Not up to date? Click here, and here, and here, and the last post here. Be sure and click the first posts headline for the comment left by J at the bottom.

Home Sewers and Industry professionals take heed and check it out for yourself. Unlike me, you probably don’t have the friends, contacts, or privates web servers to counteract her attacks. Information is a powerful thing, that’s why freedom of speech has had blood spilled on it’s behalf. Be warey of anyone who tries to squash it and read it when it’s available.

Here’s the links

http://delicious.com/kathleen_fasanella
http://delicious.com/network/commonreader

In case she tries to pull them – here’s her entries:

#
27 JUN 09
Buttercup Mercantile » Remodeling Our Store SAVE
gidget’s store. so scary I shiver all over. psycho home sewer. wish I had created a tag for just plain crazy.
TAGS

* sewing_hobby
* passive_aggressive

#
All Sewn Up » SAVE
oh my. Is gidget off her meds? wow. wannabe who pretends to work in industry.
TAGS

* passive_aggressive
* psychology
* sewing_hobby

—
Edited July 28, 2009 4:26pm. Oops missed her third delicious entry:

—

——–

Read for yourself and think twice before any associations with a woman like this.
Oh and I don’t take meds and if I did – I’d be sure to take them on time, thanks for your nurturing comments once again, Kathleen Fasanella. Anything else you want to say?

After 4 years as a member of the Fashion-Incubator.com forum (paying member, regardless of the mention that only one person has paid), I’m leaving it for reasons stated in my final post on their forum.

No doubt I will be slammed – as many other designers / contractors have been – some secretly – some very openly with attempts to damage their livelihoods in this tough economy.

If you enjoy wasting years, your money, your time, and valuable concentration and thought – hoping that forum members will be helpful and not spiteful – then by all means join, buy the book, donate money (don’t expect an acknowledgment that you did) – and go for it!

Me – I’d rather put my recommendations, money, thoughts, time, and energy into building truer friendships and allies while I develop my line. After all – there really aren’t any boogey vendors that aren’t going to let you buy from them because you didn’t buy into the forum. Too many real people in the industry have left the forum.

Here’s my final comment because no doubt it will be deleted – as I find most are:

“Well, goodbye folks after 4 years! Heads up to any other folks seen as a threat on here as [an_honest_and_ethical_contractor]* was.

Since my comment was deleted by Kathleen concerning how sad and heartbreaking it was that there was such an angry exchange between them under Software / Renting CAD, nothing more was intended other than to express a two-line sentiment. Now I understand why no one else has responded to that thread – most likely they did and it was deleted as well.

Obviously there is a great deal more censorship and back biting here than I was aware of and want no part in it.

As for me, I’ll take the money I’ve paid (yeah – I’ve paid over 100.00 + book as have others) and put it towards someone who is more sincere in their desire to help. Just a heads up to all the rest living in a bubble as I was.

Maybe it’s time for another forum.”

edited : *name replaced because it’s not necessary to the facts

edited: 2:26 AM Sunday June 28, 2009 For users that don’t know to hit the headline of this post to view the comments, here they are – unedited – for you to draw your own conclusions and to remove Evelyn’s full name. from:
———————
8 comments
Leave a comment »

1. Kathleen June 27th, 2009 9:22 pm edit :

Hi Gidget
Why would anyone slam you? People can disagree with your opinion without getting personal about it. Nobody is going to hold it against you that you got too personal. So far, everyone has said they’re sorry you’re leaving but they don’t agree with what you’ve said.

To avoid problems, it is probably best to only say what you know to be certain. For example, you said “because no doubt it will be deleted – as I find most are:”, how do you know most are? How can you know that? You can’t. That the forum is littered with so many criticisms of me kind of makes the opposite point. In addition, the mention about slamming and saying “real” industry people have left..is also untrue. In your email your email to me, you said ” I certainly don’t intend to fight any battles for anyone else” but isn’t that what you’re doing? The problem is, you don’t have all the facts. You really *don’t* know. You don’t know because I haven’t done exactly what you accuse me of, slamming. Speaking of slamming, did I tell a soul about that last contract job you did? I helped you get that job. Sarah came to me for a referral of you and I said she could trust you. That you ruined the whole lot, Sarah lost out and I looked bad for recommending you. But did I slam you? No, until this moment, I haven’t mentioned it to a soul. You’d said your husband was laid off so I passed your name out very liberally for awhile, I felt really bad. Sarah is the only one who gave me feedback. As with other referrals I’ve made that were bad (like Irv, who you also think is “real”) nobody wanted to tell me the referral I made was bad. So much for slamming.

