Partial Unveiling Fish Chandelier

Well, it's missing a bulb and I still need to string 4 1/2 fish strands, but it looks good. Because it has 6 bulbs, it is not casting fish shadows, alas. 

It's custom and bespoke and delicate. No two fish are the same, and there are non-fish surprises such as a wave bead that ties the color scheme together and a glass bubble. There is a massive deep green fish. They all sparkle with Aurora Borealis (it's a bead thing). I wanted to make a blue whale gathering up the fish into a readily edible mass like I witnessed in Juneau, but never did. I don't have the right colors any longer and I like it without predators. 

I put the longer strands in the middle, the medium ones in between and the shorter ones along the outside for a graduated appearance that mimics the bulb stems. I want to learn how to make a circle with beads to create one octopus, but so far all I managed is one transparent star fish. This is the perfect task to beat the heat and humidity. A bit more fish making and I'll need another project. Alas, all of our ceilings are covered and I need to move onto another medium but light fixtures are my favorite. Oh, and after I finish with the fish, I need to strand my plastic flowers because this chandelier is CONVERTIBLE! The flowers should cover the space better than the fish because they are larger. 

Rhode Island

Candy colored Lincoln Park. I have no photos, but the pictures live strong in my mind of the glorious tack that was a 1970s family style New England amusement park. Mom would pack a lunch that I would dance through with anticipation in the parking lot. I was tall enough that my father took me on the Comet coaster and it's not an experience I'll soon forget: if not for my father's karate chop to my waist on that first hill I was falling forward onto the tracks. Good times. My sister would invariably get sick on fried clams. Many rides I wouldn't consider tackling because I was certain my parents wouldn't go for it, but those cages that could, in theory, swing 360 degrees sure looked dangerous. I always felt bad for the people in the Monster ride who would emerge on the second floor. The humans pinned against the circle had nope written all over it.

But what I did ride I'll always remember. Storks, motorcycles, boats, some sort of garish barrel, rocket ships, cars, and the flimsiest ferris wheel this side of a carnie. I got into one of those bucket seated multi-armed deals with my little sisters and misjudged the centipedal force to crush my baby sis. No one cared about safety or intestinal health back then. No one seemed to have planned anything besides my mother's lunch: we'd see families strapped with massive plushies that would take the entire backseat on the ride home. Ugly, cheap huge eyesores that they already regretted winning for $100 in today's equivalent. 

This is incredibly girly, but many of those arcade games had dolls made out of nylon stockings and outfitted like Mae West in a riot of pastels and pouf. I'd dream of these visions of femininity all night as I could still feel my body sliding down "the big slide". 

Nostalgia is a powerful thing. I have lost touch with that young, wild girl who was brimming with excitement. The world seemed so magical. It was magical.

My father drove me out of Rhode Island in an Oldmobile Cutlass Supreme in 1979. I just drove my own self out of Rhode Island and I couldn't believe I'd do the same horrible thing to myself. It is magic. Every corner has the cutest pre-Revolutionary homes with their diamond lead glass windows. I found the homes in Providence I remember thinking even back then, special. I visited Federal Hill finally and felt the presence of Guy Alba cutting hair until close to 100 years old. I grew up in a magical place and it's still breath-taking. Rhode Island gives you a sense of discovery. Maybe it's because I didn't actually have an itinerary and my co-pilot was Tootie Pie but I am counting the days until Rhode Island is mine again.

Full, Fuller, Fuller

 

The fish population growth

I feel confident I will get the chandelier up. I vacillate between this optimism, unfounded, and the pits of depression about it. On the plus side, I have 26 of the 42 strands, or 104 of the 168 fish, completed now and thankfully it's starting to look like a collection of fish and not a sad middle school dance with infusible clumps of friends. I am hoping we may get fish shadows once installed. So, a mere 16 strands to go, or just 64 more fish to create! Piece of cake.

As for my mood, I may have inadvertently gone off my meds again. It is too easy in this day and age to fall off the depression radar and not get your pills. Far too simple. And, the best part is, you may or may not be aware of this fact, because of plans not covering certain prescriptions or quantities or other arcane reasons to prevent me from my meds, and using substitute, off-brand names that you're not at all familiar with. Am I taking an old prescription, and my current one is not covered? Well, that's for my depressed ass to get on top of for the umpteenth time. Chasing down meds is a full-time job.

Speaking of full-time jobs, I need one. Another indignity besides the medical system is the job search. Impersonal, sure, it's business, but there should be the beginnings of a relationship and it isn't there any more. We're in a race to the bottom and it scares me. 

Happy fish! Just keep swimming.

Half Complete Fish Shoal and Dining Room Disaster

My fish shoal is 1/3 complete. I made 16 strands of four, out of a total of 42. This creates low fullness on the 6 inch diameter ring I am staging the fish strands on. I am doing this diligently to avoid hanging the chandelier. I have cleaned it. I have the bulbs. I need to ask for help, and I have no problem asking. The problem is no one wants to lend a hand. 

