Trimming the Moon

Bought this Fiskars rotary trimmer at Costco about a month ago, and finally got around to using it. After a little fiddling (duh, there is a lock for the sliding cutter), I got the hang of it and trimmed up the collaborative Halloween storyline deck (artwork similar to this deck shown but with a spooky story card too) in virtually no time at all. This was the first time I attempted to trim my cards with anything but scissors, and I was much happier with the results. Not as wonky or iffy around the edges.
The surface is smooth and slick, the measuring markings are clear, and the cutter moves easily. The little feet on the bottom held the whole shebang in place really sturdily on my table too. It came with an extra blade too, I don't know how long the blade will last on this gizmo.

But after trimming this deck, I was again disheartened by how completely off a lot of the measurements are in these collaborative decks. They are supposed to be 3x5". Seems pretty clear huh? But only about half of them actually were. Most of the errors were pretty close and I didn't lose too much of the image or the words. But some were off by quite a bit. I hope that the future decks tighten up on this. Especially for the useable decks like the tarot one!

Now to trim the two copies of the recent tarot Carnivale Mystere collaboration. That's a lot of cutting to do!

I was recently struck by the view of the half moon and the cloudy sky/silhoutte of my house and trees. So I'm sharing here my two best pictures which kind of captured what I saw.

A Bag for the Big Book

Here is a special bag I made within the last month. I apologize for the bad pictures, I'm not sure why I didn't use the flash, or take this out in the sun. I'll have to re-shoot it when it comes back around to me.

I recently was given the task of sewing a bag to house a very special book. It is a specially hand-made journal for recording the thoughts of all the women who become priestesses in our organization, Sisterhood of the Silver Branch. It is a remarkable book just to hold, very substantial, not to heavy, quite long and surprisingly skinny. As it journeys from one hand to the next, we thought it best to have some kind of protective bag. So I came up with this!

Lunaea found the beautiful fabric (Hoffman "Silent Inspirations" by McKenna Ryan) and she also bought a special vintage button on ebay.

This is closer in color to what the fabric actually looks like, it is the "ice" colorway of a similar print, "pine needle panels".

It was pretty easy to put the bag together, and I just kind of winged it making an oversized rectangle for the bag, layering the fabric over batting, quilting it with metallic decorative thread, then adding the lining and flap closure.

Here is the flap closure on which I did some decorative embroidery and a whirlpoolish swirly design. I used rayon and also metallic threads. The button was really perfect, it is a silver almost pewter with swirling leaves.
This shows the lining which was a silky, shiny polyester charmeuse weight fabric that I had leftover from a cape for one of the many Halloween costumes that I've made over the years. It was very ravelly and slippery to sew. I hope that it is strong enough to hold up to some use.

Cornucopia Full Again

I wish I could buy these Ugg boots, aren't they cute? I have no idea why they sell these in California, who needs warm boots like these?? I have been hankering after a new pair of boots for a while now, perhaps I'll find have to make some felted ones or maybe some Arwen's Elf boots!

So with our living room almost done, we're now looking to replace the teeny tiny sconce that is almost at the top of the 22' wall. It looks rather silly and puny and just plain lonely. I'm looking for something big and dramatic, so we went to the lighting store. Armed with only my camera on my phone, here is what we found that I liked. None of them seem big enough though.
Is this not THE cutest picture ever?
If only this was 3' across, or maybe we could put up more than one.... I love the shadows it casts.
I liked this floral shape, but no way am I getting an upward facing wall sconce. It would fill up with dust and dead bugs, and since it is so high up the wall it would not be easy to clean out... makes me go ewwww just thinking about it.

Recently I've been looking into some of the newer fabrics that are out there as alternatives to cotton. Cotton is really tough to produce organically, and it is a crop that depletes the soil at a pretty quick pace. A good blog for info is Organic Clothing.

So bamboo keeps coming up as an alternative. Dharma Trading has three types available. And there is actually a partial bamboo mix batting for using in quilting. Next time I need batting, I'm going to try this one. I've heard good things about it sewing up well, haven't heard or read anything about how it washes up though. Couldn't find it online either, even though someone had said they bought it at Joann's...

And finally,

How about this for a cool workshop/class to take? Women Art Life looks like a really worthwhile one to spend your time and money on.

