Mythbusters

I was looking for something to crochet for my husband just for fun and decided on a Jamie Hyneman Mythbusters "action figure." Of course, when he was completed, our 6 year old decided it was his and my husband never got to touch it. Such is life. A friend saw a photo on my Facebook page and asked me to make her one, and make an Adam Savage to go along with it. I mentioned offhand that it made me want to make the Mythbusters logo as well so she asked me to go for it! Here they are in their completion. I'm tempted to do a whole series of Mythbusters characters; Kari, Tory,and Grant.

I started each doll with a "magic circle" of 6 sc, increased over a couple rows, then decreased for the neck and rapidly increased for the body, leaving holes for the arms. The hardest part for me was the feet. I went back and forth across the top of the doot for a few rows, then around the whole thing again for the sided if the shoes, inserted a pipe cleaner  around the inside of the shoe, then decreased every stitch around and sewed closed. I added the arms at the armholes, but didn't stuff them so I could cross them when they were finished. Then I embroidered the facial features. I sure hope she likes the finished product!

Poor little Prince Charming

At the end of October, I called the Dr to get an appointment for the Little Prince. He was coughing like crazy and it had let up for a few days then started in again. Our Dr was out of town till sometime in November, I don't remember the date. I waited a bit to see if it cleared up on its own again. Unfortunately it didn't so I was forced tp take him to a walk-in clinic. I would have been nervous about it, since the staff doesn't know my son or anything about him, but one of the Drs was my pediatrician when I was a kid. Great man. We were lucky enough to get him. He prescribed an antibiotic called azithromycin with a warning that asthmatics could have a reaction to it. After being on it for 2 days, the asthma was worse than it's been in about 4 years. I took him off the antibiotic and back to the clinic the next day. We had to give him breathing treatments every half hour or so for several hours to get him to breathe! He was panicked. We even dosed him with half a benedryl.  I took him back to the clinic where he was put on a different antibiotic by a different person and sent for a chest xray to check for pneumonia. The xray was clear, thank God. The coughing didn't let up, though. I brought him back to the clinic a week later and saw my old pediatrician again. He put him on a different antibiotic again, plus some phenergan cough syrup with codeine. I peeked at the paperwork. Under the diagnosis section he wrote "asthma, bronchitis, pneumonia." Darn. He wants to see him again tomorrow to determine if another chest xray is needed.  Yesterday was the best day we've had in weeks. The nights are still bad, but I think he's finally getting better.

A Personal Facebook Flame

A friend on Facebook posted something that made me extremely irate. She was all upset that the girl in front of her in line at the store was dressed in designer jeans, had new acrylic nails, and fresh highlights in her hair...then paid for her Red Bull with a bridge card.

I felt the need to remind her that we don't know her situation; maybe she had the designer clothes before her husband lost his job and forced them to go for state assistance, or maybe she does hair and nails for a living and had the stuff to do herself already. Maybe it was all a gift from her sister! It escalated from there, her telling me that I was going to get offended no matter what she said, me telling her I only get offended when offensive things are said, like that. Then other people needed to chime in with experiences they've had with other customers and bridge cards!

Their thoughts?
1. if she can afford the luxuries, she should pay for her own red bull.
2."When my tax money is paying for her food I at least expect someone to not be better dressed than I am" (yes a direct quote! Unbelievable!)
3. it upsets people that others that need assistance live higher on "THEIR" tax money

My thoughts?
1. None of our business.
2. Maybe she can't afford the luxuries anymore and that's why she's on assistance...she's certainly not going to sell her clothes for food money if the state is paying for it and if she had them before, it's none of our business.
2. the state obviously doesn't have an issue paying for red bull or they wouldn't.
3. it isn't your personal tax money paying for others' food choices, you are not being billed for her red bull, stop acting like it!
4. "I expect to be better dressed than people on assistance"? ok not a direct quote anymore, but that was the general idea. It is the most egotistical thing I've ever heard! As I said before, we don't know this girl's story. We shouldn't make assumptions.

Also: personally bashing me (or anyone) on a public forum is rude, inconsiderate, childish, and uncalled for. I bowed out of the conversation at this point, when they proceeded to "HOLLA" at each other and become even more unbearable. Sorry, I stopped speaking teeny-bopper 20 years ago. Grow up, stop being judgmental, and don't assume you're always right.

