Happy Mother's Day to our children

I admit to some ambivalence about Mother's Day. No disrespect to my wonderful inspirational mother or to my sweet mother-in-law who happens to be visiting with me now.

The thing is I figure mothers don't need to be thanked, children are such a gift.

One part of that gift is what the experience does to you and who you are.

So here is my list. Please feel free to add to it. You know you are a mother when:

• You are eighty and you still tell strange kids to do up their jackets
• You have saved that single small mitt you knit for them when they were two, even though that kid now has kids of their own
• You have at least sat down one million times and before your bum hits the couch someone yells "Moooom" and you get up again
• You have at least two million times said "Don't yell, come here and tell me what you want"
• You have made sandwiches with your coat on
• You are an expert in some sport that you a) never played yourself b) never were the least bit interested in yourself
• Your favourite room in the house is the bathroom because it has a lock
• You are sure you have spent more time in your car than your house
• You go into their room when they have left home to sniff their pillow and tell your husband you were just in there folding laundry
• You have learned to sleep with one ear open
• You say you are not too tired when you are

Happy mother's day.

Now what what have I missed?

BTW here is a spectacular article from the NYTimes today on mother's clothes.

Wonder what of my creations anyone will save.

Quick summer dress

Thank you so much for all the supportive comments. Much appreciated. I heard at the shelter that puppy mill moms are the most difficult dogs to take in - all they know is being in a cage, the puppies at least get to leave. They are generally fearful and poorly socialized.

So far Miss Daisy is exceeding expectations as they say in the big world. She is apparently making up, mile by mile, for all the time outside she never had before and is excellent on our long walks, social and gentle with every person and dog we meet. She doesn't know how to play yet (we have a couple of fun dogs at home in the family who will help with that) and had no clue what stairs were. She follows me around one step behind me all day and sleeps happily with us all night.

The only incident we had was when we went out to golf, the first time we had left her, and she chewed a hole in her beautiful nylon traveling crate. We got a shock when we came home and she was not in there, until we found her upstairs in the bedroom sitting beside a pair of my shoes. Point taken, enough being caged up for this lifetime.

Here is the latest picture, the ears are coming up:

Now I realize too that this is meant to be a sewing blog and yes I have done some sewing.

Here is the latest version of Brensan Designs KISS dress that goes together so nicely.

I know I always accuse my photographer of taking my picture all slanted over, but seeing this I realize that what is off kilter is me. But so are the trees, so at least we have a theme going. Stretch cotton sateen from Mood, finally sewn up.

This pattern has optional back and front French darts but since I wanted a sort of everyday dress I put in the back darts so it wouldn't look like a sack, but left out the front darts to spare myself the experience of looking down and my belly under the seatbelt in the car and seeing the rolls. It just makes it more comfortable to wear, even though it does reveal the realities of my figure:

I like this pattern so much because it requires zero fitting finesse and because of the cool construction techniques. The best one is the way the top of the back seam is sewn for the first few inches ( you can get the neckline over your head) and then the zipper is inserted. So neat and so much nicer than all that fiddly unsatisfying stuff you usually get at the top of a zipper in a dress:

The facings are bagged so the neckline and armholes are particularly neat, you can find that technique here.

An excellent pattern.

This should come as no surprise

Ok.

Where we last left me, on the edge I live on and frequently sew from, I was volunteering at a dog refuge shelter.

Well.

Yesterday afternoon I brought home this two year old poodle Schnauzer mix. Her name on her cage said Heidi but the family quickly figured that since Miss Heidi at home is heavily invested in the Terrible Twos and painting her body with stuff you shouldn't use for that and trying to make rules for things like who gets to open the doors or else - many events that prompt "No Heidi!" that this would be counter productive.

So since this new dog likes to stop and smell the flowers Miss Scarlett has phoned in the name Daisy, which is who she is now. And she doesn't know she has a name anyway.

The thing is Miss Daisy was abandoned after her time in a rabbit cage at a puppy mill. She was picked up and sent to be euthanized but ended up with the group that tries to save those dogs, and ended up being walked by me.

These puppy mill dogs really have had a hard time. The ones I have tried to walk won't, they have never been out of cages and don't know how to do it. These are animals that often have not walked on grass, played, being patted, or even had names. 

This little dog really loved to walk however and was the only dog I ever have seen who actually stopped and smelled the flowers. I was told to expect that she would stay in her crate for a long time and I would need patience.

This is a long way from Mr. R the terrier chutzpah king.

But I figured I wasn't going to go home and leave her behind not knowing what would happen to her.

So we came home and she did hide in the crate. She looked at a ball and didn't know what it was. She doesn't know what Good Girl means and looks worried when we say Come. I still have not heard her bark.

But I took her out for a walk and we walked and walked and she was so happy. And she ate so well and I felt her bony back and wondered how many meals it would take to fill her out.

The sound of the dishwasher, the washing machine, the beep of the iPhone, the sound of garlic being chopped at the chopping block startled her.

And last night she was put in her crate but started to fuss and when she came out she tried to get up on the bed. 

And she slept all night, quiet and relaxed, between us.

We will see how we go.

She is a good girl. 

Just doesn't know it yet.

As requested

Here is Vanessa. Other dogs in the shelter can be seen here.

Vacation report

We are going into our third week here in Florida. Monday I go back to work online with two courses and I am looking forward to it. My classes are interactive and I enjoy talking with my students.

I have been doing a whole lot of knitting and some sewing. The sewing is a dress I will post pictures of, but to be really honest I have sort of downshifted right now and getting that organized is not something I am going to get to today. 

The knitting is a sweater for my youngest son. I am in the search for a generic knit in the round pattern I can adjust to different folks and basic stitch patterns and this was a version of that. Sort of a knitting TNT. Not sure if I am there with this one. 

