Done, done, finally done!

Two years ago I began working on a project for my little sister, Sophie. No, sorry, wait, this story begins way before that.

A long, long, LONG time ago in a galaxy far, far away...my best friend Rachel and I lived in the same town. When we weren't playing horses - which was most of the time! - we played with her Felicity doll. Felicity, for those who don't know, was one of the American Girl dolls, each based on a fictional girl from a different period of American history. There was an was a series of books about each girl, and, for the lucky girl whose parents loved her (sorry, Mom, I guess there's still some latent bitterness there), you could purchase an 18 inch doll that you could dress in all her gorgeous costumes. Felicity was the colonial girl and she was our  favorite, mainly because (you guessed it) she was crazy about horses, and eventually ended up rescuing and owning her own beautiful copper colored horse Penny. I'm fairly certain Rachel and I both wanted to BE Felicity (when we weren't fighting over who got to marry Roy Rogers...two small hearts were broken the day we found out he was both already married AND old!) and wear her dresses and own her horse and live her exciting colonial life, which coincided with all the events leading up to the American War for Independence. (Too much back story? I apologize...I really AM getting to the point eventually...) Anyway, I desperately wanted my own Felicity doll, and her lovely dresses, and my very favorite was this blue dress she wears to the ball at the Governor's palace:

 (Gorgeous, right?)

So, fast forward about **** years, and Sophie, lucky girl, now has the American girl doll AND the coveted blue dress that I always dreamed about as a child! (Clearly we all know who the favorite child is in THIS family!;-) And I just happen to have some blue satin fabric the exact color of the Felicity dress...and so I decide to let my inner child live vicariously through my little sister. Thus, I promise to make Sophie her very own replica of Felicity's blue satin ball gown.

We find a pattern that is very similar and will require only a small amount of modification, then search the fabric stores for trimming similar to the Felicity dress. Cutting out the pattern and the fabric pieces is always my least favorite part of a sewing project! Finally we actually start sewing, a little bit at a time each time we get together. Slowly, slowly, the dress starts to take shape. Lining, interfacing, boning, satin, lace, muslin...this is the most complicated pattern I've ever attempted! The goal is to finish the dress in time for Sophie to wear it to the Regency Ball that is held every year in Albuquerque.

Then....we learn the sad news that there WILL be no Regency Ball this year! What? This certainly puts a damper on our enthusiasm. Now we are making a beautiful gown for...what? Interest wanes, and the project is shelved for months, maybe even an entire year. Sophie occasionally reminds me to work on it, and I get a little bit done here and there. The stupid zipper takes 3 attempts before going in right. (Oh, zippers, how I hate thee! Always have, always will...) Finally, the dress is complete except for the underskirt, the hem and a bit of detail work.

Then September 2012 arrives. Sophie reminds me about her unfinished dress...and I remember an upcoming date - September 19. Official Talk-like-a-pirate day! We examine a flyer that promises a dozen free Krispy Kreme donuts to any patron dressing like a pirate. I recall the similarities between Sophie's dress and the dress Elizabeth Swann wears in Pirates of the Carribean. 

And so we suddenly have a goal. Finish the dress before Sep 19! Wear the dress to Talk-like-a-pirate night and earn those donuts! One more long afternoon does it. Bam! Details finished. Bam! Hemmed. Bam! Underskirt made. (Yes, I know sewing machines don't go "bam." Unless there is something very wrong with them. That's just how I felt.) She dons the dress and...perfection.

The underskirt looks nearly white in these pictures, but it actually a pale blue.

Close up of the lace details:

The back:

My lovely little sister! It was definitely worth all the time and effort just to see her look so pretty and happy!

Someone get this lady a carriage. I'm pretty sure there's a ball somewhere she should be attending.

