Annika's Atelier

Snow-homish

2012-01-15T12:49:00.000-08:00

Stuff in the Mail

2012-01-14T10:51:00.000-08:00

This week has been an ever-so international week for me, mail-wise. Earlier in the week I received some needle lace books from Italy:

"Bordi" featured 8 gorgeous border needle lace projects. They look very very Renaissance-y.

Punchetto is a deliciously colorful type of needle lace done in Italy. A few years ago I saw a short video on Youtube of a woman creating a piece of punchetto with just thread and a needle. I was so enthralled by it I had to track down some books on it. This book is a little advanced for me, but the beginner's book was out of stock, so I'll have to wait for that one.

Ricami d'Assisi featured delightful renaissance creatures in a type of cross stitch.
It is so exciting for me to see these wonderful examples of embroidery and needle lace. I have a new passion!

And today, our esteemed postlady had me sign for a copy of Perlen Poesie, which is a German beading magazine published in Hamburg. Their November issue featured an article on micro-macrame and included photos of some of my pieces and Joan Babcock's too.

Dragonfly Protoype

2012-01-10T10:05:00.000-08:00

I've been creating dragonfly protoypes for an upcoming tutorial for a beading magazine...after a point I realized I had been over-designing the poor critter and backed off to a much simpler design...

Etsy Swag

2011-11-17T05:36:00.001-08:00

I have been busy lately knotting up 50 (yes 50) micro-macrame owls for the etsyRAIN holiday sale in 2 weeks. I don't have time in my life to actually participate in the sale, but I am part of the 20 or so artists who created swag for the swag bags that will be given out to the first 50 customers. I got bored making these critters in monotone so I started getting all creative with colors...

I even knotted up a couple of 'em in the University of Washington colors of gold and purple: go dawgs go! Just don't eat my owls...

Manukura, the White Kiwi

2011-11-01T16:28:00.000-07:00

Poor little critter - she had to have surgery to remove two stones from her gizzard.

But according to the Beeb, she appears to be recuperating well.

My Micro-Macrame Video Ad - First Try

2011-10-30T12:23:00.000-07:00

My Micro-Macrame Video Ad

What do you think? I am trying out a couple of different ideas for a business video.

etsyRAIN's Handmade Holiday Craft Show!!!

2011-10-30T11:38:00.000-07:00

I'm not selling at this craft fair because I'll still be moving into my new place that weekend, but I am supplying swag for the gift bags!

Wooeeee!

Knitting Machinery

2011-10-12T20:03:00.000-07:00

Karin is visiting me and last night I got out the Singer knitting machine to show her how to use it. Of course, it took me about an hour to remember exactly how I cast on with it and to knit some swatches. Today she went over to Churchmouse yarns on Bainbridge Island and bought some yarn to make a poncho with. Here she is knitting away!

As you can tell, Jynx is not at all impressed.

Here's what about half of the poncho looks like...I think it took about 40 minutes, maybe a little less, to do this much.

Arabella

2011-09-24T08:23:00.000-07:00

Okay, so I was fumbling around on the living room floor yesterday and a faery darted out from behind the sofa. To save her from Jynx, who is a Supreme Catcher of Many Small Wriggly Things I caught her under a water glass and took her over to the faery front door (the one by the television set). I put her down there and she squeaked her thanks. We got to talking about the neighborhood and I asked if I could take a picture of her for my blog and she shook her head vigorously "No!" She made it clear that to take a picture might mean her soul was captured in 2D and she didn't like the thought of it. So I asked if I could sketch her. Again, she said no. Could I made an image of her in needlepunch embroidery since it wasn't all that 2 dimensional? She reluctantly agreed. In fact, I think she kind of liked the idea.

Gnarf Cat and Blue Embroidery

2011-09-17T09:02:00.000-07:00

Last week I found an incredibly cool embroidered wallhanging - it measures 105 cm (about 42 inches) and I think it would be perfect either in my teeny tiny dining area, next to my Incan Calendar wall hanging or as the headboard of the bed in my guestroom/office...

Hmmm...where to put it? I also thought about getting rid of all the surrounding frou-frou and using just the center piece, but, all that outer busy-ness is kinda growing on me.

I had this oh-so-profoundly-brilliant idea to create a set of punch needle embroidered pins this week and started on my Fuzzy Moggy series. Here is Moggy #1, a prototype also known as Gnarf Cat. I picked that name because my friend Tini uses the word Gnarf quite a lot and I don't know quite what it means, so I googled it and I must say, I think it appropriate for this little fellow. He measures 3 cm by 4 cm-ish, and is made from plain old sewing thread. He has Austrian crystal bead eyes, though! Now I have to glue him to a piece of cardboard and slap a pin thingy on the back!

Quilty Goodness

2011-09-11T08:59:00.000-07:00

I started one of my deranged Florida patchwork quilts sometime in 1991 (?) and used the patchwork part of it:
1. in a movie - it was part of an outdoor street market scene supposed to be somewhere in the Bahamas
2. as a duvet cover
3. as a wallhanging
In 2001 or 2002, I decided to make it into a quilt, so I replaced the duvet backing and added a layer of batting and pinned it. And there it sat for a few years. So by 2005 I realized I was never going to get around to doing the quilting part myself, so I sent it off to a professional quilter with one of those big fancy quilting machines and had her quilt it.
Like an idiot, I didn't want to pay for her to bind it because I kept thinking "Oh, that's the easy part! I'll do that myself!" Well, when she mailed it back to me I put it in a plastic bin and forgot about it. Well, not exactly. Every time I went by that bin I looked at it and thought, I'll get to that next week/month...
Last week I got it out and FINALLY FINALLY sewed the binding on to it.

Of course, I cannot sew a straight line to save my life, so I sewed the binding on with a compendium of wavy and most crooked lines.

Then I added threads of differing colors to the mix:

Is it the best quilt I have ever made? No. Is it finished? Why, YES!!!

In a Red Currant Jam

2011-09-10T08:38:00.000-07:00

The Northwest is renown for its cherries, apples and berries, but I was completely surprised to find a half flat of red currants at Central Market! I didn't know we grew enough of them in this area to merit them being packed up in half flats and sold in grocery stores. So, naturally, I HAD to purchase a half flat and make some jam.

While I was in the check out line by the cash register a man behind me in line said "Oohh, those things are sour! What are you going to do with them?"
"Make jam," I replied.
"They're really really sour, you can't eat 'em. I know, 'cause I tried a couple and had to spit them out." he said.
Niccccceeee, I thought. Some old dude goes around sampling the fruity wares and spitting all over the floor of the produce section. Just greaaaaaat.
So I brought them home and started removing their little sticks and stems...Aren't they just darling?

And, yes, I did have to put one helluva lot of sugar in the pot as I cooked them!

I actually got 4 jars out of this batch, but gave one to a colleague at Amazon.

What to do? What to do?

2011-09-10T08:03:00.000-07:00

There's a big fabric swap in Tacoma next month where I will be able to sell some of my treasured fabrics - I know, it's almost sacrilegious to do so, but it must be done - and as I am sorting through my goodies to sell I came across my collection of devore/burnout velvet scarves.

I'd collected them over the years to put together one of Kayla Kennington's Paris evening coats, or Panel Tops but, (let's all chime in together) I never got around to it.
Looking over my collection, though, I realized I really didn't want to sell it; there are too many pretties! And I would never get back the money I've invested in all these scarves.

Admittedly, most were purchased for a few dollars at either Goodwill or Value Village, but I've amassed them over a period of probably 10 years.

So I need your help!
What should I make from all these luxurious snippets of Devore velvet?

Doors to Faeryland

2011-08-01T10:40:00.000-07:00

I'm not all that observant most days, but yesterday I was looking down at ground level and came to realize that there were several doors to faeryland near my new apartment!!!!
There was even one IN MY APARTMENT!!! Right by the tv set. Sheesh!

All I had to do was go outside to see several situated very close to my front door:

And just a little way behind the the ground cover, if you look carefully...

Found Stuff Piling Up in Enormous Stack

2011-05-30T09:15:00.000-07:00

The Ibsen Pinata made for Cinco de Mayo in the First Year Graduate Students' Office. I made margarita cupcakes to add to the festivities.

Eileen and me being goofy in the office at the end of Spring term 2011 at Stony Brook U:

Road Trip: Niagara Falls, New York side:

Mount Rushmore in South Dakota. I found it sad that so many people around me kept asking "Now which president is which?" Jeez!

