivacious and chatty little girl turned, over the course of two days, into a sunken-eyed, hollow-cheeked child who was too weak to even sit up and play puzzles. I pestered the doctor about the fact that Piper was exhibiting signs of extreme dehydration, but got the same "it's a virus, it'll pass" response I get to everything. Even when Piper lost over a pound in two days, I was brushed off. I was freaked, because for a kid who only weighed 29 lbs to begin with, that's a pretty big loss. She wasn't eating, she wasn't drinking. I had to sit with her in bathtubs full of cool water and pump her full of ibuprofen to keep the fever at a reasonable level. All she could do was lay on the couch glassy-eyed and watch cartoons or listen to stories. I was freaking the hell out. I followed all the instructions I was given to the letter, trying to coax her into drinking Pedialyte or eating crackers, bananas and rice. I kept weighing her and so far she's lost about 3 lbs, 10% of her body weight. I ran her into the pediatrician's office both last Friday and again on Monday, making the 40-minutes-each-way drive only to be told that it was no big deal, not to give her too much medicine (I got yelled at Monday for giving the antibiotic the doctor had prescribed during the Friday visit) and not to let her have any juice. I ground my teeth and tried not to panic as my baby got sicker and sicker.

Finally, on Wednesday, I couldn't take it any more and when, on the way back from a grocery run, she asked to have "chicken and fries" for lunch, we hit a drive-through (like I needed an excuse to get Chick-Fil-A). She ate more at that meal than she had in the past five days put together, and I started to feel a little less anxious.

She was well enough yesterday for a quick trip to the big children's library (I was looking for a book they had weeded out, so I could buy it, but no luck) and a treat from the French bakery. I am letting her watch just a little more TV right now, and then I'm shutting the damned thing off. She has watched more TV in the past week than in the past six months, and I suspect there's going to be some withdrawal. I did get to introduce her to a couple new things (I love Kipper, but four hours in a row is enough), like:

- The Last Unicorn, a beloved movie from my childhood. She loved it and now asks to watch "the beaunicorn one" every other day.
- Shaun the Sheep, which was new to me too. I adore Nick Park (creator of Wallace & Gromit) and Aardman Studios*, so I thought we'd give it a shot. It totally cracks me up, and I love that the sheep are always using their brains and cunning to solve problems.
- Hocus Pocus, which is one of my all-time favorite Halloween movies. It's silly and ridiculous and features Bette Midler camping it up like only Bette can. The storyline is still a little bit over my 3-year-old's head, but she enjoys screechy witches on brooms as much as anyone.

I realized this week that once again, my Fall is whizzing away. How is it almost Halloween? We haven't done a single fun Fall thing yet. No hikes, no apple-picking, no cider doughnuts. No pies, no vats of homemade applesauce. I made pumpkin bread, apple-pumpkin muffins, and sweet-potato chilli, but that's been it. We have scheduled a visit to the pumpkin patch Sunday morning. I am trying to work on knitting, but I just can't settle down and get to it. I feel like the summer dragged on forever, and now my favorite months will be over before I can blink. I think it's because October is so warm here (still 80+ most days), I just don't realize what's going on until it's almost over. The leaves have barely started falling from the trees. Yesterday Piper was feeling well enough to play outside for a while, and I attempted to rake up a leaf pile for her and her little neighborhood friend to jump in. The result was pretty pathetic, even though I raked up everything I could find from our front and decent-sized back yards, and a little from the neighbor's yard as well.

*When my siblings and I were kids, my dad used to watch the Angry Kid cartoons with us and he laughed just as hard as we did. Now that I'm older, I understand why he laughed so hard. I totally love the geniuses at Aardman, because the same is true of Shaun the Sheep. Piper and I laugh in the same spots, sometimes for completely different reasons. The original Creature Comforts was much funnier than Creature Comforts America, though.

The Sandals Really Make the Outfit

2010-10-21T08:35:00.000-07:00

Taken weeks ago, during a "chilly" spell (meaning it was only 67 during the day, not 87).

My Sweet New Ride

2010-10-20T08:45:00.000-07:00

This bike is awesome. What is more awesome is that it was FREE. I won it. I never win anything, but I am always entering contests and drawings. To have my first win be a totally sweet brand-new Cafe 8 bike...well, I'm over the moon. There's just a few hitches:

1. It's really big. I'm going to have to lower the seat almost all the way in order to ride it with any degree of control. It is not a light bike by any standard, and
2. as I have a 3-year-old who needs to somehow be on there with me, I am concerned about being able to handle a sizable bicycle with a big 'ol extra seat on the back. Particularly since it will contain a squirmy, loud child much of the time.
3. All the child bike seats are really fugly. There seem to be about three models of commercially-available child bike seats in the U.S. and they all look like they're made of Duplo blocks.So I have this sleek, awesome-looking bike, and now I have to make it look like a Tonka Toy by putting a huge plastic seat on the back. I'm looking on EBay for a vintage one, since they are mostly wire-frame deals that won't add significant weight. Unfortunately, most of the ones I've found so far seem to be rusty, dirty wrecks.

Whew!

2010-10-19T09:02:00.000-07:00

Has it really been that long since I've posted? Argh.

I feel like so far this fall was supposed to be a frantic sprint that would soon wind down, but has instead turned into a marathon. Having Piper in preschool 11 hours per week has turned out to suck up a lot of time, not free up a few mornings. Between the 25-minutes-each-way drive and volunteer duties (which are NOT going well, by the way), I am feeling more time-crunched than ever. My husband is working crazy hours, which leaves almost no time for family stuff. I love, LOVE October, but so far we haven't done any fun fall things - no walks collecting leaves, no pumpkin patch, no apple-picking. I feel like the summer dragged on forever and fall is just sliding through my fingers. Our neighborhood has been particularly unpleasant lately, which is making me anxious and jittery. Piper has been really sick for over a week now, with hardcore stomach troubles and a recurrent raging fever (103+) that my irritating pediatrician assures me is "no cause for alarm." I've also been warned that this thing is highly contagious and that we are sure to get it before long. Which is grrreat, because we both totally have the time to spend a week laying around eating crackers.

Last Days of Summer

2010-09-30T07:49:00.000-07:00

I hope, anyway. It's been in the 70's and rainy this week, lovely Fall weather that I am ridiculously happy to see. I took these on a day when the temps were still in the 90's, but the light had changed to be more...well, Fallish. I don't know how to explain it exactly, but one day you wake up and the outside looks a little different. Even if the temperature has you sweating and drinking gallons of iced tea.

Man, it was hot that day. Hence the wet dress (we were playing in her wading pool). I am not sorry to see this summer go!

Conversations With Piper: Poop and Parts

2010-09-29T10:24:00.000-07:00

We've now reached the poop stage, I think.

