Sunday, January 26, 2014

Why You Need To Follow A Pattern

Ok, it should say Why I Need To Follow A Pattern.

Sometimes, I  make very pretty things.

This is not one of those times.  In fact, it gets wildly out of control  by the end.

K-ster's pajama pants have been through the mill and back and it's time for some new ones.  Nothing I have found is quite as stretchy or comfortable as this old pair he has.  Oh and did I mention the price?

These pants were like $15 back when Bradlees was still around.  Bradlees was a cheaper version of Target and was the epitome of "uncool" clothes when we were in school.  But, things like pajama pant were fine to buy there.  The price was good and they lasted well over a decade.

I really miss Bradlees, actually.  It was higher quality than Kmart and some of the t-shirts and basics like that still exist in my closet and I wear them today.  I think I've seen some Prides Landing (their brand) t-shirts in his drawer recently.

Let's pause while we remember Bradlees.

Anyway.

I've had it in my head that I need to learn how to sew stretch fabric, so I bought a multipack of sewing machine needles that included a stretch needle.

There was a great sale for teachers at Joann fabrics over the long weekend, so I got some material and saved crazy  money and thought this was the way to go.  The fabric was super stretchy.

I figured I could use the old pants as a rough guide and if I cut slightly larger, it would surely give me room to play. And when it was a major hit, I'd make a bunch and get rid of the tatter remnants of pajama pants he has now.

My first victory was that I sewed the pants correctly.  Pajama pants have very few seams, but when I made some for myself a long time ago, I did it wrong every single time.  I would sew the crotch wrong and have two long columns for legs instead of real pants, connected at the waist.

This time, I did it totally right on the first shot.

I didn't hem them or put in the elastic because I wanted k-ster to try them first.

I realized very quickly that I had the stretch going the wrong way.  Instead of the side to side stretch that would make sense for elastic waist pants, I had it going up and down.

I guess I envisioned him doing lots of high climbing or low squatting while wearing them.

And the leaves got me all confused.  If I had cut them the other way, the leaves and trees wouldn't have gone in the right direction.

This wrong way stretch might pose a problem at the waist, I realized.

So, k-ster gave them a try and just above his knees, they were no longer fun pajama pants.  They quickly became spandex.

I thought about it for a while.  I knew I didn't have enough material to start over with the stretch going the right way.

But I thought I could improvise.  I'd add a panel on each leg and that would give him plenty of room in the thighs and then the elastic at the waist would suck it all in.

But I might have gone a bit too far.  What do you think?  The elastic waist will take care of that, right?

I might have made my first big mistake when I added panels on each leg that were the width of the toaster.  I didn't use my toaster as the measuring device.  That would be silly.  It just happened that when I was taking pictures, I noticed that the width was the same.

Don't worry, I tapered them.


But, see, there was the problem that the panels weren't as long as the legs to begin with.  But I figured I could just take them in at the bottom.  I'd just have to taper them more.

They're pajama pants, never to be worn out of the house.  Who would care?

So, again without elastic or hems, k-ster tried them on.  He was very insulted that the waist was that big.
I put it in again so you would remember.

I explained that I was going to put in elastic at the waist and all that material would give him so much room and comfort.

And then I discovered my biggest mistake of all.  The crotch is too short.  Even if I didn't roll down the waist for a covered elastic, it would be too short.

It's a tragedy, really.

I hate the material so I can't even make them for myself.  It acts like microfiber and just catches on my skin.  Plus, I don't like camo.

If I had bought a pattern, this never would have happened, right?

