Tuesday Project Roundup: More Polka Dots!

Finally, here are some halfway-decent photos of the vintage-style blouse I made a couple of weeks ago. It was fast and fun but I made it in cheap polyester print from JoAnn, so I think that is making me like it less than I would if I had made it in something a little nicer.

I do love the button-back detail, though. I have to thank this sewing blog for telling me how to put on a button-back blouse by yourself (button the middle two buttons and pull it over your head, then reach up and down to get the top and bottom ones). Genius! Who says living alone is inconvenient?

One final note: I debated looking for an actual vintage pattern, rather than paying full price for a new one, but then I read that the pattern manufacturer donates a portion of all sales to Ally Cat Allies. Sold!

Minus The Scotch (For Now)

Today is the first day that I'll be working from my new office (!). Just like Peggy Olson, I'm moving up as a copywriter. Unlike her, I don't have booze and paper cups in my desk drawer. Yet.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. On this day in 1932, Amelia Earhart took off for her solo flight across the Atlantic. She was the first woman--and the second person, period--to do so.

2. Toby has been getting more comfortable on his daily jaunts outside, which means he's getting more adventurous. Last night he discovered that he could run really fast up and down the lawn. He's still being good 90% of the time, but it's nerve-wracking. My nerves are wracked.

3. You know how I sometimes link to the Big Picture photoblog? There's a new blog puts funny captions on pictures from there: The Big Caption.

Stack Those Lions!

The week's almost over, right?

I Like These

T-shirts with book covers on them? OK! These are all from Out of Print Clothing (there are men's styles, too!).

Tuesday Project Roundup: Polka Dots!

I still need to get a picture of the blouse I talked about last week (which is also polka-dotted), but it's dark AGAIN this morning so here's a picture of the project after that, a polka dot skirt.


I found this fabric at Yellow Bird Fabrics and used a vintage pattern from my mom's collection. It's not a really fitted pattern so I had no problem riding my bike in it.

Toby, as you can see, is unimpressed. He just wants to go back outside. (That's the story here Chez Meowing at any given time, actually: at 8:00 last night, 9:00 last night, 11:00 last night, 5:00 this morning, right now, etc.)

Toby Says:

"Look at me! I'm OUTSIDE!"

"I'm not in my veranda!"

"I can watch birds!"


"I can roll and do other cute things so my mama won't suspect that I'm getting ready to chase the birds!"

(Karen says: No birds have been harmed in Toby's outside adventures. But I feel bad that the quail are so tame after three years and now I have to shoo them off when he's out. However, Toby > quail.)

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Since it looks as if the last frost danger might be behind us, I stopped at Western Garden yesterday and got some heirloom tomato starts and some non-toxic methods of snail control. Then I was nearly overwhelmed by my own smugness--good thing I wasn't driving a Prius.

1a. I am riding my bike to work today, though.

2. It was Irving Berlin's birthday this week, and the Writer's Almanac told us this about him:
He came to New York City with his family when he was five, and when he was eight his father died. That was the end of his formal education. He never learned to read or write music, and he never learned to play in any key but F sharp.
Incredible! This is the man who wrote just about every showtune I know (other than the score of The Music Man).

Want To Travel Europe Vicariously?

My work friend "Josie," who took the wine class with me and is all kinds of awesome, has QUIT (slightly less awesome, although it was to move) and is now taking the summer to travel Europe with her husband. Follow her adventures on her awesome blog.

She started her travels in London this week, and guess what? She got to go to T.S.Eliot's grave in East Coker! I am very jealous.

Speaking Of Styles From The 40s

I started thinking about Raymond Chandler yesterday and all the women's outfits he described. They're really fantastic--"a brown linen suit with a pimento-colored scarf," a white suit with delphinium blue gloves and hat--but this one is the clear winner:

She was searing a white wool skirt, a burgundy silk blouse and a black velvet overjacket with short sleeves. Her hair was a hot sunset. She wore a golden topaz bracelet and topaz earrings and a topaz dinner ring in the shape of a shield. Her fingernails matched her blouse exactly. She looked as if it would take a couple of weeks to get her dressed.

Tuesday Project Roundup: Should I Attempt Pants?

I have a finished project for this week (a blouse from this pattern, to go with pencil skirts), but it was too dark last night to get a good picture with my toy camera. So instead, let's talk about pants:

That blouse pattern is very 40s, which is an era I love only for Raymond Chandler, but it and some sewing blogs I've found have had me considering a pair of high-waisted 1940's button trousers.

