riarug

Moving Notice

2007-11-19T09:04:00.000-05:00

I've decided to pick up where I left off, but I've moved over here. A fresh start so to say.

Small Steps

2007-03-13T16:22:00.000-04:00

To get back into the swing of crafting, I started small last night. Organizing my embroidery threads. Here is some of them here. Those large spools on the top right hand corner are wool threads that I was given when a elderly friend of the family passed away. I hoard them carefully and have only used them a few times. Always looking for that perfect project that will lovingly show them off. There colours are brillant still. I had to by some more floss bobbins to finish up this task tonight. a great way to justify a little TV watching.

Um..... 8 Months?

2007-03-02T10:49:00.000-05:00

Hi, I say sheepishly.

I do exist. Just did not exist in blogville for a while. Can't even say why really. I guess what I needed was "out there". I miss it in "here" though.

I was pretty creative here and there. Sold some jewellery. Helped to pay for a trip to the Dominicain Republic we took this past week with Hubby, Lina and myself.

My mind has been flowing in other streams for a while I guess.

Many thanks to Angharad. Girl, I know you checked up on me and I can't tell you how much that meant to me. I was just lost for a little while. I looked at your kind inquiry many times, and I just didn't know how to respond. I know, I could have just said hi, but somehow, I had no voice.

I don't know what I expected from blogging. I found a community, wonderful people, like minded people, I never seem to meet outside of blogging. But for a while, I guess I needed a little grounding. I was spending WAY to much time blogging or reading blogs and lost touch I guess with the world where others don't know me as well. Maybe I closed off a little of myself to non-bloggers when I should have been trying harder to keep myself open to them, even though I don't find much in common with them.

Now that I look back at the length of time I've been gone from here, I realise what it is that bothered me most about not blogging. Blogging has been recording my creative life. 8 months without that record and I guess I kind of feel sad that this record of events as they occur is somehow lost in a way.

I guess without having recoginzed it before that a need to create a record of my life is exactly why I started blogging.

Anyway. A lot can happen in 8 months. Alot has. But I guess I need to start recording my life again. So here I am.

Well, where do I begin?

2006-06-28T09:27:00.000-04:00

So Lina tried something new this last weekend. She drag raced her bike at the King of The Hill drag races in North Bay. I really had my doubts about her going through with it but Friday night after waiting two hours in line to register, she got out for her first time trial and did wonderfully. She listened so well to instructions! Hubby put street tires (from a scooter) on her Honda 50 and explained in quite some detail what she had to do. Friday night she did an 1/8 of a mile in 23 seconds and reached about 29 miles and hour.

Lina and Hubby at the line setting up in front of the Christmas tree getting into the "box", Lina is on the red Honda in the red suit and blue helmet.

Here is Lina waiting in the staging lane. Her little friend she met there, JJ is on the blue Yamaha behind her.

Here's Hubby giving her some last minute advice and instructions.

So Saturday she made it to the quarter finals! Sunday she "broke out" (went faster than her dial-in time) and so didn't go on. By then she was down to a 17.2 second 1/8 of a mile and 35 miles per hour. If she was more confident with her gears, she could probably get it down a few seconds and believe it or not would be just a few seconds slower as some full size vehicles!

Hubby brought his bike up too, cause we were there anyway, and did very well, getting a third place in the superbike class.

After the day was done Sunday, Hubby took Lina up for a helicopter ride that was there on the grounds. All in all an exciting weekend for Lina.

And, she wants to do it again. I wonder when the next opportunity will be? I'm so proud of you Lina for trying something so different!

Getting Bigger!

2006-06-13T14:38:00.000-04:00

Yah, I know, not at all crafty. But I just had to update. This little critter is now 6mm long, and both caterpillar's are eating up a storm, if you can call tiny pin sized bits a storm. You can even make out his little feelers!

getting bigger!

Red-winged Blackbirds too!

2006-06-09T15:32:00.000-04:00

Oh! Did I forget to mention that our neighbour called this morning looking for an eye dropper. I guess a clutch of eggs they had found (damaged) had a chick hatch this morning - to their shock and surprise. Our neighbour said she was taken aback when she heard peeping this morning when she woke up. Anyway... Lina snapped these pictures this morning at the neighbours. Man we barely got the kids on the bus for the excitment of egg hatching going on!

Red-Winged Blackbird Chick

Feed Me!

Monarch Time

2006-06-09T13:32:00.000-04:00

What a day we had yesterday. I waited until yesterday morning to tell Lina that I had to pick her up from school for a doctor's appointment - one she had been dreading - to get her needles updated. Anyway, we got over that one, the amazing part was that when we were exiting the building we saw a Monarch fluttering around the parking lot and before our eyes it proceeded to land on a little milkweed plant sticking out from between the brick walls of the building and the asphalt and lay an egg! Well, we were amazed. In the 4 or 5 years that Lina has been raising Monarchs in the spring we have never had the good fortune to happen upon that wonderful event. We gather caterpillars in late spring and keep them in a huge jar we have. We feed them fresh milkweed daily and watch them grow. Lina has been able to see them change into a chrysalis, emerge, pump blood into their wings and fly away many times. But we have never found any eggs.

Now that we know this is the right time for them, we stopped on our way home and found 3! And more wonders, this morning when we got up one had hatched and shortly after a 2nd one hatched in front of us! The third one is still in it’s egg.

Here's the container we put the leaves in last night. I had no idea when they would hatch and I didn't want the leaves to shrivel up and dry out so I put them on some moist paper towels. in the picture there is two hatch caterpillars and one egg.

Close up of the remaining egg

Here's one of the little guys, can you see it's Monarch markings?

Here it is against a ruler. Those are millimetres!

So we were able to watch the tiny caterpillars under a magnifying glass. There really tiny, if you look at the photo with the ruler, those are millimetres, so he is under an eight of an inch in size. Lina has started a journal and we will be watching them every day.

Next Pincushion Challenge!

2006-06-01T09:18:00.000-04:00

Look what boogaj has given all those that participated in her inaugural pincushion challenge. I guess I earned my "fruit badge".

So this month's Pincushion Challenge is Flowers, I'll have to get around to putting up the button on my sidebar. So, since I had nothing in particular to post for "Inspiration Wednesday" yesterday I will be searching out some flower pincushions that inspire me today.

Pincushion challenge

2006-05-16T09:18:00.000-04:00

In a eureka moment I had it! A slice! So here is what I came up with for boogaj's pincushion challenge, an apple slice, and of course plain pins seemed, so... well... plain.

So I got out my fimo and made a little worm, who promptly slithered up a pin to get a look at his new surroundings.

Pin

No school today - rotating strikes.

2006-05-11T08:54:00.000-04:00

Lina is with me at work today. She is busying herself in our Boardroom working on finishing her package for her new penpal. We got an email yesterday and her pal's package will be on the way shortly. I can't spend the whole day here, Lina won't last that long, but I have quite a few things I can only do here so I am here for the morning.

I put together a package of craft materials and so far she has made about 8 artist trading cards and is packaging some blank cards up for her friend to draw on so they can trade.

As usual (it seems to be the usual situation), I have not been able to work very much on my things. The house, the bicycle riding, the family take up my time while at home. But the weekend is on the way and I have hopes that now that I can see the floor of my craftroom, that I will be able to get in there and get some work done.

A nice surprise for Lina.

2006-05-10T09:12:00.000-04:00

Hubby surprised Lina last night with a 14 foot trampoline. I think Lina would have bounced until dark if I hadn't called it quits for the night. When she went to bed, she asked me to tell Daddy, if she was asleep when he got home, to tell him that she wanted to smother him with kissess and tell him, "thank you, thank you, thank you!" well she was asleep when he got home but I had a video to show him of her first jumps and he had the joy of hearing her ask if she could go out and jump this morning before breakfast.

Proud Momma - You show 'em girl!

2006-05-03T16:20:00.000-04:00

I was so proud of Lina last night. She started Gymnastics about 6 weeks ago and is insisting that she want's to be in the "keener" class. That is the class where they streamline the "kids with potential" into the competitive classes. The recreational was 1 hour a week. The Keener is 2 hours a week. The competitive would be 4 hours a day, 3 days a week. That sounds just icky if you ask me. I definately have some issues with the whole body image stuff that can accompany gymnastics. Lina takes after me, I am not overweight so much as I am what people call big boned. Lina is too, she is definately NOT one of those slim little girls that weigh 20 lbs wet. No, she is a 63 lb healthy kid. Anyway... back to being proud. Lina has been tying out for the Keener class and for the last three weeks and I had lots of talks about building strength and what her goals were and prepared her for whatever decision the coaches made. So as of last night it looks like she will be in the recreational class for now. I don't mind really, I like her coach in that class and she has promised me that she will help Lina with her technique and strength. But Lina has been doing sit ups and push ups at home along with practicing hand stands, splits and cartwheels. I really don't want her to get discouraged, I would like to show her that if she has a goal then there are steps that she can take to get there and not to let anyone else tell her she's not good enough (yes I know that there are limits to this but I think this one is attainable for her) so I am going to ask the owner of the gym to give me and Lina some concrete steps that Lina would have to take to get back into that class. We as parents are supposed to help our kids get to where they want right?

So last night I had prepared her that she may be in the recreational class for a while so this was the last time she would be in the Keener group. Man did she try her hardest. All those sit ups really paid off and she was able to keep up with the other girls in almost everything. Not to mention the fact that she was eager and attentive the whole 2 hours. You show 'em girl what they'll be missing! She was sweating pretty good when she was done. I give her a really big hug and told her that I (even if no one else noticed) saw how much effort she had put in.

On the craft front I started fooling around with fabrics and designs for a pincushion this morning. Starting on something just before you leave the house is almost never a good idea. So of course I don't like the design I tried. I will more than likely work on it this weekend, tomorow I have my annual financial audit to take care of and Brownies tomorrow night. My mom and her new boyfriend are coming up on Friday - we haven't met yet. I will try my hardest to at least get the foundation made so I can work on embellishment next week. I am crossing my fingers.

More Pincushion Ideas

2006-05-02T12:47:00.000-04:00

Today I searched out some free patterns for pincushions, just to get an idea of the mechanics of making some of these neat designs. I am sure there are many more out there, but these caught my eye.

These I love and I think I will be making these as gifts at some point. Pretty crochet flower pincushions. Find the pattern at Granny's Garret

Crochet Pincushion

Here is a pattern for a Seminole Patchwork pincushion from Michaels.

This one is pretty cool because it is so packable. A flat pincushion - the pins are inserted in the sides and not pocked into the top. The directions are here at Fiber Arts on the Plains.

Flat Pincushion

And finally here is a beautiful violet pincushion I found at Violet Patch. This one is beautiful and I really think the tutorial is well done.

Violet Pincushion

Please, if you use these patterns, consider dropping by a word of thanks to the individuals for posting the patterns.

I didn't get anywhere on mine last night. As it turns out, I did plunk my butt onto my roadbike and peddled about 25-30km with my hubby and our friend Jody. My shoulder pain (fibro) has still not receded, so last night about half way into the ride I was pretty stiff and sore and had some difficulty with standing up to pull up some of those hills. Anyway, I made it home, proud I had gotten through it, but even after my very hot shower, I had little ability to do anything other than crawl onto the couch, with a warm blanket, and read a book. But, I haven't stopped "thinking" about pincushions, so when I actually sit down, you'd think it would be a breeze.

Back in the saddle / Pincushion Inspiration

2006-05-01T15:29:00.000-04:00

I'm giving Booga_J's Pincushion Challenge a try. Since I am trying to get back into the swing of things, I searched out some nifty pincushions for inspiration.

These I found on a japanese site here. I like them because the look so cosy in theirlittle cases, and because I think if they were stuffed with sand they would sit so nicely. Kinda look like little cat beds.

Japanese Pincushion

This one was intesting in that it fits this months challenge theme "fruit". However, I don't have any tools for needle felting so something like this is out of the question for me. They are found here at My Favourite Thimble

Watermelon Pincushion

This one is my favourite and I am wondering how to work it into a "fruit" pincusion. You can find it here at New Pathways into Quilt History

Fabric Pincushion

This velvet pincushion is sooo appealing too. I love so many things about it. I found it at Beardeaux Bears and Friends.

Velvet Pincushion

This Korean embroidered turtle is wonderful too. Oh so much inspiration. I wonder what I should do? I found it at Arts and Crafts Korea.

Embroidered Turtle Pincushion

Lina and I didn't quite finish her pen pal project yesterday. We ended up going with my dad to his woodlot a few miles south of us and taking Lina for her first real dirtbiking excursion. She was so tired when we got back that she needed a little down time. Not to mention the fact that we ended up with company for dinner.

Tonight, I am forcing my butt back onto my road bike and going out to peddle for an hour. I am starting to develop a spare tire around my midsection. If I am going to look all buff (yah right!) on my motorcycle then I better get back into shape. You know it's spring when....

Will post some pics of my pincusion progress tomorrow.

Busy times

2006-04-28T13:26:00.000-04:00

I guess I dropped off the face of the Earth... no it's hasn't been THAT dramatic, just a combination of things. My year end financials here at work was due to the accountant this Wednesday, last weekend was our spring Brownie camp and I have been suffering with a Fibro recurrence. This one left me with severe neck, arm and elbow to wrist pain. But, I'm on the mend.

Lina and I have been working on a little gift pack for a new pen pal in Australia - you know who you are! We are so excited. We have decided on a theme for this first mailing and I am hoping to get it in the mail by the end of the weekend.

I am also working on ideas for booga j's pincushion challenge. My current idea involves handpainting cotton stretch velvet, however, I think when I actually sit down it will evolve into something different (and with materials on hand).

Now that other things in my like have settled a bit, I expect that I will be able to blog on a regular basis again. Hope so! I've missed surfing the net and recording the inspiration I find.

That New Look Thing

2006-04-12T15:55:00.000-04:00

Hmm, what are those table post thingys below? Well they are the only way I could think to organize the 100s of links I have. So as I slowly delete them from my bookmarks, I am placing them in organized posts. I figure I can find them easier that way. So that table at the bottom of every page will link back to these posts. It might actually work. I am sure that down the road some other way will pop up, but for now, this isn't too bad. If anyone if interested feel free to browse. It will definately be a work in progress.

Beadwork Resources & Inspiration

2006-04-12T11:42:00.000-04:00

Beadwork

Mine

Others

Icicle Ornaments

Art Doll - February 2005

Art Doll - March 2005

Buggy Hairclips

Flower Hair Pin

Purse - Leaves of Change
In progress

Toys - Resources & Inspiration

2006-04-10T22:42:00.000-04:00

Toys
Mine	Others
	Finhold Gallery - Unique Teddy Bears * Inspiration

Basketry Resources & Inspiration

2006-04-10T22:32:00.000-04:00

Basketry
Mine	Others
	Basket Makers * Resource/Tutorial

Netting Resources & Inspiration

2006-04-10T22:29:00.000-04:00

Netting
Mine	Others
	Knots Indeed * Resource/Tutorial

Website Library

2006-04-10T22:15:00.000-04:00

Website Library

Whimsical Style

Details Art & Green Shoelaces (Interior Decorating and Unique Gifts)

Sticks (Furniture and Unique Gift Items)

Felt Resources & Inspiration

2006-04-10T22:05:00.000-04:00

Felt
Mine	Others
	Morna Crites-Moore*Sewn Folk Art

Leathercraft Resources & Inspiration

2006-04-10T21:46:00.000-04:00

Leathercraft

Mine

Others

Gypsy Purse

Gypsy Purse II

Leather Leaf In Progress

Anderson Leather *Inspiration - braided seams

Pincushion challenge

2006-04-10T16:25:00.000-04:00

Thanks to whip up for passing along the info that Booga is pondering a monthly pincushion challenge. Check it out!

Tidying up

2006-04-10T16:07:00.000-04:00

Well, I definately have a long way to go in my cataloguing but if you scroll down to the table at the bottom of the page, you can begin to see my feeble attempts to get my links organized. So far only "tatting" and "beadwork" go anywhere but I can't wait to get everything done so that I can just click on a topic and access all of the links. I am far too lazy to remember which post I referred to a specific site in.