Linking here:
http://threemangoseeds.blogspot.com/
http://www.gingersnapcrafts.com/2014/01/wow-me-wednesday-139.html
http://www.flamingotoes.com/
http://www.adornedfromabove.com/2014/01/wednesdays-adorned-from-above-link_28.htm
http://sewmanyways.blogspot.com/2014/01/sew-darn-crafty-linky-party_26.html
http://icetrail.blogspot.com/2013/08/blog-linky-party-list-hop-tools.html
http://www.the-chicken-chick.com/2014/01/clever-chicks-blog-hop-71-with.html
http://www.cherishedhandmadetreasures.com/2014/01/creative-corner-blog-hop-98.html
http://www.skiptomylou.org
http://www.sewcando.com
http://www.thesitsgirls.com/diy/valentine-crafts-to-love/
http://www.myturnforus.com/2014/01/freedom-fridays-with-all-my-bloggy_30.html
http://www.glitterglueandpaint.com/throwback-thursday-22/

Thursday, January 23, 2014

I Have Another Confession

This is #2 in a two part series.

I bought Dixie cups for the bathroom recently, and I'm actually using them.

In a household where paper towels are taboo and the cheapest toilet paper out there graces our butts, I have recently declared it necessary to bring paper Dixie cups into the bathroom.  Not generic Dixie cups, mind you, and not plastic or wax covered cups.

Just the original paper kind.

And my real confession?  I like the taste of the paper when I drink water out of it.  I always have. 

There you have it.

Bleach and Dixie cups.

I might as well just start smoking cigarettes and painting my fingernails while eating Splenda and drinking a diet soda.

Wednesday, January 22, 2014

I Have A Confession To Make

This is a two part series. 

Part 1.

I like the smell of bleach. 

I'm really hippie/crunchy/earth friendly when it comes to cleaners and smells that I can tolerate.  I've tried using something other than bleach on my whites, but every so often, I use it because I don't think any of the hippie/crunchy/earth friendly products are doing their job.

And the smell.  It's really all about the faint smell of bleach in the sheets. 

And the towels.

And anything else I can get into the load of whites.

Wait 'til you see my next confession.

Tuesday, January 21, 2014

Phone Woes

I resisted getting a cell phone for almost a decade after everyone else had started drinking the Kool-Aid.  I have lots of reasons why I don't like cell phones and I won't bore you with them here.

When I went to Belgium for a month in 2003, I felt like I needed to have a cell phone on the plane in case we were hijacked.  It was not long after 9/11 and I get weird about needing to feel in control on a plane, so I was sure that traveling over the ocean for that long necessitated a cell phone to bid adieu to everyone as we went down.

As I went through the procedure of buying the phone, I learned that it would be the cheapest way to call home while I was there, so it was a good win-win.

I was sure that when I returned, I'd let the contract run out and then not bother to renew.

Ha ha.

I've been with t-mobile since the beginning because they were the only carrier at the time that had an overseas plan.  I just kept it when I got back because I liked the monthly price they charged for the amount of calling and texting I did and on we went.  I have a grandfathered no contract plan that works fo rme.

3 phones later (3 phones in 10 years is pretty good, right?), I'm feeling a little pressure to join the big kids and get a smartphone.  At almost triple the monthly fee that I currently pay, I just don't want to do that.  And, the district provided me with an ipad that allows me to do a lot of things on the internet that I would do on a smartphone, as long as I can find wifi.

When I got my phone the other morning, it looked like this.

Which is what it's supposed to look like when it's closed.

But then I slid it open and it looked like this.


And that isn't what it's supposed to look like.  The screen was dead.  I could still dial and make a phone call but no texts would show up and I would not know if I had missed a call without checking my voicemail from another phone.

So basically, I had to call the old fashioned way by dialing a number and hoping it was the right one.  And if someone called, it was like the old days with no caller ID.

I felt like a pioneer.

What bothered me the most was that for a while, there was still a very faint light that allowed me to think that there might be an incoming text and I would never know what it said!

I spent 2 days with it like that and warned anyone who texts  me often that I was out of commission.  And I debated for those 2 days what I wanted to do.

K-ster checked with his provider to see what adding a phone to his account would do and how much the phone would be.  I checked with mine about upgrading.  When all is said and done, there wouldn't have been much difference between his or mine but mine would have allowed me to get a new phone every year if I wanted to for about the price I would be paying on his plan.

