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So, as you may imagine, the other seasons were much more attractive to me.

Spring in Seattle is more like the storybook/movie kind. It’s gorgeous here. After months of gloom and drizzle, the sun appears and the drizzle still drizzles, but it’s a nice kind of drizzle…the kind of drizzle that keeps the landscape emerald green and produces glorious flowers everywhere.

Before I made the Pacific Northwest my home, I occasionally attempted gardening, but the results were usually poor. Trying to grow vegetables in the short growing season and rocky soil of Montana and was challenging. Only the greenest of thumbs succeeded. My mom’s friend, Peggy, could probably grow corn on Mars, so she does well there. For me, with only the faintest tinge of green to my thumb, Rocky Mountain gardening was too difficult to be fun.

Here, it’s a totally different story. Plants want to grow, and mostly do it without the intervention of an eager gardener. I’m dying to get out in the fresh air and plant things. I’ve started cracking the books.

And I’ve planted peas outside.

And have started more temperamental things indoors (tomatoes, peppers, tomatillos, oh my!)

I’ve also got a bag of dirt and echinacea seeds chilling in my refrigerator. It’s kind of funny to see it sitting there, in between the eggs and cheese. It’s worth it though! In a few months, my garden will be filled with those lovely purple-y flowers and buzzing bees.

Spring has become a season to enjoy all on its own, but also for the wonderful things it promises.

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They were quite possibly the best muffins I have ever made…light in texture, moist and sweet, but not too sweet. I’ve used this recipe before, but this time, they were inexplicably better.

By Sunday afternoon, I had finished the bodies of the costumes.

It was an awkward affair sewing on those tails. I can’t say my stitching was particularly beautiful. I *think* they’ll stay attached…if Eeyore’s falls off, I hope the actor has presence of mind to pretend it was meant to happen. After all, Eeyore’s tail is supposedly only affixed with a tack. I used an uncovered button from a make-your-own button kit for the “tack.”

M and I decided to use flannel–and not faux fur or fleece–for the bodies of the costumes so the actors wouldn’t get too hot under the stage lights. I couldn’t live with an unfluffy skunk’s tail, however, and used faux fur for that. Boy, that stuff makes a HUGE mess. I think I still have bits of that up my nose and my sewing machine certainly needs a good cleaning.

I finished two hoods shortly afterwards. Here’s the skunk and Piglet.

Eeyore’s hood required a little more work, since it needed a mane. I didn’t finish that until later in the evening…

I’m not too thrilled with how the mane turned out. It looks a little bit like the moppy ‘do worn by Moe of the Three Stooges. I am not a hair stylist for people or talking animals. I did the best I could and called it quits when I ran out of the yarn.

My pattern review can be found here.

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No, Mom, I didn’t eat anything…unusual…why do you ask?”

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Throw pillows are perfect little sewing pick-me-ups. I made two for my daughter.

The pink pillow on top is constructed from a felted sweater and closed on one end with ribbons. Simple but pretty!

The floral pillow is made from rescued pieces from a store bought pillow that fell apart years ago. I had to do a little bit of creative bleaching to brighten it up a bit and had to sew around some holes that developed in the fabric. I also used two fun trims…one is a narrow green and pink loopy trim and the other has green and pink feathery bits poking out from one edge (how do you like these technical descriptions?). I hope the thing last more than a few days! It’s nice to have all those bits and pieces out of my stash closet.

This morning, I was overcome with the desire to do something about the nasty mouspad we had next to our family computer. I browsed around the internet and found many tutorials for sprucing up mousepads, but decided against anything pieced. I wasn’t sure how much seam lines would affect the mouse’s performance. I decided to try out 12-22’s method and it worked out great.

Much better with chuckling pirates!

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Claire and I couldn’t imagine how his activity could be more interesting than playing with fancy paper, glue and stickers…but we’re both girls.

I came across this idea in a Scrapbooks, etc. magazine. It’s a really easy project, since it only involves using die cutters to create the flower and circle shapes, and taping the pieces to purchased lollipops. However, when you need to make 60 of them, it takes a lot of time. It’s a good thing we started early! Doing this at the last minute would SUCK (pun intended-you know, the valentines are suckers).