Sixteen strands of 4 fish. Looks sparse
and still tangles.

It's okay. I have been known to weed my friends' driveways and sweep up confetti and other thankless jobs because later, my friends would hold the ladder as I get another plastic bag out of my tree or loosen that screw I can't budge. Whatever. I'll do it alone. It is cemented to the ceiling. Fine. I am trying to remove it and I want to cry, and this will make it that much more glorious when I finally achieve it, I must say so to myself to keep from doing myself in. 

It still tangles. The fish are disappointingly tiny. They hardly sparkle. Many fish are non-symmetrical and will always seem to be swimming in circles. I am not in a great mood.

The old fixture is down - cue religious music. It required the use of a spatula. The new chandelier is HEAVY and I need help putting it up. There it is. That is why it stayed on my floor and became covered in dust. The dream of a new chandelier. I have not been getting what I want lately. I think it's part of the aging process. People flock to you when you're young and beautiful. Become a bit janky around the edges and suddenly, you lose all appeal. It is men and their frustrating lack of ability to see women as people. They did it then and they're doing it now. What can I do but persevere?

I am past the halfway point: 25 strands out of 42 total. They're so small. I liked the overlap that the inspiration fixture had and the basis in art also had. Here they are for reference:

In comparison, my fish are sparse and overfished to the point of colony collapse. I still have the flowers to fall back on. Oh, maybe the layering of the fixture will give the illusion of fullness. I am noticing how narrow the inspiration fixture is compared to mine and the fish in the inspo are about a third of the width. My fish are minnows and not worth catching!

Fish Work - Going For It

A good view of my lighting design. 
There should be 48 fish here, but 
the bubble takes spot #48

I will have a convertible chandelier. It will feature plastic flowers some days and beaded fish others. I am putting off more urgent matters and it doesn't matter. I am making my own world and I only have myself to consult with. 

What a nightmare! Making the fish is easy and fun. Hanging these MFs is a whole 'nother thing. Keeping them from becoming a tangled disaster is proving almost impossible. So here is why we seldom see such things as dangling chandeliers. I've made some 50 of them and strung them onto jump rings and dangled them and they're all in a rat's nest right now. Frustrating.

I know that I write this to no one. No one listens anymore. I pay my therapist to listen and I can see the reflection off her glasses as she surfs the web during our sessions. Tootie Pie, forget it. People's attention spans can shrink all they want, as long as they can greet me in the store and make eye contact at the register. I guess that is too much to ask.

All this talk and no where to direct it. Back to the fish!

I found a cord by Kreinik which is metallic, meaning it holds its shape better than string, but isn't as easily caught like the wire. Fiddling with the fishing line was way tedious. The cord is the solution and it's iridescent! So it's back to making the fish, which is soothing and I'm becoming an expert. The key is to keep the loops from forming kinks, so keep your wire in a U-loop and not a loop-dee-loop. The cord is #12 in Crystalline. I am looking for my blue ball beads to look like bubbles. I think it will be adorable if I ever put up the new fixture and finish the other 200 fish to hang.

Still stringing the next group of 4 
strings of 4 fish, so only 32 pictured
here. I need to not add the strands
as I go because BALANCE

Obviously the fuller version looks better, but the fishes' tails are catching even this sparsely populated. It kind of makes you appreciate how they either don't collide IRL or they are so slimy they simply slide off each other. 

Chandelier/Mobile Creative Direction

Fishy

I suppose I could have a convertible chandelier: that's the beauty of the hook idea! It's about time I put up the kitchen chandelier and I can develop the mobile portion later. I may have found two great creative directions. I don't want to make hundreds of tiny beaded fish only to discover that it doesn't quite look right. So a quick mock-up was in order and I think it may work. The chandelier is just over 20 inches in diameter, and the fishy is 1 inch. There are 6, 14 and 22 concentric sets of rings, or 42 strands. If each ring has 4 fish, that would be 168 fish, and if it has 6 fish, that would be 252 fish. That is doable.

Fishy x252 (but here only 52 of them)

Here is a mock-up of just the outer most row half completed. It already looks like it will appear full. We don't want a constant reminder of overfishing over our kitchen table! This project is on tap for tomorrow. I am putting off the switch because I'm not 100% sure that the electrical box will hold this heavy fixture. But, I know that the six arms will put out much more light than the current 120V inside a plastic coated fabric shade. 

So I must talk myself off the edge, but beads are so sparkly! And by now I've made 6 whole fish. They're mostly blue. I could justify this by saying that I am using up the beads that I have on hand, but ain't no way I have 252 fish worth of beads, who am I kidding? And I have bubble beads, but maybe only 5 or 6. Fun!

Ran out of black flower sequins so 
resorted to some sort of flanged deal
for one fish.

