Obsession

Every year about this time I go through the whole, "I'm such a loser because I can't meet deadlines for gifts" whine. Why do I do this? Why do I have to only give gifts at Christmas? Why do I insist on making things when the recipient would be just as happy if not happier with a gift certificate to Bath and BodyWorks? I do this every damn year. EVERY DAMN YEAR! I start the year with the Tasha Tudor frame of mind that I will work all year creating gifts for the people that matter in my life. That goes pretty well until March, then I hit a snag(this year it was starting a parttime job) and come Thanksgiving weekend I'm in panic mode. I don't wait until the first of December to panic or the week before Christmas to panic, I begin my stress induced panic attack about two days before Thanksgiving when I realize it's flippin' Thanksgiving and I haven't even bought the turkey much less thawed it out and so it all begins. the joyous holiday season. ARRRGGGHHHH! To add insult to injury, between DS#2's birthday and DS#1 Christmas list I spent about $500 over the weekend and it all managed to fit very comfortably into two shopping bags. OUCH! That really hurt.

While going through some stuff under the pretense of "organizing" I ran across my The Scarlet Letter - Samplers, Needlework, Reproduction Samplers, Historic Sam wish list from early this year. After browsing the site I'm still in love with all the items on the list and as soon as the Christmas shopping is complete I plan to treat myself to one item on the list every week until I have everything on it. First on the list and more for emotional reasons, my maiden name is Gibson, I have to have the Margaret Gibson 1839 Reproduction Sampler and the second item on the list because I love mermaids and anything related to the sea, Reproduction Sampler Coraggio this sampler is on my list. Other can't live without items, Books recommended for charts of antique needlework - Page 3, the top two titles on this page, Animals Embroideries and Patterns and Embroideries and Patterns of 19th Century Vienna both by Raffaella Serena. Then on Page 5 and my #1 choice, it's the 5th title down on page 5 is the book Here Be Wyverns by Nancy Spies. The second book from the top, Old Italian Patterns for Linen Embrodiery looks interesting too. The last book on the list and I can't remember what page it's on, is Patterns: Embrodiery of the Early16th Century by Claude Nourry.

Believe it or not I work really hard at trying not to be so materialistic, but from the looks of the above list and all my dreams of owning my own LYS size stash of Koigu and Kureyon, not to mention the list of things I want from Nordic Needle, The Stitchery catalog, Patternworks, etc., I reckon I'm not doing very well in my goal of not acquiring so much stuff and for it not to mean so much to me. The facts are when Hurricane Ivan hit my area a few months ago other than family pictures I was pretty much at peace if we had lost everything we owned it was just "stuff" but on the bathroom counter along with the family pictures I also stored several rubbermaid buckets of stash. That's pretty wrong to associate the value of my stash with the value of my family pictures. Hmmmm really need to rethink those priorities and my value system.