coffee break

At 10:pm??  Yep.  Since I finally have a day where I don't have to get up early, I have just made a cup of coffee that I hope will help me stay up for a while.

Textile Heaven (or Hell) - however you define it
For several days I have been sorting through the stuff I brought home from my mother's apartment - it just goes on and on and on.  I cried over love notes my parents wrote to each other before they were married and laughed at a wonderful photo of my father in a false nose, moustache and glasses at my brother's wedding.  I am wondering what to do with the numerous albums of my first wedding, which I certainly don't need. I have my own -- and now have my parents' and grandparents' duplicates. My children may/may not want them for a variety of reasons.

Then there are the textiles I have rescued and don't know what to do with.

Linen dishtowels in virgin condition from 1963-1971 -- and yes, I have more of them in my own closet.  What possessed us to collect them?  And now what??

 Hankies from the 1940's and 50s.  Who uses them any more?  They are beautiful, fine cotton and they all need to be washed.  There are probably collectors of vintage handkerchiefs but I'm not sure the effort of selling them on ebay is worth the work.

 Silk handkerchiefs: the yellow one, a souvenir from the S.S. Nassau when my parents took a cruise. The one on he left, hand-painted silk with lace edging.  And the one on the right can only be from the ship my mother took to Europe at age 8, when she went to stay in Poland for a year to cure her asthma. What to do with these?

And a huge pile of my Nanny's beautifully embroidered tablecloths. I have a ton of them myself.  My mother used to send them out to the laundry with a "do not use bleach" sign on them.  They came back clean and ironed, for very little money in the 1950's and 60's.  God only knows what they cost to send out nowadays.  I have a bunch I have washed and thought I was going to iron. Uh - no time.  This goes on and on and on.

Cleaning the Studio
I stopped at the studio for five minutes late this morning to pick up a dust mask and some gloves to take on my trip.  Four hours later, I was finally on my way home. I had not been there since April, when I printed the last of the scarves for my class reunion and the place was worse than disaster: it was just plain disgusting.  I washed out containers, completely cleaned off the print table and put down new, white PFD cotton.

I cleared the cutting/ironing table and put down a clean sheet  I folded up all the silk yardage I didn't even remember that I had and put it into a bin, and threw all my unfinished scarves into another bin.  I unearthed some printed cloth that I will take with me as class samples; I vacuumed, and I threw out three bags of trash. Took home a load of sheets and canvas table cover that needed to be washed.

Did not take a photo but I will do so tomorrow when I go back for a few more hours.  A third table, loaded with Thermofax screens, dyes, and other STUFF, needs to be cleaned off and all of that put away somewhere (but where??)  I have drawers full of things I print with - some in triplicate and quadruplicate. I can't bear it - I shall have to throw out the excess and like Noah, get down to two of everything.

This is just the tip of the iceberg. I think when I go back tomorrow I will take my iPad with me.  I bought a bluetooth keyboard for it and it makes all the difference.Almost feels like a real computer -- except that I know Blogger will give me grief when i try to post photos.

We shall see what develops.  Right now, the coffee has done its job: kept me awake long enough to write this and worn off enough so I can fall into bed.