Things I have noticed and things I have done

First of all there is not a lot of great sewing progress to report.

Beautiful new baby last weekend and for the last five days my husband and I have been taking care of the little girls while their folks were visiting the NYC son on location, although that location is now Brooklyn.

I would be more jealous if it were not for the fact that I myself will be there in two weeks time - garment district lookout. Me lookout too actually. Since I am going to be staying with my son and his very nice girlfriend, who must by now be wondering what she got into when she signed up to be the Nova Scotia Consulate, I have also decided this is my visit to Conquer the Subway.

No big deal of course for normal people but I have two profound handicaps. 

One is claustrophobia (undoubtedly a product of my upbringing on the Canadian Prairies were everything was above ground and you could see across at least two provinces (hills and mountains are known as something that ruins the view). The other is my incredible lack of anything resembling a sense of direction. I still get lost in my own house and it is a bungalow and I have lived here for 26 years.

My problem with getting lost is partially due to the fact I get easily distracted. If there is someone on that train with a cool fabric on her coat I will miss my stop and at least ten others. 

I am hoping that the magnetic field that is the garment district will keep me straight.

Our time with the little girls was fantastic, once we figured out that Miss Scarlett was happiest if she slept in my big cozy bed with me and Rascal - which put my husband on the couch - although it did make it clear to us that it was probably a good idea that my daughter have a break and we glad we could help her do it. Taking care of a 4 and 2 year old requires planning for a 5:00 a.m. start time and the three hours every night when you sit on the couch and say "I shouldn't have sat down." I figure it is that they just are so much smarter than we are. 

Which is a good thing.

And which brings me to a thought I had this morning reading the NY Times. Some kid has just published a scientifically significant study of the bacterial contamination of kosher and organic chickens opposed to the other stuff.

The line that I noticed was that to do this he, helped by his mother, bought 213 chicken thighs. Ha. I can see it now, a woman standing at the meat counter with her car keys "Listen I know this sounds silly but my kid has this project..." I wonder what favours she had to pull to store them? 

No one knows what mothers do.

So right now this mother is off duty except for hemming another edition of the Barb pants. I wore my last version to work where they got the "sitting down all day test" which revealed a need for a 1 1/2" addition to the waist. 

That's all the sewing I have been able to do, except for several garments that now have sleeves and not much else, done in prep for my Burdastyle class this Thursday. I am ready to go on that one and actually think sleeves are one of my best things, sort of balancing out that sense of direction thing.

Later.

Good news story

If you have been reading me for a while you know that my dear step-daughter has had a complicated pregnancy, following in fact a long tough road to get there.

Well, yesterday morning she delivered a perfect baby boy, a month early but absolutely healthy and wonderful.

Her water broke after dessert at my house on Sunday night and she went right into the hospital. The thing was her husband was away, nearly all the way across the country and had to get home as soon as he could.

Fortunately Westjet got him right on a flight and even held a connection 30 minutes for him, making up the time in the air.

During the flight of course, when you can't use your cell phone, our son-in-law had no idea what was going on at home.

Cut to our girl in the labour room.

Her cell phone rang and when she answered a very polite male voice asked her "You don't know who I am but I am the pilot on your husband's plane. We just wanted to know how you are doing."

Not sure what she said but they made it, just in time.

Thank you Westjet.

Flypaper thoughts Friday edition

• When your husband says, "you should sew this weekend" you have to wonder.
• Little bossy lately?
• Too long a story about the meeting at work?
• A clever man's rephrasing of slow down kiddo.
• I'll take it.
• Working on sleeves this weekend for my last Burdastyle seminar of the year 
• Interesting conversation with an old sewing buddy
• He said "I don't so much want to wear it as figure out how to make it"
• Some of that in us all
• New glasses again, now a pink, clear, purple and blue
• I love accessories and these count
• Those discount boys send things out fast
• Did ten bags of leaves this week
• About 10%
• I love trees
• Had a room built on the side of the house at an angle to go around a tree
• The only one I can climb
• Or could
• Folks sit in the living room and say "Is it me or is your hallway crooked?"
• I tell them about the tree
• What I don't say is that the Chinese say if you cut down a tree someone dies
• That's what someone told my mother
• I am taking no chances
• What do you think of the new Vogues?
• I am speechless
• Used it all up at the meeting
• They got a case of the depressions down at BMV?
• Even for Hallowe'en it wasn't funny
• May do a review just for sport
• That Stylearc is looking better by the minute
• I got hit with the domestics last weekend and made four pans of lasagne for the freezer
• How long does that stuff keep in the freezer?
• Ate it all week and now don't want to see it again for another decade
• Come by and I will give you some
• I will meet you on the curb
• Went trick or treating with the girls and family last night
• At one house the man asked if he could borrow my witch's hat to wear to work
• He is a church organist
• Not sure what denomination
• Left it with him
• Played dentist with the girls when I sat them today
• Miss Scarlett looked at my molars and said "when I grow up I am going to get a gold tooth too."
• We both like to accessorize
• Never too young to start
• "At the front"
• Maybe wrong about that

Babs, Barb and Barbie

It was a full week. 

Two days ago I put my almost 86 year old mother on the plane to go home back to Winnipeg. Protesting all the way that she doesn't need a cane but that it is the "open Sesame" of service and excellent if you want to queue jump.

My mother really is something. You would have to go a long way to find anyone, of any age, who is as cheerful or who operates as much on shear positive willpower. 

