Done got myself in trouble

I truly have wanted to blog of late. I even started a post, to realize that, when I left it up on the computer, one of my children closed it down. What a waste of time! What I was going to blog about was Sarah's senior pictures. Instead, what I will blog about today is how I got myself into trouble by joining both NaNoWriMo and NaBloPoMo this year. Yay!

I don't really have a concrete idea of what I will write my NaNo novel about this year. Probably a continuation of the one I started last year. If I can ever get the NaNo site to come up and check that that is within the parameters.

Meanwhile, I will be getting gussied up for the OVQG meeting tonight, where I will be honored as a past president of the quilter's guild. I'll have a lot of progress to report to my therapist next time I see her! Yay me!

I'm never taking that boy anywhere, part 2

ARGH!

Well, in my defense, I did say that I wasn't going to take that boy shopping again. Now I'm upping the ante, at least until he is off his steroids.

Here's the story: David had an appointment at the Nephrology Clinic this morning, but early. That would be 8:20, for those who demand completeness in their narratives. Cincinnati traffic that time of day is not at all pretty, but we (that would be all five children) and I got there on time, met with the nephrologist, etc.

Oh yeah, this is funny. So, usually it's just David & me or both twins & me at the clinic visits. I know I've mentioned the rest of the children at one point or another but clearly the doctor was not expecting to see us en masse today. Heh. Sarah stayed out in the waiting area but Rachel, Abby, & Keziah opted to go back with David and me into the room. When Dr. G. walked in, he looked around and said, "Wow! Got the whole group with you today!" to which I replied, "Well, 80% in here anyway."

I love that.

He gave me a strange look and then we talked about David's issues with the nephrotic syndrome and the steroids he's currently on. Once he's weaned from the steroid this time, he will switch to a second-line medication which will (I hope) put him into remission for longer than say 2 days. David started doing his hyper activities that he does when he's hopped up on dope, I mean steroids. As we were finishing up with the doctor, he did one of the things we like least, namely slinging his head from side to side while simultaneously jumping up and down (and moving forward with his jumping) and emitting a shrill yet loud sound. Dr. G. looked at him and said, "I'm glad we're stepping down his steroid dose." "Not nearly as glad as I am," was my reply.

Then we were off.

The reason why I hauled all the children downtown this morning was that I wanted them to go to the Art Museum. They're having an exhibit of famous (in the quilting world, anyway) old quilts from the collection of the Shelburne Museum. Naturally, I would have preferred to stroll through the hallowed halls of the museum sans children but moments like that in my world are few and far between. At least when I can actually get downtown without children. So I decided to risk it.

Yes, I know. You'd think I'd have learned by now. Apparently I'm stupid like that.

The thing about quilts, especially antique quilts, is that you can't touch them. You can't even make like you're going to touch them or the elderly security guards swoop down on you like a duck on a June bug and let you have it. It's like being in trouble with your grandmother.

Naturally, being a 3-year-old boy hyped up on steroids, did not heed my increasingly strident warnings about not getting near the quilts. So I picked him up and carried him around as much as I possibly could.

Ever tried carrying a 40+ pound squirmy (and did I mention "hyper"?) boy around? It's not much fun for the carrier or the carry-ee. Occasionally I could interest him in the quilts by pointing something out. "Look Dave! What does that look like? That's right! It's grapes!" After a while though, that just wasn't happening.

Meanwhile, the Sisters were all looking around and seemed to be enjoying the exhibit. (It really is a cool exhibit...antique quilts from the early 1800's, less antique ones, and some modern art quilts by a former Cincinnatian, Terrie Mangat.) I really wanted to go and contemplate the beauty of the Amish quilts they had on exhibit but by that point, David was much too wild. I knew it wouldn't be long before my restraint of him would fail and I didn't want him to be equipped with that knowledge for the future. After perusing the gift shop (which was watched over by an exceptionally lovely person who didn't mind our invasion of her quiet sanctuary), I started to make my way down to the exit. I told the Big Girls that they could just hang out and look at whatever they wanted to look at but I was taking the twins outside. Eventually, they decided to just leave with us and we were off.

Yes, this doesn't sound like a major thing but I'm just giving you the barest of facts. Imagine the squirming and loud boy, the proximity of the fragile quilts, the hush of the galleries, the intense interest by people not of our family. I don't get flop sweat nearly as often as I did when the twins were small, but I did today. I will be so glad when David is steroid-free and we can see what sort of a boy he really is.

