A day off

After some rather stressful work-related meetings and conversations, I decided to give myself an entire day off. It's a stunning concept and one that needs to be revisited more often in this household. When we moved to Berkeley in the late 1980s, our realtor observed after a day of house hunting that she'd never seen anyone with the "drive to completion" that I have. (This was because I insisted on looking at every last house on the market.)

The drive to completion often serves me well. I generally hit deadlines and really crank on things when the end is in sight. That feeling of accomplishment that comes from getting things done is highly satisfying. But lately it's morphed into working seven days a week, and that's not healthy for anyone. Paul and I are both trying to remember that there will always be more work to do tomorrow, and that it's important to step back and just do something else every now and then.

So,my something else today was making split pea soup, taking a walk with a friend and Pearl, watching Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist (meh), and sewing. My mom gave me a couple of fat quarters when I visited her in January and I'd seen raves about the Lazy Girl Wonder Wallet, so when I saw the pattern at Home Ec I grabbed it. I made one a weekend or two ago and finished another today.

It's a great pattern: they're very quick to make and now that I've made the basic pattern I see all sorts of possibilities for modifying them—different sizes or pocket configurations, for example. The one change I will definitely make is to use a heavier interfacing in the main body of the wallet. I'm not sure why, but the flap flips up a bit on either side of the button when the flap is closed (the button is just decorative and hides the stitches that secure the velcro). I thought heavier interfacing might help. You may note that I have two sizes of velcro dots—the small one seemed a little too small, so I opted for the larger on the second wallet.


I also initially thought I'd use a metal silver-and-blue button that was on a shank, but realized that I'm likely to use this wallet when I walk downtown and don't want to haul a purse; the button with the shank would have been uncomfortable in the pocket of my jeans. So I used a couple of gorgeous pearl buttons I'd been saving for something. Guess this was it!