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Today is my Birthday

Happy 52nd Birthday to Me!

G got me a pretty new bauble. Actually he got it a while ago, and I knew about it, because he doesn't drive and can no longer manage his money without help. But still, it was his choice and his intention, and I merely acted as both facilitator and recipient….. probably tricky ground that. But life is what it is and we make the best of it.

I am in the sewing room today. Not entirely sewing, as we had a rather fraught and frazzled week. I find myself squeezed for time between the parting of last week's guests and the arrival of the new crop on Wednesday. But there will be progress on creative pursuits, not merely necessary tasks.

Once upon a time it seemed to be so easy to say something self-centered like "it is my birthday and I want to sew all day". And it would be so. But I have only recently come to accept that my life now doesn't work this way. It isn't that I don't want the time; but by focusing on my want, I set myself up for frustration and it is not a pretty sight. It isn't that G doesn't want me to pursue my own interests, but that the thought "Mardel sewing" gets stuck in his brain like a broken record, actually causing him to focus more on me than if I just seize those quite moments for myself whenever they occur. I never asked to be a caregiver, I suppose few of us do, but fighting it only causes more grief. G's memory and hold on the progression of time is highly variable; sometimes good, sometimes caught in an endless cycle of confusion where he doesn't remember what happened a few minutes ago, a few days ago, or if it has happened at all — the thought is all that exists, in the moment, at that moment, to the exclusion of all else, past, present or future.

And so my goal for this, my 53rd year, is to learn to better appreciate the small moments and make use of them, to let creativity flow when the moment occurs rather than thinking I must set aside a time and a place. Already I am seeing progress rather than frustration.

July 5, 2010
A Reader Cooks

Or is it the other way around? I'm not sure. I love to cook. I love to read. I am not sure I am either a "cook" or a "reader" though. I do know that I love cookbooks and that I love not only to browse through them and ogle the recipes and cook from them, but that I actually do enjoy reading them, front to back, just like any other book.

Recently I was cataloging my cookbook collection and the process was making me think about all the different books and why I had them. I decided to randomly work my way through some of them, cooking and reading, mostly out of curiosity about why I originally purchased them and what I thought about them now.

The first book I grabbed, Cookwise by Shirley Corriher, was chosen because although I remembered that I have used it for reference, I couldn't actually remember that I had cooked much from the book. So I started reading and cooking. Well, actually in this volume there was more reading and less cooking because it is basically about the techniques and materials of cooking and the recipes are designed and arranged to illustrate the points. This is good from the perspective of learning, but not necessarily so good when you just pick up the book looking for something to cook for dinner.

Cookwise was a very interesting book to read and it contains a lot of valuable information. As I mentioned, I have used if for reference, and I will refer to it again and again as it has some tables and charts that are either not available or not as clearly presented in my other cookbooks. It has a very thorough discussion of baking, which doesn't directly affect me any more as it is based on wheat, a grain I can no longer use. I don't do much baking anymore anyway. But there is still good information here that I can apply to good gluten-free baking because success requires understanding the underlying principles and knowing what one is trying to emulate.

As for the recipes; I find these less successful. There are really only two recipes I have tried in this book that I will make again. One is for my favorite sour-cream cornbread, a recipe that I easily adapted to hold up better as a gluten free bread, and one which my guests adore. It is not dry minimalist cornbread. I will save the book forever just for the reference materials and because it contains this cornbread recipe. The other recipe is for a cake by Rose Levy Beranbaum and I actually bake it from Ms. Beranbaum's original version.

Notice that the two recipes I use are for baked goods. There are other recipes in this book but I find they all emphasize sugar and starch too much as a substitute for fat. Now I enjoy me a good dessert now and then, but everything that I have tried is too sweet for my taste. And I am not convinced that adding more sugar and starch to food to make up for fat and flavor is all that healthy of a choice either. I certainly find it less satisfying.

In the end I find Cookwise excellent as a reference work and only so-so as a cookbook.

The other book I pulled out of the shelf was a book by Rick Bayless called Mexican Everyday. Now this book is more of a cookbook than a reference book, but I still read it all, and cooked quite a few things as well. I found more to cook here than I did in Shirley Corriher's book, and although there are several things I will make again and again, I did not actually find that I was happy with many of the recipes as they were written. I made a fair number of changes and revisions to suit my own taste.

