Incoherent Scribblings

A Dismal November

This month has to be the worst month I have had in meeting my stitching goals since I first started setting them back in April of 2005.

As a reminder, my November goals were to:

1. Finish “Above the Clouds.” - No. I really tried, but just couldn’t do it.
2. Stitch, finish, and mail Outi’s replacement Birthday Exchange piece. - No. I had a pretty severe attack of the frogs and had to put it away for a bit.
3. Participate in the November SAT. - No. I had to work.
4. Work on “Poet’s Heart.” - No. I didn’t even pull it out of the WIP pile.
5. Start “Kitty Cat Row.” (My fabric has been shipped and should arrive any day now.) - Yes! I started it Tuesday and will upload a progress picture soon.

I am not really “upset” but I will admit that I am a bit disappointed. I had such high hopes for the month, but all I really managed to do was burn myself out.

Anyway, for December I hope to:

1. Stitch, finish, and mail Outi’s replacement Birthday Exchange piece before Christmas.
2. Participate in the December SAT.
3. Work on “Poet’s Heart.”
4. Work on “Kitty Cat Row.”

A Somber SBQ

This week’s SBQs were suggested by Heather and were sent to me over a year ago. I have not asked them yet because it is a set of extremely complicated questions and without the context that prompted them, they are very difficult to answer. I agonized many times on how to word this SBQ so it would make sense without surrounding context but I couldn’t figure out how to do it, so I shelved it.

However, today when I was browsing through SBQ submissions and stumbled upon them again, I decided the best thing is to include the context along with the questions. Therefore, in order to answer this week’s questions you should read the following text before you do so.

I recently attended a stash sale organized by friends of a stitcher who had passed away from ovarian cancer. I didn’t know the stitcher, but I quickly learned things about her, such as who her favorite designers were and that she was much better organized than I am (she had almost no duplicate charts!). In talking with her friends, plans were to donate the funds collected from the sale to the hospice which cared for her at the end of her life.

The friends had organized everything, from going through her stash right down to what they were doing the day of the sale, because her family really had no idea of the value of her stash or what to do with it.

It was a rather somber experience; I even felt tears in my eyes a few times thinking of the woman who had once bought these charts in her LNS with plans to stitch them someday, gone home and lovingly filed them away, and then been unable to complete everything she wished to do. I felt guilty I was benefiting from her death and her losses. I felt honored to be offered the opportunity to take care of some of the things she had once loved. I felt like I knew things about her from the kinds of things she liked to stitch.

I realized if something happened to me, most of my stash would languish in my home because it wouldn’t cross my husband’s mind that he should do anything with it, and he’d have no idea *what* to do with it, either.

This experience made me think of lots of questions which would probably be great for an SBQ …

* * *

What would your stash tell others about you?

Most of us stitchers joke about having reached SABLE (stash acquired beyond life expectancy), but have you thought about what you’d like done with your stash after your death? Do you want it to reach other stitchers who will love it, too? Would your family know what to do with it or recognize its value?

How well organized is your stash –would someone be able to come in and put together a sale easily, or would it require lots of organizing work ahead of time? What would you like to see done with the funds collected from such a sale, i.e., should funds go to your family, to a charity or charities of your choice, to a charity or charities of your family’s choice, etc.?

Are there certain items in your stash which are rare and highly desired by stitchers that might make a much larger amount of money if sold on eBay? Have you done anything to designate which items these more valuable ones are to guide your family in how to handle them? Who would you tell your family should handle such a sale so that they don’t have to do it themselves? Have you done anything to make these thoughts known to others, either through discussions or through a codicil to your will?

Have you ever attended a similar sale of a passed stitcher’s stash? How did it make you feel? Did it encourage you to make any changes in your stitching lifestyle?

As you can see, these are complex questions indeed.

To answer the first (and in some ways easiest question if someone who didn’t know me, but knew cross stitch looked through my stash she would see that I am a stitcher with a variety of interests and stitching styles. She would notice everything from simple beginning charts to complex designs with specialty stitches and embellishments. She would quickly see that though I keep a variety of fabric on hand I prefer 32 count linen. She would know I was a serious stitcher because I have a full set of the embroidery floss I use most (DMC). And finally, she would also very easily find out that I have a fondness for stitching cats, pretty ladies, and flowers.

Now for the other questions:

After my death all I really hope is that my stash goes to the home of a good stitcher. I think I would prefer that my stash is merely given to that stitcher rather than sold because it would alleviate any stress that my family might have over the value of my stash and I know the recipient would appreciate what had been given to her.

Snow in Texas

Snow Cactus
Originally uploaded by blondelibrarian.

I have heard tell that out here in West Texas there are few things that get folks as excited as talking about the weather. Since we live in the desert I find this rather amusing because typically the weather here isn’t all that exciting. With the exception of a couple of days in early October where the thunder rumbled and there was a sudden, but brief downpour, in the two months that I have lived here the weather has been anything but thrilling: It has either been hot and dry or windy and dry.

