Leap Day

I should thank February 2012 for tacking on an extra day so that I could post a second time in February. What was up with this month? Although I've sat down at the computer every day to check email, run through Facebook, and do some editing work, I haven't felt like writing. Which is a disappointment to me.

On the other hand, I have been sewing a lot, pursuing quilt ideas and color combinations in a more focused way, and that has been rewarding.

I've done some mild planning on a class I might be teaching in the fall - but I'm leery of putting too much energy into it until I know for sure the class will go. A lot of things are like that right now - waiting to see if something will or won't happen, will or won't work out.

Waiting is not my strong point.

But here it is Leap Day, and I completely forgot to give it the minor holiday attention it apparently now deserves (?). Instead, Cora and I have been too focused on the fact that March 2nd, Friday, is Dr. Seuss's birthday. She tells me that her class is studying Dr. Seuss at school the past couple weeks. Yesterday she wore her Cat in the Hat shirt. She tells me she has decided to wear it until they stop studying Dr. Seuss. While her teacher is used to seeing her wear the same outfit twice in a row, I'm not sure what she would think of a week of the same shirt. I am hoping we can peel it off her little body and wash it at some point.

She already has planned what she will wear for Dr. Seuss's birthday. It includes, of course, the shirt.

What the kids are watching these days

Last night Cora and I were watching TV - she has been adamant about watching House of Anubis on Nick. It seems to be a kind of Dark Shadows for middle schoolers (putting her far below the demographic) - very convoluted plot lines involving kids at a British boarding school and ancient Egyptian curses, myths, and symbology. Frankly, I didn't think she was really following it. But then I asked a question, and she unfurled the whole plot, and while she didn't understand all of it, she had all the plot points nailed in place and even some good insights into character motivation. Huh.

And then a commercial for the latest Twilight saga DVD came on. We see Jacob saying "I know what I have to do." Next clip he is running, shirtless, through the woods.

Cora: "Really? That's what he had to do? Take off his shirt and go running?" Then, a moment later: "Can I have that movie when I'm 12?"

Yes. Yes you can. Right after we watch every episode of Buffy.

Winter is Winter, as it turns out

Yes, we had a lovely reprieve in December and early January, as temperatures soared in the high 30s and the snow stayed away.

Yes, I know we need snow and ice and cold and even disgusting gray slush to maintain the natural order.

And yet...well, this picture from January 2011 still best expresses my feelings towards the Midwest winter.

(I'm not sure which expression I love more - Cora's SnowZombie face, or Trout's apparent protest to having to wear a headband.)

Onward

The Christmas season went by fast, for the most part. As usual, there were things I meant to bake that I never did. Cards, such as they were, did not go out as early as hoped for. Fewer things were handmade than I intended. Looking back I see that I did a terrific job of managing Cora's expectations, and a really lousy job with my own. Looking farther back I see that as a theme of the past two years. Will 2012 be different? We shall see.

I believe the common approach to the new year is to square up the previous years resolutions. I did part of this for publication elsewhere, but here's the brief assessment, with the goal followed by the result:

Dye sock yarn with Kool-Aid. Knit socks. – dyed worsted yarn instead, gave for Christmas presents, kept some for myself for a new hat. One new recipe a week. 52 recipes. – probably accomplished this one – didn’t track well though; when I got to the end of March and had already tried 21 new recipes, I stopped listing them. Write more. Publish more. – wrote little, published one poem (frankly, only submitted to 12 publications over the whole year), but also several  essays for the Simple, Good, and Tasty web site and blog posts. Make cards. Send birthday cards. – total fail  Read more. 60 books. – read maybe 20 books ( for adults) in 2011, but dozens of articles and magazines, plus many, many, many picture books. My all time reading record is about 120 books in one year, so 60 seemed a reasonable goal. Make a quilt, start to finish. – yes! four new tops completed, one completed, though technically quilted by someone else, but it was finished and under the tree for Cora this year.  Finish four unfinished projects. 1 per season. – an abandoned scarf became an earwarmer, I had two old quilt tops quilted, and I finished the tree skirt I started eight years ago.  Journal. At least a list. At least 5x/week. – total fail, even if I stretch to counting blogging as journaling. Can only claim victory if a Facebook status update counts as a journal entry!

