Cough. Sniffle. Ugh.

Don't worry, I'm not dead (yet). January was pretty much a wasted month, 3 weeks of which was spent hacking up a lung (Adam), sweating out a fever (me) and spreading germs (Autumn). So I haven't had much to blog about, unless you'd all like to read about just how much snot a single preschooler can produce in a day, or how poor sweet Adam actually volunteered to sleep on the couch so he wouldn't keep me awake with his coughing. We've been a pretty miserable bunch, to say the least, but we're (mostly) fine now.
I was finally feeling well enough to sew something, so I whipped up a new nightgown for Miss Little in a flannel she picked out herself. She said she wanted jammies with "a Dinosaurus Rex" on them.
Doesn't she look thrilled? I guess the grumpiness hasn't completely worn off yet. The pattern is McCall's M4497, altered to lengthen the top into a dress. It was a quick, easy sew, finished while the prehistoric princess napped.
Dinosaurs are her latest passion. It all started when we took her to the Science Center to see the "Dinosaurs Alive! 3-D" IMAX film. Now every weekend she begs us to take her back to see the huge skeletons and dig for fossils for the millionth time. She has officially proclaimed dinosaurs to be as cool as dragons, "because they growl and stomp their feet."
I love all her various interests, and the unwavering excitement she shows for each one. Whether it's dinosaurs, pirates, fairies or baking, she greets every new opportunity to learn about and interact with our world with such wonderful enthusiasm.

Thank you to everyone who left comments on Autumn's guest blog entry. She was so thrilled to see that people were reading her story. I'd like to make her presence on my blog a regular occurrence, maybe a monthly guest blog entry. She had so much fun creating a story to share and acting it out (all her idea, by the way). I can't wait to see what she comes up with next.

I'm off to down some Dayquil, but before I go, great big HUGE congratulations to Frank and his partner on their freaking adorable little ball of cuteness. He is precious.

Guest Blogger: Autumn

"The Cowboy Had a Horse"

by Autumn (as dictated to Mom)

Once upon a time there was a cowboy, and he was riding his horse. He just stopped and got off of his horse for a minute and fed some pigs.
Then he found a shell on the ground. The shell came from the ocean. It was blue. He put it in his pocket for safe keeping.
Then he found a bottle when he was going to the beach and there was paper in it. It was a letter!
It said

Dear Cowboy,
I know you have this bottle and you opened it and I know you're reading it.
Love, Mommy

Then the shell just moved! It had legs and very sharp claws that snapped up and down. It had brown eyes. And when the cowboy was looking at the shell he thought it was a crab from the beach! He took it back to the beach and put it in the water.
Some fishies were swimming in the water when he was putting the crab in there. Then he saw a splash coming right at him! And when he saw it again it was a fish! When it got more close to him it smacked him with his tail! He put it back in the water. Then more fishies came and they just knocked him down! And do you know what they were? Sharks! They were fighting.
The cowboy ran away back to his horse and he rode it again.

The End!

Girl at Work (or, musings of a feminist mom in a personality-smothering world)

For a while now Autumn has been begging us for her very own tool kit, so when I found this on sale for $20 after Christmas--at Joann Fabrics, of all places--I had to pick it up for her. It came with tons of realistic looking tools, nuts, bolts, a vest, hard hat and tool belt, and even a length of caution tape. One thing she asked for that wasn't in the kit were pieces of wood to work on, so I covered some scrap cardboard with wood grain contact paper. Autumn was thrilled and she is now hard at work in the kitchen, hammering and sawing away.

CAUTION: This is the part of the blog post where I go off on a tangent that has little to do with the original topic.If you haven't figured it out, Autumn isn't exactly a typical 4-year-old girl. She'd much rather build something or visit the science museum than play with Barbie dolls or wear a princess costume. She likes superheroes, dragons, pirates and sharks, while her female cousins prefer Cinderella, jewelry and tea parties. We try hard not to push gender roles and stereotypes on her, and let her decide on her own what she is interested in. She often chooses, with no prompting from us, what most would consider "boy" things, and to the dismay of some family members we have done nothing to discourage her.

