Playroom

For the last few months, getting into my sewing/scrapbooking/storage room has been an obstacle course. You had to move stuff to sit anywhere, and walking across the room meant that you really had to watch where you stepped.

It.
Was.
Awful.

I keep the door to this room closed and babylocked, so I don’t SEE the mess, so if I’m not in there, I don’t THINK about the mess. So I haven’t been doing anything. Plus, the floor creaks, which wakes Helen up (her room is directly underneath). So it just gets worse and worse and worse.

Then, all of the Christmas stuff was in there, including the bath fizzies that I bought for the girls. Any of you that have girls know what this means — especially to a room that lives with the door closed. It was UNBEARABLY stinky to go in there. Cloyingly sweet. Bleah. So I just didn’t go in there — for about a month. 🙁

On Monday, Jerry played with the girls for a 3-hour chunk of time and I attacked that room. Filled up three very large trashbags with junk, and now the floor is CLEAR. All of the chairs (four) are CLEAR. And it’s so stimulating to be in there!

Monday night, I didn’t play in there, which is unusual. Usually after I clean the room, I can’t wait to get in there and mess it up again. But I guess I just needed a break from it, I don’t know. But yesterday? Yesterday, Helen went to her Nannie’s house and Alice graced me with a 3-hour nap. I sewed for about 2.5 hours, and then for another 2.5 hours after the girls went to bed.

Today? Well… I even got some time in there today — while Helen was awake! And she didn’t destroy everything in her sight!

Helen doesn’t take afternoon naps very often anymore (maybe 1-2x a week), so when Alice is napping in the afternoons it’s sometimes a challenge to come up with activities that will keep Helen busy and quiet.

For Christmas, my mother gave me this book: Quilt Toppings, which has a lot of ideas for how to embellish quilt tops after the sewing part is complete, before the quilting part happens. Mom is also a quilter, and we’re always looking for ways to stretch our skills.

One of the suggested embellishments is plain old Crayola crayons, and plain old Micron markers, and using freezer paper ironed on to fabric (shiny side facing the fabric) as a stencil. HEYYYY! I have all of that!

So I got out a piece of freezer paper, cut a flower stencil out of it, and ironed it to some plain white cotton. And announced to Helen that we would be coloring on fabric. “Is that allowed?”

I explained that this is something special that she can do ONLY when Mommy is watching, and so we set to work. She wanted me to color, too, so we both worked on it (and I filled in gaps so that it would be more densely colored). Then I heat-set it, outlined it with pens, and sewed on some fabric borders out of my scraps… She’s trying to decide if she wants me to make it into a dolly blanket or into a pillow. 🙂 I think she has decided on a blanket, which means I have more sewing to do… Not that I mind, of course.

I’m enjoying this age (3.5) so much more, now that I can trust her to be in my sewing room (but only when it’s this clean) without getting into stuff. I still keep her locked out unless I’m in there with her, though. She’s WAY too curious to be left alone in there, definitely.

Jerry’s PC (where I upload photos) died last week, so I’ll try to take a picture of it later today and upload it on mine. 🙂

And tonight, after the girls go to bed, I’m going to go play in there some more. I can’t wait!!!