I thought we could avoid it, because we are not the sort of people who find poop jokes funny most of the time, and we don't usually spend a lot of time talking about poop. I thought there would be a few questions about poop, maybe, but had no idea that this subject would occupy so much space in my daughter's brain. I think it comes out of a growing awareness of bodies (her own and others'), body functions, and discovering how many creatures share characteristics. Whatever the reason, we have been discussing poop and body parts a lot lately:

While petting the cat:

"Mommy, is this Mei-Mei's belly?"
"Yeah, but don't...just...just - pet her gently, okay? GENTLY."
"I'm pettin' Mei-Mei's belly."
"Yes, you are. GENTLY. Don't squeeze."
"Mommy?"
"Yes, Baby?
"Do you think there's poop in Mei-Mei's belly?"
"Well, yeah, I think there's probably some poop in there."
"Do you think she's going to poop in the litterbox?"
"Yes, that is where kitties are supposed to poop."
"Do you think there's poop in her belly?"
"Yes, I imagine so."
She paused and then looked at me. "Mommy?"
"Yes, Piper?"
"Is this your belly?"
"Yep."
"Do you think there's poop in your belly?"
"Probably."
"But do you think you're not going to poop in the litterbox?"
"No, kiddo, I don't think I am. In fact, I can say that I am definitely not going to poop in the litterbox."
"You're gonna poop on the potty."
"Yes, I am. Because that's where people poop, they poop in the potty. But kitties poop in a litterbox."
"Mommy?"
"Yes, Baby?"
"Do you think there's poop in Ellie's belly?"
"Yes, I think there poop in Ellie's belly. Don't whack Ellie on the head like that..."

Before we go to the playground:
"I'm going to go potty before we go, okay? You really should too."
"Are you going to poop?"
"No, I'm not going to poop."
"You should poop! Please try to poop!"
"Kiddo...oh, you know what? Never mind. Just find your shoes, okay?"

When I'm giving Ellie Benadryl:
"Is that Ellie's medicine?"
"Yep. It's for her belly."
"Does Ellie have scratches on her belly?"
"Yes, she does. That's why I'm giving her medicine."
"Did Ellie scratch her belly? And that's why she has to get medicine?"
"That's exactly right."
"Mommy? Do you think Ellie has poop in her belly that she was scratching?"
"Yeah, Kiddo, I think there's probably some poop in her belly..."

At least every other day, we have a conversation similar to this. We also talk about how other people do the same things we do; that is, if it's bath time at our house, she speculates that one of her classmates is probably also taking a bath at their house. I can see where her little mind is going with this, and how she's realizing the world is so much bigger than what she sees and touches every day. It's pretty damned cool, actually.

Purple Poncho in Action

2010-09-27T13:01:00.000-07:00

I finally got a photo of it where she's not naked or blurry. I realize that the poncho itself is slightly blurry in this photo, but trust me, it's better this way. This is the only one where she wasn't making some really freaky face. Wait, I did find one where she was only making a face that was merely a little weird and not really freaky:

She is exactly like her father; every time I pull out the camera he starts making strange, freaky faces too. Trying to photograph the two of them together usually causes me to pull out my hair, kick things, or give up and buy myself a gigantic sugary latte instead of shooting pictures.

For a Brief Instant, I Almost Got a Warm, Fuzzy Feeling

2010-09-22T08:51:00.000-07:00

A couple Saturdays ago, for 90 minutes, I didn't hate our neighborhood.

A helicopter was hovering just past the woods that border our subdivision. Our best guess was that they were filming whatever was going on over at the Whitewater Center. It was interesting, but hardly cause for alarm.

The neighborhood kids, however, were pretty wound up. Particularly the little boys, who whizzed around on their bikes trying to get a better view of the hovering aircraft. The best view could be had from the sidewalk next to and in front of our house, which led to a cluster of kids hanging around my mailbox. It also meant I got to hear all their theories on what the helicopter was doing there.

"Man, it's the cops. They lookin' for somebody. I'm out."

"I heard a horse from the stables back there got loose. It's running around in the woods and they're trying to catch it. They're gonna shoot it, I think."

"Somebody said a prisoner got loose. He was cleanin' up the highway and he escaped. He murdered a bunch of people. He's gonna get us."

"Maybe it's a tiger or something. Maybe a truck with animals in it crashed on the highway and now they have to find all the animals in the woods."

I found all this amusing and somewhat charming, which is a refreshing change from the stress and irritation I usually feel when I think about where we live. For a few minutes, it was a neighborhood I wouldn't mind staying in for a few more years, instead of one I can't wait to move out of.

The kids gradually lost interested and drifted away. The rotten kid from next door went back to throwing rocks at cars and his friends. Even though we were standing in front of our house, at the end of the driveway, I could hear teenagers screaming "Fuck you motherfucker, that was my fuckin' shot, you fuckin' motherfucker! FUUUUUCCCKKKK!!" as they played basketball on the court in the park behind our house.

Ahhh, I thought. Back to normal.

Ugh.

2010-09-21T07:19:00.000-07:00

This is as close as it gets to an action costume in the "girls" section (WTF, must EVERYTHING be segregated by gender?!) of Halloween stuff. They also had a "Sailor Sweetie," so you can encourage your daughter to be a tramped-out parody of a demanding and noble profession by land OR by sea. Modern womanhood really is all about choices.

I Think You Are Using the Word "Style" Incorrectly.

2010-09-17T11:01:00.000-07:00

Snapshots: Not-August 2010

2010-09-13T11:04:00.000-07:00

I thought I had all this written down already, but either Blogger ate it or I am starting to dream about blogging. Either way it means that I'm re-writing it from memory, so 80% of this post is only 75% true. Guess what I re-read lately?

I am a note-writer and list-maker. Our house often looks like some Notepad Fairy came through and sprinkled every flat surface with oddly-sized and brightly-colored mini books of paper. I love to write things down...and then forget about them. This leads to finding weird notes I've written to myself, one or two tiny pages of an itty-bitty spiral-bound dollar-store notebook filled up with my huge scrawl. I always tell myself to just get basic ideas down, because I'm sure I'll remember the details later. When, weeks or months later, these forgotten works of genius re-emerge, I stare at "beans pumpkin onion ball glitter SAVE!" or "Forget try NPR birTHdy" and have no idea what it means. The most baffling one I've found lately was in the kitchen, on a page torn from a mini-notebook with Sailor Moon on the cover. It said "wicked witch thought promo snatched away by fresh-faced no idea how works." I am completely clueless as to what I was talking about, but my writing is so frantic it must've seemed really important at the time. I spent 10 minutes yesterday staring at the note as I slurped down my morning coffee and wondered if I could turn it into a haiku.

Always with the questions these days. At bedtime yesterday: "Daddy? Do you think food makes my nose grow?" At lunch: "Mommy, do you think some strawberries could be purple?" Playing outside: "Do you think bugs could eat some dirt?" Any time of day: "Mommy, do you think we have three cats here in this house? Just three and not four?" "Mommy, do you think pumpkins are good to smell?" "Do you think the kitty's belly smells like food? Or does it smell like candy? Do you think cats like gum? Do you think Mei-Mei has gum in her belly?"

