My First Renovated Bathroom

You see that title, and you noticed it said "My First..." and you became scared.  Scared that I would knock down a structurally significant wall in my house and the whole thing would come crashing down.  And you are right to be afraid.

I have been bitten.  My lust began when I was introduced to a sledgehammer and has followed due course, ending with me and a hydraulic nail gun.  (There is really no way to make that sound less dirty.) (Okay, I guess if I didn't end with the nailgun part.  Or start with the lust part.)

ANYWAY.

2 months and here we are:

And after:

And after...

Lastly (and please don't forget all that dastardly white tile and plaster and lathe!)...

 Voila! :

Party, right?

Adopting the Position of a Professional Bowler, I Am Still Able to Drywall

A few people have asked how the bathroom remodel is coming along.  You know, the room I tore down with a sledgehammer because I can't stand one more fucking day of the Polar Vortex?

It's coming along fine.  I did terribly injure my knee doing it, but I'm just trying to ignore it.  I'll get it fixed when I'm done.   I have developed an unusual technique for continuing to work while not being able to move my leg.  I use a stool and then sit on it with one buttcheek, leave my hurt leg extended, then fold my other one OVER the hurt one and twist forward, allowing me to clear the way for using my upper body.  Incredibly, Julie refused to take a photo of me doing this because she thought it looked too pathetic.

Whateve, she still mad that I tore down another wall in there when she thought it was salvageable and I promised not to remove it when she was at work.  She said "DO NOT take down that back drywall".

Sorry, honey.  (I had our babysitter take this picture to text Julie.  If there's one thing I learned from high school is that its easier to get forgiveness than it is to get permission.  Plus, big cartoony gloves always make you look innocent and friendly, no?)

Then I had that meniscal mishap.  But we're still cooking.  Joists replaced, plywood subfloor in, substrate installed, drywall up and taped.  There will be a person coming to set the tile, sadly.  It was the part I most looked forward to, but I cannot swing it, knee-wise.  Oh well.  But see here the progress:

Pretty sexy looking, right?

Cabin Fever Defined

I interrupt this message about better mothering and tedious self-improvement to announce this:

I have lost my mind.  I don't know,  I mean between the cabin fever and trying to make sense of the Woody Allen saga, I am beginning to think I have lost my grip on reality.

I demo'd my first floor bathroom.

I was tired of seeing those yellowed marble tiles every time I pee.  That, combined with a few ill-timed session on the elliptical at the gym- when I was forced to watch home improvement shows on HGTV that show lots of inexperienced people tearing apart their homes, I got the idea that if I wear a tight henley and look cute doing it, I might be able to swing this.

That's fine, you say- she must have some experience doing this, right?  Otherwise she would never demo a whole room without having proven skills that she can put it back together properly, right?

Here is my resume for professional renovation:

I patched drywall in the basement once.

DONT DO IIIITTTT!!!!  You say.

Too late.  My bad.

One day and an 8lb sledgehammer...

And I'm up to my 'nads in plaster and lathe...

But WAIT, before you call my mom and tell her maybe she should talk to me-  see here!  I am a very mechanically inclined woman and I truly believe construction is 100% common sense.  (Though I did have to call a sturdy Mexican guy to lift the 200 lb. tub out of its spot).  Watch me as I chronicle my choices and tell me if you're concerned at any time that I will fall through the floor to the basement.

How do I turn around a 130 yr. old door?  Why, I remove the catch latch casing and open it up.  I am able to flip the mechanism inside the box, and replace it into the door.  Naturally, undoing the brass doorknob reveals that the set pins in it need to be replaced, so I get longer ones with an alan head.  Then I chisel new hinge placements and pound the hinge pin back in, upside down of course.   Isn't that what you would do?

I'm sorry.  That sounded braggy.  But before you judge me, understand that four days ago I was a person who had never attempted such things, and today I am woman who can repair floor joists and replace the missing subfloor in an old Victorian.  So grant me that one?

Stay tuned for the next episode, "Oh SHIT.  Bee's Nest! RUUUUUUNN!"

It's Happening Again. Terrible Hats 2.0

Aww, poor little guy thought I was over that embarrassing thing where I work on winter hats an make the children try them on when they're in the pattern fitting stage.

