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Show and Tell Tuesday: A Proposal

So I’m reorganizing my life and improving it greatly, and I really want to start making things again, and I really miss seeing the things you’d link to in here of what you were making: quilts, painting, whatever. On the other hand, I have a lot of work to do. I am scheduling GBT ahead of time (which takes about fifteen minutes a month so no problem) by putting up generic (what did you read this week?) posts that I can add to if I’ve read something I want to talk about but that will go up regardless so you all have a place to talk. And I thought, “Why not do the same thing for the crafts/cooking/whatever making post? So that’s what I’m going to do. If I’ve made something I want to flash at you, I can add that, but the generic post will go up so you all have a place to post. And if anybody knows how to put an image in a comment, now would be a good time to share.

So the plan is GBT and S&TT every week, possibly generic. Good Things Sunday and Good Intentions Monday probably the same, but if I get busy and drop them for a week, I will feel no guilt. Watching Wednesday whenever I find something or remember something, so intermittent. Flashback Friday unless that’s a drag. That’s Sunday, Monday, always Tuesday, sometimes Wednesday, always Thursday, sometimes Friday, and on Saturday I rest. Or it’s a wildcard because something has come up. If some of those evoke no interest they will just fade away into retirement. Unlike me.

So what I made this week was this plan. What did you make?

45 Responses

  1. Sounds like a good plan Jenny, no worries if it doesn’t stick though – keep the pressure off yourself.

    I haven’t made anything much in a while, I’m in too much pain to be really creative. That said yesterday I made some cupcakes (no icing) with pecans and sultanas in them because I am trying to lose weight and it was an easy recipe. The stuff from shops has way more sugar in than these. I do try to stay off sweet things but it is my weakness. Usually I try to eat some dried fruit (figs, dates, apricots) to get that sweetness hit but sometimes cake or cookies are the only thing.

    Good news though – after two years of prodding I got a call from NHS Fife on Tuesday last week and an appointment with my previous surgeon to get my pre-ops done. Last time this happened he gave me the hip replacement operation date there and then (then called with a cancellation date later). So I am hopeful that this time will be the same. Relieved I am going to the same surgeon in the same hospital because I know what to expect, and got great treatment last time.

    What happened though after I let everyone know was I totally crashed, exhausted. I hadn’t realised how stressed out, frustrated and on edge I was with all the waiting until it stopped. Feeling a bit better today. Appointment is for 30th Sept so not long to wait really. Trying to envisage a future time when I will not be in pain and be mobile again.

      1. Debbie, did you see that Theatre Jennifer checked in at the end of Sunday? Seems like she is doing well.

        3. Although I love to hear from Shass, gaps in her participation are not unusual, so I am not worried yet. But for Gary Jordan to go silent for this long is really scary. I hope he and his family are okay. I’d blame it on the East Coast power failures, but it started well before then.

          Thanks for the heads up about Theatre Jennifer! I missed that post and will be very happy to go back and read it.

    3. Congratulations, Christine! I hope you get a surgery date on the 30th and it is not a long wait. I’m glad you feel better today and are able to get some good rest this week.

      1. Thanks, Natasha! I had given it up for a while but after I had my cataracts done I found I could see enough to stitch again. Of course, I also have a lighted magnifier that I sometimes have to use plus I now have to use needle threaders.

    4. Ooh, what a beautiful reminder! And I am very impressed with your patience and eyesight. The one time I tried to do a picture of light reflecting off water I almost went blind.

  3. The only way I have found to share photos is to copy and paste a link to social media.

    With that in mind, I am still a bit stalled out on starting a new painting and have been continuing with the low hanging fruit plan, filling in easy bits on a started piece like a wonky paint by number and finishing small projects with easy Christmas gifting in mind. I’m trying to use up supplies. Now that the only craft store near me is Hobby Lobby, where I shall not tread, I impulse buy less and am starting to work on long planned but never started projects. A friend gave me a bunch of beads that I won’t use in my jewelry and I made sun catchers. Easy in-front of the TV work with my hands.

    Gotta figure out some sort of Christmas ornament for this year too.

    https://www.instagram.com/p/DdljU6Vm1tI/?stkn=MWtoZnB4amIwYTI2cA==

      1. Dang! Autocorrect screwed me over. 😡 I had typed Dream catcher.

        Also, is anyone else having issues with Instagram links opening the app but not taking you to the post?

  4. That sounds good, Jenny, except for having a post on Friday. I’ve noticed that GBT really goes on for two days and I’m hoping we don’t have have a Friday post to distract us. GBT is the highlight of my week and I like that the highlight lasts for two days!

  5. I am not in my “making things that show up in photographs” era but I love seeing what other folks are making, so I like this. 🙂

  6. I think this is a great plan. I don’t have any photos to share today, having been in a place of boredom and ennui, but hopefully I’ll burst out of my funk shortly.

  8. Last spring I was working on knitting a French market bag. I had the body almost completed but was stalling on finishing. Realized I didn’t care for the colour combination. Ripped it out and started again. The pattern isn’t complicated but requires attention and counting. So far, I’ve ripped out as many rows as I’ve knit. However, I’m sticking with it and will post a photo when I’m done (and figure out how to share my IG account).

  9. That sounds like a LOT, even if many of the posts are generic.

    Had a thought — what if you combined the Show & Tell with Good Sunday? I already tend to share my quilts on Good Sunday, since creative pursuits tend to be the things I feel good about in my week, and IIRC, others do the same thing.

