Tag: craft

Identity Crisis

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Do you ever get hit upside the head by a reality of yourself that you didn’t recognize? I’ve been studying issues of culture in one form or another since pretty early and formally beginning in high school. I know all the dimensions of communication. Okay, some. The field has advanced since 1999 when I buried my head under a rock contrary to the way I tote out my intercultural background when writing grants. Anyway, I am SO polychronic when I thought I was entirely monochronic.

What else do I not recognize about myself? I like to try new ideas on for size, but, guess what, I have a low risk tolerance. Honestly, I have no clue who I am and it’s causing uncertainty in my interpersonal interactions. I’m having some major communication huh-whats as of late and I think it’s because I’m being all high context when I should hang low for a while.

And so now my attempt at being more low context while holding true to my need for a great deal of field dependence, face-saving, and conflict resolution. How do I say this without offending the offensive? By that, I mean how can I say this without having to deal with these actual people anymore ever? Person 1, quit taking money from hungry people because you want fancy drapes. Person 2, is it possible that you could put your offense/defense in your pocket for a second and look at the community surrounding you? You are loved, but your targets can sometimes get hurt. Persons 3 and 4, maybe YOUR children need therapy because you’ve closed their minds. Oh, and look up jingoistic. I think you are using it incorrectly.

This is what helped me sleep this past week. It’s so wrong, it’s right.


This was the second place winner in craftster.org’s ironic cozy contest.

Glue Batik with Family

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Last night I spent a couple of hours trying to put together a clever, well-narrated, and inspirational slide show together to express on my blog how much freaking fun we had with this freaking glue batik project. (Tomorrow is “F***ing Friday”, so even at this late hour, it’s just “Freaking Thursday”.) Long story short, it didn’t work and you’re stuck with this.

Credit where due. Please visit That Artist Woman to see the the real deal tutorial on easy kid friendly batik. OH! Her latest post is batik for grown-ups. It’s pretty cool too.

So, here goes….

Step 1: Find a beautifully lash-ed, juice mustache-ed girl of six to agree to model and volunteer her family for a nutty mom project. Give everyone some gel school glue to make designs on some cheap old pillowcase. I put cardboard inside the pillowcase to prevent soak through issues, but then I got stuck to issues. That’s okay, because it all comes off; next time I’ll cover the cardboard or use a plastic cutting board or one of those rubber place mats or something. Anyway, let dry.

Step 2: Use watered-down acrylic paint and, you know, cover the dried glue designed fabric as you please. Initially I watered down with a 4:1 ratio of paint to water, but I think a 1:1 makes for more of a watercolor effect. My fear was dissolving the glue with the paint, but as it turns out I needn’t have worried. I thought I was genius for using the cracked ice tray as the whachamacallit for the paint. The cup of blue liquid is leftover Kool-aid from the yard sale Kool-aid stand and isn’t paint. The Cortaid was required after the yard sale too. I’m still bitchy – ITCHY. I totally meant itchy. Anyway, let dry.

Step 3: Once the glue and paint have dried, DUNK THAT PUPPY! That Artist Woman suggests using your tub and after taking her up on her advice, I totally concur. I wasn’t patient enough to let the glue slowly dissolve. I agitated it. My kids taught me the fine art of agitation, so I was really good at it. It’s better than picking scabs and popping zits! Oh, my so satisfying. Anyway, let dry and call maid service. WAIT! I am the maid! Grrr. I hate contingencies.

We agreed that the family member with the crappiest day gets to sleep with the pillowcase. My sincere hope is that the kids will adore having the pillowcase in their bed and so won’t come into mine. I’m tired of knees and elbows in my back and up my nose. But he’s my husband and I knew that went with the territory. The kids have their own beds and should use them.

Buy My Friends’ Way Cool Stuff

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My pal Tracy is selling at auction this silvery cheeked hornbill and macaw feathered, white buckskin with detachable seed beaded handle, peoyte pow wow fan. Maybe I didn’t sell it right, but the part that’s the best is that Tracy is nothing if not practical. Therefore, this fan moves air. She will custom bead the darn thing too! Tracy is a member of the Caddo Tribe in Oklahoma and my algebraic bff from back in the day when we ignored equations in favor of geometric applications to friendship bracelets. Finally, without being related to anything, she has shampoo commercial hair and crystal clear skin.

Oh, but Tracy isn’t my only gifted artist friend. I have tons, and another one selling her wares is Anneliese. The girl has an etsy store. She’s also a friend from high school, but she did real math and was even a member of Mu Alpha Theta. Of course, it did nothing to cure her of her quirky greatness.

