my dream

So.

Several weeks ago, I mentioned my dream.

Not a while-I-was-sleeping dream, but a long lingering this-is-what-I-want-to-do-someday dream.

~

Sewing is something that I am passionate about.
Helping women is something I want to be passionate about.

I feel deeply the desire to do something,

but I've never been quite sure what that something was.

My role as a homeschooling mom (who makes pretty much everything from scratch and tries to love her husband well,
while keeping the house somewhat picked up and clothes mostly clean and still be available to serve others)
keeps me pretty well occupied,

and I've never really felt or heard a call to do 'X'.

And so I've done very little.

~

Remember this quilt?

(It felt really good to bring Nancy's dream quilt to life :-)

Well, Nancy paid me generously for making it for her.

She told me, "I know you didn't want me to pay you, but you can do some of your giving with the money."

I still have some of that money tucked in the sweet thank-you card she gave me,

but I've spent most of it.

The biggest chunk was spent on

- can you guess? -

a sewing machine.

Rahab's Rope is an organization that rescues Indian women (girls, really, lots of the time) from slavery.

They house them, love them, disciple them,

and teach them skills.

Including, but not limited to, sewing skills.

For which they need sewing machines....

While I was happy to give a sewing machine to the school, what I really wanted
was to give one to a person.

So before I bought the gift of a sewing machine, I contacted Rahab's Rope.

I didn't hear back from them for a few weeks,

then one day, I was thinking that it'd been plenty long enough, maybe I should send another message,

and the phone rang.

It was a gal from RR, telling me she'd gotten my message,

and while sewing machines normally go to their school, they actually just had a woman  that requested her own personal machine.

She'd been in their program for quite some time and was an experienced seamstress.

She was in charge of their rice bag production

(which made me wish I'd bought one ;-)

She also had aids.

And two little girls who were HIV positive.

A sewing machine would allow her to work from home, and be with them.

It would allow her to become self-sufficient,

which is the whole goal of Rahab's Rope.

I couldn't get that machine ordered fast enough.

I sent Nancy a text: 

Guess what you and I just did :-) :-) :-)?

We just bought a sewing machine for a woman in India...

I was so excited!

Ya'll.

That sewing machine changed a life.

Nancy and I, 

two middle-aged women,

changed a life with the gift of a sewing machine.

And a tiny seed of a dream was planted in my heart.

~

When I started on Any Which Way, in red,

I didn't have anyone in particular to make it for,

it just wanted to be made.

I thought maybe, perhaps, I could sell it, so I kept track of my time.

People would ask, "Who is this one for?"

I would say, "I don't know yet."

But I had a dream...

Mitchell  (Tyler's brother) was visiting and Tyler was showing him his quilt, which I'd recently finished.

I pulled out my little stack of red and white blocks, and showed those to him, too.

I don't recall exactly how the conversation went,

but his positive response to my quilts
(this is a man with impeccable taste!)
resulted in me telling him (and Tyler) my dream,

"I want to sell quilts  and use the money to buy sewing machines for women rescued from slavery."

My dream
 is to change lives

one sewing machine at a time.

When I first had the dream, I thought it would be years before I could do anything with it,

I mean, I just don't have a lot of time....

But I decided to start now.

Do what I can.

I probably won't sell Any Which Way;

(which is finally basted and waiting patiently to be quilted)

I have a lot of time invested in it,

and I seriously doubt any one would want to pay my rate of $10 an hour plus materials, 

but the making of it

helped cement my dream, and voice it.
(It also helped me realize that even though it was excellent for sharpening my skills,
I probably need to pick simpler projects if I hope to actually sell them ;-)

I'm not entirely sure how to go about the selling of my stuffs,

probably a (very poorly stocked) etsy shop,

but I may not have to worry about that though, because God has already dropped 2 custom projects in my lap.

(the super secret project I mentioned, and a quilt that I was hired just last week to make)

so maybe He will just bring buyers to me too.

By my calculations, 

those 2 projects, plus the ridiculously fun pigeon quilt that will be available for sale in just a few days,

will buy 3 sewing machines.
Three!

Ya'll.
I'm living my dream.

I get to combine two things I am passionate about,
and

I am changing lives

(one stitch) and one sewing machine at a time.

(please know that I know that it's not really me doing the life-changing, I just get to be one of the tools)

fun fabric play

I pinned the fabric from the book Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus several months ago.

