Marmalade

Why cats enjoy life better than people do.

I see trees of green, red roses too

Inspired by Rice Freeman- Zachery, I began a little journal skirt for Daria, who will be seven in just about three weeks. Greta was reading a poem today ("A garden is a lovesome thing, God wot"), and so I decided to do a sort of garden theme. But first I had to sew the skirt, and I didn't have a pattern, so I drew one from the skirt she was wearing (she had to take it off first, of course). I have all these scraps of denim left over from a skirt I just made for myself, but it wasn't quite enough, so I spliced in some other strips on the sides from some pin-striped denim scraps. I guess that is why a fabric freak saves EVERYTHING. Anyway, it turned out very well, so I will use the rest of the pin-striped stuff to make the waistband. I also stamped and hand-tinted a frog and a bumblebee onto muslin, and tomorrow I will root around in my bins and come up with some flowers for the appliques.

I was in a high-end children's boutique yesterday and saw some outrageously expensive things. Who is buying this stuff anyway? But I am not too shameless to ooh and aah a little, pretending to browse while really just checking out new design ideas. It seems that all the rage in little girl's couture is a petticoat under a skirt, with a border of gathered tulle peeping out from under the bottom of the overskirt. Well, hell's bells, I can do that! So I think when it's all said and done, Daria's little journal skirt will feature a wonderfully feminine frill at the hem. She'll love it and look great in it, too.

When do I have time to sew, you ask? Mostly in the early mornings, before the kids get up. And sometimes in the afternoons, when we have finished school for the day and the girls are playing together. I used to just leave all my sewing out, but the chaos gets to you eventually, so now I always put it all up before I start dinner. Only takes a minute, but it makes such a difference in my mood to not have to look at a mess while we eat...

This is Greta this afternoon, playing and singing her little heart out a la Louis Armstrong, "And I think to myself - what a wonderful world." Some of her happiest moments are at the piano, belting out a song. A lovely child.

Lone Star Ticks and Other Madness

I saw a flea on Pagosa this morning, remembered suddenly that I was out of his Sentinel, then realized all at once how itchy I was. Psychosomatic response, I know (emphasis on psycho), but itchy all the same.

Back in the day, I was quite "crunchy" and I tried to quell fleas, ticks and sundry crittters with good, old-fashioned diatomaceous earth. Be kind to your planet, I told myself, as I vacuumed and wiped down my baseboards, and redusted the yard. Be kind to your planet, I reiterated, as I dabbed antibiotic ointment on the moist, hairless spots my dogs were chewing on themselves. Be kind to your planet, I intoned as I dipped my kittens in a natural, and ineffectual, preventive.

One day, I reached down to idly scratch the back of my knee and came away with bloodied fingers. Twisting around to peer at the source, I discovered five, fat ticks feasting ON ME.

"Ohmygod!" I shrieked. "Ohmygod, ohmygod, ohmygod."

I knew my yard was infested with these ticks. I knew because I had picked several off of my large, St. Bernard cross that same morning. What I hadn't known was that the ticks would find me so delectable. And I had had no idea of what a shuddering little girlie-girl I was, just below the surface. "Bugs! Bugs!" I ran around in a circle. "Bugs on ME! Get them OFF!"

Since then, no matter the cost, I have always dosed my pets with meds which target the problem from the inside. And I let John run over the yard with his little sprayer. Don't ask, don't tell is our official policy around here. No more fleas, no more ticks.

I gotta' get to the vet...

April Showers Bring May...

I woke up this morning with a vague nervousness, anxiety niggling at the back of thoughts. I tried to pinpoint where it was coming from. May is a crazy busy month for me, so maybe that's it. My oldest daughter has a piano recital, all three girls have dance recitals, my middle daughter has a birthday, as do both my parents, there's Mother's Day, and I am the caterer for a big senior high banquet at the Presbyterian Church (serving about 200). Throw in my 10-day trip to California, and you've got a real circus. So WHAT was I worried about? Oh, yeah. All that stuff I gotta' do.

