No Idle Hands

2011-05-14T09:46:00.017-05:00

Grannie Dreams
Sarah informs me that her future mother-in-law is already trying out grandma names.

I would say "Getting a little ahead of ourselves, aren't we? Can they please get married first?", except that I have no room to talk.
While I was on Martha Pullen's site looking for handkercheif edgings, it occurred to me that Sarah, unlike the Gymboree-sta, might indulge me in the matter of dear little hand-smocked daygowns for future Baby Genny.

Or, as Taylor is the youngest of three sons, dear little pin-tucked bubbles for possible Baby Milo.
I asked Sarah about it and she applied a little daughterly blackmail: "If I do, can they still have those wonderful hand-carved wooden toys?

"Well, of course."
"Okay, then."

We will have to gently dissuade his mom from "Gogo", though, because that is the name of a particulary repellent Mixo-Lydian refugee in my Thirkell's. We're suggesting Gigi. That's what we call our great-grandma, but with "Nanna" in front of it.

2011-05-10T08:27:00.002-05:00

Fr. W. on why there's no whining in Modesty:

"And ladies, before you come to us with your complaints, just consider- our necklines are higher, our sleeves are longer, our hemlines are lower and we're wearing black."

2011-05-05T09:00:00.008-05:00

Snippets

Sis arrived with MJ for some babysitting, carrying a ziplock with three pairs of panties. "We are toilet-training" she announced. "I've had it with the diapers."
"You are so psychic," I said, "I was just thinking this morning that it was time to try it again and you know what you should do? Invest in some cheap Garanimals shorts and tops so she can get them off easily."

The Fashionista looked at me as if I'd suggested she dress her in a burlap bag.
"She can learn in her regular clothes. O learned in tights."

"Yeah, but you didn't teach her. The Montessori gals did that."
Which is one reason why Bubs and the Potty was such an ordeal.
But I should have known better- this is the mom who religiously changed Gastric Reflux Baby's clothes eight times a day, so she always looked cute. A couple of peed-on pairs of leggings are nothing, in her book.

But MJ, her tushy pampered by the Princess Potty with the cushy seat, was having nothing to do with my IKEA molded plastic piece of minimalism. She'll just wait until she gets home, thank you.

Bubs is being an jr. usher, which means he is handing out the order of service leaflets at the door, a perfect job for the Mayor. Sis and Jas were explaining to him what ushers do- "They ask the guests if they're a friend of the bride or the groom, so they can tell which side to seat them on."

"Oh- so you know who they're cheering for?"

Ves appears in the bathroom door while I'm putting up my hair: "I think I've got this figured out- if they catch the 9:00 am train to San Antonio, they'll arrive late at night. But I have to see if they can rent a car at the station, so they can get to their hotel-"
"Honey, what are you talking about?"
"The kids's honeymoon... so if they can't rent a car there, they could take a taxi-"
"Why are you doing this? It's Taylor's job."
"Are you sure? I remember planning our honeymoon."
" Yes- when you were the groom."

"Oh."

Went to the Stickley exhibit at the DMA and came home reeling drunk on fumed oak, hammered copper, leather and nubby linen.
I'll just move in here, thanks. Can I get an applewood bacon, Boston lettuce and heirloom tomato on hippie bread from the restaurant, please?

I know we've all had the experience of seeing some particular style of art or craft that sounded a loud interior gong: the Arts and Crafts works, particularly in their American expression, did that for me. For years, until they opened the small A&C room upstairs, I would make a pilgrimage to the Blacker Doors, the only large work of the genre the DMA had, and moon about in front of it until the guard gave me the fish-eye. Rooms and rooms of the same was a bit of sensory overload, but I loved it.

Oddly enough, being a fiber lover- I had never cared particularly for the textiles branch of A&C, but being able to see actual examples have converted me. I bought a repro catalogue of decorative items to copy designs from for future projects.

And it seems that there's a store in Grapevine that sells reproductions of Stickley furniture- they had a little sitting area in the exhibit, which they had underwritten. Don't worry, I'll find a justification...

Went on another little binge at the DFW FiberFest again this year. It's the atmosphere: hundreds of fiber fans milling about, enabling each other to spend money like drunk sailors in port. Insisting that if you like that colorway in a worsted weight, you have to get it in laceweight and chunky, too. Or you need that particular blend of roving in another color as well. And surely you'll find a use for that one of a kind giant terra-cotta button. And the wool wash. And the lavendar-impregnated stones.
The mantra is : Go on, you know you want to...
The next day's hangover is less painful, though, I understand.

2011-04-30T11:45:00.005-05:00

In which we have a minor dress crisis, thanks to Miss Middleton.
"Ackkkk!"

"What's wrong, sweetheart?"

"Her dress! Look at her dress! She has lace over a sweetheart neckline, too! People will think I copied her."

I come over to the computer where Sarah, who's been at work all day, is seeing Her Royal Highness, the Duchess of Cambridge's wedding dress for the first time and mildly freaking out.
Never mind that tea-length white crepe with an abstract all-over lace overlay does not equal a tussah silk ballgown with a train and priceless perfectly-matched Carrickmacross bodice and sleeves. Never mind that 'people' are 160 of our closest friends and relatives, not several billion strangers all around the world. The similarities are what counts.
Because brides can be crazy.

"But honey, she has a plunging neckline and you have a jewel and yours is sleeveless and she has long sleeves-"

"I like her long sleeves."

(patiently)
"We can put sleeves on yours. Short ones."

(considering)
"No, that's okay."

"Really?"

"Yes."

"So, are we good?"

(sheepishly, 'cause it's really not a case of "B stole my dress")
"Yes."

Happy one-month engagement anniversary, Sarah and Taylor!

2011-03-23T16:44:00.004-05:00

On the Corapi reactions

First: I had no idea who Fr. Corapi was when this story broke. It turns out that I have actually listened to him briefly on the local Catholic station a time or two- but didn't know it was him. So, I have no opinion on the case itself, beyond a wait and see stance. I am praying for all involved, of course.

More worrying to me is the reaction in the Catholic blogosphere, especially the response of Fr. Corapi's defenders to those they consider insufficiently proclaiming his innocence. Wise and cool heads have tried to defuse heat vs. the light about this, but without much success.

Clearly, many people are deeply invested in this. It seems Father has quite a reputation for orthodoxy and has been instrumental in bringing many people back to the Church, or helping to deepen their understanding of the faith. Some feel so strongly about him that they are willing to read the minds and hearts of others on the strength of a blog comment, and accuse them of various faults from stupidity to being modernist tools of the devil. The kinder wish for them conversion and repentance, the more severe wish them a similar experience of false accusation.

What this all needs is a huge helping of Prudence, Charity and Temperance.

Prudence to not discuss those things that we don't actually know anything about.

Charity to not make silly assumptions about others simply because they have a differing opinion, or no personal stake in the subject beyond the general welfare of the Church: it is entirely possible to be a perfectly devout and orthodox Catholic in America and not know Fr. Corapi from Adam's off ox.

Temperance, because there is such a thing as informational gluttony.

And on that last virtue, that is all I have to say on the subject.

2011-03-01T08:36:00.003-06:00

Morgan Jane, Doctor of the Church

For Christmas this year, I adopted the plan of buying a Nativity scene for the Y's and giving them one piece a day, ending with the infant Jesus on Christmas. Bubs was the one who really got into this, to the point that I sort of planned the discovery of that day's figure for him. For example, one appeared in the theater dressing room when we were collecting loaned costume pieces from "A Little Hous Christmas". But it seems Morgan was paying close attention as well.

She and Sis were in the garden decor aisle at their home away from home- "Oh! that's the Hobby Lobby- I go there with my mommy"- when she spotted a resin statue of a cherub.

"Mommy! It's Baby Jesus!"

"No, honey, it's a little angel. See, he has wings."

"No, Mommy! It's Baby Jesus, he has curly hair, and his mother is Mary and his birthday is Christmas!"

All with emphatic hand gestures, while the granny next to them is biting her cheek not to crack up at our pint-sized Teresa of Avila.
"Morgan Jane," says her mom "I did not know you were a Bible scholar."

2010-06-05T06:42:00.004-05:00

Shape of Things to Come, pt 2

"... with the cordial cooperation of many unpleasant powers or dependent nations, large and small, who felt that having avoided fighting themselves it would now be a good plan to throw their weight about and demand Self-Government, Self-Determination, Ambassadorial Status, large gifts of money and arms and complete freedom to be as nasty as they wished to be to everyone, while no nation- under pain of expulsion from a number of Leagues or Pacts, known only by their intials though most people had not the faintest idea what words the initials represented- was to be allowed to defend its own frontier, protect its own nationals, or publish any newspaper article in any way depreciatory of its grasping ill-wishers."

- Enter Sir Robert, 1955

Seriously, Angela? Stop it!

Interesting that Thirkell and Kipling were cousins. She refers to him as 'prophetic' a number of times in her novels, and she seems to have had a touch of the quality as well.

Reading through the new ones I ordered from Alibris- she will eventually have her own shelf, at this rate.

2010-06-01T08:09:00.003-05:00

The Shape of Things to Come

"...we are living ourselves under a Government as bad as any
in history in its combination of bullying and weakness, its bid for
the mob's suffrages, its fawning upon unfriendly foreigners who despise it,
its effort to crush all personal freedom."

She was writing about England in 1946, but might as well have been describing America in 2010.
The author? Angela Thirkell, whose post-war novels were full of the despicable exploits of Them, who harassed a war-battered citizenry with bureaucratic nonsense, meddling into things about which They knew nothing and general mischief done just because They could.
It's a rare thing for a comedy of manners to send a shiver down your back.

2010-06-01T07:41:00.003-05:00

Man vs. Skwerrel

Because the kids are in the yard constantly, I mostly garden organically and steer clear of pesticides. But measures had to be taken against the squirrel, who is re-foresting our backyard with oaks.

Now this is mostly my fault, because I mulched the paths with the two big bags of oak debris in the first place, creating an annex to the All-U-Can-Eat buffet I was already running at the bird feeders. Acorns+ raised beds full of soft dirt+ squirrel instincts= the New Forest.

I don't mind plucking seedling trees out of the paths. In fact, his dedication to his job would be adorable, except that his wallowing around in the beds was causing havoc, so I bought a bottle of some sort of Repel-All at Lowe's. O and I tore up some muslin strips, tied them to short bamboo stakes and sprayed them with the solution.
And we may have been a little over-enthusiastic,

Because my yard STINKS.
But we expect that to fade with time.

2010-05-13T11:42:00.003-05:00

Oh, snap!

(Boring technical spinning post. feel free to skip.)
Okay- at the Fest, I was seduced by some silk waste at a vendor's site, which spun up into a rope of gems.
For her.
I wasn't happy with the texture of mine when I spun some up. It was much too stiff- a problem of silk- and had little give. Researching on the Net, many suggested combining it with a 1: 2 ratio of wool, so I decided to dye up some merino that was in the bin, using my new "greener" dyes, also from the Fest.
All was going well until I took my eyes off the pot for a few minutes and it boiled. OVER, actually, but only onto the stove, not the floor. Whew!
After the pot cooled and I was rinsing the roving, it began to look as if the whole mess had felted. Which makes sense, because that's how you make those Austrian boiled-wool jackets.
Damn.
Because I don't have any use for five six-foot long lengths of amethyst felt, however lovely and brilliant their color.
Still, some of the shorter pieces that have dried all the way through are pulling apart, so perhaps all is not lost.
Note to me: PAY ATTENTION!
UPDATE: False alarm. Once the roving dried, it was fairly easy to card it out and re-card with the silk. Next up, spinning two batches to see how they do.

2010-05-07T06:46:00.005-05:00

Plant a Garden, Light a Candle

Forget diamonds-guess who's getting a compost bin, handmade, for Mother's Day? That'll neaten up the yard a bit.

You would not believe how many people are vegetable gardening now. Trav's old Boy Scout Master's wife, with whom I had a long, enjoyable talk at Boy Scout Food Drive. She's even growing berries.

My next-door neighbor, who put in one raised bed last year, like me and my four, and is doing another this year. Just herbs and flowers- but she's composting.

The lady around the corner on Devon, who's container gardening in her side yard.

The nice young couple two doors down from us, that Sis met through PTA. They have matching-aged kids, and the little girl came to play with O at our house. Then they all came down to look at my set-up in the evening. One of the lizards, the one with the short tail, appeared, to the delight of the little boys.

And those are just the ones I know about. I'm sure there are many, many more.

As next-door neighbor said: "I just want some beauty in my back yard."

The rest of us want the veggies- but we also want a usable skill. And though gardening is NOT a hobby in which you're in control- hah!- at least you feel like you're doing something useful. A couple of hours' work in the plot leaves you tired, but comfortably so- unlike a few hours in front of the computer, contemplating the current situation.

From the B'ob:

In your day-to-day life , you must refrain from activities that advance the infrahuman tide of ugliness, barbarism and falsehood in our endarkened world.

And when you refrain, you must put something else in that place. Not everyone can choose the garden. But we can all choose something. Bless you in your choice.

2010-04-30T07:51:00.003-05:00

Neutral Ground

Earlier this month, I went to DFW Fiber Fest. (Like a gun show, but with yarn.) One of the classes I took was on Dyeing Yarn and Roving, taught by my spinning instructor. We worked in the little convention center's kitchen- it's a water-heavy process. She instructed us to choose three colors from her collection of dyes and illustrated various ways that we could apply them to our fibers.

Those of us who were dyeing roving (unspun wool) had to consider how our combinations would look when spun into single strands and then plied together into yarn. Leef told us about a process that would, if we liked, prevent the 'barber pole' effect of two distinct colors twined together. You divide your fibers into two equal batches, as usual. You spin one as is, preserving your distinct colors. The second you comb, with carders, into one muted color called a 'neutral ground'. When you ply these together, they balance each other- the original colors retain their individuality, which is actually strengthened by being offset by a shade that combines them all.

I think, here in America, we have lost our 'neutral ground'. The commonality of our culture has been splintered into so many warring social, ethnic, racial, religious and even economic factions that there's not a lot holding us together. Now, this is not to say that there's ever been a time when things were perfect- we are a nation of fallen human beings- but we had a vision that actually worked. But the bases of our 'neutral ground'- the ideas of the Founding Fathers, a shared and common Judeo-Christian morality and a unique American consensus of who we were existed to ground our individualities and allow them to flourish.

