A Bunch of Miscellaneous Stuff on A Friday

Good morning, my little chickadees! I am so very amazingly proud of myself in a total Donald Trumpish sort of way, minus the dead-ferret-on-top-of-the-head hairdo, that I figured out how to enlarge everything on this monitor. When I bought this super-duper iMac last year, I got the largest screen available--27"--so I could, you know, see stuff. And while it's groovy and all, everything is the same size it would be on a much, much smaller monitor, with just a whole bunch of white space on either side. I knew I could click on the "AA" up there on the toolbar to make it bigger, but I never did. I just kind of squinted along. And then yesterday, for some reason, I started clicking that every time I opened a window, and whoa! What a difference. Now if I could just figure out how to make it stay that way, from window to window, all the time without my having to do anything about it. Nevertheless, I'm happy. It's silly to have a huge hulking screen taking up over half the desk if you've still got a 12-point font.

First, before I whinge and stuff, I want to make sure you've been over to CreateMixedMedia.com this morning, where my post is about this cool thing we're going to do related to small-art-business questions. We're collecting your legal and financial questions about starting an art business, and we'll get An Expert to answer them. That's the beauty of my working with these people: they have a TON more resources than I ever would. So go over to The Creative Life, read the post, send us your questions (and I say "us" in only the loosest sense, because you can rest assured that I am not going to be giving you any legal advice. My idea of legal advice? Don't do anything anywhere with anyone or anything ever because you know how most people think, "Oh, I won't get caught"? Yeah, well, we're the kind of people who would ALWAYS get caught. So don't do it. Just sit there quietly with your hands folded on the desk and don't suck on the crayons.

Oh, wait. I was channeling Miss Sterns, my third grade Art Teacher from Hell. Never mind.

Where was I? Oh, so go there. Read that. While you're there, read Karen Wallace's excellent column about boundaries. I read it this morning and am really thinking about what she said. While I'm good at setting boundaries and have few problems, I do have one person I see now and then who seems to think that, since I don't have A Real Job, I owe it to the few liberals (maybe 12, I think. In a city of over 100,000) in the community to be more involved. He's always suggesting stuff, and when I say, "Gee, you know, I don't really have time," he rolls his eyes. I come away from every conversation feeling both hopeless about the dire state of affairs and how we're all doomed and how it's only a matter of time until there's nothing left, and guilty for being such a total slacker.

I hate this about myself. Because of the way I was brought up, blah, blah, blah, I internalized the belief that hard work is the measure of your value as a human being. If you work hard, you're a good person. If you don't, you're not. But you can't work at just anything! Oh, no. Working hard at being an exotic dancer? Non. Working hard at being a stand-up comic? Nope. Working hard at being, oh, an exploration geophysicist? Alrighty then! I even thought of majoring in geology, just to impress my unimpressible dad. The one and only course I took quickly convinced me that the only thing AT ALL interesting about geology was the part about dinosaurs, which I adored. The rest was as dry to me as day-old toast. Without the butter and strawberry jam.

For the most part, I minimize contact with people who think that, because I stay at home all day and often don't get out of my pajamas until after noon, I am a complete and total slacker. People who think I should volunteer or take part-time work, who wonder why I'm not still subbing or working for animal control or trying to get my Ph. D. and, you know, Do Something with My Life. Former employers, family members, neighbors--to them, I'm just someone who doesn't have a job.

Yeah, I got my buttons pushed. It's been a week where I've made the deadlines just by sheer willpower, plowing doggedly through one after another, holding the carrot in front of my face. The carrot? The carrot is making the balsa wood dividers for the drawers I'm going to use to organize my embroidery floss. I'm really excited about that, so it's my carrot. Have I worked on those this week? Not yet, but the carrot is still there, dangling, just out of reach.

Now, I know enough about psychology, which I think was my minor (I can't remember, and I feel all Dilbert's Boss about that: in one comic strip he tells Dilbert he can't remember his major in college, and when Dilbert professes amazement, he says, "I don't bother remembering things I can write down." (No, I didn't remember this: I have it laminated and stuck to the door of the refrigerator.) Apparently, I don't have my minor written down anywhere. I could probably google myself and find out, though.

[Here I actually snorted.]

Anyway, I know enough to know this is about *me* and not about anybody else, not about the guy I talked to or my parents or whatever. It's me thinking I don't work hard enough. Even typing that makes the sensible logical part of me laugh like a crazy person, but there you go. I obviously have Issues still to work on, even at my age. And isn't that a surprise?

OK, I've got to speed it up here--I just got a phone call and have to go shower and get dressed--more on that shortly.

It's been an unsettled week, starting out with the antibiotics for the ear infection from the second piercing. Then, on Tuesday, Moe had what we think was an allergic reaction to something--I got off the phone from an interview, and he was pacing and licking himself, throwing himself down and trying to lick his back, quivering like horses do when they've got flies on their back. I brushed him and wiped him down with a damp washcloth, trying to help. He said he was having trouble breathing (he looks me in the eye and breathes through his mouth and then shuts his eyes, very plainly, and makes an adenoidal noise). I called his vet. He used the litter box and then threw up twice, and I called her again. She came and gave him a short-acting steroid, and he was better, but he obviously feels lousy. This morning I started him on the antibiotics she left--they usually help. But I can't relax when someone I love is sick--it's one of the things that makes me crazy (and, yeah, I know:  there are rather a lot of those things). So I'm checking up on him all day, asking him how he feels, petting him so he knows I'm trying to take care of him. He's not happy with me At. All. If he's not loads better by Monday, we're going to have to try to figure out what's going on. I don't even want to think of the possibilities. Please don't tell me any cat-health-related horror stories. Please.

I've been thinking about something else, something I've noticed from the podcasts. I keep track of the stats through my podcast host, noting which ones get a lot of downloads and which ones don't. We--I and the people I talk to--notice the comments here and on the site, and I'm always thrilled when they get to read how much people enjoyed listening. The podcasts are kind of a big deal to me. I pay every month to have them hosted, and doing them takes a lot of time. For a 30-45 minute podcast, I start with about about 60 minutes of conversation. I edit it, which takes 3-4 hours because I listen, go back, cut, listen, go back, tighten, listen, go forward five seconds, go back, cut--all the way through. I want people to like how they sound, and I want listeners not to have to listen to Skype noise or long pauses. Then there's the text, the images, uploading to Dropbox (for CreateMixedMedia), the host website, my blog. All together, it takes a full day to get a long podcast ready to go. I try to find people to talk to who will be interesting and informative, who are comfortable talking, and--big deal--who have the time to talk to me for an hour without a script. I don't want to do the same people who've done all the other podcasts and who've been talking about their work for years, saying pretty much the same things. But you know what? Those are the people whose podcasts get the downloads and the comments. When I podcast someone with something to say, like Tom Braxton, who's not only a terrific musician but also a brilliant guy and a lifelong teacher who has really thought about creativity and the work it takes to make a life of it, guess what? Or with Greg Davis, a photographer who quit his corporate job, bought a camera, and began traveling the world taking photos? These are fascinating people, but do people listen? Do they comment? No. I was embarrassed. I find these people, ask them to do me this favor, take up their valuable time, and for what? As far as they can tell, no one's listening.