I have avoided making pants because of difficulty fitting two curved tubes (vs. one mostly straight tube for a skirt), but I'm also fairly confident that Simplicity patterns fit me well. With that in mind, there's this re-print:

Except it uses a zipper closure instead of buttons, which as I understand it is a modern tweak (it was considered unfeminine to have pants that zipped--and a fly was definitely out!).

I could also go full-on vintage, with something like this...
...but I think the potential for fit issues goes up exponentially.

I'm probably only considering pants because of the STUPID WEATHER, which should be warmer again by the weekend. So maybe I'll stew on the pants idea for a fall project.

Next Up: Stealing Money Out Of My Purse And Taking The Car Without Permission

Toby will be three in less than a month, so in cat years that means he's anywhere from 18 to 28 (the internet has no clear answer on this). It also means that he's suddenly decided he wants to go OUTSIDE.

He's been an inside cat here for two years and his foster mom said that he had been inside before that, but he caught the call of the wild last Monday and started charging out the door whenever I opened it. In an effort to control the situation a little, I started putting a collar on him and letting him out for short bursts. He LOVES it.

[No picture because I am terrified of leaving him unsupervised for even 30 seconds.]

I am all kinds of conflicted--I always planned on letting him out (with supervision) when I had a yard with a secure fence, but the apartment is open in front and back to cars and other yards and more scary things. He's being really good about staying close, but I think this tiny taste of freedom is going to go to his head. But I don't think there's any going back now....

Friday Unrelated Information

1. The Writer's Almanac was all about Hemingway earlier this week. It talked about his life in Cuba and how "The Old Man and the Sea" was originally going to be part of something called The Land, Sea, and Air Book. I wish I could have seen that.

2. Meowmania! Visit the link and start clicking.

Thing #3 Starts Today

I am FINALLY instituting my spending freeze...it's a little sad that I meant to do it for three months at the beginning of the year, and here I am a week into May hoping I can make it a month. (Why a week into May? The local fabric store had an anniversary sale and, um, so did J. Crew.)

So from now until June 6, I will not buy shoes, ready-made clothing, or ANY fabric*, nor things for the house that I want but aren't essential (a desk chair is the exception, if I find one, since it's on the list.)

I hope I can do it!

And that is definitely a first-world worry...


*I had originally said "no really expensive fabric" but I have enough yardage stacked up to be sewing through July without buying any more, expensive or not.

I Have No Words

It's not health food...do they think...whose idea...that URL...I mean...just NO.

(This came in the mail yesterday with the grocery ads. It was so inexplicable I had to take a picture of it.)

Tuesday Project Roundup: Pencil Skirt #3

Here's the third variation on a pencil skirt, with a shaped waistband. (I love the fits of that Burda pattern; can you tell?) This is an orange pique that I bought thinking it would be a top, but then I caught Skirt Mania so now it's a skirt.
(My legs really aren't blue in real life, I promise. This camera is really temperamental in low light and with the color orange.)

"no guarantees in this life"

I probably think about the end of the world more than is healthy. I remember seeing Mad Max as a kid and obsessing over what I would do in that situation. (I still cant watch disaster movies.) Between unseasonable weather, bomb attempts in New York, oil spills, etc., I was thinking about it again more than I probably should. So I had to remember this poem:

Yes, by William Stafford

It could happen any time, tornado,
earthquake, Armageddon. It could happen.
Or sunshine, love, salvation.

It could you know. Thats why we wake
and look out--no guarantees
in this life.

But some bonuses, like morning,
like right now, like noon,
like evening.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Oh, this weather...at least it will be a good weekend to stay inside and sew. I've finished the third pencil skirt and am moving into a polka dot phase. Maybe someday it will even be warm enough to wear everything I've been making!

2. I can't think of anything to cook lately. I think of things that sound good and then once they're made I don't like them. Maybe this is the weather's fault, too.

3. On a less complain-y note, I found a site that makes fun of the worst science fiction covers you've seen. Like this:

You're Making Me Re-Quote Hemingway, Weather

I posted this at the beginning of April two years ago when it was merely cold and rainy, so now that it is NEARLY MAY and there is SNOW I think I am justified in re-quoting:

Sometimes the heavy cold rains would beat it [spring] back so that it would seem that it would never come and that you were losing a season out of your life...You expected to be sad in the fall. Part of you died each year when the leaves fell from the tree and their branches were bare against the wind and the cold, wintry light. But you knew there would always be the spring, as you knew the river would flow again after it was frozen. When the cold rains kept on and killed the spring, it was as though a young person had died for no reason.

