Pink Leader's Pontifications

13 November 2009 @ 12:59 pm

When I woke this morning all I could think of is that I need to figure out some stretches or yoga specifically to counteract the head/neck/shoulder stiffness created from my embroidery. I already do weekly chiropractor visits for maintenance, but when working with the frame while sitting on the couch watching TV I'd need an adjustment each night before bed. I'm obviously addicted to this project, so I need to look into ways to make the going easier for the remaining 1000 hours or so this will likely take. (okay, I hope I speed up some over time, but that's a conservative estimate.)

So I've been thinking of Google searches to run. Stitcher's stretches? Yoga for Needlework? A quick search brought up this link for How Yoga Helps Stitchers, which deserves a closer look, but not much else. It is the hunching over of the back, but then the drawing back of the shoulders to hold the frame up that is a battle. We even joked at the Plimoth jacket stitching sessions that we needed mandatory yoga/stretch breaks because it was so easy to get engrossed and forget to pause and stretch.

And then I check my email and see this in my inbox from Blue Heron Wellness, the place I go for acupuncture:

Yoga for Shoulder & Neck Pain with Debbie Jensen

Join Debbie to explore the shoulder and neck - development an understanding of the anatomy and learn how to use yoga to resolve, reduce, and prevent pain in shoulder, neck, upper back and head. Let Debbie's clear, knowledgable approach empower you to control of your body!

Saturday, Nov.14, 1:30 PM - 3:30 PM

Boy, doesn't that sound like just the thing? It's like seeing the Grail shaped beacon.

But, I was planning to make an appearance at the Tournament of the Lily on Saturday. And then I see the cold rain at my window. But it should be mostly dry by then. And still likely muddy. It's not like I've made anything special for the event, nor was I planning to attend feast. Alan's committed to going for the rapier portion, but that means he'd be on another separate field from the pomp, etc.

Poll #1484923 Yoga-Lily
This poll is closed.
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: None, participants: 25

So, on Saturday, should I?

Go to the Tournament of the Lily.
6 (24.0%)

Go to the Yoga for Shoulder and Neck Pain class.
18 (72.0%)

Go to the Yoga class and send me details so I can attend too.
0 (0.0%)

Tough it out, stay home and embroider more.
1 (4.0%)

Tags: embroidery, health

Mood:

curious

18 comments | Comment

11 November 2009 @ 03:33 pm

what priorities?

This is randomly my calendar image for November.

( priority setting fail... )
So, what should the priorities be? Embroidery? Cleaning? Laundry? New Shoes? I need to tend to them all, but the embroidery is the most enjoyable and lazy-like on the list.

Tags: cleaning, embroidery, health, pictures

Mood:

cranky

8 comments | Comment

03 November 2009 @ 04:53 pm

Not quite a bulleted list for Halloween

I've consumed 64 oz of water today, with only one potty break. Throat is dry.

I spent most of Saturday carving pumpkins, tidying the front room, and napping. Sadly I was lazy with the costume- wearing a white tunic, white veil and pale make-up to be a ghost.

attack_laurel was much cuter in her pink eyelet dress and black lace jacket. Enjoyed the company for answering the door for the trickle of Trick-or-Treaters.

I dressed Ladybug as a Marine for the evening. Or rather, I put the dog back in her Lil' Devil shirt for a few hours. Devildog? Get it? Ladybug was surprisingly well-behaved with the ToTrs. After the first few, she sat still and was content for someone to pet her to keep her from rushing the door. Good Bug!

Sunday was more cleaning, lounging and embroidering. And napping. I finished my latest little embroidery nibble. Glad I drew it out for a test, because I'm certain after just the drawing that I didn't want to do 4 of these. But the one was fun.

Didn't sleep well on Sunday night. I'll blame too much candy/sugar. Actually it turned out my back was bugging me. I spent Monday night on the heating pad, lacing up my next embroidery project to the fabulous Spanish Peacock slate frame.

Also, our guest rooms will be full now through the holidays. We've got Orlando in the green room for the next 5 months, and an old friend from high school will be in the blue room from 11/14 until he finds an apartment on this coast. I need to warn Blue about that since it is kinda her room.

