Category Archives: Series

Childhood Memories, FAD (Fiber Art Dames), Mayan - Monkey Dancer, Mayan- Turtle Dancer, Squares a Dancing, Textile Artist Stitch Club, Thoth

Smoky Fall

Hello,
It is a gray and cloudy day here with the smoke from western fires mixed in our air.     I am not complaining – I am just surprised at how far the smoke has traveled.    My sympathy goes out to the folks in the fire area .    The  burning   wildfires continue to bather me.   I want to make a third quilt noting these destructive events .     I tried to dye, reds, oranges, yellows and blacks  last Friday with that in mind. I was not successful! I am not sure exactly why, but Liz did mix lots of new dye last time. Hopefully tomorrow when we dye again I will get what I want and can start the work.

 

 

 

 

Textile Artists Stitch Club started a new assignment on Saturday with Clarissa Calksen. She showed us how she creates potatoes and puffs and how she suggests we assemble them. I am still building my forms and I have yet to embellish them. I seem to be working slowly on this new project, but I really like the challenge.

The Pixies had a meeting this week and we are going to continue to work with crows. My flags were a success.
FAB also had a Zoom meeting and it was stimulating.

Progress Report: Monkey Dancer- Mayan Series This piece is 21.5″ X 23.5″. This series continues to fascinate me

Golden Garden    This work is 38″ X 49″.       It is made completely from fabrics   I have altered in some way.   Some I did with Liz an some in the QBL class in the summer of 2019.  There is silk folded dyeing, silk screen, direct painting and a bit of shobori in this one.

 

 

 

I am enjoying using my fabrics.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Turtle Dancer- Mayan Series I finished cutting and placing all the parts for this work yesterday. Now I need to begin the outlining in black.

 

 

 

 

Green on Green I finished assembling  and quilting on this work  this week . I am ready to do the hand work of stitching down the binding now.

 

Squares a Dancing. I finished seven more of these fellows this week I now have 168 done. I also cut into 5 inch squares the last pair of Eric’s pants.   With these last squares, I   thinks I am nearing the end of this project.

 

 

Wool Rug     The work is 29″ X 36″ . This project is now on the floor in the entry to the studio.   It is made from wool scraps form shirts and extra’s from a jacket.    Lots of fun.

 

 

 

 

 

Thoth  Pillow       I finished this pillow this week too.  I like to make a form and stuff it with the extra batting that I cut away from projects.   That is what this one is full of.   I made the stencil  of Thoth  for a quilt that I did for my husbands  office   years ago.   The quilt is hanging in the living room now.

 

 

Childhood Memories: Grandpa Merritt’s Domain

    Grandfather Merritt was a farmer who used diversity to make himself successful.    He was a short  round man, who wore a straw hat in summer and a felt hat in winter.  The only time one did not see him in a hat was indoors or on Sundays at church.   He had the perfect farmer  tan.   For work days he wore a blue shirt and blue and white striped  Oshkosh Bygosh bib overalls.   Sunday was a brown suit, white shirt and tie.      We went to church on Sunday morning and came home for  lunch and a quiet afternoon, that often included a nap with an occasional Bible story  from   Grandmother’s  Bible story book for  Children. The “Blue laws”meant that nothing was open any way.  We then went back  to Church for the evening service .   Grandpa raised a variety of live stock and the land beyond the door yard, with the exception of the chicken yard was his kingdom.    He did visit the chicken yard when, he cleaned the manure  out  of the chicken house and when he chopped off the heads of chickens for our chicken  dinners .      The barn  yard surrounded the house on three sides and the  forth side was the road.   Next to the house on the south was the two bay garage.    A turquoise blue ford occupied the first bay and Grandpa’s green ford pickup occupied the other.  There were windows along the back of the garage with a work bench under them. There was also a set of stairs that lead up to the top of the garage were lumber was stored.   Farmers have to be able to repair machinery so he often had odd stuff on that work bench.   Grandfather used lots of bailing wire to “fix” stuff too.

    Beyond the garage and across a gated lane was the sheep shed and a small pasture. I remember one spring job for Dad and Grandpa, was to sheered the sheep. Gene and I had a job too and that, with the help of Snookie- a white maxed breed dog, was to separate the lambs and move them to the barn yard. Snookie could also cut out one ewe at a time and herd it into the pen for shearing. Dad and Grandpa would select a ewe and after turning it over would tuck it’s head  under and between their legs  to hold it still. They then would begin shearing  at the throat,   and cut the wool as close to the body as they could down to the flank of the ewe. They slowly turned the animal as they worked from top to bottom until they reached the other side. Keeping the fleece in one big piece was the goal. When they were done shearing they released the ewe into the farm  yard to find their lamb again. There was lots of bleating. Grandfather put a tight rubber band on all the lambs tails when they were born. That rubber band cut off the blood circulation and the tails would eventually fall off. This was done for sanitary reasons. As the shed and pasture emptied. Gene and I would collect all the lambs tails. After shearing 75 ewes, both Dad and Grandpa always had blisters at the end of the day even though they traded the electrical shears and hand powered ones back and forth. Snookie, Gene and I heard all the sheep back into their pasture and barn when the shearing was done. It was a full days job.

Stay safe

Keep Creating

Carol

 

Childhood Memories, Flag Challenge, Mayan - Monkey Dancer

Beginning Fall

Hello-
Labor Day is the unofficial end of summer and the beginning of fall.  I see a few Box Elder and Wall Nut leaves drifting down on my walks this week so I see deviance of  fall’s approach.   I love the changes but there are still lots of flowers blooming and there is color every were.

I did make a button necklace for my friend Chris to celebrate her 75 Birthday.  There are 75 buttons on this necklace.  that was the challenge.

 

 

 

 

 

This week was quiet as there was no assignment from Textile Artist Stitch Club and Liz and I  are going to dye tomorrow. I had two Zoom meetings and they are fun but no images of others work comes from those experiences. Susan did challenged us to make flags this week using Robert’s crows shots. This is my solution. I enjoyed it and they are up on the studio now.

Progress Report- Wool Birds I finished this little piece this week. It is 20.5″ X 21.5″. It was a jump off from Susan’s Birds a few weeks ago.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Monkey Dancer-Mayan Series I am doing the quilting on this work now. It is moving slowly along.

