Cleaned the house this morning, because we had company coming. Denise and her daughter Elliana were coming over - Ellie to play with Adam, and Denise to work on a quilt she's making for Ellie for Christmas. As I was cleaning the house, I hurt my back. Not too bad at the time, but it got gradually worse over the course of the day. By the end of the day I decided it would be best if I did nothing but lean on a heating pad and rest.
I forgot to mention it, but last week when I was driving around, I heard this song on the local pop radio station. It was written by a local kid, and it's called "Pullman". As you may or may not know, Pullman is the college town about 35 minutes from here. Anyway, it's supposed to be a rap song, but it's really horribly badly fakily done. The voice on the kid is just too whitebread to be seriously considered "from the hood", and the lyrics .. UGH. The refrain goes, "We ain't hurtin nobody / We just like to party / We ain't hurtin nobody / In Pullman." As I say - UGH.
I leave you with a poem I wrote two nights ago, at 3AM:
He howls like a wild creature
From the depths of his belly -
Each cry a condemnation of me.
The mommies in the readership will get that.
Did some more sewing in the morning, until it was time to go meet with a charity I'm working with. I'm designing some databases for them (for free - they're a non-profit). Stopped at the bank on the way to make some deposits and find out about adding QuiltIndex.com (I got my DBA!) to the Lark Group business account. Got some forms from them, then drove like a bat out of hell to get to my appointment on time. It was scheduled for 1, I got there right at. The volunteer secretary told me she's very sorry, but the people I was supposed to meet with are in an interview, and could I come back at 1:30. I said No problem, how about 2, though? (Wanted to go over to Moscow and have time to come back.) She said just a second, let me go ask. She goes, comes back, says "Why don't I take your number and have them call you?" Now... this pissed me off. I live an hour away from this place, so going there and coming back takes 2 hours out of my day, not to mention the kink it puts in Mike's day since he's on Baby Duty. But I left my number, and went my way. Did my shopping in Moscow (just a quick stop at the Joann's) and came home. Found a message from the charity (at 12:30) saying they were *very* sorry, but they were in this interview that had gone an hour and a half over schedule, but maybe they could meet with me at 1:30. Now... you tell me why they could meet with me at 1:30, but not at 2! Needless to say, I'm really less than happy about the situation.
Did more sewing, had lots of minor irritations all day, and got very crabby by the time dinner came around.
Errand day. Started out with a visit to Kathy - my last one for awhile. I've decided to save the money and start going back when we can better afford it. Mike's not entirely happy with this decision, I think, but I figure I can always make an appointment if things get bad again. No dentist appointment this week, so we just went straight to the grocery store (the boys had done the bank and the Grange while I was in with Kathy). Nothing really to report. I wonder what errand day will be like next week, when we aren't scheduled for anything and can go in whenever we like, without feeling hurried. Will be nice, I think.
Quilting, quilting, sewing, sewing. The usual.
We got a new digital camera! The old one broke over the weekend, so we ordered another one, and it showed up today. Woo! It seems to be pretty easy to use. The pictures are coming out a little dark, but I bet that's something we can fix if we just mess around with it a little. I finished my second sampler quilt for the Red Cross Auction. It's up now, if anyone would like to bid on it. I spent some time last night updating the QuiltIndex.com website. More specifically, I changed the navigation bar so that instead of changing something about it on every single page, I only have to change one file, and the change is replicated across all the pages. Cool.
I have been very busy over the past several days with the relief efforts. Highlights:
That's all I can really think about that's worth reporting.
My poor truck. I drove our truck all over Creation yesterday. I had to go to Lewiston to pick up the baby's pictures, so while I was at it, I made several stops along the way. Arby's and the bank in Colfax, Michael's, Joann's, Wal-Mart, and Staples in Moscow, Joann's in Clarkston, Sears and Shari's in Lewiston, then Quilt Something! in Moscow. By the time we got home, it was 8:30 and I was very tired.
Most of my shopping had been to buy supplies to make patriotic pins. I'm going to sell them on QuiltIndex (once our merchant account is approved and we can accept credit cards) and donate the proceeds to the Red Cross. I spent a fair amount of money and probably could have just donated that to the Red Cross, but I wanted to feel I'd done more. I just hope I sell enough to at least cover what I spent.