My Off Off Broadway Debut

2011-05-18T17:51:00.000-07:00

Saturday I took the train into NYC to perform in a show at The Tank called American Decameron. This show was a collection of monologues given by several people - mine was about how I'd found a book at the local Goodwill that had previously been owned by a classmate of mine, Waylon Lenk. My monologue went something like this:

"I was perusing the woo-woo section of the used book shelf at a local second hand store this afternoon and came across a most interesting book: Restoration and Eighteenth-Century Plays by Women. Oooo! Now this is a truly fascinating collection, but what really struck my curiosity is the previous owner of this book had crossed out the book's previous owner's name and written his own name in large Capital letters on an inside page. Jeez, that name sounds really familiar but I cannot place this mystery man. Where have I seen that name before? I really am cudgeling my brains about this because I know that name from somewhere. But where? Is he that Cambridge spy who defected to the Yukon over the Norwegian moose scandal a few years back? Didn't he co-author that novel about Florentine artifact smugglers who got embroiled in a VAT scam with what's his name? Or was he the director of the vintage classic motion picture movie Gidget Goes to Hell and its sequel Gidget Goes All the Way and Gidget Goes Down...to Rio?

I am at a loss. If you know who this guy is, give me a shout. I'm pretty sure he didn't mean to donate this ultra-fantastic book of restoration plays, and if you find him, tell him he can have the book back for a nominal fee. Now, I'm not talking blackmail or anything, so don't get your knickers in a twist over this matter. It's just that used book stores don't give books out for free, especially ones that have been autographed by famous people..."

As it turns out, a man from the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival was in the audience and really liked the show and encouraged us to participate in their festival:

Making Stuff, Packing Stuff...

2011-05-04T18:53:00.000-07:00

The term is finally winding up here at Stony Brook and I have been packing all my stuff in fairly-easy-to-ship boxes and sending them out to Washington in batches. I'm down to only a few projects still due for my classes; one is a Powerpoint presentation on Ibsen's "The Master Builder" due the end of this week and another is a performance in "American Decameron" at a place called The Tank in NYC on May 14th. I am performing two monologues - one of them is a video that will be broadcast during the show; it can be viewed here: Invisible. I called it Invisible, partly because most women over 40 are invisible to men and partly because the character is...well...dead...It was inspired by something Linda Shaffer told me years ago from when she worked in a funeral home.

And here's a puppet head I built for a raggedy puppet to be used in "American Decameron"

Apparently it lost its head in Korea somewhere. It was fun to build it a new one out of paper clay and styrofoam. Here he/she is next to a buddy puppet who had somehow managed to keep his head screwed on tight.

And here are some flip-flop socks I managed to finish last week.

They are only one-tenth as cool as the Easter socks Tini knit and sent to me!

The flowers are in bloom here on Long Island; here's the view from my basement apartment window

A New Term at School

2011-03-05T15:10:00.000-08:00

Man! This term is sooo kicking my ass! I have so much writing to do, a ten page paper here, a twenty page paper there, that I've been wondering lately what I've gotten myself into. On Monday I have a paper due on Arab interpretations of Hamlet since 1975.....ehdhashasdhadlkwrtn (incoherent mumbling has ensued).
And...I have to write 50 blog posts for one class...arrrgghghghghghghhh! Here's a link to the blog where I post those entries...Grant Group. You can tell which ones are mine - my name is in the taglines...Can I just go home now???
Luckily, some of the posts can be vlogs (video blogs); so far I have posted a couple of them on the Grant Group blog. Here's a silly one called Two Aspects of Abandonment; we each had to create a video with the theme of Abandonment. Most of the other students got all angsty with their videos, but I thought the whole thing was a total joke. In it I talk about a 61 VW bug. I never owned one; I did, however, drive my brother's 67 VW around until I crashed it into a telephone pole and got a ticket from an uptight cop for parking in a moving zone!
Here's some test footage for a project I am working on with a fellow student - this shows my new haircut. Admittedly, this little video snippet is a bit unsettling and...well, in the words of my fellow student, a tad bit creepy...

I was busy over the Christmas holiday knitting mitts for the long hard cold winter that overtook the Northeastern part of the US. Lucky me, I still love snow, I find it quaint, charming, picturesque, etc. etc., but as of yesterday I am officially SICK OF WINTER.

I actually knit four pairs of these cuties but only have one pair left because the rest were given away to fellow students. They were very simple to knit up, which is always a big plus in my book. Lookie! There's a tea towel with darling little hedgehogs behind my hand! Woooeee! I love hedgehogs!

Happy New Year!

2010-12-31T20:55:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year! May 2011 be a great year for all of us. Tonight I am in downtown Snohomish, Washington at a friend's house. This morning at dawn the roads were just a tad frosty and icy.

But Jynx didn't seem to mind. She slept right through it.

Yesterday Chris, Linda and I drove over to Port Townsend. On the way we stopped at Fort Flagler - Here's Linda scouring the beach

Here's Chris examining a b-i-g- g-u-n

And here are some deer we came across at Fort Worden which is in Port Townsend.

Corn Snow

2010-12-31T20:40:00.000-08:00

I've been busy creating wire knit bracelets for my online store on ArtFire;

I knit beads and wire together on a spool:

My brother Chris, his wife Linda and I went over to the peninsula yesterday to take a look at Port Townsend. On the way we stopped at Fort Flagler where we found the ground peppered with what Chris calls 'corn snow' - that is, snow pellets the size of corn kernels.

Finger Monkeys!

2010-12-16T12:14:00.000-08:00

In case you were wondering what to get me for Christmas, may I suggest...
a finger monkey! Oh, okay. It's probably illegal to own them in the States, but still...Finger Monkeys

Party Time!

2010-12-16T09:30:00.000-08:00

My first term of graduate school is finished - now just waiting to see what grades I've gotten...
I've opened up a store on ArtFire, too. Here's one of my new seed beads and knitted wire bracelets which I think could also make a mask...

OMG! A Play Reading!

2010-12-08T14:28:00.000-08:00

It has been two months since my last entry here mainly because I have been consumed by writing papers and creating PowerPoint presentations on things like Cardenio - Shakespeare's Lost Play, The History of Tanztheater in Germany, creating a Regie Buch/Dramaturg's Protocol for a Steampunk version of The Tempest and 14 one-page papers on various Shakespeare plays - Midsummer Night's Dream, Hamlet, King Lear, the Merchant of Venice, Henry the Fourth, part 1, and one other play, but I can't remember which one...
Sheesh! Such is the life of a graduate student.
Tomorrow night is the first public reading of a portion of a play I wrote for my playwrighting class - we're just going to get through Act one and a tiny bit into Act Two, but I'm happy that I've written that much!
I am exhaust-a-pated!

So here's a collection of images from the past and present.
Can you spot my high school yearbook picture from 1976?

This is the reflection of the writing on the back of my monitor in the morning sunlight:

Here are two photos from the beach a few miles away; I love how the water carved rivulets in the sand.

This last photo is my little basement studio apartment's window looking out onto the garden in the backyard. Note the bat-winged pumpkins!

Some Frou Frou Ideas

2010-10-09T06:08:00.000-07:00

Here are a couple of ideas I have been toying with. I just took all of my glitzy junk rhinestone jewelry bits and placed them on the back of an old hand mirror and the top of a glass jewelry box. These two pieces are visual mish-mashes of sparkly kitsch. I haven't glued the jewelry bits in place yet - I'm still playing!

Whaddaya think?

College Life

2010-10-03T08:22:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the bloggery hiatus. I think perhaps I've been recovering from the shell shock of moving cross country in the sweltering heat of early August to find a place to live close to campus and lately, settling into college life. Whew! What a transition! But a much needed one. I can't say I've fallen in love with Long Island yet, but I am adjusting to the rhythm of life meted out in semesters and the weekly workload expected of a first year grad student of dramaturgy.
After a summer of inactivity creative-wise, I've also managed to work on a few smallish projects this past month. I FINALLY finished the Sami bracelet kit Karin sent me from Sweden:

I had a cold last weekend and worked on a cross-stitch pattern of a medievallish gryphon I found on an Italian embroidery site - I'll post a picture of it later.

My Apologies

2010-05-23T20:26:00.000-07:00

I have been away from this blog far too long. But at least I have been busy elsewhere; so many little projects begun and in varied stages of completion, including a cape

made of the most silky soft houndstooth with a silk charmeuse lining. I think I found the houndstooth suiting at Pacific Fabric last summer; the silk charmeuse was (let's all chime in together) A Find at Goodwill.

Last month or so I joined a Mini Cooper club and went on my first rally.

I was to go on another Mini event this weekend, which was held at Maryhill's Stonehenge on the Columbia Gorge, but last week I broke a toe and it is really painful trying to shift gears for more than a short trip at a time. So I missed out on the photo op here:

Sigh. I did finish my next pair of socks, a lovely soft bamboo wool blend in purple stripes They're a bit big, but my poor abused toe is quite happy and warm. I also dyed a couple of skeins of wool with Kool Aid and am waiting to knit it up and then felt it into some elf slippers...

My Hero...

2010-02-17T20:48:00.000-08:00

I was perusing DudeCraft's blog just now and came across a photo of my beloved Hero robot...oh how I miss him! I received a Heathkit Hero Robot kit as a Christmas gift sometime in the mid-80's (Thanks, John! You always gave me the coolest stuff!) and set about putting him together immediately. I think it took me 3 or 4 days to get him finished to the point where he could roll down the hallway and sing "Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer do..." My cats hated him with feline fury and swatted angrily every time he came within range.

