Read something good!

A good friend and crit partner has her debut novel out  and
If you're on Kobo (or know someone who is) and you'd like a copy of Free Falling, here's the link. Grab it while the promo is still live

: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/free-falling-15

taking a cloth breath

.

There's too much good stuff in the river basket to just dive in. I am quite overwhelmed, but gravitating to the stuff that looks like mayhem. I feel like swinging a machete at a nazi picnic but, the cloth will have to suffice, I guess. It's probably a good thing that I'm not twenty.

I actually ironed some of this before I got started. I find that huck and linen have to be whacked back into 2D before you can compose.

 At least my "THAT SUCKS" radar is still working.

I already see the big problem, lack of contrast. Fixing that with stitch never works.

Back to the drawing board, a little at a time. I won't even ask myself why.

It feels good. The section on the right, with the blue background, has promise on its own.

This section of the design wall is just to the left of where I sit for the day job. If the clients are quiet tonight, I may make some progress with this, but I'm going to give it time before I thread a needle.

back to winter in GA

This is how it goes in Georgia. One or two sunny, brisk days to call Fall,  then the cold and damp sets in and this is pretty much what to expect from winter with the odd freeze here and there.

It was darker than this when I dropped Captain America off at Pre-K this

morning. The teacher who met us at the door was Minnie Mouse in polka dot long johns.










And yesterday, we got a jump on the mobs.

I'll be in the wind a while

Shopkeeping

The bottomless basket has been replenished.

After picking a few choice pieces for my own (now manageable) hoard, I ripped and cut my way through the stacks of cloth that have been piling up as the summer's dye days have come and gone. Lots of color textures that are new!

There are linens, broadcloth, sheeting, flannel, lawn, huck, gauze, poplin, and some weird stuff I have no name for, only that since it took the dye, it must be mostly natural cloth.

If the day job gets quiet tonight, I'll be packing up a bunch of fat baggies for the shop. I'll be going out of town on Saturday, so last ship day this week will be Friday.

These pictures are all the same basket, I just reached in and churned it a bit. Tasty all the way down.

make it so

Vote to make it happen.

post Michael

Taken from the parking lot early this morning at La Madelaine. I was trying to decide if I needed a nap or a cup of coffee. Their coffee is really good.

All Michael brought us was an all-night rain. If there were any breezes, I slept right through them. I'm sorry for the devastation on the gulf coast. I had planned on a camping beach vacation there this week but changed my plans. I would have been in the thick of it had I gone.

The rest of this day unfolded beautifully, bright blue skies, fat scudding clouds. My house is opened up to the fresh air for the first time in weeks.

Thanks for everyone's concern. We were unscathed.

Waiting for Michael

pocket repair on the dixie mink

"The trees crouch leaves twitching. Rain so fine it won't fall."

I fell asleep in the car waiting for the coffee place to open. I was so cozy. I wished that I had some stitching. Will have to make a car kit for if and when the mood strikes. Mending will be enough.

After coffee and writing down the bones of a new short story, I found a new, used bookstore that also sells used Lego by the ounce!

Meanwhile, Charlie weathered the early storm and a pre-K Wednesday. I own him another dollar and thank him for another morning out of the house.

Freaky Monday

Nana by Charlie

We had a long day together yesterday. School holiday for something or other. I am now being corrected if I botch a lyric from "Yellow Submarine"

 A grand time was had by all.

Today I joined the mobs on catch-up day at the post office and got everything shipped out ahead of Hurricane Michael, so if you are expecting a package from me, stand by!

It looks like we might take a hit this time. Too early to tell.

Story

"...i am so so Done with this scene in this country...just so Done
with it, I pledge my allegiance to cloth and thread to
women who make things...colors, cloth, paper, children, families,
gardens, meals that feed, warm places for animals, for the
good men in their lives that give back, that make lives for the
good men and hold them up..."

 

A quote from a friend. I'm sure many of us are feeling this.

I was domesticating myself yesterday, something I only do when what I really want is to be breaking things. Wreaking havoc. There was a week's worth of dirty dishes, all my everyday clothes in the laundry, etc. I was listening to the speeches before the first vote.
I broke a plate and cut my finger.
I used HOT water on the clothes.
But my mind went elsewhere and I organized and wrote the next book in my head. Got the notes all down. Yes, bits and pieces are already around, but like bits and pieces of cloth, they need to be given purpose. A point. Listening to the speeches before the first vote, my story took wing.

Women have more power than they know.

Maybe you have stories?

Here are some curated groups of cloth and thread. A place to start. Or maybe just a place to escape to.

the list

Way back in '92 I was working for AT&T as a telephone operator. Good money and benefits. Not a bad job if you were thick-skinned and unconcerned with a stranger's opinion. I personally found the daily quota of assholes amusing, but at any time, up to 20% of the crew was out on stress disability. Did I have something missing, or something extra? I never figured it out.

Then AT&T dropped the bomb. Our office was closing. We could quit, retired (if eligible) or relocate - take "lateral" positions in Pleasanton, CA, Silver Spring MD, or Atlanta. I forget how much notice we had. Months.

They brought in outside soft skills coaches and counselors. The union helped some I recall. There was a career counselor. An Episcopal minister with a handful of degrees in something. I can only suppose he was qualified to put us through a battery of tests...the kind of thing all over FB these days. "What you should be when you grow up". That sort of thing. At some point, we were asked to write our top three job choices (?) on a blackboard. I wrote:

Phone Slut
Writer
Supreme Court Judge

Two out of three ain't bad, to quote Meat Loaf.

weeks fly by

A piece from the last (I swear) dyefest. There was a nice clutch of threads too. None of it posted yet. I may make up some bundles tomorrow.

I've been putting in what feels like 18 hour days.

A new project on the horizon, too.

No school today, so I spent it artfully in good company.