Rayen

Last month when I got out a pack of 5" squares I promised myself I could keep if I made something out of them this summer (I like to keep promises to myself) I spread out all the squares to have a look at the colors and prints. I realized right away they weren't exactly my cup of tea anymore; I've been gravitating toward solids and hand-dyed art cloth for a long time now. I think I bought the pack at a quilt show back in 2008, and the line is probably out of print now -- all the more reason to make something out of it. This is how an idea comes to life: I play with the fabric, look at it and rearrange it. With the recent flare-up my hands haven't been too steady, so I knew I wanted to keep the cutting to the bare minimum. I also wanted to use as many of the squares as possible in one piece. So I turned everything en pointe, fiddled with the placements and then sewed it together on the machine. I focused on matching up and sewing the seams as perfectly as

I knew when I was diagnosed with arthritis at 28 that the time I had to use my hands was limited. I had already given up a lot of dreams because of my condition. After two surgeries left my dominant hand basically useless all I had left was one. I lost painting, knitting and a lot of other abilities. Thirty years after that I made do with one hand (and got pretty good at it, frankly) arthritis invaded my working hand, ultimately leaving me with three fingers I could use. I was cheerful about it. Three fingers are better than none. I got thirty-five years of limited use out of my hands, and I am grateful. Most people with my condition aren't that lucky. I think sewing, quilting and my other creative endeavors have helped me hang onto as much use of my working hand as I could. Now the painful truth is I've finally run out of time, and I'm rapidly losing what use I have left. My fingers are stiff as little boards, the joints swollen and painful. Gripping a

I bid on a small lot of yarn, as it had a few colors I needed for a holiday project. I had a couple of challengers but in the end I won it for a little under my maximum bid. It arrived last month beautifully packaged in a very nice floral storage box. It came with an unfinished knitting project, ten expensive skeins of yarn in mint condition, some wool roving, very nice scissors, a collection of jumbo knitting needles, patterns and even some buttons. Everything is in excellent condition with no smell; the roving is absolutely gorgeous (I've always wanted to try working with that, and now here's my chance.) The Sugar N' Cream cotton yarn skeins are worth $3.00 each, and the Buttercream Alpaca skeins are $11.00 each; just those ten skeins of yarn are worth over $70.00. That's why I'm comfortable with pricing this lot for resale at $100.00. I paid $13.54 for everything. Savings: $86.46.

I bid on a couple of jewelry lots over the summer, and ended up winning a small collection of Napier pices. Let's see what I got for my minimum bid. For those not in the know, the Napier Co. has been in the costume jewelry business for a long time (since 1878, in fact.) They're the avant guard of fashion jewelry, and make everything. They also do it so well that they're highly collectible. My mother had a couple of their pieces. The bracelets in this lot are especially pretty. Napier's designs are quite distinctive. What caught my eye about this lot was that it included Napier's iconic silver-plated Clam Shell Charm Bracelet, which was designed by Eugene Bertolli. It debuted in the 1950's and was reissued in 1982. It currently sells for $200.00 in used condition on Poshmark and almost $400.00 with the matching earrings on Etsy (I didn't know all this off the top of my head; I looked it up.) I was surprised to see that one shell h

To finish my memory lap quilt made out of my old t-shirts last month I decided to use some thrifted binding I had on hand versus buying new. It's off white, and pure white would have been a better match. Still, the backing was a thrifted sheet, the batting was thrifted and the embroidery threads were all vintage, so it just felt like the right choice. Once I sewed it on I thought it worked fine, and the quilt was complete. The quilt turned out much prettier than I expected it would; the embroidery was a big help. It also feels like me to me. The back. I learned something from every stage of this project, and while I'm not in a rush to make another quilt out of t-shirts, it was definitely interesting. Detail of the backing, darkened to show the stitching. I surprised myself by making this quilt; I didn't think I had it in me. Now I think I have one more large quilt left in me for this year (which will be the kit.)

This is going to be a weird post, I'll tell you that up front. After watching the romantic dramedy Crash Landing on You some years ago and seeing Kim Soo Hyun (one of the highest paid actors in Asia, aka the King of Endorsements) make a cameo with long hair and wearing a green track suit, in which he acted like someone mentally challenged, I never got that scene out of my head. Although I was pretty sure it was a cultural reference that flew right over my head, the casting was just bizarre. In the west it would be like having Chris Evans play the autistic character role in Rain Man . Anyway, fast forward to this summer, when Viki.com added a film called Secretly Greatly that featured Kim Soo Hyn with long hair, wearing a green track suit and looking like a mentally challenged person again. I had to know what he was playing, so I watched the movie. And, well, I might be more confused than I was before I did. The beginning of the movie starts like an over-the-top Asian