Greta, my oldest daughter, plays the piano very well. There is a lot of raw talent there, of course, but she also is able to spend about an hour a day practicing, which means she tears right through her lesson books. She is getting ready for her first intermediate performance piece, Handel's Menuet in G Major. She works diligently on her technique, but it's her sensitivity that is wonderful to see develop. She is an imaginative child anyway, so it's not too surpising that what inspires her most about music is the feeling it evokes. She is always making up a little story to go with each piece, trying to get inside the reason behind the dynamics. "It's softer here because they are catching their breath. It's louder here, because they are running up the stairs." Etc... I am very proud of her. She has only been taking private lessons for a year now, but her composure and elegance at the piano just makes me misty-eyed. She's only eight, after all.

Tote bags

I have not spent anything like the 70,000 hours of remedial work evidently needed for me to be able to easily access my own photos and subsequently post said photos on my blog (!). But I am prepared to take the plunge and put up two blurry pictures of a couple of tote bags I just finished. My daughters are going to their first slumber party tonight (yes, all three of them), and the party is for two sisters who have literally grown up with my three girls. I am stuffing these little bags (which have been appliqued, lined and lovingly assembled by a woman who almost always decides to bite off more than she can chew, and all at the last minute, of course), with blank diaries, colored pencils, rubber stamps and silly hats -- they are little girls, after all.

I don't know how you people so effortlessly publish your photos and various graphics, but my hat is off to you. If you could know the painful minutes I have spent laboring over these two little pictures, you really would feel quite sorry for me, I'm sure...

True story

Several years ago, I nearly died in an emergency room in Austin, Texas. I was twenty-five years old. I had had a miscarriage two weeks earlier, so when I presented in the early morning hours with shortness of breath and pain in my chest, they assumed I was having a panic attack. "Losing the baby really bothered you, huh, sweetie?" the young resident asked me, patting my hand distractedly and ordering some blood gas work. A half hour later, he was back, staring perplexedly at the veins which would not yield a sample, so matter how many times the nurse stuck me. "She is awfully pale, Doctor," she said.

They hooked me up to a blood pressure monitor and listened to my chest and abdomen with a little more interest this time. "Does it hurt here? And here?" Just as they began to put it all together, the machine started making noise and suddenly there were half a dozen people bustling around me. A nurse tapped rhythmically on my hand, telling me to hang in there, and I felt cold air hit me as they cut my hospital gown and undergarments off me. I heard the clicking of the wheels and the impact of my bed hitting the swinging doors as they rushed me into surgery. I remember struggling to pull the mask off my face to tell my husband I loved him. His stricken eyes burned into mine as he was pushed back and dropped from my view. Dimly, and over the crushing pain in my chest, I realized they were going to put me to sleep and I arched my back in an effort to get to the drugs faster. I honestly had no thought of living or dying. I no longer wanted to survive that pain. I was strangling.

The miscarriage of 1o days before had been a misdiagnosis of what was really an 11 week pregnancy growing on my ovary. A blood vessel had burst and I had proceeded to bleed more than a third of my total blood volume into my belly. My lungs were collapsing, and my organs were shutting down. I was minutes from going into arrest.

But I lived. In the days afterward, I fought with pneumonia and an amazing weakness, but I was soon home again and recuperating. Seven weeks later, I was back at work part-time, pale and tired, but getting stronger every day. But on my third day back, I started having pain and pressure in my abdomen. I called the doctor and spoke with his nurse. "Bladder infection, most likely." I told her I doubted it, and insisted on coming in. When they scanned my belly, they discovered more internal bleeding, this time off of huge cysts which had developed on both ovaries.

Now the doctor was using a soft, soothing voice and telling me that I was going to have to do chemotherapy. Never once did he use the word cancer. Some of the cells from the ectopic pregnancy had settled in parts of my abdomen and were rapidly dividing and reproducing. Very rare, I was told. Another surgery would be required, then several trips to the hospital for IV drips. I might feel nauseous, he told me, fatigued. He called my chemotherapy a "cocktail" and told me that with the particular one they were going to try, only about 30% lost their hair.

I was extremely pragmatic about the whole thing. The only emotional moment I really had was when I went into a little boutique near the hospital. I rooted around, admiring the handmade dolls and animals, choosing a small, black bunny for myself. "Should I wrap it up?" the lady behind the counter asked me. "No," I said. "The bunny is for me. I am starting chemotherapy today." I felt the tears well up, and we were both embarrassed for me. "Good luck," she chirped at me on my way out the door, refusing to meet my eyes.

