A Look Back at 2022

Happy New Year!

Last year’s post remarked that even if I gave up other posts I would always stick with this and this year that turned out to be true. I posted a lot of photos on Instagram and kept up project notes and things there, but sadly neglected this. That’s ok, though. I really just love my big look back. I’ve also thought, “why bother even clicking post? Isn’t it enough to have this saved as a Google doc?” and you know I am looking into printing out that massive document. I’ve got 13 years’ worth and each one ends up being like 20 pages with the photos included.  As usual, I began by reading last year’s post, which I really loved. All day today we’ve been sharing memories so I feel pretty ready to do this. Sticking with my categories…

Making Stuff (aka, mostly sewing)

This year I only made one garment, but it had been on a to-do list for quite some time-the Winslow Culottes! They are voluminously fun, and as they are black seem very practical for the wardrobe, but the truth is I haven’t worn them very much.
I did a lot more crocheting this year, accomplishing a 2021 goal of making a hat. I actually made 3! (Just realized one is not pictured, but it’s a chunky knit made for Tabby for Christmas.) I finished another small blanket, and got started on an accidentally large ripple afghan. I’d hoped to finish it by now but gasp! One of my colors is apparently discontinued. In the Christmas hubbub I could not deal with it, but now I will need to turn my attention to finding a suitable replacement.  Although it’s not done I am proud of what I have so far.

My biggest “making” achievements this year were finally finishing my Dresden Plate quilt–Hooray!!– and making six (!) of mmmcraft’s new pattern for a felt house. I loved making these little houses and tweaking details. The tiny string of lights inside! The little trees! The mini Santa! It took my miniature loves to a new level. I kept one for myself but gave the others away as gifts.
As for other felt things…I did make my 3rd witch, this year with a mushroom theme. And in the spring I turned one of the Twelve Days patterns into an Easter Bunny, styled after my favorite Easter story, The Country Bunny.   I  started the yearwith hearts for Valentine’s Day and ended it with a snow globe yesterday.

As for the quilt, well it was everything I wanted it to be. This summer I buckled down and got to hand quilting it. I found a method that worked better for me and methodically worked my way through the Beatles’ catalog while standing and quilting at my ironing board (using it as a raised table.) I love these fabrics and will cherish this quilt.

Our Pets:

This spring there were some sad losses. Both of our guinea pigs, Samson and Louie, died (of old age natural causes) bringing an end to an era. I still find myself setting aside salad trimmings for them. Very sadly our beloved giant rooster Carl died. And very sadly and unexpectedly my mom’s darling dog, Harry, died. We miss them all.

 

Their losses left a little room for an opening, though…

A big highlight of our year was the adoption of Goose, a kitten. Goose was a birthday surprise for Tabby and was possibly the most successful surprise ever. We had decided in the summer that we’d get Tabby a cat (she had  been requesting we get a cat for the past year or so) and it would be a birthday surprise. We wrapped up a cat carrier and took a video of her opening it. When she realized it meant a cat, oh my goodness. That video. Pure joy! Two days later we went to St. Hubert’s and looked at lots of cats and Tabby picked the tiniest kitten there, which she promptly named Goose. We have loved having a kitten around and she is a delight. My camera roll is totally full up of just a million pictures of her. At this point she’s well integrated with Liesl and Sweetie and Willow, which is great. She especially loves batting at Willow, which Willow tolerates with gentle amused grace.

In the spring Willow had a torn ACL, but we’re happy to say she recovered nicely! 
In the fall we got 8 chicks to replenish our very small (6 old hens) flock. One ended up dying, so that left seven. They are grown now, but haven’t yet started laying. We look forward to that happening!

Garden:

We didn’t even plant our garden out front this year. We’re really floundering here. We opted to just do tomatoes in containers,which were very successful. The peonies were gorgeous, as usual, but the coneflower beds seemed a little meh this summer. And for the first time (honestly, how we dodged this bullet for 18 years when no one else in our town has I don’t know so I should just be grateful) the deer discovered and ate almost all of our hosta. The front porch houseplant bonanza was charming, again, though, so that was something.

In the way back we successfully grew pumpkins (about a half dozen), and the corn looked pretty good until…the deer ate it.

And, though our garden may not have been ravishing, we had some very welcome visitors this year-hummingbirds! Though we’ve had hummingbird visitors in the past, this year we had several times daily visits from at least two separate hummingbirds (possibly a third, too.) Every time they were a delight.

 

Concerts:

This year Tabby and Clark got to go to a lot of concerts, too! It’s great seeing them get to see bands they like and Paul is just a hero in our house for driving us all to Philly all the time, scoring tickets, knowing how things work, and taking care of us all so that we can rock out to live music. My list of shows this year is stellar and basically represents every music I like:

The War on Drugs (exactly what I wanted them to be), Glen Hansard & Marketa Irglova (heart achingly beautiful. I’d forgotten what beautiful music they make), Kishi Bashi (and Tall Tall Trees) (will never disappoint me. This particular show was very tiny and just A++), Kurt Vile (who also showed up at as a surprise guest at another show!),

Kraftwerk (perhaps the weirdest concert. I loved the whole experience, 3D, die hard fans, cool sounds), Aurora (she is so great live, Tabby came with us) Beach House(all 4 of us went),Guster (we just love these guys. Had tickets to see them a month later at Carnegie Hall but bailed), Decemberists (it had been so long! Truly one of my favorite bands and they sounded amazing), Ben Folds (we’ve seen Ben a few times before and this wasn’t his best but he’s still good), Elvis Costello (I’ll call this the one semi dud of the year), Pearl Jam (with Clark, which was incredible. They will never let me down), Kathleen Edwards,Death Cab for Cutie (our 3rd, and maybe best, time seeing them), Mother Mother (with Clark & Max, what a fun high energy show),and we ended the year seeing 2021 EuroVision winners Måneskin (with Tabby.) Going out with a bang because g-d this show was so fun. They played a song (I Wanna Be Your Slave ) TWICE, once in encore, which was just nuts but also a fantastic move because everyone loved it all over again!

