I didn’t count on being invited to brunch on Mothers’ Day. My youngest granddaughter who is the only grandchild that lives near me, was most insistent that I join her, her sister, and their mom at the Bistro where my son works. He had invited me as well, so I decided to go. Normally, it’s just another day. He lives about an hour away.
We were to meet at 1 pm so I planned to leave around noon to arrive close to 1. It didn’t matter because traffic was crazy. I don’t usually encounter that many cars. The granddaughter lives 15 miles closer than I do, so I expected them to arrive before I did. Nope! They were a half hour late.
After our meal, the girls went home and I waited for my son to finish cleaning up so he could ride home with me so he could borrow my other car to move his stuff out of my garage and have transportation to his upcoming appointments. So I spent all day not working on my faux leather.
Today, I applied the final coat of glaze and I’m waiting for it to dry overnight. So there’s no picture today. But I will have one tomorrow.
Thursday was my weekly lunch with a friend. We usually meet at a cafe owned by friends of my son. My friend and I been meeting here since we each retired twelve years ago. It’s a nice little place that serves breakfast and lunch seven days a week. It’s one of three owned by the couple.
Lunch was fine. We mostly meet so I can have some social time outside of my house because I like to stay home. In fact, the maker space, lunch, and knitting at the public library provide the bulk of my social interactions.
Because it’s orange barrel spouting time, I have to take a detour to and from the cafe. I decided to go home along some of the back roads I used to travel when I lived on the nearby lake. It was interesting driving down roads I used to bike down with a toddler strapped in a seat over the rear wheel. In spite of being in the car, the distance I used to bike daily to visit a friend was farther than I remembered. Apparently, I had thought nothing of biking the ten miles from my house to theirs.
I decided to take a drive to where my former in-laws lived. I haven’t been in that area since they sold their property 40 years ago. The property consisted of a colonial style house on 15 acres between two roads. There was a shed-type building that used to house chickens and another larger shed that was used to stable a couple of horses when the kids were young. Once the kids grew up and moved away, the stable became a chicken house where cockfights were held on Saturday nights. I could have gone forever without knowing that. I’ll bet you could have as well.
The house was still there, but the 15 acres had been parceled out and there were a lot more houses. The land closest to the highway was more wooded and overgrown than when they lived over there, but I passed eight new homes before I got to the old house. There used to only be one between them and the highway. The house still looked the same. I guess whoever owned it appreciated the classic lines of the Colonial.
I didn’t stop, but seeing the house brought back memories of pheasant chicks in the garage in the early spring, disturbing holiday celebrations, and weekend trips “home” when we lived in Illinois. My father-in-law never seemed to get to hunt any of the birds he raised, although his friends frequently did. The man also had a beer distributor deliver 30 cases of beer every month. I used to find partial six packs all over the property when I took a walk. They used to wonder why their oldest son was such a drunk.
I stayed on the road and drove along, looking at all the changes in some areas and how certain other properties remained the same. The road meandered as country roads do, but I knew where I was. Eventually, the road became the road that leads to my street. All in all, it took 40 minutes longer to get home.
A few zines for the Craft Sale.
I’ve included a photo of the zines I’ll be selling. The Title is Insanity Shuffles because as it says on the back, “Insanity doesn’t just run in my family. It slinks, oozes, shuffles. Occasionally, it cartwheels, jumps, strides, pounces, and gavottes.” They’re essays and other items that may or may not be interesting. That’s the story and I’m sticking to it.
I did get the dishes done. I was busy. I performed The Wisconsin Lilac Chainsaw Massacre and managed to reduce one lilac by half and get most of the cuttings down to the street for pickup. I’ll give another go tomorrow – maybe. I haven’t checked the weather forecast. I also whacked down the invasive dogwood whatever that keeps sprouting in what was once a nice perennial garden. Like an aspen, the thing spreads via its roots.
If I hadn’t had to plant a couple arbor vitae and a lot of tall flowers to keep the old lady that lived next door out of my yard, the dogwood wouldn’t have taken over so badly because I would have kept mowing over them. But the old biddy next door had to be in my yard, pulling everything she considered a weed and leaving them either on top of my trash can of just tossed in my driveway. So I wasn’t mowing that area very much and the dogwood kept growing in the perennials.
The neighbor was a load of fun. She used to sneak over and put her trash in my bin. Her reason for doing so was that the can the city gave out was too large so she would just do it until she got the smaller bin. However even after she got her bin, she’d use mine until I finally told her I didn’t want to deal with her if she fell in my driveway while trespassing.
She objected so strenuously to my cans being on the side of my garage that she could see from her window, that she bought and had someone install, six-foot high vinyl fence panels on her property to hide my cans from her sight. The fence panels ran the length of my garage. I moved them to the front of the garage and she installed two more panels. I considered moving the cans down the length of my driveway a few feet a year to see if she would keeping buying fence but I never did that. She’s gone now so no more problems. I have a nice couple as neighbors now.
Anyway, back to my list – part of the list was to finish 3 Japanese stab bound notebooks for the upcoming Artists’Night we’re having at the Makerspace I belong to. I did practice cards of the patterns I intended to use, but one pattern took a lot of practice to get right.
First there was getting the design on graph paper. Then determining the stitching. Once that was done, I did a practice card. It was stitch, take out the thread, start over, take out the thread. I finally got the pattern and the stitching steps right. I still had a bit of trouble because the more complex the pattern, the longer the thread has to be and even with the waxed thread, tangles occur.
Then the fun began. I lost count of the steps and had to start over. After a few tries, things fell into place and the pattern started to take shape. I got two-thirds of the way done and ran out of thread. Spent a lot of time sewing the book. Halfway through, I realized I used a wrong hole. No big deal. Pulled out the thread and ripped the cover. I made a new cover.
Realized that even though I was using longer length of thread, it was too short. Picked the thread out. Started over, halfway through got a major knot. Gave up. I’ll try again tomorrow. I have to go make a new to-do list.
However, due to an impulse buy that took two hours to complete, I did not get several items done which are now on today’s list. But I do have a new car. Not really that much of an impulse as my old car is 25years old. It’s still in great running condition, but it’s getting harder and harder to get parts for it.
The old car, a ’98 Saturn, will be my “I need to haul brush to the dump” car, while my “new” 10 year-old car will be the “travel on the highway” car. I figure the Saturn only has another year or so before the repairs are out of my price range. I must say after 40 years of driving a stick, the automatic is scary. I caught myself several times, feeling around for the clutch and putting my hand on the shifter.
My new to-do list has the things I didn’t get to yesterday on it. I hope to get them down before I need to leave for the maker space I belong to for a work day. My plans for that are to clear out and straighten the fabric bins which have many pieces of leftover fabrics that need to be measured, tagged with the yardage, and folded before going back into the bins. We have have quite a few members who make costumes. Others make clothes and household accessories. Some even bring in sails and boat cushions to repair, while others do upholstery. Hence the leftover fabric.
I also need to clean and oil the sewing machines and serger. And make certain they’re in good working order. I also do simple sewing machine repair. We have a member who repairs machines for a living, but I do the basic maintenance for three machines and the serger.
Sillytoes Crafts 