2010-04-26T09:51:00.002-05:00

Snippets

Ture confession: how long has it been since I cleaned out the corner cabinet over the drainboard? Let's just say that I found an envelope containing five quarters, which had "Sarah's Lunch Money" written on the outside. And since Sarah wasn't doled out lunch money since the end of middle school, I'm dating this relic around 2003. Yikes.

The Yarbs went to Alabama for Easter to visit Jas's grandmother and his mom, who was staying there with her. Sweet Granny Richards was worried that her advanced age might scare the babies, but Sis was all "Oh, please- they hang out all the time with my grandmother and she's eighty-four!" The highlights of their trip were a family reunion where Bubs, once he got used to the crowd, was the Mayor of Everything, meetin' and greetin' every table and a trip to an uncle's farm. There O surprised everyone by being a fishing fool- though Bubs was the only one to actually catch anything.
We watched the dog for them, which meant that someone went over every four hours to visit with him and let him out for a while- he pines while they're gone and needs the company. And we're soft enough to giiive it to him.

My 'REPEAL" sign has faded in the wonderful rain we've been having, so I need to re-do it with proper white and black paint on a piece of plywood. I will put my handy husband to work on that.

Sarah's new play, a Steel Magnolias-esque estrogenfest about a college swim team, features a director she's never worked with who is a pleasant enough woman, but one of those people who has no unexpressed thoughts. None. Brain to tongue- no stops in between.
One of the cast members, who has worked with this gal, asked Ro if this was her first stage managing job. Ro shared her c.v. with her, who then asked: "Have you ever worked with X (the director)?"
"No."
"Hmmm- do you drink?"

We celebrated V's 60th birthday with a little bar-b-que and cake at home. He got a travel watch for his summer trip and Sis gave him a collage of bluebonnet pictures of the kids. For non-Texans: a bluebonnet photo is a pic of your kids or dog or whoever in a patch of the state flower.
Chi-chi foo-foo photos involve white and pale blue dress-up clothes, classic shots use denim and white. Bandanas may be involved.
Her particular clump of bluebonnets were somewhat damp, which was why she had a hard time getting a good shot of M.J. the Fussy.
'Seriously," she said,"do they make Xanax for babies? You should hear her at night when she can't find her pacifier in bed: 'BINK-EH?! BINK-EH?!? WHERE YOU, BINK-EH?!' We tried the holder attachment, but that just made her freak out: 'BINK-EH STUCK! ARGHHH!'"
"I know it's hard- but just think how proud you'll be of her in twenty years when she graduates Summa Cum Laude from college like her Fan Target."

The electrician came out to replace the entry hall light fixture. We now have a nice bronze and frosted glass chandelier instead of the gold curlique and crystal pendants one that graced us for the last quarter-century. At this rate, we'll have a whole new house, eventually. He also moved the switches for the driveway light and the garage light into the house by the back door- something else we've been thinking about for, oh, the last 25 years.

Speaking of quarter centuries- today is the 25th anniversary of my entry into the Church. Too big a topic to do justice to- let's just say that my gratitude outweighs any struggles and disappointments.

And speaking of the Church, locally; for about 10 years, I attended the local Traditional Indult Mass here. It was graciously hosted for nearly twenty years by the Discalced Carmelites in their chapel in Oak Cliff, though daily Masses were held in several different parishes during that time.
Now, a monastery chapel is not very big and even with two Sunday Masses, folks were crammed in like cordwood. And while I liked the Trad Mass very much, I hadn't any problem with the Mass of Paul VI, especially when it was not celebrated with silly hoo-hah. But back in the beleagured days before Benedict XVI declared that any priest at any time could celebrate the Traditional Mass, if you weren't in a constant state of indignation, you could feel out of place.
So, for a combination of reasons, I stopped going there for several years, except for the odd visit.

But now, after twenty years of prayer and sacrifice and obedience to the bishops, the community has been declared a parish and has bought a former Korean Baptist church, with a rectory, that they are in the process of renovating. And from December to April, their numbers have doubled. Which just proves what we always suspected: many more people would have come, had there just been room for them.
And after several visits and some concentrated prayer, I have decided to move my parish membership there. Being relieved of the constant fight for recognized status had cooled a lot of people off and released that energy for more positive pursuits, which I would like to be a part of.
So we shall see...

2010-03-16T18:48:00.003-05:00

Grandpedant

So, Nini was over yesterday and while we were making Outrageous Oatmeal Cookies from Starbucks (cut the salt and cinnamon by half, okay?), we somehow got into a conversation about: economics. And I mean a serious conversation about goods and services and pricing and value and why monopolies are bad. We must have talked about this for fifteen minutes, waiting for the cookies to bake. And if I used lollipops and Littlest Pet Shops instead of guns and butter- she's eight.

In the last year or two, I've noticed in myself a tendency to teach almost all the time I spend with the babies, especiall with Ni, since she's older. Oh, it's not that we don't have fun, and giggle and act silly and tease each other- but I sneak ethics lessons into the doll house and onto the farm and include some sort of life-lesson- gardening, cooking, sewing, cleaning, handcrafting- into our time together. I know to stop when she gets bored- but it's there.

Now, it's not that Sis and Jas don't do this as well- they are excellent parents with good values. But I know I paid more attention to certain things my grandparents taught me, than my mom and dad. And we have the extra time to back them up, that they don't, trying to make a living and bring up three kids.
I think I look back at when our own kids were young, and think of all the things I wish I had known to emphasize, but just didn't, and want to fill in the gaps with the g-kids.

But most of all, I think my motivation comes from the urgency of these scary times- and the conviction that they will have to be so much stronger than I thought my own children would ever have to be to have a life of Truth, Beauty and Goodness.

2010-03-09T07:08:00.003-06:00

What Not to Wear

About a decade ago, I had a CTJ "Oh, no!- is that my butt?" moment involving a photo from

the Orchestra Trip to Corpus Christi of myself frolicking on the beach in mom jeans. This caused me to make the switch to skirts and dresses most of the time. A denim jumper and a T-shirt is my versions of "jeans and a top".

However.

When the Yarbs take the kids to Dallas Heritage Village on Saturday and Morgan Jane keeps calling all the frontier ladies "Mimi's", including this:

scary-ass horror film denizen of a scarecrow, it might be time to re-think the wardrobe.

Of course, she is only nineteen months old. So maybe not.

2010-03-03T09:21:00.003-06:00

Ah, Youth! or "Alright, hard head."

Well- I got my eyes LASIK'ed back in late January, so my computer time has been limited. For those of you who haven't had the procedure, they put you in a room the temp of a restaurant refrigerator and immobilize your head so that you're looking up into the maw of the Mother Ship, with its psychedelic lightshow. Then the lasers go brzzzzt, brzzzt and you go home to put various drops and gels in your eyes for weeks.
Close-up vision is great, distance vision is taking a while to clear, as my correction for that was hewge. I'm getting re-acquainted with the face I haven't seen clearly from a distance in twenty years.
A glasses-less Mimi disturbed the babies for a while, but not long.

So...I volunteered at the Boy Scout Food Drive and took charge of the glass table. We pack all that separately, due to breakage. Now, one of the things most often packed in glass is condiments and condiments sometimes live in the depths of the pantry for years. And years. Until the B.S.A. drive comes along and they get sent to us.

In addition to the Scouts, we had a church youth group doing their Saturday shift, so they came along to help as well. Two of them were assigned to me and did a great job- until their curiosity got the better of them.

A scout brought three small dusty jars of something dark brown solidified into a gelatinous mass in some oily dark brown liquid to our table.

"What's that?" my helpers (let's call them A and B) asked, fascinated by their horribleness.

"I have no idea."

"Ooooh, let's open one!" said A.

"Yeah!" said B.

"Is the label in English?" I asked. It wasn't. In fact, there weren't any labels, only some writing around the rim of the lids.

"Can you even read the alphabet That's written in?" No.

"Look, I've been working here a long time and if the jar is obviously ancient and everything on it is in an unknown alphabet, DON"T OPEN IT."

(Yes, that sounds xenophobic. But if you can read on the faded cutesy-country label that it's a jar of Aunt Sue-Ellen's Chow-Chow, you have at least some idea of what you're dealing with. Otherwise, you don't.)

"Oh, please let us open it! Please!"

"Okay, but take it into the restroom."

They return a few minutes later, pale and abashed.

"Well?"

"OMG- it was horrible! We both nearly barfed!" said A.

"It was so gross- I've never seen anything like it." said B.

"Can we throw it away now?"

"YES! YES!"

Well, alright, hard heads.

2010-01-17T11:47:00.006-06:00

Snippets

Not complaining, just noting that one of the things you have to get used to as you get older is that it takes much longer to recover from stupid things, like a cold, that you would have shaken off in a day or two, back when. So we need to plan accordingly and be patient with ourselves.
And take the Zicam.
Because as long as we hang out with our beloved little germ-pots, there will be infectiousness.

Finished Stocking #1 and sent it to Ann Arbor, for trying-on (probably accompanied by hysterical laughter) and feed-back before I tackle the next one. This one looked like the dog's dinner at the top, where I was working out the shaping decreases, but improved towards the bottom, where it was, essentially, a sock. I can do those.

When I was at the annual sale at the Woollie Ewe (because somebody is having a baby) I was discussing this hose project with the cashier and mentioned that my vintage pattern called for size 13 needles, which couldn't possibly be our 13's. She looked it up on the needle conversion chart and sure enough- they would now be 1's, which makes much more sense. This is a WWII-era pattern book, when, since they couldn't get nylons or silk stockings, the capable just knit their own.
Interesting.

V. has an idea: every month we will choose one room in the house and concentrate on whatever needs to be done there. It can be de-cluttering, repair, decorating, whatever. First up, since January is half over, will be the hall bath. It needs painting and some new decor, now that it is officially the guest bath again. Did you know that genius Wal-Mart now has cans of ready-mixed paint in basic colors for the non-obsessive DIY'er? Yep, we picked up two gallons of 'Fresh Lettuce' or whatever it's called and that was all there was to it. I repeat, genius.

Harry Reid was coming to Irving, but he cancelled. He may have indeed had serious business in Washington, but we doubt it. Heck, I wouldn't have wanted to face a plaza full of irate Texans, and I'm a native.

Once upon a time, we were this young couple- virtually possessionless, except for our clothes, our books, a couple of cartons of albums, a stereo, a guitar, a typewriter and our wedding presents. Then, three-plus decades pass. We produce four kids, who leave home, but store their stuff in the old office, the garage, the guest room closet and the storage unit. Relatives die and we acquire some of their wordly goods. We've been living in the same house for a quarter of a century and never experienced the clear-out that a move would provide.
And although we are not really collectors, except for books, that's still a lot of material that wanders in and never wanders out again.
So, I am going through my stuff, at least, and having a Free-for-All. Just putting it on a table in the front yard with some sacks and a sign "Free Stuff. Table not included."
Given our magpie human nature, I think it will disappear. All of it.

Now, having just said that... it's still nice when you have some papier-mache eggs and a chopstick and some florist's foam and some sphagnum moss and a flower pot and a bag of miscellaneous silk flower parts and hot glue and acrylic paint when your kid comes by the house, needing to construct a Venus flytrap, for her play.

TC is doing Doubt for this year's serious drama. Now, I'm not at all a fan of this play- so tired of the pedophile priest theme- and yet such is the spell of the theater that I'm loaning them my garden statue for the set. It's insidious.

Discovered that Continental-style knitting is NOT the way to teach little fingers the craft. No, the one hand, then the other hand rythm of English style is much easier to grasp. O did two rows completely by herself when we switched methods and was elated at her accomplishment.

2010-01-12T17:44:00.000-06:00

This fine family
could use some prayers for their sweet daughter.

2010-01-05T10:09:00.004-06:00

Love my kids, because

they think that instead of buying these, which as you see are about half acryclic, Mom will be enchanted to knit you some in 100% merino and send them to you in Michigan. Just the thought that she believes I can figure this out and do it is very endearing.

although my cooking is best described as " adequate, with some high points", my son-in-law remarked, when I sent over some Chicken Maryland for dinner at their sneezing, wheezing, runny-nosed house, "Pretty much everything your mom makes is awesome."

somebody went to somebody's house and perfectly performed the tasks of a certain seasonal mythical character, including leaving a note for the eldest child that they would be the first person he'd call, if he ever needed an assistant. And even though it was in their trademark serial killer handwriting, it was so sweet it made us tear up, a little.

they constantly work to improve their parental skills, and don't flinch at the hard decisions, if it's for the good of the family.

they are on the lookout for ways to add to their job skills, like becoming certified in first aid- in case scenery falls on someone, or something. There isn't always a doctor in the house...

Love them lots, as my late mom would say.

2010-01-01T14:53:00.003-06:00

A treat for the new year

A guilty conscience drove me into the side yard with a scoop of birdseed on my way to Mass this morning, but before I could fill the lantern feeder, one of these:

the kinglet who's been the star of the yard for a week, flew from branch to branch of the althea bush and lit on the suet feeder, not two feet from where I stood. As still as the Mary statue, I was able to watch him for almost a minute- a tiny mushroom bird come to life.

A good augury, I hope! But a delight in any case.

2009-12-31T06:33:00.028-06:00

Christmas 2009
The Holiday Store

The back stock in my domain
Just a fraction of the prepared food boxes

The site, in prep mode. Please note the lovely electric blue walls.

Cap knitters. The lady in the middle is our long-time volunteer Maxine.

Who just retired, at 84, to knit more caps.

Infants and Under-3's Table

Adult and Family Table

All set up and ready for shoppers

Anatomy of an Enchanted Forest

The table

The trees, ready to be unfurled.

The fixin's

Bare trees

More fixin's

Add one granddaughter, several 'discussions', lots of mind-changing and

The finished result!

With an added improvement by V.

Kitteh-approved.

The Nativity scene, waiting

White Christmas.

On Christmas Eve morning, Target and I were in the sewing room, finishing up one of her presents. She had just flown in the previous evening from Michigan.

I looked out the window and said "Oh, look- it's snowing."

"No, it's not," she said.

Um, yes- it was.

She was furious.

In spite of our worries about the Yarb's air trip to Florida, we enjoyed this unexpected Christmas treat.

Christmas Eve

In a big departure from tradition and to accomodate the Yarb's plans- we had a family dinner on Christmas Eve, then went to their house for the kids' presents. After that, we returned home to open our presents. Contrary to someone's predictions, the world continued to spin on its axis. Plus, she got some great presents, like a DVD/video player and a vacuum and a mixer from her Nanna.

