Jun 17, 2016

LEARNING CURVE

I decided to try a bargello background instead of simple tent stitch.  I'm not sure if it will be too busy when the rest of the piece is complete, but I'm pretty much making this up as I go along.  

The good news is that I'm using a readily available perle cotton for that white-ish background, so if I end up having to replace it a short trip to the Michaels will solve the problem of running out of thread.

Stewey and Bosco are snoozing in the sun and I'm off to the laundry room and then the library.  We're trying to get into routine here at Chez Spinster, so it's back to lists and schedules.

(At least for today anyway.)

(Tomorrow will be a total crap shoot and all of my best laid plans will go right out the window.)

I am determined to re-live the summers of my youth one of these days.  Mom made sure we were up and out early...at the pool, on our bikes, out on the porch swings, or doing something fun.  Given my rotundity (even as a child), I was usually the one on the porch swing with a big fat summer book in my hand.  I went from Nancy Drew to Danielle Steele to Jackie Collins with a few classics thrown in there for good measure.  I think there was even a summer of bodice-ripping romances, and for some reason the name Kathleen E. Woodiwiss comes to mind.

I was lucky...my mom and dad never really censored what I picked up.  If the book was at all "controversial" like Judy Bloom's Forever, I could count on a kitchen table conversation about being a proper young lady and what the expectation was for me going forward as an adult-ish person, and how my mom would know what I was doing 24/7, no matter when I was doing it or where I was doing it.  So any ideas I had about becoming a "hotsy totsy" were pretty much squashed right then and there.  

But reading those big fat summer books...no matter how high brow or low brow was the highlight of my day, just like stitching is now.  One of these days I'll get really smart and combine the two by listening to audio books while I stitch, but for now methinks I'll just have to set aside time for both in between puppy wrangling and loads of underpants sploshing about in the laundry machine.

So here's to big fat summer books and porch swings and clean laundry and stitching!   The weekend is upon us, the sun is shining, and we're hurtling headlong right into it all.  Happy Friday, kids!

16 comments:

  1. I like the cream background that you have stitched so far, Coni. I don't think it is too busy. Enjoy your weekend!

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  2. And happy weekend to you too. I never did inherit my mother's ability to see all and know all. She never did tell me the secret either. I guess that's why my daughters ran amok! :{ Cathryn

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  3. I used to spend hours a week riding my bike to the public library and getting books. I loved reading when I was a kid. Pretty much my summers were reading and going to the pool.

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  4. oh your stitching looks wonderful! I love the purple (my fave color!)

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  5. Audiobooks are like Ambien for me! So if I tried to stitch and listen, I would be face down on my project leaving unsightly drool stains.

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  6. Audio books are awesome. My library has more books on CD than I can ever listen to. Once I have a project figured out....I love to stitch and listen.

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  7. Ah, memories of a canvas hammock, library books, & a daily allotment of 3 Oreos!

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  8. I love the background with the corners running in opposite directions! I loved my summers as a kid, too. Lots of reading and bike riding, and when I was 12, I discovered crewel embroidery. Been hooked on stitching ever since.

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  9. I have always been a voracious reader and I remember being about 7 and pulling one of my mother's books off the shelf to read. She told me then, and it was the policy for my entire child and teen years, that I was welcome to read anything I liked and she'd help me with any words I didn't know, but if the content was age-inappropriate, she wouldn't explain it to me. And that worked for me. I wish Goodreads had existed when I was a kid. I'd love to know what I was reading back then. I remember my mother had quite a stash of Kathleen Woodiwiss and Valerie Sherwood novels.

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  11. I love how the background looks! Your childhood summers sound much like mine did. Good memories :)

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  12. Nancy Drew was one of my favorites. I can still the library shelf with the pink covers and they had an odd library smell.

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  13. I'm 55 and still love reading Nancy Drew! My mom said it was okay for me to ride my bike over to your house. I have some new glitter nail polish, the latest issue of Tiger Beat, and a couple of dimes for the ice cream truck!

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  14. Oh, Nancy Drew!! And a group of book about a young nurse names Cherry Ames!..In our little library we had numbered cards to check out books. The librarians knew mine to well I never had to tell it to them--they had it memorized!! And then there was swimming in our local lake. I wish Summer's were that easy again!

    Debbie in Kansas

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  15. I started listening to audio books while stitching and I love it! Wish you luck on this project.

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  16. I started listening to audio books while stitching and I love it! Wish you luck on this project.

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