Oh, sure--y'all listen. The subscribers listen. And some few people really get into what I'm trying to do, talking to creative people from other fields. But then I do a podcast with someone who's been everywhere and talked to everyone, and they get a ton of downloads and lots of comments, and I realize that while people may claim they want to be introduced to new people doing cool stuff, what they really want is to find out more about the few famous people they already know. And you wonder why you see the same people on all the blogs and in all the magazines. Fame sells, and don't you ever doubt it.

This makes me tired.

OK, I'm going to quit before I start grousing for real. I've got to go shower and stuff because I've got to go pick up orders for some blood work. I went in yesterday for the hand x-rays to find out what's going on with my thumbs, which are newly irritating and giving me some grief. He got the results--this is the chiropractor--and called this morning and says he can't see anything with the thumbs but that the fingers don't look so great, and he wants to try to find out exactly what's going on, whether it's just galloping (no, not his word) osteoarthritis, passed to me from my dad, as we've long assumed or whether there's something inflammatory going on. Everyone has always asked if I've had blood work done, but because the distal joints of my fingers--the ones at the ends--are the ones affected so far, we've all assumed that kind of ruled out RA (with RA, those joints are seldom affected--I wonder why that is? If I had time, I'd do some research. Oh, wait! I have plenty of time because, you know, I just sit around at home in my pj's! Well, gee--I'd better snap to it, huh?)

So that's the boring, self-involved round-up from here. Sorry not to have more interesting stuff to share, and sorry this week hasn't been full of exciting stuff to show and tell. But you know, there was that podcast earlier in the week. . . .

Podcast with Christine Doyle and Tonia Davenport

I was going to title it Podcast with My Editors, but then it wouldn't turn up if someone were doing a search, so never mind. Today I got to talk to Christine, who's the Editorial Director for the F+W Craft Community--she oversees North Light Books~~

~~and Tonia, who is the Acquisitions Editor, which means she gets to search out new authors for North Light.

I work with them over at CreateMixedMedia.com and knew you'd love hearing about all the stuff they know--between them, they have a lot of experience and pretty much have their fingers on the pulse of the mixed media community. Plus they're just nice people.

As always, you can listen here, on iTunes at "Notes from the Voodoo Lounge," and at my podcast host blog. Enjoy!

So What Are You Working on Today?

Yeah, yeah, I know: some people actually *get* the whole concept of "weekend" and "relaxation" and "doing nothing." I know that. Some people get it completely. I, however, do not. To me, the weekend is a time when everyone else is off work, so I don't have to check email to see if someone needs something or has something that has to be done rightthisveryminute. That means it's a time when I can do my own stuff, stuff I like to do but never have time for. (Oooh, nice end prep!)

One of the things I like best in the world is problem solving. You've got a problem, I'll come up with a solution. Whether it's health-and-lifestyle related or something about organizing your space or how to fix a recalcitrant deadbolt lock, I'm your woman.

Well, not that I have a ton of technical expertise. Snort. That's hardly the case. And not that you're particularly going to LIKE my solutions. But I love figuring ways to make things work. Since I've been working hard lately, and since I knew everyone and their dog would be totally out of pocket today, with even the grocery store--gasp!--closed for Easter Sunday, I tackled a couple of things I've been thinking about.


Here's the first one. The windows across the front of our house and the one in the Voodoo Lounge have those wooden matchstick blinds over the windows. While these are groovy and cool and everything, they afford no privacy at all:  you can stand outside [yesterday I was thinking about how someone came up with the words "inside" and "outside," and I imagined them working on a wall that was going to be part of a house and talking about it, like maybe where the mud plaster would go: "Which side are we plastering? Are we putting that in the in side of the wall, or the out side?" This makes me happy to imagine, this conversation]  at night and see inside, see shapes and colors and details, just as if there were no blinds at all. I didn't want to add drapes or curtains--those would be just an invitation for the cats to party while we're sleeping:  Clarice is just looking for something new that's climbable (and do NOT feel sorry for them--in that photo? That thing to the left? That's their top-o-the-line 6-ft. carpeted climbing post. You'd think they would be grateful, huh? Yeah, right on that).

I could have used spray adhesive and put some kind of paper or fabric over it, but that would have been 1) tacky and 2) non-removable without leaving sticky residue. So I heaved the big sigh and got out the huge swatch of fabulous orange cotton I bought at some estate sale--yards and yards of this stuff--and starting making some panels. I finished one and got it sewn (yes, I sewed it in place; I'm thinking I'm going to give in and use dots of tacky glue on the others, because trying to sew over those matchsticks and getting the thread caught on the ends nearly drove me insane, plus it was painful because I had to do it while the blinds were hanging to make sure the fabric hangs right) in place to check. It's OK, plenty opaque, looks great with the light coming through. So I've got the other 4 torn to size and pinned and ready to hem. Then I'll iron them again, take down each section of blinds (blind? is it ever singular? Ooohh--and think of the etymology:  to make blind! Used in this sense from 1771).

Anyway. Where was I? Oh, yeah:

And then, after I get those done today (and it's to the boring part for me, the part I don't like so much. I love the figuring-out-how-to-do-it part, and I love the part where I finish and get to show The EGE. I just don't much care for the slogging part in the middle once I've got it figured out and have done one and know it's going to work. Boring. But without it, you don't get to the Showing Off part. Alas.)

 So after that, I get to work on this. It's also at the slogging-it-out part, though. Too bad for me. But figuring it out has been fun. Can you tell what I'm making? It's from those cabinets I've shown you before, the ones I had built to house rubber stamps and that now hold almost everything, but--most important!--my beads. What am I going to put in this drawer? And--the bigger question--how many of these am I going to make? (That last question isn't for you to guess; it's what I'm trying to figure out).

I wonder if Michael's is open today. I doubt it. Nobody's open today, which I find offensive, really. We have to go to Barnes and Noble--there are some of us who go there every Easter to support them because they're virtually the only store in town that opens. The Dreaded Wal-Mart is open, of course, but they don't need our support. Barnes and Noble doesn't either, but hey--they're bucking the trend and risking the wrath (and boycott) of the majority of the population.