Sometimes, Work Is Work

I like trying to figure out how quotes by fiction writers apply to commercial writers. This one's by Ursula LeGuin:

I am going to be rather hard-nosed and say that if you have to find devices to coax yourself to stay focused on writing, perhaps you should not be writing what you're writing. And if this lack of motivation is a constant problem, perhaps writing is not your forte. I mean, what is the problem? If writing bores you, that is pretty fatal. If that is not the case, but you find that it is hard going and it just doesn't flow, well, what did you expect? It is work; art is work.

Tuesday Project Roundup: Not A Pencil Skirt

I got a fancy new purse for spring and I didn't want to just throw it in my wire bike basket, so of course I had to sew a liner for the basket. I just made up a pattern and used some fabric on hand--a big vintage print and leftover pillow backing fabric. (When everything you own is either aqua, turquoise, or orange, all your fabric coordinates!)

Now I can carry my purse and it won't get wire marks:


And look what else fits in there!
I was putting it on and he came to investigate and jumped right in. No, I did not try taking him for a ride.

Today, We Ride

If it's not going to be like Copenhagen, maybe it will be like this:

Lady parade, coming through!

Friday Unrelated Information

1. I got caught up on the new Glee episodes last night and my favorite hair insult ever was in the latest one (the cheerleading coach is always making fun of the teacher running glee club's hair):
"I thought I smelled cookies wafting from the ovens of the little elves who live in your hair."

2. My friend Kara told me about a store that sells apparel fabrics here in town and now I can't wait to check it out! I am really excited about the thought of getting suiting and silks and nice things in person instead of online.

Thing #20: Find A Perfume

Thing #20 on the 30 Things is done, and the winner is L'Heure Bleue, by Guerlain. Created in 1912, this is described by Guerlain "a bouquet of roses softened with iris, violet and vanilla," but you have to go read some of the reviews on Basenotes: "An old woman sobbing softly in a church" (?), "a mixture of White Diamonds and baby powder" (!), "thawing earth and sulking, hardy blossoms." Apparently, it is a love it or hate it sort of smell.

To me it smells mostly like violets (I'm no perfume expert), but expensive violets--kind of how I imagine someone's apartment in Paris would smell. It seems calm, and kind, and confident, and those are all good things to be when you're 30.

This Week's Poem

"the door to the invisible," from Back Roads to Far Places by Lawrence Ferlinghetti

the door to the invisible
is visible

the hidden door

is not hidden

i walk through it forever

not seeing it

i am what i am

and will be

what i will be

Tuesday Project Roundup: Pencil Skirt #2

I'm on a roll! Here's a repeat of last week's skirt in a different print (from here):
I love this silhouette but it's not the most practical one for walking fast, riding a bike,* running away from zombies, etc., so I'm going to have to move on as soon as I get skirt #3 from this pattern finished.

*Obviously we did not die on the ride to work yesterday, but we did get two honks, and not approving ones. I'm sure cyclists don't get honked at in Copenhagen.

It's A Big Deal When You're Sedentary

Today is the first bike ride to work! I met up with my bike-and-knitting-friend Kara on Saturday morning for some practice in a neighborhood parking lot.
(Oh hai, do I look like I know what I'm doing? Because I'm going to be on the road with the cars soon!)

We circled and stopped and started and amused/puzzled the neighbors to no end, and then we rode to get brunch. It was pretty much like this video. Let's hope the Monday commute is, too.

Wonderful Copenhagen from Copenhagenize on Vimeo.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. I found a Michael Chabon quote about being a grown-up that I liked a lot:
We are accustomed to repeating the cliche, and to believing, that “our most precious resource is our children.” But we have plenty of children to go around, God knows, and as with Doritos, we can always make more. The true scarcity we face is of practicing adults, of people who know how marginal, how fragile, how finite their lives and their stories and their ambitions really are, but who find value in this knowledge, even a sense of strange comfort, because they know their condition is universal, is shared.

2. I know this has made the rounds already, but for some reason I can't get enough of it. Inexplicable.

Yes We're Going To A Party, Party

It's my mom's birthday today! Happy birthday to a great mom!

