needle & thREAD

 

This shall be brief. You're looking at the sum total of this week's needlework. I packed some pretty cross stitch, but I haven't touched it. I don't know what I was thinking when I thought I'd be passing the time with a needle and thread.

Reading? All my reading has been from the  The Complete Tales of Beatrix Potter and  the Random House Book of Humor for Children. Karoline is so into Peter Rabbit right now that I think it's time for another trip down the rabbit trail. She was only 8 months old or so the last time.

For now, though, it's time to tuck my dancers into bed and sleep fast before another day at the beach (or in the convention center that has lovely views of the beach, as it were).

What are you sewing and reading this week? I am eager to hear!

  Or are you embroidering? Pulling a needle with thread through lovely fabric to make life more beautiful somehow? Would you share with us just a single photo (or more) and a brief description of what you're up to? Will you tell us about what you're reading, also? Would you talk sewing and books with us? I'd love that so much.

    Make sure the link you submit is to the URL of your blog post or your specific Flickr photo and not your main blog URL or Flickr Photostream. Please be sure and link to your current needle and theREAD post below in the comments, and not a needle and theREAD post from a previous week. If you don't have a blog, please post a photo to the needle & thREAD group at Flickr. 

       Include a link back to this post in your blog post or on your flickr photo page so that others who may want to join the needle and thREAD fun can find us! Feel free to grab a button here (in one of several colors) so that you can use the button to link:-).

with needle & thREAD

In the sewing world, we're still kind of crazy about headbands. I told Katie that I'm fairly certain that every female who has come through our door this week has left with a headband. And all my girls have at least two each. The headbands have inspired me to clean out my scrap basket. I had saved pretty much every scrap since I started sewing a couple years ago. Now, the only pieces in the box are pieces large enough to use for a headband or some other such project. I recognize that my days of piecing quilts from tiny scraps are too many years away to justify the mess those scraps make in my scrap basket.

Speaking of the tidying baskets, not much reading is happening here these days. I have been cleaning and organizing like crazy this week and listening instead of reading. Several of you asked for links to good listening. Lately, I've been listening to Andrew Pudewa:

Nature Deficit Disorder

Teaching Boys & Other Children Who Would Rather Make Forts All Day

The Four Language Arts

Nurturing Competent Communicators

Fairytales and the Moral Imagination

I admit to crying not far into that last one. I'm a big fan of fairytales. Suggesting them to homeschoolers has not always been a happily-ever-after experience for me. It was nice to be among friends.

All of these talks have been excellent. I don't think I've learned anything new, philosophically speaking. I'm not going to drastically change the way we do things around here. Instead, there has been a sense of kinship. Here are folks who speak my language (far better than I speak it). These methods work. They do. And they are sound and they are faithful. 

I pulled out my copy of Tending the Heart of Virtue to re-read. Amazon tells me I purchased it in 2008. I remember buying it at the recommendation of Katherine, shortly after the first online firestorm of protestations against the way I was educating my children. After the second firestorm, three years ago, I stepped away from homeschool groups--both online and any place else. It's hard enough to raise a family that is in the world but not of the world of the secular culture. Why heap onto that feeling like a pariah in homeschool circles, too? There's no upside. Homeschoolers have so many hot buttons; seems pretty easy to set off an alarm every other day.

I'm not interested in dissent. 

But here's the curious thing. After three years away from all those "support" groups, I have a deeply rooted sense of confidence in what is happening in my home. It doesn't come from someone else's affirmation--not even Andrew Pudewa's affirmation. It comes from looking back on how I've spent the last 25 years and knowing that I gave my best to God. I made mistakes every single day. I still make mistakes every single day. But I sought His will and I answered His call as best I could.

One of my favorite phrases when sharing with other homeschooling moms is "In our family..." It's the ultimate caveat perhaps. This is what works in our family, with our children, and our husband and father. Your mileage my a vary. God may have put you in another vehicle altogether.

I love to talk with young moms about home education. I love to share what I've learned along the way and I love to hear the enthusiasm and utter joy in their voices. Young moms have an idealism that reminds me of newly wed idealism. You know, when you look back and wonder at the miracle of how you dared to marry someone and make a whole new family? How did you get so brave? You need that same courage and idealism to embark upon home education. I love to watch and listen to it. It is such a gift.