Tags: embroidery, holidays, pictures, pup

Mood:

thirsty

Comment

14 October 2009 @ 03:07 pm

KWCS

I had a great time at KWCS in Philly this weekend, due entirely to wonderful friends and interesting classes.

Friday night was a fun dinner and hanging out with Drea and Calli, and the food was delicious. The applewood smoked ham calzone was super yummy.

Saturday I skipped the first class I had on my schedule, but I was moving slow and taking my time. oh well. It allowed me time to chat and visit with folks before settling in for a day of learning.

I really enjoyed the Pleated and Embroidered 16th cent Shirts class. I can see why others might have complaints, but considering the information covered, I thought it was an excellent intro class to the evolution of some shirt construction and basic into to pleatwork embroidery without going into too much mind-boggling technical detail.

I also loved the unintentional companion classes of the Ins and Outs of Extant Garments by Drea Leed, and Working with a Mundane Textile Collection. They showed great examples of extant pieces, some of the problems of recreating exactly from those pieces due to different postures now vs. then, some of the cool details found when taking a close look, what materials to prepare when you have the option to look at extant pieces from a museum collection (pencil, paper, gloves, calipers, markers, scale, etc.) There was also a bit of the lifting of the veil on the state of museum collections, problems with cataloging, the reasons to be as specific as possible in your questions, etc. Both had different foci, but were wonderful classes.

Alas I skipped the V-neck gown class, which I heard was insanely crowded, to sprang geek with Kyle from the East and look at his various attempts to recreate the pink and green argyle garters from the MFA, both playing with scale and patterning. He's on a good path and has an appointment to view them, which I know he'll adore. So cool!

Then I went shopping and got so distracted that I was a tad late to teaching my own class. Oops! Luckily I wasn't too late and since it was the last hour of the day I could go over the hour allottment. I hated that I felt like a monkey on crack when teaching and bouncing all over the place on the details, but did try to cover as much as possible. I wish I had more focus, but there were wonderful folks who asked great questions that let me fill in the blanks that I had skipped over. I was also grateful for the interest in butterfly token sales and that most of my handouts when away. I now only have 4 more butterfly tokens, and another decent donation I need to send up to Plimoth. Whoo!

Saturday night was enjoyable hanging out with the Spanish Peacocks with James and Calli fetching dinner back to the hotel, fun partying with amazing ladies who I rarely get quality time with, not enough sangria, various states of undress, and good times. We stayed up far too late, but had such fun that it was completely worth it. Alas I didn't join in on some of the puppy-piling as I had a slight tickle in my throat I didn't want to share. This turned out to be a very good idea as I've now been home sick and slow for the past 3 days. Bleargh.

Sunday I took the Frauenrock class, which had a lot of great information in it, and loved the aha moments of the hat portion of the hours. Whooo! I then spent the rest of the time hanging out and chatting with folks, and got so distracted chatting and comparing notes with Drea L. that I ended up skipping the Wappenrock class. Rats! Ah well, I hope for the notes to help me out when I get to that stage.

Kit and I took off around 5pm as things wound down, and I blathered to her the whole way home about the different classes I took, what value I got out of them, etc. She had the bright idea of calling Jim and Sandy as we were within 20 minutes of their place when we started thinking food. Though they had eaten, there were leftovers for us and we had a wonderful few hours stopping and visiting with them and chatting. Dinner and fun companionship is far better than the travel plaza we hit on the way up. We even got some beagle love. Made it home around 9pm to crash all too soon.

I realized that some of this pedagogy and putting together of classes for a coherent teachable moment from work has rubbed off on me. I did some mental comparing of classes and where things could be improved, what went right, what gave a good feel and what was a tad off-putting. I need to analyze any future classes I do from this point of view as it seemed some were more enjoyable and exciting than others and most of that has to do with delivery rather than interest in the subject.

Must think further on this, but for now another nap on the comfy couch of doom.

Tags: costuming, embroidery, events

Mood:

sick

13 comments | Comment

30 September 2009 @ 03:23 pm

Dreaming

So, looking for a bit of inspiration and also looking forward to next Fall and the Jacket Study Tour, here are some links for some of the items on the agenda.

