In Which I Learn Things, Make Things, and Solve a Mystery

As you may remember, last year’s Writers in the Field was an epic mudfest, complete with tornado warning. This year we had glorious weather. I picked my friend Barbara up early on Saturday morning and we headed west, with a stop at Buc-ee’s so she could buy breakfast and experience Buc-ee’s, and so I could retrieve my perfectly-cooked omelet from my thermos.

We arrived at the venue a few minutes before classes started, so had time to get our badges and orient ourselves. One of the first people I saw was my friend Amber, another critique group member who had also come for her first experience with Writers in the Field and would be sharing a hotel room with me.

The day passed in a succession of classes. The one I most wanted to participate in was a leather journal-making class, but it was already full. I was relieved to find that it would be offered again on Sunday and I immediately got my name on the list! Instead I went to classes on starting a video channel and the future of spaceflight, and then it was my turn to volunteer at the registration desk. Since I also did this last year, it is now a tradition!

My two hours volunteering passed pleasantly, and then I moved on to an alternative energy class—always a popular topic with me. Following that, I eagerly showed up at the Tandy Leather booth to make a drawstring pouch that I thought would be a good visual aid for one of my classes.

One of the things I like to say about myself is that I “never met a craft I didn’t like.” So this weekend was my first real introduction to leather crafting. I liked it. And Jeff, the Tandy representative, was such a gentleman. I love my little drawstring pouch. And when I heard that he would be offering another leather journal class on Sunday, I added that to my schedule. He provided all the materials for free!

Having finished my pouch, I went to a class on author branding, and finished up with a survival demonstration of fire-making in the wild. I consider myself pretty adept at starting fires, but I still picked up a few pointers.

Barbara and Amber and I met up and drove to our hotel and got checked in before heading to a nearby Chinese restaurant for supper. After our long day outdoors, everyone was tired, so there was no partying that evening. Amber fell asleep reading and I stayed up a little later because I had a LOT of reading to do. From now until May I will be reading at least four books a month, and I am finding it hard to keep up. And I had planned to do some work on my computer but I couldn’t find the mouse I knew I had packed and in the end I never even took my computer out of its case.

On Sunday morning I think I entertained Amber with my tea-making routine. I made a big mug of tea to have for breakfast and then made a thermos full of tea to save for the afternoon. The three of us met in the hotel dining room for breakfast and then drove back to the venue for another day of classes. I was all about the leather crafting yesterday! I started the day making my leather journal at the Tandy booth. Jeff had at least a hundred different leather stamps we could use, and stains for coloring the leather afterward. I had a lot of fun experimenting.

Later, I joined the bookbinder for the handsewn leather journal class, where we learned to sew and bind a little journal. That journal used a much softer leather since we had to sew through it. The whole process was quite time consuming, but I greatly enjoyed it. Then Jeff was offering a belt-making workshop, and I couldn’t resist! I don’t even wear belts at all, but Jasper always seems to be in need of them, so I made one for him. I didn’t have time to make it fancy, but it’s very sturdy.

Other classes I took were on toxic plants and wildlife, lost-proofing yourself in the wilderness, Antiques Road Show of the Tudor Court, and Victorian Ladies’ Needlework.

By Sunday afternoon I had amassed the following loot:

1 belt, 1 fringed leather pouch, and 2 journals. The brown one has removable inserts and the black one is actually sewn to the leather. I am still working on a closure for that one.

Barbara and I drove east as the sun set behind us and the glorious pearly-white full moon rose in front of us. Watching the moon rise is one of my favorite things about driving home from Dallas in the evening.

I felt very stressed and pressured when I arrived home, though, because I had a LOT of class work to do and I couldn’t find my computer mouse! I completely unpacked my suitcase and no mouse was to be found. I KNEW I had put it in there, but it had somehow vanished. I cannot work fast enough without it, so I had to make a late-night run to Walmart to buy a new mouse.

I was up late and up early to do more class prep and take Sammy to school before my class started. After class I had a doctor’s appointment which went well. Hopefully I’ll get my lab results tomorrow, but the doctor was thrilled with my progress since the last time she saw me a year and a half ago.