Two of my dearest, closest, and most forever friends aren't going to homeschool in the coming year. These were my two phone calls or visits for the quick "I hardly have to say it and she already gets it." Women who have held my hand--literally--in some of the scariest places I've ever been. Last night had me wondering at the aloneness of it all. Endeavoring to educate one's children in your own home, taking on that entire challenge for nine kids over twelve years each? That's a formidable task.

We all need kindhearted, holy support. Let's be that to one another. 

What are you sewing, reading. Heck, what are you cleaning and organizing? How are you preparing for the next season? What makes you happy? About what are you excited? It's a free-for-all. Just talk.

with needle & thREAD

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We're binge sewing this week! Monday afternoon, I found myself alone in the house and I wandered into my sewing room to see about putting together the blouse I cut for Katie weeks ago. I didn't have the right shade of pink thread. Since I really wanted to settle in with my machine, stitch a little, inhale steaming cotton, and feel the contentment that comes with creating a bit with my hands, I found another quick project.

It's been the Summer of Humidity here. It rains nearly every day and when it's not raining, it feels like a steam room out there. My hair is looking ridiculously unruly. My go-to is always a folded bandana to pull it out of my eyes, but that look isn't the greatest very often. 

Andrea posted some really cute headbands on Instagram last week, so I followed her lead. I used the turtorial at Happy Together (I love the name of that blog!). Once I finished one, I saw the potential.

Last spring, I promised several girls in Katie's dance class that we'd sew this summer. These headbands are perfect for dancers and they are also the perfect small project to get girls sewing. Yesterday, we had a friend for Katie and a friend for Kari come sew with us. Each girl chose her own fabric and I helped each one make hers individually. After making the first four, I recognized that the younger girls' probably needed a slightly smaller band, so I cut Sarah's down as I went. There is actually a link to a smaller pattern at the Happy Together  site. I think I'll check that out before our next pair of sister friends come to sew next week. 

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 All pictures above are kindness of Katie with my iPhone. I had every intention of taking good pictures with my big camera but quickly discovered that I had my hands full. 

I've been reading Educating the WholeHearted Child this week. It used to be that I read this book the first week of July every year. The book was revised a few years ago and now it takes me much longer! It's so well worth the time though. I don't tend to go to homeschool conferences or retreats. This book is it. I take time to sit with  pretty pens and notepaper, a cup of tea, and intention to pray and I let the wisdom seep into  my bones (hopefully).

The nice thing about the revised copy is that the Clarksons have perspective now. Their children are grown. They can look back with some sense of confidence. They can also draw upon the reflections of their kids. What worked? What didn't? I can tell you this. The Clarkson clan is real. They struggle like the rest of us. But a great deal worked!

Lest you think all the fun was had by girls druing yesterday's crafternoon, I assure you the boys created, too. Nicky made cupcakes while we sewed and then everyone got in on the act of decorating. A good time was had by all:-)

What are you sewing and reading this week? I am eager to hear!

What's on your summer reading list? Do you have a summer sewing list?  Or are you embroidering? Pulling a needle with thread through lovely fabric to make life more beautiful somehow? Would you share with us just a single photo (or more) and a brief description of what you're up to? Will you tell us about what you're reading, also? Would you talk sewing and books with us? I'd love that so much.

    Make sure the link you submit is to the URL of your blog post or your specific Flickr photo and not your main blog URL or Flickr Photostream. Please be sure and link to your current needle and theREAD post below in the comments, and not a needle and theREAD post from a previous week. If you don't have a blog, please post a photo to the needle & thREAD group at Flickr. 

       Include a link back to this post in your blog post or on your flickr photo page so that others who may want to join the needle and thREAD fun can find us! Feel free to grab a button here (in one of several colors) so that you can use the button to link:-).

needle & thREAD

I'm finally hitting my groove with this costume thing. Dance costumes are outrageously expensive. So, when they arrive, one naturally expects something well-made from quality fabric. That's the first piece of education. They are never well made and the fabric is cheesy. The next piece is that there will always be mistakes in sizes. Then, there's the greatest piece: don't be afraid to improvise and rig it to make it work. 

