Uncommon Grace

Q

...is for quiet. Oh, I think it's probably been communicated pretty well in the past how I love the quiet moments of life. That's when all the real listening happens.

...is for queen. My childhood ambition to be The Queen notwithstanding, I have at least managed to secure my role as queen of one thing: clutter! If my husband were ever to divorce me (which he wouldn't), it would probably be due to my huge clutter problem. Mellow as he is, this is the one thing that really, really drives him crazy.

Oh, but speaking of queens, have you seen that this new film is coming out in 2 weeks? I am so very excited! Elizabeth is my favorite film of all time, so you can well bet that I'll be there opening day for its sequel!

...is for quilts. I am endlessly fascintated with the entire quilt process. We only have a few family quilts, mostly divided between my mom and me, but I love how there is that little bit of family history stitched right into them. Eren's R post speaks about this idea so beautifully (although she's talking about rag rugs there).

And speaking of new things having to do with my q's, this book arrived over the weekend and I am completely smitten!!!!

I've been toying with the idea of making a quilt for Elisabeth, but didn't have any great ideas so far. And then I saw this:

and thought it was, as the title says, "Just Sweet Enough." There are lots of other inspiring ideas in there, too, lots of inspiration as I think this out!

And how amazingly cute is this? Oh, my.

Look who's home!

I'm so, so very happy.

O and P

O

...is for ocean. I have never lived near one, but I am an ocean person for sure. When I first saw it, I was overwhelmed with peace and a sense of being "home." That said, we will never leave our middle-of-the-US home because our family is all clustered near here.

...is for orchestra. I really do miss being part of one. But not enough, right now, to sacrifice the time that joining one would require.

P

...is for Pisces, my astrological sign. I fit the bill in an almost stereotypical way. It's kind of silly, actually.

...is for pink. Need I say more?

...is for punctuation. I am pretty wild about punctuation. I really love it! But I get a little crazy when it's misused -- for example, apostrophes. I made up a "rule" about apostrophes, which is: "When in doubt, leave it out."

...is for penpals. When I was a girl, I had penpals in Austria, Italy, the Czech Republic, France, several different US states, and Japan. This was just the absolute best way to learn about different parts of the world. It was an awesome experience.

N

...is for nose. Don't really like mine. I think it's bulbous. But maybe no one likes their own nose.

...is for naps. We could all use a few more of these at our house lately. Since my "surgery," which was a weekend full of grandma-activity for my wee ones, we have been feeling overstimulated and in need of some down time!

...is for night shift. I used to work 12-hour night shifts as a nurses' aide from when Elisabeth was 3 to a few weeks before James was born. It was hard work. Gruelling, actually. But we needed the money very much, and I don't regret having done it. I don't think I'd ever do it again, though.

...is for "not any more." That's what Elisabeth said when I was talking about the previous "N" entry. She is probably as happy as I am that I don't have that job anymore. She still sometimes talks about the days when I would come home after an all-night shift (pregnant, no less), and collapse into bed. She listened to a lot of Jim Weiss CD's during that period, and remembers it as a boring time. I don't blame her!

M

...is for Mama. My favorite job so far. My name. The "thing" about me that motivates, informs, and defines everything else.

...is for Mom. I learned how to be a mama from her. She's wise, kind, generous. And so smart.

...is for music. A big part of my life. In a lot of ways. Although I definitely like the sounds I'm surrounded by to be carefully chosen; I am not one for constant background music. It feels distracting to me. (As much as -- or more than -- my wee ones, I seem to be sensitive to overstimulation.) So, we play surprisingly few CD's in the house, eat dinner without a soundtrack, etc. Sometimes it's just awesome to rock out, or to dance to "fairy music" or salsa, for sure. But I tend to think it's all the more appreciated when the moment for recorded music has been chosen and agreed upon. Though we are constantly surrounded by other forms of music throughout our days: both children love to sing, I sing a lot, and then there are the other "musics" of our life -- the dog barking, a creaky chair, my knitting needles softly clicking, Elisabeth's chatter, James's humming, the sewing machine slowly sewing, a breeze outside the window and a neighbor's wind chime, the occasional melancholy train whistle or airplane or traffic sounds, sometimes our "real" instruments -- my cello, the children's little toy xylophone, my pentatonic flute, daddy's guitar or brassy instruments. Even my typing. These are the sounds, and the music, of our days.