Now I must admit that I am a huge fan of Diana Kennedy. I have all her books. I have cooked extensively from all of them, and although I am not a purist and do not always cook everything the classic traditional way she describes, I can do so when I am in the mood to put in the time. I also have several of Rick Bayless's other books, which I have also used, and I am a fan of his restaurants, where I have eaten several times. And being a bit of a Diana Kennedy and mexican food snob, I'll admit that when I received this book, I was not particularly impressed. Mexican Everyday takes quite a few liberties with traditional Mexican techniques and flavors. But I didn't really give the book a chance.

To my mind this is not Bayless's best book, but it may be his most accessible, at least of the books I have read. And I do find the book inspiring. Reading this book filled with me with all kinds of ideas for making things I would not have made had I not read the book, and although I don't find all his techniques for simplifying things agree with me, or there are some things I do differently, I have to admit that I will use this book again. So far there are many recipes that I have been inspired to make, and many that I will make again and again, using my own techniques and changing them, often a good bit. So far there is only one recipe that I have liked pretty much as it is written, a recipe for slow-braised lamb Jalisco-style. I am not saying the recipes are bad; they aren't. I am not saying they don't work; they work beautifully. I am merely saying that that the actual execution does not really resonate with me although many of the ideas do.

So in the end, I think I rate this book pretty highly, even if I change most of the recipes. It seems pretty evident that I am more interested in ideas and inspiration than I am in recipes that work but which I find insipid, no matter how good the information surrounding those recipes.

June 29, 2010
Why I won’t take in alterations.

photo courtesy of fontplaydotcom.

People who don't sew think nothing of asking if I will alter this or that for them. I've had strangers at home depot ask if I will alter their jeans. I always say no.
This really isn't that unusual; it happens to most of my sewing friends, and most of us decline, with exceptions for family and the like.

My issue with alterations is only partly that the people who ask usually have no appreciation for the skill or work involved, although that is an issue not to be taken lightly. I am stubborn. I enjoy sewing partly because I am creating something functional out of something flat, in which case probably any sewing would suffice, but also because I like to be in control of what I create. When I am sewing something, even if it is just an alteration, I want it to fit my vision, and I am a very grumpy craftswoman when my vision does not match that of the person who requested the alteration. It has nothing to do with the ease or difficulty of the work to be done. Sewing is my hobby, and although I may chose to alter my own garments to fit my own vision of how I want them to look on me, I reserve the right not to provide this service to others. It is a completely selfish stance and I stand by it.

Most of the time.

I just shortened a bunch of pants for G and the actually cutting and hemming went very quickly and easily. It was a fast easy job and the results made G immensely happy, which is more than enough reward. But I did not go into it all smiling and happy-like.

We agreed on two points.

His pants are too long. They weren't always too long, but apparently as one loses stature with age one does not lose it entirely through the torso, although it could be just be his increasingly stooped posture that causes the pants to drag on the floor.

He was willing to take them to the dry-cleaners to be shortened, but we both agreed that he would have to wait too long. Since these are not fancy pants (they were machine hemmed to begin with), I agreed that it would be easier if I shortened them for him, in which case he would be able to wear them the same day and would stop tripping over his pants legs and falling down.

But we disagreed on two points also:

First I was in my selfish mode and I wanted to finish my skirt first. I figured that waiting a day or two for the pants was still better than waiting a week for the dry cleaner.

The second issue was sartorial. I thought G wanted to hem his pants too short and I didn't like it. I thought I didn't particularly have issues with how other people chose to dress even if I wouldn't chose their style for myself. But apparently I do have issues about how my husband choses to dress. He wanted his pants to be hemmed at the ankle, the shorter the better, and I frankly wanted them a little longer, not long, but long enough to cover the ankle bone.

In the end I relented on both topics. If I feel I spend all my taking care of him and the house, that is my issue, not his, and it is not something over which he can exercise any control. And, of course, they are his pants, and what is of paramount importance is that he be happy with them, comfortable in them, and that they do not cause him to fall. So I made them shorter. Not surprisingly it was no harder to sew them short than long.

That doesn't mean I will start sewing for everyone else. Family, friends and neighbors need not bother asking.