The leather jacket

My first year of college, my mom bought me a leather jacket for Christmas. It was a nice jacket, real leather, but not terribly fancy or expensive. It wasn't any of the "I'm rebellious" or "I'm a Goth" or "I ride motorcycles" styles of jacket or, even worse, the "I'm the kind of girl who rides on the backs of motorcycles wearing little else" kind of jacket. It was just a nice classic black leather jacket that goes with everything.  I loved that thing - I wore it everywhere, for everything - except maybe skiing, and that was just cause leather doesn't like snow. ;-) I wore it to school. I wore it on dates with Robert. I was wearing it the night he proposed to me. (Along with 2 sweaters because it was 2 days before Christmas, outdoors, on a bridge at the UNM duck pond, on the very coldest night of the year! But that's another story.) I wore it throughout our marriage and even, unbuttoned, while I was pregnant with our kids.

 It looked kind of like this...

And then, one sad, sad day, ten years later, came the Great Mold Incident of 2010. You all know the story - 100% contamination, with everything having to be either washed or tossed. Well, you can guess the rest. That poor faithful beloved leather jacket, which I had completely worn out, was determined to be not worth saving. Or rather, not worth the amount of money it would cost to have it dry cleaned, because it would literally be cheaper to buy a new one. So it got tossed...and tears were shed...and life went on until...winter arrived again. And suddenly, I had no jacket. I had two nice heavy wool dress coats, which worked for the very coldest days, and some sweaters, but nothing in between.

My mom, being the sweet and generous lady she is, offered to buy me another leather jacket for Christmas. This sounded like a great plan...until we actually tried to find the jacket. Me, being the boring, traditional, and stubbornly-change-resistant person I am, decided I wanted the exact same jacket. Or as close a facsimile as possible. In vain we hunted - regular stores, department stores, thrift stores, online. Nothing. There are a million and twelve leather jackets in the world - and none of them looked right to me. I tried - I really did. I tried to give the other jackets a chance, to broaden my horizons - but I just didn't like them! They were too modern, too trendy, too "fashionable." I wanted my jacket. Soft black leather. Hip length. Button-up front. Pockets and princess seams. Plain and comfortable and safe. Is this too much to ask? Apparently.

This is just ridiculous looking. Too "fashionable" for me!

Winter passed and still no jacket. Spring arrived and the search was abandoned. Summer's heat made us forget the very existence of jackets and cold and snow. And then came September first...and along with the start of school came the first hint of cool wind and yellow leaves that reminds us: Fall is on it's way. Fall...season of apples and leaves and delicious pumpkin baked goods and...jackets. Oh yeah, jackets.

The search resumes. Day 1 is not going well so far. I'll keep you posted.

Pain

"Grief knits two hearts in closer bonds than happiness ever can; and common sufferings are far stronger links than common joys." -- Alphonse de Lamartine

"Difficult times have helped me to understand better than before, how infinitely rich and beautiful life is in every way, and that so many things that one goes worrying about are of no importance whatsoever." -- Isak Dinesen

"I walked a mile with Pleasure
She chattered all the way;
But left me none the wiser
For all she had to say.

I walked a mile with Sorrow
And ne'er a word said she;
But oh, the things I learned from her
When Sorrow walked with me." - Robert Browning Hamilton

"It's like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger, they were. And sometimes you didn't want to know the end. Because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened? But in the end, it's only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer."  - J.R.R.Tolkien, The Two Towers 

"Pain is never permanent." --Teresa of Avila

Growing up I probably experienced more physical pain than most people. I had many injuries and surgeries, and I learned and grew a great deal from those experiences. I learned how to sympathize with other people's suffering.

But the past two weeks, I have been learning about a different kind of pain - emotional, not physical. And I have to say I prefer the latter. I would rather break my bones or have another concussion than deal with losing people I love.

