Gadzooksery and Boxing Week
One of the ways I monitor my calcium level is working the daily crossword puzzle and the Seven Little Words puzzle. It isn’t a very precise measurement and I did request some blood work at the expense of another large bruise—but the word Gadzooksery–a term referring to archaic items happened to be one of the words this past weeks.
While Boxing Day seems to be an English tradition of ‘boxing’ up of extra items to give to the needy among us —somehow I always end up using the days between Christmas and New Year’s as an early spring cleaning–tossing out vintage items such as cassette tapes and the very nice boxes that held them neatly in place. I did find a use for one of them—it holds rocks and water for the orchids that live in my dining room window sill.
Tiring of regular bookshelf cleaning, it doesn’t take me long to switch to prowling through my sewing room’s contents. For those of you who urge me to call it a studio—no—it is my sewing room or perhaps work-room where all sorts of projects and wish to do projects linger in boxes and books and magazine and file drawers. There are always surprises to be found there.
The past two years I have tried to focus on my mother’s left-over projects—and what can be worse than picking up where someone else left off—and to use their color palette.
These were my mother’s favorite colors—she dressed me in them when I was too young to sew for myself or object to her choices.
I had convinced a group of friends to sew up one of her patterns and fabric choices as a donation to the local quilt guild–but there was more left—and worse—much of it had been cut into from both ends leaving me raggedy ends.
I started cutting the day after Christmas–there is still more in the box to go—but the finished quilt will be donated to MD Anderson in their quilt sale benefiting Ovarian Cancer—Mom died of complications of Ovarian Cancer, living far beyond expected predictions with most of them good years.
Guess I am made of tough stuff. And either blessed or cursed with frugality and determination.
Sylvia Weir Art 