V&A item number T.228-1994, also known as the Laton Jacket. http://collections.vam.ac.uk/objectid/O11095

V&A item number 1359-1900, the jacket that provided the embroidery pattern. http://collections.vam.ac.uk/objectid/O15345

The description mentions a third jacket, so I wonder which of these jackets that may be:

T.4-1935 1620’s embroidered jacket: http://collections.vam.ac.uk/objectid/O110094 -unlikely since it is all black with speckle stitches for shading
T.259-1926 1620-1640 jacket part: http://collections.vam.ac.uk/objectid/O115757 -unlikely since it is just a portion, but easier to see the back
173-1869 1600-1625 embroidered jacket: http://collections.vam.ac.uk/objectid/O115772 -unlikely since it is on a silk ground instead of linen
T.70-2004 1630-40 embroidered jacket: http://collections.vam.ac.uk/objectid/O101730 -unlikely since it is monochrome and a different aesthetic.
T.106:1 to 4-2003 1600-1620 jacket parts: http://collections.vam.ac.uk/objectid/O86509 -this one would be cool to see in its pieces and fits the right category.
919-1873 1600-1625 jacket: http://collections.vam.ac.uk/objectid/O80226 -I'd love to see this one, but wonder if the loose fit will rule it out.
Obviously I'd love to see T.124-1938 1630s embroidered jacket: http://collections.vam.ac.uk/objectid/O110107 and T.843-1974 1630-39 embroidered w/wool jacket: http://collections.vam.ac.uk/objectid/O115768 but guess the monochrome and wool embroidery will rule them out as well.

http://www.goldenthreads.co.uk/ Golden Threads in the UK is the company that applies the gilt to the Gilt Sylke Twist threads for Access Commodities. I'm assuming this is manufacturer for the behind the scenes tour.

Embroidered Jacket in the Manchester City Galleries- 1610-1620, Accession Number: 2001.131, entirely in grapevines

The Museum of Costume in Bath, with two embroidered jackets, and their Stuart glove collection, though I can only find some of the gloves online. But Elizabethan Costume site says it has these shirts/shifts as well as a lovely jacket with ribbon closures on the front. Regardless of what they have online or not, it certainly looks like a drool-worthy experience.

Royal School of Embroidery in Hampton Court, to see a modern embroidery workshop, and view the large workroom and their collection of textiles as well.

http://www.embroiderersguild.com/collection/index.php Embroiderer's Guild in the UK, owners of the similar patterned panel from the same workshop as the V&A jacket the embroidery pattern was taken from.

This exercise makes me really appreciate those museums like the MFA, V&A, LACMA, etc. who do put massive amounts of their collections online. Also, a part of me likes a full day at the V&A, and a part of me thinks, only a day?

Tags: adventure, embroidery, museum

Mood:

enthralled

5 comments | Comment

07 September 2009 @ 10:44 pm

The weekend

I have a cute husband snoring on the couch, and a tired pup crashed out on her bed while I watch more of the Dirty Jobs marathon.

We've had a fun full weekend. Spent Friday night at home out on the patio enjoying grilled streaks with mashed taters and a crisp salad. Good food, lovely weather and the best company of my sweetie and our pup.

Saturday I slept in nice and late, made a yummy brunch of the leftover steak and some eggs, and we got on the road to Arvonia. I got to embroider while Alan drove to the farm, where we got to see the progress made and spend some time with friends. Saw Cyndi's progress on her embroidered sleeves, plans for Tom and Heather's new country home and plot, and awww over the poor gimpy feet. After dessert we said our goodbyes and made our way to M&M's place for more pup play and good conversation with Mike and Kirsten before crashing.

Sunday dawned with the sound of the pond waterfall, the occassional frog chirp, and eventually fresh scones for breakfast. While we had fun company, we got back on the road home before noon. The pup spent most of the time crashed out in the back of the truck, but I did try to keep a bit of vigilance for the cool truck I spotted on the way down. In Warrenton I saw the truck again so we pulled a u-turn to go inspect it. A pretty silver 65 Chevy truck with a 350 engine and locking hubs for 4x4. Nice old truck.

