Social Media and staying social

I miss Google+, I had some real communities there. I've tried Pluspora but I lost my log in and my interest. I have an instagram account now. And I'm in a couple Discord communities. I've had twitter since practically the beginning but there's so much negativity (attacks, news, etc) that it's hard for me to use. I still sometimes pop in and check on people. Now I have a ko-fi account. I'd like to (someday, somehow) get enough money to buy a new iPad. My iPad's screen is cracked and it's old enough that it doesn't have the latest iOS and some apps won't update anymore.

I'm doing the 26 day racial equity journey with a friend and a friend of hers. We just finished the 2nd week. There's been some eye opening information, some expansion of information I already knew, some new to me viewpoints or aspects, and also review of information I know.

On Saturday I had a zoom meeting with the Palmetto Tatters' Guild. Since they can't meet in person they scheduled a zoom one. Considering their location, I can make the zoom one, unlike the physical meeting. I finished another bracelet during the meeting, using Martha's pastel 8:1 HDT, with silver seed beads this time. Due to the whole Empress thing, Tonya convinced me to get out my tiara and wear. She was wearing hers in my honor.

I'm using the same thread to make some edging for my other masks.

I also ordered a Goulet pen, with converter, and a pack of ink samples. It writes very smoothly. The nib is a tiny bit bigger than my (Monza) pen's fine nib. So far I have the included ink cartridge (blue black ink) in it and I haven't tried the samples yet. I had to find my pen/ink sample notebook. Keeping track of colors, names, and brands will help me in the future.

I have started the 3rd round & 4th of Coronavirus doily. I ran out of shuttle thread on the 3rd round, so I had to pull some yards from the ball and wind it on a shuttle, so I could reload the ring shuttle. I'm about to run out on the ring shuttle again, but the 4th round is all chains, so we'll see how long it lasts.

I don't know what I had done with the thread for the 3rd round so I had put it aside. I found the thread, and resumed work, in Lizbeth 10 Country Grape Dk. I'm thinking about donating it to the NC History Museum for the (future) Covid 19 exhibit. I contacted them about it, and I'm waiting to hear.

I wouldn't object to donating a mask, but I still need mine.
I played with a masked selfie

Still at home

I'm still staying home but I've bought masks to supplement the ones I've made. I've decorated anther one of my masks with tatting. I go back to work onsite in just over a week. I wanted enough to wear a different one every day.

I made a couple bracelets. One is with Martha Ess's pastel rainbow in size 10 (part of the dyeing experiment for Palmetto Tat Days). I used agate beads. I finished another one, but I'm blocking it so I don't have a photo.

Shuttle I ordered arrived. Isn't it pretty? On the bubble wrap that protected it.

I joined a drawing zoom class. Not bad for a mechanical pencil, huh?

Another storm today.

Ummm, really late post?

In the end, I didn't get the pictures until the weekend, so I decided to just post today.

I went to see mom for Mothers' Day. The day before was a bit stressful.

I went to get my car inspected while CD got the oil changed in his. Of course, both of us had stuff come up. Most of mine was recommended maintenance, not OH WOW GET IT DONE NOW, which is nice. I got some of it done. However, the stuff CD needed took a bit longer. So I said, I'd grab his stuff and take him to his Tai Chi class. Except, I somehow managed to bring the wrong bag. Instead, we went to lunch.

The dealer said his car was done so I took CD back. He could pay for the repairs, get his car, we could transfer his stuff to his car and make the afternoon class. Except 'ready now' meant still on the rack. By the time they got it down, etc, CD had missed that class, too. Quite a bummer.

I had to go shopping to get some stuff for mom. I had ordered a portable DVD player for her. I had to make sure I knew how it worked, get it charged, etc, so I could show her how to work it. I bought some of the other stuff on her list while I was out.

Mom loves her DVD player. It's not very big, but she watch her DVDs again and that's the important part. I'd found those half-dozen Last of the Summer Wine DVDs and she hadn't even seen them yet. I ask her if she remember how to use it when I call her and if necessary go over it with her. I specifically found one that's easy to use.

The Deadlands game on Thursday had one player missing. She and her husband were out of town. Since she plays our heavy hitter, we decided to avoid combat. The son of one of the other players came. He's a pretty good player.

I finished the tatting on a bracelet. And I've gotten past 2" on my stitch gauge for my mock cable wristlets.

One of my friends drew this and posted it, I colored it

Missed another one, oops

I successfully donated whole blood on the 15th. Yay me. Whole blood is a little easier than platelets for me; only 1 stick. After that, I had an interview with a grad student for their research project. The project is about people and roles they play.

I made RG an ice drop pendant. I got it done just in time for her birthday supper on Saturday. We had a lovely time. JJ had not gotten CD's email about the supper but I had left him a voicemail, asking if he wanted to carpool. He showed up just in time for us to leave and make it to the restaurant.