More Background On The Skirt Obsession

Another reason I'm suddenly into skirts, as stated yesterday, deserved its own post: I've started watching the TV show Glee. A sewing blog I read linked to another blog devoted entirely to one Glee character's outfits, which were mostly cardigans and skirts. Without having seen the show, I started following the outfit blog for some fashion inspiration.

Fortunately, my friend Kara found out that I had never actually seen Glee and she loaned me her DVDs of the first part of season one--which I watched in a week. Guys, I love Glee! There's music! Unpopular kids! Insecurity! Drama club! Gay teens! I LIVED this in high school. And I can finally think about it and not cringe.

Tuesday Project Roundup: Pencil Skirt #1

Hooray, a project that fits and has big pink flowers on it!
(Toby wanted me to get him and his heater in the picture.)

This is one of my new favorite patterns: It fits, there are no fussy details (Cynthia Rowley, I'm looking at you), and I can make it in about 3 hours. In fact, I'm working on a second skirt from this same pattern this week and have a third one planned out, too.

After being more pro-dress than pro-skirt for the last couple of years, I'm really into skirts suddenly. I think that's because I realized that skirts give you far more options for wildly mixing colors and patterns.

Today's Quote

...is by Galileo. Yay science!

I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with senses, reason and intellect has intended us to forego their use and by some other means to give us knowledge which we can attain by them. He would not require us to deny sense and reason in physical matters which are set before our eyes and minds by direct experience or necessary demonstrations.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. I know why so many writers are alcoholics. It's been so busy lately that I've had a hard time shutting my brain down at night. I have also discovered the Negroni. Coincidence? If it stays busy, before you know it I'll move on to pink gin and then probably just a straw.

2. Do you need a panflute? Find out below.

Happy Birthday, Barbara Kingsolver

I have liked everything from her that I've read. Maybe instead of reading Dune for the nth time again, I should go to the library in her honor and get one of the short story collections I haven't read.

Quarterly Report: 30 Things

It's been three months since I put up my list for this year, so I thought I'd report on it. Seven things are done or going well, I've already had to modify a couple other, and the rest are pending. Commentary on successes, modifications, and challenges below:

1. Put the money that I was using to pay off debt into savings for a down payment on some sort of house, townhouse, or condo.
Yes, I am doing this every month--Toby needs a yard to play in. I'd like to start channeling some extra money in there in addition to the main savings.

3. Stop buying non-essentials (ready-made clothes, really expensive fabric, shoes, magazines, etc.) for three months (months TBD)
I'm cutting this back to a month at a time with the option to extend it to the full 3 if I can get back into the frugal habit. (I think that May and June will be the months--I want to start after I get my tax return, which is getting spent on things like vacuums and desk chairs and end tables.)

6. Buy a living room chair--armless, small-ish, but comfy. This will help with seating to accomplish #22.
Done!

7. Sew new pillow covers for the living room.
Done!

8. Buy a vacuum.
As soon as I get my tax return.

9. Refresh my yoga skills and then...
10. Start doing yoga once or twice a week.
I'm going to try to get to the intro class this month, then get into the habit of an evening class in May.

13. November-March, walk or ride to work at least twice a month. April-September, up it to at least four times a month.
I get a resounding FAIL on walking from November to March--I think it only happened once. And my 4 times/month goal in April isn't going to happen, but I will try to ride at least once. Fortunately, I have a bike buddy who works across the street from me to get me going.

14. Eat at one new restaurant a month--any meal, but it has to be somewhere I haven't been before.
So far, so good! Between Vegas and fun work lunches with my bike buddy, I'm doing just fine. And I'm counting the bar at Bambara as a restaurant for this month.

18. Stop biting my fingernails (I mean it this year).
Really, how hard should this be? It's not so much the nail as the skin around the nail that I destroy, and the more stressed I get the more that happens. Maybe I will try a manicure next week.

19. Wear more colors of lipstick than "pink" and "darker pink."
Um, not only have I not been wearing new colors, I've pretty much stopped re-applying it after all the morning coffee at work.

20. Find a perfume I want to wear regularly.
Samples of some classic Guerlain and a new Chanel scent are on their way!

21. Stock and maintain a home bar and keep it stocked. No drinking it up and not replacing it. TAX RETURN = BOOZE. Hooray!

22. Have more people over to the apartment--not huge parties, but a few people for dinner, or drinks before a restaurant, etc.
Yes! Between a wine class (see below) and the three attempts to see Sherlock Holmes, Toby has had lots of after-work visitors.