Gift Season Approaches!!

I'm coming around to the idea that I don't want to go on a big buying spree for the holiday gift giving season that is upcoming.

We're absolutely swamped with stuff around here. This has been brought home to us in a big way, over and over again as we trudge through into year two of the remodel. The garage, backyard, front yard is filled with stuff that hasn't even made it back into the house.

Why oh why do we have all this stuff ???, I keep asking rhetorically. No one answers...

We (my family), all seem to have a hard time giving up what we already have in order to replace it with something new. That rule or tip just doesn't work for us.

So it seems silly to be buying tons of new things to plop on top of the old things and gather even more dust.

I'm vowing to try hard this year to give things that are basically consume-able. Things that will be used up, not be too precious, things I've cooked that the giftee can consume quickly or use up or even giving experiences (tickets, trips, etc.). No knickknacks. No things just to give things.

I don't think I've come around quite far enough to the take the Buy Handmade Pledge though.

Maybe next year... The reason I hesitate is that part of the pledge is to request that others only give you handmade stuff. And at this point I don't think that is ok. If someone wants to give you a gift, let them! If they don't know you well enough to know that Handmade is A#1 in your book, then it would probably be quite rude to turn up your nose at their non-handmade gift. I think there is a lot of education needed so that people would think Handmade first.

Sewmamasew has a great list of tutorials all month long of gifts to sew

TreeHugger has a very cool list of gifts to give (or ask for) rated light green to dark green.

Some Questions I am asking myself:

What are my gifting ideas for the season? Is there a theme or vibe happening I need to expand on? What is my reason for even giving gifts? Obligation, duty, it is expected vs. joy, loving to give?

What do I like better, to give or to receive? How about others in my family or group of friends?

How many presents do I end up buying or giving or receiving? Is it enough, or do I always want to give or receive more?

What is it about this time of year that makes me happiest or craziest?

Roses in November

Heya, Happy Friday!

I'm having some minor surgery today, so I'm writing this just past midnight to keep up with posting everyday. Which I can't believe I've actually done so far this month, thanks to the incentive posed by nablopomo.

I'll tell you, so far the record is Waaaay better than I'm doing on my Nanowrimo.

Aren't these roses a wonderful surprise for the middle of November? They sure smell good too. sshhhh, don't tell them what month it is!

Here is how my front lawn looks. Someone *ahem* who shall remain nameless decided to smash theirs on the front lawn instead of the traditional launching off the deck down to the garden we usually do (in hopes of volunteer pumpkins next year). Guess next summer I'll be mowing around the front yard pumpkin patch...And to prove that absolutely anything looks better in a kaleidoscope:

Homemade Olive Status Check:

Olive check, so far so good! They are plumping up nicely, the skin is splitting a bit, and the water smells very olive-licious when it gets drained every day. Mostly by me. sigh. We're almost to the brine making stage.

Nightmares and Dreamscapes

I recently worked in RedDog Scott's Nightmares and Dreamscapes (yes she was inspired by the totally excellent short story collection by Stephen King) journal for this long running, overdue and overwrought collaborative swap that we're in together. (no I don't have my book back yet either!) For her journal to have been gone for a year now, travelling around from artist to artist, and having so little art in it didn't seem right! Lots of the artists did one page (not a two page spread), or no page. Sheesh! There is only one more person in the chain from me to her, so I did three spreads to make up for the lack of art she'll be receiving back. Hope she likes it!

Note: All pictures are clickable to enlarge the view!

This first one I called, "Calling All Angels", the background is a stamp that I carved, stamped with black ink (which looks rather grey, may need to reink that stamp pad!), the handmade paper is actually a deep purple on the lower left side of the page, on top of that is a playing card from the nekkid deck (The Nude in Art published by Spanish company,Fournier)a painting of "Death and the Young Maiden", some doodles, some journalling about calling on angels to help you sleep through the night when you are worried.

This is the right hand page, which has the same stamp and ink utilized, some more journaling, and a mini quilt with a stone angel photo transparency attached to the page with mini brads.

A detail of the mini-quilt. I used a lot of decorative stitching around the edges, and purposefully frayed the edges of the fabric.

