The Adventure: March 2010

I know I've been a buzz kill (or maybe even a joy vampire) lately, but I'm finally starting to crawl out of my dark and twisty hole of sadness. I've been spending time with NBC on Thursday nights (Community, Parks and Recreation, The Office, and 30 Rock), and it has lifted my spirits immeasurably. I needed a good laugh. And I've been directing my focus and energy into knitting the blanket for Ben, so I'm feeling productive while I'm having my laugh. I also took some much needed break time with Ben last weekend. While my friend came over and cleaned our house, I took the little midget to the beach. I loved my sneak peak of spring break and summer, and I needed some happy time with him (not that the temper tantrums, throwing of toys, and hitting haven't been happy...of course they have...I love that the terrible twos started a few months early...I love it.).

Anyway, I hauled him to the beach last Sunday despite the fact he had not stopped whining and being crabby and annoying all morning long. We had breakfast at my favorite beachside eatery, The Stuft Surfer, and we played. Oh how we played.

The rest of the day he was a big whiny almost-two-year-old, but for two blissful hours we had fun.

Michael Scott was right. Hope grows in the dump.

I am not crafty. I do not have a crafty bone in my body. When I took Home Ec in junior high we were supposed to make all kinds of crafty crap. My sequin shirt was the ugliest thing I’d ever seen, and a solid half of the sequins had come off by the time I got it home. The hole in the top of my tissue box cover was too small to pull Kleenex through (which wasn’t a huge problem since the cover itself was just a smidge too small to hold Kleenex boxes anyway). The frog stuffed animal? Limp and decidedly NOT cuddly. Once I tried to make my own dress. It was lopsided. I have attempted cross-stitching, latch-hooking (I think that’s what it’s called), and knitting. All projects elicit a solid “ummmmmmm…..I think I see what you’re going for, but…..maybe not quite” response. Probably because I abandon most projects 30% in because I either get tired of making the effort or the product is just sad with little hope of revival. My knitting actually seems to be taking a turn for the better. I’ve started at least three blankets for Benjamin since I got pregnant. I abandon them quickly because, again, a third of the way through I realize that they are awful and need to be abandoned before I waste any more time crafting a sinking ship.

BUT this fourth attempt at a blanket is, with the exception of a few gaping holes that I THINK I’ve figured out how fix and to avoid making again, the blanket might actually become a blanket. I feel like I should get some kind of award for this. But maybe we shouldn’t get ahead of ourselves; it’s only a quarter of the way done.

I have crafty friends who design birthday parties for their kids that are out of control. We’re talking hand-crafted decorations and party favors, carefully coordinated themes, and professional photographers. Their parties seriously look like they came out of Pottery Barn and Martha Stewart catalogues. For Ben’s first birthday I blew up some balloons. And put out bananas and stuffed monkeys. For a monkey theme.

I digress. We’re not talking about my varsity knitting or party planning skills, we’re talking about my complete lack of skill in all other crafting genres. So naturally when we were asked to have team shirts for the upcoming jog-a-thon at work, I said to myself, “why don’t I just make them myself?”

Bad plan.

Obviously I waited until the last minute. My primary objective in life has recently been cleaning food off the floor, which my child has generously used to decorate the kitchen (and Molly’s dining room, and restaurants…but that’s another post altogether). The important thing to note here is procrastination. If I wait long enough, the t-shirts will make themselves. But seriously, how hard could it be? I buy shirts from the 5 for 10 t-shirt warehouse, get some iron-on transfers from the craft store, ba-da-bing, team shirts. Um, no. I got the shirts last night. Turns out adult ones are 3 for 10. I also cleaned them out of bright yellow shirts. I’m sure they’re bummed. On to Michael’s, where I purchased aforementioned transfers. So far, okay. The only catch is that you have to use an inkjet printer, which I don’t have at home, only at work. No big deal; I’ll just bring my iron to work, print them out, and iron them on. Ba-da-bing, team shirts.

Um, no. The logo that my student designed was a little off-center and jumbled. It took me a solid 20 minutes to figure out how to adjust it. The time? 8:05. School starts at 8:30. Then I was supposed to print them out in “mirror image.” Couldn’t figure out how to do that. I emailed it to Matt at 8:10, who emailed it back to me all mirrored at 8:15. This kind of bummed me out. I was hoping that Superhusband wouldn’t be able to do it so that I could legitimately quit. No go. So I printed one out and did a tester. It came out great. 8:23. Hey, maybe this won’t be so bad. Ba-da-bing, team shirts.

Obviously not. I let the students in, thinking I would do their shirts one at a time. Terrible. This is when things really fell apart. Last week I had the kids sign up for sizes, and I bought the exact number of shirts they signed up for because by the time I had to purchase them only half had paid and I didn’t want 15 bright yellow shirts on my hands that I couldn’t return. Obviously the students did not take the size they signed up for, several kids who hadn’t signed up for a shirt at all showed up with money wanting one, and the next thing I know tiny little girls have large shirts because beefy boys have grabbed the smalls to be funny, and I don’t have enough shirts for everyone who wants one. Oh, and in the meantime school has started, I’m supposed to be teaching, and instead I’m printing logos out on regular paper because the ink ran out, I had to get a new cartridge mid-way through the printing, printed a test page on regular paper, and then forgot to put the transfers back in the printer. I printed 20 logos on regular paper before I figured it out, then tried to consol the sweet, sensitive student I put in charge of the printing and reassure him that it was my fault and not his. Then I re-loaded the printer, laid the logos out to dry around the room as they printed, cut them out, then ironed them on the shirts, all while trying to get the students to work on the study guide for their big test tomorrow. Within ten minutes students were coming to me because their logos were coming off their shirts.