As a family we also went to see the iconic Blue Man Group, which turned out to be a lot of fun. And a very big deal for me, Paul and I went to see The Music Man on Broadway, starring Hugh Jackman and Sutton Foster. This is one of my favorite musicals and to see it on Broadway with those two was just an absolute dream for me.

Big Things:

This year had some big things in, mostly all having to do with Tabby and Clark. Tabby graduated from 8th grade. With things “back to normal” at school this meant there was a flurry of activity at the end of the year-an awards night, a dance, and graduation.

Over the summer Tabby performed in her 4H club production, as usual, but she was also a camp counselor at 4H day camp for a week, in addition to attending sleepaway Girl Scout camp. Meanwhile, Clark went on the trip of a lifetime at the start of the summer–he went to Europe with a group from school on a tour and study of Holocaust sites. It’s the longest he’s ever been away, not to mention being overseas and experiencing something big and meaningful. We missed him but loved hearing about everything and seeing pictures. Although a lot of the trip was very sad and a lot to process, he also got to experience the wonders of being in a new country, traveling with friends, eating new foods, and so on. When he got back he got his driver’s license, and boy did that change a lot of things. He went on vacation with his friend’s family in Cape May and drove himself there!

Then in the fall Tabby and Clark got to attend the same school for the first time since kindergarten/3rd grade. It’s his last year and her first year of high school. She’s also doing vo-tech and really enjoying the Graphic Communications program. Clark’s applying to colleges, which is surreal.

So while nothing momentous happened to me or Paul, just being parents of all these big changes is plenty momentous enough.

Hmm…I did just remember something pretty big. I turned 50! We had a grand party and it was a lot of fun celebrating.

Trips:

This year we were able to do a lot of traveling! We took one regular vacation over the summer and three other mini (2-3 nights) trips. (Plus lucky Clark also went to Europe and Cape May. My goodness!!)

In the spring we headed to Washington, D.C. primarily to do a couple of days at the Smithsonian. We saw some wonderful exhibits, spent time at the zoo so I could see my beloved baby panda, and trudged around seeing monuments. It was super. I love D.C.

In the summer we rented a cabin in the Berkshires on a lake in some middle of nowhere community. It was glorious. We have all agreed that the lake was the best swimming we’ve ever had in our lives. We primarily played games, read, and swam. But we did venture out to Stockbridge so we could all go to the Norman Rockwell museum. I had been there a few years before and was eager for the others to experience it as I found it quite moving.

A couple of weeks later we wrapped up the summer by going to this place in the Adirondacks we like, right on the Hudson River, just south of Lake George. We were happy to return there and spent some touristy time playing hilarious miniature golf in Lake George (we had eyed this place last year and were determined to go this year.) We had a dramatic end to the trip when a huge storm came in, knocking down terrifyingly large trees on the property and knocking out power. It was too scary/unsafe to stay so we ended up basically fleeing and getting home well after midnight.

Then, this fall, we took a trip we’ve always wanted to do, which was visit Salem, MA for a couple of days. We went a couple weeks after Halloween so it wasn’t crowded or crazy, and had a lovely time. I’d say many many of our Christmas presents came from here because there were tons of little shops to wander around and visit. We did go to the Salem Witch Museum, and out to eat, and the second night we did Massachusetts fun–candlepin bowling. It was a lovely little jaunt. As a special bonus, my niece met us for breakfast before we left and we haven’t seen her in years, so that was just wonderful.

Special Moments and Random Memories:

And now, the random list of special moments and memories throughout the year. I asked for input from the rest of the fam, so some of their things are in here, too.

First night in DC and going to an underground taco place, Tiki Taco, and having the best tacos EVER.

Running into a friend at the Museum of Natural History (Tabby)

One day this summer Clark, Tabby and I went to Sandy Hook and had a gorgeous beach day. Clark remembers that there were lots of dead crabs floating in the water, which shockingly didn’t bother me. But I do remember the sheer thrill and joy of watching dolphins frolic and leap!! Also, swimming out to a distant sandbar with Clark to jump over the waves.

Walking Willow by the river and being surprised by a heron taking off close by. (Clark)

Stopping on the way home from Cape May to meet Dad for lunch and getting Kirby drinks. (Clark)

This memory is not fun, but is definitely crazy–Clark and I driving across our one lane bridge (he was driving, 2 days before license) and a car swooped onto the bridge and drove right into us!!!

Going all the way to the Mann with Paul and then everyone being sent to shelter under the pavilion and waiting two hours before they finally said the concert was cancelled. It sucked but hearing and watching the big storm roll in was pretty cool.

Spending dozens of hours this summer in the basement playing Stardew Valley! I’ve never been this caught up in a video game and I adooooooored it. Totally caught up in the world, so relaxing and fun. I loved my little farmer, Ramona.

A special memory from two days ago–Clark and I replaying Kirby’s Epic Yarn the day after Christmas. It was very nostalgic as we remembered each level. We were perplexed that something we recalled Clark playing for months when he was 8 (and good at it) took us 6 hours. Also, he was much nicer to play with now than then.

Speaking of video games, in January Paul started playing Pikmin and it became his walking delight for the entire year.

We have a running joke in our family about Clark finding money on the ground. When he WhatsApped us from Prague to tell us he found the American equivalent of $250 on the ground we couldn’t believe it. He literally just finds money everywhere!

Lunar Faire! We went to our first Lunar Faire this summer and loved it. (everyone else went to other ones, but this is the only one I went to.) It was held at a local buffalo farm and had a pride month theme. There was a simply beautiful moment looking at the full moon rising over the farm with the lunar faire letters glowing in lights.

Spontaneously stopping at an accordion museum in Connecticut and finding out it really was a little local museum that was a collection of hundreds of spectacular accordians. The owner and his wife were so friendly and sweet, played for us, and let us play too.

Taking Clark to visit my alma mater (Trenton State College, now TCNJ) and walking in to the student center. I had not been there since I graduated in 1994 and it was emotionally overwhelming to say the least. I became immediately teary. Seeing my old dorm room window was pretty cool, too.

That moment in the beginning of the Music Man when Harold Hill (Hugh Jackman) suddenly stands up and reveals himself.

Watching all three seasons of Umbrella Academy all together. We loved it and got so caught up in it. 

