Bucktooth Mama

Hi everyone! I am frantically working away trying to get things ready for my new shop! I will be selling bags, art, and downloadable items. I am super excited, but also totally busy. I just wanted to let you all know that (even though if you know me in person, I seldom seem to believe it,) silence can be a good thing! See you all very soon!

I can only tell you how I have known this Monday was coming for a few weeks and have tried to hide my head under my pillow. It’s a day full of commitments and good stuff, but I don’t really have two seconds to spare. The only thing pulling me through it all is knowing that soon, VERY SOON, my life will be taking a drastic change and time that has not been my own will certainly be! I plan to spend some of those recovered hours, minutes, and seconds here and at On The Rag Mag. I have a whole backlog of posts in my brain and I can’t wait!

P.S. Check out Cass Elliot’s knee socks and boots in that video!! LOVE them.

I haven’t written lately.
I must confess that I have had something of a writer’s block.
Life changes and trying to keep my footing have taken all of my energy.
There is this constant dance to modern life.
How much do I share of myself, my kids, my life?
With all the upheaval in my life, I keep asking myself why? Why do I feel compelled to share things online? Why do I do any of the things that I do?

Part of this existential crisis is because my children are suddenly school aged and I’m facing the fact that I no longer have babies.
Part of it is that the job for the non-profit I have committed myself to for four years is at an end.
Part of it is that I need to start making some money and fast if I want my life to retain any semblance of what it has been.

The whole of it though is that it is very easy to become a caricature. I think that we often define ourselves by the checkboxes we can tick off about our selves.

I could so easily just be that crafty mommy blogger. I am so much more, as are all of the other women classified as such. I could just as easily be the funny fat girl that is into fashion, the neurotic Jewish mother, the feminist with no sense of humor at all. I fall into all of these categories and then some.

Like trying to listen to your own voice when you speak, trying to categorize yourself will lead to stuttering and frustration. There are things I am wanting to share, but often feel out-of-place. I DO love crafty crafting. I also have a potty mouth and a sarcastic wit. I love playing with my kids and I love going out with my ladies and talking about how much we would have to charge for hand jobs to make it a viable business.

I’m looking to live an authentic life. I long to treat others with compassion and kindness. I do however have a rich and deep vein of snarkiness to my core, and that makes it so hard to balance it.

Watching television with my five-year-old daughter she points out that someone is hideously strange looking. I agree, but what do I tell her? Do I laugh with her or correct her or both? That’s where I am coming from. I want to talk shit with a flower in my muzzle. I want to be that crafty loving positive pleasant bitch that I am.

The thing is, no one is limiting me but me. It’s a choice that I have made, to sensor myself, to share only parts. I can say that it is motivated by fear. Fear of failure, fear of success, fear you won’t like me, fear that you will. It isn’t logical and it doesn’t make sense, but it really doesn’t need to.

I have so much shit to work out, and it looks like this is the best place to do it, sooooooo… there you go.

Do you remember when I shared my New Year’s Resolution with you? If not, let me remind you. One of my resolutions was to make myself something every month. I spend a lot of time making things for others, but I very rarely in the history of me making things have made anything to keep for myself. After my January and February projects, I understand why that is.

I have talked a lot here about my struggles with perfectionism. When you are as “type A” as I am, it is incredibly difficult to be reminded of your failings every time you pick up the item that you have made. It’s funny, because I don’t do that with things people have made for me.

I think it’s a good exercise in pushing my own boundaries though, to have to live with the imperfect things. It’s an added bonus to actually having things I have made because I need them.

Speaking of which, my February project was a new carry on bag for me. My January project was a skirt, which I need to get a picture of at some point. Back to my bag though, it’s a big ‘un.

I have made a few bags from the Style Stitches book, which I have shared here. This bag is called the Cosmo bag and was featured on the cover of the book:

It’s the first project in the book, and it’s categorized as easy. It has a million bajillion pieces to cut out and to iron interfacing to, so it is not a quick project. I didn’t want to have to invest in more interfacing when I am flat broke, so I used an interfacing I have on hand, which was a heavier weight than the pattern called for. Probably helpful in that it is my carry on, and I tend to pack those things FULL of books, yarn, and anything that is too heavy to go in my suitcase.

I used this amazing fabric called Too Muchery, designed by Helen Dardik. I wanted to have a lot of interior pockets, as being at the airport is stressful enough, without having to reach in a gigantic bag to find your liquids or gum, or what not. Here is a pic of the interior:

Just one side of those big brown pockets is large enough to hold my iPad, to try to give you some scale of this gigantic bag. This fabric had me craving salami the entire two days it took to put this bad boy together. It takes up an entire chair!

