We're Off!

We're off on a fabulous adventure--I should have lots of eye candy as we go along--

Quick Peek: Digital Studio, Autumn Issue

Did you know you could make digital collages with apps on your iPhone? Me, neither, until I got this issue of Digital Studio. I'm not offering this as a give-away--it's going to be saved for reference. Cool!

Moe Says "Hi"

Thought I'd show Moe's fabulousness--he looked so regal in his nest he made. Never mind that I try to anticipate their sleeping spots and put blankets or towels there, things that can be washed periodically when they get furry. Oh, non: Moe likes to find his own places, thank you very much, and lately it's been on piles of pillows. This is on the bed (where there is, of course, a fluffy blanket waiting for him, but noooooo) in the Voodoo Lounge. 

And The Winners Are~~

Nancy, you get the issue of Somerset Apprentice~~ 


Carol Leigh, the notebook is yours~~


And since Char the Mad Shopper never sent me her address, the issue of Art Doll Quarterly will go to the first US person (sorry, but I'm not doing international shipping) who posts a comment and sends me their address. I hope to get to the PO this afternoon, and the next trip won't be for a couple weeks.


Congratulations!

The Myth of Civility

Yeah, yeah, I know I've written about this before, but last night set me off again, so indulge me here.


Many people bemoan The Loss of Civility, harking back to some distant time when human beings were universally civil: kind, compassionate, well-mannered. Where everyone was on their best behavior all the time and where every conversation was both intelligent and entertaining. Those were the days:  The Days of Civility.


This is, of course, a crock. A myth. Just check in with Charles Dickens, for instance. Or anyone raised in the South in the 1850's, or. . . .


There has never been a time in the history of the world when everyone was civilized. Some people--I am one of them--believe we're born little savages and then must be socialized before being let loose upon the rest of humanity. More and more, we believe, the socialization isn't happening. So when we gritch about the lack of civility, we aren't harkening back to some Golden Age of Niceness but more to an imaginary time when all parents were like ours--because most of us doing the gritching had parents with similar styles, I'm guessing--and did their best to train us up in the way we should go. Spanking was involved. Yeah, I'll say it:  my parents spanked me, and I'm a better person for it. Did they hurt me? Seldom if ever. But there was always the IDEA that they might, that they'd be so thoroughly and totally disgusted by whatever I'd done that they would finally snap and whap me until I died, maybe just from boredom. Here's the point: I didn't want to risk it, so I didn't screw up much. I didn't learn how to act from school or church or society. I learned how my parents expected me to act and what would happen if I didn't and how acting The Right Way made everything easier and calmer and more pleasant all around.


We People imagine that the world would be better if everyone else had been similarly civilized by their own parents.


So. Last night? You're wondering what set me off this time. It was the guy taking a whiz in the parking lot at Starbucks. Standing inside the open door of his SUV, peeing in the parking lot. Now, this is not the first time I have seen a guy peeing in a parking lot--oh, lord, no, sadly enough--nor the first time I have seen a guy peeing in the parking lot of a place that serves food and drink. No again. But it was the first time I have seen a guy peeing brazenly in the parking lot of Starbucks, which has nice clean restrooms right there in the cafe that are always open and available. And--get this!--when I go in and talk to the baristas, it turns out that this guy and his female companion had sat in Starbucks for over an hour, making not one but SEVERAL trips to the restrooms.


[Also, they said, sitting in the corner making really weird noises; they thought at first they were having some sort of odd sexual encounter.]


You sit in a place and avail yourself of its restroom and then, when you're ready to leave, you pee in its parking lot? Does this not strike you, too, as just the teeniest bit hostile? In a "Take that, you stinkin' Starbucks people!" kind of way? 


I don't know anyone else sees this, but someone who pees in the parking lot less than 20 feet away from a very busy major street and just across the access road from the interstate--there's a reason for that. I, of course, suspect hostility and perversion, both. I suspect that, late at night, he's remembering this episode and how his naked parts were out in the fresh open air just yards from unsuspecting people in their cars, and--


Never mind. You get the idea, and there is no excuse for it. Period.


And that got me thinking about all the other bad behavior for which I can find no logical, blame-reducing excuse. The complete stranger who posted a comment on one of my how-to videos on YouTube this week, asking, "Does the carpet match the drapes?"


I read this and thought, "Whatever in the world possessed you to ask a total stranger, a middle-aged woman you have never even seen in real life, such a stupid and unsurpassedly rude question?" Just complete and total bafflement on that one.


