Monday, January 22, 2024

Ghosts

 

Whatever you may call this, from Victor's perspective this is a cat toys automat. It's a little tricky to get to - you have to negotiate a swivel chair that may have stuff piled on it, but after that, the table underneath provides an excellent perch from which one may select something nice to pull off and play with. Or several somethings. And of course, the cat toy automat is open 24 hours if you absolutely positively need a new toy at 2 am.

Because of the way the house is laid out, it's just about impossible to keep Victor out of the sewing room. The best I can do is cat-proof it. So one day recently when it was far too cold to get outside to do a little gardening, I decided to put the cat toy automat out of business, at least for the next few years.
The toys are gone but their ghosts remain. In truth, many of the items on the board were only supposed to be there until I took the time to put them away in their proper places. Obviously, some items had been there several years without my taking the time to deal with them. 

The ribbons have gone into the plastic tubs where ribbons belongs. Likewise beads, needles, insect pins, bits of lace, patches, embroidery, quilting, and knitting samples all have their places. The feathers don't fit into the box in which I currently store millinery supplies, so I'm still puzzling out that one.

It's still January, but I notice that the streetlights don't come on until a few minutes after 5 pm.
Victor and a rain boot cat toy

Tuesday, January 16, 2024

A January Task


Is there a more January task than carding buttons one has cut off of worn-out clothing so that they can be re-used? If I didn't sew some of my own clothes, and if I didn't hate shopping for buttons, and if the outside temperature today wasn't well below freezing, I'm not sure I'd bother. The only way I've found to keep track of these salvaged buttons is to sew them onto small rectangles of cardboard, cut from tablet backs that I keep for the purpose. 

You can never have too many sets of white buttons. I think these came from a much-loved LL Bean shirt. Their clothes typically have nice buttons and I like the pie-crust edging on these.