Lemonade

Sometimes, a day starts out on a really crappy note.

You know, like finding out that the trailer that contains a huge amount of your Scouts' camping equipment has been broken into.

I got that message first thing this morning, so Daniel and I took off into town to deal with that. I crawled around inside the trailer and was relieved to find that nothing obvious was missing, but the latch itself was destroyed. I made the police report (not that I expect anything to come of it) and then one of the Scout dads and I ran all over town trying to find a new latch.

We couldn't find one, so we secured it as well as we could in order to form a plan, which will ultimately involve towing the trailer over here to put it in my garage so that I can go through it, clean it out, and inventory everything that is in there - a job that I've been meaning to do for months. And one of the Scout grandpas thinks that he can weld the latch to repair it for free - a huge bonus for our little pack of boys.

Of course, in order to get it over here to inventory the contents, there has to be room in my garage - which would not normally be a problem.

However......

A month or so ago (maybe more) a friend of mine found out that a friend of hers was cleaning out a "hoarder house" - it was a house that was apparently stuffed full of fabric and craft goodies (the owner had passed away), and the person who was cleaning it out didn't want to throw all of the fabric in a dumpster. So I went over and spent a few hours going through floor-to-ceiling piles of fabric, batting, sewing supplies, partially completed quilt tops, spools of thread, and so much crap that it was unreal. I piled as much as I could into the van and brought it home.

However, it all stunk. It had that nasty musty stale animal old lady smell to it, so I piled it all in the garage until I could figure out what to do with it.

I had hoped that just leaving it in the garage would kill the smell, but it didn't. I started to worry that I wouldn't be able to get rid of the smell and I'd just have to toss the stuff after all.

With the latest development of the Scout trailer being moved in sometime in the next few days, I knew that I had to do something with the pile today, so I started going through it. I unrolled all of the batting and hung it out on the clothesline to air out, and I took the first pile of fabric and quilt squares and quilt tops and tossed them into the washer with lots of detergent, and hoped for the best.

When the first load was done and I opened the washer, I was greeted with no smell at all. Not willing to risk the odor coming back in the dryer, I hung it all out of the line to dry. Some of the tops started to pull apart, and some of the fabric basically disintegrated, but I think there is quite a bit that is salvageable with a lot of patience and a little bit of luck.

Some of it is remarkably hideous. Some of it is gorgeous. Some is hand stitched, some is done by machine. Most of it is polyester (ick) but some of it is cotton. There is absolutely no way to tell how old any of it is.

Now that I'm getting a chance to actually look at some of the stuff, I think I'm going to do what I can to finish as much of it as possible into quilts - some are going to be small lap-sized ones, some a little bigger, and some might actually be twin or full-sized by the time that they're done. And when they're done, they're going to be donated somewhere. I've seen a couple of programs over the years where foster care agencies look for quilts and blankets for kids that are in state custody, so that's where I'm going to start.

Busted up trailer. Dirty hoarder fabric. Cluttered garage.

Lemons.

Motivation to clean, organize, and inventory the trailer along with getting it fixed (hopefully) for free. Fabric that is coming clean with not much effort. Cleaner garage. Being able to take stuff that I have to turn into donations for someone who needs it.

Lemonade.

Perspective. 

Awesomeness. Lots of it.

The past few days have been crazy insane, but in such a good way.

I went to Oklahoma City and ran a (slightly more than) 5K leg of the Oklahoma City Memorial Marathon on Sunday. It was an amazing experience. The marathon itself is a fundraiser for the Oklahoma City National Memorial & Museum that honors the victims of the bombing there 20 years ago. With over 25,000 runners, this was by far the biggest race that I've ever participated in, and it was incredible.

 I ran faster than I've ever run before, and amazed myself with what I accomplished that day. I ended my leg of the run with a smile on my face, and didn't stop smiling for the rest of the day.

But more on that later....

I got a ton of stuff done outside today. I mowed the grass (always a huge job), finished weeding the huge front flower bed, got some more flowers planted, watered stuff, got some more seedlings transferred out to the garden (hopefully these actually, you know, survive), planted some more flowers, watered stuff....you get the idea.