The truth is, as much as you may like your friend, he’s …embellished… his history and if you read his earliest entries on the forum, he freely admits he’s never worked in the industry. I have a database of his contradictions with urls to the published entries by date. Certainly nothing I could fake. Are you sure you want to go toe to toe legally over something I can prove? Like I said, I understand you are upset altho I do not know why (there’s something else going on) but if you’re slanderous and libelous making unsubstantiated claims, it’s easy to have your host pull the site which is kind of a waste of everyone’s time. Say all kinds of horrible things about me you know are true, lord knows I have plenty of sins but back off what you cannot prove.

Here is the response I left to your comment:
———-
Wow Gidget, call me confused! I emailed you beforehand explaining I wanted to delete your comment (the only off topic one) and I thought we were good. I don’t understand why you didn’t say so. That seems like back biting to me. With all the personalized help I’ve given you, emails, phone convos, even getting you jobs etc, I’d say $100 for the book and only one year’s renewal when you’ve been on for three plus, is the deal of the century. I wish you continued success as you move forward
———
I still have these messages, coming and going in my inbox and can prove it legally if need be. What I don’t understand is, there’s got to be some horrible huge miscommunication here. You’ve never acted irrationally before. Gidget, what is going on? This reaction doesn’t make sense considering our friendly relationship thus far, what else is going on in your life?

Since I posted this, I searched my records and found a donation from you on March 12, 2009 for $100. Considering how you’ve repaid my many efforts on your behalf over the past four years, I really don’t want it. I have sent you a refund, Transaction ID #0XK054499E1155608. I have posted a screen cap of the transaction which anyone can see, assuming you don’t delete this comment that is. http://bit.ly/qLHb8

You know, one thing strikes me as odd. You have no problem benefiting from the referral system when it is to your advantage, such as when you wrote me about Evelyn (other than when you’ve gotten work). I told you she was a lovely person. That wasn’t good enough, I had to tell it to you again. I got too busy to follow up but I meant to write Evelyn at the time to tell her she should check with Sarah for a referral about you. I can’t give a referral for you anymore. I can only tell people to check with someone who did hire you. As you know, Sarah was very dissatisfied. That’s a referral network. But like I said, it works both ways. It’s kind of self serving to expect a one way benefit, imo.

2. Gidget June 27th, 2009 9:47 pm edit :

Kathleen,

This has to do with a personal issue – You deleted my post without saying you were going to do so. Nothing else.

I can state factually that you delete posts, because you did mine.

Here is the message that you sent me before doing so without my knowledge:

“I’d rather we didn’t get into a lot of controversy. J is still a member in good standing and you’re free to contact him. He is welcome to return at his discretion. I think he would be surprised at the warm reception he would get.”

Funny – I didn’t read that as: I’m going to delete your post. My comment was to only express sadness at the obvious (by then) argument that you were having with a fellow contractor.

As for Sarah Mxxx – she got her money back – value-added embroidery. She never completed a proper sample with binding. I made it clear to her that I was new and if she was willing to take a chance on me, I would take a chance on her.

I was left with a week and half (after she had to send more fabric and the masks I cut out and fused had come back from the embroiderer – for whom I paid the expense of btw) which covered a holiday to figure out what satin to use and try to make it work.

I returned her products, all remnants and a check for her deposit back to her at my own expense (84.00 for shipping) overnight in case she could find someone else to finish the job.

As for Evelyn – I asked your opinion because she stated she knew you. Oh Yeah – and I only asked it once! Wanna check that email again?

Anyone wanna see any letters? I’ve got copies too.

As for your return of the 100.00 I wouldn’t touch it with a ten foot pole. You keep that Kathleen, it’s been earned with blood, sweat, and tears.

Don’t threaten legalities either. I’ve made no libelous or slanderous comments, I’ve merely stated the facts as they happened to me.
This is my personal blog. Last I checked – I have a right to my own opinions and to post reviews.

As for taking down my site via web service provider? Well – we are the service provider and it’s our server.

