i have a feeling

this blog is going to slowly turn into a flood blog with all the things I want to try this fall/winter.

This weekend is folkfest so we're going to that all day on saturday. Then on sunday we're picking fruit in the morning, then heading to a birthday lunch for my mom, then to a birthday dinner for my mom on the other side of the family.

But the fruit... Oh the fruit! I'm quite excited!

Jams! Juices! Chips! ...drool...

I'm going to be canning a lot of it, and dehydrating a lot too :) My plan really is to stock our cupboards for the winter, to make life a little bit easier.

Winters are always tough around here. Jobs, no matter what you do, really, are seasonal. Hubs, is most definitely no exception. He'll get a bit of work here and there, and we do plan on working the market all winter with our products. But with a new baby, the first little bit is going to be interesting. Might as well have as much food as we can preserved and stored and easily cooked.

I really need to invest in a good dehydrator...I'm going to be borrowing one for the time being, but I would rather always have one on hand so I can dry when I need to.

I really really hate wasted food, and sometimes, freezing everything just doesn't cut it.

So, other than dehydrating fruit and vegetables for munching, I also want to try other recipes too. Whole meals, etc. Would be great practice for when we start taking our family on long camping trips/hikes.

Other foodie news: We going gluten free...and man oh man is it tough! I've tried gluten free pancakes from scratch, and bread...and neither worked properly. (Note: I also need to invest in a really good food processor that will crack (and powder) grains...mine does everything but...) I have a major problem with spending money on something I can make at home. *note here why this is probably going to be turning into more of a food blog*. I make laundry soap, and toothpaste, and other bread (though, I need a bread maker to do this more often...Ugh! for needing to spend a ton of mulah up front to save spending more in the long run in store...), now I'm starting to make our own gluten free flour (so far, rice and coconut), so i can keep my family fed (going gluten free for H. & M.) with out having to spend 5$ on one loaf of bread.

Then there is the whole trying to eat as organic, local, and healthy as possible without breaking our measly budget. So far, we've done ok. We hardly ever buy crap food, we almost always bake our goodies ourselves (unless of course im craving something or were just feeling hot and lazy), meat is barely ever seen in our kitchen, and if I cook/bake something, I usually end up making it completely vegan, and most of the time sugar free. (I dont like touching/cooking meat. I hate eggs in baked goods..although in a sandwich or in fried rice its delectable.. and our milk is usually just used for drinking..cause between toddler and husband we go through quite a bit!)

AAANNNYYWAYS....ive been on this computer for far too long, and it's already hot as balls in my apartment so im gonna go sit outside with some blueberries till hubs gets home :) ttfn

Welcome (or re-welcome) to the Crooked Pocket!

I have been mulling names for my blog and shop over in my head for quite a while now, and "The Crooked Pocket"just seemed fitting.

I have some issues with pockets that I'm working on..either putting them on upside down, on the wrong side of the fabric, or..when I finally think i've got it... it's F#@%ing crooked! And i wont even begin to rant on how much i LOATHE stitch picking...sigh

This is what happens when your only uninterrupted working hours are past 10pm and the only thing on your mind is: "I have to be up in less than 8 hours, because my baby doesn't like to sleep in...". And not being able to drink copious amounts of coffee doesn't help.

Productivity will skyrocket once I squeeze out this baby early November.

Anyways, I finished a bag yesterday that I'm very proud of, and will be finishing another and a few refashion garments to be posted (hopefully) by midnight tonight.

Two new designs that I'm very very excited to share. (I'm holding myself back from keeping it for myself! :] ).

The first (and finished) bag is a new design for my bags. It's a messenger style bag (as opposed to my Vertical hip bag, this one is horizontal) and would make the perfect diaper bag or school bag! When testing it out I packed it full of books, as well as my netbook laptop (although this could fit up to 15" laptop) and it was great!

As always, this bag is made from recycled/re-purposed materials (upholstery and drapery swatches). My bags probably wont be made with vintage belts anymore (at least not the larger bags), so the strap on this one is made from gorgeous green striped drapery fabric.

Anyways, H. is up...

cheers!

-e.

finally all moved in

I love our new place! :D Im quite happy there, and the cats and hubs and my lil lady are all happy there too!

We don't have internet yet, or an accessible wireless signal, so I am going to be quiet for a bit. But i will be working!

I went through all my bag fabric, and clothing to refashion and put together (potentially) almost 2 grand worth of merchandise for my shop, and only a week or two worth of work.

Unfortunately, getting things together to be able to sell at markets didn't work this summer, but I will be contacting someone about the night/winter markets to try and get on with that.

In other news, I'm 27 weeks pregnant today, feeling huge and uncomfortable as the baby is still sitting super low causing a lot of pelvic pain. On top of that, my back (where I had the epidural during labour with H. ) still hurts/tingles, which is what I'm assuming is also causing the sciatic pain in my legs.