...is also for three summery pleasures of mine to which I am fondly bidding farewell until next summer: the mint patch that grows by our front stoop during the summer (originally our landlady's herb garden, but the weedy mint has overgrown the rest), my favorite lime and mint beverage, the mojito, and my other favorite limey beverage, the margarita. My husband makes really, really awesome margaritas and mojitos. During the summer, I pretty much have a mojito-a-day. I have a (kind of embarrassingly) low alcohol tolerance, though, so I have to have weak ones. ;) 

L

...is for Lucy, our 7-year-old beagle. She was my first anniversary gift from my husband. I was thrilled to pieces. Over time, honestly, she has really become my husband's dog rather than mine. I am not as attached to her as I wish I could say I were. She is a noisy dog, and has a real naughty streak to her. But she is truly the most gentle dog when it comes to children. They could probably sit on her and simultaneously pull her ears and tail, and she'd just patiently wait it out. And, sadly, years of apartment life (lack of a proper yard and exercise), are beginning to wear on her and she has some bad arthritis in one hip already. Oh, Lucy, you deserve some love.

...is for late. Oh, my, I am always late. Everywhere I go. Sadly, I think it's actually a personality trait.

...is for laugh. I have a really "distinctive" laugh for which I was teased a lot as a girl. It is a bit guffaw-like. I don't actually mind it at all; I think it sounds sincere rather than superficial. My husband has always said he likes it, as well (one of the reasons I love him, of course). And Elisabeth has inherited it from me. ;)

...is for lunch date. 10 years ago today, my husband "asked me out" for the first time, and we had lunch together on our university campus. It was understood from that moment on that we were exclusively seeing one another. I'm such a sentimental one, I know.

Despite the fact that Elisabeth has been denying autumn's arrival all weekend (most trees haven't begun to change around our house), I will say that we have had some very un-summery weather today. The sky just opened up and it began to rain, a steady, quiet rain. Not like the torrential downpours of summer. So, I think autumn has arrived.

You are all so sweet!!

I am so grateful -- and humbled, once again -- for the many of you who left comments and emailed me about my "surgery" yesterday. (There were no incisions, but the hospital people kept referrring to it as surgery, so we sort of started to do the same.)

Everything went really well. They did an x-ray afterwards (while I was still out) and told my husband and my mom that it looked like they had completely "powdered" the stone. So probably no fragments that I'll even notice passing. Yay!

I'm still in a bit of pain and pretty groggy, but everything should be back to normal by the end of the weekend.

It wasn't so bad. ;)

K

...is for knitting. Can you believe that I never took a good picture of some knitting for this post? Oops. Anyway, I learned to knit when I was 9. I didn't do much with it, though I never really forgot how to knit, through my teens and during college. The first knitting project I really picked up after all those years was a pair of white angora bunny slippers for Elisabeth's first Easter (pattern from Martha Stewart Baby). The Easter Bunny made those, actually, now that I recall. Anyway. I'd see knitting projects in Martha Stewart Living over the years (I started subscribing the summer we got married, so I now have 8 years of mostly untried project ideas), and I'd think, "I could make that." But I never did pull out any needles until after Elisabeth. About 3 years ago, a friend got me started on a pair of toe-up socks (still unfinished), and that was really when I was hooked. (Although that sounds like a crochet metaphor. But anyway.) Some time after I had James, I realized that I could read a pattern and figure out anything that I needed to, and I have really not stopped since. Although I know that I rarely share pictures of my knitting here. I kind of tend to start projects and have a lot going at once without having too many finished projects to share. However, I'm sure that'll change as fall starts to kick in and I'm more interested in cozy indoor activities. OK, I do have some photos of the hat I knitted for Alicia's sweet little N:

It's the cabled greenspun beanie from Nature Babies: Natural Knits and Organic Crafts for Moms, Babies, and a Better World by Tara Jon Manning, knitted with Green Mountain Spinnery's Cotton Comfort -- a favorite yarn of mine.

