Some Friday thoughts

* I'm almost done with the first of the "Elegant" socks (This is a Nancy Bush pattern, from a back issue of Piecework). 78 stitch socks on size 0 needles take a long time to do.

* The copy of Modern Log Cabin Quilting I ordered came yesterday. After looking through it once, I decided I am going to order a copy to go along with the rest of my mom's Mother's Day present - it's a neat book, and it has a lot of the sort of smaller projects (potholders, tote bags, placemats) that she sometimes likes to do as gifts for people. One or two of the quilts are a little bit abstract for my taste, but I really, really love the cover quilt (picture here). I'm thinking actually about going to the little quilt shop this afternoon and getting four yards of some kind of pretty solid-colored fabric (that's what the main part of the top calls for. Maybe a light yellow-green, and then use bright "floral" colors (bright pink, bright purple, bright yellow prints - I have some scraps of Kaffe Fassett prints that would work nicely) from my stash for the crosses. Or get a yellow and use blues. Or a strong dark green and pastel floral prints. I don't know. I will decide when I look at what colors of Kona cotton or whatever solids they have. (The nice thing is the crosses in the quilt take only tiny bits of fabric, so you can use scraps or bits of "precious" fabrics you don't want to use all up at one go).

There's also a quilt in there where you can "frame" important pieces of fabric (things like vintage embroideries, or fabric where you've printed photos on it). And one made from t-shirts. (I have a lot of old conference t-shirts that have gotten kind of tatty and I don't wear any more; it might be nice to recycle them into a quilt).

* I kind of rethought my curmudgeonliness in re: the royal wedding this morning. I had been griping and rolling my eyes because it seemed like the past few days, every time I tried to catch a bit of news or local weather, the people were talking countdown to The Big Day or speculating on the dress or talking about the guest-list. And you know, I have no interest in the whole celebrity-watching, paparazzi aspect of it. But this morning, after my workout, I switched the television on. (There were three choices of programming, pretty much: Royal Wedding, "Paid Programming," and kids' shows). So I watched a few minutes, because by that point the vows had been said and the choir was singing, and I'm kind of a sucker for British choral church music.

And I continued to watch. (I think they played one of Elgar's marches as the recessional. Maybe Pomp and Circumstance #1, if I remember it correctly). And I watched as the new couple left the cathedral.

And then a giant cheer went up from the crowd.

And you know, that's when I changed my mind. I know, I know, not all the Brits are on board with the pomp - probably most aren't. But seeing that crowd so happy at that moment, so excited for a glimpse of royalty (Probably much of the crowd were tourists, at that - from the U.S. or Canada or the rest of Europe or even Australia) that it was hard for me to begrudge them that.

Also, there was tradition and decorum in the moments I saw, and I think in our modern world we're sadly lacking in decorum sometimes. So it's kind of nice to see.

(That said? If I were in Katherine Middleton's place, I'd be alternately throwing up and having to put my head down on my knees to keep from fainting. I do not do well with being that much the center of attention)

(I don't know how the wedding is being paid for. I can say I wouldn't be down with it coming out of the tax coffers, but I kind of suspect it didn't.)

I will say I hope that William and Katherine have a happy marriage, at least as happy as possible given the fishbowl they live in. (And I found it creepy to read some headlines that were trying to compare her with the late Princess Diana - not just creepy from the aspect that Diana died in such a horrific and public way, but also...that's her husband's mother, y'all.)

* Lynn was talking about paper dolls yesterday (in response to my post on stickers). I had paper dolls too, as a child, but as far as I remember, most of mine were ones I made myself. (I did have one - which I actually still have - that was a little girl dress-up doll that must have come off a Halloween card - she had a witch's costume, and a black cat costume, and, I think, a pumpkin costume. And I had a set of Shirley Temple paper dolls (a modern version - I think the copyright date was 1976) that one of my grandmas sent me).

I also had two that I made that were animals. When I was a kid, I had a little golden book called Daisy Dog's Wake-Up Book. (I was able to find the title online; I couldn't specifically remember it). It was about a dog who went around and woke up her animal friends very early on the day of her birthday, to remind them to come to her party...and then, she fell asleep at her own party, because she had been up so early!

Two of the subsidiary characters were a mouse, and a cute donkey who wore round-framed glasses. I drew the donkey and the mouse and turned them into paper dolls - and gave them a whole elaborate story. In my version, they were their more "grown up selves." Donkey and Mouse (at one time they may have had first names, but I mainly remember them as Donkey and Mouse) worked at a big city newspaper - Mouse was a reporter, and Donkey a photographer. (In those days, I didn't think about the fact that people would be very specialized in their roles...so they covered all kinds of stories, from fancy society parties (for which they needed fancy dresses), and county fairs (jeans and turtlenecks) and sometimes they had to go undercover as investigative reporters). They lived in a town on the outskirts of the city; they each had their own little house but on the same street so they could hang out together. They also played tennis, so they had tennis dresses. (I think that was because I was in day camp during those years and learning to play tennis myself).

The fun thing of paper dolls was as you thought up a new adventure, it was relatively easy to make new clothes for them...for "real" dolls it took a lot longer, and in some cases it was hard to have the design execute successfully from what you "saw" in your head.

(Donkey and Mouse still exist; last summer when I was up visiting my parents I was going through one of the drawers in my bedroom and there was the box with them and (most of) their clothes (some of the clothes got too tattered over the years and I threw those away))