What that's about: I bought enough balsa wood for only one or two drawers, not knowing if I could make it work. Now that I see it WILL work, I want more, but I'll have to wait until next week to go buy it. And that irritates me--I don't back The Behemoth out of the driveway and drive its gas-guzzling self all the way across town for something. I wait until the weekend when we have other errands we need to run. Having a huge SUV has actually saved me a ton of gas--I don't drive it, and I'll walk downtown rather than drive, and I consolidate errands whenever possible. So this makes me grumpy.

Anyway--back to work. Laundry, sewing, more cutting of balsa. Have you guessed what I'm making?

And what are you making today? Hope you're having fun and getting to solve lots of problems--and isn't that just the best?

XO

Do Something. Do Anything.

This week over at CreateMixedMedia.com, we talked about Making Bad Drawings. I showed you some of my bad drawings, and I showed you some stuff you might want to do with them, and then I showed you what I did with one of them.

And then this morning, in one of those perfect moments of sychronicity, when it seems like everyone's on the same page, the fabulous Melanie Testa tweeted a link to this video, by Lev, of Ingredient X. (And, yeah, you definitely should go there and check out more of his videos, because they're wonderful.)

I had to quit what I was doing--and I'm ironing tea-dyed fabric to freezer paper, so it wasn't like I was sitting around scratching my nose or something--and share. And here it is.

See how it all fits together to tell you the same important thing? Isn't life wonderful like that, when it heaves the big sigh and decides it's time to give you a little push?

Go. Do something. Do anything.

XO

What Writing Is

I've been working this morning and was thinking, as I got up to get yet another cup of coffee, that people who don't write all the time must have a completely different idea of what "writing" is. Writing as a way of life. Writing as work. Writing as an art.

I am not the world's best writer. Far, far from it. I am too left-brained, too plodding, too given to thinking of writing almost mathematically. Not that I know anything about math, which would make thinking about math just the teensiest bit difficult. There are writers whose skill makes tears come to my eyes--sentences, even just phrases, that are so beautifully crafted that I want to lick them. Chew them up and swallow them. I don't know what that means, but that's true:  I see fabulous writing and want to consume it.

I don't mean flowery, glittery, emotive writing. I hate that. I hate writing that goes on and on and never gives me a single, graspable concrete image. Some of the most popular writers are very evocative and very emotive and colorful and flowery, but when I read their writing, I'm left feeling as if I've eaten cotton candy. All fluff, no substance. I don't like poetic prose. (I don't even like poetic poetry; I like narrative poetry.) If I can read something and come away with one or two perfect sentences, sentences that do what a sentence should do--tell you something clearly and succinctly and so wonderfully that you can see it or feel it or smell it or hear it or experience it exactly as the writer intended--then I'm happy. It's what I work for, in my plodding left-brain way.

What I was thinking this morning is that people who write but don't live it, don't think about it and love it and dream it--that they must believe writing is about laying out the information in a logical order, maybe tossing in some adjectives and adverbs to add a little zip. What I believe is that good writing occurs in the interstices. It's not the one sentence following the previous. That part is easy, if you pay attention. The part that's hard is the subtle connection between the two sentences. The reader has to believe that the thought or description or explanation is so seamless that there is no gap, no pause, no--well, no seam.

I was trying to explain what I was thinking about to The Ever-Gorgeous Earl, who is, in truth, my Everything. You think I'm being all sappy here:  My Everything. Nah. What I mean is that he does everything for me:  he cooks stuff that is healthy for me, he shops, he cleans, he drives me places. He's the person--the only person--to whom I can vent about things that drive me nuts. He listens to me rant, and then he cooks me some tofu. And he generously serves as Listener:  if I'm working on something important, something I want to be as nearly perfect as I can make it, the only way to tell what it sounds like is to read it out loud. While I can do that when I'm sitting here all alone, it's not the same--I tend to stop in the middle or pause to correct something. If you have a Listener, you read all the way through. All formal and stuff. You know.

This morning I was reading out loud to him while he was hanging out with the cats, and I stopped, and he said, "?" and I tried to explain that there was something missing between two sentences. They seemed to follow logically, but there was a gap, a little space between them that bothered me. I can't explain this because I can't put the paragraph here to illustrate it. It's something so subtle that sometimes just exchanging one word for a synonym will work. Sometimes it requires more than that. The worst is when you realize that the problem between the two sentences is a shift in tone or focus that's going to require that you rewrite a significant chunk of what you've already written and with which you have, almost certainly, fallen in love.

And that's the problem, especially with new writers. You work hard and craft something you can be proud of, paragraphs that can hold their own, and you fall in love with them. You've got this sentence here that you really worked on, and then this one here that fairly glows, it's so wonderful. You revised these maybe a dozen times. You love them like you love your favorite recipe, altered and tweaked until the flavors sing together.

Except this sentence isn't singing. In fact, it's not playing that well with its fellows; the neighbors on either side aren't taking it into their bosoms.

This morning I think I solved the problem with a parenthetical addition, "that connection with other people," that seemed to fill the interstice and make everything flow. Maybe not--now that I go back and read it again, it seems a little clunky. But for me, that's always a problem: I read something and love it. Then I realize it doesn't work. I sacrifice it, mourn a little, find something else that can take its place and shoulder the burden a little more elegantly. I think I'm done. I go back later and read it again and think, "Eh, maybe not." I try something else. That's it! I LOVE this!

Two hours later I read it again. What was I, on crack? Where did I get "onerous"? How does that fit into a how-to involving Play-Doh? Good lord, woman, you need to shut down the computer and go beg to be allowed back on the rolls of substitute teachers. While you're at it, you should maybe install a better thesaurus (I say "install," instead of "buy," because, really, who buys reference books any more? I ask you).

I don't know. Maybe I've solved the problem, and maybe I haven't. The good thing is that I adore thinking about this, about focusing my world down to one little patch of words, maybe half a dozen, and working with those and thinking about denotation and connotation and relationships, about assonance and repetition and alliteration and parallel structure.

Geek me.

The bad thing is that this will never make me rich, and it has made me very odd, and I spend way, way too much time thinking about things that no one else will ever notice.

The other good thing, though? It makes me very happy that I get to do it, anyway.

Podcast with Ari Seth Cohen of Advanced Style

Oh, my little chickadees, you've heard me rave about Advanced Style before. Many times, probably. It's one of my favorite blogs, and not just because I love the people involved, like Debra Rappaport, whom you met here. No, I love more than anything the affirmation that you don't have to give up and be dowdy just because you're over 50. Or 70. Or 90. You can have fun with how you look and the clothes you wear, and you can spread joy just by going out and being yourself. Ari, the creator of Advanced Style, has shown us that, and we love him for it.

So of course I had to talk to him. You knew that, right?

And here he is:

Come Draw with Me~~

Over at CreateMixedMedia.com, I'm making Bad Drawings and want company. Plus you get to see how bad my bad drawings really are. Yikes!