Target, in spite of the snow

Morgan and her G-daddy. The children wore their pj's to dinner.

I don't know how to cut this. Ignore.

A little confused.

O and Bubs with their Santa gifts. He had come and gone when we were having dinner

as a special favor, because of the trip.

Romo in his present from Mimi- fat man in a little coat.

O: He must like it, Mimi- he's not biting at it.

Me: Darling, I don't think he can move his head.

Sarah, in her work shirt, and Bubs

Mass at the monastery

When celibates decorate...

The founding monks were escapees from Hungary. This lovely cloth was the table cover for the Nativity scene.

A lovely rest of Christmas and a Happy New Year!

2009-12-22T09:28:00.003-06:00

Christmas

The bells of waiting Advent ring,
The Tortoise stove is lit again
And lamp-oil light across the night
Has caught the streaks of winter rain
In many a stained-glass window sheen
From Crimson Lake to Hookers Green.

The holly in the windy hedge
And round the Manor House the yew
Will soon be stripped to deck the ledge,
The altar, font and arch and pew,
So that the villagers can say
'The church looks nice' on Christmas Day.

Provincial Public Houses blaze,
Corporation tramcars clang,
On lighted tenements I gaze,
Where paper decorations hang,
And bunting in the red Town Hall
Says 'Merry Christmas to you all'.

And London shops on Christmas Eve
Are strung with silver bells and flowers
As hurrying clerks the City leave
To pigeon-haunted classic towers,
And marbled clouds go scudding by
The many-steepled London sky.

And girls in slacks remember Dad,
And oafish louts remember Mum,
And sleepless children's hearts are glad.
And Christmas-morning bells say 'Come!'
Even to shining ones who dwell
Safe in the Dorchester Hotel.

And is it true,
This most tremendous tale of all,
Seen in a stained-glass window's hue,
A Baby in an ox's stall ?
The Maker of the stars and sea
Become a Child on earth for me ?

And is it true ? For if it is,
No loving fingers tying strings
Around those tissued fripperies,
The sweet and silly Christmas things,
Bath salts and inexpensive scent
And hideous tie so kindly meant,

No love that in a family dwells,
No carolling in frosty air,
Nor all the steeple-shaking bells
Can with this single Truth compare -
That God was man in Palestine
And lives today in Bread and Wine.
-John Betjeman

A blessed and merry Christmas to everyone.

2009-12-19T09:50:00.006-06:00

Grumpy.

Dear Madam,
I realize that it is your prerogative to mutilate your body with as many tatoos as you like, but could you please refrain from lifting your shirt to show your friend the newest one on your stomach in front of a lobbyful of parents waiting for the elementary school Christmas program?
Thank you.

Dear Sir,
If a small child is standing and watching a performance, would you please not kneel in front of him, completely blocking his view?
Thank you.

Dear Virgin Wireless Phone,
While you may think your new ads are so very clever, hip and with-it ("My hot boss is going to be there. Oh, who cares if he's married?"), I think they convey that yours is the network of sluts and morons. As I am neither of the above, please consider our business association at an end.
Thank you.

Dear Young Male Cast Members of "A Christmas Story" (and you know who you are)
Seriously, guys- is it that hard to put a shirt on a hanger? Do you really want to go on stage looking like an un-made bed? Do you want - no, you know what? Never mind. Last two days- not really worth it.
Love,
Miss S.

on the other hand:

Dear Yes!, Ode, Newsweek, Mother Jones et. al.
Re: Anthropogenic Global Warming

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Yes, I was laughing out loud at you at Barnes and Noble.
heh.

Not so grumpy.

2009-12-16T08:04:00.002-06:00

In Which Americans are Great. Again.

So, Friday was my last official day working at the Holiday Site- but I went in on Sunday after Mass to snap a few pictures of the set-up before the store opened. I found Dru and Cathy there as well, who announced that they were in a panic because, according to our gifts expert, who's been in charge of that program for fifteen years or so, there were enough toys to last through, oh, Tuesday. When Fran tells you there aren't enough toys, you listen. And panic.

So, they had raised the points on all objects and converted stuffed animals, which are usually free into point items as well. Which meant that each family would still get toys, just not so many.

I decided to divert some of the kids' "in honor of" charity monies to the agency and promised to call back on Tuesday to see what was needed.
"Toys, of course," said Cathy, yesterday morning.
So, using V.'s genius suggestion that I shop at Big Lots, where they have the same Barbies and Fisher Prices as W-M, but cheaper- I got several bags of stuff and delivered it to the site.
Where everyone was much more relaxed because corporate volunteers and old friends had e-mailed all their families and friends and gotten out the word that we were hurting for toys and they had responded with the generosity that makes this such a great country.
No one's going to get a lot- but everyone is going to get something. Something good, too- not dollar store junk. Because that's how we are.
No one involed will see this- but THANK YOU!

2009-12-15T08:56:00.001-06:00

Enchantment.

That's the only word for the home of the theater family who hosted the cast party on Sunday. Imagine a suburban custom home already decorated in a cozy cottage style. Then imagine it full of every Christmas decoration you can think of. Then double it.

"See" said our host, who also plays Ralph in "CS", to the set-building foreman: "this is why I was never able to stay late on Saturdays. I was getting all this stuff out of storage."

The focal point was the eight foot tall tree on a revolve, hung with hundreds of blown glass ornaments of all sizes, some of which revolved themselves. But everywhere you looked, there was a new delightful surprise. Like the row of little wooden angels on a ledge of the roll-t0p desk or the small tree trimmed with the vintage pasteboard village and little red elves that had belonged to our hostess's mother. Or the same type of nativity scene that was featured in our famous family photo. Etc., etc., etc. An extravaganza of color, frost, shine and glitter.

Now, decorating is not my sphere- the Enchanted Forest is my highest acheivement- but I can recognize the thought, time and effort that went into creating such a lavish visual treat for their family and guests.

So, thank you, H. family, for a wonderful evening that will be remembered for a long time.

Oh, and the cake apparently made of truffles? That was good, too.

2009-12-10T07:38:00.003-06:00

My Daughter, the Junkman
Target calls from the Berkely of the North with her Christmas list and a little work-related story:
"So, we pick up the fridge in the house- where she hasn't lived in three years- and something falls out of the bottom-"
"Please don't tell me what -"
"- and it was a CAT SKULL! And she's like 'oh, I thought one of the cats had disappeared'. So, we're pulling away and she comes out of the house with a plastic bag and asks if we can throw it away for her and it's the rest of the cat!"
"So, she just swept Kitteh up in a dustpan and gave him to you?"
"Well, it was only bones and some fluff. But yes."

There better be some adorable piece of free furniture in a pick-up this week to make up for that.

2009-12-09T20:27:00.002-06:00

One Thing
I really enjoy about Christmas is the seasonal opportunity to write post after glowing post about all the volunteers we get at the Holiday Store. Even among those who are there sort of under duress- Boy Scouts, youth groups, Key Clubs, student councils- you seldom get a total grump. Plenty of Klass Klowns, or the somewhat inattentive among the kiddos, and possibly a guy who has a Bright Idea he's determined to implement among the grown-ups, but the vast majority are simply good folks who want to give to their community and are grateful for the chance to do something tangible for someone else.

If I stop and really think about it, the sheer size of our operation is staggering. We have 1000 + families signed up. Experience tells us that we might have a no-show rate of 20%, but we have to prepare as if everyone will be there. In my department, that means constructing 1400-1500 pre-made food boxes (about 40% of our families will qualify for two boxes).

This entails receiving the donations, setting up a sorting station, supervising the sorting crews who sort through the foodstuffs and box up not only the categories we'll be keeping on site to make boxes, but also the items we want to send back to the agency to use there. Besides the actual sorters, we have someone taping and lableling storage boxes, someone handling the trash from the donations- bags and boxes-, someone carting the filled boxes to their proper spot along the storage wall and someone handling the food we won't be using.

Filling the food boxes is the same, but in reverse: we empty the storage boxes onto tables, fill the boxes from a specified list, fold them shut and stack them in another storage area in columns of five ('cause it's all about the decimal system). And taping new boxes and handling the trash. The din created by twenty-five LDS Scouts and their leaders is not to be believed, but they made over 100 boxes in an hour.

It looks impossible on the surface. But dozens of people come through our volunteer program and it all gets done. Like I told the group this afternoon who sorted a pile of food about 8' x8' x5',
"This is like a holiday miracle." Even if I know it can be done- because I've seen it done so often- it still amazes and gratifies me.

Everyday people forming a small, short-lived community to benefit others. Other people being as generous as they possibly can, even in difficult economic times. Seems as if everyone is convinced that everyone else is worse off than they are- and they should do something about it.
We've been asked so often if donations are down and are so happy to say that they aren't. People who've worked hard for two hours hauling around canned goods checking to see if we have any more open volunteer spots because they can come back if we need them.

And that's just the food service. Don't get me started about the toy sorters, and the set-up teams who lay out and decorate the store, and the people who bag the stocking stuffers, and put together bikes and the dry-cleaners who cleans our gently-worn coats ( the only not-new items in the store) for free and the folks who stock the tables with gifts and shop with the families and carry their purchases and their food boxes to the car.
Because that's too much generosity for one post.

2009-12-08T07:01:00.005-06:00

Snippets

Busy? Oh my goodness...

"A Christmas Story" opened Friday. All went well and almost all performances are sold out. V. was going to take O on Sunday, but they had another engagement with Granna, who was in town, so he and I went together- admiring his set, which I helped decorate, the costumes and our turkey.

I don't think I've mentioned the turkey: our director was hauling around a bag of great big styrofoam balls out of which he had to construct a prop turkey. So I volunteered Sarah, to relieve him of one job, and we all collaborated on the most luscious, golden brown fake turkey ever to grace the stage at TC.
I made the basic body out of carboard, large papiermache eggs and a cut up styrofoam ball to fill in the open spots and Sarah covered it with papiermache. V. made the drumsticks, out of medium p-m eggs and dowel rods. We taped those on and I swathed the whole thing in muslin. Once it had dried, I put on a base coat that I liked, but V. decided it was too orange. So he put on a glaze of brown and he was exactly right- it looked perfect! They loved it at the theater and we always enjoy it when they pull it out of the oven.
If I'd thought, we should have recorded the whole process in photos.

It occurs to me, that perhaps little boys do not hang up their costumes because they don't know how to hang up clothing. Don't laugh- one of our actors had never worn a shirt that buttoned before. I think there will have to be a lesson, as well as the usual CTJ about respecting the costume.

Holiday Store is underway. We open outrageously early - the 13th- because of Christmas falling on a Friday this year and depriving us of a weekend of distribution. That means that we will have to continue to fill food boxes during distribution, which means that the box-building station will have to stay up, along with enough back stock for however many boxes we need. We can estimate that fairly accurately, but it still entails taking up a lot of space we wouldn't otherwise.
A new wrinkle- we have lost our freezers, so we are giving out gift cards for poultry, instead of the actual birds.
The good news is that donations are not down, in spite of the economy.
And all the items we got as year-end tax write-off from corporations are good stuff.

More later- must go organize food sorter.

2009-11-29T12:49:00.002-06:00

America vs. The Narrative

Wow, this is good. In the same vein as Theodore Dalrymple on the psychodrama of El Quaeda, Friedman makes one of the problems of East Vs. West clear.

2009-11-26T10:09:00.004-06:00

Family Food Network (updated)

Cell phone call overheard by Sis at the Target: "I don't know what she thought bringing that pumpkin pie- like it's the same as sweet potatoes. I mean, if you're gonna bring a pie- just bring a SWEET POTATO PIE!"

Target called me about a week ago to get the recipe for the Brocolli Rice casserole that's been a staple side at our Thanksgiving dinners, ever since my sister brought it home from her sorority at UT. It was one of those dishes that spread like kudzu through the kitchens of middle-class America in the '70's. Today we'd say it went viral.
After I read it to her over the phone, there was a short silence.
"So, this is the worst recipe ever, since it's a heart attack in a casserole."
"Well, sweetheart, it is over thirty years old."
"Ohmigod- there's Cheez Whiz, a stick of butter...Davy cannot possibly eat this."
"You could Google it and see if there's a lo-fat version. Just buy your Cheez Whiz early, or there won't be any left." I said, remembering the year I managed, in one of those slo-mo sequences, to snatch the last jar of that product off the shelf in the HEB before the other woman got it. I'm usually the least aggressive person in the world, but the thought of telling my extended family that there would be no B-R casserole because I wimped out spurred me to action movie lengths. If I'd had a bullwhip, I'd have used it.

She calls a week later to ask if she can use fresh steamed brocolli, instead of frozen and what kind of rice should she buy? It seems, searching the net, that someone has decided to jazz this up with wild rice. That is just wrong, people. It's basmati or Uncle Ben's. But steamed brocolli is okay.
She is also bringing two other things to dinner: Herb-butter bread and our new favorite appetizer. This is a jar of jalapeno fruit jelly, poured over a block of cream cheese, and served with crackers. That's the whole recipe and the boyfriend can't eat that, either.

But he can eat the Herb-butter bread, the recipe for which I copied from, I'm sorry to say, a 1971 copy of S2x and the Single Girl by Helen Gurley Brown. It's nothing but butter turned green with a variety of herbs and garlic salt spread on French/Italian bread. It evaporates the second you take it out of the oven.
It's my second party piece- the first being tacos.

We are going to my brother's for dinner. We will see how a walking Morgan likes the deer heads that terrorized Bubs year before last.
Grateful for so many things, you included. Have a wonderful Day!

Update: my youngest brother's wife brought us a new appetizer: Keebler stackers topped with white cheddar, slices of Granny Smith apples and honey. There was an actual honeycomb, because it's about the presentation. Alas, jalapeno jelly on cream cheese has met it's match and lost.
She also brought this for dessert, to which she added some dried cranberries. Words fail.
Lucky day for us all when Chas needed a legal assistant.
"I don't know how good her skills are, Mom, but she sure is pretty."

2009-11-16T08:30:00.002-06:00

More Gratitude

- That Sarah has the best sister in the world. Target has offered her her pick of the furniture she has in storage: "as long as you give it back and don't break it". So, she can use the money she would have spent on a bed, etc. on rent.

-This site. What a great writer. Send all your potential converts here.

