I Love Sewing and Knitting! ❤

These past few weeks, in addition to working way too many shifts (at my “part-time” job… grrrrr!), I have been madly crafting some organic, bamboo velour cloth diapers for a dear friend of my eldest Elfling. It’s been awesome! :0)

I made 14 diapers for her with some of my hand-dyed organic, bamboo velour; organic, cotton velour; and two different weights of fleece (200wt Wind-Pro and fuzzy). Each diaper has an inner of luxuriously-soft, organic, bamboo velour. Yum! 

This one is my absolute favourite diaper. Squish!

I’ve also been knitting like crazy! My Elflings insist I’m a robot, because they’re certain no real human could knit as fast. I assure them I’ve seen people knit much faster than I. ;0)

This is so exciting! I have a crazy-large stash of wool that I’m finally making time to work through.

Here’s a pic of some of the set I put together.

I just adore the colorway (Deep Space by Mosaic Moon) of this set. It’s bright but gender neutral, and so cozy!

Here’s a pic of the sweet, baby boy wearing the sweater. I have permission to share this photo, and I am super-excited to show how much cuter the sweater actually looks when worn by such an adorable, little person as this wee Elfling. Awwwwwe! ❤

Five years sober!

The end of June marked five years ago that I started a journey which took me away from drinking and self-destruction, and into a better life for myself and my family. It’s been a difficult road, and one I’m still making. I’ve had to admit one of the main reasons I drank was due to childhood sexual abuse. I was medicating my feelings of loss, violation, rage, lack of control, resentment, disgust, and horror with an excess of booze that both putrefied my entire body AND took away my self-control. Realizing that my drinking was causing me to feel the very things I was feeling from the abuse, I had to make a different choice. Self-destruction was ruining me and taking my family down with it.

I’d started drinking when I was 16-years old, which is also when I started being sexually active. I did stop drinking when I was pregnant with my first child at 18, but started drinking socially on occasional weekends when she was 4-years old. I really thought I was in control, and carried on this way until my daughter was 8-years old. I stopped drinking again when I was pregnant with my second child, and remained such until my youngest was 2.5-years old. While I was attending Mount Royal University for Journalism, I fell back into old habits with classmates, and started drinking socially again. This continued for almost three years until I was pregnant with my twins. Once again, I abstained from alcohol until my youngest children were 2, then believed, once again, that I was in control and could drink socially. Looking over the numbers, the past 24-years of alcohol abuse have been sporadically broken up, but the fact that they are there is a stain on my tapestry. Part of me wishes I’d made the choice to permanent sobriety years earlier, that I had realized and faced the withertos and whyfores of my devastating attacks on myself sooner instead. I didn’t though. I quit drinking for good 5-years ago, for reasons that included: health, happiness and family, and I’m better for it. My family is better for it. Life is fucking awesome!

Related post: Circling the Drain

Spoiler Alert!

I feel super-bad about not being very present with my beloved Veggiewitch Blog. I’ve been tied-up with: moving my Mama into her suite (which is awesome, by the way, and she is settling-in nicely); looking for a bigger house for us all to live comfortably (which we have also found, and, barring any unforeseen circumstances, we will likely move into in January 2013); Homeschooling my Elflings (grades 3 and 9 FTW!); trying to honour my daily posting challenge on Mouldylocks (365 Days of Awesome is harder than I thought!); and I’ve also managed a little bit of crafting for my “witchy” little business (diversification with a kinder, gentler, veg-friendly edge). The following are a few spoilers for things I’ll add to my shop on Etsy, Veggiewitch Designs.

I was getting frustrated with the number of lovely lip balm options that I just didn’t want because of beeswax in them, so this is my interpretation. Pretty simple, really, but it has no beeswax at all, and hasn’t been tested on any animals… other than myself and my Elflings. ♥

I got some really great feedback on my cream deodorant. Thank you to everyone who participated in the trials. As a result, I have perfected and finalized the formula, which is now totally stable and completely minimizes the amount of waste (no more stirring!) in the prototype. As well, I have a roll-on version, which many prefer for it’s ease and mess-free application.

This body butter is something I’ve been playing around with for a bit. Our skin gets so dried-out here, especially in the Winter (super-cold, forced-air furnace, dry climate…), and I wanted something that would work and last. This is it! A little goes a lo-ooooo-ong way.

And it works!

I’m doing a testing phase with some natural deodorant. *happy dancing* It’s made by me with 100% organic, unrefined coconut oil, so with the organic essential oil, there is a base note of coconut. It smells super-yummy, goes on really smooth, is applied like cream with your fingertips, and totally works. I was getting really sick of stuff that didn’t work, or reading deo labels that had combinations of aluminum, propylene glycol, and any number of the dirty dozen in them, so I made my own. WOOT! If anyone is interested in being a guinea pig tester for me, please comment on this post. It would be $3 USD for the shipping from me to you, wherever you are. ♥

Please let me know if you’d like lemongrass (citrus and floral – fresh and clean), lavender (floral, mild and sweet), unscented/coconut, or if you’d rather wait for bergamot (the scent of earl grey tea). The testers are 1 oz size. I would like to know your impressions on the scent, efficacy, feel, etc, as well as how long the tester pot lasts you. TIA! ♥

Also, I’m going to post my email address for those of you interested in testing, and want to contact me directly. Just contact me at: veggiewitch (AT) shaw.ca