Nashville Stitch N Bitch

anarchy in the pre-k

Just a reminder! Remember to either email me or leave me a comment with the favorite/grossest/weirdest food in your neck of the woods that can rival fried corn on the cob and I'll put you in the random drawing this weekend for the winner of an autographed copy of Mason Dixon Knitting!

So, my bloggy neighbor on the Knitting Blog ring stephanie is going to be in town tonight at threaded bliss but will I meet her? Oh no. This day has been cram packed with pre-k excitement and scheduling down to the moment in order to get the husband out of town for the 800th trip in 2 months. Perhaps I exaggerate the 800 thing, but it feels like 800. Especially when it's a particulary rainy weekend and/or someone of the kid variety is sick even though no one is actually sick and it's not raining at the moment, it still feels like the 800/sick/rainy combo.

Today I needed to get some plants in the ground that have been sitting patiently in a little red wagon out back all week in anticipation of their new summer homes, and for some reason I thought that having a little friend over for Maeve would help things along. Har de har! They bested me! This is the first moment since 9:30am that I've had 2 seconds to even consider doing something un-kid-related.

WAYS TO KNOW YOU HAVE AN EXTRA CHILD IN THE HOUSE

1. Dirt. By golly there is more dirt in the house than out of it. We tilled the garden this weekend and the gravitational pull of it is more than the kids can bear. Much "gardening" was done today (note the tiara). I was trying to run dirt damage control until I overheard, "Get the buckets! Let's make dirt castles!" So much for that sandbox we put in last week.

2. Paint. We have a big canvas out back that the kids can paint on and rinse off, but when you add an extra child, "canvas" becomes a more fluid term. Maeve and friend painted one another's hair, then, because he wouldn't stand still for the hair painting, they just poured a bottle of paint on Truman's head. Paint tracks in the house, paint tracks on the patio, paint on the clothes of every member of the house.

3. Barbies. It's a naked Barbie explosion in the back of the house. Oh, the humanity!

4. Unstrung leis from the dollar store. Perhaps this isn't a problem for your particular household, but for whatever reason we have lots of leis around here and they were found, worn briefly and systematically unstrung to create garland for most of the house and the outdoors. I found the poor dog an hour after the kid had gone home looking like this:

And yes, there is a dog under there.

4. The friend calls your husband "Mr. Hell." OK, she didn't really, but it's only a matter of time until they learn to read and do.

Goodbye Maeve's preschool girlfriend, hello vasectomy for Jim!

Whew.

So the big quilting machine the I bought myself as a very early birthday present I could never get to work. It locked up. It's been a sore subject and a big thing sitting on my cutting table for a couple of months now. The nice lady that I bought it from has been very nice and helpful but slow as hell. I finally took the thing in myself and had it serviced and it's working! Working, working working. I had been trying to cram The Monstrosity through my poor little home machine and it was just generally pissing me off every night. Hooray! The days of cramming are over! Let the quilting begin!

Have fun tonight everyone! Blog like mad about it tomorrow!

xo

joyce kilmer, whoopie pie, and a contest

I've been so enthralled with ericka's tree sweater saga and what better day to talk about it than Earth (aka Arbor) Day? Joyce "only god can make a tree" Kilmer would be thrilled with the tree sweater. Nothing makes me more giddy than seeing someone do something because, at least in their own mind, it must be done. I imagine her in the middle of the night mattress stitching that thing on the tree. Art for art's sake baby. Right on with your tree sweater makin' self Ericka. Our family isn't making art, but outside planting tomatoes and flowers and in utterly unEarth Daylike thoughts, considering in what most sadistic way to kill Box Elders.

Quilt news because you know you need it: 1 five year old plus 1 almost three year old plus pretty weather plus something to do every night this week equals zero quilting and even knitting time is at a premium - car trips and book signings (and gee, there seem to be a lot of those lately) mostly. Even when I do have a stretch of time I mentally can't warm up to this monstrous quilt right now and so it sits in a heap on my table waiting for me and my patience with it to return, kind of like the tree in that Shel Silverstein book. It has infinite patience for me and my brood, but it should count itself lucky because I have considered cutting it down and turning it into a boat more than once. I pieced that quilt up there last year during one of Jim's trips and really ought to finish it. It's just scraps, and I really like it, but I don't like the batting in it and didn't know I didn't like it until I started quilting it. Luckily the quilting didn't get too far, but I still need to pick it all out. Next! After Monstro is finished. And after that quilt for Maeve's room. And the one for Truman's room. And and and.

