So I mentioned below, when I went to Georgia weekend before last, my dad gave me 3 boxes of vintage textiles my grandmother had wanted me to have. 3 GIANT boxes. Tulio and I went though one:



First is a GIANT pile of doilies. Some are probably purchased, but the majority of them are clearly hand made, crocheted or tatted, probably by one of my great-grand-mothers. If you scroll down to the lower post, you can see a really elaborate one with pansies -- there is a whole set of them. They are beautiful and lovingly made, and I am so not a doily person. I have no idea what to do with them. Archive them for my grandchildren, I suppose. I briefly toyed with the idea of sewing them together to make an afghan. They will be nice for decorating for holidays and so forth. See me slowly transforming into a doily person there?



Heaps of embroidered textiles -- dishtowels, tablecloths, pillowcases, bedspreads. This is the part where I start having some seriously ambivalent feelings:
The primary emotion I felt at my grandmother's funeral last year (which was overall a fairly horrifying affair, but that's a whole different story) was regret that I had not known her better or been closer to her. Having said that, the barriers between us were not entirely of my making -- she had her idea of who I was and was comfortable with that and any further closeness would have messed with that. So going through these textiles started to make me upset -- I would have loved to know more about them; know who made them and who they made them for, and were they funny and obsessive like I get with needle crafts or did they just make things to have something to do in their spare time? I know she really wanted me to have these things, but I wish she had given them to me while she was still alive, and maybe we could have looked at them together and she could have told me about the people who made them and her memories of them and I'd have a better sense of where they and I came from. But that didn't happen so oh well. But my mom better get started on her memoirs.



Among the mountain of embroidered textiles are some mysterious sets consisting of a large embroidered thing and 2 smaller embroidered things. What are they? guest towels? dresser scarves? Whatever they are they were evidently popular at some point because there are at least 3 sets.



THIS is highly amazing. It is a pillowcase but I think I'm going to frame it. It is AWESOME.

And finally we come to another thing I feel conflicted about:



A complete set of country blue acrylic placemats that somebody around the time of my birth lovingly crafted on some kind of yarny-loom-thing.
My first instinct was to get rid of them, but now I'm thinking that these awesome retro 30's and 40's era textiles that I am enjoying so much probably look just as dated to my dad and his siblings as these placemats look to me. So perhaps my kids will love them? Maybe I should hang on to them just in case...

Two more boxes to go!

In the meantime I turned 32 which is funny because I really thought I turned 32 last year. So I didn't age at all this year! yay!

I have lots of crafty tutorials planned and photos to post but I haven't gotten it together enough to actually do so.

Also: Lemurs! lemurs lemurs lemurs. And dwarf lorises!

darn it, I was going to post a hilarious photo but I can't find the cable for the camera. Pretty soon I will post it, though!
The other day I had a flat tire (not so hilarious, and a car a few spaces down also had the exact same tire flat, so I worried about tire-slashing vandals, but since it turned out to only be a teeny puncture in my tire, it is more likely that someone threw some nails around the entrance road to my apartment complex or something like that. ANYWAY). So I called AAA, because, while I am perfectly capable of changing a tire, what's the point of having AAA if I can't make someone else do that for me (come to think of it, what do I have a husband for?). so I call AAA, and a guy comes out to change the tire. Now I have to set up the scene. Tire guy has jacked the car up and is bent over removing the flat tire. I have the trunk open so I can take the spare out. But there's a lot of crap in my trunk and I can't even get to the spare! (Mind you, tire guy is bent over). And I exclaim "Whoa, there's a lot of junk in the trunk!" and tire guy says "excuse me?"

In other news: Center Fest was really successful and I made a decent amount of money (and bartered with another vendor for a beautiful basket). Malloy, owner of the Fiber Loft is selling the leftover stock at the store, and I already sold a hat there! I'll be teaching a needlefelting workshop there October 25th, and I should have a pattern or 2 for sale there pretty soon!

My sister spontaneously and for no apparent reason sent me an awesome shirt with an angry muffin (or it could be a cupcake, there is debate) saying "AH MUNNA EAT CHOO!".

My mom is leaving for France on Wednesday! Lucky mom!

Today we organized the closets ( we have a termite inspection tomorrow and had to empty the closets anyway), so I took the opportunity to organize my yarn stash/collection, which consisted of taking it out of the 3 storage boxes it lives in, throwing it around on the guest bed, and then tucking it back into the boxes in a more systematic way. Now, despite the fact that I removed a grocery bag full of yarns I intend to donate, and removed all the sock yarn to put in a little box by itsself, somehow the yarn that was left would. not. go back into the very same boxes that it came out of. I guess maybe it was compressed and then inflated when I removed it? I don't know, but it's very strange.

