They Had Me in Stitches

Last year Christian started school a week later than everyone else so all of the volunteer sign-up sheets had been filled out.  Mike and I ended up doing a handful of things for a couple of parties, but were never exactly in charge of anything.  I like it like that...I don't like to be in charge (you can imagine the consequences this has for parenting sometimes...), especially of collecting money or putting some big shindig together whether it's a party or a field day.

This year, however, we were around for the sign-up sheets.  Our names are on several lists, which is as it should be.  Do you know how much the first-graders love to have their mommies and daddies in the classroom?  Their little faces light up, radiant with joy that mom or dad has come to spend that time in the morning with their little boy or girl.  Christian's classroom has morning centers and his teacher this year loves for parents to come and help the kids out at the different learning areas.  It's a very hands-on, parent-involved, make-learning-fun environment.

So, on the sheets there are always blanks that get filled in quickly:  there are moms who love to organize the parties; there are parents who know they will be available to drive for field trips.  Then there are those spots that remain blank until the very end of the parent-teacher meeting, the spots no one particularly wants to take.  I noticed on one of the sheets that there was a spot such as this, an as-of-yet unclaimed responsibility.  It was called Friday Stitchery.

Mrs. C. also noticed this blank and brought it up to all of the parents at our meeting (before school started they had a little coffee for the parents to sign up and get familiar with the classroom and the curriculum).  We all looked at our feet, checked our nails, admired the maps and the White House poster.  I could feel my heart start to beat faster, and I knew, I just knew, that I was supposed to do that job. 

I can't say that I was initially overjoyed with this sudden and certain knowledge. 

I put my name on the list and decided I would stay after the meeting to make sure the teacher knew this was a tentative commitment (is there such a thing?).  I had a feeling, however, once you sign the sheet there is no going back.  Kind of like Mr. Anderson with that pill in The Matrix.  Well, I swallowed the pill.

I brought home the crate with all of the supplies from last year.  I looked through it, searching for instructions or any helpful info.  The teacher had made it very clear that while she loved for the kids to do the stitching, she had nothing to do with it.  Meaning her input was ZERO.  What I did know about stitchery was that each child worked on their own set of nine squares, stitching a basic outline on each one that would represent a different aspect of their school year.  For example, the outline of a triceratops for the dinosaur unit, or a Texas state flag for the unit on our state.  It was the responsibility of the Stitchery Mom to cut the fabric squares and get the designs onto the squares (think dot-to-dot, but with a needle) for the students to sew on.  In the crate I found embroidery hoops and leftover material, as well as thread from last year.  Needles were already in there.  But I saw no instructions about specifics.  How big were the squares supposed to be?  Was I supposed to use particular designs?

I called the mom who was in charge last year; we're friends.  I made her go out to dinner with me so I could pick her brain.  She told me about her experience, some of the things she did, but really what I was left with was that I could do whatever I wanted.  Oooh, the power went straight to my head!

I went ahead and bought new fabric; I was going to need 108 squares total.  (And somewhere along the way someone reminded me that there was a new student in the class which actually meant I would need 117 squares, but I think it will all turn out fine in the end.)  I got the first set of squares cut out, and then I went about the business of figuring out the design.  I thought it would be nice to start with one that reflected the Christian nature of their education, as well as one that hopefully pointed to the importance of their relationship with the Lord.  I looked up a couple of things online, and finally settled on a design that I thought was simple and meaningful.  I sent it to the parents to get opinions and everyone thought it was good.  I then began the process of marking the fabric with a water-washable pen...

I enjoyed this process.  It was therapeutic in a way, repeating that pattern over and over until all thirteen were done.  I began early in the day so it wasn't that late when I finished.  And getting to the end of the pile left me with a great feeling. 

Somehow I ended up with an extra one; it was providential, I suppose.  (Apparently, I'm crafty, but not so good with Math.)  I decided to experiment a little with the thread to see what might work the best. 

I tried doubling it, not doubling it, and also dividing the six strands in half.  I tried out different thicknesses in needles as well.  I was a little worried that if I took a square to the class that a grown-up had worked on the kids might think,"Oh, I can't do that!  That's so good."  I don't think I had anything to worry about!  (Maybe not so much on the crafty, either!)  It wasn't as easy as I thought it would be.  The thread and needle combination that I used at first wasn't quite right.  But I finally got a combo that I thought would work well for them.

