needle & thREAD (and a recipe and a giveaway)

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Today is back-to-normal day. The tree is still up and will remain so through the weekend, squeezing every last bit of sparkly lights out of the twelve days of Christmas. But the secular world will do as it does and insist on its own way. Local children return to school today. The dance studio is open. Mike commutes in to his office with everyone else who works in our nation's capital. There's grocery shopping to do (and it doesn't involve a list for three giant celebrations in a row;-)..

I'm going to hit the gym first.

And then, as the weather turns sharply colder and we settle in to see how this typical hard-to-predict storm does its thing, I will sew. Today's sewing will be a few hand towels to stack in my foyer bathroom. We had a our fair share of fun witht he the making and giving of embellished towels over Christmas this year. And I made two for us. They look so pretty! To take the sting out packing away all our pretties, I thought some fresh "everyday" towels would be fun. I have some Heather Bailey fabric that will go nicely in there. I'll whip them up this afternoon. All this towel embellishing has certainly allowed me to practice some quilting skills. I've learned a lot about "stitching in the ditch." I plan to get to Mary Beth's quilt next week.

For the rest of this week, there are some flannel pjs begging to be had. I hope I have enough flannel. These girls keep growing! I'm planning on cutting Oliver + S sleepover pajamas tomorrow. I'm very much hoping tomorrow is a snow day and flannel pajama sewing seems so appropriate.

I have several new books going just now. The first is a book of body care recipes. Over the last year, I've become very committed to watching what I put on my body as carefully as I do what I put in my body. I've switched all my makeup to this brand (which I dearly love) and I'm making sure that soaps, shampoos, lotions and such are truly "clean." I enjoy mixing bath and body concoctions and played with several recipes of my own to give as gifts. This book offers me some fresh ideas. Several of you wrote to tell me how much you liked my detox bath recipe last week. Below, I'm sharing a simple one from the book. I chose this one because it requires nothing to special in the ingredients department and very little prep time.

I've gotten the sewing room tidied to a point where it doesn't look like Santa's elves had a drunken party in there. The goal before I sew today is to completely clear the desk. Then, the laptop will go on the desk. My iPhone will go on the desk. And there they will live except for designated writing times (laptop) and voice conversations (phone). There are too many people in my life who require my face-to-face fulltime attention for me to be clicking around much at all. I know there are excellent tools to be had in my computer, iPad, and iPhone and I'm grateful for them. I just don't want to be married to them. I think it was easier to achieve healthy balance when computers were tethered in our homes. I appreciate portability, but by anchoring mine I hope to give myself time to pause and consider my options before engaging.

Along those lines, remember way back when I told you about Rachel Macy Stafford's new book, Hands Free Mama? It's here! I think the subtitle sums it up nicely: A guide to putting down the phone, burning the to-do list, and letting go of perfection to grasp what really matters. Sounds like a maifesto for the new year:-).

I have an extra copy of Hands Free Mama. Leave me a comment and let me know what your sewing resolutions are for the year, or what you're planning to read, or how you're going to live a little more "hands free" (or any combination of those resolutions) and you'll be entered to win the book. Winner announced next week!

What have you been sewing lately? Or are you embroidering? Pulling a needle with thread through lovely fabric to make life more beautiful somehow? Would you share with us just a single photo and a brief description of what you're up to? Would you talk sewing and books with us? I'd love that so much. Tell me about it in the contents or leave a link to your blog. I'll be happy to come by and visit!

You can get your own needle & thREAD button here in your choice of several happy colors.

Flowers and Spice Stress-Relieving Milky Bath Salts

This is warming, calming, de-stressing bath blend for the high-strung person who has a tendency to feel chilled all the time. It helps relieve muscle aches while simultaneously softening skin. 

1/2 cup Epsom salt

1/2 cup powdered whole or nonfat milk

2 drops each of the follwing essential oils: vanialla, rose otto or geranium, cardamom

Pour the Epsom salt and the powdered milk together directly under running bath water. Add the essential oils immediately before stepping into the tup. Swish the water with your hands to mix.

Relax. Soak for 20 to 30 minutes.

A Post for the New Year

Gathering My Thoughts

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I find myself:

::noticing God's glory

How wonderful is it that on the Christmas when several children received bicycles we had amazingly warm weather? Pretty wonderful.

::listening to 

this has been my soundtrack this week. Collin Raye has a beautiful voice. He teams up with Marie Bellet on this album. Marie Bellet has been providing soundtracks to my life for decades. Absolutely perfect album. I love it! Highly, highly recommended.

::clothing myself in 

Headbands. I can’t decide whether to grow out my hair or not. In the meantime, it’s headbands.

