humble pie

I thought I'd share my recipe for humble pie. Jenny and Julie, you're gunna love this.

Humble Pie

1 heapful of "I hope Thom doesn't want to play sports."
1 large portion of selfishness over personal time on Saturdays
372 eye rolls over parents going to their kids games instead of out to lunch with us
87 white lies told to a child as to why we haven't signed him up to play

Mix well over a period of a couple years. Pour into a dish of crusty looks of distrust when told that kids games are actually a lot of fun. Bake at a ridiculously high heat.

serves one

For all you out there that have gingerly told me for a while now that kids sports are really a great thing only to be meet with smart remarks and a hand wave, you should know something. Today I am eating my words.

Yesterday was Tommy B.'s first game. It was 80 degrees and a little windy. He had soooo much fun despite the fact that his mother refused to fall into the "Soccer Mom" profile, so she wore stylish clothes and brought no lawn chairs or water.

He scored a goal in the first half, then he decided to get a little social time in while the ball was still in play. Now, that's my boy.

the results

Finders Keepers

Ahhhhh. Good art day. I was inspired by recent events.

Available for purchase here.

floating

"Do you believe in fairies?....
Originally uploaded by i.anton

Well, I'm still floating around up in the clouds. It seems the vacation I have been gifted from my usually worrisome mind will be an extended one. The laundry pile has formed a personality all it's own and it creeps and growls at me with rick rack teeth as I pass by, but I am unaffected.

I have recently acquired a small stash of vintage wall paper and I have every intention of channeling my dreaming state to create something wonderful today. Ben is out on the ocean fishing for a scaly foe that will fight the good fight, and Tommy B. is playing with bugs in the sunshine. Laundry be damned. Today is an art day.

finders keepers

Well, the call finally came. A child with down syndrome had wandered off from home and the Search and Rescue team were called in. There have been other calls. Lovely little calls, involving skull bones, decomposing bodies and suicidal people, but until Ben gets his first responder certification he can't participate in most rescues. Tonight was a different story. With a child missing, they needed him.

The phone rang just as we were sitting down to dinner. My husband has always been a fast eater, but tonight I was dumbfounded as I watched him finish off an entire cowboy dinner (sausage, beans and cornbread) in three gulps. Thom and I were only half way through our meal when we saw a blur of a uniform leave the house.

Thinking that this was an opportune teaching moment, I turned to Thom and said,

"Did you know that Daddy is going out to help find a little kid who wandered away from home?"

"What's the little boy's name?", he asked.

"We don't know. It might even be a girl. Whoever it is, they are lost outside in the cold and dark. Don't you think it is great that Daddy likes to help people?"

"Uh, yeah." He seemed a little underwhelmed. I don't think he grasps how cool his dad really is. I mean, lawyer by day, search and rescue guy by night? That is bascially the formula for a super hero.

We sat eating our dinner and I smiled at him to reiterate the point that helping people makes us happy.

And then he said, "You know Mom, if it is a little girl, maybe Daddy could just bring her home and we could keep her."

Finders keepers.

evidently

There is a little something that has cropped up over the past little while. A few of my friends have remarked on it, and after the twentieth person said something, I started to take it seriously. Evidently, I have a phone etiquette problem.

I don't say "good-bye" at the end of the conversation.

I guess I just don't think it is necessary. I mean, if you say to me "okay, tomorrow then, at noon", and I say "yeah, I'll see you there", isn't that the end of the conversation? Do I really need to say some sort of trite farewell after having said "I'll see you there"? In my mind it's a closer. Click. I guess I could add "with bells on!", but that's just cheesy. The conversation is obviously over, right? Hang up.

But evidently, some people rely on the traditional good-bye to acknowledge the end of a phone conversation. I would love to promise you all that I will, from now on, give you the proper good-bye you are looking for, but that is just so accommodating, and not like me at all. But, what I will do is this. I will start ending my calls with "10-4 big buddy".

Will you be needing me to say "over and out" afterwards?

Okay, on to other business. Could the maker of this goooorgemoose gift please step forward? I received this super fun surprise from my Pink Christmas secret friend and, as so often happens during the Christmas chaos, I lost the note that came with it and I desperately need to thank this talented girl for her thoughtfulness. I remember recognizing her as one of my readers so I'm counting on her to get this message. She also sent along a magnet board from Steel Dreaming Designs which I immediately hung and put photos on. It was such a fun package to receive!

