It's my birthday. Hooray! And I'm serving up some goodies, like last year. Care for a slice?
The price? Tell me your most embarrassing story. Moo-ha-ha (evil
laugh, twiddling fingers). Of course, I can never think of one of my
own. Never. Either my life's been dull, I'm not easily embarrassed,
or I'm in complete denial. Isaac, on the other hand, just shouted from
the other room that his whole life has been one embarrassing story.
After an hour of straining for an embarrassing memory, my best offering is a story Isaac insists I should find embarrassing:
My husband is a huge fan of The Lord of the Rings series. He claims to
have read the series at least 20 times ("about once a year since I was
twelve.") So, when one of the movies came out (not sure which), I
rummaged through my fabrics and old costume bits, and ran out to
various thrift stores to put together makeshift costumes for us to wear
(an act of love & support -- complete, unabashed geekiness). I
even got my sister & brother and their spouses on board. Isaac was
a leather-clad man of Gondor and I was an elf, of course. My dress was
some bulky, crazy dragonfly- inspired costume I designed in college. I
needed equally awesome hair, so I hopped from beauty store to beauty
store in search of long locks to add to my own. In one of those store,
I discovered these things called "hair rats," which are like long logs
of rolled-up hair. They're used for adding volume to buns and
beehives, I guess. I'd never heard of such a thing. Hold that
thought.
So, the movie geek fest was a complete disappointment on my end, I
couldn't find a parking spot in time and ended up running to the
theater, then hunting out my family in the dark as the opening credits
rolled. No one ever saw my amazing braided elf hair, glued on ears,
and repurposed-junk-jewelry headdress. Ah well. I do think Isaac, who
arrived in a separate car, had plenty of fun scaring small children in
his grungy leather garb and scraggily blond wig (with real yak hair
glued to his chin -- now that's commitment!) And that was the point,
after all, for Isaac to have a blast.
Ok, back to the story. So, some time later, in examining my hair
brush and its need of a de-hairing, I had a thought, "Hmmm. How do
those hair rat things work anyhow?" I pulled the hair from my brush,
rolled it up, and started playing. Not that embarrassing really, but strange enough to keep it to myself, I guess. I never did find
the perfect use for my homemade hair rat, I have a lot of hair already,
but I did leave the thing in my bathroom drawer.
Weeks later, along came Isaac, minding his own business, looking for
some sort of something, and discovered that abandoned hair wad for
which he demanded (with a mighty smirk) an explanation. He has a major disgust for lost hair (which makes the yak-hair beard even more remarkable).
I explained myself, the history, the fascination, the miraculous height of 60s hair and so on. Oh, he laughed. And. he. laughed. By the
time he got a grip, I was feeling a bit embarrassed. Isaac still can't get over it and brings it up to embarrass me whenever possible.
Ya, I know, I haven't set the standard very high. I guess I
could make a birthday wish for something terribly embarrassing to
happen this year so I'll never have a blank look again when asked for
my most embarrassing story. Or maybe posting that atrociously posey
photo of us in costume can be my new story (I was trying to be all "my hero!" campy, but that doesn't really come across). And, yes, I'm feeling a slight tinge of embarrassment now.
So anyhow, in consideration of all poor, generally unembarrassed
souls like myself, I'll give one stack of fat quarters at random, even
if your story's not very good ;) But the other stack, the other stack
goes to the most hysterically- horrible embarrassing story ever told.
So, bring it on! I'm ready for a good laugh... or cry.
Oh, and here's a token photo of Isaac & I as old folks (that's
some sort of plate behind Isaac's head). I found this treasure while
hunting for the elf photo. We were gussied up for a friend's 30th
birthday party. Laura calls this proof that I don't embarrass easily.
He really
wanted to know how to do that binding. He even learned how to do
perfect little corners. All of those pieces and details, and that long
wait for binding directions, then he handed it over to me with ten
minutes of hand-stitching to go (tacking the binding down) and said,
"Here mom, you can finish it." 
Oh, and I was looking back over the other doll blankets I made last
Spring and saw this mention of Shear Genius. I forgot to tell you guys
that I had an elevator conversation with the winner of the show while I
was in Vegas last month. He consequently missed his floor and had to take an
elevator back down. Whoops. 