Or the people who, when they win one of the give-aways we do here, will send me their address. Not a note saying, "Oh, gee, thank you so much for picking me! I'm so excited!" No. Not even their actual name, since they often use those irritating pseudonyms. No:  just their address. They send me an email with nothing in it but their address. Period. Like an invoice. (Well, not like *my* invoices:  I always put "Thank you" on my invoices.)


I could go on for many, many pages about this, but I won't. I'll just use those three examples from this past week and let your own experience go from there. As you can see, I spend much of my days totally gobsmacked, with my jaw hanging, wondering how on earth people got to the place in life where they decided that manners are a waste of time. When did this happen? You can't blame it on society, because that's not where those of us who were raised differently learned how to act. Society didn't teach me how to act. You damn sure better not blame it on the schools, because it's not the teachers' job to teach children how to be civil. No:  for some reason, parents are not teaching their children how to behave like creatures who walk on two legs and wear clothing. Oh, I can't even say that: my cats are more civilized than these people! They don't pee randomly in other people's spaces. They aren't rude. In fact, they habitually salute us--the humans in the house--and each other. They respect each other's space. They don't defecate near where they eat (they prefer to use the box farthest away from where they eat), unlike a loft apartment I once visited that had the toilet and the kitchen separated by a partition that didn't quite reach the ceiling, so you could, I suppose, sit on the toilet and exchange odors with whoever was cooking breakfast.


So I don't know. But wait! I just realized that the cats I'm going by are all neutered. Could that be the key? Take away the hormones, and people learn manners? Huh. It would sure be worth it to me if that guy in the parking lot were not only suddenly uninterested in exposing himself to strangers but, as a bonus, found himself also unable to reproduce. Then we'd be getting somewhere!


OK. I'm going back to work. Thank you for stopping by, and I hope that the rest of your day is marvelous. Pardon my casual attire, and please pass the canapés.

Video Review of the Autumn Issue of "Somerset Apprentice"

Watch the video:


Check out the site.

Post a comment if you'd like to enter for the give-away of the copy of this issue--I'll pick someone on Friday. Good luck!


XO

It's the Last Week of October: Have You Had Your Mammogram Yet?

Yeah, yeah--I know that by now you're kind of tired of the ribbons and walks and ads and nagging, but, hey: it's important. I know The Experts are now saying that mammograms might not be A Good Idea, blah, blah, blah. I don't buy it. I think they're saying that because of pressure from insurance companies who don't want to pay for them. Our own insurance company has always paid in full for a yearly mammogram, but I'm guessing that's not the way of the future. 


If you don't have insurance, check with your local women's clinic. This is important. I had my first mammogram at age 19. There was a lump, I went in and had it checked. Just fibrocystic stuff going on. But I've had mammograms ever since--for a while, I was having them every six months. I've had a needle biopsy and two surgical biopsies and have had every possible kind of lump-like thing except cancer removed, and I'm here to tell you:  it's worth it. It's worth the peace of mind of knowing you're doing your job to take care of yourself. Most mammograms will show nothing. Some will require further testing--the ultrasound isn't bad at all. Most of those will show nothing. Some will require surgery, and most of that will prove that whatever-it-was was benign. In the cases where there is a malignancy, finding it as soon as possible is the key--that's what you want to do. The cure rate for breast cancer caught very early on is very good--latest studies say that the 5-year survival rate for the earliest stages is 98%. That's pretty great, you know?


And guys? You get in there and check your own chest, too, OK? I know a man who had breast cancer. And, no, he did not have "man titties." He's just a regular middle-aged guy with a regular, middle-aged guy body. He's smart; he got it taken care of. Mastectomies don't look so impressive on you guys; you barely get a scar to look tough. It happens to y'all, too, so be aware. And while you're doing that, don't forget the testicular self-check, too. Yeah, yeah, The EGE's health students snickered at that, too, but that's OK. Snicker about self exams all you want, but do them. Or, gee, get your partner to do them if you're all squeamish. And that's all I'm going to say about that. Do whatever you need to do to make it a regular thang. Take it seriously, but don't stress.


Take care of yourself. Find a medical professional you like and trust so you can ask questions if you find something that needs further checking. There's a big, beautiful world out there, and you've got a lot of things to do in it--your health is what will let you do that.