In the end, I was not totally pleased with my stitching, but I absolutely love the bag. The big button broke in the airport on the way out of town, but otherwise the bag held up to a lot of rough handling. The two exterior pockets which you can’t see here, each fit a water bottle. I loved having a place for every little or large thing in my bag. I am thinking I may have to make one out of a lighter interfacing for my everyday purse.

As for the trip, if you follow me on Instagram or Flickr, you will know we had a crazy time. Three days in Disneyland, one in Lego Land, and two at the beach. My parents were so kind to take us and spend all that time with us. My dad and I both suffer sensitive stomachs, so my mom and Brett took the girls on all of the wild rides. Well, most of the wild rides. As you can see below, I made my way onto one or two of the exciting rides as well.

For the past two weeks I have had it in the back of my mind to make the girls skirts for Valentine’s day. This doesn’t mean I looked at my fabric stash or even the patterns I have. I just thought that it sounded like a nice gift. Last year I made them embroidered pillowcases, and the year before that I made little heart shaped monogrammed pillows for their beds.

At 8:00 last night I took to my fabric stash and my patterns to figure out what I was going to make. I eventually settled on the easy peasy “Lazy Days” skirt from Oliver + S. Then I went through all of my red and pink fabric and ribbons.

I whipped these babies up in a few hours, and was on to something else by midnight. To say the pattern is simple is understating things. It has great directions, is free, and comes together so fast! It took me a little longer on Sadie’s skirt because I doubled the fabric. I cut her skirt 20″ long and Olive’s was 17. I had to grab a pair of their pants from the dryer and measure them as I had forgotten to measure either girl. I just made a free hand heart template for the pockets.

This morning the girls opened them up and loved them! I was a little nervous as Olive has a tendency to want whatever Sadie has, but she ended up really liking her own skirt.

Sadie was super pleased with her skirt. I hope it will fit for a while. These girls are growing so fast we can barely keep them in shoes and clothes.

We sent them off to school with their valentine’s in tow. Sadie insisted on making hers this year. We perused pinterest, magazines, and websites to find what she wanted. A friend of mine posted this idea on instagram and Sadie loved it. We took cupcake liners and made little ribbons with them. On the back she drew another one that said, #1 friend!

The best art table is a messy art table!

For Olive’s cards I took a drawing she did, scanned it in, and then added a little text and a border. I spelled it Balenstime’s day because that’s how she says it and I love it. She hand signed them and then added glitter to each one.

I love my husband, but we aren’t crazy about celebrating the “couples” version of Valentine’s day. I know not everyone loves the holiday. Often I hear that it’s a commercial holiday made to sell things. The thing is, how can you refuse a special day that is about celebrating the people you love and GLITTER? Especially as a kid where you exchange candy and cards at school? It’s just fun. Sadie was bursting with pride, so excited to share her Valentine’s with the kids in her class. What’s not to love about that?

I always go a little more crazy when I am not around here puking out my weird thoughts. They just kick and rattle around in my head and create these weird grooves of insanity that I go over incessantly. It’s like magic when I push them out my fingertips and onto the screen.

Are you convinced I am having a psychotic break? Maybe I am, maybe I am.

2013 has been a crazy year already guys. Pretty much every thing in my life is in flux and it’s rough riding these waves of change. I am desperately trying to hang on, but I have had some low days. It makes it pretty difficult to stay upbeat when you’re dealing with career and financial issues. Being a stoic Capricorn, I am horrified by the amount of emotion that keeps leaking out of me. I know it sounds dramatic, but guys, it’s been rough. I have been doing what I do best when I get really stressed, and that’s organizing. It doesn’t make much sense, but I feel like if I can at least get a handle on my own space, maybe I can figure out how to proceed in life.

Have you seen the film Ratatouille? If not, you NEED to. I don’t care if you are grown up or a kid, you should view this film at least once. If you say to me, but Melissa, I really hate vermin. I say to you, TOO BAD. Just go watch it. My favorite thing is when the food critic Anton Ego orders some perspective at the restaurant (This clip is quiet, so turn it up):

The best part is that he DOES get some perspective, but you have to watch the whole movie to see what I mean.

Today I got some perspective myself. We visited the local food bank with Sadie’s class. Not only did we tour the facility and sort food items, but we delivered the food to some people.
For all the problems we have been having, at least we do know our kids are fed and don’t have to worry about being hungry. Figuring out which services to cut back on is nothing compared to going without food, toothpaste or healthcare. Things can always be worse, and sometimes it’s helpful to see that with your own eyes. I don’t want to speak ill of the people we delivered food to, I’m just saying that I have been freaking out over here, but really, we live a very good life. The perspective I needed came at a good time. Just as if I had ordered it up.