The next two-page spread is called "Dream Fragments", Another stamp I made (using the leftover rubber pieces from trimming a sheet of rubber stamps, adhered to a clear plastic block with rubber cement!), stamped in purple, over painted with watercolor crayons in brown , orange and yellow. Another playing card from the nekkid deck, this time surmounted by thread, batting and glitter. Don't you have fragmented dreams like this? I know I do, stuff is hanging over me, people are watching me, yikes! No wonder I wake up.

The right-hand page, with the same stamp, glittery trails (to represnt stardust), a cool silvery star sticker (I have no good star rubber stamps), a goddess figure stamped repeatedly and surrounded with the word Sleep in different fonts and sizes (I cut these out of the yellow pages that I use for a glue workspace).

Here is a detail of the wordy stamp (from Stampin'Up) that says: "What each of us becomes is fashioned from the stardust of our dreams."

A detail of the trio of goddesses with sleep words and star sticker.
Now onto a nightmare page, same background stamp used as previous page, just overlapping and with more than one color, watercolor crayons over that, a magazine picture collage, some smeary scary writing.
And the facing page is all about Edgar Allan Poe. This one has a little glitter too, some more magazine pics, origami paper, watercolor crayons and same stamping. Here is the alternate view with the book in the pocket. The illustration with the hand with an eye in the palm and ears on each finger is an advertisement for speakers or something like that, but it reminded me of the nightmarish creature in the movie Pan's Labyrinth which totally freaked me out.
In one of my more recent thrifting finds, I had a small book with famous poems, one of which is The Raven, so I ripped that section out and sewed it up the side as a binding and inserted in the pocket. I was into listening to Garrison Keillor read it on Prairie Home Companion on their Halloween show this year. Spoooooooky! Oh and speaking of Poe, I heard on Halloween on NPR, that two Poe historical museums in Baltimore and Philadelphia are fighting over his body (gruesome, eh?!)

Hassling Elvis

I was in Costco the other day, checking out the christmas toy extravaganza and was surprised to see a talking singing Elvis head. Doesn't he look mean? Or slightly evil?
Then right next door, I came upon this!

A completely hassled looking Elvis.

Out of the box.

Hair tousled just so.

Looking so very up to date.

And slightly like David Hasselhoff (hassle Hasselhoff, hmmmm).

I think someone was confused and thought this was one of those style my hair to death Barbie heads.

Or maybe the Costco employees were bored after hours.

Who knows!?!?!

All I know was that I was laughing so hard I cried (by myself!), watch out for the crazy lady in aisle 3!!

I was sad that I was by myself and couldn't share this absurdity with anyone, then I recalled the camera on my new phone, woohoo, and here you go, share the laugh with me.And just to prove you can make a cool looking kaleidoscope out of any picture, here you go: Hassled Elvis Kaleidoscope!

Wearing Out

What we wear. The theme of self portrait challenge this month. These are pictures from the dog walk this morning. Taken with the camera on my phone which was a little blurry smeary this cold AM.

So, to describe the outfit of the day:

I'm wearing my very very old, ready to be retired red fleece pullover. It is no longer soft and comfy, it is becoming scratchy, so it will be replaced. I love to wear red. I chose it because it was already out and sitting on the chair when we scrambling to get out the door this morning.

Underneath I've got a brand new white tee-shirt which has the football roster and logo for my son's team. It isn't a men's tee, it is a women's so it is cut differently and I think I like it, at first it seemed tight, but now I'm used to it and like how it looks.

Then I've got black "sport" knit pants from Land's End, my newer ones that actually have some stretch and elasticity remaining. They are so comfy and look pretty flattering I think. Except for, I know and recognize that I should really really throw out the completely used up ones that make me look like a schlump.

Boring grey and black Joe Boxer ankle socks and my earth shoes. I wasn't planning on walking the dog, she talked me into on the way back from my morning bus run of dropping off kids at school. Otherwise I'd have had my tennies on. It was pretty cold out, so I wished I had my gloves or hat. But Zelda got me to walk pretty quickly to warm up.

I have to admit right up front, I don't wear very exciting clothing. I never really have, even when I was younger. I also used to really care about what I wore, I find that now, I truly don't care about it much. I have other things that are of primo importance in my life. I think that is something that does change for a lot of women as they age.