He looks at old pictures like this one of Phinny and laughs, thinking ha ha, you really got the worst of mom's bad sewing didn't...WAIT!  WHAT?!:

Sucka.

Who's laughing now?

Your sister, that's who.

She comforts you, gently whispering, "It's okay little buddy, she won't make you wear this out in public- it's just a rough draft.  Just a rough draft, little buddy.  There there."

This hat is yet another expression of my inability to believe in the limitations of old sweatshirts paired with double-sided fleecy whatever that stuff is called.  I will update you on further humilations iterations of this hat.

Isn't it just terrible what I do to my children.  Terrible.  But when you force a fifth grade tomboy to wear a handmade approximation of Annie's orphan dress and participate in a "Little Orphan Annie Personality-Alike" contest and she wins a Jackson Browne LP and a coupon for unlimited Mr. Turkey hotdogs, this is the result.  It seeps down through generations.  

No one will ever be safe from Mr. Turkey.

One Month Clean

Isn't that what recovering persons say, "I'm one month clean."?  Or is that outdated?

Well, whatever they say, that's how I feel.  It's been one month since I began my effort to be a calmer, more present, and more open-lapped mother.

But, just like smoking, or whatever other vice one uses as an emotional steam valve, one has to keep on quitting.  I think it takes a very long time before being totally calm and present is the natural state.  At least for me.  It's a beast that had really taken up residence in my heart for a while- the distracted, secretly tight-wound claustrophobe that I turned into.  A complete eviction may take some time.

Like, in the last week, I've noticed certain elements of my distracted mom self creeping back in.  Those times when I desperately want to be released from the constant responsibility of these beautiful, mewling little people.  I grab a quick look at e-mail, or Facebook just to stretch a tentacle out into the world at large.  It's like taking 'just one puff'.  I'm just checking out for a second.

But then seconds turn into minutes, and then there's just one more thing I want to read on the computer, then I put on just another quick show to buy myself a little more breathing room, and then...the zombies come.  They want me, so they crowd around me like seagulls pecking at me like I'm french fries.  Then I get annoyed and then they say they want more yogurt and then I'm all, "Where are my slippers!" and they are like, "More yogurt, mama!" and I'm, "You JUST had yogurt!' and they go, "More!" and they paw at my lap and begin wrending my clothes and I'm like, "Your bowels are going to seize like hardened concrete if I give you one more cup of yogurt!" and they say "Kefir then!  Mama, I'm hungry!" and I bark, "That is IMPOSSIBLE!  You are not hungry.  It is not POSSIBLE that you are hungry!" and they say, "Maaaammaaaa, yoooogguuuurrt" in that terrible gravely whine and I say, "Oh fuck, PLEASE with the constant dairy!" and then "Will you LET. GO. of my pants please!"

(/march to kitchen, fill cups of yogurt- silence the seagulls)

SO.  I see what's happening here, the slippery slope of distraction and the desire to escape.  It requires constant vigilance, constant maintenance.  Here's what I have learned in the last month of staying calm:

1.  Know your triggers.  One of my triggers, for example, is children.  So I moved out.  Things are much easier.  No, just kidding.  But I did come to terms with the fact that there is just ALWAYS going to be the whining, the Needing, the fighting.  I am, like a person getting sober, learning to cope with the loud constant static of life with children, without relying on frequent spacing out and escaping.

2.  The frantic begging and exasperation approach doesn't ever work.  I can say with certainty that spazzing out when the children behave as mongrels, always makes the situation worse.  I am practicing what I call the Lebowski Approach.  When Griffin colors all over the wall with non-washable crayon on a wall with specialty-80-dollar-a-gallon paint that we have no spare of, I say, "Dude.  You just did that."  And then I look at it and I nod for a moment.  "You totally colored all over the wall, little man." My niece, Logan, has a tattoo that says "Let it Be."  I thought it was a little silly when she got it, now I think it's genius.  A needed reminder that things just are.  They just are.