I am finally getting around to reading those Stieg Larsson books. If they're as good as everyone says, I expect to spend a lot of nights staying up way too late reading them. I do not understand why they feel the need to re-make the movies, though. I think I'll be skipping those. I am still working on Consuming Kids, although since I find it too upsetting to read right before bed and that's when I get 99% of my reading done, it's been slow going. Very much enjoying the author's blog, though.

There has been a paper explosion at our house. I was doing a pretty good job of keeping the in/out flow of paper, junk mail, bills, and stuff at a steady pace, not allowing things to accumulate on flat surfaces and in piles around my desk. In the last month, either the rate of intake sped up or I slowed down. There are now piles and piles of paper on every flat surface in the house. I believe part of the blame rests with my mother-in-law, who not only brings a stack of not-that-useful papers, articles, magazines, and books every time she visits, but also sends thick packets of junk every month as well. Expired coupons, magazines totally unrelated to our lives, color-copied magazine articles, puffy foam glitter-shedding stickers, detailed instructions for craft projects we will never get around to doing. She sends it all and more, and we have to at least keep it and look through it all, because she will phone up and ask about each item. I am trying to repay her in kind by sending folder-fulls of Piper's artwork to her house, so that her floor can be covered in crusty flakes of dried tempera paint, stickers that never come off, and crayon-shavings the same way mine is. I take special pleasure in giving her the papers covered in glitter.

I keep subscribing and then un-subscribing to the Wardrobe Refashion RSS feed. Some days I'm all inspired and some days I'm like "aaahhhh too many posts oh the crazy embellishment helllp!"

Piper started preschool last week (which is why it's been so quiet on this blog), and so far she loves it. This is a 100% improvement over the school we had her in last year, where she cried and begged us not to take her every morning. We are getting to know the other parents. It's awfully cliquey, since most people there have already had kids in for 1-2 years, and the 2-year-old class, where all the other newbies are, doesn't meet on the same days as Piper's class. It's a non-profit, so they rely heavily on parent volunteers. I decided to jump in and immediately signed up for 4 or 5 things. I'm hoping I haven't bitten off more than I can chew.

Another New Header

2010-09-03T23:00:00.001-07:00

It's still not quite right, but I do like it much better, and I didn't scream this time. It didn't even take me very long.

Summer Can Suck It.

2010-09-02T13:28:00.000-07:00

Okay, so I'm sure I'm not the only one tired of the heat.

Not everybody lives here in the Southeast, which is apparently the sweaty armpit of the U.S., but ye gods this has been a hot summer. I am so ready for it to end. The end of scorching days and nearly passing out every time I mow the lawn and ozone alerts and the hostas I worked so hard to plant in the spring and which looked so nice for 6 weeks getting crispier and deader every day. The end of not being able to drag myself out of bed and go for a run because it's 85 degrees at 8:30 a.m. And I am definitely ready for the end of stratospherically-high electric bills.

Which is why the trees in our back yard presented me with a VERY welcome sight earlier this week:

Now, if the weather would just follow suit, I'd be a really happy camper.

Punkinhead

2010-08-30T09:48:00.000-07:00

When my best friend's little boy was three, I made him a hat. And he loved it. And loved it. AND LOVED IT. He wore it everywhere. He carried it around and picked at its edges. Some kid at his day care tried to steal it, and my friend snatched it right back from the thief (and the thief's mother, who was all "Oh, yeah, it's our hat, totally") with a "I know this isn't your hat, because my friend Steph made this for MY kid. See the frayed parts right there? That's where MY kid keeps picking at it, because it's HIS hat! So unless the universe is SUPER weird today and you have a friend who also kitted your son a hat in these exact colors and which he picked apart in exactly the same spots, we're taking our hat home now."

She can be pretty fierce when it comes to her kids and her hand-knits.

Anyway, her little boy loved it so much that he literally loved it to pieces, unraveling and picking at it until it was in shreds. It took me a couple of years, but I finally got around to making a replacement. I actually finished this in March or April sometime, I think, but then it got really hot and they were moving so I didn't mail it off. I came across it this week when I was "rearranging my stash" (i.e. taking all the yarns out of their containers and lining them up and touching them and dreaming up 10 projects for every skein).

It's orange, like the original (she called him "my little pumpkinhead" when he was a baby). It really is a nice, pumpkin-y orange, not the traffic-cone color it shows up as in these photos (and wow, does my camera hate to focus on oranges, reds, & yellows). I got the stripe a little too high on this one, but oh well. I hope he likes it. My friend said that not only did the little one love the original hat, but that her older son and her husband had all taken turns wearing it as well, so I'm thinking of making a few more to send to them. It's still pretty hot out, hardly wool-hat weather yet, and this pattern is super-fast, so I think I can manage two more by the time the snow flies.

And yeah, I know this yarn is mostly acrylic, which I usually try to avoid like the plague, but this is machine-washable and inexpensive. I'd rather give an inexpensive gift they will use (and is easily replaceable when some kid steals it or her husband gets it all greasy under the car) than a show-piece they're too afraid to wear. He loved this hat, and I can keep cranking these babies out until he goes to college, something I could not do with a more expensive or delicate yarn. Sometimes I gotta suck it up and make peace with the non-natural fibers, you know?

Pattern: Sparkling Pom-Pom Ski/Toboggan Hat (sorry, you have to log in to see LB's free patterns)
Yarn: Lion Brand Wool-Ease Thick & Quick
Ravelry details are here.

15 Answers

2010-08-25T08:50:00.000-07:00

...to questions my daughter has asked me in the past 24 hours:

1. "Well, yeah, I do think the Beatles probably ate a big bowl of ice cream when they got home from work. What flavors do you think they like?"

2. "No, I do not think Daddy wants you to stick that up his nose. In fact, I'm pretty sure he doesn't."

3. "No, you cannot hold Mei-Mei. She does not like it. Yeah, that? What you're doing right now? DON'T. Put the cat DOWN."

4. "Yes, there is poop in the cat boxes. Yeah, it's pretty smelly."

5. "Well, if you want to eat a block of dry ramen noodles for a snack, I suppose I don't see the harm in it."

6. "In that picture? Oh, that big pile is George's fan mail. The boxes are candy - jelly babies. Yep, because he likes candy."

7. "What's in his mouth? Uhh...candy. Yeah, it's, um, candy." [It was a cigar.]

8. "Yeah, I think the Beatles probably liked to drink water."

9. "I guess strawberries could smell like cabbage."

10. "No, I do not think Ellie wants to wear that necklace. Please stop whacking her with it."

11. "No, you cannot go outside and get the mail while naked. Just putting on shoes doesn't count."

12. "What's in Ringo's hand? Uhh...a drumstick. I think it's a drumstick." [It was a cigarette.]

13. "Sure, it can be time. I'll get it out for you. 8:30 a.m. can be time for Play-Doh if you want it to be."

14. "No, I will not give you any more whipped cream on your strawberry pancakes. Eat some strawberries, eat some pancake. But no more whipped cream."