Now, if only my doctor wasn't such a tool.

I have my next appointment on wednesday, and there is a lot to discuss.

There is a lady at my grandmas church who is suffering from leukemia, and they believe is running out of time if they dont find a compatible donor for her, or if she gets bumped to the top of the list for this new cordblood/stem cell treatment, that may very well let her live for a long time. I'm not sure of all the details of this whole situation yet, (i'm going to be talking with her soon) But since there is such a long waiting list for the banked cord blood, I offered to donate our baby's cord blood to her. I will only donate however if I make sure its going specifically to her. I dont want my baby's blood sitting in some bank waiting to be distributed to someone i dont know, while this friend of my family is dying because i couldnt give it to her. I would feel better about helping her if i can. If not, then the blood will stay with my baby, and we will wait till the cord stops pulsating before its cut, just like we did with H. for the benefits it has for baby.

If this goes through though, this blog may have a new segment :)

post deleted...

Note to self: stop using blog for bitchfests.

That is all.

and the worst blogger/shop owner of the year award goes to...

Do i even have to say it?

I've been busy with wedding family stuff, and fighting with my sewing machine to try and finish three vertical hip bags that my cousin ordered before she had to go back to Sask.

Note to self: No more cheap machine needles... >.<

I'm also going to go ahead and blame my sheer exhaustion due to pregnancy + toddler for my procrastination.

I have been getting things done though! My berry bags are complete I just need to take some decent pictures on my shitty camera and post them to etsy. However, I did have to change my design. I got really frusterated with the fused plastic insert that I was making them with. They just never turned out right, and the shape was a bit awkward. So, scratch that idea (I now have to come up with something else to use all these bloody bags for!

So I redesigned, and came up with the same bag, but perfectly shaped/sized to hold a 4litre Ice cream pail. I figured, who doesn't use an ice cream bucket to go out and pick blackberries with? So this is a more stylish, and comfortable way to do it. Plus it makes a cute little bag to keep knitting stuff, or anything else you may find fits in it.

The pics here make it look a tad awkward, but i promise its not at all (most definitely not as awkward as trying to pick berries one handed with an ice cream pail balancing you as you reach as far as you can into the prickles without getting killed. Note: This may just be me :P )
The new pictures for etsy will be better! This was late last night...

In designing this bag, (and don't ask how I came about this.. :S ) I also came up with a pattern for clothtoddler training pants from t-shirt scraps that I can't use for bags, hats, dresses and prefold diapers. So this will be another thing that will be added to my etsy after I get the time to sit and make, make, make! Oh how i wish i had the time every day :(...and not at 11pm when I would rather be cuddling on the couch with Hubs watching a movie and drinking tea.

But he has been really busy too! He has been carving away and getting ready to open up his own etsy making hand crafted organic body jewelery. Using bone, antler, wood, and soon, stones. As well as leather and other items for necklaces, etc. Bone Rattle Organics will be open soon.

I'm so very excited for winter this year. Winter brings baby, and more time with M. As well as our art binge, where we spend all our free time working on art and sewing and jewelery to sell online, and have a selection to sell at the winter and spring markets. This is what both of us have been dying to do for a living and are only now starting to be able to.

M. just got an evening job at a gas station a couple nights a week, and once mowing slows down he will still have an income through out the winter. So I can actually get childcare subsidy and be able to get a baby sitter so i can work a couple days a week as well. Then hopefully he will have enough hours to go on EI when we are ready to leave.

OH btw! I havent mentioned anything yet.. we're only just starting to inform people of our plans.
Hopefully this spring our little family will be moving down the coast a bit to the sechelt area (were looking anywhere from madiera park - gibsons). Mostly we are just both pretty done with PR. Itchy knees, I guess. I doesn't really feel like home anymore, and we just can't settle here. When we were staying down there for a couple days, it felt right there. There's tons of family and a couple of our closest friends. Plus much more going on in the way of arts and crafts. PLUS we can get to van or PR and only have to pay one way (coming home). It's still a plan in progress but we're pretty excited about it.

Other things I've been working on:

Made some dipes for H. We've narrowed our stash down to just flats, but we have been folding our flat diapers into rectangles instead of the oragami fold for the past few months because it's quicker, they fit her better, and we can double up easily for night time. I had a bunch of scrap flannel and some super soft fleece kicking around my stash so i made up a few "pre-flats" (half way between a prefold and a flat diaper). They fit her well and absorb a lot. The fleece also keeps her feeling dry and lessens her bum rash. (We're still working on her diet and what she can/can't have...it's a slow process :(...).


The flats i have will be altered to also include a strip of fleece, making a moisture wicking pocket for extra liners. The fleece will be in a position where it will work for oragami fold, or just folding into a rectangle. We have always had to fold an extra liner into the flat for miss H. so this will make it a bit easier, and we can reuse our diapers from the get-go with the new babe.