I'm going to keep nagging at you because I'm entitled to. I've had a ton of mammograms. I've had earliest stage melanoma, so I have regular skin checks. My dad had colon cancer, so I have to have a colonoscopy every five years. Do I love this stuff? No. I am not a hypochondriac, and I don't like going in for medical stuff because I don't like hanging out with sick people because I hate being exposed to germs because I have too damn much to do to have time to be sick. But. If I'm going to have cancer, I want it to be like the melanoma:  find it early, get it taken care of, move on. Be healthy so I can work.


I want it to be like that for you, too:  good health and lots of it and plenty of time to do the things you want to do. 


Haven't made those appointments yet? Do it today, OK?

This Week's Give-Away: My Perfect Journal

In my online art journal group--theartjournal--we talk a lot about The Perfect Journal. What would it look like? What would be its salient qualities? What size? What kind of paper? What kind of binding?


I've used a ton of journals in my lifetime of journal-keeping, since the fall of 1973. Spirals, sewn signature. Ones I've made myself from paper I tea-dyed (every. single. page. omigod.). I've used big ones and small ones, fancy-schmancy expensive ones, ones given to me as gifts.


You get the idea.


For a long time, my favorites were the ones I had bound at Kinko's out of heavy cardstock and book board covers. I loved these--the cardstock was heavy enough for me to use Sharpies, and ink didn't smear very often, and the cardstock was cheap. But Kinko's said the heavy book board was too heavy for them to punch, and they said they wouldn't make any more for me. They even claimed I ruined their machine. (I don't buy this, as I remember back when the people at Starbucks used to claim they couldn't adjust the temperature in the cafe and said it was set by "Corporate." Now that they know us, we know this is not true and that they set it how they like it and then feign helplessness. I seldom believe anyone's excuse for why they don't want to do something/change something.)


And then I discovered these at Hobby Lobby. 

8" x 11", with heavy covers, and with heavy, smooth, pure white paper that feels almost as heavy as cardstock and on which NO INK (that I've tried so far) smears. This is like heaven for a left-handed person, let me tell you. They're $6.99, and with the every-other-week coupon, they're $4.54 each. I have been stocking up, and I have enough now to last me for several years, yeah, buddy.


So this week I'm giving one away. It's kind of silly, as postage will be more than the cost of the notebook. But I want to offer one to someone who maybe doesn't have a local Hobby Lobby where they can print out a coupon (here) and run out and pick one up for less than $5.


(And if you do go here and print out a coupon, be a mensch and print out half a dozen and offer one to someone in line behind you who maybe doesn't have one, OK? Thanks!)


So if that's you, post a comment telling me something about journals. If you toss your name in, you MUST check back on Friday so that if you win, you can send me your address right away (unlike the person who was supposed to win the little wooden pencil pod and has never gotten in touch, which is irritating in the most irritating way, but never mind, because now it's going to someone else) so I can get this out on Friday before the trip. OK? OK!


Good luck!

More Clothes!

Here's a denim jacket I altered. It was given to me by a friend who was clearing out her mother's house. It was a regular jacket--Mandarin collar, long sleeves, regular jacket length. I cut off the sleeves, half the length, and the collar and then appliqued it with felt--I buy wool jackets and felt yardage and then run both of these (in loads of like colors) through 1-2 cycles with hot water, plenty of detergent, a long cycle (18 minutes is the longest on my machine) and 2 rinses--to full it. So far tests indicate that I can then cut and applique it to cotton fabric with no further shrinkage in future cycles. I hope that my tests are indicative of universal results but just assume that they won't be--sooner or later I'm bound to run into trouble with something that just keeps on shrinking and has to be removed. 


Shudder. It will probably be on a piece I've beaded heavily. 


Here's the front--and a look I don't like. 

The thing with balance:  if you have form-fitting on the top, you need something to balance it on the bottom, and vice versa. This just looks dumb to me. Very dorky. But I've been forcing myself to wear all my various Born shoes and figure out things I can wear them with. This was an attempt, but I won't be doing it again. I hate it.