I kind of like the look of the ridged white crystal on the one and only green fish. To supplement my used up supply of eye sequins, I have a bunch of clear ones on order. And I have one more tube of light blue beads before I can justify purchasing more, but that day will come! I heard there are two separate hobbies: beading and collecting beads. They both sound doable!

And becoming a small
school

Now 14 fish start to
cluster

As I work on the fish and work through my bead stash, I am working out how they will be attached. I will most likely attach a jump ring and hang from clear fishing line. Only the hook will be in their backs, not their plump lips. Did you notice their luscious lips?

 

Bonus Marimekko Free-Form Rugs

A view of rectangular mate reflected in mirror

Beauties. I thought that hemming the contours of these rugs would be disastrous and I was pleasantly surprised. Because I tried to hem the rectangular base rug with yarn instead of thread, most of my problems with this simple job could have been avoided. Having switched to quilting thread makes things so much easier. Like with the rectangle, I couldn't manage to figure out the whip stitch so I just straight stitched both. That was another part of the problem with the larger rug.

So now the question is, do I do one more, in kelly? I think it's time to give the kitchen some love with the new chandelier and cushions (finally for the banquet).  

A rather unfortunate
worn spot on oak floors

Arial view reflected

Let's Get SideTracked with Paper Flowers

It's probably a rose based on the foliage

As if still maintaining a blog isn't throwback enough, I currently work above, get this, a Barnes and Noble store. This hanger-on always has paper flowers for sale and, well, my bedroom has two vases, one of which has a fallen-off bit of my pampas grass stuffed in it and nothing in the other. Also, it appears that Winblaad's Tusind og en nat bride is holding, let's call it a peony. So, combine these two things plus a visit to the library for a book called Paper Flower Art and I am distracted again. The bonus of this new tangent is I need not buy one thing. I used:

• 

  My paper peonies and
  the amazing effects
  alcohol inks can give. It is 
  giving off rose vibes without
  manipulation!

  craft paper
• 93% isopropol alcohol
  
• food coloring
  
• alcohol ink - Ranger alcohol pearl alchemy and was in Clearance at Michael's
• crepe paper
• iridescent pigment powder - Jacquard micro-pearlescent
• craft paint - Americana Hauser Medium Green
• hot glue, hot glue, hot glue

All of this I had on hand. The 93% alcohol was bought previously to use the iridescent pigment powder to try to make my plastic flowers iridescent. I have been on an iridescence kick for a bit. After trying to brush it, spray it, and just dump it onto the plastic, I realized that the one alcohol ink I did buy to see if the problem was my formulation (it wasn't) did not color the plastic bottle it was packaged in and therefore, my experiment was never going to work. Why does it say on the bottle that it works on non-porous materials? 

Now, the book tells me to buy 180g crepe paper from Italy, but I have left over crepe paper streamers from Tootie Pie's piñatas, and so I just used that. It doesn't stretch or cup like the Italian stuff, sure, but it looks 100 times better than the ones sold in Barnes and Noble which are just cut from tissue paper. Oh, and you get to push the crepe paper roll into the alcohol solution which makes each roll unique. And your hands red. I even used gel food coloring, which didn't mix well into the alcohol and so it looked like the roll had deep red pustules, but with time, the pustules spread out across the paper creating a lovely pink. I doused this same roll with the yellow-gold alcohol ink that I actually purchased and my homemade iridescent concoction. After drying, I wrapped the crepe paper around my hand 10 times or so, and then cut out peony petals. I also read that you need a styrofoam ball to make the bud, but I just wadded up some of the leftover crepe paper from my cutting.

I used card stock for my stems and leaves and lots of hot glue to attach them and the petals. Each peony was created using different crepe papers. One red one took a bleach bath, and the white got the above-mentioned pustule treatment. I did the red for the bath on all, but the gel one got a second dosing with what was supposed to be orange, but just became pinker and yellow - no real blending of gel colors there. I have one more roll and bought more food coloring to try again. Here they are: 

I sprinkled some petals around the 
vase to make it look legit

This seems like a good way to make money! The worse looking ones sold at B&N are $8 a stem. I created four stems, including a bud. I actually like mine better than the cupped ones in Paper Flower Art, despite mine not having pistels and stamen. The author, Jesse Chui, used double sided crepe paper and for her stems, tubing. Her pistels were created from floral tape - I'll leave this for the clients to ask for. 

I have now a bowl full of petals, but this will only create 2 stems most likely. My version's stems are awful and I bought clear tubing for my refrigerator from an aquarium store years ago, so maybe! This is currently pure profit but if I end up purchasing supplies for Tootie Pie's room, who knows? If I sold my bouquet above at $5 a stem that's a nice $20, but I do believe I spent an inordinate amount of time drying my crepe paper and all sorts of other inefficiencies and it took the better part of a day. A fun day, but $20 a day, man, that won't get you far.