-Good theater parents. One mom has sent me three e-mails with a zillion links to possible jammies for her kid.

-That the Yarbs garage sale went well. They made some $$$ and got everything else off the premises- a big load off their minds

-That when you slip up- like yelling at someone you love over a character trait you've consciously chosen to ignore- you can repent and start over again...and again...

-That I never have to play Mario Kart ever- the pace gives me vertigo and I fall off the couch. Someone else will have to deal with the obsession.

-That Bubs can read the whole alphabet and understands symbols, like the "No" sign. There was a little incident in which he asked his dad how to spell "Mom", which he wrote on the door blackboard and then added the symbol. He was mad at her about something- but grasping how that works- genius.

-That there was a spot at St. Catherine's pre-school for Bubs.

-That flannel looks like wool from a distance

and other things too numerous to mention.

2009-11-10T08:08:00.003-06:00

CS update
Finished the Flying Monkey, except for the hat elastic. It is great- of course I stole from the best.
Found a leather ladies's jacket and some brown pants at the GW, so Ralphie's Soldier of Fortune costume will be Indiana Jones. One of the theater mainstays brought in a spare overcoat for The Old Man and a canvas fedora. We'll use the hat, add a white school uniform shirt, properly distressed, and - Instant Costume!

Scut Farkas is mostly done- I altered a fleece lumberjack shirt for his jacket and we have a coonskin cap. He'll get some thrift store jeans for himself. I found an ugly plaid fleece remnant at JA, which I might use for his muffler. We'll see- I might find something better.

Took up a coat that was left over from "Steel Magnolias" for an overcoat for Helen. So, she's complete, except for eyeglasses and a decision on her hair.

I'm using a lot of felt this show, in the fantasy sequences and the department store Santa scene- it has the right cheesy Depression-era feel to it.

Esther Jane, our ingenue character, was a challenge. I was resigned to making her a dress, and was making myself nuts searching for the right print, until I looked into the closet in the sewing room, of all places, where hung the perfect pale blue hand-knit pullover with a navy, white and pink Fair Isle yoke. I think it might have been a thrift purchase of Target's. It's a little large for her, but so what I wanted that we'll cope. She will have a blue flannel skirt to match, a dickey with a ruffled collar and a pink beret and scarf. A pastel heartbreaker.
I'm considering ringlets, but that may be more trouble than it's worth.

Today's goals- JA for fleece, flannel, corduroy, broadcloth, silky solid. Storage for mobcap and Sike's coat and any other useful shirts. Party City for glasses (?) and a white Cowboy hat.
Does Ralph need a western vest? Yes, for his big scene, as Red Ryder, I think.

2009-11-10T08:01:00.002-06:00

Gratitude: Nov. 10

Bubs. No explanation needed.

Oh- and the U.S. Marine Corps. Happy Birthday!

2009-11-09T08:30:00.003-06:00

Days of Gratitude: Catching Up
The Fort Hood atrocity (like Robert Avrech of Seraphic Secret, I refuse to call it a 'tragedy') and the House vote on healthcare slowed me down. But still, I am grateful for:

Americans who have not succumbed to PC. Please see the One Cosmos archives for the best take-down of this pathology available.
Americans who will not surrender their personal liberties without a fight.
Smart people, who are also wise people. I am blessed to know so many on the Net. You know who you are...
Even though we have theological differences, being united with Evangelicals and non-lefty Protestants in the Culture War. I am especially grateful for their many excellent women's sites, which are so encouraging.
Goodwill, where I found a lot of useful stuff for the show.
No divas.
That the neighbors, after the death of their ancient kitty, who we would watch when they left town, have a new cat.
The creativity and handiness of Sissy- who put together a wonderful personal prop for me for the show. Her unerring eye is invaluable.
Every time I leave the house to get into the car, the garden lifts my spirits with its vibrant fall growth. (It also makes me feel a little neglectful, but that's a thought for another day.)
Getting to spend a couple of hours with just Miss O. We went to Joann's - oh, fun!- but she likes crafts and loves to discuss Mimi's costuming. She is simply the dearest little girl on earth.
Her sister, OTOH, is the funniest. How I treasure our walk up the block on Friday. She is tip-toeing over the acorns on the sidewalk in her little bare feet. (It wasn't that cool, and I refused to wrestle with their heinous baby-gate to go get her shoes. Yes, I'm a terrible grandmother.) "Morgan, let Mimi carry you." "NO!" "Sweetie, you're going to hurt your footies." "NO!" She can do that "NO!" thing for twenty minutes at a time. Miss Independence.

2009-11-05T10:24:00.003-06:00

In Proper Order

What I've learned in the costuming biz, is that there is a Sensible Path from here to there.

First- search costume storage

Second- ransack the thrift stores

Third- Discount stores (Ross, Marshall's, et. al.) and Party City

Fourth- construct from scratch

Rentals are always an option, before Four. And there is Borrowing, but that is usually more trouble than it's worth.

So, I've completed One and am off to the Goodwill today.

From the photo album from the last production of this and what one of the previous cast said, it seems as if the last time they put this on, it was pretty cobbled together, re: costumes. We have a little more time this year and hope to do a better job.

So far, The Old Man and Ralph, who are repeating their roles and costuming themselves for the most part, are done. Ralph, whose daughter was Helen last time, generously donated her outfits, which fit and suit our present Helen perfectly. She needs a pair of glasses and a coat and I can cross her off the list.

There were lots of shirts, coats, hats, scarves and gloves in storage, so outfitting Ralphie and friends will be mostly running up some knickers and picking up some more sweater vests and pullovers. They will have to wear tights, I think, under their knickers, to prevent sock creepage, which they will hate, but Suffer for your art, boys!

Or maybe ladies's trouser socks. We'll see...

There were Elf costumes in storage, but they were not so great and huge. It's a long enough scene that I'm comfortable running up some new ones. Felt, so they look slightly cheesy, as befits a Depression-era department store.

Only one of the fantasy scenes needs a costume from scratch. I found a ladies jacket that will be a wonderful coat for the soap-blindness scene. He will also have a derby and will look like a little Magritte. Leftovers from Prince and the Pauper will be his Shakespeare costume, with a cape and a hat added. We're undecided if his Soldier of Fortune outfit should be Jungle Jim or Indiana Jones, but that can be assembled. So, the only thing we need to construct is the Cowboy suit. This will be only chaps and a Buffalo Bill jacket, but the extensive trimming will be the time-consuming part. This will be fun, and I may see if Joan wants to do it- it's right up her alley- if she has time after re-upholstering the little love seat.

There is a scene in which the Mom appears as a Flying Monkey, so she will need the little jacket and pillbox. I briefly thought about re-cycling the Sword Swallower items from Oliver!, but the vest won't fit: matron vs. teen boy. After four top hats and Luke's Luigi cap, I feel like I've got this hat business down. All in purple and black felt, because the witch is purple and black and the felt was in the materials closet.

2009-11-04T16:40:00.003-06:00

Gratitude: November 4

1) Found encouraging amounts of usable items for the show in storage. Thanks, former costumers!
2) The ability to go to Mass any day of the week, if I want to. Went to the 12 noon one at St. Ann's today, since I was in the area.
3) Having know, on-line, this Raccoon. Rest in peace, Ximeze. You will be missed.

2009-11-04T16:31:00.002-06:00

Gratitude- Nov. 3

I'm having a little trouble with these posts- not because I find it difficult to be grateful. Instead, I spend most of my time being thankful for things- I'm the type of person who goes to fill up the coffee maker in the morning and thinks "Look at that! Clean water is coming out of our tap! Thank you, Jesus!" "There are new morning glories on the vine!" "It's rained for nine days straight-the lakes are refilling. Whoo-hoo!"
For today:
1) I was able to step in and replace the costumer for "A Christmas Story", who had some family issues. The cast has some of my favorite actors in it- one of whom is almost totally costumed already.
2) We can go to the polls in America without being threatened by violence. In fact, that's so rare that it makes the news when it happens.
3) Grocery stores.

2009-11-02T17:10:00.002-06:00

A Month of Thanks
Stole this idea from Sis, who borrowed it from Clover Lane. Thinking of something(s) that make me thankful every day in November.

Nov. 1
1) Even though I had the flu/a bad cold for a solid week, I had access to all the healthcare I could need, if I'd wanted to use it. I refused to give them the satisfaction of being a stat, though, so I have no idea what I really had...
2) Speaking of health care, I have 1 Rep. and 1 Senator who listen to we the people.
3) I used the down time of flu/cold to finish a comfort shawl for church.

Nov. 2
1) Morgan Jane was wearing the tiniest little pigtails in the world this morning. This was heart-crackingly adorable.
2) Sarah has another job at the same theater as before.
3) The agency is going to do Thanksgiving food box distribution on site, in the former Senior Adult Services part of the building.

I didn't necessarily say they'd be BIG things. Though there will be some of those, too.

2009-10-22T16:58:00.002-05:00

Overheard

at the Hobby Lobby: "She said 'well, in my country anyone can eat whatever's in the refrigerator' and I said ' well, you're not in your country now, so don't be eating other people's food!'"
Annoying as they can be, sometimes you hear an interesting side of a cell phone call.

2009-10-21T12:21:00.004-05:00

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways-

Proof yet again that my kid is a genius. She has photoshopped up a wonderful card for their
anniversary- Sissy and Jas through the decades.
Mom, because she is something of a doof, didn't immediately get the joke. That the fourth girl pic looked just like Fan Target (they look exactly alike in photos) should have tippped me off, but I was too busy loving the captions. But I now bow to the utter hilariousness.
Oh, and check out who's driving the convertible...
Happy Anniversary!

2009-09-22T09:09:00.009-05:00

Time to get cracking

on the H'ween costumes!

Umm, Sal, you say, it's not even the end of September yet.

Yeah. So?

As you may remember, last year we did an Animal Planet theme: flamingo, elephant and bumblebee.

This year, we're being more eclectic: Ni is an angel, Bubs is Luigi, the Mario brother and Morgie is a pumpkin, which is just an excuse for her to wear a big fluffy orange net and organza tutu with a green ruffled Empire bodice and an enormous-ass green bow in her hair. Which her mama has already finished, by the way. Because our otherwise most sensible daughter is a Halloween Crazy Lady.

and I'm her enabler.

I'm making Ni's costume, using this pattern, the bottom left view:

out of white satin, organza and tulle. The vest is a silver net backed with organza and she will have purchased wings and a halo.

And I'm also responsible for Luigi's cap. That should be fun- I love a challenge!

2009-09-21T07:30:00.002-05:00

"Oh, me name is McNamara, I'm the leader of ...

the blog?
A wonderful serendipitous find. Every day a fascinating collection of Catholic history, quotes, saints, books, movies.
And baseball.
Go, thou, and check it out.

2009-09-19T16:34:00.003-05:00

Doll Photos
Retreived the camera and took a few photos:

She looks a trifle snippy here, but her face is much more appealing in the top photo

Soft Dolls and Animals have a feature with photos of people's interpretation of patterns they've published, so I thought I'd send her picture in.

2009-09-01T07:47:00.002-05:00

You May Be A Winner,
if you're me and you entered the Texas State Fair Arts and Crafts competition.
Got the official notice that my Handspun, Any Item entry had won First Place. Which is very gratifying, indeed. Unless- and this is just a little niggling thought- I was the only entrant.
We shall see, at the Fair.
My character doll placed 10th in that class, so it will not be displayed. But O has her eye on it and it will join our large family of dolls at Mimi's and have a happy, useful life. Beautiful as they are to look at, and as absorbing as they must be as an art form, I admit I don't much see the point of dolls that you can't play with. We, OTOH, have gone a little crazy with the Waldorf dolls. They are so very appealing and come in so many sizes, skin tone and hair variations that the temptation to make 'just one more' is very compelling.

2009-08-20T06:49:00.003-05:00

Rallying at the local Rep's office,

who does not support Obamacare, we were approached by a lone woman who engaged the small group next to me:
"I can't wait until we have socialized medicine."

Debate ensued. She was somewhat combatitive and not really listening. Neither were the group members who were talking to her, frankly, as all she had were the talking points in her hand, most of which we knew were not true.

Noticing that she had a pronounced accent, someone asked where she was from, originally, and if she was an American citizen. Turned out she was from France and had dual citizenship.
Okay.

If you want an effective counter-protestor, you might want to steer clear of people that can be told "Well, France is that way- don't let the door hit you on the way out!"

Not that we said that.

Our best speaker, Don, asked her why she wanted the plan. I missed part of her answer, because there was supportive honking, but whatever she said made him say, kindly, "Ma'am, you just don't understand Americans. We don't want to be taken care of, most of us. We want the freedom to make our own decisions."

As it becomes clearer every day, we have a lot of elected officials who don't understand Americans, either. Or if they do understand, despise and fear them. Despise them because they don't think the way they 'should' and fear them because they might strip them of their power.

Here are some of our group at the City Hall protest on the 17th. The "Social Security: Bankrupt" sign is one of ours. I didn't get to that one, so haven't had any contact with really organized pro-Plan supporters. They tend to stick to the Town Halls, I think.

2009-08-08T19:28:00.002-05:00

Nancy and the Astroturfers
A photo essay linked from the Anchoress. Just doing my bit to spread it around...

2009-08-06T15:27:00.003-05:00

Senator Cornyn Asks Why
Americans are being asked to turn in their fellow citizens for exercising their First Amendment rights?

I am not aware of any precedent for a President asking American citizens to report their fellow citizens to the White House for pure political speech that is deemed "fishy" or otherwise inimical to the White House's political interests.
By requesting that citizens send "fishy" emails to the White House, it is inevitable that the names, email addresses, IP addresses, and private speech of U.S. citizens will be reported to the White House. You should not be surprised that these actions taken by your White House staff raise the specter of a data collection program. As Congress debates health care reform and other critical policy matters, citizen engagement must not be chilled by fear of government monitoring the exercise of free speech rights.

2009-07-31T14:50:00.004-05:00

Our State Fair

is a great State Fair and it is coming up soon. I have less than three weeks to get my entries finished before delivery day at Fair Park. This year I'm entering three categories:

Infant Sweater Set, 2 or more pieces. This will be a sweater and hat in burgundy with a tan border embroidered with flowers (or appliqued knit flowers, haven't quite decided yet) and ruffled trim.

