Big day.  I had a project that I couldn’t accomplish by myself, so my buddy Cora came by and we videotaped a couple of projects together.  It was fun having someone else to craft with, as I am normally alone in my crafting pursuits.  Cora is a real craft maven though.  She is a seamstress, crochets, quilts, knit,  you name it, she does it.  Years ago, Cora taught me how to can and we’ve canned together often over the years.  It’s great to can with someone else as all of that slicing and dicing can get really old after a while.

My project today was a simple fleece scarf but little did I know, fleece is a wily substance.  It stretches whenever and wherever it wants and then doesn’t return to its original shape.  I’ve watched so many videos on making fleece scarves and every crafter made it sound like it was the simplest thing possible.  Ok, maybe for other people, but not for me.  Cora explained it this way, “You really need three arms to do this.”  Well that definitely leaves me out.  You need one arm to hold the fleece, one to hold the measuring device and one to run the rotary cutter.  I became the arm that held the measuring device.  I’m really glad we did the video and not just because I got to work with one of my closest friends.  I think our video is honest and shows the difficulties of working with fleece and the ways around it.  I’ve never seen any videos that go into detail or that show the tools Cora had to make the project go smoothly.  End result, we (or should I say Cora) made three scarves for our mother/daughter team and matching scarves for our little girls’ dolls.  Cora offered to make scarves for my dogs but I hesitated and then said no.  After all, they already have Christmas collars and all that fur to keep them warm.

Ok, no more stalling.  I am absolutely going to get something done today.  I know I keep saying that, but this time I really mean it.  I have a project that I want to do but keep putting off.  The time has come to do it.  No more procrastinating.  It’s an album that will be a gift for a very good friend.  I’ve been doing small bits of it here and there but I really need to finish it.  The problem is I don’t want to make something that isn’t worthy of her.  She’s crafty and so is her daughter.  I don’t want her to unwrap it and realize I could have done better.  So I’m putting it off until I am absolutely certain it will be great.  How can I be sure–there’s the rub, I really can’t know for sure.  By the way, what does that statement mean anyway.  “There’s the rub? ”

Q From Paula Conneran-Weig: What does the saying There’s the rub mean and what is the origin of the phrase?

A The phrase is Shakespeare’s. It comes from Hamlet’s famous “To be or not to be” soliloquy:

To die — to sleep.
To sleep — perchance to dream: ay, there’s the rub!
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause.

By rub, Hamlet means a difficulty, obstacle or objection — in this case to his committing suicide.

PS Remind me never to wonder what a phrase means, or to find the answer.. Yikes!

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas.  Everywhere you go.  The snow is coming down in waves.  I heard our weather forecast for Christmas was supposed to be in the 50’s.  I can’t ever remember a Christmas that we had such a heat wave.  I can tell you though that I remember a lot, ok most, Christmas’s that look like the weather we are having today.  Snow, snow and more snow.  Our dogs love it and come in just covered and stand patiently waiting for someone to wipe them down. They are golden retrievers and the snow hangs like an additional coat on their fur.  They get so excited when it snows and bring most of the snow drift inside when they come.  I wish I got as excited about snow.  Maybe it’s the ice or driving in snow that makes it not so fun. When we were kids there was always the chance of a snow day.  Adults need some snow days as well.  Wouldn’t that be great?  I’m giving myself a snow day tomorrow and you are welcome to join me.  Of course I’ll be wrapping gifts and doing a couple of videos and some laundry, but other than that, I’m taking the day off. Oh, maybe do some baking as well.  Definitely a snow day though.

 

I started wrapping Christmas gifts today.  I’ll be honest, the more I wrap, the more present seem to accumulate.  I love to wrap gifts and it’s no surprise, it involves ribbon.  I’ve always been a huge fan of presents that look really special.  When our niece and nephew were young, they used to point out the presents I wrapped because they were so different from the others.  Mine always had huge bows that were wired and the gift wrap made a statement.  The rest of the family consisted of men as my mother-in-law had passed away and both of my husband’s brothers were divorced. Their packages were either gift cards or all of them had the same gift wrap and no bows or the bows fell off in transit.

I also love to see reflective gift wrap so the lights of the tree catch the paper and make the room seem even more festive.  I like to use a wide variety of papers so no two packages look alike either.  It’s even more important to me now because the vast majority of my gifts are for a family that Rich and I adopt for Christmas.  We want their Christmas morning to be special and memorable and wonderful.  We spend a little bit of Christmas day talking about how we think the little girl will react to her new bedroom or the doll we found for her or the art supplies she wanted.  Our parents have passed away and we don’t have any children so it’s important to us to give a deserving working family a Christmas that they will remember.

When I was a kid, my mother always surprised a certain coworker with special Christmas gifts the woman had mentioned throughout the year.  This lady had no family and was pretty much alone.  She never knew my mother was her Santa and I always loved that she didn’t.  It gave my mother so much joy and I can only imagine what it gave to the receiver of those gifts.  It was my favorite part of Christmas.     I honestly can’t remember the first year we adopted a family since my staff and I always had a family we bought things for every Christmas.  When I quit working, I found an agency to go through who would help me find the perfect working family for us.  We like to make sure we really do a great job so we limit the number of family members and we like to have a little girl to buy dolls and dresses and we like to spoil the parents as well.  Every year we get a thank you note that makes me cry.  Since it’s anonymous, the agency passes the letter to us and these families take so much time to make sure that their gratitude is heard.  We are so grateful for them in allowing us to celebrate Christmas through them and hopefully, someday, they too will be able to adopt a family or person for Christmas as well.  Wouldn’t it be great if everyone could pay it forward in some way.  It doesn’t have to involve money.  It can be taking the time to call a friend who needs someone to listen.  Or an elderly person who has no one to talk to.  The woman in the checkout line in front of you who needs 20 more cents and is digging in her purse for it.  Someone to hold the door for you.  This Christmas, if each of us took a moment to think of one small thing we can do that could enrich someone else’s life, isn’t that what Christmas is all about?  I really hope it is.

