So You Think You Can Sew

Apologies for the lack of posts recently. I was away for a couple of weeks, then sick, then, well, out of the habit of regular posting, I guess. I've got a tonne of cool things planned for the next few months, though, so I hope to blog lots.

First, here is something cool I got for Christmas from my mom:

It's a Cricut Expressions die-cutting machine. They're aimed more at scrapbooking and "arts and crafts" (not in the William Morris sense) folks, but there's third-party software that allows you to cut your own designs. I haven't attempted that yet, though it is my ultimate goal, and being able to cut my own designs is really the only reason I wanted one. But I have tried the cartridge that came with the machine, and was able to make some little envelopes for some letterpress valentines I printed ages ago, complete with a heart on the flap. I didn't take any pics, but I'll put them in my Etsy shop soon.

Another cool-but-useful thing I got this year is a fancy new Dremel rotary tool (from BillyZ). I did have a no-longer-produced "Wizard" rotary tool made by Mastercraft, but this one is so far beyond that . . . Anyway, I have lots of little tasks that will be made easier, plus a whole pile of new ideas.

This particular model even has attachments that will turn it into a jigsaw and a planer (I don't have those yet, but they're on my list--right after the router attachment). I can envision wooden book covers made easier, plus little wooden boxes. I love boxes! I might have to make a trip to Home Depot for some wood soon.

And none of this is what I was going to write about when I started this post. What I was going to write about, and what the title refers to, is this:

Every once in a while I get it into my head that I can sew. Or that I can sew well, I mean. I've been puttering with sewing machines since I was six (or somewhere thereabouts) when my mother let me use scraps of fabric to make little purses and bags and simple Barbie clothes (that last one required the assistance of my older sister). But I'm not exactly gifted with a needle.

Anyway, my sewing machine (which I sold to a friend and then bought back when she moved away) had been sitting untouched for a year when I suddenly got Ideas (yes, with a capital "I"). So I made a pattern for a stuffed octopus (yes, out of my head--one of my other occasional hallucinations is that I can make 3-d shapes from my Ideas). Then I cut it out of some fabric I'm not likely to use for anything else, and attempted to sew it together.

In retrospect, a different order of assembling the pieces would probably have helped with some of the pointy seams, but it turned out rather well, considering. A few tweaks and I think it will be done. Alas, it takes to long too make up to be able to sell as a toy, though maybe with some different fabric and hand painting (or hey, hand-printing . . . hmmmmmm) I might be able to market it to the "art doll" folks. Or maybe I could sell the pattern, though I'd have to learn how to draw a pattern properly.

Things to fix: the part where the legs join the head needs work. It's fine and the front and back, but too difficult and not so nice looking on the sides. Not too difficult a fix, though (I think, maybe). Also, the legs. I like them, but I think I should have made the left and right sides different, instead of mirrored. Also more curl in some of them. Again, not too hard to fix.

Letterpress at the Homestead

While I generally have done most of my printing at the Dawson Printshop in Halifax, I've also been slowly working towards setting myself up to print here at home. My studio space isn't huge, and I have to do downstairs to get water (the tap in the photo below is currently non-functional), and since it's on the second floor, I can't have anything too heavy. Eventually I hope to build an outbuilding of some sort with a concrete floor and then acquire a bigger press.

What I do have in here is a small proof press--the bed is cast aluminum, I think--that I was given by a friend. My first experiment of the day was to attempt to print a random assortment of mostly wood type (given to me by B's dad in Pennsylvania). It was a not-entirely-successful attempt, and though I ended up with some usable sheets of printed paper, they weren't quite what I was aiming for, and I can tell I'm going to be doing considerable trial and error with makeready to make this press work as well as I'd like.

The problems I was having are, I think, a combination of issues with the press itself (primarily the cylinder and the fact that I can only lock up type on one direction, which is not the direction of travel of the cylinder, so the pressure of printing works the type loose) and issues with the type (being old type, it's all different heights, and being a random assortment, it's extremely difficult to get it to lock up tightly). Still, it was a worthwhile experiment, and I am not giving up.

