amelia studio

Flock of Triangles Progress

I've been taking my sweet time working on a quilt for my middlest little girl (just like I did for my biggest little girl's quilt). I am about a quarter of the way through the top of Denyse Schmidt's Flock of Triangles quilt. I was a little off on my math, so this is slightly smaller than I wanted it to be. I'm thinking I'll add a border. Maybe yellow? C requested a blue and yellow quilt and was wondering where the yellow was when I showed her this. I had planned on more yellow on the back, but maybe some on the front would be good. I was hoping to get this done for her birthday in September, but I don't know if that is going to happen. I don't want any late-night quilt freak-outs. That would kind of take the fun out of it, no?

Two Candles

 
We celebrated my littlest girl's birthday a few days early in order to take advantage of a weekend day off. We don't do big parties very often here, so it was small and sweet. That's a lot of cake for so few people. The cake was supposed to look like a flower, but I think I could have put frosting on just about anything and she would have been happy. I think this dude (aka Buckle Face or Dr. Buckle) was the gift favorite. M is crazy for buckles. And there has been lots of dancing to "Girls Just Want to Have Fun," thanks to Auntie Angie's card. Lots.of.replays. Please no more Cyndi.

(Did you know my sister and I tried to meet Cyndi Lauper when we were little, so we waited for.ev.er for her after a concert? When she finally came out, her head was wrapped in a towel, and her giant bodyguards did a good job of pushing two little girls aside. It's not like there was a crowd. Just us little kids. Lame.)

Anyway, happy early birthday, Dolly Doll. We'll sing the birthday song again later this week.

A List

My Almost-Two-Year-Old's Various States of Dress and Mind While Shopping at a Local Children's Clothing Consignment Sale

1. wearing a sweet sundress with turquoise Mary Janes: happy
2. pulling sundress off after spying pretty clothes on racks: screaming
3. naked save for diaper and Mary Janes: happily wandering
4. no shoes, no clothes, yanking on a hot pink tutu: crying
5. wearing hot pink tutu (with tag) and Mary Janes, but no dress: smug
6. wearing hot pink tutu (while I remove tag): writhing and shrieking
7. topless tutu girl walking out the door: shrieking, "No go that way! NO!"

So, in exchange for a large bag of cheap winter clothes for my oldest child, I have allowed my youngest to break me. Discipline? What discipline?

Tuesday Nights

Even though I've stopped taking classes at the Clay Guild, I'm still trying to make sure I continue to work on my ceramics on Tuesday nights. I start right after dinner, and Chris puts the girls to bed. I have a wheel at home, so there's no sense paying for the classes. They were a jump start for me though. The Guild also has workshops/demonstrations once a month, so I'll be sure to take advantage of those. The last one was with Bowie Croisant, and I learned a lot about mold-making, something I've never tried before.

For the next few Tuesday nights, I'll probably be working through the stash of cone 10 clay that I have. After that, I'll be moving on to cone 6 because I am the proud owner of a new-to-me kiln! We're still working out the wiring issues, but I hope to be playing with that soon.

I've been wanting to try some things with colored clay, so I started working on that last night. I didn't get as far as I had hoped because I was having a horrible, bad, terrible throwing night. So frustrating. I flopped about five pots before I decided to just take a break with a glass of wine and some YouTube pottery videos. When I started again, I managed four bowls, but was only happy with one of them. I'm hoping I can improve the others with trimming. With the colored clay, I only got as far as mixing up some samples, so it's slow-going.

I have this very specific idea in my head of what I want to make, and I think it is what I want to do for a long time. This is very exciting to me! So I just want to get going with it. This is difficult only working one night a week. I'll be able to add a few hours once Parent's Day Out starts again. I just need to be patient with myself and my progress. I really enjoy these evenings, flops and all.

Today

I can't believe I haven't been in this space for four months. It was a rough spring for the H clan, and a busy summer. As most of you who know my family in person know, we lost a young member of our family this spring, our nephew, Chris's sister's little boy. For a long time, all the things I normally blog about -- the little bits of our day -- seemed trivial and not worth the time it took to write about them. But I knew that was just one of many expressions of grief, and that the need to single-mindedly cling to those most vital would ease, and simple pleasures would return. And to some degree they have. Not every day, but many days. These things may fall away in times of crisis, but they make up the remainder of our days, and so, our lives.

Today's little things:

• sleeping through the alarm and rushing schoolday tasks
• finding something orange (hairclips) for E's orange day at school
• the smell of zucchini muffins baking
• the ritual of making a latte (and drinking it)
• C asking again (and again) when her birthday will be (September)
• dishes and laundry (always)
• vacuum lines on the living room rug
• windows fogged with humidity
• M bestowing unsolicited hugs on our grumpy doggy visitor, Casey
• the happy prospect of my Tuesday work night (back to the clay, at last)

It's been a quiet, peaceful day. I wish you the same.