The goals for 2012 are very similar. I still hope to send birthday cards (something I have not managed since Cora was born, but that was nearly six years ago and I really think it now makes a poor excuse). I hope to read more than last year. I'm sticking with the same cooking goal and also hope to finish some unfinished projects. I have a collection of batik fabric I have never cut into. This is the year. I hope to write more - and to finally finish NaNoWriMo - and to send writing out more often.


I would like 2012 to be kind to me. I hope to find this year more sustaining. I hope to leave a lot of the sadness I've been collecting behind. Or at least get the scales to tip in the other direction more often.

An artist

Cora and I have been making things. Fun things. Cool things. She has an amazing hunger for arts and crafts and baking - where does she get that? *ahem*

She's at her little art table now, with paper, scissors, watercolors, google eyes, a very large bottle of glue, glitter glue, ribbon, colorful duct tape, foam stickers and playdough. Earlier, she cut out snowflakes. Then she made me a playdough sculpture with red duct tape and a sparkly foam heat. Before that it was a craft with fabric and fabric markers.

She's standing up, mostly, only sitting down for certain parts of her work. She found last year's one-piece pajamas and they barely fit her, but she is wearing them. Purple with silver flowers. A t-shirt underneath. A ponytail leftover from ballet this morning. She does something on her page - paints something or glues on a google eye or rubs some glitter glue over something - pauses and looks at what she's done, then surveys her table to see what else she has to work with. She makes a decision about what comes next. She works slowly and intently. She knows exactly what she is doing.

I do not have anywhere near enough craft supplies for this girl. We have a pink crate that we keep everything in, and she can easily deplete it in a weekend. I love this of course, but also am still figuring out what to do with it all, how long to keep creations for, which craft supplies are worth keeping a larger stash of, and most of all what I might do to a) find more space for her supplies and b) find a way to keep up with her supply consumption!

But I love seeing her serious face as she does her art, as she puts it. The way she is clearly thinking about the aesthetics of her creation, considering options, pursuing an inner vision. She gets frustrated sometimes when the finished product doesn't match that inner vision - haven't we all be there before? We talk a lot about frustration being a part of the process, a part of being an artist, something that you learn from and use to spur yourself on, not something to spend time feeling bad about or saying mean things to yourself about.

She says she wants to be an artist. I say she already is one.

A new milestone

I've read about this moment on other blogs, but it came sooner than I expected it would: Cora asked me not to write about something she said - not on Facebook or anywhere on the computer, she specified. She knew she had said something funny - she meant it to be funny - but she said she would be embarrassed if anyone other than me and her dad knew about it.

However, she gave me full permission to share her idea that we make our family Advent wreath out of teeth. Which, she is sure, is what the Tooth Fairy does.

She also is hoping to spread the word about next weekend being Eat New Foods weekend. They don't have to be entirely new; a new preparation will also fit the bill. For example, as I have never served poached eggs, they would count as a new food. They are, in fact, first on her list of foods we should eat. New Foods weekend will be a challenge for us - we are at a disadvantage geographically, for one thing. And while it would make it easier if we included the vast realm of foods we have never served by choice (cheese in a can, shelf-ready bacon, frozen breakfast pastries...), I am not prepared to open that can of worms. (By coincidence, something else we have never eaten.)

A sample list of projects

Recently, I pawed through all my fabric, looking for two things: neutrals and an advent calendar kit I bought about two years ago. Found some of one, not a sign of the other. Which means I put the kit somewhere "safe" and/or "easy to remember". Ha! 

In the process, I found a number of projects I really should finish. I thought it might be fun to list them. I reserve the right to make this a partial list so as not to scare anyone. Including myself.

I couldn't have made this list, or even looked through all that, anytime in the last several months. It would have been too hard, because I wouldn't have had any time to devote to anything. Now, though, I am making some space in my schedule so that I can do things like this again. Because, as you think I might be able to remember, few things make me as happy as making something.

Cora's sweater - 1-1/2 arms to go!
Knit market bag - handles needed
Cowl - yeah, maybe 1/4 done? But it's for me, so there's no time pressure
Noro socks - same as above.
Christmas quilt from an old block exchange (how old? I was still stitching by hand) - need two new blocks and then I can, you know, put the top together and so forth
Couple small quilt tops that need to be made into actual quilts
and a couple more quilt projects still in the works at various stages

Despite all those, and the secret ones, I would still really like to find that kit!