Technically...

...I could say that I've already done my four posts for this week, if you go from Saturday to Saturday.  Or, technically, I could say that I failed because I've only posted three times since Sunday, the start of the week.

But, oh!  Look at the time.  11:59 is the time I STARTED this post, so I win either way, technically.  

Right now I am reupholstering a chair that must be from 1968.  It's a messy business that makes your back sore.  Too much floor time.  I've never done this before so I'm a little nervous.  I've sewn enough that I have confidence that I can do it, but there's the little details that I thought I'd figured out and now I'm wondering if it's going to be all screwed up.  

I took a pattern from the upholstery that I pulled off, but now that I've cut some of those pieces out of the new fabric, I am worried about it.  I didn't account for how the old fabric was all stretched out.  It won't lay flat.  So, what if I made it too big?  Then the piping won't be right on the edge.  I guess I could measure it.

Rachel!  Where are you?  Oh yeah, you're in Farfarawayville, Egypt.  Don't you hate it when some of your best friends move?  Far away?

And when your sister moves to Reallyfarawaytown, Egypt?  That REALLY sucks too.

Guess what's funny and kinda ironic?  Rachel and Lacy, my sister, only live about 45 minutes from each other.      

But that doesn't help me with my current reupholstery project.   

And neither does this totally random subject change.  (There is a correlation that you can see at the end, so it's not as random as you might think at first.) 

For Christmas, we bought our Ella a bunch of various art supplies.  She gets art supplies every year for her birthday and Christmas, it seems, but these Christmas gifts for Ella were a little less "Crayola-ish" and a little more "pro-ish".  (Not that they are professional quality things, for the most part, but they are much nicer than the very elementary things she's used in the past...)  She was so darling when she opened them.  The bigger present was an travel art kit that came with a big canvas shoulder bag containing several different mediums of paints, canvases, brushes with a nifty brush-keeper and a travel easel.  When she opened it she squealed with delight, squinting her eyes, and hugged herself, jumped up and down and exclaimed with great conviction, "OH!!!  Now I'm an ARTIST!"  It was one of the most genuine reactions I've seen from her and it completely melted my heart.  It was a good moment among many others that Christmas morning.

So, a few days after that (a week?), Ella wanted to do a painting.  I also had ordered her a painting technique book and so we experimented with some techniques, she and I.  Mac and Rohan joined the party later and we had ourselves a family art day, which I enjoyed immensely.  

In my enjoyment with my children, I couldn't help but think of my darling little sister, Lacy, who moved (to Reallyfarawaytown, Egypt, if you recall?) not so long ago.  Lacy is one of the most creative people I know.  She is an artist.  In our shared childhood, we had a good relationship.  We were friends, for the most part and I sorta looked out for her.  (Did her hair, helped her pick her outfits, walked to school with her trying the whole way to get her to move faster so we wouldn't be late...)  She was most often completely content to be by herself and draw pictures, paint, make some amazing sculpture out of paper, etc.

One year when cottonwood trees were dropping their cotton, Lacy wandered around and picked up little bits of this fluff from around the yard (or wherever it was... can't recall).  She collected enough of these bits that she decided she wanted to make something out of it.  So, in true Lacy fashion, she got some brown fabric and drew herself a little pattern for a bear.  Then she cut the pieces out, got a NEEDLE AND THREAD, and stitched this little bear up by hand, one limb at a time.  She then stuffed the limbs, body and head with her treasured pile of cotton that she worked so tediously for, and she hand-stitched all the limbs on to this little tiny bear that she created.  As if that weren't enough, she proceeded to embroider a nose and eyes onto the face. This bear was probably a total of about 6 inches in length.  It was the cutest thing, and when I was helping Lace pack up her house to move (Reallyfarawaytown?), we stumbled across this little treasure of bygone days.  

That Lacy of my youth woke up as my children and I made watercolor creations and she's been walking with me ever since.

And I miss my Lacy so dearly.  And love her so.

Goodnight.

Manic Monday: Leaf

This picture is exemplary of our autumn this year in Idaho. A color-shifting leaf in the still-green grass. It has been a beautiful fall this year with crisp mornings and warm, sunny afternoons. Perfect.

My mom has a huge garden... probably a quarter of an acre... in which they have row after row of corn, among other veggie-delights. They have been out of town and asked that I go and pick some corn. I picked. And picked. And picked. I might have picked three of the fifteen or so rows that they have there and I had three garbage bags full of corn! That's a lot, in case anyone was wondering. I couldn't possibly eat all this corn (plus D's been out of town so that's one more corn-eatin' mouth I was missing) so I started giving it away. I gave some to neighbors, friends, and I had something to drop off to one of my tenants so, naturally, I brought corn with me to give to them. There is a point to all of this... be patient.

I was on my cell phone so I was distracted as I walked up to their door . I knocked, realized they weren't home and hung the corn and some smoke detectors on the doorknob. I finished my phone call, and, as I walked back to my car (sans distractions), I heard it and felt it. The perfect crunch of the leaves under my feet. Without warning I was thrown back to the autumns of my childhood. My sister, Lacy, and I looking for those leaves with just the right crunch as we walked ourselves home from school. I never knew which tree they fell from, but they were small and would curl up just so after their descent from their lofty summer perch. We would seek them out and CRUNCH! For some unknown and inexplicable reason, this brought joy to our little child-hearts. The assault of memory didn't stop there...

Sounds were important to Lacy and I. Images were brought to mind of some sort of seed that dropped from some other unknown kind of tree. They were about the size and shape of a pea and we would chase around looking for that little group of seeds. When we found our treasure, we would roll our foot over them in just the right way and grin at each other. Those little seeds had a POP that was, somehow, a little bit of heaven.

Fall came and went and the season changed to winter, bringing it's own set of special sounds. The muted world of freshly fallen snow was a quiet joy that I kept all to myself, but Lacy and I had our very own fun, winter sound too. This one we had a name for. "Fun Ice" it was called. You know where a pock in the sidewalk had a little bit of snow that would melt in the daytime and freeze in the nighttime? Just a little thin sheet of ice would form and it would be hollow underneath. Or it might be in a bigger crack of the sidewalk or perhaps something in the gutter... but the important thing was the certain type of ice that would form on these imperfections in the ground. Our ten-minute walk home from school would often stretch into two hours in pursuit of "fun ice". The noise it made... a delicate crunching and popping sound was far superior to the leaf crunching or seed popping of the fall. "Fun ice" was, by far, our favorite of seasonal sounds.

But as much as "fun ice" was my favorite, I am profoundly grateful right now for the certain crunch of small leaves that I experienced Friday. It's incredible that a simple sound could bring back memories of innocent, quiet times with my gentle sister which, in turn, could have my eyes burning with almost-tears for the simple joys of being alive.