The Finished Cell Phone Case

Here it is. The flap is a little snug to snap, but I think that's a good thing. The heart covers the back of the snap, the prong things.

I had fun doing this, so I'll probably make some in other colors eventually. Or not. Depends on if I start something else I love. I definitely have plenty of thick wool felt and silk for the lining and floss and beads, and I have 5 more magnetic snaps, so. . . .I would make some in a bunch of colors just to have, but, man! There are so many things I want to make, and if I make multiples just because it's fun, then I won't get to make any more of, oh, the leather roses I did as a test. Or the animals I'm working on. Or the journal skirt--it needs more stuff. Yiiiiii--I need more hours in the day, more hands, more free time.

Coco le Moco

Her name is Coco, and Coco le Moco doesn't actually make any sense in any language--"le" is, I think, French, although since I Don't Do French, I could be wrong. "Moco" is "booger" in Spanish, and Coco is a booger, indeed. Hence, Coco le Moco.

She doesn't live here, although we'd be hard pressed to prove that. She, like Humphrey, actually belongs to the guy down the street, who has visitation with his kids every other weekend (or so we surmise). Humphrey started hanging out at our house, terrified of loud noises, newspapers, the broom--you name it. So the guy got Coco. She started getting pregnant when she was about 5 months old. The kids kept us informed. I'd keep telling them they needed to get her spayed, but they were delighted with the prospect of kittens. Coco kept having miscarriages, and this year I finally asked the guy if I could get her spayed. He agreed immediately (I'd made the mistake of telling our vet who owned the cat, and she wouldn't spay her without permission, of course). I was happy to do it just to save her from the cycle.

So Coco is spayed. And spoiled. And needy: she talks constantly about wanting to be in your lap, but that's not enough: she wants you to be petting her and talking to her, too. Fortunately for us, the people next door like her, and she adores the man, so she spends time over there with them, getting petted and being further spoiled. We're terrified the guy is going to get yet another kitten for his kids. I won't say any more because it makes me grit my teeth a lot.

Anyway, long story just to introduce these cool photos from yesterday, when she reminded me of The Princess and The Pea out on our porch:

Blah Saturday & RX

Ick. And ick, ick, ick. And that's trivializing it, but I don't know what else to say. I'm not sure what's going on, but the people at the Farmers' Market this morning said we've got big fires to the north, in Andrews, and to the south. All day the sky has been not-blue. I can't tell if it's grey or brown or some unholy combination of the two, but it's ugly. Butt ugly. And scary. And sad. It smells of smoke, even though you can't see it this week, and it makes your eyes burn and your soul feel tired.

They arrested a guy for setting one of the fires--I don't think it was this one, but another one. [And just FYI: we here in West Texas are in the middle of one of the worst droughts anyone can remember, with fires burning everywhere. Neighbors tell of foxes and coyotes coming into yards looking for water. The EGE keeps a plastic litter box (bird-leg height) filled with water out on the sidewalk. Some mornings it's completely empty.] If I were In Charge of Things, this guy, who's been arrested for arson before, would be dead. Yeah, harsh, I know. But what people don't think about in thinking about the danger to people and property and homes and livelihood is:  all the animals who are killed in fires or who are displaced and then die. I can't even think about it. But this guy wouldn't be walking around with a lighter in his pocket ever again.

Anyway, so it's not a day to be outside, and as we walked home from the market this morning, trying not to breathe too deeply, the streets seemed strangely empty. Eery. Hardly anyone outside. Creepy. Post-apocalyptic, which is not where I need my brain to go right now.

So it seemed like a good day to make a new cell phone case. We won't even try to figure the logic there. I've been thinking about this for a while and even bought the little magnetic closures but haven't had time to figure out how I wanted to do it. Then I thought, "Gah. I have more fun when I don't 'figure out how to do it.'"

So I didn't. I just picked up the stuff and started. Here's what I've done so far, because I know Zom will nag me if I don't post process photos. And rightly so:  I'd want to see if you were making something from scratch. (And, gee, I'd better go down there and put in some labels/tags/whatever-the-hell-you-call-them, too.)

I started with some wool-ish felt from joggles.com. I'd already washed it to shrink it more/more tightly. I didn't want the felt fuzz to mess with the phone, so I got some Misty Fuse and ironed some silk from some salvaged something (shirt? boxer shorts? I don't know) to the inside. I eyeballed it and cut. Then I attached the closures. I didn't want the inside metal parts to scratch the phone, so I covered it with felt--orange felt from some garment I bought from Goodwill and washed in hot water. I do that in the winter, when I can get jackets in good colors and pain-in-the-buttedly take them apart. I hate doing that--the iron-on interfacing makes me gnash my teeth. But never mind--I have a stash of felted wool ready to go! And I feel good about it, because, honeys, these were not jackets anyone was ever going to buy and wear. Mid-1980's, I'm thinking. Shoulder pads. Plastic buttons. Whoa.

 I'm putting this orange edge on to keep the silk in place. This is not a polished-and-finished-edges kind of thing.

 This is the felt over the metal on the inside.

Now I'm stitching. Then I'll do some decorative stuff and then sew up the sides. We'll see how that goes. This was supposed to be just a trial, but I like the colors, and so far, so good--so it may be the actual usable one. If I KNEW it were going to work out (and this is where it's a good thing to plan, never mind how much more fun it is not to), I'd embellish it to a fare-thee-well (I love using "fare-thee-well"--I've told y'all why before but will again (what a surprise, huh?):  a previous editor argued with me that "fare-thee-well" was either non-existent or obsolete. Puh-leeze. So I use it every chance I get. Of course. You knew that).

Anyway, so that's how much I'd embellish it before I sewed up the sides. But if I spend all that time and it doesn't work out--it's too small, for instance, or the phone is wonky, or it won't stay shut, or, gee, I don't know--then I'd be reallyreallyreally pissed. So. I don't know where I'll go with it, but I'm going back to it now--

Hope you're doing something fabulous today, and I hope you're safe~~XO

A Bunch of Miscellaneous Stuff & A Question

Good morning, good morning! It's bright and sunny here but already windier than all get-out, which does not bode well for the rest of the day (it usually doesn't get windy until after noon, and if it's already windy, this afternoon could be a pile o' dusty misery, indeed).

I'm sitting here resolving, once again, to give up wine-with-dinner entirely. We had pizza last night (cheese + bread, pretty much, and, really, not even that, since they screwed up the order and put on tomato sauce, and I don't eat tomato stuff--nightshade family + arthritis, which is a whole nother thang), but we like wine with pizza, and so I thought, eh, what could it hurt?