Here's a side view of the shoes, down there in the bottom corner (these photos were taken at Starbucks, of course). I love these shoes even though they look clunky. They're sooooo comfortable (I had a conversation with the chiropractor about why it is that it's more comfortable for me to wear heels if I'm going to be standing around; he explained, with demos, that it's because of the lack of curvature in my spine and neck. Huh. I'd thought it was just my imagination and an excuse to wear Cute Shoes, what seems a folly at My Advanced Age, Shoewise, but no):

Amusing myself with a cologne ad--you can see my brand-spankin' new sunglasses, as well. And, yes, they, too, are trifocals. This was The Month of New Glasses, with a new prescription, and after years of ending up with glasses that did not work for me--progressive lenses that had no peripheral vision, cute little glasses with tiny lens that might as well not have been there--I was determined to find glasses and shades that actually WORK for me and do not look like Old People's Glasses, as in the question a kid asked The EGE years ago: "Why do you old people always wear such big glasses?" I got regular glasses and sunglasses that I intend to wear for many, many years. I'll have the RX lens replaced as needed, but these frames are going to be around for a long, long time. I realized this expensive and time-consuming (multiple trips to the optician's office) thing was necessary when I spent most of The Big-Ass Eastern Road Trip sitting in the passenger seat wearing two pair of glasses--my sunglasses, for distance, and a pair of cheaters for seeing the iPhone and its maps. I mean, really--when you've got two pair of glasses on your face for miles and miles and MILES, you realize it's time to bite the bullet and Do Something. And stop collecting pairs of glasses that don't work and that you hate and that you never, ever wear. Hence these, which I love but am still getting used to--hard to walk in when you're used to being able to look down and see your feet and now cannot. I don't like wearing glasses but have had a RX since grade school. The optomitrist says I need to wear them only when I need them--I don't need to wear them all the time, like at the computer. For distance and for close-up, though. Sigh. Getting older isn't for the weak-willed, that's for sure.

And here's the back of that jacket. The eyes are much cooler In Real Life--they look matte here, and you can't see the 3-D eyelids very well--my favorite part (I can remove the eyes for laundering, if necessary):

Yeah, that's real hair!

Here's a denim skirt that obviously needed help. I found it at Goodwill last week, half off--so it was like, maybe, $2. It was exactly what I'd been looking for:  a sturdy denim skirt that was full enough so I can sit cross-legged in it, something I can't do in my altered Levi's skirts. Obviously, it's not working yet--it's too long, hitting me at a very unflattering and awkward-around-the-legs length. I've since cut it off to right below the bottom on my knees but don't have photos yet. You can see the front of another denim jacket--$20 new at (shhhhhhh) The Dreaded Wal-Mart:

I have Size Issues. I envision myself as being much larger than I actually am. For most of my life, I wore big baggy clothes, thinking they fit and never really seeing the overall picture of someone looking as if they'd been swallowed by fabric. Only lately, as The EGE began taking lots of photos, have I begun to think about how things fit. It looks hideously baggy here. I don't think it's actually that baggy--just full. It actually fits around the waist. It just looks hideous here. 


Tie-dyed orange and pink t-shirt, pink leggings (they came that color! and for $3!). Cool Lucky Brand shoes I got in Phoenix--The EGE found them for me; they matched the bag I was carrying that day, so how could I resist? The EGE is A Shopping Enabler. I swear I'll never shop with him or my friend Ashley, but I always do, and I always end up buying either shoes or bags. These shoes have just been to the Shoe Repair Guy, so I'm not going to be buying any more Lucky Brand shoes--I've had two pair, and the others I gave away because I couldn't walk in them. Cute but dumb and not well-made.


Here's the back of that jacket, also with the felt. I LOVE working with felt, even though preparing it is a lot of work. Plus it stinks like wet dog when it's wet. Gack. 

This is my favorite piece so far. I'm working on another jacket just like it, altering it to be "Voodoo Love." Doing a bunch of tiny, intricate beading right now. Sigh. It takes forever.


Maybe we'll get more photos today, so check back.


XO

Those Pants I Dyed

I thought I'd start this--what I hope to be a series of posts about wardrobe and altering and putting stuff together--with those green pants. The ones that were a blah green and got dyed, remember? Let's pair them with a $6 cotton long-sleeved (NOT "long-sleeve"!) t that I tie-dyed (dyed first in golden yellow and then in my own shade of bright orange):

Let's do them straight--how you could wear them if you were trying to blend in:

This look makes me feel like I'm in drag. It's soooo not how I think of myself. The tied linen shirt--got that at the Texas-Sized (not "size") Garage Sale for, I think, $2. Dyed it in golden yellow--it was a lime-ish green.

OK. Obviously, you've gotta roll up the pants. Then let's put an apron over them. And, yes, you wear this out of the house. Who wears aprons at home? How boring would that be? Extra-comfy Born flats.

Then let's top them with a chambray dress. I dyed this in golden yellow, too. It's my go-to color for almost everything--makes many colors pop. The dress itself needs some work, obviously. It's Eddie Bauer, found on clearance at least 10 years ago and never worn. Maybe 20 years ago, when I thought I'd wear it as an actual dress.

