Sometimes you just need to make cookies

I was reminded of this truth yesterday, as the ice storm that swept through Southwest Oklahoma (which is, oddly enough, where my husband and I find ourselves now living) threatened to take out our power. As it began to get dark outside, it suddenly occurred to me that if the lights went out, we would find ourselves without candles and, perhaps more importantly, without cookies.

So I quickly whipped up a batch. (And then, since the power was still on, I decided to make dinner.)

Now, the last time I made chocolate chip cookies, I was also under a bit of pressure - you see, the movers were coming in the morning to pack up our apartment to go into storage on the other side of the country. The Lieutenant and I were packing up a few select things to come with us as we moved from Virginia to California for six weeks, then to Oklahoma for five months of training (for the Lt.), and then back to California again (at which point, we will be reunited with our stored household goods or, because everything in the military is referred to by an acronym, our HHG).




I was starting to pack up my kitchen, when I discovered a pound of butter in the fridge. Now, before you tell me that this was not the best use of my time (Mama...), I'd like you to just TRY to throw away a pound of butter and a package of chocolate chips. I defy you to do it. You can't! It's just unnatural.

Besides, it doesn't take long to make cookies if you have a KitchenAid. And mine was about to go into storage for seven months - we had to have a proper goodbye!

So powerful. And red.
Sigh.
I miss my KitchenAid.

Into the oven they go!

Mmm... Now, because I'd been trying to use up my pantry before the move, I only had whole wheat flour left, so I just used that. Which means these were healthy chocolate chip cookies.

These stackable cooling racks were a wedding gift, and are brilliant. They, sadly, are also in storage.

Sukie and Jojo came over in honor of our last evening of living in the same city/on the same coast - we ate healthy cookies and drank beer (healthy too, I'm sure, in its own way) and played Settlers of Catan. Sukie also helped me pack three seasons' worth of clothes for two people into two suitcases. She's a marvel at fitting things into suitcases.

The next day, the movers swept through, ate some cookies, and packed our entire apartment up into boxes (that is, they packed everything except for what we'd already put into the car). You should've seen them. They were like packing ninjas.

Our apartment, ready for the second round of movers - aka, the loading ninjas.

Now, having lived with that carload of belongings for nearly three of the seven months the Lt. and I are "perched," so to speak (and having complained about some of the things I couldn't fit in), I must say that I'm very pleased with what I did choose to bring - it's just enough to make pretty much any place feel a little more like home. But more on that another time.

For now, may I recommend making a batch of cookies? You'll be happy you did. Trust me.

Earring organization {lame craft warning}

How lazy am I?

I needed a way of keeping my earrings handy without tossing them in the darling boxes I have been using for a long time. {You can see them there in the reflection -- they are little boxes that Habou painstakingly covered in small bits of Christmas cards. They have little "fussy cut" images and sweet messages tucked into them, then lovingly lacquered. I love them. But they are not the best for storing dangling tangling things!}



{You can also see my red engagement ring box. I put my ring in there every night to prevent the grinding of my two rings together, which had resulted in the wearing down of both. I am determined that the next 30 years will see no deterioration of my rings! I do keep my wedding ring on in case there's a fire and the people who rescue us are wondering if I'm married.}


The earrings were just too jumbled that way. Often I would find myself in the morning holding three unmatched earrings, vowing to wear whichever pair I found the match for first.



I've seen the clever craft that involves putting gutter mesh into a frame, making a very attractive earring holder. But I didn't have a frame handy, and I was committing very few crafting ergs to this project.

I tried figuring out how to make a small mirror work,

but failed, pretty much.

Finally I came up with the very most lame, low-energy, anti-aesthetic, lazy way of pulling this one off.
Habou said, "You can cut off those little bits sticking out..." Ummm...okay....

The Chief looked at it and remarked, "Maybe you could spray paint them or something?"

Hmmm....nope.

Maybe when the spray paint thaws, in the spring, I'll rethink. Meanwhile, this is what I'm going with.



A ribbon.




Poked through some gutter mesh.

I did wash the gutter mesh first, yay me!

Cowboy quilt in action!