Maybe then I'll take him somewhere with me again.




Oh! I almost forgot the pictures!


First, the obligatory homeschool field trip picture in front of the museum.



Second, a picture of Abby kissing one of the massive pillars out front. Yes, she specifically requested this photo and no, I don't even pretend to know why.



Third...ok, this one has a story. As I was attempting to figure out how to get onto a road that would eventually lead us home, we drove past this very cool tree at the edge of some random parking lot. I pulled into the parking lot to turn around (I'd finally figured that I was going the wrong way). I contemplated the tree. Surely it would not be a good idea to make everyone get out so I could get a picture of them in the arms of this awesome tree? Oh well, as I've said before, I'm stupid like that so I made the "abandon ship" announcement and got them over by the tree to take pictures. The second one was the last one, when I told them to "be goofy". Of course, at that they excel.

Happy Friday everyone!

Wordless Wednesday: What I've been doing today and a question

Today was the first day this year that I hung laundry out on the line. I so love hanging laundry out. I love the savings of it and I love the way the laundry smells when it's finished. It makes me happy. It's indicative of how very nauseated I was when pregnant that I couldn't abide the smell of line-dried laundry. It would literally make me puke.

So anyway, it's warm and I'm finally inspired enough to hang clothes out (no, nothing in my house gets done without my being inspired to do it...got a problem with that?). Because we are klassy with a capital "K", I have my own homemade laundry lines. I tried to find a picture of Friend Gina's beautiful lines for comparative purposes but couldn't locate it. Since we don't have a gorgeous laundry line in our backyard, I improvised.



Oh yeah, I know my mama's proud.

I also decided to wash the quilts that Friend Husband and I had used on our bed all winter. You might not think that this would be that big of a production, but it is. The main one that we use is ginormous. It almost hits the ground on both sides of our double bed. I call it the "quilt that ate Cleveland". That one has to go into the washer all by its lonesome.

The washing of the quilts necessitates that I clean my porch. No, that was not a non sequitur. Stick with me. When I wash the quilts, I hang them out on the porch railings to dry (unless it's the middle of the winter and someone has just urped all over them). So I had to clean the porch railings and sweep the parts of the porch and front sidewalk that would touch the damp quilts. I also had to threaten the twins and the neighbor urchins that if they touched those quilts I was going to have to hurt them. Severely. The girls learned long ago that you don't mess with Mama's quilts. So here they are, in all their clean glory:


And here are all the urchins in their unclean glory:


Only the brown ones are mine. The other two ostensibly live next door, although they spend a fair amount of time over here.

BTW, the quilt on the porch swing is the huge one. I made it my ownself and it took something like 8 years. It's a memory quilt with blocks from folks we knew (and liked) in Columbia, MO before we moved. (Yes, people we didn't like were not invited to participate.) The pink quilt is one that my Mamaw made years and years ago. It's a modified Ohio Star with a Glorified Nine Patch in the center. You probably can't see it but the setting triangles around the Nine Patch block are floral fabric. From curtains. I remember those curtains. Those of you who are quilters are shuddering now. I'm surprised, given how delicate that fabric is, but it's held up well. She had two of them on her beds in her house in Brady. I'm tickled that I have them now.

I also took time to smell, if not the roses which are not yet in bloom, the flowers.

These are from Abby's garden. And the ones below are from mine.


And now for the question. For the last few (five, maybe, hee hee), I've wanted to repaint the shutters on our house. I've cleaned them and cleaned them but I think it's time for a new look. The problem is that the brick on our house is sort of a funky color for brick and I'm not good with warm colors. Here's the house, or at least some shutters:


I was thinking at first about a soft, mossy green (because I love green so and I thought it might look ok) and then an electric blue (because I'm weird that way). But now I'm thinking that something like a barn red would look better. What do y'all think? Here's a Klassy superimposition of the colors for your perusal.

At any rate, all the shutters, the side of the garage, the porch, etc. need to be pressure washed. I think my daddy should pack up his new dog, his pressure washer, and himself and get on up here to help me, don't y'all?

Seriously, though, I'm decorating impaired so tell me what you think about the shutter colors. And have a wonderful Wednesday!

Wordless Wednesday

Friday/Saturday

What are y'all up to today? I am going to be basting that quilt. Sigh. As JoAnn said yesterday, it will be a good thing when it's over. It took me quite some time to unbaste the 1/3 of it that I had to last night. I dread dread dread trying to get the rest of it done but I will. We will also go to the grocery this morning, as I haven't had a chance to do that this week. We keep running out of stuff like milk.

