Misfits of various kinds and how they're beautiful

Blogger is doing some upgrades, with the result that it published a half written post instead of scheduling it for Friday.  I've now retrieved it, completed it and here we go. I wondered how I was getting comments on a post I was still writing! Anyway I think  we're now rebobulated. 

Here's Thursday's outfit, just because. It's the eighteenth century design skirt I showed you when I made it. Unbleached muslin. With the hand painted top. Just wearing what pleases me, because I can.

One good side to having to wear a school uniform for seven long years --  for the rest of your life there's the unfailing pleasure of choosing your outfit every day. Even if it's t-shirt and shorts.

Here's Wednesday's comic relief. The gist: I had the water heater replaced three weeks ago at the condo, handed a  check to Joe, the nice plumber. As of yesterday it still had not been presented. No lost in the mail scenario possible, so..I called.

Office: Good morning, XCX plumbing

Me: I gave Joe a check for $2000, date etc, not yet presented

Office: but key this ur Keith if

Me: excuse me, I can't hear, could you repeat?

Office right over me: URBKEURBKEURBKE

Me: can you please speak into the phone, a bit more slowly?

Office: Is.this.better. can.you. hear.now?

Me: thank you so much, yes

Office: urbkevisiburythis

Me: what?

Office: I  will notify them Uribeheheheurble and they'll $_-$-#call you

Me: They need to find and present the check, it's $2000 out of your income stream.  I don't need a call. (No point in mentioning I've had many days of float on a substantial amount, and I don't assume she grasps the concept of the float)

Office:  crickets, dial tone..

No thank you for being thoughtful enough to alert us, no goodbye. However, first thing  Thursday morning the check clears. Now maybe the permit paperwork will get here. Sigh. Results matter, but a decent phone system would help.  Also manners makyth man. And woman.

Update: check cleared, permit paperwork arrived Thursday. The permits alone, one for plumbing, one for electrical, cost $200. Five minutes work by the inspector. I think I should get into the permitting business.

Today was one of those days where the groceries haven't arrived yet and what to have for lunch. 

The last of the spinach, steamed, the baby Bella mushrooms from the freezer, sauteed, in olive oil, butter and curry leaves, little omelette, mini naan for the lovely juices from the mushrooms. This naan has funny expression, I think he's trolling me. 

Onward. Misfits, last week's packaging out for pickup, very responsible marketing on their part, to take away their specialty packaging

Replaced by this week's order.

I'm enjoying stone fruit this year, evidently a good year. Pluots and nectarines here along with the usual gala apples without which mornings are incomplete. Dessert after lunch will be a piece of whatever fruit is ripest.

Tuna for tuna salad, broccoli to keep up with green vegetables, and a lovely fat little chicken for many meals. I roast then go from there, all kinds of ideas. In this weather, chicken salad sounds good. Especially since mayo is now a staple around here.

This food, organic, interesting, is a big part of feeling well, I believe. Good ingredients, and it's interesting to cook and eat all these colors, just as well, really, since cooking is always there to do.

Here's a great list, showing me I'm living in the lap of luxury

And to all cat people

Happy day everyone, purr with pleasure! Chat with a cat.

Erasure and Persian rugs, Neighborhood Happenings

The Hajii Baba presentation today was a departure from their usual multi slide rug program. It was a scholarly examination of the colonialism and commodification the West has imposed on the art form of the Persian rug. 

This has also enabled the total erasure of identity or credit to the women and children who actually created the rugs, while the men who traded in them grew rich from the rug makers' poorly paid and unrecognized labor. Even Western photographers actually in the process of picturing women and children at work never got their names, just referring to them as "women at a loom" or in generic terms. 

It has also enabled a hierarchy of who has the authority to speak on the art form,  and who commodified it as a luxury item for Western prestigious customers. The notion of white supremacy underlay the assumption that colonial art was being  "rescued" by being taken from the land where it was created.

The pushback is under way, with scholars and others starting to acknowledge that the artisans should be recognized,  that Eastern cultures can curate their own art without  western input, and that there is gross disparity between artisan earnings and that of the middlemen and buyers of their work.

With that preamble, I think the slides speak for themselves.

