Obsessed

Cure for an obsession: get another one.

                                   - Mason Cooley

Ever since I purchased those five Alexander Henry prints from the quilt shop I’ve been obsessing over them. Between searching online and thumbing through quilt books for inspiration, I’m beginning to lose my mind. It’s like when I see a line of fabric I love but can’t seem to locate anywhere because it has long been out of production, even if the line was mediocre at best and I would doubtfully do anything with it, I can’t stop searching for it. Perhaps that is why I finally just caved in and bought the prints that I did. Or perhaps I’m simply becoming a hoarder.

So now the difficult part of this whole equation is what to do with it? I’m no closer to having that answer than I was when I started this game. Do I find a pattern I like and attach it to the fabric in hopes that some day after I finish my bazillion other projects I can get to it, or do I stack it away on a shelf and pretend like it doesn’t exist? Those options, at least in the current state of my mind, don’t seem like plausible options to begin with. Perhaps I need to stop obsessing over finding the perfect pattern and simply work on what I really wanted to do before all of this In The Kitchen business got in the way and start working on my Christmas Quilt. Alas, it looks good on paper, but my mind will undoubtedly play games with me and force me into a deep, dark place where instead of coughing up what sounds like Gollum I’ll cough up Alexander Henry Spotted Owls.

New Quilt Project

After cleaning I was bored. Let’s just say that me and boredom are a dangerous combination.

I was tired of cleaning yesterday afternoon, and figured my objective of mopping the floors and laundry and dishes and vacuuming and litter box changing had been achieved, so I stopped. Oh, I could’ve continued with various other tasks, but decided against such extreme measures. After all, I can’t have everyone thinking I’m some super being, can I? In all seriousness I still had to go grocery shopping, so I gathered the bags and walked out the door and drove off. Now, here’s the thing, I decided to take the back roads and as I was doing so decided to go ahead and take a trip to my local quilt shop, The Country Manor to say hi and maybe pick up a couple more batiks for The Desperate Housewife’s Quilt.

Okay, so here is the thing… I love this shop. Besides the fact that it is filled to capacity on every shelf, bolts are also in front of the shelves on the floor as well. However, the owner was not in that day, which was a little sad for me. Apparently even she gets a day off every now and then, though this was the first time I’d been in without her. So I perused the back section where the clearance fabrics are, found quite a few adorable children’s fabrics that I passed up because the thought of even getting any of those right now is still a little painful given the uncertain circumstances involving our kids, and kept looking. I found the batiks, and found a couple that I liked, but decided to continue looking in the rest of the shop before picking up anything.

For the last couple years I’ve had my eye on Alexander Henry’s In the Kitchen line, especially the creepy owls and mushroom prints. I don’t know why but this line brings up a flood of memories from my childhood while at the same time is comforting and cute. I decided that since we had a little extra money, and me being me can’t seem to leave well enough alone and save it for a rainy day (which, by the way, it was raining like crazy yesterday too so technically…) I picked out five of my favorite prints and got a half yard of each. Apparently this line was created to have that retro feel and is continuously adding new fabrics. I love the Brady Bunch look it evokes and can’t wait to find a retro pattern to tweak to my liking. Of course, I’ll need to add a few solids to the mix to fill in.

Time to Clean

It’s time to clean the house again. Do you think anyone will notice if I don’t?

Litter boxes need changing, floors need swept and mopped, carpets vacuumed, dishes washed, clothes washed and dried and folded and the windows wiped. This seemed so much easier when I was unemployed. I mean, I normally keep up on the dishes and laundry and general upkeep stuff, but the every week or two (or four or more) stuff gets, well, pushed by the wayside sometimes. I have nothing to blame except myself, my quilting projects, and Netflix.

Typically I try to get all my cleaning done and out of the way first thing, that way I don’t have that GUILTY sign over my head when I’m working on a quilt block or watching another episode of Dollhouse. That won’t be happening today, as I can probably get most of it done except for mopping which will have to wait until I get some cleaning solution since, well, I don’t mop very often. I think in the old house I mopped the floors once a year or so. I will have to look at our chemicals we brought with us, as we left a lot of them at the old house when we moved, to see if we even have anything. The only times I’ve mopped here was to clean up our dog’s pee puddles and for that I used half a cup of apple cider vinegar with a drop of Dawn dish soap in about a gallon of hot water. That’s called me being cheap, but it works.