The thing is, we're constantly changing. Once upon a time, I could drink two glasses of wine with dinner every night with no ill effects. But I couldn't have even one cup of caffeinated coffee without feeling like I was going to jump out of my skin. Now I can drink coffee again (only in the morning, mind you), but one glass of wine makes me feel blunted the next day--not hung over, but with a slight weird sinus pressure-thing and the lack of desire to do anything but sleep. I keep trying--once or twice a week--because The EGE's doctor said he'd like for him to drink red wine. And he doesn't really like wine and isn't going to drink it if I don't. So I've been making the valiant effort--plus I love wine. Or at least I used to. Someday, I'm guessing, I'll be able to drink it again. And once again not be able to drink coffee. It's all change, everything. Used to, I ate chocolate every day. At night I'd sit in bed and watch The Tonight Show, back when Johnny Carson still seemed funny, and eat a bag of chocolate-covered peanuts. I was running 4-6 miles a day, so I could do that. The idea makes me feel a little ill: I no longer eat peanuts, and I hardly ever eat chocolate. Maybe someday, though. Who knows? I just go along trying to do what my body tells me to do. Last year's blood work showed it's working fabulously, so that's what I do.

Anyway. So working on that. I've been blogging about "Flee The Hot Glue Gun!" over at CreateMixedMedia.com, so you might want to go over there and read those. Part II went up today. Part I is here.

Then just yesterday we launched a new Flickr group, The Open Page, so we can share our visual journals. Doesn't matter if it's drawing or collage or notes or whatever--if you've got visual pages you want to share, we'd love to see them. There are some up already here. A lot up, in fact. So cool--it hasn't even been 24 hours since launch! Please join us--there's no competition for fabulous pages or anything--just sharing. If you need something to spur you to make some drawings or paintings in your journal, this might be just the thing.

A reminder: if you come here and there's nothing new and you're bored or whatever, you can always check the Twitter feed up there in the right-hand column. While most of what I tweet is just stuff that entertains me, sometimes there are links that you might find interesting, like during a coffee break or something. I don't know if re-tweets show up there or not. I hope they do--one of my former editors tweeted a page of way-cool bookshelves (impractical but way-cool). Check them out here. Aren't those cool? My favorite is the spilling books, but I think it might drive my eyes crazy. The branch one is cool, too--I fell in love with the branch coathooks on the wall of the studio at Valley Ridge last summer, and I keep thinking I'll make some. We have the branches from the trees we've trimmed, and I could get The EGE to saw them, since someone--ahem--is leery of the saw. I wouldn't be if I had a big sturdy table for it--I used to use it. But now there's nowhere to set it up properly, and it looks like it wants to eat my fingers. Yeeeeee. I think it would be cool to spray paint them gold. I love gold spray paint!

And now the question--I know someone here knows how to do this. See the URL up there? In lots of blogs, like in Melanie Testa's blog, there's an avatar before the URL. See her cat? I love that! I want one! I googled to find out how to do it but can't find instructions that make any sense. Have I mentioned that I *loathe* forums? It's like the blind leading the blind. I just want instructions. Some things I can figure out myself, but this isn't one of them. I fear maybe it's not possible for blogger. Is that the case? Anyone have experience with this?

It seems there was something else I wanted to tell y'all, but dang if I can remember what it was. Oh! I know! I just finished reading The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, and if you haven't read it, you should. It's about cells and medical research and a family, and Rebecca Skloot? That woman can write. Imagine: I went through the entire book and did not once--not once!--think, "She should have used another word," or "That would have made more sense if she'd said. . . ." The whole book! Plus you learn stuff, too. Excellent book--the best I've read lately, for sure.

Thanks to everyone who read yesterday's post and left comments. It's so good to feel useful--you know, like the things that make me nuts also make other people nuts, and maybe together we can figure out how to keep them from making us quite so nuts. I'm feeling a little hung over (not wine-hung-over) from the worry--you know, tight, sore neck, tired from the stress. I think it would be a great day to do yoga nidra--I downloaded an MP3 to use last New Year's Day (I usually go to yoga nidra on New Year's but didn't because someone new is doing it and didn't fill me with the least bit of confidence that she had a clue about, well, pretty much *anything* (she called me twice about it and didn't remember, the second time, that we'd already had the same conversation two days earlier. I was all like, "You know, you might want to see about cutting back on the meds, sweetie.") So I didn't go. I downloaded the audio but haven't ever used it. Today might be a good day to do that (it lasts an hour).

Oh! Another thing--I got another hole in my ear--the other ear--yesterday. I'd planned, in a vague sort of way, that I'd get it done 4 weeks after the last one, I hadn't made any concrete plans. Yesterday was the day, though, and it seemed like the thing to do. I think there's one more hole in my future, but it will be a while--I want these to not be sore any more before I get another one to deal with because, gee, guess what? The interviews and podcasts are all done with Skype, on the computer, with a--hello!--headset. As in, something that goes over my ears. And, man, does that hurt when you have a new piercing wadded up under the earpiece for over an hour. Duh. The holes through the cartilege take forever to heal--the girl who does them said 4-6 months--yes: MONTHS. Of course I didn't believe her (I never believe anything) and so came home and looked it up, and sure enough: 4-6 months. Amazing.

I'll try to get a better photo soon. The room was dark, and apparently that makes PhotoBooth a little wonky.

The coolest thing:  when we did the hole a month ago, it bled a lot. The EGE reminded me that I could meditate to control this, but I'd forgotten to do that. So this time I told her I'd see if I could keep it from bleeding. (I know this works because when I had Dr. Mendez cut on my scalp, and he didn't want to do it because scalps always bleed a lot, I told him I could keep it from bleeding much. And I did.) And so yesterday there wasn't even a drop of blood. She was surprised. Meditation is a powerful thing. I need to work on it a lot more.

Well, amn't I chatty today? I'll probably be back--it seems there was something else I wanted to tell you. Huh. A memory sounds like a nice thing to have.

XO

PS--If you know how to do that avatar thing, please let me know--thanks!

Silly Dude

OK, I said I'd post some photos of the piece I'm working on, so here goes. If you listened to my podcast with Zom, you heard her talk about how pieces go through stages where they just aren't working out, remember? This piece is at that stage. It's simplistic, without direction, ugly, boring, and a waste of time. You can maybe detect a hint of disgust.

 I wanted some dimensional eyes and so made these from felt (wool felt, black) and cheap fleece (white). They are more dimensional than they appear here.

Stamped and then painted over. It should have been heat set, but I didn't think about adding text until after I had it on stretcher bars. Too lazy to take it off. Plus it won't be laundered, I hope.