3.  Sing it out.  Sometimes when a person pisses you off, singing in an exaggerated opera voice is the most appropriate thing to do.  The loud, high sound and concentration on hitting the right pitch is a perfect focus for free-floating rage vapor.  Try it!  "Meeeee me me me me!  You are whiiiiiniiiiing and it makes me want to throw you down the staaaaaiiiiirs but I love you very much so I woooooon't!  Because then I would have to drive to the emergency room in this snow-ho-ho-ho-hoooooooo."

4.  Be sure I have scheduled, protected, REAL time to myself without the marauding crowds.  That is why I have been waking at 4:45am every morning to be sitting here in the quiet of this room.  It is critical, I tell you, to maintain space before welcoming the zombies.  I have to store up a lot of open space before they can come and fill it up.  Then I can pour myself into them during the day, without the desperate need for a little escape.  Because I know the zombies won't give it.  I have to take it.

5.  Last but certainly not least: see how much better I like myself.  When I get through a situation like, oh, I don't know, someone just spit a mouthful of chewed up crackers and cheese onto my bedspread because, you know, their mouth felt crowded, and I can say, "So you did that.  Thank you I LOVE wiping up pre-barf, you adorable little thing," I feel a lot more like myself  than I have in a couple of years.  It makes me feel like Lisa, instead of an overwhelmed parenting machine straining at the gears.

It's not been easy, this last month.  You remember my post for a couple of weeks ago, "Saying 'Yes' to Atomic Mess"?  Where instead of letting insignificant battles lead to explosive frustration, I'm all, "Suuure, you want to take a few extra things to nap?  Sure, honey, here.  Let me make you a boat to set them in so you can carry them up the stairs easier to your crib."

And I go to grab her favorite book and return to this:

Seriously.  Give them a inch.

Ms. Judgy Judgington Apologizes

You remember Deb Cohan.  She's the woman who started a dance party in the OR before her double mastectomy.  I had the incredible joy of getting her response after my blog post about it.  She wrote that I am a "wise mama".  (Coming from her, I'm feeling like Damn.  I better be acting like it then, right?)

I was invited on Facebook for this Friday to her Virtual Gratitude and Love Mob ( thank you Brit< Deb).  What a better time to use the invitation to show love and gratitude to someone I haven't shown nearly enough to over the years.  My little sister, Ariane.  So here we go, Frog.  May you someday soon be a dancing nurse in the OR:)

Phone rings, it's Ariane.

A: "Hello.  What are you up to?"
L: "Not much.  Driving to the grocery store.  What are you doing?"
A: "Oh I'm just between Surgery class and Pharmacology and I had a minute to call and say 'hi'."

!!!!

Seriously?  Just between surgery class and pharmacology and had a minute, for me?

My sister has seven kids.  They range in age from 1 to 20.  The four youngest are boys.

And girl found a minute in between surgery and pharmacology class to call me.

This is remarkable for many reasons.  Today is a good day to tell you why.  It's a good day to apologize and show off my dark underbelly of Big Sister Judginess.  (Don't worry, it's been dying for a while and is cold, hard dead now.  But we can think of my judginess as a huge sea creature slain by my strong, smart sister- and I think she deserves to stand by with the dead carcass and have a victory photo snapped.)

You see, my sister was a little bit the fuck up.  I was, on the surface, the success story.  Sorry, but that's how it looked for a while.  I always knew she was smart, and I always knew her heart was huge, but the truth is those qualities got buried in the haywire journey of youth.  I was busy fiercely driving toward some notion of success that was unfamiliar to my family, and I viewed my sister with judgement, frustration and worry.  I was mad about her teen years, and, in a way thought she was taking the easy way out as she built a family and I moved through life racking up a few superficial achievements.

Now here we are.  I am a mother too.  And something very peculiar has happened.  I am watching my sister still, yes.  Observing how she parents and watching how she gets through life, which has handed her some Grade A bullshit lately.  And I am not judging anymore.

I am taking notes.

Hear this, little sister:

Remember when I borrowed your car when I was home once a few years back?  I was shocked at its condition!  McDonalds bags abounded and I think I had to move my feet around on the floor to get any room for them to touch bottom.  Just because you had a bunch of kids- you couldn't get your damn car cleaned?

DECEMBER 2013:  I literally could not get my car cleaned because it was too messy.  That's right- there was too much crap strewn about for the cleaners to actually get to the dirt, so I passed the carwash again, promising myself to take a load in the house when I got home.