I also have a little 5x8" platen Kelsey parlour press. I've had it for a while and puttered about at getting it running (all it really needed was rust removal and lubrication). I finally got serious a month or two ago, and today got the packing in and some gauge pins on. I still need to adjust the platen some more, but I printed up a whole pile of little holiday candle images which will be cut and folded into gift tags. I might ink up in red tomorrow and do some more. I also have a Santa and some holly I'm going to combine with "to" and "from" in type and try printing those.

Pop-Up Birthday: Super Secret Project Revealed!

If you follow me on Twitter (I'm anagramforink), or are a friend on Facebook (if you want to friend me and I don't recognize you, I will probably ignore your request, so include a note saying who you are), you might have noticed my notes about the super secret project I was working on last night. Well, it's finished and I can reveal it: a pop-up birthday card for BillyZee, who catches up to me in age today.

Happy birthday, BillyZee!

I originally had a completely different birthday card idea in mind, so it took me a while to get started on it, which is why I was still working on it at the last minute, late last night. In fact, I just completed it as the Boy Himself pulled into the driveway, home from work at about 1:30 am this morning. Phew!

And, in case you couldn't tell, that is a self-portait (though the green hair, giant eyebrows, gappy teeth and bare toes should make it obvious to anyone who's met me).

Busy Getting Nothing Done

It seems to be the story of my life: I'm busy pretty much all the time, and if I'm not actually making or writing something, then I'm reading or doing research. Even when I play videogames, I'm working, because I work for a gaming website. So I've been busy all weekend, and have crossed almost nothing off my to-do list. I really need to write some articles. And get some product made for the Halifax Crafters spring market, which is in a few weeks.

To be fair, I didn't just waste the weekend. I did organize my stock of existing product to get some idea of what I need to make. There is a batch of half-done tiny pocket journals, and I will have to do a batch of Japanese-binding jewellery. And I came up with an idea for new product. One of the things I've been wanting to do is make greeting cards from my illustrations, but I haven't had any I liked well enough to use. But now (you'll see if you read on) I have a couple of images I like. So next time I'm in Truro or Halifax, I'll visit Staples for some of those pre-cut greeting cards that are made especially for inkjet printing on. My large-format Canon photoprinter does really nice prints, so that end is covered. I'm also going to do magnets. I just have to decide how many of each thing I'll be likely to sell, because I'm short enough on funds that I don't want to buy more supplies than I actually need.

I've mentioned ATCs before--that is, Artist Trading Cards. They're little trading card sized piece of art that you trade with other artists. Or you can sell them, in which case they're called ACEOs (Art Cards Editions and Originals). I made one a little while ago to trade with a fellow Etsy Steam Team member.


Leonardo's Clockwork Scarab was made in a hand-coloured edition of 15, two of which stay home (one for me and one for BillyZ), two are on sale at Etsy and ArtFire, one has gone to CreativeEtching, one will go to a trader partner in . . . Sweden, I think, and 9 are left to trade.


Doktor Valentine's Discombobulation Ray was an experiment in markers, which I'm not so good at. A last minute application of pencil crayon highlights saved the image, and it'll become magnets to sell at the fair, and later online. I haven't put it up for trade yet, as I'm rather fond of it, but if the magnets turn out well, I'll either sell the original on Etsy, or make it available for trade.


Aeryn Daring in Sepia was a less-successful experiment with sepia drawing ink. I'm not fond of how it bled, though fortunately it's really only noticeable up close. I also don't like how the paper texture is so visible--guess I'll have to buy the good watercolour paper soon. Otherwise, it turned out OK, and it's up for trades. I may do magnets from this one, but I haven't decided yet.