I am seriously running out of time for my projects to be completed in time for Christmas.  I’m not sure what to do first. I think I’ll prioritize based on what is fastest so that at least others will also have time to do those projects as well if they so choose.  It’s kind of scary when Christmas sneaks up on me fast and I’m not prepared.  Even more frightening is how tired I am.  I think I’ll just go to bed and worry about it tomorrow.  It’s 5:30PM.  I need to either power nap this exhaustion off or give in to it and just go to bed as soon as supper is over.  I’m voting for plan B.. Just give in and go to bed.  Whatever project was in my head can definitely wait until tomorrow. Of course I still have all of the wrapping to do for the Christmas family and that could take a very very long time.  It’s not worth stressing over, give in and go to bed.

I really want to buck up or man up or whatever people say when they want you to be tough…Frankly I’m going for, give in or give up or whatever saying works with I am too tired and need to sleep.  Tomorrow is another day.

Time is running out on our Christmas projects and I have so many good ideas left.  Seems like I should keep some of them for next year.  I did hoard that Michael’s bargain of clear ornaments in planning for 2016.  When did I start planning ahead like this?  I’ve always bought things after Christmas for gifts for the next year, but crafting projects?  Ok, I never really had the time or interest in crafting until recently.  What’s changed?  I guess I found a hobby that allows me to express myself and hopefully encourage others to try something new as well.  I really enjoy hearing from new people and have met some pretty incredible individuals in the short time I’ve been doing this.  I’m looking forward to new ideas and projects for 2016 as well.  I think it’s going to be a great year.  I’m planning on it!

I bought the cardboard “K” at A. C. Moore and decided to cover it with glittery washi tape.  It would have been the easiest project ever if the washi tape had any adhesive on it..Alas, it did not.  Not as easy as I had hoped.  Still, pretty cute for our little girl’s room though.

 

I made the video of the corner rounders and was kind of surprised at the results.  I had always heard that the corner chomper (and yes, that is the real name of it) was THE corner rounder to own.  I knew it was heavy and cumbersome, my friend Linda gave me the heads up on that.  But I really thought for the money (almost $30), that it would be a great tool.  Not only was it cumbersome, but it didn’t round corners any better than the other corner rounders and in fact, the $7 corner rounder made the corner champer appear ineffective at best.

I used so many different corner rounder and kept having the same results.  I started to wonder, “Is it me?”  Maybe the reason so many corner rounders fail is because of the way I use them.  Maybe I’m the fail and not the punches.  I did get two different punches to work so I’ve decided it might not be me, but I’m not ruling it out.

Rich bought a new computer today so that we don’t have the problems we’ve been having with downloading videos.  He will get to 95% downloaded and his computer crashes.  It happens at least twice for every video he uploads.  In his shoes, I would have dropkicked that computer as far and as fast as possible.  He’s so much more patient than I am.  I can’t believe he hasn’t given up on it yet.  I’m more than happy he’s decided to upgrade his computer if it makes his life easier.  I just wish I had known that was the problem all along.  Maybe we could have saved him some aggravation.

The only downside of a new computer is the set up and getting oriented to whatever changes have taken place since we purchased our last one.  I’m hoping it’s not any worse than having the system crash two or three times a night, but you never know.  Let’s keep our fingers crossed that it’s a smooth transition.

I have a plan for a video.  It’s one that seems pretty ridiculous but just hear me out.  In the paper crafting world there are punches made specifically for rounding the corners on paper.  You would think that this would be a pretty easy feat.  I thought so too, until I started using different corner rounders.  Some round the corners but leave a weird edge on either side of the rounded area.  Some you can’t figure out how to put the paper in to accomplish the paper rounding.  Some are too hard to squeeze, and there are those that require brute strength to push the lever.  Tomorrow will be where the rubber meets the road (so to speak).  What does that mean anyway?  If the rubber didn’t meet the road, your car wouldn’t go anywhere.  So I guess tomorrow the tires will spin and the car will move forward (or in reverse) depending on which gear it is in.  I’m not sure why anyone felt the need to make an analogy where there is rubber or a road, but such is the nature of this blog.

Back to the plan at hand.  I’d decided I needed to buy a variety of punches and will pnly  keep the one or ones that actually work.  Believe it or not, there is a huge selection and  different types of corner rounders.  I went to Joann’s and there were two aisles devoted to punches and I bought one of every variety.  I’m excited about this experiment because this is exactly why I started the You Tube channel.  To help others ultimately purchase the product that will:

A.  Work for them, because not all punches were created for people like us.

B.  Do what the product says it will do (in this case, round corners).

C.  Find the product at an affordable price

D.  Allow us to buy one and done..I’ve never used that saying before, but it makes sense here.  Why do we have so many of a certain product?  Because whatever the product is, it doesn’t work for us the way it should. So we keep buying products until we find one that does.  (Please refer to my scissor video.)   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dh2Elfn2xAk

I’m really looking forward to this discussion.  I have a corner rounder that works, but is really hard to use.  I’m hoping tomorrow to find “One and Done” and I hope you’ll join me in my quest.