Catching up

Did you know that one of the rules of blogging is not to start a post with things like, I’m sorry I haven’t written in so long or sorry I’ve gotten so behind or some other somesuch?  So let’s pretend that I’m not saying, hey team, I’ve been swamped with living life and haven’t turned on a computer for recreational purposes for about 2 weeks now.  And let’s definitely pretend that I’m not going to tell you that I have 3 weeks worth of pictures safely sitting on my camera’s memory card, and please by all means, keep pretending that I’m not opening with an apology about all of that.

Truthfully, I’m not feeling all that apologetic, I’m actually kind of feeling smiley and rife from how much fun summer is, even if it comes at the cost of getting the useful stuff done.  In the last two weeks I’ve had a weekend of fun with one of my best friends in the whole entire universe, we’ve ridden our bikes, we’ve had a visit from my stepmom and adorable little sister (who is more woman than little sister these days, but remember, we’re already playing make believe here, so let’s add that to the list) and we’ve splashed and floated and blended and dyed (the couch covers…more to come on that) and just generally ramped up the pace to 10,000 miles/hour.  Presently my mother-in-law is visiting which is such a treat, and this morning Asher stared into my eyes and touched my cheek and said mama with such familiar tender conviction that I thought the world might end on that little note of perfection and leave me tingling forever.

So, that’s what we’ve been doing.

Here’s a little peek…

Asher is still obsessed with airplanes:

Drew and Asher reading (airplane books) together is still one of my favorite visions of home:

And Charlotte (our friend that came to visit) is still beeeeeeeeeeeeutiful:

Charlotte (Coco to us, Auntie Coco to Asher) is a 6ish foot tall beauty who is taking on urban food systems with gusto and style and she is a whirlwind of good times and quiet times all at once.  In the two and a half days that she was with us we managed to squeeze in a little dash of everything from serious conversation over cocktails to causing a top 40 dance party in a bar to swounging (that’s swim/lounging) in a lake to cackling as we told each other really inappropriate secrets until 4 in the morning over a mountain of watermelon.  She inspires me…good friends should do that.  I love that we’re still making memories and still finding things to laugh about and getting better, it seems, with age.  I love this woman.

What else?

Well, I made my blueberry pie for the 4th:

And then took a rather unflattering picture of the final product:

And I also whipped up an airplane blanket for Asher which I briefly considered doing a tutorial on, but I’m afraid that it would read more to the tune of “If-You-Make-This-Don’t-Do-What-I-Just-Did” which isn’t overly helpful to anyone.  It’s janky stitching probably isn’t going to win any crafty competitions, but it sure does make Asher happy to go to bed every night blanketed in airplanes and so far he hasn’t noticed or seemed to care that a close look will reveal that this blanket was most likely sewn by a boozy 5 year old with a lead foot.

Although this is an incredibly easy and straightforward project I ran into a little trouble because the bias tape that I used wasn’t a standard width (it was more narrow) and I just kind of sucked at making the corners…no excuses there.  However, if you are a newbie that’s interested in doing this, I did find this tutorial about attaching bias tape by Amy Karol to be really helpful and oddly amusing.

Oh right.  Dyeing the couch.  So Drew and I bought a slip covered white couch and quickly discovered that white was not going to fly in our house.  No worries, we’ll just dye it right?  My confidence was boosted by this post on Young House Love, and by my friend Lindley’s success with dyeing her slipcovers but…well…we’re on our second round of dyeing (the first was a blotchy Ecru bust) and gearing up for a third.  I am going to do a whole post about this adventure, but I wanted to let all of you know that not only am I eating about 1/2 a watermelon a day these days, but we’re also currently sitting on one:

(That’s my sis holding down our pink couch)  In my attempts to dye the cover Crimson–you know, DARK RED–I wound up with pleasantly pepto.  More dye getting ordered, red couch to come.  I have to say that the Key West vibe in the living room is very summery and festive, but I’m pretty sure that Drew mentioned something about not having pink furniture right before the whole ’till death do you part’ bit, so I’m hoping to remedy this.

In reading back over this, it seems that I’m a little hit-or-miss with my domestic crafty bliss here, but I guess all I can say is that I’m having fun trying and learning as I go, and that if you check back in about 6 years or so, I might actually be able to share something in an educational capacity.  And remember how funny it was that one time that I tried to dye the couch red and it turned out pink?  Remember that?  Yeah, me too.  Good times.

In closing, I am going on a little solo adventure this weekend to a friend’s wedding, Drew is going to keep the home fires air conditioner burning blowing with his mom and Asher for company and I’m going to be really excited about being out and about in the world and I’m probably also going to choke up when I talk to Asher on the phone because that is one of the weird paradoxes of motherhood.  It’s going to be a lot of fun though and if I start to miss my fellas too badly, I’ll just turn to one of the 8 girls I’m sharing a hotel room with and ask for a hug, so that’s pretty awesome. More to come and…

This pink couch is for you!