Jun 15
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

I had made a bunch of swatches, which I liked, so I unified them onto a single postcard.

I’m headed for a train, no post tomorrow, nothing til late Sunday or Monday, depending on trains and times and friends….

Jun 14
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

I succumbed to the Really Big Grommet Punches, only in part because of Wallace and Grommet, but they are not quite so satisfactory as the smaller punches. Nice, handy, smooth circles, really big circles, but the little thrill of each hole is not-so-much as with the littler guys.

Here we have two pink squares with one inch holes in them, one grommetted to the background, both with things floating in them, caged by stiffish plastic. The beaten copper piece is a countertop sample with additional holes punched in it, held on with eyelets and decorated with beads. Note the color of the background. Pink was to produce some Pink Postcards in time for the Pink Postcard Swap, which I did, and then used a bunch more because it was fun, but now, well, orange. Lots and lots of orange. And more holes.

I’m headed to New York city tomorrow, to see some Radical Lace and Subversive Knitting in Manhattan, and then Devorah Sperber’s pieces over at the Bronx Museum. Cathy is coming too, which is nice, but not until Sat. morning, so I get Friday entirely on my own. I’m thinking of how to spend it, without spoiling the stuff that we wanted to do together. I don’t think I want to shop – I’m feeling overwhelmed with stuff, and I don’t need to look at stuff if I’m not going to get anything – but I may see if I can find a different museum, one we aren’t planning on seeing on Sat.

I’ll report back as best I can.

Jun 13
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

Clearly I was channeling bustiers. Or shoes.

Bustiers.

Middle school band concert tonight. I am gathering chi.

Jun 12
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

An exercise in seeing into the piece. Like the problems I had with too many layers of scrim/chiffon, once there are too many layers of holes the whole (excuse me) piece loses some definition. Here it is hard to see that the cut out shape is repeated in all the layers. I could organizing them so they line up better.

I like the gold edging on the top layer of purple leaf cut-outs.

As for Circus… today was our last class. We had a lesson with Caroline, and she had all kinds of ideas for tossing Alice about. We swung her, she walked from shoulder to shoulder to shoulder, she did a back bend on our backs as we stood on all fours, she stood on our backs as we crawled across the floor. Then she practiced globe – balancing on one of those large balls and making it roll along using a funny little penguin walk because if you stand still you fall over.

Plus, I have homework for the summer

• hang from the chin-up bar, tuck-up
• hang from the chin-up bar, one knee then the other tuck-up
• handstand from hands-on-floor – no momentum
• pullups and dips, jumping pullups (let’s you do more sets) and spy pullups (see Mistress Krista)
• back strengtheners: superman and kick-ups
• more stretching

Caroline assures me that all this will result in smoother trapeze behavior, esp getting up and coming down. The handstand stuff, that is for the partner acro so I don’t have to scramble up my partner’s knees.

Jun 11
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

I did it yesterday, really. It was (erm, almost) done. Except I was so cross-threaded with life and the universe, and so profoundly tired, I went to bed.

This morning wasn’t much better. My favorite yoga class is done for the summer, and last week (when I wasn’t there) was when they said so. I’m still tired and grumpy, and sneezy and dopey and a couple other dwarves too, I’m sure.

BUT – I finished this. Then I went and bought the really big punches, for really big grommets. I couldn’t live without them. Well, I could, but I didn’t want to. I won’t bore you with the justifications I applied to myself.

VERY LARGE HOLES, coming soon. Stay tuned. .

Jun 10
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

I had scraps after the last round of cutting up postcard base material (Timtex and Fast-to-Fuse, for those who wants to know) because they were an odd size and 4×6″ didn’t fit evenly. So now I have 2″ and 1″ squares to decorate and punch holes in and attach to things.

Part of the cool set of punches includes eyelet setters. The whole set is for the scrapbooking crowd. They get cool tools specially made for them in ways the quilters don’t seem to. So I cruise the scrapbooking aisle whenever I hit the craft store. That’s where I first saw… the eyelets.

I have an ongoing fascination with the eyelets. I think that is why I chose holes for this month, so I had a reasonable excuse to get eyelet punches and the little metal eyelets themselves. Sweet little holes. Rows and rows of holes.

I nearly came home with a grommet punch and setter last night.

In other news, River and Sage came to play today. It is such a treat to see them, our old favorite neighbors who moved and are now treasured friends.

When I called Alice downstairs for breakfast, River and Sage were perched on the edge of Alice’s bed while the witch puppet (courtesy of Alice) told them they would be cleaning the bathrooms and making all the meals for the next month (I think she was channelling Auntie Tribulation from Nightbirds on Nantucket). When I remonstrated with the witch, River said “That’s all right, we were going to tie her up next.” Clearly they had a plan.

Later, after food, repeated games of Blokus, dollies and running about, they were sitting in Alice’s room thinking about what to do next. I heard several ideas floated, including going in the backyard, going fishing (except I left my fishing pole at home, says River) sidewalk chalk, until Alice suggests “We could go dynamite a car dealership”. This is greeted with silence for a moment, until River says “we’d probably go to jail” and Alice agrees “and our parents would be disappointed in us” and Sage says “wouldn’t the dynamite be hard to get? plus you don’t want to hurt anyone”… so they decided to go outside instead.

She’s nine. She’s a girl. Where does she get these ideas?

Jun 9
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

An exercise in making your eyeballs wobble. Did it work?

I used this leaf punch, pointed to by Mimi K months ago, to cut out a bunch of leaves.

It needed the cool hammer (see  Jun 8) and a mat that I wasn’t trying dimly to protect before I could smack the punch hard enough to get through all the layers. I realized they were an exercise in symmetry as well as holes.

Jun 8
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

Elegant lines of holes in eye popping pink and purple fabrics. The punches are so sharp, I didn’t need the eyelets to neaten them up.

I have two sets of punches. The first set is old, and interesting, and was given to me by a friend, and  has character and a history and even a great wooden holder:

and all the edges need sharpening. I didn’t realize this was the case until I broke down and purchased this:

soulless, mass produced, no history, no sweet wooden block, one quarter as many choices of size, and yet, I am smitten. And embarrassed. These ones work so well. The hammer. Just look at the cuteness factor on that hammer. Unfortunately, even using the cute hammer on the old punches doesn’t work that well. They really need sharpening. I need to ask my dad if they can be sharpened.

Jun 7
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

Captivated by this image of a wall with a pink hole, I tried to make some kind of lath wall effect with satin stitch rows. They make an appealingly shaggy texture when cut into. I love the way the stitches sink into the velvet too. Then I was wondering what you called the circles that were cut out of the holes. Are they holes too? or just circles?

Bed now, the rest tomorrow.

Jun 6
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

The corners into holes was so cool I did a bunch of them. Next time I satin stitch all the holes before I stick them together.