So the week with Kay and Ann comes to a close, and I don't have one picture to show for it. Were there photo ops to be had? Dude. You know there were. Last night was the finale signing for Nashville at threaded bliss (and you KNOW Sheila has her some pictures of the event) and it really was a great event. My own mama was my date and we had a great time. I met jen (aka "the hager twins called me lovey" from the brush with fame contest) and we had beer and RC and some kind of yankee dessert called a Whoopie Pie brought to us courtesy of tisra. I think every knitting store should have beer and Whoopie Pie at least once a week if not daily. I also appreciate the volume of knitting that went on during the event AND that it was actually projects from the book. One girl actually completed her log cabin blanket simultaneously with the completion of Ann and Kay's talk and in a burst of enthusiasm which can only be attributed to too much sugar, too much beer, excitement to be finished with so much garter stitch or a combo of the 3, she leaped to her feet and yelled. Now that's a book signing.

What I mostly learned about Ann and Kay this week is that given the opportunity to eat together, we are not above any particular food genre. "Bad For You" wouldn't exactly cover it... I would say it went from "Down Home" to almost dipping into "State Fair" territory. We didn't cover deep fried Oreos or giant turkey legs, but by God, if it could be fried, you can be fairly certain that we made sure Kay got a good intro. Catfish, barbeque, fried dill pickles, even fried corn on the cob were covered. I think I got enough sweet tea in her that she could've flown her own plane home today. I had a fun time this week girlies.

OK, so if you live in a part of the world that Ann and Kay didn't get to on their rockstar book tour, what I have here is a GENUINE AUTHENTIC AUTOGRAPHED by Ann and KayMason Dixon Knitting book! To give away! Just leave me a note either by email or comments and let me know the oddest/grossest/best food in your part of the country. I'll take all entries and pull one at random. Have your entries in by SUNDAY APRIL 29!

xo

where knitting meets hee haw

Isn't this the purtiest quilt? I saw this today when I was at a mamaparty. A mamafriend was visiting from out of town and all of the other local mamafriends got together for a picnic and all around fun day of food and water sprinkler fun. paige swears that the quilt was something that someone bought off of QVC for them and that it has matching shams, but I could swear it's feedsack. I don't think it's an old quilt, but I do think at least the prints are old fabric and the binding if not the quilting totally looks hand done. I'm in love with the gradient around the outside of it. I didn't spread it out completely as you can see in the pic because I couldn't. No room. Behind me, this is what was going on -babies, tits, and general chaos. I really really really want to make something similar to this quilt but you know what? I can't. I can't because I have to finish the monstrosity I started and the monstrosity I started is such a monstrosity that I can only quilt about 1 square a day. And if my math is correct, at this rate it will take me 2 months more to finish. But one day! One day this QVC quilt and I will tangle.

So on Monday nights, the husband and I have a date night. Generally we go to see a movie, and then go sit at some restaurant's bar and eat and have a drink and talk about adult type things. Sometimes we even use curse words because we can. Mostly I don't drag my husband to knitting events on date night, but last night ann and kay were in town and being a nice guy, he obliged with a little hanging out at the book signing! There was talking, there was laughing, there were books flying off of the shelves right and left. Afterwards, I was chatting with a few people (and I hate to say it Ann, but one of your friends recognized us as those people from her neighborhood which is actually our old neighborhood and your current neighborhood. Those people who had the baby Jesus, Mary and Joseph on the Harley that one Christmas followed in subsequent years by baby Jesus, Mary and Joseph in the horse trailer and baby Jesus, Mary and Joseph in the Cadillac (if only we could've found a carseat). Anyway, we've been found out as your those people friends.) Right in the middle of the heat of book signing mania, I spotted none other than the hager twins! And it hit me that Ann and Kay must know about it! After I shoved some potential book buyers aside, Kay agreed - blog potential was high - pictures had to be made. Husband and I chased the poor Hager Twins around the bookstore but they disappeared as if into a secret panel Hager Twins wall of books. We questioned the DVD section guy who didn't know who the Hager Twins were, but said that two guys had been asking where the Hee Haw DVDs were. Hee Haw indeed!