Remember when I breezed through college, furious that you couldn't figure out a way to finish high school?

JANUARY 2014:  I wanted to take a class at the local community college this semester, but couldn't make it happen.  You know, between my three children and my part-time nanny.  Just can't swing the commitment yet.  Call me between Surgery and Pharmacology so I can moan about it, eh?

And most importantly- this last Christmas when I visited home.  Your kitchen was a mess, woman!  I couldn't find a coffee mug.

And here, I cry.

I couldn't find a coffee mug, because you were too busy...hugging your baby Donavin.  Your one year old baby.  Fuck the dishes, there you were in a room full of kids and a catastrophe of Christmas toys, calmly letting your baby climb all over you.  You were smiling that natural smile you always have with your kids.  You were tuning out a little and talking baby talk to little D while he cooed a gummy smile at you and flopped lazily back into your arms.  And then little Spencer came by and you offered him some sweet words about where he could find a missing toy.

I've got it now.  And I'm so sorry.  Because you're teaching me so much about what is important.  Your kids are confident and happy.  (Even though- zip up their coats!!  God!).  They are one hundred percent sure and confident that you can be relied on.  They come to you and climb up, never worrying if its the right time.

This is a thing that I have only recently started to learn.  My heart has not been totally open and I've struggled with patience and calm so so much.  But something clicked after Christmas and things are changing.  A good part of it was from watching you.

I've seen strength in you this last year that blows. my. mind.

As you lay in a hospital bed in Ann Arbor, on the verge of giving birth to your seventh child, and your forty-one year old husband lay in another bed down the hall trying to recover from a stroke and a heart failure, your other kids together, taking care of one another, I was beyond stressed for you.  All I could do was send pizza.

Yet you never cracked.  You just Got It Done.  As you always do.

I see deep intelligence, an amazing sensitive heart and worry and frustration all living together in you.  It's all there and you still have a smile and an open lap for your kids.

For all the successes that I experienced along the way, this parenting thing has seriously kicked my ass. And it's only the most important thing I've ever endeavored to do.  I have many times complained on the phone to you about how hard it is.  I've many times been calmed by your advice.

And after all these years, I can honestly say, I wish I was more like you.  I am trying to be more like you.  (Well, except the kitchen.  I will FREAK the fuck out if I can't get to a coffee mug fast.  But we have discussed how important the kitchen is on the list of priorities, so I'll work on that.)

So that should do it, Frog.  Hope you like my Virtual Gratitude and Love Mob:)

Congratulations on making it through your first semester of nursing school- a feat that seems literally impossible.  I love you very very much and am so proud of you.*

*Though, at some point, we will need to discuss the time you stole my Benneton rugby and lost it.  Maybe when you graduate or something.  But your not off the hook for that.

National Treasure of Sewing Know-How, Right Up in Here

Is it too pretentious to have two artist references on my blogue two days in a row?  But I get a pass, right, since I didn't post for so long, and because they aren't super pretentious artists, right?

Here's a picture of Phinny after she made herself into a Jessica Stockholder sculpture:

This is what she does when she hangs out while I'm sewing.

That was just for fun.  Now the serious sewing stuff.

All the time all the time I am thinking I should just kick this whole re-purposed fabric thing and make it easy on myself.  Then I can't find any fabric I like, so I'm back to finding the kind of well worn, durable finishes I get from old fabric, and its Groundhog Day.  (Plus there's a whole "Save the Earth" element going on there.)

Here's a recent scarf from striped sweatshirt and a tomato red t-shirt.  I simply sewed a bunch of diagonal pieces of the sweatshirt together and sewed them flat onto the red, leaving the seams undid. Everyone liked it though, so we've designated it a Family Scarf.

And I made this other one out of t-shirts.  

The scarf is not a winner, but in making it, I realized I am the winner of "World's Most Dumb Sewist Award".  Why, you ask?  Oh just this super obvious little thing about it took me like four years to realize that seams with a topstitch will fold over when you sew them against grain.  Oh, so that is why it has happened to every damn knit thing I've topstitched a seam on for the last four years.  