Baseball season officially started tonight for Daniel. We rode our bikes up to the practice field and on our way back, we got to see some wildlife that we don't get to see very often - at least not sitting still.

But probably the best part of the last few days....

Remember that memorial quilt that I was working on? It was for my friend's mother-in-law, whose husband passed away in January. I was given a bunch of his work shirts and pants to use to make a quilt. My friend gave me a basic pattern idea, we talked about various details, but for the most part I designed it as I went along. I was terrified that the mother-in-law wasn't going to like it.

After we got done running the race in OKC, my team and I went out to eat. We were sitting in the rocking chairs in front of a Cracker Barrel, waiting for our table, and I scrolled through my facebook newsfeed. There I saw it - my friend's post with pictures of her mother-in-law seeing the quilt for the first time. It was all I could do not to burst into tears right then and there.

Right there. It just doesn't get any better than that.

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I know I've been nagging on my facebook page, but I'm going to do it here too just in case you missed it. This coming Saturday is the Great Strides Walk for Cystic Fibrosis. I am participating in that to raise money for research for a cure for this horrible disease that directly affects our family. If you would like to make a contribution, you can do that here.

But wait! There's more!

In order to encourage people to donate, I've agreed to do a couple of things.

For $1000, I will dye my hair purple (not the wash-out kind, either) AND I will get rid of my ugly rainbow-colored crocs that everyone loves to hate.

Seriously though - please help if you can. It would mean so much to me.

Blanket Update

So a couple of weeks ago, I posted the deal about creating Mom Cave Designs, and I figured that it was time to give a semi-official update on what's been going on with that.

It's been interesting, to say the least. People have shown a tremendous amount of interest, and I can see that there is definitely a market out there for weighted blankets (among other things). I honestly  had no idea how fast something like this could grow. Since I got started, I think I've completed 3 blankets to order, I have one blanket that is being made, and I have orders for 5 more (that's off the top of my head, but the numbers are pretty close). It might not seem like a ton, but it's been keeping me busy. I got a little bit of a break last week while I waited for supplies to arrive after I ordered them, but that gave me a chance to get some stuff done around the house.

The most surprising thing that has happened though.....I have had several people contact me to basically say "your prices are too low" or "you aren't charging enough for your work" or "you're never going to make any money like this". You get the idea.

It dawned on me that a lot of people who are following me on the Mom Cave Designs page don't necessarily know me as Non-Stop Mom. They don't all know who I am or any of my story, and that helps to explain the low pricing.

I'm NOT in this to get rich. I'm just not. I don't need the money. When my second ex-husband unexpectedly passed away, Daniel and I started receiving Social Security benefits. Those benefits caused a lot of drama for a while because of the people who felt that I didn't deserve them, but that's another story altogether. The reality of the situation is that we receive enough money on a monthly basis to pay all of our bills and have a little bit left over. We are not rich. We don't have much in savings (that happens when you buy an older house) but we survive and we manage to do a little extra here and there. So "getting rich" off of these blankets is not really a priority. Will a little bit of extra money here and there help us? Of course it will. Is it the driving force behind doing this? Not even close.

What we want to do is make them affordable. The blankets do absolutely no good to anyone if they are so outrageously priced that people can't afford to buy them. We want to help people get the blankets that they need without having to sacrifice something else that is equally as important to be able to afford them.

I don't see it as doing anything amazing or spectacular and I certainly don't expect any kind of recognition for it. I just want to be able to sew and create things and help people, and if I make a little bit of extra money, great. It'll be even better when we get to the point that we can start making blankets to donate to those who need them, but that will take a little bit of time yet.

At the same time though, I am a mother first. I have 5 extremely active and involved kids. They are in sports and extracurricular activities and Scouts and church and everything else under the sun. I'm a single mom, and even though The Dude helps me out when he can, he's not here all of the time and so the housework and the grocery shopping and the yardwork and the kid chauffeuring and everything else falls back on me 99% of the time. The Mom Stuff has to take priority, especially when the kids are at home - so when they're here I run around and do what needs to be done around the house, but as soon as they're in bed or at school I head down to the Mom Cave and get busy. Right now I have a fairly quick turnaround on the blankets but as time goes on and I get busier with that, it will probably slow down a bit - but I don't plan to raise my prices any time soon.