You know, it's hard to remember after a few days what you did. At least for me it is. I wonder if it's because I have a toddler and he sucks down every available ounce of energy I have.. Oh, well, here's what I do remember - Sunday I posted an auction benefiting the American Red Cross, and Monday I posted a second one. I've started working on a second red-white-and-blue quilt to auction for the Red Cross. Yesterday I finished the top and put the backing together. Now I just need to sandwich and quilt it.
Monday night I went to the Endicott School to be interviewed for the local newspaper's "My Favorite Recipes" column. I think when it comes out this week I'll scan it in and post it here so you can read it, if you want. I also got interviewed that same day on the phone about the quilter's resource page. I think they might do a story about that, too.
I'm still having some trouble with last week's catastrophe. I was watching a show yesterday, though, about how Americans are likely to go through some post-traumatic-stress-type symptoms, and it sounded like some of the stuff I'm going through, including feelings of depression, hopelessness, anger, less patience, more irritability. Some would just call them "female problems" but they've been not properly timed to be that, I think. This, too, shall pass, but My God, what kind of animals live in our world that could do this kind of thing?
Busy day today. I launched a new quilters resource page for relief efforts sponsored by or involving quilters, and sent out a big mailing about that. Spent a TON of time adding stuff to that once it was live. More email, finished that quilt, and started back on the project we were given at class last night. Cooked dinner (nothing spectacular), and that was really about it.
Made pancakes for breakfast, just as a change of pace. They were... not great. But still better than cereal, which was my alternative. I've been feeling the need for breakfast lately, although I've been mostly ignoring that. Maybe I should pay more attention to it. Was a lot easier when I had parents around who'd just make something for us. Now that I'm the parent, I think maybe that's not the best system in the world.
More quilting, more time spent organizing something I'm announcing tomorrow on QuiltIndex. I got the top finished for the quilt, got it sandwiched and basted, and even got half of the quilting done. Tomorrow I'll do the other half, and finish the binding. About 3:30, I left Adam and Mike home and headed to Spokane. I had my first quilt class at a quilt shop there. It was really more of a club than a class (Debbie Mumm Friendship Club). The teacher seemed very nice, the project was interesting, and one other girl in the class was friendly. But the rest of the students basically didn't talk to me at all, or even ask where I was from. The staff was nice enough, but I caught one criticizing me (supposedly under her breath) for coming shopping for stuff 5 minutes before they closed. (It was 10 minutes, and .. um.. you close at 8, not at 7:50.) So I was pretty put off by that, and didn't pick out anything beyond what I had already gotten. I was also more than a little peeved at the prices (average $10/yard for fabric) and the fact that they don't even provide you scissors or thread for this class (you can start to sew at the class if you want, or do it entirely at home). I'll give the class one more go, just in case this is just an off week (would be understandable), but if my experience is no better I'll just do my one other class I've paid for there (in December) and chalk it up to a learning experience.
9AM appointment with Kathy (talked about - well, guess), 10AM appointment with the dentist (it hurt - I hated it), then home. The boys did the other chores while I was doing my thing. Came home, checked some email, sent some email, did more quilting. Quilted most of the day, with little bits of email in between. I am almost finished with a top I'm making. I'm going to auction the quilt and donate the money to the American Red Cross, along with a bunch of other stuff (details at QuiltIndex tomorrow). Ate dinner in the living room while Adam slept in the bedroom. Rented "The Mexican" from DirecTV to get my mind off of .. well, guess. The movie was ok, and had a couple of really funny moments. The ending was insipid and stupid, though. After dinner, Mike was getting ready for bed. I checked outside and saw not one, not two, but THREE raccoons. It reminded me of that episode of Creepshow (remember that show?), where the germ-obsessed guy keeps killing the roaches, only to find millions of them later (he comes to a bad end with regard to the roaches - I'll leave it to your imagination). So Mike went out hunting them, and got one. Tomorrow we'll probably go out and see 5 of the bastards.
I spent most of yesterday watching news reports of the terrorist attacks on the east coast and trying to make some kind of sense of the whole thing. I can't. To be perfectly honest, it just pisses me off that people like this get to live in the same world with my son. They don't deserve to breathe his air.