::talking with my children about these books

The final installment for Mr. Benedict and friends. It’s been a lovely time together. Now taking recommendations for books to read aloud and discuss with early teen boys.

::thinking and thinking

About the year just passed and the year ahead. Goal setting, daydreaming, asking God what word He’d have me choose. Thanking Him for the year of Renew.

::pondering prayerfully

“My own idea, for what it is worth, is that all sadness which is not either arising from the repentance of a concrete sin and hastening towards concrete amendment or restitution, or else arising from pity and hastening to active assistance, is simply bad; and I think we all sin by needlessly disobeying the apostolic injunction to 'rejoice' as much as by anything else.

Humility, after the first shock, is a cheerful virtue.”

C. S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain

::carefully cultivating rhythm

I have dearly loved the rhythm of the last few days. Before going to sleep last night, I ventured to open the email regarding soccer practice for Nicholas. Four times a week. In January. And February. Out of doors. Drafting a plan for new rhythm as we speak.

::creating by hand

I’m nearly finished with my third Boyfriend Scarf—the one that’s truly for my boyfriend. Karoline has requested one just like it in a “color for her.” I still have a Honey Cowl to finish for me. I wonder? If I order Karoline’s yarn after I finish Mike’s scarf, can I push myself to finish the Honey Cowl before the new yarn arrives? We shall see.

::learning lessons in

The importance of rest.

::encouraging learning 

I’m looking forward to settling into studies in earnest again soon.

::begging prayers

for all the intentions of our prayer community.

::keeping house

We cleaned well yesterday. The house smells like lemon and eucalyptus oils. The laundry is nearly caught up. We’re ready to welcome a new year.

::crafting in the kitchen 

Mary Beth, Katie, and I completely re-did the spice rack. I had several boxes of 4 ounce jars that I’d purchased for a different project and found to be too small. The rack on my pantry door has different sized shelves. The jars fit in all of them, some better than others. We printed labels and tidied up. This system will work much better for spices purchased in bulk. And it looks might pretty –at least it does today.

There will be Hoppin’ John tomorrow. Always is.

::loving the moments

when he comes home. (I say that a lot, don't I? Reunions are just plain awesome.)

::giving thanks 

for the chance to see that joy does indeed come in the morning—after a good night’s sleep (or two or three).

living the liturgy

These Days of Christmas are such a gift in so many ways. Tomorrow, we celebrate the new year, but we do it with a day set aside to honor Mary in role as the Mother of God. Such a good place to begin. We have so much to learn from her.

::planning for the week ahead

I will go to finish up at the dentist today.

Tonight we’ll celebrate the new year with our family tradition of dipping and dancing. Fondue is the perfect New Year’s Eve tradition for us and every year looks a little different, but I’m so glad we do it this way.

Dance begins again right after New Year’s Day. For real?

And then there’s that soccer schedule. I’m shuddering a little as I let the reality settle in.

Several orthodontist visits are on the books this week (only metaphorically speaking, because I’ve yet to order my calendar.

I have every intention of soaking up the last few days of rest that remain in the Twelve Days of Christmas.

{{{Psst: It looks like my friend Joy has successfully keyed in social media link buttons at the bottom of my posts. Try 'em out for us? :-) Thanks!}}}

These Days...

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These quiet days tucked between Christmas and New Year's are unfolding in peaceful, restorative slow.

Amen.

I've needed these days, having felt not at all like myself by the end of Christmas Day, and not very much liking the person who'd come to live in my skin. Too much hurrying, too many problems to solve, and this year (for the first time) I think too much consuming. As if the perfect package tied with a pretty bow could somehow make it all better, whatever "it" was.

But these days are not that at all. In these days, little girls squirrel away with the mug of leftover chocolate kisses and make brightly colored confetti messes of the wrappers. I sigh, leave the mess until after the picture, and remind myself that there will be no more candy until Valentine's Day at the earliest.

I have made endless jars of stock with the carcass from a dinner that actually reduced me to tears the night Patrick came home from school. I'm not a very accomplished turkey chef, it seems. Furthermore, I'd forgotten how overwhelming a suddenly full home can be. Now, there is golden stock, simmered 48 hours to render every healing property within, captured into jars and waiting in the freezer for whatever may come our way. Redeemed that tearful meal I did.

I ventured back into the dance studio after a brief post-Nutcracker respite. We enjoyed planning and hosting two "Princess Teas" for friends and neighbors. Any time there is an excuse to dip strawberries and snip flowers, I'm there, even if it means venturing outside during the days intended for staying home.