Latch Hook Bonus Rugs and Another Chandelier Pre-Contemplation

Hemming the rectangular Marimekko was too straightforward - let's add curves. I would have liked to have created a larger rug than the 3x5 feet that I ended up working on FOR-EVER, but these mini flower rugs are so adorable and quick to turn out.

Sweet little flower rugs

Also, this is the end, again, of my yarn. Look how tantalizingly close I came to finishing off all of the Sulfur/Chartreuse! I now want to create a freeform flower rug for Tootie Pie's room. I wanted to do a pink tiger skin rug, surrounded by flowers, but now think just a flower. But, my next project will be the lighting fixture installed in the dining area. Here are some of my ideas for the dangly parts for the hooks:

Is it just me, or is no one else noticing anything other than the floaty gathering of objects in the air? We have two arrangements that are orderly above, and two look freeform and natural. Because my floaty gathering is not uniform, lucky me gets the natural arrangement, which will admittedly be easier; I picture one person on top lowering or raising one object until it's perfect, and then what? Knots always make the string ever so smaller and the joy of the arrangements is their perfect hanging. Not for me. I love the neon green behind the boringly dressed mannequins. I have been collecting hand cut plastic flowers for ages and I wanted the string to contain the color, but the magic of these mobiles is that they seem to float, so clear thread it is.

Of course, the two I like best are the naturally hung ones. The one I like best is the first one with the knit blobs, which would be the hardest to create and may look too heavy for the space. I am debating nixing the hanging blooms, but this change in direction means I have cut out the clear plastic flowers for nothing. I also smoothed their edges and pierced them using the hot knife technique meaning I inhaled toxic vapors for nothing, too.

Here are my flowers:

And now that I've made an army of flowers, I want to switch to beaded fish and possibly a blue whale made of beads in an amalgamation of these:

Those tiny 3D fish! I'd need to make around 4,000 of them, but they seem really quick. I feel like fish should be translucent, and flowers not so much, but we're not going for realism. I feel like part of what makes the fish school chandy so cool is the size of the fish to the tiny diameter of the light. My chandelier is wider and so either the effect would disappear because the fish are too small, or I'd need to increase the size of the fish, but they're so adorable like minnows. She gave one fish a trout pout!

It will be flowers in the short term and we'll think about the fish. Do I really need another medium? I just added yarn, I cannot add beads!

LIC artist Eduardo Anievas Blue Fish. I need
iridescence, big googly eyes, and lots of these plump
little jewels

Cutting Gets Easier for Boontje Garland and Sputnik Light Homed

I added a chicken. The 
Queen Anne's lace lost
a tiny floret, ah, we'll say
a bear ate it

My knockoff Garland light is veering further from the inspiration. I collected more milk jugs and then free handed the following cut-outs:

It is getting easier to make my own designs and I added a bird. Tord Boontje never ventured into the fauna. Ha! This is a project that could never end, but since I ended up with an extra ColorCord and have plenty of lighting hardware in the basement, I may start to sell them. They don't melt if you stay away from incandescent bulbs. 

And now we need a slate
grey or shamrock starburst
ceiling medallion to set 
off the crisp blossoms

I suppose my apprenticeship ends and my artistry begins. Although, it hardly looks bushier since I added the new stems, but there was a bare patch that they covered. I love this.

The cutting will continue at a greater pace since I discovered how to make cottage cheese. I am still trying to perfect my yogurt and had success once out of three attempts. The milk that doesn't turn into yogurt becomes cottage cheese and I get the jug afterwards. Pretty much perfect if I could manage to set yogurt consistently, but hopefully soon.

Too high now and cord
isn't hung correctly

Also love, my Sputnik. It is bright. I need to extend the wire again. For reference, it was shorten, lengthen, shorten, and now lengthen again. 

Wire correct length and cord
swagged. Now I need to
introduce more fuchsia
to this corner

Triumph and Pain in New England

It was a beautiful weekend full of nostalgia. I didn't get to spend the day with my mother, but the next best thing is the charming Auntie Bernie and I got a double helping of her! Too many people Bernie and I loved have passed and she witnessed my beloved Gramps go. I had the honor of witnessing my mother bear untold misery with joy and with her philosophical outlook not ceding an inch. I have had a miraculous life, thanks to her, and I need to commemorate her after an eventful Mother's Day.

She skated. I don't know her record, and I don't know who to ask, but I do know that she attended regional sectionals in the old ice rink in Flushing Meadows Park. She and her mother drove down from Boston and I can just picture the two of them on the Parkway missing the exit over and over again. After all that effort, she did not compete in the national competition that year because it was held in California. She also qualified in pairs and quads, which needs to make a comeback. My passion for ice skating is from her.

My mother was once young.
Her family built their world
around her skating. This costume
was made by my Nana. My mom
looked good in clothes!