I got it into my head that since he is tall and slim I should make a long thin sweater but I may of overdone it. We will see when I get home. If it doesn't fit him it may fit Lowly Worm, an entity that Richard Scary readers will recognize:

The other thing I have been doing has been therapeutic.

I am a big walker. I should have self-identified that with the last shoe post. If you can't walk in it, it is of no use to me.

When I first got here I went on my usual morning beach walk along the route Mr. R and I used to take. 

I also did my annual thinking and at one point that even included serious consideration of going to a place here called The Electric Chair and getting Rascal tattooed on my wrist. 

But then I figured that wouldn't be fair to the other dogs that proceeded him, and then how could I do the dogs and not the grandkids, and then there was the love of my life, and my children and by the time I figured I would be a 60 year old with sleeves I decided to pull myself back over the saner part of the line.

And my feet took me one morning past the local shelter that takes in animals other shelters were about to put down.

I decided me walking by myself every morning was the waste of a good dog walker. So every morning since I spend about two hours walking dogs from the shelter.

I really enjoy it a lot.

My own dogs have always been of the purebred carefully cared for type and I have had my eyes opened here. There are some terrible stories. I am not taking my husband with me because he is a sweet soft-hearted man and would be teary at what some people have done in a few of the situations. I have worked for politicians and am of course better prepared for this kind of stuff.

The thing is that even with a few bad stories there are not bad dogs. Overwhelmingly these are lovely, lovely dogs and being in contact with them, walking them as opposed to just looking at them in the pen where no one would be at their best, I have let lose of some of my preconceived ideas on refuge animals.

These would be:

• You don't know what you are getting. Actually neither do you with any dog but with the dogs that are a little older than puppies, - teens, adults and even seniors, you do know exactly what you are getting, particularly if you spend some time walking and getting to know the dog.
• These dogs have behavioural problems. Actually few of them seem to. You have to remember that in many cases these were pets that were owner surrendered because of non animal issues - the owner died, got sick, or had to move away from a pet friendly housing situation. These dogs are trained, loving, and ready to fit into a home.

Of course the puppies are more adoptable but the older dogs are wonderful and many have 3/4 of their lives ahead of them and have the advantage of already being trained and socialized.

If I could I would write a few new cards on some of the pens if I had a chance. This is what they would read.

My name is Vanessa. My owner passed away and when I came here I was despondent. Wouldn't even move. However after some attention I got my perk back. All I want is to go around the block once a day and spend the rest of the time smiling and watching you.

My name is Arthur. I am two and lived on the streets and then in shelters my whole life. I should be a mess but I am not. I am calm and happy, cheerful and sturdy. I am an optimist.

It gives me a lift every day to see these guys.

Project photos later.

I knew it

I have been thinking about this a while now. Just when women start to breathe and lead lives of their own defining, someone somewhere decides they need to be slowed down.

Often these someones are fashion designers, who of course are just expressing larger themes.

In particular the shoes so many women try to wear these days seem to prove this. I mean a girl just can't keep up, all day on her feet, staggering behind in 5 inch heels. 

When I see shoes like this, I think really? These are just designed to trip you up. I mean I love pretty shoes but do these look like they belong on the feet of someone who has worked to be comfortable in her own skin, on can stand on her own two feet?

Which may be the point.

What do you think of this?

Flypaper thoughts, Florida version

• No real sewing to show because I have been knitting
• Unless you count online fabric ordering
• I do
• The knitting is going well
• Once you unravel a sweater it is easier to knit the second time around
• They aren't kidding about that gauge stuff
• Went for a drive past Cape Canaveral
• Which reminds me
• If there is one thing that drives me crazy it is outer space
• Shooting off into space
• To me just one more example of a bunch of men starting a new project before they have cleaned up after the last one
• And aliens
• I mean really, who has the time?
• I don't care if my grandmother claimed some of her relatives in Alberta were kidnapped by aliens
• Of course being her relatives they gave them back
• Let me tell you too if it was one of my kids who had signed up for this one way trip to Mars they would be in big trouble
• Big Trouble
• Ordered three yards of purple "scuba knit" from Fabricmart in the weekend sale
• Ever the optimist
• Am well aware that at my age I should be going for elegant and classic
• Black pants, white shirt, black cardigan
• However when I was upside down in the dentist's recliner a few weeks ago, hoping that TV didn't fall on my safety glasses, the hygienist said I looked sharp
• She was referring to my rose coloured dress that matched my, not surprisingly, rose coloured glasses
• If it came to a draw I think I will go with sharp
• Elegant and classic is being well handled elsewhere in say Manhattan and Paris
• Someone has to hold down the fort on home-made sharp at the dentist office and I am taking that one on
• Purple scuba knit might be pushing the luck of that particular envelope
• Article in the NY Times says that fewer folks are golfing these days
• They are figuring out how to change that
• Bringing the fees down from a week's groceries might help
• Except in Florida where anyone can, and does, golf
• One idea is 15 inch holes and you kick the ball not hit it
• Listen golf is hard
• Some things are hard
• Lapped zippers are hard
• Fitting pants is hard
• Reading knitting instructions right the first time is hard
• Really hard
• Raising kids who don't want to go to Mars is particularly hard
• Looking sharp upside down at the dentists when the dentist is next door from where you had the dog put down a few days before is hard
• It requires conscious colour coordination
• Thing is it is OK if things are hard
• Not every thing can be a skim
• I am riding my bike every day every day
• Also hard
• My husband has noticed
• The stagger into the door
• I thought if he came with me that would be support
• He thought if he surprised me with a put-it-together motor that would be support
• Cultural differences
• Might be dealing with an alien
• What do you think?