Thank you for showing your colors. I don’t need to prove anything.

Oh, and I am healthy and happy and busy – Thanks for asking.

3. Gidget June 27th, 2009 9:55 pm edit :

Oh – and I forgot to mention since you seemed confused about it in your last two emails:

My legal name is :

GIdget Joyce Lynn O’Hara Barrett
My company’s name is : Buttercup Mercantile, LLC
Buttercup 149 is a division of Buttercup Mercantile, LLC

And it was 85.00 for the book in 2005 – maybe it was 2006 – by my lovely husband, Michael Barrett
It was also two donations 1 around 2007 when you began expressing the need to charge a fee to forum members, of 25.00 and 100.00 in February of this year when I read that you were charging 45.00 a year to catch me up to that point. Do I want a refund? Not at all – services rendered – fees paid.

4. Gidget June 27th, 2009 9:58 pm edit :

— On Sat, 6/27/09, Kathleen wrote:

> > From: Kathleen
> > Subject: Re: from Evelyn xxx the author in Atlanta
> > To: “Evelyn “xxx
> > Date: Saturday, June 27, 2009, 6:24 PM
> > Hi Evelyn
> >
> > Gidget (joyce barrett, buttercup 149) came to me and asked
> > for my opinion of you. What I meant to do but got too busy
> > and forgot to do until now, was to suggest you contact a
> > forum member who hired gidget to do some work. The forum
> > member you should talk to is SarahM, her profile is here:
> > http://fashion-incubator.com/phpbb/profile.php?mode=viewprofile&u=8703
> >
> > best
> > Kathleen
> >
> >
> > http://www.fashion-incubator.com
> > ~~~Nurture people, not products~~~
> > Twitter: kfasanella

Thanks for the email Kathleen. Glad you could find time to nurture people.

5. Kathleen June 27th, 2009 10:23 pm edit :

Wow. It is really low of you to post private email. I really don’t need to say anything. Your actions speak louder than my words ever could. I really can’t help you with your problems Gidget and I’m sorry. But you shouldn’t take them out on other people.

If you paid $85 for the book, you didn’t buy it from me or Amazon. The list price is $60.

6. Gidget June 27th, 2009 10:24 pm edit :

Funny – After just receiving yet another inflamed email cc from Kathleen of an email she just happened to remember to send to Evelyn, maybe I should remind Kathleen that I’m not in the CMT Shop business anymore. Continue to send more fun emails to Evelyn, she’s no doubt thinking, “What the ?”.

Hmm.. let’s see – anyone else you can send an email too? Nope – don’t think so.

7. Gidget June 27th, 2009 10:28 pm edit :

Yep – Actions do speak louder than words, Kathleen. That was my whole point all along. Sad but true.

8. Kathleen June 27th, 2009 10:39 pm edit :

Gidget, I can’t find it in my heart to be “inflamed”. You are obviously very distressed and I really don’t know what to say to you. It does not seem possible to have a rational and fair conversation with you.

I wish you well. i hope you attain all that you feel you deserve. I hope you and your family are prosperous and healthy. I send my sincerest wishes for a full and happy life. Good bye.

—- End of comments paste —–

Just for the record, we never spoke on the phone nor were ‘friends’ and very rarely did we ever communicate via email. I merely admired you as someone with a mission to nurture people and communities. The only distress I felt was in learning that it wasn’t true. But life goes on and unfortunately web owners are not spheres unto themselves – there are usually sides involved.

——– Beginning of paste of the only ‘Evelyn Email thread Ever Sent To Kathleen Fasanella by Me” ——-

That is all I needed to hear. Am very much looking forward to talking with her! Thank You, once again!