I had a truly revolting cold. It is mostly better now. But while I had it, the people upstairs had a leaky pipe AGAIN and water came through our ceiling AGAIN and the maintenance guy took forever to respond to the page and I was up late because of it all (the maintenance guy was super helpful when he did show up and came back the next day to paint over the water stains from the LAST leaking pipe). I had a staff meeting the next day and we had to say what we would like to be reincarnated as and I said "as a bear and I'd live in a cave in the woods with no pipes and no maintenance men and I'd sleep a lot and it would be great." It's kinda still true.

My husband is grouchy because there is some drama in his family of origin. He better get over it soon.

I've completely lost my cooking mojo and can't even remember what people eat other than sandwiches and mac and cheese. Any ideas?

These are the high points of the past couple weeks (as my life has become more interesting, I have become a slacker blogger. back when everything was boring, I would share all kinds of dumb details!)

*Tulio and his cousin Julio and I went to the farmer's market. It is really awesome and there are lots of farmers and hippies and an art market, and little kids sitting on the grass singing songs with hippies, and it's just a really good time. Anyway, there was a lady walking around with a big old iguana perched on her shoulder. And a lot of people clustered around her admiring it. Tulio and Julio look at it admiringly and say "Doesn't it look delicious?" and then proceed to discuss the best way to cook it (soup, they agreed). Turns out, one of the women surrounding the iguana lady understood Spanish and told the iguana lady "Watch out -- they're planning to eat it!" I DIED laughing, and the lady told Tulio and Julio "Be careful, you can't assume people don't understand Spanish!" I kept giggling for, basically, the rest of the day. And we got some fucking delicious tomatoes.
*The next day I went to a meeting of a local knitting group. It was so fun! I immediately felt comfortable with everyone there. I need to share some pictures of the project I've been working on, because it is really awesome. Ooh, I finally got my Ravelry invite (that's how I found the knitting group, in fact), so I am going to have to switch to Flickr now.
*After knitting group Tulio and I went to the first birthday party of the son of one of my coworkers. It was held in a colorful and bizarre place called Gymboree. When we walked up, we looked through the window and saw all the babies dancing in a circle and it was cute. Then we went in and were greeted at the door by a perky lady who wanted to know how old our child was. It was then we realized we were the only people there without a baby. as dementedelement said, MAJOR FASHION FAUX PAS! It was a little awkward. And there was a lady there with quadruplets (another co-worker, in fact), you'd think she would have loaned us one.
*My work week was pretty unbearable until my boss was abruptly fired. Suddenly, it's like a dark cloud has lifted and I got so much done today and had a good time. I feel badly -- I had wanted things to change, but not like that -- but I'm glad that it happened at the same time. Mostly I feel bad because I referred to him as a "vortex of chaos and negativity" and my coworkers have been repeating that. Oh, and then I did an impression of him as Gollum clutching IMPORTANT PAPERWORK THAT WAS SUPPOSED TO BE DONE BY A TEAM BUT WAS BEING HORDED BY ONE CONTROLLING PERSON to my chest and saying "My preciousssssssss." Another coworker of mine, upon being told "I hope you won't be upset but so and so has been asked to leave" said "Oh, I'm not upset." and then she refused to sit at his desk under the grounds that it has been contaminated by all his negative energy. We are a bunch of bitches.
*TULIO GOT HIS DRIVER'S LICENSE TODAY!!!!!!!!!! Well, it is a learner's permit, but he can get a real one as early as next week. And now I don't have to drive everywhere!!!!! He can drive sometimes too!!!!!! I would like to point out that he lived in Georgia for almost 3 years and those bigoted fuckers at the DMV would never give him a license, and talked to him as if he were a turd, whereas he's been in NC less than 2 weeks and not only got one but they were nice to him too. my own visit to the NC DMV was a million times more pleasant than any interaction I've ever had anywhere in GA (although the Gainesville office is nicer than the Athens one). I should stop now, my hatred for those racist pigfuckers at the Athens Driver's Disservices is close to uncontainable.
*Right now his cousins are all over for a Man Party. One of his cousins brought me Mexican food and a bottle of rum as a propitiatory gift because they are going to get rowdy tonight!
Tulio is awesome -- he has confiscated all their keys and told them that if they get drunk they are welcome to stay in the guest bed or on the couch.
I love my husband!
*I get paid next week! I am REALLY looking forward to it!

I just finished month 1 of the self challenge!
I have lost 6 pounds, 1 inch around my waist (although none at all around my hips and my thighs are actually bigger D: ) and am generally firmer all around. my arms and calves look great! and most importantly, I have a lot more energy (and am eating craploads of fresh fruits and vegetables!).

going strong into the second month!