Selling hats and hand warmers

Free Range Fingers is my Etsy Store. I have been making hand warmers for a while, and expanded to scarves, then neck warmers and a few odd stuffed animals, and dish clothes. Then I made some hats for the kids. Eilish wanted ears on her hat and before you could say "Holy hats batman!" Lots of people started to ask for hats. I LOVE making them, each one so different. I think the idea of making something that someone else will enjoy is fun. I also started to experiment with crocheting with recycled grocery store type bags. The best thing i have made with those, I think, has been the can cozies- they really work quite well and I feel good about recycling.
I am looking forward to seeing where this path leads....

Still here... really!!

I let this go again but I came back. Things got really really WILD here. Whenever you have more then one child over the age of five, you are a professional juggler. Adding another child is not impossible but it requires a re-balancing of everything- otherwise you will be dropping those apples left and right! Caite is with us Monday through Friday now and I think we are officially settled into that new schedule. Volleyball is over at NCSD so we have Soccer two nights a week instead of sports four nights a week, and Caite is in school and has an after school club twice a week as well. Big deep breaths! I have been working about 25% capacity for a local magazine- not at 100% of the time I have allotted for work time, but way way better then 0%. We are making ends meet, almost all the time, cutting corners, and compromising enables us to be able to get what we need, even when it can't be what we want. I am always trying to learn how live a stressless life, and I think I have accepted that no life is stressless. It isn't the stress level, or lack, it is what I choose to do with it. So, I am back on my even keel, and can again look outside the walls of our home to meet up with folks for coffee, or attend meetings and network without feeling like I am losing way too much of myself in the process. I even feel like I have my juggling balanced enough to try and plan a date night for David and me sometime really soon! I am looking forward to that- we need some time to be just us ^__^

Color

I go to a poetry reading every month. Next month's "theme" is color. It is a subject I love, and think about alot. I could write volumes on it. In fact, i was sort of worried that whatever I wrote might be to much for many folks, so I wrote a poem with RoyGBiv in it. Everyone remember Roy G Biv? Your art teacher in school taught it to you as a way to remember your colors-
Red
Orange
Yellow
Green
Blue
Indigo
Violet.

I wrote the following silly thing-
Ruby eyes
Opening in darkness
Yellow teeth gleam
Gaping maw
Biting deep
In
Violent fury

I am still thinking about color, I just have so much to say about it. The silly little poem will work if I feel silly but I know I am not done with this subject.

The Mother

Russet Fur, shining white
Small sharp teeth that nip at night.
Mice beware, and crickets too,
Rabbits hide, she's after you.


Kits are safe with in the den,
Dreaming of the hunt again
Mother watches, licks their fur,
Keeps them safe from trap and lure.


Alone she hunts in forest deep,
Alone, she puts the kits to sleep.
She guards her den, her heart and soul.
And works to keep them safe and whole.

Summah

Is there anything as enchanting as watching children letting a jarful of fireflies go- to fly free into the night? The giggles!
A family is like a big ship in slow moving water-- it takes a while to get it turned and headed in the direction you want it to go. I feel like ours is on the right track! We are finished with all things elementary, my baby graduated from fifth grade last week. The oldest baby graduated from high school and I am SO PROUD of her! She has overcome more in her short life then some folks do in a long one, and done it with humor. She is my hero. And- I have a new job designing for Foothills Spotlight, a magazine in Cleveland County NC. Ads, layouts, so much FUN! It is part time, and I only have to go into the office once in a while, the rest of my work is from home which is GREAT, esp for summer when everyone is home.
Life is good.

Beautiful

Monsterous is beautiful-
Dark
Sleek, slimy, strong
Unforgiving, rough, invisible.
Monsterous is beautiful-
Fragile
Lacy, floating, shining
Lovely, and yet sharp, deathly
Monsterous is beautiful-
Rich
Coppery, liquid fire
Passion encompassing life...
Monsterous is beautiful-
Poisonous
Unblessed, unshriven, unwanted
Needing nothing, taking all...
Monsterous is beautiful.
~~Dee

still here

Bet you thought I gave up. Goodness knows I have started and abandonded so many blogs over the years, I may be responsible for half the unused clutter worldwide. Hope springs eternal, I am still writing this one.
I have been busy campaigning to save my children's school, North Carolina School for the Deaf. Long story short, the VERY people who are supposed to nurture and guide the school have for the last ten years been running roughshod over it. Firing teachers and hiring fake administrators, cutting the budget and padding their own budget etc.
The short story is that the Senate appropriations bill is in our favor, and the NC Senate passed it. The House looks like it will be a stronger fight and boy I am weary. I have the greatest support in the world but none from current parents- I email them and beg them and no one ever responds which is so frustrating. Today I feel like giving up. But I can't because the simple truth is that I am doing something that NEEDS doing. My kids need that school, and so do other Deaf kids. So I will slog on, hating the politics, hating the emails, letter writing, visitng Raleigh and general ass kissing involved in persuading very powerful people to do what is right for people with almost no political power at all. And when it is done, I am going to take a long vaation from the whole mess.
Or that is the plan anyway. I know there will always be something that needs doing.
And I will be there. That is what parents do.