15. "Yes, I think the Beatles liked to eat pie. Probably cake too."

Purple Poncho

2010-08-23T11:43:00.000-07:00

This took longer than I intended, what with our busy summer and near-constant company. It was supposed to take a couple of days and wound up taking over a month. But she really loves it, and it was easy. I was so afraid of sewing it up that I had the finished pieces done for almost a week before I seamed them together. I'm not sure if I did it exactly right, but it looks pretty good. This was a really inexpensive project. I used stash yarn, but this is discloth cotton, and it's less than $4 for two balls.

Pattern: Spice Girl by Candi Jensen, from Total Baby Knits
Yarn: Lily Sugar n' Cream Solids
Ravelry details are here.

She's worn it around the house a couple of times - she likes to put it on and dance around (to the Beatles, natch). She's worn it out of the house twice, which is pretty good considering it's still over 90 here every day. I'm hoping to put it on her and get her to sit still so I can snap a photo. Silly of me, I know.

Don't Bother To Cut The Cheese

2010-08-18T11:44:00.000-07:00

Suffering from cabin fever combined with a lack of imagination last week, I took her to the grocery store right before naptime. We were both hot, cranky, bored, and sick of being cooped up inside (it was yet another day of near-100 temps and ozone alerts, so outdoor activities were off the roster). I couldn't think of anything else to do, certainly nothing that would get us home in time to attempt a nap, and I needed some things anyway. It's not like it was a hardship; she loves the grocery store. There's one two minutes from our house, but I usually drive a little farther to the one that's more fun for kids. She gets a free cookie, I rarely turn down her request to ride in one of the cars with the big plastic "car" on the front, I let her partake of the samples in the produce and cheese departments, and at the end of the trip, I usually pony up $0.50 for her to ride the whiplash-inducing singing dragon located in the vestibule.

On this day, we swooped in and scooped up the items on my list. She asked for "cheese, that big one to eat in my hand," and pointed at the 1/2-lb blocks lined up in the dairy case. I figured cut-up cheese would be a pretty decent snack and told her to put it in the cart. We survived the checkout line, she rode the singing dragon, and we headed for home. I could tell that she was really, really tired, and I realized that I was playing a pretty dangerous game here. Sure, our little field trip had probably helped tire her out, but now there was a good chance she would fall asleep before we got home. If she did, well, GAME OVER. If she falls asleep somewhere that's not her own bed, even for the last three minutes before we pull into the driveway, she will not take a nap. Will. Not. No amount of pleading, bribery, yelling, taking away books and toys, putting a baby gate on her room, letting her lay down in our bed, or reading 35 books in a row changes this fact. It's even worse if it happens before bedtime, because then she won't fall asleep until at least 1:00 a.m.

Anyway, I knew I had to do something. She sleepily mumbled something about being hungry and asked for her cheese, so I grabbed it from the bag, opened the wrapper, and handed it to her. A half-pound bar of cheese, and I gave it to her to munch on like it was a 3 Musketeers. She only ate a few bites, but she did not fall asleep on the way home. She took a 2-hour nap later in the afternoon.

Improvisation and a disregard for cholesterol. I has them.

Welcome To My Birthday

2010-08-13T12:09:00.000-07:00

YUP. Not only is it Friday the 13th, 90 degrees and rising (actually 93 at the moment I write this, I took the photo a couple hours ago), but it's my birthday.

My very nice husband gave me my first present at 12:02 last night, a bottle of raspberry lambic, which I immediately had two glasses of. I'd been reading this book before bed and it made me so anxious I couldn't get to sleep. I'll post a full review after I've finished it, but so far I have two things to say: 1) this marketing stuff is scary, scary shit with long-term societal implications; 2) everyone who has kids, wants kids, likes kids, hates kids, or has ever been a kid should read this. I'm now an avid reader of the author's blog and looking forward to reading her other book ASAP. Anyway, two glasses of lambic and an episode of Psych are a good cure for can't-sleep anxiety.

He gave me my other present this morning, a set of movies: The Color of Magic and Hogfather. We are some big Pratchett fans in this house. Piper sang me a song: "Happy birthday to Mom-my! Happy birthday to Mom-my! On your birth-day, you! can! eat! CAKE! Happy birthday to Mom-my!"

Life Lessons, Brought To You By Tragically Ordinary

2010-08-11T12:28:00.000-07:00

I am miserably sick today with some sort of sinus thing, and since I haven't quite completed my latest knitting project (and therefore can't share it yet), all I have for you is a list of things I've learned. These are things I've been thinking about a lot lately, because we've had some discussions about our future plans for this little family (actually, at this stage, it's more like 'plans to have a plan to make plans') and for ourselves. Friday is my birthday, which I always dread, but I'm trying hard not to get too hung up on it this year. I'm trying to view all the hard knocks and missteps and bumbling that have occurred in my life so far as learning experiences, instead of a list of reasons why I shouldn't be allowed near people and should never be given power tools or a checkbook.

What I've Learned So Far:

1. Wear an apron while cooking bacon. Do not cook anything while drunk or naked. Definitely do not cook anything while drunk and naked.

2. If you buy your significant other something awesome for their birthday, and the same year they buy you some unwanted, bewilderingly useless kitchen appliance for your birthday, it's time for a new relationship. This is particularly true of college relationships, and quadruply true if the other party doesn't understand why you're upset. If they can't comprehend that you make $7.50 an hour yet managed to buy them an amazing and perfectly-chosen $125 gift, and that their reciprocal $35 newspaper-wrapped breadmaker might be upsetting, especially given that you don't bake, they're probably not The One. If you've been together for two years and get a shrug and a "I didn't know what else to get you," they are definitely not The One.

3. You will never be able to convince anyone else that their significant other is not The One. It's really something they need to realize on their own.

4. If your baby makes a gigantic mess every time she eats blueberry applesauce, either deal with it or stop giving her blueberry applesauce. Don't try and feed it to her while she's in the bathtub. It's going to make a bigger mess than you ever imagined.

5. If you're moving to another state, some place you know nothing about, RENT for a year.

6. Investigate strange smells promptly. This applies to any and all strange smells in any and all locations.

7. All mothers are crazy. All mothers drive their daughters crazy. Most mothers-in-law are crazy, too. Everyone's definition of "crazy" is different, so it's all (HA!) relative.

8. Air conditioning, a working dishwasher, and a sense of humor are key components of a happy marriage.

9.Before you buy that extra t-shirt or stack of discount books or whatever trinket you're eying, consider how you feel about moving it back and forth across the country a few times. Doesn't sound like fun, does it?

10. Don't confuse "adventure" with "stupidity." Don't confuse "caution" or "responsibility" with "fear."

So what about you? What have you learned so far?

What I Learned About Making Headers.

2010-08-06T15:13:00.000-07:00

You may (or may not) have noticed the new header.

This is what it looks like without the text in it, because...well, because Blogger is frustrating and all their NEW! AWESOME! CUSTOMIZATION OPTIONS! don't really work with my old template edits.