This dance season has been quite the education for a fairly new seamstress who has been fighting perfectionism all her life:-). 

But I'm hitting my groove. I'm learning to cut and piece and make do. I'm also learning that not much can happen that sequins don't improve.

Reading has been light. I can't find my copy of Magical Journey: An Apprenticeship in Contentment. It's here somewhere. I'm counting on it reappearing next week when I have some calm days for binge reading. Maybe I'll finish Kristin Lavransdatter , too.

In the meantime, I picked up Second Nature, Michael Pollan's new book. I'm a fan of Michael Pollan, so this one is the perfect to fit into my tidy threesome of Mother Culture books.

"There is no sadder sight in life than a mother, who has so used herself up in her children's childhood, that she has nothing to give them in their youth. When babyhood is over and school begins, how often children take to proving that their mother is wrong. Do you as often see a child proving to its father that he is wrong? I think not. For the father is growing far more often than the mother. He is gaining experience year by year, but she is standing still. Then, when her children come to that most difficult time between childhood and full development she is nonplussed; and, though she may do much for her children, she cannot do all she might, if she, as they, were growing!...

Is there not some need for 'mother culture'? But how is the state of things to be altered? So many mothers say, 'I simply have no time for myself!' 'I never read a book!' Or else, 'I don't think it is right to think of myself!' They not only starve their minds, but they do it deliberately, and with a sense of self-sacrifice which seems to supply ample justification.

Mother must have time to herself. And we must not say 'I cannot.' Can any of us say till we have tried, not for one week, but for one whole year, day after day, that we 'cannot' get one half-hour out of the twenty-four for 'Mother Culture?'--one half-hour in which we can read, think, or 'remember.'

The habit of reading is so easily lost; not so much, perhaps, the power of enjoying books as the actual power of reading at all. It is incredible how, after not being able to use the eyes for a time, the habit of reading fast has to be painfully regained...

The wisest woman I ever knew--the best wife, the best mother, the best mistress, the best friend--told me once, when I asked her how, with her weak health and many calls upon her time, she managed to read so much, 'I always keep three books going--a stiff book, a moderately easy book, and a novel, and I always take up the one I feel fit for!' That is the secret; always have something 'going' to grow by. If we mothers were all 'growing' there would be less going astray among our boys, less separation in mind from our girls...

A brisk walk will help. But, if we would do our best for our children, grow we must; and on our power of growth surely depends, not only our future happiness, but our future usefulness.

Is there, then, not need for more 'Mother Culture'?"  

~Charlotte Mason Volume III, no. 2 The Parents' Review

 

 

Do you have three books going? Would you like to have three books going? Which three?

needle & thREAD

Remember how I said I wanted slow? Turns out I have it in the reading and sewing departments;-). I've made very little progress since last we chatted books and sewing. The voile frays easily and I think I need to use French seams. Anybody have French seams advice?

I intended to put this sweet little top together yesterday afternoon, but there was a crowd of children who all look very much alike gathered in my great room watching Midsummer Night's Dream and I kept being inexplicably pulled into their presence.

Especially delightful was watching how perplexed Mary Beth and Christian were when Karoline kept explaining plot and characters. At first, everyone (except Karoline and Sarah) were a bit at a loss with the language and the names. When Karoline kept filling in the blanks for them and then Sarah embellished Kari's tutorial, the big kids were more than a little chagrined. How were the little girls comprehending so well when they were struggling? Then it was revealed that they'd recently been reading this excellent picture book and listening to this read aloud.

The whole scenario did make me wonder though: print version first or performance first? Shakespeare's plays were written to be viewed by an audience. But the language does make it tricky to follow along the first time you see it.

Last night, we found ourselves at Michael's and Kristin's house. Knowing I had no sewing to report, I asked Kristin about  her quilt. I think perhaps she'll come back and report on it another day. Stephen is trying out for a new soccer team that is 24 minutes from our house and 4 minutes from theirs. I currently allocate an hour to get to the team where he's played for the the last five years. That team is dissolving. This one sure looks like an answer to prayers. Is it fair to ask your prayers on this one?

How is your summer sewing coming along? Leave a link and show and tell or just chat about it in the comments:-)