Once home Alan was useful and the pup and I napped solidly. But we had more plans for that evening. Around 5 we headed up North to the Toscano's to help celebrate Carla's birthday, which also gave the Bug time to run around with the beagles. The food was as good as anticipated, the company was charming, and the conversation never ceased to entertain.

Today we did some shopping at IKEA (alas a bust), Lowe's which was mostly window shopping, Behnke's for crape myrtles, and Home Depot. I sandwiched the shopping with the Dirty Jobs marathon on the Discovery Channel and some work organizing UofA class proposals. Not a bad weekend at all, but I could use another one.

Posted via LiveJournal.app.

Tags: embroidery, home, pup, tv, uofa, via ljapp

Current Location: US, Maryland, Montgomery, Fairland, Mica Dr

1 comment | Comment

03 September 2009 @ 04:35 pm

needle noodlings

My ankle is feeling much better after spending all day yesterday wrapped. Of course now my knee on that leg is feeling all twingey, usually only when I hyper-extend it, which I either do all the time or am doing it more lately. grumble. Seems like I need to wrap it when I get home. My right wrist is also a bit sore, but I'm going to blame that on the excessive mousing I had to do today for start of the semester checks. Maybe it's all psychosomatic after reading the article on ibuprofen and trying to avoid it except when necessary. I don't seem to have tummy problems, but man do I seem to have immune problems. Sinus infections/colds are to me like moths are to flames. grumble. (Though on the whole less so since my May move to another building at work. I always thought the air system on campus would be the death of me, although this one is very loud.)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Anyway, for the past two nights I've sat beside my latest embroidery nibble (Thanks for that term Tricia W.) and not managed to pick it up. I've been on the computer running down the battery working online on stuff until far too late leaving no time to play with needle and thread. (I'm sure the needy pup nudging my elbow with the super soft ears and big brown eyes has nothing to do with my lack of stitching.) I vow tonight to at least outline one more area, darn it!

I also noticed that while I posted a note back in January looking at heathered silks on extant pieces, and my experiments with creating my own custom silks, and promised to post further about more experiments with only 2-ply of the Soie Perlee, AND that I did experiment with creating 3 2-ply threads from 2 3-ply threads with the leaf on

isenglass 's pincushion, I hadn't really taken notes on that. (Update: I had mentioned it briefly in this entry, but completely forgot about it.)

Making 3 2-ply threads from 2 3-ply threads was tougher than creating 2 3-ply threads with a 2:1 color ratio. They wanted to tangle much more, the twist wasn't always as even, and I really lost a bit to the loose ends at the beginning and end of the new threads. So trying to create them from pre-twisted silks was more headache inducing than I had hoped, but it was possible. It would likely be better to twist them directly from the filament like Tricia Wilson does in the first blog entry on the subject. But I do think it gave a finish that is closer to the extant pieces. If you view the original size (2816 x 2112) of the embroidery you can more easily compare the relative sizes of the threads in use, and the heathered 2-ply thread is closer to the GST in thickness than the almost super fluffy 3-ply. (You can also see every stitch, all my mistakes, and that I needed a much higher count linen. Man that was a good focus.) I should really do some side by side comparisons, and try to bring them together with some of the images I have of extant stuff to check out the relative thickness of the Soie Perlee to what is often found in use in period. It is likely that the Soie Gobelins is a better fit for this type of work. I think I have some in pink and gold, so perhaps yet another test/comparison is in order. So many experiments, so little time.

Tags: embroidery, health, threads

Mood:

curious

4 comments | Comment

01 September 2009 @ 09:54 pm

Site updates

attack_laurel 's suggestion on Saturday, I updated my String Arts page with new pages for my Mother-in-Law's panel as well as the Craft Swap pincushions. I also updated my page on my participation in the Jacket Project.

I also updated my calendar since I have to work on the morning of the Lochmere Baronial Birthday event, so might show up for the afternoon, or might head home to crash. We'll see.