She does like some "girly" things. She doesn't own any Barbies (instead she plays with her mommy-approved Groovy Girl) but loves Barbie movies, in which Barbie always plays a strong, confident role and saves the day. The one Disney princess she seems interested in is Ariel from The Little Mermaid. On last summer's Florida vacation Adam's mother signed all of the girls (Autumn and three cousins) up for the Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique, a beauty parlor where they would receive Disney princess makeovers complete with hair, makeup, a costume and photo shoot, without my knowledge. By the time I found out it had already been paid for, so I didn't have a whole lot of choice in the matter. My little tomboy was going to be slathered with shimmer and lip gloss. I had to grit my teeth and remind myself that if I want to be a truly open minded parent I needed to let Autumn give it a try and decide for herself. When the makeover day came each girl got to choose which princess they'd like to look like, and Autumn chose the Ariel makeover. She was whisked away by her "fairy godmothers" and primped, polished, glittered and fluffed for the next hour or so. About halfway through I actually had to step outside and cry, but in front of her I tried my best to be enthusiastic. By the time the godmothers were done with her my little girl had been transformed from thisto this.Oh. My. God. Can you say pageant queen? I think someone hid my kid in a broom closet somewhere and replaced her with this Bedazzled tiny person. Well, she had a lot of fun being Ariel for the day and still likes to wear the costume (sans makeup and body glitter), but despite my fears she is still the same old Autumn. I will admit that she did look cute, in a slightly horrifying way. If she chose eyeshadow and tiaras over foam swords and pirate hats I certainly wouldn't love her any less, but I am glad that she's the way she is.

We are feminist parents. Unfortunately, for most people this is a dirty word that conjures up images of angry, bra-burning, man-hating, hairy women who want to take over the world. But I can guarantee that this is definitely not the case. I shave my legs and wear skirts. I love and respect the men in my life. I have never once used the word "womyn." I believe in true equality. I believe in respect for both sexes. I believe in equal treatment in schools. I am against forcing children into gender roles and snuffing out their true identities. I am against the objectification and dumbing down of women in our society. I want my girl to grow up knowing that it's okay to be true to herself and ignore the status quo. I want her to feel confident and empowered and respected as an individual. Sadly I know that this will get harder as she grows older. All we can do is try our best and send her out into the world with our values instilled in her and hope that it sticks.

Brown paper packages tied up with strings

Due to the gift of the Christmas flu I'm blogging about our holiday a little later than I would have liked to. Santa took some time out of his very busy schedule to stop by Adam's sister Terri's annual Christmas Eve party. Autumn is the one in the red hat without the beard. Luckily last year's Christmas dress still fit her. The shoes didn't, though, so she wore pink high tops to the party.Unfortunately I didn't have the time to make fabric gift wrap for all of my gifts this year, so I went with the next best thing and used recycled brown kraft paper, baker's twine and these adorable handmade tags. These pretty packages contained the aprons and play food for Adam's nieces (packed in mini cake boxes, how Martha of me) and the scarves and a video game (not handmade, I know. Bad Xan) for the nephews.The kids seemed really happy with their gifts, especially the girls. All three of them immediately wanted to put their aprons on and start baking. I was very pleased, and their parents were impressed.

