in my head i have a list

in my head i have this list. of things i never thought i’d say. i add to this list periodically.

it all started when the boys were little and i said ‘don’t run in the house.’ of course being a relatively new mommy i didn’t know you had to add ‘and don’t skip, hop, jump, twirl, roll, etc.’ you get the idea.


as the years have passed ‘things i never thought would come out of my mouth’ has grown to include not only silly, funny, weird, gross, and improbable, but now i’ve dipped into startling.


and it’s not such an unusual thing to say, it’s just that it startles me every time.


it startles me to state my age. i’m not sure why this phenomenon occurs, except that i don’t think i ever expected to BE this age. it’s not particularly old, and i don’t mind being this age.


it just startles me every time i hear the words come out of my mouth.


So now i have another thing to add to the ‘list.’

HAPPY TURKEY DAY

too neat to create

just did a MAJOR clean-up (for Turkey Day.) since i was on a roll, i decided to clean/neaten up and ‘purge’ the studio.



now it’s too neat to create! i’m afraid to mess it up!


i think i’m one of those people that can’t create if things are too tidy. i need a bit of chaos! not too much, just enough to spark that idea that’s been percolating in the back of my mind!


okay, let’s face it, i’m just lazy and don’t like to clean!

candyland and competition

i am totally uncompetitive (or so i think) and here’s why……



growing up i went through the usual game playing stages, a.k.a. ‘the candyland phase’


i was obsessed with it. played it every day (which also brings up the question, how did my parents ever let me live, but that’s another post entirely.)


i played mostly with my mother, because when i played with my father, he creamed me. i mean he killed me, decimated me, obliterated me.


i distinctly remember one game he had me in tears, (he was VERY competitive, which is probably why he was so successful.) and i remember my mother’s words to this day ‘oh, for Christ’s sake jack, let the kid win once in a while’.


and i remember thinking, ‘she LETS me win?” and then LIES about it? no, not possible.


but maybe, just maybe i wasn’t the greatest candyland player that ever was. maybe my mother WAS letting me win, hmmmm. intriguing thought.


and THAT”S why i’m not competitive, (or so i think.)

what Janome and i made today

here are a few pics of what i made today on my new baby.

$$/gift card holders for the Alliance gift shop for the holidays.

 for the little girl on your holiday list, a mini purse with magnetic snap to hold your endowment (just big enought to hold a gift card or a nice crisp bill.)

 there's nothing like a fuzzy flip flop to perk up a boring monetary offering!

and what better way to give a Starbucks gift card than in a mug.

and when the $$ has all been spent they are ornaments to add to your Christmas tree (or chanukah bush.)

my new baby

it always happens, doesn’t it? just when you are in the middle of some project, poof!

my baby died on me. right in the middle of working on some stuff for the Alliance (of course!)
so, off to the Husqvarna Viking hospital she went. (it was bad, parts fell off! i think she’ll be there for a while.)
in the meantime i needed a backup plan.
here she is. Viking’s little sis, Janome. isn’t she cute?






just a basic work horse, but she has some tricks up her sleeve for such a base line machine.

so far, so good. not a big learning curve and i’m off to the races!
i’ll post some pics of what we made together soon!

"Some people make the world more special just by being in it."

thank you everybody! (and you know who you are!) for being there for me.

now back to our regularly scheduled program

(i hope.)



i’m hoping things settle down now and i can get back to making messes and making THINGS.


so here’s to hoping for some wonderful results to post in the near future!

when negative is a good thing

negative has such a, well, negative connotation

except when it’s biopsy=NEGATIVE

WHOO HOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

i wanna be famous

when i was 16 years old i thought i was going to be rich and famous. okay, maybe not so much rich but i was sure i was going to be famous. a famous writer living a bohemian existence in Greenwich Village or some other ‘cool’ place. living in a loft, penning deep and honest truths that just had to be told. having affairs, never marrying.

well, you get the idea.

suffice it to say, none of that happened.

but i still want to be famous.

i was thinking about this the other day, when my son said something that just knocked me off my feet.

he said, ‘you’re badass! you don’t realize just how tough you really are!’ (talking about the way i face what life has thrown at me lately. not earth shattering by any stretch of the imagination, but trying at times.)

and a light bulb went off in my head.

i AM famous…… maybe not in the textbook sense of the word, but famous in the sense that i am a significant role model to my family. to my kids.

that’s fame enough for me.

meet shiny, twinkle & flasher….

i guess I’m destined to be a cartoonist not a ‘fine artist’

lol