Laundry is done, pup is snuggled on her bed, I've got the NatGeo channel on watching The Human Family Tree, and an Ace wrap on my left ankle since it is being a bit weak and achy. I probably stepped on it wrong when we were out chasing bunnies last evening.

Tags: embroidery, mil-panel, pincushion, tech, tv

8 comments | Comment

29 August 2009 @ 11:16 pm

Craft Swap Completion

So back in January there was this craft swap meme on LJ. I foolishly agreed to participate, and I'm glad I did, but I missed the two month date by quite a bit. oops. Oh well. Sorry.

Anyway, these are the results:

salviati got the lily,

narniarose received the rose, the butterfly was made for

isenglass , and the honeysuckle went to

caemfind

and finally the spider was for

allasondrea

Now, hmm.. what's next?

Tags: embroidery, pictures, pincushion

Mood:

giddy

6 comments | Comment

25 August 2009 @ 09:56 pm

Sweet bag thoughts

The conclusion I'm coming to is that while some of the sweet bags used detached buttonhole and other non-tent stitches, it seems to be universal to not leave any of linen ground showing, and cover it with gold/silver in the Gobelin stitch. Coifs, forehead cloths, jackets, nightcaps and even some large panels allowed the linen ground to show through, if not littered with spangles, but not so much for these tiny bags. The only bags of the period I could find with the ground showing were either larger bags with simpler blackwork embroidery or had a silk satin ground to show off.

*Note: if anyone finds an extant sweet bag with the linen ground showing, or an account thereof I'd be most grateful for the source.

Guess I need to try the Gobelin stitch in the background of a small pincushion first to see how it goes. Or I could order the strawberry nibble of Tricia's that uses it.

( some links... )

Tags: embroidery, museum

Mood:

thoughtful

22 comments | Comment

20 August 2009 @ 04:34 pm

KWAR/KWCS poll

Known World Academy of the Rapier and Known World Costume Symposium, Oct. 9-11, Philadelphia, PA
Poll #1446489 KWAR/CS
This poll is closed.
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 18

Are you planning on going to KWAR/KWCS in Philly in Oct.?

View Answers

Why yes I am!
4 (22.2%)

Nope.
10 (55.6%)

Still considering...
4 (22.2%)

Would you be interested in my Plimoth Plantation's recreation of a Stuart Embroidered Jacket class/lecture/Gen rambles for an hour about the cool project?

View Answers

Sure!
7 (41.2%)

Heard it! Please stop talking...
0 (0.0%)

I already told you I can't go you evil woman!
9 (52.9%)

Eh, not really, I'm there for the pokey.
1 (5.9%)

Would you be interested in a 2 hour session on learning the stitch types?

View Answers

Sure!
5 (27.8%)

The instructions are online! I do not need your help.
0 (0.0%)

Again! Not going! Shut up!
10 (55.6%)

Y'see, there's this rapier half of the weekend?
1 (5.6%)

Maybe, if it's not up against something else I really want.
2 (11.1%)

What about a class on the Masters of Defense Tournament Style?

View Answers

Sure!
2 (11.1%)

The what?!?!
0 (0.0%)

La la la, I can't hear you....
9 (50.0%)

And take a break from my Costuming classes?
5 (27.8%)

Maybe...
2 (11.1%)

Tags: embroidery, events, poll

Mood:

curious

10 comments | Comment

23 June 2009 @ 12:36 pm

squee!

I just got a communication back from the MFA regarding the un-numbered polychrome embroidered coif we saw back in January 2008. It is MFA accession #34.226. They have a great pic online of the lace and a teardrop spangle, and you can see the gorgeous striped leaves and neat gathering of the coif at the crown. So cool! Now I need to go back and change all the image names that I have from this coif to reflect the correct accession number. Whee!

Tags: embroidery, museum

Mood:

chipper

3 comments | Comment

04 June 2009 @ 12:00 pm

Pictures from our last Plimoth visit

Session 6 (for me) Pic-Spam!
We're in half of the pictures posted to the blog at the end of the session from this weekend past. Whoohoo!

Just to show you that no one can escape the lure of the Jacket Project,

anselmatthews spent far more time with his

cathgrace during the visit than I think he had imagined. Dubbed Captain Oe by the ladies, he joined the small group of only 10 other gentlemen (or XY chromosomes) who have worked on the Jacket.

