End and Prepare to Begin Again

It's been a downhill slide around here. The usual terrible twos were squared into endless pain and suffering for everyone in our household. There were tantrums where there were never tantrums before. Stress mounted. Finally, with no hope, I told Tom: "CALL THE DOCTOR!" We didn't even know if she was sick. She's been on allergy medicine for about a week, and tylenol, because she was congested. But she seemed mostly well except for behavior that eventually drove us to a desperate visit to the pediatrician. The doctor said she has a bacterial sinus infection and can take antibiotic now. It's a relief. Now I can rest assured that she is not the devil after all. She's just ill. She'll be better soon.

Nothing else has been going on really. Ellie has been stressed too, because of the touchiness and undue amounts of crying and screaming from her little sister. She's enjoying her Christmas present, the keyboard.
I've spent some hours embroidering, usually in the evening, in the dark, with a tiny bright light to see my work. Now that I see it in the day, I'm not sure I will keep it. I might work on it a little more before I decide if it will come out nicely or if I should start a new one.
I was loving this one but took a break from it because I was too stressed. Usually embroidery absorbs stress. But this week has been soul-draining.
Finally today I couldn't take it anymore and went out (without Julia). Julia went with Dad to the doctor. Ellie and I went to the big bookstore to browse away our troubles. It's been hard on all of us. We didn't even realize today was New Year's Eve until around 5:00 p.m. Needless to say we have no special plans.

My new gig: Teacher Prep. There are different pathways that lead to the job of teaching school. You can go to college and study teaching. Or you can study a specific topic and later come back around to teaching it. In my case, I studied English language and literature, then law. I've taught English to kids and adults in Japan. I've taught a lot of tennis. I'm a whiz at writing and office administration. Now I hope to bring it all around to a new beginning in a school setting.
I put my resume in a couple online teacher databases. Now I am studying for an exam for certification. I've taken this test before (without studying) and passed it. But I think it might have expired, or only applied to work in Massachusetts. Anyhow it seems a good way to reintroduce myself to the general topic matter.

Sewing and embroidering now compete with this reawakening to literary analysis.

If anybody is actually reading this, Happy New Year's Eve. New beginnings are inspiring.

Winter woodsy goings on

Finally the snow is here. The weather man has been warning of snow for days. Now it comes, peacefully.

Big fluffy flakes landing on the trees. Each one holds on to another. When you go outside, it sounds muffled. The air is slow and thick.
Ellie is getting crafty with the snow now. She makes it look easy to change flakes into people.
The brook bubbles along down there. My eye peers off into the shadowy distance. I always want to see deer. I never do. We know they are out there, walking by when nobody is looking.
Ubi knows too. She knows there are mice who tunnel under the snow, over to the bird feeder where seeds spill out.
Inside, we are noisy. The kids yell and argue for sport. The dog barks for no reason. The sewing machine hums and bumps. Voices yell to each other room to room. Countless snacks go down. The smell of banana bread fills the house. Cartoons from one room, jazz music from another room, talk radio from another room.
All this makes me want to go back outside for a minute, for the quiet that only comes in winter.
Most of my sewing is underway but here is something I finished today.

Grey versus Yellow

Rain. Drizzle. Darkness. Clouds. Puddles.

Bad weather is good for sewing indoors by the fire. After several days of sewing indoors by the fire, it's not as appealing anymore. Today I went driving around the lake. Usually it's one of those inspiring drives where the earth seems a great place to be. Today, just dark and rainy. No wonder this is a seasonal location where people come only during the summer and fall.

I looked for pictures all day but there was nothing. I didn't see anything good until this break in the clouds and fog right before sunset. These days following Christmas are short days but they last forever.
I spent a couple hours in the fabric store, lost in color. I got some nice picks. Here they are before going into the washing machine. My eye was drawn to the yellows. And also to the nature prints. Anything to bring life into the sewing room during the winter.

Bright little yellow chicks. I can almost hear them peeping.

Julia opted to stay home with dad all day.

Luckily she seemed happy to see me again when I got home.

She's my little chick. I should get her a yellow shirt.

Christmas Day

I wasn't going to blog today so I didn't take many photos of us all hanging out in pajamas today. But then I made this turkey (mixed feelings and my regrets to Mr. Turkey). He turned out so great that I got the camera to record this cooking achievement in blog history. It wasn't that hard to make dinner after all, especially with a few short cuts (stove top stuffing, gravy from a can, etc.). We've decided Christmas dinner is a tradition worth keeping. I especially enjoyed that we did not make a fuss over the meal. It would have totally drained me if we had made the kids sit at the table (which is full of Christmas decorations half taken down). It was so nice to relax the "rules" of Christmas and just hang out all day, and eat the meal on the couch.