This was a moving and well researched program, dealing with much more than the beauty of the rugs and the tradition. Politics and agency underlie it all. 

In other news, I finished the skirt!

Here it's completed and pressed

this is how I hem, so the stitches are invisible from the right side

and here you see the overlap at the side, plenty of coverage despite the slit

And this is how it works. Modeled over tights.  First fasten the back, bringing the straps to the front

then fasten the front, bringing the straps round the back.

I'm pleased with it, very nice body to the pleats, nice hang.

And here's the matching fabric I plan to make the pocket from, with the bias tape  for edging. You'll see. This is how the pocket looks

Also while I had a needle handy, I finally figured out how to fix this summer hat which is too big. I found it has this gingham ribbon attached only on one edge, inside the brim.

That was an easy fix. I stitched down the hem leaving a gap,  to create a casing, to thread elastic through, to draw in the brim. Done. Now it fits and I'm wondering why it took years to figure this out. 

In other happenings -- years ago a neighbor friend and I had a purely imaginary neighborhood newsletter, named H--- (name of development) Happenings. Whenever anything interesting happened, we'd check it as a possible feature in H---Happenings.

The latest Happening is the safe delivery of a grandchild to neighbor Gary, after his daughter's complicated pregnancy, mom and baby fine, older siblings very excited. It entailed her going for specialist care to a city hospital quite a distance away, her father going with her. 

He called me last evening,  to update me, and to ask me to coordinate moving two huge bookcases back into the house from the patio.  They were out in the fine weather,  being painted by contractor M.  Rain was in the forecast, he couldn't be there, didn't want M. to move them alone, would I ask neighbor on the other side to help. 

Eventually it was all worked out, after numerous missed connections. In the course of these, I heard everyone's earthquake stories,  where they were at the time, what they thought it was at first,  childbirth stories, both in Bangalore and New Jersey,  also dog training in progress, how dog-friendly Colonial Williamsburg is, and Tuesday Trivia Night at the local bar. All of these got involved in the arrangements. 

The upshot: bookcases safely moved indoors,  mom and baby fine, expected home in a couple of days,  grandfather touch and go! Me, drinking tea to recover from the unexpected evening, and planning to check how contractor and Mrs M did at Trivia Night.

Happy day, everyone, be ready for anything, you never know.

Skirt happening, whitlow grass

That skirt I showed you yesterday at Marion's world? I found some cream unbleached muslin, cotton weight, the stuff I used for curtains,  and a skirt is under way.

That batik fabric hanging in the doorway might be another skirt, though I did make one last year from it. We'll see.

So long since I did any hand sewing, this was great. The skirt is an 18th century pattern, with slits at the sides so you can access the Lucy locket pocket that ties round your waist under your skirt. This pose is tricky because I was holding it together with one hand, having run out of pins.

You can make this pocket as big as you want, so it's good under a full skirt. Eighteenth century wearers were known to carry live chickens in these pockets, among other items, but I expect I'll just carry my keys and phone.

Here I've done unpressed pleats, just set by eye, front and back. Box pleat in the middle, knife pleats out to the sides.

The skirt has a waistband at the back which becomes a belt that ties at the front. The front waistband ties at the back. 

This is very easy to make, fits however you fasten it.  It's like two aprons joined at the sides.

I did French seams for the sides, and pre finished the edges of the side openings. This was accompanied by Ash learning to use her new vintage knitting machine. My YouTube watching doesn't get my undivided attention.

The front waistband is under way and tomorrow I'll do the back. After that, hem it and I have a new skirt.

Then I'll make a muslin Lucy locket pocket.

I did do other things, walked and found a natural bouquet, violets with, I think, whitlow grass, tiny white flowers new today. 

The woodpecker was busy chipping out her nest again, and a Carolina wren shouted for ages. We still have a couple of juncoes, usually gone by now, but this year staying longer. They're winter residents, usually October to March.

Home to a pot of tea on the patio, very warm today, in the 80s, no biting insects yet.

So I marked the change of season by summerizing the sofa. 

The warm winter throw is now in the laundry, and here's the white summer quilt in place. Hand stitched pillows. Posh.

Happy day everyone, however you observe whatever season you're up to where you live.

And here's a bit of Basho for wisteria lovers