Yeah, I'm a real expert after working almost exclusively with knit fabric for this long.  A reeeeaaal National Treasure of Knowledge right here, my friends.

This is Crazy, This Is Crazy, This Is Crazy!

Hi cornpones,

I HAVE been working you know.  I've been workin' on my twerkin'.  Yes, all these months I've been spending all my free time perfecting my booty bounce.  Because, well...zeitgeist.

Also, I made this recently.  It is the Grabbox Quilt for Phinny.  This is just the front and it may remain as such since I'm afraid to eff it up by trying to back it.

It's about a kertrillion pieces of sweatshirt sewn together.  Here's a rather lovely shot of multi-generational art-making.  Rug handmade by my Grandma Agnes Boyle, and wooden bird sculpture by Phinny!

For scale:

And here's a bonus close-up with Phinny's wooden bird.

And I have done other things, too, so you stay tuned to find out what they are, okay?

Guilt. It's What's For Dinner

I'm almost there, folks.  I'm really really close to arriving at the bottom of my barrel of tolerance for parental guilt.  This is good, because my kids are little.  I figure if I can, as Missy Elliot says, "killit with a skillet" sometime soon, I'll be able to create room to turn on some of the more outwardly damaging things associated with motherhood: martyrdom, criticism and perfectionism.

So, in my effort to start having some goddamn compassion for myself, I'm starting a parenting group.  It's called The Worst Parents Club.  In real life.  Here's the flyer I gave to some people:

Are you the Worst Parent Ever? 

Do you sometimes feel like if you hear the sickening crunch of one more Cheerio under your slipper that you might fastpitch your mug of not-enough coffee through the nearest window? 

Does hearing Gisele Bunchen say her son “thinks broccoli is, like, a dessert” make you want to tie her up and force feed her doughnuts until her own mother shows up and apologizes for her very existence?

On a bad day, does someone telling you to “enjoy EVERY minute of parenthood” cause you to fantasize about delivering a precision death strike to his or her windpipe?

If so, then this is the club for You!

Forgot everything you learned in other parent support groups.  This is going to be The Worst one yet.  Because it isn’t designed to help you get any closer to perfect.  It doesn’t even need to make you feel better.  (Though it probably will.)

No, this group is going to talk about failure, pain, and kids who will eat only Lucky Charms for dinner, delivered by parents dressed in a Pony Express costume.  And then we’re going to talk about how that’s okay.  (Sure, we might talk about strategies for upgrading said child to merely Golden Grahams, but it will be against the Law of The Worst Parents Club to feel bad about it.)

If we start by showing forgiveness for ourselves, for our complete lack of expertise in this, the most important work of our lives, things can only look up from there, no?

The Worst Parents Club will meet once a month or so (depending on how Bad we’ve been).  Our goal will be to start the casual discussion by fessing up (anonymously, if we choose) to our lowest points and then, buttressed by our glass of wine or coffee and the relief of finally being surrounded by parents who are willing to admit just how low they can go, we’ll spend the rest of the time working our way up to the parts we’re actually proud of. 

Come prepared with an open heart, a muddled head, and a love for your child that is so enormous you threaten to burst into an exploding asteroid of guilt at any moment.  And we’ll make you feel better.  In fact, by the time you leave, I promise you will be whistling Dixie in four different languages.  Okay, maybe not. But the wine always helps, doesn’t it.

Love yourself, whynot,

Lisa

I got a lot of responses.  If you are a friend of mine living nearby, e-mail me to find out about my plan to sneak up on our guilt and beat it to death with a pillowcase full of soap.  (You see there?  Without even thinking, I associated guilt with prison.  Fascinating.)

 

Bobblehead Loves His Striped Pants

This is really pushing the limits of correct human proportions and I would say that, despite the mathematical impossibility of this child's head size, he is one lethally cute little sir.  In the yellow and gray sweater pants I whipped up.  You own those pants, Griffy.

My babies are 1.  As every friend and acquaintance has observed over roughly the last two weeks, I " have survived".  Parts of me have, yes, though parts of me have been temporarily (I hope) subsumed into the Coiled Snake of Bitchery that is Post-partum Depression.  I'm digging out finally though, now that I actually admitted that I have it.  Have had it.  Continue to have it.  Need to get rid of it. 

