2013 Approaches

The Dashing Bachelor, my Christmas 2013 Mystery Quilt.

Yes, 2013 approaches. It's on the way and won't be stopped. Also, I need some new approaches to life, to work, to people for 2013, and I've been thinking about that subject a good deal.
 
I'm in Southern California right now, visiting my sister and brother-in-law for the Christmas and New Year's holidays. This trip, this break is giving me time to do some reading and thinking about how to approach 2013 with renewed vigor, purpose and gratitude. And, yes, even those of us who don't work outside the home need an occasional break!
 
There's been an on-going discussion on one of my quilt lists about choosing a word for 2013 -- a sort of guiding principle for the year. I like this idea. It's sort of like when we set goals for the year when I was working. As the year progresses those goals would inform how we spent time,  money and effort.
 
So my word for 2013 will be Mindfuless. What am I doing? How am I spending my time, money, talent and effort? Am I supporting my goals? Am I growing, or treading water, or sliding backwards?

A year is a precious resource, at my time of life more precious with the passing days. Will I use my year fruitfully? Stay tuned as I figure it out!

Time Passages

[Note: This is the first in a projected occasional series of posts about my family history.]

I've always thought one of the most formative aspects of my childhood as well as one of the more interesting things about me was my parents' age. You see, my parents were older than the parents of my peers. 

Today it's not unusual for a woman to have her first child at age 33. It's not even unusual for a man to have a child a couple months before his 50th birthday, especially a child by a second marriage. But in 1955 that was a little late for people to start a family. 


The story of how my parents met and fell in love and so forth is a story for another post. But mom and dad had independent lives before they met, and they got a rather late start in the business of raising a family.

Dad plowed fields with horses. He remembered when tractors and cars first appeared in rural Nebraska. He remembered the horrors of the influenza epidemic of 1918 And in settling down late he was following a family tradition. Both his father and grandfather had also married and had their families later than usual. Paul was born in 1870. And Dad's grandfather George was born in 1826. 


Think about it. You may know, or have known, one of your great grandparents. John Quincy Adams was president of the United States when George Hanson was born. 

Dad's mother Linna's brothers and father served in the Civil War. And her daughter Pauline's husband John served in World War I.


On my mother's side, I reach back into history due to her large, close extended family. We were close to her aunts and uncles. Her father Bob and several of her uncles served in WWI as well. And my mother's three oldest brothers served in WWII.


So the stories told around our family tale were of a different time. We heard stories of several generations of a family of immigrants living together. Of young married women with children of their own shocked to realize their mother was pregnant. Of young men going to travel in Turkey or fight in Europe when it took weeks to get to those places. Of the Great Depression. Of a mother newly arrived in the US, suddenly widowed, raising her children on her own. Of people moving and visiting and staying in touch. Of people falling out of touch and sometimes reconnecting years later. 


The stories I heard gave me an appreciation of family and taught me that -- sometimes shortly and sometimes over the course of decades -- things generally work out. Bitter feuds can be mended; sad estrangements can end. Decisions that seem foolish today turn out OK. And family endures.


Today, my family is greatly reduced. My only close relative is my sister Linna whom I don't see as often as I'd like. But she and I have shared memory and history that bind us more tightly than bands of steel. We are estranged from our brother Paul but maybe someday we'll see him again. 


I have extended family. They are scattered and I don't see them often. But the funny thing is this. Family still endures. In moving to South Carolina I'm now closer to a couple cousins here in the Eastern US, so maybe our paths will cross again.

Cat Tales

Most of the fathers I've known are pretty tough cookies when it comes to buying gifts. They don't have a long list of wants, and the usual ties/coffee mugs/tools are just so much clutter for many dads. 

The father in my life right now is Frank's father, also Frank Young. He's a really fine man and a great guy, and he's been so very good to me over the last few months. I've usually been able to find good presents for him in the past, and I wanted something special for him for Father's Day. I was chatting with my mother-in-law, Melinda, and she came up with a great idea. 

They'd been thinking about getting a second cat for awhile. Melinda and Frank are both cat people. Their cat, Monty, is a pedigreed Siamese. He acts -- and is treated -- like the lord of the manor. I've said several times my ambition in life is to be reincarnated as one of Frank's cats. 

Now, Frank is about the biggest Dean Martin fan on earth, so Melinda came up with a brilliant idea: "We'd" get a tuxedo kitten for Frank, and we'd call him Dino. She was the brains behind this idea. The execution was now up to me. 

