So, PainfullyHIP makes me happy. They especially made me happy this morning when there was a new article posted about the new term “recessionista” and how everyone is jumping on the “let’s sell cheap, mass-produced, poorly made clothes that looook like you spent 3 hours on your bedroom floor sewing buttons zippers on so you don’t feel bad about continuing to consume in these tight-wad times”. BLEUUUURGH.
Anyway, I made a comment on the article, it’s the first one.
I covered my house with scoured and still-wet sheep’s fleece the other day.. I love the weird farmy smell of wet wool. I also scoured some llama fibre with about a million guard hairs in it that I don’t know how to remove. ADVENTURES IN LEARNING, GUYS!
Here’s the mountain of Merino/Romney cross after I washed it.
It had been in my closet almost a year, unwashed, so the lanolin was pretty stubborn but after a few baths it let go. I want to somehow learn how to collect the lanolin from fleeces I’ve washed so that I can use it for handmade cosmetics that I eventually want to make.
A few days ago, Alex secretly picked me up in his garguantumongous work truck and we drove 2 hours to Saskatchewan to make a delivery at a pulp mill. It was a great excuse to take some knitting along that had nothing to do with my course (it’s been far too long since I’ve done any of that) and he liked to have my company. We saw about a million deer on the way there but I didn’t get any photos of them
My friend Chris James (poet-brainiac-bowielover extraordinaire) just emailed me! Just this second! I do believe he has poetry books of some sort in the works to send me. He makes me want to create a giant through-post arts collective of people who mail eachother pieces (writing, little paintings, doo-dads, etc) for collaborative works.
I love having ideas, even just baby ideas. I have a few people in mind for this already . If this thought progresses past the larva stage, I’ll let you all know <3
This is Cordelia II, my sewing machine with computerparts. I got her last year for my birthday and I have sorely neglected her. She is the second sewing machine I’ve owned, and her predecessor now belongs to my sister. Cordelia II and I have had a tenuous relationship in the last year, because the first project I tried to make with her (a pair of cotton pajama pants) came out gravely misshapen and too small in the butt area. I maintain to this day that this was, in fact, her fault. We also made an attempt at fashioning a gorgeous foufy skirt, but I have since put the pieces away and don’t remember how they go anymore. Cordelia II has spent the remainder of time in various closets.
BUT NO MORE!
All is forgiven. Cordelia II and I work wonderfully together now (especially after a beer or two). Fluid and flawless, she and I sew like a dream. In fact, while the needle glides through the fabric, one is reminded of that scene in Monster when Charlize Theron and Christina Ricci are skating around the roller-rink gazing into each other’s eyes. One can even hear, as a matter of fact, Journey’s Don’t Stop Believin’ cranked over some crackly loud-speaker. Such is the beauty of it, really.
Just like this (except I’m Charlize Theron and Cordelia II is Christina Ricci)
We turned a pair of high school jeans into a cute denim skirt. Check it.
I can’t really add a bottom hem right now, or do any of the fancy double-stitching (or whatever it’s called) until I get myself an iron and ironing board (or something like it) but I don’t care. It’s the first project I’ve finished in years with a sewing machine and I’m proud. I used to make myself hoodies out of old shirts in high school, but they were always sketchy looking. I’m actually not scared to wear this. Yay me!! I mean.. US!
. If this thought progresses past the larva stage, I’ll let you all know <3
