Just because I care about you

One day a teacher asked her students to list the names of the other students in the room on two sheets of paper, leaving a space between each name.Then she told them to think of the nicest thing they could say about each of their classmates and write it down.

That Saturday, the teacher wrote down the name of each student on a separate sheet of paper, and listed what everyone else had said about that individual.

On Monday she gave each student his or her list. Before long, the entire class was smiling. 'Really?' she heard whispered. 'I never knew that I meant anything to anyone!' and, 'I didn't know others liked me so much,' were most of the comments.

No one ever mentioned those papers in class again. She never knew if they discussed them after class or with their parents, but it didn't matter. The exercise had accomplished its purpose. The students were happy with themselves and one another. That group of students moved on.


Of course, there's a poignant ending to this story with all the students saying how much the 'paper' meant to them. To me the previous portion is what is important. People never seem to realize how valued they are - how much they are loved. I've had it in my mind for some time to make a list of the qualities I see every day in one special person I love. I'm sure he has no idea how great he is. I think it's a cool idea for a pillow.

Cleaning

Around our house, when the kids were teenagers, I had a reputation as a 'magician' accused of making things disappear. Or, as Joey used to say, I "cleaned them into oblivion". This was less about 'cleaning' and more about 'memory.'

I'm trying not to do this to Bob. I work hard at not moving his stuff. The exception is the kitchen counter. I move stuff from there when I trying to prepare a meal.

Today is cleaning day at our house and I usually try to put things away so the cleaning lady doesn't have to deal with our 'clutter.' I'm sitting here trying to rationalize why I didn't neaten up Bob's sink in our bathroom when I did my own. Actually, I just forgot and now I'm feeling bad. He's always so appreciative of everything I do...

Kid Cards - The Boys

I just had time for a few 'boys' today, but I'm still thinking about a fire helmet and a train engineers, and a knit cap.

Pump Boys and Dinettes

Judy and I saw Pump Boys and Dinettes last night at Drury Lane Theater. Neither of us had seen it before, so we were looking forward to it. We weren't disappointed! It's a cute, fun, spirit lifting show! and it ended before 10: which makes it perfect, in my book!

Judy, sitting next to 'you know who'. I couldn't sit there.

Ms. Invisible

For years I thought I had an anonymous face. People never remembered me. Being a ‘people person’ I remember everyone, so I was aware when they didn’t recognize me. It was especially hard when Joe kept running into people he knew everywhere we went. I not only felt anonymous, I felt invisible.

That changed after I started making cloth dolls. Then, when I would re-introduce myself to someone and they would say “You’re the doll lady.”

Shortly after I started the doll pattern business ‘SewSweet Dolls’, I met a woman I’ll call K, in the Doctors waiting room. I was pregnant with Joey and she was expecting her first child. We would see each other frequently and got acquainted. Later I was invited to a party given by a friend, and who should be there but K. We had a mutual friend.

Through the years I have run into her regularly and she has never remembered me. In the past 5 years or so, Bob and I see K and her husband in Fresco's frequently. She even poked me once to ask whet I was eating. She came into my shop looking for Chelli Chique, she waited on me and followed me around a store she was working in and never once remembered me.

Lately I have pointed her out to Bob and to my friend Judy. Honestly, everywhere I (we) go, she’s there. I don’t try to catch her eye or smile at her any more.

Judy and I have had season tickets to Drury Lane Theatre for many years, on Wednesday nights. When the theatre schedule was changed, we had to switch to Thursday nights. The first Thursday we attended, I spotted K and her husband standing in the crowd. Our seats turned out to be behind a very large man and neither Judy or I being very tall, we couldn’t see around him. We requested different seats for this season, and got great seats in 3rd row center. What good luck!!

Guess who’s is sitting right next to us. . .

Tonight is the 2nd play in series. We take turns sitting on the aisle, so I will be next to K.
I’m not sure what I’m going to do.

Kid Cards

I've been playing with paper today. I bought lots of big sheets of scrap booking paper and now I'm cutting them up into little pieces. That doesn't make sense, even to me... however, it's what i have to work with. I spent hours last Saturday, trying to find tiny black dots, the stick-on kind. I found tiny white dots, but not black, so i bought tiny black brads, which is the closest thing I could find. I wanted to use them for eyes. The tiny black brads look(ed) really cute to me, until I did one kid with just dots for eyes. I like that look better. Glad I didn't buy tons of the others. The thing I like about the brads is they help secure the kid to the card, but I'll figure out another way to do that. Glue is not my favorite thing - I'm messy. Hot glue is even worse! I usually wind up gluing my fingers to my project, and - don't get me started on crazy glue...

Here are a few of my little cards, they are 4" x 5" approximately. You can clearly see my arms holding the camera over them. I have to find another place to take pictures.

Courtship Quilt

The shower was last week end, so it's safe to show the Courtship Quilt. Mom loved all the colors in the pictures so we chose shades of gray as the accent colors. I love the way it turned out. I also love the 'moody' black and white coasters Amy made as a gift from the brides sister.

The coasters are all the color of the one at the bottom. I cast a shadow on the others while taking the picture. In the uncropped version, you can see my arms holding the camera above the coasters, forming an arch. If I lighten up the pic, the bottom one will 'blow out'. hmmmm

Scrap Book Expo

I just found out that there's a Scrap Book Expo in St. Charles August 21st and 22nd! Registration begins on 6-12 I think (I have to recheck that). I had some trouble with the web page, but I think it's my computer. I keep getting error messages saying something about the 'script' on the site, but they can't all be wrong, so it must be me. Even though I'm not a scrap-booker this sounds like fun. I'm anxious to see the class list.

I'm a Quilter now - I need books

Oh my gosh! I can't believe I bought an old book on Quilting, by Family Circle. I probably got rid of this book last year. (What is that Charlie Brown expression? Arrrrgh! or something like that? fill it in here.) Last year I wasn't a quilter, this year . . . I might be. The good news is it was in a cool resale shop in Geneva, Deja Vu, and on sale for $1. It has lots of great patterns in it and is the only quilt book I'll ever need! Yea, right . . .

It's Official!

We're moving to the Berry House in Geneva next week. The name of the shop is Simply Sassy. I'll be working out there one day a week. We haven't decided which day yet, but I'm happy to do that. It will be a nice change of pace. Dawn, the young woman we are moving in with, is very nice and seems like a reasonable person. I like the 'stuff' she has so far. She wants us to be 'established' before Swedish Days. That's a very popular annual event in Geneva. We've done Swedish Days before, as an exhibitor. It's very well attended. Geneva is kind of a 'destination' place so I think this will be a good move for us and I'm excited to be doing something positive 'out west'. The '3rd Street Shops' has fallen on hard times.

We're on the move, again . . .

Seems like the Market isn't what it used to be. We need to be 'where the action is' so we are moving out of the 3rd Street Shops (formerly the Market) and into Geneva. We haven't crossed the t's or dotted the i's yet, but things are looking good.

Amy and I toured Geneva last week and found some old friends there. We'll see how it all turns out, but I'm optimistic.

This is our display in the 3rd Street Shops. We're trying to see if it will fit in our prospective new space. I'd hate to give it up, but it's pretty large.

Amy's surprise

Two of Amy's dogs, Emily and Rufus are siblings of Irene's dogs and Amy wanted to do something special as a surprise for Irene.

I heart this!

A synonym is a word you use if you can't spell the other one.