I finally let him go one day in early 1999 when I took him to Goodwill's to drop him off with a couple of bags of old clothes. One of the attendants was so thrilled by the prospect of owning his very own robot I said to him "Oh hey, this guy is for you -I'm giving him to you, not Goodwill."
My final memory of Hero is looking back in the car mirror and seeing that excited kid clutching him as I drove away...Miss you, little guy...

Still Up to No Good, As Usual

2010-02-08T21:25:00.000-08:00

My apologies if you are put out by my lack of blogging these past two months. I have been busy but unsettled, trying to figure out where my life is going to go next. I'm employed once again which is always good for the ego.
Recently I got crazy busy and knotted up several bracelets to put on Etsy but nary a one has sold yet. I'm not all that surprized; I think Etsy is besotted with jewelry already.
I finally got around to skeining up a big uhhh wad of single ply wool I bought off a guy from New Zealand. It took me three nights but I now have 24 skeins of lovely yarn to play with.

It took me another week to wash the skeins because they were lanolin sheep sweat stinky. But now they smell fresh as cheap shampoo!

I also knit a pair of plain old socks for myself. I like the southwest colors especially on dark dreary rainy winter days.

Two weeks ago I had the great good fortune to see the Firesign Theatre perform live at the Kirkland Performance Center. I am still absolutely smitten by those crazy guys after all these years.

And last week I was blown away by a broadcast of a live performance of "Nation" which was aired in a little theatre in Mount Vernon, about 40 miles north of Seattle.
The National Theatre in London has been broadcasting performances of some of their shows all over the world by satellite and the Lincoln Theatre in Mount Vernon is one of three venues in this area that participates in the live broadcasts.
So I have been out and about, making mischief and bon-vivanting around town.

Stuff Around the House

2010-01-07T19:44:00.000-08:00

I don't have a whole lot to say right now, so I thought I'd just shoot some stuff around my house.
Narnian Lamps

Shoes I bought for $1.49!

The Avon critters who took roost on the bathtub

Some ornaments I made for Christmas that I didn't get to put up because I had such a bad cold I didn't really have Christmas this year...

Hey! Book Giveaway Contest on My Other Blog!

2009-12-28T09:00:00.000-08:00

Hello! Today is the first anniversary of my micro-macrame blog and I am giving away a copy of my book Micro-Macrame:30 Beaded Designs for Jewelry Using Crystals and Cords to the lucky winner who best describes what it is they like so much about micro-macrame...So click on this link to get over to the micro-macrame blog and leave your answer in the comments field there (not in the Annika's Atelier blog comments here). The winner will be announced this Friday, January 1, 2010! What a great way to start the new year!

Long Time No See...

2009-12-18T07:22:00.000-08:00

Okay, okay, I have been gone a long long time. I've been quite busy with other things like: finding a new place to live, moving house, teaching classes, the Swine Flu, traveling to Oslo, Paris and Kiel annnnd sorting out my new place and looking for a job. I suppose you'd like to see pictures of at least some of these excuses. Like maybe Paris and Germany.

Obligatory Eifel Tower group shot. Tini, Clare and I weren't taking any of this seriously.

The Sacre Coeur in Montmartre. For some reason, I kept returing to this place, first with one group of friends, then again with another.

Hanging with Val at Versailles.

Dinner with friends old and new.

Tini's turkey, in Daenischenhagen in Deutschland. The poor bird barely fit in the oven. It was magificent, but that's not surprising, since Tini is an excellent cook.

Me learning to spin. It's all Tini's fault; she made me do it. Now I am addicted to spinning.

King Tut! Who knew we'd find the King Tut exhibition in Hamburg?

Lucky Find

2009-09-23T17:59:00.001-07:00

Linda and I visited the local Goodwill this afternoon and she spotted a lovely costume for me.
It must have been either a stage costume or perhaps the original owner had lost weight and had to give it away. It is missing a few pearls and Swarovski rhinestone spacers at the neckline of the bodice which are pretty easy to replace. Also, I need to create some sort of chemise to cover the underarm area or continue to go au naturel and astound the neighbors. I donned the wig (which doesn't match period-wise) just to hide my own ragged haircut (world's worst haircut inflicted on me about a month ago which is growing out. Slowwwwwllllyyy.)
Anyhoo, the costume cost a whopping $60.00! Luckily, I already had a standard corset which works underneath.

Back from the Bead Bazaar

2009-09-14T10:25:00.001-07:00

This past weekend I had a booth at the North West Bead Society's Annual Bead Bazaar, which was held in the Lynnwood Convention Center. I sold quite a lot of books and micro-macrame kits for making my infamous owl earrings and kitschy baroque bracelets. Both days I knotted kitschy baroque bracelets and answered questions about cords, crystal beads, the history of macrame, and where I found the gnarly wire tree on the display table where all the owls were perched.
Many people stopped by to gawk and talk about my jewelry because they hadn't ever seen macrame done on such a tiny scale before. It was great fun to be there in the midst of so many talented jewelry artists but today, I am exhausted!

Sand Animation

2009-08-26T12:27:00.000-07:00

The following video is from Ukraine's Got Talent. Sand animation artist Kseniya Simonova won for her two pieces on that competition.

Her work is so powerful and heart-breaking.

Hairless Spud Update

2009-08-24T21:13:00.000-07:00

I have been following the slowwww progress of Spud the hedgehog's recovery on the St. Tiggywinkle's Wildlife Hospital website. He came to them completely bald covered with scabs due to some undetermined skin disease, poor little critter. He was barely recognizable as a proper hedgehog.

But with regular warm baths which he seemed to enjoy readily, daily massages with aloe vera, good quality dog food and several bouts of medication Spud has improved to a point where he is regrowing his spines.
Yeah, baby! Catch his update here.

Burda, Burn Tests and Fancy Scribbles

2009-08-21T12:50:00.000-07:00

Had a good rummage through the calligraphy pile last night and came up with a couple of samples of stuff I did a while back. This one was for the halls at work for Halloween last year. When I left Microsoft at the beginning of summer, it was still up in one of the halls.

This next piece is a test for a class I took a few years ago. The words came to me in a meditation so I duly scribed them in a sort of blackletter hand.

Now for something completely non sequitur:

I did a burn test on that steel blue/grey raw silk mix I'm making the Marci Tilton V8600 jacket out of and it definitely is part silk, but I'm not sure what else...rat hair? Bamboo shoots? Cotton candy? I dunno.

I have also been meaning to make something from this lovely Burda magazine from 1965. Details to follow in a later post.

PNWA Summer Conference

2009-08-02T07:12:00.001-07:00

No sight of that wicked canny feline Super Bob, but I just got back from the PNWA Writers Conference where Were-Dolphins and Bionic Shrimp made an appearance, at least in the minds of a few writers who attended wayyy too many Urban Fantasy, Sci Fi and Steampunk-oriented workshops.
There was a book signing one evening, and like most book signings practically no one came due to the late hour in which it was held - after a dinner banquet with Joe Finder as the guest speaker. Most of the conference attendees headed straight home after the dinner and who can blame them? They were tired after a long day of sitting in on talks about the publishing world. When I finally found the table where my pile of books had been heaped up in a corner I saw that my name card had been hastily slapped together - they had scratched a very wiggly Annika deGroot in Sharpie on the back of one of Terry Brooks' printed name cards. So I told fellow authors that I was Terry's alter ego (hey - we both have white hair and write about elves...) May be next year they'll hold the booksigning party before the banquet in that hour+ lull between the last workshop and the start of the banquet. One hour is plenty time to saunter over to your favorite author's table, strike up a conversation and get a book ot two signed.

Aspen Choker Tutorial

2009-07-22T09:39:00.000-07:00

The tutorial for the Aspen Choker featured on the cover of Micro-Macramé: 30 Beaded Designs for Jewelry Using Crystals and Cords is now available online. It features a supply list, step-by-step instructions and lots of color photographs to help you learn how to create this modular choker. Let me know what you think of this lesson; I am actively seeking feedback!

Super Bob

2009-07-20T07:35:00.000-07:00

Last Monday at around 7 p.m. I heard a crash on my front porch so I went out to investigate and there was Super Bob the local bobcat. Lest you think he's quite the cutie, be aware that he is three times larger than my biggest house cat, Gato

(Oh, I didn't name Gato Gato, which I think is a dumb name for a cat; he came to me with that monicker thanks to his previous owner who wanted him put down because she had to move. I call him "Otto" and sometimes "Gelato" and yet other times "Gateau" because he does look a bit like a cake to me...}
Anyhoo, Super Bob is a menace to suburbia. He had just treed my cat Jynx and was about to climb up that tree to get her when I chased him off with a broom. Yes, bobcats will eat domestic cats, the little cannibals!
The very next day I called the state wildlife folks and they referred me to a trapper in Snohomish - don't worry - the trap he brought out is a catch and release trap and that's exactly what will happen to Super Bob - he'll be caught and released out in the true wild somewhere far far away. Having seen Super Bob up close and in person, I think the trap is a tad too tiny for his giant hulking frame. So the trapper has ordered a bigger cage from Minnesota. In the meantime, Zena, the neighbor's-dog-who-thinks-she-lives-at-my-house rolled the trap over and ate all the sardines that were meant for Super Bob. So the trapper moved the cage to a different locale and staked it to the ground.

