Follow the sat nav

Welcome back to my little corner of the internet.

I've missed writing and getting thoughts from my head through my fingers to the page. Things have not gone as planned. Do they ever?

I wrote the first two paragraphs of this post a couple weeks ago and although my sentiments have changed slightly, I would like to keep the authenticity of the original post intact. So they remain just as they were (I've put them in italics for the sake of differentiation).

Originally, I had written a whole slew of welcome back posts complete with all my grand intentions of homeschooling and being a stay-at-home mom, finally. But God had other plans. My religion is very close to my heart and I struggle to put into words what my thoughts and feelings are. I'm still pretty raw and entirely overwhelmed by the blessings and the trials I have experienced in the last two weeks. It hasn't all be bad, not at all, but last week I just about cried for one reason or another every day. But I know the Lord is good. And that whatever plan He has for me and my family is a better plan than I can imagine, though it may not look how I think it should look.

We moved across the country. In our family, a move isn't a move unless it's across the country or the ocean. So we're thousands of miles away from routines and home and all things familiar. I have a terrible, truly terrible, sense of direction so I've been using the sat nav to get everywhere. But isn't that how it goes - on earth as it is in heaven? I'm new here. So I need guidance - temporally and spiritually. When we arrived on earth, tiny and indefensible didn't we need guidance? Our parents did everything for us because we could do very little for ourselves. As we grow, the need for guidance doesn't disappear, it just changes and as a perpetual child of God, I need continual guidance.

Picking up from where I left off all those weeks ago, we moved. And I needed the sat nav. And I made a connection to God's plan through the need for a sat nav. AND now I've taken that sat nav story and run a half marathon with it (a half marathon btw is on my never-bucket list, I am so not a runner). But, please continue...

In the beginning it's quite easy to follow the path that the sat nav tells us because we don't know the way, so we place all our faith in route we are told in direction-by-directionally based pieces. We haven't had the chance to look around and get our own sense of direction including shortcuts, and stop-overs. We aren't distracted by the possibility of other routes. Or Target. As I got more and more comfortable driving, I trusted the sat nav less and less. I have no reason not to trust the machine, although I am warned that the map is out of date, and given my directionally-challenged nature, I should be much more wary of where my brain is telling me I should go rather than the sat nav. However, I found that I would question the directions. I would double check the overview and triple check the address before trusting, having faith that this device would get me where I needed to go.

The scriptures (and if you're LDS, the prophets) are like our sat navs. They are filled, programed (in keeping with the sat nav analogy) with the correct routes for us to follow. The test of our faith is whether we trust their directions and follow them even after we "know" the way.

I have lately realized that not only has my reliance on the sat nav decreased, but also my speed has increased. I started of trepidatious, unsure of what the speed limits were and keeping a close eye on available road signs. As my comfort with the road increased, so did my speed. For one thing the flow of traffic is quicker than I'm used to - and to be fair, there aren't many clearly posted limits. However, this analogy has to do with sin rather than faith. When we're comfortable stretching our limits in one area, it easily transfers to other areas. When I'm lax in my temporal experiences, I am usually being lax in my spiritual upkeep as well and not doing all that I should to follow God's promptings and keep His commandments. Wo, unto those who are at ease in Zion, or something like that. When I'm not paying my full attention - to the road, to my children, to my spouse, or my scriptures - that is when things start to slip through the cracks and the toddler takes a sharpie to the wall.

But what does all this have to do with Rose & Toast? I dunno. But I needed to write them. Things, life, don't always turn out how we plan them and this space is a perfect, world-class, fantastic example of that. It has had so many incarnations with no set direction or organization or consistency other than it's all my writing. I don't know when I'll write again. I don't know what I'll write again. But chances are I'll write. Again and again.

I'll keep writing. 

#Hallelujah

Last night, we had a special Easter presentation at our church. We were moved around different rooms that depicted scenes from Holy Week, Christ's last week. We began waving palm branches and shouting "Hosanna" for His triumphal entry into Jerusalem where He was hailed Messiah; through the Last Supper; the Garden of Gethsemane; His trial, beating, and mocking; the Crucifixion; and finally two of my kiddos helped "roll the stone away" to see that "He is not here." 

It was an incredible visual and my kids all responded to different elements -- the images of Christ, the singing, the stories, etc. It was a long but beautiful night where we gained a clearer understanding of what those days may have felt like. How He suffered. How He lives. The final hymn we sang was "He is Risen" and every time I get a catch in my throat. It's just so incredible to me to know that the Savior died for my sins (and your sins) and that He not only died for us but He lives for us. He Lives!