Hopefully it will prove useful for someone else some day too.

Yay! eBay.ca!

2006-04-08T10:18:00.000-04:00

Here's my glad bounty of Handcraft Illustrated that came in the mail yesterday. I even got to sit down this morning with blackcurrent tea and browse uninterrupted for 20 minutes. Oh my! I definately have to keep collecting. These are mostly from 1995 and I have never seen any of them. There are quite a few projects I want to try. Yay eBay!

Mischief Mittens and Girl...

2006-04-08T10:12:00.000-04:00

The Girl is, of course, Lina. I was trying to take a few pictures of some of the items I have been working on and Mischief jumped into the fray and got into the way, then along came Lina and before we knew it we were in the midst of a cat and girl photo shoot. He's grown so big and has been trained to stick by Lina's side at bedtime. The rest of the time he's into everything and what he gets into he bats around the house so that I find pencils under cubboard doors and hair elastics on the stair. He also likes to carry things in his mouth but we have not figured out ow to get him to fetch yet.

The rest of the week...

2006-04-07T09:02:00.000-04:00

Well, what a week it has been. When I last blogged I left off because the after school care program called me as Lina was not feeling very good. I knew she was coming down with something Monday morning however I did not realize it would come on so quickly. Tuesday I took her to the doctors and the infection was already in her lungs. I brought work home with me and we spent two days on the couch watching everything imaginable on the tube. It's not very efficient to work on a couch with a sick child but we got into a system whereby I would time the refilling of fluids and medicine with my bathroom breaks and she would try not to wiggle too much and upset the piles of receipts I was trying to enter into the computer.

Yesterday I HAD to get back to work in the hopes that my boss and I would have a few moments to get caught up on things, Lina was getting a little bored with being at home and I honestly thought she would be on the mend. Last night when I picked her up, she was almost hoarse and hacking badly. She stayed with daddy instead of coming to Brownies with me; we were selling Girl Guide cookies around the nieghbourhood. Last night I was awake all night listening to her coughing and haking and sniffling. I got up with her numerous times and kept the cough syrup, tylenol and kleenex running.

This morning we are all worn out, Lina just got up, it's 9:30 so she probably had about 2 hours sleep. And... she's mad at me for letting her miss her bus. She wants to go to school today because there is a book fair at school and she wants to buy something. Tears already, man is she tired. I hope she beats this illness soon.

April Showers

2006-04-03T14:10:00.000-04:00

So far April has been a busy month. My mom came up from Petawawa on Friday night to help me with Brownie Badge Day on Saturday.

Saturday Lina, Mom and I went to a local church for the big day. Lina was earning badges of her own, Mom assisted me to present two 1 1/2 hour sessions of "Share your Talent for Music" to 7 and 8 year olds. To earn these badges, the Brownies were to:

Learn a Canadian Folk Song
- we learned Donkey Riding thanks to a wonderful resource online: The Great Canadian Tunebook which does not only supply the words but midi files of the melodies.

Play or sing two different types of music
- here we sang the folksong and also at the end of the session tried our hand at singing in the round. Again I found a wonderful little site on the net called Beyond Row Row Row your Boat which has the music, words and midi files for some great little rounds. Mind you they were a little complex to teach the girls, but they enjoyed listening to them. We sang the Girl Guide standard "Make New Friends" which another group working nearby on their "Wodd Works" badge spontaniously jumped in and sang with us.
- we also talked about what kinds of music the girls liked and then listened to many snippets of different genres of music and talked about how the music made them feel. Both the morning and afternoon session had a variety of music interests in them.

Make up your own song, play or sing it
- here we really had fun. I brought in some tupperware containers and a bag of elastics and the girls experimented with rubber band guitars, they played on an xylophone I brought in, it was really fun listening to the girls playing their guitars and tuning it to create tunes.

Make a musical Instrument, such as a drum, cymbol, or flute out of recycled material
- this last one was the best. We made wonderful music with straws (check this one out, it really works!). We made kazoos with waxed paper and combs and the best part was that we made Kalimbas from wood and bobby pins that the girls coloured with crayons and could take home.

All in 1 1/2 hours - amazing.

When we were done, the three of us went to the mall. Lina wanted to shop. She's been saving her allowance to buy something. I say something because going to the mall always results in some adjustment of her plans. She has been checking out the flyers to get the best price for a lava lamp. It was either that or the newest Barbie thing, a Mermaidia doll. The doll turned out to be to expensive, the lava lamp not as appealing when facing an entire pink isle of Barbie. But, she spent quite a bit of time making up her mind. I gave her a few options, such as save for two more weeks and I will kick in the rest of the money for the doll (earning $2 a week for cleaning her room means that it takes quite a bit for her to save so I try not to make it a descourage exercise for her). She surprised me with shopping savvy when at one point she had two toys in her hand and proceeded to tell me she didn't think one was worth the price the store was asking for it. I think all in all she spend half an hour making her decision. I kicked in abot $4 and Lina is now at $0 again but it was a worthwhile learning opportunity. If it kills me, Lina will be far ahead of the game as far as being money smart if I have anything to do with it.

Well, I'll finish the rest of the update in a bit, the afterschool care program has called and I need to go pick Lina up from school. I knew she wasn't feeling great but I was hoping she would make it throught today.

New look

2006-03-30T13:34:00.000-05:00

My blog is undergoing a revamp. And it has not been easy, the effort of getting thinks the way I want them is giving me a headache. Now Blogpatrol isn't working and my stats are all gone. Flickr's been giving me a hard time too, all of my pictures disappeared and I got tired of waiting for help so I went a reloaded them along with some new ones.

I am working on indexing my site, hence the table at the bottom of the page. I am trying to put all of my links and projects into a useful format. I am not sure this is the best way but I am going to give it my best. I am hoping that when I am done, I can use the table to access all of my projects as well as all of the links I keep recording.

If it doesn't work I am going to have to take the plunge and get myself a true and proper website I guess.

On the cool side I won my first eBay auction! Not too exciting for those who are old hands at this. I have won an auction or two in the past however they were on behalf of my husband and involved motorcycle stuff. This auction was for 6 Handcraft Illustrated magazines, which are no longer in print. I am so happy! Now I get to try out Paypal and start looking at selling things myself (not quite yet).

Tonight is a fundraiser spaghetti supper for Girl Guides and Boy Scouts and I have volunteered to stock the craft table. Not with stuff for sale but with something for kids to do. So, Pasta dinner - we'll be making Pasta Animals! Cool eh? I am going to try to get a few pictures of them tonight. I made a giraff, a dog and a truck, after all I am bringing in Lina's street carpet for the kids to play on.

This week has been mad. Monday was a District Meeting for Guiders, Tuesday was Lina's second gymnastics lesson, tonight is the spaghetti dinner and Saturday I am presenting at Brownie Badge Day - 2 sessions. So I will be quite happy to sit down with a glass of wine Saturday night when it is all over.

I've also been working on a little amigurumi pattern (will be reveiled later) but I am having a hard time trying to figure out what to do with the face. Hint - Easter themed.

I am happy to hear that Backtack is coming up with a new round soon, April 5th is the sign up date. I don't think I will be entering this one. I have promised to cleanup my UFOs before starting anything new. But I am excited to see what the girls at backtack come up with!

Science Fair

2006-03-27T09:37:00.000-05:00

I had to share. For those of you who may have been reading my blog for a while, you might know that our daughter has had some learning difficulties in the past few years. Imigine my swelling pride when I picked her up on Friday and found that she had won a first place medal for her Science Fair entry "Sand Erosion in a Box". First place out of all the grade twos that entered a project in the fair.

I am so happy that she has had the opportunity to see that hard work has concret rewards. Yeah to Lina! To celebrate, hubby and I took her to the movies Friday night. She wore her medal the entire time.

Science Fair

Illustration Friday - Monster

2006-03-24T11:47:00.000-05:00

A little while ago, I participated in an ATC trade with the theme "Virus". I certainly had alot of fun anthropomorphizing (gotta love those big words) those silly little viruses. And wouldn't you know it, at the time I had a "Monster" of a cold.

Monster of a cold

Before I forget....

2006-03-23T15:58:00.000-05:00

I wanted to scan these cute embroideries her as well. They are from the Make it Yourself book I posted earlier today. They would so whimsical on... well something.

cute caterpillars

And not to forget these birds. They are the reason I bought the book! The book only cost me 50 cents, a bargain, I get to laugh at these creatures whenever I want.

cute somethings

Cool Jewellery

2006-03-23T13:49:00.000-05:00

Last week, Friday when I took the day off to be with Lina on her March Break, we went to Value Village (second hand bliss!). The trip cost me about $12 for 6 knives, 6 forks and 6 spoons. All sterling silver.

When I was in Cuba, I bought myself a ring made from the handle of a spoon, something like this I love it, it's so compfy and so out of character for me. I bought my mom a bracelet made from a silver fork, something like this one, her's is a little fancier due to the original silver motifs on the handle. Anyway, I love silver and I love old stuff, so I thought I would toy with the idea of making some for myself. Now all I have to do is figure out how to bend it the way I want it to go. And I need a jeweller's saw to cut the pieces.

Value Village Silver Cutlery Find

Silver Forks out of their bag

When I showed my hubby what I had bought, he (and more than a little bit of me) figured it was a shame to destroy the cutlerly, especially since they are a matched set of 6. Well I can't see me using silverware, so I think jewellery it is!

Children's Craft Books II

2006-03-23T13:26:00.000-05:00

One of my favourite things to do instead of going to the gym at lucnh to work out, is going to Allison the Bookman's Used Book Store and browsing the craft magazines and books. I'm usually good for about $15 work of new treasures every trip. Probably the reason I didn't go today, I'm broke.

But the last time I went I netted a few books that I am still pouring over. They don't find a place on my bookshelf until they resided on my night table for a few weeks.

Arts & Crafts, A Manual for Leaders was a booklet prepared by Maggie Miles for the Ministry of Culture and Recreation Canada. A Google search produces absolutely nothing regarding either it's purpose or its origins. However, as the cover indicates the Minister of Culture and Recreation was the Honourable Robert Welch, a Google search indicates that he was Minister from 1975 to 1978 so that places the printing of this book during that time.

I love the illustrations and the projects are simple and yet very stylishly done. There are projects on puppet making, paper mache, design, applique, stichery and weaving. These are pages 71 - 73 and explain how to make paper figures. The happy partridge is my favourite.

Lina started Gymnastics on Tuesday. While shopping at Rebuilt Resources, more than just a second hand store - for some leotards for her (did I say I was broke this week?), I found some vintage craft books.

This one is Volume 3. Printed in 1975, it had a few quirky knit fashions and then I found this project for kids. Spool knitting. OK, so I know that we still do this today, but what the? Did kids back then have more patience? Check out the blanket made of spool knitting. I can't get Lina to sit still for more than an hour of spool knitting, how long did it take to make that blanket? I do like the hat for the doll and the little mice though.

Yummy! More to come.

A new chapter... so to say

2006-03-15T11:45:00.000-05:00

I've begun a “new chapter” in my life, so to say (ha ha). Today being my Inspiration Wednesday, I was in my craft room this morning looking for something that inspires me to post about or surf for today and I noticed that I have started to amass quite a few vintage children's craft and activity books. So, I thought, well wouldn't that be a wonderful resource to share with people? I get quite a few ideas for crafts from these books, both for me, my daughter and for Brownies, that it seems rather selfish of me to keep them all to myself.

So many of these crafts and activities get recycled after a few decades into new books and magazines I think it is fascinating to see them in an earlier incarnation.

So, I started a new Group on Flickr called Vintage Children's Craft Books which will store what will hopefully become a wealth of vintage craft ideas and activities for kids. Please stop by and join. Please stop by and post your own books, magazines, pamphlets, craft sheets... And don't forget to post pictures of your creations, inspired by these wonderful resources. Even better! Post pictures of what your children create!

So, for my first book. The Lucky Sew-it-yourself Book, written by Camille Sokol and illustrated by her husband Bill Sokol.

This is a very cute booklet copyright 1964, my copy was reprinted in November 1972. It is called "The Lucky Sew-it-yourself Book" written by Camille Sokol, pictures by Bill Sokol, published by Scholastic Book Services. I got my copy for free from my daughter's school which from time to time places great stacks of books in the hallway for anyone to help themselves. We've been helping ourselves a lot this year! A search on Google netted the delicious fact that both Wee Wonderfuls and Turkeyfeathers have a copy of this book as well. Lovely people to have something in common with. I also found an ISBN or reference number: B0007I8NL8 PAPERBACK-CG.

Sew-it-yourself

The full pages of this project "Make an Apron" (which I post in honour of Amy at Angry Chicken, whose Tie-One-On inspires me so much) are available at the Flickr Vintage Children's Craft Books group or in my Flickr album.

Apron craft

The search also revealed that the Sokols authored/illustrated another book that I would like to see called “How to be Mother's Helper”. According to Alibris.com, it is contains “Simple instructions on knitting, cooking, gardening, making collages and other things for the home from available household articles.” published by Platt & Munk in 1968. (There are a few pictures from the interior shown here , just scroll down and click on the picture of the book and a pop-up will reveal a few charming pages.

Mother's Helper

A search of Bill Sokol also revealed that he illustrated quite a few children’s books with his delightful style.

I have more books to come. So stay tuned.

I'm off tomorrow and Friday with Lina, maybe this could be something we work on together?

Please let me know if anyone's kids make the apron, and I will link to them here.

Little weavings

2006-03-10T14:42:00.000-05:00

I am feeling so blah today. Yesterday I spent the whole day cleaning and puttering around the house, buses were cancelled for our entire area due to freezing rain so I had Lina home from school, I haven't been feeling well and called in a sick day because I am fighting something in my throat, ears and sinuses and felt I needed to attend to that anyway.

One of the things I had to accomplish yesterday was to get some weaving together for Brownies. I had offered to put something together for the girls to work on over the March break. We've never really asked them to challenge themselves with new techniques.... anyway that doesn't really enter into why I am feeling so crappy today.

I actually enjoyed putting the little kits together and tried many different ways to ensure the girls would have success with them.

So I made 19 little balls of yarn (Red Heart does come in handy guys!)

Then I tried to figure out the easiest type of shuttle and came up with drilling holes in popsicle sticks. I figured it would be the easiest way to weave in and out of the threads.

Then the looms, after making a prototype I made 19 cardboard looms with 17 slits on either side. I thought it might be easier for the girls if I drew a template on the looms so that they could use it to make their tension as even as possible and at the same time would know when to stop or at least how long to make their weaving.

And here is the little woven purse prototype.

This morning, I felt just a little bit proud when Lina came out from her bedroom still rubbing sleep from her eyes and proceeded to pick out her ziplock bag from my Brownie stuff and start weaving on her loom. Joy, joy, joy.

Tonight, hubby and I were sitting at the table after dinner, not quite wanting to move and Lina proceeded ahead of us downstairs to watch TV bringing her loom with her. She's about 1/3 of the way through. Tension is a bit off, but she's doing it by herself. I am so proud.

Illustration Friday - Tattoo

2006-03-10T08:44:00.000-05:00

This is a detail of a larger composition of different henna tattoo designs I sketched. Ink.

