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Sunday, August 14

Updates on my Dr. Seuss Quilt

Dear Singer Sewing machine... please let me finish my quilt. I've been ever so nice to you, why do you insist on skipping stitches? I've had you repaired 3 times and you are a mere 5 years old! Are you a lemon disguised as the greatest quilting machine ever? I'm sad that we're not getting along. You've given me years of fun and relaxation. Please tell me what I need to do to make you happy again. I really don't want to have to replace you.

Signed,
Your loving friend
I love my machine... and we've only recently been arguing.

Here's a few pics of the quilt so far! I finally finished stippling it last night. Now all I have to do is a mitered binding.

Pardon the bird... it's a good tutorial, but the bird needs to go!




I encountered a few issues - basically the tension on my machine kept going wonky, and I had to restart the stippling since it gave this effect on the back. It kind of looks like stray hairs? After looking into it, I found out that there's numerous reasons why this can happen.

This Janome forum helped me solve some of my issues and I managed to FINALLY finish my quilt... Hopefully I'll have it ready for Kate's upcoming birthday! I'm trying to figure out what I'm going to do for her first birthday, and since this will be a rare occasion where I get to choose what to do for her birthday, I was thinking on what else... but a Dr. Seuss themed birthday!!!


Can't believe it's almost been a year!

This year has gone by so fast - I'm now starting to feel nervous about "returning to work". If you haven't yet heard, I was one of the unfortunate souls who experience the wrath of our new government "job creation" initiative... aka let's cut the public sector. My return date is coming soon and without a job lined up yet - I fear I'm returning to a wasteland of my former life. Most of my old work friends will be gone. I won't have my amazing office, and I'll be on a serious job hunt contemplating about what is to become of me... Anyone looking for a Graphic Designer? I'm for hire!

I've had a great time this summer and it saddens me to walk back into a routine when everyday brought on a new adventure (that often came with a few credit card swipes); the Experimental Farm, The Children's Museum, The Science and Tech Museum, countless days at Gymboree, the local pools, the beaches, cosmic adventures, bike rides, farmer's markets, mommy playgroups, organized baby events (Bibmababy was involved!) and today we hit up the Navan fair. I still have a few things that I want to do before Kate starts daycare. I really want to hit up Calypso water park. I think we're going to have to go at it alone since most of our playgroup friends have already started daycare.

My focus on Bibmababy has lately gone stale... I'm trying my best to create new items, but a mental laziness got into the way. I'm over-tired and emotionally drained. As much as this year with Kate has been unforgettable - it's also been one of the most emotional in my life. I lost a dear friend, and there isn't a day that goes by where I don't think about him. I've lost people in my life before - but for some reason this one is really affecting me. His passing is surreal. I was looking forward to seeing him this summer and really regret bailing on him last winter. I also regret the last conversation I had with him the night before. I told him I was going to force feed him my placenta. He called me a granola because of my cloth diapering. You'd have to know us to realize that we just had that kind of friendship. We met back in grade 7 when he called me a cabbage patch, and I called him a ninja turtle. He was too cool to come to teen dances, but waited for us outside afterward skateboarding in the parking lot. Singing along to Spice Girls. He asked me to be his fake wife at our 10th grade parenting class where we had a fake wedding with a string ring he got from a bubble gum machine, built a fake house and adopted a fake African boy he wanted to name Skywalker Roy and had strong feelings about teaching that kid Buddhism. I was allowed to do whatever I wanted with our Asian daughter. I named her Penelope Rose Fortune Cookie. Again - you had to know our sense of humour. He drew my tattoo, left me sketch art for my locker, serenaded me with S-Club 7 and finally at the end of our high school journey, he was my first kiss (hard to get people to notice you when you're "one of the boys"). We double dated at prom(cue Fatboy Slim), I was fortunate enough to get a Shortsleeve as a date SCORE! (love ya Shawn) and he was the "background date" when I went to prom with Marc (Marc let me wear soccer shoes under my dress). Nothing came of it but probably one of the best friendships I had ever had. We kept in touch when I moved away, and our visits became less frequent when he moved away from our small town as well. Through the miracle of Facebook, we reconnected, and it led to our ritual Friday afternoon chats and razzing. He tried to convince me to move to Toronto to be closer to him and his friends (I was going through a pretty rough patch and considered selling my house and jumping ship). He told me he'd always be there for me. In a way I feel like he is. He left me with numerous memories (Blair Witch Hide and Go Seek, drunken bike rides at 3am, the guitar lessons). He introduced me to great people and he will always be a part of me. So dear diary... I'm coping - and learning to appreciate everyone I have in my life. You never know when someone you love and hold so dear to your heart leaves us. This post was meant to be a happy look at the past year, but I guess I had things that needed to be said - I know some of you reading this who do know me personally are probably having a hard time reading this. You know how great Yvan was and how much everyone is hurting. Miss you buddy.

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This post made me cringe - I kinda sorta still (guilty!!!) use disposables when I know we're going to be out of the house for a long time and I know there's a poo coming...

http://ourmountainofgrace.com/2011/04/why-we-chose-cloth-diapers/