June 28, 2010
Garden Progress

I seemed to have fallen off the world-wide-web for a while and landed, with a good sized thunk into wide world. In other words I seem to be spending my time living my life rather than fretting about it. I just got on with it.

You know, I probably once had a bit of a Martha Stewart complex, without the staff to pull it all off, and I did everything. And I recently accepted that I not only can't do everything, I actually need help. I had realized this long ago, and I knew it intellectually, but was experiencing a rather significant disconnect between what I knew and what I accepted. That changed.

And so I hired a talented designer and friend to do my pots for me this year. I always loved doing the pots, but hadn't done them for a few years just because I hadn't found the time to gather the plants I wanted as the process of dragging G from one garden center to another is far too confusing. And of course Celeste did a fabulous job. You can enlarge the picture, but I didn't do the best job of making the collage so some of the pictures are pretty tiny.

And the best part was that once I had one thing taken out of my hands I was eager to work on other things. So I started pulling the front yard together and working in my flower bed, cleaning them out, mulching here and there (I should have done this much earlier) and really thinking about how the light had changed and how I was going to need to do some serious rearranging of plants to suit the new conditions. I also realized that my plans at the beginning of the season were a bit too ambitious. I am not going to get the vegetable garden cleaned and actually growing vegetables this year. So planted some of my vegetables and herbs in the front bed. As you can see, I am still working here, and some plants will have have to be moved again. But I am making significant progress here.

And progress is being made with the front yard as well.

Here is the front yard as it is right now.

No I didn't do all this work. The thought of it was daunting. I hired someone to cut down the plants and then dig up the yard and remove the old slate walk because….yes, we are going to put in a new bluestone walk next month and I do want to save the slates for use in a few other areas of the yard.

I have grand plans. But they will only be accomplished in small increments. First the walk. Then the front yard between the walk and the house on the right in this photo. We will probably enlarge the stone bed by the house, put in another planting bed, and have an area with gravel and slates and some kind of outdoor sculpture, or a potted plant. it is all rather sketchy in my mind right now.

Only after this is done will I seriously tackle changing the left side of the path which is not as seriously in need of work. I will clean out around the rhododendrons and feed and mulch them this year. The pachysandra and hakonechloa will stay. The rhodies may be moved or they may not. I am working with a designer, but I have to maintain my own stubborn independent streak. As I said, I am moving in stages, and beds have to be built, and soil has to be amended. What you see is pretty much solid clay. This means the area where the path was is actually easier to walk on now without the slate, but the soil needs serious amendment before planting; and with my penchant for woodland plantings such as rhododendrons and hydrangeas the beds must be dug at least 12 to 18 inches and heavily amended to achieve the light, high organic matter soil I required.

I actually think this new front yard, bare clay and all, is more welcoming than the old front yard which was a frightening mess of the overgrown and broken down. Approaching the front door was something like asking an acquaintance how she is doing only to have her launch into a diatribe about her liver spots and all that is wrong with the world. Far from welcoming; it only made you want to turn and run. Here is a picture I posted here last year. Believe me when I say it was no better before the digging commenced. In fact, it was probably worse.

As you can see, there is still plenty to do, but the difference is that before I was overgrown and mentally unkempt, just like my yard. We are both on the way to new ventures.

And because I cannot leave you with that old ugly photo, here is another picture of a recovering shade bed.

June 26, 2010
I’ll be back to sewing soon enough

I walked into the family room this morning to find a body on the floor.

Granted it was only Raggedy Ann. Ann was given to G by an appreciative patient 30 some-odd years ago. The surgery wasn't open today so I did not reattach her foot, merely returned her to her rightful place above the fireplace. Besides, that foot has been injured for some time now.

You've seen the fireplace before in some of my pictures. I added a few baskets to the top, baskets I took off of other furniture or shelves as I have converted the family room to a workout room so G has a place where he can walk on the treadmill and use a few hand weights without having to go downstairs. I suppose not everyone has a stone fireplace and a wet bar in their home gym, but it seems to work for us right now, and that is the point, what works for G at this stage of his life, as I am much more flexible.