I need to start further back, with her parents, my grandparents. Nana designed and executed Mom's costumes and possibly her partners', too. I'm sure it wasn't "fun" in the way that my creations are never actually fun, but getting this photo was a family affair. I wish I knew more about her programs and her music. The stories she told involved mishaps and her trademark anxiety. I am certain that she was a vision. What a pity that my Gramps never had the experience of moving images. He'd be out with his drones, I'm certain, if he was still here. Did he print the signs for the competitions? Programs? One thing is for sure, he did take still pictures! Thank you, Gramps, for saving what you could.

One of my mother's dying wishes was to have my father get together with his family "on the water". Last year, I tried to make that happen, and got three out of the four in one room on the Coonamessett River. I was a bit disappointed but I tried my best. And then it happened. My magical Uncle Pat made a phone call and the last sibling showed! And then the mom magic began.

I've been saying since Mom died that she is powerful as a spirit and she has rightly chosen me as her vessel. I became her. It was wonderful! I was possessed by a very, *very* friendly spirit. She has been gradually leading me to a total takeover and it was as gentle as her love. Just for a moment and a quick photo, and then she was content to watch again but WATCHING SHE WAS. 

Everyone could have been someone else except for X. My X was when my family uprooted to the Midwest, and I don't know the woman who I would have been if I stayed. I am looking for clues. Who would I have been and would I choose her? I feel unfaithful. I would choose her, no questions asked. But, what about Tootie Pie? No, right? I'd still like to get to know this fascinating woman.

I remember not caring about my mother's stories, so I understand that Tootie Pie really doesn't care about the tuna fish sandwich that I threw. But I care now about Mom's tales, and I pretended to care at the time. Not with follow-up questions, mind you, but with an emotion that whole generations are not familiar with: politely listening and nodding, all the while composing your grocery list or otherwise occupying your brain with everything except with whatever your conversational partner feels like going on about. I think we should name this. Let this percolate. In any case, kids today don't indulge their parents, and I think it's to their detriment.

My quest will never end. My BFF from kindergarten, whom I met with now three times, remembered a field trip that was taking up space in my brain but was formally inaccessible. These type of things are gold! Another boy friend reminded me of the reason we were on the lawn that day when I was so deep - planting a tree in memorial of the wonderful Mr. Short. I changed his death into retirement when I left and it took an old friend to remind me - Mr. Short died. I got to relive the pain again, because in my mind, he didn't die, and that didn't make sense. A lot of my childhood didn't make sense.

I used to go to Mom for answers, and I don't have her any more. So, somehow, that makes me want the answers even more. I will return to Greenville and it will slowly reveal itself to me. That's what makes life grand.

Am I Self-Made? Not Society-Failed, At Least

Things went wrong in my childhood, naturally. I once was sent to the principal's office for successfully scaling a drainpipe to the 2nd floor. I carved "I hate Mom" into the softened wood of our window sashes when I was deprived of some long ago forgotten luxury. She absolutely could not deal with my grass stained knees. Normal stuff. So I was woefully unprepared for when, at 10, the wheels came off the bus and I moved from my idyllic New England town to Cleveland. Poor Cleveland is finally failing on its own merits instead of its poor comparison to Rhode Island. Puberty timed its entrance perfectly, making this life's earthquake all the more difficult, but as much as I was up against, I had a secret weapon: my three ladies. My sisters seemed like my world, because we were on a different level than Mom, but I'm the oldest, and Mom and I had a special friendship that was kind of unhealthy, I am realizing now. We built up a boogey man for our problems, and he had a face and name: Dad. Despite the fact that she was brutally ripped from her home and family, she faced the Midwest with her typical spirit of total dominance, done with a beautiful smile. 

I had my struggles with her, of course. Most notably, London. Oh, my, how we argued over that! I broached the topic one night of maybe trying out London for a summer because my roommate was, not because I actually wanted it. I paid for school on my own and was practical, and so it wasn't really an option, until my parents went code level orange because I floated an idea. Then my mind was made up and I was going to London whether I felt like it or not. Three months later, when I told my parents that we needed to talk, she said, "You're not going to London." I can be dominating, too, Mom, so it was too late. The tickets were bought, passport obtained, and it wasn't as if they could threaten to cut me off. Quite the chess move on my part! I was going to be self-made and visit abroad! And, so, I did.

So, I did do it solo financially the minute I was an adult, but whose idea was this? As long as I remember, I was going to college. Then I realized there was no money for it, but that was okay, because I'd been working hard at school which came easily to me, so I got grants and scholarships. A complete success story and I did it alone. I went back to London, then Paris. I got a frantic phone call one night from her because there was a problem with the lines and she made me pick a date to return and so I did: Thanksgiving. I wish I could have lived out my little adventure on my own time instead of artificially truncating it, but I was breaking Mom's heart.

