HELLOmynameisHeather

Happy Memorial Day

Happy Memorial Day, Americani! 

I'm feeling appropriately patriotic.  If you have a chance to watch The Story of Us series on the History Channel, do.  I've watched several episodes over the last two days.  It's had me choked up on more than one occasion -- the struggles and triumphs of our country's past (and present).  The series is intelligently paced.  It ties in the technological advancements of each era as well, and shows their impact on historical events.  It's just good.

So now LA Ink is on while I type.  I go high-brow, I go low-brow.  I'm strangely relating to this episode.  The main tattoo chick is interviewing for two new employees while absorbing their duties in the meantime. I'm hiring for two positions right now too.  Sorting through resumes took an entire day by itself.  Tattoo chick, I feel you.

I'm not too busy to celebrate Memorial Day though!  The BBQ brigade is coming to our house today.  We have a new backyard to christen, after all.  And it's gorgeous out.  For now.

Hug a soldier, hug a veteran, hug the free earth beneath your feet!

God bless America.

Growing Things

Wow, is it already the end of May?

Last week I was swept away by a birthday blizzard on one side and a Spring Market squall on the other.  My brother's birthday is the 16th, Isaac's is the 17th, my sister's husband's is the 18th, and my mom's big day is the 20th.  Add to that a trip to Minneapolis last week from Wednesday through Sunday and a father in the hospital. (He came home on Sunday too -- after two weeks.  I won't go into it without his consent.  He does seem to be doing much better now.  We were worried.  Love you, Dad!) 

I have a book-contribution to photograph, fabric to finesse, patterns to polish, kids to cuddle.  (Now I'm just having fun with alliteration.)  Mayday, Mayday!

Minneapolis, what a beautiful city!  I don't know what I was expecting exactly, but I was pleasantly surprised.  The weather was great, the city was clean and lively, and the public transit system was fantastic, and there was a Target right downtown.  I picked up some flip-flops and chocolate on Thursday, grabbed apples and couscous on Friday, and made a last-minute umbrella-run for Saturday's rain.  This is exciting stuff -- as on most of my city-stays, I lack some mundane object I have left behind;  there was no want this time. 

I love to catch up with everyone at Market.  Friends everywhere with new patterns, new books, new fabric, new fabric shops, new wallpaper.  Some with launch-parties, some with cake-parties.  I forget to work.

Minneapolis was great. I feel completely refreshed right now.  And I'm happy to be home to my little green garden of growing things. 

I have a number of outdoor projects to scoot-to before the coming heat scoots me back inside: work tables to build, chairs to refinish, a storage unit to clear out, a new garden to tend.  Truthfully, I can't even start on this list till a whole different work-list is checked.  We'll see how it goes.  The blaze is on its way.

I've got some fresh energy so I'm hopeful.  I'll keep a camera handy.

And school is out tomorrow!  My kids are all mine again. This makes me squishy.  I go.

Planted

Any guess what the Baileys are up to today?

Short Live Long Hair (mine anyhow)

It's a glorious day!  I won't say how long it's been since I've had a haircut, but if my excitement is any bellwether, then you're on to me.  Too long!  I'm letting my hair down.  My neck is thanking me. I have trimmed off six inches or more.

We're designing two new tables for the warehouse this week -- out with the old.  And finishing up the backyard.  I'm sending in my housewares designs and working on business-organization stuff, like training manuals and business forms.  Fun!  : /

The studio is clean, the dogs are bathed, the laundry is folded, the lists are made.  I can take it.  At least I'm no longer tangled in hair.

Long Live Long Legs

I have some fun, old sewing books I like to flip through on occasion -- sometimes for laughs.  Take for instance the following discussion about the absurdity of various fashion trends, from Fabrics and Dress by Rathbone and Tarple, 1937.  Hang in there with me.  There's a good laugh coming.

First up is the fabulous headdress above, a la Marie Antoinette -- Watch out madame, you're tipping starboard!

"Regardless of how reasonable or sane the inspiration for a fashion may be, the style sometimes is carried to extreme, with grotesque and absurd results. We can glance through books on historic costume and pick out many "follies" which have grown out of sensible fashions.  Outstanding among the freaks of fashion has been the headdress made popular by Marie Antoinette, Queen of France and Royal Dictator of Fashion..."  And the book goes on to discuss the fabulous hair-do above. (I say go for it, Bjork. I liked your cheeky swan dress.)

The next folly of fashion on the table are poulaines, medieval shoes with liripipe toes. (This seriously takes me back to my History of Costume class my Freshman year in college. How in the world did I recall the term, poulaines?)

"Shoes with long toes were another absurdity of fashion to which we often point with ridicule... richer and more eminent personages wore shoes with tips a foot long and princes two feet (Fig. 4)" And so forth.

Now here's where it gets good.

"Another recent fashion, which will probably seem as absurd as many of these when it becomes long out-of-date, is the very short skirt of 1928-1929, which was about three inches above the knee (Fig. 7) When worn with extremely high heels, it made the expanse of the legs much longer than the length of the skirt..."

Wait.  What?.

Innocent eyes, look away. 

The scandal!

What woman would want her legs to look longer by wearing a short not-that-short skirt?  Just the most absurd idea in fashion ever -- the extremely short skirt of 1928-1929 -- clearly as absurd as the pirate hat and the carrot shoe.  It will never last.

I do love my old books.

-o-o-o-o-o-

Regarding poulaines: "Such shoes proved a hazard among the French Crusaders at the Battle of Nicopolis (1396) when they had to cut off the tips in order to run away." Isaac Asimov, Isaac Asimov's Book of Facts, 1979.

Some fashions don't repeat themselves -- for good reason.