Just a girl with a dream

I have been watching a sewing machine on Kmart.com that is on sale and is also on sale at the store. Tomorrow night is Kmart's Friends and Family night and since I work for Sears and Kmart is owned by Sears Holding so my discount applies. Mark, the love of my life, has promised me an early Christmas present. A shiny new Kenmore sewing machine to replace the evil hunk of metal I currently cuss at.

When we purchased the one I have now it sewed like a dream, and then, something happened. This machine is one we can not figure out who it was made by. There are no defining numbers, marks or a name on it. The manual is no help either, just a very basic manual. One I should have read more thoroughly when I was trying to figure how to make it zig zag. I set all the dials and buttons and nothing. Re-read the instructions and way down at the bottom in tiny print it says "Don't do this before you do that or you will break the something something". Ah, well, I see, now I have broken the something something. I can deal with that. There are ways around not having a zig zag stitch I can still sew a straight line.

I got along nicely for a while, completed a new robe for Mark and a couple of other little projects and then clunk a nest of loops, sew fine for eight inches and clunk another nest of loops. I adjusted the tensions, re-threaded, cleaned out the bobbin area, nothing helped. A 30 minute hat project took me over two hours of seam ripping and sewing very, very, very slowly.

Mark must have decided he better do something to appease me after being met with curse words, tears and then grumpy silence. He knew I was a girl with a dream of perhaps one day, maybe, selling some of my bits at Craft Saturday and some of the shows held at the Iowa State Fairgrounds and Adventureland. And then, and then, who knows, maybe infinity and beyond!

Just a girl with a dream. But first I have to get a sewing machine that actually works correctly.

Wish me luck, I will need it because my luck will run foul and that sewing machine will either go off sale or it will have been sold from the store before I get there.

Jon Gariepy, Artist and my Father

This is my Dad, Jon Gariepy

He is one of the coolest guys I know. He brought to me a love of art in many forms. When I was a kid growing up I knew a visit with my Father would involved something to do with the arts. A haircut, my Father is a hair designer, a trip to the Laguna Beach Art Festival, watching him add split shingles in the condo in Tahoe, a Monet art exhibit, watching him photograph a still life papier mache' "picnic" out on the brick path he laid himself, going to a documentary of surfers doing what they do best, catching a wave and riding the tube. So many things....

I am no where near as good as him in painting, drawing or ceramic sculpture as pictured here. Matter of fact I really suck at it. My artiness took me in a different direction. I went in a crafty direction. I re-purposed old mason jars and garage sale furniture with paint. Boxes of bowling pins from friends that owned a bowling alley into people with air dry clay and rigid wrap. While I enjoyed making those things, I was a bit embarrassed to tell him that's what I did because I didn't think of it as "art". He asked me one time if I was doing anything and I said no, just some craft stuff. He said, "well, that's art. You're being creative and that's what art is all about."

Yeah, my Dad is one cool guy. He work is just as cool as he is. I love his style. It's unique and makes me smile. It's comfortable. If I wasn't his daughter I would definitely buy a piece or two. A ship or a car or the Russian Icon... (hint, hint, hint)

My art has turned a new direction, I'm still re-purposing things from garage sales and the Goodwill, now it's mainly clothing and cigar box purses, but I do have my eye on some old snow skis for a winter scene for the front yard. I have taken up sewing and I am almost as bad at it as I was in high school, but I am getting better with practice. I have more patience now for it, unless my forty year old, twenty-five dollar sewing machine isn't having one of it's fits.

I'll just keep doing the things I love, because I am my Father's daughter as my Mom always tells me.

Is this thing on?

Wow! That's a big header.

Right. Now. What to do?

*Still doing some decorating here since I am unfamiliar with Blogger.
*Move all two things from the old blog.
*Try to write on a more consistent basis since I am easily swayed by new shiny things. Errr, wasn't that the whole point of the blog; writing about the new shiny things?

If anyone other than me reads this, yes, I do talk to myself.