My last header picture was one that I took when we went to an exhibit at MOCAD, two years ago. It's been up there that long. I just never found the time to change it, and since I couldn't exactly remember how I got it up there in the first place, I figured I'd probably better not monkey with it. But a few nights ago, armed with my new computer (an early and much-appreciated birthday gift from my mom), this nice tutorial, and some gumption, I decided to change it. I've fiddled a bit with the code for my page; I thought I knew what I was doing. Ten minutes, tops, I thought.

Three-plus hours later, I had learned the following things:

1. I don't know what the hell I'm doing.

2. Blogger has lots of choices for tricking out your blog and I don't like any of them.

3. If you're going to pick a photo to crop for a blog header, it has to be one where you only like a tiny portion of the image. If you have a DSLR set on high resolution and large photo size, and you try to use a very close-up shot of something you just end up cutting off most of whatever is in the picture. It also can't be fuzzy or blurry at all because that is only emphasized when you crop.

4. I don't have any photos where I only like a small part of the image. At least not any non-fuzzy or non-blurry ones. I did go through the pain of trying to crop 6 different pictures that were too huge, though.

5. That photo I was certain I took of Piper's feet last summer, when she had her toenails painted cherry red and she was wearing those yellow-and-white retro-looking polka-dot sandals? I never took it. I have 45 other pictures of her feet, but not that exact one.

6. High-resolution pictures of feet look terrifying when cropped close and put up on a large computer monitor. It's like they're going to leap out and kick you in the chin.

In the end, I had to go all the way back to years-old photos I took with my point-and-shoot, because those were small enough to crop and still give me something halfway nice to look at. It's still not quite right, but it'll have to do until I can get something better up there.

Lego Fallingwater

2010-08-05T08:00:00.000-07:00

This thing is so cool. I want it. I have nowhere to put it, and I'm sure that even if I did find somewhere to put it, it would take all of three seconds before a) the cats knocked it over, smashing it back into all 811 individual bricks or b) Piper found it and disassembled it back into all 811 individual bricks.

But it's pretty cool anyway.

Found at Barnes & Noble

Lobster Ravioli

2010-08-04T12:02:00.000-07:00

"This is awfully awesome. These are tasty and good."

-She picked these out herself. Seriously. Her grandma was in town and told her to get whatever she wanted in the grocery store. My daughter was quite adamant; I tried to talk her into spinach tortellini (the kid LOVES spinach, can't get enough of it), but she wouldn't let me put the lobster ones back. "No," she said. "I already said I just want the lobster raviloi. I just want the lobster ones!" And she scarfed them down, without even a drop of olive oil for seasoning.

At the Park

2010-07-29T08:40:00.000-07:00

Breakfast as Reward

2010-07-28T07:17:00.000-07:00

Her three-year checkup went swimmingly; the doctor said she is "absolutely perfect." Piper only cried once, during the part of the exam where the doctor asked her to shrug out of the paper gown so she could look her over. This is a vast improvement over past doctor's visits, which often required a nurse and a parent to hold her down so shots could be given or ears inspected. I rewarded her bravery with breakfast at Ikea, her favorite place in the world. Some people will roll their eyes, but I figure they have lots of things to play with, beds to try out, ketchup, potatoes, chocolate milk, and mac & cheese - all under the same roof. When you're three, that is the height of perfection.

For those of you that subscribe to my RSS feed: some weird half-finished posts may show up today; I was cleaning house and accidentally hit "publish" once or twice instead of "delete." Sorry!

Photography Fail

2010-07-22T07:16:00.000-07:00

One day last week when the morning cloudcover provided some really great outdoor lighting, I got her up and dressed and marched her outside to try and take some 3-year pictures, of the sort suitable for giving to the grandparents. The whining about how they never have any pictures and you can never see her face in the ones you send blah blah blah has gotten particularly loud lately. I never get photos taken professionally any more; the few times I've had it done it turned out to be a lot of money for pictures I didn't like all that much and which end up languishing in a box somewhere because a) the grandmothers cannot seem to get me a list of HOW MANY and WHAT SIZES they need and b)I am a lousy correspondent and forget to send them to our friends.

So I thought I'd try my own this year; I have a DSLR and my computer will occasionally cooperate long enough to upload & edit on Picnik. How hard could it be?

I got exactly four pictures before she started jumping around in a mud puddle and fell, covering the cute-yet-not-cutesy outfit I'd picked out in red clay dirt. I think this is the only close-up of her face, which I took with my phone just after her mud-puddle dive. Just be glad it's not a video, or else you'd hear me begging her to stand still for Mommy, just one more second PLEASE as she whines about needing to go inside and change her clothes.

In Which I Whine A Little More About The Heat

2010-07-20T15:28:00.000-07:00

I have been completely exhausted since summer set in, and I'm starting to think it's not my fault. Every one of our houseguests so far this summer has also been exhausted. Some of them required a nap every single day of their stay with us, even though none of them were toddlers. The lone toddler/preschooler in the house (that would be mine, natch) has fought her naps with a vehemence I find admirable, since I have to drink two glasses of ice water and mentally steel myself just to ~~swim~~ walk into the kitchen and get some grapes.

The cats are pretty miserable. Piper is really sweaty. I am drinking so much water I feel like I could float. I have stopped cooking for the most part, and we are subsisting on cut fruit and cottage cheese and yogurt and chopped vegetables and pita chips with the various dips I concoct from whatever happens to be in the fridge. We're making our own popsicles and smoothies quite a bit.

We have the air on, but most of the day it's just enough to take the edge off, and even that is getting pretty expensive. I also have a sneaking suspicion our A/C unit is about to crap out on us. It's five years old, like the house, and was doing an okay job until a week or so ago. I've noticed it seems to be working less well, not cooling quite as effectively. One more thing to add to the to-do list.

I bought her a little plastic wading pool*, but every time we use it, we are immediately chased inside by huge black wasps**. With the dry summer, they quickly flock to any water source, and although we knocked down a few colonies during the spring, I can't figure out where these huge, aggressive ones are coming from. I am allergic to bees and many other stinging insects, so I was pretty freaked out to see no less than EIGHT enormous wasps hovering over the wading pool as my daughter splashed away. It's been the same thing every time we have any water outside. As soon as I find them, they are toast, but until then we have to find something else to do around the house.

*Let me tell you a story about this: several weeks ago, when presented YET AGAIN during the late afternoon with the tease of oppressive cloudcover that made everything hotter but did not result in any rain, I actually shook my fist and howled at the sky, "RAIN, already, would you?!" The clouds apparently heard me, and paid me back by dumping the only 45 seconds of rain and fierce winds we got all day on me at exactly the moment I exited the store pushing a shopping cart containing a flat plastic wind-catching wading pool and a three-year-old doing her best to climb out. We were all soaked, the pool almost blew away, and I ran the shopping cart into my ankle pretty hard, which caused a bruise that, over a month later, is still fading into ugly browns and yellows.