Then, in true jet setting knitting book tour lifestyle fashion, we all went and ate hamburgers and drank champagne. I think Kay might've trashed her hotel room later.

Big, fat, fun girls! Thank you for having us! See you again this week!

xo

green is good

I did it! 700 safety pins. Seven Hundred. sevenhundred. It might as well have been 7 million according to my fingertips and to my index fingernail which felt like someone might have been trying to pry it off in my sleep. That qulit isn't moving a MILLIMETER though. And the quilting has begun baby. Oh yes it has. More on that later when I actually have something done besides a little ditch quilting. So far, it's a mixed weight class wrestling match with the quilt winning at the moment.

The girl and I dyed some eggs today. She's the idea man, so she came up with the dying theme "weird." Now some moms I know (I'm not linking links or anything) pull out the Martha guns on us and dye their eggs with like, crushed black walnut, and beets and onion skins and all that stuff. Maeve and I are Easter purists - we go for PAAS, and some glitter paint. (This is the girl that picked out Fairytopia Barbie for her birthday so couldn't we already guess her tastes?) We did put some oil in the water so that we could get a swirly effect and we double dyed some of them because we are reckless egg-dying party people like that. She's wondering what we do with them next and keeps looking to me to give her an answer. She'll say "Mom, they look like they're dry now!" in this very sing songy excited voice, and then look at me as if I have any idea and of course we both know they were dry hours and hours ago, but neither one of us really know what to do with 16 glitter painted hard boiled eggs.

In the interest of low amounts of craft news other than quilting (and documenting that is about the equivalent of the Black Stockinette Men's Sweater saga) I thought I'd give you some pictures from the trail from my daily walk. I really want to find out the names of some of these wildflowers, so if anyone can give any insight, I'd really appreciate it!

Our house is in this little gap surrounded on almost on all sides by hills. The one building that you can see in that picture is the Catholic church at the end of my street. The view here is from a big ridge in the park across from our neighborhood.

This is a little part of the trail, wider than most of it. I like this part because it goes through a thicket full of berry bushes of different kinds and there are tons and tons of birds. So much great wildlife in the park. I have almost walked right into a deer on more than one occasion because they just don't move out of your way anymore and Jim and I have seen a bobcat run across the road. A flock of wild turkeys run around the golf course like they own the place. We saw a coyote one night a couple of weeks ago standing in the parking lot of the Temple down the road from us.

I know this one! Jack in the Pulpit. Right?

These are the ones I'm not sure about:

That green right there in the last picture is that green that I was talking about. The green I want to internalize and then let transport me to Green Nirvana.

Help educate the unwildflowereducated among us oh ye knowers of wildflowers!

xo

safety pin-a-long

Can we have a Safety Pin Party? I'm not talking a never mind the bullocks style safety pin party, I'm saying everyone comes over to my house and we all sit on the floor and pin baste this big ass quilt! Sound fun? It's no blood and vomit Sid Vicious thing, but there will be safety pins and booze (and no matter what your mom told you, yes, safety pins and booze do mix).

After an hour (and seriously, I mean an hour) of pressing the front and back, this is how the pinning went:

8pm - kids in bed*

8:10 - I begin taping the backing to my living room floor with packing tape

8:15 - Truman up to go to the bathroom

8:17 -when I come back in the room, both dogs have made a little happy place to sleep - on my quilt backing

8:18 - I run the batting through the dryer to "relax" it (tip from paula reid)

8:20 - Turn on wild at heart, part 3 in my Attempt To Appreciate David Lynch (I have watched season 1 of twin peaks, blue velvet and now Wild at Heart and last night Dave and I agreed to part ways)

8:30 - Truman up to go to the bathroom again (he's new at this whole potty thing and still hasn't gotten nighttime worked out yet), I watch Diane Ladd smear red lipstick all over her face in what? An act of lurid melodrama? A symbol of her inner turmoil? Self satire? Absolute brilliance? The silliest direction chioce I've ever seen? I can't tell anymore.

8:40 - I attempt to get the batting straight on top of the backing

8:45 - There's Truman again

9:00 - I put the top on the quilt and realize that there is no way to pin this thing other than to just sit on it, hope for the best, and smooth as I go from the center out

10:30 - I have pin basted about 1/4 of it, Truman has been to the bathroom 4 more times, the dogs have taken up residence on one corner of the quilt and I don't care, and David Lynch and I have broken up.