Chirimen Hoard

2009-07-05T08:44:00.000-07:00

The chirimen from Fabric Tales in Japan arrived the other day. For poly chirimen it is very very nice! I couldn't help myself - I had to get some chirimen piping, bias tape and extra fabric for perhaps another Hong Kong vest or Joplin Pullover...

Now all I have to do is create a pattern by doing a rub off of the chirimen jacket and grading it up to my size.

Flying Fox Bat Babies Video

2009-07-04T15:07:00.000-07:00

I am a big fan of Bat Conservation and Merlin Tuttle.
The name of the video sounds like they're into eating baby bats, but it's just a bad title, so ignore it. This is really a short video of how a dedicated group of folks Down Under are caring for baby flying foxes. The flying fox is a fruit bat found in Australia, Indonesia and that part of the tropical world.

Lacemakers of Puget Sound

2009-07-04T09:56:00.000-07:00

Last week I went down to Kent to attend a meeting of the Lacemakers of Puget Sound. Lacemakers of Puget Sound is a charter chapter of the International Old Lacers. Amazing work and amazing ladies! There were some ladies working on tatted pieces, but I was blown away by the intricacy of the bobbin laces being produced and how many fancy bobbins everyone owned!

Here are several yards of delicate black silk bobbin lace in creation.

Another lady was working on a two-color piece; you can see the pattern she's using on the right side of the photo.

Here is a lovely lady with a handmade lace neckpiece.

Author! Author!

2009-07-02T09:53:00.001-07:00

Bead&Button Magazine has published a short review of my Micro-Macrame book in their August 2009 edition.

Me so happy! To quote their esteemed reviewer, "Under the influence of a handful of talented fiber artists such as Annika deGroot, macrame has come a long way since the '60s..."

Ahhh, I used to dream of being a talented fiber artist and now I am one!

My Older-Than-God Commercials Reel

2009-06-29T10:01:00.000-07:00

I was prompted last week to upload the demo reel of the commercials and video/film projects I worked on in the late 80's and early 90's. A "reel" is a compilation of commercials (also known as "spots") and other shortish projects worked on that show the capabilities of a particular filmmaker. This one runs a bit over 9 minutes - enjoy it if you can...Actually, the pieces I am most proud of are the ones I edited. Skip past the director and producer segments and go straight for the gold in the editor's section.

Hmmm... it's missing some of my best stuff... must shovel out the hovel and find the other reel...

Chirimen Jacket

2009-06-25T07:54:00.001-07:00

The other day I found a gorgeous chirimen jacket at a consignment shop. Although it was a P for Petite and I am an E for Enormous, I bought it to study the details and hopefully recreate it in a larger size. It is fully reversible with a lightweight black nylon shell and has welt pockets (both inside and out).

But what really interested me was the padded collar; it is padded because it has a rain hood inside! Look at the beautiful delicate zipper pull - I almost didn't see it.

At Fabric Tales there are some lovely offerings of rayon and polyester chirimen fabrics.
In case you are unfamiliar with chirimen, it is that uniquely textured crepe from Japan that comes in either silk, rayon or polyester. Polyester chirimen is washable but doesn't have quite the fine silky feel as the silk or rayon versions. The rayon and silk versions are usually in shorter widths like 25-27 inches (63-70 cm), but the polys are usually 43-45 inches wide (110-114cm).
I can't decide between this polyester fabric Floral Snow Rings on Charcoal which is here

or the Ume Blossoms fabric which is here.

The truth is I wish I could order one already made from the designers. But I have looked all over the web and cannot find this jacket in their offerings for this year...and I've had no luck on eBay either.

As a side note, check out the patterned fabric cords on the Fabric Tales site...

St. John's Day, 2004

2009-06-24T07:29:00.001-07:00

June 24th is St. John's Day and often you can find St. John's Wort blooming around here at this time of year. 5 years ago, it was on this day that my mother, Dr. Sybil G. deGroot passed away. She was 78 years old.

My mom was one of the most remarkable people you could ever meet; in her youth she had been a Rockette at the Radio City Music Hall, later she became the first woman in the U.S. to hold a Doctorate in Engineering Psychology (which is also known as Human Factors and Ergonomics).

To try to sum up her brilliant life and career in just a few sentences seems so inadequate and trite. After 5 years I still can't find the words. Even what I wrote in my book isn't enough:

"Those who knew her will agree, my mother led a most remarkable life. Highly intellectual and only sometimes circumspect about it, she was a curious blend of scientist and social butterfly. Her eyes flashed sage green whether engaged in scholarly pursuit or dancing a fandango on the neighbor's coffee table. I will always miss her."

I'm Thrilled!

2009-06-23T08:25:00.000-07:00

My book just received a lovely review from Crafty Pod!

Beaded Buddha Embroidery

2009-06-21T20:10:00.000-07:00

Happy Solstice to one and all!

I picked up Sherry Serafini and Heidi Kummli's The Art of Bead Embroidery: Techniques, Designs & Inspirations book the other day because I have long admired their artwork. Here's my first attempt at following one of their designs; I'm not going to make a bracelet out of it but rather use it as a centerpiece for a micro-macrame neckpiece.

Elf Slippers - A Must Have!

2009-06-15T13:51:00.000-07:00

Who can resist nice warm felted wool elf slippers? I can't. I had to have them - I ordered a pair in purple from mommayaya on etsy. I think they will look quite lovely with my teal-colored fingernails, don't you?

Autographed by Author

2009-05-29T07:46:00.000-07:00

I've been going into every bookstore I pass and rummaging around in the craft section until I find a copy of my book. I then take the book(s) to Customer Service and ask them if I can autograph my own book, do they have a pen I can use and can they slap an "autographed by author" sticker on the book's front. Usually the customer service rep is thrilled to do so.

I was perusing the Onion and came upon the following stat:

Hmmm...this has given me some ideas for dedications...hmmm...I think I'd change the last one to: For the itteh bitteh kitteh committee...

I See a Pattern Here...

2009-05-22T09:06:00.000-07:00

A few years ago everyone was gaga for the Retro Butterick '52 pattern B4790. At a rummage sale recently I found the updated 60's/70's version of that wraparound dress.

But then I'm easily smitten by anything simple and unusual, like this mother/daughter combo of a wraparound...

They kind of remind me of something Isabel Toledo would have designed. Speaking of the unusual, I came across a charming pair of Russian ladies patterns from the 50's...

There were no fitting suggestions or fabric requirements on the back of the pattern envelope or even a separate printed sheet of instructions - what information there was was on the pattern tissue. Our Russian sisters simply had to make do.

Criss-Cross Blouse

2009-05-21T18:07:00.000-07:00

Months ago I read Ann Smith's review of a delightful blouse on Pattern Review and knew I had to make that blouse! Tracking down the Japanese pattern book it came from was a bit of a task, but one happy day it arrived in the post and I was set! I transferred the pattern to butcher paper and took the whole shebang over to Kinko's and had them enlarge it 135%. C'est tout. I did nothing else to the pattern because I figured I would just make a muslin of sorts and see how well it fit as is with no alterations. The fabric I chose was a rich red poly chiffon with a directional black sheen. I bound the edges with bias strips of the poly chiffon and placed a few tiny buttonholes down the front placket.

The way the fabric drapes in a criss-cross on the back was exquisite, but the front still looked frumpy. Nevertheless I wore it to high tea at the Empress Hotel with my dear friend JoAnn in Victoria last November, having nothing better to put on. Oh, poor, poor me.

Hmmm, must redraft the front....

PR Weekend in Portland

2009-05-20T14:58:00.000-07:00

I am still recovering. Met and got reacquainted with so many talented wonderful ladies that I am still twirly-minded. Deepika and I had the great good luck to have lunch with Pati Palmer of Palmer/Pletsch fame on Friday and she was most gracious and kind. She gave a most instructive lecture on blouse fitting problems, tailored jackets and fitting pants (trousers to youse cats in Europa). I kept mumbling "Aha! That's the exact point I should have done what she's showing instead of what I actually did!" Pati has revived my fitting courage and I am going to attempt a jacket before too long. I wanted to sign up for some of her classes this summer but it appears they are already sold out and I won't be able to attend her November classes because I'll be in Paris with the European PR Weekend crowd.
Anyway, here's one photo Diane E took of Roseana and yours truly.