This is all over 14 years ago. Time has flown and I have three gorgeous little girls. I had them all at home with a midwife, and each was a perfectly ordinary, garden-variety pregnancy and birth. I have so much to be grateful for, and I truly am.

Easter Weekend, and that must mean a family get-together of some kind...

The girls and I are having our oshi mugi with butter and brown sugar (brunch!) and rubberstamping. The dining room table is a mess, but who cares? Lil, my five year old, is my little artist. She can draw incredibly well and has a serious interest in all things art. She has a tiny paintbrush in her hands right now and she is carefully painting in details on her rubber stamp. You never have to tell her how to do something. She always knows exactly how she wants something to look. Give her a palette of paint and she will spend several minutes mixing her own colors (just like Mommy) until she gets it right. I love that about her.

Not much to report today. We are going to go on a nature walk in a little while and John has family in town for the weekend. His grandmother has been awfully wiggy lately, writing whining letters and airing her grievances. I get to see her tomorrow, and I am just hoping she doesn't make my visit too uncomfortable. For some reason, she has found a name for her pain and, well -- you know the rest... In any given family, on any given day, somebody is being difficult. I suppose it is Nonnie's turn to act the nutball. I get to see my own grandmother next month when the girls and I will travel back home to Los Angeles. She is ninety-five and going strong, but she has become a bit petulant herself of late. I can't pretend to understand what it must be like to grow old and suffer the indignity of losing pieces of yourself with every passing month. Small freedoms, which I take for granted, like driving and gardening and even changing your own sheets or bathing yourself in private, are beginning to crumble away from my grandmother. She frets and I try to understand. It's dangerous for her to be on the roads, but she would still like to try. She has trouble getting in and out of the shower and she might fall, but she doesn't want you to wash her naked body. The news makes her fearful and anxious, but who are we to tell her what she should or should not watch? I have genuine empathy for her. I can see that when she takes a look around her, everybody is the enemy. We are trying to control her. I know why the elderly are so often paranoid. I would be, too.

Pagosa

Good morning! Here is a picture of our dog, Pagosa, sitting in my husband's chair, patiently waiting for five o'clock to roll around. He is named for Pagosa Springs, Colorado, where John and I were married. I actually drove a fair distance to a shelter in Louisiana to pick him up, when he was just 6 weeks old. Something about his face said, "Choose me." So we did. Ain't he sweet?

Introspective thoughts on why I'm NOT a size 6 (or even an 8 or 10!)

I have assembled my little zippered handbag and have begun the bead work. Beading is a funny process. At first, I always seem to think that I am just going to accent a few details and leave it at that. Then I get into it and I begin to notice more about what my little project is saying to me.

I am hopelessly domestic. I am the mother who brings homemade cookies to the dance recital. I am the one who works two weeks on a knitted scarf, wraps it tinted cellophane and presents it to my daughter's piano teacher at the end of the year. I am the one who writes sympathy cards to the bereaved and then walks down to the post office to choose an appropriate stamp. I make macaroni and cheese for my girls, with a fresh cream sauce, four cheeses, grated nutmeg, and breadcrumbs made from my homebaked bread. I paint portraits of my friends' pets. I am almost ridiculously proud of my children.

What I am most emphatically NOT is glamourous. I have friends who can look like a million bucks as effortlessly as I can patch my husband's jeans. I haven't a particle of sense when it comes to personal elan. I have worn the same hairstyle, if you can call bangs chopped off straight across the brow with a kitchen knife and the rest pulled back into a banana clip "style", since the seventh grade. I have worn the same Doc Marten clunky sandals since I was pregnant with my second child because they are comfortable. I eat delicious food with total abandonment and precious little guilt.

None of these are crimes, I know. In fact, I am happy with the adult I turned out to be. I like NoApologies' statement about herself on her blog. "I am not fat, but certainly not thin." Me, too. The psychic energy that would be required to get me back into my twenties body would be so monumental, I just throw my hands up in the air and enjoy my evening walks instead. I am not saying I wouldn't like to look adorable and firm again. It's just not a priority (or terribly realistic, to be honest). I know women who are hanging on with enameled fingernails, clinging with an ever-growing desperation to the attractive young girls they used to be. But how important is it really to turn strangers' heads? I'll let that fall to the young. I am now at an age where all teenagers are beautiful. All of them.

