The Holly and the Chaos

It has been brought to my attention that I'm always posting about stuff I'm working on, but never stuff I've completed.  The question was, "Do you EVER finish anything?"  Well, yes and no.  In the case of the nativity barn in the previous post, that project is kind of in a holding pattern as I percolate over how to do the people and animals.  Sometimes it takes me a long time for things to work themselves from the depths of my brain into reality.

Case in point:  I have a tote full of twig wreaths that I bought years ago.  Small ones, around 6 - 8", kind of too small to hang on your door and too big to hang on your tree.  I don't know what I thought I was going to do with them, I didn't really have a plan, but they were on sale and well made, not junky, so I grabbed them. I had some vague idea involving beads and wire, but although I've mulled  THAT over for a long long time, I couldn't ever formulate any kind of design.  Last year, I bought these neat berries at Hack and Livery (and if you've not been there, you need to go.  I have to go in every once in a while and just take it all in.  It's magical.)

They have been sitting on my desk here for about a year now, looking pretty and defying me to come up with a purpose for them.  Then at some point a few weeks ago, the hand of inspiration reached out and slapped me.  I needed to combine those berries, those wreaths, papier mache birds (which I'd been meaning to make also since last year) and handmade holly leaves.  Birds I can do, I've worked with papier mache before many times.  But holly leaves?  How to do that?  Of course I could BUY some and stick them on there and call it handmade, but that just wasn't going to work for me.  If I didn't already have the berries, I'd find a way to make those too.  But the leaves were enough of a challenge.  How to make leaves that are 3 dimensional (as much as leaves are), had a shape, would HOLD that shape, and look as realistic as possible, not cartoony?  Percolated about that for the last couple of weeks.

Then, while digging through my Little Shop of Chaos for something else, as is frequently the case, I came across some really stiff felt pieces that someone gave me.  Didn't think I'd ever have a use for them, but you never know, so I stashed them in there (which is why it's chaos. My dad would approve wholeheartedly.) and the fact that I didn't have any green didn't bother me in the least, as I wanted them painted anyway.  So then I had to figure out how to give them shape.  Gathering thread down the center just made them frilly, and that wasn't what I was going for.  BUT, after playing around with one for a while, I discovered that if I folded them in half and made a seam down the back and then gathered THAT, it made them curve in just the right way!  Looks like this.

So next I've got to get them all painted and then figure out how big to make the birds.  Cardinals? Bluebirds? Goldfinches? Chickadees?  Some of each?  I've got a lot of wreaths, and a limitless number of leaves.  But only one spray of berries.  Maybe I'll have to figure out how to make berries after all. And back into the Little Shop of Chaos I go!

Old Moss Woman's Nativity Barn

I'd like to address all those people, whoever you are, who commented (and then deleted them) on my last post; these people said all sorts of nice things like "you've given me lots to think about" and what a "thought-provoking post" that was.  If you read my last post, you'll no doubt agree that none of those descriptions apply.  So I'd just like to say, don't bother commenting and then deleting your comment, just so I get the email; I'm not clicking on your links because I'm not stupid enough to fall for whatever phishing scam this is.   ANYway.....

...hope all our east coast peoples are all prepared for Sandy!  The wind is picking up outside already even though she's not supposed to hit until tomorrow night.  I need to go to the store sometime today and get some last minute stuff but right now I'm trapped in my house.  Preston is really sick (head/chest cold) and literally didn't sleep all last night so he's sleeping now.  While that sounds like a good time for me not to be here, I can't even get dressed because if I do my dog gets all excited and starts talking to me and she doesn't know how to use her inside voice.  Plus she starts running around the house and making general dog noise so I'm just sitting here enjoying my third cup of tea and trying to figure out what kind of figures I want to make to go with this nativity barn I put together.  I was thinking something that resembled Matreshka dolls, and so far looking at how the barn came out, that's still the plan.  Kind of making it up as I go along. It makes me think of a picture from Old Moss Woman's Secret Garden. I've had the stick barn for years not knowing exactly what direction to go with it,  but apparently this is the year I actually make it happen. It called to me from the depths of my stockpile of raw materials. So today I glued green stuff from a model train tree kit and this viney thing to it.  So far so good.

It's Hard to Get a Head...

...unless you have $5, that is, in which case all you have to do is find the right yard sale.  I found this plaster head at just such a yard sale today just when what I needed most was a life-size head that weighs enough that the wind won't blow it over.  We were at the farmers' market again, Sue and I, and the wind was exceptional.  But thanks to my fortuitous find, I was able to stop picking up my prairie bonnet every two minutes.  The previous owner of the head informed me that she made this head in sculpting class at URI, and it made her happy that it found a new home.  I think it's a great job.  I do have to paint it though, it's got some discolorations on it, but I'm thinking I'm going to leave it white. Right now I really can't tell its gender, and I think for my purposes that's a good thing.  He/she is going to live in my shop in between shows, and for now showcase Sue's hats as they're kind of heavy and the styrofoam heads tend to be too tippy.  Besides, those wig heads have no personality whereas THIS one has loads of it!

While that one may remain white and undecorated (that may be hard for me to do), I also bought a doll bed at the same yard sale which is destined for...I don't quite know yet, but not white.  Marked at $3, it was a simply constructed box with a headboard and footboard with a cutout heart at each end.  It spoke to me.  It's American Girl size, and I envision it with a mattress and pillow, fitted and flat sheet and pillowcases, and patchwork quilt.  When I was little, one of my favorite things was a doll bed that my grandfather made, and all the linens, ruffled pillowcases and pieced quilt that my grandmother (or was it my mother?) made to go with it.  I still have all that stuff. 