When my daughter was four, she was lucky enough to be invited to her daycare worker Saima's, Mehndi ceremony. Not being from the same culture, it was such a wonderful experience for both of us (I got to chapperone). I was in Toronto a few weeks prior to the day so I stopped at a clothing store in "Little India" and asked for a salesperson's help in finding something appropriate for my daughter to wear. I asked several times if her wearing such clothes would be OK but was assured that I was honouring her careworker's special day. I was informed that for a Mehndi the traditional colours were green, brown, and orange all colours referring to the henna paste in its different stages. The henna leaves are green when mashed and made into it's paste, the tattoo is brown when the paste falls off and fades into a vibrant orange with time. I ended up choosing a cream Ghagara with a cream top, a dark green Shalwaar and cream Odhni (hopefully I got all of those names right). She looked so cute in the outfit, I let her wear her ballet slippers with the clothes and we brushed her hair til it shone and she wore it down. Saima was delighted that Lina wore a traditional dress, I was relieved that I didn't make a faux pass. Saima's mother gave all the ladies, girls included, bangles as a gift and Lina delighted in the fact that her entire outfit jingled and shimmered all night. Uma, Saima's older sister had told Lina she would give her a henna tattoo that night. Lina loved watching all of the different customs, and so did I. I took many pictures. Lina did indeed get her tattoo, a pretty flower on the palm of her hand and when we left she was so tired she refused to let me put her arms through her coat because Uma had told her that the longer she left the paste on the darker the tattoo and longer it would last, so she refused to risk smudging it. She went to sleep that night curled up around her hand so that it wouldn't get smudged. In the morning I had to argue with her about letting the dried paste fall off. She had thought it was the tattoo, it took a bit of convincing to let her see that it was the stain underneath that was the tattoo. Her mother-in-law would be so pleased, her tattoo was very dark and lasted at least three weeks, amazing kid.

Note: "many people especially brides believe that the darker the mehndi stains her hands the more the groom's mother will love her. "

Felt Bag

2006-03-07T08:47:00.000-05:00

I finished another little bag last night. The taupey grey bag and red blanket stitch made me think of sock monkeys so I tried some felt applique and made a little monkey face. The bag is actually only slightly larger than this scan of it. I have no clue what to do with them. I have a few more to embellish and by the time I am done I am sure Lina will have thought of some use for them.

Illustration Friday - Insect

2006-03-03T10:49:00.000-05:00

A pretty dragonfly to remind me that Spring really will be here eventually. Pencil crayon.

Inspiration Wednesday

2006-03-01T16:30:00.000-05:00

Just a little inspiration. It's the end of the day, I have to go home (and make more miniature felt bags). But I did run across this masterpiece today and thought I would pass it on. You HAVE to go to Craftster and check it out. This is one women's gift to her 1 year old daughter and you really should check out all of the amazing work.

Little bags

2006-03-01T11:46:00.000-05:00

Oh look! I can be creative. Yesterday at work, don't ask me why, I started to think about little bags, little felt bags. And I actually went home a made some. This is a milestone in my life. Wow, I think and therefore I create? These little guys are about 3 inches tall. I need to make more!

We're Baaaacckkk!

2006-02-24T13:23:00.000-05:00

Here is Turtle sitting by the pool, sporting his new Cuba T-shirt, sipping his pina colada (sans alcohol - he's just ayoung turtle after all). Ah! This is the life.

Here is Turtle working on his tan. And yes the water really is that colour. Turtle thought about applying for an extended Visa but he is an entrepreneur and the government doesn't exactly encourage small businesses there.

And here is Lina. She really enjoyed herself: swimming in the pool, drinking plenty of Arenas Blancas, trying snorkeling in the ocean, swimming with dolphins, jet-skiing with crocodiles, riding on a huge catamaran, searching for shells, finding coconuts, riding scooters with mommy and daddy, shopping for trinkets, dancing on stage at every opportunity and staying up late every night.

Mommy and Daddy enjoyed sipping drinks by the pool, people watching, swimming in the ocean, and really enjoyed the fact that a friend had a 13 year old who loved to spend time with Lina and who gave them the opportunity to put their feet up once in a while.

up up and away

2006-02-13T11:05:00.000-05:00

Well, 24 hours from now I should be at the Toronto airport trying to keep Lina from floating to the ceiling in her excitement.

She was up at 6:30 am this morning and I am VERY happy that I didn't keep her out of school today, she's driving us batty.

Everytime we ran into someone who's been to Cuba, they would tell us to bring little gifts to give as tips. We've done that before, leaving shampoo etc, but this time it just felt so cheap. Hubby had bought a new set of luggage for our trip so we had plenty of bags so we packed one large suitcase full of clothes that Lina has grown out of so that we can give that out down there. That felt much better. We are trying so hard to explain to Lina that living in Canada is different that living elsewhere. It will interesting answering her questions when we get there.

Well, I have to go. I have a zillion things that need to be taken care of. And here I am sitting at work on my day off finishing things I didn't have time to do last week.

Be back soo.....

Illustration Friday - Simple

2006-02-10T14:03:00.000-05:00

This is as simple as it gets. Its an inkblot turned creature for an ATC exchange I hosted last year. My daughter and I had a blast making the blots and then finding the best way of making them live.

4 things

2006-02-10T09:55:00.000-05:00

OK,

So I am not sure that I am actually supposed to do this or that I am the only Ria that Sweet knows, but it looked kinda fun so here goes.

4 things (Is it natural that I want to pick the least boring things to say)

4 jobs I've had:

Telemarketer - first job, 16 years old. Lasted three weeks. I have never been hit on by so many men or hung up on so many times. Never... again!....
Tax Preparer - H&R Block. I took the course because my cousin worked there and at 17 scored the highest of all the students and was offered a job. I worked nights and weekends and found it strange to be doing people's taxes when I had never even paid a telephone bill.
Caterer - my friend and I worked long into the night after our day jobs to make frozen home-made pasta dishes which she sold to her contacts during the day.
Office Manager - for my father's mine engineering firm. I worked for him for 5 1/2 years and learned more about my father in that time as a peer than I ever knew about him as his daughter.

4 movies I could watch over and over

Pretty Women (There is just something about getting your own way in the end)
Beetlejuice (Isn't Michael Keeton sexy in this role?)
Cable Guy (First time I saw it I thought it was the darkest movie, but now that whole "Salt Peanuts" scene is tatooed to my brain)
Grosse Point Blank (yum... John Cusack)

4 Places I've lived:

Born in Whitehorse, Yukon
Stratford, Ontario
Toronto
North Bay, Ontario (someday, I will have something more exotic to say)

4 TV shows I love:

America's Next Top Model
Dirty Jobs (Discovery Channel)
Anything on the Food Network (our friends have pointed out to us that we watch the Food Network like people watch sitcoms-is that strange?)
M*A*S*H (I pretty much know all the episodes by heart and I am in withdrawals cause its not on TV anymore)

4 Favorite places I've vacationed:

East Coast of Canada - When I was 17, my Aunt (From the Northwest Territories) picked up cousins on her way accross Canada and we drove out to Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island for a month. I could write a book on that.
Vermont - 7 months pregnant I found myself amongst 3000 mountain bikers in the foothills of Vermont camping in a farmer's field at the Pedro's Mountain Bike Festival. I couldn't bike into the hills (a little to dangerous considering I was pregnant maybe?) but I did join my husband biking all around the small towns.
Dominican Republic - Flew our mountain bikes down with us and biked all around Puerto Plata for two weeks. Very awesome.
Motorcycle Races - yah I've been other places that would be considered more vacationy, but weekends with my daughter, husband and friends at the races is one of my favourite things.

4 of my favorite dishes:

My homemade cheese stuffed tortellinis (used to make a decent dollars catering remember)
Homemade chinese sweet and sour chicken balls, chicken fried rice and eggrolls (my husband used to work in a chinese restaurant)
My husband's Prime Rib with homemade french onion soup, caesar salad, Yorkshire pudding, au jus, Wolf Blass Yellow Label Cabernet Sauvignon and my baked blueberry cheesecake.
Lightly toasted bread smothered in melting butter and dipped into a bowl of corn syrup piece by heavenly piece. My daughter thinks I gross, should I tell her I used to eat toast with brown sugar and butter smeared on it. Oh better yet, should I tell her I used to make toast and dip it into ketchup. Oh oh, and then there's that whole dipping of the bananas into Miracle Whip, ah to be a child again.

4 sites I visit daily

Bloglines
Google (image search)
CBC Radio (I listen online to their Toronto signal every day)
probably blogpatrol to see who has come to visit my blog, I can hope right?

4 places I'd rather be

in my craftroom
homeschooling my daughter
on my road bike pedalling for at least 40-50 km in the summer air, all alone on a side road in the country
on my motorcycle (I can actually say this now that I have my own bike - yipee!)

4 people I'd like to tag

well, anyone who may venture by and read this. Let me know if you take up the challenge.

All paper airplanes

2006-02-09T15:46:00.000-05:00

Tonight at Brownies, we will be making paper planes. I am SO psyched! I spent a while - before getting a touch of food poisoning - last night making planes and I have pretty much found a winning design - thanks internet.

The girls are working on their "STEM" Key (science, technology, engineering and math) before having our paper airplane contest, we'll be learning all about magnets. I've been fiddling with them all day, picking up pins, staples, paperclips. Most of the other staff have been dropping by to fiddle with them to. Science is so cool!

Tomorrow is my last day at work before I hit the beach in Cuba. I have so much to do that I wish I had another week before I go, can you believe I said that?

I have a clear table

2006-02-08T08:39:00.000-05:00

I have managed to clear off my table and put most of my craft junk into basic groupings. So last night I finished my DECEMBER Bead-It! challenge. Yuk!

But, the craftroom is beginning to have function, and it's easy to clean up.

I started tatting a bookmark last night while listening to the radio. I might be able to get into craftmode after all.

Yipeee!!!

Anyway. March's Bead=It! challenge is "Floral" Go here for details if you want to try it with me.

It snowed last night

2006-02-05T08:02:00.000-05:00

I guess that's a bit of an understatement. I am glad though that instead of the rains we had in January, it looks like February will be a month of snow. This picture was taken this morning just before the sun came up. There's just something about heavy snowfall that is sooo silent.
This is Lina's playset in the backyard, and yes that's the bush behind us. We live in the country and can look out at and walk through undisturbed nature whenever we want.

And here's my shed. It's supposed to be all mine (cause my hubby has his garage) but somehow 4 motorcycles made there way into it last summer and are still there. If we stay here long enough that will be my studio one day (sigh).

A winter wonderland eh? We will be getting another dumping today, there is a winter storm watch centered over our area. Well, gotta go start up the snowblower now.

a little musing.....

2006-02-03T08:24:00.000-05:00

As the snow falls like gently falling rain, straight down with no wind to blow it about, and the sky begins to brighten from dull grey to early morning blue, I sit at my computer and ponder the road ahead.

Wow, poetic eh?

I'm at home today, working. Or at least I'll be working in a little bit. It's only 7:41am right now and I think I can afford a cup of tea before I launch into work mode.

Last night when I went to pick Lina up from after school care, I was taken aback by the care worker wishing me to have a good weekend. I thought I'd heard her wrong. It wasn't until Lina reinforced what she had said that it dawned on me that today was a professional development day for the teachers and Lina has the day off. See how much attention I have been paying lately? So, of course I hadn't made any sitting arrangements for Lina today. You know, its days like this that I really appreciate my job. Because when it comes down to it, I really depend on being able to stay home with Lina when I can, after all its one of the few ways I counter act my feelings of guilt for not being a stay-at-home mom. A rant for another time.

So, back to my poetic thoughts. I've stepped into February. It's the 3rd and I feel like I'm dipping my toes into chilly water. Don't quite want to get in but I know I'll get used to it once I'm there. I didn't make any resolutions this year. I just decided that I needed to breath this year; a new philosophy I guess. So knowing that we were heading to someplace warm I dutifully started exercising (I beat the New Year's resolution rush and started before Christmas). But, when the results did not approach model material on my schedule, I sat myself down and said, this has to be a life-change. The goal can't be to get in shape for a trip, it has to be to get in shape for life. The vacation is just bad timing. I figure I'll start to see some results sometime around mid-August. (heh) It was a little hard to get over the fact that I actually gained weight, but I consoled myself with the fact that my jeans didn't force extra blub over the waistline as they had been. Yah, I know, muscle is heavier than fat. I have a lot of muscle I guess. See, just breathe. It's all good.

With that philosophy, maybe this year will be the year I slow down the transition of brown to grey that has been progressing rapidly lately. It seems only yesterday (actually it was about 10 years ago) that I noticed I'd started to grow white eyebrows. Let's just say, philosophy aside, I pluck those suckers as soon as I see them.

Hubby and I have booked our vacation; we are leaving for Cuba on Valentines Day (coincidence) and will be back in Canada on February 22. Lina is counting the days. Last year when we went to the Dominican, we left her with my Mom. We regretted that before the first day was done. We kept saying, "I wish Lina could see that!" or "Lina would love that!". It was a good swift kick in the family keester to have both of us realize and joyfully accept the fact that we love to experience things as a family. And that it gives both of us so much joy to see the world through Lina's eyes. We resolved that we wouldn't leave Lina home again. I am so thankful that both of us feel strongly about that. I would be saddened if it was only one sided and one of us wanted time alone as a couple and the other wanted family time. People kept telling us we needed "us" time because we do everything as a family, well poo on them, we can take a day here and there when we need it, but we do things as a family because it gives us all great joy!

Well my tea is cold, Lina has finished her cereal and I need to get going on work. Lina and I have been reading The Magician's Nephew by CS Lewis and we have only one chapter left, It's payday today and I told Lina if we go into town today we'll pick up The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe. I am so happy she has been enjoying the book, we took her to see the Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe during the holidays and I was worried a bit. I wanted to read the books to her first because reading books is soooo much better.

I have resolved to attack a little more of my craftroom today, if I get a good amount of “work work” done first.

Here's an idea of what I am up against.

OK so here is my current bead shelf with some of my beads on it, organized by colour usually. I have quite a bit more to find and put up.

And here is some of my reference material. It used to be much fuller but, see those binders on the bottom shelf? They are full of cut up pages from magazines in page protectors. they are one of my favourite things, concentrated inspiration with no advertisements! They are even organized by topic, so at Christmas, I can open a Christmas binder and just devour page after page.

But look here, this is the sad state of the rest of the room right now. Here is the closet coverted into full shelves and it is chaos. I dumped alot of stuff in here so I could see my floor and put up shelves. My room is still useless and it will take me quite a while to get completely organized.

Unorganized closet chaos

Ouch, gotta go now.

Just breathe, it's all good.

Animals

2006-02-02T13:26:00.000-05:00

Look, its Mischief Mittens, and he's actually still. Not for long though. He only has two modes, Mach I and comatose. Here her is snuggling up to Kramer on the no-longer-only-a-dog pillow.

Mischief

And here they all are, poor Kramer, no room for a big Ol' dog anymore on this bed.

Furry Friends

Weird Inspiration Wednesday (yah - I know it's Thursday)

2006-02-02T12:47:00.000-05:00

Hello!

Phew, man. New boss, no time. I feel my burdens have been lightened now that my semi-annual Board meeting has been completed (last weekend). Now that I have survived that I can work on other things.

I volunteered to present a badge at Brownie day in April. Its call "Making things go!". So I have been researching cute mechanical toys to make with balloons and elastics. Along the way I have found a few quirky sites that I just had to stash somewhere.

Check out Whatblog, cool and quirky. I love the wooden toy (click on the category "toys") whose head comes off and lets you see what they are thinking.

And how about a site to showcase mechanical toys made while bored at work with only materials found on hand? The site is called Deeperbeige.com, the area of the site I happened apon is called Bored at Work. My favourite is "walkything". Check out THAT ingenuity.

How about a deskpet? A Llama say? Check out akafab. I'll take a dodo in red.

What a funny quirky day.

Ignore this

2006-01-25T22:03:00.000-05:00

Ignore this picture, I'm just stashing this here for other purposes.

Old Photos

2006-01-25T14:00:00.000-05:00

Lina is working on her "Family Heritage" Badge for Brownies. She is pretty lucky that this is an area I can really help her with. She is supposed to draw pictures of what she, her mother, grandmother did and played as a child. I have been scanning images of relatives (boys and girls) that Lina and I picked out to show her friends what children wore way back when.

This little girl is my Great Aunt Agnes it would have been taken around 1910. She was my Grandfather's younger sister. His picture is below.

Don't you just love her ringlets?

Agnes Evans b.1906

This is my Grandfather. My father's father. What a handsom little man. This picture would have been taken around 1907. He looks like an executive, someone who should be reading the New York Times and smoking a pipe. I wish I could have met him, he was apparently a very nice man.