Garfield cartoon

Too cute to keep to myself!

Little prince charming

I have really enjoyed my time home with the little prince. I'm sure going to miss him when he goes back to school. He'll be 6 in a few more weeks.

I cut his hair a few days ago. He can't sit still, though, so he ended up with a buzz cut. He doesn't like it, but that's ok. Neither do I. It will be easier to take care of his seborrhea, now that I can see it under his hair!

Me, an author?

I'm a photographer. I love taking pictures of people, landscapes, animals, just about anything. but in between shoots I craft. I crochet, I bead, I started to learn to sew, and am learning to knit. A friend recently told me that while the photography business (New Memories Photography) is slow I should think of writing a pattern book for crochet. I laughed at the idea, but she saw through me. "You're thinking about it aren't you?" she asked. I couldn't deny she was right. I had already wondered, in the 3 seconds since her statement, whether I should go for a theme, such as cancer awareness projects, or if I should stick to a book of hats and scarves...I have so many ideas for different roads I can take this down that I can't start any kind of book or focus on any other project! I think what I am going to do is finish the legwarmers and flower pillow I'm making for the flower child (my niece, Abi), and I'm going to finish the sock monkey throw for little Prince Charming (my son), oh, then I have a baby blanket to finish knitting in the next 6 weeks or so, unless I decide to give it to the newborn as a Christmas gift, in which case I can set it aside and work on it later...do you see my problem with focus? It's a definite issue that needs to be addressed. No, fixed. It needs to be fixed. Focus, Kendra. Ok, so I believe that after the wedding I'm shooting on Saturday, the Relay for Life event on June 10-11, and getting into a summertime routine with my family, I may have enough of a focus to start, well, enough focus to come up with a plan. If my other projects are finished and I haven't started any new ones. That's a big "if."

Cancer Quilt Project

For a Relay for Life Auction, I'm going to put together a cancer "quilt." It will actually be an afghan, but I like the alliteration :D

I need my knitter and crocheter friends to work up 6" squares using any stitch, any pattern, any color you wish. If you'd like to make a square in honor of someone, there are specific colors for specific types of cancer found here

If you're drawing a blank as to a pattern to make your square, you can find ideas here

Any questions, please ask! The most important thing is that the squares have to be 6 inches, so they fit together properly without ruffling or puckering. I will collect the squares and sew them together and organize the auction. If you live too far away to meet me, I'll PM you my address so you can mail them. I'll be sure to update progress, share pictures, and announce what we got for it when it's all over and done.

If you don't crochet or knit, pass the info on to someone who does. Let's help raise money to fight cancer and raise awareness!

Friend visit

Today a first happened. A neighbor boy that we know from the bus stop came over to play with Jordan. At first he asked if a hat he found on the playground belonged to my little prince. But when the little prince asked him to come inside and watch Garfield with him he said sure! After just a few minutes he said he had to go home and ask for permission to come over. He was sure his parents would approve so assured us he'd be back in a few minutes. A few minutes later, he came back and played with little Prince Charming for an hour. Then he told us he had to be home, but he'd come back if he could. A few minutes later, he was knocking on the door again! He stayed for a couple more hours, I made extra food just in case he was there so he had a corn dog and french fries with us, politely thanked me and put his plate in the sink. After a while they got a bit rowdy, but not too rough. The neighbor boy accidentally locked himself in the bedroom while they were playing the three little pigs. With a shotgun. I've never heard the story that way, but it's all good! :-)

With all the problems we've had with socialization and sharing and communicating, this was a huge step.

After bath time tonight, I gave the little prince a breathing treatment (he has an upper respiratory infection that's irritating his asthma) and he fell immediately asleep! The only problem with his behavior today was new as well. "I told you..." to whatever he says. He's ordering us around! He's always been wonderful about asking politely for something but now he's trying to order us around. Hopefully he doesn't try that anymore.