Alrighty then....

I'm also looking into the things that I need to do to actually eventually turn this into a legitimate business if it looks like that would be a good thing to do. Right now, it's still in the little more than a hobby but not quite a business stage. I don't want to jump the gun and do all sorts of crazy official stuff until I know exactly which direction we're going and where we might land with all of this stuff.

For now, I'm learning as I go. I know that I can make the blankets and I'm enjoying doing it. I welcome any input or suggestions or critiques that anyone wants to give. I've had people ask if it's ok to share the page or share the blog - please do, because otherwise we won't be able to do this. (For the record, I've thought about starting a secondary blog just for the business stuff, but honestly..... it's so intertwined with me and who I am that it would be hard to separate it...... so it'll all just be contained right here in this nifty little package.)

There are other things rattling around in my skull but for now I just wanted to explain the lower prices a little more in detail for those who don't know the whole story. And just in case you haven't been around here for a while - if you have any questions, just ask me. Seriously.

The Start of Something ...... Small to Medium (for now)

So.....

If you've been hanging around here for very long, you know that I sew. Kind of a lot. Or at least, I try to when I'm not running around like the proverbial headless chicken all hopped up on caffeine. I've always wanted to get a business going around it, but so far that hasn't really happened yet. A craft show here and there, or a special order once in a while, and that's been about it.

Then, a series of things happened.

Actually, it started a couple of years ago when a dear friend of mine took in 3 little boys who were in need of a new home. Keep that in the back of your mind for right now, ok?

I bought this house. And it has this incredible basement that I can almost totally devote to my crafty stuff. Getting it cleaned up and usable has been more than a little bit of a chore, but it's so close to being perfect that I can spend time down there actually sewing instead of hyperventilating over the mess.

Then my friend got another child, the little sister of the boys she already had in her home. One of the boys started showing some signs of autism and other sensory issues, and she has been doing everything in her power and within the foster care system to meet his needs. She called me one day and asked me "hey, what do you know about weighted blankets?"

Huh. I've never been asked that before. So I started researching. I was astonished at the prices and knew that I could make them for less money than what some of these companies were asking. I started crunching numbers and doing thousands of searches online for supplies and ideas and prices and ideas.

The Dude and I talked about it. We talked to friends who have experience with these things. We brainstormed. We drew pictures and talked and discussed and made phone calls and did more research and discussed and bickered (but just a little).

And then we went to Oklahoma to see my friend and these precious children, and to help them move into a new home. The Dude, my friend and I all sat down and talked and crunched numbers and brainstormed some more.

On the way back to Kansas, he and I talked about it some more. We both decided that this is something that is worth pursuing, even if it's just a short-term project. I ordered the pellets needed to weight a blanket, and dug through my fabric stash to see what I could make for her little boy as a prototype.

It took me more than a few weeks to make that first one, as life was too crazy for a while. But then I got it done and had it ready to ship to her. I had done everything except for take pictures of it, and she called me and asked me to come back down to help her - she had just moved again (long story on that one) and was diagnosed with diabetes, and she was struggling. I packed the boys into the Traverse, pulled out of the driveway, went to the gas station, went back to the house to get the blanket, and hit the road.

Once we got there, we basically forgot about the blanket other than pulling it out of the bag to show it to her, and then it got put aside. I don't remember exactly what happened at one point, but her little boy started to have a meltdown. He was extremely upset and was kicking and screaming and crying and flailing all over the place. She got him in her arms and sat down on the couch and motioned for me to hand her the blanket. I tossed it to her and she draped it across him, and as the weight settled on him, he immediately became quiet and relaxed.

She and I looked at each other in shock. We had never witnessed what one of these blankets could do.

I knew right then and there that this was something that I need to do.

I've referred to the basement in this house as the "Mom Cave" ever since we moved in, and as ideas for this have been rolling around, so has a name for our venture. "Mom Cave Designs" was born. I snagged a facebook page for it, but didn't post anything until tonight as I kept working on ideas.

