What would a week without a deadline look like? If you find out, let me know.... SuperStats midterm was the highlight... or lowlight... or maybe just the what-the-hell-is-this-asking-me?-light of last week. So to get past that I used my, ahem, free time (read: time I stole away from other things) this weekend on a project. A craftycrafty project. Mwahahahahahaha!
I made slippers.
I am an inconsistent knitter/crocheter. One of my big problems is patterns. I feel about patterns like I feel about recipes. Which is to say that I can only adhere but so closely to them. Then I start questioning them, then I either make adjustments, or I lose track of where I am in the pattern... This is why I am a pretty good cook, but not a particularly good baker (baking requiring the precision of chemistry, cooking less so). This is also why I've never managed to make a sweater.
So I looked up slipper patterns. I disliked many of them. I tried to follow one, managed to crochet a slipper toe that was large enough to use a sling for the cat, thought about it for a while, and then just decided that I could probably just visualize what needed to be done. Et viola! Slippers!
They were pretty easy, actually, and quick once I'd figured out the sizing. And Mary-Jane-y! Which none of the patterns I saw were, but who doesn't love MaryJanes?
I just got an email that some neato fat quarters I ordered aaaaaaaaages ago are finally coming. I might even be able to enjoy them if I survive this weekend and the imminent deadlines.
This summer has been a wild, wild ride, on all levels, with a whole lotta work to boot. Some big changes that have left me scrambling just to hang on-- but exciting things on the horizon if I manage to do that. In the meantime, it's a bit of a bumpy ride. Which is all to say that if I haven't answered an email you sent me in June...
Speaking of bumpy rides, we made it through the Week Of Natural Disaster (TM) in Virginny, starting, of course, with the earthquake. I know a 5.8 isn't much to old hands at these things, but it was big doin's down here. Not nearly as big as some people seemed to think (yelps that the end times had come seemed, well, misplaced), but big enough to knock things off shelves at work and at home. There've been aftershocks, but I've only felt two, one of which was a 4.9 that woke up Mr. P and The Kitteh. I, however, was already awake, despite it being 1 in the morning. In both the lead up to the actual earthquake and to the late night, sizeable aftershock, had a headache that went away immediately after the earth started shaking. Which either means that I'm like the cats and dogs that freak out just before an earthquake, or it's just a coincidence.
Then five days later, Hurricane Irene. While we were in it, it really didn't seem all that bad-- very, very wet, and sometimes pretty windy, but we left the front door open (just the glass outer door closed) through the duration, so it didn't seem too worrisome. Later, we found out we were just lucky.
I took this on the way to work on Saturday-- a week later. That's the roof leaning against the front of the house. Mr. P passes this way most days and said for most of the week the top was open and you could see right in-- for the first couple of days with the tree still inside. We know quite a few people who lost power-- some for more than a week. We only lost it in short bursts (when we heard transformers blowing up nearby-- probably from trees landing on them). We did lose internet for a week..... Yeah, really not anything to complain about.
The storm blew away our internet, but also brought in a lot of rain and a whole week of cooler tempertures, which was actually pretty awesome. The garden did Not. A. Damn. Thing. this year, pointedly refusing to thrive. I got beans. That is all. Not one tomato (despite having a dozen plants, different varieties). No cucumbers. Even the flowers have refused to bloom. Actually, most things have looked terribly diseased. But, weirdly, some things seemed to like the abuse of Hurrican Irene dropping ten inches of water and little (and not so little) branches all over them.
I've planted these flowers for three years and this is the first time one has bloomed-- which it has done four times since Irene.
All summer I've had morning glory vines, but no flowers....
And then there's the tomatillo plant, which grew very tall and looked healthy, until we got back from Maine and found two thirds of the leaves had been stripped off, by this:
An enormous tomato horn worm. Since the plant hadn't done aaaaaanything, I just left it out there. The day after Mr. P and I investigated this thing it disappeared.... we assume some bird's super duper dinner. Two days later? Hurricane. Two days later? Three tomatillos finally started growing. Perhaps I just have masochistic plants?
Sadly, neither earthquakes nor hurricanes can disrupt my insomnia. This week's 4:30 am project? Knickers! (American ones, not British ones).
Black courdoroy. I saw a picture of some chick in a magazine wearing knickers and thought, hmmmm.... those look kinda cool. I mean, they kind of remind me of being a kid in the 70s when I feel like I saw people sporting knickers. But I thought, where would I be able to get knickers? Wait! I know! I'll make some!
So I did. I put a shiny button on the cuffs.
Spent a looooot of time reading theory and philosophy today for a project that totally snuck up on me.... Damn those stealth academic projects! In between reading I put some of my haul from the farmer's market into action:
First apple pie of the season. And it is yummy, boy. Ohmnomnom. So I guess all in all not a bad weekend. I had to go to work on Saturday, but got enough done that I didn't have to go in today (the day of the labor), which would have been kind of depressing. Here's hoping that things let up so I can catch up with laundry and novel reading and maybe even blogging and not going into the office.
