The Gillywatt and Domesticity

No, a gillywatt's not from Harry Potter. It's an Arctic bird Jeremy and I learned about this last week. In the short summer of the Arctic it nests high on a cliff. When the eggs hatch Mama gillywatt dives 250 ft below the ocean surface and holds her breath for about 20 minutes to get the fish that her little babies need. Jeremy turned to me and said, "And you think it's tough to feed our girls." OK, so at least I don't have to work THAT hard, but they're also done caring for their young in about six months. (I make no claim of spelling the name right or the details right, I have a fuzzy memory.)

Though feeding time may be intense around here, I have branched out a little more with my food skills. In the last two weeks I added poppy seed dressing and naan (an Indian flat bread) to my list of homemade goodies. Though this made me feel relatively impressed with myself, the Lord has a good sense of humor.

I decided I need to make comforters for each of my three girls. I can sew Christmas stockings, so how hard could this be? Ha, ha, ha. I enlisted the help of a friend who is a good seamstress and she took me to look for material. I forgot that things like that include skills such as matching colors. This is not a strength of mine. I half froze in the fabric store, overwhelmed by how many choices and trying to figure out how to put colors together. So I have somewhat commenced on this VERY intimidating project to me. I'm hoping to be done by Christmas.

Let's just say that mastering the domestic skills is a baby step process for me. Sometimes I pity my girls for my lack of textile skills, but then I remember I can teach them how to build fires, cook some yummy food over a fire, use a compass, and tie some fine knots. I wonder what fun things they will teach me.....