Going out to a seafood restaurant in Salem and just getting a big bowl of mussels for my dinner.

Seeing Tabby’s beautiful drawing of glass (white on black) in an art show, and then this school year stopping by the school for a work thing and seeing it hanging up in the school’s office!

Hearing Tabby’s teacher describe her as she presented her with a very special award. It was one of my proudest moments ever and sometimes I start to cry just thinking about it.

At my birthday party feeling a little tipsy and merry and talking at length to two also tipsy and merry friends about all the weird things in our silverware drawer. We were cracking up as we looked at baby spoons and other stuff and I’ve often laughed just remembering that.

Hand quilting on a hot day while listening to all the Beatles.

Playing miniature golf on our vacation at a place that was the best theme I’ve ever seen carried out–it was Swiss and every hole was something about Switzerland. We had an absolutely grand time.

Deciding to visit the Baltimore Aquarium on our way home from DC and discovering that something I’d remembered from childhood as being huge and terrifying was….not.

Arriving at the lake on our vacation and just walking directly into it and swimming right out. The water was incredible. 

Playing in the lake–charades jumping off the floating dock-Clark pretending to be an old person looking at facebook on their phone, playing catch with a tennis ball in the water.

Lots of good times this year!!! So far Tabby and I have managed to still not have caught Covid, though Clark started AND ended the year with it, and Paul also had it. Fortunately they did not feel ill with it. Knock on wood that Tabby and I can keep our streak going this year. We really had a lot of wonderful family times together this year, making lots of happy memories and just really enjoying time with each other-games, trips, shared experiences, and so on. I really couldn’t ask for anything more, so here’s to a 2023 that has plenty of fun and games, experiences and learning, laughter and wonder, creativity, and at least a few dips in a lake 🙂

Happy New Year! 

Sarah

A Look Back at 2021

Happy New Year! I think even if I end up going down to never posting here I will always write this year end look back. I love reading my past ones and it really is a wonderful scrapook of the year. Obviously this is the second New Year’s where there’s a lot of “worst year ever” “kick it to the curb” “good riddance” etc.  And yeah. Year two of a pandemic and a lot of terrible things in the world. It was a tough year. Last night I found myself listing all the bad things and moments and I thought “holy cow, this year was terrible.” But! I’m going to be a Pollyanna because you know what? There were a lot of really good times, too. And just because this year was hard I don’t want to overlook all the good things. For one thing, we all got vaccinated and boostered! Yeah!  So this post is going to be relentlessly cheerful because no one wants a recap of all the bad moments. And years from now I assume I won’t say “Oh yeah, in 2021 my knees hurt so much”, instead I’ll say “remember when Clark started driving?” So, moving on… Oh, and of course the counterpart to this is the recap of my year in reading, which is  my  Top Ten Books of 2021

Sewing
On my cluttered sewing table I keep a notepad, one page lists the goals and notes for the year, on another page I wrote down everything I made. I took a look at it yesterday and saw that I very neatly managed to evade my 3 main absolutely-must-do surely-I’ll-have-no-problem-accomplishing-these three goals. (I STILL haven’t made Winslow Culottes, though I did finally buy the fabric for them, I STILL didn’t finish my Dresden quilt although I did finish the top and begin hand quilting it, I STILL didn’t use/make anything from the sewing with knits books I got for Christmas last year.) On the other hand, I made a ton of stuff.  I garment sewed, cross stitched, needle felted, embroidered, created miniature objects, beaded and seqined, used my serger, hand quilted, painted, and drew. It was a very creative year!  No 12 Days of Christmas felt this year-instead I made three sets of Santa and Mrs. Claus and had a lot of fun with them, especially making the sets for my brothers and creating teeny tiny accessories (the plum pudding and hobby horse I was very proud of.) I also made the elves, which I loved and was super proud of the teeny tiny pencil. Finally I made the Ghost of Christmas Past. I love making these felt creations, embellishing them with embroidery, sequins, and beads. I also had a lot of fun creating my “Spider Witch”. As with the others-I was especially proud of the tiny accessories I created for her.

I made lots of festive Christmas things:
As for clothes, I made 2 Ashton tops, a not great Ashton top hacked into a sundress, another Roscoe dress, and my best garment of all–the Pussy Bow Blouse in cherished Rifle Paper Co. floral rayon.  I also made a skirt that was way better than I thought it would be. For next year I want to make another Pussy Bow (I meant to make a long sleeve for the winter and just didn’t) and those darn Winslow Culottes.

It seems so long ago as it was the first make of the year, but I did make my 3rd Maker’s Tote, the small size, for myself. I love how it came out. Maybe another goal this year is to make another Noodlhead bag pattern…. 

And finally, my big handcrafting accomplishment this year was learning to crochet! It was a big goal for myself and I loved learning to do it and also just doing it! I haven’t done any in a while, but I think January is a wonderful time to sit around crocheting up something. I think the goal for this year should be to learn how to make a hat.

Last year I included a paragraph “for posterity” about our daily routine. When we went back to school this fall (Sept 2021) it was a return to totally normal schedule, classes, routine. It was such a welcome relief and immediately felt normal and regular. So much that my colleagues and I would sometimes say “huh. I forgot that last year we weren’t doing this.” In reality, we were hybrid in-person/virtual until March when we went back to school full time. And even though we were there, it was still weird and weird schedules (an hour and a half of lunch and recess duty outside every day.) Being back at school and work with a regular schedule was great for all of us. I was happy at work to do activies I hadn’t done in a long time and to have a regular rotation of classes and nothing virtual. Of course, as I’m writing this with school set to return in 2 days, I think hardly anyone will be in school next week due to Omicron variant having nearly everyone exposed, quarantining, or testing postive.

