Saddened
As I’m sure everyone reading this knows by now, author James Rigney aka Robert Jordan passed away yesterday. I haven’t even read the last couple of books and became disenchanted with the series several years ago, but it’s still a sad day in book world. Those books changed my life. Without those books I never would have found my internet home, never would have met Mike, never would have met some of my bestest friends, never would have had Erik. I would be a poor, lonely shell of a teacher, screeching at asshole freshmen and petting my ten pet cats.
Ok, so I’m not a screecher when teaching and I’m allergic to cats, but you get the idea.
I was also hit rather hard by his age: only fifty-eight. My mom turns fifty-eight this month. That’s much too young to die from a rare disease, or any disease at all.
I guess he dictated the plot outline and a ton of notes since he knew he was ill, so at least his series should be wrapped up in some fashion sometime in the future.
On to other things. . .
I’ve been a giant stress ball, trying to get my mom’s quilt done. I got the binding attached to the front yesterday and now I just have to hand sew the binding to the back then do a thread inspection/trim and I can call it good. I’m tempted to post a picture now, with the binding only half-attached, but that would take away the pleasure of posting the actual, complete quilt. It’s amazing how much I can hate a quilt before the binding is on, but once the binding gets attached it suddenly becomes a quilt and I start liking it. Not that I will ever like this quilt, but it doesn’t seem like a hack job anymore.
I was also stressing out b/c I am part of this birthday block group and though a lot of people send out late blocks I am not a late block kind of person. A gal has her birthday tomorrow and I thought she would just have to wait till I got back from my trip, but in the end I firmly told Mike to keep Erik out of my sewing space and managed to whip together a really cool block for her. It will still be a few days late, but at least it won’t be a few weeks late. Here’s a pic:
She wanted fall colors and a fall pattern. Instead of doing the traditional maple leaf, I went with a block called Bear Tracks from Quilter’s Cache. This is not a color palette I’ve ever worked with before, but I think it came out pretty darned awesome. I can actually envision doing a whole quilt with this pattern in those colors. It would be really cozy to snuggle up with on a cool autumn evening.
Autumn is in the air here, but not so much that it actually requires a sweater (or that our newly broken car A/C can be waved away). I had a Macy’s gift card, so went to their big sale yesterday afternoon and found myself a sweater for a measly $9.99. I’ve kind of threw my 100% rule out the window after having Erik because I don’t love my body 100% and it’s really hard to find things that don’t highlight my upper belly. Seriously, people are always talking about muffin tops and how they are caused by people wearing pants that are too tight, but I have a gigantic muffin top even when I’m naked. I don’t like being fat, but do I have to have the fat look like a social deformity on top of the general grossness of just being fat? This sweater camouflages it pretty well so I wore it to a play date in the park today. Big mistake! I was sweating like a pig. I looked so purty with my unshowered hair and sweaty pits! I bet everyone wanted to be my lesbian lover (since there were no men there to lust after me in a hetero way). But! I love the sweater. I have been wearing the same three “fancy” dress tops all summer and I am so tired of them! If you’ve seen me in person this summer, you’ve seen me in one of the three tops.
Thanks to you all for telling me I’m not insane for not wanting to keep the shirt that does Erik no favors in the looks department. I have no qualms at all about getting rid of hand-me-downs. Erik wears a lot of pants from Braxton, but the shirts are all camo, sports, ripped, bleached, and gross. I don’t even take most of them to the consignment shop because I know she won’t accept them. Erik is a rough and tumble guy as well, but his clothes don’t get that beat up. I think it’s because Mike and I launder clothes properly and my sister . . . doesn’t. It’s amazing the difference proper care can make. I guess I was freaking about buying something I realized I hated, but at a little over a quarter, I haven’t exactly lost money. I’ll make money if it sells at the consignment shop. If I had the time and energy I could become a yard sale scavenger who sells my findings on Craigslist and ebay. I don’t think clothing does well in either of those places, though.
I know I had a bunch of other stuff I was going to post about and other bloggy obligations to take care of but I can’t remember any of them right now. I just need to go to bed. Will I ever get any sleep again? I can’t believe I am sort of thinking we need to have an other baby. Do I really not want to sleep for another several years?