My much needed moment of Zen for the day...

There is no way to be a perfect mother, and a million ways to be a good one.  – Jill Churchill

I really need to remember this quote on days like today.  My kids got up at the crack of dawn… I went to bed late… not the best combination.  It was just one of those mornings.  Back packs and books were missing, the favorite shirt was in the wash… and even with the early start, the kids barely caught the bus as it was driving away.

After school, I served the kids a healthy snack.  When I left the kitchen to go vacuum, Ben decided he wanted something not so healthy.  He climbed the pantry shelves, to the top shelf and the cookie jar… and accidentally knocked my newly filled container of powdered sugar off the shelf.  It burst open and powdered sugar went everywhere.. all over the boxes and cans of food, my wheat grinder, Bosch and waffle iron, walls and floorboards.  Ben ran to the sink and grabbed a wet dishtowel.  Bless his heart, he wanted to get it all cleaned up before he was caught.  When the dripping wet rag hit the piles of powdered sugar, he ended up with a nice sticky wet glaze all over everything.

These are the moments when it is wise to count to ten… then breath.   I wanted to yell, I wanted to scream, I wanted to bring back old fashioned switchings…

But then I remembered the “good mother” quote… and I thought, what would a “good mother” do right now?

So I brought the shop vacuum in from the garage and calmly told Ben to do his best to clean it up.  He did the best job an 8 year old could do.  And tomorrow I get to scrub down my pantry for real.  I’m looking at the bright side.  At least I will have a really clean pantry.  And even though the day didn’t start out so hot… at least I made a little progress in the motherhood department.

Now for the dishtowel, I have another easy idea for a Mother’s Day gift.  Have you seen the darling dishtowels from Anthropologie?  They are wonderful… and expensive.  Some cost as much as $24 for one towel.

Last week my mom and I were visiting quilt shops and I found lace and rickrack trim from American Quilting that looked just like it belonged to an Anthropology towel.  So I bought a little.

Here’s how I made the towel:

1. Cut your fabric into a rectangle.  I cut my fabric 20″ wide by 26″ high.  The finished towel is 18″ by 24″.

2. Using a fabric pen and ruler, mark a two inch square on all 4 corners.

3.  With wrong side of the fabric facing up, press each corner of the square in half, making a triangle.

4.  Press a 1/4 inch hem all the way around.

5.  Now turn hem 3/4 inch and press all the way around.  This will now make a mitered corner on each corner.  Make sure all sides meet evenly at the mitered corners.

6.  Trim away the small bit of the triangle that is showing at each mitered corner.

7.  Pin to secure.  Stitch all the way around. Remember your stitching will show on the front of your dishtowel, so keep your stitching an even distance from the edge of your towel.

8.  Pin your lace to the front of your cloth just covering the bottom seam. 

9.  Bring the lace around to the back and tuck into mitered corner.  You may need to unpick a few stitches at the corner to make it fit neatly.

10.  I stitched my lace into place by using a straight stitch along the top edge of the lace.  Experiment on a small piece of lace to find what works best for the lace you have chosen.  Some may require hand stitching with blind stitch.

This project was a cinch to make and was a fraction of the cost of an Anthropologie dishcloth.  Luckily I have enough fabric to make two.  One for me and one for my Mom.  If you haven’t checked it out, I really love the tutorial on Freda’s Hive for a wonderful waffle dishtowel.  I think it will be my next project.

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