Valerean

This is one of my favorite purses, whichj developed a big shreddy hole in the back side from (I assume) rubbing against things as I've used it. It's a Vera Bradley I thrifted in a huge lot last year , so I paid only about $1.47 for it. I also certainly have enough purses to just get another from my Vera stash and use it, which I did. I really like this purse, though, so I decided to repair it, launder it and use it again. Since I didn't have any scraps that match the fabric of the purse, I went with a white dotted dark blue patch that goes fine with the floral print. I pinned down the patch in a rectangle and sewed it over the hole, reinforcing the edges with a blind stitch to give it extra strength. Here's the finished mend. Holes and fraying are common problems with vintage Vera Bradley products, as the fabric and thread used to make them is extremely thin and cheap. This purse was in new condition when I began using it back seven months ago. ...

For the May edition of my calendar tote project I decided to use a vintage embroidered crazy quilt patch I've been saving for a while. I'd like to do a theme of vintage embroidery with a black tote. Ordinary I avoid black, as it tends to be depressing, but this time it feels right. I did test the patch against a cream colored cutter quilt piece and while it does bring out the bird a little better I prefer how it looks with the black. I also got out my basket of vintage crazy quilt pieces to hunt through and see if there are some smaller bits of embroidery work I can incorporate. All of these came to me as cutter pieces, which kind of breaks my heart, but crazy quilts are well known to disintegrate, especially because of the types of dyes and the thin silks used during this era, so I feel lucky to have them anyway. The granny square I crocheted in Gumdrop silk yarn last month doesn't quite work with my idea. Neither do these blocks. These defi...

My guy and I saw this local fisherman when we went on a hike by one of the local lakes last week. If you'd like to see what else we did, check out my album of pics here .

A few famous authors who were my peers back in the day have been announcing their retirement lately; I won't name names because I don't want to attract their fan bases here. Let me just say that I completely understand what it is to cope with increasing mental and physical limits due to age and infirmity, and how hard a hit the ego takes because of that. They have my sincere sympathy. I don't have a retirement date set for myself just yet. It's getting closer, but I have not noticed any diminished capability on my part other than it takes me a little longer to get things done. I asked for and was given more time this year to work on my current big project for the day job. My editor and I have both acknowledged that we're in the winding down stage of the career, not that it matters when you're a writer for hire. No one knows that I'm the one writing these projects, so no one will miss the real me when I hang it up. Kind of nice that way. After writ...

On the thrifting front I'm doing a little at the online auction. I have an urge to paint again (I don't know why; I'm terrible at it), but all the art supplies I had are either dried up or too old to use, so I put in a bid on this lot of supplies. There are actually 20 journals in this lot, which I plan to make covers for, embellish and then give as gifts. This little quilt has the most charming primitive applique work I've seen in a while, and I'd love to add it to my collection. Stay tuned to the blog to see if I win any or all of these.

Last week the first of the corn crop arrived at the local farm where we shop for veggies, so we made a trip to buy a bag. Although we can get corn cheaper at the supermarket, this is one of the times when we don't worry about the expense. The first trip to the farm for corn is kind of the unofficial start to spring for me. We'll be making trips out every few weeks to shop at the farm now until they close for the summer. Why don't we buy our veggies where we can get them cheaper? Supporting our local farmers is more important to us than saving money. I didn't take a photo, but we bought a bag with a half-dozen ears of corn and a big basket of baby cucumbers. It was ten dollars. I shared half of the cucumbers with our neighbor, who has her son and his family visiting them. There isn't much we can do about the economy, or stopping corporations from destroying family businesses like the farm. All we can do is show our support by spending our money whe...