You ever have one of those days?

Before I get to the point of this post, let me share some Cute-ness. She was quite happy this morning.  I thought this looked very "first day of school", even though I never had Guess as a kid.  It was probably partly because Guess jeans are not cut for a Pennsylvania Dutch body (at least not the female body) and because, in 1987, $60 was A LOT of money to spend on a pair of jeans. But on her, they look adorable. I told her I would be brave if she could be brave and we went to school.  And then I had to kiss her and tell her to have a good day, and I lost it. At least I got out to the car before I started sobbing, but I probably looked stupid, running out of the daycare.  If only she'd been asleep, it would have been OK.  She spent most of the morning asleep, she drank 9 oz of formula, and, when Left-brain went in to get her, she was in the jumpy chair, asleep.  Exercise wears her out.  Hopefully tomorrow will be easier.

I decided to clean up my side of the garage in order to distract myself, since I was watching TV, and a baby cried on TV and I got up because I thought it was my baby.  Left-brain took care of most of it, which makes sense because most of the mess is his stuff. But I seem to have developed amnesia because there was a HUGE tub of cross stitch magazines I was not aware existed.  And, yes, I uttered a curse word when I opened the lid. More out of shock than any other emotion.

There's a line in Sex and the City where Carrie states, and I am paraphrasing here, she has no savings because she prefers to keep her money where she can see it, and spent it on shoes. I know I have quoted this line before, usually jokingly, but seriously, in addition to the boxes upstairs, and the ones in the corner, and the tote bag of stitching magazines, and the half-full box I knew about, this one was there. Not only do I keep my money where I can see it in a bad investment, apparently I hide it from myself  and then deny to myself it exists. But, there it was. I decided to go through it, take out the ones I thought I might stitch from in the near future, and then consolidate boxes, to at least get an idea of the proper size of the collection. It really wasn't too bad. Most everything from that box and the one I knew was half full fit together in one box, I put the kits in the other box, and have the charts to go into binders or chart boxes.

One of the things I am grappling with, though, is the fact that so much of this has been in the garage, un-noticed, un-cared for, and unappreciated for a long time. At least two years, but there is a stack of magazine boxes in the corner that I haven't opened since I moved in. I know one of the basic things they tell you in organizing is that you should get rid of things if you haven't looked at them in this long. Does that apply to craft supplies?  As I was pushing the one now-full box of magazines back into position, I kind of wondered if I could use them all as the basis of a master's, since I have enough to qualify as an expert and, hey, it would be nice to be a "masters" stitcher, right?  A little stupid humor, forgive me. But, I know myself well enough to know that I would not be happy getting rid of them either.  This probably does mean I am a hoarder . . . doesn't it?  I joke about this, but part of me does wonder, how bad of a hoarder would I be if a professional actually looked at my stuff?  At least it's in boxes and not on the floor. I did tell Left-brain when we move, that big box is going to be a killer. He thinks I am fooling, I am not!

And the crazy thing, I STILL HAVE NOT FOUND the LK Flip-its I rebought in the fall of 2010 and lost. Not that I lack stitching projects, but where in the HECK did they go?  And why can't I find them? I'm a stitcher, not a squirrel, and these are charts, not acorns!  They didn't get buried. I remember them being in my old computer bag, but they are not there anymore.  This is the second time I bought them, second time I lost them. I have been through every box in the house and they are not there. Wierd wierd wierd.  I am going to rebuy them and stitch them one at a time, so that I don't lose so much.  Strange, hunh? 

I also found a box of books that had disappeared, among them Little Heathens, which I was reading when I first got together with Left-brain. It's a great book. I know, I don't often recommend books on this blog, for the reason that I know my opinion on books isn't well-schooled and not always in conjunction with the rest of the world, but I really do like this book and am going to re-read it now that I re-found it. I now have a good supply of books to get me through the fall, by shopping in my own garage. Didn't even need Goodwill for this!

If I could just find those Lizzie Kates . . .

Checking in

It's been a while, but I haven't stitched very much in the past two weeks.  Left-brain and I have been fighting a heinous cold for the last week, and it's taken all our effort to keep upright.  Monday, I had such bad chills, I had to wear a sweatshirt all day, and slept with 4 blankets.  It wouldn't have been so bad, but this was my last week home with the baby and I was miserable most of it. 