When Jasper got off work, he wanted to go to the battery store on the north side of town to replace his watch battery. By then it was raining steadily and I didn’t want to have to take off my socks, so I went to put on my clogs. The clogs that I took to Dallas for the weekend but never wore. Can you guess what I found in one of my shoes? Go ahead and guess.

I picked up one of my clogs to put it on and my computer mouse fell out of it. I have no idea how it got in there, but I had a good laugh about it. Now I have two computer mice.

Jasper and I both had watch batteries replaced and then after taking him home I went for my walk in the gym. I was glad to have a dry place to walk! I have spent the evening reading and preparing for my classes and for my book club meeting which is tomorrow.

Parting Shot:

Some lovely beaded Victorian “Berlin Work” from the Victorian Needlework display.

Amazon Saves the Day & There is a Cute Invasion

Today I got up at a good time, got a great start on my class preparation, did school with Jasper, and got some other stuff done before deciding to go ahead and get the DVD we would be watching in class this afternoon and set it up.

My class just finished reading the Jane Austen novel Persuasion, and I thought they would enjoy seeing the movie. Well, guess what? I went to the Jane Austen section of our DVD shelves and there was no Persuasion! I KNOW I own it and have watched it before. I recently organized my DVDs and could have sworn that it was right there where it belonged. By now it was almost lunchtime, and my class starts at 2:00.

I spent an hour and a half looking for the DVD. Jasper helped me look. We did not find it. Jasper suggested Netflix. They don’t carry it. Then Lucy showed up and suggested Amazon’s instant video streaming. Now, I have Amazon Prime but have never, ever used the video service and had no idea how to go about it.

Fortunately I have offspring who know more than me. Lucy knew that Mercy’s Amazon account was already set up for our TV, so all we had to do was text Mercy and ask her for her PIN. Just before my first student arrived, we were in business! Yay for technology! I’m just waiting for the DVD to show up sometime in the next day or two. Because you know it’s going to.

Unfortunately, I was feeling rather under the weather all afternoon–nothing serious; I think it was just something I ate. I did enjoy the movie and got some knitting done.

I know I said my next knitting project would be fun, but it isn’t. I am finishing a project that I started years ago because my guilt about it has become unbearable. When it is finally done, I WILL start a fun project!

While we were still having class, Spencer got off work and then took off in his car to go fetch his new puppy. There was a lot of begging about this puppy. What convinced me to give in was the fact that Captain Jack is so lonely. I think he would be less likely to keep trying to get over the fence to play with the neighbors’ dogs if he had a little friend here in our yard.

Shortly after my students left, Spencer arrived with his new puppy, which he has named “Rudi.”

Rudi is half Labrador and half German shepherd. He is tiny and adorable and Captain Jack is beyond thrilled. He licked Rudi so much the poor little puppy was soaking wet!

Lost in the Woods

Did I feel like getting up and going to Walmart early this morning? No. But of course, I went anyway. Jasper, for once, didn’t feel like going either. Some nights he doesn’t get much sleep because Spencer is a very loud snorer.

Instead of hanging around at the house doing housework, I took off to run some errands. Even after almost a year of having a second vehicle, I still think all the time that I can’t go anywhere on Saturdays. It actually takes mental effort to remind myself that I really can go. Most of my errands were related in some way to the bridal tea I’ll be catering on Thursday. It’s going to be a busy few days.

This afternoon I had a big project in the kitchen, which I can’t really talk about at this point. It was tiring but successful.

I kept waiting all day for Lucy to return home, but then she texted me and said there were no plans to return her today or even tomorrow. I was ready for her to come home, so I offered to go get her, despite the horror stories I’d heard about trying to find her friend’s house in a rural area over 20 miles away.

Just as I was pulling out of the driveway, the young man who has been working on my serger pulled up. I was very happy to see my serger again as I have a huge list of sewing I want and need to do. I’ll be putting it through its paces tomorrow I hope!

So anyway, off I went with my Google directions and Delilah (my GPS) for backup. For once, I can’t blame Google for what happened. The directions were correct. The problem was that two of the roads which I was supposed to turn onto were not labeled in any way. So I went sailing past my first turnoff and drove through increasingly rural and overgrown terrain until I found myself on a dirt road. I was pretty sure I’d gone too far.