 

 

 

 

 

Bunk Bed 1-I have finished assembling the first of these quilts. It is ready for quilting and the finishing of the binding.

 

 

Green on Green. It is an assembled top now. I think it will become one of the quilts that I donate to the nursing home for folks in wheel chairs.

 

 

 

 

Wool Rug I could not get the oval rug to do anything I was happy with so I started again. I am trying another approach were I am working on a squared format.

 

Squares a Dancing There are 161 completed squares now. In my cleaning yesterday I discovered another pair of pants to cut into squares so the end is still a ways off.

 

 

 

Childhood Memories – Farm Summer 4
Many evenings after supper Gene and I would play a game we called “Over the Mountain”. We would go to the garage, a stand alone building. While standing on opposite sides of the building, we would throw a ball over the garage after “Yodeling “. If one caught the ball then, one would run around the garage trying th surprise the other person and throw the ball to hit them. If you caught the ball the throw was worth 2 points and if it hit you, or you dropped the ball it was a negative point. We played that game until the grandparents got new aluminum siding.
There was an old Poplar tree in the back of door yard. There was a great swing hanging from it and we all had a good time swinging there. The one spring the tree was struck by lighting and had to come down. I think our youngest cousin, Mike missed the swing the most.
The house was five miles from town and the view north was across a very flat landscape. On summer night one could see the street lights out the front room on the second floor. Mom and Dad usually slept in that room. Gene took the middle room and I slept on the sleeping poach on the east end on the second floor of the house. It had three windows on three sides. The bed had a brown metal head board that had a flowers painted on the center panel. There was a chest of drawers with all the leftovers from Grandmothers dress making in it. I loved looking through those scraps. Some times I even got to take one of the rolls and make a dress for my Betsy Mc Call with it. I especially love one bit of scarp that had a purple pussy willow print. I made my dolly a K amino with that and I still think it is among the doll clothes in the doll chest. One could hear the windmill turning on nights when there was a breeze. I could also hear the sounds of the hogs as they opened and closed the grain dispenser as they were aluminum and dropped with a distinct sound. Some nights it was very hot with out any wind and Grandfather would sleep out on the picnic table under my north windows. If it was very quiet one could hear the sliding squeak of the corn as it unfurled in its growing process too. There were also crickets and cicada in late summer. Many nights I fell asleep to the sounds of summer there.
In late summer Grandmother’s Gladiolas would bloom. She was always proud when that happened, and took them to Church were they were put in the big vases on both sides of the choir in the front church just behind the pulped.
I helped Grandmother with the laundry sometimes. The lines were quite long and they hung down low, especially with the weight of the wet laundry. But Grandfather had set up two ten foot long 2″ X 2″ boards that he had added a screw eye to at the top of. . He had run the lines through the screw eyes. This meant that one could lower the lines so one could hang the cloths and when one was done, the polls were razed and that pulled the lines up and the wet clothing too. They really flapped in the breeze and one could walk under them as well.
The year that Mom graduated from Greeley and I was ready to begin my seventh grade, Grandmother Ester was fed up with my hair and took me to the hair dresser. She went every month and her hair really was that old lady blue with lots of tight curls that were popular at that time. The shop was in a fellow farmers house and consisted of as sink, a hair drying chair, a chair like in the barber shop and several chairs for others. There were lots of women’s magazines there too. I got a pixie cut and the care of my hair was a lot easier- even I could comb it out. Mom was not at all happy with my appearances when she first saw me. “Thank goodness it will grow back,” she said.

Take care

Keep creating

Carol

Childhood Memories, Mayan - Monkey Dancer, Mayan- Turtle Dancer, Squares a Dancing, Textile Artist Stitch Club, Thread Painting

Lake Visit

 

Hello-
Summer is winding down and I see signs of fall around here. When we went for our second trip to Mill Site late last week, we saw many trees starting to color. The second Treadle Sewing machine went to a second family and they were very grateful. It is good to pass things forward. Judy has been working away on her piecing.
That is the part she enjoys the most and she had two projects. This one with little pink squares and a second in shades of blue. She and Nancy spent a peasant morning arranging the squares for that project.

Liz ans I dyed today. We had a good time as it has been a long times sense we did any of that.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I enjoyed my Textile Artists Stitch Class from last week with Anne Kelly. The project was a book of memorable experiences or trips. I did mine on the trip to Australia that I took with Wendy last Nov.
Page one is of a Pygmy Penguin. That was a cold and enjoyable evening.

 

 

The second is a Koala. We visited three parks were they were on display and we even got to hold one.

 

 


Then I could not forget to honor the dive day on the Great Barrier Reef. The water was so pleasant and the sights so wonderful.

 

The last page was my celebration of the ocean and the wonderful time we had.

 

 

 

Then this weeks Textile Artist Stitch Club teacher was Allish Henderson. She had a do a portrait collage on hand made paper and with free motion drawing. And easy thing for me with all my work for the childhood series.

 

 

 

Progress Report: Golden Earth I am done assembling this base. It has lots of my hand dyed fabric in it. Now I need to do the top work and finish it

 

 

 

 

Wool Birds I am almost done quilting on this project. It is fun and simple.

 

 

 

Monkey Dancer- Mayan Series Last evening I finished the outlining of appliqued parts of this work. I will start the quilting soon

 

 

Turtle Dancer- Mayan Series I have only drawn this work and need to enlarge it and start the pieces.

 

 

 

 

Laura’s Blue Birds I made these little Eastern Blue Birds for my friend Laura. She liked my Bee shirt and said she too had a short that needed spots covered. I will trim them up and send them in the next day or two.

 

 

 

Bunk Bed quilt 1 I am putting the boarders on this quilt now. It is a Christmas present so I have lots of time. I will make a second that is very slimier for the other bed. Then the twins will have a set.

Wool Rug This is a pure experiment. Liz got me started on it when she showed me the tool she had purchased to roll the fabric. I thought it looked remarkable like a belt buckle and went home and found one . The matched and I was off and running.

 

 

I followed the instruction and created a monster of a ball of the wool. Note the red buckle.

 

 

 

 

I started to assemble it yesterday. It is slow work and I had to improvise the ends as they were wadding up. Good thing this is not going out into the world.

 

 

 

 

Masks Eric wanted a new mask without a tie in the back so I tried a new design. I will make a few more as I fear that we will be wearing them a while.