Valkyrie I'm very pleased with. It was an attempt to get away from the over-detailing I tend to do in inks, and just use a simple outline with basic washes. I think it's successful for what it is, and it will become greeting cards. Maybe magnets, too. I've entered her in a couple of mythology-themed ATC contests, and when those are over I may put her up for sale on Etsy. If the greeting cards turn out well.


The Fox & the Grapes illustrates an Aesop's fable and was an attempt to get myself to use more dynamic perspective. It's actually a detail from a larger image that has more vines and leaves and the rest of the fox's tail--I'll probably go back now and do the whole thing on a postcard. This is another one that will be greeting cards (and maybe magnets). I'm hanging on to it for a while, but will probably sell or trade it eventually.

We've had more spring birds showing up, despite the recent snow, but that's a post for later. Right now I have a big stew to make.

It's a Coming

Spring, that is. Bill spotted a couple of new visitors to the birdseed in the past couple of days, one of which was a grackle, and grackles are spring/summer birds around these parts.

If that's not enough evidence, I found a couple of dandelions (or dandelion-like weeds) flowering next to the house. I'd take a photo, but I keep forgetting until it's shady where they are and they've closed up their flowers for the night. But they're there and I've seen them.

The pheasant has continued to come back almost every day, strutting up the driveway with his long tail at a 45-degree angle. And yesterday we saw a big brown hawk chasing another bird in our yard. It happened so fast there was no chance to identify either bird except brown hawk with pale head and something vaguely falcon-shaped. Maybe. Of course I didn't have my glasses on, but I was at least outside or I might not have seen them at all.

And most evenings (and even some surprisingly early afternoons) we hear an owl hoo-hooing in the nearby woods. Plus there was that skunk last week that woke me up with his delightful smell at 5:30 am. So spring is definitely on its way, though the weirdness that is Nova Scotia weather could still mean cold and wet, or even snow again, before the winter gives up.

Addendum: So those dandelion-like weeds I mentioned are in fact coltsfoot (Tussilago farfara), and according to my one book on NS plantlife (Edible Wild Plants of Nova Scotia by Heather MacLeod and Barbara MacDonald), they shouldn't be blooming for another two months. Hmm. At any rate, they weren't in shade yet when I popped outside (and I discovered many more of them), so I took a few photos of which this is one:


I'm going to need a good general book on NS plants (that includes the non-edible variety) before this season gets too far advanced.

And The Winner Is . . .

I finally got myself organized and chose the winner of the 2010 "Flying Machines: possible and improbable" calendar.


I determined the winner my counting up how many entries each person had and writing their name on that many slips of paper. Then I shuffled the papers, put them in a box and shook it vigorously, opened the box and shook it a little more, than asked my lovely assistant (the fabulous BillyZ) to draw one of the slips.

So without further ado, the winner is Sunshine Folk! Yaaaaaayyyy! (Imagine Kermit the Frog and his arm-flailing enthusiasm--and if you don't know what I'm talking about, get thee to a video rental place and get some old Muppet Show episodes.)

I didn't get the huge response I was secretly hoping for, but I think the contest was successful in its own modest way, and I'm thinking about having another contest sometime in the not too distant future.

If you didn't win, and you're very sad about it, you can still buy a copy of the calendar on Etsy or ArtFire. And if you read this blog, I'll give you a secret free postage discount. Just post here, and I'll make a special Etsy or ArtFire (your choice) listing just for you. There's no time limit on this offer--as long as I have calendars to sell, you can get free shipping by posting here. (If you want to buy several items, let me know and if the postage isn't too high, I'll give you free shipping on your whole order. If the shipping is a bit steep, I'll knock off the cost of the calendar shipping from the total.)

Anyway, THANK YOU!!! to everyone who entered. You guys are the best.

Or Falling Off a Bicycle

Well, I managed to do pretty well with keeping up on my NaNoWriMo word counts. Until Friday. I missed a couple of days, but managed to get caught back up again. Then came Friday, and snow, and a full day in the printshop, and driving home in the dark and wind. I was both tense and limp by the time I got in the door. I managed to feed myself some leftovers and then collapsed on the couch next to Bill, who'd had an even worse day of driving than me--his driver's side windshield wiper went on the way in the school and he had to drive leaning over to look out the passenger side. To his credit, he made it to school, did the whole day and made it home again.

