March 2012
I can’t believe March is over already. In some ways it has gone so slowly (hello, events of March 7 that have left me less than myself…) and in other ways I can hardly believe it is already April. I have got a lot of things to tell you about. Really. But typing is still painful. I have some permanent nerve damage in my left pointer finger from when I sliced it, and touching anything sends tingles and shivers through it. So even now, 3.5 weeks later I am still typing with 9 fingers. And it is still under bandaid wraps everyday. That little bit of constant pressure relieves a lot of the tingles that are coming from the raw nerve. It’s not super painful, but it is enough to make me want to avoid touching anything. But it is getting a lot better. A LOT better. For which I am truly grateful. It could have ended up a lot worse. After two weeks of staying home sick with my little Creamie she is finally better. For now.
So here is my March, via my instagram feed. Three months into the year and I am still successfully taking a photo everyday. Next year I think I’ll set a goal of taking a real camera photo everyday. But I am so glad I have my phone with me all the time and can catch small moments I’d otherwise miss. Like yesterday. Creamie tried chopsticks for the first time and successfully ate one french fry. Very authentic, I know. You can click on that mosaic to go to flickr and get more info on any of those pictures.
Scott isn’t home tonight, and so I took the opportunity to make cauliflower crust pizza. I’m kind of on a veggie kick lately, and I’ve been avoiding carbs and sugar for two weeks. I have been craving pizza, and I figured if you put enough oregano and fresh herbs on/in it then it’s going to taste like pizza no matter what, right? Right. I liked it. It still needs some tweaking to be perfect, but it was awesome to eat pizza without breaking my no carb streak. (I’ve been trying the South Beach diet again, and in the past two weeks I’ve lost 10 pounds just by being careful about what I eat, it’s awesome.)
And speaking of what I eat, I also started making my own Greek yogurt. It’s been a staple the past two weeks, but after forking out $12 for two quarts of nonfat Chobani, which lasted only 4 days, I did some math and figured at that rate I’d be spending like $800 a year on yogurt. So I tried making my own. I’ll share that whole process on Monday after I take some pictures while I make it tomorrow. It now only costs me $2.50 to make two quarts of nonfat Greek yogurt. Win. Be back soon.
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Life Lately
Whenever you think stuff is caught up and under control you get thrown a couple dozen curve balls. And a few chickens just to throw you off. (No, we didn’t get chickens. But imagine if someone was hurling a dozen baseballs AND a few chickens at you. That’s kind of how I feel lately.) Last Sunday Creamie wasn’t feeling well, by Tuesday morning she was much better, and then Wednesday health in our house took a nosedive. And we are still hanging out there, skimming the ocean, trying not to plunge into the sea and drown. OK, I’m probably being dramatic. Kind of. But Creamie hasn’t been well since Tuesday afternoon, with various completely unrelated things, which when they combine equal a horrid storm of snot and yucky coughs that prevent everyone in our house from sleeping. Blerg.*
Top row: Spring is here. (I think part of this nastiness is allergies for her. Which is why I hate spring and am obsessively in love with winter. Winter I start missing you the first time I see a teensy hint of green anywhere.) I am deep cleaning my whole house. She is riding her bike around the kitchen in only underwear because she changed her name to Tarzan (and Tarzan doesn’t wear clothes). And she is really into toast as a midnight snack lately.
Second Row: When she first got sick all she wanted was to snuggle with her daddy at night. I took out my own stitches. I am a DIY’er like that. My finger is getting much better, but I am still not typing with it or playing the piano. I got a new vintage book in the mail. Dorothy Grider is my favorite illustrator. And Creamie has been working at her new office with her new cardboard and sharpie computer.
Third Row: We got some snow. It stayed for two days. She was too sick to get off the couch and we missed it all. We made butter! (more on that tomorrow). She is taking care of her sick babydolls and rocking them and getting them juice and applesauce a lot.
Last Row: Mama Flashback: Her tiny little person at 11 months old pushing the cart at Costco, all by herself. Creamie’s nailpolish of choice. She is currently painted a different color on each hand and foot. Pink and brown on her toes and black and clear on her fingers. Her choice. Still sick. She had a coughing attack today that scared her so bad because she couldn’t breathe. She only sleeps with some serious medication. And still wakes up when it wears off around 4 or 4:30 am… and then up. for. the. day. So so gross.
And the last pic. I left my house this morning for the second time since last Sunday. It was kind of momentous. I’ll be back tomorrow with the story of how I came to make butter last week. It’s a good one.
