grounded and floating bits

Esme and I walked up to the school bus stop this morning.  It is still raining, it has been off and on for a week or so.. but we saw where the lilies are starting to try to come up - I guess that must be what they are, and we planned to look for a place to put the Love in a Mist seeds we got free last year and never planted.  They say 'when ground can be worked at earliest point in spring, plant in well-drained soil'.  Mark suggested up there would be a good place, high up enough on the hill they might come back year after year.  We scoped out where we might put sunflowers later.

I came back and went into the main garden and uncovered the sticks and leaves off of the oregano.  I took a pinch of it in my thumb and forefinger and scored it so I could get a good smell of it.  It is so strong right now because the leaves are new.

I met the wild chicken halfway back from the garden and she is trying to live in the doghouse in the rain, the one I packed full of extra straw last fall.  Not a terrible place for a chicken, close enough to the house bad things probably would be worried about cats and dogs and the goat nearby.  I gave her some food scattered in the dry areas under the tree.  She walked within three feet of me to eat - so she has been having a hard time the past few days getting enough if she came that close to get the food I was throwing.  'Wild' means she runs at the sight of you - and doesn't come within six feet of you unless she has a reason.

The floating bits.
I found a great deal on  an item that could be our room divider.  We talked about that project but it seemed too expensive for something we didn't need right now.  Then it fell in my lap at ten dollars - so I get to pick that up after the rain dries up and hopefully we will find a way to install it over the next few months.

I've bound off the blanket and am tying in the ends.
Laundry, huge piles of laundry.
I need to get a bit more sleep.. but it is hard to go back to sleep for an hour or so only to get right back up.. there are so many things that could be done in an hour... like laundry... like planning ...

Someday this year I need to get the novel out and read it again, and see the next step.  I had thoughts about Paul and Isabel in the time rift and I never thought them through much because it entirely changes the story of Brian and Ingrid that was where I started... Ingrid and Paul are siblings.. and Paul has been lost since they were little more than children....the 'piece of Ingrid' he took with him, that makes her distant still.. I was going to turn that into a key but I never got there.  I need to brainstorm on paper but I never end up doing it more than just in my head.  It's been something like four years running and this  story seems to add to itself when I'm not looking but hardly ever when I actually WANT to make progress with it.  Even the title keeps feeling false.. like someday it will pop into my head and I'll know it is true, but it hasn't happened yet, so I just keep calling it the Magpie story in my head when really that is just Ingrid's nickname, and the story is so much more.

I wanted to read the Auster book again before I started.  I just remembered that was the kickpoint last time.  Something was reminding me of that book.. I bought it, read a few chapters but then got sucked into something else.  It's a slim volume.  In the Cities of Coin and Spice by  Valente made me think of the Auster book, which made me think of the writing project, which made me run in mental circles ruminating on what it was that I was trying to coalesce...

I should investigate a light for over the washing machine, even a stickup one... Esme forgot her necklace in her pants pocket last night and I had to dig through the wet clothes mid cycle with her to find it.  It was almost stuck around the washing machine agitator and was stuck partially in one of the holes in the bottom of the wash-basin... hard to get it out but we managed and it didn't even break.  So hard to see in there, though.

Made four mood playlists on my music... Deep, Rise, Bang and Scrape.   I need one more, a shortened group of Rise and Bang to make something like Fly.  I'm looking forward to getting my favorite song in the mail to add in.  I used to listen on Spotify and put those all in but after they became subscriber or you don't see anything at all (instead of subscribe not to see ads), I haven't been back.

Super simple purple sleeveless

Two down and a few more to go. I made this super simple purple sleeveless dress tonight while Mark was stewing chili. Esme had said she liked this dress at Niddle Noddle quite a bit, so we found a fabric similar to it when we were in town today. I omitted the sleeves of her regular pattern and made it a single button overlap closure instead of a zipper, to keep it cool. She says it fits well.

I think I have a few other things to plan - a pair of pants from the brown/blue flower fabric she chose and she has asked me for a cat doll with green eyes - which I have stalled on in favor of getting real clothes made. I like the fact that I was able to make good use of the machine these past two days - sitting down and actually DOING the job is only about an hour or two, but getting myself up to the task of sitting down and devoting that hour or so, that is usually the hard part. There are so many other things clamoring for attention, but the sewing is very rewarding.