If you’ve been following, and I presume you haven’t, I am pro-handmade gifts. I’m not prepared to make, give, or sell my own goods, so I have to do some searching. I found this Indie Collective that may help expand my shopping sources of handmade goodness.

ON EDIT: Tracy gets her fan handles from waste at new home and remodel construction sites. She sells them just like that too. Her feathers are naturally molted and cruelty free. So, see? Way cooler than I expressed. And she has photos of herself with her grandmother and a table of fans.

Needle Craft

My girlfriends report that their 1930s wife scores are in the 30s and their rating is poor. Their modern attitudes are exactly why I want to be their buddy. I like to bask in their liberation. I guess I’m not all that superior by second millennium standards.

Naomi takes the cake with a score of -7. Who knew that was even possible? Interestingly, she has been married for at least as long as I have and seems quite content in her marriage. I’d be more confident in asserting her marital happiness if her husband was an equally rotten 1930s hubby. The other interesting thing is that she teaches preschool. You would think that would be in her favor score-wise, but you’d be wrong. She spends too much of her time talking to kids about fair and equitable treatment in addition to respecting others.

This begs the question that if I’m in this fast crowd with fast womyn, why is my score skewed toward traditional wifeyhood? I have a few answers. My first is that I’m a good test taker. I think I mentioned this. The second is that the questions are problematic. For example, “Do you wear a dirty apron?” I don’t wear an apron, therefore I don’t wear a dirty one. I have been salivating over some aprons recently, so that might change. For now, no apron. The third is that I have romanticized the traditional roles of women because I have never known a traditional woman.

Skip past this paragraph if you already know the family history. My great grandmother was a widowed mother of 3 girls. My grandmother was a widowed mother. My mother followed her family path for women and also worked to support the family. My dad’s family set the same example for me. My grandmother owned and ran her own store with no man in her life and my grandmother worked all the way up to executive vice president of a major bank with little more than a high school diploma.

Somewhere those women learned some important domestic skills. My grandmother sewed the most beautiful French seams. It just never came to me. When I was in my 20s, my mother decided to teach me “huck toweling”, which I’ve heard others call “Swedish toweling.” Yes, it’s a child’s craft, but I have childlike skills. Anyway, she had towels but no good floss and she wasn’t looking to make anything beautiful anyway, just clean out her closet. The floss we used came from the friendship bracelets I made instead of paying attention in Algebra.

My mother decided that we would do “pattern samples” rather than create something that either of us would cherish. We thought about making more, but huck towels are TOO EXPENSIVE and the idea faded. Now that I have a daughter, maybe I should rethink that. Let me know if you find a good price on real huck towels, not the terry/huck blend or the stiff junk. ANYWAY, my mother’s attention to detail on the project was still impeccable considering they are just pattern samples. She had us do smaller designs on the no-show backs and she fringed the edges. Nice, huh?


I DO cherish these stained pattern samples. I liked the time with my mother. She’s like the rest of the women in my family and can do pretty much whatever she puts her mind to doing. I’m not sure that these generations of women were particularly fond of men. My great grandmother didn’t wash boys and girls clothes together because boys were dirty. My grandmother (not the French seams one who was a widow) housed her husband in a bedroom as far from hers as she could get. My mother tried, but after a couple of generations of widows ahead of her, maybe she didn’t expect my dad to live as long as he has.

Now, for the peek into my 1930s superior wifesmanship, perhaps I have romanticized the traditional marital roles as a rebellion. Sometimes, it’s not worth the bother. Most of the time, it pays off. If Jesse didn’t appreciate my efforts, they would go by the wayside a long time ago. As it stands, I get coffee with love notes delivered to my bedside in the morning and ice cream sundaes in the evening. Also, I think a person’s score will change on this kind of quiz over time. I won’t always be a superior 1930s wife. Right now, I am. I did my first ever embroidery project to give to Jesse to show him my gratitude for not giving me crap for being imperfect.

I used George’s Klutz book for inspiration and direction. The saguaro, native to the Sonoran Desert, is a couch stitch with four strands on the top thread and two to pin it down. The ground, which should be more brown, is a four-strand stem stitch, and the sun is a four (?, I can’t remember) strand back stitch. Since the hankie was a delicate close weave, I used a delicate needle.

And now back to my wifely duties….

I’m Crafty!

I’d love to explore artistic expression, but I’m too cheap to buy the supplies required for such an obsession. Frugality aside, I do not consider myself particularly creative or even artistic. On top of that, I don’t have a point of view that I just have to show the world. Even so, on occasion I can craft when given careful guidance and inspiration.

