hopefully something rhetorical

I thought I would share the second installation of handmade Christmas.  Yes, I know Easter on Sunday.  Yes, I know that it is April, but I am slow.  This handmade gifting is still a little new for me.

So, without any further ado here are the gifts that went to the family from the midwest.

• Starting with my father-in-law’s quilt, this is truly a man quilt.  It is made with a cheater flannel for the blocks on the front, and it is bound, backed, and batted (wow, there are a lot of “b” words in quilting) with flannel.  After it was washed, it was this yummy, heavy quilt that would be perfect for a cold day.  It was hard to part with this one!  But, I did.  And, it is loved in its new home.

• The other quilt I “made” was for my brother-in-law.  I already posted about this one asking for advice.  Ultimately, I left it the way it was, and it was loved as well!  Now, I am just hoping that Sam will actually use it!
• Next, I made the my nephews crayon and colored pencil rolls.  And, as I posted before, I love these little things.  They are particularly great for little boys that want to draw.  And, mom is loving having a quick set of crayons to take to dinner.  I was most interested in the fact that the three year old put away each crayon after he used it!  That made Mom much happier with them too!

• To create a reusable gift bag for each kid, I just went to Hobby Lobby and got canvas and denim bags.  With a quick bit of fusible interfacing, I added a monogram for each child.  It was an easy way to gather up all their goodies.  And, I felt great that it wasn’t a huge tone of wrapping that just got thrown away.

• For my sister-in-law, it was a cute, cheater panel table runner.  There will be more of these in my future.  The pattern is super cute, and it was a great way to practice my stippling a little more.  (Sorry for the awful picture on this one!)

• And, finally, for my mother-in-law, I made a quick little apron to accompany her crafty gift card.  The apron is nothing overly complicated, but I really have fun doing these. It is the same pattern I used for my giveaway apron back in December.  They are just a dish cloth with a tie and some binding.  The colors on this one are pretty cool, and I was happy to be able to add a little something handmade with the rest of her gift.

So, that wraps up the midwest portion of the Handmade Christmas.  Now all that is left to show off is the stuff for my family!  I will post that soon, so I can finally get this all up and mark Christmas 2008 as actually done.

The other day, I posted about my family’s cleaning tradition.  We had always called it mumphing.

However, my mother left a comment on that post about the fact that she and my father had decided it was spelled with two “m”s.  I didn’t think much of it until today when an old family friend looked it up on urban dictionary the way I had it spelled.

Mom wins.  Two “m”s from now on!

On February 28th, I took the following photo.

I thought I was taking a picture of the last snowfall of the year.  And, then we woke up this morning, exactly one month later, to this!

Can you believe it?  It will be April on Wednesday.  This seems like some sort of cosmic practical joke.  Last week, we were taking a tour of the yard looking at all that was starting to appear.  And last night, we wrapped everything that needed it in frost cloth, but we aren’t hopeful that all those cute little buds are going to make it.

Instead of just talking about the weird weather though I wanted to share what I forgot to add to my little blog list from the other day.

About a month ago, I tweeted that I had found a treasure.  It all started in January when Ali Edwards showed pictures of her new office space.   And, hiding amongst the pictures were those lockers!  I fell in love.  I couldn’t help it.  I started looking online and figured out pretty quickly that these little locker banks can be found if you are going for new ones, but they aren’t easy to locate otherwise, particularly from my current location in the middle of the United States, almost literally.

Then, I went to one of the “vintage” stores in town (really it is a junk store).  When the BGF and I arrived, we realized that the other true vintage stores in town had moved right next door.  It was awesome.  And, what did I spy outside but a beautiful set of lockers.  I called the boy and explained the situation.  I am not sure that he really knew what or why I wanted these little beauties, but he picked up on the excitement and said okay. He is so good that way. I don’t even think he knew that I had been looking for them.

I went inside immediately and claimed them as my very own.  The next day, we brought them home, borrowed a set of bolt cutters to get a few remaining locks off, and put them to immediate use in my office!

I can’t put into words how much I love them.  They are exactly what I was looking for and pretty reasonable considering I didn’t have to ship them to me. I love all the goodies I can stash away.

I haven’t decided whether or not I plan to paint them.  For now, I just content to have them here!  The cats even like them!  They are definitely my favorite junk store find ever.

Do you ever take a break, but you don’t realize it was a break until you get back from breaking?  That is what happened.  Last week, I visited my family back home in VA while the boy and I were on Spring Break.  And, while I meant to post, I didn’t.  I didn’t grade either.  It was a little wonderful.  So, instead of actually posting here, I am just going to talk about the things I will be posting when I am done breaking (most likely this weekend…as if you were waiting with bated breath…ha!)