Amazon Ratings

2009-04-28T10:49:00.001-07:00

Today I popped on to Amazon to check the rating of my book just for fun and found that I was right behind Kenneth King! The Kenneth King! Yeah, baby!
Ratings fluctuate by the hour; luckily I've been holding fairly steady in the 8,000 to 10,000 range for the past few days.

I hate to be a pest, but if any of my friends who haven't posted reviews of my "Opus-in-Ink" could do so on Amazon, I'd be very very grateful. The publishers at St. Martin's would also be grateful. In fact, the entire Universe at large would be grateful. The only person I can think of who probably couldn't be bothered to be grateful would be Rob MacGregor, my theatre pal who now resides in Istanbul (for reasons perhaps unmentionable)...

Sans Appendix

2009-04-17T09:33:00.000-07:00

I made it through surgery yesterday. I had been having a hellacious pain in my lower right side for the past 6 months and in trying to track down what the pain was, I have endured a Catscan, an MRI, a colonscopy, two ultrasounds and various bouts of being poked and prodded by doctors, nurse practitioners, physicians assistants, and whoever else happened to be in the examining rooms at the time.

Finally I was sent to a kindly surgeon who performed laparoscopic surgery on my abdomen yesterday to find out what this mystery pain was. As it turns out, it was something that was sort-of but not quite fully ruled out a few months ago.

I am now appendix-less. My poor old beat-up appendix was hard where it should have been soft, due to recurring infections. It might have gone gangrenous given half a chance (just to spite me, I'm sure). I now have three tiny holes in my stomach where they inserted the laparoscopic camera and who knows what else, which will probably not even be noticeable scars in a year or two.

Such relief, I tell you. I am obviously sore as hell today, but pain meds are a goodly thing.
Soon I will be wiggling my way back to belly dancing and losing weight! Yahoo zzzzz...Oh, did I doze off? Pain meds are gooooood....

On a positive note, I am teaching myself Adobe Photoshop special effects. Here's a sloppy first try of an old picture of me:

I Dream of Gene-y

2009-03-15T19:22:00.000-07:00

I don't know much about the BJD craze - it holds only a slight fascination for me - How is it that women can be so frenzied over ball-jointed dolls? I got a HauteDoll magazine the other day out of curiosity and was amazed at how popular they are. Huh. But I did perk up when I found 7 Gene dolls at the local Goodwill one night. I bought the prettiest one, who was decked out in a sultry 40's gown, drove home and checked out prices for Gene dolls on eBay to see if I had been ripped off. I hadn't, so the next morning at 9 a.m. I returned to that Goodwill and waited impatiently for the doors to open. I was in good company; a gal drove up in a neon yellow Mini S with black and white racing stripes and checkerboard side mirrors and parked next to my little darling (the official transport of the Ministry of Magic). I had brief worries that she would be vying for the rest of the Gene dolls, but when the doors finally opened, she darted off to the other side of the store while I made a beeline to the glass case where the 6 beauties were waiting to be freed from the confines of a second-hand store. Here are another 3 of the 6:

They all look just a tad haughty if you ask me (which no one ever does).

I'm back. Sort of.

2009-02-21T20:09:00.000-08:00

I've been so busy with work and other responsiblities I haven't had the time or inclination to blog for the past two months. What a slug!
I do have one tidbit of exciting knowledge, though - I received an advance copy of my book last week! It was thrilling to open the cover of my first publicly acknowledged writing endeavor - never in my life did I think I had enough knowledge about any subject to actually produce a book...! I am still in shock.

I found a lovely porcelain/parian ware candle holder the other day at the Goodwill:

And while at Stargazers in Bellevue, I treated myself to a big chunk of celestite.Celestite is thought to be good for communicating with angelic wisdom, and God knows, I sure could use some of that right now! I just like it for how sparkly it is.

Slush and New Wellies

2008-12-29T15:43:00.000-08:00

The front is melting sloooooowwwwlllyyyy but it is melting.

The Mini Cooper is still stuck in the slushy mess that was my front yard. So is Linda's car.

But JoAnn and her husband Don came by and took me shopping. I managed to get out to Fred Meyer and buy some new Wellies!

So Not Dreaming of a White Christmas

2008-12-25T10:32:00.000-08:00

As it appears to have manifested in reality.

I had shoveled most of the snow off the front deck last night but to no avail.

My brother gallantly offered to drive over in his 4 wheel megavan and take me to his house for the holiday, but I think it's snowing a little too hard right now - maybe later. In the meantime, I am happy, safe and warm. I've had a lovely breakfast of mushrooms, eggs, saugages, lingonberry jam and tangerines and left-over rum-glazed sweet potatoes (from last night's dinner). I've finished all the little gifties I was making for friends and family.

Jynx wanted to go out but thought better of it when she realized the snow on the deck was higher than she is tall...

Stuck in Snow-Homish

2008-12-22T19:13:00.000-08:00

Ahhh! I have been so busy making stuff that I haven't had time to attend to this blog! Bad me! Bad me!
I've been snowed in for the past...5 days? 6 days? and anticipate being stuck here until after Christmas. But the good news is I LOVE SNOW! I do! It isn't the cold that bothers me in winter it's the darkness. An evening with snow on the ground is actually light.
Did I ever menton that I love my knitting machine? In the past two days I've made 10 pairs of wristlets for Christmas gifties; they're no where near to being as elegant and delicate as the ones Karin made for me last year, but they will suffice. I had fun using up all the doo-dads of yarns I found at Goodwill this past year. I kept finding single balls of pima cotton/bamboo blends, or pure merino or pure pima cotton or mohair - they probably were the leftovers from sweaters or shawls. Here are some of the not-quite-finished pairs of wrist warmers. Still have to sew the sides together on some of them.

We're catsitting Lily who helped in making the wristwarmers. At least she's pretty sure she helped.

My Book Cover!!!

2008-12-02T16:36:00.000-08:00

Halloween Pix

2008-11-09T17:55:00.000-08:00

Here are some pix from the halls of the Ministry of Magic where a dark angel and I were enjoying the grim festivities.

Welcome to the Office of Dispelling Convexing Conundrums!

Here's the window closest to my office, with its droll-yet-festive black lace valance.

The skeletal sconces and cobwebs added a macabre touch to the halls.

Beautiful Day

2008-11-09T17:29:00.000-08:00

I just got back from a convention in downtown Los Angeles. I find LA to be a most ugly, dirty, brash conglomeration of busy-bodies zipping this way and that. By Saturday I realized I needed a day of cool greenery away from the glaring traffic. So I made my way to the Huntington Library and Gardens in Pasadena. The concierge at the Westin was able to find me a rental car while she printed out great directions to the Huntington and then to LAX.

I got there early - too early for general admittance - but there was a conference on the Arts anbd Crafts movement going on in one of the buildings, so the gardens were already open.

Their new Chinese Garden was delightful. I had read about it in several LA tourist-oriented magazines and pamphlets and knew I just had to have a good long look.

After a lingering stroll through the Chinese garden, I sat in the Japanese garden.

Halloween Decor for the Office

2008-10-26T12:38:00.000-07:00

Here's an image-heavy tutorial on how to build a Scary Hand Wall Sconce. It's a kind of goofy crafty homage to Jean Cocteau. (Well, sort of.)
You'll need:
Halloween-oriented glove
battery-operated candle
20 pipe cleaners
hot glue gun and glue
4 3" heavy cardboard circles (or heavy cardboard and a waterglass and an exacto knife)
Cotton or Poly batting
needle and thread

First get about 20 pipe cleaners to create the bony structure of a hand. Use three pipe cleaners per finger, three pipe cleaners to create the outline of a palm and a few more pipe cleaners to weave in and out of the palm to give it strength.

Then stuff the fingertips of your scary bony glove with cotton or poly batting and wrap some of the batting around the pipe cleaner fingers as you insert them into the fingers of the glove.

Sew the fingertips of the glove together, overlapping the thumb on top of the other fingers to create a fist which can hold a candle.

Cut out 4 circles of cardboard or two circles of foamcore. These don't have to be circular - they can be oval, which would probably be better - but I didn't have an oval template handy so I used a waterglass as a template. Make them about 3" in diameter (75mm ish).

Cut out a rectangular section in the centers of three of the circles.

Place the three of the cardboard circles inside the stuffed glove. Thread the pipe cleaners from the bottom of the palm frame in through the rectangular cutout in the circles. Hot glue to secure the pipe cleaners to the cardboard.

Sew the edges of the glove at the wrist together around the cardboard circles or hot glue them down to the cardboard.

Hot glue the fourth cardboard circle on top of the glove and other cardboard circles.

You can now attach the scary hand sconce to the wall. I would use that removeable sticky tape stuff that either Scotch Brand or 3M puts out (I can't remember which) so that you don't permanently damage the wall. And instead of putting a candle in the fist, think about using one of those cheap-o kid's Halloween flashlights; just point it back towards the wall.

