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Am so looking forward to having the time to put together a little gift set for my gorgeous new nephew Beckett over in Toronto.
I absolutely love this retro car fabric by Robert Kaufman which has sadly now been discontinued for some time - this is my absolute last piece from my stash and it is not a particularly large piece so I shall need to be somewhat creative with it.
I think the Peas & Carrots fabrics by Moda blend really well and I cannot resist including one of the Anne Claire Petit crochet cars from my gift company stock even though no doubt Beckett has a nursery full of soft toys already.
I'm hoping to make a baby blanket and a couple of matching accessories, perhaps some little soft baby cubes too if I can stretch the fabric that far.
I'll post photos of the finished items as soon as I can.
Livvy finishes school for the summer tomorrow which no doubt means we shall have yet more rain but still, it will be great to spend more time together.
Well Livvy is down in Hampshire with her dad visiting her grandparents this weekend so I am a free agent for once - a rare whole weekend to myself always seems such a luxury and I always manage to convince myself that there are far more hours in the day and plan huge projects - like err removing another piece of wall ........
Livvy was so excited about seeing her granny and grandpa, not least because she wanted to show them the fantastic school report she brought home this week - all straight A's! I was especially proud of the comments from her teachers who think she is an absolute joy to teach who wants to learn for the love of learning something new.
When I had to pull Olivia from her little private school and put her in the local state run one I admit I was a little worried as to how she would settle and it has taken some time for her to do so. Her old school was lovely, girls only and the class sizes were small, but at the same time I wasn't particularly happy with the pressure the children were put under. I wonder, was the pressure really for the children or more the need for the parents to be seen to be getting their money's worth? To me, childhood passes so quickly and I do believe children should be allowed to enjoy it. I did dislike the fact that they had homework every night and so many of the other girls had extra tuition, did Kumon etc that Livvy was beginning to feel that she wasn't intelligent because she wasn't doing long division at six!
Therein lies the quandry as a parent, if you don't push your child in the same way then they can all too easily feel as Livvy did but if you do push as opposed to, in my book encourage them to do their best, then are you not just setting them up for resentment and disappointment later on in life? I can remember an incident once when, during a play date, we were playing a game of Junior Monopoly with a friend of hers, who was devasted that she didn't win - the child couldn't play a simple game without feeling the need to be the best, taking all the enjoyment out of it. In life, there will always be someone who is better at something, have more than you, good luck when you don't etc just as much as there will always be someone who is worse off than you etc. and to me, we all need to accept ourselves for who we are - yes we can aim to be the best person we can be but we don't need to lose sight of ourselves in the process.
I was discussing this issue recently with a good friend of mine and she recommended a great book "Affluenza" by psychologist Oliver James who describes it as an obsessive, envious, keeping-up-with-the-Joneses contagious middle class virus causing depression, anxiety, addition and ennui. Definitely worth a read.
Over in Toronto my brother is once again taking part in the Annual Fringe Festival with his show Gibberish while my sister-in-law Nicole, has been looking after this little cutie:
One week old already!
Nicole's mum hasn't seen Livvy since Chris & Nicole's wedding when she looked like this:
I told you childhood flies by :)
