not a bad morning...

1 loaf of bread baking

2 loads of laundry washed and hung

3 lunches packed

4 quarts of fresh-from-the-garden tomatoes canned (yes, all by myself!)

5 pages of "William Wilson" read (yeah, not terribly impressive, but I couldn't think of anything else I'd done 5 of...and somehow it just seemed like there should be a 5)

Amazing what can be accomplished when one stays off the computer for a few hours. ;)  Anyway, I've decided that I've earned myself an hour of working in my creative space before getting back to cleaning the kitchen. Yes, at this point, the old creative space needs many hours of loving care to get it cleaned up and useable again...but that's okay, it's fun just to be in there and I find ideas just begin flowing. (Note to self: Take the time to write those ideas down in inspiration notebook! You *know* you never remember those ideas later when you don't!) (Another note to self: Take some before pictures.) Thank you to my dear friend Chris for inspiring me...seriously, Chris--thank you!

sewing lessons

Max. As rough-and-tumble as they come. Sitting still doesn't come easy for this little guy. Everything must be taken apart to discover how it works. Or just destroyed for the sheer joy of it. Best little hugger around. Rarely forgets to thank you for even the littlest things. Loves to create...maybe to make up for all the destruction :p).

A few weeks ago, he wanted to try his hand at sewing. And what did he want to sew? Well, a cat--of course. :)

Let me tell you, the Maxidoodle is such fun to create with. He somehow manages periods of patience that are rarely seen elsewhere in his daily life. While it did take us a period of three days to complete his cat, when he was working on a specific task, he stuck with it until it was done.

Making a pattern:

Pinning it (we used an old shirt):

Sewing on its button eyes/embroidering its nose:

Sewing up its body (I had to do the tough areas like the legs, but he did an incredible job overall!):

Stuffing it:

Hand sewing the opening:

Showing him off:

Great job, Max! Next, could you make me one?

one more down...finally

Gray's room as been on the verge of being done for weeks now. All I needed to do was sew some pillow covers for some old couch pillows. (We sold the couch at a garage sale years and years ago, but saved the pillows to use as floor pillows.) Since Gray's room has cement floors, I figured he deserved to have them in his room...but being so ugly, I figured it was time to finally make them some covers. Anyway, *finally* sewing them up yesterday allows me to say that his room is done for now.

Before shot:

And after:

(Over the winter, we're hoping to put down carpet squares throughout the main part of the basement, and I hope to sew a room divider to hang between Gray's room and my scrapbook area. And next summer, hopefully we'll get his room painted.)

And just for the heck of it--pillow covers are born:

Yep--he loves them! :D

what is so hard about this

This is not meant to be whining. But I must say that I am feeling an overwhelming amount of frustration. Not so much the kind of frustration that is laced with anger, but more the type that is infused with sadness.

The things I dreamed of accomplishing this summer just aren't coming about. It's not like they're big dreams. Just many small, simple things. For my small, simple life. (And I mean that in the most positive way.)

It seems like no matter how much I plan, no matter how hard I try to keep things organized, everything just comes apart at the seams anyway. Nearly three weeks into summer and the house is nowhere near where I'd dreamed it would be at this time. Our summer education plans have been haphazard at best. I've barely made a dent in next year's school work. And I've done no crafting at all. Truly, this just leaves me feeling depressed.

I feel like I need to regroup. But really, I'm not sure how. I'm not sure where exactly it is that things are falling apart. No, it *definitely* didn't help that I was dreadfully sick for the past five days. No, it didn't help that we had to attend a family reunion for three days. And the kids' activities--track camp, book club, soccer four nights a week--yeah, that kind of stuff takes up time, too. I don't know, maybe now's not the time to worry about it. I'm still not really functioning right because of this damn virus...and maybe when I'm really feeling better, my brain and body will be raring to go and things won't look so pathetic.

You know, in fact, I'm not going to hit that publish button tonight. I'm going to wait until morning, when hopefully I will be able to look a little more clearly at what has gone right so far. And maybe I'll even have some fresh ideas for getting back on track.

Goodnight self. Sleep well, would you?

*****
Okay. Well, I wrote the above two days ago. I'm still feeling like somewhat of a failure...but I've decided that letting that get me down will get me nowhere. Instead, I'm just going to hop back on board with my original plans. Tweaking here and there. No, this entire house will not have been through its thorough cleaning before mid-August. This was my goal, because this is when my dear friend Chris arrives. But I've got to stop stressing about deadlines. And I know for a fact that Chris is not coming to see our house, he's coming to see our home--and that is always in business, tidy or messy. :D

If things had gone according to plan, Max's, Gray's, and Annie's bedrooms, as well as the library, would have been through their super-weedings/super-cleanings. While progress has been made in every one of these rooms, Max's is the only one that is actually finished.

His before photo:

His after photos:

--finish sorting through every little thing in room (to trash? to recycle? to give away? to keep?)
--decide what kind of containers we still need for organizing and put everything away "in its place!" (and I didn't even need to buy any new containers--found a way to make everything work with what we had :D)
--build bookcase
--get lamp
--wash all bedding
--wipe down walls
--wash window
--dust
--vacuum


By next weekend, I do hope that I'll have "after shots" of the other rooms. Gray's room really is close to completion. (Well, the "completion" I envisioned for this summer anyway.) And both Annie's room and the library have dents made in them, but both still have a ways to go.

Heather at Capricious Reader has started a new feature--Saturday Farmer's Market! So fun--a look at what everyone's growing in their gardens, buying at their Farmer's Markets, cooking up with all their fresh produce. Mmmmmm...

(Thank you, Heather! And thank you, Chris, for telling me about it!)

And if I'm looking at the bright side, I should mention that the garden is growing like crazy!!! We've munched down all the radishes, we've been eating lettuce like crazy, we've had raspberries to munch, and Rich ate his first jalapeno last evening. And soon we'll be eating Annie's cherry tomatoes, and green peppers, and kohlrabi, too! :D

And here's Annie standing in front of the garden...finally wearing the dress I made her! (And now that she's finally put it on, she's decided she absolutely loves it. Thank goodness! And Kara, she loves the socks, too!)