Tag Archives: ellie

Partial Results

The air quality tests for asbestos have been returned and the presence of asbestos is within the EPA’s “it’s all good” limits. Which is such a relief! I’m giddy glad that we aren’t all breathing through asbestos-lined lungs. The Big Question of the morning is: Is the return of one test (albeit the scariest one) enough to convince us it’s safe to send her to school? None of the mold tests will be back for a few days, no telling about lead and asbestos dust. I heard that the Fire Marshal would be there today. So is one enough? What if we send her back and the place has 9x the legal limit for lead contamination? I’m not particularly interested in using my child’s health to make a show of good faith.

The press knew this afternoon about the results of the asbestos in the air. They didn’t report it until their news programs, of course. Parents weren’t notified until 9:30 last night. There’s something really wrong with that. Again we were notified by email (I replied to the superintendent and reminded him that up this way we don’t all have internet), but the Superintendent did attach PDFs of the reports substantiating the results. He at least as figure out that assertions of safety aren’t enough. I am grateful for that.

There’s been a lot of trouble with the media and the school system’s PR guy. The PR guy keeps saying things like, “…Board of Education said it does regular testing for mold and asbestos levels to ensure the children stay safe.” And we keep saying, “Then where are the records of these tests? If these tests have been done, just show us the results! You could have saved yourself a lot of trouble if this were true just by just showing us the evidence!” And the press never ever questions the PR guy about it. Whatever happened to investigative journalism? I’ve told at least two reporters where to look for proof of that statement – all they have to do is make a phone call.

I’ve missed our little chats.

Seven

My child is seven.

seven

Traditional Build-a-Bear + Moe’s trip. She made a cat of course!

And she had a birthday party with a MAGICIAN. Which was pretty much the best thing ever. Even though her original magician ended up iced in (Remember when that ice storm happened in Nashville? That’s where he lived.), substitute magician was wonderful and the kids loved him!

sandwichboardbday

This is my sign in the living room – the party was at our pizza place. Yes, there is a wagon in the living room.

I can’t show you many pictures since they are full of other people’s children (and most are seriously blurry), but watch me pull a rabbit out of my hat!

outofmyhat

Army of Cupcakes

Birthday Preparations are underway.

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Cupcakes for school!

They have belly buttons because I decided to make mini cupcakes out of the rest of the batter instead of eating it and opened the oven halfway through baking. Frosting will cover that right up.

Aw, Nuts

October is my second best month for toy sales (early Christmas shoppers). Weirdly, August (and the last half of July this year) is the absolute best. Which does mean that September is a bit of a scramble to restock.

cashewbear

The latest finished piece.

That’s Cashew Bear. He’s made with Lion Brand Nature’s Choice organic cotton. I’m actually a big fan of this yarn. It’s readily available, reasonably priced for an organically grown cotton AND plant-dyed. You do have to watch the dye lots since shades can vary radically between batches but I don’t care because plant-dyed is cool. Nature’s Choice listed as a worsted yarn, but I treat it like bulky with no trouble. The soft spun core plied with a skinny thread gives a fun wooly texture to the fabric but it can be a problem for seaming. The friction caused by drawing the strand through the knit stitches may cause the strand to fray and break. Which may cause you to tear out your hair. Not a huge big deal with toys – I just swear a little, pick it out and start over. If I were making a sweater I would consider using a different yarn for the seams.

While we’re on the subject of cashews (we’re not really but stay with me), Ellie’s school is peanut free. Which means that for my vegetarian child, a dependable source of lunch time protein has become completely unavailable. Since I can’t give her cheese every day, she’s not real big on leftovers and veggie deli slices aren’t the easiest things to get, enter the nut butters:

nutbutters

Presented in order of highest protein content per serving to lowest.

While peanut butter (as a legume) still has the best concentration of protein at 8g per 2T, sunflower seed butter is right up there with 7g. Almond butter has 6g, cashew 4g, and Nutella (while the most chocolaty of the contenders) has only 2g of protein. There are other brands of hazelnut spreads that I have not investigated, so it may be that the protein content is higher in those. The fat content ranges from 18g (cashew) to 12g (Nutella weirdly). Those are just the nut butters I have found available locally! Know of any others to add to my collection?

ETA: Ellie has just revealed that she does not care for SunButter. I’m going to have to figure out something else to do with it.

Take Two

It’s the first day of preschool! Jump for joy!

jumping in striped legs

Check out those stripes!

You thought we already did that? She spent a total of eight days at the old place. The third Friday morning, she told me she would rather stay home and clean the house with me than go to school and have birthday cupcakes with her class. We were already REALLY unhappy with the place (our choices are few) but sticking with it as long as she seemed to be enjoying herself. We called the Montessori place a couple towns south (it’s a drive or she would have been there already). They said “Sure we have room, but if you aren’t in a hurry, we’re opening a new school down the road from you!” We weren’t in a hurry and school started today.

And she was not shy.

The Official Pattern of Dish Rag Tag V: V is for Victory is up and ready for download on Ravelry and in my Free Patterns (it’s at the very bottom). Incidentally, the Free Patterns page has been spruced up a bit and now has pictures.

If you’ll excuse me, I need to get started on Ellie’s Halloween costume! I am so glad school opened this week – I had no idea when I was going to find the time to get that done.