And then I thought about what I need a phone to do.  And really, with the amount of time I spend online in the classroom and at home, I don't need to be online on the go.  Yes, there are many times I wish I could quickly go online in a store to check something or check an email that had directions to the place I currently can't find.

But really, tripling my bill for that isn't something I want to afford right now.

I heard rumors that carriers do let people still keep just a voice and text plan in this age of smart devices, so I check with t-mobile.  The girl told me they had one non smartphone in the store for $72 which we all agreed was too much.  She told me to walk my little self right over to Kmart and buy a prepaid t-mobile phone that would take a SIM card and it would work fine and my plan wouldn't change.

I was dumbfounded!  So, I walked my little self over there and for $35, I bought a fliphone that is really exactly what I need.

Buying a prepaid phone made me feel like a drug dealer or terrorist, especially when the lady asked me if I was going to go over to t-mobile for help with it and I told her no, I'd be doing it myself.  I felt very sneaky getting it out of the package and setting it up in  my car.

But, it does exactly what I want and has a nice battery life and didn't break the bank.

Now, if I can just find the choice of sounds for incoming texts so I can change it from sounding like an incoming bomb, I'll be tickled pink.  I've changed the ringtone but I really fear I'm stuck with an incoming explosive for my texts no matter what I do!

Sunday, January 19, 2014

Remember These Crocheted Dish Towel Toppers?

My mother always had (maybe still has?) these hanging in the kitchen.  They are really easy to make and I remember her whipping up a few in the summer on Aunt Mildred's porch.

If I ever write a book, it should be called On Aunt Mildred's Porch because that is where my entire summer took place every summer until I was in high school and Aunt Mildred stopped coming down.  All of the crafts that I learned were practiced on Aunt Mildred's porch.

It's where I trained to be an old lady.

Back in those days, we didn't have etsy, so my crafts were given to unsuspecting relatives as Christmas presents.  Now I can sell my wares on the internet and put those skills to good use.

Back to the towels.

I hang my dishtowels on the oven door, but I have never made myself these handy crocheted toppers that let them hang.  It's pretty smart, actually, because they don't fall off like mine always do!  I had a general idea in my head of how I wanted to do them and then I looked at some online to see what people did.

I completely made this up, but it did what I wanted it to do.

You can hang them on the refrigerator too, though they probably wouldn't work too well on a side by side refrigerator because they would forever get caught on the doors.

The kind that my mother had/has always had/have pictures on them but I chose to use plain, microfiber towels.  I am not a fan of microfiber because it always catches on my hands, even when I don't think they are chapped and rough.  But, I know the rest of the world is in love with microfiber, so I did it for you.  All for you.

You can find this pair of blue topped/off white towels on my etsy or contact me and I'll whip you up a pair in the colors of your choice.

Linking here:
http://www.flamingotoes.com/2014/01/think-pink-sunday-148/
http://www.the-chicken-chick.com/2014/01/clever-chicks-blog-hop-70-with-three.html
http://mommyondemand.com/happiness-homemade-3/
http://www.cherishedhandmadetreasures.com/2014/01/creative-corner-blog-hop-97.html#more
http://www.skiptomylou.org/2014/01/19/made-by-you-monday-187/
http://www.gingersnapcrafts.com/2014/01/wow-me-wednesday-138.html#more
http://www.adornedfromabove.com/2014/01/wednesdays-adorned-from-above-link_21.html
http://www.myturnforus.com/2014/01/freedom-fridays-with-all-my-bloggy_23.html
http://accidentallywonderful.blogspot.com/2014/01/accidentally-wonderful-wednesday-2_21.html 

Friday, January 17, 2014

Remember Where You Came From

My sister got me hooked on playing bingo at a local church a couple of years ago.  I wrote all about it here, on my 500th post anniversary.

It's very competitive and I'm still surprised at the variety of ages present.  It's not all old ladies, though they do make up a hefty percentage of players.