...is for knuckles. I crack mine way too much. My husband hates it. But it feels good!

...is for Klee. I had a friend in college who believed that it was always best to decorate a room using the artwork of only one artist. I thought this was a cool idea, so I started framing Paul Klee prints for our living room when my husband and I were first married. I'm not sure if I still agree with that "rule", but I am still really into my Klee prints. I really, really love the one shown on the left above, "Rote und Weisse Kuppeln" ("Red and White Domes").

...is for Katrina Kenison. Her book Mitten Strings for God remains my very favorite book (parenting or otherwise), even after having read and re-read it at least 12 times over the last 5 years. Not a "how-to" parenting book, it's a collection of reflections that I find endlessly inspiring every single time I pick it up.

...is for kidney stone. My lithotripsy procedure is today. I am really nervous. I've never had general anesthesia before, and it's pretty scary to me. I just can't wait until the whole thing is over. I'm sure I'll be begging to see my babies afterward. I don't know if I'll post tomorrow or not. My urologist seems to think that the recovery on this procedure is less than 12 hours. But we'll see.

J

...is for James, my baby. Though I don't think he'll be my last baby (I hope not!), he does feel so much more "babyish" than Elisabeth did to me. I guess we always expect more of our eldest children. But this baby, this wee boy, he's so sweet and tender and quiet and soft. He's a gentle soul. And he's a courageous little climber, too. And a silly little growler. It's amazing to me how individual he is; how different he is from how I would've ever dreamed. And he's just 18 months old! I can't wait to see what he'll be like in 6 months or a year or 5 years. I know I am privileged and blessed that I get to be his mama.

...is for Jane Austen. Oh, my, I am really grasping at straws for this one. Pride and Prejudice is my favorite novel. But I'm not super into the rest of her oeuvre. I know, I'm snobbish. It's rather too "happily ever after" for me, though, especially Sense and Sensibility, which I really don't care for. However, I do love the name Jane, and kind of talked about naming my second child that (had it been a girl), though that idea was quickly dropped once I realized that one of Elisabeth's most important toys was/is a doll by the name of Janie. And so it goes.

I

...is for intuitive. I have these great skills of intuition. For example, I can often tell if a person comes from a family with brothers or sisters (I can usually guess quite accurately ... how many, older or younger, etc.) When I was growing up, I had a number of foreign penpals, and we'd exchange letters about once a month. I could almost always tell when it was going to be a day for a letter to arrive from a certain one of them. Spooky, huh? Well, intuition is just the ability to make a good educated guess after doing a lot of observation. So this might be more appropriate as "o is for observant." ;)

...is for Italy. The only European country I've visited. I went on an orchestra tour of Italy when I was a teenager. It was great ... I'd love to go back, although I'd really like to go to England first. I am such an anglophile.

...is for inherited. My mother-in-law gave me a ton of vintage lace and linens a couple of months ago. She gave it to me with permission to use it to make into something else. I haven't been able to bring myself to cut into any of it yet ... I'm more a sentimental type than she is. Although I am totally appreciative that she gave it to me and encouraged me to repurpose it.

H

...is for "husband." OK, I don't know why I always refer to him as "my husband" on this site. I guess to avoid the whole name issue. I am awfully paranoid, I know. He has enough of a performing presence and reputation that I worry about sharing too much about his identity or his work here. But here he is, my musician life partner, of whom I'm really proud, despite his sometimes (in my view) awkward & conspicuous absence from my writing here. I really think I need to work on my focusing! That photo is really out-of-focus. Oops.

...is for hideous. I say this a lot. Really, a lot. When most people would say something "sucks," I say it's hideous. Sometimes I "cluck" (like a "tsk") first, too. It's just another of my eccentricities, of which there are several. ;)

...is for home. Home comforts, homebody (I may be the biggest homebody in the world), homebirth, homeschooling. My life is very home-centered, which is comfortable to me, but I also think it expresses a certain value set that my husband and I have chosen to embrace. I have a feeling that if you're reading this, you might have something to do with the craft-bloggy community, and you might also embrace a similar value set, so I'm pretty sure you "get" it.

