Category Archives: Gifts

I wasn’t completely sold on the Sidewinder pattern that I made up for the Sew Sweetness Secret Santa exchange, but I had already cut the pattern out in another fabric, so went ahead and made it up, then made it up again. The third make was in a music-themed fabric, as I am a working musician. I thought I’d give it to one of the music professors I work with at Youngstown State University. But when it was all finished, on the morning I was taking my new half-sister (whom I discovered two-and-a-half years ago via Ancestry.com) to the Cleveland … Continue reading →

In mid-March, I attended the 50th reunion of the Class of 1968 of Forest Lake Academy, near Apopka, FL (Orlando outskirts). I grew up in Orlando and attended Orlando Church School (now Orlando Junior Academy) from 1st through 8th grades, and Forest Lake Academy from 9th through the first six weeks of 12th grade, when I dropped out of high school and started college a semester early. I was a rather lost soul. It was the 60s. I had no clue what I wanted to be when I grew up. For years I’ve attended the reunions of the Class of … Continue reading →

What to do when you realize you have all the necessary Christmas gifts for the family gathering except for one—your [virtual] sister-in-law? You dig into your treasured shibori stash, find a tutorial you like, and whip up that one last gift. The treasured shibori fabric was destashed by my friend, quilter MaryLou Alexander. MaryLou’s quilts all begin with high quality undyed fabric, which she scrunches and folds and stitches and dyes with either MX dyes or natural dyes, before cutting and piecing and machine quilting. (She’s currently in her natural dye period. Everything in my treasured stash comes from the … Continue reading →

I hate how busy I’ve been this semester. I’m preparing a full-length “Cosi fan tutte” for late April. A kids’ version of Cosi, with its own abbreviated score, will be presented the morning of that event’s opening. I have not yet seen the kids’ cuts, but know that I am the orchestra for that production, where I believe I’m only accompanying the recitative (but the entire score for all the rehearsals over the entire semester) for the full evening opera. A 45-minute opera for kids, Billy Goats Gruff, is to be presented today at Stambaugh Auditorium and then five times … Continue reading →

My New Year’s resolution is to have only one project going at a time. And that translates to “finish what you start.” I can be a tad ADD, i.e. “Look at that pretty piece of fabric; I think I’ll sew that today.” And my Very Bad Habit is to throw each new pretty thing onto my cutting table. And the mess begins. If I can stick to my resolution—and 15 days into the year (half a month gone already?!), so far/so good—I can get rid of the clutter and mess and feel more at peace in my little basement haven. … Continue reading →