I put each of their squares in a Ziploc baggie...

and then realized that I wanted to put the squares in the embroidery hoops so that they could get started right away.  So, I did that, and got everything back in the crate, all the bags, all the thread, all the needles, and my camera!  I set it by the front door, where Christian's bag hung on the door knob, so we would be ready to go in the morning.

I have to confess, I didn't sleep very well last night.  I think there were lots of reasons (I never sleep well, actually), but I was so nervous about trying to teach all the kids what to do.  I don't remember my phone going off at all (it's my alarm)...I just remember sitting up all of a sudden, hearing Michaela upstairs, and saying out loud,"Oh no!"  I knew that I had slept right through the first day of stitchery.  I grabbed my phone and it said 7:16.  Phew!  It was all right.

I got Christian up, we all had breakfast, I even showered!  Mike stayed home with Eliana and Michaela went to Christian's class with me.  I grabbed up the crate and we arrived a couple of minutes early to class.  Mrs. C. said to us,"Well, there's the Stitchery Mom!  Christian, where is your bag?"  Well, of course we left his bag hanging on the door!  But I had the stitching stuff, darnit.  My sweet Michaela ran home and grabbed Christian's bag for him (we live very close to his school) and brought it back so he could turn in his homework.  And we all had a chuckle about my feeble mind.  I am getting older, you know.  My birthday is at the end of this month; I'll be turning the ripe old age of 35.  And believe me, I can feel it in my joints and in my bones.  I don't even want to talk about my gray hair. 

I was so grateful for the six other moms that showed up to help.  And they all thought I was amazing for having everything ready to go, for being so organized.  If everyone only knew how funny that is. 

EVERYONE, THAT IS VERY FUNNY! 

Between the moms, Michaela, and the two teachers in the class, all of the kids at least got a start.  There was a bit of pulling out of stitches, and redoing this and that line, and wrapping the thread all the way around the hoop, but overall I got the impression that things went well.  As they get used to the stitch (a backstitch) it will get easier.  At least, I hope that is true!  This is going to be a wonderful project for them, and something they will be able to take a lot of pride in.  I'm looking forward to working with them throughout the year and seeing them get closer and closer to their goal of a finished quilt.  Oh, I don't think I mentioned  that earlier.  The nine squares will be put together into a quilt that they will get to take home with them (probably after the summer); it will be pieced by a professional-someone who knows what they're doing.  I'm not that good! 

So, today we began the journey...and it was a great deal of fun!  I will say that I never knew sewing could make me sweat.

The Kids Can Have Fun 'Cause Dinner Is Done

The last couple of nights dinner was taken care of long before dinnertime, so I was able to take the kids to the playground a couple of blocks down our street late in the afternoon.  I thought I would take the camera since there aren't enough pictures of them on this website already.

It was a lovely evening last night; there was a gentle breeze and although it wasn't exactly autumn-like weather, the intense heat of summer was elusive for a while.

Christian and Eliana discovered that "X" marks the spot.  Just what spot, I can't tell you, but I can tell you that it's marked.

It's hard to see in that picture, but the red circle has an "X" in its center.  They thought this was so fascinating.  It is so amazing to me how amazing the simplest things are to them. 

Once we got to the playground, Christian disappeared in search of sticks and dirt.  This is always a successful endeavor.

Michaela ran around the small jungle gym with Eliana right behind her the whole time.  Eliana wants so much to be big, and thinks she is, in fact, a very big girl.

Once she was hanging on the bar, however, it was obvious that she still needs a great deal of help.  It was a sweet moment to watch.  She grabbed back onto Michaela's neck but then said,"Again?!"  Sometimes the two of them are inseparable...wherever the one is, the other is right alongside or behind.

Meanwhile, Christian was up a tree without a ladder.

He doesn't need one, because he's a monkey.

We headed down to the creek because we discovered that a group of wild bandits messy boys had gotten creative with the sand from the sandbox and the water from the water fountain...this muddy concoction was all over the slides and other parts of the jungle gym.  So, we wandered down to the water to watch the ducks.

I suppose we hadn't done that in a while because at first Eliana was quite cautious.

As she watched them, and heard them quacking and chatting with one another, and saw them waddling all around together (there were a lot of them) she was quite entertained.

Now, while I do not want a duck to come over and sit on my lap or anything, I can appreciate their loveliness from afar...they had very pretty wings; there were several different kinds of ducks, and then there were ducks that were the same kind, but that had different colored wings.