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New Green    I started a new top using lots of the greens I had hand dyed.  It is very early in the process.

 

 

 

 

 

Squares a Dancing    I finished 21 squares in the last two weeks.  I am still enjoying the process.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Childhood- McElhinny Farm Summer 3
Spending time on the farm meant Gene and I had to find or create our own fun. We spent a lot of time playing in the creek in the east meadow. I learn one summer about the effects of fertilizer runoff from the farms up stream, as that caused a algae bloom in the creek water way. Sure made for a sluggish flow. The only place in the creek that it did not grow was in the pools under the trees where the cattle often stood in the afternoons to cool off. Gene and I would waded in and used sticks to haul out big clumps of the green stuff. We piled it on the rocks on the shore where it looked like green and gray laundry drying there. I was always amazed at how small the piles had become when we went back to the creek a few days late and all the water had drained out.
On the farm north of Grandmother’s farm and across the gravel road lived the Cumming family. It consisted of three folks, Holt, Lillian and Sue. Some afternoons and after a call from Grandmother, Gene and I would walk up the road to join Sue in some play. They had an old plow horse that we would ride bare back. The horse was named Ginny. Sue would set in the front follow by myself and Gene was the last. When Ginny had enough of our foolishness she would run across the pasture and down a gully, quickly charging up the other side. We would all slide forward on the down plunge onto the horses neck and just a quickly, slide backward and off Ginny’s rump. Gene always landed on the bottom with Sue and myself on top him. Ginny would gallop away and that was the end of that game. On one trip down to the Cummings we spent the afternoon making sorghum. With the plants in old grain bags we beat the bags on the steps to remove the seed from the tops of the staffs. Then the seeds went into a hoper and were grown down a bit before they were cooked. We never got to taste the fruits of that afternoon, but we still had a good time. There was yet another farm with kids farther north of the Cummings. Buddy was the oldest in that bunch and he was a year older then Sue. Sometimes we were all together and playing. One of our games that was strictly a farm kid game, was played only when the corn was tall, it was called “ Halls and Doors”. We would go out in the field and space our selves at the end of a row- a hall and then quickly run down between the rows all counting to ten as fast as we could. When one reached 10- we called “Doors!” and then everyone had to change rows and begin to count again. If one caught up to a fellow runner in the field and tagged them, the person tagged had to stop and count to twenty before they could move again while the rest of the folks went forward. The goal was to get to the end of the field first. This game has disappeared because the new improved corn plants can be plated much closer together and there are no more “Doors” wide enough to pass through in the fields. One time while we were in the south meadow of the Cummings farm we were all climbing trees. Buddy was showing off and making his sway back and forth. He lost his grip and fell to the ground braking his right arm. It was a very clean break and it looked like he had a second wrist. He yelled and cried all the way back to the house with the rest if use following. Lillian bundled him into the car and we all went home. Buddy proudly showed off his cast at church on Sunday the next time we saw him.

Enjoy fall and all it means to you.

Stay safe and be creative

Carol

Childhood Memories, Flag Challenge, Mayan - Monkey Dancer, Textile Artist Stitch Club

Tomatoes

1 Comment

Hello,
I sure am enjoying the wonders of summer. I do not grow tomatoes as the squirrels always take a bit out before I harvest, but my friend Betty and her husband Dave do and they kindly share.

 

I spent a day with Liz and her neighbor and we did Shobori in Black. The tee shirts came out great.   My dyed stuff is  in the washer at the moment.
Julie Booth was the instructor for the Textile Artist stitch club this week. We are only working with the blanket stitch this week in black and white. We all drew numbers and used her chart to determine our parameters. Mine Format was circular with the layout to be scattered with thick lines that were jagged. I am still working on this one.

 

Progress Report: Golden Garden This work is 32.5″ X 45.5″ . I added the buttons to the center of the applique yellow circles at the end of the week before finishing it.  All  the   base fabrics but one are   ones . I hand altered in some fashion.     

 

Many are from different classes.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Monkey Priest Mayan Dancer Series   

I am making slow progress on this fellow.   I also decided to call these new ones dancers because of the new background fabric.

 

 

 

Flag Play Susan challenged us to do flags this week. I decided to do the work on interfacing and draw/paint with water soluble crayons and pencils as I have never really explored these before. I am learning a new skill and I like the little challenge.

New work After finishing Golden Garden I am moving onto a new piece here.  The birds are wool with a felted chest of white.

 

 

 

Squares a Dancing I now have 126 square for this project. I am still coming up with different ways to develop circular patterns

 

 

 

 

 

Childhood Memories-  The McElhinney Farm  II

The garden was as imports for the successful running of the farm as the animals and field s were.  Grandmother Ester loved Zinnia’s and always grew then from seeds of the previous years flowers at the east end of the garden. It was fertilizer ed with manure form the chicken house so the garden was always bountiful. Grandmother grew two species of tomatoes- reds and golden ones. She said the golden ones were less acid. Another memory of food was summer of lunches. Grandmother told us in the morning if we were going to have corn for lunch so when she rang the big bell mounted on the gate post in the door yard we knew what to do. You could hear the bell from a long way off and we would come running to the machine shed. Behind the shed was the corn field . Grandfather Merit planted seed corn in the first eight rows to fool the raccoons and it worked. We knew to go into the field and count eight rows in before we started picking. We were to pick as many ears as we wanted plus one for Grandmother and two for Grandfather. We then shucked the corn and carried it back to the house. After handing our corn to Grandmother were she put it in the boiling water. We went to the basement to wash up and then returned to the kitchen and sat down at the table. The lunch was the fresh corn with as much butter as one wanted along with as many tomatoes and ice tea too. It was great and it is still one of my favorite summer lunches. She also grew beans, peas and onions as well as other vegetables..
I really did not have choirs at the farm but I was often asked to gather eggs. I did not mind that job too much with the exception of one hen. I though of her as the “Mean Pecker” because she always peck my hand when I slipped it under her to get the egg. I often skipped her nest and let grandmother get extra eggs from her the next day. Grandmother’s egg money went for fabric and other extra’s she wanted.
Bailing hay was a big event at the farm, Grandfather would watch the weather and when conditions were right he would cut the clover. After it had dried it was raked into rows and the neighboring framers showed up. They came with their trackers and hay wagons and the many jobs were divided up. Gene and I always wanted to help. They never seemed to find a job for me and I was sent back and forth from the field to the barn and back again before I was told to go help Grandmother. I was in tears when I got to the house” Gene is littler and younger and they let him help,” I lamented. Grandmother gently explained to me that it was a case of the men not feeling that they relieve themselves without embarrassment.
I remember when the phone line was added to the McElhinny Farm. It was a party line and their ring was two longs and a short. But one also heard all the other rings when the line was in use. I was a bit scandalized one day when I came in to find Grandmother listening to a neighbors conversation. Dad pulled me aside and we a talk about being judgmental of others . He told me to think of two reasons why she might do that and then empathized with why a person might be doing an action before I judged their actions. That idea of thinking of the reasoning for actions of others, served me well through out my life.