So I returned to fucking Grand Rapids, Michigan, to live near Mom and Dad. It was a memorable year! Dad insisted on going to swim with me and always wanted to race. Mom did her pristine breast stroke so as to preserve the 'do. I introduced her to my date and she said, "Nice to meet you, Kurt". We left and he said, "That's weird! Your mom called me by my brother's name!". I had no idea what my date's first name was and had to look him up in the phone book. It turns out, he was unlisted, but not his brother! In any case, I had a true friendship with both of my parents, I guess you could say. Although, if you do say that, I'll have you know that Dad was a friend of my real friend. I hated that they were a package deal.

Picnic at one of Mom's secret beaches
and a custom summer dress for Lucy.

It is not fair that my friend is gone. I was planning on at least 10 more years. But, I have to look at the bright side which is that I had her for 53 years. And as for self-made, there is no such thing. Everyone once needed help. But there is such a thing as society-failed and it is only the luck of the draw that makes us one or the other. Many of my students were facing puberty without a solid parental figure helping. It is of course usually the female that helps these "self-made" individuals. I am fortunate. I had the best.

I just celebrated my daughter's 17th birthday at a wonderful Peruvian restaurant. Reminder: I have a minimum wage part-time job. She has a pretty awful parent, but I like to think that I am the parent she chooses to align with. I know that 95% of the rationale for that is our shared female connection. She is as independent as it is possible to be at that age but still in that weird area where she relies on us for cash and rides and food and - basically we're staff. Then we're vacation rentals and ATMs, I get it. I want to make college easier than it was for me, at least financially. She did the real work, though, which is getting her education and taking it seriously. 

I may be the only generation who got to sort of envision a future that actually panned out. Mom thought 4 years of college was impractical, because lengthening college shortened the amount of time she'd need to work, which would just be until she became a mother. Until me. But, ten short years later, she was back in the work force and I had to "prepare" dinner twice a week. She could have been the leader of the universe, but she constrained herself using the information she had available at the time. I lived the dream for a moment: I had a career in a male-dominated industry and I made a killing. I made a nest egg and now I can enjoy it. I did it, Mom! I wish you were here to celebrate your success. I wish, I wish, I wish...

Latch Hook a Custom Rug

Rugs these days are pretty cheap, and I use both meanings of cheap. I found a beautiful looped pile ocean themed rug in yuppie central's garbage night, but upon unrolling at home, it was pulled by cat claws and, well... more cat activity occurred sadly. If I'm being honest, though, an underwater theme is great for my hall, but maybe a bit too predictable for this Ocean Stater. I need something quirkier and less practical than sparkly corals. I needed custom.

Top, left most orange flower looks
like Chicken Little in profile

It all seemed so easy in the planning phases. As ever, there were fits and starts and do-overs. I believe that my yarn issues goes back to my original mock-up image which, in retrospect, had white space columns along both long edges. In the end, I have 5 Hobbii white skeins and one complete chartreuse left over after the yarn reordering. Since I knew my lengths were short for the kelly and chartreuse, it was inevitable that I'd be buying more yarn. Now I can use my loom with the leftovers. Yes, I have a loom, and it is Barbie sized and made of plastic. It came with the mechanized loom inventor's bust, who years ago adorned my 6th grade moon landing rocket ship and never found his way home to the Industrial Revolution. He hung out inside the Apollo behind the circular window that was somehow convex and gave the impression that he was more than just shoulders and head. Also, and this was appropriate for my population, he was brown. Not in actual life, but the bust is brown and he looks like a person of color instead of a pasty Englishman. He is hanging out with a plush foiled astronaut and, this was 6th grade we're talking about, Sponge Bob. Those were good days. I feel my academy owes its 3-year Spirit Week domination to my creations. My favorites were the cities of New Orleans and Dubrovnik. The moon landing was the culmination of the 60s and I loved my decade because A) I am from this decade and B) Sesame Street! I know there were many huge milestones in the 60s, but from my standpoint, ain't no bigger cultural sensation than the Muppets!

Even Tootie Pie is impressed! I hemmed it, painstakingly, and will wait to trim it until it needs its first refresh and I'm prepared for it to shed all over again. It is still white!

Post mortem: costs

• Original purchase of $151.85 on wool, backing, and hook
• Supplemental purchases of $80-something of extra wool ($27.21) in Hobbii Shamrock (3) and black (1), and $55 for 2 skeins of Sulfur and 3 skeins of gold fusion from Cascade.

    This ought to be lower, but I bought too much white by half and the incorrect sized hook. 