*Blerg: adjective/expletive. It’s been getting a lot of use at my house this week.
P.S. Also, can I just tell you how much I love Big Huge Labs for letting me make all these mosaics for free? Love big huge labs. And I don’t care who knows it. Click on the pic to see it on flickr with a link to each individual photo and more info… if you are into more info and stuff.
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A Quilt for Me!
One of the goals on my 30 Before 30 List is to make myself a quilt. Over the past few years I’ve made more than 25 quilts. And I didn’t have a single one to snuggle with. The first quit I made SHOULD be on my couch, but it is on Creamie’s bed until I finish her big girl quilt. Which, ahem, has been cut out and half sewn together for more than a year! New goal: Get on that. But instead of finishing hers and reclaiming that first quilt, I made a new one for me. Whatever, goal completed. Number 29 is crossed off my list.
I was at work at my little quilt shop a few weeks ago and saw the pretty Heather Bailey dotted paisley fabric that is in the border. (It’s a reprint from her FreshCut line.) It’s not really my colors, but I couldn’t stop staring at it and touching it. So I grabbed some more things that went with it and a little ricrac and came home. That was on a Tuesday. On Friday I cut it out and started sewing and by Saturday at lunch the quilt top was finished. It was a record.
I dropped it off for my friend to quilt (she longarmed it) and waited for my turn. In the meantime I sliced off the edge of my finger. That day she called me to say it was done. And then she was super extra nice and when I told her what I did she told me to bring in the binding and she’d trim the quilt for me and machine stitch it on. And so with my less than 24 hour old wound I did what anyone would do and spent 3 hours watching a movie and stitching that binding down by hand. With a lot of Tylenol and a huge bandaged finger. The first 12 inches or so was pretty awkward, but after that I got in a groove and it went much better.
My favorite part of this quilt, other than the fact that it is done and I’m using it everyday…. actually, wait. That is my favorite part. But I really like how the ruched strips turned out. They took FOR.EV.ER. I don’t know that I’ll do that again. Maybe. They are really cute though. And I love the ricrac. And that I got to use some of my favorite print, Henna Garden from Sandi Henderson in there too. (It’s the green on green circle/floral print.) But mostly I love that it is done.
I backed it with minkee, which is the softest stuff on the planet and my friend Kellie quilted it with feathers in the big border, leaves in the small green stop border and then loops and swirls in the middle. And if I was making it again I’d probably choose the darkest blue polka dot fabric for the binding instead of the bias stripes, but whatever. Live and learn and snuggle down in your finished quilts and then don’t worry about it. The quilt is finished at 58″x72″. I didn’t use a pattern, but I’m making another one for a friend and I’ll share more details when that one is finished.
Also, I woke up to snow this morning, I’m sure it will be melted by tomorrow. Which in my book means that it doesn’t count. Stupid Lame Winter 2012 is over and we are officially in Spring. Which means I’m on medication for allergies. Yeah, they have already started. Sigh.
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Party Time
Every year my fun neighbor Jessie hosts a fantastic St. Patricks Day breakfast. She goes all out. Green everything! This year she had at least 50 people shoehorned into her small house all wearing green, eating green and just enjoying being together. It’s one of my favorite traditions we’ve adopted since living here.
I make green baking powder biscuits every year. But this year Creamie and I got to go all matchy matchy in striped tights. Hers are from her Halloween costume, and mine? Well mine are just for fun. Happy St. Patricks Day! Hope you are doing something fun.
PS- Thanks for your nice comments about my cut. My finger is getting better. The doc decided (at a lot of urging from me) to leave the stitches in a few more days. I’m glad he agreed with me. The last two days it has looked and felt a LOT better. I hope to be back to my regular (almost) self soon.
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Small Setbacks
Right when I started to feel like I was right on top of things I had a minor setback. Last week I sliced off the edge of my left index finger while I was cutting out a quilt. At first I didn’t think it was too big of a deal. I mean, it hurt a lot, and it took quite a few bandaids to get it under control. But I finished cutting out 10 quilt kits for a class I am teaching next month and then went to pick up Creamie from school.