**I am so OVER the Southern bugs. It's always something down here. Ants, crickets, bees, flies, wasps, various kinds of huge and freaky beetles, earwigs, ~~giant flying cockroaches~~ palmetto bugs, ticks - some kind of many-legged critter is perpetually making its way into my house. They are all huge and aggressive and bold. It goes on pretty much year-round, and I am about ready to pack it up and go back to shoveling snow in the North just so I can be assured of a couple months where I don't have to worry about entomological invasions. This year seems to have been a good one for ants, wasps, and spiders, because I have been battling all three constantly and I am so SICK of it.

A New Low, or a New High, I'm Not Sure Which

2010-07-16T07:02:00.000-07:00

Last week, we dressed up like cows to get free food.

Oh, yeah. Head to toe.

A certain chicken-sandwich chain to which we have recently become addicts had a "dress like a cow, get free food" day. We weren't going to go, but all three of us were hot, cranky, and anxious that day, so I took a white trash bag, a black trash bag, two of my husband's old white undershirts, a pair of scissors, some tape, and, with a little assistance, 20 minutes later we had three cow costumes. All three of us got a totally free lunch, and Piper loved her costume so much she wore it continuously for the next three days. We had to pry it off of her at bedtime, because three-year-olds don't understand that wearing a giant plastic bag to bed is not a good idea. By about day 5 of being loved on, it bit the dust, and we gave her the two decorated shirts to run around with, much to her delight.

As we cut and taped and fitted, my husband said he thought I was pretty awesome for taking a pile of stuff that most people would throw away and making costumes out of it in less than half an hour, although he was unsure if the fact that we were doing it only for the free food canceled out the awesome part.

"I'm not sure either," I said, "But I am hungry."

Also, I think this is the biggest tangible reward I have yet obtained from any sort of crafty endeavor or project. I am not sure what that says about me, or my craft skills, but I can tell you that a free lunch tastes DELICIOUS.

A Fairly Rockin' Felicity

2010-07-14T09:02:00.000-07:00

Due to ozone alerts, hot weather, my child's desire to be naked most of the time, company, and my own exhaustion, we've spent a lot of time indoors lately. I felt like I was in the grip of some heat-generated inertia, and my usual cure for that is to knit something. A small, fast project, something to shake off the funk and get my gears turning again.

Piper dug a ball of pink I-don't-know-where-it-came-from-but-I'm-assuming-it's-acrylic yarn out of my stash and asked for a hat. I was afraid I might not have enough, so I asked her if it was okay for me to add black stripes. She eyed the yarns critically for a moment and signed off on the project.

A few days later, I presented her with this:

She had hovered anxiously over me during the knitting process, inspecting it as my fingers worked as fast as I could go, asking "Is my hat done yet? Are you done knitting it yet?" at least three times a day. She actually wore it for an hour or two:

And miracle of miracles, I actually got her to sit still for a few pictures.

Pattern: Felicity by Wannet Clyde (Ravelink)
My Ravelry details are here.
And here's one more picture, since it will probably be October before it's cool enough to wear it for real and get some shots of it in action:

Les vieux amis sont les meilleurs amis

2010-07-12T09:02:00.000-07:00

I have been so TIRED lately. Just absolutely, positively, worn out. Tired to the point of laying on the couch staring at the ceiling while Piper scatters toys in her wake and rummages through the fridge. It has been miserably hot here, close to 100 every day for weeks on end with humidity that makes the air difficult to breathe.

On top of that, our city has been in the top 5 places in the nation for ozone alerts for almost two weeks. I heard the phrase "orange-level ozone alert" multiple times every day on the radio for over a week before I looked up what it meant. The newscasters on tv & radio were quite happy to repeat the phrase every chance they got, but they always neglected to mention that it means air pollution mixed with intense humidity and that when it's at an orange level you're supposed to stay indoors as much as possible (especially young children, the elderly, or anyone with asthma or breathing problems), not exercise outside, not drive if you can help it, and avoid idling in traffic if you do. Which just sort of made me laugh, because school is out for the summer and the last thing any parent wants is to be trapped in the house all day with kids, and it's not like you can walk to much here (and it's too hot/ozone-y to do so even if you could), so "try to stay indoors" means everyone will have to jump in their cars and drive all over from one air-conditioned locale to another all day long.

We just got done with another round of company - my godparents were here for five days. Piper hadn't seen either of them since she was an infant, but took to them right away, happy to have more people to play with her and read her stories. They also took her for a ride in their bright-blue convertible, which, as far as she was concerned, was more fun than anyone could ever ask for. My parents are due in this weekend for a few days, and in a couple weeks, some friends from Chicago are coming through on their way back from the beach.

I have to say that, although I love my family, we have been looking forward to our friends' visit most of all. I never do manage to get down to the Windy City to see them when I visit Michigan; these trips North are always just Piper & me, and I can't seem to manage the 4-hour drive between Detroit and Chicago alone with a car-hating toddler. But they are kind enough to drive up and meet us halfway when we're there, and made the drive all the way down here for a weekend visit last Spring.

With every set of company, there's extra cleaning and cooking, and it's nice to have grandparents around to entertain the kid, but it's different with friends. There is comfort in being able to cook something and knowing the people at the table will eat it, instead of inspecting it for surreptitious vegetables or refusing to touch it because "I don't like the smell of curry." It's nice being able to suggest Ethiopian or sushi for lunch and hear enthusiasm rather than nose-wrinkling and thinly-veiled ethnic xenophobia. We can each browse the Internet on our phones or laptops while watching a movie and share stuff from our Google Readers and nobody thinks twice about the arrangement. They can work our electronics without written instructions and four run-throughs. We all like the same kind of movies and they don't require the volume turned up to ear-spliting levels.

These are friends of my husband's, from college, and as happens with many couples, they've become my friends too. We have a few friends here, but none as close as friends from our old life and locales. All this moving around has made me realize that I keenly miss people who know me. I like making new friends (who doesn't need more friends?!), but sometimes I just want to hang out with people who already know that I like my margaritas on the rocks and have listened to many of my drunken ramblings but don't hold that against me. People who I can trade music with, who will point me to new bands and listen to the mix cds I make for them. People we already have a history with, already share an ease of space and conversation with. Since moving here, I've so often felt like I was swimming upstream against a hard current to make and keep connections, fighting all the time to maintain the few friendships I've managed to cultivate. It will be nice to let go and drift for a while, floating along surrounded by familiarity.

Quilt Top

2010-07-02T11:11:00.000-07:00

An in-progress photo from making the quilt. I took it that night, emailed it to myself, and forgot all about it.

What you can't see in this picture is all the cat hair, bits of thread, and random debris stuck to the back of that flannel sheet because our spare room/office/guest room always gets forgotten when the vacuum cleaner comes out.