Post mortem: technique and tools

    If anything, the Hobbii yarn was more consistent in thickness and tied for knots with the more reputable Cascade. Learn from my mistakes and splurge on the more expensive canvas. The crummy one I bought from Dimensions had glue blobs, some squares broke, and the edges were an uneven nightmare. When hemming, you really only need 2 or 3 good border squares. Use actual thread instead of handy extra yarn! Oh, and if you have a large canvas, roll it to make the hooking easier. This will tear up the back of the hooked areas and also your couch, if you decide that it is the perfect hooking surface instead of the non-catching kitchen table. The canvas will definitely cut you. And, if you don't heed my warning and go with the Dimensions canvas, it will be simultaneously too stiff AND pliable, in a way that cannot be described. There are different sized hooks and chances are, you will pick up one for 3.5 gauge by accident.

Post mortem: accomplishment

    I already miss my latching project. The planned mini rugs will be a quick and fun hook, but the hemming should be a debacle. Enough faffing about! 

I do love it. I will have an outdoor photo shoot of the rug where I attempt to make it look twee and wear cool shoes and pigeon toe my feet or whatever the kids today go for. 

It would be easy to buy a rug. Probably cheaper. I have 3 other rugs, and one has emotions with it and the others are disposable. My Persian rug from my grandparents will always be my prized possession for many reasons - the one I like to brag of is that because of sanctions, you haven't been able to buy a Persian rug since my Nana was in the department store selecting ours. Other reasons are its huge scale, the beautiful natural colors, and of course, the thinness and overall fineness of it. I cannot imagine how long this took! The amount of knots is incalcucuable.

Impressing Myself - Rewiring a Sputnik Ceiling Fixture to a Swag Fixture

I've been lowballing
tri-state residents for
years before someone
accepted!

I failed Electrical Engineering. First problem was it was three times a week at 8 a.m. Second problem was over confidence. I was certain I understood how to make the light blink using ands and ors and parallel and serial and, well... It wouldn't work. And I experienced it again when I found my dream chandelier, the Sputnik! I have a ceiling fixture taking up valuable floor space for the dining area, so this will go in Tootie Pie's room, but we're keeping the fuchsia chandelier. This Sputnik needed to be switched from a ceiling light to a swag. 

Most tutorials say to just switch out the ceiling end connection with an outlet, wrap the correct wires into the screw socket, and voila! But, I don't have an outlet on my ceiling and so I needed a longer cord. I originally bought the clear kind, but didn't realize that the Sputnik is grounded and the transparent kind I bought only had the 2 prongs, so back it went. The second time I went for something special, since I realized after I bought the transparent cord that it didn't have an on-off switch, it wasn't grounded and the fixture was, AND I found much prettier cords. Everything at ColorCord.com is beautiful!

So pretty. I need an 
extension cord in this color!

It took forever, but I figured out how to get the canopy off. Luckily, the chandy has a wire to attach it to the ceiling so that the weight doesn't pull out the wires. But the canopy wasn't just attached to the bar, but also to the wire that holds the weight, which prevented me from getting it off, until I figured out that there's a button on the bottom of the wire attachment that allows it to come off. If I hadn't figured that out, there would be an extra piece at the base of the wire, because I could only manage to move this adjustable canopy finish cap forward to make the wire shorter and shorter. I backed it out okay eventually because it had a hidden button. For a moment, I thought I'd need the jaws of life or a blowtorch to remove the canopy. And, since this is a knock off Sputnik, the wiring was not standard, and my electrical skills are weak. It is a 24 light fixture, and I ended up having to take each arm's wires out and marking the hot wires. Just like in Electrical Engineering 101, I thought my first attempt was golden and the second! I even visited the hardware store to purchase a current tester, but they were double what I was willing to pay. This was the incentive I needed and I did it right finally! If everything was easy, there would be no sense of accomplishment. It works!

In the end, I got the chandelier for $50, plus I had to buy the cord with the switch and a grounded outlet, which cost me $43.93, and new wire nuts cost $2.99. Labor was free but not inexpensive. Under $100. Not including 24 light bulbs. And, a ceiling hook, which, I already had, but I bought another - oops! I will probably eventually find wire nuts - it might be time to organize my hardware. And, a plug converter that I need now because my outlet isn't grounded! Such a rollicking success!

On the one hand, it is
not within the vernacular
of the room...

Now that it's installed, I don't love it! I have turned Tootie Pie's bedroom into a lighting showroom! Even taking into account the facts that it doesn't have the benefit of a full flight of bulbs and that the cord isn't swagged - it doesn't go. In the end, I should have not bothered with my Tord Boontje inspired creation and put the OTHER chrome, armed chandelier that has been on my living room floor into my room, and the Sputnik in the kitchen. The thought process is that the fixture that is on the floor has a base that mounts fixed to the ceiling. Both bedrooms have center ceiling wires and the chandeliers need to move, because we're tall people with little spatial awareness. But, what's done is done. In my next home, we will have 3 bedrooms, one of which will be the craft room, so that my rug making and electrical work, and come to think of it, skyline painting, gardening, and a host of other activities, can all be done in a separate location instead of in our main living area. For now, my studio is immediately upon entry to our home, and her bedroom should be a beacon of Queens.