The Mollyanna Bowl
Some people, like my friend Anna, don’t wait for “someday” to do something that strikes their fancy. I discovered this the pleasant way while lingering at her home. We were perusing books on how to use recycled objects to make crafts with your kids. We agreed that the majority of the materials used in one book in particular were not recycled nor even recyclable. This is a bit of a sticking point since I’m not sure I’d want to keep or give away some of the crap, uh, crafts. I don’t like the idea of craft for craft’s sake because then you wind up with a bunch of JUNK and a house that smells like an old lady’s (that last part is purely conjecture on my part).

We did come across a braided rug technique used to make coasters. It seemed like something we might try this summer with the kids. Unfortunately, Anna had just given away her scraps to the best second grade teacher ever, Molly. We came up with the idea of using plarn (yarn made of plastic shopping bags). As I was still pondering, I realized Anna had already left the room, gathered supplies, and was cutting up shopping bags in strips. Plarn, we agreed, would make for a terrible coaster. We made bowls. This is my Mollyanna bowl full of CSA apricots.

I learned several things on this project.
* Plastic is a pisser to sew.
* Use clear thread and a thimble.
* Don’t prejudge the outcome.
* It’s okay to waste time like this. It has a name: experimentation.

The Art Teacher Utility Apron
Anna (again with the ANNA!) bought a bunch of oil cloth for use as a table cloth for her youngest child’s birthday. I’ve been looking at this material for some time. It’s colorful and functional and fantastic! Here Anna was buying it so casually and comfortably. Actually, what she bought was vinyl with a meshy backing, which is commonly called oilcloth though technically it’s not. Later, I saw a utility apron my friend betts* made for an auction at the school (a mix of traditional and contemporary oilcloth she bought in Mexico). Then betts* announced plans to make another apron for Molly while Anna was securing a Vy and Elle bag. Suddenly, I’m all about aprons and working with oilcloth or vinyl.


One day while sealing tiles for the Borton Environmental Learning Lab’s human sundial, the art teacher talked about how she identified with my son. She mentioned that she found it hard to take risks and get out of her comfort zone, but that she decided to do that this year with clay. Her clay work, well, I can’t express my thoughts on what she and the children did. It was moving to say the least. Plus, that she “saw” my kid out of hundreds and cared about his well-being – again, I can’t express my thoughts on that. After talking with her, I decided to take a risk and get out of my comfort zone. With the expert help of my pal betts* who made sure I didn’t sew the multiple pockets upside down, inside out, and backwards, I sewed this “oilcloth” utility apron for the art teacher. Isn’t it lovely? It took five hours minus buying time, but including the time it took to go home and get the foot pedal I’d left behind.

On this project, I learned:
* Make sure your foot pedal is stored with your sewing machine.
* Pay attention to the instructions, even when instinct tells you something else.
* Listen to betts* when she tells you three times, “don’t do that!” before she begs “please don’t do that.” What she means is, “your pocket may be right side up, but your seams will show.”
* I can top stitch!
* Slow and steady wins the race.
* Perfection isn’t a requirement.

Father’s Day Basket
Thanks to my mother-in-law I have cable (and high speed internet). One of our channels features networks that we don’t get in order to entice us to upgrade. I’ve never been thusly tempted, however, I was temporarily sidetracked from reality shows and Fox News by DIY. I rushed to the computer to look up their projects. Father’s Day was at hand and the kids wanted to make something for their dad. The DIY website provided several possibilities.


We made this basket out of old grocery sacks. You have to see it live on his mail table to fully appreciate it’s beauty. It looks great and when he’s tired of it, it’s totally recyclable. Our plan was to paint it, but as it was this took us three days.

I learned much with this project too.
* You need more than three days to weave and paint a basket with your kids.
* Rotary cutters make quick strips.
* It’s okay to BUY Dad a gift.

My future crafting goals are to make oilcloth lunch bags for my kids, sewing a shirt, and learning pottery from Mechelle and Anna. I’m giving myself years as a deadline for achieving any part of this as I still have an eight year quilt in the closet, a latch hook rug, and a cross stitch pillow turning to dust in the hall closet.

Kakefuda Furoshiki

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I haven’t, and may not find time to, wrap my Christmas gifts. Maybe that’s a good thing because I just stumbled across this You Tube video.

This is furoshiki, the Japanese art of gift wrap. Kakefuda in Kyoto, Japan is such a cool place. Judging by the website, that is. Go see it. I visited Kyoto in 1991, but was so busy looking for a McDonald’s that I never saw such a store! Not that I would have had money to shop, but I could have looked.

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Obsessing Green, Blue, & Red (but mostly green)

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I’ve modified this entry from my “other” blog. It’s old, but I was thinking about it recently and wanted to share.