My mom immediately sent me to get it checked out. Creamie stayed with her for the afternoon and had an extra dose of preschool. She now has the letter U down pat. And it turns out I did need stitches, only three of them, but still. Stitches. (And if details make you queasy you might want to skip this next part.) I sliced off a piece of my finger with a rotary cutter, and initially I didn’t think there was anything to stitch. But after looking at the doctor told me that he was just going to stretch my skin up and stitch it to my fingernail. So he gave me a few numbing shots, one right underneath my fingernail which hurt almost as bad as giving birth, and then stitched through my fingernail to close up the wound and stop the bleeding. And then I got a tetanus shot to top things off. He wrapped it up good and told me to come back in a week to have the stitches out.
I went and picked up Creamie from my mom’s, my arm sore from the tetanus shot. And I didn’t think too much of it until the numbing shots in my finger wore off a few hours later. Then it was five days of constant Tylenol and trying to keep my hand above my heart so my finger didn’t grow it’s own heartbeat. That lovely black square, the bottom right above, was taken at about 3 am while I was waiting for the Tylenol to kick back in and I could go back to sleep. I have taken more extra strength Tylenol, and the pain has bothered me more in thsese past five days than the five days after giving birth. For real. Of course I did do a little sewing. I finished the quilt for the class I am teaching and then did the handwork on the binding of another quilt. Both on the day that it happened. I was dumber then. And perhaps that is why that black photo of my bedroom ceiling happened in the first place. Whatever.
I keep bumping it and it bleeds again and it is generally miserable. This is the first I’ve sat down to type since then, and I’ll just say I’m grateful for spell check, because typing with only 9 fingers is a lot more than 10% less effective… And I of course bought myself some new Flea Market Fancy to cheer me up. It totally helped. But cooking at my house has been non existent. Good thing I have several meals in the freezer that we have been able to eat. And I have a great hubby who helped me make roasted turkey and mashed potatoes for dinner yesterday. Today I traded out the big huge cumbersome bandages for a few bandaids. And I was able to take a shower and wash my hair all by myself. Which felt good. It’s getting better. But it freaks me out that the stitches are coming out on Wednesday… I might skip that appointment and take them out myself on Friday or Saturday. I have taken my own stitches out more than once before. I’m kind of anti doctors office….
So, there you have it. We’ve been really enjoying the springy weather, for the first time in my life. I think it has mostly to do with the fact that winter was non existent. And I do have some picture of finished projects to show you, but I think they will be mostly wordless posts. Typing is still really awkward. Maybe I’ll see if I can figure out posting from my phone. Because I’ve come to be a great texter. My thumbs can find those letters lickety split! My other 8 fingers aren’t so good at taking over for the one…
On Saturday I spent the evening with some lovely ladies chatting, drinking diet coke out of cute straws and looking at the beautiful home of Erin. It was a much needed escape after the week I had. I’ll be back soon with some photos, but not many words for a while. I’m sure you understand.
Leap Day Fun
Yesterday we had all sorts of great fun together. Being LeapDay we decided (OK, it was pretty much all me, I decided…) that we should do something totally different than our usual day. It is like a holiday, right? Yeah, kind of. Scott rearranged his schedule so that he could be home all day with us. That made it a holiday in and of itself. I didn’t have to do the morning-we-have-to-be-out-of-the-house-before-8:35am-with-both-of-us-dressed-and-ready-battle all on my own. Two to one is a million times easier. I really miss him and his help in the mornings…
After we dropped off Creamie at preschool we went to breakfast. Like a date. In the morning. So so awesome. Then we did a little thrifting, picked Creamie up and went to lunch. The afternoon was spent bowling, eating ice cream and setting up a tent (a real tent) in the living room to watch a movie and eat snacks. A bit of happy mail thrown in made the afternoon extra awesome. And then we had waffles for dinner and finished it off with a little snuggle and TV time which eventually turned into a pillow fight. Not *that* kind. We really were just beating each other with pillows. I think I won, I ended up on the floor with all the pillows. She with the most wins, right? It was such a great day. I can’t wait for 4 more years to do something equally ridiculous. (I also found this idea this morning and I think I’ll do that this week too. I’m all about time capsules. I think. I think I’m all about time capsules.)
And with February over and March officially here I just wanted to tell you I am still right on track with this years 365 Instagram project. And amazingly I’m still on track for four of the 8 other new years resolutions. Two months in and a 50% success rate is doing better than average in my opinion!
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Playing in the Snow
A picture says a thousand words, right? Well it better, because even though this post was NEARLY ready to be published on Tuesday evening, life got in the way and I’m just now getting back to the computer. Good stuff. I love when the good life gets in the way of other things. But back to the snow and the pictures that say a thousand words. Go.