I hate mopping. I hate it with a passion. It seems like one of the most pointless tasks to me for some reason and yet when I see a nice clean floor it brings a smile to my face for the fraction of a second before our Great Dane, Lucy, comes prancing in or one of the cats finishes using the litter box and twirls across the floor. Alas, me stalling is not going to make the tasks disappear. I suppose it is time to clean once more. [sigh]

Halloween Decorations

We’ve started putting out our Halloween decorations. It’s hard to believe just how little we have left.

The other night we decided to dig out the Halloween stuff from the garage and start decorating the house. I always thought that we had quite a bit of stuff, but since we moved a good third of it was left behind either as garbage or garage sale fodder. That includes all of our costumes. Yes, I’m shedding a tear as I write this in mourning of all the lost costumes and wigs. I don’t know why I let myself believe I’d never want to see them again, but now that it is closer to Halloween I realize the error of my ways!

Anyway, back to decorations. The inside stuff was always pretty limited. However, we had enough to make it feel like Halloween was upon us. Now it just feels like, meh, there it is. Sad. I don’t know if that means I should be on the lookout for more stuff, which isn’t really an option, or if I should instead find other ways to make the house more Halloweenie. I do know, however, our current display is quite lacking.

Desperate Housewife's Quilt: Block Eight

When life gives you choices such as being outside while big floppy rain drops pound on you or staying inside and sewing, the decision can be difficult. I chose sewing.

After church yesterday the plan was to come home and work on the pond, but it was raining and neither of us wanted to work in the rain. So instead I went back inside the house and started working on the eighth block of Jane’s Desperate Housewife’s Quilt. Yes, I know I’m lagging behind, but I figure if I take my time and actually work on the blocks they might even be usable for their intended quilt.

I briefly looked over the instructions, chose my fabrics and started making cuts. I’d suggest reading the instructions all the way, as I found that simply looking at the picture with all the cutout pieces doesn’t tell the whole story. However, fortunately for me I’m not necessarily a stickler for directions and don’t mind that my four-patches are a little different. It called for eight black squares for the four-patches, the same as the background fabric, but I chose a dark blue instead. Typical of me, once I realized my mistake I’d already made my cuts and I hate waste so they stayed.

A little more than an hour after I started it was finished, which for me is a record. I also only had to rip out one stitch line because I’d decided not to pin and one of the center points wasn’t pointy, which is also a record. Besides, with me finishing the block so quickly we were able to do something else perfect for rainy days… watch Season 3 episodes of Merlin that just loaded onto Netflix’s instant view!

Hockey

Last night we went to a hockey game with a couple friends. It was awesome.

While I may not enjoy playing many sports, I do like watching live events.  So when friends of ours from church asked us if we wanted to go to a Portland Winterhawks game, we said yes. My husband had never been to a hockey game and I hadn’t been to one since I was eighteen or nineteen. The game was awesome. Of course, it helped that the Winterhawks dominated the game and won and that there was a huge fight that put seven players in the penalty box, one of whom was sent out of the game completely.

Now I’ve never really understood the rules of hockey to quite get how the game worked, but our friend was kind enough to explain the rules pretty simply and it certainly helped with why players would be moving the puck around in the fashion they were. Thanks, now I know some of the rules of hockey. Will I remember them? Doubtful, but we’ll see. My mind works in mysterious ways. Perhaps I should tell my brain to store it in the Random-Facts-To-Pull-Out-Of-My-Ass-During-Dinner-Parties file.

Working Cake In

Sometimes life makes you juggle. I’m not a very good juggler.

One of the most difficult things about working and running a business on the side is finding out a good balance between the two that satisfies your bank account and your sanity. Most small business owners lack both. I definitely fall into that category.

Anyway, so I’ve got a cake for Sunday that I’m making and of course have to work not only today but the people the cake is for are taking us to a hockey game tonight. This squeezes my window of decorating opportunity even more than normal. I suppose it doesn’t help that it is for a wedding reception either. I’m going to make it as easy as I can on myself and take any shortcuts only I would notice. Hopefully my window doesn’t come crashing down on me.