I can't go every week because it's hard for me to be out on a school night.  We play until like 9:30 and that's kind of late to be out.  I'm usually pretty wound down by then.

Now who's the old lady?

I went recently and, as I have almost every time I've gone, I won a little something.  I've never won big, but when I've won, it's usually been whatever it cost to play plus a little extra.

This round is my favorite and I think I've won on it twice.  Instead of calling each letter/number combination and posting it on the board, this one is faster and they don't call the letters.  They just call the numbers and they do it pretty quickly.  It's how I wish the whole night was played.

It's called the 'shotgun round'.  You have to cover the whole board.  It's funny how when it's not posted to the board, you feel a little lost if you think you might have missed a number.

This time, I had two boards, which my sister says we always do.  I can't remember having to balance two boards in such a cutthroat game before.  I was very busy going between the two boards.

Did I mention it's my favorite round?

I was ONE NUMBER away from winning when someone yelled BINGO!  I was kind of sad because I love to win this one.

As they were checking on the woman who yelled bingo, my sister and a friend noticed that I had only #31 left and I had already covered it on the board above, so they were sure it had been called.  Since there's no penalty for calling a false bingo, except the shame of looking like an idiot (which I did once and had to hang my head although I think it shamed my sister more than it shamed me), I covered it and yelled bingo.  So did one more woman across the hall.

As the guy came over to read my card, the caller said something about how it was already closed out because the woman had yelled bingo.

Now, in most rounds, everyone who has legitimate bingo gets to be a winner and they split the prize for that round.  You'll hear the first loud and proud BINGO and then a few more echoes.  I wasn't surprised when she said that it was already closed after the first person yelled it out.  I thought this round was different, but I wasn't sure.

But no one in the room would have her claim that it was closed after the first bingo.  Even the caller was like WTF?  It didn't have it in print anywhere and she hadn't said before she started calling that it was just the first person.  It started to feel like Real Housewives at my table as they started to protest and I feared the table might just get flipped.

The caller gave in to the pressure and allowed my board and the other woman's board to be checked and indeed, there were 3 winners, so we split the prize.

As the man came back to give me the cash, he said that in the future, the definition of 'shotgun' is that there can only be one winner.  Well, someone should make that extra clear next week.

I wasn't going to dispute it because I totally understood.  It's so that lame people like me don't realize the error of their ways and call bingo after the fact.  If they had stood their ground, I would have been ok with it.  My table would have been irate, but I get it.  That's how I run bingo in my classroom.   I only ever allow one winner per round.

The Catholic church is much more forgiving.

I didn't deserve to win because I wasn't paying attention.  Sometimes, it's like I'm still Catholic with the guilt I create for myself.

Since my sister and my friend s-ster were the reason I ended up winning, I gave them each $1 and told them to buy something pretty for themselves.

I was feeling super generous because I was in a church hall.

Oh, and don't forget, when you play bingo at the local church, you need to remember where you came from.  That's why I wore this.
I've come so far.

Go 'Dores!

Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Poor Lady Mondegreen

When I wrote about misheard song lyrics, I didn't know there is actual term for them.  They are called 'mondegreens'.

A writer named Sylvia Wright, who wrote for Harper's Magazine wrote this in 1954:
"When I was a child, my mother used to read aloud to me from Percy's Reliques. One of my favorite poems began, as I remember:

Ye Highlands and ye Lowlands,
Oh, where hae ye been?
They hae slain the Earl Amurray,
And Lady Mondegreen."

The actual words of the ballad are:

Ye Highlands and Ye Lowlands,
O where hae ye been?
They hae slain the Earl of Moray,
And hae laid him on the green

Every time I read this, I just roll all over the place because it is so hysterical and I would so have done this myself.   I keep seeing poor Lady Mondegreen, slain beside her earl.

A few more wrong lyrics have popped into my head since I wrote that post, so here are a few more.  Sadly, in some of these cases, I used to know the correct words and someone told me how they misunderstood and now I can't remember which is the correct phrase when I actually hear the song!  Please add your own in the comments.

