Valerean

Writing poems with a free concrete poem generator is fun. :)

On Independence Day my guy and I went downtown to watch the parade, and I noticed this adorable baby stroller across the street from us. It costs something like $700.00 or more. I used to push my babies around in a holding umbrella type stroller that cost me $12.00. That's how much more expensive the world has gotten, I guess. A little before July 4th we took a drive out in the country and in a pasture stood this wonderful hay bale sculpture of the State of Libery (the artist may work for or own an Ace hardware store.) I love how people in the country do things like this for holidays. Miniature ponies (and one very resistant llama) at the parade. Also a common feature at our rural town's celebrations. I got a lot of good ideas for stories while we were out and about, something I've neglected to do lately. I've got to keep a better eye on the world for inspiration. It's wonderful out there.

Once a garment has for whatever reason become unwearable we think of it as trash. Not so in other countries, particularly in the east. For example, Japan has their traditions of boro and sakiori , and recycle so efficiently they could teach the rest of the world how to deal with their clothing waste. Today I want to show you another way of recycling textiles: kantha quilts from India, which is a way of turning old saris and discarded textiles into quilts. Here's a cutter piece from a kantha quilt. Kantha quilts are fairly easy (and cheap) to find on Etsy and eBay; I bought a bag of these scraps for my art quilting. It's a dense piece with simple running stitching which is easy to take apart. So let's see just how many layers it has. According to some articles I read kantha quilting goes back at least 500 years. It was a way to creatively reuse old and unwanted clothing and create beautiful, colorful blankets for the family without having to spend money on...

While out thrifting I picked up a bag of yarn with other stuff mixed in (and promptly forgot to take a pic before I opened it.) Here's everything, includin 16 skeins of yarn. There were lots of surprises in this bundle, like nine little fabric gift bags. I often give earrings or other small items as gifts so I love these. The big surprises were two upholstery needles, a spool of upholstery thread, tacks for a upholstery gun, and some gorgeous faux diamond buttons. My neighbor does custom upholstery so I'm going to offer the tacks to him. There were even some big buttons, beads and sewing-related items in the bag. I paid $8.99 for it, making it a very nice bargain.

Back in May I needed to find a new pair of dog walking sneakers, as my current pair were cracking and not keeping out the rain. I saw this pair of Reebok Breast Cancer Awareness Women’s Duramax White sneakers in my size at the online auction, bid on them and won with my minimum. Reeboks tend to run $80 to $120 retail new, so I got them for a steal. What sold me on this pair: the breast cancer awareness is always a nice message to promote, and I'm pretty sure the shoes are brand new as they're still bound together with a plastic store tag and have foam display shapers in them. The clincher was the pic of the soles. Used shoes always have scuffs and soiling. These look unused to me. Here's what they looked like when they arived. They had one tiny scuff on the sole, as if they had been tried on once in a store, but otherwise are brand-new. A nice pair of shoes for $10.99. :) The second, third and fourth images in this post came from the original aucti...

Yesterday my guy and I went wandering, and we stopped at The Old Packing House in Umatilla so I could pick up more pink fabrics for my pink-only quilt. I was insanely lucky to find five yards of a dark and light mottled salmon pink fabric that I can use as backing, as I want all the rest that I've acquired on the front of the quilt. This will also let me make the quilt as big as I like. Here's everything that I have so far assembled on my sewing table. I'm just waiting on some beads and then I can get started. In the meantime, I'm finishing up the poem for the quilt today. It's a lot! Ha. I'm really looking forward to it, though -- and I've already lost all of my dislike of pink while gathering everything. :)