Our (and when I say "our" I mean me and The Dude because he's in on this too) general idea for the blankets is this - while we will have some standard blankets on hand (after we get them made), we will make them to order, because we know that kids (and adults) who need them sometimes have very particular requests/needs. We plan to sell them at very reasonable prices, because we're not out to get rich off of these. We actually want to turn some of the profit around to make more blankets that can be donated - either to kids in the foster care or mental health system, or to families who can't afford to buy them.

We want to make a difference.

Of course, it's going to take a while to get this going full-speed. There are some things that we need to do first to make it easier - small things like getting a piece of wood cut to make a tabletop for the pool table to give us a big work area, buying a bigger ironing board to make working with larger pieces of fabric easier, buying the pellets in bulk to get the biggest cost savings, buying some bulk fabric and thread, etc.... and other things like looking into what needs to be done to turn this into a legitimate business should it grow and succeed as we hope it does. For now, we're going to take it all one step at a time, but I already threatened him that if this takes off, he's going to be learning how to use a sewing machine pretty darned quick!

Mom Cave Designs will be more than just the blankets though. It will be everything that I make, but with a focus on the blankets. As of right now, I have pictures posted of two smaller lap blankets that I made as samples, and also some Trick or Treat bags that I made that I have for sale. I plan to post more items over the next few days, as I go through my inventory and see what I have. Anything that is sold in the near future will help to fund the initial startup costs to get some more blankets made.

As this progresses, I'll be posting updates on the Mom Cave Designs facebook page, so if you'd like to keep up on the day to day progress you can follow me there - but of course I'll always be on my regular Non-Stop Mom page too.

So.....it'll either be really cool, or it'll be a train wreck. Only time will tell. :)

Lots of -ations today

Today was a day full of -ations.

Information.

I spent the morning and early afternoon at an information fair in town today, handing out flyers and talking to people about Cub Scouts as we try to round up more boys to join our pack. I ran into some people who I haven't seen in a very long time (and The Dude ran into a buddy from his youth who now lives in Florida and was just "passing through" the area - weird) and met new people and talked until I couldn't talk anymore - which is a huge feat for me because believe it or not, I don't like to talk to people.

Celebration.

We went to a barbecue today to celebrate the life of Jared's classmate who passed away 2 weeks ago from brain cancer. The food was wonderful, lots of money was raised, and there were so many people there to celebrate and honor the life of a little boy who touched so many in his 9 short years of life.

Someone asked me how the kids were handling his death. Honestly, they seem to be handling it better than I am. Jared doesn't say much about it, other than asking an occasional question or two. I've tried to talk to him about it, especially in the days leading up to and right after Sam's death, and I've explained a lot to him. I think that he understands it, but he's still young enough that it doesn't consume him. But as a mother, I just can't even imagine how his family feels. I just can't. It tears my heart to shreds if I think about it too much, especially when I realize that it could easily be one of my kids.

They even had a pink fire truck there.

Frustration.

Just trying to get everything done that needs to be done before I start my crazy work schedule on Monday. I have so many things that I need to do, and I'm quickly running out of time. I feel like I have to have the house clean and the laundry done and put away and the meal planning completed and and and and and........ My inner control freak is coming out in a really big way, and it's driving me insane because I know in my heart that everyone will survive even if the house is a mess - but that's not how I want it to be.

Inspiration.

Along with trying to get household stuff done, I'm also trying to finish up some craft projects. After the barbecue, The Dude and the boys and I went fabric shopping (ok, I shopped while they walked the mall to stay out of my way), and just the simple act of picking out the fabrics that I need got my mind spinning and I was able to sit down tonight and design the quilt squares that I need to make to finish one project.

So for now, I'm going to go cut fabric into pieces and sew it back together again and maybe get one thing crossed off of the to-do list.

Just one. That's all I need before I go to bed.

Random stuff and a super-ish moon

Just a typical day around here. Kids staying in pajamas all day, playing around, getting into fights, and all of that fun stuff while I cleaned and sewed and did all of that fun stuff.

I'll tolerate the room being a disaster just to see them playing together.
Nicely. For hours.
And yes, my boys are playing with Barbies.

OK, seriously? How does this happen on a spool of thread? 