...is for Halloween. It's my favorite holiday. Oh, I love Christmastime; don't get me wrong. But try as I might (and sometimes I do try), I just can't replace Halloween from its place of favor. I am really not into all that horror stuff. (I used to be until Elisabeth was born, though, and then I had a traumatic experience watching a PBS documentary about pharoahs when she was about a week old and I was home alone with her during the evening for the first time. The chanting of a men's choir in the background of the documentary while they were showing artifacts from a tomb was so terrifying to me that I have never been able to stand anything scary since then. Isn't that something?!) But I really love decorating for Halloween, I love the ritual of carving pumpkins, dressing up, the festive harvest elements of the holiday. And I do love a bit of mild spookiness (along the lines of this book, for example). I am finding, as the air gets a bit crisp in the evenings, and the sunlight begins to have that hazy autumn quality, that I am just about dying to get started on Halloween preparation.

...is for home again, home again, jiggety jog. We are back from our visit with our out-of-town friends. What a fun and refreshing visit. We don't get to see these friends nearly enough (out of town and all that). We had a fantastic, crafty (some sewing, some knitting), chatty, apple-pie-baking, curry-eating, kids running everywhere, time. And it's good to be home, too. And thank goodness my children slept for a good bit of the long drive (there and back).

...is for Heather. Thank you for your sweet photos of my scrap swap stack. My camera is with Canon right now, so I was unable to photograph them before I sent them. Heather is completely correct in saying that Elisabeth was quite instrumental in the selection, careful folding, and consequent wrapping-in-yellow-tissue-paper-with-too-many-stickers of the stack.

G

...is for Grace. That's me. Since this blog is basically all about me every day, there's not much I can do to summarize myself right here, except to say that, like everyone, I'm a very complicated person. And a very simple person.

...is for glam. Despite my dreadlock-craving, natural-living, hippie-chick tendencies, I am also pretty glam. Love the fancy stuff. Love makeup (despite lack of it in above photo, or about any other day around here). Love old-fashioned elegance.

...is for girl. I am adding this for several reasons. 1. I am a girlie-girl (see above). 2. My daughter is a girlie-girl. 3. "Girl" is one of the very few words that Elisabeth can't pronounce properly ("euphonium" is another). She says "gore" instead. She can say "curl" and "pearl" just fine. But she can't say girl. So cute, in my mama opinion.

...is for grocery list. Last winter, my husband and I agreed to divide up the household chores to keep me from getting overwhelmed and to keep him from feeling dumped-upon. So he does the grocery shopping now. I printed up some handy little grocery lists which has made the job of grocery planning easier for me and shopping easier for him. Everyone's happy, at least in theory. ;)

...is for gone. By the time you're reading this, the kids and I will have left town for a long weekend to visit some lovely friends. Be back next week!

F

...is for fabric. My stash is still in what I would consider its infancy. But it's slowly growing ... half a yard here, 2 yards there. This photo is of some cotton velour I got last month to make little toys and tiny dolls.

...is for fresh. I can't get enough fresh, local produce to satisfy me! When we have friends with an abundant garden of goodies to share, even better.

...is for freckles. I have the freckles that come with my red head's complection. I have always liked them, too. I never got why people complained about freckles. I think they give a person's "look" such character. And I think they make me look younger than my age, too, which is kind of a plus.

...is for flat tire. I got one yesterday afternoon while heading out for my afternoon of cello lessons. I couldn't get ahold of my husband who was in meetings all afternoon (and whose cell phone managed to jump out of his bag and stay home ... James?), but we were so, so blessed that the father of our long-time babysitters (3 sisters who have been babysitting for us since Elisabeth was tiny ... and as they have grown up, too) was able to come help us so that I made it pretty much on time to my lessons! I have to say that this family has been such a blessing to our little family over the last 5 years, and I don't think I'll ever be able to repay their many kindnesses.