Character Doll which can either be a dressed purchased doll or made from scratch. I'm doing the latter and chose Anne of Green Gables as my subject. She will have hair of handspun yarn and fyi, the Kool-Aid recipe for 'decidedly red' is half a package of Orange with a teaspoon of Black Cherry. The pattern I'm using is one from Soft Dolls and Toys magazine- a re-working of an old Betsy McCall doll by Aletha Ike Putney.
Handspun, any item will be the Diva Scarf from Lion Brand in a pink, green, yellow, lavender blended colorway called "English Garden". I bought the wool from Jehovah Jireh Farm on eBay- they have some beautiful dyelots.

I'll try to post some photos once I get them finished.

2009-07-28T17:02:00.002-05:00

Well,
Bubs seems to be fine. His tox screen, CAT scan and MRI were all clear. The assumption now is that he had/has some sort of middle ear inflammation that was causing the motor impairment.
We are all very grateful that it was nothing more serious than that, though of course, we are keeping a close eye on him. Thank you so much for your prayers.
"Thank you for having me," he told the nurse when he hugged her good-bye.
Sweet little guy.

2009-07-27T17:38:00.002-05:00

Prayers, please
Bubs is at Children's Medical for the night, having some tests for some worrisome neurological symptoms. Your prayers for him, and all the Yarbs would be appreciated. I'll update as I know more.
Many thanks!

2009-07-24T08:12:00.005-05:00

Happy Birthday, Morgan Jane

Who knew, a year ago,

when you were just a tiny little snippet

That you

would grow into the craziest, quirkiest, funniest, scary-smart toddler-girl we ever saw?

Surprise!

That's what you are, each and every day.

We love you, Morgie Jane.

2009-07-21T13:30:00.002-05:00

Snippets

I have the Oliver! photos, but don't want to post them until certain people have seen the show.

Target and Davy had tickets for Sunday, along with Sissy, Ni and friends. I had a frank talk with him at family dinner: "Look, sweetheart, if you're just going to this to be polite to the mom, it's really not necessary. I won't be offended and I can re-sell the tickets." Which I knew would be an important point, since one of his former careers was being a ticket-scalper in Chicago.
"No, no- I really do want to go. I was in Oliver! in like fifth grade. I got beat out for Oliver by a kid whose name was Oliver, but I was a gang member and know all the songs."
Well, okay, then.

Bubs found some of Ni's deadly magnet-n-rod toys, which I took home and threw away. Apropos of that, Marge told the story of how, when she was an R.A. for Governor's School at Hendrix, which is like summer play-college for high school students, one of the young men decided it would be a good idea to insert his testicles between two super strong magnets from the physics lab. It took a trip to the ER to remove them, after six hours or so. Good times.

I had just figured out how to operate the ice/water controls on the Yarb's new fridge and was getting some crushed ice when Bubs walked by.
'That's enough, Mimi" he decreed.

While decluttering the house after neglecting it for weeks, I found an American Scholar on the bedroom bookcase. I read an article on two author's correspondence and part of the critical article that followed. The next day, while browsing near the Dickens section at H-P Books, I found a slim volume by the same author on books and reading- a combination common-place book and book list. Synchronicity demanded that I buy it, along with an Annie Dillard and The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion. Now I have to buy a lot of other new books, as well, as recommended by Mr. Dirda.
These buying sprees go in cycles- one idea trips another and off I go on Amazon and ABE, tracking down the pertinent texts.

Before that, I went to the Tea Party Gov't. Health Care protest at our representative's office in Irving. After the protest, we were invited in for some refreshments and had a long and informative talk with some of his aides.
What I wish? That in groups like the above, we could all just agree that indeed, we all think very decidely about whatever subject and just leave it at that. There's no prize for hating socialism, or Obama, or abortion or anything else more than everyone else present. Really. Conserve the energy and use it more constructively, I say.
This reminds me of why I was never a very good 'Traditional' Catholic- just couldn't get into the competitive angst.

De-cluttering the garden, as well, but that goes on the other blog. What I've decided is that though I've enjoyed the last few years costuming the musical, I'd really rather garden and mess with the children. Both activites have their own vitality and I love them both, but for right now, I lean more towards the introverted and contemplative. The times seem to require that, somehow.

2009-07-11T09:28:00.002-05:00

Opening Night
went beautifully. With the exception of one set glitch but these things happen...
The theater was sold out. The orphans softened the audience up and Bumble, Corney and the live kitteh warmed them up and it all went great from then on.

Bits and pieces:
One of the older Gang members, in full raggedy costume and top hat, playing a Bach cantata on the director's keyboard that he'd brought in for warm-ups.
A passle of orphans, giving our menacing Bill Sikes with his beard and banged-up face, a big group hug.
Fagin- delighted that I'd added more tie to his costume, in lieu of not noticing in the design stage that what he needed was more vests.
That V. didn't recognize a guy he'd worked beside on sets for weeks, thanks to make-up and hair color. And that Greg was so gratified that V. noticed he'd been borrowing a little from Johnny Depp's Jack Sparrow, for Fagin.
How excited, yet well-behaved, the little ones were. Last dress rehearsal is usually a morass of notes for everyone and utter frustration and disgust for the director and it does make an impression on them. At least for opening night.
Always and everytime- being amazed at the talent of ordinary people: students and software designers and nurses and teachers and salesmen and housewives getting togther to accomplish something as complicated as good musical theater. No false pride here- if they ever made me a personal t-shirt, like they did for Jas's dad, it would include the phrase "Sometimes, I really am a genius."
Never seen a cast happier with their costumes- with the possible exception of Tom, in that sauna of a great coat. Suffer for your art, pal. But that's not really fair, because he was asked (begged) to take the role. And he took it, since he's a pillar of the community.

All in all, a success.
Pictures, as soon as the CD is available.

2009-07-08T06:54:00.002-05:00

"...and I hate your @$$ costumes!"*
No, of course I don't- we're just both so tired we don't know which end is up. Doing this is a little
like having a baby or wallpapering a room by yourself- you get into the big middle of it and wonder why you ever thought that was a good idea. But the results are so worthwhile that a type of amnesia sets in until you find yourself doing it all again.

This was my To-do list yesterday:
Sew remaining buttons of Bumble's coat
Baste cape to Bumble's coat
Change a button on Dodger's vest
Top-stitch the front facings of Dodger's coat
Baste false hair into two workhouse caps.
Add a hook and eye to a necktie as he can't get it over his head with his make-up on
Add ribbon ties to a hat (and I did the wrong one, because I didn't write it down, so Joan repaired it.)
Run elastic through the waist of two skirts, try them on the actress and stitch them down.
Sew buttons of the front of the Sword Swallower's vest and attach a braid closure
Let down the hem in one pair of rental pants and take up the hem in ditto
Add some ragged, flimsy fabric to the hem of Fagin's coat, so that it looks as though the lining is coming out
Put a pocket inside one of the gang vests
Distress orphan costumes. This involved laying them out on the drive outside, spraying them with grey spray paint and then dry-brushing them with brown paint, turning them over and repeating the process. I only did half of them, because I wanted to see the effect under the lights (they need a darker brown, it turns out) and because it was too darn hot out there.
Collect all costume pieces we rejected for Fagin's Gang and hang them on the spare rack.
Ditto for Women's Chorus.
Move petticoats from dressing room to the wonderful dressing area Joan and her husband rigged up in the Green Room for the women with those plastic latch strips, a curtain rod and rings and an old knit sheet.
And that was before the rehearsal began...

If you're wondering why all those things hadn't been done earlier in the process, some problems just don't show up until you see a costume under the lights or an actor rehearses in them. We just can't keep the actions of forty-one people in mind at all times and need the actor to let us know what little fiddles the costume needs. And, when we see the whole ensemble on stage, we often have to fill in items: this grouping is too pale, he needs a different neckercheif, she needs something on her head or off her head, a color looks weird under the lights, an actress needs her skirt taken up because she has to climb stairs with her hands full of props- things like that.

My To-Do for today:
Spend the morning with Bubs not thinking about theater at all.
Distress orphans
Take up pants hem
Tack other pants hem to legs
Tighten elastic in an underdress sleeve
Make a workhouse top
Start Good Show notes
Order flowers for volunteer moms

So, not so bad.

And the feedback we're getting is very gratifying. One of our Mr. Brownlow's said to me last night "I want to be Fagin, just so I can wear that costume."
Nice...

* paraphrased from Waiting for Guffman, the best community theater movie there is.

2009-07-03T09:32:00.002-05:00

Nickels and Dimes
That's what we're working on now. The last little details: bonnets and neckercheifs and shawls and distressing. Someone needs their sleeve shortened. Someone needs the sleeves removed from their shirt so they don't die of heat stroke under their black cordouroy coat. Mobcaps need to be assigned, ditto the top hats I found in storage. I discover that I gave Charlie's workhouse pants to Tim, but can give Charlie Sike's old knee pants because I never liked them and he wants to wear boots that look better with trousers, so everybody is happy. We have to make decisions on hair. I have to send out the Green Room Rules e-mail for the parents to impress upon their children and must try to not sound like a big old B in the process. Toni needs a ruffle on the back of her Old Sally cap to hide her hair. David needs a Sowerberry cravat and knife handles for his leather (suedecloth) Knife Grinder apron. I don't have to make those, but I do have to sew them into the pocket.

I have two-three large projects still to finish: Bumble's blue coat, to make a dress for one of the little girls and to shorten the sleeves on an underdress and to finish the hem on Dodger's coat- we wanted to see it in action before making a decision on the length.

Then, some housekeeping: reinforced Ziplocks for the kids' bits and pieces, moving clothing racks, stocking up on Febreze, final labeling of costumes pieces and taking the rejects back to storage. Not to mention Good Show notes for the cast and thank-you's for my wonderful volunteers.

2009-06-27T20:56:00.002-05:00

The Home Stretch
Tech Rehearsal is next Sunday, July 5. That means we have six days to have everything completed. Thanks to our wonderful volunteer moms, we are able to hand off some items- Madeleine is sewing the housekeeper's dress and Becky is running up some simple skirts and petticoats for the women's chorus. Joan is continuing to turn out the fabulous street dresses and bonnets.
I have two major projects left: completing Sikes and sewing all of Bumble. And two minor projects: doing the last little finishing items for Oliver and the Dodger.
Right now, awash in the minutiae of so many things still remaining, it's hard to recall our initial enthusiasm. But it will all return when an actor tries on their costume and their face lights up because they love it and it will help their characterization. And when they take to the stage and we can see the whole company as a whole, it will all be worth it.

2009-06-24T09:16:00.004-05:00

Snippets

I was feeling very guilty because Morgan McGyver Yarbs put a screwdriver in her mouth while they were here on Saturday - I was tightening the bolts in my IKEA chair, turned around and discovered that she had crawled behind me in her ninja stealthy way and helped herself to a large regular- until her mother confessed that Morgie had climbed up the stairs ALONE and was in the bathroom unrolling the toilet paper while she was in the kitchen and thought Jas was watching her.
She is THAT kid- the one who must have a constant keeper. Someone has to be on assigned 'Morgan watch' at all times, or she'll be on top of the refrigerator.

Pete was not happy about the Mr. Bumble costume offered by the costume rental place, so I offered to make him one. This is one of the pitfalls of costuming- the lure of the new. One must guard against it vigilantly or else you're going "Hmmm- you know, I've never made a 19th century greatcoat with a capelet and a bicorne hat..." and that way lies Crazy Town.

Our Oliver continues to grow- I had to open the back armholes of his 'poor' jacket so he could move his arms. Lucky for us, his 'rich' jacket is made of stretch suede cloth- it may last him through the show. The musical director has had to transpose some of his songs to a lower key- he's not Bryn Terfel yet, but he's losing the pure boy soprano you associate with little Oliver.

Orphans turned out very well, circus girls all look good, too. Tess's material was lying there, staring at me until I went "All right-FINE! I'll sew you!" and got it out of the way.
Fagin's Gang need a bunch of pants alterations and two more vests to liven things up- it was getting very brown, grey and black around there, but they are coming along.

As Geoffrey Rush kept saying in Shakespeare in Love: 'It will be fine.'

2009-06-20T10:10:00.002-05:00

Happy Father's Day

to all Dads. Thank you, for all you do and the sacrifices you make.

2009-06-17T10:47:00.002-05:00

Professor Mimi
will be giving her lecture on costumes to TC's summer theater camp kids tomorrow. It includes a brief talk on what costumes are supposed to do and how we try to accomplish that, and a short sermon on 'respecting the costume' and how we remember who does and who doesn't. IOW, it goes on your permanent record. The one in my mind, anyway.
Then, we'll break into pairs and draw slips assigning them a character to design for. They are not allowed to choose one for themselves because theater does not work that way. I give them scratch paper, pencils and crayons for doodling ideas and a big sketch pad page with a croquis traced on it for their finished project. I may include a batch of swatches that they can look through for their creations, as well. We mount these in the lobby for the parents to see on the last day of camp when they perform the show they've worked on.
This went well last year and I hope to improve on it this year.

Today is Oliver Day. My goal: to get him almost completely finished.
Sike's hat is teh bomb, if I do say so myself.

2009-06-16T09:12:00.002-05:00

Progress So Far The orphans are almost finished, thanks to Amelia's mom and grandmother. Their swatches are on the left. The color value is poor on the bottom one, it is more yellow, less green. My helpers put patches on them of the co-ordinating fabrics, one of which is the top sample. I threw the muslin items, along with half of the Gang shirts, into a tan dye bath, with a little grey added. I'm adding plackets at the front opening of some, closed with one of the antique buttons from our trip to the Hill Country (where Fagin's patches came from, as well.)
Some of the orphans may get jackets of the second from the bottom swatch- we'll see.

The swatches on the right are for the Artful Dodger. From bottom to top, they are: trousers, vest, coat, coat collar and pocket flaps, and hat. I wanted to keep them in the same color family- I don't like the Artful Dodger as Clown look, where they make him the Cat in the Hat. These look quite sharp and dapper now, but they will all be distressed.

We worry that Joan will be perturbed when we take a paintbrush to her wonderful creations for Nancy and Bet, but they must be in character and we're not planning to re-use them for anything else. She does the most wonderful work- I'm making V. buy me my own camera, so I can take photos of the processes and the finished product.

Her Mrs. Sowerberry is genius- a great concoction of all types of black textures.
We discussed ideas for the women street vendors for 'Who Will Buy' and she found perfect calicos and solids for them: a yellow and rose print for the Rose Seller's skirt over a yellow underdress, a spring green and pink overskirt over a strawberry pink for the Strawberry Seller and almost a white and blue toile with a blue skirt for the dairymaid. What a picture they will make on stage together.