(It's a fun book , but not one of our favorite favorites; I'm not suggesting you run out and buy it, you understand)

Thanks to one of Lee's Work in Progress sponsors a few weeks ago,

it was on sale, so I snapped up a half yard of every DLtPDtB fabric available in the shop.

 (I didn't want to lose money on it ;-)

As soon as I got it (which was wicked fast!) I hopped on Fabric.com and combed through their selection of organic fabrics

 (the DLtPDtB is also organic. I'm hoping to sell the quilt, so I thought all organic might be nice. But, as you'll see, I sorta mucked that up...)

and purchased a few that I thought would go,

including 1 1/2 yards of cheater print (blocks were bigger than I anticipated, pooh!) to use as my back.

The package with those fabrics arrived on Friday,

but I was so busy it didn't even get opened until Sunday.

I pulled them out, grabbed my previous stack of DLtPDtB fabrics,

and laid them out to see how they'd play together.

Two of my Fabric.com selections got vetoed, but the rest were perfect together.

I pet them,

and rearranged the stack, and set it aside.

Monday evening, while soup was simmerring on the stove, I cut into them,

just one simple 5" strips of  each of the twelve fabrics.

Which should have taken no time at all,

but 4 of the fabrics were waayy out of whack and took a good bit of time to properly straighten. 

Not counting the squaring up time

(I didn't feel like it was fair to include that labor in the price)

from first cut to final starching,

I had a quilt top in 2 hours and 25 minutes!

But then I decide it was too bland,

and I spent every spare second (and some not-exactly-spare seconds... ;-) yesterday

making a couple of pigeons to add.

It's no longer an all organic quilt, 

but gosh, it's cute! if I do say so myself :-)
and I had a lot of fun making it.

Sometimes simple
 is good.

Linking up with Lee's Work in Progress :-)

there he goes

driving off by himself.

Brandon hadn't even left the driveway and Josiah was talking about Jeremiah driving in just a few years.

I told him to shut his mouth.

lately (with numbers)

Tyler hasn't fussed at me 1 single time for not posting

in over 2 weeks.

If that doesn't tell you how hectic things are right now,

I don't know what would.

We did start school.

Thus, the extremely full schedule.

I've never schooled 5 before.

I was right to be filled with trepidation.

As Eva said - very sympathetically, "Oh. You've got 5 this year.

5 about did me in."

It's not so much that it's bad,

it's just that the days are so full.

And I have to do so much talking.

I'm tired of talking by 9:30.

In the morning...

And I'm just plain tired.

I've turned into a 2 (and sometimes even, 3!) cups of coffee a day person,

and I don't really like that.

I mean, I like coffee,

duh,

but I don't like drinking (regularly) more than 1 cup in the morning.

~

242 (our small group from church) started back up last week, after taking the summer off.

The kids were so excited;

they've missed it.

Truth be told,

I guess I missed it, too.

We are in the perfect group for us.

I love them.

~

My grandpa (Mom's dad) died yesterday.

He was 91.

It wasn't anywhere near as special as Johnny,

but my 2nd favorite present (as a child) came from him - a Barbie townhouse.

I don't know if Mom suggested it to him

or if he picked it out all on his own

(I always assumed he did, but now, as a mom myself, I'm thinking he may have had help ;-)

Either way,

I always thought it was very generous of him, because something that great had to cost a lot of money!

I'm pretty sure I got his money's worth out of it.

~

Tyler and I had a birthday party to go to last night.

I have lots of clothing options for summer,

but not so many for fall, and it was downright chilly yesterday,

so I decided to whip up a short-sleeved cowl neck top (which I've never attempted before)

to go with a skirt I'd made recently,

but didn't have the right color black shirt to match.

We had to leave at 3:45.

I started making my pattern around 12:15.

I also had to take a shower (and wash my nappy hair) and get ready to go.

And eat lunch.

At some point, I remembered that I'd never hemmed the skirt, so I'd have to do that, too...

yikes.

I'm not happy with the fit of the shirt, 

but it was wearable

and

I was ready to go at 3:37, with 8 minutes to spare.

(I'd even cleaned up my mess, too!)

The party ended up being outside,

so I was a little over dressed,

and a lot freezing.

But, according to my girls, I looked adorable.

Jeremiah said I looked Halloweeny..

~

I've worked on this post for 2 days now,

and 6 people are ready to eat dinner,

so I think I'm going to call it done.