Today I worked on a quilt. There's not much I can do from the other side of the country, but I can spend some time organizing and publicizing efforts by organizations to use quilting as a way to heal. I'm making an "American Spirit" quilt that is to be donated locally. I also blacked out the main page of QuiltIndex and created a logo for quilt-related sites to post to show our solidarity with the victims and their families. If you're a quilter and you have a website, you are welcome to use the image.
Besides quilting, I mostly just watched more news reports. I think most of us are still in a state of shock and deep grief and sorrow, so the paralysis I'm feeling is probably not unique to me.
I wasn't so paralyzed that I couldn't kill a raccoon last night, though. If you've been following this journal, you know we've been hunting these coons for weeks now. I finally decided to just shoot one of the damn things in the garage, rather than try to chase it out and take my chances there. In hindsight it might not have been the safest move, but there is one less coon around here. I hope the other just stops coming around, and we don't have to keep hunting it down.
What a day.
After checking email and doing a bit of webwork, I got dressed and went to Pullman. I stopped along the way to mail some letters from Endicott and make some deposits in Colfax. Today was the Patchin People's monthly meeting. They take the summers off, so I haven't seen a lot of these women since May. It was nice to get together with them, and I even had a couple of quilts to show off (ones I finished at the retreat in May). The guild is doing a strip-of-the-month program this session, and I'm participating. So I went over to Quilt Something! in Moscow to buy some fabric. Colleen, the owner of the shop, did a presentation for our guild today, and she gave us all sachets and grab bags (mine was full of patterns), so I wanted to reward her kindness. Plus she's got great fabrics and reasonable prices, and Moscow's only 5 minutes away from where I was anyway.
After I did my fabric shopping, I drove back in to Colfax to do a little grocery shopping (mostly pickling salt, milk, and toothpaste) then came home. More email, then went downstairs to eat dinner (which was DELICIOUS - chicken-and-rice casserole and squash fried with picante sauce). After dinner, Mike went out to do chores and hunt coons, and found a de-throated, dying duck. This really pissed him off, so he went to kill and bury the duck, then look for the coons again. He didn't have any luck, so I went looking, too. I didn't have any luck either, but this has now become very personal. We're going to be putting poultry away earlier at night and hunting coons until they're both dead.
Yesterday, Adam and I went to the fair. Mike's back was still pretty tender, so I decided to just go it alone. Not my best idea ever. Adam is HEAVY, and he doesn't follow well. He gets interested in something, usually a blade of grass or a passing stroller, and stands stock still to investigate it. This doesn't make for very efficient fair-going. But we prowled around for awhile anyway. Our first stop was the children's petting barn, where Adam showed the most fascination with some kittens and a mother hen with her chicks. After that, we went out to see the 4H dog show/contest. We saw something you almost never see at a dog show - a dog FIGHT. Yes, while they were "exercising", apparently one dog decided to pick a fight with another. The owners (girls, about 10 years old) jerked them apart, but some of the other (younger) girls were not paying attention and kept running their dogs right past the riled-up dog. Every time it happened, the dog's owner had to try to restrain him (and he was not a small dog), and she shot the offending girl a look that would have frozen lava.
Then we walked around the grounds for awhile. Stopped for a little of that nutritious fair food, then went to look at the quilts. Surprisingly few entries this year. Then we went over to the livestock barns. We didn't visit them all, but of those we did see, Adam seemed to enjoy the ducks, chickens, and especially the goats. You can tell these goats have been handled a lot, because they just sidle right up to the gate to get their petting. Adam squealed whenever this happened and managed to "pet the goats nice". Pigs? We don't need no stinkin pigs. He gave one a token pat, but after that it was all goats, all the time.
Then we went to the carnival. I expected this to be the easiest part of the trip, but BOY was I wrong!! We waited in line for the carousel, and he was dancing to the music, so I thought it would be a big hit. In fact, he refused to sit on the horses and screamed almost the entire time. We ended up sitting on one of the benches they have on the carousel until the whole miserable thing was over. After that, I took Adam to pick a boat from the stream (different color bottoms get you different prizes). He finally caught one, so we got our prize and went to the ferris wheel. He absolutely hated this, because it required you to be still. He vacillated between being petrified and still to being screaming and trying to stand up. By the time THAT little bit of fun was over, I had had enough, so we left.
Today was a mostly relax day. I started out with this being my idea, but about halfway through the day, I popped my hip out of joint or something, and walking became painful. Walking while holding the baby became extremely painful. So I mostly napped and lay around a lot. Between that and Mike's back, we make quite the lively pair, let me tell you.