23. Learn more about wine.
I learned about value wines of Italy in January and that was really fun. I really want to take one of the classes on French wine later this year.

Tuesday Project Roundup: Not Easy, Green, Etc.

I can't say this is my favorite project ever, but at least it's wearable:

It's another Cynthia Rowley for Simplicity pattern, but I have to complain that the fit is really inconsistent from pattern to pattern: Cutting the same size in all three, the yellow dress was way too big in the bust, this tank from last year was also a little loose, but this tunic ended up really snug in places.

Unfortunately, it's easier to take something in than to add fabric that you've already cut off*, so even though I planned this as a dress it ended up as a tunic. (I, ah, probably need to start walking more and stop eating lemon bars for breakfast, too.)

But it's wearable, and it's done, and I do like this part of the pattern a lot--that decorative piece around the slit has a backing of sky blue, for just a little contrast:




*Say it with me now: MEASURE TWICE, CUT ONCE!

Probably Wrong, But Funny

(Click for big. Not as wrong--or as funny--as this, though.)

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Have you seen this story of the World Rally Championship in Mexico? You need to read it because it's awesome:
Bill Caswell, an unemployed Chicago racing freak, entered the Mexico round of the World Rally Championship in a 1991 BMW 318i that he found on Craigslist. The car cost $500...he found a loophole in the FIA rules that let him enter a twenty-year-old car in the same event as guys like Ken Block and former F1 driver Kimi Raikkonen.
He gets mooned! He almost falls off a bridge! He finishes third in his class!

2. Haven't we all wanted to see Michael Buble being stalked by a velociraptor? Now we can, thanks to bubleraptor.tumblr.com.

A Poem For When It Is NOT Snowing

I am not even going to talk about this snowstorm. Instead, here's a poem from The Writer's Almanac this morning about springtime and Easter.

The Saints of April

by Todd Davis

Coltsfoot gives way to dandelion,
plum to apple blossom. Cherry fills
our woods, white petals melting
like the last late snow. Dogwood's
stigmata shine with the blood
of this season. How holy
forsythia and redbud are
as they consume their own
flowers, green leaves running
down their crowns. Here is
the shapeliness of bodies
newly formed, the rich cloth
that covers frail bones and hides
roots that hold fervently
to this dark earth.

--For Jack Ridl

Manicure SOS (First-World Problem)

Does anyone reading this get manicures and have a place to recommend? I don't know what it's going to take to get me to stop destroying my hands, but that might be a place to start. (Of course, I would feel too embarrassed at the state of my hands right now to go to a manicurist, so I'd have to try to get them fixed up a little beforehand. Kind of like cleaning the house before the cleaning lady gets there.)

*Doesn't that post title look like it could be a song title?

Tuesday Project Roundup: Prints Charming

Groan! Sorry, I only have a pile of spring fabrics this week. The current project has to be turned into a tunic instead of a dress because of length and fit issues, so I wasn't very excited to finish it Saturday.
But as soon as I can finish the now-a-tunic, I can make those pink flowers on top into a pencil skirt. The bottom fabric is for another skirt and the two in the middle will be dresses.

It's Monday

It's going to be a busy week at work, but at least I can listen to Otis Redding knocking it out of the park with his cover of "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction."



Otis knows what it's like to be unsatisfied! He knows how it feels to have to write websites when you just want to shop online! Sing it, Otis!

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Life has posted some previously unpublished pictures of Steve McQueen from 1963--"enlarge" will take you to the full gallery, which is well worth it:


2. My office started a March Madness bracket thing, which I don't understand at all. I do understand a contest between cake and pie, though. (Pie for the win!) March Madness: Cake vs. Pie.

3. I don't get a newspaper any more, as you might have guessed from the lack of all political content over the last six months, but yay, a health care bill passed! I really didn't expect it to.There's a good Paul Krugmen op-ed from the NYTimes to read here.

A Poem For Thinking About Stuff

Lately I've been going crazy shopping for spring fabric and thinking about shoes to buy and things to get for the apartment (more than usual, I mean), so today's poem is about things.

Things

Liesel Mueller

What happened is, we grew lonely
living among the things,
so we gave the clock a face,
the chair a back,
the table four stout legs
which will never suffer fatigue.

We fitted our shoes with tongues
as smooth as our own
and hung tongues inside bells
so we could listen
to their emotional language,

and because we loved graceful profiles
the pitcher received a lip,
the bottle a long, slender neck.