Busy week and a good boy

We've had a wonderful weekend. The little prince has been very well behaved, doing what he's asked when he's asked, even going to bed withttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifhouhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gift a fuss. We bought him an Easter present of little plastic bowling pins and bowling balls to say "thank you for being so good" and he really seems to like them. What he likes best is making us set up the pins for him even though he's perfectly capable of doing it himself. :-)

I have a rather busy week ahead. A possible boudoir photography shoot tomorrow, running to Kalamazoo to get photo paper, receiving a photography order from a shoot last week, Relay for Life Team captain meeting, receiving final payment and pickup of photos taken this weekend. Still working on the cancer quilt project, and have a couple orders for autism awareness bags that I need to start. I'm knitting a baby blanket for a friend, but since I'm new at knitting it's coming along very slowly. Hopefully it will be done before she has the baby!

crocheting for a cause

I've been crocheting a cancer "quilt" for a while now. the idea is to get all my crocheter/knitter friends to participate with making 6 inch squares and I'll sew them all together and see how big we can make it. I have enough squares between what I've done and what's been turned in to me to make a throw blanket. I'm impressed with the response I've received so far. I have others pledging to send squares by my deadline of May 31. The quilt will be auctioned off at the local Relay for Life event. I'm hoping it brings in enough money to make all the time and energy worthwhile. I don't know though, because I live in a small community, but it's a worthy cause...it could go either way.

I recently took a break from the cancer quilt project to create an Autism Awareness tote bag. It amazed me that there are no free patterns out there for autism awareness. I decided rather than buy a pattern (which in itself was hard enough to find) I'd create my own. This is the result.

more progress

I love seeing how much progress m little prince makes. He's started using not only complete sentences, but putting more than one together and making conversation. I'm in pretty close contact with his special ed teacher. He started writing at school and while he doesn't like to do it, maybe because it requires sitting still, he wrote 2 whole sentences at school a couple weeks ago and I nearly cried with pride.

bad start to a good day (hopefully)

Yesterday my little prince had no school because of road conditions. I receive a text from the webmaster of the public school's site and also a call from the school itself. When I got the call I turned off my alarm so I could sleep in. Unfortunately, I forgot to turn it back on for today. So today i wake up at 8:43 (the bus comes around 8:10, class starts at 8:45) and hurried to get the little guy ready fro school. I actually debated a minute on it because he's been coughing and the weather doesn't help his asthma. He got his antibiotic, cough syrup, and a breathing treatment this morning. So I get him together and out the door to find the car was covered with a layer of ice. Hard, dry, stubborn ice. I didn't comb my hair or bother to put on socks, let alone shower(!) in order to get the little man out the door as quickly as possible, but now I have to scrape hard, stubborn, dry ice off the car. I finally get moving and about a quarter mile down the road, the defroster heats up. I take him to class and get back home in time to get ready for work. so my diet is completely shot, I had a frozen breakfast sandwich as I was running around getting things together.

Teacher meeting

I met with the Little Prince's teacher today. He told me that Jordan was having issues focusing his attention on his classwork and instead wants to run around the room and climb on tables, etc. It was the same conversation we had at conference time. I asked again what I could do to help but was told "just keep doing what you're doing" as if that's an answer! I signed a paper saying it was ok to have an occupational therapist observe little prince charming. I don't know what good that will do, but the sp. ed. teacher thought she should have a peek at him so I signed it. I told the teacher that I didn't like how he kept saying Jordan "can't" do something unless someone is there prompting him. I prefer "won't." I also reminded him that my personal goal is to have Jordan fit in with the rest of his class and I thought his attitude was kind of a cop out. Not my original words, but I believe he grasped the sentiment. He had told me that the gap in Jordan's behavior vs. classmates' behavior was going to continue to grow and I told him I was told last year that after a couple years he would be right where he was supposed to be. He told me I was lied to. I still choose not to believe this. I think that if the teacher believes this he isn't trying as hard as he should to get Jordan's behavior up to grade level, or even appropriate age level. He said Jordan functions as a 3 year old. And "there's a reason 3 year-olds don't go to school." The Sp.Ed. teacher was very helpful though. She gave me specific goals she wants on the next IEP and ideas to reach those goals.

maturity

I can't believe how much the little prince grew up over Christmas break. All of a sudden he decides not to give me a hug and kiss when the bus gets to the bus stop. He yelled "goodbye mom" as he ran away from me! I alternate between being proud and petulant.