Concerts
There was a brief glorious period this year where we were all fresh with the glow of being vaccinated and things opening up again. We got to have an epic return to Game Day with our dear friends! We hugged people! And also very momentous–we got to go to concerts again. So many of Paul’s cancelled 2020 concerts had been rescheduled for the fall of 2021 that it resulted in him going out constantly for a very concentrated period of time. For me it was just a few concerts this year: Japanese Breakfast, St. Vincent, Hella Mega Tour,  and Nada Surf. Japanese Breakfast was highly anticipated and touted, big return to live music, our favorite venue and it was WONDERFUL. Amazing to be out and about, felt safe (they checked vaccinations and everyone remained masked.) St. Vincent was incredible, too. Really fun show. Hella Mega was a big family outing at a big venue. We had so. much. fun. seeing Green Day, Weezer, and Fall Out Boy together.  And finally Paul and I saw Nada Surf, a fave band of his. They were great, but it was a bit marred by an aggressive drunk lady causing a physical scene with people around us. I also went to see Almost Queen, a tribute band, and I didn’t love the big outdoor Asbury Park scene, but it was fun. Paul and I also had an elegant concert experience one weeknight-a one hour concert in the tiny auditorium in Princeton where the performers and audience were on the stage all together. It was two amazing mandolin musicians and really lovely. I think the kids may have seen more shows than me! Paul took Clark and Tabby to all kinds of things. We do have tickets for things in 2021, but many shows are being cancelled again, so who knows what we’ll see this year. And that’s ok.

Garden
This year’s garden was again in the front yard and it was slightly better than last year? We had some really nice sunflowers. Our roses were great, the raspberries were abundant, the morning glories were very slow to bloom but when they did there were truly heavenly. In our way back Paul did an experimental untended garden of corn and pumpkins. We harvested four tasty ears of corn and 3 beautiful pumpkins and a million bumpy decorative gourds. I just asked if we should give up on vegetables and devote ourselves to flowers and he suggests we give it one more year.  We weren’t without beautiful plants and once again I took all the houseplants and put them on the front porch to create a lovely oasis. My magical pink petunias from a porch container in summer 2020 bloomed indoors over the winter, I repotted them on the porch for this summer and they are STILL BLOOMING inside.

The Animals
In the chicken coop we are down to 8 hens and 1 rooster. We did have a hen and a little rooster die. Meanwhile, Carl continues to putter about blindly and do just fine and our NINE year old hen, Buffy, is robustly still with us. We may need to consider in the spring getting more hens or chicks. 
We had a big loss this fall-our beloved rabbit, Gordon, passed on. He was 9 and had a long and sprightly life.

Vacations
We went on two vacation this summer. First, we went to New Hampshire for a week to stay in a house we’d rented years ago and talked about ever since. The main draw for us was total access to the owner’s kayaks, paddleboards, and canoe. The weather wasn’t great but that didn’t stop us from swimming in Little Squam Lake’s beautiful waters and floating around in kayaks and paddleboards. After last year’s couple days away up in the Adirondacks we made sure to book 3 days there to end the summer. It was wonderful going back and messing around in the lake together, going on a white water rafting excursion, and spontaneously being super touristy and walking around Lake George and playing mini golf. All vacations included lots of time to play cards and other games, read, and watch Paul paint his Pantone postcards.

 

Random Highlights:
My new favorite annual feature. Just a random nonchronological list of memories, moments, highlights. 

Watching Fall Out Boy and all their pyrotechnics while it literally poured rain on all of us. We were drenched and I was crabby but knew eventually I’d look back on it and laugh and indeed, I am.

The incredible surprise of coming home from a week away and finding Paul had painted the whole side of the garage in a mural I’ve always wanted! 

Companion memory to the above–driving home with Tabby in the most severe rain/thunderstorm I’ve ever experienced. It was terrifying! We had to pull off the highway.

Spending a night away in a hotel with my bff and holing up watching tv and talking and laughing.

Seeing real loons in person!! 

Watching the bald eagle at our river drinking from the river and splashing around and then casually flying up to a tree.

Going on a hike through a forest and swamp in NH to get to a little “secret” (not really, it’s listed) swimming area. We saw so many cool new-to-us mushrooms and fungi! We were Seeking everything like crazy.

Taking Tabby on a suprise outing-out to a fancy tea house for tea. It was a “someday when things open up again we’ll go there.” I told her to dress nicely and we were having an outing. We had a lovely time and took fancy pictures and delighted in being seated in the Princess Diana corner.

Baking a peony ombre cake and discovering my new favorite cake– pistachio strawberry cake. Also, putting fancy sprinkles on everything.

Clark getting his driving permit and my very first time driving with him going into the Somerville Circle.

Watching Paul paint his Pantone postcards at the picnic table overlooking the lake while on vacation.

Buying a guinea pig Christmas tree ornament with Paul in a Lake George shop

That glorious one time this summer when I won Catan!

Dying my hair purple, pretty spontaneously. Getting to work and realizing I hadn’t really thought through that everyone would see it and it would attract a lot of attention.

Discovering that we have lilies of the valley growing beautifully. I guess we planted them and forgot? It was a lovely spring surprise.

Going to the Great Swamp on my birthday to enjoy a hike and finding out that it was some special snake time and everyone was all excited to see what looked like thousands of them to me. 

Tabby and I spent a week with my bff and her girls doing Girl Scout camp. It was a million billion degrees. We loved being with them but this memory is the one that will make me laugh every time–each day after camp Jo took us to a different fast food drive through for a treat. Driving up in her big mini van and saying into the speaker “I’ll have seven medium waffle fries.”

Taking Clark in Philadelphia to see John Mulaney and afterward finding an awesome little fancy street restaurant and eating incredible bao buns and soup dumplings at 10pm in a twinkly street.

Taking Clark into NYC and wandering around and we just happened upon the John Derian shop completely decked out with the most incredible Christmas ornaments ever (purchased tiny mushrooms and bald eagle to commemorate some of the above memories.)

Driving to New Hampshire and realizing all of a sudden that Clark had been playing the same song on a loop for like an hour.

Repainting our tiny downstairs bathroom. The change from bright yellow to soothing light aqua transformed the place!

Having our Christmas cookie party again! We missed it last year and were thrilled to have it this year, a little smaller and with lots of open windows, but oh my goodness that feeling of holiday celebrating with friends we hadn’t seen in a long time was wonderful. A very merry day.

