Stitch and Botch Sunday

So I spent a few hours today making something for the baby in my Craft for My Kids swap. Off and on all day, in between painting the front door, playing yo-yos with Willow, buying duct tape in awesome colors from Wal-mart, watching Matt's softball game, scrapbooking/collaging with the girls, eating pizza, etc., I worked on this thing while watching season one of Friday Night Lights on Netflix's Browse Instant feature. And I was proud, too--my stitching has never been so even, I got the tricky part just absolutely right through my own skill and intelligence, I even matched the thread, even. And then I snipped the last thread and evaluated my finished product, and...I made it twice as long as it needed to be, and only half as wide. ??? Totally botched the project; there's no fixing that width. Totally botched the fabric; it's good for nothing but scrap, now. Fortunately, I pulled a fabric from my stash that will be almost as awesome, or maybe even more awesome, depending on my partner's tastes, than my first choice, and I made Matt pause his video game to come in and do the simple arithmatic with me this time so I know I have a perfectly cut item to sew up tomorrow. On the grump side, I hate wasting fabric, because that wastes money, and we're very poor. On the non-grump side, I'm pretty stoked to be using stash fabric now--isn't everybody stoked when they get to use up some stash? Makes room for more stash!

In additional botchery, remember when I posted that I'd learned to sew Velcro for this swap? Um, no. I did a test wash today of one of the items I'd used the Velcro on ("test wash" is code for "Sydney mashed banana into it"), and it did not do so much of the staying on nicely thing that I'd hoped it would do. On the grump side, now I have to do that part over and I wasted money on stupid Velcro. On the non-grump side, I'm pretty stoked that tomorrow I'm going to buy some snaps and a snap-setter--I have always wanted to learn to set snaps!

And, um, finally...don't freak out, grandparents, but Willow's hair, which used to look like this:

today looks like this:She did the back middle (unsupervised, with "Momma scissors") and I evened out the sides. It's adorable, of course, and though there were dire consequences for using Momma scissors without permission, there were no consequences for the hair cutting--it's her hair, right? I firmly support her right to have control over her own body, within the limits of safety and public codes of conduct, but I do still get to cry quietly in the bathroom with the door closed. Adieu, sweet little baby curls. Adieu.