Glimpse into my
in-process home and 
future starburst area

Ah, she took it down! She CAN be motivated to do things in her room! I never tightened the ceiling hook in her ceiling because I was meeting resistance; not the type of spectacle I want to try on my own - and I tried DIY electrical! Sputnik starburst will live over our refrigerator. Now I regret the cloth cord, because kitchen surfaces should be non-porous. Oh, well, this can be swapped out again for the transparent cord when this bright, cherry pink is coated in grease and mystery sauce. For now, we have more than enough task lighting and my electrical skills are back up-to-date. 

When I Go Back to the Calculations

Where did I go wrong? Here we have less than half of the Gold Fusion/Marigold complete and yet, no more yarn. I'm less than halfway done with the Sulfur/Chartreuse flowers and more than halfway finished with that yarn. It seems like the Yellow I'm only going to use one of the 2 skeins. So, what's the issue?

Starting on the repeat

I recalculated. My numbers are correct. Funny enough, it's the sketchier Hobbii brand that I computed correctly. This leads me to believe that the Cascade brand is not 220 yards as advertised. 

I am also having serious customer service issues with Yarnspirations.com and their poorly labeled hooks. They are either hiring only the mentally challenged or they are evil geniuses that determined that a service outlook founded on leading the consumer on a ridiculous goose chase is more cost effective than fixing the problem. So, I will make sure that I tell the vendor to cease selling their goods.

Yarn and conspiracy theories. The more logical explanation is that companies decided to dupe the consumer because they can. Well, no more from me.

Nice to imagine, but
I think this junks it up

In any case, I am thinking my rug looks more runner-like than I'd like. Stupid canvas manufacturer never learned the golden ratio. So, in order to full it out and use up the extra yarn, how about a width-increasing border of pompoms? Because, the only thing more impractical than a white rug would be the addition of vacuum clogging pompoms. So, on the one hand, the mock up looks festive, but on the other, does it clutter up the modern, clean lines of the Marimekko design, or did I take care of that already with my insane color scheme? I will probably make the pompoms and if they look funny on the rug, I'll turn them into a cool garland. 

In the end, I dropped another $80-something for the yarn I forgot to order in the first place. When I factor in the non-slip back, the only plus to hooking a rug yourself is complete control of the design. 

Oh, since my new, custom rug is too small for the floor (yet, simultaneously, too big for me to hook sanely), the solution has been located. Small individual flower rugs scattered around the main rug. 

Let's plan our next major
project while still in the
midst of current one!

And, finally, I decided against the pompoms and will go with length increasing fringe on the shorter edges. White is out because it will get sucked into the vacuum. I have 11 inches to go with the hooking, then fringing and hemming and binding and all that good stuff. The anticipation is off the charts here!

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It's Just a Bit More Complicated Now, Love - In Defense of When Harry Met Sally

As a rule, I do not necessarily enjoy, for lack of a better term, chick flicks. Never saw The Notebook. I kind of hate movies with Julia Roberts and Richard Gere.  My friends dragged me to Serendipity and just UGH! I was massively uncomfortable and the whole thing was so predictable. But, there is Harold and Maude, the Before trilogy, and of course, When Harry Met Sally. Offbeat romances? 

What I like about Harry and Sally is the realness of it. Love is complicated. You don't write your phone number on a dollar bill and then send it into circulation. What you do do (ha!, I said doodoo) is keep running into that guy that you were forced to interact with and that you cannot stand. Relatable. And because you don't see eye-to-eye with this dude, you feel okay being authentic. They put on a front when they are set up with each other's best friends, and true love is hiding in plain sight as a buddy that they are just bouncing ideas off of and getting the opposite sex's perspective. Yeah, it's a great movie because they are both clueless that they're in love. Like Moonstruck, love doesn't solve your problems: it just creates a mess. Embrace it.

We get a glimpse, just one moment, where we get the happily ever after! This movie is genius!!!! His love of her OCD when it comes to food is everything! And that, my friends, is love. Love is being annoyed to the point of insanity and still being attracted to this soul. Not the blue eyeshadow and not her alphabetized VHS tapes (yes, this is somewhat of a delayed review. I'd also like to congratulate Brian Boitano on that phenomenal free skate = just great!) but how she spends hours on her hair and too much money on shoes and other nonsense that makes her Sally. Harry, where are you? You're late...

These two went to the same Midwestern college and moved to NYC. They disliked each other immediately, and were honestly themselves in an age where it is much easier to be annoyed than find the good in someone. But love will find a way. Sex is easy; it's intimacy that's hard. They are equals until...

I love New York. It really doesn't deserve me and I am too good for the Big Apple, but there's just something about it. Love it or hate it, you probably have an opinion. Like me. Take it or leave it, but I am what I am and I love it, so, Harry, I'm ready, and it helps if you don't bring that coffee table. That stupid, Roy Roger's, wagon wheel coffee table!