Joseph Henry Evans b.1904

I got a digital camera!

2006-01-23T14:30:00.000-05:00

Hey! Finally!

I took the plunge and parted with a few (or more) hundred bucks and bought a digital camera.
Aren't you impressed? I am. It took me two years to part with the dough.

So now I can slowly introduce you to me...in pictures.

Here's my old dog Kramer. Ain't he a beaut? And so snuggly.

Give a bit and I'll figure out how to use this contraption, no one, in my opinion needs this many options in a camera. I have fallen asleep reading the manual twice now.

But I and very excited.

Pictures of a disorderly craft room will appear soon.....

Inspiration Friday - Cats

2006-01-20T12:37:00.000-05:00

Pretty Literal eh?

This is a ATC drawn for a Nervousness SWAP a year or so ago. His image became very popular with my daughter, neice and nephew who like to call him "Frazzled". I think he was up late last night finishing some crafty project or another, drinking WAY to much coffee and is at the point where one gets all giddy, giggly and twitchy. If you take a moment to stare into his eyes you'll find yourself getting very very sleepy...... zzzzzzzzz.

Ha Ha! Now that you are under my spell, you suddenly find you have the urge to smile to yourself, yawn contentedly and while you curl up on top of some sort of unfinished knitting project , a human will stroke your fur as you purr contentedly...

Oh, did I say that? I've been awake since 4:00 am because one 11 year old siamese wanted to sleep on my head purring and one 10 week old kitten (who is a purring machine) wanted to sleep on my neck while simultaniously bitting one 11 year old cat on the head. I'm tired and worn out (in a giddy, giggly sort of way) and said 11 year old spent from 5:00 on outside and said ball of Mischief was dumped unceremoniuosly into Lina's room with the door shut behind him. Unlike me, Lina can sleep through an earthquake. I figure Mischief is hers and she can deal with his fiestiness at 5:00 am better than I.

Moms who don't deal with sleep deprevation are such grumps!

I didn't get to post my craft room organization pictures yet (along with some other items) on Wednesday I ended up with 6 kids at my house due to the freezing rain (buses cancelled) so mid-afternoon, I couldn't concentrate on work any more and spent my time cleaning and working out on my bike. I will get them posted ASAP.

Home... again.

2006-01-18T08:36:00.000-05:00

I knew it would happen. When I left work early yesterday I made sure I had enough work to keep me busy at home today. The freezing rain was bad enough that I had to pull over on the highway twice on the way home to re-scrape my windows. It rained all night and into this morning. It's 8:38 am now and the rain has started to turn to snow. All of the area's buses are cancelled, school buses and city buses. So as Lina won't be going to school today I agreed to watch my other Brownie Leader's children as well. I am starting to think buses will be cancelled every Wednesday now. This is the third week in a row that buses have been cancelled.

Anyway. It isn't the best timing for me. I have to get 15 binders for the upcoming Board Meeting and they need to get out via Purolator on Friday. I have hotel arrangements, flight arrangements and catering to deal with and while at home I am without a printer. Needless to say I opened a file on my hard-drive called "to print" and I will be keeping the printer busy first thing tomorrow.

I am working on gathering some pictures for Inspiration Wednesday to post in a few moments. Today's theme is "if only...." and will feature wonderful craftroom organization... from other people.

Progress

2006-01-17T12:28:00.000-05:00

My craftroom is coming along. I am so excited. I can see the floor. OK so I am easy to impress.

This weekend I forced myself to get a last coat of paint on my shelves and got both of them up. I went through all (and I mean all - phew!) of my magazines and organized them into subjects. Now I have sewing/emroidery magazines and books, house/garden/decorating, knitting/crochet/weaving, beadwork/leatherwork/metalwork, drawing/journaling/art, kids crafts, and holidays. Those magazines which I don't keep whole (such as Piecework or beadworking magazines) I cut up and have just the best parts and ideas in page protectors in about 15 large binders. Next I am going to get those divided into subjects as well.

Now that I can see the floor, I need to sit o it and go through my boxes one by one. I already threw out about 3 garbage bags out of my closet. Most of which comprised of daily reports I got from Lina's daycare since she was 8 months. It was a walk down memory lane to read about when she played with blocks and when she bit her friends. But ultimately I couldn't find a good enough reason to keep them all and out they went. Next cam 4 years of Lina's artwork. I kept quite a few pieces, especially those that had her hand/foot/fingerprints on them.

So now it is time to get mean and decide what stays and what goes. The good news is that I now have a full shelving unit dedicated to photos and genealogy. A full shelving unit dedicated to resource materials and magazines and will probably have space now to store completed work (for craft shows and maybe an internet store - I have one on Etsy but nothing to sell at the moment).

This week marks the first week of my new boss. It'll take quite a while to get everything the way he would like to see it. I am optimistic that my job may run smoother after he is through making changes.

We are expecting some wicked weather here today and tomorrow. A total of 25 cm (about 10 inches) of snow and/or ice pellets is expected to fall in the next 24 hours. I have seen anything yet but for once I find the prospect exciting. Rain last week brought our snow levels down dramatically and the world was getting to look grey and tired like it does in the spring. A new blanket of frosty clean whiteness will be a welcome sight!

4:04 pm Update: Crap. So much for fluffy white snow. It's decided to be freezing rain instead. I am homebound early before I get stuck in town. Hopefully snow tomorrow!

Rain Day

2006-01-12T16:02:00.000-05:00

Back to the grind for me. I was stuck at home yesterday because of some nasty freezing rain, mind you I worked most of the day (joys of having a laptop). The radio didn't announce that the bus companies were cancelling the schoolbuses until just before Lina was to be picked up, so she was waiting for the bus when a neighbour stopped to tell the kids that the bus wouldn't be coming. Not quite a snow-day but fun for the kids all the same. I had four kids at my house for most of the day (the 3 neighbour kids, 7, 9 and 11 years old).

I tried to get into the office to pick up some work for the day but I had to turn around half way after a tractor trailer jack-knifed on the highway. By that time I was all over the road because of the ice so I turned around and went back home. Our street was a skating rink by the time I pulled into the driveway. I practically skated to the neighbours to get Lina.

Working out has made me so tired that I spent last night yawning. I took today off from the gym. It's not much fun when I am so exhausted all the time. So I treated myself and went out for lunch with a few people from work. Chicken sub and wedges, yay!

Tonight I am back to Brownies. I'm not quite enthusiastic about it but I'll get er done! (OK no more redneck comedy for me)

Tomorrow is the last day for my boss and then next week we start under our new boss. I'm afraid that it'll be a while before I am in a routine again. I did have time at lunch to check out a few new pictures at flickr and read all of 1 blog update but I am so far behind checking out what everyone has been up to. I have 119 updates to read and I'll never find the time. I feel so out of the loop. My craftroom is still a shambles but there is light at the end of that tunnel. I actually said no to some Brownie training this weekend. Can you believe it? I actually said no and put my needs first for a change. And to think I didn't even make any resolutions this year.

I'm All Smiles

2006-01-11T11:49:00.000-05:00

OK, so, last night Hubby tells me that he'll be a little late coming home because he has to stop of at the grocery store to buy me a cake. "Why bother?" I ask, cause we don't usually go out of our way to celebrate the adult birthdays around here. "Well, you know if I don't buy one, Lina won't talk to us tonight, it's a big thing to her". He's right. Lina NEEDS to have a cake to celebrate a birthday. So when, he got home, the cake was off limits, I wasn't allowed to look at it.

After a wonderful steak dinner with portobello mushrooms and some red wine, hubby proceeds to set up the cake complete with 36 candles (yes, it looked just like a torch). Jody was over and the guy wouldn't stop recording the whole fiasco with his cell phone. When Hubby put the torch down I was dumbfounded. There written on the cake was....

For those of you who don't know what that means, it means this.... that my Hubby went out and bought me this...

... and that it was sitting in his truck outside waiting for me. What a freak! Who does those things? I can't stop smiling. Jody has the whole thing recorded, me sitting there with an incredulous look of awe and disbelief on my face as Jody, Hubby and Lina sing Happy Birthday to me.. I am now the proud owner of a 2003 Honda CBR 600 F4i. My good friend Stef and I agree that I'd better keep up the gym stuff so that I can show off my butt this summer. When I noticed she was online this morning and sent a quick "guess what I got for my birthday?" to her she responded "what another bike?" when I sent her the link to a picture the bike she just about crapped - she had been joking about the getting another bike thing.

So. Hmm. I guess I'm not going to get any older for a few years.

Thanks hubby, you are a hard act to follow! (His birthday is in April and I don't know what to give him that is even half a special and as thoughtful!) I can honestly say that you are wholy responsible for making the past 18 (going on 19) years the most special of my life. I can now say that I have spent half of my life with you!

Wow!

Good Morning!

2006-01-10T09:00:00.000-05:00

See... I am trying to retain my momentum. Yes, it's the 36th anniversary of my birth. I sure didn't feel like waking up, no... actually, I just didn't feel like getting out of bed. Hubby and I have been working out at the gym for a couple of weeks now and my body just decided to say "holy crap will you give me a break already!" Oh well, I guess it is worth it, to mark my 36th year today, I actually had to use a new belt notch today or my jeans would have settled a little lower on my hips.

I intended on scanning an image of me when I was about 6 holding my Sasha doll (I have these two dolls although this photo credit belongs to http://www.sashadolluk.co.uk/) to show Angharad how special those dolls are to me but opening up my craft room door reminded me that I should have put another coat of paint on my shelves last night 'cause the room won't organize itself. Finding old pictures will be a challenge for a few weeks.

By the way, Lina just loves her kitten and the new addition to the family is relishing his new "Uncle". Fester, my 11 year old Siamese is being heartily tortured but the little critter whom Lina named "Mischief Mittens", a very fitting name if I do say so. Poor Fester can't even walk down the hallway without the little-leach-with-teath latched onto his rear. Kramer, our big Golden Retriever is good with the critter though. They are the same colour and they look quite cute together with the Mischief curled up between Kramer's paws.

I will see if the digital camera is in the office today so I can take some pictures tonight.

Happy New Year!

2006-01-09T08:47:00.000-05:00

Hello All,

It is pretty obvious that my surfing and my computer life have been sadly neglected while I was on my extended Christmas Break. When I turned on my computer this morning at work, I had 169 updates to read on my Bloglines account- Whew! I have a lot to catch up on. I am happy to report that I am rested, energized and optimistic about this new year. I think I will make a habit of taking time off after the holidays every year - it's been a long enough break for me NOT to do any thinking.

Tomorrow's my birthday. I will be 36 and I am having a hard time with the fact that this one is actually bugging me. I never cared about my age before. I just don't feel 36. Not that I felt 35, but this one seems to be on the other "side" of something. One of the kids from across the street told me a few months ago that I don't "look" like a "normal" mom. She said moms tuck their shirts in their pants, were high cut waists and don't do cool things like ride motorcycles. I guess the 36 thing is tied to the fact that the age disparity between the inner me and numerical age is starting to widen. Oh well, societal views never held much clout for me anyway. I figure I am going to be 25 for ever. (Should be interesting when I'm 80! ha ha)

Christmas was not creative this year. But it was actually nice just for that reason. Lina and I did make a 30 foot garland for our tree but other than that I didn't stress myself out by making any Christmas gifts this year. I know that I will have to make up for it (to myself) next year, but I'm OK with that.

What I am most excited about occured in the last three days of my holidays. I have taken a huge plunge and have torn my "craft room" (we've been calling it the "crap room") apart and have started actually redesigning it. Designing it as a workspace. I have one wall that will house 10 feet of table space and above it will be 3 shelves 10 feet long. It wasn't supposed to be so involved, I had actually just intended on cleaning it, but I quickly came to the conclusion that this room was no more than a junk room and that I deserved to have a dedicated space designed for what I like to do. I am so happy with the colours too. The walls are already a soft grey and the shelves and tables are going to be what's call "semi-sweet chocolate" a nice dark brown. Everything is a mess, especially since I had to put the craft junk back into the room (it was in the hallway) because we had a 4 month old puppy come to visit who chews on everything. I am still in the process of painting shelves, it takes so long because I have to warm up the garage with a propane heater to paint (hey it's Canada eh!) and I have to use oil based paint on the shelves. When it is complete, I will have a permanent set up for my sewing machine (no more dragging it out of the closet and trying to find my bobbins). I will have peg boards for my beadworking tools and I will have over the workspace lighting for sorting tiny beads. I also decided to weed out my craft room and concentrate only on those techniques I use most regularly. Knitting, crochet, beadwork, drawing and photography/genealogy will stay, as will sewing. Everything else, I will take a hard look at before keeping. And that way I can really think about some of the new things I would like to try - like journal making!!!

I'm so happy happy happy. Now I only hope my husband has the patience to deal with my decorating project for the new few weeks.

I hope everyone had a lovely holiday season this year!

LUCK HAS IT....

2005-12-23T20:06:00.000-05:00

Luck has it that I am actually at home, and that Lina has been graced with her friend Chloe sleeping over and that Hubby and I are relaxing in front on the TV. It's December 23rd and we gave my in-laws a puppy for Christmas- one week ago- which means that for the next year we get to hear the play by play on what the pup ate on any given moment. They have not had a puppy for 12 years and they have a lot to get used to.

My brother is in the middle of thinking about getting his daughter a horse. So it is an animal Chiristmas for our family. "Torque" which is what my brother wants to call Lina's new kitten, is due at our house tomorrow. I am on pins and needles waiting for Lina to meet her new pet.

Happy Holidays All.

It has been a trying year for all.

Love Ria

Fa la la la laaaa la la la la.

2005-12-21T10:30:00.000-05:00

Hey all!

Well a good start to the morning this morning as the office staff stood around the water cooler sipping coffee/tea with a shot of Bailey's in it, while munching on coffee cake. It'll be a slack day around here. We are all going out to lunch together and afterwards going bowling. Bowling? Yes Bowling. One of the young technicians here is a bowling geek (I say that in the nicest way and I am sure he would not disagree), and my boss and the data guy are really competitive at anything when there are bragging rigts at stake. They've already been on his case about how they are going to best him today. It should be a really amusing display of inappropriate non-sportsmen like behaviour. I can't wait. Unfortunately, circumstances added up today that prevent me from going to Lina's afternoon play. I will see the play tonight but I guess in the afternoon version she has a line she get's to say. This is where it sucks being the only administrative person in the office. I am the one who makes all the arrangements and makes the payments. My mom is going to Lina's afternoon performance, I am glad, I am going to ask for a play by play when I get home. I will be videotaping Lina tonight. I have 3 years of her preformances on tape. One of these days, I am going to have to put them all together and cry while I watch the progression of her acting career.

So Lina is getting a very special gift for Christmas this year. A couple of years ago, Lina started asking for a pet of her own. We made her start small. She has be diligently caring for beta fish and gold fish now for two years and I must say she is a pretty consciencious fish owner. It took a bit of convincing, but I managed to get my husband to grudgingly agree that sooner or later we would have to follow through with our promise to Lina. We had told her that if she could take care of the fish then we would consider something larger. Now I guess getting some mice or a rat or something would be the next logical progression but, seriously with us being gone so much in the summer to races, a rodent doesn't make too much sense.

So Hubby and I have conspired and we have adopted a kitten for Lina for Christmas this year. I can't wait to see the look on her face on Christmas morning when she receives the little critter. He is just eight weeks and is a little ball of orange fuzz. My brother is babysitting him right now. I adopted the kitten from the Humane Society. I had to have a long talk with the officials at the Humane Society, they don't allow pets to be adopted for Christmas here. However it was pretty obvious that the timing had nothing to do with a spontanious gift. My husband and I talked about it for weeks before I picked up the little guy. We better than many people know this is a lifetime commitment. We have an 11 year old siamese and a 10 year old golden retriever and our chocolate lab was 11 when he died last February. We have had more than our rightful share of medical problems, surgeries and conditions, we can't bring another animal into our home without really considering what the consequences are.

