Getting personal...

I can't believe how much I've gotten done. Unfortunately, by the end of the day yesterday I had managed to give myself a migraine and went to bed rather early. I had intended on working until late, but that just wasn't happening. 

However, I managed to get the tables switched around and I've begun sorting some more of the fabric and supplies I intend to keep. I've also started going through one of my downstairs cupboards and sorting the books and magazines that were in there. Which ones are true to my vision, which ones will make some thrift store shopper squeal with delight... that style of thing.

I think I've managed to get something stuck in each of my two vacuum cleaners and will have to have my husband bring in some of the tools from his work truck to dissect them and remove the offending chunks of whatever it is. I'm not looking forward to that. I know for a fact I sucked up some spider egg sacks. <erp> Stupid arachnophobia!

I had some things sitting in my basement for ages waiting to be laundered, but since they aren't things I use frequently, I always did the more necessary items first. I got all of it done! The only thing left is the current laundry and a sleeping bag that had been packed away in my cupboard. I even wore a pair of silk pajamas I purchased months ago to bed last night. I got them at a thrift store in the Halloween department, and they've just been sitting down there waiting for the delicate cycle. Thrifty hint: Always wash thrift store clothes before wearing. I may wash my stuff before it goes to charity, but not everyone does. <shudder>

I now have four more boxes of stuff for charity and one that's about half-way full. I can't begin to tell you how awesome it feels to get rid of this stuff. I guess I'll have to admit that I am some sort of hoarder. Luckily, I found a doctor who finally gave me a proper diagnosis (ADD) and the right medication. I had to do an awful lot of calling around and our insurance blows when it comes to mental health treatment. Not to get on a soapbox, but if we would spend more time and money on mental health issues, we wouldn't have things like the Colorado Theater shooting. That's my humble opinion.

But back to the studio...

I am nervous about really digging into my stuff. Partially because of the spiders, but mostly because I look at some of the stuff and wonder what I was thinking. Then I get upset with myself for spending the money on something I never used, am never going to use, and will be getting rid of momentarily. Then I get upset at myself for wasting so much time and energy on the stuff I never did/will never do. Then I get all sentimental about things. It's no wonder people who hoard don't want to get rid of their stuff. It's emotional. It's depressing. At times it's even gut-wrenching (and I'm not just talking about the spiders). It's not a very comfortable place to be. Well, not while you're doing it. I have to remind myself that I'm finding my authenticity. I go downstairs and look at how far I've come, and I'm really proud of what I've accomplished already. If I took a picture of it the way it is now, I'm sure there are those of you who would say, "Um, that's the before picture, right?" Hey, I had a lot of crap. I didn't take any before pictures. But I have posted the pics of my loads of stuff going to charity and that should give you a pretty good idea of what the "before" was like. Some of that came from the garage, but still. Lots o' stuff! That way, when I get around to posting the after pics, you can be all impressed. 

I sometimes have to stop going through everything to catch my breath. I sometimes feel like I'm on the verge of crying. I haven't broken down, yet. I'm sure at some point I will. I've gotten very sad about a few things, but haven't been brought to tears over them. A couple of things I found in the garage were close. Like the bio in the program I found from the last show I did in my hometown before leaving for New York City "to make it on Broadway." Or the pictures of little girls in my "Someday" folder. Yeah, that tripped up my depression for a couple of days. I didn't do anything for fear of finding more so-called "failures". On the other hand, I found things like this:

Yep, that's me in the middle with the stellar horns!

It's one of the things that I found that remind me of who I really am. A performer who's also really good at costuming. Not only did I portray Titania, but I also designed and single-handedly built all of the costumes for this production of A Midsummer Night's Dream. The director had originally called me to just do the costumes but at the time, I really wanted to focus on my acting. When the actress playing Titania couldn't do the show, he called me back and asked if I'd do both. Obviously, I did. I'm really proud of that head piece and all the costumes I did for that show. The kids in the show (there were only 3 adults in the cast, 4 if you could the 18 year old high schooler) were really great, even if they did underestimate themselves and their ability to do Shakespeare. I made sure they got over that in a hurry.

I do love theatre. I love spectacle. I love history and fashion. I love fabric. I love designing. I love fantasy. Now, I'm trying to make that fantasy a reality. I'm not sure how that's going to happen, but I know it will.

Kiss my tuchas, spiders!

In yesterday's post I mentioned vacuuming up the spider webs in the basement as I clean up and make room for my new sewing studio. This is not a pleasant thing for most people, but I'm arachnophobic, so it was kind of a big deal. I was worried that I wouldn't be able to empty the canister when it got full. Well, I managed to get the vacuum canister emptied all by my big self without vomiting or so much as a dry heave. I got a little lump in my throat, but I did it. For those of you who understand the psychology of phobias, you should be very proud of me. Just sayin'.

Yesterday afternoon I started to panic as I looked around my would-be studio. I've nearly gotten to the point where I need to start making piles of the things I want to keep. The whole organizing thing. I start off thinking like this:

Tools

Supplies

Fabric

Reference materials.

Then my head starts spinning with all of the subcategories and subcategories of the subcategories...

Tools:

 - for cutting

 - for measuring 

 - for quilting

 - <sigh> cutting for quilting

 - cutting for garments

 - measuring for quilting

 - measuring for garments

 - for tailoring

     - for marking

but I need to mark for quilting, too, and that's a different pile of tools...

 <son of a...>

...aaaand my brain shuts down. That and I don't have a great place to set up the space I'll need for doing all this organizing.