On Christmas I wore my new favorite hat, a handmade gift from Faye. It matched my spankin' new stripes perfectly.Faye also made me this freaking awesome Jack Skellington hat and matching scarf, for my love of all things Tim Burton. I can't help but smile every time I wear them. Crafty friends are the best.In exchange I made her a crochet hook clutch so she can crochet on the go. Well, she already crochets on the go, but now she can do it in style. It holds 8 hooks, including this one I bought her from Etsy. When I made it I didn't have the actual crochet hook on hand so I had to guess at the sizing for the pockets. Luckily it fit perfectly when it arrived in the mail, and Faye seemed very happy with it.Now, on to Christmas morning. Autumn woke us up at a fairly reasonable hour (though Adam was still exhausted because we had stayed up very late the night before) and we all (including my grandmother, who came down from PA to celebrate with us) gathered 'round the tree to watch Autumn open gift upon gift upon gift. There were only a handful of gifts from us. The other ten million or so were from my mom and grandmother and the queen of overgifting, Adam's mom. You know how kids just tear through everything in all the excitement that comes with opening gifts? Yeah, Autumn's not a normal child. She opens everything very carefully and very, very slowly. It took her nearly two hours to finish. But it was plenty of fun to watch and she loved every single thing she got. Her stocking was stuffed with a tube of bubbles, a new pirate t-shirt and a beautiful hand bound book. From Adam and me there were also the puppets and treasure hunt bag, Underdog and Barbie as the Island Princess on DVD, and that final gift I almost wasn't able to make, a sink for her playroom kitchen. It was one of the few things that she requested, and I'm so glad I was able to pull it off. She was thrilled.The grandmothers showered her with lots of wonderful books, new winter clothes, and toys that will surely nurture her creativity and desire to learn. My personal favorite (and hers too, I think) was the Super Fort from Adam's mother, which is currently being used as a pirate ship in the kitchen. I think I'll have almost as much fun playing with it as she will. In fact, I'm off on a high seas adventure right now. I hope your Christmas was filled with warmth and laughter and family.

All is calm, all is bright.

Phew. Wednesday all our ornaments were finished and our tree is set up, decorated and filling the room with that wonderful piney smell. I must admit I didn't think I'd get everything done in time, but I think I was pretty successful. There are a couple of things I haven't checked off of my to-do list yet, though. I didn't get around to making a tree topper, and I ran out of my red and green prints so the soft trees have been put on hold. Plus I don't have the materials I need for Autumn's last gift yet. But other than that I think I've accomplished most of what I wanted to. So without further ado, a tour of our tree.
Scrappy balls...Salt dough shapes, made with the small one...Hand embroidered muslin...Glittered felt...Button wreaths...And a cranberry and popcorn garland.Ah. Now I feel Christmasey.

On the Eleventh Day of Crafting: Why am I doing this to myself?

Ha. Well. The past few days have been unpredictably busy, leaving very little time for crafting, so of course I fell way, way behind. BUT before you lose all faith in me I am getting back on track now, and only have a few more things to complete tomorrow on the last day of my Christmas crafting marathon.

I've finished two scarves for nephews Luke and Evan, in the colors of their favorite football teams...Three stockings are hung from the DVD shelf with care...Pirates for Autumn, Superman for my geeky boy love, and stripes as my homage to stripey tights. Why is mine facing the wrong way? Good question. Anyway, I also completed a few more goodies for our tree and a special gift for my good friend Faye, which I won't post pictures of yet because she reads this blog (no peeking Faye!), but I'm sure she will love it. Speaking of Faye, she made me something awesomely awesome for the tree this year, which I'll show you all tomorrow. Hopefully!

On the Sixth Day of Crafting: Gifts for Nieces

Okay, I may not have posted yesterday due to a rather stressful and busy evening, but that doesn't mean I wasn't sewing up a storm! Yesterday I made aprons and play food for Adam's three nieces, Sunny, Grace and Annie. Each girl gets an apron, a pizza, and cookies. If I can find some at the dollar store I might throw in some small wooden spoons or rolling pins as well.The pizza crust is actually perfectly round, but it looks quite lumpy in the picture because it's filled with rice, so the kids can mold it and roll it flat to make their pizzas. I made a similar pizza for Autumn with loose "cheese," but this time I glued it onto the sauce because I learned that, while it's cute to let her sprinkle it on the pizza herself, all those little pieces end up everywhere and make a big mess. I think I may add a few loose pepperonis though. Today's project is still in progress, so I'll post on that later this evening.