I will be away next week on Thursday so there will be no entry  as I am off to deliver a treadle sewing machine to an Amish family.

Keep Creating

Carol

Childhood Memories, Daily Practice, Mayan- Parrot Priest, Mayan- Vulture Priest, Squares a Dancing

Studio Time

1 Comment

Hello
Another week is passing and summer is in full swing. I love the color that is all around me at this time of year.   This week I spent a lot of time in the studio and enjoyed every min.  That is where the work gets done!

This week was also a  lay off week for the Textile Artist Stitch Club so I gave myself a little assignment. I found this project that I had started on a visit to Florida with Susan a few years ago so I decided this week would be a good time to complete it.   I cut the bird stencil with Susan and applied the color then too.
It is 15.5 “ X 19.5″. I am happy with the final results.

I spent the day with Liz today. We had fun.    We ended up reorganizing the work space and sorting through our collection of stuff.   It was a job that we really needed to do.

 

 

 

Progress Report: Parrot Priest: Mayan Series # 5 This work is 20″ X 23″. It is fused down ad then out line stitched by hand. The Parrot is my favorite part of this project.

 

 

I am getting good at doing the feet for these fellow as they are all so similar.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Monkey Priest: Mayan Series # 6 I did the drawing and then enlarged it to make a pattern this week. Head dress, clothing and hand position are the things that change for the most part with these little fellows.

 

 

 

 

Blue on Blue This project is             36.5 w X 41″ l  . I really enjoyed the play factor in the work on this project. I love all the textures and tints and shades of blue too. It was a good work to try stuff and explore.

This work is really a collage of textures using silk papers, ribbons and various unique weaves.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Golden Garden I did a lot of hand work on this piece at the end of the process. My stitches are mostly in the applique of the circles and not decorative. That is a way to go on the next piece.
Nancy is the person who pushed me to make this into a garden setting.

Wool Birds Doing the birds for “Susan’s Birds” got me to thinking how much I like bird shapes. That coupled a big bag full of felted wool that my friend Angela gave me, were the inspiration for this new start. Then while I had the roving out I thought I’d add the light chests to the little birds. It will be fun to play with this piece and see were it leads me.

 

Felted Dryer Balls I finished up these five balls this week. They were all started way back in Feb. But got burred. Good to move forward with this project and complete the task.

Felted Back grounds- Landscape When I had the roving out to finish the dryer balls I looked at the colors and started playing with layouts. I will use some of the wool from Angela’s bag for this too.

Shore Line I was looking at a calendar page and thought the simple background would be a good place to add some machine drawing on top. Time will tell.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

New Projects    I pulled fabric for two new projects this week too.  Not sure what I want to do , but I feel that the colors work well in both collections.

 

 

 

 

Squares a Dancing  I just keep working away on these fellows.    I now have 117 finished.

Childhood Memories- Summer: Grandmother  Ester

My parents went back to school in the summers following grade five. Mom went back to Greeley Colorado and Dada went to the University of Iowa in Iowa City. As kids Gene and I stayed with the grandparents alternating from week to week. Dad would drive in and make the exchange on Sunday afternoons and spend some time with us. I have a difficult time recalling what happened each summer so I will talk about the homes of Grandparents as separate entries. First I will cover staying with Grandmother Ester and Grandpa Merit my Dad’s parents. They lived on a farm they owned about five miles outside Morning Sun Iowa. Both of their families live within 30 miles of that small town. They were Presbyterian and the church was an important part of their social lives. The daily routine in that house involved reading a chapter from the Bible every morning after breakfast. When they got to the end of the book, we would start at Genesis again. Gene and I both went to Vacation Bible School at the Sharon Church that was on the opposite side of town and surrounded by a cemetery and corn fields. We always had to memories a new Bible verse every evening for the next day so I knew lots of them. Grandmother usually stayed and helped distribute a sack of cookies and juice  for the kids in the late morning.
The summer that we were studying Romans I learned to carve Ivory soap. The class did a map and I carved three domed homes for it. I later carved an own out of some green soap that was part of a book report for school. I loved the stylized illustrations in the little hand outs that we got in church school and spent many hot afternoons trying to mimic that style of drawing.
Because Mom was in Greeley, Dad encouraged me to write to her. I do remember doing that several times over the summers. When I was done I went to Grandmother for an envelope and after the add was added, Grandmother gave me a nickel and told me to put the letter in their mail box across the road, saying the mail man would add the stamp at the post office in town. That system worked as Mom did get the letters.
Grandmother Ester had a big garden on the south side of the house. Her fruit trees were there too. I remember climbing and picking the cherry’s from the cherry tree. I love her cherry pies. She also had a peach tree and a plum tree, but I have no memory of helping with the harvest of those. Tomatoes, beans, peas and onions were always in the garden too. She canned and froze lots of things. They rented a locker from a man who ran a big freezer with lots of smaller units called lockers in town and she kept some frozen vegetable there along with cuts of beef. When we went town on Wed night for the usual grocery shopping,  the locker was the last stop before we headed home. Grandmother did not have a strawberry bed but the farm north of theirs did and we went there to pick berries. That farmer had big 2″ X 12″ boards laid out across the patch to walk on and harvest the berries. After the season was over, they took the boards up and let the plants spread out. In the following spring the farmer would put the boards down on the older plants to  assure that the  newer plants were always vigorous. As a part of the strawberry season we always had a family ice cream event. In the late afternoon I would go with Grandmother to town to the ice house where she would purchase a block of ice. We drove home and Grandmother made power milk biscuits. The family started to arrive. It usually consisted of Grandmother’s sister Helen and her husband Bernard along with their grown childerden’s families. The men cranked the ice cream churn in the basement. I tried once, but found it too difficult and I really wanted to play with the other kids any way. We all ate out doors at the big pick nick table  in the fading evening light and enjoyed our home made ice cream , biscuits and strawberries. It is still one of my favorite desserts.