"I should get kisses"should be "passionate kisses"

"I haven't seen you in a dress"  should be "I haven't see you in ages."

"Wasn't very long, up in Everett, man took me in off the street" should be "Wasn't very long, a benevolent man took me in off the street"

"She'd never heard of Mr. Crowe"  should be "she'd never heard a rooster crow" although k-ster thinks it's "east of crow" which he says is like the middle of nowhere.  He's wrong, but he insists "east of crow" is a real term.  Maybe in Hazzard County.

Linking here:
http://www.myturnforus.com/2014/01/freedom-fridays-with-all-my-bloggy_16.html

Saturday, January 11, 2014

Short in the Trunk

K-ster doesn't like the word trunk when it refers to the torso.  I think it's a funny word and definitely a strange one to use for the middle of your body.

Sadly, I have a short trunk.  My legs and arms are long enough that petite clothes don't fit, but my torso is like 6 inches long, so there are always issue with tops.  And pants.

Or, there were problems with pants, until the day someone invented the low rise pant.  OMG.  That was my saving grace for the past decade.  Even those super short waisted pants that exposed everyone's muffin tops and more were perfect for me.

I was made for the 2.5 inch zipper.

Pants that fit below or on the hipbones instead of coming right up to the bottom of my bra? 

Yes, please!

I was so happy when even stores like Land's End and LLBean (the mom jean capitals if ever there were any)  finally added an option for pants to be below the natural waist for us short ladies.

I am sad that all jeans since about 2003 have had the "erased" look on the butt and thighs and I refuse to buy them.  It limits my choices severely.  I have never seen a trend last so long.  I was sure it would be gone by  now but it's still out there and look so trashy!  So many times, I find just the right color and when I open them, the thighs and butt look about 10 years older than the rest of the pants.

I thought we had advanced enough in fashion to say goodbye forever to the Lori Loughlin/Candance Cameron high jeans from the Full House Days. 

Remember in those 80s shows how anyone who was a dancer had to wear really weird clothes, even when they weren't dancing?  Like Jessie from Saved By the Bell who had those super high waisted jeans. 

Or all the girls on the Cosby Show.  Those pants had high waists and lots of extra things going on at the waist.

I shudder at the fact that I had the most bizarre pair of navy blue pants in high school.  They were not too high in the waist, but high enough and then the top folded back down and made some sort of a triangular type thing.  I'm not talking about yoga  pants that are made of stretch material and are meant to fold back down because it makes you look thinner.  I'm talking about material like khaki pants that folded back down.

It was almost like wearing a tutu of cotton material.

I know you're jealous that you didn't have a pair too.  Or maybe you wish you could find yours and send me a picture because google has no idea what I'm talking about and can't produce the right picture for me.

And I paired them with a pale yellow shirt that had little objects on it.  I hated the shirt and I knew it looked back on me but I kept wearing it.  I might have worn that outfit for my entire sophomore year.

I tell you all this because today, I was in TJMaxx and saw a sign that said "the sexy high waist jean".  Cue the needle across the record.  I actually stopped right in my tracks, jaw on the floor and had to look at every pair on the rack to confirm that indeed, they were sky high waists.

And in no way sexy.

And then I just laughed and laughed.  And no one was nearby to share it with me.  So I laughed some more and ran far away.

I came and googled the high waisted pants and lo and behold, they're baaaaaaaaaack.  And they're being sold as "sexy".


Wow, imagine the longest car ride of your life, you have to go to the bathroom, you finally get to a rest area.... And then you have to unbutton all of this.  Notice how it's definitely not a picture from the 80s/90s because she has a tattoo on her waist!

This is a fabulous image of the "erased" jeans that I hate so much AND a high waist. 

You can't get much better than that. 

Oh wait, yes you can. Gosh, don't these shorts just look so comfortable?  Perfect for playing tennis, riding a bike, working in the garden, being Baby in Dirty Dancing....
And I have saved the absolute best for last.

