Valentine's Day In Midlife, Or, Saturday Morning at 6:15am

It's Valentine's Day tomorrow. I hope each and everyone of you enjoys yourself, in whatever way makes you happiest.

In a moment of madness I signed up for a swap, organized by Amanda of first milk. Her blog is poetic, childlike rather than childish, and full of wonderful photos. She even went to Paris. I blame the madness on Paris.

We were supposed to send 1) A present 2) A small thingie, maybe something sweet 3) An actual Valentine.

The photo above, (which I have already shown to Twitter, so apologies for the reiteration), is the carnage which resulted in my house. Let me say only that fine motor coordination is not my strong point. Crafting, for me, felt like those dreams in which one is trying to fly but cannot quite remember how. With any luck, the poor soul on whom my efforts were inflicted will receive her package today. If not I shall shriek at Fedex and make their sorry lives miserable.

The photos below are of the much more refined package I received this week. From Melissa at The Avid Reader's Musings.


A Valentine (dark chocolate so no qualms in the eating), a book of cartoons (I love cartoons, always have, always will, even when they go by their graphic novel fancy name), and a notebook. I use notebooks. To remind myself of which errands I am on, so that I do not return home, open the back of the car, and realize the dry cleaning is STILL WITH ME.

Look more closely at the Valentine. Isn't that chic? Almost looks like it was cut out of the New Yorker?


To say nothing of the fact that Avid Reader was new to me as a blog and she reviews books. I love books. They are the artistic equivalent of friends. I always have trouble knowing what to read next, and have been soliciting suggestions. Nice timing.

Apparently the best ways to keep your mind healthy as you age are: 1) Learn new things 2) Have friends 3) Eat fish oil and dark chocolate. This week was a good one for old brains. The discovery that one cannot attach tissue paper to anything when one has glue on one's fingers counts as learning. I thank you all so much for the chance to make friends here. The chocolate's on the counter and the fish oil's in the icebox.*

Have a wonderful weekend everyone.**

*My mother's way of saying refrigerator. A nod to Maureen at IslandRoar. You know, the friends thing.

**If you feel like looking at gorgeous pinkness, take a look at Summer is a Verb. This week she's posting on Valentine's shopping and how she met her husband. Good for daydreaming.

***Update: here is the link from lauren at kidchamp.net, showing the fruits of my labors.

Ironic 50th Birthday Party Decorations

Hello Kitty. Hello 50. And, I made this by cutting Hello Kitty wrapping paper into rectangles of overly varying shapes, folding said shapes inaccurately, muttering to myself about said inaccuracies, pasting said folds with a glue stick, and hanging each bunting bit from a pink ribbon. It was a beautiful day.

My Cozy Theory Is Off To The Theory Graveyard

I had a theory about the recent spate of crochet. I was wrong.

I thought we were cozying everything. Not just tea kettles, but stones, clocks, trees. Oh, and Cher's boobs. But these recent apparitions have changed my mind.

This is from a cafe that displays crocheted food. Via design*sponge, prime crochet perpetrator.

This is a crochet wedding cake. From Offbeat Bride. A world unto itself.

I see now that this is a simpler phenomenon. This is a an art trend. Crochet. The crochet that ate Manhattan if you will. So we must ask ourselves, what next? If we have ceased to cover with our crochet, and begun to model instead, I propose the following.

From the Israeli artist Neta Amir, featured here on etsy. Her blog is killer. Yes, she has conquered my horror of crochet by taking it all the way to the nubbly fuzzy edge.

Installations featuring hordes of crochet people living crochet lives. "Sims Crochet." Only time, and the relentless force of a trend breaking onshore, will tell.

Cozies Redeemed. Barely.

I have trouble with cozies, crocheted and knitted covers for things that have no need of warmth. I saw this here. I felt my blood pressure rise. Have they no mercy? I am haunted by visions of my future as an increasingly angry old woman, muttering bitterly to herself amidst peeling paint on the front porch, cursing all signs of knitting needles and crochet hooks.

Luckily for mankind the possibility of redemption is always with us. Even cozies can be saved by humor and art, our great redeeming capabilities. Along with kindness and forgiveness. (Oh yeah, and lactation.) Things can always get better. So it came to pass. First she saw these,

And said this, "So the title is apt 'An Ode To Cher' or should this be 'An ode To Chers Bewbage'???" Aha. Cozied earrings look like Cher's boobs. There is hope yet.

That's not all said the Ginzo knives salesman. The real saviours are here. Wrapping, cozying, shrouding, all have had their apogee. You may already be nodding your head, yes, yes. Uhuh. Christo. Jeanne-Claude. The Reichstag. Yeah. That.

Which turned into this.

Not a crochet hook in sight. Nothing twee, nothing fey. Maybe an approximation of cozying history.

Happy Easter. Happy Passover. Here's to forgiveness, kindness, redemption. And I guess to Cher's boobs, if anyone's in the mood.

Ironic Crafts - The Limits of Cozies

They are at it yet again. Cozies. On everything.