Kathleen wrote:
> Hi G
>
> About her project, I can’t say anything because I don’t know. As to her character and integrity? She will never deliberately cause you ill. There’s no malice to her, not an evil bone in her body. Lovely, generous, kind and gracious, the world would be a better place with more Evelyns.
> k
>
> http://www.fashion-incubator.com
> ~~~Nurture people, not products~~~
> Twitter: kfasanella
>
>
> — On Thu, 6/18/09, Joyce Barrett wrote:
>
>
>> From: Joyce Barrett
>> Subject: [Fwd: Wheelchair sketches]
>> To: kathleen@fashion-incubator.com
>> Date: Thursday, June 18, 2009, 9:53 AM
>> Hi Kathleen,
>>
>> I was contacted by Evelyn xxx about a partnership
>> of some sort with her wheelycovers. From google I’ve
>> read that she is an accomplished author and will be talking
>> with her later today to get more details about what she has
>> in mind. She had mentioned that you knew who she was,
>> and was wondering what your thoughts were?
>>
>> It sounds like an exciting opportunity that maybe we could
>> start some sort of co-op for our products together via a
>> website. She had alot of couture type words on her
>> site, so maybe her hearts in the right place and she became
>> victim to tag phrases. lol
>>
>> Thank you in advance for any insight, opinions, or advice
>> you may have.
>>
>> Gidget


——- End of Paste ———

The End

I know it’s easier on my eyes – just like he is …. now how cute is that, it even does emoticons!

Not to mention it’s my favorite shade of blue in the title bar! He’s so awesome! {{{{SLO}}}}

What do ya’ll think – Do you like the new design?

I’ve recategorized and tried to clean things up a bit so ya’ll can find what your looking for. If something’s missing – let me know.

As kismet dictates, the desktop decided to fry it’s processor chip, moving on to the motherboard. While at Mom’s on Friday, apparently there was a power surge and it’s now gone. Hmmm….. I came home to a no-longer blinking, but steady orange glow from the front panel. When we unplugged the power cord, the lights stayed on.

Anway, I decided to just hop around the net tonight. It’s 3:56 am now, and decided to share my travels because I had a good time!

It started at Butterick’s new pattern catalog for the winter 2008 season, remembered to check out Ottobre patterns for boys.

While at Ottobre, I ran into a source in Finland for organic underwear. Looking at their catalog, they discussed a cream they sell for diaper rash, made from marigold extract. I decided it would be fun to search for how to make an extract. Any extract! wouldn’t that be kewl?

Using Google Books search took me to an 1881 book called “Health at Home, Or Hall’s Family Doctor
By William Whitty Hall” That was interesting in an of itself! But he discussed calomel as one of the “home medicines” to have on hand. I searched for that, turns out it’s a mercury based? mineral made from minerals found in Germany and Texas. Well, so much for Dr. Hall’s statement that “these items can be found readily within a farmer’s acreage!”

Somehow, I remember to search for extracts, and found that email DID exist in the 1800′s.

Here is an excerpt from the Techno-chemical Receipt Book written in 1887:

The Techno-chemical Receipt Book Containing Several Thousand Receipts, Covering the Latest, Most Important and Most Useful Discoveries in Chemical Technology, and Their Practical Application in the Arts and the Industries. Ed. Chiefly from the German Od Drs. Winckler, Elsner, Heintze [et Al.] By William Theodore Brannt, William Henry Wahl

See – Techno and email were terms in 1887. Wonder if nerd or geek is in there somewhere too?

It’s a really fun book to read – after an hour, I still haven’t gotten through the table of contents. If it was made – they can tell you how! It’s a web journal all unto itself.

ANNA GREEN WINSLOW

Heroines may not distinguish themselves at the head of an Army, but freedom [will] be won by a fighting army of amazons…armed with spinning wheels.

I read this right after reading Benjamin Franklin talking about a conversation with a male friend on whether or not women should be educated. Not much has changed in the world, excepting many an amazon’s choice of weapon!

Farmhouse Planning and Cutouts *This is a great document for eternal redecorators like me!

Fitting Coats and Suits

Tailoring A Woman’s Jacket

Potato Recipes

This one in particular is fun: Aunt Sammy’s Recipes (Uncle Sam’s Auntie’s Radio Show Recipes from 1926)

The Index is just a paper form of Timelineindex.com’s Period pages, meant as an aid to show the kids how history is divided up amongs different groups for ‘dealing’ with history data. Time Periods are almost always politically motivated, highly subjective and always full of conjecture. Still, this seems to be the prevailing time period grouping during my lifetime, and when kids hear things like “Jurassic period” I want them to get a glimpse of how that fit in with the rest of history. Their site offers really good information about who where when.