My job is to get it past that icky stage, which will require something--I don't know what, but something. I like that: my brain needs a challenge, and this will be a good one. How do I take this thing that's like something you could get in a stitch-by-numbers kit at The Dreaded Wal-Mart and make it into something I wouldn't mind having around my house? Well, lots of stitching--I know that much. What else, though, I haven't figure out yet. As my mother would say (although in a different context, one that meant, in her "We'll see" response to a request to do something/get something/buy something, "No"),

"We'll see."

When I stitch, I often have help. I can distract Moe with a sheet of paper. He methodically shreds it and slings the spitty bits all around him and then is happy. You can see I had help this morning. He's on another round of antibiotics and is starting to feel better again.

Art Heals

We know that's true: art does heal. It heals lots of things in lots of ways. I've been thinking about that a lot lately because I've been working on a profile of an artist who's discovered for herself just how true it is (Art Doll Quarterly, out in the fall of this year). 


Today I'm thinking about it even more because, not to sound too much like an old hippy (I wasn't; my parents wouldn't have tolerated a hippy in the house), I have to say: My head is in a very bad place this morning. I've written here many times about anxiety-related disorders, about obsessive-compulsive disorder and my tiny little propensity for worry. 


Snort. I actually snorted when I typed that. Let's be honest: a huge, HUGE tendency to worry. About anything, about everything. I can look back over my life, what little snippets I can remember, and see some of the worries, worries about everything from termites (when we moved into this old house) to cancer (always a huge worry--it's actually kind of funny, in retrospect and in view of what's happened in the last several years, how worried I once was about melanoma) to loss (how terrified I was, as a child, of losing my mother). 


Et cetera. If you're with me, you know exactly what it's like. If you don't get it, be glad. Be very, very glad. Unlike being a clean freak or being really well organized, being a worrier does not carry a lot of side benefits. Well, that's not true: I tell The EGE that people like me seldom have house fires. We seldom run out of gas on the highway. We are a very well-prepared people. 


But we are also a big pain in the butt. Not only to others, but to ourselves. Because, my dears, we worry. We worry a lot. And worrying is not fun.


Because I pay attention to this, I have arranged my life in ways to minimize my worry. We have good insurance. I practice mindfulness. I eat a diet designed to keep me on an even keel, both physically and mentally. In 2000, I quit watching tv and avoided newspapers, and I've really been careful about what I allow into my head.


And then I got complacent. Because things have been going so well in my brain, I'd begun to slip. I've been reading the Sunday New York Times and picking up the Midland newspaper several times a week, and then here lately I Netflixed a whole string of documentaries about everything from 9-11 to the economic collapse to the dire predictions about December 21, 2012 to the total disaster of last night, Escape from Suburbia, about peak oil and the looming energy crisis. I thought, you know, that I should maybe catch up on all this stuff that people reference all the time. The first time someone mentioned 2012 to me, I had no clue what they were talking about. I figured I needed to know this stuff.  


Now, I gotta tell you, in case maybe I haven't mentioned it before: I am a skeptic. (I am also a cynic, but that's a whole nother thang--as per a conversation I had the other night in which someone asked which I was and I said, "Both. Absolutely." I try to squelch my tendency toward the latter, but I wholly embrace the former.) So the whole December 2012 thing would be just one more wacko waste of time except for this tiny, tiny little fact: if enough people believe a wacko notion, someone, somewhere will do something stupid, something that may well lead to a chain of events with consequences we can't even imagine. So, for instance, if enough people talk about December 2012, there is someone, some group, someone bent on their own agenda, who is right this minute figuring out a way to capitalize on our fear and preoccupation. A large dirty bomb next November might be devastating, but one on December 21st? Whoa. You get my point, so I'm not following this thread.


So while the religious apocalyptic videos just made me rant at people's gullibility and lack of understanding how their own actions can impact other people in ways they can't even imagine, Escape from Suburbia is all too real. It's not about Mayan prognosticators or the second coming or the rapture; it's about the rapidly-diminishing natural resources on the only planet we have. 


Never fear--I'm not going into a long rant here or spreading dire warnings about the future and sharing my own nightmarish fears. Nope. That's not my point. My point is that, before the end of the video, as I felt myself becoming increasingly depressed and anxious, I went, "Whoa. What exactly are you doing?" I realized that these weeks of Netflixed documentaries have begun to have an effect on my brain. I feel unsettled, worried about the future, worried about cars and travel, electricity and water, health care and food. And, and, and.


I got up and took all the videos--even the ones we haven't watched yet--and packed them up to go back to Netflix. I'm not watching any more. I know things are, indeed, dire. I know that big change is inevitable. I also know that there's very little I can do about it except the things I do already. 


[Here let me be clear: I'm not advocating my way for everyone. Absolutely not. We have to have people, esp. young people, who want to change the world, who want to get into government and health care, find alternative sources of energy and change the way people think about their lives. This is vital. I do not want other people to be like me. I'm thinking here of 1) myself and 2) people who are like me, bless their hearts.]


It reminds me of my mother, who suffered from serious depression. To her, it was normal--I think both her parents were depressed, as well, although not to the extent my mother was. By the time I was in high school, I would periodically get my mother to a doctor and get her on antidepressants. She didn't "believe" in them, but she'd take them for me. After a couple weeks or so, she'd start to feel better. Lots better. And then, after a couple months, she'd quit taking them. She didn't need them, she'd tell me. She felt fine. It was an endless, frustrating cycle, as you know.


That's me and the news. Current events. Documentaries. Because I've avoided these for so long, I felt great! I was OK, and I was perfectly capable of reading the newspaper and keeping up with current events and finding out what I'd missed during the years I didn't.


Wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong. I have always been a person with Anxiety Issues, and I always will be. Just because I know how to deal with that doesn't mean I've cured it. It doesn't mean you could bombard me with dire warnings about impending doom and I'd be able to go, "Eh. No biggie." 


Isn't it amazing that you have to keep learning things over and over? Isn't it even more amazing that the people you think have it all figured out are still figuring it out? I know that the way to keep my brain on an even keel is 1) not to feed it crap--horror stories about termites, cancer, the impending end of life as we know it, etc. and 2) give it plenty of other stuff to think about--art stuff, big projects, problems to solve. I KNOW that. But I got complacent.


Several months ago I got this note:

"I'm writing to thank you for Living the Creative Life, but most especially for Creative Time and Space. I bought the first book for myself and the second was a Christmas gift from my son. I follow your blog so I was expecting to enjoy your writing but what I didn't expect was how much it would change my life.
 I'm 50 and have had an anxiety disorder for as long as I can remember. I've seen doctors and been on all kinds of medications. I've talked about it with a therapist. I've researched self help and put together a tool box full of breathing exercises and distraction techniques. I wasn't expecting to find an answer to "how to stop my brain from getting trapped in little OMG circles" in an art book. Thank you!
 Giving my brain creative problems to chew on has not only reduced my anxiety more than anything else I've tried has, but it has really improved my art and the quality of my life. My head is now a much more pleasant place to hang around in.
 I wanted to let you know you are touching lives and it's very appreciated."
-C


(C very kindly gave me permission to share her note)


See? I know this. I know that the way to deal with anxiety is to fill my brain with projects and problems and the things that 1) keep it happy and 2) provide something useful to other people--at least that I *believe* is useful to other people. 


