Rayen

A dear friend gifted me this yarn bowl, which she said she thought looks like me. Since I'm like an albino without the pink eyes I get the resemblance. :) I've named it Happy Cat, and it will remind me to be grateful that I am blessed with a craft I can still do, along with such generous people in my life. Refusing to be depressed about what I can't do means focusing on what I can, which is crochet now. There are so many things I want to make it's like stepping into a new world. I won't give up quilting, but since I'm losing the ability to hand stitch I know it won't be my primary focus anymore. I haven't really planned anything in crochet for 2026, and for many reasons I think I'd like to keep it that way. The joy of being spontaneous and discovering new things is too delightful. I just taught myself last night how to crochet bookmarks, and now I want to learn all the free patterns there are for them online. This also keeps m...

Lately my insomnia is raging again, so I'm making an extra effort to take refuge in things that make me calm and happy. At the moment I'm working through the leftover yarn in my scrap basket and making a wrap with a very interesting repeated stitch that is turning out kind of fabulous. I'm still embroidering the March tote for my calendar project, although that's still slow going. I might embroider just one panel so I don't run out of month before I finish it. My guy planted our spring garden and things are beginning to sprout. This weekend I'll harvest the first of our scallions and use them in a stir fry.

I watch a lot of quilting and crochet content online, and I'm a big supporter of the crafting community at large. My patience is usually better than most, too. That said, even I have limits, and a few of them are zero tolerance. So here are: Ten Things That Turn Me Away from Your Content Anger Issues: I watched one maker on Youtube who had what seemed like interesting pro-craft content, but they presented everything with so much annoyance and even rage over their craft, their supplies, where they sell, the competition, and basically everything involved in their business that after a couple videos the content proved too toxic for me to keep watching. People who are that upset are not entertaining to me; they remind me of things from my past that scarred me. If you're so enraged about what you do for a living that you can't present your content with zero anger, you should really try to do something else with your time and your life. Assumptions: Making stat...

My gears are definitely whirling this week. If I don't make an effort to quilt something (other than my calendar project) I'll probably stop altogether and get completely caught up in crochet, so it's time to plan some quilting projects. At the quilt show last year I bought some fabrics that I haven't yet used, like this bundle of dragon/castle/treasure themed novelty prints that I'd like to turn into a tote (maybe for the calendar project.) I planned to start quilting by machine this year, but I haven't yet worked up the nerve to try a fully machine-quilted project. Same with this arty motivational novelty print bundle. Actually this one I might save for the calendar project, too. Then there is this panel yardage scrap with flamingos. I have to do something fun with this. I'm still struggling with the necessary step of giving up hand-quilting. My arthritis is flaring up so constantly it's always uncomfortable for me to hand stitch, an...

After rehabbing basket #2 from the pair I thrifted, I really didn't have a lot to do to it. The sides are nice and I like the airiness of the woven material, as I plan to use it as another project basket. The bottom was the problem, as it was not entirely solid but woven loosely with big gaps. I took a ball of sage green yarn from my scrap bin and crocheted a flat circle in single stitches to serve as a bottom liner. I didn't use a pattern, but just increased in the round for fifteen rows until it was the right size. As with the first basket I then sewed the bottom liner to the basket with big stitches so I can remove and launder it in the future if it gets soiled. Now I can put small items like stitch markers in the basket and not worry about them slipping through the gaps in the slats.

I don't know if it's the general happiness of 2026 (compared to last year, anyway), spring about to arrive or just pure intellectual restlessness, but lately I've been missing writing for pleasure. Everything I do in that department is for income, and there's nothing wrong with that, either. One must pay the bills. It's just that I've always enjoyed writing stories for the sake of just writing stories. I have an archive of close to a thousand of them that I've never published. When I get like this I think about a guy I knew back in the day when I was writing for NY. We met online and I enjoyed talking shop with him so much we were becoming friends. He had a novel planned and it sounded really good, and I intended to help him on his way to publication once he did write it because he was very talented. Then suddenly, just after Hurricane Katrina, he drowned in a boating accident. I have not written anything outside what I do for the day job in a...