I love this video for so many reasons, the most important being that it's like a "Where's Waldo" of famous LDS singers. So far I've found Alex Boye, Peter Hollens, and Donny Osmond. David Archuleta has to be in there somewhere, right? Who can you find?

Have a very happy Easter, my friends! Hallelujah! 

For the love...

For the love of what I'm not yet sure, but man alive you guys, I'm super sorry to change everything on you all over again. I just can't bring myself to do it. To write dear, personal things about my kiddos and not feel enormous guilt about the whole thing. They are my life and I want to protect them from all the nonsense that happens which I think includes giving them their privacy. My whole world revolves around them so it's difficult to exclude them from something like this, but I think if I'm going to succeed I need to trust my gut and my prayers. So here's the deal:

Rose & Toast was begun as a crafting blog for me to explore my creative side. It then meandered into a lifestyle/motherhood/nonsense blog. It almost very nearly became a photography blog, but again, privacy monster shouted loud in my ear that plastering their precious faces was not really what I wanted to do. And now, I think I'll return to the crafting (and reading) side. I feel like I need to do something with my hands in the evenings, especially while watching Netflix. I am working on the Pumpkin Passport and am LOVING it so much. It's the cutest thing and I will be hanging it in my girls' room once it's completed. The other day my husband mentioned, yet again how I have not finished his quilt, and I feel horrible about it, so I want to finish. I have a sticky note filled with WIPs and want to cross them out. We are in terrible need of a new quilt/comforter for our bed and I've had a hexie project in the works for over 6 months for one of the boys. I hate that I've started so many things only to let them sit. I want to create a home and no, it doesn't necessarily mean I need to be a sewer, but at the same time, for me it might mean that. My girls still wear their "Thanksgiving dresses" all the time, Wookie especially. They love their quilts and I love the idea of having things we've created on the walls.

Our family motto is "Invenium Viam aut Facium" (it's Latin for "I will discover the way or make one" - my husband is a classicist so it fits). Sewing is hard. Crochet is hard. Stitching is hard. But if I want to create a certain type of home then I need to discover or make a way. So here we go again, Rose & Toast the crafting blog. What this means for the rest of the blog is that I'm going to take down most of the posts that have the kids in them and probably a few of the more personal ones too. I'm going to start taking better pictures of my stuff and really work on finishing things. It just seems like the right thing to do. So sorry again for the whiplash.

PS: I so want to use the gorgeous designs my friend made me as a label, they are too perfect not to use

The Girl on the Train // thoughts on the book

I first heard about this book from a review on Postcards from Purgatory and was intrigued when the reviewer wrote "[the novels discuss] that childlessness - in two very different circumstances -- is a breeding ground for self-hatred and insanity." (The other novel discussed in the quote is The Diver's Clothes Lie Empty, which I haven't read.) Those lines piqued my interest so I placed a hold at the local library, only to stumble upon a sale at a local book store getting four books for $20 and ended up buying it (among others).

It's a pretty quick read and if you're interested in reading more there are summaries abounding all over the web (including in the review I linked to).

Initially, I was intrigued by the idea of childlessness breeding self-hatred and insanity. Having many children myself, and having them for pretty much all of my adult life, I don't really relate to the idea; however, I can see how the opposite can also be true. I feel like sometimes my children bring out the worst in me, or more accurately I show them the worst in me, which brings on the mommy-guilt like nobody's business. I love my children more than almost anything in this world (my husband beats them by just a hair, but he's sworn to me forever and someday, some far away day, my birdies will fly the nest), and I would willingly die to protect them from any harm, but they do drive me crazy sometimes.

Though, childlessness is a prominent theme in the novel, the theme that actually struck me most was how you can never really know a person. I've known this for quite a while now, but was impressed with how the author addressed the issue. The book is divided into character sections. We get snippets from the minds of Rachel, Megan, and Anna. The reader knows their minds but the other characters clearly don't. For example, the main character, Rachel, is struggling with alcoholism, severe alcoholism, and it causes her to act rashly at times, so we get her shame, guilt, and justification for behaving that way, which makes logical sense when reading from her point of view. But when we see the same scene from Anna's point of view, the whole thing looks completely different and often the two interpretations don't quite match up. This is done on purpose. We're supposed to question the motives, intentions, and sanity of these characters. Even or perhaps most especially in marriage.

Anna and Megan are married, to Tom and Scott, respectively. I was fascinated by the portrayal of those relationships. They are so different, yet both draw from the theme that you cannot fully, truly, know another person. Their thoughts. Their motives. Their trustworthiness. In the one instance, Scott is misrepresented in many instances by other characters, but it's his wife who ends up being most misrepresented; in the other instance, everything seems rosy, cozy, and fine, despite what seem like minor inconveniences. We know this because we get to see into the women's minds in a way that their spouses never do. Once events start to overlap, the confusion grows. We spend the most time in Rachel's brain, so we know her the most, but there is a point in the novel where I questioned her honesty with herself. She shatters her own credibility and even she questions herself, forcing us to question: how much can we trust our own selves? 