I have asked my niece to take a picture of the gapher and when she emails me, I'll post it up here. I can't wait for Christmas morning, the little critter really needs a name.

So our tree is up, but the rest of the house has not been decorated yet. I am taking Friday off and that is my mission for that day. My shopping is basically done, just two gifts left to pick up. It feels weird to have the shopping done. It must be a sick symtom of getting older. Normally I am in panic mode at this point. Something along the lines of having started way to many ambitious projects for gifts and staying up late into the evening on Christmas Eve and even as long as into Boxing Day working on stuff for people yet to visit. It has been so bad in the past that I have put off Christmas visits because I was still working on people's gifts. I figured out a month or two ago, that I wasn't going to be able to make gifts this year so I didn't try. Feels good and bad at the same time.

Things have somewhat setteled around the office, one of my co-workers was the successful applicant for the General Manager position and so after Christmas he will begin to take over the role. It feels good knowing who will be my boss, the not knowing was way to stressful.

Well, what a motormouth I am this morning. I suppose I better get back to finishing up some things around here. I certainly hope all of you have a wonderful holiday, whatever you celebrate and I'll try to post during my break. (Yay, I am taking two weeks off!)

Illustration Friday - Imagine

2005-12-16T08:51:00.000-05:00

Just imagine, if unicorns really exist....

Unicorn

Working away....

2005-12-15T13:44:00.000-05:00

Since I haven't posted any scans lately, yah you are right I have not bought myself a digital camera yet, still scanning, anyway I thought I'd let you all in on one of my almost completed projects. It's a little beaded wreath, about 5 incches across with snowy white flowers against icy leaves. It's going to go on a long trip before it gets to it's destination. When finished, it will be my entry for my December's Bead-it! challenge - "Ornamental". After all when finished it will become a tree ornament. I hope it's new owner will be pleased.

French Beaded Wreath

Illustration Friday - Surprise!

2005-12-09T08:50:00.000-05:00

Surprise! A cat is about to pounce!

Surprise!

Oh where oh were has Riarug been. Lost that's where. My boss annouced about a month ago now that he has decided to leave our organization. We are a small organization and he is our General Manager. It's been a nerve racking experience for me and some of the other staff here, wondering who the Board will choose as the new General Manager. So, to prepare, I have been in a fury trying to complete as much outstanding work as possible so that I will be able to assist the new Manager in getting to know us and his new position - training the Manager in other words.

I've been doing little else. I am so busy at work that I have no free time to blog. I've even been working through my lunches! I have a tree up at home, but it remains undecorated. Lina and I have decided we are going to make most of the ornaments and the tree will only be decorated in white, silver and gold. I think I proposed the idea to her because in my heart I really want to buy a white tree, but it doesn't make financial sense to buy another right now.

We have been making a chain garland out of ribbon pieces from the dollar store. It looks somewhat like this one from Jenny of Sew Darn Cute! Except our if made from filmy, guazy ribbons. I have also been making white snowflakes from pipecleaners like those Martha Stewart ones (you can see them in the background of the pictue on this page).

Tomorrow when it is light, I'll go down into our shed and bring up the boxes of ornaments and Lina and I will go through them and pick out the gold, silver and white ones. And today at lunch I am going to the dollar store to pick through the ribbons so we can finish our garland. Lina is loving working with the glue gun. This is her first time using one and the ease of which she can glue things has set her crafty heart on fire. Last night, after Brownies, we made pompom animals. Since her birthday theme was Madagascar, we made little zebras and tigers from a kit and put thank you tags on theme so she could give them out to her friends as thank you notes.

Speaking of her birthday, that is probably a BIG reason why I am so tired. We had 4 little girls sleep over (7 year olds) last Saturday and at 4 in the morning one of the little girls came down with the stomach flu... bad. At first I thought it was just the excitement from the night before and the cake and such or being in a strange house, she really didn't want to go home though. So I cleaned her up and her bed (there were 5 girls sleeping on two mattresses in Lina's room) puke was not a welcome sight. Believe it or not, neither the poor little girl nor I woke anyone else in the house (except my husband). Anyway, I figured out after the third time she threw up that something was amiss and instead of settling her down again, I sat with her in the living room while she watched Madagascar on Lina's portable DVD player. That was at 5:30 am-ish. At 6:30, I called her mom to come and get her. It broke the little girls heart - she REALLY wanted to stay and wake up with the girls and play. I was vindicated for my decision to call her mom when after I went to the bathroom to check on her I found that she also had diarreah. The poor thing. Her mommy arrived shortly after and we packed her up and got her snuggled in her mom's car. The other girls woke up just before she left and after they said good bye, I turned on them and loudly exclaimed - Bathroom! Wash hands, faces now! With soap! John was already up and busying himself with washing down doorknobs and walls and generally any surface that the girls could have touched. I shooed the girls out of Lina's room and pulled all of the top sheets and pillows and anything soiled that I might have missed and got it down into the laundry. I am happy to say no one other than the poor girls mommy got sick (yet). There is something to say about being quick with germ hunting when someone is sick in your house. Neither John nor I can afford to be ill right now.

Well, I'm off home. I have a splitting headache that just wont go away. Hopefully crafting will cure it!

And were almost off....

2005-11-28T09:25:00.000-05:00

Every year we've waited until Lina's birthday was over (this coming weekend) to put up the Christmas Tree so that we could have some sort of dis-connect between her birthday and Christmas. This year I'm itching to get it up and I am starting to wonder if the separation is all that necessary. It's hard having her birthday at the beginning of December. When she was little, the gifts would start arriving via mail the week before her birthday, then the Christmas gifts started coming in and then it would be Christmas and then there were a few gifts that would arrive after Christmas. It was just a big month of gifts and it did become a little tiresome and overwhelming. Now that she is older it is a little less crazy. So maybe this Sunday, even though it is her birthday, maybe we can get the tree up and begin decorating it.

She has decided she would like a sleepover this year so we have invited 5 little girls to stay over this Saturday. It should be crazy but I am pretty much prepared to handle it. Afterall, as a Sparks Leader, I've had 15 - 5 and 6 years olds sleepover in a church hall before and we all made it through the night so how much worse could this be?

Lina wants to have do-it-yourself pizzas, watch Madagascar and have pancakes and sausages for breakfast. That, I think we can handle. I am thinking that we might make cupcakes the night before and the girls can decorate their own. We'll probably do some sort of crafts and have popcorn and such. If they are into it, I'll set the tent up in the reckroom and they can sleep down there. If not, I'll turn Lina's room into one big mattress and they can bunk down in there.

Well, I spent this weekend getting recertified for First Aid, so between that and the attempt to get an extra hour of sleep each night this week maybe all will be well. At some point, I am going to have to talk to hubby about wearing that pair pf PJs he got for Christmas eons ago. I can guarantee at least one child will walk into our room next Saturday night and I don't want to have to explain to some girls parents why she saw my husband in his underwear.

So this month is all about inspiration. It's usually my most creative time of year. So, instead of Inspiration Wednesdays (which I am far behind on) I will post 'em as I run into them.

Season's Greetings all!

Illustration Friday - Small

2005-11-25T10:28:00.000-05:00

Along the family theme (see post below), I thought I'd post two images for Illustration Friday. The first by my daughter Lina, was drawn when she was small.

Chick drawn when Lina was Small

The second drawn by me. It's amazing how cool small things can look close up. This one is my avatar. It's one of my favourite drawings.

Oh, and a "small"note. This is the actual size of the drawing. It was and ATC (Artist Trading Card - 2.5 inches x 3.5 inches), so even the drawing was small.
Ladybug

Time for a post... Family Friday

2005-11-25T09:02:00.000-05:00

Indeed. Where the hell have I been. I have been crafting, dreaming of crafting and wishing there were no other distractions so that I can craft some more.

I freaked out yesterday when I realized it was a month from Christmas Eve. Yikes! Time to get my ass in gear.

Last night at Brownies, I taught the girls "Must be Santa" and added 13 ASL (American Sign Language) signs to it. They are going to work on their "Communication is Where it's @" badge and it includes learning other ways to communicate such as sign language and brail. They thought it was pretty cool, especially when they they learned that the sign for reindeer was to put their hands up to their heads like antlers. They will perform their song in front of their parents next week at our Christmas Gathering.

I've been busy trying out some amigurami softies. Just funny little creatures, nothing fancy. I've also been crocheting a granny square afghan. Not sure who's going to get it, I just hate to sit around watching TV if my hands are not busy. I've been busy making art dolls and sending them to my exchange partners. I've been putting the finishing touches of embroidery on my Backtack project. Yes I whispered that word.

I've been reading my regular blogs and seeing what everyone is up to. Life has been going on as well. My Mom took a job out of town so I have been enjoying starting to write letters again. Which brings me to Family Friday.

If I would have had more forethought this morning, I would have brought in and scanned some of the letters that my Grandmother left to me when she passed away. When I was young, I had the wonderful gift of two Grandmothers who felt that letter writing was an expectation of a proper upbringing. My maternal Grandmother (mom's mom) lived in Whitehorse, Yukon. She had 8 children and a hoard of grandchildren, and yet she wrote to us all faithfully. I cannot even begin to explain how special I felt when the mail was brought in and there was a letter for me. I didn't know my mother's mom very well, she lived so far away. The fact that our whole relationship was based on letters and all of it between her and I, that she was interested in everything I had to say was a gift. Especially growing up in a family with many troubles. Just before Lina turned two, my Grandmother passed away. I decided I needed to go to her memorial service so my Mom, my Mom's foster daughter, Lina and I flew up to Whitehorse. We visited with family I hadn't seen for quite a while and met cousins I had never seen face to face. And after the memorial service the Aunts and I sat down and went through my Grandmothers things. While my Grandmother was alive, I rarely saw her without knitting needles or a crochet hook in her hands. She was of the mind that idle hands were a lazy waste. I still have two afghans that she made for me when she came to live with my parents for a year before I was ten. They are two of my prized posessions and I snuggle them under my duvet when the weather turns cold. When the Aunts and I met to divide her things it wasn't furniture or money or china or anything that we were interested in. Not at that special gathering. It was her collection of well used needles and leftover balls of yarn and pattern books. I had such a feeling of family and inclusion at that moment with the knowledge that the Aunts had waited for me before the opened those boxes that had been packed away when my Grandmother moved into the hospital for the last time. My Aunt Pat took her needles, and if I remember correctly may have taken home an incomplete afghan to complete as well. I came home with her pattern books. But most amazingly, I came home with letters I had written to my Grandmother when I was little and that she had kept all those years. It brings tears to my eyes even now to think that she felt our correspondance was just as special as I did. Although, she had the foresight of an adult and kept my letters, hers I have lost over the years.

My paternal Grandmother was a strict proper women with many peculiar beliefs. She lived in Beaverton, Ontario so we were able to visit many times throughout the year. She heartily felt that a wife's job was to serve the husband and keep house for him and that children were best seen and not heard. She used to be a grammer teacher before she had her family. I would never say that we were close, I was not a boy. She and my brother do have a lasting relationship though. As kids, we used to enjoy finding ways to get into mischief without Grandma catching us. Mom and Dad usually listened to her and meeted out some punishment or another if Grandma caught us up to no good.

But, my Grandma did write letters. She was a different person to me in those letters. Exclaiming pride in my accomplishments and being very gracious with her return correspondance, suggesting resolutions to my problems and asking after my friends. She is 93 now, still living on her own albeit she is not mobile anymore. And even though she and I do not have regular correspondance, I know that two of my cousins write to her without fail on a regular basis. She is not able to answer them being to frail but I feel a sense of satifaction that she can have this comfort even now.

Last Sunday, I sat Lina down and helped her write what was basically her first letter to her Grandma. It felt wonderful to sit at the kitchen table with music playing in the background, me writing a letter to my mom, Lina composing a letter all her own. She told her Grandma that she had visited the Humane Society, that she had earned her "Pet Pals" badge by telling her friends about how to care for animals and that she had seen a cat at the Society that she would have named Buttons. Helping her to start the letter "Dear Grandma, How are you? I am fine", well what can I say, it felt right to continue a long standing family tradition in such a simple way. Grandma should have the letters now. Lina made her an art doll and included a photograph she had taken at the Sudbury Science Centre. I hope my Mom keeps these little correspondances, it would be nice for her to share them with Lina some day when Lina has a little one of her own.

I can't wait to see what my Mom writes back. I asked her to address Lina's letter to her personally. Family Friday, the continuation of a special tradition.

Bead It! December Challenge

2005-11-14T10:05:00.000-05:00

So for anyone who would like to participate in my Bead It! Challenge, just click on the Bead It! button for details on how to go about it. The deadline for December's challenge is Dec 31. December's theme is "Ornamental". You can tell I was leaving the door open for Christmas Ornament type outcomes but anything goes as "Ornamental" could apply to just about anything.

Have fun beading! I will as soon as I get my backtack project into the mail. Almost done~!

Bead It! August challenge is finally done!

2005-11-14T09:08:00.000-05:00

Can you believe it? I am catching up! Here are two dolls I worked on to finish the August Bead It! theme I set up ages ago. It was a double challenge for me. I have Art Doll Birthdays owed for a Nervousness exchange and I needed a kick in the butt to get a move on workingon these in the hopes that Nervousness would some day be up and running again and I could finish the exchange. Yay! So now that Nervousness.org is up again I have reconnected with the group and have a list of people to send dolls to once again.

I liked the simplicity of this doll. I was really happy with the metal leaves against the metal wire.

Art Doll 3

But then I tried filling in an entire doll. I really like the way this one turned out. I have two more in progress. I will post pictures when I am finished them.

Art Doll 4

Illustration Friday - Night

2005-11-04T09:17:00.000-05:00

A simple moon for this week's illustration Friday's theme.

And indeed it was.

2005-11-03T22:00:00.000-05:00

I did. I did have a good day. I walked around with secret smiles and I did pause to run my hands across the smooth suede of the handmade journal she made me.

It was made even better by the fact that when Lina arrived home I showed her that she had received a package and was even further blown away by the fact that her package contained a Lina sized version of the beautiful bag made for me. Her very own. And inside was a beautiful little kit to create her own magic wands and a wonderful little book containing cat paper dolls and all of the outfits that any respectable crafty cat would wear. Lina loves cats. We walked home from the neighbours tonight (after showing our neighbour - mother AND daughter) what wonderful gifts we had received. My neighbour loves journals, she is a prolific writer (journals) and is working on writing a novel in her spare time. We devoured the pictures in the journal making and keeping book together.

And I did gloat. Gives me a sick satisfaction to show something like this to the non-initiated. First of all "Look and see what a wonderful thing the internet can be! It brings people together all around the world" and second "See I don't waste my time with "crochet" (everything is jokingly crochet to my husband) - it yeilds the most amazing rewards and unfathomed friendships!" So there!

And yes, I am sore, but I have fought this battle once or twice before and I am on the downward slope of my upward battle. I have figured out that I can stay off meds with a good diet and proper exercise. I have learned that this thing is cyclical and it will show up around this time of year. I have learned that I cannot do everything. THAT one was the worst. (Actually I can say it now - that's the first step, but do I actually mean it? I'll have to work on that one). And I recognize the signs that this monster is flaring up. This time I figured it wasn't going to completely do me in so I did the unheard of - took a week off of work for no reason, well no "normal" reason. I have been drinking 50 million glasses of water - trust me on this one, my teeth have been floating. I have laid off sugar (what thoughtless person put Halloween smack dab in the middle of a fibro flare?). And I have laid off alcohol (that one was pretty hard too considering I like wine with a good steak - oh well). I have forced my 20 pound overweight arse onto my bike every morning and sweated out a good workout. And I have laid off the caffeine I had stupidly let back into my life so I can get a good nights rest. Phew. That is a lot to accomplish in one week. Not to mention the fact that I have taken time to breath. Alot. And to begin to dabble and create. I think I need another month. I'm not me yet. If time could only stand still so I could catch up with my potential. It took off on me when I was in university and I have been ignoring it, abusing it or chasing it ever since.