It was fab to get a tour of it from R, as she is both a docent at the museum, and also one of the artists who contributed pieces of coral to the exhibit.
The reef in DC is a satellite reef-- part of a larger project designed to shine light on what we are destroying when we are terrible environmental stewards, as when we dump trash into the ocean. You can watch a TED video about this intersection of math, craft, and environmentalism by going here. The coral reef in DC will be on display in the Sant Ocean Hall until April 24th. (There was also a lovely orchid exhibition going on, and a neat archaeology exhibit near the forensic lab and the skeleton of the Smithsonian scientist, Grover Krantz, and his irish wolfhound).
The reason why the word satin is only one letter away from Satan is that satin is of the devil.
Glitter? Also of the devil.
Pretty much anything in the fabric store your five year old niece would think was awesome? Of. The. Devil.
Mr. P kind of summed it up when, upon returning home last night he said (and I quote), "Holy crap! There's glitter everywhere! It's on the cat! It looks like a five year old exploded in here!"
Indeed. There is glitter everywhere. The problem with glitter is that, while shiiiiiiny, it does a piss poor job of sticking to what it's been stuck to. Unless it's the cat.
But it is very shiny. And princess-y. Right?
Satin, I have now discovered, is a complete PitA to work with. IT SLIDES. It's slippery. EVEN WHEN PINNED.
On the upside, the only thing left is to get the zipper in. Attached to the slippery satin and glittering overskirt. But almost done. To my eye it looks huge. I used the size five pattern, so it should be her size. Except when I hold it up it looks like it should be for a twelve year old. Maybe she'll still be into princesses when she's twelve?
This morning I got up thinking about a skirt. More of an idea of a skirt, but one I thought I'd like to make. So I poked around in my fabric stash and found some fabric I thought would work well, and then I started drafting a pattern for it, and then I thought: pockets! I'd like to have some pockets! Now, I'm kind of partial to patch pockets, but they wouldn't work for the skirt I was thinking of. What I really needed were some pockets sewn into the side seams. It's been a while since I'd done those, so I checked my handy dandy sewing reference book: The Reader's Digest Complete Guide to Sewing. I picked it up at a yard sale or a thrift store or some such ages ago for like a dollar, and it has proven to be incredibly useful.
Lo and behold, there was a description of exactly what I was looking for-- inside pockets on a skirt!
But then I thought, hmmm.... maybe what I really want are the kind of pockets that you get on the front of a pair of jeans. I flipped the page, but there were no more pockets in the women's clothing section. I was baffled-- surely there must be something in here about pants pockets? I checked the index, and there, under pockets, was a whole section on trouser pockets. Half a dozen entries! But none in the women's clothing section.
Instead, they were all in the "sewing for men and boys" section. So efficient the way that so many levels of sexism can be wrapped up in one section heading! The women's clothing section is not entitled "sewing for ladies." Because the implied audience is ladies. The subtext is, in fact, sewing for you. But when it comes the the male of the species, it is not about men sewing, but about women sewing for men and boys. And only men and boys need pockets in their trousers. I guess because they carry the wallets?
Certainly I'd noticed that the illustrations (and instructions on how to capture some hot fashion styles) were dated, but I'd never really noticed how sexist it is. I guess this sort of highlights how little sewing for men and boys I do? The book was published in 1976, which to me seems so.... not that long ago. Maybe that just means I'm getting old?
I just love vintage patterns. This one is from the 1940s. I found it in a box at a Goodwill. I've made a bunch and sold them, so I made some more... but I'm thinking maybe I might keep one for myself....
I went away on travel for work for a few days and came back and everything was in bloom. For a week the yard will look great-- all the azaleas and the dogwood and the lilac are in bloom. Then the blooms fall off and I remember how scraggly those azalea bushes are.
Of course, I saw bunny in the yard yesterday morning, so I need to get a fence up soon or there won't be any lettuce or radishes. The squirrels and chipmunks have already dug up and eaten most of my nasturium seeds and all the artichoke seeds (?!)
In the meantime, I've been making some wearable blooms:
Between the snow days and the holidays I've been able to finish up a couple of projects. Mostly in an attempt to avoid housework. I hate housework. It's just so unsatisfying. As soon as you're done you have to start over again.
Today I finally tried out an idea that I've had for a while. I had a set of drapes that were saved (via Freecycle) from the landfill that I needed to make into something. I started sewing up the drape part (a rather unattractive print) into market bags. But then I still had the lining. So I decided to make those into market bags, too-- I finished sewing the first one today. But it's just lining, so it's kinda boring looking.
My only other accomplishment for the week was that I finally finished reading Frankenstein. Overwrought doesn't even begin to come close. It's only 246 pages, but it felt interminable. Now I know why I never got around to reading it. I mean, when the creation of the monster is the most believable thing in the book, you're in trouble. This is one of those rare cases in which every movie made with the book as a basis is more enjoyable.
In the meantime, I should probably go clean the bathroom :(
