Un-Stuck

I don't know how this will ultimately play out for our family, but I do know God has pressed it into my heart for the past three years. How could we ever say our family is too full for these little ones? How could we not help them get un-stuck?

Jedd Medefind invites you to watch STUCK adoption documentary from Both Ends Burning Campaign on Vimeo.

Roundabout Way

I want to pin this image. It is from a magazine that stopped publication a few years ago, but remains one of my favorites of all-time, Cottage Living. I found a PDF with the picture, copied the part I wanted, and stuck it here. So I could pin it to my dream board for our future mountain house.

Yes, you can all come stay.

I love the ledges, the hearth, and the pass-through to the kitchen and dining area.

This will likely be the only image ever to have been pinned from my blog.

Matchstick Mouth

I recently watched The Help. In the movie, there is a scene where a young woman is asking for housekeeping advice from a maid. She needs to answer the question, "How do I keep my eyes from watering when I am chopping an onion?" The answer? Hold an unlit match between your teeth.

I tried it tonight, and who knew? It worked!

Sewing Accountability 2013

My sister and I are doing a little project this year. We have both had sewing machines and teach-yourself-to-sew books for over a year. But we haven't yet learned to sew. SO, we are holding each other to making some sort of progress every month this year. For me, this is to finish a chapter a month in my book.

To begin my work, however, I had a few things to mend before I got started. This was good, as they helped move project-unpack-and-move-into-your-new-house-finally forward. Who can get started on something new with these hanging over the head? Here was my short list:

• sew hook & eyes back on peasant blouse (that I happen to love and haven't worn in years, due to missing hook & eyes)
• sew buttons on smocked UGA jumper so KW can wear it (mom added darts to girl-ify it)
• sew button back on KW's coat
• mend pocket on Arden's sweater that KW was wearing last week
• add final stitching to t-shirt quilt I made for B, to hold the batting in place

So, there you have it. My February project is also not from the book, but along the unpacking lines. Watch for a post...I hope it turns out well. I am actually doing something new.

On the Rope

A couple of years ago, I wrote about the first stage of the Advent calendar my mom knitted for me. My intention was to create the weights out the yarn my mom used to knit the mittens, then hang it up the following year. That was my intention.

What really happened was that I took it to Memphis with me in a non-descript box during our summer visit. Because I was going to have a lot of time to work on it, then, right? Then I accidentally left it there. But I didn't realize it was missing until - you guessed it - it was time to at least throw those mittens in a bag again. By then, my sister had moved home and was living in the room where I had left the box. Everything in the room had been shoved in corners and stacked in other places. And, did I mention it was in a non-descript box?

Finally, the mittens were discovered and recovered! This past summer I added the weights, which are styrofoam balls wrapped in the various yarns used to make the mittens, and we finally got those babies up on the rope. Lee and I had a lot of fun hanging up the calendar. (There were some bursts of over-controlling mom ruining the moment; I plan to do better with that next year.) Despite the horrible, flash-less pictures, it looked really cute, though there is still some tweaking I want to do for next year.

Next steps for this treasure:

1. Finish writing the "script" we will use. (I found one that I thought was really cool until we started, so I am writing my own, using this one as a model.)

2. Gather all of the "treats" for the mittens to store with them. (Of course, chocolate is included every day, but I will buy that fresh.)

3. Determine a permanent order for the mittens and sew the numbers on. (1-25, in case that is not readily apparent.)

4. Re-assess some of those balls, and make new, smaller ones. (My yarn wrapping skills turned out to be nil, so some of those weights ended up being huge.)