Well, finding Dino was quite an adventure. We call him the 400 mile cat, because that's about how far I drove in my quest for him. I searched a couple on-line databases for tuxedo kittens and the cats I found ran the gamut of adoptability. 

Melinda and I figured that this would be a good time of year to find a kitten. Well, yes and no. The shelters and rescues I first contacted were so strict in their adoption policies that getting a Top Secret clearance would have been easier than adopting one of their cats. And I know what I'm talking about because I've observed the Top Secret clearance application process. 

One woman wanted to do a home visit which would have involved a 120 mile round-trip drive for her. And the cat is question -- while a tuxedo -- was over a year old, and has a rare heart murmur. Adopting him involved agreeing to take him to Charleston annually to have an ultrasound so some vet could study his condition. Um, no thanks. Why doesn't the vet adopt him, or at least help place him somewhere near Charleston?

One rescue had picked out "my kitten" before I visited them, and already had plans for his cage as soon as they could get me out the door. Again, their idea of a kitten and mine were a bit different, since this cat was clearly fully-grown and was so shy even the foster dad couldn't hold him.

Finally, I found a listing in a County shelter a mere 40 miles from me. They're open from 3:00 pm until 6:00 pm only, so there was no way to contact them by phone. I drove to the shelter and, guess what? He wasn't there. Oh, he was still available, but they were fostering him an additional 50 miles farther away. Nevertheless, he still sounded promising, so a couple days later I set out again to see him. By now it was the Friday before Father's Day and time was running out. This kitten was the last chance I had. 

Luckily he turned out to be Dino. He was, oddly, being fostered at a dog kennel. He was racing around like a mad thing every time a dog barked, but who could blame him. And clearly he had no fear of the dogs, so I thought he'd stand up to Monty. So, I delivered him and he is just what Melinda and Frank wanted. He's super cute, about 8 weeks old, and a bundle of kitten energy. He's got great tuxedo markings, and the tip of his long tail is white. As I expected, he shows no fear around Monty, and he's already making himself at home.

Of course, I'm on Monty's list forever for bringing this interloper into his domain. And Monty WILL have his revenge. Turns out Melinda and Frank are going away for a week in July and guess where Monty and Dino will be staying . . . I figure it will be like Vacation Bible School. We'll do crafts -- building birdhouses springs to mind -- make s'mores and sing around the campfire. Or maybe we'll just sit and watch the birds outside, run around the house like lunatics and nap a good deal.

Fred, as you can imagine, is not amused.

Developments

I see it's been about a month since I last posted. I can't believe I've been so negligent, especially since so much has been going on with the house.

First, the house, to all intents and purposes, is done. I've made my final payment to the contractor who, all in all, did a great job for me. There are a half dozen very minor items on my punch list which he will take care of on Friday.

The electrician still needs to do a few things including put the connectors on my internet lines. But since my friend John helped me order and install a wireless router the hard-wired internet outlets are something of a moot point. The router works just fine, and I can use wireless anywhere in the house. I can even connect to it on my iPhone, although I can't use the phone in my iPhone.

I've installed my land line phone, after a brief kerfuffle over the serving CO and getting the cable laid across my property. I have ordered DirecTV and it's due to be installed tomorrow. This will be the first time I've ever had anything other than broadcast TV, so this will be a treat for me.

Today I ordered a sofa for my den. This is the sofa. And the fabric.

My mother in law helped me pick it out. I ordered some pillows in a wild, coordinating fabric that will really perk up the room.

Yesterday I found a cat to adopt. He was given up by an elderly man who was going into assisted living. He's a 7 year old male and seems very friendly. He was taken to a local county shelter where they would have put him down. Luckily the vet they called said she thought she could place him. He's been in her office for a couple weeks, and I think he'll be glad to be in a home and be the only animal here. I will pick him up tomorrow. I am naming him Fred after Georg Friedrich Handel. His coloring is pure Siamese, but he's beefier and shorter than a Siamese. 

Lastly, I have been unpacking, sorting, purging and organizing my stuff box by box. I'd say I'm about half way through, with plenty still to unpack. But it's getting done. It's getting done.

The important thing is that the guest room is ready for guests, so when your travels bring you my way, I will have a warm welcome ready for you.

