Runaway October

I’ve been feel­ing quilty lately. Baby show­ers seem to be the best inspi­raion for me. I gives me a dead­line and an excuse to give a gift that will last instead of some­thing that will be used for a month or two and then donated.

I have few baby gifts that we still use now that my youngest is a year. One of them is a small sam­pler quilt that my mom picked up at at a truck stop some­where out­side of Payson, Az.

Here’s the ver­sion I cre­ated. I think it turned out really well. I had a cou­ple dif­fer­ent quils in mind when I des­gined this. Purl­Bee lists a great tuto­r­ial. Crazy Mom Quilts had a beau­ti­ful ver­sion. Don’t for­get this sassy one too.

I used 6or 7 dif­fer­ent greens that I picked up at JoAnns. The brown is a super soft linen blend. The back­ing is Alex­ader Henry’s Giraffe Cross­ing.

When I asked the mama-to-be what her nurs­ery theme was she said giraffes and out­doorsy col­ors. I hope it fits in okay. If not I know quite a few boys here that would be happy to keep it!

(That’s my 6’2″ brother for size reference!)

So last night as the two kid­dos and I crammed into the tub (scary thought, huh?) for a leisurely soak, I real­ized that I say some really stu­pid things.

Don’t make your lit­tle brother angry!!

• Why not? Is he going to turn into an ax-wielding mon­ster. The thought makes me laugh. Those two teeth of his would fit per­fectly into the face of a psy­chopath. Will he turn into the Incred­i­ble Hulk? If he was green maybe peo­ple would stop touch­ing his head. I could tell them he has a con­ta­gious dis­ease. Take that nosy old ladies at the supermarket!

Do you under­stand me?

• Does it mat­ter? Even if the under­stood they’re not going to lis­ten. They can bob their lit­tle heads and say ‘Under­t­snad’, but the point is they don’t care what I say.

Don’t you dare!

• Again, what am I going to do? Put them in a time­out? Big Whoop. Time­out is the same as play time, you just have to face a wall for a cou­ple seconds.

What were you thinking?

• Again, it doesn’t mat­ter. With a lim­ited vocab­u­lary it’s really hard to express that you thought stick­ing your fore­skin in the vac­uum cleaner tube and then clos­ing it would be fun. It’s also hard to explain that cov­er­ing your­self in per­fume, includ­ing open wounds, seemed like a good idea until you feel off the bath­room counter. And even if mama did under­stand you, she’d still be mad. A blank “pity me” stare works better.

Boys! Be nice!

• “We are” is typ­i­cally what I hear. I guess when you’re under 3 run­ning the baby’s foot over with a wooden truck is nice.

What things do you find your­self say­ing as a par­ent that make you won­der why you bother to say it at all?