I've been working my way down, or more accurately across, my lists, from the north end of the house toward the south. There isn't much to see in the family room now, just exercise equipment, although the bookcases are still there. I expanded them a little and moved a few books and am happy with the results even though the boards don't match. G thinks the room is a little stark, and in a way he is correct, but there are so many books I have trouble seeing it as truly stark. But I know what he means: it doesn't look like a family room.

I otherwise haven't made much progress on my list this week, although I've done a fair amount of knitting and reading and catching up with small tasks. I cabinet fell apart as I was moving it over the weekend, not a great loss as it was pretty rickety, but the top fell off and bounced off my right big toe before tumbling down the stairs to the garage. I have a pretty typical crush injury, not too bad, with a little swelling, a small fracture, and probable torn ligament(s). It doesn't look as bad as it feels, and actually it is much better already as long as I don't wear a shoe or need to bend, flex or push with my toe. The foot pedal on my sewing machine is still an iffy proposition, but I should be back to that soon enough.

June 17, 2010
New List, New Attitude, New Shoes

Yesterday was the third, and last, day without power as the electricians finished up the job of rewiring the house.

One job down; even if I didn't have to do anything other than write the check and keep everyone calm while the work was being done, I still can claim some sense of accomplishment.

I have had a lot of things on "my list" for this year, but what I didn't actually have until this past week was an actual list. I had vague instructions in my head, the kind of thing that really gets one nowhere but depressed, things like "clean up the yard", "deal with stuff" and "get your life back". And I realized, as I engaged in an internal rant about people who tell me this is too much work or that is too much work or I should do x or y, that I pretty much got myself into this mess and now I need to dig myself out of it. It is true that I simply wasn't dealing with my life, and I let it pile up, it is part of who I am, this emotional investment in my immediate family and surroundings, not that there isn't a downside, as I can pretty much shut down when the emotional turbulence reaches a certain point. But going somewhere smaller or just somewhere else doesn't solve the problem if part of the problem is me.

So I made a list. Immediately I felt better. And I've knocked a good many things off that list although it is still over 8 pages long and not all the items are easily done in a few moments time. But there are easier tasks and harder tasks, and there are mindless tasks and tasks that are good for those times when I need to blow off steam or something. There are tasks for days which seem run like a broken phonograph record, skipping and repeating the same few notes over and over, and there are tasks for days where concentration is high.

I no longer feel overwhelmed because I know what I have to do, and I accept that I cannot control anything, at least I accept that I can control some things but not most things. Today I accept this; I can't really promise that I will stay in such good rational humor every hour of every single day.

Best of all, encouraged by all my recent progress, I treated myself to new shoes, and they arrived yesterday. They are pretty shoes, classic, so I can justify them in my warped brain, even as I acknowledge that work boots are really all that my current life requires. Although they will go with quite few things in my wardrobe, they were purchased to go with a particular skirt. I suppose that means it is time to do some more sewing.

June 10, 2010
Where do the days go?

Since last I wrote I have fallen into bed each night in complete exhaustion, pretty much out before my head hit the pillow.

Wednesday began two days of house rewiring, and the electrical work is not done yet. I expect the electricians to be here another day this week. I spend the first day, the day with no power, rearranging the books and cleaning all the shelves in the family room. I had intended to move only a few books, but quickly realized that the shelves really need to be completely reorganized. I worked all day Wednesday until the electricians restored the power at 7 and left for the night. If I could have ordered pizza in, we would have done so, but instead went out for a light dinner and a relaxing negroni at my favorite local restaurant.

Thursday heralded more electrical work as well as the arrival of house guests. I decided to bake a rhubarb tart, another all day proposition as I decided that I was not happy with the idea of a simple pie crust and I wanted to work out some kind of gluten-free pastry shell. Several attempts later I came up with a good version with excellent flavor and passable texture and the finished pie was quite good. I learned a lot, but I don't think this is the end of my search for the perfect dough.

For some inexplicable reason, in my flour-crazed state, I also though this was the perfect day to reorganize the pantry, a job that, confounded by socializing and preparing food for friends, was only finished in the wee hours.

Friday we were much of the day; routine chores mostly although there was a lovely meal at the Culinary before one houseguest departed and another one arrived. Friday also saw me unpacking a large crate of furniture in the driveway that the UPS man left behind (not my regular driver) as it was too heavy for me to drag into the house by myself without unpacking it first. Suffice it to say I managed to get everything indoors before the downpour.

