besides needlework , I'm hooked on sudoku , crosswords and word games , general knowledge quizzes and Mah-jong. I also love reading anything and everything from ancient history / archaeology to light weight chick lit depending on mood . I knit and have just taken up patchwork again also with a new puppy in the house (black Labrador - Jasper (Jazzy) ) lots of country walks . I also belong to a high tech gym which I try to get to a couple of times a week and with DD aged 5 and DS aged 17 am kept very busy !!!!!! Jan
you'd be the first to take me up on the offer! A lot of friends/family complain they need help, but when I offer it, they decline. I think there's something embarrassing for a lot of people to have another person come in and help organize - a pride thing or something. I've thought of getting into the professional organization thing, but there's more to it than just being able to organize stuff! In the meantime, I'll continue working on my own DH and his/our stuff!
As far as needlework goes, besides ccs, I like to knit and crochet (although the cs time usually wins out! :) ), do surface embroidery, know how to do crewel (but prefer not to) and can sew reasonably well. I'm about to venture into "fancy" fabric, i.e. the really shiny, slippery stuff, for a blouse for DD's horse shows. Anyone got any hints? Tia Mary??? ;)
I also *love* to bake/make sweets (and eat the end results!) but cooking meals is better left to DH!
I have been teaching Sunday School for 16 years now and sing in my church choir, was a GS leader and involved with Cub Scouts when the kids were younger.
Other pasttimes include reading (mostly mysteries), riding my horse, watching DD at her horse shows and camping whenever possible (which hasn't been much lately :( ). I used to collect Beany Babies but after I had about a hundred or so I figured that was enough! :)
Keep the booze bottle handy, and throw the kids out unless you want them to learn new words. Wrestling with the shiny stuff usually reduced me to drinking within a few minutes.
After running a business, chasing a 2-year-old, baking a baby, and learning how to cook cheaply for my family (gak), there is no time for anything else--including stitching the model of the pattern I so wanted to get on the market before the end of the year.
I used to organize for fun, but now I do it to keep my sanity.
When I was sewing on the machine with shiny, slippery stuff I found one of the most useful things was to put a piece of thin tissue paper on top of the satiny fabric and sew through both pieces. If it's really bad, you could use one piece on top and another on the bottom. I'm talking about the think kind of tissue that's used in gift boxes. It'll kill your needle rather quickly, but it will help keep the fabric from sliding too much.
LOL! Hm. I currently don't drink booze and don't use nasty words, either (besides which, my kids probably know more nasty words than me---they're 22, 20 & 19!). Am I gonna regret my decision to attempt this project? :)))
forgive my ignorance but does this mean you've got "one in the oven"?
reading... yes, I forgot to add that. See, I had my kiddo and she left the nest 4 years ago. I never imagined I'd have *too much time* on my hands but I do. It really can be a problem emotionally. Still, i look back on the toddler and teen days and am amazed how much I did back then including stitching.
bull! sorry but I totally disagree with people who think that genre fiction is somehow less difficult than literary. Even though I like to imagine I am a literary writer - it's more because I can not write genre fiction! Be good to yourself. You're obviously creative and intelligent and I'm seeing that in just one post.
yeah - just wait until they start badgering you to alter their clothing or sew some kind of costume or..
massive waste of time.
i probably do enough for the both of us. :P
speaking of gumbo - i'm always looking for a good but simple recipe.. (i'm no chef) preferably not lizard - but seafood. Just can't find a place here that really does it right. There was one place - they closed down a few years ago and I can't seem to drag my hubby to Crazy Cajun.
I can't imagine anyone turning down an offer like that! My beloved niece is highly organized and I have her over at least once a year to sort out my kitchen cabinets. She is marvelous and I am grateful for the help. It leaves me more time to stitch!!!
Jais!--a Christmas bairn, whose presence I'm REALLY starting to feel in the fatigue department (I'm not sure, but I think the week-long war with the 2-year-old is contributing).
And I have to tell you--you gave me my first smile all day with that business. lol
My sister-in-law is not a fiction writer. She analyzes literature and writes her analysis (something that simply bores me to tears). She thinks that is a form of creativity, although I kinda think it's a form of regurgitation (but then, isn't it all?).
I can write literary things, but the people whose work I love to read, i.e., Umberto Eco, Neal Stephenson, Tom Wolfe (well, actually, I *can* mimic his voice although it doesn't suit me), Ayn Rand...I just don't think I will ever have the depth of knowledge, the life experience, or the sheer skill to pull all that together like they do. Eco's probably forgotten more stuff than I'll ever know, and while Stephenson's mathematics (_Cryptonomicon_ ) and science/history (_The Baroque Cycle_) are something I enjoy struggling through--well, let's let the word "struggle" say it all.
Genre fiction is just easy for me (or was, before I didn't have time to think up stuff).
On the other hand, the short essay is my favorite form of all, and there are plenty of newspaper essayists who are better than I.
Ah, something to look forward to! Ha! We are in the process of buying a house that needs lots of work, so since I'm the handy one with the power tools...
I actually don't like gumbo, lizard or otherwise. However, you might find something here that's to your liking:
Well, that depends. Do you enjoy sewing more than I do in the first place? That alone might up your patience quotient from a few minutes to an hour. Any sort of machine sewing generally reduces me to profanity unless it's that miraculous once-in-a-blue-moon occurrence where it zips through the machine with no wobbles or troubles at all.
With the nasty slippery stuff, I'd put in ten times as many pins as usual to keep the two pieces unslippably aligned, and guided it through the machine with a death grip. I'm sure Tia Mary has some professional advice for you, but I'll say that if *I* could get a decent-looking slippery shiny blouse out of the process, you can do it, too. Just plan on it taking longer than plain cotton that behaves itself.
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