It sure would be easier to be Zelda the wonder dog. Dressed up for her involves a bandana. And it isn't even her idea, never crosses her mind to put on something besides her collar. How nice would that be? Not that I'd be comfy being a nudist in a non-nudist world...

I am all about comfort at this point. Because of the illness that I have, there are physical issues that I have to accommodate, mainly no binding waistbands allowed. And of course with my body shape, I really should have a defined waistline, in order to not look like the proverbial brick house. Oh well!

Then there are the preferences that I've ended up with at this point in my life. I find that I gravitate to mostly cotton, soft knits, natural fibers. Anything with colors that I like, that is what I choose to wear.
I don't see a lot of people, or interact with them on a daily basis in a professional setting, so that freedom from wearing business suits or *gasp* pantyhose is definitely not missed! Oh and here is a kaleidoscope made out of one of these pictures, just because.

What are you wearing??

Closets and Chairs

Six closet doors being painted. They were removed when we demolished our upstairs and then stored during the remodel. We hated how they looked so dated and ugly, so I sanded the rough spots and painted them to match the room doors and trim. I propped all the doors up on the front lawn and went crazy painting them before the rain this weekend, had to do two coats. Especially since these little tiny gnat bugs decided to have a mass suicide on the wet painted doors leaving behind red wine colored streaks. Not too pretty, thank goodness for coat number two of paint, which I let dry in the garage thankyouverymuch.

Not perfect, but much better than we could find at the local Home Despot. There, it was either mirrors or very lightweight doors that would break. I know how hard the boys are on doors, and it seemed really silly to spend $1,000 on mirrored doors that would just get ruined. So hey, This price was right, *free*. I love reusing stuff. Unfortunately we had to purchase tracks and wheels for them as those got bent and tossed during the demo for $25 a set. But they glide very very smoothly and now we don't have to look at our closet contents all the time! Hooray, what a difference that makes in the room, I had no idea.
Last thing to do is install some kind of facing trim to cover up the track glider up at the top, but we have lots of unused new trim lying around that matches the closet door framing, I just have to paint it on a sunny day and get handy husband to install it.
Next up is some sewing, gasp! No really, sewing. I'm recovering or making a slipcover (haven't decided quite yet), a chair that we got off of Freecycle several years ago. You can see a tiny bit of it here, it is a very intensely ugly deep orange. Currently it is a ground chair, with no legs, and we are in negotions as to what kind of legs to add if we do. This is Alex's chair, so he chose this super cool fabric from Fabric.com.
Pretty mod huh?

Box of Rocks

Alex was sorting a container of his tumbled rocks the other day. There were a lot of cool colors and shapes. He is trying to think of what to make with all of these. Some are pretty enough to make some kind of jewelry or decorative stuff.
And seeing all these stones in lovely little piles, reminded me that I'd like to make some cabinet pulls with stones (bigger ones from our river or beach). I really really loathe the pulls in our kitchen, and I do not want to spring for new ones, as all the ones I like are of course quite spendy and we have a lot of cabinets!
I'd also like to reuse the existing pulls somehow. So I thought I'd try to make some like these or these.
My idea is to chop the offending handle off the posts, drill holes in the stones, and glue in the posts from the old pulls. This will possibly take some new drill bits, (oh yoohoo Dremy-moto...Dremel motor tool), I know I have a diamond bit that I bought when I carved my own runestones, not sure if that will work or not though, and some type of super duper glue. There are a dizzying array of glues at my small hardware store, so this will take some research.

Stuck on Repeat

Revisting, the lowly poker chip carousel.
Not much to say about it, except that it works. Poker and blackjack was played until about 3am. Margaritas were consumed (virgin ones!), and spilled on said carousel. Washable is a good thing it turns out. Next thing you know, they'll be asking for a green felt tablecloth...
The yellow chips bother me. I think they aren't usual in a set. In my dad's I think he may have had a different colour and that is what my eyes are looking for. We also have a set that have white, red, blue and beige. The beige are offensive somehow. That set was purchased when we tried a system of rewards for good behaviour. I also stole some to use in making collages..
The yellow chips aren't so bothersome in this kaleidoscope though!

I wonder if someone collects these? I saw a few on ebay that were wood or other fancier materials or interesting shapes. Oh and a dustcover too, which may make a lot of sense! I have some playing card fabric which would be a natural....