So here they are, in completely random order, blog post ideas to be:

• I want to share the wonderful pictures of the newest member of our family, my brother’s little girl.  She is a cutey!
• Handmade Christmas Part 2
• Handmade Christmas Part 3 (I am so excited that all Christmas presents have been gifted.  It only took me an extra few month.  I am totally starting earlier for next year.)
• I found an awesome and unique new remix artist that deserves a post of his very own.
• And, I have something brewing about my own art too.

I think it is a good list.  I can’t wait to get back here!

There is a new meme going around that is pretty funny.  I heard about it here, and I thought that I would play along.

Apparently, you type “Unfortunately [insert your name here]“, with the quotes, into Google and see what comes back.

This is what I discovered:

Unfortunately Sandy disappeared.

Unfortunately Sandy made the very difficult decision to not continue and descend from this point.

Unfortunately, Sandy’s was merely a guide track for the musicians, not even properly on mic.

Unfortunately Sandy hears her and cannot understand Rizzo’s behavior.

Unfortunately Sandy is not the food capital of Utah.

Unfortunately Sandy fell into a coma from which she never regained consciousness.

Unfortunately Sandy was sick and unable to judge.

Unfortunately, sandy soils may lack nutrients, can drain too freely, and may dry out too quickly.

And, following Helen’s lead, I thought that I would add my own:

Unfortunately, Sandy did not want to clean her house but had to because the realtor comes tomorrow!

Hope you are all having a great day!

Yesterday, my BGF told me a story.  Really, it is her story, not mine to share here.  But, she has taken a break from blogging, so I thought that I would step in for her.

Apparently, she was at work and made up a word while she was talking to her coworkers.  She has a really cool job working at a plant nursery, but everyone knows that she is an English major, so it caused roughly the following discussion.

CoWorker#1: That’s not a word. You can’t say that.

BGF:  Yes, I can.  I am an English major.  When you graduate with an English degree, they give you a piece of paper that says that you are allowed to make up words.

CW#1: Really?  No way.

BGF:  No, really. I have it at home.

CW#2 (in on it): Oh yeah, I have heard of that.  I was a Communications major, but I had friends that talked about it.

CW#1:  Wow!  Will you bring the piece of paper in?

BGF:  I don’t know if I even know where it is now.  But, I will look for it.

When the BGF told me about it, she recounted with some joy that they had actually fallen for it. And, while it is not completely true that English majors are ever given written permission to make up words.  Making up words is something I have enjoyed ever since I was little when my father made up the word “mumph.”

Mumphing is what you do when you have company coming over.  If you imagine the act of shuffling papers back into a nice, neat pile and apply that action to the whole house, that is mumphing.  My father created this word as a way to talk about what we needed to do before the wonderful woman who cleaned our house every two weeks came (with 4 children spread over 14 years and two working parents, it was a requirement to have help with the general cleaning).

mumphing = straightening, but not necessarily cleaning

And, this term has followed me throughout my life, particularly into my married life. It actually makes me a little giddy when the boy looks at me and says something like “We need to mumph, right?”  I love it because the boy never had a chance to meet my dad, and it makes me think they are some how connected through language.

This word is part of our lives.  And, it always makes me feel better to know that we have a defense against quick get togethers.  You know, when you are out at the bar, and everyone decides to come over.  We know that we are safe.  We can run home and mumph!    In some weird way, it tells my typically perfectionist self that we can just make it good enough. It is actually a sign of what a high regard we hold you in when we decide to stop mumphing when you are coming over.   And, to be honest, true mumphing often includes moving piles of things that really should be put away to a room at the back of the house that you can close the door to.

However, as of Sunday, our house will officially be on the market.  Looking around right now, I am still not exactly sure how that is going to be possible, but I am determined that it will happen!  We will get there.  But, it is quite clear that the time for mumphing in this house is done for a while.  And, this is a little unnerving for me.  This is the first house the boy and I bought together.  And, so much of us is evident in all the nooks and crannies.

In fact, this whole process of opening my house up to people to come in and critique my furniture and paint color choices kinda freaks me out.  Logically, I know that I just watch too much HGTV.  Yes, people that are looking at houses say nasty things about other people’s decorating choices.  That is just what happens.  But, really they are just trying to see themselves in a new space.  They aren’t focused on the pieces of my life.  In all actuality, they are trying to see past them.

But, I can’t help to hope that this process is a quick one.  I am sending all those good thoughts into the universe.  Now, we just need the Army to tell us where we are going next!

Sunday is the spring daylight savings time switch.  We spring forward.  We lose time.  At this point in my semester, when I am trying to get my house on the market and get grading completed before Spring Break, this isn’t something that I was looking forward to.

