Things You Have to Plan For

As much as I'd like to deny it, the summer is dwindling away. A teacher friend told us recently that summer vacation is like a weekend: June is Friday, July is Saturday, and August is Sunday. Well, Sunday is coming and therefore it's time to acknowledge the inevitable (at least a little). So, we bought out academic planners this weekend. Every year I wait until the very last second to get one, but this year we were more on the ball, so I could actually complete a project I've always wanted to do: the cover for the planner. I basically did it with no pattern or measuring which made it extra fun and a little dicey at one point, but here it is.The fabric is the most beautiful barkcloth that I bought from Reprodepot a hundred million years ago. I've already made a knitting needle cozy with it and you might remember it from this money belt I made. I still have a fair amount, but it's dwindling. Therefore, I'm not insanely picky about where the the pattern ends up when I'm working with it (I'm just slightly crazed about it at this point,) so the front cover ended up a little plain. But some serendipitous moments occurred too, like this fish swimming up on the back cover, and the little guy on the linen tape peering over the fence at him. And here's a close up of that tape, because it's so flippin' cute. I really fell in love with it because I'm partial to black cats (I live with two) but the whole design is really darling. I put the ribbon together with velcro, because by the time we get going in September, I'll be in and out of that planner with ridiculous speed.

And another favorite part for me is this little pocket for lunch money that I put in the front (it was also an easy way to get good placement of the fish.) And I used this opportunity to try out one of my fancy decorative stitches on my relatively new machine. Be prepared to see much decorative stitching in the future...it was crazy-fun. Of course, it meant that in all of my non-measuring I had to trip the sides of the planner cover to fit in once I'd added the decoration, but after a few moments of the crafter's panic mantra: I-just-almost-finished-this-and-then-I-had-to-take-it-one-step-further-and-now-it-might-be-ruined, I managed to work it all out. So take that, August! I'm ready for you.

And while I got lost upstairs making my planner cover, Andrew got lost with his Sumi set.