Circles

Circles 

I'm cutting up polka dot cloth and sewing the raised velvety black dots, outlining with white thread, onto this green silk. 
(It's a long scrap edge: twenty-five cents at the Thrift Store.)

I don't want to make projects, I just want to sew things onto other things. But this is becoming wearable. 
My friend Jill is getting married in three weeks--I'm going to try to finish it into a scarf I can wear to her wedding.

Cupcakes

I'm making something else for Jill's potluck wedding reception too:
One Hundred German-Chocolate Cupcakes!

Jill was saying what a racket the whole wedding business is: 
if you want to order a wedding cake,  for instance, you're supposed to meet for a "consultation."

I said if she was OK with something informal, I could bake a cake--maybe even find some cake tiers. 

So we consulted (not such a bad idea) and settled on cupcakes as easiest to transport and serve, and out of the kinds of cakes she loves, I chose German Chocolate because it's impressive but [fairly] easy to make look good, or, rather, you can't make gooey coconut-pecan glop look good. 
It just does.

Clearing

Life has gotten happier this week.

To begin with, the apartment is super clean: 
I'd washed and painted walls three weeks ago during a weird cool spell (in the 70s--almost unheard of in July), so the dried egg is off the kitchen cabinets, and the cobweb swags are gone from the bathroom ceiling.

So it's really nice around here, and I feel love for my little home, beleaguering as it sometimes is. (Noisy, crowded neighborhood, etc.)

Mz has found a nice place to move to on September 1––a house with a yard and garden in a much quieter neighborhood, with (fingers crossed) compatible housemates.
The mood around here lightened a lot, once she made her decision to move. The pressure's off.

I'm quite pleased for her, now, and I'm starting to feel excited about having an empty room. 
Even with her room, which the landlord had added by knocking through a wall, this place is only a tiny 1-bedroom apartment, but it'll be bigger than anywhere I've ever lived alone.

"Tiny", that is, in the US Midwest, where some folks have walk-in closets bigger than Mz's bedroom (with the blue-and-white quilt); I sleep in the kitchen area and each morning tilt my mattress up against the wall.

One thing I want to do is set up my sewing machine where I can leave it. I'd use it more if I didn't have to put it away every time: it's  bulky, you know. There are lots of things I'd like to sew. (Or so I think.)

Fresh
 
It's been two weeks since I turned the Garbage book down, and I still feel relieved. I walk down the alley and see giant TV after giant TV set out for the trash, and I think, thankgod I don't have to dwell on this. 
(I imagine these behemoths are getting tossed to make room for flat-screen TVs, but why, all of a sudden, is there one in every block's alley? And where do people who deny we have an environmental problem think all these things go where they'll have no impact?)

Anyway, my mood is so, so much better, like a clean apartment, I can't regret turning the work down at all. Even though now I feel stuck as to which way to turn for work... 
But I trust it'll be OK, somehow, 
and meanwhile I'm not sunk in despair and dread. Yay!