First it was rocks. They tried to trick us and called it crochet. But I knew. I knew it was a cozy. Now even design*sponge admits this is a cozy. They have a baby bottle cozy. Of course in my case since my children thought bottles were the devil the equivalent cozy was my cashmere sweater. But I understand bottle cozies. You need to keep the bottle warm. Although the thought of sticky milk or formula mixed with crochet does not make me feel too warm or fuzzy. Only sticky.

Sources, clockwise from upper left: design*sponge, design*sponge, for me for you

But now they are cozying clocks. Don’t they know that time is cold? Time doesn’t care one whit for crochet. You can’t cute up time, make it into a bunny, add some spring flowers and a fey frond or two. Time is not cozy. DIY all you want you cannot DIY immortality. Although the God in which I do not believe knows the human race can’t be stopped from trying.

Source: design*sponge

Ironic Wedding Invitations

MBM asked me a very good question. What is an ironic wedding invitation? Well, in the world of High WASPs, emotions are a very tricky thing. One must have them, after all, being human. But one must not carry on about them. So classic wedding invitations have to say, "Here I am. I am an invitation to a wedding. A wedding is a known ritual in which two people are getting married. That is all we need to discuss." But an ironic invitation, like this one below, can say a little more.

This invitation and reply card etc. says, "Oh look, a somewhat tacky (the ultimate shame) romantic image. However, we will ignore that image, and even poke sly fun at it with our rock and roll BBQ. All the while we will adhere to all wedding conventions and language." And the calligraphy will be hand done, "Because, (name of person being scolded) calligraphy type fonts are not... (the done thing is implied but not said)." A type font is a type font and should admit to its origins.

The final effect is one of respecting all conventions and yet indicating that one might somehow rise above them. Of making a gesture towards love, but quickly, so that no embarassment can be felt, by anyone. Frankly it's all pretty exhausting. And while what I'm saying is true, I'm exaggerating. You have to exaggerate to be able to describe all this, and once exaggerated it sounds worse than it is. For the most part. And BTW I made the invitation up:).

Ironic Crafts - Tea Cozies Redux

OMG. Someone else was overwhelmed by the thought of tea cozies for rocks. She, however, persevered.




design*sponge

Ironic Crafts - Make Your Own Teabags

This DIY project over on merriment design, via EAD, where you make tea bags, (you know, tea bags) reminded me of a cooking moment I had once. It was for the Field of Greens cookbook, an delicious but elaborate vegetarian set of recipes, by Deborah Madison of, yes, Greens restaurant in San Francisco. The recipe had artichokes in it. There was an elaborate (surprise) set of instructions on washing and cutting and chopping and scraping 12 whole artichokes. I assumed when I started down the recipe path that I was going to wind up with some architectural construction of artichokes with leaves all lovely etc. So I washed and chopped and sliced and scraped. I sustained injuries. Artichokes are really a fancy kind of thistle and they have some serious prickles. At the end of all this, I had, ta-da! - artichoke hearts. Yeah, the kind that come in all sorts of jars and cans. I cursed. I bled. And then I cursed some more.

I am unlikely to make my own teabags. Or any for you. Sorry.

Ironic Crafts - Wedding Program

Among the many wedding bloggers I really enjoy is a blogger from the UK. She goes by Eli and Me, the name of her blog is Mother and Bride. I actually found her when I was looking for someone who was a mother of a bride to follow, so I could vicariously enjoy in advance what I expect to go through when my beloved daughter eventually gets married. Instead I found a British mother of a little boy preparing to get married herself.

Anyway, she posted recently that she looks forward to starting to craft. Programs are among her proposed projects. She writes, "And if a project can't be done whilst drinking wine and enjoying the company, it never even gets started."

I can just IMAGINE what lovely handmade programs would look like were I in charge, drinking wine, and crafting away, and drinking wine...

Ironic Crafts - Cozies

I saw this on design*sponge.



These appear to be rock cozies. Cozies are usually for tea.



via Flickr

Cozies, as the name implies, are to keep things warm. I don't really need to keep any rocks warm at this point in life. Perhaps in other years it would have been helpful. If we abstract the concept of a cozy to the next level, cozies are for something you took some time and care with, and that you are looking forward to enjoying. But if you leave this thing uncozied, it may suffer.

I do need cozies for other things in my life. My work, for example.



Me, with PictureIt!, since I am getting cooler by the minute, using this Flickr image.
My hellebores.



Me, with PictureIt!, even though I plan to learn the Adobe suite, using this Flickr image

I wish I had cozies for many things.

Ironic Wine Charms

At the lovely and famous blog, design*sponge, they showed this DIY project today. Making wine charms, you know, so no one else drinks your Pinot. So pretty.



However. At this point in my life I do NOT need my wine glass to look any prettier. It looks pretty enough already. It calls to me. Here are the wine charms that I would like someone to DIY for me.

By me on PowerPoint since that's all I know

Volunteers?

Valentine's Day

Here is an interesting if fairly useless fact. High WASPs make their own valentines. They start with one of these.

http://thoughtfulday.blogspot.com/

Then add this paired with this:

To make these:

Made by self on PowerPoint(R) since that' s all I know.

Then you can add a sprinkling of this:


And that’s pretty much it. Writing should be done by hand. If you want to get really wild and use red and pink pens, OK, but judiciously.

Unless you are between the ages of 2-18. Then you can do whatever you like.