Tuesday, after what seemed like months of waiting we finally got real snow at our house. And it didn’t even all melt away before we got out there to play in it. It’s of course long gone now, but it was here. Tuesday, it was here. It started snowing on our way home from preschool and it didn’t let up for a few hours. We had those big fluffy flakes that stick on your eyelashes and everything. It made me so happy. And as soon as it stopped we got all dressed up in snow garb to go play. And due to playing in the snow I completely forgot about her dance class Tuesday afternoon. #MomFail.
But this might be her only chance to play in snow this year, which is completely depressing, so I figure it’s all worth it. It was an afternoon well spent.
Potty Break. She started running for the front door. Novice snow mom here forgot to make her go before we got all dressed up in snow gear. So we took it all off at the front door, she made a beeline for the bathroom and then we put it all back on. And my biggest fear was that the snow would melt before we got back out there. Seriously, I’m moronic sometimes.
But we got to make a teensy snowman, snow angels, and she threw plenty of snowballs. I think we stayed outside for two hours. And by the time she was done it was getting dark, and I could hear the dripping of the snow melting off of cars and houses and I was so thankful for the one afternoon of good fun in the white stuff. Now, if only we can get a few more days like this before spring really comes that would be great.
It did snow a bit today, and hailed even. Which is closer to rain than snow (in my opinion). But it’s long gone now and my world is back to that awful shade of dead winter gray/brown/yellowish blah.
PS- I thrifted her coat last year for I think $5. Also, I have had some major luck in the thrifting department lately. I’ll share soon.
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Playing in California
When we were in California last week the thing the most important thing to me besides spending time together was not stressing out about anything. I hate vacations where you feel like you have to cram everything in and by the time you are done you need a vacation to recover. You are going to need time to recover from being away from home anyway, so don’t make it worse by cramming everything into an calculated hourly schedule. But that’s just me.
So while we were visiting Grandpa we hung out at his house a lot. Had lazy mornings. Didn’t stress out about not being somewhere by 9 am. Lovely. We went to a park Scott remembered from when he was young called The Dennis the Menace Park. (Seriously.) He was dissappointed to see that all the cool old toys have been replaced with standard run of the mill hard plastic and metal play equipment. It used to have a big cool castle theme. Now it’s just primary colored play equipment. This sword in the stone was the only thing left from the old park. Creamie loved it anyway. We had our picnic, she ran around touching everything and we left before it got too cold for dinner and a little shopping. A perfect day.
Creamie and Grandpa got along great. She shared her books and fruitsnacks with him and he sat down and watched cartoons with her. She talked his ears off I’m sure. But it was so sweet to see them sitting together on the couch watching cartoons on Sunday morning. It was one of those things I hope never to forget. And I hope we can go visit again soon. Not only is Grandpas house the perfect vacation, it is full of beautiful old things that make me smile just to look at. Look at the treasure I saw peeking out from the top pantry shelf while I was looking for napkins! Catherine Holm! And the wallpaper in his dining room is one of the most beautiful patterns ever. And the little turquoise fawn in the china cabinet…. sigh. Grandparents always have awesome stuff don’t they. I should take pictures of every single thing I love about my loved one’s homes. What a fun little album that would be to look through.
A big part of our trip was focused around eating. As it should be. We ate at all our favorite places while we were there, the doughnut shop around the corner being one of them. This girl would do most anything for a rainbow sprinkle doughnut. Do you remember this post?
I got to do one more REALLY fun thing before we left LA and headed down to San Diego. I e-met Shannon more than a year ago. And she is absolutely lovely. Her blog, Little Luck Tree is full of pretty pictures and tutorials and very doable DIY projects. She just moved across the country to Hollywood and is living her dream of acting. I am so excited for her! She came and met me for lunch just before we packed up the car for the second half of our trip and I wished I could have spent another few hours talking. And we didn’t even get to the shopping or the thrifting! Also, my face is totally pink from our day at Seal Beach. I forget how often to reapply sunscreen every time we are on vacation…
Shannon and I met at a cute little spot for lunch (delicious food and real plates!) and talked about life, blogs, geeked out about “famous” people, caught up on all those things in real life that just don’t transfer as well into internet conversations and generally just had a wonderful few hours sitting out in the sunshine. And when it came time to go, we both admitted we are blogger geeks and had to take a picture. And then we both pulled out our Instax camera’s and laughed at each other. She found some poor unsuspecting diner to juggle gigantic oldschool cameras while we stood there like happy idiots. Thanks diner guy.