So, I called mom. Sometimes when I'm feeling overwhelmed, I can call mom and the conversation will spin off into an idea. I had been worried about using a table we have that we take camping with us. We're heading out again this weekend and I didn't want to take over the table. Then I remembered that one of the tables I have downstairs is even smaller than the one in the camper. I could set up the camping table, transfer the stuff from the smaller table, and we could take the smaller table with us. We only use it for setting up our Foreman grill. So that's my new plan of attack. It's a start, anyway.

<sigh... of relief>

I got the big table downstairs but needed to clear off some more of the floor and do some more vacuuming. I sucked up a big brown spider. <shudder> But I found my missing yoga toes (I had lost one and had been alternating feet) and now that I'm in a show which requires me to be barefoot and agile, I'm glad I found it. Seriously, that was pretty exciting for me. I have no idea why it was down by the laundry. I must've scooped it up with some clothes I took down to be washed. 

In my paper journal yesterday, I got pretty excited about the basement. I started envisioning what it would be like to have a real work area down there with a proper table for laying out fabric and cutting patterns so I wouldn't have to do it on the floor any more. Storage that is actually organized so I can find things and it all makes sense. I'm good at envisioning organized places, but putting into reality and then keeping it there is the hard part for me (see above). However, if this is going to be a home business, perhaps it'll be easier. When I worked at the fabric store, it drove me nuts if things were put away in the wrong place. I was always reorganizing things that had been just stuck any old where. I enjoyed it, actually. I took pride in it. Then I'd come home and completely shut down. Honestly, I think it's my medication that's helping me. I know it doesn't work for everyone, and I really put it off and made excuses for myself, but I haven't been this motivated in... ever, really. Plus I have the diagnosis, so it helps knowing that I can actually do something about it and it's not entirely my fault. I'm not stupid and lazy. I've just got some farkachte synaptic signals.

I forgot to mention in yesterday's post that I did a burn test on some fabric I had gotten at the thrift store. It's a cute brown and ivory gingham and I thought perhaps I could use it for the backing to the Grandma's Flower Garden baby quilt. I just wasn't sure if it was polyester, rayon... It was hard to tell, but, since the quilt top is 100% cotton, it'd have to be a (mostly) natural fiber to use it. Turns out it's acrylic, probably Orlan. Yeah, can't use it. The cotton will continue to shrink a little for a few more washings and the acrylic isn't going to shrink at all. That will make for some unattractive bubbling in the quilting, so it's out. Oh, well.

I went on line and downloaded a fiber burn test chart.

This one is from Ditsy Prints.

I cut a small swatch from the fold line of the cut edge, held it in a tweezers over the sink and lit the bugger on fire. It was really easy to do. Since I do like to shop at thrift stores, this will be a handy skill to have. You could even do it for clothes if the tags have been removed. That is, if there's a bit of seam allowance you can clip out. Then you'll know how to wash it. There's your thrifty hint for the day!

I also forgot to mention that on our drive home from the air show, I completed 5 more hexagon flowers and started a 6th. I now have 21 complete flowers for my niece's baby's quilt. So I laid them out to see if I need/want more and to sort of figure out how many more I would need. If I but a path of single hexagons between the flowers, I would have a crib sized quilt right now. But I'd really like to make it a throw so it'll last longer as she grows. 

Well, I need to get back downstairs. If you've been feeling stuck in your own studio or organizing your stuff, I hope this will be some inspiration for you to know that you can do it. If I can do it, you can do it. Yes, folks, it can be done!

Grandmother's Flower Garden

I want to post some "in progress" pics of the hexagons I'm prepping for the hand-sewn Grandmother's Flower Garden quilt I'm making, using a technique known as English Paper Piecing, for my youngest niece's baby, due this November.
I've posted some completed "flowers" in previous posts, but here I'm going to show how I prepare the hexagons for hand piecing,

I used a precut piece of fabric from a purchased kit to make a cardboard template (using the cardboard from inside a fat quarter package). From that, I used my rotary cutter to make hexagons from the additional fabric. I used freezer paper for the piecing shapes. It gives body to the fabric as you're sewing. I drew hexagons onto the freezer paper using a sharpie and the inside of one of my nesting hexagon templates. I basically made a honeycomb pattern on the freezer paper then cut them out. At the edge of the paper were half hexes, and I put them together and used those as well.
Then, I pressed the paper shapes to the wrong sides of the fabric hexes. Freezer paper has a shiny side with a thin layer of wax (much thinner than waxed paper, which I don't recommend using - the wax is too thick and the paper is to thin), which will temporarily adhere to the fabric when ironed on at medium heat. If you don't get it quite lined up, you can peel it off and try again. The size of the paper shapes I made leave a little more than the usual 1/4 inch seam allowance, but I was using what I've got handy to make it go a bit quicker.
Once I have all the paper attached via iron, I fold the seam allowances down, using the paper as a guide. I then baste them, going through the paper. This will give me the creased edge to work with as I'm hand sewing. Once the entire quilt top is assembled, I'll remove the basting and the paper, another advantage of the freezer paper and it's temporary stick-um.
A thrifty hint: many second hand stores have craft sections where you can find spools of thread. Now, old thread can be weak and break, and there's no reliable method of testing the age of thread. However, for doing a little hand basting, like I'm doing here, it's fine. Just take off the outer, dusty layer, if necessary and use the rest. I often put my thread ends outside for the birds to use in their nests. Finches seem to like to use it. I just make sure it's in a spot where other animals aren't going to try to eat it. I have a flower pot that works nicely for this.