I added the word “Theory” under each group of questionable or total lack of accurate dating methods. That’s my take on it with the research I’ve done so far. With carbon dating 1/2 life of 7,500 years and carbon’s limited use – unsure accuracies of newer methods of Carbon 12 and 13 and helium – and the fact that I don’t think they found a tree with over a 5,000 rings on it, lol. On the other side of things, checking my Bible, I can’t find anything over the 4,000 B.C. date range (for authorship dating only) and that was Scofield’s take on things. God didn’t say when he decided to create the earth and us, or even what clock he was using. It was a long time before humans came close to a standard time frame anyway (after the Mayans I believe) if your interested in checking it out. Me, I’ll stick with Theory and try to make it very clear to the kids just how much mis-information is out there being touted as fact by political advocates and try to do my best to muddle out the facts for them.

The dates are based on the Homeschool in the Woods recommendations. They seemed like a great place to start and with it being in a journal format, we can add pages as needed. I broke them out into 3 different pdf’s, mainly so I could correlate some of what was in the state curriculum guides with what I wanted to teach.

So, if you are so inclined to begin a journal – Here’s the pdf’s. Total pages for the notebook: 120 pps. (including preface)

#1 – Creation to Christ’s Birth 23 pp @ 5,838kb

*Note: I include a preface page as a handout. My kids are very young, but I want them to get a basic start on understanding the Evolutionist’s / Geological timelines vs. the Creationist’s Timeline. More importantly, I will use it as an opportunity to teach them about theorists, scientists, facts, and the old adage “Don’t believe everything you read (from humans, of course!”)

I believe God created the world – and he did it in his time! Personally, I don’t worry about what clock he was using. But the kids need the information and to understand where it’s coming from – on all sides – to the best of my ability to teach it to them. I’m trying to raise “thinking” human beings here!

#2 – Christ’s Birth to 1860 60 pp @ 13,853kb

*Note: I stop off at 1860 because the state cirriculum does…. There’s alot going on here, so I’m sure we will be using dividers to seperate historical eras.

#3 – 1860 to Present Day 36 pp @ 8,086kb

*Note: I say present, but I’m looking forward to grandchildren one day, so it goes to the year 2025! The kids will have to print timelines for their own kids after that!

If you have a paint program you could fill in the main date, a period specific heading and page #’s or just use a fine line marker and write it on the page. I’ve made this template based on the Homeschool in the woods website TimelineHelps. Amy Pak of Homeschool in the Woods was very kind to put up all the information anyone would need to create a history timeline. She has a beautiful blank timeline book that you could purchase where all of this is done for you. If I had the money, that is definitely what I’d be buying! I am hoping that we will soon be able to buy the CD of timeline figures from her.

I’ m thinking of dividing up the time periods amongst the three kids. The Georgia Cirriculum uses for example 1860 to present for 5th graders and up to 1860 for 4th graders, but I really don’t like the idea of skipping around. I prefer the idea of learning about history as it happens, to immerse yourself in it. I’ve just got to get my courage up to tell myself – so what if so and so is learning about the American Revolution while our son is learning about Moses! As with most decisions in my life – I’ll just see what direction the butterflies are flying towards today! One thing I am sure about is the first few weeks of timeline keeping will be about dating methods, geological timelines and the whole ‘You can’t beleive everything you read’ discussion that seems to come up an awful lot in our discussions as it is.

If you have a solution that works for you, please don’t hesitate to share it with me. I’m new to this and could use any help out there!

The gallery has blackline maps, historical maps, continents, countries, clip art of every kind, fraction clip art, vegetables, people, photos, anything that you could ask for as a basic clip art library for teaching, it’s there!!!

The gallery extension can be found here.

If you don’t have open office and want to check it out, go here.

In addition to the extension above, you can download an extension for making CAD drawings, a writer’s tool box, a template for writing scripts + many other fun things.

As a homeschool mom just in the throes of historical timeline planning mania, this discovery could not have been made at a better time! Anyone who needs images for teaching, will really appreciate this gallery.

Another great source for cliipart (posted in the comments at open office) is: http://openclipart.org/

THANK YOU TO THE OPEN OFFICE DEVELOPMENT CREW!!!! This Mom sends you a great big kiss!!!
** Addendum 8/24/08 As Rado pointed out – Open Office is free and open source! Definitely a great program!

*addendum: Since adding the link for the gallery, I felt I should also mention two of my other favorite sites:

Really good clipart / worksheet site for those of you who may have not seen it: Scholastic’s Printables

3-D Paper Crafting projects (like making a model of the Syndney Opera House) can be found at: Canon’s Papercraft site.