Even what was beyond us
was recast in our image;
we gave the country a heart,
the storm an eye,
the cave a mouth
so we could pass into safety.

I Know It's Called "Before," But A Lot Of "After" Was Left Out

I finally watched Coco Before Chanel last night and it was about what I expected: More romance than fashion, with lots of montages. It started out pretty well but ended with Chanel being reflected in endless mirrors while models who were 2010-skinny put on a fashion show. I know there was more to the "after" of her career than that.

I enjoyed that the film's first half presented her as so cynical about love...until "the love of her life" died and the penultimate montage made it seem like she spent the rest of her life mourning him. (What about Stravinsky? Or that German officer she met in WWII? Talk about a pretext for a film.)

But it was enjoyable, if only to see some sewing and fabric on film. My favorite part was near the end, when she unrolled a bolt of powder-pink boucle suiting in that same "my lover is dead and I'm sewing through my grief" montage. I want some of that boucle!

Tuesday Project Roundup: If You Get An Outfit You Can Be A Yogi, Too

When I wrote "Refresh my yoga skills" on my list of 30 Things, I never really did the math on when I actually last did yoga. Well, it turns out that "in college" doesn't mean just a few years ago anymore, and after a decade without yoga I think I need to amend #9 to be "Learn yoga skills all over again."

Fortunately, I have a way to carry my mat to class now, assuming I can make myself start going:

This was a fun, fast project made entirely of fabrics I had around the house. The pockets around the bottom, the strap, and the lining were left over from the pillows I made before Christmas, and the body fabric was a filing cabinet cover I made when I moved here that was recently retired in the Post-breakup Living Room Re-do of '09.

I have to give special thanks to my crafty friend Kara, who inspired me with her bag last month and then suggested this pattern (a free Amy Butler download). Thanks, Kara!

Two Years Of Toby

Today marks two years of Toby in my life! He's the best cat and the best friend and very probably the love of my life.*

Here he is on day 3 (so small!):

And here he is on day 728:
I love this cat so much. Here's to many more days.

*I'm also celebrating two years of being a crazy cat lady; can you tell?

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Today in 2003--seven years ago--W announced the beginning of the Iraq War. Seven years is longer than our involvement in any war except Vietnam, but don't worry: The War in Afghanistan has just tied that (8 years, 5 months).

2. Moving right along, this set of pictures of Paris in the springtime will get you singing "April in Paris" or "I Love Paris [in the springtime]."

3. It will be bike-riding season soon. I see many more devoted riders out already. I'm always intimidated by the thought of riding again but then I get over it.

Because The Internet Is Great

I found a new site devoted to pictures of Mick Jagger (with an awesome URL)--what better thing to share on a Thursday?

Serious Mick.

Good Mick.


Houndstooth Mick!

You're welcome.

Next Time You're Around A Typewriter

I just learned two more pangrams (sentences that contain all the letters of the alphabet) in addition to "The quick brown fox" and thought I'd share:

1. Viewing quizzical abstracts mixed up hefty jocks.
2. Back in my quaint garden jaunty zinnias vie with flaunting phlox.

Now you can impress your friends while trying out different typewriters.

Tuesday Project Roundup: So Much For Finishing Before Spring

I know that we will have a few more snow storms before the weather really starts getting warm, but the equinox is Saturday, and I don't think I will have sleeves and button bands by then.

Oh, well--as my mother said when I complained that this sweater seemed like it was taking forever, "It seems like thin yarn."

Let's Hear It For The First World!

Yesterday morning the Liberty of London for Target merchandise hit stores, and now I understand the mentality that leads to stampedes for discount DVD players. Fortunately, it was a Sunday in Utah so no one was rioting for floral-printed home goods, but I ended up going to four different Targets anyway. My friend Kara and I were on the phone comparing selections between Targets: "I'm at Jordan Landing and they have candles and stationery!" "Centerville has a lot of dresses!"

Yes, driving miles and miles in a car, to get stuff made in China, that I don't really need but was heavily hyped and marketed*...yay, America!


*I am happy with what I bought, though. And I appreciate some good hyping; I work in advertising. Besides, I focused mostly on home stuff like a teapot and dishes. So very practical!