Here's another something or other to attach to the wall: a small plastic skull with a fake candle hotglued on top. When I was a kid, my stepbrother - a budding paleontologist - found an old skull in the woods. He dripped different colored wax all over the top of the skull and used it as a candleholder. I never went into his room because he kept the skull by his bedside and it scared the bejesus out of me to have that hollow-eyed thing staring at me.(As an adult I keep wondering who would let a teenage boy keep a real human skull in his bedroom? Perhaps it wasn't real, but to a six year old, it was creepy!)

There was a sale at JoAnn's Fabrics yesterday and I found the remnants of a bolt (approx. 3 meters left!) of red skull black lace (for $3.00 a yard! Yeah, baby!) which I'm going to use as a valance over one of the windows in the hall outside my office...

Winged Pumpkins

2008-10-20T20:27:00.000-07:00

Mmmmwaaa haa haa haa! My evil plan worked! I have successfully swapped pumpkin and bat genes to create Tiny Winged Pumpkins!

Oh alright, Miss Party Pooper. I swiped the idea from Martha.

Geisha Cover for my Sony Vaio

2008-09-23T17:26:00.000-07:00

I have been quite the busy bee lately, after a long funk on non-creativity. When I arrived home from work this afternoon I realized I couldn't keep stashing my tiny Sony Vaio in my pocketbook - sooner or later bits and pieces would break off of it and get lost in my purse. So I made a case cover for it out of a piece of Geisha print canvas I found at Pacific Fabrics a few months ago.
The lining is a piece of garnet-colored velveteen I haphazardly "embroidered" with double needle stitching - well I did have to learn how to do double stitching some time in my life...

I've also been busy stenciling cards with a nifty tree stencil and a sort of embossing pastey stuff. It took me more tries that I care to remember to get the layering of the paste on the stencil right, then I sprinkled glitter on top of the paste and let the whole thing set for an hour.

This summer I planted only two tomato plants since with foot surgery I wouldn't be able to do much digging in the garden (and getting my foot dirty). here are some of their offspring, accompanied by a cool pair of woodpecker scissors I found at Target.

Tini's Blackberry Vodka Delight

2008-08-26T17:40:00.000-07:00

Usually I make blackberry liqueur in late August/early September, since I figure you can have only so many blackberry pies and make only so much blackberry jam. But this year, after reading Tini's recipe for Blackberry Vodka Delight, I knew I had to try it.

I didn't have enough regular sugar, so I used the box of sugar cubes I had stashed in the pantry for tea parties. Someone had given me a tiny bottle of Stoli blackberry essence vodka recently, so that too went into the batch. Necessity being the mother of invention, etc. etc.

Whoo Hooooooo! Can barely wait the requisite six weeks to taste this!

Official Blackberry Report from Snohomish

2008-08-22T19:02:00.000-07:00

Here is your official backyard blackberry picking report for the week of August 18th:

Nope, not quite there. Still need about a week of ripening before these babies are ready to pluck. Time to dust off your recipes for blackberry conserves, pies, cordials and liqueurs.

I still think we're looking at a half-n-half scenario here. I'm going to lighten the load and pick the ripe ones tomorrow morning.

Predictions from 1930 about fashion in 2000

2008-08-08T19:01:00.000-07:00

FaerieWorlds and Florence

2008-08-05T19:39:00.000-07:00

Last weekend I drove down to Eugene Oregon to attend FaerieWorlds, a three-day weekend of faery-related festivities. Entire families of faeries attend.

Afterwards, I headed over to Florence which is on the coast to enjoy the beach and sand dunes. Okay, if you want to see great pictures of Florence and the sand dunes, go over to Tini's blog.

I honestly can't say which I enjoyed more - the faeries or the ocean...

Beady Wiry Idiot Cord

2008-07-27T10:28:00.000-07:00

I bought a Clover Wonder Knitter yesterday at Hancock's Fabrics in Kirkland so I could fiddle around with wire and make some gewgaws. I didn't have anything special in mind; just wanted to create something a little airier than the densely knotted micro-macrame or tatted stuff I've been pondering lately. This fiddly bit is made of 28 gage brass and a mixture of size 8 and size 11 seed beads.

I think it would be nice to make one chain of this long enough to wrap around a light bulb several times.
It's a sparkly something.

Special Award for Best Use for a Pottery Barn Curtain Panel

2008-07-09T11:52:00.000-07:00

I've been working on a costume for the upcoming FaerieWorlds weekend in Eugene. I found a devore velvet curtain panel at Goodwill and splashed some ColorHue dyes on it to create an outer vest for my costume.I'm using two OOP patterns for this: the shirt from the re-enactors' costume and the long vest from the work ensemble:

The shirt is finished. I used a rather slippery georgette and some Chinese frogs for clasps:

Time Traveler

2008-06-26T19:08:00.000-07:00

Huh! So that's where he was staying that year! Sheesh! I have been playing "phone" tag with him for over two centuries, the rat bastard!

Speaking of time travelers, earlier this week I went aboard the Nina, a replica of Christopher Columbus's favorite caravel. I was amazed at how steeply she sloped from one end of the deck to the other and how tiny the captain's compartment was. The hold below was used back then for cargo, but nowadays, it serves as bunks for the modern day crew. This replica is exquisite; she measures a little over 60 feet long - that's only 18.288 meters. And the original made three voyages to the New World five hundred years ago! She also survived a hurricane in 1495.

As some of you may know, a portion of my novel-in-progress takes place aboard a caravel and I was very excited to be able to actually feel what it was like to be aboard such a beeeeauuutiful replica of a medieval/renaissance ship.

Caravels were in use from the 13th to 16th centuries.

Knitting Ideas

2008-06-21T19:50:00.000-07:00

Recently I've come back to knitting after a long hiatus (several years) and started digging around in my archives for old knitting magazines. I found this delightful hybrid of styles in a Vogue Knitting magazine from 1994:
I love that it combines Fair Isle with Aran - what a hoot! It's as if the person who knitted it said
"You said you wanted something Scottish, but you wanted Cables???? I thought you wanted Fair Isle!!! Oh, whot the hell...I'll just do both."
If I ever chose to knit this piece, the Fair Isle part would be easy for me but the cabling might prove problematic.

I definitely want to make one of these Fair Isle vests though. I've wanted one for at least 20 years. It reminds me of John Lennon. Time to start on one, then.

I was rummaging through another box and came up with a stack of old knitting pamphlets from the late 50's - early 60's. This beauty stood out:
I love the satin binding at the edges, but can do without the tiny bows.

Elizabethan Tatting

2008-06-19T11:52:00.000-07:00

While I was in Los Angeles last March at the Pattern Review West Coast Weekend, I took a tour of the FIDM's Costume Design Exhibition. Up close I noticed that the purple gown from Elizabeth - the Golden Age had the loveliest dark blue tatting on the cuffs. Tatting! Whoo Hoo! Long lacey loopy tatting! I knew that tatting was a fashionable craft in the Georgian era, but don't have much info on its use prior to that time. Even if it is anachronistic (I'm not saying that it is, just that I don't know if it is) I thought it was a brilliant use of it. Love the combination of purple and deep cobalty blue ...mmmm...
Also fell in mad mad love with this costume:

Actually all of the costumes were magnificent. Umm, on the blurb for the red jacket I think they meant 2008 not 1998...

On Vetiver, Rhubarb Fools and Spontaneous Human Combustion

2008-06-16T19:25:00.000-07:00

Have you ever wondered what just might happen if you, say, used the absolutely wrong hair condition after shampooing? Might your hair begin pulsing with phosphorescent luminosity? Could it combust spontaneously and burn in a manner that cannot be extinguished with plain old tap water? Will it begin to corkscrew curl and frizzle so fast that it shatters into thousands of teeny drain clogging fragments?

It's kind of like mixing rhubarb with kiwi or pineapple - I've never tried those combinations - how do they taste? Will they fizz up on contact? Hmmm. I do know from experience that peanut butter sandwich + tomato soup = metallic listerine-like flavor. It tastes nasty but on the other hand, it just might cure gingivitis once and for all.

I bought three gorgeous stalks of raw rhubarb at the Maltby Farmers Market the other day and boiled them down with ginger and sugar so I now have some delicious rhubarb sauce. Might as well make a fool out of it. But I'm not sure there's quite enough of it to go around. Dare I add some fresh pineapple to the mixture? Or is that just inviting trouble?

Now for something completely non-sequitur: When Tini and Heiko were here last month they bought me a giant bar of my favorite vetiver soap (maybe they were trying to tell me something...?) I love the stark woodsy/tall grass smell of vetiver! It is an old old smell like patchouli or oakmoss, not as cloying as sweet grass, but not bitter, either. It speaks to me of the long ago, of somber places where silent, watchful elves once held court. A few years ago in a fiction writing class, I mentioned vetiver as an ingredient in a concoction and my fellow classmates didn't know what it was so they told me to take it out of the writing. I replied "go find some and smell it. It stays." Harrumph!