Oh! We celebrated Mother's Day last night. We were on the road on Mother's Day so we pushed it forward to yesterday. I had a hideous day yesterday and told Doug I was in no mood to "celebrate" but he overrode my crankiness and did it anyway. He brought home some wonderful Chinese food, a cheesecake sampler and a lemon meringue pie. And the gifts! And the cards! Generally speaking, the girls make their own cards and they are so very special. Sarah made me quite a lovely one. If my camera were working, I'd take a picture of it. She drew roses and a stained glass window with a mother holding a baby. It was so sweet. Rachel and Abby also made their own cards. I always save them to look over and ponder in the future.

I got a lot of yarn for Mother's Day! LOL! Go, team. The only problem is that they are now jockeying for position to see which yarn gets used first. A lot of pressure there, you know. I told them that I have a few other projects I need to finish first before I can use that yarn and I hope that will buy me some time. Doug got me 3 skeins of Lion Brand Homespun in purple, black, and blue...here are the swatches:

The swatches really don't do them justice, they are gorgeous!

Rachel got me a skein of Red Heart Light and Lofty in "wine". Here's the swatch which again, gives no clue of the luscious color:

Abby got me a skein of Bernat DenimStyle in what they call "Faded Khaki". It's green and some light whitish color...I love it. I love green. Swatch which does not do justice:

And Sarah did not get yarn. She was distracted at the check-out by a movie that she'd heard me talk about a lot and that's what she got me:

She didn't much like it when we watched it last night but it gave us ample opportunity to talk about how drugs (including alcohol) can totally mess up your life, the importance of marital fidelity (which Cash obviously didn't abide by) and other issues. They finally understood why, although I enjoy Johnny Cash's music, it always makes me uneasy. He was a complicated sinner. Anyway, so that was Mother's Day and it was lovely.

Now off to baste the quilt.

Monday Memories

I am a dingbat but I am aware that it is Sunday night.  I will not, however, be around tomorrow until possibly very late so I thought I'd throw this out tonight.

BTW, Friend Gina and I had a great time at the knitting guild on Saturday.  We were the youngest folks there (by decades) but we got to know some charming ladies.  We also did a field trip to a knitting store.  I knew it would be interesting and weird to make my first visit to a yarn store.  My first trip to a big quilting store gave me a panic attack.  This didn't give me a panic attack but I felt more like I was in Chinatown in San Francisco and couldn't read the signs.  I saw (and patted) much gorgeous yarn but as I didn't really know what it was all useful for nor how much to get, I didn't lose control like I do at Meijer with yarn at 90% clearance.  I did see some sock yarn that looked quite yummy.  One was knitted into a scrumptious green sock with various patterns attributed to the yarn rather than the knitting.  I started salivating but I did not buy any yarn.  I'm pretty far away from socks at this point and I exercised a bit of self-control there.  But I know where to find my sock yarn when I want it (and it was sheer pleasure to see and handle some of those beauties).  So that, Friend Gina, is why I didn't go off in the yarn store.

Ok, today I am going to remember the first two quilts I made.  I know that those of you who have made scores of quilts will probably think this a ridiculous blog.  I haven't made scads of quilts and it is easy for me to remember my first two because I made them for my first two daughters.

Back when I was young and had been married a few years, Friend Husband and I decided it would be a good time to start our family.  Back then, I was as fertile as a rabbit and it took no time at all to achieve this momentous science experiment.  As I started telling people and enjoying the shocked looks (remember that I was in a very liberal graduate student environment at the time and they thought it was wild enough that I shared my husband's name let alone procreated with him), a dear friend told me that I needed to make something for the baby.  I asked her what she had in mind and she said, "Oh, I don't know, something like a quilt." 

Ok!  I had read Little House on the Prairie repeatedly in my youth and figured that I could do that.  The nine-patch block was mentioned as the first block that most little girls made so I decided (the first of many decisions that led me down the primrose path) that I'd make Sarah's quilt be a nine-patch.

Shall I enumerate all the idiotic decisions I made after the first one (of relying on my memories of LHOTP to help me along with this)?  I shall.  Among them were these:

1. I decided that I wanted to make the quilt to be unbelievably soft for my newborn, so I chose flannel for the fabric.  (Collective groan here, fellow quilters.)  Actually, flannel isn't that bad to work with...if you don't buy it at WalMart, which I did, and if it doesn't have a great big weave to it, which this did.  Nevertheless, I moved on with my flannel.  The other thing you have to know about working with flannel (especially poorly woven WM flannel) is that it stretches, so you have to be careful.