I've started learning how to loom knit cables. I knitted, I ripped, I knitted, I ripped, and I knitted. And ripped and knitted. They aren't great, but they are discernibly cables.

I found out the power had never been turned off in Mom's apartment. She was paying someone else's power bill, essentially. I had sent the company my POA and told them to discontinue her account but apparently they never got it. I called them on Friday (when I found out she was still getting billed) and that's when I found out the POA wasn't in her file. Grrrrr.

The tatters' meeting on Saturday was lovely. We didn't get our usual time, so we had it 10-3 instead. I tatted around a wood key and made a heart and started a bracelet. However, the beads and thread color didn't work out so I cut it apart before I was quite finished.

We also had two new tatters. Anitra helped one and I helped the other. Both had mastered flowers (1 ring with lots of picots) and were learning chains and bigger rings.

Leigh from Somthingunderthebed.com brought some books and I now have a few more to add to my wishlist.

She had brought this old, early 20th century German tatting book with her. She also talked about having an early 20th century German book without publisher or designer name. She's been trying to identify the designer by finding (probably) her designs in a magazine. Magazine publication was more common than book publication and sometimes have the designer's name; although not always.

Leigh's been looking for German magazines of the same era. However, she doesn't know the names of any applicable ones and neither do any of her contacts. I posted something in social media and someone in my circles pulled up a German catalog. I don't know if it will pan out but hopefully Leigh will find something helpful.

After the bracelet didn't work out, I made some hearts from the thread (and I've been having fun with my coloring page of the day calendar - I work on them whenever, so I'm nowhere near close to today).

The weather has been absurdly warm for this time of year. Not just the Bradford pears have been blooming but so have the star magnolias, tulip poplars, and other trees I don't know the name of.

I went to visit RG and her dog, Dez, recently. Her dog is almost a year old and up to fourteen pounds. Here's a still from a short video of her chewing on one of her favorite things, an antler.

US politics ahead:
When a white supremacist is a trusted advisor in the White House, with an admitted goal (in 2014) of destroying the US government, is it any wonder I'm depressed.

15000 words+

Yes, I'm behind. Yes, NaNoWriMo is still eating my brain. Plus I had the spreadsheet from hell this past week at work. It wasn't not a truly difficult spreadsheet, just data entry. But I had to find the correct reports (new system) to get the information and even then it took two help tickets to find out why some of the data was not there.

Tri-Tatters meeting was Saturday. ~19 tatters there, including 5-6 who were either new or re-learning how to tat. Pretty cool. I've made one bracelet and one more would be done, but the thread shredded. I'll be helping monsterunderthebed with the scans of Tatting Times. Whee!

Playing pathfinder tomorrow. Looking forward to it.

RG got a job! About 2 weeks after her severance ended, so the timing was pretty good. Not great, but pretty good.

Have a picture from Neko Atsume, a tablet game I've been playing. They finally made a version in English. Too late, I've already renamed all the cats I've found so far.

Palmetto Tat Days, less than a month

It's less than a month until Palmetto Tat Days. I haven't started fretting about my prep yet. I have gotten emails about homework, though. And packing will be...interesting this year.

Thanks to Anitra's car being a yutz, we'll be taking my car. Another local tatter will be coming with us (we'll call her V). My car is Honda Civic. I think I'll be packing smaller to get all of us into it. We have a bag of tins from CK, plus the ones Mom and I have collected to take. Plus there's the infamous poncho and its decoy, neither of which qualify as particularly small. Figure at least 2 bags for each of us on the way down, and 3 bags when we return (we will be making purchases after all). It's going to be a squeeze. Added, we're picking up a 4th tatter on the way. I have ordered a TripTik from AAA.

I'll be Georgia Seitz's assistant in her class on weird joins. Such a thrill. Georgia Seitz is such a sweet lady. I've been working on that project instead of the gold/silver bead bracelet and necklace.

homework for Georgia's class

Had the monthly date with CC last week. She's applying for a project at work. Her video interview was Friday. I need to find out how that went.

I am terrified of dentists. I wasn't always, but the older I get the more anxious I get about them. It's not a phobia because it's not an irrational fear. I have a small mouth, soft tooth enamel, and a sensitive gag reflex; both of these contribute to a potentially lousy visit. Add in some past experiences, and well, let's just say it adds up.

However, I had a toothache, and it got bad enough I couldn't sleep. It wasn't a constant pain either, it would come and go in waves. After a couple days, I worked up the nerve and found a dentist in my insurance network, and who was close to my home. They saw me quickly, at least for an initial problem-solving and we've scheduled a follow-up to take care of some other issues. The dentist and staff were all very nice and understanding about my anxiety. The dentist even asked what incidents contributed to my anxiety so as to avoid doing those things, or at least be aware of possible triggers.