I embedded a ton of pics in this post already so I’m just going to end with one of me, a family photo, and a fave. Also, I realize that Willow didn’t get enough photo play here but I assure you she had plenty of frolics in the meadow and river, she pounced on rocks (last winter she actually caught a vole/mouse/something by pouncing into the snow just like a fox), and had many photos taken of her sitting beautifully in streams to cool off. Favie is Paul’s legs up in Little Squam Lake.

Family portrait is our New Year’s Eve pic. It pretty much sums us up.

And self portrait is taken by Tabby at the tea shop. If I write a book this can be my author photo. But I wrote this big post so consider it my author photo here!
 Here’s to a new year that, well, I don’t want to set the bar too high. So how about this-finding happiness and joy where we can, taking time to create and imagine, and caring for each other.

Happy New Year!   Sarah

awww, I couldn’t leave Willow out here. Here she is living her best life:

Stockings Were Hung by the Chimney with Care

Merry Christmas! Last year I had a million (seemingly) handmade gifts to reveal at this point, but not this year. The Santa couples were received by my brothers and sisters-in-law and they loved them. I wrote a little backstory for each couple that I included in their keepsake boxes. You can read the stories at the bottom of this post.

I did have a big sewing project that I kept putting off and am pleased to report was finished in time for Christmas Eve-new stockings for all of us! I’d made Paul and the kids stockings about 15 years ago and though they were cute, the letters and embellishments weren’t holding up. (Mine was awesome because my talented grandma made it.) Honestly, the planning of this took forever. What kind of fabric did we want? What style did we want? I literally created a google poll for the kids and Paul to take. We decided that we wanted our names down the side in felt, sewn atop a quilted stocking of cute fabric. And the cuff would have the embellishments. Kudos to Paul for being sent to Joann’s with the instruction “Look around for green and red pompom trim or something.”He  found adorable fluffy pompom and tassels. I happened to have that red gingham ruffle. We all have different fabrics, but are all basically green for the stocking, red for the cuff. There was a bit of worry that Tabby’s wouldn’t be done in time because the original fabric order didn’t have enough choices. Fortunately she ended up looking through my bin of fabric and choosing and old print that I had a lot of and don’t even know where it came from (but I’ve always liked it.) Our names are in red felt that I hand stitched on with embroidery floss. I also made these stockings larger than our old ones to really accomodate all the goodies that would go in them. I really love how they turned out!

 

The fabric I used for my ruffle was from the Peppermint Please panel by Sarah Watts. I had bought this way back in early November, the idea being you could make drawstring bags for gift giving out of the printed fabric.  One panel had the rectangles with cute graphics, another panels was just four background type fabrics. (Why one panel had 6 and the other 4 is confounding to me.) Anyway, I liked the mouse with yarn and thought it would be cute to use for my cuff.  I ended up making just two drawstring bags, both fully lined (using old pillowcases from when the kids were little-now it’s a sentimental lining!) They are so nice that we immediately declared we’d only use them for gifts within our family so we’d get to keep them.

One of the picture panels had a sewing machine on it, which would be perfect for a handmade gift, or….. What if I made it be a cheery little holiday decoration? After seeing it sitting on my ironing board during the season I thought it would be nice to hang up. On that dreary day after Christmas when you’re sad that Christmas is ending I decided to try my hand at something I’ve been wanting to for a long time-some free motion machine quilting. I had the presser foot (acquired a couple of years ago but never tried) and settled in to watch a couple You Tube videos and figure out how to set it up. Then practice practice and finally just jumped right in. I think it’s pretty good! (very first picture up top.) Just don’t look at the back. Where you will clearly see that I have a long way to go figuring out speed and stitch length. However since this is just going to hang up and not get strenuous use/washing, I just left it. I added some little embellishments to the picture:

and then I bound it with some nice red fabric (from the stockings).

As for Christmas itself? A lovely family day at home, as usual. Sticky buns eaten and presents gleefully unwrapped and delighted in. Now we’re in the doldrums of Christmas week where I both want to make the most of everything and also do nothing and also worry that it’s going too fast. I’ll be back for my favorite New Year’s tradition-a recap of the year!

 

Meet The “Woodland” Clauses

Santa and Mrs. Claus live in a beautiful forest home resembling a wood timbered ski lodge.  Mrs. Claus is a friend to all the animals and often feeds the forest creatures by hand. She has a warm woolen cloak to wear and warm woolen mittens, too. The shades of red and green they wear remind them not just of the greens of the woods-the mosses and firs- but also the early spring Nordic wild strawberries growing abundantly. The forest has tall holly trees with shiny green leaves and bright red berries that make the woods look like they are decorated for Christmas. Mrs. Claus often cuts branches to decorate their home. Her skirt and cloak are embroidered with holly sprigs. She holds a mistletoe ball that she made herself from the beautiful mistletoe growing in the forest.

Santa spends a lot of time tending to his beautiful sleigh and the reindeer in the stables. Because of this, his cloak is embroidered with two reindeer heads, bedecked with crystals. 

They might love their rustic life, but make no mistake-it’s Santa and Mrs and as such they do have some tastefully luxurious touches, such as gold buckles and trim. When Santa travels around the world on Christmas Eve he likes to have a snack that’s not just cookies children have left out, so Mrs. Claus sends him off with his own Christmas pudding to snack on.

Both Clauses love to give gifts to children and grownups alike. Mrs. Claus has wrapped a special gift for Crissy in her luxe red glitter wrapping paper, while Santa carries a festive stocking filled with the North Pole’s specialty candy canes. 

The Clauses wish you a merry Christmas this year and all the years to come!

Meet the Boca Raton Clauses

Santa and Mrs. Claus spend their busy months of the year at the North Pole, supervising the toy workshop, keeping on top of lists and charts and requests, helping the elves, and more. When they are not there they head directly to Boca Raton to rest and relax. Mrs Claus, especially, has a fondness for luxury shopping and she can really indulge her high end shopping desires there.
Both Clauses wear shades of aqua and coral to remind them of the sunny climes, accented with plenty of bling.
Mrs. Claus wears winter white boots with gold buttons and matching white mittens. Her belt is made of soft gold leather. She loves to shop not just for herself, but also others. Her lavishly wrapped gift is for Karen-is it a new Hermes scarf? A bauble from Tiffany? Or perhaps something from an up and coming artist? She carries a mistletoe ball that she picked up in a gallery-it will last year round because it is made of semi precious gems rather than actual plants! Santa blanched a bit at the bill for that one but agreed it is a beautiful addition to their home and perfectly befitting their Christmas royalty status. He himself is also luxuriously attired.  His coral undersuit is accented by a deeper aqua overcoat. His belt and white boots are accented with gold leather and his boots have gold buttons. He carries a stocking filled with the North Pole’s specialty candy canes and a hobby horse made by the Head Elf. 