She starts school tomorrow. I have another week off, but this lets me ease into letting her go to daycare without having to keep myself together for work. I have been getting a bit emotional for the past couple weeks whenever I think about it, even though I know it's how it has to be, particularly with the current state of business, but it doesn't make it easier to think of my tiny daughter being away from me.  I have to send her out in the world now, and I don't want to.  I never in my life thought it would be this hard to do this--I was Rachel, who never wanted to be tied down, who took a lot of her self-worth from work, and now, all I want to do is cuddle her.  And take pictures of her, LOL.

I know it will be OK.  The staff is kind; she smiled at Miss Julie on Wednesday when we visited. I know she'll take good care of her.  I'm going to try to not call during the day.  I think it will be better for me not to do so.   Then, when I get to go get her, she won't know how I worried about her. And I do think it will be good for me to get some stuff done while she is not here.  I have to renew my car license, and there was all that baking I had planned to do before I realized you don't bake in a house with a baby without some other person there.  I might get the naps I haven't been able to get in 8 weeks. I have some ornaments to finish.  So I'll have some work to do to occupy my mind. But when I go get her, someone is getting kissed and kissed and kissed.

Where has the time gone?

 Has it really been almost a month since I posted last?  Oops.  The time is slipping away fast from us. It's hard to believe it's been 3 months since I've worked out of an office and that Chubbity just turned 6 weeks old.  She is starting to smile with a purpose--Sunday, I was dancing to entertain her, and she smiled at me. I guess I looked kind of funny, but today, I told her she had a "biggg boo-teh" because of how her diaper was fitting and she smiled again.  It makes me happy to think she thinks I am funny. She starts daycare in two weeks, a week before I go back to work, and I don't know how I am going to handle it. Since she was born, I haven't been that far from her all day long, and it is hard to think that I have to start letting someone else look after her for 8 hours.  But, it's what has to be done, and I have to be a mom and put my feelings aside and be happy that she has this opportunity.  I am grateful we got into this wonderful daycare, and I want her to love it there.

I have gotten a little stitching done, not so much as I would like, but it's hard to find time. I do like these little projects, so much easier to complete in between cuddles and feedings. Today she was playing with my threads, maybe I do have a stitcher in the making.

This is my Itty Bitty Kitty Quilt progress for the past two months. These were a little more trickier to do than other months.  Lots of color changes in the one for August. This photo doesn't do it justice.

 And my progress for the year so far. 2/3 of the way finished. I love this project. 

 This is the a freebie by Jean Farish. I finished it in the wee hours of July 1st. Kaydence had just been wheeled into my room, and was lying there, looking at me, and I was too scared to sleep, in case something happened to her.  This will go on a keepsake box for her, so it was appropriate for her to watch Mummy stitch it. 

 And a finish by Pam Kellogg, from her Millenium Cats series. I was looking at these charts, which were freebies I printed off in 1999, and got to thinking that they would make great ornaments.

 The Halloween one, Spooky, is for a cat-crazy friend, but I am going to re-stitch it for myself. The WIP below is Thomas, the November cat, which will go on my fall tree.

 One of the things I have noticed has changed this year is that I am not so much drawn to Halloween designs and decorations, but really to fall items in general. Maybe it's because I don't have a lot of "fall" things in my stuff, or maybe I am drawn to the idea of warmth, abundance, family and contentment that fall symbolizes to me, but I am digging fall stuff.  They have a lot of pretty things at Joanns, including some chocolate brown placemats. I keep thinking how pretty they would look on my dining room table, with my cream tablecloth, and the new cream and red dishes that we are going to buy to replace the ones DH had from his single days.  I will wait til they go on sale, if they are still there, well, they are meant to be mine.

This is a very special WIP I started, from a chart taken from a photo of Kaydence holding my finger with her hand.

I think this is her index finger, but I am not sure yet. The chart is very easy to follow and I am making really good fast progress.  I can not wait to see this progress.

You can kind of see, in the background of this picture, the clipboard thing I am using to store the chart while working on it. I found this at Walmart this summer, in the school supplies.  It has a clipboard, but also has a storage compartment underneath that holds the threads, needles, scissors, and the WIP itself. It's a slim compartment--big highlighters don't fit, but small ones do--and I am really pleased at how well this works for this project. I am sure it will work great when I have other projects in there with fewer floss colors to work with. It was a bit of a splurge for me--I think it was $6 or so, but I'm on a budget now--but I really like it. I haven't seen them in regular Walmarts, just the bigger supercenters, but if you are looking for a storage solution, this might work for you.

That's all for today. Chubbity is starting to fuss, so I have to run. I will try to write more faithfully now, but it's all dependant on her demands. I hope all are having a great summer, and looking forward to fall.