Whew, a sigh of relief as the first day of the year comes to a close. Oldest son, Brad, was home for a visit and I was busy doing things with him today. All the usual things that need doing before one of your children heads back to their home city.

We started the day with a family breakfast. Nothing fancy, just fried potatoes (chopped leftover cooked potatoes and carrots, fried onions and bacon diced and browned, lightly seasoned and all mixed together), sunny side up eggs and toast. Such a treat now that both boys eat eggs. Seems only yesterday that one of them wouldn’t eat eggs and the other one only liked them cooked like rubber… The only downside to breakfast was the realization that the dishwasher decided to give up the ghost. That just meant more family fun time as we washed the dishes in no time flat. (Must start researching new dishwashers in the morning.)

I sewed some burlap bags out of coffee sacks. Didn’t think to take pictures – oh no – that would be too easy. Trust me, they were cute. Brad brought the sacks home from work, and it was his idea to have bags in different sizes for as yet undetermined use. Great – I’ll be cleaning burlap fibers out of my sewing machine and the studio for the next few weeks. Thanks, Brad.

Recently I bought a couple of sewing machines at Ikea. They are simple little machines that would be useful for anyone to own. They sew basic straight stitch and zig zag, plus do several decorative stitches and make buttonholes. For most people this little machine is all that is necessary for repairs and occasional projects. And for a mere $80 – what a steal of a deal! Due to some obvious interest, I gifted a machine to each of my boys. That meant that on today’s agenda I needed to teach Brad to use his sewing machine. I demonstrated and Brad practiced the basics of threading, filling bobbins and sewing. I rounded up a few basic tools and some extra thread, pins and sewing machine needles to round out his gift. We boxed the machine and packed it into a suitcase, with plenty of clothing for padding. Can’t wait to see what he creates. Did I think to take photos of Brad at the machine? Well, no, in fact I didn’t.

I practiced the ancient art of sock darning (at least it seems like a very long time since I’ve done any) on Brad’s favorite hand-made socks. I just happened to have the perfect color of wool yarn in with my crewel embroidery supplies. Doesn’t everybody?

We went out for a dinner of Indian food at a restaurant called “Green Chile” since I was far too busy doing other domestic chores to whip up a nutritious dinner. The food was quite good, but the restaurant was busy so the service was not as good as usual. At least we didn’t have any dishes to wash! Brad was quite impressed with how gentle Kush has become since spending so much time with me. Well, pretty gentle, and more so when her nails are trimmed. Before he left for the airport, he spent a little time chilling with Kush while she was enjoying a gift box. Before we knew it, it was time to head to the airport. I opted to say my good-byes at the door and stay home to blog. What a good mother I am.

 I did manage to put away a few of the sparse Christmas decorations that we had out this year. I’m anxious to get all the holiday decor put away and the “let’s just stash it here for now” piles sorted and put away properly so that I can get to work in the studio. Marc’s quilt is calling to me. Actually there are so many projects calling to me that I might need to start wearing earplugs if I don’t get busy! So to start the year off with a bang, here is a photo of the Ikea sewing machine. This is Marc’s machine – not fully unpacked but with all the hype on the machine I thought I should include a picture. I’ll take photos when I give Marc his sewing lesson so that you can see the machine in action. With a promise like that I’ll bet you can hardly wait for my next post…