Sunday, June 3, 2012

Eclectic Updates


So.... some eclectic updates from my end. Very eclectic, so be warned.

First, thank you all so much for your support of the whole Lunch Bucket Movement. Buying my buckets, asking for a pattern, buying my pattern... thank you! Thank you! 

The past few weeks have been slightly nuts. In addition to making Lunch Buckets and writing the pattern, there were also days when I was making offerings to the weather gods so I could take photos, and then shaking my fist - clearly, I am not one of their more faithful devotees -at said gods for sending deluge after deluge of rain (and hail), then finally taking photos, then having the camera card get corrupted and losing all the photos, then having to swallow my pride and re-grovel at the feet of those selfsame deities, and then editing the photos, getting the buckets listed on etsy, panicking when you bought all those buckets within 24 hours because I had zero shipping boxes, then driving several children and towers of boxes to the post office so many times that the postal clerks started to tease me and postal customers started to make comments about it looking a lot like Christmas in there. And then there was the pattern - writing, rewriting, scanning, re-scanning.... and then blogging about everything. 

And somewhere in the mix I had to make meals and feed my family as if it were any normal week of the year (not that I feed them properly on normal weeks, or that there are any normal weeks, I mean).

But it was fabulous, friends. Manic, breathless and like a race of sorts, but fun. I seem to remember this happening the last time I did a pattern, but it's a foggy memory. Not only because it was so long ago, but because I suspect I repressed it or had selective amnesia - you know, like how you conveniently forget what labor and childbirth felt like so that you could have more children after?

The day after the pattern went out, though, I needed to get out of the house. So the kids and I spent the morning at the zoo and the afternoon at the park. Didn't even stay in the house long enough to pack lunch or anything organized like that. We just grabbed our keys, sunglasses and respective stuffed animal friends and fled. Fled, I tell you. A whole day out with no sewing and no pattern editing or computer work. Whooooooo. I did nip back in the house between escapades to check email, in case Internet Explorer was mean to any of you, though!

And then I plonked myself on the sofa, grew roots and read through almost the entire Sisters Grimm series. Except Book 9. Oh, it's here in the house alright, calling to me. But I want to savor this moment - we're on the brink of summer, with all those warm, school-free weeks ahead of us; I am done with a major sewing project and that multitude of handmade gifts; I have finally replenished my supply of chocolate desserts which curiously depleted during the Lunch Bucket Movement; I am about to start on another fun bag and I have the climax SG book to read. An entire unread book! (And I am totally loving Puck, who has the best lines ever, but that's not really relevant to this post.)

And then I discovered that the outdoor water park that is just across the street, offers morning lap swims in heated pools! An outdoor heated pool in Minnesota! That has lap swims! I can do laps again! True, I will look like a drowning victim for a while until my bad shoulder gets used to all that rotation again and I will have to wake up earlier than the cows but still!!!!! Laps!!!!! 

Ah....... it feels like the day after an exam - that sense of freedom and open possibilities.

Not for long, though. I have projects to start, the fabric for which is already desecrating the floor of my newly-cleaned sewing room. We have a wedding to attend and I suspect, based on what I've seen on the racks at Target etc, that I will have to sew a dress. Curses. And there's a bag I must make, because it's big and has gathers and is so not like me at all (although it has piping). Love. And, finally, there's a wicked Sigmund Freud cartoon I need to draw, because it's been stuck in my head forever.

So that's where I am. Crazy doesn't even begin to describe it.

Let me leave you with one photo of fabric:
Has she finally lost her marbles and embraced funky print, you ask?

It's not for me - it's for Dad. With his birthday and Father's Day around the corner, I did what every dutiful and loving daughter does: bought him fabric. I do realize that the perfect gift would've been a JoAnn's (or SR Harris) gift card, but he doesn't live here, pity. So camouflage twill it is. I bet amazon doesn't list that among their Top 10 Father's Day gift ideas. Their loss.


7 comments:

  1. Now we just have to hope that that fabric makes its way TO your dad!!

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    1. Amen to that. Also why I bought him fabric, not handmade him something that would break my heart if it lost its way home.

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  2. You guys would love Tikkitikkitembonosarembocharibari rucchpipperipembo, Tikki Tikki Tembo by Arlene Mosel. The reason I was checking in tonight, though, was because I wondered if you had read Flat Stanley by Jeff Brown. You and the girls would love it, I can just picture Flat Stanleys by the dozen in your home! As much as I LOVE sewing and crafting, I REALLY LOVE reading, maybe I should blog about that?

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  3. yay! i'm not the only one who collects twill camo!!

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  4. My fingers are itching to buy your bucket pattern, but I have to wait until my birthday next month. You should feel proud because I haven't purchased a pattern in over a year, haven't increased my stash, haven't craft shopped at all. But I know your pattern will be well worth the wait and the splurge, because you're so talented and detailed and all-around brilliant.

    I also had to say that my daughter gobbled up the Sisters Grimm series, and since I work at a Book Warehouse, she was able to read Book 9 before it was even available to the public on May 8th. She said it was worth the wait and "perfect." So... enjoy, you deserve it.

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    1. Thanks! I resisted reading Book 9 for a full 24 hours. A whole day! I'm dying.

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  5. You are by far the funniest blogger I read... I sit at work (sssh), reading your posts, cracking up. I am quite the distrubance. Love your buckets!! Love your blog!! You have so many genius ideas. Thanks for sharing!!

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