This was my old way of thinking.  Losing time relates to not having enough time, a constant fear of mine. But, this season, I have decided to take my word to heart and embrace the daylight saving that will occur on Sunday.

And, because for me, knowledge helps me embrace what I don’t know, I thought that I would share what I found out about the benefits of daylight saving time changes.  Some are related to me specifically, but most could easily be adapted to anyone reading.  And, because I am a true English teacher, my source is at the bottom!

• Moving time forward helps those activities that require more sunlight.  So for me, life.  I need more sun in my days, so this is my number one happy benefit.
• Traffic fatalities are reduced when there is extra sun in the afternoon.
• More light in the afternoon means more safe times to walk in my neighborhood with no sidewalks.
• There is a perception that energy is saved, which makes sense logically.  (Although, some don’t agree that this is the case because people are using energy in the morning hours they wouldn’t have had to use before.)

  Wikipedia

So, here is my little list. Instead of fighting that which is outside of my control, I am going to embrace this year’s time change and revel in the extra sun!  Hope you will join me.

Me: “I love the word demolished.  It is a great word.”

The Boy: “But, wait, if demolished means destroyed, then what does molished mean?”

M: “What?”

TB: “You know, de- would be the predicate.  Wait, is that right?”

M: “No, I think you mean prefix.  Wait, do you know what a predicate is?”

TB: “Yes, it is a part of a sentence.”

M: “Yes, but what part?”

TB: “The end part.  You know, it is where the object gets verbed.”

M: “Hmmm….I guess the object does get verbed.”

I haven’t been in this space much lately.  As I mentioned, I have had my wife here visiting with her beast, her description not mine.  I mean how could you not get distracted with all this cuteness around!  I really had no hope.

But alas, the wife left for the next adventure last weekend, so I thought that I would share a little of what I gifted this holiday season.

As I have mentioned several times already, I was a little slow with Christmas this year.  I have been getting things done in “phases,” and the 25th of December was not, apparently, a good deadline for me to have.  I have two phases done, and one more still to complete.  Unfortunately, the gifts I still have left to do are for my family.  But, the good news is that in just a few weeks we are going home, so I am going to have them all done to take with me.

Until then, I thought I would share a few of the other goodies I made.  This is phase one!

First, I have a new favorite baby gift, thanks to Maya over at maya*made. In November, she posted about a simple gift that she has made for her own children and for others, and I have made quite a few of these since then.  This one is for my friend’s little boy that will arrive in just a few weeks.  And, I have a few others that still need to get to their recipients that I won’t post here quite yet.  I followed her idea to just use two pieces of flannel.  Sewn together, it is the perfect weight for a little receiving blanket.

Side note: I am a little bummed because I forgot to snag a picture of the one of these little blankets I made this season that I liked the best before it got on the plane last weekend.  So, I will have to see if I can track a picture of that one down still (hint..hint..)!

But, in addition to the little blanket above, I had a few other handmade goodies for my friend, Bonnie, and her family.  I posted a sneak peak of this table runner back in November.  Now that it has been delivered, I can share the finished product.

This is my spin on a little Hanukkah table runner.  (And, as everyone else is experiencing, pictures are hard in the winter, so please excuse the lighting of all these pictures.)  I thought it was holiday-ish without being overwhelming.  The candles were really fun to do!  And, the back is pieced as well, so you can always flip it over.  In hindsight, I probably would have actually quilted this one, but I wasn’t exactly sure how I wanted to do it, so I skipped it.

And, my favorite thing I made for them was also for their table.  I already posted a little bit about them here.

They came out so much better than I expected though!  And, that Lizzy Dish fabric couldn’t be more perfect. I used it on the back too, so they would be more versatile as the kids got older or if Bonnie wanted to change things up a little.

I know that more of these will be made as more and more of my friends are having kids.

And, last but not least, I got pretty good at the crayon rolls this  season.  These seemed to be a big favorite around blogland.  And, I know why.

They are so fun to make, and they are really useful to throw in your bag and take with you to the restaurant, etc, which I witnessed firsthand with my nephews over Christmas.

So, there’s phase 1 of Handmade Christmas 2008!  I will be back tomorrow with phase 2!

I didn’t do a great job of making sure that Valentine’s Day was amazing for the boy.  So, when I saw this meme going around, I thought it sounded like fun.  It is all about the boy.

What are your middle names?
My middle name was given as Lynne, which is a family tradition for women on my mom’s side.  And, I changed it to my maiden name when we got married, also a tradition.  The boy’s is Edward, which is also his father’s middle name.  Needless to say, we already have our middle names for our would-be-someday children.

How long have you been together?
We have been married for almost nine years, but we have been together for almost 11.