Acid washed AND skinny AND high waisted?  Hello 1980, 1990, 2000 and 2014!  Didn't think they could put 4 decades in one pair of pants.

 Wow, lime green right up to the eyeballs.  Pair them with high tops and NKOTB is back in action.

Really?  My eyes actually shut down, never to be opened again.

Notice all but the shorts are shown with no tops on?  What do you wear with a high waisted pair of jeans?  Does this mean the crop top is coming back?  Or will we tuck shirts into those high waists?

Given the height of these jeans picture, I could just top them with a bra and be completely covered.

sources:
 http://www.2bstores.com
http://search.hottopic.com/clothing/High-waisted-Jeans
http://www.boohoo.com/restofworld/clothing/shorts/icat/shorts/
http://www.gojane.com/

Linking here:
http://www.the-chicken-chick.com/2014/01/clever-chicks-blog-hop-69-with-scratch.html

Friday, January 10, 2014

Redneck Northern Lights

Yesterday, they made a big deal on the news about how our area might be able to see the Northern Lights once it got dark.

I'm talking about the Northern Lights that are the natural phenomenon, aurora borealis.  Aurora is latin for sunrise and borealis is Greek for north wind.

There's also the aurora australis in the southern hemisphere.

There, now you learned something!

Not this kind of northern light, which I can look at any night of the year.

I saw some Northern Lights once, but I thought I was having some sort of brain collapse and didn't enjoy them.  They were pretty vivid but so out of the ordinary that I didn't know what I was seeing.  It was like green ooze across the sky and I was pretty freaked out.

It was ridiculously cold last night, so I never made it out after dark to see if I could see them.  It was pretty unlikely that it would have been worth my while.

This morning, however, I got my own Northern Lights show.

Tuesday, January 7, 2014

The Secret Quilt Reveal

When I was thinking about what we should give k-ster's mother and her boyfriend for Christmas, my annual what-will-we-give-them dilemma popped up.  I kept thinking and then one night, it came to me.

They just bought new living room furniture, so they need a lap quilt for the couch!  Brilliant!  I started thinking about the colors and the pattern I would use and I couldn't sleep, I was so excited.

I had seen this pattern on pinterest and I had it stuck on repeat in my brain, like the song that just can't stop playing in my mind.  I simply had to make a quilt like this and this would be the perfect time to try it out!

I knew I wasn't going to make it in random colors like this because the new furniture is more neutral.  The couch and matching chair are beige and there are accent pillows with blues, browns and greens.  And they got a new recliner that's a light blue.

So, I went and got the fabric that I thought would totally work.  I fell in love with the colors instantly.  And proceeded to go to my sewing room and make log cabin squares.

Except that I completely forgot that log cabin squares have the light and dark right in the same square, like this.

So, I made an unspeakable number of colored squares and separate beige squares and when I went back to pinterest to figure out how I was going to arrange the squares to make the pattern, I was really puzzled.  I could not figure out how this was going to work.  Colored squares, beige squares.  What???

And then it hit me.  DUH.  They are supposed to be on the same square and balance each other. 

GRRRR.

Back to the drawing board.

I had already bought twice as much fabric as I thought I would need because I wanted to make another quilt like this and put it on my esty page.

So, I ripped out some pieces, left some intact for a future project and started again.

When I finally made enough squares that I thought I would need, I laid it out on the bed in the pattern like the multicolored quilt.

And was sorely disappointed.  I forgot to take a picture, I was so distraught.  It looked silly.

I think the problem is that the multicolored one on pinterest was very haphazard in its color selection and arrangement, except for the white.  In mine, I have a very specific color arrangement going on.  The beige didn't do enough to offset the colors and it looked weird.

I think the brown was too strong and it stood out too much.

GRRRR.

Back to the drawing board.

Thankfully, the log cabin (when done correctly!) is insanely versatile and you can rearrange it 'til the cows come home and eventually find a pleasing pattern.

