whoa

Just when I had pretty much come to terms with the realization that my mother had lost all sense of rational thinking she surprises me yet again. She showed up at my house this morning with the news that instead of getting married tomorrow she's going to break up with John today and ask him to move out.

Wow. I was really stunned. Happily stunned but still very surprised that she actually came around to realizing that getting married to this guy probably wasn't a good idea. She had just come from a meeting with her therapist (whom I know also thought this was a bad idea..like everyone else in the known universe) and I suspect that her realization must have been helped along by whatever they talked about. She confessed that John is controlling and insecure and that she just knows it wouldn't have worked out. She doesn't want another divorce in her future. (Note: These are all things that I told her.. especially the stuff about this guy being obviously insecure and controlling by pushing this marriage issue so early in their relationship.)

Being as I don't really have much trust left in my mother after all the less than stellar decisions she's made in the last 4 years or so, I'm only allowing myself a modicum of happiness about this decision. I don't want to get all ecstatic that she's come to her senses only to find out that she's been talked out of this by John and ends up marrying the dude anyway. She did seem pretty resolved to this decision though so I doubt that will happen. When he's moved out I'll breathe a bigger sigh of relief. I've only exhaled halfway at this point.

TtV

Today I discovered a photography technique called Through the Viewfinder. It's basically using a camera (usually digital) to take a picture through the viewfinder of another camera- usually one with a large viewfinder like an old Kodak Duaflex or the like. But before I read about what type of cameras these photos were being taken through, I went and grabbed my mom's really old, broken Canon AE1 SLR and tried taking some pictures through it's really tiny viewfinder. I had some not so satisfying results and then went and learned about the Duaflex and promptly went to Ebay and put in a bid for one. It isn't like I really need another hobby but I've sort of had limited interest in photography lately and this new technique has revitalized it so I'm going to run with it for awhile.
Here's my favorite result of my first hasty attempts at this. A few more can be seen on my flickr account.


I'm off to bed now.. I'm up waaay to late reading about this ttv business!

its hopeless

My mother will not listen to reason. When faced with logical and valid concerns about her decision to marry her boyfriend of two months next week she (and his) only response is that they are doing it because they want to and because they can.

The Patchwork Tree

Knitting has been taking a back seat to my newest interest- embroidery. My first project was a blended piece. The trunk of the tree was knitted in some novelty yarn and then couched onto the fabric background. It was pretty much freeform. I didn't draw anything out beforehand and just dove in and started stitching. I learned a lot and went through stages of not liking results and then just continuing to work the piece until I liked it more. Ultimately, I'm happy with my results from my first foray into embroidery. Well.. not technically my first since I did a couple things in high school but this was the first time that I actually picked up a book to learn a specific way to stitch.
I'm on the home stretch of my second project. I think I'm done with the main image and now I just need to put a fabric back on it and finish the edges nicely. I'm still trying to decide what color to use for the border. I'm thinking I'll keep it minimalistic and just use some black fabric for a border with stitching done around in the same color as the branches.

artistic inspiration

Recently I've been spending alot of time browsing the handmade goods on Etsy.
I find it to be a wealth of inspiration. So much so that I've gotten back to some other art forms that had been shoved to the wayside by my newfound love of knitting. A few years ago I discovered woodburning- or pyrography if you want to be really geeky about it- and just loved it. There's something so haunting about the finished product that I just love. Perfect examples can be seen in my favorites list which is linked in the sidebar as Beautiful Things. There are a couple of tagua nut pendants that are done with a combination of burning and oil painting that I just adore and have inspired me to try my hand at something similar. I bought some tagua nut slices and took my cheapo wood burning tool to a couple. My results have been less than what I hoped for and I think part of the issue is that my tool is just inadequate. It's the $10 dollar variety from a craft store. I'm going to keep at it though and see where it goes. I went and got a piece of basswood to practice on and found that it's much easier to get nice results from that than the tagua.

I've discovered through Esty that something called Art Cards Editions Originals (ACEOs) are very popular. Basically any kind of art in a 2.5 x 3.5 inch trading card format are really popular collectors items right now. I've been looking for a way to make money from home and I'm going to try to plug into that market and see how it goes. I've almost finished my first piece which is a combination of knitting and embroidery. It's cute. Not exactly how I pictured it in my mind but it's been a learning experience. I'm having a lot of fun brainstorming and being inspired.

valentines day and family drama

oh the Mama drama never seems to end. I've been struggling to avoid being too emotionally invested in the choices my mother makes for her own life. It is, after all, HER life. It's just difficult to watch something chug along that appears certain to end in train wreck. She's got this new boyfriend... well fiance technically, who is - get this- 30 years old.

I will be 30 years old this year.
My husband is 31 years old.
My mother is engaged to a man younger than my husband. I find this very disturbing. Even if he weren't so young, I would still be disturbed that she's already engaged to a man that she's only been dating for about a month. She'd probably already be married if she didn't have to host a memorial this coming August for her deceased husband. She didn't think it would be proper to be remarried before that is taken care of. *snort*

I could go on and on about some other choices related to this newest development but I think I'll leave it at that for now. I'm trying to come to terms with seeing my mother in the harsh light of reality without the rose colored glasses of childhood. It has been quite unpleasant to say the least. It seems I must accept that she just isn't going to be the typical gramma for my children.. baking cookies and stuff like that. She's like a kid who refuses to grow up. *sigh*


on a happier note- Valentines Day was really nice. B baked a delicious German chocolate cake and bought some yummy chocolates for us.He bought me an obscenely expensive box of Godiva truffles that were positively divine. I've never had a more delicious hazelnut truffle. It was to die for.

Well.. we finally got ourselves a vehicle to call our own! Whew.. what a relief. Our subaru broke down way back at the beginning of the summer and we've been borrowing my father's old Ford Explorer and occasionally my mom's truck ever since. Car shopping is such a pain in the neck. It's only compounded by the fact that we needed a car that could fit three carseats in the back. Turns out subarus are a tight fit, if we would have even been able to at all. Since we need something big enough to also haul a great dane, that eliminated sedans. We were left with the choice between a mini van or an suv. After reading lots of reviews of various different options we decided to go with a Toyota 4runner. We were fortunate enough to find a really clean 1996 model with only 113,000 miles on it. It's running beautifully and we all fit so nicely in it. I'm so relieved to finally have that taken care of and since we spent well under our budget, we've even got some money left over to take care of some pressing dog care issues... Namely getting the two corgis fixed.. No puppies for us! Way to much of a headache that would be, we ultimately decided.