I don’t use my camera (an Instax 210 wide) nearly as often as I should. It was Shannon that actually encouraged me to take it out of the box months ago. My dad gave it to me for my birthday last year. (Shannon’s cute little white Instax is the Mini version.)
As for today? I am working on a new project that is totally for me. I also found out I am going to teach my first class at my local quilt shop at the end of April. Exciting! I’ve been eating my mom’s plumberry jam on everything I can add it too, breakfast lunch and dinner. Creamie asked for some orange juice this afternoon, and after I squeezed her some I decided to try out a green smoothie with some of the baby spinach in the fridge. I’ll just say I’m a total fan. It will be hard to not eat one every single day. Though with two cups of spinach in there and a bunch of fresh fruit that might not be such a bad thing. I’ll be back soon, I almost feel completely caught up on my life and ready to jump into some new things.
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Seal Beach, CA
When we go to California to visit Grandpa one of our favorite things to do is go to Seal Beach. It’s a perfect place in my opinion, and I am not usually a beach kind of girl. I prefer mountains, and snow and fireplaces to beaches. But this place is very nearly perfect. It was perfect weather for the beach, warm, sunshiney and not a cloud in the sky. Creamie has never been so happy.
As soon as we laid out our big blanket on the sand Creamie started taking off clothes to get in the water. Her little skirt was off in no time flat and it was all I could do to keep her underwear on her. I was glad I found these little boy shorts for her a few days before we left. I didn’t much mind her walking around in these undiepants.
I found a small bucket of beach toys for $5 before we left and it was one of my best buys. She was in heaven. I think she played here in the sand for 3 straight hours. I took more than 300 pictures, but I’ll spare you the full photo journal.
This was the first of many picnics on this trip. I can’t count the number of sandwiches I ate. But I was really glad we took our big picnic blanket. I used it almost everyday. It was perfect. (This is the quilt I made for Scott last year from his dad’s clothes, that post here.)
She was burying her dad’s feet. And doing a wonderful job of it. Also, I think I have about 50 pictures of her from this trip with her toungue out. Beaching is serious concentrating business!
After she fell in the water a few times she got cold and we put her swimming suit on her. And then she got cold again and we traded a swimming suit for jeans and a fleece jacket. Going to the beach requires a LOT of stuff. Especially for us. At the end of the pier on Seal Beach is a really great restaurant called Ruby’s Diner. It’s another California favorite.
I love this girl. Also, I finally found a pair of sunglasses that was under $20 that doesn’t hurt my head when I wear them for more than 10 minutes. These aren’t them. I am not letting my new one’s out of my sight ever. They were too hard to come by!
Most of our time in California it was pretty cold. Her little fleece jacket got a LOT of use this trip. So I was glad we went to the beach when we did, it was such perfect weather. For February. She has been asking me all morning if she can go to the beach after lunch today. She sure loved it.
Also, I should point out that I don’t get in the water. I do the beach in pants and a jacket and stay on the dry sand. I did walk down to the water to talk to those two while they were playing, but I try to keep my toes out of the surf. I am a total beach woosie. But these two? They’d get in the water if it was 45 degrees. And they have. Crazies.
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30 Before 30 List
I turned 29 last week and I made a list of 30 things I want to accomplish before I turn 30. (I got this idea from this lady) And then it got lost. In one of those stacks of papers and receipts and stuff that is on top of every single horizontal surface in my entire house….. you have those too right? The Stacks?
But here it is. I have already started a few of these. I’ve been working on perfecting my pizza recipe for years. I have never made the same pizza twice because i am always unsatisfied with the results. I really hope that I can finally get #2 down. But I’ve also made my first crochet project (#3). We went on vacation (#28). That was on my list before I knew we were going to California last week, so I am counting it. I hope to get away sometime before 30 with just Scott. We’ll see how that goes. I have a few roadtrip ideas (#22). I am working on #9. Number 20 will make me fat. I better do that one and then undo the damage done before I make that dress (#4).
I taped my list up next to the door in my crafty/storage room so I can see it all the time, and I have a copy of it in my phone which I look at a lot as well. I actually have a lot of lists in my phone. I am a total list person. I have lists of menu ideas, new years resolutions, blog ideas, places to go on vacation, thrifty things to look for, sizes of spaces in my house that I am looking for the perfect thing for, a clothes shopping list so I don’t get sidetracked and buy too many things that don’t go with what I already have. You know, lists. Do you make lists of things? I’d be lost without a good list.