And the weekend was full of house things and driving back and forth to Truro trying to get the right bits to install the new faucet, and again no writing happened. So anyway, I'm three days behind on writing, which is really just a point of pride. There's nothing saying I have to complete NaNoWriMo, but I'd really like to. And of course, today is such a perfect day that I've had a really hard time keeping myself inside working. There's a gate that needed disassembling, so I could have the boards to put up a shelf, you see. And now I really want to go out a snap a photo of a mushroom I spied in the undergrowth near the driveway, and I have to move those last couple of gate boards up next to the house, and, and, and.

In other news, I'm working on a fairly large job printing business cards and hang tags for a textiles artist. I had hoped to get started on that today, but getting Bill to school takes precedence over getting me to the printshop. He should have his truck sorted out by tomorrow, though, so I'll head down then. The polymer plates are ready, and they look pretty good. Some of the type is quite small, but I've printed type that small before and haven't had too many problems. So main issue is going to be the pressure on the press. The Vandercook Universal 2 that's in the shop has developed a problem where the press bed won't drop as far as it should, no matter how you crank it. By using very little packing, it's still possible to print polymer plates--as long as the paper isn't too thick. I'll be printing on textured card stock, so I hope that I'll be able to get the pressure to cooperate. Otherwise I'll have to print on the Universal 1 in the Design shop. Which I actually like better, but I'll be more likely to be in the way of some class or another, and the Universal 1 has issues of its own.

(Photo: the Dawson Printshop's Vandercook Universal 2 proof press, before it developed press bed pressure adjustment problems. Photo by Niko.)

Anyway, if I can get that job started tomorrow, I might be able to finish it by the end of the week. Then it'll be back to holiday cards, a 2010 calendar, and book jewelry. And maybe a couple of really fantastic blank journals. Oh yeah, and a binding job. I'll need to start that this week, too.

Catalogues for Sandra Brownlee

I'm supposed to be printing cards today. A Halifax stationery store, Duly Noted, is patiently waiting for an order they put in several weeks ago. Alas, today the car decided not to start. In fact, it didn't even seem to try to start. I'm hoping it's something simple that BillyZ will fix in five minutes after he gets home this evening, but in the meantime, I'm not printing.

I'd have had the order finished a couple of weeks ago, if not for a couple of rush jobs that I didn't feel I could turn down (not to mention that the extra income is very welcome since we just bought a house). The first job was the certificates for the Lieutenant Governor of Nova Scotia’s Masterwork Award. (How could I say, "No," to the Lieutenant Governor?) The design had mostly already been completed when the Dawson Printshop printed last year's certificates (I was in Pennsylvania for a few weeks when that happened). Former Dawsonite Carley Colclough did the rest of the design long distance from BC, and then I made the polymer plates and did the printing.

I miscalculated a little when getting the paper together; the paper was from the Colours line by Papeterie St Armand, which is rather smaller than most of the stock we use. And the certificates are quite large. I had thought I would get four certificates from each sheet, but was only able to get two. This meant I didn't have enough paper to make many mistakes. I cut a lot of scrap for testing and re-used some of last year's discards. I managed to print all six certificates (the five finalists and one winner) without a single mishap, which has to be a record, considering it was a four-colour job. It was nerve-wracking, to say the least. I'm very proud to have printed something that will have the Lieutenant Governor's signature on it.

The second rush job was binding the exhibition catalogues for Sandra Brownlee's show at the Mary E. Black Gallery. The show is called Departures and Returns and is on right now, so if you're in Halifax be sure to check it out. It's textiles, but her notebooks are also on display, so there's something there for book people, too.

