Wall Hanging

I created this  cute little wall hanging for a friend's son birthday. T if you are seeing this, act surprised on Sunday. I am making something special for her daughter's birthday party next weekend and if her kids are anything like mine what one gets the other one needs. So I made this for him cuz he likes cars. I also had a co-worker ask me to make her one for her granddaughter's birthday. Maybe I'm getting over my fear selling my stuff.

Necklace Cowl Tutorial

So I saw this cool idea for a necklace cowl somewhere on-line (wish I remembered where) and I thought I'd make one for myself.

I crocheted a whole bunch of single chains each one slight;y longer then the next.

 I also crocheted a little swatch to cover up the ends.

I added all the chains and sewed the ends together.


Then put on an enjoy.

Ania

What I Wore Wednesday - Christmas Pictures

What a week it's been, there was some sickness in the house Tutu and I caught a stomach bug, we decorated the house for Christmas and took our family pictures.  After months of repression I have started working on my grief. You can read about my progression here and here.

My children have all gotten to love the self-timer on my camera.  As soon as they hear the beeping they run to join me in the picture.   My cousin was over to take our Christmas pictures on Saturday but the better pictures turned out to be the ones I used the self-timer for because they all found it more fun to press the button and run into position for the picture.

 

As the previous weeks I'm linking up with The Pleated Poppy and Mama Go Round.

Headband - made by me
necklace - made by me
jacket - Penningtons
dress - Catharine's
tights - Target
shoes - Target

Dress - Addition Elle (the dress is over 10 years old, I wore it to my wedding shower)
leggings - Penningtons

Headband - made by me
jacket - Dress Barn
dress- Catharine's
tights- Target
shoes - Target

Here is one of our family pictures. If you want to see more you can check them out here.

headband - made by me
sweater - Penningtons
pants - MXM

headband - made by me
t-shirt - upcycled by me
wrap - upcycled by me from a nursing top
pants - MXM

 And this is what I look like after work, I take my pictures and run to change into my comfy clothes.


I've also been busy working up some crafts. I made a few cowls for Tutu and Muffin (still need to start Monkey's), I finished my throw for watching tv (well i finished it earlier but I had to fix it because Muffin got to it with scissors), and on Saturday the girls and I made cupcakes. We were trying out a new red velvet cake mix from PC, to see if they were any good. We have a winner that we will use for Monkey's birthday party.

Tutu in his cowl

Muffin with her car.

My throw, the pink ruffle is where I had to fix it because Muffin cut my thread.

And our cupcakes, not sure which way I'm going to decorate the flowery one or the ruffle one.  I still have a another week and a half to decide.




As the Holidays approach more craziness will be upon us.  I hope I can make it.

Ania

Release the Floodgates

So yesterday I released the floodgates on my emotions, I triggered the switch and they all came pouring out. The good, the bad and the ugly all swirling around me, just like the floodgates are released. Currents are formed, things that lay silently on the bottom are being moved around and rising to the top.  I feel I could so easily succumb to those currents fighting me trying to pull me under. To sit a spell in those ugly, sad, depressing emotions. I am working to keep my head a float, to stay above those emotions and not get dragged down to the bottom.

I wrote my post yesterday on my break at work and when I was done I ended up having a 20 minute cry in the bathroom. The emotions just poured out of me. When Rock finally came to pick me up from work I was done. I didn't care about anything, all I wanted to do was crawl into bed, have a tea and a red velvet cupcake and cocoon.  When I came home I saw my children's smiling faces and said I need to fight this, I need to stay strong for them. 

I am tired of being the strong one, the one everyone depends on, the one who can handle anything, the one who does.  That said I want my children to see me as strong.  I know have to make a compromise, I can't just give up and go to the other end of the spectrum and give up. I need to strong while still allowing myself to vulnerable. I need to allow myself the  time to grieve, to live it he emotion but be strong enough to come back out and function for my family.

I realized that I haven't painted from my heart in a while because I think I was scared of what might come out. I did do a few quick paintings but my sketching, painting and journaling have been abandoned for a few months. I need to reconnect with that self and work through this, grow and heal.  I will try and share this journey with you guys as well.  I hope that my healing my help and inspire others to heal as well. 

Welcome to this new journey and new chapter. 

Ania

I did my best - a grieving process

So it's almost been a year since my MIL passed away. In some regards I can't believe it's been a year time has flown by but other times I can't believe it's almost been a year because time has dragged on.

