sketchy artists

I have done nothing. Nothing, I tell you. Kate is a whirling dervish- crawling, climbing, almost walking, charming, silly, wailing, teething, giggling, babbling- you name it, she's doing it! Oh- but not sleeping. She still isn't much a fan of sleeping. Drat.

My beloved old Necchi bit the dust this summer, but it was resuscitated by a gem of a man named Harold. Harold is a sewing machine repairman from Idaho Falls, and at a mere 80-something years old, he still makes the trip to Jackson once a month to fix machines. He said it was a treat to work on an oldie but a goodie- I grinned and forked over $60. Hooray!

I've been writing a bit, researching agents and publishers for picture books, and getting fairly no where with it. But I've had fun thinking visually. I've been fairly uninspired, otherwise- but horray, fall has settled in Teton Valley and the October issues of Country Home and Country Living have arrived, so my head is buzzing again! Those October/Halloween issues rock my world every year, and I don't even care about Halloween much- go figure? Buth they are consistently my most favorite... aaahh, pumpkins, glowy warm colors, recipes for pies and spice cakes, visions of sweaters and toasty socks dancing in my head...

I think I'm going to make a square wreath for our front door made of sticks and felt leaves. Our door is an orangey-ish stained wood, so I'm thinking plain sticks wouldn't show up very well, so I'm thinking that I will spray paint the sticks a nice chocolate brown- don't chocolate dipped sticks sound nice? And since the only fall color here is the yellow that the aspens go out blazing in, I'll just do yellow leaves. I really do miss oranges and reds... we do catch glimpses of some nice reds along the creek banks from the willows, but it just isn't enough for me.

Miss Lovely's new favorite book is The Mitten- you've probably heard the story somewhere along the line. A little boy asks his grandmother to knit him some snow white mittens, but she tells him that if he drops one, it would be really hard to find in the snow. But she knits them anyway, and lo and behold, plop a mitten goes into the snow. A mole crawls in the mitten, then a rabbit, next an owl, then a badger snuggles in, next a fox, a grizzly bear, and finally a mouse- yup, the mitten is stretched 38 times its original size. The mouse tickles the bear's whiskers, the bear sneezes, and all the animals come flying out. The mitten shoots into the air, and the little boy catches it. Phew. The last page of the book shows the grandmother holding the two mittens- one boy-sized, and the other all stretched out.

Miss Lovely is also obsessed with putting things inside other things lately, so I was thinking I should make her a mitten and all the little animals that go in the mitten- how darn sweet would that be? Now if I would just get around to making it...

Happy fall! Happy raking! Happy log-splitting!

Annie