I won't go into it too much here, but post-partum depression is a sneaky, evil thing to have.  All this time I just thought many bad things about myself.  That I am an inferior mother, wife and person.  That my pain and rage is a selfish matter made of kicking and screaming that my previously over-indulgent and spoiled existence has been interrupted.   But I think suddenly, thankfully, that I get it.   And it's serious and terrible, and there's a new sheriff in town and that shit is on its way out.  NOW. 

I'd love to go on, but this is mostly my creative blog, so I won't because it could get weird.  I kind of wish I had more of a mom blog because I would love to bust that crazy bullshit wide open and say exactly what its like and talk to other moms who have gone through it.  Suffice to say, if anyone reading has been through it, I feel you, girl.  Yuck.

Alas, we have survived, haven't we.  We had a lovely birthday party and I made a quilted "AND", which was fairly speaking, one of the most satisfying micro-projects ever to grace the sewing table.  I don't know why, but it just made me laugh.

 

Our fella and his mom:

Our ladybaby on her special day:

 Happy Birthday adorable little people of mine.  I love you and I promise I am back to you after this brief recent absence of heart.

The Baby Hobo Mothership!

Phew.  It is done.  Behold the Baby Hobo International Headquarters!:

300 sq. ft. of pure disorder, coming right up.  I sort of failed to budget for storage solutions, so after this photograph was taken and I proceeded to move in all my other equipment and fabric, it became not pretty, rill fast.  But that is how it goes.  I will iron it all out over time, then post an honest picture of the place as it actually operates as a workroom.

I need to build a bigass cutting table, and procure just a couple of shelves/ carts, then I'll be good. I will report back from the floor shortly.  I am currently just trying to bust through a couple of orders and reel in the dough, you know.  So I can buy me a Mercedes Benz.

Baby Hobo On The Horizon

That sounds like part of a retelling of some weird acid trippy dream "Then, there was like this boat?  A boat?  Yeah, I think a boat, sailing toward me, and it had like this, baby hobo in it!  It was SO WEIRD!"

I would like to, in this single post, tell you everything I have learned. Ever. No just kidding.  only things I've learned in the last month.

1.  Babies cry because they're babies sometimes and you don't have to do a touchdown dive toward them the moment they make a peep.

2.  Booze DOES HELP.

3.  Businesses (like Baby Hobo), grow gradually, not overnight.  Especially when you have thirteen thousand kids.

When you spill a whole cup of coffee on your computer, your number FOUR key will never type a FOUR again.

5.  You should spend every cent you have on help to keep you from losing your shit because you have thirteen thousand kids.  Make up for it later.

6.  I need to do creative work.  I thought I was going to immerse myself in mothering until the day all of my children are in school full time.  I feel immersed alright, like I'm drowning.  I cannot do this twenty-four hours a day every day.  I need help and I need to do my own creative work.  For the good of everyone.  Luckily, I'm with a partner who calmly recognizes this, and feels the same way (on my behalf), so she's been totally on board helping re-evaluate the plan.

7.  I want to make money doing creative work.  I've stopped doing myself the disservice of thinking of it as a hobby, and decided once and for all that creativity really is an important part of my identity. To respect my talent, I want to use it to make money- so I can contribute to all the other abundance and privilege I've been afforded.

8.  Doing my own creative work is infinitely more satisfying than being an art dealer.  I liked the curating aspect of that gig, but the toil! the interpersonal heartbreak! the lack of tangible reward!  None of these are (so far) part of sewing baby shoes. It seems way easier to build a brand of useful products than to massage a vague, pretentious identity for an art gallery.

10.  A person can be addicted to tofu.  "Hello.  My name is Lisa.  I'm an addict."

11.  Eat less + run = skinnier.

Now.  There are two hot, sweaty guys building out the interior of my new studio as we speak (which, 100 degrees in a closed room?  You couldn't pay me enough), so by this time nest week, I expect to be putting up a final coat of paint and moving in!  My equipment that is, not me.  Although, on a tough night, you never know.