10:45 - Screw this. I need ice cream.

Realizing I can't leave the thing in the floor because the kids will wake up in the morning and just want to tap dance on it (just tap dance if I'm lucky) I just pull the tape up, roll it up and stash it and I guess I'll pull it out tonight, straighten it, retape it and start pinning again. I have a gazillion safety pins, but I'm estimating this will take several hundred.

Meanwhile the afghan was finished for my stepniece's wedding present. It's very airy for a throw, but she had the fab idea of maybe using it as a table cloth. The poor girl will have to block it because anything larger than, well, something little, cannot be blocked in this household (see "dogs on quilt" above").

Safety pin-along tonight at my place!

xo

P.S. - I'm extra lucky that I live across the street from an 800 acre wooded park full of hiking trails and creeks and wildlife and such. When I drop the kids off on their school days, I make a run for it to the park so I can hike. It's 70 and beautiful here today, the wildflowers are crazy beautiful on the trails and the green in the spring here is so miraculous that you just want to absorb it through your skin and let it inhabit your body and let its green gorgeousness shoot out through your fingertips. I feel better now - like I have the will to go on with the pinning, and like I might even give eraserhead a try.

*a loose term which means they will be asking for something to drink, to go to the bathroom, for me to read or sing or fetch some thing for them for the next hour or more before actual bed time occurs. Not to be confused with actual sleeping.

five

Yesterday the girl was five!

According to Maeve, five means:
1. you get to drive
2. you get to play with stuff like Barbies
3. you get to be line leader at school
4. you get to stay up real late and drink coffee
5. you get to wear weird shoes

I'm not sure what she means about the weird shoes bit, but the rest of it sounds right on!

And yes, five means your dad takes you to the ultra cool toy store to pick out something fun that you would like and you pick out the stripper-iest Barbie that has ever been made just to torment your poor mom who doesn't even get to stay up late drinking coffee even though she's nearly 5 (times 7 plus 3).

Yesterday being the fifth, sibyl tagged me with a "five on the fifth" meme. A day late, as usual, but a bandwagoneer all the same.

1. Five minutes to yourself: how would you spend them, ideally? Sitting in the sun and knitting

2. Five bucks to spend right now: how would you spend it? a movie matinee

3. Five items in your house you could part with, right now, that you hadn't thought of already? dust buster, eyeliner, VCR, a giant box of books, some cooking paraphrenalia

4. Five items you absolutely, positively could never part with in your house? craft supplies, nice soap, DVD player, real Coke, good lotion

5. Five words you love? they're all curse words.

If you've been wondering where I've been, the huband spends enormous amounts of time out of town during the spring and the name of my own personal game is Wear The Kids Out (with the subtitle So I Can Knit After Bedtime). So we picnic and we go to the park (sometimes more than once a day) and what all of this means to my craft life is - well, that there isn't much of a craft life at all. Hell there isn't even time to sneak in a timely blog post. So what you're getting here is 10 free minutes bribed with cookies and the promise of park time right after.

If you've also been wondering where the hell that king quilt is, I can assure you that even though little is being said about it, much (except this week) has been accomplished. It has been laid out, pieced together, the back has been pieced, the binding has been pieced, cut down to size and pressed, and it is awaiting layering, basting, quilting and eventually binding. I've been listening to alex anderson's quilting podcast and recently heard a great one that included an intereview with quilter extrordinaire paula reid who explained how to quilt even giant things without using a frame. Her stuff has been so helpful that I actually look forward to quilting this. This is a big honkin' quilt. 110" x 110" and just the back and top are incredibly heavy, and I can't imagine what adding the batt will do. Wish me giant amounts of luck as I quilt this monster.

In the last of my news, I've joined Claire's crewel-a-long, a group blog that I'll join as soon as I get the afghan that I'm working on finished. I've wanted to try crewel for a while now, and this will give me a good excuse. Will the other real crewel alongers laugh at me as I try a kit that I got for Christmas? Will I fall flat on my face and they all crewelly make fun of me? Tune in to the crewel-a-long blog for the horrible suspense of it all!

xo

P.S. - Tag to my blog friends - emily, nicole, cranky!