So, I came up with this.  I know it has a name.  My mother will probably tell you.  Church windows, maybe?  Kaleidoscope? 

But, when I put all of the squares together, it was too small.  Even for the back of a couch.

GRRRR.

Back to the drawing board.

I had to double the number of squares to make the pattern work.

It ended up almost as big as a twin size quilt, which is a little big for the back of the couch.

And it's really thick because I had grand plans to quilt as I go.  I just can't learn my own lesson from my frustrations with this method, and I continue trying to make it work.  I was SURE it would work this time.

See how thick it is????  I don't know what I was thinking, but it made the quilting a little difficult, to say the least.

I'm not proud of the quilted part of it, but I do love the colors and how it all came together.  I especially love the paisley on the back.

 I think it's really neat that the paisley ties everything together.  I used it in the squares too.  I edged it in the light blue which is the center of each square.

At one point, I almost just gave up and tore it all out, with no intention of telling them I was ever going to make it.  Then I saw it like this, when I was sewing on the binding and totally fell in love with the colors. 

I decided the beauty of the colors would make up for the damage the apparently blind person did while quilting.
As as usual, all I can say is a big EFF YOU to the quilt as you go method.  And I will swear again that I won't ever try it again.

And as I type this I am already conjuring up something I will quilt as I go.  I simply cannot control myself.  I am determined that I will do it successfully once in this lifetime.

And when I do, that will be the one quilt I actually keep for myself!

Linking here:
http://www.skiptomylou.org/2014/01/06/made-by-you-monday-185/ 
http://www.flamingotoes.com/2014/01/think-pink-sunday-146/
http://www.adornedfromabove.com/2014/01/wednesdays-adorned-from-above-link.html
http://www.myturnforus.com/
http://www.cherishedhandmadetreasures.com/
http://mommifried.com/ladies-blog-share-link-party-cry-frozen-river/
http://sewmanyways.blogspot.com/2014/02/sew-darn-crafty-linky-partyfebruary_16.html 

Saturday, January 4, 2014

I Finally Know What To Get My Father For His Birthday!

This is one of the coolest toys I've ever seen. My sister has had it on her wish list for my niece, L-ster, for a while, but I thought it was just going to be another noisy toy and never investigated it much.  She got it for Christmas.

It's more than just something that plays music.  This is absolutely brilliant.

There are 13 instruments and 15 songs.  Each instrument has a place to go around the outside (a shape and color match up) and you can put up to 6 instruments at a time in the center to play the songs.

Here's the coolest part.  It plays the parts of the instruments you choose.  So, if you choose to just put the drum in the center, you'll just get the drum part.  If you choose the drum and tuba, you get their parts.  Etc. 

You can mix and match the instruments for each song and during the song, you can change it up.  If you take off the instrument, it stops playing that part.

You can also speed up or slow down the song as it goes.

It's so much fun to mix up the instruments and put something like the drum and tuba in the lullabye to see where they play.

Throughout the week, I spied just about each adult having their own turn playing with this thing, but my father was the most fascinated.  He's always been one who loves to pick out the instrument that is playing in any given piece of music, but this allows him to do it in reverse:  put the instrument on and hear what part it plays.

I think he can't get over the technology behind it.  I know I can't.  Each instrument has some kind of senor on the bottom that the middle of the symphony can read when it sits there, so it knows what to play.

L-ster likes it, but at 2.5, she has no clue what the special nuances of this symphony really are.   She just likes identifying the different instruments, including this one, the koto.  I haven't even bothered to look up what it is, but it sounds like a piano or clavichord or something along those lines.

She also decided that the guitar would be a good "tool" to "fix" her non-broken train.

Combining my father's 2 favorite Christmas presents that L-ster got this year!  If he could sit in the back of her train and play with the symphony while she drove him around, that would be perfection!

