Planet Nice Crafts

Yes, the last post was July 27 – I think that is amazing. What happened? Well, starting a new job and Fall semester everyone. Fall semester 2019 has been the semester I have worked the largest number of hours (20-25 a week) while still taking 4 credits and trying to save the planet. Good things have been happening during this ‘soon to be ending’ semester. At the beginning of it, just when I thought I was finished with sewing for the theater, I discovered that they really needed my help and I was challenged to carve   out as many hours as I could from an already full schedule. Here is my favorite piece I think I have ever sewn for the Theatre Department, it was the main character’s coat for the Fall production “The Little Prince”: I went to see the play and didn’t really understand it even though it is considered a children’s play, but I was very pleased how durable the coat was despite all of the actor’s movements. It hung beautifully, not really a credit to me but to the...

Well, because PBS did NOT ask me to do a guest post on their blog for Civilizations, I am just going to have to do one here 😊 The first 2 episodes have aired and are available at http://www.pbs.org/civilizations/home/ . I thought they were fantastic.  As promised, the show delivers a global perspective from Mesoamerica Mexico to Prehistoric Spain to Ancient Greece, Italy, Egypt, Jordan, and China. T he photography, both of the close-up details and the landscape with the help of drones, is breathtaking. Just from my traveling experiences, it may be better than actually being there meaning to watch these remote, historic places from the comforts of home so that you can focus on the actual objects of interest without having to worry about anything else is kind of a treat.  The “big” pieces of art, no matter how early in time they were created, are beautiful and represent the awe-inspiring potential of human achievement in my mind. Other pieces are more haunting such as the ...

Slow but steady progress has been made on the quilt top. The wintry weather has made it easier to seclude myself so a little sewing can be done and a lot of homework 😉. Here is a shot from this weekend’s storm: The column is a decent measure of snowfall! Moving on to the quilt, a few more cutting steps were next and what should have taken 2 minutes led to a full day adventure of sorts. This is where I started off with the focal blocks: But this is what was the ending of the adventure: Can you tell the differences? Actually, looking at it now, I don’t see the mistake as obviously. The next step was to create the angles on the focal blocks, yes more cutting with a dull blade. The 1 st and 3 rd   blocks were cut smoothly without issue, but one of the neurons was not firing correctly that day and I ended up cutting the 2 nd and 4 th blocks the same way instead of mirror images! After some brain muscle flexing, I came up with a rescue plan. Luckily, I saved th...