The first day was heaven! They created our first ever lapbooks. That was alot of fun! I had asked them if they would do a lapbook on what they wanted to learn this year, but they wanted to do presidents. lol. So, they did books for George Washington, Abraham Lincoln and Thomas Jefferson. Go Figure! They have minds of their own! The two oldest are taking their CAT tests now. I know, they should have taken it the end of last year, but life happens. They are taking it today and tommorrow while I try to keep the youngest occupied with his own work and QUIET! He’s a little miffed that he didn’t get a test this year too. So, lesson learned, I’ll make budgetary plans to include him next year.

I realized there was a big glaring problem this year, tho. My oldest has been losing confidence, especially as his younger brother has gained a mountain of it the past year. It was never so apparent as when they sat down to take the same test today. Suddenly, things that he could do without a test sheet in front of him, he couldn’t do when taking the test. It wasn’t nervousness about being tested, as he says “I like coloring in the bubbles!”. I think the biggest reason there was such a difference, in addition to sibling competition over the summer break, is that in the past I’ve sat next to each of them while they took the test (each on different days). My oldest thrived on the one-on-one time as he tried to acheive all the “right” answers. My second child thrived on the sheer challenge of taking his first CAT test.

I went to google and typed in “confidence in 10 year old boy”. What came up was a Canadian site, jumpmath.org with an article referencing a book “The Myth of Ability” by John Mighton. After reading about the results of using the Fractions unit, I downloaded everything I could get. I’m grateful for the chance to try it out. It will only take a few weeks to know if this will help him and I’ve made plans after reviewing facts for the next couple of weeks, to try it out on all three boys. After all, we having nothing to lose, especially while we wait on our books!

I did get the first of three boxes from textbooksheaven.org and it wasn’t what I had ordered, altho it will work as a substitute for one child’s language arts program. I wait in angst over what is coming in the other two boxes. They were sent by postal book rate, after they waited on the money from paypal (who took the money from our account and held it for a week before sending it on to textbooksheaven). The missing two shipments have been lingering between Jacksonville, Fla and Atlanta’s distribution center for the last week and a half. I could have driven to Jacksonville and picked them up in one day! Maybe this week, we’ll get box #2!

As for our Saxon Math books that Slo’s mom bought on ebay for us, them nor the seller have been heard from since we placed our order the end of July. It will probably have to be disputed on ebay. The lady received the money (over a $100.00) and never sent a shipping notice and refuses to reply to Slo’s numerous emails. He is sending them daily now. We’ve never disputed, so I don’t know how long that takes before we can get our money back or the books. Hopefully it will resolve itself soon as I need those books like yesterday!

Well, that’s enough of the rocky road travels of the local homeschoolers. If you homeschool grades 3-6, you might like to check out jumpmath.org. There are some really neat games and worksheets included in the curriculum that are equally worth checking out.

On Saturday, Harry Reed called a special session of the Senate to vote on this bill. Within a moment of opening the session, he called for cloture vote on it. What did that do? It prevented a filabuster from those who opposed it, guaranteeing that it would pass. Within two hours, SURPRISE! They had voted on it and passed it. The President says he will sign it, yet the White House has stated that the signing of this bill won’t be done in a ceremony. It will be done in private. ** Of course it will be! It’s Election Year! Don’t give the American People a chance to run their government! We know what’s best for them!

Update 07/30/2008: The President signed it this morning at 7:31 A.M. on July 29. 2008. Oh Yes, He also had the Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Housing Secretary Steve Preston awake with him! Why didn’t you have the Security Advisor, Mr. President, since it included tracking transactions of every American Citizens? Coward! Thanks again, Harry Reed, Nancy Pelosi and George Bush! One more lost right.

Question? Why are they being so quick to get it passed secretively? Answer: They don’t want the American people to see it for what it really is – just like what they tried to pass as the “Immigration” bill. The American people were able to find all the crap in that one and get it stopped by the skin of our teeth.

Harry Reed learned from his mistakes, and this time tried a different tactic. Harry Reed figured out a way to get it passed – Unethical – ABSOLUTELY! Illegal what he did – NO! WIll the ethics committee do anything? NOT LIKELY! They never do!