E

...is for Elisabeth. My sweet, silly, passionate, always-on-stage, strong little one. She's such a good sister. She amazes me every day. She is also a force of will. Oh, my. We butt heads much more than I care to admit. But how would I have learned so much about myself and the world and parenting and, oh, everything, without her strong presence?

...is for euphonium. (Or "muphonium," as Elisabeth says.) My husband's first instrument. He also plays trombone and can get around on the trumpet and tuba when he needs to. I have never been really inspired by brass instruments, but over the years of having this man as my life partner, I have learned to appreciate -- and really love -- the mellow, not-quite-as-brassy sound of the euphonium. It is so understated. Like him.

D

...is for dreadlocks. Didn't see that one coming, did you? I don't have my hair in dreads, but I have been dying to do it for about the last 5 years. The thing that keeps stopping me is that I know I'll have to shave my head when I'm done with them ... and me + shaved head = not interested.

...is for dolls. The dolls that I make, and the many hours that I spent in dollplay in my own childhood (and into my teens ... I had two younger sisters, afterall). I really believe that a doll is one of the only absolutely essential playthings for a child.

...is for Dave Matthews Band. Dave is my first true love. There are Dave Matthews songs to which I've listened literally thousands of times that still make me weak in the knees every single time. Want me to list them? Well, that would be a very long list indeed. Encyclopedia of Grace's Dave Matthews Obsession, anyone?

...is for date nights with my husband. We don't get nearly enough of these in my opinion. Favorite night out activity? For me, it would be a sushi restaurant, for him, probably Indian food. Maybe some live music, maybe a play? Or maybe just a chance to share some good, quiet conversation.

PS: Thank you for all your well-wishes regarding my kidney stone pain. I'm not in very much pain this week (I imagine the stone shifted and is not causing as much irritation now), and I have an appointment for next week to break the stone up. I'll still have to pass the fragments (yikes!), but I'm hoping it'll happen quickly and then I promise to drink more water.

C

...is for Christian. I go through phases of being more or less observant, but I find that it's something that I always come back to. I am pretty comfortable with blending other ideas into my spiritual outlook as I make my way on this journey, as well.

...is for cello. I started playing when I was 11. It immediately captured my focus and energy. It became apparent right away that I was quite talented. I grew up in a large city, though, and I was not the best teenage musician out there. My life as a musician, while on the whole extremely positive, is also tinged with disappointing experiences of being the one who was almost chosen, almost the best ... a lot of almosts. I probably could have tried harder; I could have practiced harder rather than relying on my talent (which turned out not to be limitless) to carry me. The professional world of classical music is competitive -- way too competitive -- and competition is just not good for my soul. This is probably why I got married and had children so young -- and I'm so much better for it. But I still love, love to play the cello, and I've learned that teaching private lessons and doing an occasional gig is about the right speed for me.

...is for cloth. Cloth diapers, that is. I pretty much love them. I think they are totally aesthetically pleasing (especially our many wool diaper covers), and honestly, they don't stink like disposables. Washing them myself is part of the experience, for sure. I'm a big fan of mama cloth, too. When I first made the switch, I couldn't believe I hadn't done it sooner.

...is for creating. Amber posted a few months ago about how one of the best ways to find a new career is to think about your childhood interests. Mine were definitely in creating. I loved to sew and draw and write and just make things. As I stepped into the competitive classical music world as a teen and young adult, I set aside -- left behind, actually -- so many of my childhood creative interests, and have only begun to re-explore them since becoming a mother. And for the first time -- probably since I was 14 and started having my "what am I going to do with my life" crisis -- I really feel like I am being true to myself. (Not that my musical life isn't true to myself, but I hope you'll understand what I mean. I'm already getting pretty long-winded.)

...is for Canon. Oh my, I love my Canon so much. Yes, I have been one of the unlucky ones to have experienced the Error 99 message. But, even so, I love the thing in a silly way. And I really must clean that mirror.

...is for cherry pie. Another thing I love in a silly way. I'm all about my grandmother's recipe. So, so good, and one of my only true family recipes. This pie is from 6 months ago. Time to make another!

{And, can you believe it -- I can't -- we've been having chilly autumn-y weather here for two days. Where has the summer gone?}