Video Friday: "Girl Rising" Official Trailer

It's International Women's Day. The video sort of speaks for itself.

Thanks, Charter!

So this is a cop-out post because my internet at home is borked. Dan did some troubleshooting last night and it looks like our whole neighborhood is down. So I am typing on my phone with my thumb. Not ideal. I don't have a great data plan so I'm just not going to tether my phone or make it a hotspot. See you Friday.

Blanket #1 for project Linus, finished!

And here it is, finally. This is the most time-consuming one I'll make all year. Stripes next time. Stripes.

Fully assembled, but needed to weave in ends and do border (Sunday).

And fully finished with simple border in black (today).

Now I just need to wash it and deliver it to Project Linus. Whew.

Video Friday: Patrice, founder of Afrobella, gives a TED talk

I found this via her article on xojane.com. Good stuff.

A Year of Giving: February

This post is part of my Year of Giving series. You can read the background here.

In February we focused on economic exploitation. Rather than donation, I decided to make a conscious effort to do business with those who refuse to exploit, with business people in need of micro loans, and with refugee businesses.

I switched from Folgers to fair trade coffee. My first bag was from Nicaragua, and included support for Save the Children. The second was from Southern Mexico. I rarely make it to a high-end grocery store, so I just bought the Archer Farms organic fair trade coffee at Target. I may try Trader Joe's next, since there is one near where my husband works.

I made a $25 Kiva loan to Juana in El Salvador to help her buy clothes to resell.

I bought a gift from Hill Country Hill Tribers. According to their Etsy profile: "Hill Country Hill Tribers is a collective of artisans who were forced to leave their homes in the hill country of Burma and are establishing new lives in the Texas hill country. By creating beautiful traditional and handmade goods in their homes, they are honoring their past. Through participating in classes that teach English and entrepreneurship, they are transforming their future. Proceeds from the sale of each item return to the woman who made it. For more information about this organization, visit www.hilltribers.org."

In keeping with my plan to "give as opportunities present themselves", I helped with Loretta's Pay It Forward for Lent benefitting Eagle's Healing Nest. My grandmother, Loretta Giroux, passed away on February 7th. I've written about it a bit here. Later in the month, I helped my mom run a Facebook page for the fundraiser.

I didn't finish the blanket I began in January. This month has been particularly hard for me, and getting those seams in (all of the crocheting, minus the outer border, has been finished for some time) just hasn't happened yet. I'm more than halfway done--the first three strips of four patches each have been sewn and the first two strips are sewn together--working on attaching the 3rd one, now. Ultimately my goal is to finish that blanket as soon as possible and then make two small baby afghans by the end of March. That might not happen, but either way, I've learned something useful: no more patchwork afghans. Ever. Hand sewing is just not my thing. I tried to hem another pair of Sam's pants a couple weeks ago and, well, the pants won. I gave up.

So that's been February. Shortest month of the year, but sometimes it feels like the longest. March isn't much better, but by the time we hit April I should be over the SAD hump, so to speak. I just keep that "hope for spring" in my head as much as possible.

Staycation (on purpose, this time)

So Dan and I both took Thursday and Friday off last week, to have a 4 day family weekend. Here's what we did:

Thursday morning we took Sam to school together as a family. It was fun to see Dan get to see Sam doing his thing at school. Sam really seemed to enjoy it. He sat in Daddy's lap at circle time and participated in a lot of the songs.

After class we went out for brunch at Perkin's. Then we went home and got a few things done around the house, but mostly just vegged out. I made mushroom pasta for dinner.

Friday we took Sam to the Children's Museum for the first time. He seemed to like it, but of course, he found the very few things he was not supposed to touch, in a place where you're allowed to touch practically everything. (A security keypad and a fire extinguisher on one wall; also some cleaning equipment from one of the face painting stations being put away.) I think in another year when he's better at following instructions and we're able to get him more excited about imaginative play, it will be a cool place to go. We went with Jena and Reese this time, who have a membership, so Reese is an expert at having fun there. Afterward we had lunch at Subway as a group, and later that night Dan and I had the all-you-can-eat fish fry at Baker's Square, which was yummy. Sam ate our fries.

Saturday was busy. At lunch time I got together at Panera with four old friends from middle and high school. I've known these women for 20 years, though I've seen or been in contact with most of them only sporadically over the last decade or so. Our lives have all gotten pretty busy, but it was less awkward than I thought it might have been. Maybe because all of us are mothers now, we had certain things we could talk about--birth stories, breastfeeding, how we met our husbands, etc. There was still plenty else to talk about, though, too.

After that, Dan, Sam and I trekked out to Plymouth where my sister in law and her family were celebrating my niece's birthday by staying overnight in a hotel with a pool, splashpad, and hot tub. If we'd been able to get there earlier we might have had a little more fun, but by the time we got there the pool was pretty crowded and crazy (read: oodles of rowdy kids with drunk, inattentive parents) so we didn't manage to stay terribly long. It was still fun.

And Sunday was our day to relax and prepare for the week. I woke up with a terrible backache, took some pills and lay back down for a couple hours while Dan and Sam hung out. Once the pain meds sort of kicked in (read: no more crazy spasms but still plenty of pain) I managed to do some laundry, pick up my prescriptions, and we made a family Target run in which Sam passed out in the cart. He's been refusing naps and konking out at odd times, lately.

As usual, I completely forgot to take pictures. Here is one of Sam at the Children's Museum, fading into the blue screen in the "music video" type room.

 No idea who the little girl is.

Video Friday: "Don't Stop Believin': Everyman's Journey" Theatrical Trailer

Saw this in the middle of a case of the Mondays and it put a smile on my face. Anything is possible. I so want to see this movie.