2. I decided that the only way to quilt was to do everything by hand.  After all, that's the way Ma and the girls did it, right?  Dumb dumb dumb.  And dumb.  Especially since I had done precious little hand-sewing at that point in my life.


3. I didn't really measure the squares too well, I just cut them out with a pair of scissors.


4. I didn't remember the concept of seam allowances that Mrs. Baker had tried to inculcate into our feeble little brains in 7th grade.  My seam allowances varied from infinitesimal to ½ inch.  Yeah.  Yuck.


5. I didn't know that you don't generally use cotton blends to make quilts, so I chose a poly-cotton blend to do the sashing.  Easier to hand-sew but totally different from the holey flannel in the rest of it.


6. I didn't know how to hand-quilt (I didn't know how to do any of this, to be quite frank), so I decided to embroider hearts in the 9-patch squares.  That worked for one of the patches, then I got sick of it.  Oh, forgot to mention that I was using a ginormous wooden hoop to quilt in (it was the closest I could get to Ma's quilt frame).  I don't really remember how I got the rest of it quilted, but I did it.


7. I also had no clue how to bind the thing and of course didn't bother to ask someone who might actually know.  I ended up rolling up the edges, sewing them down, and cutting off the parts that stuck out.  Oh, ouch.  This just hurts to confess.

By the time I finished Sarah's quilt, she was 18 months old and I thoroughly hated hated hated quilting.  Unfortunately for me, (well, fortunately, but you'll get the picture here in a minute) I was pregnant with Sarah's sister Rachel.  Every mother knows (until she has several million children like I do) that what you do for one, you have to do for the other.  So I felt obligated to make Rachel a quilt, although I hated hated hated quilting with a passion.

This time, though, I wised up.  I had purchased a book somewhere along the way that had beautiful pictures of quilts and the patterns for how to make them.  Hallelujah, she can be taught!  Of course, they were full-sized quilts, but I decided (there I go deciding again) that I could use their measurements and cut them down to a crib-sized quilt.  I did much better on this one.  The only thing really dumb that I can remember doing is cutting myself with the rotary cutter (see, I graduated from scissors) and using the (admittedly red) piece of fabric that I'd bled on in Rachel's quilt.  The other dumb thing I was doing at that time was taping down (with masking tape) my fabric to the cutting board before I cut it.  I couldn't figure out how to make it stay where I wanted it to otherwise.  But Rachel's quilt was made in much less than the 2 years that it took me to make Sarah's.

I hired an Amish woman to quilt it (it was an Amish-style diamond in the square quilt) and also to bind it off (see, I was very wise by this time) and she did a lovely job.  It was ready and waiting (having already been embroidered with Rachel's name by me) to take her home from the hospital.  What a beautiful memory that was! 

Some day I'll have to blog about other quilts I have made (there haven't been all that many, so I can remember them very well) but those are my memories of the first two quilts I ever made.  By the time I was finished piecing Rachel's quilt, I was merrily ensconced in the world of quilting and I have loved it ever since.

I will mention here that I cast on for my first knitting in the round tonight...a hat for Keziah.  Wish me luck and speedy fingers!

Totally random Saturday

The rest of the family is off visiting the Creation Museum in Northern KY this morning.  It is very peaceful here in the hacienda! 

I ended up having to bail on WW this morning because I spent the whole morning trying to get the children in a state fit to be seen in public.  I'm quitting the organization anyway but I wanted to go to the last couple of meetings just to have done it.

On his way out the door this morning, David ran under the table and somehow looped his arm through the shoulder strap of my purse.  Naturally, it was open and of course, everything started to come out in sloooow motion.  Likewise I was moving in slow mo and was trying to keep the guts of my purse inside the bag, even as it was streaming out through my fingers.  It irritated me greatly.  I realized that it is the perfect metaphor for my life right now.  I feel like my life is just falling out and falling apart and I can't work fast enough to keep the guts in.  Or something like that.

And while I was looking for images of spilling purses on the Internet, I found this picture of a coffin purse:

There's only one person in the world (well, maybe two) who I can think of who might want to carry a coffin purse.  Being the brain dead person that I am this morning, I was intrigued by the mirror.  I'd never thought of putting a mirror in a coffin.  Why would you do that?  I pondered it way longer than I should have until I realized that the thing is a purse.  It makes sense to have a mirror in a purse (although the sense of carrying a coffin purse is up to debate, I think).

