Christmas Complete

I'm not good at preparing -- preparing for parties, preparing for Christmas. I'm always stressed about it. Once a party or Christmas starts, I'm fine, but the prep makes me grumpy.
This year, between traveling to pick up kids in college and trying to throw a 75th birthday party for my mother, I was extra harried. Well, the party was cancelled due to a stomach virus that passed through my parents and brother's family, but we still got to celebrate Christmas.
I think this pic of the cat amidst the debris of Christmas summed it all up pretty well.

And the kids looked pretty satiated afterward too.

After we celebrated at home Christmas morning, we were headed to Earl's sister's house and there we would see little Caroline. I had planned to sew a princess dress for her, and Christmas morning it wasn't finished. Grace helped me put elastic in the puffy sleeves and I ironed, pinned and hemmed the dress as I watched the clock tick past the time we were to arrive. Earl and the boys went on without us as I continued to work on the dress. Finally, we finished and, although it's far from perfect, Caroline loved it.

Hope your Christmas was magical and created many fond memories, like mine did.

Buttons

When I was a little girl, my mother had a big coffee can filled with buttons. They were all those left over buttons that had come off clothing and all the buttons that she bought on the card of four or six from the store that weren't needed on sewing projects. I loved to dump out that can full of buttons and sort through them.
The feeling of the buttons running through my fingers was magical. And then I did what kids do naturally -- I sorted them according to size, according to color, according to shape. It's a natural Montessori lesson.
So, as an adult, I, of course, have a coffee can full of buttons too.
My grandmother, on my father's side, has a gorgeous rose-colored vase -- not really a vase, more like a glass container that stands on the floor then narrows as it rises and comes up to my waist that she filled with buttons. When my grandmother asked my mother if there was anything she would like from the house, my mom said she would like the vase with the buttons. My grandmother said she could have the vase but not the buttons. I think part of the allure of this vase/container was the buttons. My mom wanted the buttons too. I'm not sure whatever happened in this saga. Perhaps the container is still at my grandmother's house in Kentucky. She's 93.
This morning I had to look through my coffee can full of buttons for a button to go on Spencer's cargo shorts. His button had disintegrated in the middle. I wasn't worried, I knew I would find a button the right size that was compatible with the khaki shorts.
I did and sewed it on, but I couldn't resist playing with the buttons some. Even though the buttons are mine, I don't know where most of them came from.
What about this furry button?
Did I ever wear anything that had this button? I don't think so.
I picked out the tiny buttons, so small that I'm glad I don't need to sew them on anything right now.
I put a dime in the picture for comparison to show how tiny they are.
I found some cloth covered buttons. These are pretty specialized and I can't imagine that I'll use them ever again, but you never know.
And some buttons shine like jewels.
Maybe they should be made into jewelry and I could wear them around my neck. Maybe buttons should be interchangeable and I should be able to snap them on different blouses according to my mood that day.

Bloomer Injury

I'm sitting here with a hot pack on my lower back which hurts whenever I stand up. The pain hit me in the middle of the night, approximately 2:37 a.m. when I got up with my youngest son to get him ibuprofen and Sudafed for his virus.
Within minutes I had diagnosed my lower back pain -- bloomer injury.
In my spare time, I've been helping with costumes for the fall play Little Women. Mostly I've had to take in pants, sew ribbons on collars and put velcro in place of buttons for quick changes. Then came the challenge. The four daughters in the play must have bloomers. Never mind that no one will ever see the bloomers. They help make the characters feel more authentic.
I was given an assortment of sheer white material and used bed sheets to cut bloomers from. So Wednesday morning, on my day off, I was bent over the table trying to cut around the pattern with dull scissors. My husband wandered out of bed and pushed me aside. He took over the cutting.
I moved to the armchair and the coffee table where my sewing machine was set up. I had not seen the sewing machine since we moved. As a matter of fact, this is the old sewing machine and I know that I have a newer one somewhere that I inherited from Earl's mom, but we can't find it. After two years of not running, the machine is complying, although an electrical short somewhere causes the needle not to move at all while I have my foot holding down the pedal then it will suddenly race. It's a little temperamental.
I completed one pair of bloomers while Earl cut out another pattern (winning big husband points).
Then I went about my day, grading papers, shopping at the thrift store for more costume needs, studying algebra with my 13-year-old. I was blissfully ignorant of the pending bloomer injury that had already taken place but was worming its way into my muscles.
Just as I diagnosed myself, I am also in charge of treatment. Heat. Cancelled run this morning and even called off trip to work out at the Y. I thought about going and if a weight machine hurt my back then I would stop, but since I didn't recognize the bloomer injury when it occurred, I might not recognize that a weight machine was exacerbating the problem. So I'm staying home, grading papers, and I might move the sewing maching to the dining room table so I can show those bloomers who is boss and finish the other three pairs.