A Book for Alex

I’m making progress on Alex’s book, which I’m pretty sure he has outgrown, but hey, that’s what happens when it takes three years to complete a project.

I am hoping to finish the illustrating this week, but I still haven’t figured out how I am going to do the binding…

Sewing for Abe Lincoln

My nephew is going to be Abe Lincoln for a school project.  Things like this make me glad I can sew....

I even made three different sizes, and somewhat to my surprise it was the longest one that worked.

The white shirt hadn't been bough yet, but you can see the whole thing is coming together.  

Here's a better look at the hat, which is worth looking at:

The event is sort of like a science fair, only with presidents.  It's May 7, and I'm hoping to surprise him and go since I'll be in Omaha doing voice acting stuff.

Garden Irony

The leeks we have tender nourished under grow lights for two months are pathetic:

The lettuce we didn't even plant?  Thriving:

Garden Update

We rarely use our backyard.

Belovedest is not particularly fond of mowing.

I didn’t want it to look like a blah brown rectangle.

Ergo:

I wanted to figure it out on graph paper.  He wanted to move bricks around.  Seriously?  

We moved bricks around....

We’re so pleased with the layout that we disputing whose idea it was!  (HINT: mine.)

My husband made a compost sifter this past weekend.  (The compost was still too wet from the previous day’s rain to really use it, but we had to try it out…)

Despite most of the “soil” being mud, it still turned this:

Into this:

The soil-via-compost stands out clearly against the crappy clay that was under all the grass:

Tonight hopefully stuff will be dry enough to plant.

Sunday Thoughts: Wanting to Be God

My friend: I'm not sure what the purpose of winning the lottery would be. Once I have a boat, motorcycle, and a fishing pole I'm not sure what else I would need. I have that already.

Me: What I want is freedom. I don't care about stuff. I want to be able to work or not work, just as I choose. I want to have time to spend exactly as I please – so much time that it's no longer precious. So much time I could even waste it, let it slip through my fingers like sand on a beach. And I don't want to be dependent on other people for my security, like needing to have a job.

My friend: So you want to be God.

Me: (Laughing) I am a heretic, I see!

My friend: No. It is what we all want.

Then I think he said something about trust….

Today....

Garden dreaming... and maybe shopping.  It's too wet to do anything else.

A Future Project

This pretty little cottage from Somerset Studio magazine is just cardboard—the kind from the back of the artist’s drawing pad. 

It’s got me thinking that I might want to make bunches of these (and flowers and butterflies!) and then stick them up all around the top of the bathroom walls like a wallpaper border, only much, much cooler.

I’m excited to have thought of another place to put art, as I’m always afraid we’re going to run out of room on the walls…

Lamb... the Other Meat

For Easter I, the Magician, decided that we should eat something special.  So I searched around town for some lamb.  Unfortunately all of the local farmers that were advertised somewhere online as having lamb for sale either didn't have active websites anymore or didn't list lamb as a product.

I finally did find a leg of lamb at Whole Foods!...

...BUT... wowsers, at what cost!  Nevertheless, we didn't want the price to spoil the special meal, so the butcher wrapped it up and home we went.

I followed a Rosemary/Garlic/Lemon recipe (but did not make the sauce on the page).  It didn't take all that long to pre and pre-cooked it looked awsome:

By-the-way... did I mention that one leg of this beast ran $60!!!...  Imagine, with all four legs this lamb would be worth $240 at a minimum... 

A few hours later it came out quite lovely.  And the smell was fantastic!

It still came out a bit pink though.   Twas delicious nonetheless:

We ended up having several meals worth of meat.  In the end I don't know if we'd ever spend that kind of money again for meat.  It was great - but in the end it was a consumable that was gone in a week.  Maybe later this year I'll go hunt some rabbits and freeze them for next Easter!

Quotables

"I've been absolutely terrified every moment of my life and I've never let it keep me from doing a single thing that I wanted to do."

-- Georgia O'Keefe

Wow.  If this quote was even mostly true than she was a pretty amazing woman.

Alex's First Communion

Today congratulations go out to my nephew and godson Alex who made his First Communion!

Weekly Round-Up

It seems like it's been a while.....

But good things have been happening!

Dad and I, plus Uncle Pat, played in the woodshop:

What is it?  Stay tuned.....

While at my parents Mom and I measured space for a rug:

Belovedest and I planted potatoes on Easter:

First flowers from the garden!

And then--- oh joy! -- cooking with Auntie M of Four Eyes and a Stove!  Yes, you really can taste the difference when someone knows what she is doing is cooking!

Today I'm off to spend time with my nephew Alex in honor of his BIG DAY tomorrow: 

his First Communion!

Roller Skating Update

Roller skating is proving a bit hazardous to my heath:

We've discovered that YouTube videos on "How To Stop" are not proving as helpful as we would like.....

Ergo, we wised-up and got knee pads for me.

A Stylish "Did You Know?"

Did you know that the first issue of Vogue was published December 17, 1892?  
The magazine was a sort of society gazette published by and for the social elite.

For more about the history of this interesting and influential magazine, check out In Vogue: An Illustrated History of the World's Most Famous Fashion Magazine  by Norberto Angeletti and Alberto Oliva.