The quilt that started the blog . . . is DONE.

So, here it is. The quilt that started this blog.

After The Little Box of Baby Quilts was published early this year, I kicked around the idea of starting a blog. I like writing, and I like sharing my strange little quilts. But it was this opportunity--the chance to design a quilt for McCall's Quilting magazine--that helped me make the decision to try a blog on for size. It was the first time I realized that my quilt-design hat, tucked neatly away after the "little box" quilts were completed, could perhaps be worn a little more often than I thought.

What I didn't know when I wrote my first post four months ago was how much I would end up writing about my son. I keep thinking I should change the name of my blog from WildCard Quilts to WildCard Something Else because for every one post about a quilt, I write three posts about Jack. But if you are a quilter, you understand. Sometimes quilts can take a loooong time to complete. (See above photo--that quilt took four months to finish.) If I stuck to strictly quilt-related blogging as I had initially intended, you would be reading this 2-3 times a week:

    "Today, I pieced a block. Tomorrow, I will piece another block, if I can find 20 consecutive minutes to do so. Have a great day!"

No, scratch that--you wouldn't be reading, would you?

I'm glad I decided to loosen up and just write about what I love--my family, my kid, my quilts. So if you stumbled upon this site expecting pages full of quilt photos and quilt stories and quilt-related lore, sorry to disappoint. I am writing about my quilts--but much more often, I'm writing about who inspires them.

ALERT: Jackspeak

Jack: "Mommy, you be Jack and I'll be the mommy."

Me: "Okay. What does the mommy do?"

"If I was the mommy, I would grow bigger and bigger to reach the Otter Pops in the freezer. And I could buy the milk. And I could drive to Uncle Bill's. And I could pour the apple juice. And I could drive you home. And I could push the buttons on the keys to lock the doors."

"Wow. You make being a mom sound like a lot of fun."

"Yeah."

"BOO-YAH!" is back!

I've been battling a cold for days . . . but I did manage to put the finishing touches on the "BOO-YAH!" purse I started a while back:

Me likey.

Let's see, where shall I take this girl for her public debut? Hmm... The grocery store? The library? The duck pond? The quilt shop? Those are the only four places I visit these days. Let's break it down, shall we?

THE GROCERY STORE: Jack and I head to the grocery store on a weekly basis. The race begins when I sit him in the cart (with a promise of a treat at home if he stays put). We've established a nice routine--as long as I have Dum Dums in my purse and I promise to push the cart at a horribly unsafe rate of speed whenever Jack spots an empty aisle, we have a pleasant time. But I can hardly hold my new purse "just so" while barreling down the cereal aisle. So, NO.

THE LIBRARY: A little purse is just not practical here. I need a bag that will hold the equivalent of five Merriam-Websters so I can pack in the 18 books that Jack chooses to take home. We read 17 books once. We read one book 759 times in two weeks. Then we do it all over again. So, NO.

THE DUCK POND: A bag of stale bread won't fit in my funky little purse. Sigh. NO.

THE QUILT SHOP: Ah, this just might work. All I need are keys and a debit card to visit the quilt shop. Those items will fit perfectly. I may even get a "BOO-YAH!" from a staffer or a fellow customer. Bonus. YES! The quilt shop it is.

Thanks for helping me walk through this important decision in my mind. I was really scraping around for an excuse to hit the quilt shop this week.

 

ALERT: Jackspeak

"Mommy, can I please make a mess?"

Holy Handmade Batman Hat!

Pattern drafting begins . . .

Signature bat ears are firmly attached . . .

Oh dear, oh dear . . . what happened here?

Aside from a bit of sewing in high school, this is my first attempt at designing something that doesn't have straight seams. It was going so well! The eyes were cut to the perfect size, and the bottom of the mask fit snugly around Jack's head. Then I decided to sew a zigzag stitch around the eye holes and the bottom of the mask so it wouldn't rip. Everything s-t-r-e-t-c-h-e-d. With it on, my son now strongly resembles Dumb Donald from Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids. With bat ears.

I can't tell Jack the mask I stitched makes him look like Dumb Donald. Because when he first peered into the bathroom mirror through those ENORMOUS eye holes, he beamed.

"Mommy, take my mask off," Jack said. I lifted the mask off his head by the ears. "I'm Bruce Wayne!" he chirped. "Now put it back on." I fitted the mask back on his head. "Now I'm BATMAN!" We repeated the off-and-on ritual six more times.

So, Jack likes the mask. Horribly handmade? Yep. But you gotta admit that with those big black ears, he won't be mistaken for anyone other than Batman.

Or Dumb Donald as Batman.

Did you know this about sidewalk chalk?

Did you know that when you leave sidewalk chalk out in the rain, it gets really mushy and sludgy? And that you can make really mushy and sludgy chalk drawings with it?

And did you know that you can jump and dance around in a mushy, sludgy chalk drawing you made in your bare feet?

And then you can step out and show off your mushy, sludgy chalk footprints on the steps of the deck, in any color you want?

Well, you can!

Preschool pains

Jack is off and running--preschool has begun! When Brett and I attended a preschool open house with Jack a few weeks back, our little boy was quite distraught. Meaning he had placed a stranglehold around my neck so strong that when I tried to let go of him, he continued to dangle from my body like a 30-pound, 37-inch-long necklace. (BLING.) I was ready to walk out the door and head back to our cocoon for another year.

The preschool teacher allowed me to sit with Jack and the other children on the floor while she read a story and sang a song. Within 15 minutes, Jack had moved off my lap and onto the floor on his own. Then the toys came out. Jack spotted a bucket brimming with toy cars. Jackpot! I moved to sit with the other parents and watched Jack as he introduced himself to another little boy with a confident, "Hi! My name is Jack!" They started crashing cars together.

What a proud moment. My son. Crashing cars. With another little boy his age. Within the span of a few minutes Jack has busted out of his cocoon and morphed into a social butterfly! Thank you, Hot Wheels, thank you.

On Tuesday, I took Jack to preschool for the real deal. We wrote his name in his backpack:

Headed out to the car:

And made it to school on time--all with no tears and no necklace:

It was not easy for me to leave Jack there--he's never been taken care of by anyone other than family. I teared up good. And I teared up when I was greeted like this upon my return:

Jacky, welcome to a whole new world--three days a week, two hours a day. I can only hope that as the weeks and months of your first school year roll on, you'll still want to come home to the cocoon and kick back with me.

ALERT: Jackspeak

Jack with "Enja" (a.k.a. a ninja figure) and his firefighter helmet.

Jack: "Enja, can I please show you something?"

Me (as Enja): "Sure."

Jack: "Okay. This is my firefighter helmet!"

Enja: "Oh, that's a very cool helmet. Are you going to be a firefighter when you grow up?"

Jack: "No. I'm going to be a firefighter right NOW."