When Sharing Is Not Good

Eric has shared his cold. It's not my favorite thing to be sick. At least I have been able to do limited knitting and crochet projects. I am on a cup cozy binge right now. I have 7 finished with 4 waiting to be seamed. I have also sketched two other versions of cup cozies too. I plan on making 24 of each design by the  November 10 fundraiser.

I have also started to piece together the shabby chic quilt. Hopefully it will be finished soon so that I can make a few more sewing projects. They have the added bonus of not hurting my hands and being faster to make.

The more I use my hand the better it seems to be within limits. My ring finger is still not up to par, but I am working on that every day. I have not tried to fold laundry yet, but hanging up wet clothes for the clothes line is getting better. Each day is a little better.

The Right Project

This one color way of yarn has been the bane of my knitting for 12 years. It was one of the yarns in a kit I bought. I never finished he project, but used the pattern with other yarns.  Fellow knitters seemed to give it away in spades.  No matter what pattern I used, I was not happy with the results.

Fast forward 12 years and a new skill, Tunisian Crochet. At last a way to make to make this yarn look really, really good. Below is a cup cozy.  So after 12 years I can absolutely say it was not the yarn, it was the project and technique. So I might just have to see how much of this yarn I have and what to make with it.

A New Design

Tonight I designed my first piece of Tunasian Chrochet. It has 12 rows including the cast on and cast off. It can be used, to use up partial skeins of yarn. It is a very simple but sturdy cup cozy. The best part is that it can be made in only a few hours.  Let me know if you want me to write up the pattern for your holiday crafting or if you want to order some in a certain color.  I will have some at the November 11, Taglit fundraiser. The color is actually lavender but my lighting is bad tonight. 

Quilt Layout

I have gotten to the quilt lay out stage of the Taglit Memory Quilt. This is being made from 4 Taglit sweatshirts.  This will be the  center piece of the Annual Taglit Fundraiser on November 11, 2016. I will have the measurements after I finish the sewing.  This will be my first Shabby Chic Quilt. I will get together with my team to figure out the pricing.  

True or False

Mothers just look forward to middle of the night breathing treatments.

Mothers just love doing load upon load of laundry..

Mothers like to sleep at night.

Mothers like play time too.  

Mothers like to play in the middle of the night. 

Mothers just love getting up to put the covers back on the cold child who just kicked them off. 

Most days Mothers would not trade in their jobs for any other.  

Car pooling is always fun. 

I am writing this while I wait to give Eric his next round of breathing treatments. 

Mothers need more hugs.  

Mothers can do more than one thing at a time.  

We love saying "just breath"

Is the stuffed Elmo qualified to fill in for mothers every once in a while?

I do not write the best blog posts at 1 am.  

I am ready to party. 

Games are always fun at medicine time. 

We would like our kids to levitate into the right spot with out lifting them. 

Is it really 1:20 am. 

Take the quiz and send me your answers.  May a good nights sleep be in your future. 

Clothes Issues

My clothes have decided that it is time for them to grow again.  My skirts now require high heels or I trip on them. The pants that I just found a few months ago, the ones that fit perfect are now riding around my rib cage.  My question is why the scale is not moving.  Don't get me wrong, I will take the smaller sizes, but I just hate shopping for clothes lately.  I also really want to see the scale move down.  

I seem to lose inches in cycles. Just 4 years ago on this very day, I was doing my second closet clean out.  This has been a long slow journey about 5 years in the making.  I have been going down just 1 size a year.   I stopped counting the inches a few years ago. I found that inches can go up and down in a matter of days. So I am going for the long term out come. 

So my slow diet secrets are very simple and easy to follow.  I have elimated all high fructose corn syrup and similar things like agave syrup. I have also eliminated all  aspertame and all artificial sweeteners.  This year I started working on my regular soda consumption and have cut back by over 80%.  I still have the very occasional soda, but not several a day. I also try to move more.  I also seem to have more stamina.  Although, I can say with out any doubt that I still can not keep up with my 30 year old self.  Just ask John or Lisa how cranky I get after being up all night with Eric. No I don't think I can  go 3 days without sleep any more.  

A Slow Recovery and More

My left hand and I are barely on speaking terms. I am doing my physical therapy as prescribed. Progress is much to slow for me. My hand just seems a lot stiffer than I every remember it being.  It seems that no matter what I want to work on in, 30 minutes my hand is done, with a recovery time of about 2 hours.  Even when I am on a roll.  This means that is going to take forever and a day to finish anything I want to create. It is taking about a week to finish a scarf on U.S. size 17 knitting needles.

Right now I am in the middle of deconstruction 4 sweat shirts that will be paired with denim squares and turned into blankets. Yes I will have a number of upcycled things. If I have any left over denim, I will use some flannel to make a few more blankets. The big question seems to be to add binding for a more city look or skip the binding for a more country, shabby chic look. Any thoughts on this? The other odds and ends will be turned into various things for my November 11, 2016 Taglit fund raiser at the Tucson JCC. Since I can not knit as much as I have in the past, there will be a whole lot of things that I have not made before. So come do some holiday shopping and help Eric and his friends have fun. As usual 100% of the sale price will go to Eric's day program.

Now if Eric will just go to sleep before the day starts in a few hours things will be a lot better later today. It is a little after midnight as I write this.