Please stay safe and I will write again next week

Carol

Childhood Memories, Felt Work, Mayan- Parrot Priest, Scrap Happy Quilts, Squares a Dancing, Textile Artist Stitch Club

Mill Site Lake Aug 2020

Hello,
Nancy and I had a wonderful time last week at Mill Site Lake visiting Judy’s Camp. We took up a treadle sewing machine that one of my daughter’s friend gave to me as she was cleaning out her mothers house. The Amish family was very happy to get the gift. Then when I got home the woman across the street offered me a second machine. So Nancy and I will make a second trip north later this summer. Judy Showed off her Grandmothers Flower Garden quilt.

 

 

 

We made a trip to purchase fresh vegetables for dinner and stopped at a spring and filled the water bottles while we were there too.
Jake, Judy’s new puppy keeps her active and brings her lots of joy.    He is funny little guy and he likes to chew shoes.  I found a solo shoe in my car- one of a set that I had take to the Risque Mission that had fallen out of the bag.  So I passed it on to Jake and he was very happy.

 

 

 

 

 

Over the last two week I have been doing my Textile Artist Stitch club assignments. Haf Wieghton challenge was to make medallions. I enjoyed this process.

 

 

 

 

This week Cas Homes challenge the students use crumpled paper as a new element in their stitch work. I did a landscape as she suggested. I made it my own by doing the free motion tree on the machine too.

 

 

 

Progress Report: Golden Garden I am having fun working away on this piece. The base is all built from fabric that I have altered except for one piece that is less then a fat quarter. I have added ribbon, and organza shapes on top. Then I faced circles that I am appliqueing by hand.

Repair While I was up at Mill Site I work to repair this quilt from Grandmother stash. The brown shapes were falling apart. So I cut the same shapes from some of the old fabric from her house and appliqued them on top. The Blue, white and red print  piece with the pins is ready for the stitching.( center top ) All seven of the shapes are covered and requilted down now.

Blue I am having a good time layering this piece. I am not sure that it is finished yet , but it is getting close.

Parrot Priest- Mayan Series # 5 I worked on this at Mill Site too. All the outlining is done and I am now quilting around the figure.

 

 

 

 

 

Bunk Bed Quilts All the rows are completed for the bunk bed quits. I am waiting for a trip to the fabric store to purchase backing material so I can finish.

 

Felting- washer balls I am in the middle of preparing these to pass on to my friends.

 

 

 

 

 

Felting landscape I started this yesterday at the end of the day. I want some additional greens so I ordered some and they will come Monday.

 

Squares a Dancing     I worked away on the squares over this two week period and  and finished 21 of them.   I like how this project is going and I am enjoying the use of only a few stitches with lots of different colors.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Childhood Memories – Christmas
We drove home to Morning Sun and Grandview for Christmas like we did for Thanksgiving. Most years while we lived in Carroll we had a nearly visit from Santa before we left. Because Gene still believed the first years, Mom wrote a special letter to Santa to alert him of our need and set up the date. I do not remember anything special gifts except for one year when I got a rhinestone setting jewelry kit. It offered me many hours of glamorous fun. The five hour drive ended at Grandmother Ester’s home as it did with Thanksgiving. We always slept there and enjoyed the time on the farm. Grandmother Ester had a cedar tree that Grandfather Merrit had cut from one of the fields was in the living room. Ginger bread was Grandmother’s tribute to the holiday. We had gifts for both of them of course.
On Christmas day we got up early and drove to the Cocklin house. I remember there was always homemade egg noodles on Christmas day. As I got older I got to help roll out the dough. It was always one of my favorite parts of the feast. Grandpa Howard did the turkey. One year he stuff it with rice that the had soaked in Hawaiian Punch. It was pink of course- I have no memory of the taste- but it never reappeared on the menu. Several Christmas’s we did family portraits. Mon was the oldest and we were usually the first to arrive and as the other families appeared they took their places and had pictures taken. From my point of view it took forever for the other families to arrive- but then they were celebrating the normal tradition of Santa’s arrival that morning. Uncle Dale was the second child. His wife was Barbara and they had five children. Danny was the oldest and 6 month older then I. Next was Timmy, followed by Tommy and Lisa, who was the last child in that family to be born in Iowa. Following Dale’s love of hunting and fishing the family moved to Alaska before Darcy was born. Uncle Dale is still alive as are the next two children in that generation. Aunt Marcaleen was the next child and she married Paul Bell. Russell was their oldest followed by Tracy, Doug and Kelly. The youngest child in Mom’s generation was Aunt Shirley. She was married to Jerry Dean and they had three boys, Curtis, Casey and Scott. Some years Grandmother Ruth’s younger brother Dan and his family came to Christmas dinner too. Dan’s wife was Lovell and their kids were Jerry, Claudia, and Garth. The kids were all older and I do not have much in the way of memories of them.
When the Bells showed up things really started to move for us kids. Many years we wrote and preformed a play in the later part of the afternoon. We dressed up and used the pocket door in the den as our curtain. I do not remember the stories we preformed, but I do recall one year when Doug did commercials between the acts. He stole the show with his presentation for “Grandma Moses’s Spider Taffy.”
As we got older we started shooting skeet in the afternoon. I can’t say I enjoyed that much, but the men did. As the afternoon turned toward evening folks drifted off and we too returned to Grandmother Esters with our happy memoirs of a good family fun fill day.

Enjoy the summer and stay safe

Carol

Childhood Memories, Mayan- Parrot Priest, Mayan- Vulture Priest, Scrap Happy Quilts, Textile Artist Stitch Club, Textile Artist Stitch Club

Thankful

Hello,
I hope everyone is continuing to do well in these trying times. I feel so very thankful  to be an artists and a person who can entertain myself. Being able to set my own rules and goals allows me to choose to be selective in who I have contact with as well as where I choose to go. I can and do make my own fun. This week was quiet but I am still playing in the studio

There was a new assignment from Gregory Wilkins this week. We are building a mixed media collage with lots of stitching. I love his last bit of advice” It is not done until it is over done.” What and excuse to just keep going.   I had fun stitching down  big sequins, key pads from a saxophone, some  of Grandmothers Ruth’s old glass beads and old lace on my painted base.

