Step Into My Thimble

I am a literature snob, and I don’t read fast. 99% of our personal book collection is in storage about 180 longitudes away from here, plus books in Dubai are expensive and the few available libraries (even the one I work in) leave a lot to be desired.

When I saw this idea by way of Jenny’s post, it made me feel more inclined to read some of the limited selection available. I’m choosing titles based on what I can get from the faculty book exchange at work, which very few people know about and therefore don’t use. I wish that would change–and maybe I will take the P.R. upon myself this year–so that the selection would evolve a little bit. Most of the choices are older genre fiction. I’ve got the first four sorted out, plus the Stieg Larsson which a coworker just lent me, unsolicited. After the semester starts in mid-September, I am hoping at least someone will have dropped off a few decent things. If not, then I will have to add more from the romance, spy and western territory. It won’t kill me.

I’m starting with The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo so I can return it to my coworker. Who knows, maybe I will read the others (our library has them but strangely not the first one). I already have the movie but I won’t watch it until after I finish the book.

The other day I was thinking about how I have done these annual “day in the life” type posts, just kind of detailing how I spent my time as a person with a kid, a job, and various goings-on at what is usually a great time of year in Michigan (late spring). I realized I was overdue for this year’s, and now we live on the other side of the planet, something I could never have anticipated in those previous posts.

Today I poked around and also realized that I didn’t even write a “day in the life” last year AT ALL. 2009 was hated by a lot of people, but for me, up until mid-October when our utopian existence of affordable living in a relatively progressive community, a great job, super friends, and lots to do came crashing to a halt, it was a really great year. I’m sure we were just too busy having fun in the spring to even think of it. Of course now I wish I had written it just as a document of life at that time. It would have involved more complaining about irregular sleep patterns, but by last spring Maeve was solidly potty-trained, and had finished breastfeeding a couple days before turning three in April.

Nothing to do but forge ahead with this year’s though. And I will get to that soon. In the meantime, here are the previous versions:

• A Day In The Life (May 25, 2006). Maeve was only 1.5 months old, and my previous childless existence was going up in flames.
• Another Day In The Life (May 26, 2007). I was slowing down, or maybe getting better at incorporating my kid in the things I wanted to do. Wood from Sweet Juniper left a comment which made me feel cool.
• Day In The Life 3.0 (June 17, 2008). Two years old! I had gone back to work part-time earlier that year, and after a rocky adjustment to all the daycare germs and stuff, by summer we were getting used to the patterns.

Here is “Big Four” at her international school in Dubai a couple weeks ago.

Lots of things have changed since Day In The Life 3.0, living in Dubai being the hugest one of course. Summer vacation is coming in a while and we’ll have some interesting things to record on one of those days. Stay tuned!

My parents decided a few weeks ago to send Stan to kitty heaven, unfortunately without involving me in the decision, so it’s double the sadness.

I’m sorry Stan, you were the best cat, and maybe the only one I’ll ever have.

The best laid plans…

Here we are getting into some exciting repurposing craft activities. I’m in a bit of a rush to wrap up projects, too, before I give back the loaned sewing machine in a week or two. The primary reason for borrowing it was to hem the curtains for most of our apartment, and only Maeve’s room remains. Hers are double so it’s extra work.

I wanted to make her a wraparound skirt with some of the curtain scrap. It’s asking for some embroidery (a rabbit has been requested). In my attempt to minimize effort, I used the side edge of the scrap fabric, which had already been hemmed, for the waistband/tie. I just cut it off with a little extra to fold into it like bias tape. It wasn’t quite long enough so we may be putting snaps or buttons on the ends instead of tying it closed. I also used French seams on the interior, since wraparounds tend to flap open sometimes, so it looks very tidy.

The pattern is a formula I found online by searching for “girls wraparound skirt” – very simple and translatable to big people sizes too.

Because we seem to shop at Ikea practically every week here (can’t get enough of their cheap and tasty potato chips), I have been eyeing the fabric for a while. Things came together when I bought a copy of a book, “Absolutely A-Line” by Wendi Gratz, at the Kinokuniya in Dubai Mall. The book has a simple girls’ dress template that you can add to, or not. I decided to make the cover version with the bottom ruffle, using a blue home dec print and some orange linen that Ikea sells in long strips already hemmed.

Size 4 is a bit big—should have measured Maeve first, as usual—but living in this boiling hot climate she can wear it year-round.