My other volunteer mom did an excellent and imaginative job on the circus girls and has offered to put together the Strongman, if I will kit it up for her. The little girls have a longer dance than we had originally thought and I'm glad they're fairly gaudy.

One of our Gang suffered a tae kwan do injury- a sprained ankle. His mother, who's also in the cast, thinks he will be recovered by the time we open. I suggested having the set crew make him one of those Tiny Tim crutches, just in case, and he could be the Crippled Beggar Pickpocket.

V. ordered me David Lean's 1948 Oliver Twist, which I've been watching in snatches on YouTube. There are wonderful ideas in it, but we can't go quite that dark. I assured Connie, the set painter, that he had used almost the same view of the London skyline that she had chosen- great minds, etc.
V. has been working on the set crew and finds it fascinating, especially the part where Robert appears, announces "We need to do something different with this" and begins to splash black paint on a perfectly painted piece of furniture. I explained that that happens more often than you might think- Oliver's pants are a good example.

In the "You're killin' me, Smalls!" dept.- Oliver must be wearing his street clothes, except for the jacket, under a nightshirt. So the nightshirt must be opaque enough for his lovely plaid pants not to show through. The little gal at the Hobby Lobby found this an interesting problem and helped me decide on a white-on-white calico.

Today is Bill Sikes Day and I should go sew.

2009-06-10T09:31:00.004-05:00

Not about Costumes.

The Yarbs deconstruct.
And Ro takes to crime.

2009-06-08T21:39:00.003-05:00

In which I get well at the Goodwill,
Ross, Party City and Queen Beauty Supply.
Before I began costuming, I only considered thrift stores a good place to find the occasional odd book I wanted to read or a denim jumper for summer.

Now I see it them as an Aladdin's cave of wonderful things that I can acquire for practically nothing and use pretty much as is and do not have to sew. (Though it's a good source of garments to cut up for the material, as well.)
Today, I bought trousers for all the men's chorus- two pairs for Charlie, who has to be the workhouse flunky, as well as other characters, four jackets and four pairs of pants for Fagin's Gang. Now, two of the jackets and all four of the pants were originally women's clothes, but no one will complain if they know what's good for them. Most of them were on sale at 50% off, too.

Party City had two cheap-o felt top hats and while Ross didn't have any XXL grey blouses, they did have straw sun hats. I bought three- one for the Rose Seller to wear as is and two to transform into bonnets, as well as a navy newsboy cap.

I picked up a package of grey hair made out of some mysterious fiber not found in nature at Queen, as well as some scarves to use as neckties.

The mom who's making the circus girl dresses offered the Gang a bunch of school uniform shirts too damaged to re-sell and I jumped on that like a duck on a june bug. I'll throw the shirts in the washer with the muslin orphan items and dye them all at the same time. Then they'll need about five vivid vests, some more neckties, a couple of watch caps and they'll be about done.
So, if I can finish my principal men, then I can give Joan a hand with the women's chorus.

The Orphans will look well, I think. They're subtle, but largely so, if that makes any sense.
A picture would help, but Sis has the camera. We discovered that the actress playing Nancy is the daughter of Nini's first grade teacher- isn't that interesting?
And Ro stage-managed 'Rumors' with a prop mistress who's the sister of one of the chorus gals, who was also in a show I costumed last year for TC.

Bill Sikes came up to watch the rehearsal- he's anxious to get started, but Pete had to work around conflicts and they won't use him for another week or so. I described his costume in detail and he seemed pleased. But, as we agreed, any role where you don't have to wear a bra full of millet and size 13 purple suede heels is an absolute improvement.

I was on Mom Duty Friday through Saturday- Marge dragged herself up from Oak Cliff with a terrible bone-aching flu and slept on the couch until Sunday, when she felt well enough to go home and I baby-sat for Sis Saturday afternoon while they finalized their contract with the re-modeler. So maybe all my successful shopping today is virtue's reward...

2009-06-05T08:48:00.003-05:00

Today's Project: Kits
for the lovely moms who have volunteered to sew for us.
First- circus girls for Madeleine: tulle, net and organza skirt to sew to satin tops. And decorate with whatever snippets of sequins and fringe I found in the supplies closet. This a distinctly low-ball and recycle project. Colorful, though: royal blue and aqua, gold and orange, hot pink and fuschia.
Second- the rest of the workhouse orphans for Becky: shirts and pants of muslin and some unidentified homespun-looking fabric from the mill ends table. And assorted scraps for patches.
When they're finished, I'm tea-dying the muslin items to give them a little punch and dirty them up a bit and fray the unfinished edges.
Connie, the associate set designer who does all the backdrop paintings, showed me some of her designs last night. I need to jazz up some costumes so they don't disappear, but not so much that they compete.
Well, I put together a jacket for Oliver using my new patterns and though I carefully compared measurements- it did not fit. The pants did, though- so I'm inclined to think his chest measurement may have been off, which is a chance you take with letting parents measure. NB: don't do that next time, for principals anyway.
But I found better fabric for the jacket, anyway and will cut the new one larger. And give the old one to a Gang member. That's the go-to solution for anything that doesn't work out-"Someone in Fagin's gang can wear it!"
Oliver's 'rich boy' pants may go there, as well. The checks blend and they look a little green. So, I may re-do them in a larger plaid. It will not look garish and loud on stage.
Dodger's pants are ready to try on and his vest is complete. Aging his coat is freaking me out, but I'll figure it out.

2009-06-03T07:21:00.007-05:00

I Don't Need Dilemmas at 10:00 pm.

First, the good stuff. Had a very productive sewing day and when I made a trip to Jo-Ann's for circus fabric, I found this, which will save me so much work, I'm practically giddy.

No more cutting down adult patterns to fit middle school youngsters, never mind adapting things for the really little ones. This comes in ALL sizes. I bought two, the largest child and the smallest adult.

How did I miss this going through the books? Must have been all the red, white and blue that threw me off.

I must say, the Dodger's pants, previously an altered scrubs pattern, look so much better when re-cut by this. Please notice that in addition to a frock coat (Lincoln) and a tail coat (Uncle Sam), there are knee britches (Washington). And it's all in costume design, not re-enactment mode with its thousand authentic construction details.

Giddy, I tell you.

Because that's one of the biggest time issues for the small theater- altering patterns to fit your variously sized cast members. Patterns are expensive and you can't buy even all the multi-sized versions of a design. Even if you draw your own simple shapes, you must do the figuring from their measurements and draw it out on pattern paper.

Collected a pile of nylon net and tulle in vivid colors for the circus gals. Oddly enough, there was no animal print fleece at all, so I got a leopard print silky dress fabric for the strongman. Sounds peculiar, but it will be fine. There was enough rust-colored lining remnant for poofy pants, with a good bit left over for other bits and pieces- I cut the collar for Dodgers vest out of it, actually.

I think I've finally found a use for some trim that I bought for Forum. I fell in love with it and tried to incorporate it in the blue costumes (our houses were color-coded) and it wouldn't work in any of them, no matter what I tried. But I think it will meet its destiny on the rust vest.

But- the director phoned after rehearsal with a problem: Widow Corney isn't plump enough to match the lyrics of the song she sings with the beadle. Can we do something to make her look fatter?

Technically, of course we could, but her dress is almost completed, it can't be altered to be larger and I really don't want to ask Joan to scrap a costume she slaved over just because the actress's butt doesn't look big enough. We have too big a cast and not enough time for projects like that.

But I will consult with her before I give him a definite answer. She may not mind or we might be able to let another actress wear it in a different scene or we may think of a solution- a bum roll or a quilted shawl or a padded apron or something. But she is too valuable a worker to alienate over a little detail like this.

Maybe we could just trust the audience to use their imagination?

2009-06-02T07:10:00.004-05:00

It's Official

Sunday and Monday were my first official Freak Out Days. These happen when you get past the excitement of design and picking out fabrics and seeing the cast for the first time and fathom just exactly how many there are- 41!- and that almost all of them are double/triple roles.
The realization of the sheer volume of work you've attempted under a deadline...Yikes.

That was bad enough, but when I arrived at the theater last night, Pete gave me the character list for 'Consider Yourself'. "And Anne wants five of them to be circus performers."
Circus performers? On top of their two already assigned costumes?
As Sissy would say: are you freakin' kidding me?

But on second, calmer thought, I like it. It mixes it up. And since the young woman was in Cabaret last year, I can use her Kit-Kat Klub tunic as a base. The rest: satin poofy pants and a felt vest for the sword swallower, an animal skin fleece tunic for the strongman, and satin and net/tulle ballet dresses for the two little girls, probably also made from Cabaret items. There were plenty of sequin and fringe scraps in the supply closet. It'll be fine.

And though he's having understudies for Oliver and the Dodger- a departure from the usual practice- I don't have to costume them.
Freak Out over.

Widow Corney's plum dress? My co-costumer is a genius. It looks wonderful.

Had to scrap Fagin's hat crown and begin again. But, I think the old crown could be made into a cap of some sort for a Gang kid. Like a smoking cap- we'll see. Otherwise, he's almost completed- just details like buttonholes and buttons. Still debating the tie/muffler. Will ask the actor.

2009-05-31T06:09:00.002-05:00

Busy Saturday

The theater director took Joan and me to the storage units, gave us the gate and lock codes, showed us around and left us to go through the contents. There was light, but no fans- we'll bring some next time- and it was hot enough that we locked up, drove to the gas station and got Joan a drink in the middle of the search. I, of course, had my trademark vat of Sonic tea.

I'm taking V's car to rehearsal today to haul the tubs of stuff we found and could not fit in the Focus, to the theater. Once we get whatever items LHS loans us, we'll sort everything into gender groups: one in the dressing room, one in the front room- and mix and match the chorus.
We had much better luck with the men than the women, for some reason.

The set designer, who also acts occasionally, brought in the black frock coat he made himself and word in "Tom Sawyer". We were duly impressed. It is an almost perfect fit for Sowerberry, which will save us renting for him. It's a very dull black and Dave is concerned his black slacks might be too shiny, but we will see. He's not even getting a vest- just a dickey- as he never takes the coat off. He needs a temporary inside breast pocket, for some business with a lily and Joan is saving me some scraps from Mrs S's dress, so I can jazz up his collar and lapels. That's one of those twiddly ideas that will or will not get done depending on time.

Today's object: finalize Orphan measurements and talk to my sewing volunteer mom about those costumes. I need to do a detailed sketch after Mass.

Tonight, I'm watching the babies while Sis and Jake attend Fan Target's boyfriend's show. He and his brothee are doing a two-month tour of the U.S. and the Texas week ends up here in Dallas. I'll be sorry not to get to see him, or meet his brother, but there's just no time.

Various things I said today:
"You know what we need? Slut lace."
"Calla lilies- you know, cartoon dead guy lilies."

2009-05-30T19:00:00.001-05:00

D'uh!
Do you even need to ask?

2009-05-29T21:01:00.003-05:00

Just thought I'd try the scanner These are two of Fagin's fabrics: the top is his vest, the bottom one is his coat. The coat will have an upholstery brocade collar and pocket welts and the vest will have a golden brown buttonhole strip and brass buttons. He had a fitting tonight and was very pleased with how it looks so far. I found him some charcoal grey trousers at the Goodwill and a dark grey shirt at Metrocrest Thrift. They were having a 50% off sale, so I bought shirts with wild abandon. Somebody can wear them.

Our water heater was not working, so we called the plumber, who while trying to fix the heater, broke the electricity. The electric repairman came out, and several hundred dollars later, restored our power. He also put a new outlet on the porch and installed my lovely Arts and Crafts light, that's been in the top of the hall closet for two years. Since I couldn't sew, I just cut out instead and have Sikes's vest and hat ready to construct.

Took some photos of the boys in Fagin's Gang. They are cute beyond belief, and range from tiny to tall, which is how I posed them. The ass't director wrote down their names in order for me, so I can label the pictures and decide how to costume them. Not as big a project as it sounds, since two of them are Oliver and the Dodger, who are already dressed, so there are only eight of them to deal with. We or the parents will provide thrift store pants and shirts for them and then Joan and I will accessorize them.

All the orphans are going to be boys, even the girls. IOW, they will all be dressed alike in pants and shirts. Nice and simple- maybe a little boring, but they fall under the "60 seconds, Mom" rule.

Some of the gang may wind up wearing women's altered slacks, because of the smaller sizes and interesting plaids and dark colors. That falls under "Suffer for your art".

Tomorrow we ransack the costume storage.

2009-05-28T06:19:00.002-05:00

Took a break
from costumes for the evening and went out to dinner with some old booster club friends, including Michael's widow. We're making it a weekly get-together support group for her.
And this morning, I am baby-sitting for Sissy, so she can de-clutter and stage the house because their landlord want to start showing it to prospective renters.

But after that it is steady "don't interrupt me" work, since almost all the prep has been done. I feel very slightly guilty about doing the musical when she has so much going on in her life, but I am available all the other 47 weeks of the year, I can't help when they schedule the show, they didn't really have anyone else to do it and I love it so very much.

It looks like we can borrow some things from the LHS (Local High School)- I'll know exactly what by next week.

Starting with Fagin- he rehearses Friday, with his gang. I need to get the vest and coat ready to try on for pocket placement. If I put two in the coat, two in the vest and he has four in his trousers (Goodwilled), that should be plenty for picking pockets. His hat is ready to try on- I went a little overboard with the brim, I think. Otherwise, it is genius.
But as Ro and V. pointed out, I'm only 5'3", so the proportions will be different on a six foot tall man. This is one of the drawbacks of trying costumes on oneself. The top hat looked decidedly Suessical on me, but will be fine on a chorus guy.

2009-05-27T12:36:00.002-05:00

I'm only saying this once:

19th Century London is not the Ren Faire.
No one will be wearing one of those corset vest thingies over their peasant blousoe.
That is all.

Otherwise: had a good conference with the co-costumer. We are more or less splitting up the principals, with Joan taking the women and myself taking the men. We plan to give the workhouse orphans to one volunteer mom, and chorus outfits to the other.

Met our Oliver last night, a very appealing kid. His family apparently does a lot of theater- his sister, who was with him, just played Belle in B&B at Eastland College.