The week off from journaling was because we all went out of town. Mike had a business conference in San Francisco, so Adam and I went along to have a vacation. We left Tuesday afternoon and got back yesterday afternoon. Monday was spent, not surprisingly, packing and relaxing.
The trip to San Francisco was actually surprisingly smooth. We took Adam's carseat along and strapped it in. He spent most of the plane rides (brief layover in Portland) belted in. He was very well-behaved, and really only fussed on landings when his ears were hurting. We did what we could to distract him, since I couldn't nurse him and he refused to drink from a cup. We played a lot of Baby-has-stinky-feet. ;) After we landed in SF we took a very bumpy shuttle bus to the hotel. By this point I was tired and crabby, and so was Adam. We got checked into the hotel ok, but there was quite a bit of walking (considering we had a baby and a carseat in tow, on top of our other luggage) to get to our room. Once we got in the room, we let Adam toddle about and investigate. Didn't take long to realize that phones needed to be either out of the way or unplugged so he could play with them (2 phones, so there was one of each). Everything else was pretty much fair game.
He conked out about 10 or so. I had called my friend Shelley as soon as we got in to tell her we were there, but she and her sweetie were out to dinner so I just left a message. About 10:30 she called to say she was back, and was it too late. I told her the boys were already in bed, but that I wasn't completely tired, so I came down to her room to chat. We ended up staying up til 1AM chatting in the lobby (after getting thrown out by her sweetie about midnight for being too loud) - BIG mistake. We were both tired the next day.
Wednesday morning after Adam woke up, I got him dressed and we went down to Shell's room. We went out to the croissant place across the street to get breakfast, then came back to her room to eat and wait for Steve, my friend from Sunnyvale, to get there. Once he got there and we finished breakfast, we got in her car and set off to find the zoo. We got there around 11:30, and weren't due to meet other friends until 1, so we looked for a place to have lunch. We drove, and drove, and DROVE, and found not many choices (we were in an Asian part of town, and neither Thai nor Chinese appealed). We ended up having too-cheesy Italian at a dusty, crusty old place (I don't remember the name, but I do remember the dust). I had eggplant parmigiana, and basically they took 3 thin little eggplant flakes, breaded and fried them, then hid them under MOUNDS of TOO HOT tomato-and-cheese sauce. It wasn't really bad, exactly, just wasn't good. And there was no pasta to go with it. And the salad was... well, just SAD, really.
OK, so then off to the zoo we went. Met my friends Drew and Anne (along with their baby Julia), and my other friend Melanie outside the gate. Hugs, hugs, hi, hi, then we find that we JUST SO HAPPENED to arrive on "Free Day", so we didn't have to pay to get in. Yippee! There's really not much to tell about a zoo - we walked and walked and walked, and looked at animals. That's about it. Adam really only seemed interested in the penguins and a couple of tortoises. By the time we left (around 4:30) we were all really, really tired. Anne and Drew told us about a restaurant they liked called Savor, so we (Steve, Shell, Adam and I) headed off to find it, after telling Melanie bye, and Anne and Drew we'd see them at the restaurant later (they had stuff to do, and were on public transportation). We found the place easily enough (thank heavens for street maps) then strolled around the neighborhood til it was time (6:30) to meet them for dinner. We had a pastry-appetizer-chocolate thing (don't remember details) while we were waiting.
Dinner was excellent. In fact, it was the only place I ate at the whole time that was good. I had herb-roasted chicken on a bed of jasmine rice with a sauce of mushrooms and .. something brown. lol Sounds horrid, but it was really good. Adam, by this time, was really getting crabby, so he was not the best-behaved boy in the world. Not bad (he's never bad), just wanting to get into everything. He seemed to be settling down toward the end of dinner, so we decided to go to a place Shell's sweetie had recommended, called Just Desserts. We found it ok, although parking was so bad we ended up parking at the Safeway nearby. It was well past dark by this time, so it was cold. We had desserts (I had chocolate chip cheesecake) then went back to the hotel. Adam and I were both very tired, so we basically said our goodbyes, then we crashed.