Let’s continue talking about what I made last year, as I’ve yet to make a thing yet this year!! (That realization is pretty painful. It explains a lot about my mental health though. Guess I better get busy, right after I write this.)

I made this super cute sewing kit for my sister-in-law. It’s from the same people who make the Oliver + S patterns I like to sew for the girls clothing. This is an offshoot of their company called Straight Stitch Society. This pattern is called Apples to Oranges sewing kit. The directions were very easy to understand. I loved getting the digital version of the pattern! I was able to purchase it at a very unholy time of the night/morning depending on your perspective and start working on it right away.

You can also add an optional needle page to this, but I opted not to. My sister-in-law recently took up knitting, and when I was making this I couldn’t decide if it was going to be for knitting or sewing. I went with sewing though, because the pin cushion is just so cute! They also have an orange option available if you like that better.

Howdy! You may remember me from such posts as the one I made last week, or the one a week before that.

I love writing here, but as life gets a bit hectic, this is usually my first to do that drops off the list. Which sucks for me, because I am stuck with stuff bouncing around my head that needs to be spit out somewhere.

January is typically a rough month. The come down from the frantic holiday season can leave me feeling a bit deflated. Add to that the fact that the non-profit board I chair amps up the workload at this time of year, and you have me in a major posting lag.

WAY back at the beginning of the month I, along with my fellow writers, posted my New Year’s resolutions over at On The Rag Mag.

Mine were as follows:

1. I resolve to make stuff for myself. 

2. Enjoy Myself.

3. Say NO.

4. Get to Work.

5. Get & Stay Organized.

I have been working on number 5 like a maniac. Our house has been torn up for the majority of 2013, and I am feeling so happy about it! I haven’t been posting here, because I have been cleaning out cobwebs, the real kind, not the metaphorical ones. I have been migrating all of my software and files to a new computer and reorganizing my files there. I can just feel myself getting ready for something, and I am so excited about it!

I have also been preparing to make myself a new wardrobe. I am SUPER excited about this and will be sharing more later, but I wrote a little about it today over at On The Rag Mag.

I have a lot of plans for this here little place too, but it will have to come after all of my duties at the non-profit have settled down a bit. I’ll still be around, just not as often as I wish.

Let’s do some catch up, shall we?
I made most of my gifts this year. I’d love to share this present I made for my Bubbe. First let me tell you that my Bubbe is an inspiration. She is always working to learn new things. She loves to read, but she needs to wear a pair of magnifying glasses when she does so.

Every time I go over to her house I hear her mutter, “Where did I put those glasses?” She buys them in bulk at Costco, but still can never find a pair of reading glasses when she needs them.

When I was planning her gift, I knew I wanted something she could put her glasses in. I found a great tutorial here. I wanted to add something to the back so that it would clip to her book somehow. I took an unused elastic hair band, the really big kind that’s supposed to be a head band kinda thing, and cut it and added it to the back.

Now she can put it around the back of her book, or even use it as a book mark to hold her page WITH her glasses!

I think if I were to make this for that purpose again I would make it about half as wide. I don’t have the finished dimensions for the case, but it was around 4.5″. It makes sense as the pattern was drafted for a sunglasses case, but reading glasses are a bit more narrow.

I would also make the yellow elastic “catch” just a bit shorter, as it didn’t look as nice as it could have to me.

My Bubbe was pretty happy with it. I think that was because I included lace, she really like a bit of lace to tart things up. I used some of the fabric my mom brought me from Japan. I am totally in love with it and need to figure out what else to do with it so I can stare at it some more.

I have many more projects to share with you!

It’s winter break and we have been sleeping in a bit. I have been waking up to the most delightful sights. One morning it was Olive’s gigantic feet, as she’d crawled into bed with me and burrowed under the covers head first. Another morning, Sadie placed her doll Silver next to me so that I would see her awesome hairstyle first thing when I woke up.

We went to the local science museum this week. They have a cool contraption where you look at your face and try to draw it without looking down at your hands. We also made cardboard cars with rubber bands attached to their axels so they went flying forward by themselves if you pulled them back first. They also have a great art area that the girls love to spend time in.

On the last day of the year Brett & the girls and I spent some quality time with my folks. I took this picture at lunch when I noticed they were all wearing various shades of purple.

Over at On The Rag Mag we unveiled a new look, and I shared FIVE of my New Year’s Resolutions.

I also added a few new links up at the top of this site. One of them is my Etsy Shop which I can’t wait to get going this year. Exciting things are on the horizon!!

Because I am a capricorn goat and I am thinking about what I can do to get to the top of this here hill, I have this song stuck in my head. Now you will too!