From when she was admitted to the hospital in March 2010, the day before I went into labour with Tutu (3 weeks early), to the day she passed were some of the hardest days of my life.

In a span of a few weeks, MIL was admitted to the hospital, I went into labour early (thankfully because I had a partial placental abruption, I still haven't really shared my birth story from Tutu's birth), Tutu had to get admitted to the hospital for jaundice, Rock had complications from a vasectomy (and left him useless for 6 weeks, due to pain and swelling from an infection), I had major gall bladder attacks and ended up having my gallbladder removed and MIL almost passed away from an infection she caught at the hospital. Not to mention I was having issues with my milk supply from stress (I mean it's not like anything was happening). Plus the regular day to day stuff, a newborn, 2 other children and weekly visits to the hospital to visit MIL.

From when we found out that the cancer MIL had was terminal to the day she came home we had 1 week to get the house ready (the hospital wanted me to have my house prepared in 3 days to have her home (because that was so realistic given normal circumstances never mind what I had going on). My MIL just wanted to be home, she wants to be surrounded by the people she loved and get the best care possible.  I had a really hard time making the decision to take on this huge endeavour.

My point to all this is I've realized that since she passed until now I've kept us (the family) busy. We've always had something going on, a day trip here, and event there. We've been busy.  It's not that we didn't use to be busy. We were, we were always on the go but we also had out down days. We haven't really had that; I hope to change that now. I've come to realize that I've kept us busy for a few reasons 1) the guilt that my kids missed out on a lot the last 2 years when we cared for my step-FIL before he passed and more so when we cared for MIL, 2) to do some fun things with the kids that we missed out on, we enjoyed doing those activates as a family and 3) and probably the most important reason, if I was busy I didn't' have to deal with my emotions.  All that stuff going on brought up a lot of emotions within me, good, bad and the ugly. I think the ugly scared me most; I put off dealing with them while caring for my MIL because it would have been too much to deal with then. I've put off dealing with them now because I didn't want to come face to face with some of my thoughts.  I've now realized I'm tired and I can't run anymore. I can't avoid them because it's not doing me any good. I just want to rest. I want to be me again.  I need to face my demons and make peace with them.

During the 5 months MIL was home I was blessed with care from the Hospice out here. I took advantage of meeting with the social worker and I had a volunteer come and help me deal with the emotions.  I was told they were/are normal but they scared me so I put them away.  Even if they are normal emotions and reactions to the situation you don't feel like you have a right to them because look at what MIL was having to deal with. It felt petty to have these thoughts come in my head.  Who am I to feel this, when she is dealing with much bigger issues?

And so now as I have been supporting Rock these last few months with his demons, I will need to ask him to do the same. I will need the same time he had alone, to think, to pray to mediate, to feel. I need to cleanse myself from this so I can become a better person from this experience. I can forgive myself from not being able to save her or help her. To forgive those people who have said and done hurtful things to me while I cared for MIL, I should not judge their actions, I need to leave that up to God.  I need to set my conscious clear that I did everything I could, to the best of my ability at the time given my situation to help MIL. To let her last days on earth be in our new home together surrounded by her family, surrounded by love and getting the best care possible (better then she would have been able to receive at the hospital). I need peace.

I hope she is looking down on me and loves and me and feels proud of what I accomplished for her. I hope she knows that everything I did for her I did out of love. I hope she knows that even though we didn't have our girly talk times like we use to I just couldn't to be able to deal with the day to day of caring for her. I hope she knows I did my best.

Ania

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas in our house. I put up the tree this weekend so we could take our family photos.  My cousin came over and we took each other's pictures.


Here are some of the pics we took. Sadly it was a cloudy day so we had to have the lights on and the pics have a yellowish cast.  But there are some cute ones in the bunch.

My 3 little munchkins. I love them so dearly.

My 2 girls, I hope they always stay close. 

And have fun together.

Another of my three.

Tutu, the best shot of the day of him. He wasn't being very cooperative.

Muffin, was being a total ham in front of the camera. I can't believe how much older she looks.

And speaking of looking older, Monkey will be turning 7 in a few weeks but with poses like this, 

older then her years.

And the family.

And being silly with Santa mustaches.

This one I love Monkey's pose.

And here you can see my whole outfit.

Me and my love. 

And leave you with a silly shot of my 2 hams.

We  took over 155 pictures. I now have a hard time narrowing them down and editing all of them. I wonder which one will end up in our Christmas cards.

Ania