Linking here:
http://www.lovebakesgoodcakes.com/2014/01/lets-get-social-sunday-january-2014.html
http://www.the-chicken-chick.com/2014/01/clever-chicks-blog-hop-68-with-two.html 

Friday, January 3, 2014

Pa Needs To String A Line To the Barn

Do you know that reference?  Little House on the Prairie.

When I was little, I loved reading those books.  It seems the scenes in winter left the biggest impression on me.  I could just picture the snow up to the second story windows and the scene where there were such high drifts that the only way to get safely to the barn was to tie a rope from the barn to the house and follow it to get to the animals.

It's been an unspeakable amount of years since I read it,  but I can so vividly picture the scene that she described, as though I was watching Pa do it right now.

I know there was the TV series but I don't remember watching it much.  I'm pretty sure that scene wasn't in an episode that I watched.  I remember it always being daylight and sunny on the TV show.

And that I didn't like Melissa Gilbert.

We had a good laugh about this at Christmas because I've stated very clearly that I don't like to watch shows about life before electricity.  I watch Downton Abbey specifically because it's early 1900s and they are rich enough to have electricity.

Seriously.

Life before electric lights just makes me sad to think about.  If I watch a show or movie before electricity, I get all tense and distressed, thinking how hard life would have been.  I don't need that from TV!

So, how I could stand reading Little House books is beyond me.  Maybe I didn't have those requirements when I was 9.

In any case, we do have electricity today, but we have quite a storm on our hands.

It's scenes like this that make me glad I don't actually have a small farm.   Or any farm, actually.   I would totally have to tie a rope to the barn to make sure I could get there!

I made a big deal about putting storm windows on the windows a couple of years ago and this one didn't have the storm part down, so the snow came right in to the window frame.  At first glance, it's hard to tell if the snow is actually up that high or just blown in!

 This view always seems so much bigger when there's snow on the ground.


I keep shoveling the walk but the snow blows right back in.  It's just mean out there.  It's creeping toward the teens and the wind is awful.  I usually don't mind shoveling because I get warm, but the wind is blow everything right back and it's not nice.

No outdoor showers today.  K-ster seriously considered it last night.  He has a propane heater that he uses to warm the pipes and himself but I reminded him that he also had to actually get out to the shower and back.  And to the bulkhead doors to get down cellar to turn it on and off.

That might have dissuaded him a wee bit even though we had about half this much snow.

Thursday, January 2, 2014

My Favorite Posts From 2013

I posted the top 10 posts on my blog that were viewed in 2013 according to google analytics.  Most of them are craft or food oriented, so I wanted to share with you my own favorites.  These are not craft or food related.

I only chose 3 because these still tickle me as I reread them and they are kind of long.  I know your attention span is less than 4 minutes- thank you google analytics.

I can't decide if it's a good thing to laugh at my own posts when I reread them later or if it's just a sign of insanity.  Check them out and decide for yourself!

This was truly my favorite from the entire year because it was so outrageous.  I still laughed today when I reread it.

I still know I don't belong on the Amazing Race as explained here.  This was one of your favorites too.

This one left me pretty scarred when it comes to tunnels.

Let's see what's in store for 2014!

We're starting with this:
A snow day for this much snow.  At 10am, this was the "plowable snow event" that had been predicted.   They've been talking about this "event" for days.  And it's coming just like they said.  Very light and easy now, with a lot more tonight.

Remember when you were a kid and there was just suddenly snow everywhere?  Not much for predictions.  Not talking about it days in advance.  In fact, it was usually when they did talk about it in advance that they would say it would totally miss us and we'd wake up to a foot of snow.

And as much as I love knowing the night before that school is cancelled, there were not ALERTNOW messages.  There was no internet to go check the radio station's website to see if they had called it in.

We used to stand around the radio, fingers crossed, praying (it was a Christian school) that we would be on the list as they announced it.

It was the only time we stood around the radio.  I don't want you to think we were the Waltons or anything, with just a radio for entertainment.

January 2nd and we're already having snow days.  At this rate, it'll  be August 1st and I'll still be posting about school.

Linking here:
http://www.myturnforus.com/