So I'm making some changes. I went in last night and adjusted the Netflix queue, deleting all the rest of the gloom-and-doom, conspiracy-theory, just-you-wait documentaries. I'm going to quit reading the NYT, never mind that there are some cool ideas and well-written articles. I'm going to remember that my brain is a living thing, changing constantly, and that I have to feed it carefully. The things I put into it will create the output, just like eating crap will make me feel like crap.


Now, lest you think this is about Burying My Head in the Sand, no. I know that things are, indeed, dire. It's one reason I don't drive every day--most days I leave the house only to go to Starbucks. I don't drive across town--I haven't for years. I try to walk to the bank and the post office when I have to go. I'm slowing replacing the windows in our house with more energy-efficient ones. We did the roof. We've gotten rid of large areas of grass, to save on water. All those kinds of things. Yeah, I get it. 


I do what I can. But I'm not going to dwell on it. There's a difference between being careful/cutting back, and lying awake at night, wondering exactly how bad things will get and exactly how miserable you're going to be before you die in screaming agony.


So: more projects. More art. More sharing of the kinds of ideas that make life fabulous. If you talk to me, you're going to find me woefully uninformed about all kinds of things. I won't know the names of people in the news or what wars are currently going well/poorly/abysmally. I will sound, to you, as if I'm not only poorly-informed but also quite possibly a fool.


That's OK. I'd rather be a fool, ignorant of much of the world around me, than to live with a brain that makes me totally, completely insane.


Thanks for reading this far--it's way too long, and it's probably Too Much Information, really, but I think it's important to talk about the less-than-rosy parts and ways of dealing with those. There are ways; the trick is not so much finding them as it is not losing sight of them once you find them. I've caught sight of mine just up ahead--excuse me while I run catch up~~


XO

Podcast with Zom Osborne

Y'all know Zom. She comes here sometimes in the middle of the night, which is Tomorrow for her in Australia (yeah, my head still whirls madly when I think about it being Tomorrow somewhere else, so I just don't think about it, along with a lot of other stuff, like how many people there are on the planet, which is not actually a non sequitur, as you will hear), and nags me, ever-so-gently. (Just for her, in fact, I'm putting tags on this post.)

Anyway, so yesterday I talked to her. Except it was today for her, except it wasn't. It was still yesterday except it was Wednesday already. See? Doesn't that make *your* head whirl, too?

Isn't she cute? Or, if you hate "cute," doesn't she look like she'd be a lot of fun to hang out with? Or, if you're picky: Doesn't she look like she would be someone it would be a lot of fun out with whom to hang?

Gah! Never MIND, OK?

Here's Zom. She's fabulous. Enjoy. Here's more of her work.

Prepare to Go "Awwwww." And Then "Wow."

Holly sent me this, and it's made my whole day. You know me and animals, especially me and cats. So you can imagine how happy this makes me. Sure, you could argue that it's the fish on the dolphins' (or is it just the same dolphin every time?) breath that's so compelling, but I would bet money that they're exchanging much more interesting information here. How often would you, as a cat, have access to this kind of info? It's like they're doing a mind meld here.

Cool, huh?

Thank you, as always, Holly! You find the coolest stuff~~XO

PS: This link still works, so go here. Sorry about that. 

Miscellaneous Monday

Hello, hello! I hope you all had a fabulous weekend. Me? I can't even remember. It's like when The EGE comes home after subbing all day and asks me, "What did you do today?" and I look at him with what must surely be that deer-on-the-side-of-the-road-in-the-headlights look: "Huh?" You know, when you drive past them at night and they're standing over there grazing and look up at you as you drive past with this look on their faces like the headlights have caused every thought to drain out of their heads? I always imagine them thinking (well, I imagine it when I'm not terrorized by the whole ordeal of driving where there's the likelihood that some animal will dash out into the path of the vehicle, and don't you DARE tell me any sad animal-on-the-highway stories because I will have to go lie down. My deer on the highway story is the only one I want to hear unless you also have a happy one: Back in The Day when The EGE was coaching basketball, I'd drive to the out-of-town games while he rode the bus, and then, after the game, he'd drive home with me. San Angelo was the worst, because you have to drive through seriously deer-infested territory (and, yes, I know how destructive deer can be: about 1/10 of 1% as destructive as humans). The EGE always drove because it doesn't make him lose his mind. We were in a notoriously deer-y stretch, and he was going about 40 mph (in a 65-mph zone), and this little fawn skittered right out in front of us, long legs going every which way, hooves clattering. The EGE skidded to a stop right in front of it, and it stood in our headlights and looked at us. I was completely petrified, terrified it was going to skitter away and into on-coming traffic, but it didn't. It clattered off into the field, and I like to imagine what it was thinking: "Wow! Hey, Mom! I saw moons on the ground!")

Where was I? Oh, yeah: I don't remember what I did this weekend. Yesterday we cleaned off the front porch. As in swept, then vacuumed, then washed. It took forever. Do not laugh about the vacuuming part. It works, OK?

This morning I'm supposed to be working on an article but have been blogging over at CreateMixedMedia.com instead. Go on over and read even MORE about copy + right. You know I have things to say. Snort. When do I NOT have things to say? I'm still waiting for the concept to sink in: Ricë, you do not have to have an opinion about everything. About much of anything, in fact.

Also, I've got These Ideas in my head. Here's one thing I did this morning--this is how I transfer images to light-colored fabric. I drew out what I wanted on cheapo paper, clipped the tea-dyed muslin (yes, I'm actually using that fabric I dyed on, what was it? Saturday?) to it, and then taped them to the storm door.

 When I was doing that, I saw the sign on the door and thought I'd show you that, yes, I really do have that sign on the door still. The one day I took it down (it got torn and wrinkled in some wind-related door-opening), the landlord of the house next door came and stood on the front steps and yelled for me to come out. So I put another copy (I have a bunch printed out, ready to go) up. The UPS guy doesn't even knock--just sets the packages down and leaves.

Then there's John Henry.

 

 We found him in an antique store on Congress Street in Austin a couple years ago, wearing a nightgown, and I had to rescue him. The EGE bought him and named him, and my friend Keith made him the khaki trousers. He was going to make him a shirt, but we lost touch, so I bought the sweater at Michael's. It is, I think, sadly, for a teddy bear. Yikes. 