So what’s in this bill? It started out as an Energy bill. It was cleverly rewritten as a wolf in sheep’s clothing. It’s bad enough they are lying – that’s what they do best. The worst part is the last 60 pages or so of the bill, they are now becoming the American Gestapo!

So, exactly WHO ARE the terrorists that Washington feels they need to track? Seems the worst of them are in Washington!

Want to know what they did? Watch Slobo’s video or read the transcript of it.

* added: Want to see the votes on the bill and the bill in it’s various incarnations? Go Here.

I’ve been playing around with pattern drafting again. Unlike the disastrous sleeves two years ago, I’ve now got pants and a bodice – With Sleeves No Less – that fits! WooHoo….. This time, I drafted the pants from Threads magazine – wanting to see how accurate they were – and a foundation top from Moore’s book on pattern making. I had to make several changes for them to fit me, sloping shoulders – sway back – longer stride etc. I also found that my left side is almost a whole 2″‘s bigger than my right side! One would think using my right hand on the mouse and calculators these past few years would have hiked my right side up a bit more than that! I’ll just have to walk around like Igor a bit longer, I suppose.

The muslin was cut from a nice stable cotton with a grid print (looks a lot like graph paper. I used wash-able markers to make changes that were needed, changed my block patterns and then sewed it up into a really comfortable pair of pj’s. I had left 1″ S.A.’s all around, so I could add ease for pj’s, used up some pretty trims I had, added a peplum (the short bodice to my short waistline just wasn’t modest enough!) Shameless to say, I just took them off to wash them after 3 days….. I know, but they were so comfortable, I wanted to live in them!!!

Anyway, I’ve been using Open Office’s drawing program to get some of my ‘garment components’ like pockets, collars and misc. facings drafted. I started using Open Office with a pretty Manila folder color printed when my tag board ran out. I’ll add the following under manuals but ’til then, here’s some new schtuff:

1. Page 1 and Page 2 of Table of Aliquot Parts – the handy chart to figure out what 1/4 of 38″ is?

(The vintagesewing.info site has one, as does my Moore’s pattern making book but I needed higher and sometimes lower numbers, so Slobo helped me get an openoffice formula running to formulate it automatically.)

Here is the .ods or Open Office spreadsheet file and the
.xls or Excel spreadsheet file in case ya’ll wanna change things around.

2. Inch to Decimal Equivalent Chart.

The chart comes from seoconsultants.com website. I made it a jpg just for ease of printing. For some reason, the latest version of Firefox doesn’t seem to understand how to print a web page anymore. Until I can get it fixed, and in case others have the same problem, I offer the jpg.

This conversion table is handy when I’m at the Fashion Incubator. When Kathleen gives the measurements for some of her kewl gizmo jigs, welt and paper jig tutorial., I can punch in the measurements (which she so generously provides) and print out a nifty neat little gizmo jig too. One that is much more accurate than I can hand draft especially when she includes those very important measurements like bend allowances.

That’s really all the playing for now. Hopefully in the next few days, I’ll see ya’ll again with some newer – clean – threads on!

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I ran into this book, Yardsticks: Children in the Classroom Ages 4-14 : A Resource for Parents and Teachers (Paperback), by Chip Wood sitting by itself on a clearance table. After perusing the 8 yr. old section, I figured it was cheap enough that it couldn’t hurt to buy it. Now, I would have paid twice the retail price! This book was NONE TOO SOON, I tell ya! Slobo and I have been at our wits end to figure out where these burgeoning personalities were headed off to this month! I’ve heard daily, for a month, Slobo’s frustrating “I Don’t Know What Else To DO!” plea!

How often do you hear: “Nobody wants to play with me” “I’m Bored” “He keeps teasing me!!!” Then suddenly “Come-on so-and-so, let’s go such-and-such.” Two seconds later, you hear giggling and plotting – Take a deep sigh – knowing that a second or two later, #3 with come out in tears. They found something to ease their boredom! Child 3 then gets deeply hurt, because the brother that loved him uncoditionally this morning now seems like his worst enemy! How do you explain that to him? Or reprimand the other two in a way that you get more than a quick “Okay – Sowwy”.