The Clauses wish you a merry Christmas this year and all the years to come!

The Spider Witch

Last year I made the most adorable sweet felt witch based on the Lady Dancing pattern from the Twelve Days of Christmas Ornaments. I was really pleased with her and as Halloween approached this year decided I wanted to make another. I had a lot of ideas about colors and styles, so it is a little disappointing that the one I made this year is so similar in pattern to the first one–not only did I keep the dress/skirt pattern, but I also ended up using the same color palette of purple and black (I mean….it’s a Halloween witch and I was headed straight for the black/purple/orange/green, so it’s not suprising, but I still wish they didn’t both have a purple dress.) That said, her vibe is very different. I wanted her to be a “spider witch”, which basically means I wanted to embroider metallic spiderwebs all over the overskirt and then base everything else on that. so I did!

Her underskirt is solid purple and I embellished it by stitching crossed lines and adding a purple sequin/clear bead at every intersection. I absolutely love this look. Her sleeves have a large spiderweb with black sequins in them. Her kerchief is green and the belt goes with the overskirt-it’s black. I added even more purple sequins there (alas, they are not on perfectly straight.) Of course she has black boots with shiny black sequins. Her hat is wonderfully crumpled-I simply glued a bit of pipe cleaner inside the seam and then bent it. She has cascading white hair and a painted facial expression that says maybe she likes you, maybe she doesn’t, maybe she’s casting a spell, maybe she’s not.

I had so much fun making up tiny accessories for her. In one hand she’s holding her pet spider. I created the little guy by taking a mini pom pom and coloring it black. Then I took a needle and black embroidery thread and stuck it through the pom pom and snipped. Four times makes 8 little wiggly legs!

Because she is a bit less sweet than last year’s botanical witch, she has a spell book. I’m quite proud of this little spell book. It has “writing” inside, a skull on the cover, stitches to indicate a binding, and best of all-a functional closure!!

 

Here are the two witches together. I’m imagining them as teachers at a witch boarding school. The students all like the witch on the right-her door is always open for a cup of some kind of herbal tea. The witch on the left they are not so sure about-they can never tell if she’s joking when she says things like “I”ll turn you into a frog, heh heh.”

I had so much fun making her and predict that I’ll make a new witch each year!

Santa & Mrs. Claus: Two Styles!

It looks like I did post about beautiful Boca Raton Mrs. Claus,but I didn’t share about her husband, Santa. And since then I’ve also got a new pair to share. So let’s do a Claus round up and meet the Claus couples.

The Boca Raton Clauses
This Mrs. has already been shown as a luxe lady with plenty of gold metallic felt touches. Her husband, Santa, is also quite luxe, with gold buttons and boot trim and a big gold buckle. His embroidery is what the pattern called for and I used bloth blue and gold seed beads and metallic blue thread. His glorious coat is a darker teal trimmed in the same light blue/aqua that was the main part of Mrs. Claus’s coat. His body is the coral color that was her dress. His coat is trimmed in blue sequins and the white trim on his hat has gold seed beads. His jaunty hat is topped with a bell. He carries a little pink stocking filled with candy canes. I actually made two stockings, one pink, one yellow, and then picked one for him.This is my first attempt at using the soft and fluffy (and automatically marcel waved) doll making hair I got for Christmas. It’s a bit tricky to work with, but I’m satisfied with his overall look. They are a completely stylish duo.

The Woodland Clauses

For this couple I had picked out reds and greens, but the red is more of a pinky strawberry and the green is foresty, so I immediately started thinking of them as having a woodland vibe. This naturally led to me wanting to stray from the pattern and do my own embroidery design-something that would be nature inspired, like branches and holly and ivy and berries. I started with Mrs. Claus and the expanse of her skirt. I gave her a green sequin border (I accidentally purchased the same green sequins I already had, so I am having a lavish hand with the green sequins.) and stiched curving freeform branches up the center. Little french knots and pink sequins made the berry clusters and I satin stitched a few leaves. Her sleeves are the same. As for the front coat panels it is more branches and berries. I love the embroidery I did and the colors. I’m afraid the trim is not perfectly aligned and gosh I struggled with her hood, but overall she is perfectly sweet and I picture her in the snowy woods feeding the birds and bringing special treats to the reindeer. She also got the fluffy hair treatment and oh my goodness was it unmanageable. It is safely shoved in there now.

[After finishing Mrs. I took a break to make a Halloween figure and then cross stitch a Snow Buddy, posts to come.]

Santa has the same red body as Mrs. Claus’s skirt and also a green coat, but his coat is made of the dark green felt, trimmed with white. I had the ambitious idea that his magnificent coat would feature a large reindeer head with decoratively curving antlers bedecked by beads. I think you can actually tell that’s what they are, so I’m awfully pleased. I used really nice clear beads for the bedecking. His sleeves feature the same embroidery as his wife’s. I’m prety thrilled with his coat. I made his hat and mittens match (as if they are a set that he bought or received) and they are a lighter green. His belt is traditional black with a big gold buckle. I was a little worried when I saw that combination that he would be too reminiscent of Elf, but I don’t think he is. He wears fancy boots that are black with gold metallic trim and beads. His hair is a long wizardy fluffy cloud (because that’s all I know how to do with this hair, fortunately it suits him.)