Getting my Gaelic On

My latest project, whatever it happens to be, is always my favorite.  Today's latest project--or rather tonight's, as earlier in the day I was into something else--is a welcome banner.  I have made these in various forms for years, the most popular being a celtic knot, but I've had requests for all sorts of random images and sayings.  I'm not sure what inspired me to do this one, although it may have been the humungous thistle Sue has growing in her garden.  I always eradicate the thistles from my garden, and I always feel a little bad about it; in spite of their prickly disadvantages, they're really quite beautiful and attract goldfinches and assorted other critters.  But they tend to take up a large amount of real estate, and my garden is small.  Anyway, Sue and Frank allowed theirs to grow, and it's quite magnificent...easily taller than me and bigger around than my dining room table.

So this banner has been kicking around in my head for weeks, and today was the day to actually begin it.  What you see here is, of course, not the finished product but just the basic shapes ironed on to the backing.  With any luck at all, I'll finish it by the weekend.  If you care to broaden your horizons and pronounce it, it's FAHL-cha.  Much easier to pronounce than most Gaelic; I will never attempt to learn the language of my ancestors, I envision getting cramps in my tongue.

One Man's Junk....

...Is one woman's treasure!  I found this wonderful thing in a yard sale for $2.  It's about chest high on me (I'm 5'6") and the minute I saw it I knew what I was going to use it for.  It was a sickly shade of pink and was pretty banged up but that didn't deter me in the least.  It also had some markings in the middle of the shelves that made me think it might have had drawers at some point.  This is not fine American craftsmanship, it's clearly something someone with less than stellar woodworking skills put together; the wood doesn't quite meet at the corners, nail heads are sticking out in places (tried to bang them in, but they refused), but it's very sturdy and pretty heavy.  It had a million tack holes in the sides, and I can only assume some little girl had it in her room and was tacking pictures to it.  I like its banged-up-ness, it has personality. Still, I wasn't having that pink.  I debated about it for a couple of weeks.  It could have been purple, and I already had purple paint (of course haha) but for some reason it had to be green.  It just couldn't be anything else,.  So green it is, a shade that was called "lettuce alone".  I will also use that green, AND the white, in finishing the little bureau I bought two years ago (wow), whose time is coming very soon.  I might add that the paint cost me more than what I paid for both pieces of furniture.

Can I have my TV back now?

7'2", are you kidding me?  I didn't know they made humans that big.

Well, it's over.  We have been watching the Olympics for 17 days.  Everyone else I know either didn't care or was outright annoyed with all the to-do about it. But we watched it, all of it.  Or at least everything NBC showed.  Here's what I took away from my Olympic experience:

1. More commercials than you can imagine. We recorded it day by day and played it back, and it took about half the time as watching it live.  I love my DVR.
2. Track cycling is the weirdest thing I’ve witnessed since curling.  Plus watching water polo is kind of like watching paint dry, IMHO.  I must admit to pressing the FF button.
3. How is it possible to perform a physical exam on someone to determine their gender and have the results be inconclusive?
4. It made me happy to see the likes of LeBron James, Carmelo Anthony and Kobe Bryant jump around with glee like a bunch of 5-year-olds instead of the jaded professionals I assumed they were.
5. People who badmouth Gabby Douglas for giving all the glory to God for her win have obviously never seen a boxing match, where men regularly thank Jesus for enabling them to beat the living crap out of each other.
6. Mo Farah needs to gain 5 or 30 pounds. Man looks like a very happy skeleton.
7. How can 17 days go by so quickly and at the same time seem to last forever?
8. I bet the man with no legs never gets used to hearing that he may have “an unfair advantage”.
9. McDonalds’ and Coca-Cola, who produce stuff that no one should put into their body, sponsor an event that involves the healthiest (presumably) bodies in the world.  Does anybody besides me find that strange?
10. I need to go to the gym.

And now, back to my regularly scheduled life.  Since today is a holiday (!!!) I will be spending it painting the bookcase i bought in a yard sale, hemming drapes, and cooking Quinoa with stir-fried veggies at Sparky's house.  That last is an experiment, we'll see if the finished product measures up.

Mystery Fruit

Ah Monday.  Back to the grind.  Actually, when you work for yourself, the grind never stops.  Worked all day yesterday, as powwow is next week and I still have a ton of regalia to finish! Plus the mundane stuff.  I'm thankful to be so busy, people I know are unemployed and hurting pretty bad. Feast or famine, as they say.

I did spend Saturday morning in the best way, tooling around the tri-town area with Sparky, cruising for yard sales and listening to Willie Nelson, and ending up at the farmer's market.  Our usual Saturday morning!  Doesn't take much to make us happy.  I did find a new shelf/bookcase thing for the shop, all it needs is a coat of paint but that will have to wait now till after the powwow.

Where I come from, we call these "plums".  But what do I know.

I haven't revisited the subject of health food, but I'm still making a valiant effort. As a result I'm spending a lot more time in the kitchen, it seems, than I used to but the kitchen is not a bad place to be.  Something else I've learned is that the healthy food thing only works (for me, anyway) if you plan ahead. I never go without a list and a menu for the week, for which my phone's notepad app is indispensable because I can't even tell you how many times I've made a list and left it on the counter.

It also takes me way longer to shop than it used to.  Which is also ok.  I plan for it, and although the grocery store is not my favorite place to be it's a lot less stressful when you're not trying to get in and out as quickly as possible.  I'm doing a lot of reading of labels, and as it turns out there are also quite a few photo ops at the grocery store, like this one.  They used to have a preprinted Stop & Shop sign over the salad bar that read "Sate law prohibits sampling".  Wish I'd gotten a photo of that.