Gosh, blogging makes me introspective...

Okay, I hate to be one of those tiresome mommies who brags incessantly about her offspring, although I guess you had better get used to it (tee hee). But my five year old just came downstairs with this statement for me. "I was thinking about putting a carnie wheel (she means ferris wheel) in our front yard, and maybe the city WON'T get on us." Can you tell we've had a few tangles with the city? Question authority, I always say!

Cocktails anyone?

I am on my daughter's Macintosh upstairs and her keyboard is kinda' freaking me out (hair-trigger mouse), AND it's just past cocktail hour on a Friday evening, but I will do my best. I had things I needed to get done today, but instead I shopped for and found some fabulous fabric for a little handbag I have in mind. Crewel accents, beaded handles, space age print, mango-colored silk lining, perhaps a tassel or two -- the laundry is just going to have to fold itself, I guess.

We have invited friends over for dinner tomorrow night, so I'll run around here straightening at the last minute, all so we can pretend we don't REALLY live this way (tee hee). On the menu: ratatouille, mousaka, homemade potato rolls and tiramisu. Oh, and a tabouleh to start. Unconventional mix, I admit, but top it all off with a nice red wine and it'll be great.

I keep raving over people's blogs, but ohmygod, what a breath of fresh air for me! I am an early-riser (5 a.m.), and I am spending my "alone" time reading these amazing journals. I know I seem like a total geek here, but I am the quintessential kid in a candy shop, with eyes widened and mouth agape. Blog on, you marvelous bloggers!

Projects at the park

I am off to the park with the girls to meet with a group of "relaxed" homeschoolers (which basically means the majority of us either a.) don't follow a specific curriculum and/or b.) are unwilling to sign the statement of faith which the larger, primary homeschool group around here requires. I won't give my zip code to the gal behind the Toys R Us counter, much less put my name on somebody else's credo. A little too personal. And hypocritical.

I spent the early part of my morning cutting little motifs out of this campy fabric I found the other day, featuring these circus burlesque paper doll clothes. And I have all these photos of those cows which I took on my sister-in-law's ranch. They are just calling out to me. I have already done a painting of the ones I loved the best, but somehow these bovine ladies need to get on some fabric. Seeds of an idea...

30 seconds to sum one's self up...

Okay, things are relatively calm in the other room. John is watching the History Channel, and the girls are busy in that kind of mania that seems to strike just before bedtime. I will take a minute to introduce myself. It's fun to write about yourself, it's true. But you also feel a little silly. Where do you start?

I live in East Texas and I homeschool my three daughters (ages 8, 6 and 5), but please, please don't hold that against me. It's very possible that those words have brought an image of an outrageously conservative, skirt-wearing, eyes-lifted-heavenward oddball, but that ain't me, babe. Really I am just a lifelong liberal arts student (if you know what I mean) trying to find a little meaning. I relish my family, my husband, my head, my heart, my opportunities, my goals. My reasons for homeschooling are complicated, but mostly I just want to ensure that my girls are given the absolute best in education available. And until I win the lottery, I am the person for the job.

I have been knitting since I was five. My grandmother, who just celebrated her 95th birthday (!), taught me, and I have held those needles in my hands pretty much ever since. I also love to sew, and I just bought a brand new sewing machine. My house is a total shambles, of course, but while I am getting acquainted with it, who has time for dishes and floors? My mother is a fiber artist herself and she taught me weaving and tie-dye, so I suppose you could say cloth and inspiration are bred deep in the bone with me.

I have been on a sort of self-imposed hiatus of late, sidetracked by childbirth, nursing and domestic issues. But that urge to CREATE is tugging at me again, and I am not going to fight it! I have discovered blogging, and have spent several days looking at other women's awesome work. "Gentlemen, start your engines." I'm ready.

And so it begins...

I am: a homeschool mother of three, a language freak, a fiber artist. I read, I knit, I sew, I cook. I am new to blogging.