I kept reading stuff about the supermoon and saw various articles indicating that it could be seen either tonight, tomorrow morning, or tomorrow night. Or maybe all of the above. Maybe none, if there were too many clouds. Anyway, at about 9:30 tonight, I tossed the kids into the van and we went to a local park to try to get away from the city lights so that we could check out the moon.

It wasn't very impressive, but the kids enjoyed running around like lunatics in the dark for about half an hour while I tried to get some decent pictures.

Emily is wearing the purple shirt. Do you see that really
faint green blur directly to the right of her? That's actually Daniel.

The green blur o' Daniel again.

He doesn't stay still very often.

Checking something on my phone. And obviously we didn't
get away from the streetlights.

Emily was playing around with the camera.

One of the better shots of the moon - just as we were leaving,
of course.

So now I'm going to sit down and sew and maybe watch a movie. Tomorrow's plans involve church and........ pretty much nothing else all day. Although I'm pretty sure that "nothing else" will involve dishes, and laundry, and cleaning, and yardwork.

The fun never ends!

My goofy lunch dates

I've been working on a super-secret craft project and needed to get some more materials for it, so after we took the older kids back to Ex1's house this morning, we made a mad dash to Wichita to hit up the fabric store. Because well, I had coupons. And coupons are good. And they were going to expire.

So I had to go shopping for fabric. I had to.

We found a treasure in Ex1's yard.
(I actually really hate peacocks though.)

Random tree that I've always thought
looked really cool.

After we got done shopping, we were tired and hungry and cranky. So we had to stop to get something to eat. We had to.

Obviously, the food cured the crappy attitudes.

Daniel with "Astronaut Guy" - he was found at the bottom of a
swimming pool in Knoxville, TN on TMOART:12. And he's
still the toy of choice.

Alex was allowed to hold Astronaut Guy for one picture.
But only one.

That was apparently some really good ketchup.

Shopping. It wears them out.

Too ugly not to save and other randomness...

I awoke yesterday to the sound of a crash in the kitchen. I knew that it wasn't going to be pretty as I jumped up out of bed to see (a) who did it (b) who got hurt and (c) what was destroyed.

In the half of a second that it took me to get from my bed to the kitchen I knew the answers to all three of those questions.

(a) Alex
(b) no one
(c) the candy cow

I was right.

The candy cow is a ceramic cookie jar that my mother sent to me when I was married to Ex1. It was one of *those* gifts - you know the kind that you open and then look at each other, both of you thinking "um, that's interesting" but neither one says anything.

Yeah. One of those. But, I like cows, and we needed a cookie jar, and it was cute in its own ugly way. So it made its home on top of the refrigerator, where it has always been.

When Sarah was little, she climbed up to get something out of it, and she dropped the lid on the floor. It broke into 4 or 5 large pieces that I was able to glue back together fairly easily. Of course, that was just a linoleum floor that had a little bit of cushion to it.

Unfortunately, our kitchen floor now is ceramic tile. And it's very unforgiving. So when Alex climbed up to try to swipe something out of it yesterday morning and dropped it, it ended up in more than 4 or 5 pieces.

Needless to say, I was not happy.

I contemplated throwing it away....for about 2 seconds.

And then I got out the glue - after Alex got sent to his room for an extended period of time. And I spent most of the morning piecing and gluing (and swearing and grumbling).

She's definitely showing some signs of wear after this incident. She has holes where the pieces disintegrated and couldn't be put back together again. She's missing an ear and part of a horn, but she's back on top of the refrigerator where she belongs.

After all, she's just too ugly not to save.

 Other randomness for the day....

A trip to the library that resulted in returning 19 items....and checking out another 35.....

A trip to the park that ended up with everyone being really cold and hungry after about 30 minutes...

Then a trip out to eat where we ran into a friend and got to visit with her...

Brownies and ice cream after we came home...

Movie watching with the kids...

And then some more work on a sewing project....

Not a bad day.

Unveil your ideas...

I find it kind of funny that just last night I talked about how I have put the wheels in motion to actually move into a different place and then this is the fortune that I got in a cookie tonight.

