About Me

I’ve had some kind of block lately and have to force myself to write. This is an exercise. “Write something.”

The website name was an exercise in self-acceptance many years ago. I grew up disliking my name, but later realized that might have been because my mother only called me it when she was angry. When she wasn’t angry, it was some cutesy endearment instead. “Janel!” was the call of adrenaline. But there’s nothing wrong with the syllables, so I decided to make an effort. If I’m going to like myself, then I must like Janel.

I was born in western Washington, and thought it was okay because I didn’t have anything to compare it to. Then we moved to north California when I was 12 and the sun came out. Dad moved us to a somewhat remote place, at least up at the end of a valley road, where I learned that love of the land is not just a romantic idea for western novels but a real thing. I want to talk about that more in a while. It’s already on my Blogspot. Then I got trapped up here again and been trying to escape ever since. There is a way out of the murky muck without leaving the comfortable RCW– it’s called Eastern Washington.

About me. Hm. Well, I’m decently smart if I pay attention, which isn’t always. I have a variety of interests to keep me amused. If a few people like me, that’s enough.

Internet publishing caught my attention from early on, when ISPs came with hosting and everyone had a yourhost.com/~you. My diary and photos of my children went up instantly.

The Barbie patterns came later. I had to invent a pattern for my daughters’ 1999 new body Barbies, so I thought I might as well share it. When I discovered the idea of page stats and looked at mine, I was surprised. I guess I wasn’t the only one who needed such a thing.

Check out my personal blog that’s been around forever, at https://janelwashere.blogspot.com/

Other current misc in WP format, for reasons. https://playground.janelwashere.com/

Here’s me current as of recently, in a dress made from a sheet and having not had a bath for some time since this is our cold new home and there’s no water but what we bring.

Middle aged white female with glasses and a white dress, standing in the woods with sunshine behind.

Howzat for a big old Cheshire cat. Just happy to be home. I’ve wanted a home for a really long time now. And now I have a lovely nice husband, too!

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6 Comments

      1. I forget what I was looking for when I first found the recipe, but I blundered back into your site looking for Barbie patterns!

        “Janel” is a pretty distinctive name, so it stuck in my head, along with the comment along the lines of “If you say chocolate cookies, people have expectations.” Is the recipe still online?

  1. Good morning from Australia, I am a therapy assistant and was wondering if you and your followers may be able to assist me with some simple hand sewn Barbie clothes to make with some kiddos I work with. Sewing is something they know nothing about but I think it would be so great to encourage kids to make their own clothing for their dolls. My grandmother use to make them with me as a child but I honestly can not remember how.
    have a beautiful day
    Katy

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