Speaking of the couch, that's where I sat while working on this little number. I've decided felt on embroidery is intriguing. Here I've been spending hours (enjoyable hours) embroidering little pictures and then sewing them onto an 8 dollar purse, when other people are framing their embroidery work in the wood hoop and selling it for more than double that price.
They look cute as little wall hangings. Also, it gives me a way to work on images that I feel drawn to, without confining myself to images that look appropriate on wallets and purses.

Also I'm experimenting with bead thread and sewing thread, as well as the traditional embroidery floss.

Hand embroidery is really fun and stress reducing. It's really a shame that this sort of endeavor has a dated reputation. I think a lot more people would enjoy it if they thought for a moment to pick it up and stitch. Maybe the new generation of creative sewers will inspire people.

Hey wait a minute, that's how I got started too, by landing accidentally on a blog or two and feeling the pang of interest towards the embroidery handiwork.

Warm Neighbors

With no plan on this Christmas Eve day, we rolled out of bed and made up some breakfast.

We noticed some activity across the road so we headed over to our neighbors' house to say Merry Christmas. "Come in!" they said. "Do you like Baileys in your coffee?"
Then it was out to wake up the horses. They enjoyed some Christmas candy, horse style, as well as hey and vitamins and fresh carrots. This is their first winter having the new pasture or fenced area or whatever you call it. They look happy to have this big space.
I gave D.J. this hat I made. She posed with Traveller because he was the inspiration for the horse on the hat.

Everybody likes warm neighbors!

Rick and D.J. are champion cooks. I like to check out their trophies every time I'm there. I like trophies. They are neat things. I like the little figures on top. I like that they show that somebody really cared a lot about something, to be so good at it that they got a trophy for it.

My favorite today was the little chef man. I should have asked them how to cook my turkey tomorrow. I'll have to consult the internet for the low down.

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good meal!

Winter Tracks

Took a winter walk today on our road.

Over the bridge, over the brook. It makes music as the water spills through the ice sculptures on the surface.

Squirrel steps.

Bird steps? Cat steps following?

Deer tracks.

Deer toes.

Come on in, the light's fine in here.

I stayed in all day. It was sunny outside I think. I should have gone out. I was sewing.

I got one of those "ott lights." It's bright. It's so bright that after sewing in the bask of the light for a while, the rest of the house looks very dark.

After sewing in my bright light, I take my item across the room, passing by the warm fire, to the light box, where in the bask of a glowing "sun lamp," I photograph a little scene. Ahh yes, it's summery in the light box. A person could get lost in there. Maybe I need a miniature beach chair.

Tomorrow I'll go out.

Color on a Winter Solstice

My grandfather gave me this dog collection. It's been in the safe keeping of a box for years. I was cleaning this morning and thought I'd have a look at them in the bright light. This must be why people have those tall, glass, lighted display cases.

Hard to pick favorites but I really like this tiny paper mache dogs.

This musical dog is irresistible. He seems to be made of metal.

The kids needed a change of pace from house cleaning so we went... to the... Mall of Maine! I know it's crazy to go to a mall days before Christmas when we don't need anything. But it's warm in there, and colorful. We went to "Build-A-Bear," where we like to go once or twice a year.
There were some colorful window displays. I liked this giant wreathe made of sweaters.

Or this colorful quilt. I don't know how they get the cotton to pucker on the quilt. If I ever make a quilt, I hope I can make it have all those nooks and crannies like that, so comforting. It seems to absorb the color and soften the quilt.

On this winter solstice, the shortest day of the year, it seems only fair that we got this fantastic sunset. It lasted a long time. So many colors. I would have taken more photos but I was driving.
You've got to make your own colors during the winter. Stay warm, eat well, find color day to day.

Snowing and Sewing

It snowed all day. I sewed almost all day.

I like all these great fabrics so it was hard to pick favorites today. Maybe the silverware one.

Or probably the yellow one.

Family Christmas Party

We've been looking forward to the family Christmas party. Today was the day.

We drove down to Massachusetts and marveled at the crowds of shoppers. Luckily it was not a shopping day for us. We were happy to duck into the neighborhood for a home style holiday.

The cousins were delighted to spend the day together.

The dancing Santa was doing a jig.

Everyone seemed cheerful. Talking, opening gifts, sipping drinks, snacking on foods.

A delicious meal was served to us.

Many desserts too.

Some early gifts among our group here today. Kind of fun to get some presents and hope the others liked our selections for them.

Happy kids all around.

A merry day.

Also good to be home again, safe and sound and sleepy. One step ahead of the snow storm.