Shudder.


I switched out the buttons, but that's as far as I've gotten. So far.


Then there's this. It needs something else. The little silk shrug--I love it, but it needs more, too. It was a silk shirt from Goodwill. I dyed it (it was off-white), cut off the sleeves, cut about 2/3 off the length. But it needs embellishment; I just haven't decided what kind. I hate this outfit. I don't know why, but ick.

OK. And here's my favorite. I love this. The jacket thing--found on clearance at Dillards and dyed in--you guessed it!--golden yellow. The skirt I found at Goodwill--same dye-bath (it was a weak pea green). The underskirt hung down more, and the balance was all off, so I sewed it up about an inch (it's lace; it doesn't really show here). I was going to make an apron out of it, but this was WAY easier and serves the same purpose. This is the outfit I'd actually wear all the time--it feels right:

Well, maybe with different shoes most of the time.


The only non-sale thing in this whole series:  the shoes. The brown Borns--clearance. But the Keen Yoqies and the green Borns, and the orange ones? We won't talk about those.


And, as a bonus, here's the dress I wore to the jazz concert the other night. It's about an inch too short, maybe an inch and a half to two inches, and it was so tight through the chest I couldn't breathe. The neck is too high, and there's no slit in the dress, so you can't stride--there's no way you could dance in it. It's going to Goodwill tomorrow. Too bad, cos it's cute. The beaded black sweater was on sale at Dillards, and the pashmina/shawl was one we bought one year for my mom. Thank goodness I had it because the ballroom was FREEZING. I was miserable all night:  shivering, huddled in my shawl, not breathing lest I bust out some seams. Horrid.

Oh, yeah: the red glasses are brand-spankin' new. And we won't talk about how much those babies cost, either. I love them, and they're TRIFOCALS. And not those wimpy no-line progressives, either. I got a pair of those last time, and the lack of peripheral vision nearly made me hurt someone. How stupid:  glasses that let you see only right in front of yourself. These are fun--I'm just learning to wear them. I don't wear them all the time, though~~


Whew. This dressing-up-and-taking-photos thing is a pain in the butt. It's fun to see how things look and to share them with y'all, but man! I get bored and gripe-y at the photographer, which is soooo not cool.  We'll work at streamlining the process so we can show more, though--lots of cool stuff going on at the Voodoo Lounge~~

Podcast with Kimberly Santiago

On Thursday I got to talk to Kimberly Santiago, artist and author of Collage Playground, her first book. She's at work on her second, and she talked about the collaborative project she's working on called Project 2020, in which she works with children starting when they're in the second grade. 

I loved talking to Kimberly--you'll notice that this podcast is a lot more like a conversation than an interview--she's one of those people who makes you want to talk to her, so we're going to have to do some more of these on other topics. 


The podcast starts (due to my forgetting to actually start the recording software, which we'll just leave at that, thank you very much) with Kimberly explaining the kids' visual response to her question: "If you could have any wish. . . ." Don't worry--I go back and ask her more about it later, so you'll get more info as we go along. 

Here's Kimberly's blog, and here's her website.


Listen via the little player below, or at my blog page at libsyn.com, or over there in the sidebar, or at Notes from the Voodoo Lounge on iTunes. 

Some Garment Photos--And You'd Given Up on Me Already

Sorry for not getting these up sooner. Remember the stuff I was getting ready to dye?


See the khakis?

Here's the green ones now:

And the ones that were tan-ish:

I wear these rolled up a couple times. They sit low on my hips. As soon as I figure out what I like them with, I'll get photos. Promise!


Here's a skirt I got at Goodwill--I didn't dye it, but it was OK anyway:

Check out the fasterners:

It needs to be shortened--it's a little below mid-calf, a really unflattering length on me. I like skirts right below the bottom of my knees. I hate shortening full skirts--the hems have to be narrow, and then they want to roll up. I, of course, do not iron things, not unless it's imperative. I avoid anything that has to be dry cleaned or ironed. I haven't been to the dry cleaner since I wore a uniform in band in high school except to buy dry cleaner bags for the clothes in the storage building. I hate dry cleaning fluid. Ick.


Here's a brown linen skirt I adore.

 Yes, brown! But check out what I'm going to do to it after autumn:

Right now I'm leaving it plain and wearing it with orange and rust. I sewed the pink felt (from a wool blazer I fulled) to see what would happen in the wash. Nothing--it laundered perfectly--yay!