I used to think when children behaved this way, it was because they needed more attention from their parents or caregivers. After going under this theory for several months – I can easily state – It has nothing to do with it!!! When you hear, “It’s just their age” beleive it! That doesn’t mean you have to sit back and let nature take it’s course. But this book gave me several ideas for what path they came from and which one they are headed for. It helps you to lead them literally ‘out of temptation’! Just this week, I’ve been able to head all three off for the first time all year! If Chip Wood were here, I’d send him a lifetime supply of blackberry jam!

This book, tho small and concise, is bigger than the “What to Expect When You’re Expecting” series. Picking up where alot of that left off! I highly recommend this book!!!

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Top Tray:

The top tray cams are:

Buttonhole Cams x 2
III (loop-de-loop design sort of heart shaped at the loops), IV (zigzag), V (scallop design), VI ( |__|__|__| hemstitch design?) I (greek key), VII (A bartack cam – so it appears)
#’s: 2 0′s, 10-11, 14-15, 16-17, 18-19,20-21,22-23,24-25,26-27,28-29,30-31,32-33,34-35
There is an empty, unmarked slot at the top of the #’d cams in the accessory box. I don’t know what that was for.
+ 2 hubs for creating stitch combinations.
Empty oil bottle

Manual Page 5 of Top Tray Accessories:

Bottom Tray:

The bottom tray consists of these items from the manual page 7:

Box, Needle Threader w spare hook, Bobbins, Double Needle (x2), Case with needles, Screws for Straight Guide, Bobbin case with black latch, straight guide, small screwdriver (x3), seam ripper (not in my pic – but have), stopper for circular sewing (x2), screw driver large (have but not shown), quilter wire with clamp, brush (have but now shown), plastic oiler (in upper tray), ruffler and pleater (in seperate box), multiple slotted binder (seperate box also), daring presser foot, guide for blindstitch, hemming presser foot, straight stitch foot, double needle foot, button sewing foot, cording foot, transparent ziz-zag hinged foot with grooved bottom for satin stitch, transparent presser foot for making buttonholes automatically, shell hem presser foot.

On the machine now is a metal zig-zag foot.

Hope this helps someone else out there.

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The nearest town to us, where this street is located, was formed in 1882. It was settled along what was then, Georgia Pacific Railroad lines, newly laid to Birmingham, Alabama. The town grew to three main roads by the early 1900′s, one crossing over the railroad tracks. It now consists of two. The third having been leveled and rebuilt many times. The rows of stick-built buildings originally looked like a scene out of the old west, complete with dirt roads, horses, wagons and buggy carts. Each row had anywhere from 5 to 8 proprietorships. By the 1930′s, the buildings had brick and local stones surrounding them.

In the very beginning of township, there were only about two dozen families, running mainly farms and a mill. Below is a picture of the street when it was about 26 years old in 1908. The 3rd building from the left end would be the future home for my Consew. In the 1900′s, handmade furniture and farm implements were being made by hand and sold in the mercantile/hardware/feed store. The community recreation center, at the time, was a tiny railroad platform in the center of town. Here residents would watch who got on and off. Old-timers would gather in front of the feed store and talk about happenings around town. They still do this to this day, only now the seating is in front of the only grocery store, one street over and it’s old-timers mix it up with teenagers.

Sometime around 20′s-50′s, the building underwent alot of changes. The picture below shows two proprietorships. The one on the left was a doctor’s office, the one on the right, a furniture and novelty store. The furniture and novelty store is what would eventually be used as the tarp manufacturer where my lovely Consew resided.

The only history book at the library, makes mention of what a big deal it was when the movie theatre arrived. I don’t remember the year this blessed event occurred, but the movie theatre’s brick outer walls, barely standing to this day, still contained the movie reels and canisters under all the beams and rubble, until removed last month. Below is a picture of what those buildings in 1908 had become by 1950.

Finally, here is the same building row as of this morning:

It feels really good to just touch the Consew and know that for a moment in time, it stands as a testament to history of a small street in a small town in a not so very big world. That’s not too wierd is it?

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You can look for a word from their index of themes and see a picture of it’s use. It is really neat! Now I know what a pipe threader looks like! It will be a good resource for the kids, not only in looking up definitions and seeing what an item looks like, but for creative writing prompts.

http://www.dafont.com
http://www.acidfonts.com/index.html
http://www.smackbomb.com/famousfonts/index.html
http://simplythebest.net/fonts/index.html
http://www.urbanfonts.com
http://www.fontarchive.com/html/category.html