BrambleStitches

Oh, I have so much to tell you about, but first things first. My sweater won a blue ribbon at the Fair!

For the past month, anticipating our renovation, we haven’t had much furniture in the house. In fact, the only thing you could see from the street was my spinning wheel. One day while walking with the kids, one of the neighbors flung open her window and called, “Are you a spinner?”

Why yes. Yes I am. And so I met Betsy, my two-doors-down neighbor, who is also a spinner, weaver, seamstress, etc. Of course one fiber artist can not meet another without also meeting their stash of fiber. Or their tools. As it was, Betsy was cleaning house, and somehow (I’m still not sure how it happened) she offered me a floor loom. And I, dumbfounded, but not being one to let such an opportunity pass, called my brother, and together we carried it home. (And yes, if you must ask, it was awkward and heavy as hell, but it wouldn’t fit into my truck with the camper shell on.)

Please meet my new-to-me handmade 8-shaft floor loom, soon to be my Mama’s new loom. For years my mom had wanted to learn to weave, and so when she and her partner, Don, went to New Zealand for a semester this year, she finally was able to take a weaving class. She is very excited about her new loom, as she should be, and she is going to come visit me soon so she can take it home with her. (So a note to all of you who can’t get your mother to visit–go right out and find her a floor loom, and hand knit her a sweater to seal the deal.)

But back to Betsy–she is also the superintedant of the fiber arts division at our local Fair, and she asked me to demonstrate spinning for a few hours in the display hall, so I brought my new wheel (the wheel that my mom and her partner bought in New Zealand and shipped to me!) down to the fairground and had a lovely time sitting and spinning and chatting with all the folks who stopped to watch. Of course that gave me plenty of time to gloat over admire the blue ribbon on my sweater, which I am still holding for ransom. I think the loom ups the ante on that.

Happily, my mom has decided to pay up with a visit in a couple weeks, and she is also bringing me two light fixtures for my fireplace wall, which I was unable to procure locally, so I think it will be a good trade.

This dream of mine

Olga and I picked as many ripe strawberries as we could find today. You can see the plants in the bed against the garage behind her head. They don’t get a whole lot of sunlight, but it stays nice and warm next to the wall, and I think they like that.

Of course, greedy as we are, we gobbled them up while Gavin was napping. (Sorry, Gav.)

Upon waking from his nap, Gavin did his Harry Potter impersonation all over the yard with an old broom.

This rose bush has behaved very badly all season, and finally it is starting to bloom properly. It was making these massive buds that would swell and start to bloom, then suddenly get so heavy that the stem would bend over and the entire mass of petals would drop right off onto the patio in a globe of pink, then rot. Now it looks like it’s going to explode into a bouquet right on the bush, and the stems seem to be supporting the blooms. Anyone have any idea what is going on with this bush?

I want to remember this day forever.

This dream of mine

After ripping out the carpets and associated hardware, my back begged for a bit of recovery. So I went outside and pulled weeds in our berry patch. And lo, we discovered berries.

And my goodness, they are perhaps the sweetest strawberries I’ve ever tasted (and I grew up amidst miles and miles of strawberry fields, mind you). They are tiny and strangely shaped, but sweet and juicy.

After gorging ourselves on as many ripe berries as we could find (I think we got two each… I might have sneaked a third and not told anyone about it…) the kids took a nap at the same time. (By the way, that is Olga’s new rug from Ikea, a trip of which I shall tell in detail later, as it deserves its own post.)

This dream of mine

I come from a long line of wall-to-wall carpet-haters. Last weekend I put my newly-graduated-from-highschool brother, Jacob, to work helping me rip all the carpet out of my house. It took us two days to get the carpet out, the tack strips pried up, and all the staples pulled out (of which there were thousands). It was absolutely backbreaking work, but it didn’t even compare to how hard it was to scrub the original linoleum tile floor underneath. Getting rid of the carpets has also gotten rid of that stale, closed-up old house smell. Our allergies are a lot better now, too.

I’m going to put in a brand new, totally rockin’ bamboo floor this summer.

This dream of mine

Erik left yesterday to go back to Camp Lejeune, and I headed back to work today as well, after taking all of last week off. The weather cooperated beautifully, and we were able to get mostly moved into our new house (yes, we signed–it’s ours!). We love the house. It completely feels like home. The kids have their own rooms now, and they both like it. I was worried that Gavin would be lonely without Olga close by, but he seems quite happy.

I have to say, despite all logic to the contrary, I got really used to having Erik home. Gavin, who was still pretty little before Erik went to Iraq, really got to know his daddy well this trip, and now he’s wondering where his big buddy went. Olga understands the situation a little better, but that doesn’t make it any easier to deal with. Luckily, we’re expecting much more frequent visits from him during the next year.

Life in the Corps, This dream of mine

On Thursday, Erik flew home to us. It’s like someone pushed the “resume” button, or like I’ve been holding my breath for the past eight months, and now…

…now we’re all finally home.

Life in the Corps, This dream of mine

Have I mentioned that we bought a house? Probably not since I’ve been so wrapped up in Erik’s return (thank you for all the warm welcomes!), various deadlines, various kid colds, and life in general. I figure it might be time to make our announcement, though.

We bought our first house!

Actually, it went down like this: I told my husband, “Come Hell or high water, I will buy a house before you get out of the Marine Corps.”

And he, being the intelligent man he is, said, “Okay.”

Yes, it really was that easy.

Erik’s return from Iraq comes just in time to sign all of the loan and closing paperwork. We’re scheduled to close in about two weeks–a week after Erik arrives and the day after deadline for issue 118.

Homemaking, This dream of mine

Today we had a tsunami warning – or so I thought.

Our little coastal town of Gold Beach, Oregon is located roughly 50 miles from the Cascadia Subduction Zone in the Pacific Ocean, where one tectonic plate is slipping beneath another. Because of our proximity to this fault line, we have an advanced tsunami warning system consisting of two loud-speaker sirens that can be heard throughout Gold Beach. Seismologists and tsunami experts estimate that we have fifteen minutes from the onset of an off-shore earth quake to escape to high ground in order to avoid a theoretical 50 to 100-foot tsunami or sea surge. Much of our town is built below that elevation, including the Backwoods Home Magazine office, where the kids and I were this afternoon at closing time. Our advanced alert system also doubles as a noon and seven o’clock whistle, and as our volunteer fire department’s alarm, so local residents are quite accustomed to the daily bomb siren-like wail.

One wail at noon and seven, three for fire, continuous for tsunami.

Today, just as most of our staff left for the day, the siren started up. But today it didn’t stop after three whistles for fire. By the time I heard whistle number seven or eight, I had Gavin on my hip, keys in hand, and Olga in tow and we were heading out the door. My brother Jacob was right behind me and we were almost out the door when my dad called out that it was just the monthly system test. Within a minute or so the test was over, but I was so high on adrenaline that I stood there with my hands shaking for a few moments before I could collect myself enough to load the children and our things into the truck.

Apparently we have these tsunami drills on the first day of every month, and it wasn’t really meant to be a cruel April Fools Day joke, but I sure did need a drink afterward.

This dream of mine