The examples in the magazines used ribbons, which are much prettier than the bits of yarn I used, but I was trying to be thrifty! I have lots of yarn…not so many ribbons.

Both kids are looking forward to giving them to their friends. They had fun deciding which flower should go to whom–each bore a phrase a la conversation hearts.

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I’m so glad you’re going to be my sister-in-law someday soon. Really. At this stage in my life, I’m too entrenched in my ways to find it easy to bond with new people. They do their own things. I do mine. While I find them interesting and pleasant to hang around with, the chasm keeping us apart from true friendship seems too difficult to bridge. Not with you! Almost immediately, I knew I liked you–really liked you–and that we’d grow to be great friends.

But, to be honest, you scare me. In the short time we’ve known one another, you’ve somehow managed to wheedle yourself into the select group of people for whom I’ll go the extra mile. I’m still trying to figure out how you got me, the type-A neat freak, to allow my dining room to become this messy:

Yes, it’s for a good cause–your production of Winnie the Pooh–and the poor actors who would have gone costume-less due to your sewing crew bailing out on you–but you should see the gigantic wads of fur in my vaccuum cleaner bag. Fluff from that skunk’s tail continues to make me sneeze!

Yours truly,
Amy

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The book provides instructions for making your own pillow form and the cover is designed to fit over that. I had an ugly old pillow that I wanted to recover, so did a little math to change the dimensions of the patches so my cover would fit my pillow form. This was easy. If you do this, remember to use 1/2″ seam allowances. I used 1/4″ instead, since that’s what I typically use for patchwork; however, piecing gathered squares is a little more tricky than piecing flat squares and the wider seam allowances are nicer to work with.

I didn’t like the plain edges of the original pillow and wanted to add something extra there. I found a crazy fuzzy chenille-y trim at my local fabric store and added it to the edges. The stiff trim coupled with the gathered edges created some tricky sewing, but by using (and bending) a lot of pins and perservering, I ended up with a very nice pillow (if I don’t say so myself).

I also made some refrigerator magnets with the help of my kids. Together, we knocked of 50 of these in the evening. We now have plenty to keep all our artwork properly displayed on the refrigerator and some can be packaged up for nice gifts to friends and family.

Instructions can be found here.

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quix?ot?ic??[kwik-sot-ik] –adjective
1. (sometimes initial capital letter) resembling or befitting Don Quixote.
2. extravagantly chivalrous or romantic; visionary, impractical, or impracticable.
3. impulsive and often rashly unpredictable.

Currently, I’m demonstrating the third sense of this term.

Anyway, you must be wondering about the rash/impulsive decisions I have been making. Don’t worry. They’re not earth-shattering.

First, I ‘ve decided that I must take more photographs of my children this year…not just photos of special occasions, but candid photos of everyday life. So, here’s a couple to start.

I caught Claire off-guard when she was watching Coraline in 3-d. Yes, she looks scared there, but isn’t really. My little girl is quite the drama queen and thought she was being funny making that face. I’ll give her that one!

The second photo is of a special occasion. Sam earned his orange belt in taekwondo this week and was enormously proud of his accomplishment–Robert, Claire and I were cheering him on every step, block, kick and punch of the way.

My second goal is to spend more time in the garden this year. I left most of the planting work to my husband last year and only went out to mow the lawn or to pull weeds. The glorious spring weather we’ve been having has given me the urge to grow stuff. I planted some primroses this week and will soon be starting tomatoes and other veggies that need some time indoors.

In case you were wondering, the pennies are my wholly inadequate attempt to fend off slugs. Supposedly, slugs get a little shock when they come into contact with copper. I didn’t have enough pennies to make a decent barrier. I should tell people it’s a “wishing flower pot” so they toss loose change in there for good luck, lol!

My third goal is going to be the most challenging one. I need to reduce my arts and crafts stash dramatically. Here’s what happened when I tried looking through my supplies closet for a piece of blue fabric:

I have too darned much crap, which is overwhelming. The overabundance actually makes me feel less creative. I’ll probably start out with a lot of crafty/patchworky type projects and put the clothes sewing on the back burner. This approach is more likely to result in less clutter in the closet.

I’ve gathered some fabrics together for a string quilt. Seeing them all together like this makes me exicted about the project. I think they’re fun colors.

I’ll use white sashing to offset the colorful blocks.

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