The Deathwish of Children

A long time ago (about 4 years come January) Brian and I learned quickly that babies and small children don't have much of a self preservation drive. I mean they eat and sleep but that's about it. They don't get that if they roll over to far on the bed they will rather quickly meet the floor, or that standing on the back of the couch is not the BEST idea they could have today.
Our son, Jacob has always learned fairly quickly that when we tell him not to do something ("don't touch that - it's hot, it will burn you, that will hurt") he stops, thinks and listens - if he doesn't listen, he only makes the mistake once.
Abigail on the other hand has been actively trying to kill herself from pretty much the beginning. Not only does she not listen, sometimes she must get hurt two or more times before she figures out she can't 'beat it.' She was 10 months old when I had to bolt the bookshelves to the walls too keep them from tipping over when she tried to climb them. There was the stairs incident here back when Abby was only 8 months old. I am amazed that the only real injury she has sustained at this point is a burn on her fingers and that was the babysitters fault.
So today we are at the playground and they have a climbing apparatus (at the playground? go figure!) some bigger kids were stepping up (there are about 3 levels - one is about 8 inches off the ground, one is about 2.5 feet and the other is about 3ft up) and jumping down. Abby got bored with the first level in no time flat and then immediately climbed to the top (I am not sure how she got up there all on her own but she did) and said 'jump!' I was standing next to her and had my hands out to which she immediately brush away saying 'no help me!' She looked down, thought for about 1/2 a second and then said 'JUMP!' again. I grabbed her by the arm at the last second because she was gonna jump without my help but it was too high. She was mad I helped her but she only tried jumping from the second level after that. Also refusing help. After she landed, fell back onto her ass and realized that may have been a little much she went back to picking up all the beauty bark and making piles on the play structure.
That girl is fearless. Jacob wouldn't even jump off the second step. He is a bit more timid than his sister in many ways and I don't know if he has more fear, or more sense (I think a bit of both). He has always been a bit less impulsive than her.
I am going to have to make sure Abby NEVER gets the 'garbage bag for a parachute off the roof' idea or I am going to have one helluva hospital bill. On the other hand maybe her chutzpa will get her far in life.

Back in Action!

After much frustration I finally asked my questions on the forums at blogger and got an answer. A rather simple on actually: switch back to the 'Old' editor. I did that and it works! I would love to know what was wrong with the new editor (I am sure it is on my end) but whatever....this works.
I was working on some fibery things and my little helper popped up to the counter to 'watch' me as I was working. In addition to the hackle I was using, my combs and flick carder were on the counter and she decided that she wanted to play with them. Actually I believe she kept saying 'help mommy' as she 'carded' some wool. Maybe I have a future fiber lover here. She does seem to like anything I am working with - she'll rub it and say 'soft, pretty'
Quite some time ago (like before we moved -so more than a year) I started this bear. I had her all cut out and all of the pieces together, I just had to assemble and stuff. I give you "Spooky" For sale in my Etsy shop.

I also made another pumpkin...Alexis this is the one I started the day you and the boys were here:

I kinda like his evil little grin, don't you?

And last but not least this is some spinning I have been doing. Brian brought me all home some wool one evening and I love the color. It's funny because I probably wouldn't have gone for this color but I am really enjoying it. Brian said I should make something for myself so I have decided on a sweater. What you see here is about 1/3 of what I will eventually need to spin. I have 4 bobbins spun up and 5 more to go.

Then I will ply them as a 3ply and then knit me a sweater. I think I may have enough leftover for one of two things I want to do, either make a sweater for Abby to match (it's iffy on whether or not I'll have enough for this) or throw some on the loom and weave a scarf.

There are a couple more things in the works but that is what I have 'really going' right now. I must go and get ready to prepare for my presentation this evening...oh, did I forget to mention this?
Sooo while I was at the sheep to shawl I was talking to a guild member and something came up that I had my spinning notebook handy to use as a refrece. The guild member really liked the spinning notebook and long story short I am presenting a short 'workshop' (really just a talk) on how to keep a spinning notebook. I am a bit nervous as I have never really done any 'public' speaking (not since reading a paper outloud in college a decade ago). I have done one 'dry run' and think it's ok. Now I need to finish my props and get any supplies together that I might need.

And so on that note, off I go.

A slight pause

I have stuff to post but Blogger is freaking out on me again and won't let me upload pics. I am fairly sure I am doing it right since I am doing it the same way I have been all along - pushing the 'add photo' button. Don't know how even I could go wrong with that. So a brief pause until Blogger gets straightened out or I may just do what everyone else on the planet is doing and move my blog to another spot (like wordpress or something). I'll make sure it's not me first though.

Scraptacular Pet Monsters and A Few Felty Things

This morning my kids were running around screaming about monsters. Jacob was playing fun (a la Monster's Inc.) and Abby took him a little to seriously and spent a solid five minutes attached to my knee being afraid of the 'cary monter' that apparently lives in my closet. Sooooo I decided to make her a pet monster of her very own to keep the 'bad monsters' away. I grabbed a scrap of fabric, folded in half and free formed a shape right on the sewing machine. Then I realized I had to sew the face on and should have done that BEFORE sewing up the body. So I ripped the stitches on 3 of the sides, folded it up and added a face, button eyes and a homespun embroidered mouth. I sewed it back up most of the way, stuffed it and hand sewed the final bit. I give you Abigail's Pet Monster:

Well if Abby had one, Jake had to have one too. So after letting him pick the colors and deciding which button for the eyes (no, mommy I want ONE eye) I put him down for his nap and drafted this guy right on the fabric. I finished sewing him closed just as Jake was waking up:

Abby's monster is about 8 inches tall and Jake's is about 10 inches tall. They were fun and pretty fast too.

Yesterday Brian told me he was thinking about making a tomato basil risotto for dinner some night and it sounded so darned good that we decided to do it tonight. He just pulls this stuff out of his head and has a good idea of what flavors will go well together (yes I know tomato basil is a no brainer, but putting it in risotto was brilliant). He made us a great risotto on the fly with some shallots sweated in olive oil and butter, rice and chicken stock. At the end of the process he added some tomato paste, fresh basil and some peas for brightness and wow! It was the best risotto I have had in a really really long time. He even loves me so much he 'over cooked' it for me (I don't like any al dente in my noodles or rice).

So in the last few weeks I have gotten out my felting kit and started to play around a bit. I went online and found a fantastic felting site and love the technique. If you were ever interested in 3 dimensional needle felting go check out http://www.feltalive.com/. Before I found the site I turned out a bowl that I later added a butterfly to:

And then a girl using pipe cleaners a armatures. I did not like the pipe cleaner method and won't use it again. It seemed like a lot of extra work for no real benefit.

Following the tutorial at http://www.learnneedlefelting.com/ I made a couple of pumpkins...these guys are about 2.5 inches tall:

So yeah, the needle felting has been fun and I think I'll try a few other things...maybe some more pumpkins since they are in season right now.