I kept thinking that if I fixed him up, John Henry wouldn't look so fierce. Or terrified. I'm not sure which. I think he looks really angry, personally. I mean, wouldn't you? If you'd had to sit on shelf between a GI Joe with one arm and a naked knock-off Barbie, wearing a long, stained white lacy nightgown? For YEARS?

I'd be pretty pissed, too.

But no matter what I've given him, it hasn't appeared to help. And suddenly, just yesterday, I realized why: he doesn't want to wear these clothes and try to live this life I've imagined for him. He's voodoo, and he's voodoo all the way. He wants an outfit befitting his status--I don't know what that is, but I'm guessing he'll let me know once I get that sweater off him--and some appropriate accoutrements.

So that's what I'm working on today. Mostly another blog post. Then the article, which I'd better get done here soon. Then some more images transferred onto fabric. Then dealing with the still-very-angry John Henry. I wonder what his other name is? And, and spending time with Moe, who doesn't feel good today. Any day that starts with puking isn't a good day, and Moe, who was sick a lot as a kitten, hates even more than most cats. He's looking pretty sad and pathetic, so I need to go sympathize with him. And then back to work.

Hope your Monday is very un-Monday-ish~~

XO

PhotoCard: Sheila's No Fool

The Skirt This Morning

I'm trying to be better about taking in-progress photos of stuff because I know how much *I* like to see process photos. After all the stitching on the wave, I wanted to do something different--I try to switch up the stitching, doing some heavy stitching (6 strands of floss--requires more effort to pull through the fabric), then maybe fine stitching (smaller stitches with fewer strands--easier to pull, requires finer skills and more close-eye work), and then beading (easiest on the fingers, harder on the eyes, tedious to pack up and take with me to do out of the house). As we get older, if we want to keep doing the things we love, we have to pay more attention to balance, rest, rotation. The artists I know who are middle-aged think about these things, about doing close work when your eyes are fresh, about scheduling time to stand up and move around and stretch. Lisa Lichtenfels told me about putting a tv in her studio so she'd have to look up and re-focus her eyes regularly (she watches educational stuff on DVD, so don't go thinking this is permission to watch crap!).

[Note: Oh, my! Lisa has a show up at CFM Gallery in New York City. If you live there, pleasepleaseplease go and see it and then tell us about it. While I've seen a lot of her work and have her book and have her in MY book and have talked to her on the phone, I have never seen one of her pieces In Real Life. I have spent wonderful time looking at this current exhibit, though, and you should, too. Make sure to read the text--Lisa is brilliant and has a fabulously curious brain (maybe that's why I thought of her and Roz Stendahl together this morning--two of the most intellectually curious people I know). Anyway--go here, take some time, enjoy.}

Roz schedules painting when her eyes are freshest. Everyone who loves what they do wants to do it as long as they can, so we think about these things. If I do a week of heavy stitching on denim, I'm going to have trouble typing. So.

So. On to some beading. On the first journal skirt I ever made, I beaded the back yoke rather heavily--I think it was a little thin, and the beading and thread helped solidify the old denim. I figured the thread would break and the beads would start to fall off fairly soon after the first couple laundry cycles, but years and dozens of washes later, I haven't lost a bead. Amazing. I think I used regular thread, but it might have been beading thread, so I decided to use the latter--I tested the threads by seeing which was easier to break with my fingers; the beading thread was slightly stronger--and bead the back of this yoke, as well.

The blue beads are size 8 (sewn on first) and 11, I think. I can't wait for the bead show in Grapevine in May so I can buy more beads; it's when I stock up (I don't buy a ton, as I have a good supply already (and aren't you surprised about that?), but I get the colors and sizes I use most often so I never run out. I like buying beads when I can see them up close, so even though I could order these online, I hardly ever do except in emergencies. And Jane's people are the best--one time I called because I'd run out. They didn't have any in stock and wouldn't get any for about 10 days but rummaged around and sent me an open tube, about 95% full, rushing it out and charging me only for shipping. That's customer service, and that's why I'm happy to make the trip to buy from them in person.

OK. So after the beading, it was time for stitching. And because I hadn't done any heavy stitching in about a week, I used 6 strands and did the waistband. Notice that the knots are on the outside--I'm like the Princess and The Pea (snort) and can feel even little stiff threads, so there's no way I want a bunch of knots against my tender skin (I wish you could see me rolling my eyes at this. Oh, wait! You can!)

So whatever--I didn't want the knots on the inside. No big deal, right? But when you're USED to putting the knots on the inside, and now you don't want to, and you're changing the thread every couple of inches? Major pain in the butt involving much gritching and ripping out of knots.

I think when I get this done--not much left on it--I'll paint another panel, let it dry, heatset it, and start stitching on that. But there's no hurry--I've got that odd little animal to work on! Yay--nothing like a new project waiting for you to jump in--

What are you working on? Remember:  you can always tell us and then send us here, to our Flickr group, The Voodoo Cafe, where you can upload photos and text for us to enjoy (hint, hint).

Happy Friday! XO

PhotoCard: Saving Him a Seat

I Have No Idea What's Going On Here

The EGE walked through and looked over my shoulder and said, "So it's a cat, with. . . ."

 I said, "No, I think it's a donkey. It started out as a donkey, but now I'm not sure."

In truth, I'm not sure what I'm doing here, but there's been this idea in my brain for a long time, and it keeps poking at me, poking at me (alert! advertising reference!), so I finally heaved the big sigh and did this. Where it goes from here is anyone's guess. I'll just follow along and see what happens. I need something else to work on besides the skirt, though--sometimes I want to wear the skirt, to see how I might need to alter the process if I make another one (snort), and I can't ever wear it if I'm always in the middle of some huge honkin' part of it. So although there's something I'm ready to do to it, I may hold off. Or not.

The inspiration for whatever-this-is may come from the stuffed donkey, EyeOre, that I've had since birth and that sits on top of the shelves over there (and here I was going to take photos to show you, but the camera said, "Change the battery pack." So I did, but apparently that battery pack wasn't fully charged, or it didn't hold a charge, because although I had charged it at some point in the recent past, it is not, now, apparently, charged. So no more showing, only telling. Alas), and also Pino the donkey, from Apifera Farm, because I once sent them some vintage aprons for some project. Or maybe it was the illustrations in Katherine's book, Creative Illustration Workshop. 

Or maybe it was my favorite wooden donkey, which I was trying to photograph when the camera pitched the fit about the battery pack.

Sorry about that--I did so want to show you all the inspiration. Oh, wait! Maybe PhotoBooth can come to the rescue!

Yay!

So there it is, three layers of fabric--the middle is the fake felt stuff I like to use for batting--all tacked to stretcher bars. Let's see what happens next, shall we? Because, frankly, I have no clue about anything. But that's perfectly OK.