Even Carli's parents spent some of the time celebrating their 36th Wedding Anniversary adding oes to a sleeve panel.

attack_laurel and I pose with our frames at the end of the second day of embroidery.

An extremely fuzzy picture of me and my Mother-in-Law posing with the panel I made for her.

Team Oe with the completed sleeve, just prior to heading back to the airport to return home.

Yes, I stomped my feet and said I wasn't listening as my teammates attempted to force me to stop attaching oes to the jacket and head back home. They really didn't want to miss the plane home.

Tags: embroidery, pictures, plimoth

Mood:

accomplished

7 comments | Comment

01 June 2009 @ 11:03 pm

Home from Plimoth

We are all safe and sound, home from our latest trip to embroider at Plimoth. (Well, Paul and Catherine are likely either still on the road, or just arriving home about now.)

Once again, my Mother-in-Law was a wonderful hostess for our stay, and cheerfully listened to us natter on about this and that and the lessons learned with each new day of stitching. We are all extremely grateful to her for her hospitality.

Once again, we are tired, sore, happy, accomplished, etc. There was perhaps a bit of repressed emotion as we left knowing we might not get to touch the jacket again. This session focused on finishing the reverse chain stitch tendrils off the vines, and attaching lots and lots of Oes to the jacket panel pieces. Our team of Laura, Catherine, Paul and I attached over 1660 oes to the jacket pieces. Yup, you read that right, Paul was sewing on the jacket too, and he attached over 500 personally. Of course Norma was the true Rock Star finishing off more than a few pieces and lots of detached and fiddly bits.

Hugs were had all around as we left, possibly for the last time until the jacket is on display this Fall.
More later, must sleep now.

Tags: embroidery, plimoth

Mood:

sleepy

3 comments | Comment

13 May 2009 @ 11:18 pm

hoarding...

So, I've been working on a little project that won't have tangible results, but hopefully will be helpful when closer to completion. This is something I've been frankly contemplating/niggling in the back of my brain, but many thanks go to

elmsley_rose for the information and inspiration to tip the scales. Once it is fleshed out I'll share, I promise. Sadly it has been keeping me from my real embroidery, but should be fun for planning later projects. Well, that's enough of a tease for now. I should send details to

theblueleader and

attack_laurel (maybe after Jamestown Days this weekend) for more ideas/input.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ .!.
I need to go inspect myself for ticks before calling it a night and crashing in bed. I found one Lone Star tick crawling on my pants this evening as I was noodling on the laptop, but since it was still crawling, I just dumped it in the toilet for drowning. Of course once you find one tick, you feel ghost ticks everywhere. sigh. But I was doing good work. Me and the Round-up were hunting down poison ivy leaves and spraying them with the sweet chemical death. Luckily it keeps to the edges of the yard, but I did have to look very closely amidst the Virginia Creeper for hidden poison ivy groupings. I found it all along the fence to our west, and then some smaller bits peeking out on the east side up on the side of the hill. I'm betting that it was the crawling among the hill to get close enough to spray that stuff that put me in proximity to the tick I found. Then again, it could have rode in on Ladybug, but she's been sticking mostly to the yard lately. Dealing out sweet swift death to poison ivy is important enough to brave the ticks though.

Yawn... time for bed...

Oh, and Happy Birthday to the Dad. I hope he has a fun weekend with friends to celebrate, if a bit late. Today was monopolized with the passing of a friend of theirs instead, and them inheriting an exchange student from Thailand for the rest of their stay.

Tags: embroidery, wildlife

Mood:

geeky

6 comments | Comment

20 April 2009 @ 03:19 pm

a weekend away from home

A few of the positive aspects of attending the BOD meeting this weekend in Williamsburg, VA:

The company of many wonderful and entertaining friends.
Having many folks correctly identify isenglass as the creator of my pretty pink pendant that I wore in honor of her run.
Observing how BOD meetings work.
Discovering that apparently Texans are taught that Jamestown failed. :) (need to send a note to correct that- since I was stunned to hear such a declaration I couldn't accurately refute it.)
Yummy food, and particularly dessert, both at the lunch buffet, dinner at Sal's with findlaech and stringmonkey , and brunch at Lulu's with Mike and halowenslut .
Walking around Colonial Williamsburg with a group of widely different and equally wonderful folks.
Getting quite a bit of progress made on my current embroidery project.