A few of the 72 softcover catalogues had already been sewn, but I did most of them. Then I had to glue on an inner cover--it's like a wraparound cover you'd see on a paperback, but instead of being the actual cover, it's what the dustjacket wraps around. Then I had to tip in a plate to each copy and fold and install the dustjackets. It took me two full days of work to do all 72--good thing I sew fast. And I was very happy that the books all had their sewing holes punched already, which saved me some time.

On Monday afternoon as I was sewing the catalogues, I got a slightly panicked call from Sandra. She'd decided she was really unhappy with the cover size of the deluxe edition of the catalogue (which I wasn't working on), and wanted to know if I'd be able to help put them together if she changed the size. So Wednesday I drove to Joe's studio where Joe and I and a couple textiles friends of Sandra's worked on covering and attaching the new boards. The originals had been made larger to accommodate some weavings Sandra wanting to include. She decided to re-do the weavings at a smaller size, so the covers could be made to a size that fit the pages of the catalogue. We completed 12 of the 30 in the deluxe edition, which was plenty for the show's opening--Sandra can finish the rest at her leisure now that the show is installed and opened.

So today I was meant to be in the printshop, printing, but am not. Instead, I'll get the files ready to send to film to make the polymer plates for this year's calendar (flying machines! wood type! days of the week!), and I'll start on the next batch of tiny book jewelry (the Japanese-style binding, as I have to get more materials for the European-style ones) for the Halifax Crafters fair in early December. And perhaps I'll make some paste and get to work backing some suede with kozuke for another batch of mini SteamBooks. Maybe I'll even make a couple of larger ones this time.

And maybe, just maybe, I'll get a bit of work done on the website and do some writing. but that is probably wishful thinking. Oh hey, it's almost November. I have to decide if I'm going to attempt NaNoWriMo this year. Now that I'm not in school, it might be an achievable goal. And I really need to get writing fiction again.

Latest Writing: Flying, Books, Words

• Leaf By Leaf: The Beauty of the Book Form (HandmadeNews.org)
  
  Can the way a book looks (and feels and smells) influence your experience of reading it? I think it can, and in this installment of my column, I tell you why. (Books and photo by GILD Bookbinders on ArtFire.)





• Sunday Word Find: Painterly Pursuit (HandmadeNews.org)
  
  I use BillyZ's easel in the living room as inspiration for the latest word find. Because the puzzle has switched from Wednesday to Sunday, I made a new graphic. It's still not ideal, but just changing the text from Wednesday to Sunday actually makes it work a bit better.





• Leaf by Leaf: It's What's Inside that Counts (HandmadeNews.org)
  
  So after using one column to talk about the outside of books, this time I talk about the insides, and include a bit about my process of artist's-book-making. (Photo and artist's book by AnnaHawthorne on ArtFire.)





• Sunday Word Find: Drawing Dreams (HandmadeNews.org)
  
  My latest word find is all about drawing, since a lot of art and craft beings with sketches and jotting down ideas. Of course, drawing is also an art of its own.






• Complete Guide to Flying Games for PSP (AboutPSP.)
  
  I love to fly, and I like to play video games. There aren't all that many flight sims for PSP, so it was a reasonable goal to make a guide to them. So I did.

Rockhounding in Scots Bay

Not this past weekend, which was a combination of working Saturday because Friday was a day off and watching Hurricane Bill blow past (with probably a few too many "look, sweetie, you're causing three metre storm surge" type comments directed at the boy), but the weekend before, we continued our Nova Scotia explorations with a rockhounding trip to Scots Bay, and a lazing-on-the-beach trip to Brule.

To get to Scots Bay from Halifax, you have to drive through the lovely Annapolis Valley, where they grow all sorts of crops and make my favorite hot day beverage, Stutz Cider. (Actually, Merridale Cider is better, but it's waaaay expensive and you can't get it here.) From the Valley to Scots Bay, you have to drive over a mountain, or what passes for a mountain in Nova Scotia. Just before you go over the top, there's a fantastic view, appropriately called "The Lookoff":


We hadn't been to this part of NS before, and actually drove right through Scots Bay without seeing the sign for the beach. We did find the start of the Cape Split hiking trail (that's for another day, perhaps), and a really tall pier. As planned, we arrived as the tide was still on its way out, so the boats were waaaay down below.