Another weird note: I had a dream last night that Deepika and I were ghostbusting at the local Goodwill and we kept pointing to a lit candle and telling this one poltergeist to go to the light and he kept blowing the candle flame out! How rude! We tried all the Christian exorcisms we knew to no avail. Finally I started chanting "Sri Ram Jai Ram Jai Jai Ram Om..." and he took off. Honestly, you never know what is lurking around at second-hand stores. It's best to be prepared.

Mary Russell's Boots

2008-06-01T12:30:00.000-07:00

I found these charmers the other week and had to have them, even though I know it will be a good 6 months before I can actually wear them. They so reminded me of something Mary Russell from the Beekeeper's Apprentice might have found delightful.
My poor tootsies are doing well; apparently there was an abundance of scar tissue under the ball of my big left toe joint which was causing me great pain and hindering my ability to lay my foot flat to walk on it properly. Additionally, the metatarsal had shifted downward which felt wonky. The nurses presented me wih a packet of two screws - I was so out of it I don't know if they were the ones Dr. Lallas took out of my foot during this last bout of surgery, but I think they are. Mementos.Not that you want to hear all these tidbits of pedestrian knowledge...So I leave you with a soothing image of Gato playing guardian to newborn Rhiannon.

I'm baaaack!

2008-05-31T14:13:00.000-07:00

A very brief note to say I had my foot surgery yesterday morning and am doing well at home. I'll write more later. Meds are good!

Cool Stuff

2008-05-23T07:31:00.000-07:00

I met with Tuulia the other evening for coffee and she presented me with the coolest stitch holders! They're made from fiber optic beads with little Swarovski crystals embedded in them! Kiitos Tuulia!

Marcus and I were browsing in the video section of the local Barnes and Noble and I found the Robin of Sherwood series from the 80's.
Oh Joy! Oh Rapture! I bought the Jason Connery series and plan to go back for the Michael Praed episodes.

Handicrafts and Canoes Don't Mix

2008-05-22T16:06:00.000-07:00

Bad News

2008-05-09T16:03:00.000-07:00

I went to the doctor's the other day and found out I have to have more surgery on my left foot...

Cirque du Soleil and Socks

2008-05-04T18:24:00.000-07:00

Tini and Heiko, my friends from Kiel, came for a weeklong visit before they headed down towards San Francisco. We were lucky enough to get tickets to Cirque du Soleil's Corteo which was inevitably delightful.
Tini brought with her several presents: delicious smelling coffee beans, cool buttons and some more socks! Whoo Hoo! Socks! I love socks! While she was here, she finished a delicate lace scarf...God is it beautiful! What a talent! I wish I could knit like that - it just makes my eyes cross. FairIsle I can do easily, but knitted lace? Nope.

There is Something in the Air... is it Spring Cleaning?

2008-04-22T07:26:00.000-07:00

My two biggest passions are books and fabrics. Nancy was blogging about her fabric stash the other day and mentioned that other bloggers were reorging their stashes too. Well so am I. Over the weekend I removed most of my books from my major bank of bookshelves and put all my fabric on the shelves instead. As you can see, I have a good-sized stash. Colossal even. I admit I am a bit of a hoarder, but in my defense I make costumes for theatre productions every so often, so my stash is, by those standards, quite small really...
I still have three shelves of literary books to redistribute, and have devoted one side of my stash to my sewing and embroidery-related books and magazines. The fellows from IKEA are showing up sometime this week to drop off 6 bookshelves for my living room...

Snow!

2008-04-19T08:52:00.000-07:00

Well, wouldn't you know it. It snowed last night. It's the latest Spring snowfall since 1972 in this neck of the woods. Jynx wasn't having any of this nonsense!

Last night at about 1:30 the full moon came out and shone its delicate light on the snowfall for an hour or so. I caught a glimpse of the snow fairies frolicking in the pale moonlight, but perhaps it was only a dream.

Gloves and taxes

2008-04-13T20:54:00.000-07:00

All of my friends have been making the most gorgeous knitted things; Tini has her delightfully intricate socks, Karin her wristlets extraordinaire. I am one giant jealous lump! Waaa! I wish I had the time to knit something! I'm too busy with my friggin' taxes, work, etc. So to appease my envious ego, I got out the first pair of finglerless gloves I ever knit. They were made sometime in 1993, and I wasn't clever enough to know how to finish the fingertips, so I just made fingerless gloves. I experiemented with fairisle and made up patterns like a crazy fool. The yarn came from an autumn trip to Asheville, North Carolina, where my mom and I watched the leaves turn vivid reds and crimsons. Many of the yarns were picked because they were the colors present in the trees and Blue Ridge mountains.

How-are-ya Five Oh

2008-04-07T20:40:00.000-07:00

Well, the big day came and went.

Friends dropped by to offer their best wishes: Guy (pronounced "Ghee") Hotersund, the third, from Project Runway VI was quite snippy (and fierce) as he sized everyone up!

Mili-tarie Antoinette came by brandishing her rifle to proclaim "Let them eat lead!"

My sister-in-law's gorgeous Art Deco tassel doll in progress.

Linda S. and JoAnn knocked themselves out preparing the house and food. JoAnn's mom helped by making the Art Deco tassel doll bodies. Scraps of brocades, silks and velvets were laid out in pleasing palettes for the dolls' garments. Both "Guy" and I were pressed into service sewing bits of doll clothes on the Featherweight and Serger for other guests. I am still sore from running up and down the stairs at least 30 times, retrieving scissors, pattern pieces, etc. And wouldn't you know it another birthday surprise: Muchas gracias! I nominate:
Tini
Maria
Karin
Linda
KnotGypsy
Deepika
Sewing Chick
Nanflan
Laura
Ann

Tabi socks and fabric grocery bags

2008-03-31T07:52:00.000-07:00

I don't know what my fascination with tabi socks is all about, but I do like 'em and have bought another three pair on eBay. Invariably I give one pair away in some sort of sock swap within days of actually getting them in the mail. Now who could resist Sumo wrestlers on their tootsies? I ask you. I love these stretch jersey ones more than the knit ones. I actually had an identical pair to these but lost the right sock. I kept meaning to take the left sock apart and make a new pair out of some lovely jersey scraps, but haven't done it yet, so I bought another pair. I'll keep the original as a pattern.

The third pair celebrate the cherry blossoms blooming right now in Washington State. I'll probably give them away.

At the LA PR Weekend, Deepika showed me a cloth grocery bag with a pocket sewn in one side that someone had just given her. I found a like pattern at Craftster:
TUTORIAL: Singlet Style Shopping Bag (like the plastic shopping bag)

I've started making the prototypes for the dolls we're going to make at my birthday party next weekend. I've made some tiny alterations to Arley Berryhill's Art Deco Tassel doll; the turban was too long and pointy so I rounded it off. Also the little bras for the dolls will be bandeaux and the side drapes need to be an inch longer, too. Pictures to follow.

Easter Sunday

2008-03-23T13:45:00.000-07:00

50 years ago I was born on Easter Sunday (as all Christians know, Easter falls on a different date each year, so my birthday also fell on Easter when I was 11, 22, 33, and will again when I am 121). Most years I get to celebrate two birthdays - on Easter Sunday and on my actual birth date. This year I felt compelled to create a fairy doll. She isn't quite finished, still needs a little makeup and work on her hair but here she is.
On my birth date, I'm having a party where everyone makes an art doll. The pattern I've chosen is Arley Berryhill's Art Deco Doll. My friend JoAnn and I will make the bodies but my other friends will get to decorate and clothe them as they please. Happy Easter everyone!

The Equinox!

2008-03-20T12:07:00.000-07:00

Spring has sprung in Western Washington! Being an Easter Baby, I love the spring! Although the weather is cloudy and brisk, there are trees blossoming right outside my office in the most delicate pinks.

I am still super exhausted from my trip to LA for the Pattern Review LA Weekend. The fashion district in downtown LA is unlike any thing I've ever seen before - streets and streets of fabric, all types and all for rock bottom prices. It beats New York to Hell in terms of price and quantity. I bought 16.5 yards of fabric, many jerseys at $1.00 a yard and spent a total of $54.00 on fabric. More details here. But my proudest acquisition is my Candy Wrapper hand bag:

What Did You Do Today?

2008-03-09T19:31:00.000-07:00

I made 6 fairy faces out of sculpey clay for Faith the Fairy art dolls. I used flatbacked Swarovski crystals for the eyes.

Oh Spare Me, Puleeze

2008-03-08T08:29:00.000-08:00

While I was finishing up my manuscript for the Micro-Macrame book, I was desperate to come up with an apt blurb for one of my Goth-inspired bracelets. All I could think of at the time was:

"Crisscrossing and meandering in and out of itself, this final bracelet brings forth the unsettling inner weavings of covert gothic passion. Its moody blackened burgundy coloring evokes the disconsolate, swirling dance of those unfortunates forever trapped in the dark dominion of the lands of Faery..."