Making the one month overdue deadline for the craft-swap meme sadly isn't likely to happen either. But I did make progress and finished up one more pincushion and started on the next one. I also played around with dividing two different colors of 3 ply silk perl thread into three bi-color strands of 2-ply thread. It wasn't without some problems, but I have to say that the end result is pretty cool. The resulting stitching with a 2-ply of the Soie Perlee does get a finer, more densely packed and less fluffy detached buttonhole which does look closer to the originals I've seen. I wonder if I can take photos that are carefully cropped to not give away the whole before I can send them to their recipients, but still show things I've learned? Hmm... Of course I was just grooving on some reverse chain stitch on the ride home when Alan's sinus medicines tossed him into snooze-land, so I had to stop and take over driving.

We got home, picked up the Ladybug from the All Dogs Club, and arrived home with plenty of time to mow the lawn/pull out more evil vines and nap before the rain hit.

~

This morning Ladybug broke a cardinal rule. Despite that she insisted on her walk and that we walked up and down the street in the pouring rain (hooray rain boots and umbrella) she did some "elimination" after the walk indoors instead of outside. Bad Dog! I cleaned it up since Alan's sinuses are continuing to be unkind to him, especially changes in position like cleaning something off the carpet would entail. Rotten creature. But she can be so cute when not messing on the carpet.

sigh.

Tags: embroidery, pup, rain, sca, threads

Mood:

accomplished

30 comments | Comment

06 April 2009 @ 03:14 pm

Thistle Threads order

Hey embroidery (and lace) folks!

Just an FYI, that I ordered some of the #4 Gilt Passing Thread and some postcards from Thistle Threads on Wednesday last week (4/1), and my order arrived on Saturday (4/4). Now, your mileage my vary, since this was Mass. to MD, and Tricia wasn't on travel at the moment, but I was very glad with the order process and speed. So, if you've been thinking about ordering a Lace Sample Kit or an Embroidery Sample Kit, but didn't want to go through the hassle of calling Plimoth directly, this is the way to go!

(Oh, and even if you plan to order cheaper Gilt Sylke Twist threads from Hedgehog Handworks (another wonderful resource!) or someplace else, Tricia has the best photos of the threads up on her site evar!)

Tags: embroidery, plimoth, retail therapy, threads

Mood:

pleased

9 comments | Comment

12 March 2009 @ 10:18 pm

upcoming fun

Looking forward to a girls weekend in NYC this weekend. Blessed with the fine company of

stringmonkey ,

attack_laurel and

terrshee we will have a fun time looking at three floors of 16th and 17th cent embroideries, other exhibits in the Met, and get into some good food. I'll miss my Alan and the pup, but at least he won't be burdened by me taking my time at an exhibit that he has no interest in. I hear there is also a cool exhibit at the Met of items from ancient Babylonia. Frankly I'd also just like to see more of the massive Met.

I've also got two days off capping the weekend making it four days total, which gives me tomorrow to run errands and play with the pup, and Monday to recover. I should also really wash my fabric for my costume for Bob's party, and get started on construction.

Sadly my brain is full of snot, so not I'm not very interesting. Oddly enough, though my head is stuffed including my ears, my sense of smell is heightened. The smell of mulch going into and leaving work was almost overwhelming. I could smell perfume when no one was around, and the chair my boss was sitting in after she left the room. And man is the pup smelling houndy.ugh. I'd like to go back to normal soon please. I do not want a heightened sense of smell on the train or subway in New York.

Tags: embroidery, health, museum, travel

Mood:

annoyed

7 comments | Comment

10 March 2009 @ 03:15 pm

Artsy weekend

I'm feeling a bit knackered at the moment. My back and shoulders are stiff and tired. I'm sure I've also got some allergy related nonsense going on in my head.

