New project and books

 Yikes, it's been a bit since I've posted and even I get bored looking at the same post when I open the blog to read yours.  Things have been blessedly slow since Christmas and I'll say it again, I love January.  I love the abrupt stop.  I love the quiet.  I love the empty calendar squares. I love the Christmas ads and movies being gone.  I love clearing out the fancy food from the freezer.  I love when at night PH asks, "we have anything going tomorrow?" I can say, "nope."  

Some would use this time to purge closets and such and sometimes I do but I've been catering to a bad back attack since the kids were here the weekend before Christmas so not much has been done in that respect. 

I have managed to quilt five blocks of Elizabeth's BA quilt and feel good about how it's going. It's not slow, no slower than I am, and it's not big stitching fast. I am doing the cross hatch and using masking tape to guide the stitching so it's ok.  

It's ok enough that I took on another project.   I can't believe I'm saying that.  But Susan was doing this temperature tree cross stitch thing and while I think the temperature quilts are interesting I know I'd NEVER complete it nor want to be nagged by it.  But this tree looked relatively easy and each little leaf is only five stitches and once the tree is done it's easy peasy.  Remind me later that I said that.

I found the instant download pattern on Etsy.

Let me tell you again how old my eyes are!  I haven't done cross stitch in DECADES.  But it's working out, if not a little slow. I'll just keep writing the day's temp on the calendar.

It's not moving much, that thermometer.  The temperatures are stuck in the low to mid 20's.  We've been spared the big storm that moved just south of Michigan, thank the snow gods for that. Outdoors it just looks like powdered sugar on brownies. You can see the ground but it is COLD.  I have said for years that I don't care how cold it gets, just so it doesn't snow.  Snow tells you whether you are going to get where you want to go.

This is the weather when I watch  A Town Like Alice.  In that movie everyone is dealing with the heat so it warms my toes to watch it when we are either confronting the cold or a storm. 

School started back this week from the Christmas holidays and it's Tuesday so I was back at school reading to the kids.  

This week I chose two compatible books about feeling or being left out. 

Brian isn't noticed.  His teacher doesn't even notice him because her hands are full dealing with the loud child and the drama queen and Brian just isn't one of those.  He is the last one chosen, eats his lunch alone and spends recess drawing on the pavement with chalk.   But he is also the only one who makes the new kid feel welcome.  Teacher notices his drawing talent and through an assignment and imagination, Brian is no longer invisible.  When I held it up to show the kids the cover one little girl said, "OH! I love this book!" So.  Good.

Same basic principle.  Nerdy birdy's glasses are too big, his wings too small and he isn't one of the cool birds like Eagle or Cardinal or Robin.  There is a flock of nerdy birds who welcome Nerdy Birdy and he notices that there are far more nerds than cool birds and they stick together.  Till vulture shows up, alone and ignored by the cool birds, too.  Nerdy Birdy shows the way to accepting all types of nerdiness. 

Not everyone can be a jock, right?