    Here’s my latest Show & Tell: https://www.instagram.com/p/DdjvLBFIAy8/ It’s a small quilt I made a while ago, but it fits the season. And it features a cat model. If I get some better lighting today (and Mabel will let me pick up the quilt), I’ll do an unobstructed picture of the quilt and post it, so if there’s an entry later than the linked on, that will be the new picture.

  11. Weeks and weeks of no crafts, This week however was London Design Festival so I went to two free workshops.

    Reddie (Australian Furniture Co.) had me sand a reclaimed teak bowl. Oh and Food Oil brings out the colour beautifully.
    One workshop was for Ronghua in Notting Hill. They were great and they helped me make a dragonfly with premade silky wings. Ronghua looks amazing, but very complicated
    https://www.lanseichina.com/products/pre-made-petal-ronghua-kit-resting-dragonfly

  12. About all I’ve done that might qualify is cooking, but I did a lot of that, although it involved at most some experimentation rather than real creativity. The most successful dish was another large batch of ground turkey chili.  I got a number of meals out of that, mostly served over pasta, but one serving over brown rice, which I didn’t like as well.  The chili tasted a little bland the first few times, but the flavors seemed to have melded when I thawed some today. (Either that or I was just hungry.) I think I’ve got three or so meals left from that batch.  Oh, I tried a new-to-me me pasta shape, cavatappi, aka corkscrew pasta, which I liked.

    Out of curiosity, I picked up an unfamiliar brand of mac and cheese (of the kind with premade cheese sauce in an envelope).  I was disappointed but not astonished to find that it was very bland. Since I was going to have to mask it with ketchup anyhow, I added the last two of the unspeakably awful soy dogs that I had gotten as an experiment, cut up into small pieces. The dogs looked like hot dogs but did not have remotely the same spice mixture or texture. Nor did they taste good on their own terms, unlike some vegetable dishes that fail to resemble what the meat dishes that they are supposed to be imitating. I had frozen what was left of the soy dogs and was using them up as neutral protein.  I got a couple of meals out of the mac, cheese, and soy dog mix (I masked the last serving with barbecue sauce rather than ketchup). A final bit of the mix was big enough to serve as a base for a serving of chili, where it disappeared indistinguishably, which was a good thing.

    I also baked about a 5 lb (uncooked weight) package of boned chicken breasts, which I had brined and breaded (my standard treatment).  Since the temperatures went back to summer levels after that was baked, so far I’ve used it only in sandwiches, with, variously, lite ranch dressing, Walmart house brand light mayo, and barbecue sauce.  Most of it is sliced up and frozen so that I can thaw individual servings, and some or all may end up in hot dishes now that fall seems to have arrived hereabouts.

  13. I haven’t been very creative or crafty lately. Not even doing much cooking.

    I do usually ‘wake up’ when Fall comes so maybe I’ll get motivated soon.

  14. I no longer have webspace, as TypePad was killed off and I canNOT figure out WordPress and everyone says, “you MUST use WordPress!” *cries* So I can’t post pics. But I’ve been making the following:

    (a) Various pie purses, mini-pies, and a pie hat for a friend of mine to sell off. So far, two have sold.
    (b) A blue curly wig for if/when I lose my hair, it’s very anime girl.
    (c) Large cloche-ish bulky yarn hats–I made one and now Mom spent $200 on yarn for me (after saying “no more yarn for you!”) to make more hats for sale, though I don’t know where to sell those since the pies are being sold by a baker.

  15. Turns out June was the last time I posted any quilts/quilting to IG. So, I just uploaded 15 pictures at https://www.instagram.com/p/DdnXyQEjaY3/?stkn=MXdtNnhnMDBkOWhzZQ==

    The first quilt took me over a decade to figure out how to quilt it. I’m quite happy with it. It took a long while as I drew the quilting design on the quilt with washable markers.

    I was wondering about Show And Tell Tuesdays if the abbreviation might be SATT or S@TT or even S@T since @ is the AT sign. When I first typed it out, I was amused since SATT are the first 4 letters of my last name.

  16. I’ve got my sewing machine out and started work on a cape. I grew up watching my mum and aunties sewing but it doesn’t come naturally to me. However I decided to make a garment as one of my 60for60 new things. I have 3.5m of the most beautiful black baby camel fabric and a nice deep pink lining fabric, plus Son2 gave me a voucher for a sewing session so I used it to get assistance with the cutting out.

    Progress will be slow but I’d like to be finished by Christmas (I’m 60 in January).

  17. l’ve been enjoying my rock painting, especially now that it is Spring over here where l live!

    l recently went to the beach and found some nice rocks/pebbles for painting more romance book covers on. l like painting everything from the old clinch covers to the current ones, and then gifting them to friends l know will enjoy them.

  18. Since I gave up making gemstone jewelry (which I did professionally for about 30 years, while also running the shop and writing), really the only creative thing I do is writing. I could post pictures of my feline supervisors supervising my typing, but that’s all I got…

About the Author

Jennifer Crusie is the New York Times, USA Today, and Publisher’s Weekly bestselling author and co-author of twenty-three novels, one book of literary criticism, miscellaneous articles, essays, novellas, and short stories, and the editor of three essay anthologies. She lives in a cottage in Pennsylvania, where she often stares at the ceiling and counts her blessings.

Find out more about Jenny’s published works by visiting JennyCrusie.com

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