Fabric choices for Fagin, Sikes and the Dodger are set. I switched out Fagin's vest fabric, for something more gold/brown. My original choice was too much green. May change his shirt from grey to yellow/beige. Or not.
He is wearing trousers, Sikes opted for knee britches. Good choices.

Golden D'Or had coat fabric for Sikes, after I struck out at J-A's. A heavy, almost cordouroy, black stripe. There was one I really thought about, a black flocked denim, but it was too much for our little stage. Oh, damn- I forgot to retrieve his new hat fabric and walked out without buying it. Will just go with the first choice, then.

Also found Oliver's Brownlow outfit- a cream, tan and lt blue houndstooth check for the pants and a slightly darker blue suedecloth for the jacket. Remember, he needs a cap.
Also picked up orphan fabric, including five yards of water-damaged heavy linen-look for $1.oo yd.

Discovered that YouTube has lots of video of community theater and esp. high school productions of Oliver. I've seen some performances that only a mother could love. And people, seriously- lose the corsets!

2009-05-23T19:57:00.003-05:00

Just so you know

it's going to be pretty much all theater and costumes notes to myself all the time around here from now 'til the first of July. Because I am head costumer for Oliver!, after all.
I will not get to work with the Shadowlands gal, but I do get to work with Joan, who did some fabulous stuff for Cabaret.
She thinks big, where I tend to get bogged down in twiddly details- though I am MUCH better about that now- but I'm better at actual imagining of the historical period, so we should complement each other.
In addition to outfitting a 41-member, multiple roles cast, we may have to supply the 100+ kerchiefs to festoon Fagin's den. I thought of plastic tablecloths, but we'd have to see how they look under the lights. Shine might be a factor- "They're silk." "No, they're obviously plastic."

Some of my old favorites are playing major roles- Fagin, Mr. Bumble, Mr. Sowerby, Mrs. Corney. And some are in the chorus. One of the kids from Jungle Book is Noah- he'd grown so tall and handsome that I didn't recognize him.
Plus, there are some great new people- Pete says he cast a Nancy that beat everyone else out, hands down. And the character actress I was hoping for is Mrs. Sowerby. The fellow who played the triple role in Sylvia is Bill Sykes, and I can't wait to see what he does with that.

Found a Simplicity pattern for a men's Goth 'London After Dark' ensemble, that I think will work wonderfully well for tail coats and vests. It even has a top hat pattern! And a 'Deadwood' vest and coat pattern, as well. The Dickens Christmas pattern has trousers, but I'm not going there except possibly for Sikes and the Dodger. For now, only Fagin, Sikes and the Dodger are being sewn and all the other men are rented.
NB. Check with Sikes: knee pants or trousers?

I was idling with the idea of Mrs. Sowerby in a plum or purple, but the more I think of it, the more I want them both in black, like crows. I think I'll have Mrs. Corney in plum instead. That's a good color on the actress, and not too dressy for the workhouse matron. With a big-ass cap.
Yeah, I like that...

2009-05-22T08:16:00.005-05:00

My Costume Maxims

just to get in gear...

Yes, just like Aesop's morals, some of these are contradictory. It depends on the context.

1) That's close enough for government work.

2) "Sixty seconds, Mom. That's how long he's on-stage."

3) If you didn't want to wear fur, why did you audition for an animal?

4) It's a costume, not a prom dress.

5) "I was not aware the History Channel was coming to this show."

6) More is more- think Big.

7) A comfortable actor is a happy actor.

8) Sometimes you have to suffer for your art.

9) It can be fast, cheap or good. Choose two.

N.B.: Falsies must be basted in, rather than pinned. Had to use the hemostat to remove the safety pins from the 'Sylvia' bra, they'd rusted from the perspiration.

2009-05-21T16:01:00.002-05:00

We interrupt

this tranquil summer to co-costume Oliver!.
I hope it's co-, and not solo, because the other costumer was leery of taking it on, since it's
a) big
b) a period piece and
c) she doesn't really sew.
But since I am a sewing fool, with a sewing room and a big box of costume patterns, that solves that.
I only saw one of the two shows she did for TC this season- Shadowlands- but I loved what she did with it.
So, I hope we're compatible and can work on this together. Some of my favorite actors are auditioning and the set is by the usual designer and the woman who did Charlotte's Web.

Young people- here's what the director wants to know when you audition for a musical:
a) what your voice sounds like, and
b) can you carry a tune?
He is not interested in your 'stylings'. Really.
Thanks.

Obviously, we rent all the men's tailoring. And if we're really lucky, we can perhaps borrow whatever the Local High School kept from Les Mis. Slums are slums, right?
I'm rambling- I'm excited to be doing this. Can you tell?

2009-05-20T07:54:00.002-05:00

Fleeced
or maybe not.
I'm still a neophyte in the raw fiber world, so the condition of the one I bought off eBay may be how it should be. So I'm certainly not giving her bad feedback. Plus, I love a challenge.

Taking a cue from Mythbusters, who always do things in miniature first, I took a handful, stuffed it in an organza gift bag and washed it in the sink, per instructions off the Net. With a smidgen of Dawn, that gets grease, or lanolin, out of your way.

(Oh, Internet, how I love you! You tell me how to make a fat suit out of two T-shirts and fiberfill, or how to make Kung Pao Chicken, or find me that quote of Newman's on Anglicanism. Or how to process the fleece I bought on eBay.)

Once it was dry, I carded it, sort of, with the dog slicker brushes, spun it, plied it and solar-dyed it with a blend of Orange and Lemonade Kool-Aid. Now it smells quite tasty and not like a barnyard.

Since that worked out adequately, I ordered some actual carders and washed up a much larger batch in the bathtub, which I dried out in the garden on a bath towel. My using the kitchen colander to scoop the loose wet wool out of the tub will be our little secret, okay? I washed it really, really well afterwards.

2009-05-18T09:12:00.002-05:00

Michael, RIP

Of your charity, please pray for the repose of the soul of Michael and for comfort for his family. He was the father of Ro's oldest friend and died Friday after a hard-fought battle with cancer. He was a loving husband and father, a VietNam vet and just a good man, who will be greatly missed in our community.
Our daughters have been friends since kindergarten and we share many fond memories of their growing up together.
Ro, who is the go-to girl for slideshows around here, prepared the one they will show at the memorial service.

2009-05-14T14:26:00.005-05:00

Snippets

What I've been doing instead of writing here:

Gardening

Building stuff for the garden

and spinning. This is only about half of the output now. It's not exactly out of control, but has the potential to become so.

Just spent what might be my dumbest $8 ever on eBay, buying a fleece. It was advertised as 'washed', but when we opened the box, we learned that 'washed' doesn't mean 'odorless'. It's a lovely creamy white color, but smells distincly 'sheepish'. Nor is it carded, so I'm off to the Petco for some dog slicker brushes to deal with it.

Ro came in to hang about the bedroom door.
"I'm worried, Mom. B's mother thinks Barack Obama might be the anti-Christ. She's been seeing all these numerological signs that he is- something to do with 444. She's seeing it everywhere."

"Darling, you do know that numerology is complete bullshit, right?"

"Yes, but you know her. She seems so certain that if you listen to her long enough..."

"Okay- I think he's a biblical chastisement, but he's not suave enough to be the anti-Christ. Alright?"

"But he swayed a lot of people."

"Many of whom just thought it would be cool to elect the first black President and are now going 'Holy Moley- what just happened here?' So- stop worrying, at least about the anti-Christ part."

"Okay."

"And please don't pay any serious attention to B's mom."

Reading a wonderful web of interconnected works- from Schumacher's "Guide for the Perplexed" to Vincent McNab's "Flee to the Fields" to Schall's "The Order of Things". Sane people for crazy times.

I also picked up a copy of Magnificat magazine for May. The offices are not as long or full as the ones in Shorter Christian Prayer, but they involve less flipping around and manipulation of markers, which I can understand being appealing. It also includes all the Mass readings, meditations and bios of various saints. I can see why it is so very popular.

The Yarbroughs have been attending Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University and love it. They have learned so much that has helped them understand how they deal with money and how they can change that for the better. They have Fan Target in their sights, now.

She just finished a wonderful knitted baby blanket for the new daughter of some of Davy's friends. He is on tour with a show now, but it's coming to Dallas for one night, so she and the Yarbs will get to see him then. We'll be babysitting, so they can attend.

"History is the river, real life is what happens on the banks."

2009-05-14T14:19:00.004-05:00

Make the Cuteness Stop!
All the grandchildren, exhibiting various degrees of adorableness and good parenting. Miss O here, and Bubs and M.J. here.
Please feel free to skip this trip to Grannietopia.

2009-04-27T11:00:00.004-05:00

Author Crush

I'm sure we've all had the experience of discovering a new author whose work resonates within us, who confirms and enlarges our view of the cosmos- both vertical and horizontal. After the first book, we look up their bibliography and are either disappointed that they only have one or two works- Harper Lee? Jetta Carleton?- or are overjoyed at the lengthy banquet table awaiting us.

Now we know that not every work will be equally fine, that there will be a few mis-fires or rough spots and that some will speak to us more than others. But that's okay- that's human nature.

My most recent find was this gentleman:

Roberston Davies, Canadian man of letters. Who wrote, besides several trilogies of novels, plays, essays and collected letters. I've collected all of the novels, but one, and some of the essays through diligent searching at Half-Price Books. (Yes, I could buy them off ABE or Amazon, but what would be the fun in that?)

I have one book of essays that I'm holding onto unread as a hedge against national angst, sort of like those hermetically sealed containers of heirloom seeds.

But now I have a new crush, who I found via a path that led from Frances Moore Lappe (I was trying to read variant views), to Day, to Schumacher, to Belloc, to finally... James V. Schall, S.J.

Luckily for me, Fr. Schall, who is a professor at Georgetown, is a very prolific writer and will keep me happily occupied for quite a while.

I'm an avid reader at One Cosmos, but recognize that much of GB's sideboard recommendations are above my ready comprehension level. But Fr. Schall, while certainly not 'lite', which would be a gross insult, is 'less dense'. A good choice for the medium-speed among us.

In fact, once I finish "On the Unseriousness of Human Affairs", I shall tackle the 25 volumes list of "These-People-Tell-The-Truth-Books" in its Appendix.

2009-04-23T09:41:00.004-05:00

Our Education Dollars at Work
Not gobsmacked, just furious.

Sis just got back from Ni's school. She was attending something called the "Reading Restaraunt", where parents come to listen to their child read. One of Ni's selections was something they all had to write called "If I were President". Apparently, there was a list of pre-selcted "prompts" for the kids to choose from.

Sissy was okay with "I would not test on animals" and "I wouldn't have any war", because Ni is, after all, only seven and not really up on the Just War Theory. But when it came to "I would make all the rich people give their money to the poor people." it was "Whoa there, cowgirl!"

There will be a little chat tonight at home, because you don't call your innocent kid out in front of their class.

There may be a visit to the teacher, to determine from which educational outlet this came.

Mimi may have to build one of these in their backyard, so she can come in and homeschool them every day. I don't have anything else pressing to do, after all...

When I think of the decline of the great idea of public schooling for everyone, it makes me so sad.
But really, it's only a good idea depending on who chooses the curriculum. If it's a curriculum based on Truth, Goodness and Beauty. In short supply these days.

2009-04-21T07:33:00.002-05:00

Mr. C lays it out for us.
A more than usually fine post from the American Thinker.
Why we're Us and not Them, and the ramifications.
I tend to think that we're not as close to the tipping point as some believe.
Obama's was a false majority, with a lot of otherwise sensible people caught
up in the historicity, and waking up with a bad hangover now.

2009-04-20T06:49:00.002-05:00

Weekend with Bubs

Nini had a morning birthday party at one of those ginormous arcades where you cannot drop your child off and leave without worrying, so Bubs spent the night with me on Friday. I picked him up mid-afternoon and when we got home we spent an hour putting deck stain on the new tool rack V. made me for the garden.

A two-year old and redwood stain - not my brightest idea, but we had a good time. And it washes off with some Dr. Bronner's Castile Soap and a few licks with a scrubbie.

I also let him pedal the wheel, with the flyer unhooked. That kept him occupied for minutes at a time. He built blocks with Fan Ro, had dinner and a bath and then we read six or seven books while he struggled to stay awake. Rather than risk a melt-down, and by this time, I was half-way curious to see just how long he could stay up (Bad Mimi!), we decided to watch a movie. After half an hour of 'Friendly Persuasion", we repaired back to bed and he read himself to sleep in about three minutes.

Not even our new king-size bed is big enough for Bubs and anyone else. I would wake up from a kick enough to move him, but not enough to think of a pallet on the floor, where he actually took his nap next day : Ro peeked into the bedroom and asked in an alarmed tone "Mom? WHERE'S BUBS?!".
"On the floor under the bandana fleece blanket."
"Oh. Okay..."

The weather was spotty on Saturday, but we managed to work in the garden a little, feeding the birds, weeding and pulling radishes. Indoors, we played puzzles and trains and drew pictures and mixed up some Koo-Aid dye for Mimi's yarns and pedaled the wheel some more. We picked up a baked potato and some fried okra for lunch.

By the time he fell asleep on the floor, after another Berenstain Bears story, I was pooped. To the point that I bribed Fan Ro to drive him home to Frisco when he woke up. He teared up a little when he heard about the change in plans, and I almost weakened, but Ro, with her eyes on the prize, assured me he'd be fine, jumped into my car and drove off.
When she got home, I asked her if he'd been really upset. "He stopped crying at the top of the alley, Mom. we talked all the way home, about MarioKart."

Apropos of nothing on Saturday, he announced "Mimi- you're the best Mimi in the whole world.
And I'm the best Bubs." Metaphysically speaking, he's got that right.
What a great little guy.

2009-04-20T06:45:00.002-05:00

CC Needs a New Home
A letter from my brother in Austin. Know anyone in central Texas who'd like a dog?
Hi Friends,

We are looking for a home for our dog, Her name is “CC”. We have had
her for almost 3 years. She was about 8 months old when we found her at
our ranch in Gatesville. Our Vet tells us that our dog is a
Collie/Shepherd mix (see photos below). She weighs about 50 lbs. and has
been spayed and has all of her shots. She has been a great family pet and
my kids love her. Unfortunately, she bit my 3 year old niece last
weekend at a family get together. They were in the backyard at my in-laws
house and we did not see what happened so I do not know what provoked her to
bite my niece. It was just one bite but strong enough to cause my niece to
need some stitches on the side of her head. CC has snapped at couple of my
kid’s friends in our home before but had never bitten anyone.