Saturday saw more cooking, baking, and entertaining, and Sunday we simply reveled in having the house to ourselves again and I finished reorganizing of the 700 some odd books in the family room, interrupted only by a visit from the pool-cover repair guy and a trip to the farmer's market. After dinner I simply collapsed in a chair and gave myself a pedicure ( Chanel Vendetta), ripped out 35 rows of knitting, and re-knit the first 15.

It all sounds boring and tedious although it was far from that: good friends and puttering in the kitchen are enough to keep me engaged for a long time. The kitchen and the sewing room are the two places I am happiest, well perhaps curled up with a good book as well, and it had been a long time since I had seen G engaging in repartee with an old friend. It makes me think I need to manage our social life a little more actively. All in all, not very blog-able, but definitely a good life.

June 7, 2010
Where do the days go?

June 6, 2010
Another day, another opportunity to make a mistake

Well, let's see, there was sewing yesterday. In the end, there was not as much as I would have liked, but there was enough. And I probably frittered away time as well, time going over stuff I'd been over before, time learning and relearning things I used to know, time making stupid mistakes and then fixing them.

All in all, I'd say it was quite fun.

Even though I had already cut out all the pieces to the skirt, my lack of confidence was running the show and I went back and laid out the fabric and fiddled with potential layouts again, trying to match the pattern as much as possible. I'm still worried about what matches, what doesn't, how much it doesn't, and if I've made some major miscalculation and will have a giant flower right where I don't want it.

I the front is easy as it is one piece. The back was relatively easy for matching the pieces at the center seam. But at the side seams all hell broke loose. I couldn't get anything to match, or if I got one side seam to be somewhat matched, the other one was terrible.

I thought perhaps I went about it wrong, that I should have the center back be along the same line as the center front, but that did not work as I would have double flowers at the side seams, and not in a nice way, right at the hip, where I didn't want it, and no matching anywhere else.

The skirt is pegged. No two pieces are the same size. The seams are not cut on quite the same angles. Perhaps a simple solid would have been easier. But it would not have been as much fun.

So I opted for not so great matches at the sides. Hopefully they are not so bad either. I won't really know until I put it together. I actually have lots of fabric left over so I can always cut the back again, or the whole skirt again for that matter. I bought this fabric in the 90's and I was thinking of something grander than a skirt. What can I say?

So today, after all that fiddling with potential new pattern layouts, I set all this hypothetical stuff aside and started assembling the skirt. I got that the back piece sewed up. That's it.

First I hand-basted the seam, because I wanted to be sure I got the pattern lined up correctly. Then I sewed it up. It worked really well and everything looked perfect. Or so I thought.

That was before I put in the invisible zipper. Somehow, the first time I got the zipper in, I got the pattern misaligned by about 1/4 of an inch. It was quite obvious. So I had to rip the zipper and do it again. The second time was better; not perfect, but better. If you look at this picture, you can see that it is off still. You'll have to trust me that it was worse before. This I may be able to live with. I'll do the side seams next and see how the whole thing looks before I make my final decision.

I can't redo the seam again. I discovered that the fabric is permanently scarred where the previous seam was located. If you look at this photo you can see the little holes and tears in the fabric on the right hand side of the zipper tape where I pulled the stitching out. I am in the process of convincing myself it is not so bad, that most people won't notice, and it is on the backside and will probably be hidden by a jacket or sweater. At any rate, I certainly won't notice it, and so I think I might bee able to live with it as long as I like the side seams.

I must be more careful.

I learned one other lesson today. It is not wise to fuse interfacing over your basting stitches, not if you want to take them out that is. In retrospect it is so obvious it is funny….

June 1, 2010
Sugar Snap Pea and Radish Salad

Both the peas and the radishes from the salad came from a tiny, 5 x 5 foot plot in the vegetable garden. This the only plot that is currently producing anything other than weeds as I have spent most of the rest of my garden time in the front yard and the flower beds.

Today I have decided to take a break from gardening. There will be sewing. There will also be a little bit of moving around of furniture as the solution to something that had been plaguing me suddenly popped into my head late last night.

May 31, 2010