He carries the yellow stocking that I had already made, and then I made two fresh candy canes to go in it. Now, for the best part….the other accessories! I wanted to make something different and new. I thought it would be fun to try making a Christmas pudding and I also thought some kind of toy would be good, and a hobby horse seemed perfect. The Christmas pudding is one of the wood beads I use for the hands on some of the figures, painted. A red seed bead is the glace cherry. The horsie has embroidery thread mane and little 3d ears (pinched triangles of felt) and the post is a cut off toothpick. I am pretty thrilled with his wee accessories. He only needs two, and I just remembered Boca Santa has an empty hand, so I think the horse or pudding will go to him.

Here’s the happy couple:

That’s three sets of Santas and Mrs. Clauses I’ve made this year and I just love them. I love the pattern as is, but have really had fun making my own tweaks to it. The pattern calls for giving them a hanging string to make the ornaments but I’m not doing that because I like to imagine hands picking them up for years and years to come and enjoying looking at them and putting them in little scene.

Ho ho ho!

 

*I’ve just realized that Boca Santa has the year stitched on his coat, but Woodland Santa does not. I will have to carefully fix that.

Rest in Peace, Gordon

Last week we said goodbye to our beloved bun, Gordon. He was 9 years old and right up until the end had a very lively, energetic life. We got Gordon very spontaneously one day eight years ago–driving Tabby to a friend’s house we saw a sign that said “Free Rabbit, Huch $25.” Well don’t you know we went for it. Here is the day we got him: Over the years Gordon has given us a number of worried nights and agitated moments-in his younger years he would escape from the chicken coop. One day we came home from school and saw him in our neighbor’s yard! Several times he spent the night OUTSIDE and each time we were sure it was the last we’d seen of him. What chance would he have against the foxes, raccoons, and owls of the night? But he did!

Gordon lived among the chickens and he adored them, even choosing one as his special friend. (that friendship may have been one sided.) He enjoyed and was interested in Willow. And Wow! looking through old pictures I didn’t even realize we still had Pippin when we had Gordon, but look at them way back when:

In the past couple of years he slowed down a bit, but was still happy to come out of his hutch each morning and go find his favorite spots in the yard. He lost sight in one eye but didn’t let that stop him.
He loved the snow and in winter I would dig little pathways through the coop for him. He also participated in holiday photos.

He was a delight and we will miss him, but truly he had the most wonderful life a bunny could have.

Mrs. Claus, take 2

I really liked making Santa and Mrs. Claus for myself and was very keen on making them again and trying out some other color combos. I specifically was interested to see a coral and aqua (seafoam green?) combo. Very Miama Vice. or, as I kept referring to her as I was making her, Boca Raton Mrs. Claus. I imagined her enjoying shopping and luxury items, which is reflected in her fully blinged out ensemble. This is the first time I didn’t use the sulky transfer stuff, but instead just used freezer paper to trace my pieces and then used my dissolving marker to make some marks where the embroidery would go.

Her skirt is coral and has turquoise stitching on it with apricot colored sequins.For her coat I used some pinkish thread, but also metallic blue thread and some blue sequins. Although I hadn’t planned on that-the blue isn’t turquoise at all-I really liked the dark blue and how it looked against the felt.

There are both clear and gold seed beads scattered throughout. Her boots have gold sequins on them. I made her body top be the same color as her skirt so it would seem like she’s wearing a dress under the coat. Her belt is made with metallic gold felt. I opted not to stitch on it because a big gold belt with a giant gold buckle (sequin) is a chic statement piece for her. I basically love her whole outfit.

Of course it’s her little accessories that are so fun to make. She carries a gift and a mistletoe ball. Her gift is made from the same metallic gold felt so it looks like she used very fancy wrapping paper. It has an ivory ribbon and a little gift tag. I’m going to be giving this is a gift so I put the recipient’s name on the tag (and thus, blurred it out here.)
Her mistletoe ball is exactly the same as I made for my Mrs. Claus, except I used a coral ribbon.

I think she is sparkly and spectacular and was lots of fun to make. I will be making a Santa to go with her.

Summer Vacation Wrap Up, Pt. II

After NH we had a little time at home, which included an event we’d planned two years ago but had been postponed due to covid– attending the Hella Mega concert with the kids. The lineup was Weezer, Fall Out Boy, and Green Day. It was so much fun to go to a concert all together and this show was just a lot of fun. Even though it POURED on us.

Because we so loved our two night at the Elms last summer, we decided to end the summer with three nights there. (Just like last year we left after a storm that yielded heavy flooding around town. However, fortunately unlike last year, our basement was flooded and we weren’t without power.)
We stayed in the same cottage we so enjoyed, which is right in front of the little swimming area.

We spent a lot of time in the water, though unlike last year we didn’t do very much watersport, like kayaking. Perhaps we’d had our fill in New Hampshire. Though of course Tabby and I had to take out that ridiculous water cycle.

One super fun thing we did was a white water rafting excursion. We did this the first time we stayed here-when Tabby was 5. The end of the trip is right across the bay from where we stayed (and throughout the day could see other groups landing there.) That whole river and its rapids are created by a daily dam release from the Great Sacandaga Lake. It really is quite safe and tame-the rapids are always the same-but honestly it’s lots of fun and you get very wet and splashed and there is a spot where you can jump into the river and float a bit and it is just gorgeous.

We were a little disappointed by the local mini golf (and there were dropped ice creams and bug bites) so the next afternoon we sponaneously went to Lake George (it’s only 20 minutes away) and did Pirate Cove golf (a good do over for everyone), walked along the waterfront

, and had dinner out there. And we were still able to get home and sneak into the water for a nighttime dip one last time.

We just love this place and had a great time.

We left in the morning and were pleased to be home so early from a vacation, especially because..the next day we did another outing. We went down the shore to spend the day with friends who were vacationing all week there. It was so nice of them to have us for their last day of vacation. And we hadn’t yet been to the beach, so it was really nice. The water was warm and clear and beautiful. We had about 15 minutes swimming before a thunderstorm hit and we had to clear the beach. After a couple hours at the house, though, we were able to go back. It was now low tide and the waves were just gently rolling in, creating the most excellent swimming and frolicking water. And then!!! I saw something in the water. [If you know me, you know this was horrifying initially.] It was sting rays! A whole group of them! They swam right by us!! It was the most exciting thing. We saw several more after that, too. We had a great time swimming until we were waterlogged. It was a great end to the week.

