First day

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OK, were done with that one and it’s on to this year, 2012, and what a start!

Teacup version:

  • Polly ate something she shouldn’t have and she’s sick.
  • It is 57  and sunny for the moment, will reach 61 for a high with rain again later.   It was already raining like heck this morning when I went out to do my rounds.  Oh yes, and the (scary) wind turned my umbrella over when I set it down to water the chickens, and promptly filled it with water. Tonight will be 20 degrees and colder still tomorrow.  Well really we are just being plunged into the deep freeze for the whole week.
  • Took advantage of the sunshine and mucked out the chicken house before the rain leaks under and tonight’s freeze makes that job impossible.  (I’m brilliant that way sometimes.)
  • Read everyone’s New Year’s resolutions. . .

Which brings me to mine.  I’m not going there.  I just have to agree with DJ Lutz at Almost Out of Ink, when he penned this as his one and only resolution,

“I will simply resolve to try to be a better person each day. And if I can do something to make the world a better place, either through my writing or (gasp) by personal interaction, all the better.”

As regards myself, I will only add this to his statement,

I need to get my spiritual life back on track. 

NO, not to worry.  It’s not that I have given up my faith, nothing of the sort!  I’ve just been lazy about it, and that bothers me.

Something  I will do this year that is not really a resolution because I will do them regardless are:

  • Get my ETSY store up and running.  Now that all the home repairs are completed and I have a studio to work in.  * This makes me happy!
  • Continue my research for my book.

Why make it hard?  Why set myself up for failure?  This is simply the easiest and wisest choice.

*NOTE:  It is said that if you want to love your work, then work at something you love.  Now I won’t go into a whole treatise on the subject as this fellow already did that job HERE,  and its translatable into fourteen languages.  Why would I try to reinvent the wheel?   What I will say is this:   I love being a sewist/quilter/writer.  Better, it seems to come easily to me.   I could use more practice in design to get a handle on mixing patterns but that will come with practical experience and maybe a class or two.  The book could take longer.

Happy New Year Everyone!

 

 

Learning a New Craft: needle turned applique

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This week I have begun to teach myself how to do needle turned applique.  If you have never heard of this before here is a nice calming video from Deb at Connecting Threads to help you learn.

Connecting Threads can be found  HERE

Points you may want to consider before you start:

  • Start small
  • Start with something easy… something easy is NOT Maple leaves.
  • Don’t teach yourself on a deadline… like say, a gift for a friend.

If you watch the video, follow Deb’s instructions, and my hints above, then you will probably have a fun time learning this beautiful craft.  😉

If you do try it, then please let me know how you liked it!

HAVE FUN!

Communication then and now: “you’ve come a long way baby…”

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This post got started when a blog friend that I follow on The Simple Life of a Countryman’s Wife wrote about receiving a vintage, Brother, manual typewriter from her Mother-in-Law.  Reading her post, that was written using the typewriter, caused me to remember when I learned to type on this!

This baby was introduced on July 31, 1961 and turned 50 this year!  No one uses them anymore, but do click the picture for photo credit and more about the IBM Selectric.

Now, calling something from the 60s and 70s vintage just boggles my mind, but in the realm of communications the typewriter has “…come a long way baby…”

Of course, written communication is nothing new.  Humans were recording their thoughts and history on cave walls, some say, as far back as 32,000 years.  The Lascaux cave paintings discovered in 1940 are perhaps the most well-known of these.

(Please click for more photos and for credit)

You simply must go to the Lascaux site and see this interactive display: the Lascaux virtual tour

From painted murals for communication we then went to writing on clay tablets and stone.

(Click the photograph to link to the photo’s source.)

Remember the very famous Rosetta Stone?

Later, it was on to scrolls made of hides and papyrus, and of course, all handwritten!  I do not think I would have enjoyed the life of a scribe, too exacting… but then in those days the job of scribe was a male dominated position!

(Click the photograph to link to the photo’s source.)

Dead Sea Scrolls

The invention of paper led to the creation of books.  All were hand-made and very time-consuming to produce, and that led to the printing press by Gutenberg in 1440.  This was a vast improvement and cut production costs.   However, the most important thing about this invention was that it brought books, most notably the Bible, to the masses.

Now of course, by this time we were communicating via letter, but it was still a slow process.

Fast forward to the typewriter…

The first typewriter was invented in 1864.   It is made of wood! 

Please click the photo to follow the a link to the Peter Mitterhoffer Typewriter Museum, and there you will find a timeline on the invention typewriters!  Very interesting I promise!

I won’t go into all the details of the typewriter’s evolution as Mr. Mitterhoffer’s museum site does a fine job of that.  However I would like to share a little Youtube video about the IBM Selectric.  When these hit the typing lab at Claremont High we all thought it was a revolution in typing, and it turns out we were right!  It was the revolution that led to word processing!

Ah… that sound…  It was thrilling in its day.

So today, unlike the Countryman’s Wife  who enjoyed writing to us on her manual typewriter, I write to you on my new computer that Bob built for me.  It is a wonder of modern technology, and beats heck out of my old laptop that was being held together with a rather large binder clip.  😉  It’s fast, sleek, and imagine, it has replaced all the functions of the aforementioned forms of communication!

What will tomorrow bring us?

A special Thank you to the Countryman’s Wife for inspiring today’s post

If I wait till it’s done… It will never get posted!

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Yes friends I am just that way.  I want it all to be perfect, but it is not.  I think it will take quite awhile for it all to shake out, and settle into where it goes.  That aside, here is the basic layout.

The window quilt is whole cloth, and was a practice piece for machine stippling and binding the edges.   It also instantly and dramatically warmed up my room!  The handbag collection was my Mother-in-laws.  The little bed by where I work is Tucker’s place.  🙂

So, it’s all here, and like I said it still needs a bit of fluffing and folding, but it will sort itself out as I use it and find the logical places for it all.

And this is very special to me…

The vintage telephone table was a recent purchase.  The vintage telephone belonged to Bob’s parents and still has the old phone number on it… the one I dialed so long ago and he answered…  AND IT STILL WORKS!  😉

Things I learned how to do:

  1. Use a pneumatic nail gun
  2. Use a radial miter saw (and didn’t hurt myself!)
  3. Build and install a sewing counter (it’s there on the left in the first photo)
  4. Lay and cut in vinyl flooring.
  5. Miter and nail in shoe to hold flooring

Bob painted the ceiling and helped me carrying the heavy stuff.  He also helped me with hanging the wire shelving and the peg board (it takes two for those jobs).  But the rest of it was all me.

Can’t you just feel me smiling?

Now, what else can I tear up fix around here?  OH, I know, the laundry/mud room!