Welcome to Tom and Justin, my latest subscribers!

I finally found the fabric that I'd been trying to hunt up to put together some of the 9-patch blocks that I received this year in my swap.  I think that the things are breeding in their little plastic bags!  I find them everywhere now.  I've got to get back to quilting so I can sew some of these babies up so they can stop reproducing themselves.  I mean, they're sweet and all, but there are only so many things I can do with them.

I would like to reproduce a quilt that my grandmother made.  It makes an interesting use of 9-patch blocks and yet is simple.  Here is the quilt (and my sweet Aragorn who was making overtures during the photo shoot):

It was much prettier before I had to wash it half a million times with OxyClean in an attempt to remove Chinese red ink with which the twins had bedaubed it liberally.  Upon more coherent thought, I should have just left it alone.  The ink remains but the colors in the quilt are rather faded.  It is also very warm and heavy because it has a hefty batt.  The girls and I are continually engaged in guerilla warfare over this quilt.  I love to sleep under it in the winter time because it's so heavy and it's so very very cold in my room.  They like it for the same reason except that it isn't cold in the room where they sleep.  I think I'll go hide it so I can have it tonight. 

Here is the basic block:

Please note the floral fabric in this block.  It is recycled curtains!  Definitely a no-no for today's quilter but Mamaw, having been raised in the Depression, would not think of actually buying specific fabric for quilting until she'd been doing it for a while.  I don't think any of the fabrics in this quilt are 100% cotton.  In fact, I suspect that the batt in this is an old blanket.  But I digress.

Here are a few blocks along with the red fabric that I finally found in my stash.  I discovered, much to my chagrin, that there isn't much red fabric.  I'm thinking that perhaps I'll make the triangle points that are bright pink in Mamaw's quilt with the red.  Maybe some kind of whitish homespun or shirting fabric for the floral pieces surrounding the nine-patch, then I don't know what for the light pink squares.  Any suggestions?

And before I do that, I have to finish those charity blocks and that dishcloth that is going to India on Monday.  I tried to knit on it yesterday but the places where the yarn slides were too raw.  I consulted with Friend Gina and she said that she never gets knitting calluses so my hands must be dry.  I need to get on that and get it finished.  Oh yeah, and entering grades, yada yada yada.  Hear that tinkling sound?  That's the sound of the guts of my life falling out again...

Thursday Thirteen # 37

In which Lori compares and sometimes contrasts quilting with knitting 1. In quilting, man-made fibers are bad. In knitting they are wonderful. 2. A shop hop is still a shop hop, no matter which craft you persue. 3. Unknitting is no more fun than unsewing. 4. Many people look at you strangely, no matter which project you haul out to work on in a public place. 5.  Likewise, people will always come up to you and say, "My grandmother used to do that," as if you knew her and was her contemporary. 6.  People have no concept how much time/energy goes into making a quilt (or something knitted) and have no compunction about asking you do do something for them.  My standard reply with regard to quilting is, "No, but I'll teach you to do it yourself." 7.  Perhaps other people are different, but I have to concentrate when I knit.  For me, hand-quilting is a no-brainer. 8.  I could see doing both crafts in the summer, if time permitted but I think both crafts are something warm and cozy to do in the depths of winter. 9.  Stash is just a wonderful thing, whether it's yarn or fabric. 10.  Ditto free patterns. 11.  There is a saying in quilting, "I never met a quilter I didn't like."  Well, I've met a couple, but by and large quilters are generous, funny, cool people.  I don't know enough knitters IRL but the knitting books I've read and the blogs I've read would suggest that it is the same with knitters. 12.  It's a beautiful thing to make something that will be an heirloom, whether it's a quilt or a knitted sweater.  Not that I've made a knitted heirloom yet, but you get the picture.  It is like a tiny bit of yourself lasts. 13.  Both quilting and knitting calm my mind and give me back something that my brain needs to function better.  When I worked in a quilting shop, I used to tell the customers, with complete seriousness, that quilting was good therapy...and you had something physical to show for it at the end.  And I can look at a quilt that I've made, run my fingers over the quilting stitches, and remember what was going on in my life when I did it.  Sometimes I'm very glad that quilts can't talk. Links to other Thursday Thirteens! 1. (leave your link in comments, I’ll add you here!)

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