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I haven’t read Walden yet. I don’t have to feel bad about that since I am a grown woman (I swear I’ll read it before finals). In some ways, I hope that reading Walden will heal me of my obsessions. Since that hasn’t happened yet, I’m detailing some of my adventures in moving away from consumerism, diminishing my waste, culling info from creative greenies….

One creative greenie I continue to go back to is the Little Brown Dress experiment. The new revolution in almost ready to wear from the little brown dress experimenter is to rehabilitate her crappy old wardrobe. Hey! I’ve got one of those.

Here’s a whole book about rehabbing those old t-shirts we can’t part from. I’ve been coveting this book, but can’t pay retail for anything. Plus, Urban Outfitter was a red company last I checked . Oh! I’m so going to see if I can find it at the library. Sorry Walden. SCORE! I have it on reserve.

I’d like to say that I wear and buy hand-me-downs. But that isn’t entirely true. I just bought two swimming suits, which in spite of the vanity that forced me to purchase them new, will make me look like an old lady. Even so, I like them because they are tankinis and therefore make going pee easier. I tried to pee in the ocean once, but got pee-shy. I guess I’m just a pee in privacy kind of girl, therefore tankinis are a practical purchase because they prevent UTIs. My regular clothes are gifts, hand-me-downs from my babysitter (thanks Jen), or … okay just one of those two things so my washer is of crucial importance.

When Jesse bought my new washing machine, I thought I’d finally found my soul mate. The clothes go in dirty and come out clean. The washer uses less than half the water my old one did and a fraction of the electricity. Glug. Thinking of it makes my toes tingle. I had no idea the love I could have for an inanimate object. And so you can’t imagine my exponential lust for my washing machine after we hooked it up to a gray watering system that keeps, among other things, my pomegranate bush flush.

Jesse puts up with my eccentricities, but tonight his mind boggled at the frugality of resources I managed. Though maybe he was humoring me. Here’s the story – I made baked rigatoni for dinner. I used the stockpot to boil the noodles. I rescued the noodle water and boiled eggs with it for tomorrow’s lunch. The water had already been boiling, so I didn’t waste any gas while the water heated up. Of course the egg shells were a tad slimey. Then I collected that next generation of water, and used it to water my nearly xeriscaped yard.

This behavior isn’t taken into account when figuring out one’s ecological footprint. Even so thinking about ways to lessen my impact upon the blue planet can take up the rest of my evening. It would be tragic for anyone to see me as a greenie. While I think green, I don’t behave that way. I need at least 10 acres and 2.2 planets to sustain my lifestyle.

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Halloween Isn’t for Bores

It looks like Brittany Spears has a new Halloween costume. I saw on Perez Hilton that she’s got those Hollywood leach lips. She’s also got a head start on her tricks as she ran over the foot of a photographer on her way out of the doctor’s office. Hmm, the mind reels with possibilities for dressing up to honor this inspiring falling star.

My favorite costume ever was bestowed upon me by my big bro waaaay over a decade ago and I’ve seen it plenty since. I taped a giant gift bow to my shirt and attached an over-sized card that read, “To the World: From God.” But then Jack assures me that he really thinks I am God’s gift to the world.

Jack is great at costuming because he never buys anything pre-made. He also adds a sick twist on his costumes. He might, for example, take something sweet and innocent like the Easter Bunny and make it sinister. He might give it vampire fangs or a thorny crown. Maybe that’s too sinister. Sorry Jesus. Thank God I can get forgiveness on Sunday.

Going along with my boring ideas about helping others and staying healthy and not polluting the planet, I hoped that my 30 friends, excluding Tom because he really doesn’t talk to me anymore, might get inspired and make costumes this year. Keep your money in your pocket and stay away from the vinal – unless you want to do some dominatrix stuff. You know, I don’t want to judge.

If you need help coming up with an idea, here are a few from Heckel on The Daily Camera:
* Smear black mascara under an eye and tape a pea to your chest. You’re a black-eyed pea.
* Wear all black, except for one arm. You’re the Def Leppard drummer’s severed arm.
* Duct-tape your body sticky-side-out and cover in popcorn and candy wrappers and look like a movie theater floor.
* Tape mirrors on your body, and you can be everyone else.
* Wear pink and tape a shoe to your head. Say you are used bubble gum.
* Instead of pretending you are a cat but are really just wearing your underwear and looking like a stripper, why not be honest? Be a stripper.

And I hope to see pix of each of you. You can post them here or on your own website, but let me see them. I’m thinking of being a soccer mom this year. Hold on… van, check, soccer balls, check, grassy socks all over the place, check, half consumed water bottles with flotsam floating in them, check. Oops. I’m already a soccer mom.