Really. Huh. My, that's dark. If I put that in the book, noone would want to make that bracelet - they'd be afraid of getting stuck in the dark dominion of the lands of Faery... enough already! I changed tack completely and came up with something much lighter, which for legal reasons, I cannot divulge...

I made up a version of Park Bench pattern company's Chesapeake Bay jacket out of a long piece of flower-laden drapey rayon I found at Goodwill. Of course, since I didn't measure the pattern pieces and make any alterations, it is a tad bit too small for me. But at least I got to see what it will sort of look like once I do the necessary alterations and make it out of some loose woven wool-like grey with teal slubs fabric I bought in Kiel last October.

Bat Binkies!

2008-03-05T16:29:00.000-08:00

Who can resist cute tiny fuzzy orphan flying fox bat babies all wrapped up in their bat blankies?

On Rewrites, Rhiannon and the Sewing Expo

2008-03-03T20:58:00.000-08:00

Last week the rewrites on the micro-macrame book were finished - finally! Luckily there wasn't that much to rewrite or reshoot. I have been in a state of exhaustion for the last few days because once I was done with that project I was off to the Sewing Expo at the Puyallup Fairgrounds. I went on Friday and Saturday - my brain cells are still suffering from sensory overload - so many beautiful combinations of colors and fabrics. I fell in love with a new pattern from Park Bench Pattern Company called China Town. The way the front comes together in a fold where you would expect the opening of this asymmetrical tunic to be is delightful and once I took a good look at the Chesapeake Bay pattern, I was smitten. I love the way the back hangs together. Last night I had to cut it out with my new Kai scissors.

While I was gallivanting all over Puyallup

Rhiannon received a package from my friend Karin in Sweden the other day. Rosie opened it carefully and placed it on her sleeping sister.
I am still waiting to take some pictures of Rosie wearing the beautiful hoodie that Tini made for her. When she saw the hoodie, she immediately packed it away with her bestest clothes - she and her baby sister and mom were moving into their own apartment the next day and she didn't want it to get lost. Tini also made the cutest hat for Rhiannon - I must get over to Jennifer's new place and get photos taken. And - ha! a magnificent pair of socks for moi! Whoo hoo! My dogs are happy again (despite the lingering pain of surgery)!

Sam's Back!

2008-02-15T19:45:00.000-08:00

Years ago I had a teapot I called Sam. It was short for Sam O'Var. He was shaped like a camel. I loved him alot. Then one day his head snapped off! I was horrified. I spent the next few years looking everywhere for a replacement. I even searched eBay at least once a week for four years. And then another Sam came up for auction. And I won! Whoo hoo! Life is good again.
I had to drop one of my humanities classes - one called "the philosophy of communication." The professor wasn't all that good at communicating. How ironic. She couldn't be bothered to answer my emails. To understand the terminology bantered about in the class I had to expand my vocabulary to include bullshit jargon like role schema, double hermeneutics and Attributal Judgments regarding Interpersonal Events. As everyone who knows me knows, I eschew obfuscation. But like medical jargon, I suppose to some extent overly difficult writing is necessary since it is a steadfast way to justify paychecks for many academics and alientate them from everyone else.

Rhiannon's family

2008-02-09T07:58:00.000-08:00

Rhiannon, at less than one month old, got three pieces of mail addressed to her in the last week! She has taken to smiling up at her mom when she hears the word "kitty kitty kitty" so perhaps that is her nickname. When I hold her, she studies my face with serious intensity then breaks into a smile as if to say "Oh, I recognize you!"

Fly pens, MP3 players, and rotten routers

2008-02-03T07:47:00.000-08:00

The extremes of new technology. On one hand, since I'm now having to do a lot of writing for my classes, I indulged in a Fly Fusion Pentop Computer - in other words, a digital pen. It was originally made for high schoolers but I'm not proud. All I need it to do is recognize my handwriting so I don't have to retype my notes. It works. Like a charm. Too kewl.
Rosie wanted an iPod for Christmas but as she's six years old and prone to either losing or breaking one, we got her a bright pink Creative Zen Stone instead. Of course I had to get one too, only mine is blue. As did Jennifer. Hers is white. I even got one for my brother. His is black. Then you get sucked into buying the accessories...you need a "skin" to protect the thing. And that's only the beginning.
I immediately signed up with audible.com (they just got taken over by Amazon) so I could listen to audio books while I drove to and from work. Love it love it love it. So far I've listened to M is for Magic and A Study in Emerald by Neil Gaiman, about a quarter of some horribly dull alternate history about Atlantis, and Meatball Sundae by Seth Godin.
About two weeks ago the router I use to get on the internet suddenly fell off the window sill and hit my shoulder! Definitely poltergeist activity. Anyway, the router broke a few days later and had to be replaced. What a hassle. It took a few trips to Best Buy and two different routers to get back up and running. I used to be embarassed that Microsoft had such bad customer service. Not anymore. D-Link and Verizon are neck and neck in the "crappy attitude towards customers" hall of fame. The customer service rep at D-Link actually hung up on me after pumping me for address, serial number of unit, telephone number, etc. If it had been a bad connection and she had just gotten cut off she would have called back. Nope.
Well, off to write a bullsh*t paper on the theory of communication - rant on my Philosophy of Communication class to follow.

Sorry I have been incommunicado

2008-01-25T19:47:00.000-08:00

I've been ultra-busy with my graduate classes and work and a new baby in the house and physical therapy for my foot so I haven't had much time to write.
I've been going to physical therpay for my foot, which after a session feels great for about a day before it begins to ache again...and I'm back to wearing the Franken-boot for a day or two until the swelling subsides.
I've made two versions of the Textile Studio Brussels skirt in the past week because it is the easiest skirt I've ever made. I'll post pictures soon, but I don't feel like limping around trying to get my friend to take pictures of me tonight.
For the first skirt, I used Textile Studio's
Renfrew Charcoal Corded Knit and a lovely poly? wool? huh? grey plaid with lime highlights for the second. I wore the charcoal skirt 3 days in a row because it is so comfy.
I've had this Mad Hatter's Hat pattern for about a thousand years, oh, okay, maybe only two or three, but until today, I couldn't find an adequate source for straw braid...I was thinking of doing it up in a darkish purply-navy dupioni silk for Marcus, or perhaps dark purple straw braid...hmmm...what do you think?
I'm so looking forward to PR's LA Weekend in March. My tickets are bought and the hotel reservations are made and I am good to go!I'll also be spending two days at the Sew Expo in Puyallup at the end of February; March is the month for fabric fun!
So I leave with a picture from the Japanese Garden in the Arboretum I took for a plein-air watercolor class a few autumns ago...

Rhiannon is Here!

2008-01-12T21:22:00.000-08:00

This morning at 9:06 a.m., weighing in at 8 pounds, 5 ounces, and measuring 21 and 1/4 inches, Rhiannon finally made her appearance!

If the shoe fits...

2008-01-03T13:39:00.000-08:00

Today is the first day I have been able to wear a pair of shoes since the middle of November when I had foot surgery. I am limited to a pair of tweed sneakers that are a little too large because nothing else fits my swollen left footsie. I was getting SO TIRED of wearing the Franken-boot and tripping over everything! I saw my foot doctor yesterday and had some xrays taken. Everything looks good according to him, but I am still freaked out by seeing the two metal screws in my metatarsal in the xrays! I actually took several pix of my foot progressing after surgery, some with bandaging, some without, but decided against grossing everyone out by posting them to this blog; I value my friends!
I had to take Gato to the vet's this morning for a check up. Gato was thoroughly unamused by the trip, and gave me an earful of hisses and yowls, but he had been losing weight and yesterday he had blood in his stool, which is quite worrisome. The vet gave him a shot of anti-imflammatory and said the problem wasn't all that uncommon, especially in cats that were under alot of stress..."Hmmm...you mean stress like a woman in the house about to have a baby any minute?" I asked. "And a rambunctious six year old running hither and thither, poking at cats?" Yup. Poor Gato is in love with Jennifer (pictures to follow) and must be worried about the impending birth of her baby.

Nothing much to report...

2007-12-29T23:14:00.000-08:00

This coming month I will be starting on my master's degree in Humanities - I bought the cheapest text books at the university's bookstore and the rest on half.com, saving about $50, even including shipping. I'm excited to finally do something I've waited over 20 years to do; I always wanted to keep going in school past my bachelor's but never had the time or money to do so until now.

I am currently working on Loes Hinse's Tuxedo jacket for the Stitch and Flip Jacket class on Pattern Review. I am almost afraid to even declare that since I have so many unfinished projects lurking around in various closets. I have some lovely blue houndstooth lightweight wool silk suiting for it and just need to hunker down and make the silly thing.
Today I rummaged around in the costume cave and found four big garbage bags full of clothes and cloth to donate...yippee! Tomorrow Jennifer and I are hitting IKEA in the morning to check out storage solutions. Sort of low-key mundane things going on this weekend, but that's okay. Here's the highlight - a budding rock star is in our midst!