How long did you know each other before you started dating?
Not very long, just a few months really.  But, I knew the weekend I met him that he was the one for me.  And, I told people when I got home, so I have proof!

Who asked whom out?
It was more of a long conversation, not really an initial date.

How old are each of you?
I am 31, and he is 32.  We were born eleven months apart.

Whose siblings do you see the most?
Depends which side of the country we are living on at the time.  Right now, we see his family (brother and dad) a little more, but when we lived on the east coast, we saw my brothers (and mom) more often.  Mediating time between all the family is not one of our favorite activities because someone is always unhappy with our decisions on how to spend our time.

Which situation is the hardest on you as a couple?
Deployments are hard on everyone who loves a soldier.  We were not exempt from that; however, I really love the fact that we are able to fall back into each other so easily whenever he comes home.

Did you go to the same school?
Nope, I went to George Mason in Virginia, and he went to West Point in New York.

Are you from the same home town?
Nope again.  The boy grew up in a small town in Oklahoma, and I grew up in Northern Virginia.  Couldn’t be more different in that respect.

Who is smarter?
Honestly, he is.  But, I don’t like to tell him that very often.  He is able to do more book smart stuff than I am.  But, the best part of our relationship is that we are equals in humor, and we each have our own strengths in different areas.  We both admire what the other excels in, I think.

Who is the most sensitive?
I come off as the most sensitive to start, but I think he takes more personally than I realize.

Where do you eat out most as a couple?
When he is humoring me, we eat Mexican, and when I am humoring him, we eat steak.  We also have places that we both enjoy.

Where is the furthest you two have traveled together as a couple?
Ireland.  We loved it.  We want to do more traveling.  I realize that my crazy food allergies limit us a little though.  There are still lots of places in the US I would like to see.

Who has the craziest exes?
Neither of us have really, really crazy exes, but I think that he wins the prize for the exes that held onto the hope of getting back together the longest.  He is a great guy, so I don’t really blame them.

Who has the worst temper?
I am definitely the meaner of the two of us, and I get angry faster and more often.  But, I strongly believe in small skirmishes instead of big battles, so I tend to want to talk about things more to try to avoid the really bad explosions.  But, he definitely does have a temper. And, it doesn’t help that I don’t always understand/agree with what makes him mad, which I guess isn’t entirely fair.

Who does the cooking?
I cook most between the two of us, except breakfast, and that is all him.  But, lately, he has shown more interest in cooking and has been helping me out more.  I need to remember to keep encouraging that.  The task of making dinner is sometimes daunting and having help with that relieves that a little.

Who is the neat-freak?
Thank god, neither of us is a true neat-freak.  But, we do have different ideas of clean.  It is one of those areas that we are well matched for because we do really take turns on who takes the lead on cleaning.  I know that he has more responsibilities around the house though.

Who is more stubborn?
He is stubborn about particular things, but I am probably the worst of the two, particularly in terms of asking for help.  I think it is part of my oldest child syndrome.

Who hogs the bed?
He would say I do, but actually, we are both pretty good about sharing the bed.  We both steal covers more than space.

Who wakes up earlier?
We both really wake up together and go to bed together, for that matter.  But, he takes longer to wake up than I do.  I am an up-when-I-am-up kinda girl.

Where was your first date?
Technically, it would have been a Barenaked Ladies concert in Washington DC in December of 1998.  He drove 19 hours in one day to go with me, and we hadn’t seen each other since the first weekend we had met two months earlier.

Who is more jealous?
Definitely me!  He never acts jealous.  Sometimes, I wish he would a little.

How long did it take to get serious?
I was more serious to start, but he came around pretty quickly.  I told him within five emails writing back and forth that I wouldn’t stop harassing him until he agreed to marry me, and that didn’t scare him off, so I assume that he knew something too.

Who eats more?
He definitely eats more than I do, but I like to snack more than he does. He takes rules about cleaning your plate very seriously.

Who does the laundry?
I am lucky, lucky woman that he does most of the laundry.  Really, I just have more underwear than he does.

Who’s better with the computer?
I am better with the computers we have.  Really, I am just the more interested of the two of us with regards to technology.  And, I have a fair amount of patience with it.  He just wants things to work.  It is kinda the opposite of the way that traditional gender roles go.

Who drives when you are together?
He does.  But, I am not sure why.  Driving issues are actually one of the areas that we fight the most about.  The fact that is what we fight about most seems pretty dumb writing it down here.

All-in-all, the boy is my lobster (sorry, Friends reference).  We have one of those once in a lifetime meeting stories, and I feel extrodinarily lucky to have found him.  He completely changed the plan for what I thought my life would be, but he has also given it more depth and richness than I ever thought was possible.  Sorry, I sucked on Valentine’s Day, honey!