It did hit me at the airport, when I said goodbye, that I have lived my adult life away from her, although we have talked most days on the phone, and that by now there is a lot of time and distance that separates us, so much activity.

But as I watched her turn the corner through security I thought, "you are still my mommy." 

In the day-to-day of so many days now the intensity of that gets buried but it's still there, just as it always was, just like it was when I opened the back door and came home, then everyday.

I got in my car that late afternoon and turned on the radio and there was a song by one of those atonal contemporary singers where there is no tune at all and the chorus was "Hang on. Your children love you more than you know."

I had said goodbye to a son and his dear girlfriend a few days before, so I could look at it both ways.

Like I always do when I feel emotional I decided to focus on a project. You have to make yourself feel better with doing family when you miss family.

My daughter has asked me to make the little girls a bookcase dollhouse for Christmas. Barbie scale because they have lots of Barbies (some even with all body parts) and that makes it easier to play, not to display.

Let me tell you the world of Pinterest and Barbie collectors is quite the world - these folks are in deep. I looked for ideas and was quickly overwhelmed.

Now I am not a perfecto crafter,  don't be looking for a Pinterest board from me on this, so I have quickly decided to work within my limitations.

One of the things I have done is collect a surprisingly large collection of miniature wooden furniture from the knick-knack shelves of the thrift stores (now that's one weird  culture too knick-knacking), scale chest of drawers and wardrobes that are jewel boxes in disguise, rocking chairs and little tables. I have searched non-toxic paint and am going to be doing those up to match yet to be determined decor.

I have also made myself a regular on ebay, and unimpressed with the cheapo plastic furniture sold right now, have a vintage Barbie fridge coming in from Quebec, a sink from Calgary, and a stove from California being shipped to my son in Brooklyn.

The bathroom however has been a challenge.

At one point I was lurking around the house at 1:00 a.m. and came that close, that close, to cannibalizing part of the Cuisine-art for Barbie toilet parts until I pulled myself back from the ledge and came up with this, still to be glued in place and the hole in the seat cut out (once I can figure out how to do that).

This picture will give you an idea where my head is at these days:

Now that's Barbie.

Equally dramatic I finally sewed myself a pair of the Barb pants from StyleArc.

I have sort of been wimping out on this one. The pattern was named after me and I have had it for five months but didn't make it, quite honestly, because where would I go if a pants pattern named after me didn't fit or look good?

I mean what would be the plan B?

The thing is though I am, eventually, a brave person (see illustration above) so I did make a pair in some black stretch woven from Emmaonesock, black being my new muslin, without any alterations at all.

Here is a blurry picture, taken by my harassed photographer who was refinishing the dining room floor and making home made ice cream at the time, the same time.

They are IMO a perfect fit and exactly what I was looking for. A bit snug across the hips but as those who wear stretch wovens know, that loosens up in the first 30 minutes. Not sure too if I shouldn't go back and shorten them a bit too - will have to think about the shoes.

The next versions will be in different colours and easier to see:

So more on these pants later. I love them and will be making many other versions.

So that's Barb.

Next was the Hallowe'en costumes. The little girls were hopeless at standing still for measurements so in the end I lay them down on the fabric and traced around them.

Then they had to go and get pillows because the floor was too hard.

Here is Scarlett being skeptical about being a witch:

And here are the pair of them ready to be traced. The little one, Heidi, is going to be a bumble bee because she makes good buzzing noises, here she is wearing her beanie with the pipe cleaner antennae you can't see:

I made her black leggings ( we have a black turtleneck) and this bumble bee top (the witch costume took off on the broom):

And finally since this seems to be family picture day I have to share my husband's Thanksgiving "double-breasted turkey".

Leaves more for hot turkey sandwiches the next day.

Now off to lie down on the floor and draft my own witch's dress.

A surprising weekend

Not much sewing done this weekend. 

Tomorrow is my birthday and last night we went over to my daughter's for dinner.

My mother-in-law and I walked in and there was my 86 year old mother from Winnipeg, and my son and his girlfriend from New York, and both my children from here with husband and girlfriend, the grandchildren and my oldest friends, a couple I have known since university, the kind of friends who had kids the same age (nine between the two families) and are like family. My daughter said she considered a larger party but knew I would then spend the night hosting and this was better for a big birthday.

She knows me.

It was the first surprise party of my life and I was completely surprised.

The really weird thing was the feeling that this was for me. All other events I am making the party for someone else and it was strange it was for me. I kept thinking that all night.

I was so touched that they were there. 

Everyone I love most in the world in one room and the three sisters who weren't there, close in spirit. One sister sent me jewelry she knows means something to me, another wrote a really lovely card and my sister who quilts made one that is half farmland (where I grew up) and half a seascape, because that is where I have spent the other half of my life. I will take a picture this week to show you.

I felt really emotional all night and still feel that way.

Everyone is so good to me.

My mom is here for the rest of the week and I will be checking in again next weekend with my project news.

In the meantime I am just going to enjoy my family.

Until then.

Knit class on Burdastyle tomorrow

I had a blast last time and am looking forward to tomorrow.

As requested here is the link to the class.

Greek potatoes

This is Canadian Thanksgiving weekend and we have the Big Meal underway. It is traditional cooking and pretty easy.

The fact is not everyone likes some of the standards, like mashed potatoes, like my husband for instance. 

If you are looking for a wonderful alternative I have to pass on my sister's recipe for Greek potatoes. So easy and so, so good.

Here it is here.

Now back to the kitchen.