Adam had a difficult night that night. Mike had thrown his back out during the day, and Adam was only happy if I was sleeping face-to-face with him. If I tried to turn over, Adam woke up screaming. Mike was in no shape to help (he was in serious pain), so we all just dealt. About 6AM, he started sleeping normally, but I basically got no sleep that night. Steve took the train up from Sunnyvale again on Thursday, and came to my room. Adam was still asleep, and Mike was getting ready for another day of meetings. Di (Shell's sweetie) and Shell came up to see Adam just as he was waking up. Di had never seen him before, and she seemed to approve. Then she had to go do conference stuff, too. So she and Mike headed out, and I got dressed and got ready to have another day of touristy stuff. We rode a cable car up a hill, then walked partway back down. We stopped to ooh and aah at Grace Cathedral, then walked over to Chinatown.
We found this fortune cookie factory that Steve knew about, bought some flat fortune cookies, then stopped to have lunch at a Chinese restaurant. Yet another bad choice of food. I mean, it was ok, but very lackluster. Adam was tired and crabby, and so were all of the rest of us, so we took a cable car back to the hotel and all had naps. We woke back up and left the hotel around 4 and headed for Ghirardelli Square (home of lotsachocolate). That was my favorite thing we did, I think. We had stuff at the soda fountain, bought lots of chocolate, then prowled around the shops in the square. I don't think anyone bought anything except chocolate, but it was fun to look. I very nearly bought a white hat, but it was $22 and I just couldn't justify it. We walked to the bus station and took the same F line back that we had taken up. We stopped at the concierge to see the menu for a local Indian place, picked what we wanted, then Shell went to her room to drop off stuff and I went to my room with Steve and Adam to drop off stuff and order the food. Mike had skipped his business dinner again that night, so I left Adam with him so I could have a meal in peace.
Steve and I went to get Shell from her room, then we all walked over to the Indian place to pick up our (outrageously priced) order. Brought it back to Shell's room and ate and talked. The conversation was good. The food was, again, not bad, but not great. I think next time I go somewhere, I'm going to stick to local residents' recommendations. After dinner, I went back to the room and made an early night of it, since we had a plane to catch at 9AM the next morning.
The night, at least, went much more smoothly. We all slept better, Adam waking only a few times to nurse, and then going right back to sleep. I woke up at 6AM to get dressed and get packed. We left the hotel just after 7 and took a hotel shuttle to the airport. The plane rides (with a brief layover in Seattle) were not so smooth this time. Adam fussed and screamed a lot, and there wasn't much we could do to comfort him. Thankfully, it all eventually ended, we got our bags and our truck, and came home. So now it's just a matter of catching up on email (which I've mostly finished) and getting back in the swing of work and home life.
Happy birthday, sexy man-o-mine!! That's right, another happy birthday for Mike. I love you, baby!
After Adam woke up, Mike opened his presents (some shearling slippers from Cabela's and a new cheese grater). Then we all trooped upstairs for the usual - email, work, etc. There really wasn't much to report, as all I did yesterday was try to get caught up on email and website odds and ends.
Mike made his own birthday dinner, although I did manage to sneak in a batch of Blondies for him. :)
Happy wedding day to Lyn and Steve!!
After a few hours of hacking away at email, I drove into town with Adam. A new quilt shop opened up, and I wanted to check it out. My review - eh. It's big and airy, which is nice. The selection is not great (I guess that's to be expected with a new shop) and the atmosphere was .. umm... pretentious? I was also more than a little miffed that even though they KNEW they had sent me a card announcing their grand opening, they wouldn't give me the 20% off since I didn't have the card with me. So all in all, they've made all the money from me that they will.
Then we did a little errand-running, including buying a pair of shorts for me (down 4 sizes since the last time I bought shorts!) since all of mine are fitting way too baggy. There were a lot of clearance sales going on, but the available sizes were mostly too small for me. So it goes. Then we went to have a late lunch at Applebee's. It was here Adam got his second balloon of the day (the first came from the Hallmark store). Mike and I remarked the other day that Adam is at the age where he's inevitably going to be handed stuff - balloons, stickers, candy - by well-meaning shop-owners. Usually it's ok, but sometimes we wished they'd ask first.
Came home to more email and then settled down to publish this month's block for the block-of-the-month pattern I publish at QuiltIndex, and the latest step of the mystery quilt. Then I typed up the newsletter and mailed it out. I was so tired at that point, that all I had the energy to do was play several games of spades before bed.