Lime Green Toenails

2010-07-01T08:50:00.000-07:00

When the weather got hot, I started thinking about green nail polish, to be applied to my sad, neglected toenails. I wanted an opaque green, not the shimmery, silvery greens I already had so many variations of. I wanted a bright, eye-popping lime, and I think this does the trick. Most of the time I am quite satisfied with it, but once in awhile I look at my nearly-neon toes and wonder if it's trying too hard to be 80's, or if it makes me look like I have some sort of Hobbity foot-fungus. I decided that deep down I must like it pretty well, since I have painted my fingernails to match.

Piles of Surprises

2010-06-28T08:57:00.000-07:00

More birthday posts, I know. Yes, her birthday was at the beginning of the month but the craziness and business have dragged it out so that the posts have spanned all of June. Probably July too, if I don't get it in gear...anyway, here you go.

We don't use the fireplace very much for heating the house, but we get a lot of mileage out of it as a staging area. Whenever we have something to give her, gifts for birthdays and what have you, we put it in front of the fireplace. Then we wait for her to notice the goodies in the morning. The surprise and delight on her face every time is killer. This was her little pile of birthday gifts this year:

- Birthday Shirt, which has become a yearly tradition. For her 1st, we bought one of those generic "Birthday Girl" ones from some big-box store, and I was never satisfied with it. So last year we made her one with iron-on transfers, featuring owls (It said "Who's Two?", ha-ha). This year, of course, it was totally Beatles-inspired. Next year I might try stencils or something, because every brand of iron-on transfer we've tried barely lasts one day before starting to flake off. Sometimes they're peeling in a matter of hours.

- Beatles Quilt, made with love (and some choice language) by Mama.

- Yellow Submarine Hoodie, also made using iron-on transfers. When they flake off I will replace them with nice embroidered patches; I just couldn't find the ones I wanted in time so I used transfers.

- Spider-Man Sticker Book - Spidey is loved very nearly as much as the Fab Four in our house, and stickers are a continual source of fun. This was a HUGE book with tons of stickers and little scenes to place characters in. I still expect to find Spider-Man, the Green Goblin, and Mary Jane stuck all over the house.

- Dragon PJ's - my husband picked these out for her, because, although they are from some cartoon movie she will probably never see, they had a little cape with hood that Velcros to the shoulders, so that it looks like a dragon costume.

- Beatles Coloring Book - we made this ourselves. I took an old 3-ring binder and filled it with all the readily-printable Beatles stuff I could find on the Internet. I hit the jackpot when I stumbled upon pages from a never-published Yellow Submarine comic book. They are AMAZING, and many are only half-colored or less, so it was perfect. I also added a set of 10 Smencils (those things are awesome) for her to color with.

- Wooden hand-carved (but not by us) train toy - just the engine car. She's way into trains at the moment (show me a 2-3 year-old who isn't), and was quite taken with this one when we saw it at the farmer's market. The guy who makes these is really nice; I plan to go back and get some of his kid-size furniture, doll furniture, and step stools.

- Cardboard Playhouse - we had seen one at the mall, but as it cost $60 and we could not bring ourselves to spend that much on something our cats would probably use as a scratching post, so we made our own. I came up with the concept (I might have even drawn a sketch or two) and my husband did the execution. The purple duct-tape was my idea; I wanted something that looked like trim and we needed a way to shore up everything. The bad-ass chimney, however, was all him. It's totally awesome.

I waffled between thinking it was too much and being convinced it was not enough, or between being proud of all our hand-made-by-us/artistic/hand-made-by-local-crafters stuff and being gripped with fear that she would scorn our hard work and ask for a new set of Yo Gabba Gabba dvd's. I needn't have worried, because she loved all of it. She put the hoodie on immediately and dragged the quilt around with her. She was thrilled with the coloring book and tried out the Smencils right away. She played peek-a-boo in the playhouse and pushed her train up and down its walls. When we left to go out for her much-anticipated birthday pancakes, she insisted on bringing along at least half her presents. This, of course, meant that ten minutes after we left the driveway, the back seat of our car was littered with colored pencils, various articles of clothing, and half-colored pictures, but I didn't mind one bit. We had been up until 3:30 am finishing all this stuff for her, and even though we were exhuasted, I did not begrudge her even a minute of sleep. Not when I could look into the back seat and see my newly-three-year-old girl, wearing her hoodie and scribbling away in her new coloring book while softly singing "All You Need Is Love" mixed with "Happy Birthday."

Snapshots: Mid-June 2010

2010-06-25T07:11:00.000-07:00

6:00 p.m., on a Wednesday: the thermostat says it is 84 degrees in the house, although, since it is located in a cool, dim hallway, I know the main part of the house is several degrees hotter. My child is running her little Ikea push-cart into the back door over and over, each time causing a loud "THWACK" noise that reverberates in my already-throbbing skull. She is cackling madly, and is, of course, naked.

9:00 p.m. on the same night finds me on the couch, glass of wine in hand. Piper is tucked in bed, happily reading books to a stuffed elephant, and I have the last lonely cupcake from her party. I dug into the tub of frozen leftover frosting and now a mini-mountain of chilled strawberry-meringue buttercream quivers atop the little cake. I boot up the Xbox, flip through our Netflix queue, and put on an episode of The X-Files. Frosting, wine, a quiet house, and the company of Mulder and Scully all combine to give me one of the least-stressful moments I've had in months.

Somewhere along the line, I tripped over or ran into something, injuring my pinkie toes yet again. The right is far worse than the left - putting on my favorite sandals too quickly can cause a grunt of pain. I am constantly breaking, cracking, or bruising my pinkie toes. I'm starting to wonder if I could just have them amputated. I know toes are for balance or...something...that I didn't pay attention to in Biology...but I am not sure lopping them off would make me less of a klutz. At the very least, I could not ram them into things or catch them on stuff, have to hear the sickening crack! noise, then spend ten minutes rolling around on the floor and three weeks babying them.

It's too hot to cook. It's too hot to think. It's 95-99 degrees but the humidity and crap makes it feel like 107. It's too hot to...I don't know what else, because my brain, like our poor, limping-along laptop, tends to fare badly in this weather and can only go for so long before it starts to smell like burning plastic and slows to a crawl. I mean the laptop, not my brain. Well, actually, I mean the laptop AND my brain.

I have 2.5 friends here, and 1.0 of them is moving away. I was okay at first, happy for her and excited for the changes this will bring to her family, but the more I thought about it the sadder I got. She's finally going to get to stay at home with her son, but this will happen hours and hours away, where we cannot hang out all day and watch our kids finger-paint together. She's moving, and unpacking, and will have a whole new place to set up and decorate, but I'll be too far away to go over and help her set up and take her kid to the park for an afternoon so she can get things sorted out. All the stuff we were going to do together - play dates and crafting and helping with years' worth of birthday parties and meeting downtown for lunches and coffees and sharing bottles of wine - is no longer going to happen. And that makes me pretty damned sad.