Progress Report- Vulture Priest- Mayan Series # 3 I finished this piece yesterday. It is 21″ X 23″.   This series is proving to be a challenge in the assembly process.  Cutting all the little fabric pieces and putting them back together is a bit of a challenge. 

 

I am learning a lot about stitching small circles too.

 

 

Parrot Priest- Mayan Series # 4 When I start ed quilting on the Vulture Priest I started the drawing on this work. It took the better part of three days to get the fabric cut and fused down. Now I am ready to begin the stitching outlines.

 

 

 

Time Check Last week was an off week for the Textile Artist Stitch Club so I put my time in on this little work. I think the class is helping me think in a new direction.

 

Bunk Bed Scrap Happy I started this Scrap Happy as a Christmas gift for the twins. Putting the rows together sure goes fast when there are only 10 rows of 5.

 

 

 

 

Squares a Dancing I put in a lot of time doing hand work in the evening lately. With 91 squares done now I will soon reach the original goal of 100. But sense I cut up two more pair of Eric’s pants for bases I will keep going until I have used them all up. Then I will decide on the size of the final quilt.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 New work  

 

I usually audition fabrics before I start a new project.  These are the ones I am thinking about at the moment.    After several days of looking I have decided that there are really two bases here.  So I may just make two

 

 

 

 

Childhood Memories-Thanksgiving- the Feast

The meal for Thanksgiving was a big job and Grandmother Ester’s big day. When we returned from our little family walk the first thing I did was get dressed in fancy attire. When I came down stairs the work began. Grandfather would have turned the dinning table and added all the four leaves. The pad was added and then the white Damask table cloth was all spread . My job was to set the dinning room table with the good china from the china nook and the silver from the credenza. I was given Grandmother’s silver plate dinner ware many years after her death. I decided to use it daily and enjoy it. I did that for many years until the plating wore off some of the piece. Doing so made me feel like Grandmother was a daily part of my life for years. Back to the Thanksgiving feast. I carefully arranged the plates for 16 and put out the utensils and napkins. The five kids ate in the kitchen. People began to arrive  around 1:00. First were usually Aunt Helen and Uncle Bernard followed closely by Jim and Herta with their three kids, Charlie, Mary Helen, and Tom. Then the other sisters and there spouses.  Grandmother Esterd was the oldest of the family.  There was aunt Loretta and uncle Bert, aunt Illa and uncle Nathan, aunt Ethel and uncle William, and the two aunts who lived together because they had both lost their spouses- aunt Vivian and Lovel . Everyone broth in food and it was a major pot luck. Grandmother Ester always did the turkey and dressing along with the mashed potatoes and gravy. There always were two dishes- oyster casserole and Golden Glow jello salad. Pulse pumpkin, apple, and cherry pies with lots of whipped cream. One always ate too much. The talk was lively even for us kids. When the dishes were done then men would turn the table back and take out the leaves so they could watch football and the women would play Canasta at both ends of the shortened table. When I got older one of the Aunts tried to teach me Canasta- but I did n’t really get it. We kids would retire to the upstairs and play board games. Monopoly mostly- Gene loved that one. The Bates family had animals on their farm and  they always left early so we never rarely finished the Monopoly game. It was cool up stairs and Gene and I often took a nap. Folks drifted away as the afternoon wore on and we ate a leftovers that evening. Dad and Grandpa would go out do his few chores too. It was a big and happy family get together with great feeling of warmth and love.
The next day we would drive to Grandview in the early morning and meet up with Mom’s parents. Many times we joined the Bell family and went from there to the Christmas Parade in Muscatine. It was the start of the holiday season. We would window shop and then go back to Grandmothers house in Grandview in the afternoon.   One of the other activities that was a part of that weekend was the selection of one’s magazine subscription for the year.   It was  a Christmas gift from Grandmother Ruth. I sure enjoyed that gift. My parents always chose National Geographic. My choice for years was one called “Pack-O-Fun”. It was full of little craft projects one could create from trash like plastic berry boxes and egg cartons. The start of my “ look at one thing and see it’s possible reuse” , I guess. As the Cocklin family grew it became cumbersome to purchase gifts for all the kids;there were 14 grand kids on that side, so at Thanksgiving time we would draw one other persons name. That was much much simpler and with time that even disappeared. Being together was the important thing in both families.

Please stay safe and keep creating

Carol

I will be away nest week so the next post will be  August 6.

Childhood Memories, Drawing, Mayan- Vulture Priest, Squares a Dancing

Health

Hello
The human body is an amazing machine. It does so many things with out our giving it any thought. There are lots of actions that go on in our bodies with out or direction like the heart beats regularly, we breath in and out, the digestive track dose it thing and we maintain a constant body temperature. All that plus the actions our body takes on with our brains commands, like walking, eating, talking, touching, hearing and sleeping to name a few. We take it all for granted until something goes wrong. When we trip that is when we notice how we are walking.        When we get bitten by a misquote is when we notice the exposed skin. When one gets sick is when we realize how much we take out good health for granted. So take good care of your health now while you have it, it is one of your most valuable possessions, for without it you have nothing of value.
This week was a “by week” for the Textile Artist Stitch Group so her was no new assignment, but I did finish up my Concertina Book from the week before.

Cover

 

 

 

 

 

Spread one

Spread two.      I enjoyed adding the hand work to these    pieces.

 

 

Third section

 

 

The final

 

 

 

 

Liz and I did do a bit of dyeing this week. This is her mixing the dye power. Can you see her smiling?

The pieces in the pot are washing out the color.   I like this green.

Work on the line that Liz dye painted.

 

 

 

 

Progress Report: Scrap Happy I added the rows all together and added the boarders as well as the first step of binding. I can see the end of this project now.

 

Top I put this top together and although I like the color – it is not doing any thing for me now. It is in the ugly stage and I am ready to toss it out. Guess it will have to disappear for a while before I can see it’s potential again.

 

 

 

Squares a Dancing I just keep putting in the time on this project. I now have 77 squares done.

 

 

 

 

Vulture Priest I finished the top this week and now I only need to do the scepter and I will be ready to quilt it.

 

 

Parrot Priest As I can see the end of the Vulture Priest,  I moved onto do a drawing for the Parrot Priest so I can start on it this week. I am happy with this series.