Thank you Cindy for your kind words. I do hope you are feeling better too. I was never upset with you about the whole sleuthing thing. It made me laugh and it made me think. It made me feel like we were in the same room giggling about passing notes back and forth in class. (Oh I am not certified (genealogy) yet, but I am certifiably hooked. Certification is a long process in the works. I'll get it 20 years after I retire I am sure.)

And Angharad, Lina will sit down with me, when it is not past her bedtime, and write a thank you note to you herself. She is very greatful.

Of tiaras and tears.

2005-11-03T10:14:00.000-05:00

Of tiaras....

Lina had planned on being a princess for Halloween for the last month. After I purchased a pair of feathery blue wings to wear as a silly blue fairy for our Brownie Halloween party last Thursday, Lina took possession of them and decided she would be a "blue princess fairy" instead. I promised her I would make her a crown to wear. I refused to buy her a plastic crown from the dollar store. So Monday on my first official day off, before I excercised, before I tidied the house, I sat down and watched creative crafty stuff on TV and made a Cooper inspired tiara for her. I had to put my own touches on it, especially since I didn't have too many colours of blue wire to work with. But I do have A LOT OF BEADS!. She fairly glistened in watery droplets of glass. I wish she would have decided to be a fairy earlier, I would have made her a dress of leaves and petals, oh well, she loved the way she looked and told me I could make her costume next year. And of course I HAD to make a matching wand, although I like to call it a scepter.

Here. I flattened the tiara so I could close the scanner and get a better color shot. The tiara is fastened around the head with 3 mil silk white ribbons (like a head band). Isn't it amazing what you can make with some florist's wire, craft wire and some beads? So Cindy, what colour would you like?

Tiara

and tears....

Well, for the second time, Back-Tack has been a gift and I am left speechless. I was paired with Angharad of Sweet. I don't know what to say, I shed tears.

On a morning of extreme frustration, having woken up once again in pain. I am doing so good this week, trying to piece a healthy diet and excercise routine back together that to take such a step backward... well, I had started the day feeling so low and trying to get my brain in a good place to keep going on the journey back to health before my stupid fibromyalgia dragged me down. I almost wept this morning when I woke and my fingers were like sausages and my arms felt like they had been rowing slave oars all night in my sleep. I knew that once I stopped my busy routines and took time for just me, my body would shut down and avenge itself for the last session of mistreatment, but the knowledge and the living of it are two different things. Anyway, I forced myself up early and went to the gym and walk on the treadmill for about 40 minutes. It was a good relaxed change from riding my bike which I have been doing every morning this week.

On the way there, I stopped by the post office to pick up the parcel I knew was waiting for me. I was SO BIG!!! I didn't even peek at it until I got home, got my boots off and turned on the TV (I have been treating myself with watching whatever I want - I don't normally get control of the remote). I can't even tell you how amazed I was to open the precious gifts I received. Angharad, you are a jewel and read me better than I thought possible.

I took pictures with my 35mm, so you will all have to wait for pictures. First off, a BIG box of Southern California's "best salt water taffy". (It's a treat, I might just have to indulge in - just one until I get my fibro under control - but I bet it will be worth it!!!). Now I know I never mentioned that in my blog, how did you know that salt water taffy is one of my all time favourite treats! Maybe you are the true sleuth!

Then, low and behold a beautiful handbound leather journal. Then I opened up a parcel containing a wonderful book on "Making and Keeping Creative Journals". Heart be still.

I am alone here today, not that it matters, neither John nor Lina would understand how profound my silence and awe were when I opened a kit to find tools for bookbinding and journalmaking. I am stunned. Angharad, when I made the journals I made last year, you would laugh to see the rudimentary tools I used. I don't live close to anywhere where tools and materials such as these are readily available. You have provided me with a gift I could not easily gift myself with.

And the bag! It is gorgious! I love it! So clever. So stylish! Don't you wish I had a digital camera now?

As soon as I opened the tool kit I had to phone my mom. (She understands me creatively and how much I need to create or my health suffers - strange eh?) She is as touched as I. She agreed I needed to get off the phone with her and share what I am feeling.

Thank you thank you thank you.....

The best part is, I am alone at home today, and I get to savour all of this without interuption (even the taffy). While I am putting the finishing touches on my backtack project, I can sneak back from time to time and run my hands along the bone folder, the fabrics, the cases. And add to that the fact that my backtack partner is herself a bookbinder!

The worst parts are that she was so generous, she even gifted Lina with a parcel of her own. And I am bursting to see what's in it. Lina loves receiving mail of any kind which she became addicted too when I joined Nervousness. And the last that until I finish my backtack project, I can't sit down to have a go at a new journal. But I can dream...

Tonight before our Guiding Enrollment Ceremony, I am going to bring all of my items in to gloat to the other Leaders.

Thank you internet for allowing me to reach creative and talented people from around the globe, and THANK YOU Angharad! Today will now be such a good day!

Family Friday

2005-10-28T15:22:00.000-04:00

Here is the heart of our little family, Lina. A few years ago when Lina was leaving the daycare where she had been taken care of since she was 8 months, I made a card for the girls featuring Lina since she was 1 day old. The first 12 of these pictures were on the card. I added a few to bring it closer to what she looks like now. It's a wonderful thing for a mother to see a series of images like this, it make my heart melt and makes me think of all the wonderful times my husband and I had have for the past 7 years. (click the photo to check out some cuteness close up)

In order from top to bottom left to right. Lina, 1 day old; Lina at 3 months wearing a smocked gown that I made for her; Lina at a year on the rocking horse she received from Santa; lina at 14 months, examing her belly button; Lina around 24 months eating corn "on the cob" for the first time; Lina all dolled up as a clown at her 3rd birthday party; Lina at 3.5 trying out her cousins skateboard; Lina holding a worn out frog at a family reunion 3.5 years old; Lina's first fish at 3.5 years; Lina on the carousel at 4 years, Lina at the Toronto Metro Zoo in a crazy cat short set I made her; Lina at 4 with her first dirtbike; Lina at 4.5 on the bus back from Santa's Village with her daycare friends, Lina at 4 getting ready for her ballet recital; Lina at 5 after another ballet recital talking to her daddy on the cell phone; Lina in her PJs just before her 6th birthday.

And here is Lina more recently (6 months ago), she stuck her head in front of a borrowed digital camera while I was taking pictures of some products for a craft show. One of these days I'll get around to posting for Self Portrait Tuesday and you all can see how much we look alike.

Blissful week off, here we come.

Oh yah great news! Nervousness is back! Albeit, the forums only for now, but the Board of Director's are working hard to get everything going. Now I'll be able to send out items that have been missing addresses and names. More relief and stress off my already burdened shoulders.

Inspiration Wednesday

2005-10-26T15:33:00.000-04:00

Only a few things today, but I had to record a link to Tatiana Michniewicz's beautiful wearable art. They remind me of the art dolls I've been working on and inspire me to try some pendant like versions myself.

Wearable art

These Christmas icicles are sweet and funky and I think pretty easy to make, I made some similar onse last year but these guys are a little funkier.

Cute Ornaments

And finally, for the princess in all of us (you really have to check out Cooper-Stratton Designs, with her eye popping colours and "jewelry that jumps" its worth the time to check out the whimsical and quirky items Cathy Cooper makes). And yes Sauvageblue (Cindy), I did think of you when I perused the tiara section. Check out the scepters as well! Lina wants to be a princess for Halloween, she might just have to make a Cooper inspired scepter and tiara!

Colourful Tiara

A Break.

2005-10-25T11:43:00.000-04:00

I'm tired. And I don't think it is just the lack of sunlight at this time of year. I'm tired. Yes, I woke up late this morning and dragged my ass into work but it's not just that. I am uninspired. I have been getting to this point for the last few months. So, before it manifests physically - it always does (I have fribomyalgia which is controlled through diet and exercise), I've decided to take a break, a pre-emptive break so to speak. My boss just OK'd me taking next week off work. That means that including the weekends, I'll have 9 days where I don't have to think about work.

I am hoping in that time that I get reinspired to complete my backtack project and get into making Christmas gifts. I hope.. I hope...

I hate feeling blah, blah usually means that I am heading into yuck and sometimes yuck means a creative depression is on it's way.

So, I'm not going awol. But I am telling myself it is OK not to post regularly while I take a break. I'm trying to take all the selfheaped pressure from off of my back. I'll be back, renewed, I promise.

It was a horrible experience!

2005-10-24T09:15:00.000-04:00

What can I say, this weekend's experience sucked! Let me set the scene for you.

I left the office at noon, went home, packed up and picked up Lina at school. After buying a sub for each of us for dinner, we headed out to Camp Caritou where our Brownie camp was being held. Lina and I swept up, set up our bunks, brought in groceries, set up the Christmas tree and lights (theme of our camp), organized our craft stuff, set up tables and chairs and when we were done all that we sat down and made an angel for the top of the tree. It was really cute too, it was a Brownie angel, complete with brownie uniform and sash along with wings and a halo.

Then we waited. The other leaders arrived first we got them set up and then the girls started arriving. They were so excited! 15 girls aged 7 and 8. They immediately ran to the rooms to choose their bunk and get set up. I stood their smiling, my cheeks hurt I smiled so much. You could here squeals of excitement pouring out of the rooms. Parents were hugging their girls goodbye, siblings were exclaiming how happy they were that their sisters were going to be out of their hair for the weekend. Leaders were reassuring parents that all would be OK.

We started out by going over the house rules and talking about fire drills and the schedule for the weekend. Girls were giggling with each other, picking safety buddies, making up cheers for their duty teams. It was a blast, I was tired just watching all of it. We had cheese and crackers and juice for snacks. And then it happened. The water stopped working. We called the contacts on the camp emergency list and 3 people ending up coming out to try to get things going. The camp committee had worked so hard to raise the money to get a $10,000 UV system for the water so we'd have safe drinking water. Apparently the system had undergone maintenance last Monday and was checked again on Wednesday in anticipation of our camp. The girls were told they couldn't drink the water (it worked intermitantly) and were told not to flush the toilets. We had a large container of bottled water but with 15 girls the toilets started to fill quickly and using the lattrines outside about 150 feet away in the dark and cold was out of the question.

With the announcement that a part was missing from the pump, we had to make a call and we decided it was not safe to keep the girls overnight or for the weekend. We wouldn't have been able to cook the food, wash the dishes or drink the water. We had planned our food and activities around the fact that we were staying in a lodge with drinkable water. We didn't have the equipment or enough bottled water to deal with this development. So the other two leaders started calling parents and asking them to come back and pick up their girls. When we had reached the last parent and they were on their way, we sat the girls down and I told them that their parents were on their way to pick them up and that we would not be able to camp this weekend. The girls were in their PJs. They had moments before been running between rooms, singing songs and playing with their stuffed animals. Girls had been coming to us asking to call their parents before bed and we had put them off until we made our decision because we couldn't have them talk to their parents and then turn around and phone them and ask them to come pick them up.

Right around the part where I said "....we have had to call your parents and their on there way to get you....." I choked up. I started crying, they started crying. We were all in shock. The hurt and disappointment on their faces was excruciating to look at. We love these girls, this is what we do. And we made them cry. It SUCKED! So right after I told them, parents started arriving. We told them all to get packed up and one by one, sad faced, tear stained, quiet little girls started leaving camp. The last of them went home around 10:30pm. I don't ever want to go through that again.

By the time we cleaned up the place and packed up our stuff it was about midnight. Four cars driving out of camp stopping to lock up the gate in the middle of a cold dark night. To make matters even more sucky, I lambasted a racoon on the way home. After I hit it, Lina asked what had happened. I sat there with my head in my hands feeling like I was going to throw up. Lina even with being devasted about the camp tried to comfort me and tell me it was not my fault.

Her friend Chloe stayed with us overnight, I think I finally got them to sleep around 2:30am. Rebecca (one of our leader's girls) came over to play on Saturday. Lina kept asking me, what would we be doing at camp now mom?

It's Monday, it's a new week. The girls have a Halloween party to look forward to this Thursday, but I am sure that we'll have to have a talk with them and let them express their feelings about the camp and what happened.

Yuck and double YUCK!

Brownie Camp and Brownie Crafts

2005-10-20T09:21:00.000-04:00

Did I every say how much I hate not having a digital camera? Well here is a SCANNED image of a sock snowman I made last night. The girls will be making these this weekend (our camp theme is Christmas) so I needed an example to show them. Scanning doesn't do anything for this cut little guy. He is stuffed with rice so he sits so well and is wonderful to squeeze and form into weird expressions. I found the instructions here. (check our a picture of ones completed by her kids here)

Sock Snowman

I just joined a Girl Scout Swap Board to get ideas for those little crafts that the girls and Leaders cover their hats with (man, I've seen some women with so many that you can barely see their hat colour underneath!). A few girls on te SWAP board were talking about a SWAP idea to represent a frazzled leader. Here is my take on one. It is made using a recyled pop can tab, some pipe cleaners, google eyes and a safety pin. Oh and if you really want to know about swaps you can start here (but don't get addicted - don't say I didn't warned you - but they are cute little crafts that kids LOVE to do!)

Oh and just so you know SWAPS are Special Whatchamacallits Affectionately Pinned Somewhere or to SWAP - Share With A Pal

Frazzled Leader Swap

From the looks of her, my frazzled leader (brownie colours are blue and orange) could be a good start for a halloween pin too!

Inspiration Wednesday - addition

2005-10-19T15:07:00.000-04:00

Lina loves cats. I have to note this site too which has quite a few kitties I think she'd love.

2005-10-19T14:25:00.000-04:00

I finally got around to doing a little snooping on the net last night and tonight. I have been trying to recover from a weekend spent with 150 -180 Girl Guide Leaders in North Bay. It was hard to get a good measure of how many women were there because we were not all in the same room except at dinner. There's something about women when they are away from there husbands and children. Whew! Let's just say I went to bed at 3:00 am Sunday morning and had to get up at 6:30 am for breakfast and festivities. I will be yawning all week.

Not to mention now I am getting ready for the upcoming weekend. Our three Leaders will be taking 16 Brownies (7 and 8 year old girls) to camp for two nights. I am in charge of crafts so I have been planning, shopping and gathering supplies for the past two days.

Most of my surfing has been about finding some cool ideas for Christmas gifts. This last batch was mostly cute felt ideas.

This felt pillow is a creation of Liz Alpert Fay. I really like some of the pillows on her site, no to mention her hooked rugs. I think felt pillow covers would make very nice gifts for the women relatives this year but I don't know if I'll get that ambitious.

Felt Pillow

If you are looking for Christmas Ornament Ideas go no further than Christmas Traditions. There are so many pictures here and so many styles that something is sure to inspire. I liked these quirky chenille santas. Yo've got to click on them to see them close up, there so gangly and weird.

Chenille Santas

I saw these felt ornaments and thought I'd record them here to remind me to think outside the box! I never would have thought of doing that. The ornaments are from feltworks.com

Felt Ornaments

I found this little felt fishing game this morning and it is so cute that I would consider making it for Lina. And maybe even her two little cousins.

Fishing Game

And these cute little guys are supposed to be dog toys, but I think they are cute enough to put into a crib for a little one.

Cat and Dog Toys

Again I wish there was a store nearby that sold Japanese books. There are quite a few of these "Sweet Felt Collection 05" scanned into this site which have many cute pictures of felt toys and decorations.

Sweet Felt Collection Pages

And finally, go check out this site to see the minature needle felted cats and dogs. They are so cute- they break my heart.

Felted Mew

Rumaging around

2005-10-14T16:03:00.000-04:00

The Raven

I love looking back at images of older drawings I have done. It serves to remind me that I can draw if I put my mind to it. I'm in a drawing funk right now. It goes in spurts and farts. I draw intensely for about 6 months or so and then I can't pick up a pencil for a long while. The ideas don't stop, but the will to draw seems to. But with the wonders of technology, I can look back and try to kick start myself again.

The last spurt was pencil crayon. The time before was strictly HB pencil. And then there was the pen and ink period. Before that I was into acrylic. Now what?