I was so into chipotle-flavored things: chipotle black bean burgers, chipotle hummus, chipotle sauce, chipotle salsa. I think I would've happily slurped on a chipotle lollipop if I found one. Then, just as I made a HUGE pot of this soup, (I altered the recipe sligthtly by adding more onions, because I had a drawerful of them) the very smell of chipotle anything makes me want to yak. Actually, no, wait - the very thought of chipotle anything makes me want to yak. So now I have this giant freaking pot of bean soup (and those baby limas gave me hella trouble, despite what Heidi says, and I feel compelled to point out that I pretty much worship that woman's cooking and this is the first thing of hers that I did not fall madly in love with at first bite) and I am the only one in the house who is going to eat it. Er, um, not eat it, because...yak. So I tried to puree it into some sort of hummus-like bean dip/spread that my husband would eat (and maybe I could put on a sandwich), but it was gritty and full of flecks of crunchy baby limas.

So I stuck it in the crock-pot overnight to try and cook the beans into mush, and now I have semi-gritty bean mush that I cannot stand the smell of. It made my house smell like chipotles, yak, and really the whole ordeal just pissed me off. I hate it when cooking things fail, and I especially hate it when I am left with a freaking cauldron of some inedible concoction. I guess I'll cook it some more and see what happens. My house already smells anyway, how much worse can it get?

Don't answer that.

Uhhh...

2010-06-21T08:58:00.000-07:00

Do you really need an anti-bacterial hairbrush? What in the heck are
you doing with that thing that requires it to be "Cleaner. Fresher. All the Time." ?

Found at Target.

Catching Up With Cupcakes

2010-06-17T12:00:00.001-07:00

Hellooo? This thing on?

I feel like I have just come off some sort of crafting/hostess marathon; it's been non-stop action since the end of May. I was swamped with birthday projects, then we celebrated the day, my in-laws came the next day and were here for five days, during their visit I ran around non-stop tending to some low-fi business ventures, my in-laws left, and four days later we had a birthday party. Whew! I am pooped. We have a couple of weeks to get ready for the next round or three of houseguests - our home is going to be a busy place this summer.

We had a tiny party for Piper on Sunday, and I do mean tiny. We invited a couple of her little friends (and their parents, who are our friends), a couple of our friends, and turned everyone loose in the house. The total count was less than a dozen people including us. I did bake my ass off for the occasion, though (or, considering all the butter that went into those Martha Stewart recipes, perhaps I mean I baked my ass on).

I made these first, Margarita Cupcakes with Tequila-Lime Glaze, from Gail Wagman's Cupcakes Galore. The cupcake part went well enough; I swapped out the white sugar for agave nectar, since I am on a quest to eliminate white granulated sugar from our household and I knew at least one of our adult guests was a diabetic. It went pretty well, resulting in only a slightly denser cake than usual. This recipe is really, really good and contains actual tequila (as does the glaze) so they really tasted like margaritas when they were done! The worst part was grating all that lime rind. The glaze...well, I'll get to that.

Exhibit number two: I borrowed a friend's copy of Martha Stewart's Cupcakes to make these babies. Strawberry cupcakes with strawberry meringue buttercream frosting. And holy crap, they were good. At least, the second batch were. The first batch nearly defeated me. I was a little afraid of swapping out the white sugar for agave nectar, as I've generally found Martha's recipes do not tolerate substitution very well. During the mixing stage, I added four whole eggs instead of three eggs and one egg white, and while speculating on that extra yolk's possible effects, a long hard look at the batter led me to conclude I'd used too much agave nectar. I didn't want to throw it out, so, buoyed by the spirit of improvisation (and some tequila-soaked strawberries from the punch I was making), I threw in some ground cinnamon and almond extract, dumped it into round cake pans, and baked up a couple of freezer-friendly coffee cakes to serve when we have company next month. I realized while I was measuring ingredients for round two that I had also screwed up the baking powder in the first batch, and the finished cakes were pretty dense, but also buttery and flavorful. They will be great sliced into finger-size pieces and dipped in a cup of coffee.

For the second batch I went back and consulted Heidi, re-reading what she had to say about swapping sweetners. I decided that my mistake was in not following my instincts the first time around; the recipe called for more than two cups of white granulated sugar, and I had doled out the agave in proportion to that number. Normally, even if I were baking with white sugar, I would've cut that amount at least in half, as I do with the sweetners in nearly every recipe I make. The second time around, I used a mere 3/4 cup of agave nectar, double-checked my measured ingredients, and ~~ate some more tequila-soaked strawberries~~ reduced my baking temperature as per Heidi's instructions. The finished products required a double-baking; I had to pop them in for a few minutes the next morning to firm up their middles. I think the combination of liquid agave and disagreeing with Martha about what constitutes "finely chopped" strawberries made the cakes a little mushy, but they (mostly) firmed up during the second, lower-temperature, bake.

After the first pan of 12 cakes went into the oven, I added some lemon extract and grated a little lemon rind into the batter to make strawberry-lemon cupcakes. Strawberries and lemons are two of Piper's favorite things; she will eat both straight-up and right out of the fridge, so I ran with it. Those turned out pretty well, too, lemony without overpowering the strawberry flavor.

The morning of the party, I found myself trying to get a tequila-lime glaze to set at 10:00 a.m., mixing and re-mixing as per the instructions but producing only a runny green syrup that tasted good, even if it refused to stay atop the cupcakes. I don't know if it was the tequila in the glaze, the heat in the kitchen, or some sort of food-photography trickery, but it just ran off the cakes and puddled on the plate. Frustrated, I stuck it in the fridge for a while and moved on to the complicated strawberry-meringue buttercream frosting recipe.

Oh, Martha! Your cupcakes nearly undid me, but this stuff more than made up for it. I did not try any fancy substitutions this time, followed the instructions exactly, and was rewarded with a mixer-bowl brimful of fluffy strawberry goodness. Even my husband, who normally avoids any sort of fruit-flavored baked good was found licking the beaters and muttering "There's three sticks of butter in this...huge bowl...we are so screwed."

We quickly discovered that it's pretty hard to pipe a frosting full of seeds and the occasional chunk of fresh strawberry, and by now we were pressed for time, so I settled for dropping dollops of the stuff on and topping with cut strawberries, which resulted in a picture at least somewhat like the one in the book. The lime glaze, on the other hand, refused to set and look like the thick green layer atop the cupcakes in the recipe's photos, so I just drizzled it on and hoped for the best. I had tried to make candied lime slices the previous night to use on the cupcakes, but it turns out when you boil limes in sugar syrup, they turn a sickly green color that is not at all appetizing.

I put the margarita cupcakes and the tequila punch out of the kids' reach, set snacks, a homemade cheese ball, and sliced fruit on the table, made some unsweetened tea, strawberry lemonade, and put some Izze juices in a bucket of ice, and made little signs for everything. Then I sat down with a cup of punch and enjoyed the party. I think everyone had a pretty good time, Piper played until she was exhausted, and most of the food disappeared, so I called it a success. I made some pretty cool decorations, but those will have to wait until another post. Until then, have another look at these puppies:

Mmmm...I'll leave you with your drool.