I really enjoyed this book and would recommend it to anyone looking for an intriguing mystery.

Roamin' FWQ Week 2

So I have zero finished blocks for this week. I know, I know, I'm totally ashamed. But I did get some cutting done.

I'm working on #26 Cut Glass Dish and it's difficult. The triangles are small (1 1/2 inch) and there are 48 (!!!) of them. I did fussy cut a buffalo, so that's something, right?

I also helped Nins with this Yeti ice pack from Mollie Johanson's book, Stitch Love. So even if I'm not completing my own projects, I'm helping my daughter complete hers. I know it's still a bit of a cop-out and I sincerely apologize. I've totally dropped the ball and it's only the second week. I need to schedule in my sewing time, which makes it seem less fun, but if I want to actually accomplish any of the sewing goals I need to me strict with my time. So next week, I'll have at least one finished. Scouts honor.

Roamin' FWQ Week 1

I'm not going to lie you guys working with this fabric was a little bit stressful. It is a super high thread count and feels a little stiff to work with. I'm not sure if this is how all high thread count fabrics are but it took a bit getting used to.

With that now out of the way, I can get to showing the block. I started with the first letter. In this letter the lovely, Mrs. J. E. F. talks about living in God's open air. I loved that expression. I live pretty darn close to Big Sky Country (Montana) and spent a bit of time up there in my youth and the Big Sky is no joke. I'm not sure how it does it but Montana's sky is bigger than Idaho's, Wyoming's, and Utah's...combined. Being out there, feels all at once infinite and minuscule. Part of the world and detached.

So I based these blocks on the theme of God's open air, which conveniently for me, seems to fit perfectly in the Western and Roam motifs. The first block is #54 Kitchen Wood Box and was the first, and only block, this week. Cutting the fabric was mostly nerve-wrecking and piecing as mentioned above took a bit getting used to (I'm still getting used to it to be honest).

I still plan on doing the second block this weekend, but you know how life gets, so maybe next week, I'll have three. Wishful thinking, but still probable.

I'm thinking I might need to invest in some other template or rethink my strategy of cutting the fabric. Right now, I've got the paper templates and have been gluing them to cardboard as a stabilizer, but found it difficult to maneuver the fabric while keeping the cardboard from rotating too and ended up cutting inaccurately. Any tips or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

* The legless sheep is a family inside joke, I never actually saw a legless sheep and neither did anyone else in my family (that I'm aware)

Sewing Space

In the evening on New Year's Day, Husband and I sat down to discuss the goals that we were going to try to accomplish for the year. Yep, that's right, you guys knew my goals before he did and yes, we were a bit late in discussing them NYD rather than NYE. He knew most of my goals through passing conversations, but that night we sat down and discussed them in detail, so we would know how to help each other accomplish those goals.

If you read my list, you will remember that "create a sewing space" was number 14 on that list and I am happy to report: Mission Accomplished. 

We needed to go to IKEA to purchase some additional seating -- one love seat for six people just wasn't cutting it anymore. We bought their Poang chair. (Note on the price: Our chair was much cheaper than what is listed, perhaps site prices differ, I'm not sure, but we did not pay that much.) Oh, boy do we love it. It's comfy and it bounces, and I love the darker stain of the wood. We had originally planned on buying a fancy-cushy arm chair but we ended up really liking this one (and the price tag wasn't bad either). Since we had already planned on spending extra money, Husband suggested I get a desk for my sewing machine since it was part of my resolutions to have a designated sewing space. Now, I'm not advocating for spending money unnecessarily. In fact that is one of our family goals for the year, to spend and save wisely. But the timing was so perfect, we went ahead and bought the desk (and still managed to come in under budget).

I've spent the majority of my two sewing years moving between the kitchen table and a little end table and the sofa. It works fine and I was able to sew, but even in one day of having this desk I have finished one project and made headway on another. It's so nice not having to pack everything away because everything is already right there and I can sew in spurts rather than having to carve out a huge chunk of time. The drawers are filled with most of my notions -- pins, scissors, thread, bobbins, etc. -- and the cupboard holds my iron and a few WIPs. I'm still in the living room and have warned the kiddos that this is mama's space so not to touch. We'll see how long it lasts. 

It's not much in the way decorations, but I'll build it up in time. For now, it's nice to have my own little piece-of-a-wall sewing space.