I think a bunch of you are new here, and welcome!

You will learn that we will get back on topic (vaguely, cleaning) soon...at some point...whenever... but we need some time out for crafty stuff, right?

Want to see more cowboy quilt pictures? Someone had asked to see the whole thing...


Little Paul's mom agreed to take some pictures with her awesome camera and her cuties.

But of course, things don't always go smoothly in the life of a photographer, or, for that matter, a mom:






Now here's a refresher on the fabric.



See this face?

This face is why I had to use this fabric! Paul points out the little cowboy he thinks looks like him, and I think so too!




{By the way, due to my ineptitude, you might have gone to Amongst Lovely Things a tad early and not seen the Loveliness Fair with all the posts on avoiding the February blues in homeschooling. So why not go there now? There are some good ideas Sarah has linked to!}

Avoiding February homeschool burnout before it happens.

I was talking to my friend Auntie Sue the other day, and she was wondering what it is about younger moms that makes them want to listen to us. As she said, it's not that we are so great at what we do.

How to Take a Shower. Come back when you can read a long post, or honestly, just skip.

I have to talk about it...it seems to be an issue with some moms who find themselves at home with small children -- a state that strikes them as something akin to finding oneself in the outback facing a herd of kangaroos, or maybe going to Mars without the flight manual. I kind of wish there had been something like this post when I was a young mom, so take it as a message to the young me if you like.



Now, I realize that many, many people are fine with certain things that seem obvious and are part of a normal person's life.

Other people-- idealistic, romantic, very well read, intelligent people -- can't seem to manage these things, partly because they are thinking so very hard, and partly because they (we) can't -- and this will sound very strange to you others -- buy themselves what they need to get started.

Well, at least you will be amused by this little glimpse into my sadly impaired past. And no, I'm not going to have pictures of showers.



Among other impractical things, and being very young (19) when I got married (really a college student, though my husband is older than I), I took a shower when I noticed I was dirty. Usually this was every day just like other folks. But other times, if I was involved in something else, I didn't take a shower.

Truly, I just didn't have a routine. It was something I thought about in order to accomplish, or did because I didn't have anything else to do.

Since it happened often that something I hadn't planned on, forgot about, or suddenly wanted to do prevented me from showering, I was often not as fresh as I would have liked to have been at any given moment.



I was cute and not oppressive to others, don't worry. But sometimes I was less showered than other times, in a way that made me just not feel...cheerful.

And I sort of had a vague 70s hippie idea that you shouldn't be vain -- that it was a bourgeois vanity to indulge in new towels, blow dryers, and sundry items necessary for efficient grooming.

You kind of had to be there.

In due course, we had a baby, and that was a bit of a shock. I wanted a family more than anything, but the reality of a little person to take care of all by myself stunned me, to the point that even something as mundane as going to the bathroom seemed a bit beyond my capabilities.

Little by little, by dint of simply being forced to make do, I found out that you can bring the baby in with you to lie on the rug while you take care of yourself; you can leave him in his crib for 20 minutes; you can leave the four-year old in charge of an 10-month old in a playpen, while the 2-year old naps.

And somewhere along the line I realized something else.

I realized that I felt wonderful -- elated in fact -- under two circumstances, and it might be that revealing this will expose me as much more shallow than you ever really thought.

I felt positively exalted after 1) I mopped the kitchen floor and/or 2) I had washed my hair.



This led me to tell my husband in so many words: If you see that I'm feeling depressed, please remind me to either wash the floor or my hair. Or both.

And he did. Many many times he (a very hard-working young man) would gently say, "Hon, do you need to wash your hair?"

And I would think, yes, I do.

{Or I'd sigh and reply, "No, but I should wash the floor."}

One day it came to me. If I just washed my hair every other day (it was very long and very thick) come hell or high water, I would ensure that I would not experience a sense of the futility of life on account of my hair.

The heavens just parted and dropped that information right down into my brain.

{I also started washing the floor on a regular schedule, but we're not really talking about that right now.}

Skipping to where I really worked this out -- and really, many of you might want to go see what's happening on some other blog -- I am now going to tell you what you need to do and what you need to buy to avoid the pitfall of not having showered: To eliminate this cause of mental distress from your life completely, unless the electricity should go out or there is some other act of God.