We had a lovely weekend. For those who don't LJ on the weekends, I already posted a link to pictures from KA&SFest on Saturday. Since posting on Saturday, I've also tagged a bunch of the photos so if you want to just see the Scribal pictures, or the Weaving pictures, or just the pictures of Argh's stuff, you can. I had quite a bit of fun being a shutterbug at the event, and I confess that I didn't take notes so all the captions are from memory or clues by others. It also means that I wasn't very good at reading any documentation. Like seriously, the only docs I read were for the one entry I had to judge. I kinda wish now that I had sat down to read Griele's docs on her silk painted Persian head scarf, Aime's paper on sweet bags, which I imagine expands on her TI article, as well as reading some of the sound-bitey science fair presentations that were no doubt awesome if a bit hard to reach/read. I know I'm also not the only one with basket weaving envy thanks to Magda and Aime.

I made certain to point out some displays to others, and fondled a Roman mug by

thatpotteryguy that I ended up passing on. Eventually the feet needed a break, so I sat and elightened poor William the Younger about the Plimoth Embroidered Jacket project, and showed off the pictures I had on my laptop. I also shared them with Martine from Isenfir (?) (who is working on a coif of her own thanks to Isobel's patterns) as well as cool extant knitted items pictures. The point was just to show her the top of two of the coifs that I took pictures of to give her ideas on how to finish her own when it comes to that, but as always, our conversation was less of a train and more like a runaway carriage. I had meant to leave my laptop with my display so folks could look though pictures themselves, but there was both a lack of space and the layout made me a bit nervous to leave it unattended and there wasn't much room to attend to it. I did send a few more precious butterflies home with folks, but not as many as I had hoped to. Too distracted looking to think of pimping.

I've already made my Layout is Important rant back in October, and I think it still holds true. I liked the little cul-de-sac that the InterBaronial Champs section got. It was concentrated and easy to navigate. The merchants area had nice flow, and the Pentathalon area was okay too with only one table depth oer row, if a bit tightly packed, but sadly not near the other displays. The main areas were an exercise in frustration. It was tough to get to the wall of the hall down a skinney row between tables to see what was furthest down the row. I thought it was great that some folks got to be with their displays much of the day like Virag and Rowan, but it did add some obstacles. The area that James had was the best set-up for staying with a display ever.

Bah. Nothings gonna be perfect, and I didn't volunteers to run it, so I should just shut up.
I did get to enjoy the

attack_laurel 's company for the drive there and back, and for dinner afterward of chinese delivery to our place. The pup-slut got lots of attention and bellyrubs and was well behaved, if a bit beggarly.

Sunday was another beautiful day. I called and invited

lisettelaroux , her pup Simon and Tara's Brodie-man over to have a puppy playdate in the backyard. The canine's all got along quite well and tired themselves out mightily after an hour of running around like crazy-dogs. That was awesome, even if I did forget to return her crockpot. Later we also enjoyed

theodorad and

rolanddem 's company for grilled steak on the patio since the weather was so lovely.

Sadly I haven't picked up and embroidered any since the sample bits I did for the display. I can hear quality embroidery time on the couch calling my name.

Tags: a&s, crafty, embroidery, pup

Mood:

tired

5 comments | Comment

23 February 2009 @ 02:17 pm

(no subject)

Despite recent hand injuries this weekend, I was able to embroider a little bit this weekend while hanging out with friends and watching tv. I haven't really done much since finishing the panel for my Mother-in-Law two weeks ago, so it was nice to get back to it a small little bit. This was of course inspired by the craft swap meme from last month, and that if I want to make my goal, I've got one month to do these five pincushions. The designs are drawn out, so it is just sitting down and making the time.

Ignoring the Merry Rose should give me plenty of time to embroider. ;) (Of course it helps that the MR is quiet now.)

( pup ponderings... )

On that note, I've also created a dog-owners friends filter for these puppy posts. I posted the gorey doggie details from this weekend last night to it. If you want to be on the doggie filter and aren't, let me know and I'll add you. If you are on it and don't want to be, let me know and I'll remove you.

Tags: embroidery, pup

Mood:

frustrated

7 comments | Comment