Original G-nome

I wondered when I'd have a go at needle felting. Lucky for me my friend, Sara, has a craft supply shop in her garage. ;) First, I made a loose shape of a beard out of felt, then sewed the roving onto it in areas where it won't show. Then I made a lining of felt and hand stitched it to cover up the fuzzy edges and to strengthen it. Of course, it has fuzzy edges anyway.

What do you call a group of gnomes? A herd? A pod? A posse?

Craft Guilt: A Tale of Giveaways, Swaps, and Two Emilys

Ah, the craft guilt. Know what I'm talking about? Bitter Betty wrote about it and did something about it, too — she became pro-craftive and has been checking off craft chores left and right. Me? I'm just sitting around wondering when the hell I'm going to make good on my blogiversary gift for Emily. That was back in January for crying out loud. I'm stuck. I can't seem to hatch another chicken pincushion.

While I haven't been making Emily's gift (she's been so patient) I've signed up for swaps and worked on lots of personal projects, each time feeling at least a twinge of guilt, knowing I should be working on her project. Recently, I signed up for a patchwork & scrap swap set up by the lovely Linda P. I chose to swap with someone in Finland. Guess what her name is — Emily. I can't live with the guilt anymore — two Emilys overdue is too many. It's double or triple craft guilt at this point. Not only am I seeing another Emily, I'm late with my swap to her, too. ¡Ay, caramba! And, this, just before the big handmade holiday craft push. It must be resolved I tell you.

This sounds like I don't enjoy swaps and giveaways. I do, I do, but they torture me. I like to have deadlines, they usually kick my procrastinator butt into at least low gear — but, they do add an element of discomfort. Can you say craft masochist? Why put myself through this rigmarole when I could live in deadline-free luxury? It's the people. I love this silly craft community. Hi, my name is Michelle, and I have online friends. I enjoy sending a little handmade love into the world. It just takes me for friggin' ever!

So, Emily #1: is your heart set on a chicken pincushion? Can I make something else? Another style of pincushion? A mini quilt? A stack of vintage scraps, like the one in this photo — the one I'm sending to Emily #2? Oh, the guilt.

-----------------------------------------

Vintage Reading Rainbow

Guess you could have seen this coming — I couldn't help myself. I just had to do the books by color thing that's so popular these days (see last post for the before shot). Turns out my mom isn't so happy about the new order, she prefers alphabetical by author — she likes to "know" which ones she has.

These were the books my mom grew up with; they were her father's. His name was Quentin, but they called him Kip. I think I'll call him Al.

Click on the book photo if you want to see it bigger, maybe recognize a few titles.

Cold Turkey

Notice anything missing? I packed up the 200 or so kid videos and DVDs that my mom had acquired in the last five years — they were sitting in front of the books. We're going cold turkey and it's working out just fine. Boy, am I surprised.

This also explains my absence from posting. I'm still making stuff, just don't have the same amount of screen time to publish. We're also moving out to the granny unit, so things are a bit chaotic. The move is tempting me to sell off a bunch of stuff (supplies and old craft stock), so keep your eyes peeled for some sort of shop or something.

Thanks to all the lurkers who invited me to visit their blogs. Anyone else? I love finding new crafty folks.

315 Feeds in Bloglines . . .

and no new posts to read. I should probably be doing something else, right? But, sometimes, hitting refresh is all I can muster.

ROOTS

autumn2001
Originally uploaded by Green Kitchen.


Roots
Originally uploaded by Green Kitchen.


Future Farmer
Originally uploaded by Green Kitchen.

ROOTS For Reading*
Once upon a time I worked on a very fun project, called ROOT, with my friends over at Mariquita Farm. It featured Andy's writings about life as it relates to food and growing food — he's a farmer with a philosophy major. Each issue was 18 pages and included a seasonal recipe or two. I had the unique pleasure of complete artistic control; from choosing the paper (yummy French paper and a cool sparkle paper that I forget the name of), to creating the illustrations, it was all me. I also got to employ a couple friends to take photos and make images — Blaize helped edit it. We even had a testimonial from Susie Bright. ROOT fulfilled my longtime dream of collaborative creative work amongst friends. We did one issue per season for four seasons.

ROOTS For Dinner
My favorite way to use up the leftover roots from my Two Small Farms CSA box, including the ones my family doesn't like, is to dice them up small; toss them with olive oil, salt, and an herb or two; and roast them at high heat until they're caramelized bits of perfection. I think I got the idea from this book. It's a great way to get turnips and beets into people who think they don't like them.

ROOTS For Fashion
I'm horrible with laundry and/or bibs, so we have a lot of stains around here. I remember seeing a cool stain cover up over at Little Green's Flickr. So, in anticipation of dressing my baby for today's harvest festival I did a root version of stain management.

*I'm sure Julia still has copies of ROOT that she would love to sell. You can contact her at julia[at]mariquita[dot]com.