I'll post more photos as I take them--I'm in the middle of a bunch of wardrobe alterations and playing and stuff. Found out yesterday that the Salvation Army has half off their clothes on Friday and got a cropped denim jacket today for $2. I'll see how it launders. If it doesn't work out for what I want, I'll donate it back. $2 is way less than most people pay for entertainment, so I won't feel guilty however it works out. 

All the Winners!

Here we go~~


Mandi, you get the iro DVD--congratulations on being the one who realizes how cool this is!


Darla, the little tins are yours--congrats!


Sharon Robb-Chism--you get the copy of Belle Armoire Jewelry--yay!


Char The Mad Shopper--Art Doll Quarterly for you!


And now this:  if 1) you're still reading and 2) you put your name in for the little wooden pencil pod last week and 3) you still would like to have it, be the first one to post a comment and send me your address, and I'll send that to you--"Art Ist," whoever that was, didn't get in touch. Too bad. But lucky for someone else!


Have a great Friday, and stay tuned~~

Podcast with Lisa Myers Bulmash & Aimee Myers Dolich

I admit it: I know nothing about being a mother. But one of the coolest things about what I do is that I get to meet a lot of people, and the people I meet know about all kinds of things I know nothing about. Like motherhood. And trying to find time to combine that with creativity.







So this week I talked to two of my favorite moms about what it's like to find time to make art with little people in the house. Aimee, Queen of Artsyville, has two girls,

and Lisa, The Blogging Queen, has two boys, and both women are talented and creative, articulate and funny--plus they've managed to keep their sanity despite living in the house with someone under the age of six. 




As always, you can listen via the little player below, or go to libsyn.com by clicking the podcast link over there on the sidebar, or download via iTunes at Notes from the Voodoo Lounge.

Belle Armoire Jewelry, September/October Issue

Here's another little video review, plus a give-away of the issue. Leave a comment, and I'll pick someone on Friday~~

Art Doll Quarterly, Fall 2010

In addition to the little video book reviews I'm doing for F&W, I'm also doing some magazine reviews of Stampington publications. Here's the first one--a short review of the fall issue of Art Doll Quarterly. 


I'll tweak the process as I go along, but this was fun, and I wanted to share. Plus there's a give-away involved:  watch the video, check out the website, and tell me why you'd like to have this magazine. If you've read this far and post a comment, you'll be in the drawing--I'll pick Friday. 


Enjoy, and good luck!

Say "Hi" to Clarice~~

I've had gazillions of cats neutered in my lifetime, and it's always been fine. Except once, when a sweet, cuddly little male kitten went in to be neutered and came back transformed into a crazy animal who leapt over the fence and never let me touch him again and, within months, had mortally wounded two of the neighborhood cats. So, needless to say, I'm always a little leery of the whole surgery thang.


Clarice's went fine. She's home, back to her old self--racing through the house and being cute. Oh: and I just yesterday figured out why she's so clumsy on the kitchen floor. She skids and skitters and falls over, and I thought she was just a klutz. No. The fur on her feet is so thick she can't get any traction on the floor. It's like trying to run on a slick floor in fuzzy house slippers. Poor kitty. But she doesn't mind, and it is hilariously funny when she slides into the wall and keeps on going, her little feet moving as fast as they can like a cartoon character.


Anyway, so here's some video I put together. Ignore me whining about how she's going to have to go in for surgery--I'm over it. She's over it. Life is back on track.

Fabulous Clothing Score!

I had the BEST time yesterday in a completely unexpected way. Usually when I go to Goodwill (yes, the Home of Pee & Cockroaches & Wads of Hair, where I SWORE I'd never go again. Yes, that place), I'm taking a load of stuff to drop off, and The EGE and I go in just so I can see if there are any shirts or jackets I want to try to alter. I hardly ever look at anything else, and I hardly ever buy anything that I don't plan to cut up, dye, re-make, or otherwise change completely.


Yesterday I took a load of stuff by myself, so I spent more time looking around. While The EGE is perfectly content to go shopping with me, I always feel guilty because of the way I shop. I'm not a good shopper, and when I find something I might want, I have to carry it around for a while, thinking about what I might do with it, or how I'll use it, or if I'll really wear it. I have to think about what it might go with or how it might fit into my life. Often I then go and put it back and pick up something else and start all over. I do not like bringing stuff into my life that I'm not going to love and that's going to be in the way and that is, surely, someday going to have to be taken in a load to Goodwill.