Family Friday

2005-10-14T15:02:00.000-04:00

This is the side of my family that I have been working on for the past few years. It is my father's paternal line.

From what I can gather, my father's line came to Canada in 1835 from Rathkeale Parish, Limerick, Ireland. I have connected with distant cousins by chance through my research and one of them related a story to me about our shared ancestor having to leave Ireland due to a duel. Sounds romantic eh?

You know how families often name the first born son after the father? Well in my family, my brother would be Joseph the 6th (it may be more but I have not started research back farther in Ireland. OK not strange? Well try this one on for size. A few years ago, I took off and had a weekend to myself travelling around southern Ontario searching for more information about this side of my family that had settled in and around Woodstock, ON. I visited gravestones, found the original family homestead, you know the drill. Anyway, I also lucked out and managed to locate my ancestor's last will and testament. In it I found the most curious fact. Here's a snipit...

"I give and devise to my grandson's named as follows that is to say Joseph son of Connell Evans, Joseph the son of my daughter Jane, Joseph the son of my daughter Charlotte and Joseph the son my daughter Hannah the sum of two hundred dollars each to be paid to them without interest as they severally become the age of twenty one years by my executor hereinafter named but should any of my said grandson's die before receiving his or their portion then his or their portion is to be divided in equal portions between his or their brothers and sisters as they severally become the age of twenty one and all without interest."

Just in case you aren't getting the weird part... Joseph, this first ancestor already had a son named Joseph to whom he left his estate. BUT, every child of his also named one of their sons Joseph! AND he only left money to those grandchildren who were named after HIM! Talk about vain, or something I don't know but bleh! Could you imagine having 5 first cousins with the same name?

So the family in the picture is the son Joseph (the 2nd) who inherited the estate from that first ancestor. Meet Joseph Evans, born 1841 and his wife Elizabeth Cook, born 1842 and their children Joseph James (moustache), Jonathon Vericar, Elizabeth Jane, Ida Matilda, Andrew Irwin, William Blake, Mary Annette and Edna Lorena. Edna would be the little one leaning on her father's knee. This picture would more than likely been taken around 1891. One of the boys is missing, I'm not sure who, I would have to take a look at the census information to see who was living in the household at this time.

On a present note. When my brother's girlfriend had their second child and it was a boy, I begged my brother not to give him the name Joseph. "Enough with the Joseph's - give this poor child his own identity!" I am happy to say he did.

Illustration Friday - Cold

2005-10-14T10:33:00.000-04:00

Not to be too litteral, but this is coldest picture I have ever drawn. I don't think drawing snow is my forte.

This was the view from a cabin I visited the last time I was up to Whitehorse, Yukon to visit family. Yah, I know, pretty smart to visit a cold climate in the winter eh? Silly Canadian.

Family Friday

2005-10-07T09:46:00.000-04:00

Back when my little family consisted of my husband (then we'd been living common-law for 9 years at that point), myself and our three pets, my creative Aunt Pat, known to me as Pantie At (she has a thing for mixing up letters so that my brother became known as Juncle O, instead of Uncle Joe) had a family Christmas tree made for all of our various families. What a wonderfully thoughtful little gift it was. I love that it made me feel all warm and fuzzy to be included in this gift giving even though we were not married at the time and did not have children. Come on now, back then we did get more than a few frowns from our older relatives because we were not married. It is a precious little gift that I have kept all these years.

Family Christmas Tree

I have digitaly removed our names from our hats, however as you can see below us are are kids at the time, Theo and Kramer the dogs and Fester the cat in the middle. Their little hats even have little paw prints drawn on them. Such attention to detail. The tree base, heads and hats are made from Fimo and the little stockings are made from felt with glitter glue embellishment. Fester and Kramer are still with us, but Theo died this spring. I think that if we did this again, we'd have to have theo at the top of the tree with a little halo and wings or something. And of course we'd need to add cute little Lina.

I came across the tree last night when I was rumaging around in my craft room for Christmas basket ideas and decided it would be a perfect fit for family Friday. Lina's homework last night was to work on a simple family tree, talk about a coincidence. Easy enough to do considering I can spew out names and dates ad nausium. It might be cool for her to work on something along the family tree line as part of our baskets this year. Hmmm. I'll have to look for some good ideas on that.

Ohh ohh. It just hit me, maybe our Christmas cards to everyone could be little thumbprint family trees. We could draw a Christmas tree and then Lina could put a thumbprint for each family member on a card and draw little hats and decorations and name each person. I like that. As this is the Canadian Thanksgiving weekend, I'll have to see if maybe we could work a little on this.

Yay, crafty long weekend here we come!

It's Going Around...

2005-10-05T08:59:00.000-04:00

Something attacked my poor little Lina and she has been down for the last couple of days with bronchitis. I had heard this bout of illness going around was going straight to the lungs as pneumonia or bronchitis, but man does it move fast. She had no other symptoms than the cough and being tired and WHAM!

So I have been home with Lina these last few days letting her rest. We played lots of PS2 (something we hardly ever do) and watched a few movies. She hasn't even complained about being on the couch. Normally when she is sick I get about an hour of her on the couch before she complains she is bored. This time she lay on the couch snuggled up and only emerged for lunch and her doctor's appointment.

So, I have not been paying much attention to my blog, but I did manage to have a pretty good work day (worked at home) yesterday. Today, Lina is back at school (as long as she doesn't develop a fever) and I am back at work.

On the creative side, 2 attempts at my backtack II ideas have been flops. I have this super soft fashion yarn that I tried using with tablet weaving - no go! It got very tangled and I spent most of my time restringing and tying. Then I thought I would crochet a knapsack type of bag. First off I was blown away by how much of that yarn it took to make just the base of the bag, and then I decided that it was too small to carry much. I'll finish it but it'll be a personal project instead of a backtack project. So now I am starting over and considering some piecing/applique work. I don't mind, but I was really excited about the backpack idea.

I have managed to finish up some really long overdue ufo's and I am starting to feel a little weight lifted from my shoulder's. I am working really hard towards getting into my Christmas gifts so that I can get them all done by November 30th. That's my deadline for this year. Oh my, I better get cracking.

What Lina and I have in mind is to make up baskets for all of our female relatives. We are looking for ideas to fill them right now, but a few ideas are: Embroidered tea towels (using the transfers sent to me with my backtack I knitting roll), homemade chilli sauce, homemade cookies, an ornament, crocheted dish clothes, a scarf, handdrawn bookmarks, handmade stationary, cards, tags etc...

Lina has been making her gifts for her relatives since she was one year old (ornaments made from her handprints) so she expects to make her gifts every year. Now all we have to do is write up our list, buy our baskets and decide on how much we can handle with our self imposed deadline. Maybe, if I luck out with my next backtack bag and find a style I like, I can make bags instead of baskets.

Better slow down on the ideas now or I'll still be working on theses gifts next Christmas. Hmmm... this sounds familiar.

Confessions of a craftaholic and a perfectionsit.

Family Friday

2005-09-30T13:34:00.000-04:00

I don't know very much about this couple. The picture would have been taken between 1880 - 1885 as she looks to between 25-30 years old. Ida died in 1885 at the age of 3o and is buried in the Westmeath United Cemetary (Ontario). John Wright is one of the sons of Mary Tucker and John Wright whose picture I shared last Friday. Something about Ida's beauty always haunted me. I love the photo, her sereneness and her gown.

John Wright 1856 - 1942
Ida Wright 1855 - 1885

Illustration Friday

2005-09-30T11:19:00.000-04:00

A drawing of those mysterious floating lights said to lead travellers from the well-trodden paths into treacherous marshes. This ATC was completed for a Nervousness Exchange

Will o' the Wisp

Family Friday

2005-09-23T12:54:00.000-04:00

One of the signs of Fall for me, besides the fact that I start to pick up my knitting, is the fact that I start to get back into genealogy again. It's been a major interest of mine since I was about nine and I have even started working towards my genealogical certificate. I have hundreds if not thousands of photos some of which are pretty old. Some of which are very amusing. I thought that maybe for a little while, to picque my interest again, I'd post some of my favourites here with a little background on each.

John Wright 1817 - 1893
Mary Tucker 1825 - 1900

Case in point, meet my "American Gothic". Not so much the Mrs. Mary but Mr. John, wow look at the face on that guy, something only a mother could love. If he was holding a pitchfork and in suspenders I'd swear he was the inspiration for that famous painting by Grant Wood.

John Wright was born in Westmeath, Ontario in 1817, he is my Great Great Grandfather. He and Mary had 12 children that I am aware of Eva Louise, Benjamin, Silas, Lucy, Amelia, Helen, Ida, Marie, Charles, John, Joseph and Mary. All strong sturdy names. They are buried in the Westmeath Cemetary and as I have family there to this day, I have visited that cemetary many times and photographed their graves. It's strange going back there, we have ancestors that settled there in the 1700s and most of the people buried in the cemetary before 1950 are related to me in one way or another. Most of the living who belong to the older families are related too.

John Wright's ancestry can be traced back to the 1500s in England and because he is closely related to Philemon Wright, who discovered Hull, Quebec and who is one of the important figures in Canada's political and industrial history, his family's history has been researched and recorded by a professional genealogist and published by the Canadian National Capital Commission. I ordered a copy of the publication and for $29 received about 15 years worth of my time in research. One line of research down, a million to go.

Mary's family, the Tuckers apparently owned quite a bit of land in the area and her father George Washington Tucker was involved in the local politics of the day. He and his wife, Mary's mother Ann Cowdry are also buried in Westmeath's St. Andrew's United Cemetery.

One of the websites that helped to peak my interest in Genealogy many years ago was the Ontario Cemetary Finding Aid. I happened accross that site years ago and it has been a great source for me, with so many ancestors in Ontario. You can search the whole database and with a little bit of fooling around can pretty much find all the people of the same surname in a given area or even everyone listed in a given cemetary which is very helpful as many leads come from looking up names of those buried within the same cemetary (long settled families often have long histories with other families in the same area). Once you know where your ancestor is buried, you can look to see whether that cemetary has been documented by the Ontario Genealogical Society or other volunteers. If it has you can request transcripts of the cemetary to see all of the information that was written on the gravestones. Not only that but these transcripts record the location of the graves so that if you can visit, you can figure out where your family is buried quite quickly. It may sound gruesome to some but trust me, invaluable information can be learned from reading gravestones. Regional Genealogical Societies usually sell transciptions for the cost of copying so I have been able to get transcriptions of entire (small) cemetaries for $6 - 12.

(Now, sauvageblue, you can see why I am so nosey! It is part of my demeaner to fairy out details, every little detail gleans a little nugget of information.)

Oh and I am happy to say there is absolutely NO family resemblance here. Phew!

Inspiration Wednesday.....?

2005-09-23T08:53:00.000-04:00

I know, I know... but in my defence I did actually have this file ready on Wednesday, it's just I want to take Monday off work so I have been working through my lunches.

Anyway, here are a few things I've been meaning to file away this week. The first is a site with these adorable japanese kitties. They come in a few different colours and poses. I get a kick out of this guy. He looks like my Siamese does when he sleeps - fat and oblivious of whatever is going on around him. Click on his picture here to check out pictures of his other buddies.

Cutie Cat

I was looking for something having to do with cloth bags (Back Tack inspiration you know) and I came accross this kazansi site again. I keep bumping into it. I've seen a few bloggers around giving it a try and the technique seems to yeild some beautiful results. There are other examples on this site.

Kanzasi

I was looking up something having to do with felting and came accross these next two pictures. I had to record this one here because it is a child's picture of a cat that has been made into a hooked rug. I love the colourful cat and could see myself decorating an entire room around it. Lina would be so pleased. The link to the original site is here, however it just lists various workshops that are available.

Hooked Rug

These felted Halloween pins were on the same site as the rug above. I love the spider!

Felted Halloween Pins

This monkey purse was just too cute not to stash away for future reference. There are a few other shots of this little guy there as well. If only I had seen this during LoobyLu's Sock Monkey Month of Softies. I still have two sock monkeys on my craft table buried under a pile of magazines waiting to have eyes and arms.

Knitted Monkey Purse

I was looking for knitted pouches and found this little pouch mouse. Actually I was taken more by the crocheted bears on this site - Ursa Minor Minatures - than by the pouches and purses. They are adorable. This guys however was made by Mary Daub. I can't find very much about her on the web, but this little mouse is too cute too!

Little Guy

The good news is...

2005-09-21T09:07:00.000-04:00

OK...

I hope I didn't blab too much, I guess I was in a strange mood. I find that these Board meetings are a good lesson in humility. Every Board meeting I do something stupid, forget to do something and say something not relevant to the conversation. It humbles me. Gets me off kilter really. I guess I am still unbalanced.

Unfortunately the only alternative school in my area is a Montessori school which takes children up to Senior Kindergarten, Lina is in Grade 2 this year. The good news is that switching schools seems to have been a good thing so far. The teacher she has moved to this school from Lina's old school along with the Principal, so Lina knows her. That fact and the fact that Chloe, her best friend from accross the street, is in her class at school seem to have made the transition painless. Chloe, from what I can see, is a little more advanced in her skills. I worried about this at first but it seems to be a good thing. Two nights ago, Lina actually took her homework out herself and started working on it without waiting for 1) me to wipe off the table after dinner and 2) me to read the instructions to her.

Last night, Lina's homework consisted reading a short book and completing a story bubble; you know, the title goes in the middle, the plot, characters, conclusion, setting go in bubbles around the side. After completing her assignment, she wanted to write her own story. Together we made our own story bubble and then used it to write a pretty cool story about a cat that chases a mouse who eventually becomes his friend. I decided to concentrate on ensuring that she spelled the words correctly rather than worrying about all the backwards letters. She worked until 8:30pm; I was quite impressed and told her so. She is taking it to school today in the hopes she can read it to her class.

Right now I am trying to see how she functions with her work, we are using her homework as learning opportunities. I have already notified her teacher that she has difficulties and I guess I'll set up a meeting with her soon to see how she is doing in the classroom. I wish so much I had other options to consider. Homeschooling is the only option really around here. We do our work at night and on weekends after school. There are many people who work full time while homeschooling, unfortunately I do not have a good day care situation for her. She likes school right now anyway so I think this after school continual learning will continue.

Anyway, today is Inspiration Wednesday and I need to find some good links to get me back in the creative mode.

The Naughty Corner

2005-09-20T13:32:00.000-04:00

Dear backtack pal,

As you can see from the previous post's comments, I've been sent to the naughty corner. My backtack pal from last go-round says shame on me. I'm pouting and sulking now. Please, don't let my sneakiness and curiosity wreck your fun, Sauvageblue would never forgive me and I'd like to count her as one of my bloggy/crafty friends. Especially don't stop yourself from expressing yourself on your blog, I would never forgive myself. My blogging has been a lifesaver to me this past year. I'll stop snooping... for now (a-hem… unless you insist!)

I think I can say though that you and I have a lot in common. I have over extended my abilities for about a year now. I feel like I am stretching. It feels good but at the same time I feel like I'm not so limber anymore.

In answer to some of your comments, thanks for thinking I accomplish a lot, however I have come to understand that all of us feel everyone else is doing so much and that we ourselves accomplish so little in comparison. My house is a disaster zone, my craft room is in shambles and is so bad that I have taken to closing the door to it. I noticed last night, my daughter still has a bit of green play-dough stuck to one of her sheets which must have been from the other night when I chastised her and her friend about playing with playdough in bed. My bedroom has two baskets of clean unfolded clothes which are starting to mingle with dirty clothes and if I don't catch it soon, I will be forced to wash it all again. My backtack materials are half downstairs on the rec-room floor and half upstairs on the kitchen table. I have a two day old dead fish in a fish bowl that I keep meaning to empty but while leaving for Board meetings at 6:30 - 7:00 am and cooking till 11:00 - 11:30 pm, I haven't been able to get it done.

All of this sound disgusting of course but it goes to show you that on the hierarchy of the things-to-do scale, I am in a sad state.