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Sherlock Holmes was watched successfully last and and it was delightful--definitely worth the wait(s). The story was more faithful than I could have hoped, with actual lines of dialogue lifted straight from the books, and even though they made Irene Adler his girlfriend (and dressed her up like a romanticized prostitute from the Wild West*), most of the Holmes adaptations do that. Besides, I have the BBC for more accurate costume dramas--this one combined my literary crush and my actor crush. Enough said.

2. *Irene Adler was a lady marrying nobility in the one story in which she appears. I don't think she would have chosen fuchsia satin.

3. Happy birthday, Jack Kerouac!

Third Time's The Charm

My work friend and I are going to try one last time to see Sherlock Holmes in a theater tonight, so wish us luck.

And since I'm talking about movies, check out the gallery of movie posters "if they were honest." I really love the one for UP:

Wednesday Project Roundup: Travel Knitting

Even though I am still slowly knitting my way through the not-so-elaborate cabled sweater, it was too bulky to take with me on a carry-on to the beach. So I started a new project, also very popular in the knitting world--a short sleeve cardigan from a free pattern here.

I'm using the yarn I got in the fall to make a different sweater that I just got too bored with (it was a spring color anyway). So I unraveled what I had done and started again and got about six inches of the new pattern knit over the weekend.

Ultimately, it will look something like this:

Tuesday Vacation Report

I'm back from the beach and, while it was a little chilly and I was fighting a head cold, it was nice to be by the ocean.

It was especially nice to hear it at night. One of my favorite chapters of The Gastronomical Me describes MFK Fisher's visit to the coast of Mexico, and she has this to say about the ocean:
"I slept like a cat all night, dreaming good dreams in my well-being, but hearing the waves when I wanted to through the dreams."

(I brought some vacation knitting, so I'll put up a Project Roundup tomorrow.)

Two Pretty Things For Monday

Jackie Kennedy and the Taj Mahal:

And closer:

Found via Life again, from her trip to India in 1962. Lots of great pinks in that set.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Monday was Holi, a holiday I knew nothing about. According to Wikipedia, "Holi, or Holli, also called the Festival of Colors, is a spring festival celebrated by Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs and others." I like spring and colors. Read more here.

2. The slideshow name says it all (and the captions are funny): A History of Obama Feigning Interest in Mundane Things

3. And finally:

Let's Talk About Accessories

Specifically, big sunglasses: I found the archives of Life magazine last Saturday and got sucked into looking at pictures of Jackie Kennedy, whose trademark (after Camelot) was big sunglasses.
Then I saw this stylish lady on The Sartorialist yesterday, who is also making me want to talk about leopard print, as well:

I haven't worn big sunglasses in a few years because I think there's a risk, with short hair, of them looking like this. But now I am reconsidering.

Maybe The Universe Is Telling Me I'd Really Hate This Movie And, Therefore, Doing Me A Favor

I tried to go to the Sherlock Holmes movie at Brewvies again last night (a week after my work friend and I got to see five minutes of it before the film broke) and, as you might guess from the title of this, no deal. When I had checked the schedule online Monday night there was an 8:00 showing, but when we got to the theater it had been pushed back to 9:30 to accommodate a special event for Engineers Without Borders.

Dammit, Brewvies, as much as I want to continue liking you, you're making it really difficult. You should probably consider hiring projectionists who aren't so stoned they put the film in wrong. Perhaps updating your website a little sooner than the day of an event would be a good idea, too. (And universe, I know the film is in no way faithful to the Conan Doyle stories, but I really like Robert Downey, Jr. And now this has become a challenge.)

Tuesday Project Roundup: One More For The Beach

I probably should have spent my time finishing a sweater to wear instead of sewing a spring tunic (the latest reports are predicting rain in California), but I used the trip as an excuse for some more Liberty of London fabric.
I made my favorite Simplicity pattern (for about the sixth time) and it was delightful to work with the Liberty print--so much color and detail.
I bought my fabric before I saw that Target was launching a similar print, so I hope no one asks me if I got it at Target. And I hope I can layer a sweater over the sleeves easily.

Like Christmas Morning

Last week started looking up when I discovered nearly 30 full-length Mystery Science Theater 3000 episodes on Google Video*. Thirty of them! That I don't have to wait to arrive via Netflix!

Over the weekend I was finally able to see Space Mutiny, featuring the many nicknames of the hero (seriously, watch it):


And I watched Final Sacrifice, featuring the sidekick...ROWSDOWER:


I love this show so much. Toby is affronted by my laughter in the evenings.