sweet

Mommy's can be soooo stupid (or maybe it's just me)

So my kids have had a serious case of the gimmes this summer. I know why-they are with me more, and shopping with me more, and being a bit of a shopahlic, I tend to buy them things. Add Tabby's birthday is this week so the present requests start ramping up. But this summer it's been a bit extreme. When Tabitha pounces on every catalog in the mail and rifles through it pointing out what she wants, you know it's bad. I've gotten to the point of leafing through the catalogs myself at a breath taking speed while standing over the recycling bin so I can trash it before she sees it. Pathetic.

But not quite my point. My point is that today Oliver made a request for a Darda car track set. Now, Darda car track sets are pretty damn cool, and I don't blame him for wanting one. But I looked around his room stacked full of all sorts of toys (not all of it Waldorf approved either) including 3 bins full of playmobil both vintage and the latest stuff and I must admit I felt something fizz a little in my frontal cortex.

Now here comes the stupid part. I told him he could have the Darda set but he would have to give away his playmobil to make room. The catch is that everyone in this family knows that it's not so much his playmobil as my playmobil for which I use him as an excuse to buy. I know it, Eric knows it, and it turns out that Oliver knows it too, because he heartily agreed to the proposal, in a split second-no qualms.

So what was I to do. To drive home my point I made him immediately collect all said playmobil and put it in my room "to be sold". I thought he would come to his senses when he had to place the little skateboard figure on the pile, and I almost had him with the coast guard boat, but no, he sucked it up and sacrificed the playmobil-my playmobil-for the sake of a stupid Darda set.

The worst part was when he looked at me and said-and seriously he really did say this, with this look of genuine sorrow on his 6 year old face, "I'm sorry mama, I know how much you like the playmobil."

I have never felt so foolish in my whole parental life.

Now I have to figure out a way to keep the freakin playmobil while still making my point that he is not allowed to have every blasted toy on the planet, just on principle. Because I'm so good with principles.

:P

ps-I have not abandoned my crafty ways: I am admitting knitting envy and trying to capture the pure knitting love of Moonstitch's latest project, only mine is green:

wish me luck, I really do think this one will make FO status!

and another one...

This one for a teacher of Oliver's who is also a friend and who is leaving us for good. I hope she likes the fabric, it's so hard sewing for someone else when it's going to be a surprise.

And it was the last day of school yesterday, so here is the end of year shot on the steps:

:)

My New Obsession

So things are changing at the UCC, we're moving and we're adding retail! Big stuff! And that means I've been shopping! One of the first things we've ordered is some Any Butler patterns, including her latest bag, the Birdie Sling.

Again, I have some issues with the pattern directions-she adds a bunch of interfacing and fleece-which I don't understand, but I just left those out and sewed it up according to the pattern without them. And I love it.

Enough to make another one:

And just one more:

The picture of this one isn't so great, but it's the one I love best. I took it on a whirlwind trip to Sacramento yesterday to get our LLC paper work taken care of and it was perfect for on the plane. Of course I was without kids so I was not carrying 2 changes of clothes and 3 bazillion snacks, but I think I could have!

Before I sign off I wanted to send a thanks to Illinois (I think you're in Illinois), and to Kelley's friend who told her about the ucc from all the way over there. Thank you! What a thrill to find out I have an out of state reader! I hope you get a chance to come and see the UCC sometime!

:)

This makes me happy

Tetris Theme Played on Bottles - Watch more free videos

:)

Looloo

I was going to email this to a bunch of people who are into the whole "experience" of the bidet, but the list got longer and longer, so I thought it would take less effort to post it here. Check out how happy they are!

:)

Random head check

As promised, random to the extreme. Tabitha got her first hair cut a few weeks ago:

I had a moment of true remorse, but it just suits her so much that it was short lived. The picture was taking with a lens baby so it's got that dreamy, funky quality to it that makes us all love lens babies so much. Also recently, Oliver lost his first tooth, quickly followed by his second. This isn't the best picture of him, but it is of the gap.

Our tooth fairy is fairly modest by some tooth fairy standards these days, but he now has 2 Susan B. Anthony silver dollars to show for them.

Another first, for me this time, was my first ever journey without my family, with my dear friends Carolyn and Tifanie to my first ever Artfest! WOW! What an experience! Both to be on an art retreat, and an amazing one at that, and to be without the kids for 5 straight nights! We rented a great little lake house and spent the evenings drinking a glass (or three) of wine, chatting and crafting. And on the first morning, this was the view of the lake from the cabin:

I'd forgotten what frost looked like. It was such a nice feeling to be in the northwest again. This picture was followed by the realization we didn't have any butter for the toast, but we did have cream and a blender! By the time I had made the butter the toast we too cold, but I felt pretty proud of myself regardless.

I wish I had better pictures from the actual retreat, but I guess I was retreating too much for that. I didn't even send an email the whole time we were there! But you can check out some of the other participants pictures here. I do have one of the metal working samples I make from the workshop I took with Susan Lenart Kazmer. She was amazing!

I'm not completely into the form we made,  but it was sooooo much fun to bang on copper for hours. I can't wait to do it some more, and already have a bunch of metal working/jewelers tools on order for the ucc.

And to end the randomness with a slice of more random than ever, my kids have figured out how to take pictures with my iphone. I found these the other day and thought what a good job they'd done of capturing the odd moments of our lives.

Puts me and my SLR to shame.

:)