First, and dear friends, I really don't care what time of day you deem best for this, pick a time. At night? Morning? Kids' naptime? After the gym? But do bookish, impractical, pregnant and/or nursing moms go to the gym? I didn't.




Now, you need the following:

Your very own towel, and maybe even two whole towels. I have one large towel for my body and one smaller one for my hair. It's okay. You rate two towels. You have my permission. Give some thought to a hook right by the shower for said towels.

A bathrobe. This is an old-fashioned garment that you may not have heard of or considered as anything you would ever in a million years want.

But it is useful, and let me 'splain it to you.

First, it enables you to go from point A to point B without being either fully clothed or completely naked or even wrapped in one of your towels. It's truly a great invention.

It goes over undergarments in case of forgetting that the clothing you wanted is in the dryer.

It goes over nightclothes in case of wanting to start the coffee when your husband's college roommate is visiting and could appear at any moment but someone's in the bathroom.

If you get one with a terry lining (or that's terry all the way through), it completes the drying process while remaining firmly secured to your person, should you have to receive a box from a delivery-man's arms, get the dog out of the driveway suddenly, or even run out of the house in case of fire.



It's not wet, unlike your towel, and it's not clothing, unlike your clothing, although some are quite pretty.

You might even find you can remain robed long enough to pluck your eyebrows, clip your toenails, and perform other corporal works of mercy. I'm not saying you have to have a bathrobe. I'm just saying, consider it.

Slippers. The floor can be cold. Slippers can be nice. Why not get pretty ones or very warm shearling ones if you live in an icebox like I do? Throw away the ratty Mickey Mouse scuffs your roommate gave you freshman year.

Shampoo and conditioner. Stock up on what you like. You don't have to spend a lot, but do get yourself something you like.

Soap. And by soap I mean soap, body wash, whatever makes you feel clean and leaves your skin healthy. Being from the 70s, I just use soap.

Stock up on soap, because it would be silly to say to yourself, "I can't take a shower because there isn't any soap."

A razor. Paralyzed by your hairy legs? Just stick the razor (any double-bladed disposable razor will do, just change it often) in the shower, and while your hair is conditioning, give your legs and underarms a quick pass, using plenty of soap.

If you do it on a regular basis, you don't have to do it very carefully -- not in the sense that you don't have to be careful with a razor, but in the sense that you have to if you only do it once in a while and would be afraid to leave a big swath of unshaven long hair that you had missed.

Think of frequent shower-shaving as having one of those robotic vacuums...just randomly doing some of the job all of the time.

Moisturizer. Antiperspirant (yes, like shaving, I believe in this despite the 70s thing; just smell nice if you don't -- please don't start a comment argument about it :). Use after you are dried off.

A blow dryer. If it's less than 90* outside, you really want to dry your hair before going somewhere. It just looks better.

Product. Don't you love that word? Something very specific with the most generic name possible.

Why don't they call it "thing" or "stuff"?

But one reason you might not wash your hair often enough is that it might have the tendency to frizz, like mine. If so, you worry that the first part of your day, at least, will be spent with the sure knowledge that you look like something out of an 80s yearbook.

But Product (and a good haircut) will solve this for you. After you blow dry your hair, put through your locks a dab of something that says something like "crunch curl anti-frizz hard curl super mega hold gel" -- basically, nice-smelling glue.

It will change your life and you owe it to yourself to try a few until you find the one you like.

And that is all.

Now.

If you can't shower for some reason, I'm going to go further with some really old-fashioned advice -- as well as a collective-memory item if there ever was one:

How to sponge bathe.

Why, Auntie Leila, do you have to go there? Because I seem to specialize in detailed instructions about stuff everyone knows how to do...

...but do people know how to sponge bathe in this day and age of instant hot water, endless clean towels, and a bathroom for every family member?

Hmph. What if there are 20 people staying at your house and you only have 4 minutes in the bathroom? What if you are camping? What if you are in Africa?