The kids had fun watching them for a bit, and we lamented the fact that we had a couple of bags of the end pieces of bread in the fridge which we forgot to bring.  I told them we could do it another time.  And so we did.  This afternoon we headed back to the park to check out the ducks again, this time with our bread. 

Eliana was so excited to take the bread to the ducks.  She kept saying over and over,"Bread the ducks?  Bread the ducks."  I am pretty sure she didn't have a clue what it meant to take bread to the ducks but she was eager to do it, nonetheless.

On the way to the park, she and Christian played a silly game.  She would run up to Christian yelling,"Getchou!" and then give him a shove in the back.

 

He good-naturedly tripped a few steps forward, and then she would run up and give him a tackly sort of hug from behind.

Joy.

When we got to the park Eliana held up the bread and said,"Yummy!"

I told her the ducks would think it was yummy.  We got down to the, well, I don't really know what to call it.  It looks like a dock, but without the boats.  It looks like a boardwalk, but without the beach.  It looks like a deck, but without the house.  A balcony?  A hang-over-the-creek?  At any rate, we went on it in order to feed the ducks. 

I opened Eliana's bread bag and gave her a slice; she promptly took a bite and said,"Yummy!" 

I quickly showed her how to take the bread and break little pieces off, explaining that it was for the ducks, not for her.  What a goof. 

She had such a good time tearing her bread up and tossing little chunks into the water.

The ducks, of course, had a grand time. 

But they had to fight the fish for the bread.  I had never seen fish go after the bread like this.  They made the creek look like it had come to a rolling boil.

There was also a shy little turtle who was trying to get in on the action.  He really came out of his shell as we watched him swim over slowly! 

We went to the park with four pieces of bread, and as we got to the water a little boy came after us; his mom said,"I'm sorry (his name), we don't have any bread today.  I didn't know we were coming to the park."  I told them we could share, and Christian gave him the first piece.  They all had fun throwing the bread over the railing, and made it last as long as they could.  And then, once Eliana had used all of her bread and Christian's was gone, too, Michaela gave each of them some of her last little bit.

My three little ducks in a row...

They would be the only ducks in a row I've got right now, but they're pretty important ones, so I'm all right with that today.

Look, Ma! No Hands!

Well, kind of...

My mom bought me a new crock pot for my birthday (it was an early present).  Since it is the first day of September, I decided to go ahead and break it in.

Actually, the fact that it is the first day of September has nothing to do with it.  I had a roast, and what better place to cook a roast than a crock pot?

So, it's 10 a.m. and (making) dinner is done!

I couldn't do much of anything without a little help from Eliana...

I did manage to get my veggies chopped up...

and in the crock pot, covered with herbs...

Then I trimmed the fat and cut the meat into bite size pieces, because that's what my recipe said to do.  I always follow directions.  Sometimes.

I have to admit that cutting up raw meat is not my favorite thing to do.  In fact, when Michaela said,"What kind of animal is that?" and I had to tell her,"A cow," I became a vegetarian. 

Not really.

But here is something that is true.  Cutting up the meat into serving size pieces before you put it in the crock kind of defeats the purpose of using a crock pot for me.  That's a lot of work before putting the meat in the pot!  I need a better knife.  Or maybe a better recipe.

At least all the hard work is done and I can say with great confidence that dinner will be ready at 6:00 p.m.  Yippee!

I would also like to inform everyone that Michaela took the pictures that are in this post.  Maybe food photography is in her future.  She can take pictures of it, and then I can eat it.

How Do You Eat an Oreo?

Tonight we had the golden variety (the less chocolate this girl eats at night the better...no more nights like this one!)...

First, Eliana takes the top off and sets it on the table; then she eats the creamy middle with her pointer finger.

Once that is gone, she eats the bottom wafer, in little bites.

Next, she eats any cream that may have stuck to the top when she twisted it off.

Finally, she finishes off the second wafer, which is actually the top of the cookie.  She told me so.

How do you like to eat an Oreo?

Lunchbox or Navy Seal?

This is a story about a lunchbox, a bunch of twits, and a smartypants. 

Meet Christian's lunchbox, bright and cheerful, stands out in a crowd, skilled in the art of carrying all manner of food items, hot or cold...

We've learned recently that it has secret skills, too.  Like secret agent, undercover, covert-ops  skills.