I'm not sure you can quite get the idea of how high above the ground the pier was, but let's just say that Bill wouldn't get too close to the edge.


At the beach itself, there was one of the tiniest Provincial Parks I've ever seen with a couple of picnic tables and outhouses, then a rickety high-arched wooden bridge over a stream to the beach.


Closer to shore, the beach was all water-smooth rocks varying from tiny pebbles to head-sized cobbles. There was all that's left of the Scots Bay Wharf, from shipbuilding days (for more on the archaeology of Scots Bay, go here).


Farther out to sea, and only revealed at low tide, the beach was an amazing red sand/mud. So before settling down to the serious business of picking up rocks, we headed straight out to sea to dabble our toes. I couldn't tell how far out the mud went, but there were people splashing in the shallows much farther out than we were. Because of the shallow water, it was quite warm, but there was an awful lot of red silt suspended in there. I could only imagine how that would feel seeping into every crevice, so I wasn't too crushed that I hadn't brought my bathing suit.


After wandering back in from the mudflats, Bill settled down to watch the water and take more photos, while I got down to rockhounding. Due to its location in relation to the various sources of rocks and the prevailing tides, Scots Bay Beach has a little bit of just about everything you could hope to find along the Fundy Shore. I didn't find any fossils or amethysts, but I did get some very nice agates (though quite small), and quite a bit of pink and white jasper. And some grey stuff that I haven't identified yet, because I seem to have left all my rock books in BC and the websites I've looked at are mostly focused on the spectacular.


Of course, I also picked up a lot of rather ordinary-looking specimens that had interesting aspects, like some greyish cobbles with little deposits of quartz crystals, and this greenish coarse rock with specks and spots of the loveliest glowing white and green stuff. My favorite piece is a small cobble of ordinary coarse grey with a thin (ca 8mm) band of translucent yellow and grey agate through it.


I'll keep a few of the rocks as-is, but most of them will go in the tumbler. The larger ones will have to be broken up, I think. As for what I'm going to do with them, some will go into a jar of pretty rocks, some will be sent to friends and relatives, and some will be used in my work. I'm thinking of incorporating polished stones into wooden book covers, and maybe wire-wrapping some smaller ones to use with the book jewelry. Maybe.

I did wish I had my rock hammer with me, as I seem to have completely lost the knack of busting open rocks with other rocks. Once upon a time, I knew how to flintknap and, though I was never particularly good at it, I could at least get a rock to break so I could see what it looked like inside. I'll have to work on that, and maybe get Mum to dig though my stuff in BC and send me my rock hammer.


Sunday we headed out to Brule, which is on the North Shore of the province. I didn't take any photos because I didn't want the sand to get into the camera lens. I'll have to charge up the little point-and-shoot for occasions such as this, because when I wandered back away from the shore, there was a really pretty saltmarsh complete with fishing heron. The beach was a little on the crowded side, though much less so than one closer to Halifax would have been. We sat on the sand for a while, then wandered along in the water, carefully stepping over the multitude of hermit crabs scuttling along the sandy bottom.

On Monday we had to run an errand all the way out in Pictou, but it was a quick run and not a siteseeing trip, so no photos or much of anything to talk about.

I'm a Columnist! About Books!

Yes siree, I am now officially a columnist at Handmade News, in the "Inspiration" department. I'm writing a column about books and paper called Leaf by Leaf. I sort of borrowed the name from Joe's company, Leaf by Leaf Book and Paper Conservation. After spending more than a week trying to come up with a good column title and not being able to come up with anything that didn't sound stupid, and after almost going with "Bookish," I chose Leaf by Leaf partly because the word "leaf" can refer to both a single sheet of paper and a page in a book, partly because it sounds nice, and partly as a tribute to Joe, who has been a fantastic teacher.

