Frantic Tuesday

With a small but last-minute conference next week and a huge one in a month, things are certainly busy here. I'm finding it hard to focus on anything else but work.

We had a scare with the weather on Saturday. As we were heading home from an outing we saw low black clouds over the road ahead. About a mile from our exit the rains and winds were so bad we pulled over to the side of the expressway. The first thing we heard when we turned on the radio is that there were funnel clouds over our town--those low black clouds we were seeing.

We sat there until the storm was out over the lake and then drove home. We were incredibly lucky--the twisters did not touch down near us. They did some nasty damage in neighboring areas. Streets flooded but nothing like the flooding in Indiana and Wisconsin. Very scary. My sympathies go out to everyone with damage and loss.

My show and tell today is not things I've done. (I've still been making some felt finger-pincushions from plastic pull tabs in odd moments and struggling with ideas for the TIF project this month.) First, I have a lovely example of shadow embroidery on a sheer cloth. I think it might be a 1950s cocktail napkin. What do you think? My friend Terry sent me this lovely piece. The embroidery is absolutely minute but it looks to me like it was done by hand. Shadow work is something I've always had trouble with. This is perfect.

On our Saturday excursion we did some antiquing. I got this photo of young ladies in hats. I love the flowers tucked under their brims. I also found the bow-knot buttons shown at the top of the page. They look like the two pieces were made to hook and unhook but I'm afraid the plastic has become to brittle to experiment. I was most excited to find this package of Battenberg lace tape. It's much finer than any I've seen before. It's about 1/8" and just beautiful. Now I want to go back to the exhibit at the Illinois State Museum's Lockport Gallery, Urge to Embellish, and compare the tape to that used on the exquisite Edwardian lace dress that is a focal point for the exhibit. I think this may be smaller.

The Battenberg tape I've used for lace pieces, mostly holiday ornaments, has been much larger, usually 1/4" to 3/8" I'd say. I'm thinking this would make some lovely jewelry pieces. Right now I just love it in it's bright blue wrapper. I wonder what the person who originally purchased it was going to make with it.