Therefore you can imagine everyone’s excitement when the weather-person began predicting a cold front that might bring the possibility of snow to West Texas Town early last week. As the day of reckoning grew closer the speculation increased: Would it freeze? Should the plants be brought in? Would there be ice or snow on one of the busiest travel days of the year? And most importantly… Could we finally turn off our air conditioners?

On Wednesday while I was out and about I noticed a significant drop in temperature and decided it was time to pull my fall jacket out of storage. I unplugged my air conditioner and tried to figure out how (and if) the heaters in my apartment worked. That night the temperature dropped below freezing and the next day the talk of snow around town was even greater than before.

Thanksgiving Day and Black Friday passed without so much as a snowflake drifting to the ground, but when I went out on Saturday morning to do my errands I was greeted with cold, thick raindrops. I knew the temperature must be hovering around freezing and when I went to the grocery store I could tell from the thin supply of milk and bread that everyone was hunkering down as if a blizzard was coming.

A few hours later I heard the first brakes skid in the parking lot below and I decided that barring the Apocalypse I would not be leaving my apartment anytime soon as inexperienced snow-drivers made everything from driving my car to walking down the street dangerous. I settled down with some hot chocolate and my stitching and every so often I peeked out the window to see the magic of desert snow.

The next morning the clear blue sky was broken up by a few wisps of cloud and it was cold enough that the snow was still on the ground, but it was obvious that the “storm” had passed.

And by this afternoon the temperature had rebounded and the snow had all but disappeared.

Thanksgiving Break Stitching

I know it has been a while since I had any stitching progress to show and while I could blame it on all the time I have been spending with a certain someone that is not the whole story.

As anyone who has been reading this blog for a while knows, I am very, very close to finishing “Above the Clouds.” So close, in fact that I thought with a little concentrated effort I could finish Confetti by the end of November. That was my goal and I have tried very diligently to meet it. However, after almost 20 hours I was tired of Confetti and wanted very badly to change projects.

At that point I decided to start working on Outi’s belated birthday exchange piece. It was a good distraction from Confetti and I thought I was on a roll: I would finish Outi’s present in no time flat, get back to Confetti, and voilà! my November goals would be met and all would be well.

Unfortunately, things were not to be that way…

I was about one-third of the way into Outi’s exchange piece when I discovered a huge mistake. Because it was one of those boo-boos that couldn’t be fudged, I ended up having to frog out almost half of what I had stitched. As you can well imagine, by the time I was finished frogging I was so frustrated that I knew that it had to be put away for a while. (I am still going to try and get it to you by Christmas Outi!)

I keep saying that I am so close to finishing “Above the Clouds,” (and I am!) but it is a TW and as a result, needs full attention and unbroken concentration to really make any progress.

However, by Thursday afternoon I thought was ready. So with my tummy full of turkey I sat down and attempted to make some more progress on Confetti. Within fifteen minutes my desire for that after-Thanksgiving-dinner nap had taken over and Confetti was put away for the day.

The next day I tried yet again to make some progress, but I was restless and couldn’t find my stitching groove. After about an hour I gave up and began to wonder if I was in danger of temporarily losing my stitching mojo.

Disappointed at my lack of progress on Confetti, it was then that I started fondling my stash. I wrapped my DMC 100s, rearranged my bobbin boxes with the help of the kittens, and began flipping through my JCS Ornament issues.

I thought perhaps I needed a happy dance: Something simple and fast that would make me feel like I had accomplished something. Soon I was inspired. I found a scrap of fabric and within minutes I had started “Spool Ornament” by Sue Hillis from this year’s ornie issue.

After the errands were done and before the snow started falling on Saturday, my needles were flying. By the time I was ready for bed that evening “Spool Ornament” was (mostly) finished and I knew that I hadn’t lost my mojo, I was just sick of the things I was “supposed” to be working on.

Yes, I would still like to finish “Above the Clouds” before the end of the year, but I have decided that if I don’t it is no big deal. I will finish it when I am ready.

In a Word

You get to answer with one word.

1. Where is your cellphone? - purse
2. Relationship? - complicated
3. Your hair? - blonde
4. Work? - library
5. Your sister? - younger
6. Your favorite thing? - stitching
7. Your dream last night? - blank
8. Your favorite drink? - Coke
9. Your dream car? - Mustang
10. The room you’re in? - office
11. Your shoes? - Adidas
12. Your fears? - teeth
13. What do you want to be in 10 years? - happy
14. Who did you hang out with this weekend? - cats
15. What are you not good at? - bowling
16. Muffin? - blueberry
17. One of your wish list items? - Mirabilia
18. Where you grew up? - Midwest
19. Last thing you did? - work
20. What are you wearing? - jeans
21. What aren’t you wearing? - glasses
22. Your pet? - cats
23. Your computer? - laptop
24. Your life? - changing
25. Your mood? - content
26. Missing? - nothing
27. What are you thinking about right now? - hungry
28. Your car? - Cavalier
29. Your kitchen? - tiny
30. Your summer? - busy
31. Your favorite color? - blue
32. Last time you laughed? - today
33. Last time you cried? - September
34. School? - done?
35. Love? - family