 

 

 

Drawing     I am still doing a bit of  drawing.  These are all ocean micro plants.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Childhood Memories- Thanksgivings Mornings
>
> Even after we moved to Carroll, my family still drove the 5 hours it took to return home   to the Grandparents for the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays. For Thanksgiving we left from school on Wednesday. Mom packed sandwiches and fruit so we could avoid a dinner stop. But as we neared the edge of Illinois we would often stop at a dairy bar called “ Cow Jumps over the Moon” and get ice cream. The place had an amazing sign on top. It was a big shell with the moon, stars and the cow ,of course ,all outlined in neon. The cow’s neon turned on and off in a series so the cow actually appeared to jump over the moon in the course of sixty seconds. It was wonderful to my eyes. We then drove on to Grandmother Ester’s house where we stayed. We would arrive and talk a bit before going up to bed. I remember it being very cold in the mornings and snuggling back under the quilts until Grandfather Merritt got the coal loaded and stoked up. That changed when they got a new furnace of course. Thanksgiving was Grandmother Ester’s big day. She always cooked a big turkey with all the trimmings for the family gathering. I don’t remember much of a breakfast- Grandmother was too busy, so we as a family just mostly went out for a long walk to stay out from under foot. We would exit through the door yard into the machine yard, past the wind mill, and climb the big wooden gate into the barn yard. We crossed between the two barns and the corn crib to climb another wooden gate moving into the east pasture. Grandfather usually had cattle there, but I do remember one time when he housed some horses as well. We avoided the cow pies that were near the gate as grandfather fed hay from a  rack there. Then into the grass and down to the meadow to wander along the creek. Gene threw rocks as usual, but we mostly walked along, noting the changes in the few pool sizes and such. At the far south east end of the creek on Grandfather’s land was a big sandstone cliff where we almost always found some conoides- fossilized sea plant steams. Mom said that the Native Americans used them as beads and I can easily see why. Many times we would cross the fence near the creek into the neighbors pasture and explore the old abandoned sandstone church. There was never a roof in my memory and the window and door frames were gone too. There must have been stairs at one point as the two door jambs were about three feet off the ground. There were three window openings on both the east and west sides. The back wall was solid stone to the peak. We would then climb the hill behind the church to the fenced cemetery that was well maintained and always mowed. It was a fascinating place to me with lots of old markers. That was where I learned how many children  died  in their first year- some lives as brief as three days, five days, four months up to two years. Then there seemed to be a drop off. There was a huge oak tree in the south east corner. It had low branches and Gene and I love to climb it. It was so big around at the stump that Mom, Gene and I could barely touch hands if we all wrapped our arms around it. In the south east corner of that cemetery was a big sink whole about the size of a barn. Mom said she was sure there were caves in the hills around there. We did discover a opening in a corner of Grandfather’s pasture up behind the cliff face. Grandfather fenced off the area so no animals would wander in accidentally. There was a lane that lead out to the gravel road from the cemetery that separated Grandfathers land from the neighbors. One summer while I was out there with only Snookie, Grandfather’s dog, I startled an orange furred bodied  bat hanging from a branch along that lane. There was also a mound that was along the lane on Grandfathers pasture that Mom speculated was an Indian mound, but we never did anything to follow that up. We wandered back to the house around 11:30 and prepared for the feast.

Stay safe and keep creating

Carol

Childhood Memories, Hand work, Lines of Inquire, Mayan- Eagle priest, Mayan- Vulture Priest, Scrap Happy Quilts, Series, Squares a Dancing

Quiet week

Hello,
I hope folks are staying safe and enjoying summer. The Mulberry tree we walk under is nearing its end of the fruit baring time.  On the other hand, the wild raspberry patch is just getting started, so I enjoy a little treat on my way home.

The Textile Artists Stitch Club teacher for this week is Sue Stone. We are to weave a base out of fabric strips and stitch over it. To help with the stitching, it is suggested that one draw the image on tissue paper and then stitch thought it. I have only just started that second step. I like that idea however.
Liz and I over dyed this week. I pulled out some fabrics that were dyed before, but were not real successful. It was quite hot and the photo shows how the heat effected me. I really look wilted. The process was done in the Shobori style, were one warps the fabric around a poll and does immersion dyeing. I really like the effects as the colors are so very rich. We are going to do some more of that next week too. It is fun and there is lots of surprise in the process as one does not always have control of how the dye will work.

 

 

 

Progress Report: Eagle Priest- Mayan Series #3 This work is 21″ X 23″. It is the third one in the series. I learn something with each project.

 

 

 

 

I like the headdress and face area of this work. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Vulture Priest- Mayan series # 4 This work is all fused down now and I am starting to do the out line stitching. Some parts are three layers thick and hard to pass the needle through.

 

 

 

 

Squares a Dancing I just keep making one and a little more every evening. I have 56 squares now.

 

 

 

 

 

Layers I pulled this out of the pile after not looking at it for a week. I immediately saw what it needed  and made additions. Now I am ready to square it up and finish the project. It is great what time can do to help clear ones  vision.

Lines of Inquire This piece us all quilted in the ditch. I am now outlining the metallic inserts in gold thread. I will make passes around each one until I have quilted the work.

 

 

New Scrap Happy I cut centers in four colors and added the sides to them. Now they are all cut into squares and I can begin assembling the top.  Yes, they are Minions