I backtracked, stopping to read each road sign. I fired up Delilah and entered the address, only to have her be absolutely stumped. As far as she knew, the road I wanted did not exist. There was no road with the number I was looking for, so I made an educated guess and it turned out to be the right one. There was a sign saying the next road I needed to turn on was somewhere up ahead, but the road itself was not labeled at all, so once again I turned and hoped for the best.

Then came the fun of finding the house. Yep. You guessed it. The house is not identified by a house number or any other device by which one might correctly pick it out from all the other houses on that rural road. Once again I overshot it and had to backtrack. There was an unmarked driveway in the general area where the house should be, so I called Lucy and asked her for some landmarks. I hated to trespass on someone’s property, especially if the someone had a gun.

I turned into the driveway and saw a boat. “Is there a boat in the driveway?” I asked Lucy. “Not that I know of,” she said. Great. Up ahead I saw a camper. “Is there a camper?” “Yes.” About that time she saw the car coming and I heaved a big sigh of relief! I have known her friend’s mom for fifteen years, but this was my first time to experience the fun of finding her house.

We had a late supper after arriving safely home, and then it was time for Mercy and I to embark on our samosa-making project. She is going to a lunch tomorrow and she promised to make samosas to take. The problem is that one of the others going is gluten-free, so at least some of the samosas had to be gluten free. So, I researched recipes and then talked Mercy through making the filling. I think we actually got it spicy enough!

Then I made the GF dough (and I also made it dairy free) and she made the “normal” dough. I fried the GF samosas first so that the oil wouldn’t be contaminated by gluten. Naturally, I made enough so that I can enjoy some GF samosas too!

Meanwhile, I need to get some sleep so I can get up early in the morning and see Spencer off on his big adventure.

A Comedy of Errors

Today started off normally enough, with a trip to Walmart for Jasper and me. Then we came home and put food away. Spencer had spent the night at a friend’s house, so Walter couldn’t leave for work until he got here after having only two hours of sleep.

They went out to do leaf removal at their client’s property, and Lucy and Jasper and I stayed here to get ready for the chai party and do a little decorating. One thing I enjoyed doing was finally hanging all the candle lanterns that I’ve been slowly collecting since summertime. I made wire hangers and hung most of them from our mulberry tree which is next to the patio.

 

Then  Spencer and Walter came home, and Spencer was so tired that instead of helping with chai party preparation, he said he was just going to take a shower and then take a nap. Some time later, I wondered where he was, and Jasper said he had walked out of the house.

I was more than a little annoyed. We really could have used his help, and I couldn’t help thinking that if he was too tired to help with setup, he should also be too tired to go hang out with his friends. I texted him. No answer.

There was still no sign of him at supper time, or when the chai party started despite the frigid temperatures and occasional drizzle. By this time we were all a little concerned, but I think we all thought that he must have gone to do something with his friend Drew. Then Drew showed up at the chai party wondering where Spencer was. This prompted a near panic.

Drew called or texted all their mutual friends to see if they had seen Spencer.  No one had. Kat was in tears and headed over here. A couple of other friends said we should call the police. I was in the house texting Spencer again and trying not to freak out when he walked out of Mercy’s room–where he had been sleeping for the last 5 hours! We had looked in every other room of the house, but not there because after all, Jasper was sure he had seen Spencer leave!

Kat arrived within minutes, and also Drew and Lucy, who had been on campus looking for Spencer. He couldn’t believe he had slept so long and not heard any of his notifications as his friends frantically tried to contact him. I have a feeling he’ll be hearing about this for some time to come!

Meanwhile, at the chai party, as I huddled near the fire, I got to hold an adorable three month old baby whose parents had braved the cold to come. The baby was well wrapped in a blanket, but she didn’t have a hat because she had outgrown her old one and the parents hadn’t been able to find a new one the right size.

Obviously, I took that as a challenge. No baby of my acquaintance should have to go around with a cold head. The hat has already been cast on and should be done quite quickly since after all, baby heads are tiny.