I have no concern of her being around my children who are 9, 11
and 13. However, because we frequently have children of all ages in our
home (and not always closely supervised), we have come to the decision to seek
another home for our dog. It is heartbreaking for our family as we have
grown very fond of our dog. I think our next door neighbor
will be as sad as anyone about her leaving as she takes CC for walks and visits
her daily.

CC is very affectionate. I take her with me
jogging. She enjoys going for walks and does well on a leash. She
travels fine in the car and we often take her with us when we go out of
town. She also loves to retrieve tennis balls thrown to her. She
stays in the back yard during the day when we are at work and at night when we
go to bed. She stays in the house when we are home. She is not
allowed in certain rooms in the house and she knows which ones those are and is
good about staying within her boundaries. We have a cat that lives in the
house full time and they play together well. She is fine around other
dogs.

CC would be a great companion for an adult. If you know
of anyone who would like to adopt a great dog, please let me
know.

Thanks,
Charley

Charles E. Brown
General
Counsel
Hunter-Kelsey of Texas, LLC
4131 Spicewood Springs, Rd.,
J-1
Austin, Texas 78759
(512)473-0220
(512)482-8737
(fax)
(866)456-3839 (toll free)
(512)695-4442(cell)

2009-04-15T08:27:00.006-05:00

I'll be (Updated)
joining what I hope will be several thousand of my fellow citizens at our local Tea Party, 11:30 to 1:30.
We paid our taxes yesterday, and discovered that, thanks to the entrepreneurial talent of my youngest brother, we passed the Magic Obama Tax-You-More cut-off. And yet, he voted for him. We are gobsmacked, my sister and I.
Hope to get some photos.
Though a dangerous right-wing extremist, I'll be heavily disguised as a suburban grandmother, who sometimes shops at the Cracker Barrel.

Harmless.

Update:

Photos from the local Tea Party. I estimate that we had about 200 or so. Not bad for a suburb.

We lined up/marched along the city's main street at the intersection of George Bush Freeway.

Much appreciative honking. We were waving back like homecoming queens.

Lots of people were also planning to go to the Dallas event. And Rush had a fellow on who was reporting from the Southlake Party, which was a little more celeb- heavy. The Gov., who came out in support of Texas's sovereignity, as per the 10th Amendment, is going to be at several spots today and I bet the crowds will go wild.

As you can see, this was a totally grass-roots make-your-own-sign kind of affair.

Lined up along the street. Note the little guy, with his mom. The wind almost blew him away a time or two.

My personal favorite of the signs.

2009-04-13T10:54:00.002-05:00

Resurrexit sicut dixit, alleluia!

Regina coeli, laetare, alleluia:
Quia quem meruisti portare, alleluia.
Resurrexit sicut dixit, alleluia.
Ora pro nobis Deum, alleluia.

V. Gaude et laetare, Virgo Maria, Alleluia,
R. Quia surrexit Dominus vere, alleluia.

Oremus: Deus qui per resurrectionem Filii tui, Domini nostri Iesu Christi, mundum laetificare dignatus es: praesta, quaesumus, ut per eius Genetricem Virginem Mariam, perpetuae capiamus gaudia vitae. Per eundem Christum Dominum nostrum.
R. Amen.

A blessed and joyous Easter to all!

2009-04-04T20:06:00.001-05:00

Off 'til Easter Monday.
Wishing everyone a holy and blessed Holy Week and Pasch.

2009-04-04T07:26:00.003-05:00

Move over, Morgan Jane

There's a new baby in town.

This is my new Majacraft Pioneer, which I brought home on Thursday. This stock photo shows all the wonderful (boring) technical details, like

- Double heel and toe treadling- Frictionless ball bearings- Single hook flyer- Maintainance-free drive band- Super smooth patented bobbins- Lightweight- No threading hook required- Right or left handed- Five ratios available on each whorl

All of which simply mean that it is soooo nice to spin on. The treadle action is so smooth and effortless that I've really had to throttle back on the treading or it goes way too fast.

Ro came in to watch a moment and noted that it sounded different from the loaner "That one sort of whirred, and this one goes "sssssssss". Which means it's super quiet and I can spin when the rest of the house is asleep.

Like any new mom and baby, we're still getting used to each other. But I see many happy useful years ahead.

Sissy came over with the kids yesterday and Bubs and I had a little CTJ on the subject of Mimi's new wheel.

"See, Bubbie, this is Mimi's new spinning wheel and she needs you to never, ever touch it. Okay?"

Poor little guy got this 'what did I do?' look on his face.

Sis said "You're not in trouble, honey. We just need you to leave Mimi's wheel alone."

He thought for a moment, then: "Just look! Don't touch! 'Cause that will make Mommy and Mimi sooooo happy!" Yes! and much cheering for his smart self.

2009-04-03T10:33:00.001-05:00

Ya think?
The Cure d'Ars has Obama et al.'s number:

As you know my dear brethren, we are bound as fellow creatures to have human sympathy and feelings for one another. Yet one envious person would like, if he possibly could, to destroy everything good and profitable belonging to his neighbour. You know, too, that as Christians we must have boundless charity for our fellow men. But the envious person is far removed indeed from such virtues. He would be happy to see his fellow man ruin himself. Every mark of God's generosity towards his neighbour is like a knife thrust that pierces his heart and causes him to die in secret. Since we are all members of the same Body of which Jesus Christ is the Head, we should so strive that unity, charity, love, and zeal can be seen in one and all. To make us all happy, we should rejoice, as St. Paul tells, in the happiness of our fellow men and mourn with those who have cares or troubles. But, very far from experiencing such feelings, the envious are forever uttering scandals and calumnies against their neighbours. It appears to them that in this way they can do something to assuage and sweeten their vexation.
But, unfortunately, we have not said all that can be said about envy. This is the deadly vice which hurls kings and emperors from their thrones. Why do you think, my dear brethren, that among these kings, these emperors, these men who occupy the first places in the world of men, some are driven out of their places of privilege, some are poisoned, others are stabbed? It is simply because someone wants to rule in their place. It is not the food, nor the drink, nor the habitations that the authors of such crimes want. Not at all. They are consumed with envy.
(h/t to the Cukierski Family Apostolate newsletter)

2009-04-02T08:22:00.003-05:00

DVR Wars

Ro is complaining about all the movies I've got stored to watch. It seems they're taking up space better occupied by "How It's Made" and "Myth-busters". Never mind that only 33% of the actual space is being used.

"Can we delete 'Nosferatu' ? It's been in there two weeks."

"No! I want to watch it."

She gives me a Look, then curls her hands into claws, hunches her shoulders and widens her eyes a la Max Schreck.

"There- you've seen it. Now can I erase it?"

"No, I want to see the rats, the ghost barge and the print in the book turn into esoteric signs."

"Okay, FINE!"

"I could delete 'Bachelor Party'." Click. "Oh, look, now we're at only 28% storage used."

'Thank you."

2009-04-02T08:14:00.003-05:00

Happy Birthday

to Sir Alec Guiness, my favorite actor. TCM is doing a birthday retrospective of him during the day.

Here he is in his best and most famous role: Col. Nicholoson in Bridge on the River Kwai.

2009-03-27T10:15:00.003-05:00

A Song Cue
From Mushroom:

AS kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies dráw fláme;
As tumbled over rim in roundy wells

Stones ring; like each tucked string tells, each hung bell’s

Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name;

Each mortal thing does one thing and the same:
5
Deals out that being indoors each one dwells;

Selves—goes itself; myself it speaks and spells,

Crying Whát I do is me: for that I came.

Í say móre: the just man justices;

Kéeps gráce: thát keeps all his goings graces;
10
Acts in God’s eye what in God’s eye he is—

Chríst—for Christ plays in ten thousand places,

Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his

To the Father through the features of men’s faces.

Gerard Manley Hopkins

2009-03-27T09:11:00.003-05:00

Bob has company

There's an old saying that bad money drives out the good. You take enough hot checks and you'll start demanding cash. Modern religion is a lot like that. There are so many over-zealous and under-sensitive fools trying to convert you to some shallow and superficial fundamentalist sect, and so many fanatical puritans and so many devotees of odd and esoteric Oriental cults- the very words of Christianity have become corrupted and have lost their meaning. God, salvation, Christ, worship, prayer- the counterfeit currency sometimes takes careful examination to distinguish it from the good money, and people are skeptical of it all.
- "Padre", ca. 1975

2009-03-27T09:02:00.002-05:00

Please take a moment,
if you would, to pray for this little guy and his family. From a blog Sissy follows.
Thank you.

2009-03-21T21:34:00.004-05:00

Is it just me

or is it really heart-meltingly sweet that Bubs refers to his own sister as "Miss O"?

2009-03-21T21:20:00.002-05:00

Natural Dyeing
While V. took Bubs to the park yesterday morning and MJ had a nap, Nini and I wound a skein of yarn on the niddy noddy and cooked up a pot of onion skin dye from husks collected from the natural foods mart. She liked tearing up the skins into little bits, but found the one-hour simmer and one-hour steeping steps a little boring. We used the rest of the white fleece spun from my spinning lessons- one large skein and one small. The big one got the whole process, the smaller one and an orphan skein of my eBay fleece got the second go-round.
Remember when I said that that yarn wanted to stay natural? Should have listened- it did NOT like the dye. I'm trying to come up with a Martha Stewart-esque color description for how it turned out. "Dirt Dobber" is about the best I can do.
The others are lovely shades of rust, though.

2009-03-21T12:13:00.003-05:00

In Line with the Latest
from Mushroom and the QP on the transcendant qualities of the arts, this always heartens me.
Dedicated young people making music.

2009-03-16T13:42:00.006-05:00

Snippets

'Fan Target's' boyfriend is in town for 2 weeks, so we had Family Dinner on Saturday. She wanted to share the tradition of Marshall's Bar-B-Que with him, so we picked up a couple of family packs. And we ate off the Fort Worth Centennial plates I inherited from my grandmother and which are only used for family and honored guests.

While Sissy, Miss O and I cleaned up the kitchen before game playing and dessert, Marge and Davy fed Morgan Jane her dinner. "Let's just stuff her under our shirts and make a break for it", he said.

They are going to Arkansas this week, so he can meet college friends and see her school. She is a little apprehensive about this because strange things happen on trips to AR, but maybe if he's there, nothing odd will occur.

There is much progress on the toilet-training front, but people have threatened to quit reading if we don't quit writing about poop.

I finished my spinning lessons and have ordered a wheel of my own. Not the Cadillac design, more of a Hyundai, but with the potential for add-on's. I would be going through spin withdrawal, but I have to wind (and/or untangle) all the skeins I've made so far and wind them into balls, which keeps me busy. And I want to catch up on the sewing and clear my decks, to be able to spin guilt-free when it arrives.

Ro has gone to Austin to see the boyfriend in his roomates's movie at South by Southwest. It must be a sign of the times- everyone now has a movie that they edited in their bedroom, instead of a novel. She made them a cake, decorated to look like a wheel of Swiss cheese, a gigantic kitchen-wrecking project, but very cute. It seems the film is about a goat named Artois and goat cheese. As far as I can tell.

She got free show photos from "Rumors" because she was nice to the photographer, who appreciated it. She is 'jus' adorable' as the Tiny Cop. The other actor is about three times her size- no wonder they get a nice laugh.

Turning the back yard into my little mini-farm is one of the smartest things I've done lately. It's practical, it's exercise, it's soothing manual labor, it's meditative and prayerful and it's good stewardship.
Alas, many of the groups you turn to for advice, products, philosophy or fellowship are fanatic ecologists. Even the Catholic Bishops Conference for Rural Living has drunk the 'climate change' kool-aid. So, the winnowing of useful knowlege from hysteria is time-consuming, but worth it.

2009-03-10T10:51:00.001-05:00

It's not the Christmas ham, but still...
Worst dog ever.
(Not really)

2009-03-03T22:50:00.003-06:00

Got a new show
to do. Called Sylvia, about a middle-aged couple and the dog that comes between them. One cast member plays three roles: a guy in the dog park, a well-to-do woman and a unisex counselor.
He can manage dog park guy, and probably part of the counselor, but I have to do the lady from scratch.
I've been lucky so far- located a pair of size 12 heels, a size 44D bra and a 2X shape slimmer, aka a girdle, and the right size pantyhose at Marshall's. The dress has to match the shoes, which are an unusual plum suede, but nice. So- I make the dress, to have total control over it, and accesorize with jewelry, purse and shawl from Sam Moon. And possibly a new wig- the theater's collection is in kind of bad shape.
The dog is played by a young woman, who wears people clothes. She needs one sewn outfit: a poufy skirt and a shrug, with a hairpiece and bow, a baggy sweater from Goodwill, a little black dress (Marshall's again), and kneepads. Oh, and pumps for the dress. I wanted to update her a little- give her a graphic tee or some such, but the director likes the original cast photo, so we're going with that.
I'm really concentrating this time on making the decision and sticking with the first suitable materials that click. No hunting the elusive perfect fabric hiding over the rainbow.

2009-03-03T17:29:00.001-06:00

A Modest Proposal for the Energy and Economic Crisis
from Tracey at Beyond the Pale.

2009-03-02T08:07:00.006-06:00

In Which I Strike Off On My Own

Several years ago, when I first thought of taking up spinning, I bought a sack of roving off eBay. Roving is cleaned, carded wool formed into ropes. I dug it out, postponed my assigned homework, popped an empty bobbin in the flyer and spun it all.

It took about 3 1/2 hours, or one episode of The Beverly Hillbillies, one of The Andy Griffith Show and all of Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. (Yes, I don't watch TV during Lent, but stuff you've seen at least 10 times doesn't count. So much.)

Then I unwound it off the bobbin onto something called a niddy noddy, tied it with a figure 8 in four places to make a skein, soaked it in the sink in warm water and a little detergent, rinsed it well and hung it in the bathroom to dry.

It was gone in the morning- brief alarm- but Ro had moved it to the sewing room so she could take a shower.

It looked like this:

I briefly considered dyeing it, but decided it wanted to stay natural. I wound it into a ball and am now knitting a scarf out of it.

I probably shouldn't be impressed by accomplishing something billions of people have done for thousands of years, but I am.

It's a little like being The Magician. There's the same element of effortless concentration- or at least I can see the potential for it- and the transformation of one thing to another form. It's like knitting, but at a higher level.