All this, as you might guess, takes a while. A long while. I'm best off doing it by myself, because it can get ugly--hours of my standing around, thinking, picking things up, carrying them around, trying to find where I got them so I can put them back.


Yesterday I looked at stuff with new eyes. I've been looking at Lori Sandstedt's Flickr stream and the wardrobe remixes she does, and she mentions finding jeans at "The Magic Thrift" (it must be magic, indeed!) and so I wondered if Goodwill has any jeans. I knew they don't keep Levi's 501's, the only kind I've ever really worn until this year (I still wear them, but I've added others to the mix), but what kind *did* they have? And skirts?


Much to my delighted surprise, it turns out that there's someone here in town, someone who spends some money on clothes and doesn't wear them much and who's just about my size. Now, "about my size" is a mystery, as I always wore "about a size 10," maybe a size 8 almost all my life. Now, however, that size is anywhere from an 8 down to a (snort) 4. There's no way this skirt I bought is a true size 4, but there you go. The excellent thing about this is that most people will look at it, see it says "4," and let it go. I ignore the tags and go by what it looks like, which often leads to Humorous Dressing Room Moments in which I have wildly misjudged a size.


Yesterday was not one of those days, however. Yesterday was one of those days when this woman, whoever she is, had donated a bunch of stuff. Tommy Hilfiger jeans, three cool skirts, other cropped pants and still more jeans. And because the sizes are small, people had not even looked at them, apparently. After over an hour of looking and trying on--and let me tell you THAT was a feat, there in the Dressing Room of Pee, as I made sure I touched NOTHING. Nor did any of my own stuff touch the floor, nor did anything I might possibly want to buy. If, in trying on things, one of my feet had touched the carpet? I would have dialed 911 right there. Or asked someone in the store just to shoot me (and here in the land of Concealed Carry, most of the shoppers were probably packin').


All was well, however, and I went to the check-out stand with 6 pair of jeans, 2 pair of cropped jeans, and three skirts. I'd seen these skirts before but hadn't paid any attention to them, not thinking of "skirts" at the time. I kind of think these small-sized clothes hang around for quite a while.


And when it's all added up, the guy tells me that Sundays are always half price--so I get all these things--11 garments--for $20 and change. Yowza. You can't beat that. Along with some other super-cheap sale finds, I've got enough garments to both wear and alter to keep me clothes and busy for MONTHS.


Today I'm dyeing some stuff:

Some boyfriend khaki pants on sale, a linen shirt from the Texas-Sized Garage Sale, an Eddie Bauer dress I bought on sale years ago, a skirt I'm going to make into an apron, I think.

 You can see Miss Clarice helping out.

I'm dyeing three loads today. The first (already completed) is my go-to color, golden yellow. It's the under color for orange and acid green and tie-dyes with pink and/or orange, fuchsia, green.


Now I've got the tan khakis, already dyed in the golden yellow, soaking in dark orange. We'll see how *that* turns out. Dyeing khaki is always iffy--if it's a really light green, you can get a good acid green, but with any other color? Who knows how it'll turn out. Different every time.


I'm also working on this jumper that's going to be a really long vest:

Got some work to do on that one--took off the belt, but that's only the tiniest little beginning~~

Podcast with Dawn DeVries Sokol

You probably know her as the author of 1000 Artist Journal Pages, but right now everyone knows her for her latest book, Doodle Diary: Art Journaling for Girls. She's hard at work on a companion volume for boys, of course, which she says is a nice stretch for her, forcing her beyond her "girly" doodles into the world of graffiti and grunge--and she likes it!

As always, you can listen via the player below, or the link in the sidebar, or at Notes from the Voodoo Lounge in iTunes. Enjoy!

This Week's Give-Away #2

Years ago I got hooked on making little shrine pendant box things from old Altoid tins and milagros/milgritos. I made a bunch, sold some, gave some away. These are two that I started on and never finished--I moved on to something else.

The tins--The EGE fired up the grill and roasted a bunch of them for me. He did a ton of metal bottle caps, too--his brother had some soda machines and gave us all the caps, and The EGE cooked them. I wonder where those are? Hmmmmm.


Then, after they cooled (duh), I sanded them some and drilled some holes in them. The winner will get both of these--the one that's started and the one that isn't. The one on the left has a pair of legs included--what I did was drill tiny holes where I wanted the legs (on the ones I finished; this one doesn't have holes yet) and then attach them with head pins, leaving a little slack so they'd move. Then you can collage the inside of the box (hint:  make sure you don't glue anything over the inside edge of the lid so that the box will still close securely. Guess how I know to check this).