Other highlights this summer: we grew actual corn that we could eat (a whole 4 ears); we had two hummingbirds be very regular visitors to our window feeders and they were so pretty and curious and entertaining; Paul started going to some concerts again, we saw Japanese Breakfast together at Union Transfer; the houseplants on our front porch were lush and copious; the mural Paul painted on the garage; I repainted the downstairs bathroom, and that’s about it!

And now here we are, facing down the barrel of the return to work and school. This will be my 6th full year and this return to work after two months off has not gotten any easier!

Farewell Summer! (i.e. vacation wrap up)

This summer we took two trips-a regular full week, plus an additional few days in another place. And both places were places we’ve been before and loved and continued to talk about, so why not just go there? First up, a week in New Hampshire at Little Squam Lake. We last went there in 2017.Technically we were on the river that comes out of Little Squam Lake, which itself goes into the big Squam Lake. All home to lots of beautiful nature, clear water, loons, and the filming of On Golden Pond.
We rented the same little house on a quite road. What we had loved most was the access to the owner’s kayaks, paddle boards, and canoe and that did not disappoint.

The water is clear and filled with gorgeous lilies. What was disappointing was the neighbors clearly not liking that their neighbor rents her house and basically telling us not to swim or hang out by the water. It was really offputting and put a damper on the fun of jumping off the dock into the water. However, we did end up spending more time at the town beach on Little Squam Lake and it was, admittedly, a lot of fun to swim there. The water was incredibly clear and I suppose a little chilly (especially given that it never got above 80 while we were there), but easy to spend a lot of time in.

One afternoon Tabby and I hung out there while Paul and Clark went on a (accidentally too long??) hike that led to the beautiful views of Squam and then down to the shoreline to a known jumping rock. One day we all did a little hike through a forest (Paul and I seeked all the new to us plants and amazing fungi that was there) which led to a little beach you could swim at. It was enchanting. So those were two new to us things that we really enjoyed. Sadly the beloved snowball ice cream did not live up to our memories. The cabin still had a poor mug situation which made us laugh and laugh.
Just like last time we went the world’s largest arcade over by Lake Winnepasaukee. In fact, due to heavy rains one night we actually went twice and had a great time. We even did go karts on one of those nights. Oh, and two more new things. We took a boat tour of Squam Lake on a very cloudy and grey morning. This was a pontoon boat with about 12 people on it and a pleasant chatty guide. He told us about the history of the area and pointed out things to us. Best of all was that we saw loons! Although I had heard them last time, I had not seen them, so this was an exciting bird sighting for me. We were able to see the spot that Paul and Clark had hiked to and gone swimming, which was neat. It’s an oddly empty and beautiful lake-deliberately so. People (rich people. Very rich people) who have homes there “by unspoken agreement” only paint their houses brown so that you can’t see them from the water. So the whole are is very unspoiled. 
Another new to us thing we did this year was visit the “Castle in the Clouds” which is a historic home high above Lake Winnepasaukee with amazing views. I do love a historic home and this one did not disappoint. On the way back we had lunch and a stroll around Meredith, NH, which was beautiful. They had a public art installation of a sculpture walk all around town and the waterfront. We checked out a few.

And of course between all that nature and swimming and paddleboarding and kayaking there were plenty of board games and even some movie nights. It was a wonderful week!

Santa’s Little Helpers

No, not Bart Simpson’s dog–elves!

I’ve had some big sewing projects to do this summer that I am just.not.doing. But I really wanted something to do at the end of the summer when I’m desperately trying to not think about work, and enjoy doing nothing and everything. Inspiration! Why not just start another felt project? Maybe another set of Santa and Mrs. Claus? Or wait–did I ever buy the elves pattern? It turned out I had not so I immediately puchased and downloaded the pattern (@mmmcrafts on Etsy) and had a soothing and inspirational evening sorting out my felt and choosing colors. Most satisfying. For these darling little elves I wanted their colors to coordinate, but not necessarily match the Santa and Mrs. I made earlier in the year. I decided the elves would wear hats and mitts the same red I’d used for Santa’s and Mrs’s coats. For their main colors I chose some teals/turquoises and light blues, with the same ivory trim, One big difference for this set of ornaments is that for Christmas I’d received a set of metallic felt and metallic threads and I knew I wanted to bling out these elves with all the sparkle. So, they have sequins and seed beads, metallic embroidery, bells, and metallic felt. I did use some regular embroidery floss, too, and I like how it turned out.

The construction of these was basically the same as any of the other figures I made. I have to say, the day I sewed the boy elf body it took me ever so much longer to do than I thought I would. For one thing, the elves are smaller than the other figures-about 4″ high. For another, changing the thread to match the felt meant ELEVEN thread changes on that little body.

Of course, the most fun was the little accessories. I am most pleased with the elf’s pencil, which I made to look like a standard yellow Ticonderoga pencil. It’s a toothpick (I asked Paul to get me one from the kitchen and he happened to bring me a yellow one, so I didn’t even paint it) cut to 1″. I dipped the end in pink paint to make an eraser, used black paint for the end, and a thin stripe of green paint. I did also print “Ticonderoga” on one side, but I wasn’t that tidy about it, so ended up facing that part to the back.
There’s also a little mailbag, which I made to match the shoes using the same metallic felt, filled with tiny letters. Of course I decorated the envelopes just like I would a full size one I was mailing to someone. I love how they came out. For scale, here’s all the envelopes:

And the boy elf holds a list of our names and we are all successfully deemed “Nice.”
The little shoes gave me even more grief than usual and I felt like an elf cobbler. The metallic felt is soft and pliable (and feels like normal felt on the back side) and it felt like I was making wee leather shoes. Seed beads made buttons (though I only put them on the ends of one of the elf.)

One thing I did different for this set was paint their heads rather than fiddling with markers which might bleed on the wood. I like the way it came out. I think their sweet faces and jaunty beaded and striped hats look quite jolly!

I’m pretty thrilled with them and love to think of these felt people being heirlooms for future generations to look at (I didn’t put the year on either of them, so we’ll hope the year on Santa is good enough.) One thing I haven’t decided on yet is names! What should I name these little elves?