Thanksgiving Centerpiece

Grammy & Ainsleigh with the Thanksgiving Centerpiece

So my mom shows up at my house a few days before Thanksgiving with a gorgeous centerpiece that she claims to have crafted together herself. The vase is from Coldwater Creek and the flowers were chosen by her at JoAnn Fabric. The original design needed some height, so back to JoAnn's for some additional branches. I think the arrangement is beautiful and looks amazing on my table. Thanks, mom!

A Handmade Toddler Shirt & A Valance

Although I am convinced that I can purchase better made and cheaper clothing for my toddler, I am going to make her a shirt. I found a free pattern online that I like, and I have some leftover material from a quilt that I started and never finished.

I really like the unfinished quilt: Can I use the pieces for something?

Seriously, mom? What are you going to make with the unfinished quilt squares?

How about curtains for Ainsleigh's bedroom? If you just sew these squares together, I can have Uncle Darrell help me make a valance. I'll need to get wood to make the valance. And then maybe you can take down the flat sheet you tacked up to cover her bedroom window.

Okay, so our first two projects are a toddler shirt AND a valance for the nursery. Using mostly materials I already have. This should be an inexpensive project.

5 minutes into the project: I've used a crayon to trace my pattern onto my fabric, but I can't find my good fabric scissors. But it's a washable crayon, so the first time I wash the shirt the crayon marks will be gone, right? I'm using the cheap scissors that I found in the kitchen junk drawer and which I used to cut out my pattern after I printed it on regular copy paper. I'm going to sew the fabric, right? So the sloppy cutting job won't matter because it won't show. Right?

17 minutes into the project: My sewing machine is not working. Since my Memere gave me her backup sewing machine (because people who have the Memere gene, own things like a backup sewing machine), I don't have an owner's manual to figure out what's wrong. And truthfully, an owner's manual probably would not help me here. Owner's manuals seem to assume you have a basic knowledge. I don't even know who to call to get my sewing machine fixed. I'll ask my friend Amy if she can figure out what's wrong with it. Mom and I pick up the extra quilt squares that Ainsleigh has littered around the room and we watch a rerun of "Divine Design" on HGTV.

7 days later: Keep forgetting to ask Amy if she can figure out what's wrong with my sewing machine. Mom hasn't even mentioned the extra quilt squares or the valance since the first day we discussed the project.

Attempt #1 at being crafty: My daughter looks just fine in store-bought clothes. Her bedroom window is still covered with a queen-size flat sheet.

For Every Woman Who Lacks the Memere Gene

Recently, my mom and I had a frank discussion about our crafting abilities. We came to the very difficult realization that we are not as crafty as we wish we were. We have crafty friends and crafty relatives, but somehow, the "Memere gene" skipped us over. This realization was a long time coming. Over the years, we've spent hundreds - possibly thousands - of dollars on magazines and books, on equipment, materials and supplies to make everything from jewelry to quilts, and it's been wasted for the most part. We could have purchased a lot of wine and left our lofty dreams of homemade Christmas cards and hand-stitched birthday gifts behind.

My mom and I apparently lack the Memere gene, and yet when we see a crafty project, we think, "oh, I can do that!" For the most part, we are wrong. And even though we've proven it time and time again, we're giving it one more shot.

We're going to find out if we can, actually, do that. We've each chosen a handful of craft projects that we believe we have the capacity to complete and we're going to try them out, together.