Childhood Memories- Playground
Our playground in the fifth grade was a different scene from the fourth. We had big long jump ropes and could play group games with them. The girls took turns jumping and twirling. We played a lot of Aces- a game were one ran into the twirling rope and jumped once , then exited. The next person in line was to let the rope pass once and enter, then do the same single jump. After all the girls playing had jumped the single jump, one repeated running into the rope, but jumped twice. If someone missed by jumping on the rope or not entering on time, they replaced one of the twirlers and the game when back to Aces or one again. There were lots of rhyming songs that we jumped to as well- like Johnny Over the Ocean, Sampson and Delila, Blondie and Dagwood and one that we had to modify to use. It was Little Robin Red Breast. In that rhyme the last line ends in “poop”. We got around saying that by clapping when we got to that word. We played Double Dutch where two ropes were set in action going in the opposite directions. Lana Turner was the queen of that game until she broke her leg falling off a fence. We all admired the cast and were impressed by her painted toe nails when she came back to school. She said it itched and the crutches hurt her arm pits. She finally let folks sign the cast, but I was not one who signed. In the sixth grade I got a Pogo Stick for Christmas. By spring I was very good at its use and could cover lots of ground with it. I had no trouble pogoing to and from school. I even got so I could do jump rope rhymes too. I let lots of other kids try using it. It does take skill and I remained the champion of that event. In that year my best friend became Evelyn Stouton. I walked to her house after school many times. She had three sisters and she was the third girl in the family. She got mostly “hand me down” clothing and she did not like that much. But her older sisters also made her more sophisticated. Her room, in the attic was our hang out spot. Her bed was in a little cubby with a small window at the end. It was fun to lye there and watch people walk by. Her family moved over the summer and I was quite disappointed in the fall.
> My parents took me to the dentist as my teeth were a little out of alignment. After a discussion it was decided that the Dentist would try a new experimental technique to fix the problem. So one morning I went to the Dentist office at 8:00 instead of school. The dentist put bands on back teeth and wires on springs were attached to the bands
that would force my teeth forward. When I was done I walked the five blocks to school and joined my class. We had Chow main for lunch that day. I took one bite and suddenly my mouth was full of springs and wires as well as food. I went to Miss Herd and she told me to run back to the dentist as she knew he played Golf on Wednesday afternoons. I did run and barely made it to the office in time as he was in his car and the nurse had to flag him down. The dentist took all the wires and connections out and made a cast of my teeth. A few weeks later I got two retainers, one for the top and one for the bottom. I wore the bottom for about 9 months and the top for about a year. My bottom teeth are still a little crowded and crooked in the front.

Enjoy the holiday and Stay Safe

Carol

Childhood Memories, Mayan- Eagle priest, Mayan- Vulture Priest, Mouths, SAQA Blocks, Scrap Happy Quilts, Textile Artist Stitch Club, Uncategorized

Beginning Summer

Hello,
I hope everyone is staying safe and doing well.     Summer Solstice was last Saturday and  now the day light is shortening every day.   I continue to walk and enjoy the summer season as it is a visual feast. There is a Mulberry tree that we walk under every day and it is loaded with berries now. I sure enjoy the  few  seedy fruits  I pick every day.   It reminds me of my childhood.   My garden is also hostessing flowers from Grandmother Butterworths ‘s garden. They always make me think lovingly of her and their bright  color is a joy to the eye.

 

 

 

 

The Textile Artist Stitch Club had a new assignment this week. Emily Tulli demonstrated how to do a mouth. We are to do three different ones and this is my work at the half way point. I still need to add a second shade of gray and then white for the highlights.

Progress Report: Square’s a Dancing I worked hard on this project this week and finished two groups of seven. I also cut up another pair of Eric’s pants to use as bases and that is why there is a color change.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Scrap Happy I have now made rows of leftover squares for a new quilt. Nothing goes to waste in my world .

 

 

 

 

 

Eagle Priest- Mayan Series I finished the quilting of this piece this week and only need to finish off the little quilt with binding and a sleeve .

 

 

Vulture Priest- Mayan Series I drew out the next piece for this series and I am in the middle of cutting the pieces to applique to created the image. It will be ready for work when the Eagle Priest is done.

 

 

 

New Work I am working away on this new piece.   The insertion of the metallic pieces is a fun process. As I have no clear vision as to where I am going- the work is slow.

 

 

 

 

 

Childhood Memories- 5 th Grade

My teacher is fifth grade was Miss Herd. She had a reputation for being very strict and I guess she was. But she was also very fair. We had lots of routines in her class. After the pledge we had reading followed by Arithmetic. I remember lots of review on Division at the beginning of the year and then team games of all math techniques. At noon we walked done the hall to the far stairs and had a moment of “silent reflection” before we went down to the lunchroom in the basement. After lunch Miss Herd read aloud to us. I remember one book about a little southern girl and learning about her life during the Civil War.   I found it fascinating.   This class room had a little library like the fourth grade. I found and enjoyed all the Raggedy Ann and Andy books there. It was also the beginning of the TAB and Arrow book clubs for me. One could purchase books for .25 to .35 cents. My parents allowed me to purchase one or two every time there was an order. I did not read any of them until years later, but I sure enjoyed filling my book shelf with them. My reading was very poor and one of the things my parents attempted to do to help was have my eyes tested. I got some very stylish tear drop glasses that I wore for about a year. Mrs Fister   the high School art teacher, came for a special art lesson  in late November. It was about Alexander Calder. Then each member of the class each built a Christmas mobile out of an opened wire coat hanger. I made Christmas trees in the form of cones and added a few round candies for balls. The mobiles hung in the hall until  we left for the holidays. I love the history lessons   we had that year and did a special project for westward expansion. We had a puzzle map of the United States at home and under the states was a map that showed all the areas that were added as the country grew.   So I used the Opaque Projector to cast the map on a big piece of white paper and traced it out. I painted and labeled all the areas from the original thirteen colonies to the addition of the California territory. I painted the areas different colors and added the rivers and  mountains and also   labeled everything.    It hung in the front of the room for a long time and I was quite proud. Fifth grade was when we were introduced to instrumental music. I wanted to join the band, so Mom got me Grandfather Howard’s old silver clarinet. He also had a C saxophone, but the band leader, Mr Cox discouraged that choice. Playing the clarinet continued to be an important part of my life until the end of high school. Near the end of the year I volunteered to join the Safety Patrol and become a crossing guard. The main qualification, after volunteering and being at least in fifth grade, was to have perfect attendance. I did. As a fifth grader, I worked with a sixth grader for the last month of the year and became a full guard in the fall when I was in the sixth grade. We all had white adjustable belts and little silver badges. I had to leave the class a little before the end of the day to go to my post. I was assigned to the north end of Adams street across from the High School. I had that same post in sixth grade. We looked carefully and then went into the middle of the street and held our arms out so the younger kids could cross safely. I got to know many of the younger children who lived in that quadrant of the city. Sixth grade guard duty included flag duty. At the end of the day I was assigned to help take the flag down and fold it before taking it to the principals office for storage over night. At the end of sixth grade, I in tern, help teach a fifth grader to take my place on the squad.   I was very proud of my first job and took my responsibility very seriously.

Take good care of yourself.

 

Carol