Today has been a fun day. I got to spend the entire day with Sarah and Daniel, which is not a combination that I get to have very often. I love seeing the relationship between my oldest and my youngest kids when these two are together - they don't get to have time with just the two of them very often, and I think that they had fun. I know that I did.  We went to church, did a little shopping, grabbed some lunch, hung out at home, spent some time with The Dude, went out for Chinese food, picked up Alex, came home.... nothing exceptionally spectacular, but it was wonderful in its own way.

As we were driving back home after getting the aforementioned fortune cookie, I started thinking about some of the ideas and plans that I have in my head. Some of them I've talked about  here and some of them I haven't, each for different reasons. I can be kind of superstitious at times and I don't like to jinx myself by talking about what I think might be a good idea - because it seems like right after it comes out of my mouth it immediately turns into the most ridiculous idea known to man.

Honestly, my biggest plan/idea right now is this move. Getting out of this house is really our number one priority at the moment for so many reasons. The kids all need to be in the same school district. It'll be easier not only for me, but also for Ex1 when we get moved over there. This house is too small. And there are so many things about this house that I've tolerated for the past 2 1/2 years, but at this point - I'm starting to hate it. I hate it more and more every day. Moving will not be a simple process (it never really is, is it?) but we'll get through it, one way or another.

My other short-term plan/idea is this half-marathon coming up in a few short weeks. I have talked about that because otherwise I can just pretend that I'm not signed up for it and have absolutely zero accountability for it. But, I'm doing it.

Probably my other big idea - one that I've touched on briefly - is trying to figure out how to turn my crafty stuff into a legitimate business. This is something that I've wanted to do for a very long time, but I've never really pursued it. I need to do that. I'm still not sure exactly what I want to do, but I know that I want to make stuff and I want to make money while I'm doing it - and more money than I can do in a once or twice per year craft show. It's something that I like to do, I'm fairly good at it, and it'll give me the freedom to work at home and still be with my family - the best of all worlds if you ask me.

So anyway, there you have it. A little bit of a brain dump courtesy of a fortune cookie.

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And if you haven't already please READ THIS POST because it's the most important one that I've ever posted on here - and it's your chance to make me look like an idiot. So go read it. Now.

It was a sew-fest

So (sew?) for whatever reason, this weekend apparently became the official sewing weekend in this house.

I finished up my row to add to the rows that now get sent on to the next person...and I've already received the next set of rows that I have to add another row to and then send it off, but it can wait for a while because it's not "due" yet.

And I have to get my sewing machine serviced. Like, NOW.

But, while I was working on this, the girls decided that they wanted to sew too. I've tried to get them to do it before and they had absolutely no interest - but suddenly, the urge hit them.

And I had to fight to use my own sewing machine for the rest of the weekend.

But I really can't complain too much. They really focused on what they were working on, and even though they were using their own "techniques" at least they are showing an interest - and starting to learn the basics of using the sewing machine.

Now I just need to get my old one fixed and my new one serviced, and then it'll just be 3 people fighting over two machines instead of a single one - that got interesting a few times, especially in this tiny little sewing area.

But they had fun, there was a minimal amount of bickering, and they're learning a good skill. Whether or not they continue to use it will be totally up to them, but at least they'll have an idea of the basics.

 Sarah actually came up with some really cute ideas, so maybe she'll turn out to be the quilt designer of the family. I could handle that.

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He spoils me.

In other news, because The Dude is so incredibly wonderful and awesome, he spent most of his weekend off under the hood of the van - yet again. I've been having some issues with it and we I thought that it needed a new thermostat. He took my word for it and starting trying to replace it, which was not as easy as it should have been. Long story short, after some more investigating, we he fixed it - or so we hope. Tomorrow morning will be the moment of truth.

And we're going to start shopping for a new van. I don't want to, but I think the time is coming - sooner than I'd like it to, darn it.

Anyway.....tomorrow, the two younger boys have school (yes, it's a holiday. yes, they have school.) but the older 3 don't - so I'm taking the two to school, and then taking Emily and Jared over to their father's house and then Sarah and I are going to spend the day together - no one else, just the two of us. We haven't decided what we're going to do yet, but there might be a run involved, and lunch somewhere (her choice). I don't get to spend nearly enough time with her, so I'm really looking forward to it. I think it'll be good for both of us at this point.