A new-to-me blog I like : Bliss by mrs. french I have already gleaned some beautiful ideas from her inspirational pictures.

I discovered an early 1900s artist Virginia Frances Sterrett, who created beautiful art nouveau (almost Japanesque) woodblocks and paintings for several fairy tale/mythology books in the early 1920s. I read the tale of Blondine at archive.org while Esme was napping yesterday and loved it, although it is simple it would still be just a bit much for her, mostly length. Several of the Sterrett artworks look much like things I have drawn in the past - her turtle especially, and the gorgeous dropback of Prosperine's choice whether to eat the pomegranate or not in Tanglewood Tales. They have been reprinted into paperbacks on Amazon, along with Arabian Nights, also illustrated by her. I should probably put those on our list for Christmas if they are still available.

---ramble----

I did buy a few books recently - a crop science book is coming in the mail, as well as a grisly but beautifully illustrated version of Grimms Fairy Tales from the 1940s. I looked it up on Abebooks expecting it to be outrageous and found a copy that said 'good' and listed all the right info for surprisingly cheap - I will see if I am astounded or disappointed in about a week. I went seeking a specific type of copy because, in my above-mentioned reading and Mark's trying to remember specifics of Hansel and Gretel, I realized our collection contained a nice volume of Hans Christen Anderson and a 1950s text-only Arabian Nights but not any Grimm at all! I thought: Esme's education will be lacking! *sarcasm* but honestly, there is a bit of truth in that. In three years when she is wanting something to pore over, we will have some things with beautiful pictures and stories that have historically enchanted generations.

This one, if it proves to be what it claims to be, will be the non-politically correct Grimms which we will have quite a bit more to talk about on as parents but are the copies we remember reading before they were 'cleaned up for the public' sometime after that. As I've said before, it feels like I was raised in another era compared to nearly everyone else 'my age'. The world I grew up in was nothing-new and passed-me-down so the 1920-1940 books and comics I was reading in the 1970s were not 'special' at the time, they were what we had and if you didn't rip the pages you could read them and not have to stare out the window because the library was far away and new books were few and far between. We also had a wood burning potbelly stove we hung mittens up on to dry in the winter, candle light when (often) the electricity went out and a pumphandle in the bathroom for the water there but running water in the kitchen. It was an interesting place to grow up in at the time, and doing so helped foster so many things I find interesting now. I also notice, at times, that the older language in the books I read at the time still follows me now in later life.


Dora Deane 1915 book at Gutenberg
I had a copy of this at the age of eleven or so, and I remember it made an impression on me similar to Oliver Twist or The Secret Garden or Cast Upon the Breakers did as well at the time.

Thursday morning

I have to be at work in an hour - have had a lazy day and a half off of work - and a turnaround shift tonight (close and then back twelve hours later).

Esme has been cute this morning, asking me to draw sheep on her easel and showing me a few new words of hers 'pants' being the one I am happiest about. She loves to tell me her cup is 'empty' now and everything else she can think of, like the clothes hamper, my coffee cup, a bucket etc... I got drug by my pants across the house, up the stairs and across the upstairs in order to give her a diaper change. I'll be glad when she starts using words for things like that!

I've got one dress entirely finished except for noticed a problem with the skirt :( Have to take it back off and try it again.

Mark went to town while I did laundry and gave Esme her applesauce and bread. She loves applesauce or yogurt with a piece of bread and a drink in between her breakfast and lunch. Especially because she doesn't eat as much breakfast as she used to - just a quick bite with some milk and she's off running until snacktime!

Now it's time to get dressed for work while Mark makes pizza for Esme and him. He said I gave her a bath and got her all clean and now he is going to get pizza everywhere so I have to give her another bath tonight when I get home (hehe) - if she's awake!

rambling

The dilemma: I can make really complicated, original creatures. That is an ability, and the end products are very satisfying to have as an accomplishment. However, they take up so many hours, and so much handwork - that it would take me months to create one, then another month to repeat the work to the same quality. Also, the kind of work I do (hand-stitching) isn't something many others are willing to do, or so it seems. Especially complicated >20 pieces projects. Just making a clear pattern on how to make (dragon, kangaroo, etc.) is also difficult when the project is so complex. I also don't like to put out 'lower quality' objects into my shop - but they seem to be the ones that sell. That is, the simpler projects posted more often grab more attention than the strange and complex ones, many months apart.

*sigh* well back to making bird pincushions for the flea market.