Don't berate yourself on feeling you aren't accomplishing as much as someone else. It’s like that old "the grass is always greener..." proverb. Blogging is like the TV world in a way, the pretty stuff shows up but the reality of things isn't always the case. I don't really think I accomplish all that much. Not if you saw the hundreds and maybe thousands of dollars in craft materials and tools that I have stockpiled that are just waiting to be used.

We all could do more I guess, but I figured out a while ago, while pulling myself out of a creative depression (which sadly happens every once and a while) that if I dwell on what I think I should be producing, 1) I'll slide right back into depression and not be able to create and 2) I won't appreciate that I am ALWAYS using my skills to create. That last fact is really my important attitude saver. To keep creatively sane, I must acknowledge that am still creating even when I am not working with beads, or wire or leather. By working with my daughter, cooking meals together with my husband and volunteering, I am working my creative soul. Those things have to be counted too, even though it is not a finished project that can be shown on my blog it has some very concrete outcomes. My daughter is a happy and creative child and we have a strong bond. My husband and I are working on our 18th year together (and I am only 35), we talk about our relationship, we work on our relationship and we are proud of it. And through volunteering I am learning to appreciate the intangible creativeness that comes from working little people who are just discovering themselves and their abilities. I have to allow myself to enjoy the good feelings I get about these uses of my abilities and that they are just as valid a creative accomplishment as beading a dreamcatcher is.

Oh and I personally think that stay at home mom's do more work than most of us do-it-all-ers. When I was on maternity leave I couldn't believe the guilt I felt at being home. I couldn't let myself sit knowing my husband was "working" all day. Yah right! I don't feel guilty about it anymore, if I could do it financially I'd be home in a snap and be damned if I would feel guilt about it for a second. I know now that when I was home it allowed us to be a family together instead of having to spend nights and weekends trying to run a household and deal with outside-of-work responsibilities, we would be able to go on walks, ride our bikes, travel, renovate the house, garden... all things that were quality time with each other. We had a better quality of life. I never sat down, even at night I'd fold laundry while watching TV.

Now I "work" all day, and when I get home at night I flop on the couch and go into a trancelike vegetative state all too often, and if I actually compared the amount of "work" I accomplish, I would say that working outside of the home breeds laziness. Like you don't have to "work" anymore the moment you walk into the house, because you “worked” all day. Blah it’s all such a waste!

I didn't realize to someone reading my blog that I would seem heartfelt and open about Lina's difficulties in school. What I felt was frustration. I needed to vent and this was the only place I thought I could do it properly. It's like therapy to blog sometimes. And since I have a writing process when I blog, I seem to be able to discover exactly how I feel about things that started out confusing and angering me. I type everything out as it comes out, then I go back and re-type, sometimes I re-type the entry again. Then I edit, asking myself do I really feel that way? Is that really true? What I publish is pretty much what I feel needs to be recorded for later reference. And I do re-read my entries. They help to put a perspective on things. Allowing public access just ensures that I write things that I can truly stand behind and that I am truthful with myself. Not to mention the possibility of different perspectives from people who have gone through the same trials. And I am always interested in other people’s ideas! Your experiences and opinions would be invaluable.

In my research of homeschooling techniques, I did indeed look at the Waldorf theories. I am not as familiar with those as much as maybe the Charlotte Mason or the Montessori methods. I am a big believer in setting a child loose in a field and letting her discover the truths about life and nature herself. I was able to do a lot of that growing up myself and I am saddened with the disconnection children feel with the living world now. I think it is awesome that you have chosen an alternative method to school your son and that you are so involved. Sometimes I think I am too involved with my daughter and I try my hardest to back off and see what she can work out for herself, being a big believer in independence and self reliance, but it is a hard thing to balance being a mom.

So now that I have blabbed my fingers off once again, I guess it’s time to get back to “work”. Happy creating! Can’t wait to see what you come up with!

Creativechick

2005-09-18T17:59:00.000-04:00

I'm tired, tired, tired. I am sitting at my office waiting in between the end of one Board Meeting and our Board Dinner. So, I'm surfing, my eyes are sore and red and I just want to sleep. But I was so inpired by this artist I had to make sure that I posted th elink here for future reference.

Check out this artist flickr gallery here. And her website and blog here.

Creativechick

Awesome work!

Guessing

2005-09-15T21:27:00.000-04:00

I'm so bad. I've visited every single blog on the back tack list. I like a good mystery, I like solving them even more. I've narrowed my theories on who might be my back tack pal and I am working on four. I wonder, does my secret pal mind?

Trying to guess who might be my partner adds so much fun to the project, not to mention I've just got to know dozens of new bloggers. Man there are some really talented people out there! I cant' wait to see what everyone comes up with.

Brownies

2005-09-15T16:04:00.000-04:00

Well, tonight is a first for Lina and I. She will be a Brownie for the first time and I will be a Brownie Leader for the first time. I had to come up with a name tag craft for the girls to do tonight. Not knowing the makeup or abilities of the girls I came up with something that should be simple: cardstock sandwiched between fun foam. I doodled mine this morning as an example.

Name Tag Craft

Unfortunately, leaving behind Sparks I have to leave behind my Spark name which was Firefly. I rather liked that name. So now I have to choose a traditional Brownie name. It has to be "something" Owl. Tawny Owl, Snowy Owl are traditional names. I wanted something that describes me. There is no Freckled Owl as far as I know, so I have named myself "Spotted Owl" and I am quite proud of it. Did you notice that the owl on my tag has freckles? They are one of my best features I think.

Wish me luck, I am about to walk into a room with 20-30 seven and eight year olds. I am supposed to be a role model and help turn these little girls into inspired young women. Today I would rather curl up in front of the TV and start my backtack project but I know the moment I walk into the room, those little girls will be the ones who inspire me.

Back Tack Questions

2005-09-13T15:09:00.000-04:00

I hope this is OK. I copied questions asked me by my secret pal here, just because they are so fun to think about.

From my Secret Pal:

"Hi Ria, Snoop away, I defy you to find me!

I’m actually kinda worried about dropping hints, so I’m going to be extra careful!

So, let the interrogation begin- Do you have a favorite color? A favorite art medium? A favorite TV show? Any strong dislikes?

Are you a super-duper hugmungous bag kind of person, or do you prefer a neatly organized, no more space than you need kind of tote? What do you need to put in it? A certain 6 year old’s tutus? Bike tires? Motorcycle carburetors? Beading supplies?

Do you like luxury? Simplicity? Moderninty (is that even a word?)? What’s your style? I noticed you’re a rather talented jack of all trades. Is there anything you haven't tried? Needle felting? macramé? Polymer clay? Do you want to tell me out right what you want to try, or shall I surprise you based on what I know so far?

I’m going to let it go at that for now, but I may pester you again soon. Rest assured, I am all consumed about what to make you, my poor children are sooo neglected! Isn’t this fun? :)"

Hmmmm… I love a good challenge.

So.

Favourite Colours.

I am drawn to combinations. I like the creation of a mood or a feeling. I like being surprised by the accident of colours. I envy those who can walk around or work with a kaleidoscope of colours, however I tend to dress and find solace in earthy or jewel tones.

A Favorite medium.

If I new the answer to that one I could probably settle down and get to work earning a living with my creativity. I can’t figure it out. Every time I see some new thing I want to try it, usually after I try I, I get tempted by something else. Jack of all trades, master of none. However, I am always drawn back to beadwork, leatherwork, wirework, crochet and knitting.

A favourite TV show?

Well, hard to say. There is a hierarchy here. My 6 year old gets first dibs. Then comes everything involving two wheels and an engine. And finally if no one else is around and I can sneak in a few moments, I sometimes can find Crafters Coast to Coast, or something crafty like that to ogle over. When it used to be on, I’d hush the house and take control of the remote to watch Modern Masters (http://www.hgtv.com/hgtv/shows_mas) which used to showcase amazing craftsman working on some of their amazing work. (I always secretly wanted to learn to weld, learn glassblowing, and become a weaver). Superficially speaking, my daughter and I never miss an episode of America’s Next Top Model.

A better question for me would be: What is your favourite magazine? “Piecework” It defines me. (It doesn’t define my skill – I wish! It defines what I love – the history, origin and uses of handwork.)

Any Strong Dislikes.

Hate to admit it but yah. Um, can’t stand country crafts. I prefer beauty and functionality. I’m not a fan of crafts that sit around and collect dust. I’m all for art and beauty, but not big on painted wood cuts and potato bins. That’s not a bad thing is it?

Bag size…

Hard to say. I have never found a purse yet that I’ll actually stay with. I tend to stick my debit card into my pocket and go. However. My van is full of bags and various rubber maid containers most of the time. I hate to leave home without a few things that I might just have time to work on. That includes paperwork for Guiding and magazines that I haven’t browsed for a while that might inspire me. Today I have a dollar store tote that has new wool and hooks to make a sweater or shawl for my daughter at the bottom amongst the tangles are several containers of beads waiting to be put back onto the bead shelf. I have two briefcase-kind-of-bags one that contain binders to review policies and programs for Brownies and the other which contains about 150 pages of ideas that I have been collecting from websites and blogs that need to be categorized and put into page protectors and into binders. I also have a road bike and a pair of rollerblades in the back of my van not to mention a gym bag with running shoes, towel etc to work out at the gym at lunch if I have the time. See, I can’t really answer that one. I am one of those people who look like I live in chaos but I know exactly where to find a piece of paper at a moments notice. (Just ask my husband!)

Style

I’ve been wondering that one myself, however, the more I look back at my blog the more I notice that I tend towards simple clean lines and colours. However I am not above chaos that works. Checking out the links I provide on the Wednesdays that I post my Inspiration Links is probably a good hint of what attracts me. I’ve pointed out before how frumpy and “goody-two-shoes” I tend to be. I feel like an imposter riding around on a motorcycle especially some of the ones I get to try out as I can’t bring myself to speed (I mean that would just not be right – would it!) but when no one’s looking I’ll twist the throttle a bit, revel in the power and secretly wish I was downtown so I could admire myself in a store front window. Oooh what would I be if I only let that rebel in me loose?

What haven’t I tried.

Lots I guess, but probably more than most. I’ve never welded, but have tried blacksmithing when I was a child (my dad had a forge), I don’t own a floor loom but have worked with a table loom several times, I haven’t blown any glass vases, but I am pretty happy working with glass beads. I’ve tried woodcarving, wooden boxes, painted murals, painted floor cloths, I’ve painted with acrylics and water colours right now I fixated with pencil crayons. My favourite drawing mediums are pencil, charcoal and pen & ink. I have quilted but am more fascinated with appliqué. I have smocked, embroidered, done crewelwork, cross-stitched (but then didn’t everyone?). I love lace, am pretty comfortable with tatting, have knitted lace, not so comfortable with crocheted lace though.

In my craft room, I have stained-glass tools, various tools for wire-work, soldering guns, two sewing machines (one antique), an easel, (I just moved my drafting table down to my shed as it was taking up too much room and I haven’t been drawing much lately), a bookshelf crammed with magazines and binders, a smocking machine, an entire bookshelf devoted to beads, boxes of embroidery thread, a huge basket of yarn and miscellaneous knitting projects in progress, various paints, woodcarving tools, sweetgrass that has yet to be braided, wings and feathers from a partridge, leatherworking tools, an unfinished sock monkey and usually a Siamese cat named Fester.

I’m good with macramé (I was born in the 70s), have a collection of polymer clay, had tried my hand at scrapbooking, but I have to say I’m not really a big fan of that trend. (I studied Photography at University so I am loath to cut up a photograph and feel that other than the odd date and name it should pretty much speak for itself.) I have made candles and have a huge block of wax just waiting to be melted if I ever get around to doing it. I had a go at bookbinding this past year and absolutely loved it.

Of things I have never done but will probably get around to trying some day: I have never needle felted, never felted anything I have knit, never made felt. I have never spun or died my own wool, never owned sheep for that matter. Oooh but I have made my own butter when I was a kid – time consuming process – don’t think that is related but it did have to do with livestock. I have never made bobbin lace. I have never worked with a tambour, never made a tapestry. I have never done any silk screening or printing on fabric like everyone seems to be into. I have never learnt basket making techniques, although I have had a hand in re-caning a chair. I have never made any lampworked beads but I will some day.

But when it comes right down to it, I love surprises and although I’ve run off at the mouth (so to speak), I would love to see what you figure out about me. After all, you can see I am fascinated by just about anything that can be made by hand.

Back-Tack Ideas

2005-09-13T09:55:00.000-04:00

I can hardly get my head screwed on straight and I have no time to get it on right. Tonight is registration night for Guides and because I have committed to Brownies this year (I was a Leader for Sparks last year) I have so much to learn as well. I have some major busy weeks ahead.

In creative news I've pretty much decided how I want to approach my back-tack project. I am going to attempt tablet weaving once again. I haven't done it for years, I was a young teenager the first time I used the technique. I borrowed a book from our library and taught myself. Years later when I was in University and trying to get into being "hip", I wanted to make myself a bag using the technique. I made several straps, but never got around to sewing them up. Who would have thought that studying and working so we didn't starve could take up so much of a student's time?

I still have the deck of cards I cut up to make the tablets and a few years ago I found a copy of the same book I had originally learned the technique from, at a local used book store.

So when I received confirmation that my name was included in the back-tack II project, I started thinking about that book again. I knit, I supposed I could felt if I tried, I crochet, I do beadwork, I can sew, I can quilt but it's not my favourite thing to do. So as a challenge, I have decided to try to tablet weave a bag and some accessories.

Here is the book of techniques I own.

Tablet Weaving Book

And here is my old set of converted playing cards that I made in University (that was 15 years ago - yep you're right, I am a pack-rat)

Old Cards

An here is an example of one of the projects that I have been looking at for ideas. I'd like to make a bag in the style of a messanger bag. Complete with tassels and I would like to incorporate some applique work as well. Turns, out from what I can gather from my backtack buddy, the recipient of my bag and I have similar taste so I think if I am happy with the outcome then so will she.

Example

If anyone is interested in learning more about this technique, here are some links to follow which look at the history and possilities of Tablet or Card Weaving.

Discover Card Weaving: Ancient Technique - Modern Delight
Examples
Tablet Weaving
Weavershand
Tablet Weaving
Lina Hendrickson Tablet Weaving
Tablet Weaving

BackTack II

2005-09-09T11:17:00.000-04:00

Good things. I just learned that I did indeed make the cut for Back Tack II. I am SO excited. I've already been snooping around my buddy's site and have alot more snooping to do. I wonder who is my secret pal? Oh goody goody. Something new to lie in bed and dream about.

Now I need to do some bag research. Not only that, but I have to figure out some kind of crafty thing I have always wanted to try but never have. A hard thing for me to figure out since I pretty much dabble in everything. I just can't wait to see who else in on the list on what new people/blogs I will get to know.

In other news, yes I am still swamped. I worked at the office until 8:30 pm last night, went home put Lina in bed (who was watching TV in the garage while the guys readied their bikes for the final race of the year which is tomorrow) and worked until 11:30 pm last night.

The last few days I've been face to face with Murphy's Law. You know the one that goes "anything that can go wrong will go wrong", well its pretty much defined my entire week. So between snatching the last spot in the after school program for Lina, receiving the wonderful gift from Kitty Dollies yesterday and getting in on a second BackTack, I feel I might be able to salvage some good humour this week.

Such a Lovely Gift

2005-09-08T18:31:00.000-04:00

Looky, Looky what I received in the mail. While so much is going on (I was supposed to be on my way home 2 hours ago and it doesn't look like I am getting out of the office anytime soon), I was blown away when my husband handed me a package yesterday and low and behold, Kitty Violeta from Singapore, who was one of my backtack buddies (it was to her I sent my fabric to in the first half of the backtack project), sent me a beautiful pouch made from left over fabric and filled with some wonderful wool and stitch markers. I am speachless.

Lovely Pouch

Pouch Contents

This is such a wonderful spirit lifter. THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!!!

I still don't know whether I got in on the second round of Backtack, but I do know that the first list is obviously comprised of many many generous and talented people. Now I have to put aside some time to make something lovely from this gift to do justice for this surprise.