Alt. 50,000 ft.

Do you remember the ad for cold medicine when the person's head just floats away? I've been feeling that way lately. I have serious things I need to be worrying about, and yet, I just can't seem to hold a thought longer than a few moments. I'm all light and airy and suspiciously carefree.

I not complaining really, just voicing my confusion at this recent phenomenon. I am usually a really good worrier. A pro in fact. But lately. . . I don't know. . . it's just. . . gone.

photo by tara whitney

And it's not just the worrying that has become evanescent. All sense of responsibility regarding household chores and other boring commitments seems to have slipped into the dark corners of my brain, not easily accessible.

I could be worried as to why I might be feeling this way. Hormone imbalance? Brain tumor? But I'm not. I think I will just enjoy this little vacation from myself for as long as it lasts.

The photography of I. Anton perfectly illustrates my current mental status. Click on over and take a look. If you stare at it long enough you may just be able to join me in my amiable adventure.

the big cleanse

Here it is the 6th of January and my Christmas decorations are still up. You would think I didn't know that all magic, even Christmas magic, has a dark side. The dark side to Christmas magic is that on the stroke of midnight, when the calendar rolls over to December 26th, all Christmas decorations become sad and cluttered looking.

I couldn't help it really. Usually I have the glitter and bobbles wrapped and carefully tucked away before New Years. But I was out of town and so we had to return to a house that felt like a ghost town. Remains of what used to be.

So today is the day. I am ordering in sushi for lunch and I have coerced Jenny into coming over under the guise of a relaxing afternoon. I'll butter her up with a spicy salmon hand roll and put her to work.

I actually began my thorough cleaning project yesterday starting on the boy. It was back to school day and high time to scrub behind the ears and clip back fingernails caked with play dough. I scrubbed his head and checked his armpits. He cried out once or twice at the inhumanity of my project, but in the end he succumbed.


Oh happy day! Back to school! After dropping him off at his classroom, I had a knee jerk reaction to go get a cocktail. Then I remembered, oh yeah, my new diet, and then, oh yeah, I don't drink. So I went home and thoroughly enjoyed a ridiculously long, hot, kid-free shower and ate an entire tangerine without having to share one single segment.

couch crafting

Tell me. What is about cold weather that makes me want to needle craft? Is is that my work bench in the garage seems such a cold place to be? Is it the warmth of a project laying across my lap? Is it the quiet pull of the string that reminds me of the snow falling softly on my parents home in the mountains?

I'm not quite sure where I'm going with this embroidery project. It will most likely end up incorporated into an apron.

If you are interested in vintage embroidery, there are many free patterns to be found online. This little scottie dog appeared in Women's Weekly on October 30th, 1937.

I started this baby blanket on the ride to Utah. I'm thinking of adding a little embroidered squirrel to one corner. If I'm lucky, someone I know will have a baby next fall to gift it to.

last chocolate standing

I don't make resolutions. I make changes. This is not to say that I stick to all the changes I implement. No, no.

I try though. If I succeed at even a little change towards the better I mark it down as a successful year. Why beat yourself up? Baby steps people. Baby steps.

One change I will be making is to spend more time at my work bench creating new things and less time pounding out repeats. I might have to sacrifice some sales in the process, but I think it is high time for Secondsister to branch out a little. It's time to ante in a little more than I am comfortable with, if you know what I mean.

Today we are working on the last chocolate standing. We took the box of See's out of the freezer and what we don't eat today will, (heaven help me for saying this) go in the trash. And then, my dear friends, I will dawn my spandex and march, with Chariots of Fire playing in my head, into spin class with determination like you've never seen before. Starting tomorrow.

happy new year

image credit

We are back from the cold North. Sixty-three degrees never felt so good. We drove twelve hours through the blustering wind and arrived back at our home on the coast at one this afternoon. We clomped up to our beds and settled in for a long winter's nap which felt sooooo good.

Tonight we have the fireplace going and the British version of The Office on DVD. I am going to get out my yarn and needles and settle in.

I'm so glad to be home, but I will miss my family. I hardly ever get to see my nieces and nephews and I wish I could hug them once more and pinch their cheeks like all good aunts are supposed to do.

I will particularly miss the mischievous giggle of this little sprite.