If you reverse engineer the human heart, you're bound to find love at it's core*
Since Harvey was born we've had a bit of a problem in our household with leaving things on top of the car. It started with Dan's camera left up there on the morning of Harvey's baptism. Thankfully, his wallet was inside the camera case too and a neighbor returned it to our house that afternoon. Then two weeks ago Dan drove away with a pair of ski mittens on the top of the car, which I thankfully retrieved when I spied one sitting in the middle of our local thoroughfare moments later. But last week a heavy sadness came over me when Dan told me one of his favorite mittens flew off the roof of the car into the middle of the highway. Those mittens, his FAVORITE black mittens that he's had since high school, for whose sake he would never accept from me another present of mittens. Down to half a pair.
I almost started crying. Look, I'm still pregnant, okay? I'm a sentimental utilitarian at the core. For me there's nothing worse than losing something that's both loved and useful.
Dan has often extolled the virtues of these fleece mittens, the PERFECT mittens the likes of which no other mitten has ever be created. They're warm but not too heavy. They fit just right. They roll up small to fit in his pocket. They're mittens straight from heaven. So after this terrible tragedy last week he handed me the lone remaining mitten and said, "Make me a new pair like this one."
No pressure.
With teeth gritted I ripped out every stitch in those mittens, taking careful photographs of the inner seaming along the way. Then using the mitten pieces as a pattern I cut a new pair out of black fleece and stitched them together with my breath held in.
Here is the result:
They fit at least!
They're not a perfect replica. The elastic is a bit too loose, and the old ones had a tag on the inside which helped him tell right from left. So the reverse engineering is still a work in process. I have more black fleece from the yard I bought on Friday, so I can theoretically make three more pairs with minor tweaks in them before I use up the $5 worth of fabric.
To soften the blow of less than perfect mittens, I paired them with a batch of home-made chocolates (the mold was on sale for 50 cents at the fabric store, and the candy-canes were left over from Christmas.)
be mine?
And there you go, happy valentines day! You see, that's how we roll in our house. I make something off the request list that I was already making anyway, and then hand it over saying "happy whatever."
I also had in mind to reverse engineer a new t-shirt pattern for Harvey. My sized-up Carters pattern isn't really working now that we're into the toddler sizes, so I wanted to find a cheep 4T t-shirt to cut up and use as a template. Thankfully on that same Friday trip to JoAnnes the adjacent Old Navy provided such a product:
it'll be a collector's item!
Yes, the shirt says Happy Halloween 2010. I snapped it up for 47 cents.
I wanted to use Harvey's nap time today to take apart this t-shirt and make a valentines version, but unfortunately he spied me taking the photograph and immediately demanded the orange shirt go on his body. And then he looked down stroking his stomach lovingly and cooing "owange shiwt."
thank's mom! this is the best halloween 2010 ever!
So that's where we're at. Mitten pieces all over the office, and Harvey napping in a 47 cent Halloween shirt that I may never be able to dismember. Oh well. Happy whatever!
happy!
*Phineus & Ferb, what do it do