Christian's lunchbox has had a long summer.  Most of it was spent on a shelf in our kitchen; because Christian was having lunch at home all the time, lunchbox was not especially necessary.  There were two times when it got to put its excellent carrying skills to use:  when we went to the pool with all of our friends who stayed with us, and when we went to the Rangers baseball game with those same friends.  Lunchbox was so excited to be able to perform its duties; carrying food for someone is the fulfillment of its very purpose here on this earth.  Having to sit on the shelf the rest of the summer was about to drive lunchbox to the edge.

You can imagine how happy lunchbox has been since last Tuesday when lunches started at school.  It wasn't a full week, but three of the five days it was filled with Christian's lunch, so happy.  Hand-in-strap, together again.  In fact, lunchbox was so glad to be out of our kitchen that it sneakily stayed behind at school Tuesday and then again on Thursday .  We picked it up the first time the next day (Christian got out early, so no big deal; good thing for you, lunchbox!) so that it was ready for the following lunch day.  But Friday morning I was stuck with no lunchbox, and had to take Christian's lunch over mid-morning and just put it in his lunchbox which was sitting happily in the lunchbox line, amidst all the other lunchbox friends.  Totally unaware of the chaos it was causing in our house each of these mornings.

Friday Mike picked Christian up from school since Eliana was asleep and soon after they came inside I asked Christian where his lunchbox was.  It wasn't in his bag or next to the front door.  I checked on our porch, because Mike and Christian had been having a conversation out there before coming inside; I thought maybe he had put it down during their talk and then left it there.  Nope, just the front porch, the sidewalk, the grass.

Mike said,"You had it in your hand, buddy.  Did you put it down over there in the hallway before we left?"  He couldn't remember; he was convinced that he had brought it home.  I told them we would just walk over and check it out.  I didn't want to wait until Monday for a couple of reasons.  Obviously, I wanted to be able to pack his lunch on the first day of the week, especially since this morning I had gotten a call from another mom saying,"You might want to bring Christian's lunch over..."  He honestly thought Friday Pizza began right away.  I knew it didn't, but like I said, sneaky lunchbox had managed to stay at school Thursday night.  I also didn't want to leave it because Sunday morning the Sunday School classes met; I thought it would be best if lunchbox were just at home for the weekend and we didn't have to worry about the confusion of all the different people and possibly getting moved around or taken.

So once Eliana was awake we walked over to the school and looked in the hallway first thing.  No lunchbox.  We peeked in the classroom and no one was in there, although the door was still open.  I felt funny about going in there; I don't know why, but it just feels like I'm not supposed to do that.  I said,"Let's check the lost and found."  We went downstairs to the lost and found bin, and it wasn't there, either.  We ran into Christian's Spanish teacher twice; she smiled but I think she thought we looked a bit strange wandering the hallway after school hours like we were.  I tried to explain,"We've lost a lunchbox." 

She was very sympathetic.  Maybe it's happened to her, too.  She asked what it looked like, and Christian quickly replied,"It has cars all over it!"  Michaela added,"It also has car noises like 'Beep' and 'Vroom'!"  She nodded her head and said she would look out for it.

We went back upstairs since she had also encouraged us to go ahead and look inside the classroom; now that we had official permission I didn't feel so funny about going in.  We walked in the door and looked all around.  Christian walked the entire class, Michaela followed him, checking all around.  He looked inside his desk, over by the books, at the other door.  I looked on the counter right next to the door we entered, as well as to my right where a little table stood.

All the while I could hear Eliana in the background, chanting something.  She had been as quiet as a moonbeam up until now, so I turned to ask her what she was saying.  She had gotten up on her toes on the foot strap of her stroller and had her little arm and finger pointed straight up; she said again, as clear as a clean glass, "Christian's lunchbox!  There it is!  Christian's lunchbox!  There it is!"  I looked where she was pointing and right there beside my face, on the very counter I had looked at upon entering the room, sat Christian's lunchbox. 

It was laughing at me. 

I called the other kids, told them to come on, and showed them how Eliana had found the elusive lunchbox.  They laughed and laughed and we all told her what a good job she had done.  I still can't believe it; Michaela and I even had our glasses on! 

I might have to get one of those satellite trackers that you can implant.  Lunchbox, I've got my eye on you.  Actually, I've got Eliana's eyes on you.  Mine don't seem to work all that well.