I've nearly finished tidying the sewing room where so much that is good happened in the last few weeks. And I've made grand plans for many merry hours of creating to come. First though, there are mountains of laundry to tackle, some household puttering kinds of projects to do, and a great deal of renewal still to squeeze out of this year. 

After a season of excess and stress, the tub fills with a magical mixture of salt and oil and clay and vinegar; long soaks coax the gremlins and the grime from weary bodies. Restorative healing salve is slathered onto fresh skin and we're all set for the highlight of the day!

Every evening, the girls have climbed into my bed and we've watched Lark Rise to Candleford. Before this week, I've staunchly resisted the phenomenon that is the BBC streaming (I've never once seen Downton Abbey or Call the Midwife, either). We are so hooked. I've been forewarned that the series ends abruptly and that makes me sadder than sad. This will forever be the Christmas I discovered the great gift of knitting while watching a costume series streaming on Amazon Prime...

I'm grateful for the gift of time and the slowly returning peace that has come with hours of intentional quiet. One thing has crept into the margins of otherwise lovely days and I have resolutely pushed it away again and again. Mike has been gone. This was Stephen's year to play in a tournament in Disney the week between Christmas and New Year's. They left on Christmas night and Patrick and Nicholas went with them. It's true that their absence ensured quiet. There are very few squabbles without them here. No one shouts at the TV. No one stays up too late and then makes all kinds of noise while getting settled into bed. But they're gone. During this most wonderful week, we aren't together. Mike has all these days off and I don't get to have him for even a minute of them. One day, when I am old and someone asks what we sacrificed for our children, the weeks we've given to the Christmas Disney tournament will always spring to mind. It's a big deal tournament. And I hate it every time.

I miss Mike. There cannot truly be renewal without him here. It's all so incomplete. They return tonight--or more precisely, in the very dark hours of tomorrow morning. I'll shoo the little girls into their own beds after tonight's knitting and British TV binge. And I'll be so glad to wake up next to him when the last day of the year dawns.

Renewal Soak

1/2 cup bentonite clay (to stimulate the lymphatic system and draw impurities out through the skin)

1 cup of apple cider vinegar (to soften itchy winter skin)

2 cups Epsom salts (so good for easing aches and pains and the puffiness of overindulgence)

10 drops essential oils (I like a combination of lavender and eucalyptus)

Run a very warm bath and add the ingredients. Swish all the ingredients throughout the water. Soak as long as you like, but at least 20 minutes. 

This makes a mess of the tub. Leave the water there while you tuck yourself into bed. The clay will stay soft and you can drain and wash it all away in the morning--after you've had a very restful night's sleep. 

The Herod in Each of Us

A tiny child is born, who is a great king. Wise men are led to him from afar. They come to adore one who lies in a manger and yet reigns in heaven and on earth. When they tell of one who is born a king, Herod is disturbed. To save his kingdom he resolves to kill him, though if he would have faith in the child, he himself would reign in peace in this life and for ever in the life to come.

Why are you afraid, Herod, when you hear of the birth of a king? He does not come to drive you out, but to conquer the devil. But because you do not understand this you are disturbed and in a rage, and to destroy one child whom you seek, you show your cruelty in the death of so many children.   ~From a sermon by Saint Quodvultdeus, bishop; Office of Readings December 28, Feast of the Holy Innocents

There is a little Herod in all of us, isn't there? Jesus comes to us. He asks us to do things for Him; He tells us we cannot do other things. He closes doors and then opens windows so small and out of reach we wonder how we could ever pass through them. We beg all sorts of things of Him in prayer, things we are certain are just what we need--  the answer, kind and firm, is "No."

And we rage against Him.

We see Him as a threat to all things that could bring happiness. Tiny Baby. Gentleness incarnate. And we rage. And we struggle. And yes, we kill. We destroy peace. We destroy joy. We slaughter childlike faith. All because we think we know better. We are so afraid of relinquishing our own wills, that we miss the one thing that will give us genuine peace. 

We miss the Baby in the Manger. 

He gathers up the helpless and the small and the weak and the frail and He takes them to Himself. But those that rise up on their own strength and rage against Him? They are left spent and exhausted, wearied to the bone by the efforts of exerting their own will. 

All because they are afraid of the Baby in the Manger, afraid to yield to the plan He has. Afraid to become little so that He can become great in their souls. Afraid to let go and let Him be king.

Baby Jesus, I am small and weak and one of my greatest frailties is the inability to recognize that I am nothing without you. Help me to cease striving. Help me to see the great gift of grace You give so freely and to recognize that those Holy Innocents had no merits of their own. Please, Jesus, grant me the peace that comes with truly knowing that we don't win anything; the only true victory is the victory that comes when we yield everything to the man-God hanging on the cross.