Yet as hard as it is, as much as I wish I could just fast-forward to the end and not be stuck here in the middle, with pain, I have seen many beautiful things come out of it. It has knit Robert and I closer together like nothing else in our marriage, and I have never loved or admired my husband more. I have received such great amounts of love and kindness and service from my family members, and I am so grateful for that. It has made me more appreciative of my children and more willing to be patient with their small faults. And most of all, I have seen and felt the presence of God more clearly in my life, even as I struggle with my inability to understand His plan. Pain changes us. We will never be the same people we were before...but we can only trust it will make us better if we allow it.

"Weeping may endure for the night, but joy comes in the morning." - Psalm 30:5

Good News

Lest anyone accuse me of only posting complaints on my blog, today's post will be entirely dedicated to ALL the good news going on in our household right now - and there's a lot of it!

FIRST, Joseph has his first loose tooth!

(He vacillates between being excited about the Tooth Fairy visit and terrified at the thought of it falling out while he's sleeping and him swallowing it, thus depriving him of the coveted "prize." He's such a silly goose. Can't believe my oldest is old enough to loose teeth now...*sniff*...Mama moment...NO, wait, back to happy!!! Banish those tears!)

SECONDLY, James has been so well behaved and grown up lately!

Yesterday he even got out his school book and started doing schoolwork all on his own. (And yes, it was definitely motivated by a desire to test drive his new crayons.;-) It's really hard to get him to do the "sit down and follow the directions" kind of schoolwork, but when he decides he wants to do it, boy, he does it! And it's getting very clear that his preschool book is way too easy and boring for him - he needs a challenge! He reminds me of both his Daddy and Grandpa Dan in that respect. I wonder if anyone sells a phonics book entirely based on bugs....

THIRDLY, Gabriella is ALL POTTY TRAINED!!!

 (I confess this is the one that I am the most excited about. ;-) She has been working hard for months, and we promised her an "ice-cream party" once she managed to be dry for a whole week. She's come SO close several times, but then had an accident and we had to reset the clock. But this week she finally managed it, and last night we celebrated with ice cream after dinner. Hooray! That only leaves me with one in diapers. Awesome.

FOURTHLY, Elora is getting more teeth - her 2 year molars!

I count this as good news, although there are moments when she isn't terribly happy about it, poor baby. But she's growing up too. In fact, she hardly even counts as a baby anymore! She's pretty much a full blown toddler, who loves to climb and get into EVERYTHING! She's super-cute. And I'm not biased at all....

and FINALLY, my good news is that my best friend Rachel is coming to visit!!! She and her sister Elsie are driving down tomorrow for a short visit over the weekend. We don't get to see each other but about twice a year, if we're lucky, so needless to say I am VERY excited about it!!

In fact, if you'll excuse me, I need to go work on cleaning my house in preparation for their visit....

Hope your day is as filled with good news an mine!

A Letter to the President

Dear President Obama,

Your recent statement to small business owners - "If you've got a business - you didn't build that. Somebody else made it happen." - shows just how out of touch you are with the people you supposedly represent. You clearly know nothing about the struggles, the effort, and the sacrifices that go into making a business successful. Your implication that somehow you, the government, or the surounding community are responsible for our sucesses - and failures - is both arrogant and offensive.

You didn't spend all those late nights at the office while your family had to sit down to dinner without you yet again. You weren't there for the all-nighters spent trying desperately to fix a problem in order to appease a customer. You didn't give up your vacation because you weren't able to leave your fledgling company lest it collapse without you. You didn't go months without a salary so your employees could get paid instead. And you can't comprehend the joy of success, whether it's getting a new contract or finally getting paid after all those months, because you didn't have to make the sacrifices first.

You can't understand small business, Mr. Obama, because you only know how to run a giant corporation further into debt.

Sincereley,
A Small Business Owner's Wife

{you know} #2

Reason #2 Why you know you've been a mother for too long:


You look down and realize you have absentmindedly been feeding the baby sips from your coffee cup. 

And you used to wonder why she wouldn't sleep...

"You know"

You know you've been a mother a long time when...


...your entire family shares a toothbrush and you're too tired to care. (You were going to catch - whatever they've got this time - eventually anyway.)