Living Color

I'm pleased to report that the house is proceeding on-track. It's still looks like I'll be able to move in within a week or ten days. 

Every time I visited the place this week the drive was packed with trucks belonging to workers tiling my kitchen back splash, doing the finish electrical work, and painting. And I use the term "workers" advisedly The painter even had his wife there for a couple days. He says she's almost as good with a paintbrush as he is!

I'm including chips from the Sherwin Williams website so you can get a more accurate idea of the colors. My photos are pretty dark The living room, dining room and kitchen are painted Lagoon. It's a fairly deep tealy-green, and is a lighter shade of the same color as the exterior of the house. 

My bedroom and the guest room are Vesper Violet, a medium-value grayed violet. I have no clue about the intended purpose of the electrical outlet half-way up the wall in my bedroom. I will say that this house absolutely will not lack electrical outlets. Frank ordered PLENTY of them!

I plan to use grass green and yellow as accents in the bedrooms -- more green in my room and more yellow in the guest room. My father-in-law says he won't sleep in a "purple" bedroom, but I'm hopeful my other men friends are more sanguine. 

The studio is Daydream, a shade lighter of the same grayed violet as the bedrooms.

My bedroom in California was a violet so pale it was almost white. I liked the color and decided to amp it up for this house. 

I'm fearless with colors in my quilts but for some reason  I'm timid with paint colors in my house. I'm trying to be more bold; we'll see in the fullness of time how successful I've been.

The Biggest Quilting Tool in the World

Chances are that if you have a hobby you've noticed this phenomenon: Tools specifically marketed to hobbyists are more expensive than the same tool marketed to the general public. Cycling socks? If regular socks cost $7, cycling socks cost $20. Model railroad board? If a sheet of regular plywood costs $12, a sheet of model railroad board costs twice as much and is one-fourth the size. You can buy a package of a dozen spring hairclips at the dollar store for, well, a dollar. A package of 30 of identical clips, packaged by Wright for quilters to use when binding a quilt, retails for $7.00.

As a quilter I'm always on the lookout for tools in unlikely places. Often tools purchased at the dollar store or at Home Depot will be cheaper and will work better than tools made especially "for quilters". Need to label your blocks or stabilize them for signatures? A roll of masking tape ($2.00) will do the trick nicely. Need an unusual template? A window shop will cut a piece of acrylic in the shape of a bunny or an acorn for a buck or two. Need a guide for stitching that perfect 1/4" seam? A little stack of Post-It notes from Office Depot will handle that task easily.

So you can bet I'm patting myself on the back. I've just acquired the largest quilting tool in the world and it was absolutely free. It's the vinyl floor in my new studio. You can see the pattern is a black and white checkerboard. The squares are 9". When I need to block a quilt, or measure a piece of fabric, or pin-baste a quilt sandwich, this grid will keep things nice and square. 

Of course, the floor wasn't free, but it didn't cost anything extra for this pattern. So I'm calling it free.

Oh, and the studio is 15' x 30'. I think it's fair to call a 450 square foot floor the largest quilting tool in the world -- until someone challenges me for the title.

By the way, if you want to keep a pair of thread snips handy to your machine, do what my friend Mattie does. Pick up a key coil. Thread your machine's cord through the ring, and fasten the clip to your scissors. Voila! Your snips will always be at your fingertips.


In the latest news on the house, the interior painting began today, and the finish and trip work progresses. Tomorrow I'll be shopping for mirrors, towel bars and such for the bathrooms.

I'm Floored, or At Least The House Is!

Yes, it's true. The hardwood floors are stained, sealed and varnished, and the vinyl flooring is laid in the studio. And last Tuesday the Silestone fabricator measured and made the templates for the countertops; he said they'd take no more than two weeks to make and install.

This week I hope to see:

• the baseboard molding installed
• the bathroom cabinets (which have integral sinks) installed
• the interior painted

I think then the final steps of the construction will be installation of the kitchen countertops, the light fixtures and fans, the toilets and the appliances.

I have an appointment for the delivery of my studio furniture on Thursday. I'm going to shop for the guest room mattresses on Monday. And I'll call the antique dealer to ask him to deliver the guest room beds this week as well.  

My mother-in-law and I are mapping out our moving and move-in strategy. 

I've given notice to the woman who rents me a room that I'll be moving out the weekend of May 15. Keep your fingers crossed for me that we have no slips in the schedule!