My first article is called "Hi, I'm Niko and I'm a Bibliophile," and it introduces me and the ideas I have for the column. Next week I'll have something on how to get started when you really want to make a book but have never done it before.

In other news, the boy and I have continued our exploration of Nova Scotia. Last weekend we drove down the Southern Shore as far as Kejimkujik Park Seaside Annex. Because we meandered along and stopped a few times along the way, we didn't really have time to get out and hike, but we took the highway on the return trip and it's only about an hour and forty-five minutes, so next time we'll drive straight there and spend the day exploring the park.

I took an awful lot of photographs, but didn't really end up with very many I liked. Sometimes it happens that way, I guess, but it was a bit disappointing, considering the fantastic scenery. Maybe I just need to pay more attention to framing pictures, instead of snapping everything that looks pretty.

Interestingly, most of the pictures I end up liking are close-ups. I rarely like the wide-angle landscape shots. Whether that's because I take more time composing the closer-up shots than I do the landscapes, or whether it's because that's just the kind of photograph I happen to like, I don't know.

Anyway. That was Saturday. On Sunday, we went up to Truro to spend some time in Victoria Park, and I didn't end up taking a single photograph, though I carried the camera around. We also wandered around the town (or city--I think it's actually a city) and had lunch. We peered in the windows of a couple of Real Estate places and found some interesting-looking houses. Yesterday we went back up and tried again to find one in particular--a cottage, really, but two bedrooms on four acres--that we had tried to find last week. This time the office was open, so we went in and got directions.

It's definitely a cottage sort of property, but it might work fine as a year-round house, too. It's rural, but about half an hour's drive from supermarkets and such, and actually only forty-five minutes from where we live now in Halifax. Also, the price is very good. Whether we'll take the plunge and make an offer, I don't know. We didn't get to see inside the place, but hope to get back on Monday to do that. We'd have to get my mom to co-sign the mortgage, too. But it sure would be nice to be paying into our own place instead of paying rent every month.

I took a couple of photos, but haven't uploaded them yet, but the listing is here.

Busy Busy Busy

Well, I'm definitely busy, even though my bank account doesn't show it. I'm expecting an avalanche of cash any day now. Hah hah.

The Democracy 250 project wrapped up last week. The final book (the one that needed some pages re-ordered) was picked up on Thursday, and I was there to get my photo taken for posterity. I'll post that when I get a copy of it. In the meantime, here's the last book (the unnumbered proof copy):


And here's what it looks like on the inside:


I particularly like that page because of the crazy porcupine.

Each book also had a custom-built box lined with soft felt. The boxes are not nearly as "deluxe" as the books, since they're meant to be functional rather than amazingly gorgeous. The design was kept simple--just plain black cloth with the title blocked on the front. Because of their large size, though, they had to be made sturdy.


With thick felt lining, they're quite cushy and should keep the books safe. Note that the lint and bits of white stuff gets masking-taped off before the books actually go inside. I just snapped my photo before they were quite ready to go.

Once I was done being photographed, Bill picked me up and we spent a couple of hours meandering around Point Pleasant Park. Because it was a weekday, the park was quiet and lovely. We got in some nature viewing:

And some exploration of historic sites. There are the remains of something like seven fortifications at Point Pleasant, and pretty much all of them are crumbling into the sea. They put chainlink fences up in a vain attempt to keep people out, but then don't maintain the fences when they fall down. It would be nice if there were at least a few interpretive panels so visitors know what they're looking at. I live here, and I still had to look online to find any information at all.


In some places, water seeping through from above has created cave-like deposits on the walls and especially places with overhangs. There were tiny stalactites which are actually quite lovely, but which can't be good for the integrity of the structures.


And of course, there are many, many rusty things poking out of the ground and lying on the ground and suspended in crumbling structures above the ground. And I do so love to photograph rusty things . . .