I finished the tatting on the bracelet to match the earrings. Now I need to make a necklace. Karey suggested using a large bead and threading the beaded tassel/tatting through that, although the bookmark has me toying with making a lariat necklace.

A friend of mine (not a close friend but we have a huge overlap in social circles) has been going through a big change in her life. It's been a kind of a scary change for her so I plan to make a bracelet for her. Of course, I have a necklace, a star/snowflake, and State Fair jewelry project to make. Of course, I could overlap the State Fair project and her bracelet. I am taking a bracelet class at Palmetto Tat Days, I think.

C made chocolate chess pie. It is yum.

These are some things from Kickstarter projects that arrived last week. The artist did a really good job with the illustrations and the cards. I have friends who want to buy the deck and I'm trying to find out how they can do that.

I got the PDF of the gamebook, too

After the Convention

Want to feel old? Try this little website. It calculates how many days you've been alive, what happened around the time you were born, an historical event that is closer to your birthday than today is, etc. The link takes you to my birthday, but at the bottom you can do your own or someone else's.

Here's the bracelet I finished (in sunlight, so you can almost see the pretty beads). Sorry about the bizarre background.

And have you ever wondered just how far somewhere is, compared to what you know? For example, compared to your hometown, just how big is London? Try comparing the maps and see. 

Palmetto Tat Days was great fun (as usual). I took a Nina Libin class, and made one lovely pair of earrings. I started another set, but the thread tangled awfully. I messed the pig I made in Jane Eborall's class, or at least it looks quite funny. The key turned out well. Dawn taught us some origami as a break from tatting.

I won a cape! And it will go into the auction next year...once I've made some...additions

Pig from Jane's class

Key from an evening session

Earrings from Nina Libin

origami envelope

origami box, closed

Origami box, open

One of scholarship quilts; Flowers and Vines

the dragon & edging I made

My badge, with gifts

teapot edging

flying geese edging

3 weeks until Tat Days

The countdown begins. Less than three weeks until Palmetto Tat Days. I've started planning for my projects. I've reviewed Shuttle brothers alternate thread method (as per Gina Butler's video). They have pictures of the scholarship quilts. Here's the teapot quilt. I think that's the teapot I made on the lower right. Here's the flower and vines quilt; with my dragon and vines edging toward the lower left.

Here's a bracelet I made; although it still needs to be blocked and to have the findings added.

And here's where I noticed I had skipped a join and a ring.

This is after I opened the ring.
















And this is me ready to start tatting again (after retro tatting the ring and chain, with beaded join).

I have almost a dozen bracelets made. At some point, I'll need to grit my teeth and open my Etsy shop.

The camera on my iPad went out. After a few calls to service, they determined it wasn't a software problem. Since it was a manufacturer defect, and I had the insurance, they replaced it. Yay!

My niece has left for college. I wrote a letter to her today. I went to see Mom the first weekend in August. She showed me a picture of her mother's mother, as a young woman. And I could tell, even without Mom telling me, Aunt Dot was a dead ringer for her when she was young.

Other stuff has happened, but of course, I can't remember any of it.

Unseasonably Cool

It's been unseasonably cool the past week or so. The high temperatures have been in the 80s and overnight has often been in the 60s (that's Fahrenheit). See some of cloud and sky pictures I've taken:Trigger warning, there's a picture of a bug after the clouds.

It's also been a bit wet. Last I heard, we're about 4.5" above our normal rainfall for July and more than 6" above normal for the year to date. I guess we won't be worrying about the water table this year.

I found an assassin bug on my leg one day. They eat roaches, etc.

I almost have my pawns for Pathfinder organized. This is how I do it.

Scrapbooking storage case

I start with this scrapbooking storage case. It's nice because it has some very helpful features. 

locking handle

The handle locks closed. The locks slide into place. There are two levels, with the lower one subdivided into several small niches and one big layer for the upper part.

bottom part, just after I opened it

upper shelf, holds the huge pawns and the bases

It's full of pawns

As I mentioned in my last post, I helped run the Pathfinder Society games for Fantasy Gamer Conclave.  Here's my table, all set up for the first game on Saturday. I'm all ready for my players. I ran 3-4 games over the course of the weekend; they were just fights really, not scenarios. But everyone fun and there was roleplaying.

I have been tatting. The rings are Ocean Sunset in Lizbeth 20 with Leafy Greens for the chains. I started out ring and ball then decided I wanted to add a ring 'leaf' to the chains. The picture on the left is me in mid wind from ball to around shuttle to onto my flat shuttle. The picture on the right show the 'leaf'.

Here is a bracelet I made. I need to add findings. 

I ordered threads from Yarnplayer, aka Marilee Rockely. Aren't they pretty. 

This weekend I go see Mom. And on the way back, I'm scheduled to have supper with a friend from high school. She lives in California so I see her every 2-3 years when she's back in the area to visit family.

And someone online showed me this entertaining website picture; group names of fantastic creatures.