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Friday Links
1. This is lots of fun: Quilt Bot, a program that will make a quilt pattern from a photo. It’s not a direct representation but the vibes are there:
2. This is funny because it’s true. As the top comment says, “I dread the day I have to put my father in the Senate.”
@emiliochagolla126 When our government is just a nursing home for the rich đ #government #usa #senate #senator #politics #age #old #oldpeople #dementia #office #fyp #foryou ⏠original sound – Emilio
3. We all want to be her:
Thursday Poem
I’m a little late for the month of this one but the seasonality is there. This is a little fragmented but oh, this line: “People don’t know what to do/ with their hair, all their fear.” From so small to so big.
October
by Alex Dimitrov
A different smell of dirt.
The walk between
every appointment now quicker.
And cloudsâin all their indifferenceâ
somehow looking at you.
Aren’t you, too, unbelievable.
Aren’t you simply a you.
No doubt, as Woolf wrote
one October on Paradise Road:
the extremely insignificant position I have
in this important world. Choosing words
that won’t obscure how punishing we are.
Setting the alarm and keeping the eyes open.
Long. Into the dark. Or the windâ
suddenly matching our need
to change. The garment
with last year’s stain faded but there.
Of course it is cold now
but somewhere it’s colder.
People don’t know what to do
with their hair, all their fear.
When you see the world,
introduce yourself like a guest.
Like a drop of paint outside canvas.
A dog barking for no one to hear.
Trays: Like Boxes But No Lids
What else can you make out of book board and paper? Why not some trays? They’re pretty much just the bottoms of boxes and then every item in your house can have a receptacle.
The green one is a tray to hold hand lotion on the nightstand and the red one is to hold my wallet and keys. For the red one, I copied the dimensions and doubled base from the large valet tray on the Parvum Opus website, which made figuring out the measurements really easy.
The double-thick base is a nice touch and makes the tray feel pleasingly hefty, even if it eats up the book board. It’s about time to order more (and replace that red marble paper that I finally used up).
Fleece Season
The minute it gets cold, I start sewing fleece. I’m working on a Catagonia pullover in this cheetah print Joann fleece (bought last year, so it’s discontinued now) and I have to congratulate myself on this pattern matching:
I also bought more fleece at Joann last month–they have a lot more printed sherpas this season, probably because of those Free People jackets that have been popular.
An indie pattern company even released a pattern that’s a perfect dupe of the FP jacket, so that’s next while I have black thread in the serger. Ten years ago, I never would have embraced this much polyester, but it’s SO WARM.
A Visit To The FOX PARK
A person Doc works with asked if he’d seen the fox den in the park a few miles away. Seen the WHAT now? We had not but we had our Sunday goal.
Neither of us had ever visited the park before, because it’s surrounded by the city–my dentist’s office backs up to one end, our friend lives up the street, there’s a grocery complex on the east. But there were little wooded paths and more wild areas than lawn and a stable with horses and donkeys and, yes, FOXES.
And right on cue one sauntered up.
But then ANOTHER fox showed up and did one of those stretchy bows! I couldn’t speak when Left Fox appeared and could only hit Matt on the shoulder in my excitement!!
But Left Fox just laid down at the edge of the woods to have a nap!!
The Google Maps entry for the park has a bunch of fox photos in the reviews and the other dog walkers did not act like seeing two foxes was a jaw-dropping sight, so I can only assume the foxes feel right at home in their city park and there are a lot of them. Clearly, we’ll have to go to the fox park more often.
Friday Links
1. Visit The Museum of Internet Artifacts and get ready to feel old! I didn’t really recognize a lot until 1991, and that AOL dial up sound (click it to play) took me BACK. Also, the White House page from 1994 is a trip.
2. How did I not know that “taupe” is literally the French word for “mole”?! Some color history here (it’s a Twitter link, so it may or may not work).
In some records, taupe veers on the cool side of brown, while others have it on the brown side of grey. As a French word for âmole,â the only real consensus is that taupe should resemble the burrowing animal, but how itâs expressed in practice varies from source to source.
3. Putting the “no” in “November”:
4. A good reminder as we all practice our little hobbies (from artist Renographics):
Vibe Check
We ordered some kitchen appliances yesterday (Costco’s having a big sale) and next I measure for tile and start a supply list. This is me:
(from the Cats With Hardhats Instagram, which is oddly compelling.)
Or can we just go back to eating berries in a cave?
A Box For Every Item In The House
All of this paper shopping and book binding and box making has thrown me back to when I put wax seals on letters and used fountain pens every day. Working in the stationery store, I accumulated a lot of fountain pens with my employee discount. Why, I wondered, did I have a thousand dollars in fountain pens (in 2006 money; I looked up Mont Blanc’s current prices this morning and fainted) just sitting around in a desk drawer?
Clearly, they needed a special box.
I figured out the size by putting the pens and cartridges on a piece of paper and eyeballing how much room around them I’d need, then used that base to get all the other measurements. This ended up about 10 inches x 4 inches and 1.5 inches high; maybe a little big but now I can put MORE pens in there. (Just kidding, I can’t afford pens now.)
I’m pretty pleased with how I’m figuring out what pieces need to line up. This is my best “box meets spine” alignment yet!
“We need more throw pillows!”
If you ever doubt the value of learning to sew, just look at the price of throw pillows with removable covers. Eighty to a hundred dollars? I think not!
These were “free” because the fabric had been sitting around for a while (since 2021 for the green print, when I meant to make a third new pillow for the couch, and since the spring for the orange print, when I thought I needed more quilt fabrics). The zippers were all from my stash and I even had contrast piping: