Crafts..
(aka Red can compromise)
Most people that know me wouldn't think I was the "craft-y" type. In reality I'm not. I started doing all the foo-foo crafts to save my father's sanity, possibly his marriage.
Dad was a single father in a time that was all but unheard of. He had full custody of me from the time I was 3. When I was 12, he remarried. Linda aka the step-monster aka the bitch. Linda and I did not get along well. In the beginning it was ok. As I got in the 13-14 yr old range we'd developed a love/hate relationship. We LOVED to hate each other.
Dad loved her very much, but I was his world. I could see the bitterness, fighting, and snide remarks that Linda and I were so fond of lobbing back and forth like some poison tennis ball were tearing him in two. I would complain about Linda to him.. Linda would complain about me. After a few really ugly years, I decided I was better than that. I could let it go. So, I set about trying to find a common ground for Linda and I.
Linda: Hmm.. She was a clean freak, I never saw her with out makeup that I can remember, she did all the "womanly" crafts. Sewing, crochet, cross stitch, plastic canvas (anyone remember that?), all that crap. It was what she did every night while watching TV. When we weren't planning the next ambush on each other that was.
Eventually, I bit the bullet and asked her to teach me. It was the safe haven. We could sit side by side and watch TV and have something in common. I could ask her opinion and not feel compelled to mock it. Crafts and needlework saved my dad. For the first two weeks after we started doing crafts together dad would come into the front door and stare! Was this the right house? Were his daughter and his wife actually sitting next to each other and having polite conversation? He was shocked.. Started calling us "his crafty ladies". I still think he was fully aware of the double interpretation in that sentence. How crazy is that? Sure they had problems that all married couples do.. But I was the super nova that constantly threated to engulf the world.
I've actually come to appreciate crafts. Heck, I think I've done almost everything at one time or another. I do it obsessively for awhile and then move on to another. My teachers always thought it was due to my being "gifted". I think I just got bored after awhile.. I'm really not a crafty type. Linda did needlework primarily. I like the messy ones best. Candle making, paper making, odd and unusual crafts, like Tamari balls (Japanese embroidery balls, quite beautiful), shrinky dinks, and Tye Dye.
I really like Tye Dye, but I have to be in the mood for it. That one takes some time, and care to do well. I made my first Tye-Dye shirt several years ago and still have it. I recently remembered tye dye after I fractured my ankle and wasn't able to get around well enough to do the out doors things my son and I love. We made 4 that first batch, 2 for him 2 for me. I still had plenty of dye left over and made plans to make some more. So, I just got done doing another 4. Three for me, one for (if it turns out well) my beau.
Everyone in this backwoods GA has always looked at me oddly when I wore my shirts out and about. I went to Walmart last night to get another pack of shirts for myself and one for him. What did I see on my way to the T's.. 3 racks of Tye Dye T shirts. $15.99 each. LMAO I looked through them for ideas.. but heck I make more creative ones than that now! LOL And, I make them for about $2.50 each. All told the 4 shirts I made tonight took me an hour and a half to pattern (one was a bit difficult) and then dye. They are individually wrapped in plastic bags mellowing in my kitchen sink as we speak. In the morning I'll rinse out the excess dye.. chuck them in the washer and dryer and have my latest creation!
So, see.. I can back down from a fight. I can compromise. It almost killed me though! (an aside.. a friend at work work told me today I was a Master debater.. I thought my boss was going to have a coronary.. He thought Lee said I was a masturbator LOL)
Most people that know me wouldn't think I was the "craft-y" type. In reality I'm not. I started doing all the foo-foo crafts to save my father's sanity, possibly his marriage.
Dad was a single father in a time that was all but unheard of. He had full custody of me from the time I was 3. When I was 12, he remarried. Linda aka the step-monster aka the bitch. Linda and I did not get along well. In the beginning it was ok. As I got in the 13-14 yr old range we'd developed a love/hate relationship. We LOVED to hate each other.
Dad loved her very much, but I was his world. I could see the bitterness, fighting, and snide remarks that Linda and I were so fond of lobbing back and forth like some poison tennis ball were tearing him in two. I would complain about Linda to him.. Linda would complain about me. After a few really ugly years, I decided I was better than that. I could let it go. So, I set about trying to find a common ground for Linda and I.
Linda: Hmm.. She was a clean freak, I never saw her with out makeup that I can remember, she did all the "womanly" crafts. Sewing, crochet, cross stitch, plastic canvas (anyone remember that?), all that crap. It was what she did every night while watching TV. When we weren't planning the next ambush on each other that was.
Eventually, I bit the bullet and asked her to teach me. It was the safe haven. We could sit side by side and watch TV and have something in common. I could ask her opinion and not feel compelled to mock it. Crafts and needlework saved my dad. For the first two weeks after we started doing crafts together dad would come into the front door and stare! Was this the right house? Were his daughter and his wife actually sitting next to each other and having polite conversation? He was shocked.. Started calling us "his crafty ladies". I still think he was fully aware of the double interpretation in that sentence. How crazy is that? Sure they had problems that all married couples do.. But I was the super nova that constantly threated to engulf the world.
I've actually come to appreciate crafts. Heck, I think I've done almost everything at one time or another. I do it obsessively for awhile and then move on to another. My teachers always thought it was due to my being "gifted". I think I just got bored after awhile.. I'm really not a crafty type. Linda did needlework primarily. I like the messy ones best. Candle making, paper making, odd and unusual crafts, like Tamari balls (Japanese embroidery balls, quite beautiful), shrinky dinks, and Tye Dye.
I really like Tye Dye, but I have to be in the mood for it. That one takes some time, and care to do well. I made my first Tye-Dye shirt several years ago and still have it. I recently remembered tye dye after I fractured my ankle and wasn't able to get around well enough to do the out doors things my son and I love. We made 4 that first batch, 2 for him 2 for me. I still had plenty of dye left over and made plans to make some more. So, I just got done doing another 4. Three for me, one for (if it turns out well) my beau.
Everyone in this backwoods GA has always looked at me oddly when I wore my shirts out and about. I went to Walmart last night to get another pack of shirts for myself and one for him. What did I see on my way to the T's.. 3 racks of Tye Dye T shirts. $15.99 each. LMAO I looked through them for ideas.. but heck I make more creative ones than that now! LOL And, I make them for about $2.50 each. All told the 4 shirts I made tonight took me an hour and a half to pattern (one was a bit difficult) and then dye. They are individually wrapped in plastic bags mellowing in my kitchen sink as we speak. In the morning I'll rinse out the excess dye.. chuck them in the washer and dryer and have my latest creation!
So, see.. I can back down from a fight. I can compromise. It almost killed me though! (an aside.. a friend at work work told me today I was a Master debater.. I thought my boss was going to have a coronary.. He thought Lee said I was a masturbator LOL)
posted by Anonymous at
10:25 PM
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