My amazing store, Green Genes is so awesome, and they are really supportive of all my ideas and work I'm making.  So, in the fall, I expect to see a slew- yes A SLEW of Baby Hobo products available there and on Supermarket.  Finally!  Woot.  I said woot.

Sometimes All You Can Do Is Sew a Hamburger

I can't make anything right now.  Too chaotic with the big sewing machine in the playroom.  My studio interior is being started this weekend.  Phew.

All I made last week was this hamburger for Phinny, per her request.  But it is a delicious hamburger.

New Studio!

I have arrived.  I am having a room all to myself built solely for the purpose of making things.  Since the girl and boy babies arrived eight months ago, I have had less time to sew and make things (shocker) and also no single place to make it.

After a few short months, Annika got tired of Griffin's dramatics and requested her own room.  One where she could sleep without being startled awake by the feral screams of her immature brother.  So, no more sewing room.  Funny how this house seemed huge when we bought it two years ago.

Of course, when the babies are sleeping, I can't sew because one of the babies is sleeping where I sew.  Great.  Now I have my work, in various stages of completion, strewn all over the house.  Since I have my crazy monster machine in the playroom (another great idea):

But I have been keeping busy, yes.  For example, I instructed my babysitter, Natalie, to please sort these shirt sleeves by color.  Okay, I didn't ask her too, she just did it for fun.  Pretty, no?

And I've been racing to finish orders (seven of them, seven orders!)  of shoes.  Here's my assembly-line box of parts and pieces.  Finished product to come.

And so, the studio- a vast swath of real estate where I will be able to create disaster upon disaster all over tarnation.

(That's Julie.  She's pretty.  Here she is standing in the portion of the building that will be the studio, up to the leaning board up against the wall.  Took the photo from the garage side before they separate he two parts- which Jules and I have been calling "my side" and "your side".  Cute.

Are you freaking becited or what?

Playmat in Action! Okay, Not Really.

Playmat I made +  amazingly adorable baby Everett I made it for falling asleep on it in less than a nanosecond = extreme heartwarming satisfaction.

I mean, YES, this was only a reason to post a picture of this baby.  So?  Can you blame me?

The Epic Endeavor Named Grabbox

How satisfying is THIS?!

 

Phase one of Grabbox, complete.  Here's where I'd like to leave it.  Just hanging on this door for all time.  I'd like to not piece this together in rows now because it will get all wobbly and obstinate and terrible.  And I think it's lovely the way it is. 

Alas, in order for Phinny to ever snuggle underneath it, I will have to keep going on the path to quilthood.  

I have to lay it all out and arrange the rows, and I don't really have the best wide open space for that, so I may have to wait until my new studio is built.  Thasright- my new studio!  We are waiting on permits to construct a detached studio space behind our house, in which I will plot and execute the takeover of my inner procrastinator, nag and creative confidence goblin.  It's about the get REAL up in here.

For now, let's just behold these hundreds of bits of sweatshirt.

Knot Crabby

It's a Knot Crabby of course.  For teething.  Made of old t-shirts.  But not anywhere near the armpit part of the t-shirt.  The down by the edge parts and have been thoroughly sanitized parts.  Griffin attacked it, so I guess I'll make more.  It's needs some design work, obviously, but I like the idea. 

(PS: I do not know what happened to the color in the bottom picture.  It makes it look like a depression-era teething solution where someone ties dirty rags together.)

Anyway.

"Shuz"

"Those shuz are MINE!"

Baby shoes are really hard to make!  I know you're looking at these little buggers and thinking, 'how hard can it be to take apart a pair of Robeez from the thrift store and sew it all back together?' (Hey wait, that's a good idea).  

Well, since I just always haaaave to line things, these are lined, with a gray suede sole and have 4 different fabrics in them.  Now, if I had an industrial straight stitcher that could power through all this without demons, surely it would have been much easier.  Maybe I should talk nicer to my machine in these times of trial- where I'm holding 4 layers of different fabric together with different stretches and sewing around the curve of the baby-sized heel.  I always berate it.  I'm totally brandist and make remarks about how if I had a Juki instead of a cheap Singer, I wouldn't be having this problem.

Anyway. Shuz.

For the baby boy:

 

Hard to get a shot with shuz in action, but here's a close one (/pegleg).