The leather cord may need to be replaced--it seems OK but may be brittle, since it's been years since I did these.


So what would you do with these? How would you finish the one on the left, and what would you do to the other one? Post a comment, and then check back on Friday~~

Good luck!

This Week's Give-Away #1

I've got a couple of things that need new homes this week. The first is a promo DVD sent to me when I was working on the Belle Armoire piece about Peggy Russell. It's short, of course, but I'm thinking that if you're a fan of iro Design, this is something you'd enjoy. Go here to find out more, and then leave a comment and tell what grabs you--I'll pick someone on Friday. 

Stay tuned for more~~

Look: Bling!

I love shiny. I love bright colors, stuff that sparkles. I like sequins and glitter and rhinestones. I'm just lucky I restrained my self from leaping into the whole Ronco Rhinestone Setter craze back in The Day.


My taste was, as you might guess, the bane of my parents' efforts to form me into a Person With Taste. I had taste all right, just not the kind for which they hoped.


So imagine my glee the other day when I went it to Dustee's, one of those  girly-girl shops full of cheapo stuff that's going to fall apart the day after you buy it, stuff that's horrendous in its gaudiness and fabulous in its sparkle. I didn't look twice at the cheap plastic bags and suitcases and bible covers; I was after a replacement rhinestone. My friend Linda Rael gave me a pair of fabulous earring-things--things that go over and around the ear--that her grandmother(? great-aunt?) wore as a ballroom dancer. They're fabulous, and I wore them immediately--we were at Adorn Me! in Houston last March--and then noticed that one of them had the largest rhinestone missing. We searched all over, and I've looked in Michael's and Hobby Lobby and everywhere else for a replacement, but they don't make them big and sparkly--the rhinestones in the craft stores are bland, flat, ugly imitations. 


Hence my foray into Dustee's, where they have tons of cheap rhinestone jewelry with rhinestones that are meant to be sparkly. They have tiaras! I don't need one of those, since my niece-in-law gave me hers, which is so much cooler than any I've seen anywhere else (it's the one you see in some of the videos--thanks again, Stephanie!). Anyway. So to Dustee's. And there on the counter was a box full of earrings on clearance for $1 a pair. Since I didn't have the rhinestone-missing earring with me, I wasn't sure what size I needed to replace it, so I bought a pair that had a bunch in all different sizes. Brought them home and fell in love and thought how much fun it would be to actually wear these--like in all 10 holes in my ears! Ten sparkly earrings, all at once!


So I went back and spent $16 and got these:

And have been testing them out to see if they're going to make my ears itch--if so, they now have plastic sleeves you can slip over the posts. (So far, so good.)


Once upon a time I looked down my nose at fake jewelry. I, like most other women, had bought into the Myth of Diamonds--how rare they are, how valuable, how they Mean Something. I had no clue about the diamond mines of South Africa, about the misery of the people forced to work there, about how diamonds are quite plentiful, once you get past the whole forcing-people-to-dig-them-out thing, and how companies that sell them buy them up and keep them off the market to artificially inflate the price. Kind of takes the whole romance out of owning that Keepsake Diamond, doesn't it? So while I have and wear the diamond necklace The EGE bought for me when we were dating, and I have a couple rings and several sets of studs, I have no interest in ever buying any more. But I do love sparkle. Oh, yeah, baby. I'm thinking that, someday, it would be fun to have HUGE cubic zirconia or some other really sparkly stones set in gold or silver--some metal that wouldn't get funky--and wear them constantly. With the tiara, of course. 


The whole mystique about diamonds, the reverence, the attitude of women who have Important Pieces--that owning these pieces of jewelry indicates their worth, for example--is kind of baffling when you stop and think about it. You've seen it. Women with Big Stones, usually given to them by a man, seem to believe that the stones mean something, and that they themselves are important because of them. Very odd, again when you think about it, this attitude about stones that come from carbon and are harvested at the expense of human beings' welfare.

And fun to riff on, you've got to admit. Then you can think about our concept of "value" and of what is considered "classy" and what is considered "tacky" (even the word "classy" is considered tacky) and who gets to decide.


Or you can just pile on the bling and sit in the sun and slowly turn your head from side to side and watch the rainbows dance. That's what I'd recommend.