Brush your teeth.

Get a basin or sinkful of very warm water.

Get a washcloth. Get some soap or body wash.

Wash your body in sanitary order, rinsing the cloth and resoaping as needed: Face (rinse after washing, then just use a bit of soap), back of the ears, neck, underarms, euphemistic areas (front, then back), feet. If you have the luxury of replacing the water at any point, do so. Place washcloth in hamper.

Freshen your hair with a bit of clean water on your hands. Apply scent. You are as good to go as you can reasonably be expected to be under the circumstances!

Teach your children to sponge bathe, as Auntie Leila fears the younger generation believes that if there is no shower, there is no way to get clean, which isn't true.


My dear young friend, you will do the others in your life a good deed if you, rather than unwittingly projecting the sense of cluelessness you feel inside, offer them the hopeful sign of your fresh, cheerful presence every day that you are able. I know that it isn't always possible. We all have our bad patches, even in the best regulated households! Try your best, though, and you will see the results, I promise!

XOXO!

Stash building and busting

Today's tasks are many.

I'm reconciling my checkbook, with great joy and cheerfulness of course; trying to get things cleaned up after feeling somewhat under the weather this past week; catching up with the ironing; and sundry other things, including dreaming about my projects.


I had to stop what I was doing to tell you all about it.

When I left my reconciliation (that sounds like it was a sacrament, but it really, really wasn't) to take a picture of part of my fabric stash in the pantry, I saw that I had left a shirt halfway ironed.

Pathetic.

However, it's still there.

I think I hinted to you that I needed some life in my stash.

How's this? CUTENESS!!



Meanwhile, as this synapse-firing pile of excitement was taking its time getting to its mama, (something about the UPS driver, who was averaging one delivery a day in the weeks before Christmas, not being able to find our road, suddenly), I did manage to go through my piles of fabric and remove all the pieces that are just too small to do anything much with.


I was desperate. I had to have some handwork for the hours I sit around waiting for Miss B!


A couple of dance lessons' worth of making into strips (and smaller) later, and voila! a patchy project to keep me on my game while I find time to sit at the machine and sew Rosie's quilt top together.

I've been wanting to make this kind of quilt for a while. Of course, as I'm doing it I'm thinking about all the other ways to use scraps, but I have a feeling that I will always have the opportunity to try something else out. If my synapses hold out.

Here's how far I've gotten.



I like having something that doesn't have a deadline or a promise attached to it. I'm not even thinking about values or placement, other than the red in the center. I have my scrap bag and I don't have to worry about the pattern -- I can just grab it and go!


And my stash is feeling better too :) (This is only one side...one of these days I will show you the whole thing -- maybe after I dig the ironing out!)



Back to catching up...

Wedding Quilt Finished!

{Updated information on texting your donation to the Red Cross is at the bottom of this post.}

And just in time!

Not in time for the wedding, of course (which was over a year and a half ago) - the movers were literally at our apartment packing up our belongings when I drove to the post office to put this in the mail.

(we moved across the country in November) (and then halfway back again over Christmas) (but more on all that another time).

All but a carload of our belongings were going directly into storage for about seven months - I couldn't spare the space in the car for this quilt-in-progress, but I also wasn't about to let it go into storage until the summer. There's nothing like a firm deadline to get you moving, isn't there?

(I suppose some might argue that the wedding itself is a firm deadline. I had, after all, started this before they got married. But once that passes, you get to invoke the "one year from the wedding" rule for gift-giving, and once that passes (because a year from their wedding you're getting married yourself), then you start making up your own rules - like the "handmade gift deadline extension" clause, which is what I invoked for this one)

This quilt was for a good friend of mine from college and his lovely wife Jeanette.


They got married July 2008 in an absolutely beautiful (and enormously fun) wedding - for which we were encouraged to wear Hats!

Quoth a Knight of Columbus: "We like your hats!"
Quoth Becca, my pithy college roommate: "We like yours too!"

My initials were different when I started this quilt. I blame my husband for distracting me (we started dating soon after Gladden and Jeanette got married) and preventing me from finishing this quilt sooner.

I forgive him, I guess.