Surprise Surprise

got up early this morning (Bella was pesky and I got tired of shoving her off me... Rosa it made me remember the youtube cat video you posted) anyhow I got busy sewing rags when the phone rang.

It was the dentist telling me that they had a cancellation and since Maddie and I were due for a cleaning would we want to come in at 10:30...She mentioned getting it done before Maddie went back to school. This is what life is like in a small town. I asked her what time it was LOL I do not have a clock in the studio that works.She told me it was 8:30 and that she was surprised I was up. I thought for a minute and decided to just get it over with. I accepted the last minute appointment and walked across the hall to let Maddie know she needed to get up earlier. Grumble Grumble was all I got.

I went back to sewing. First I wound up my two clocks and set them so I would know what time it was. I sort of like the sound of ticking clocks. It is something that you just don't hear much anymore. Anyhow I sewed up a bunch of corduroy rags then woke Maddie up and went downstairs to take my shower.

I went out to get the mail and low and behold there was my package of books from Kat. Ya could have knocked me over with a feather. I really didn't think she had actually sent them. I had finally cracked and sent her a very cranky note on Facebook telling her that I no longer had sympathy for her as an irresponsible teenager but rather a thief and liar. I told her that I knew she had been online that morning and since she chose not to answer my question about the status of the books that she claimed she was going to ship the day before that she was not to be trusted. She wrote right back that she had shipped them that morning.

I opened the package and found to my slight dismay that there were only two of the three books inside. I wrote back to her after my shower and told her about all the places I had found her online and that I would call the other book a wash. I told her I hoped it scared her a little and that she would be more careful online from now on. I also told her that the art's community is small and that she should in future treat people fairly.

She wrote back later that the other book was in the mail and had to be shipped separately. I am not sure why, but I am glad to have gotten the book I really wanted anyhow and to be done with the whole cloak and dagger thing.

Maddie and I went to the dentist.. had good checkups... took two hours... We then stopped at the Outreach resale place in town. I found a pile of ties 4 for a dollar, some hooks and eyes 10 cents a package and a pinking shears for 75 cents. Maddie found a mess of stuff including a wire rack for her ever mounting record collection.

then off to Janesville to drop off her little sewing machine to be repaired. It is the most adorable machine it is a Pink Kenmore and hopefully just needs a tuneup. The lady at the shop said they no longer make Kenmore sewing machine parts so I might have to look for other machines to borrow parts off of. I would love to get it working. I gave it to Maddie a while ago because it was cute and rather small... perhaps a 3/4 size. I bought some thread and sewing machine oil. Maddie wanted to show me the adorable Hello Kitty machine they had for sale. I have to admit it was darned cute. It also was rather cheap and very light. I do not trust machines that are too light.

After that we went to Goodwill and shopped around. Picked up stuff, put it back, found more stuff, kept some, decided against other things. Still came home with too much.

then we went to buy ink at Office Max. I use the Epson with the chairs on it and Maddie needed the fish... no not those fish... the other fish LOL They were having a sale on flash drives so we each picked up another one of those. I recently found out that our new server at school will not be able to be accessed from home so I will need to use the flash drive to move drama files back and forth and sometimes they are rather large.

Last we went to the grocery store and bought some cereal and fresh produce. By then it was 3:00 and we were starving so we stopped at MacDonald's for Happy Meals. Came home and Maddie went straight to bed. I sewed rags some more then decided to blog :)

That is all

Don't mess with the Drama Nazi

For over 70 days I have been doing battle over an EBAY transaction. It all started innocently enough when I wanted to buy Maddie a classic makeup book for her birthday. The book is normally quite expensive so I kept my eye on EBAY and finally won the bid on one for almost half of what it usually goes for.

I really should have known better. If something seems too good to be true it usually is. My first clue was that I had to contact the seller to send me an invoice. I had purchased two other books from her very cheaply (under 2 dollars each) and wanted to combine shipping on them. Three days after the auction I still had not received an invoice and because I did not want a bad rep as a non paying bidder I got her contact information and called her.

I payed for the books and waited. And waited. And Waited! in the meantime I sent several requests for information from her and never received any responses. Finally I saw that my time was running out to file for a dispute so I set that up. Because I had payed though PayPal I needed to go through them. I followed all their instructions and wrote two more e-mails through their dispute form.

Finally she answered that she was so sorry, The books had somehow gone astray and come back to her. However she had moved since then and it had taken all that time to reach her at her current address. She said she would ship the books that Saturday or the following Monday. I was a little puzzled that the books had come back since in over 300 transactions I have never had a package go astray.

Again, being the soul of patience I waited and waited and waited, I sent two more e-mails and got no response. I sent another one through EBAY and got no response. Finally PayPal sent me a message saying if I did not escalate the claim I would run out of time.

I really hate conflict and by this time I realized this was a university drama student who had used her college e-mail account in EBAY and was not checking it. Yes I felt sorry for the girl, but dang it I wanted my books. I did not call her again because I didn't see why I should incur phone charges when she owed me.

PayPal tried to contact her with no success and finally after another couple weeks notified me that they had ruled in my favor and had been able to collect $5.06. Oh now I was mad! I had spent close to $60.00 with that girl and someone was going to get me my books or my money. My friend Susan (the lawyer) offered to yell at her for me, but I told her I would give it one more try.

I called the girl twice with no response and finally went to the computer to see what I could find. Right off the bat I located her Facebook account. Silly people think they can hide. I then used her EBAY user name and Googled it figuring she was not bright enough to use separate name in EBAY from everywhere else. Danged if I wasn't right. I found her Youtube account, her Gaia online comments, and her Gurltalk comments.

I started with Facebook and sent her a rather terse message. Danged if she didn't reply within hours. She still had not sent the books. Some sob story about medical bills, being overdrawn, dropping her cell phone in a drink and not being able to get out of bed.

She was very apologetic and did not sound like a lying brat at all. She thanked me for being so understanding and I wrote back that I was understanding up to a point, that she had had my money for over 70 days now and that she had better get the books sent out on Monday. I just sent another note asking if they had gone out today and she wrote back that she had not been able to get a ride to the post office, but that she had arranged for one tomorrow. I am not sure what to believe anymore

I know she just completed her freshman year as a musical theater major at West Texas A&M, She is currently part of the chorus in a production of TEXAS: the musical, in Canyon Texas in Palo Duro Canyon (not sure how she can be bedridden and still be in that play)I spent quite a bit of time looking through the galleries of the play there and it is a lovely theater out of doors. They even had pictures of the fourth of July parade and I am pretty certain she was marching in it with the rest of the cast. I watched her You Tube expose and found out she was in a bad mountain biking accident which left her with a rather large scar on her shoulder blade. Her real name is listed along with her picture in the cast of the show and there are seven or eight portrait pictures on her Facebook page. I know her home town and the name of her high school

Today, with a little help from Maddie I located her My Space page too.

Frankly it is a little distressing to see how much information I have been able to discover about this girl in only a few days and I reminded Maddie again about how careful she needs to be when she puts information online.

We shall see if Kat sends me my books, but if I do not hear from her, I might just be popping up in places she does not want to see me. I am pretty sure that she never mailed the books in the first place. I was just not too big a priority in her world. I believe her about medical bills and think that is why she was selling her books. She will not use my money however without some kind of penalty. I have dealt with a great many actors and I think I can take this one!

The Play's the Thing

Tuesday (Puck’s birthday) we went to see our second play in Spring Green. Coincidentally it was Midsummer Night’s Dream, which of course features Puck the fairy. It was fun to take a him to that play. It was a fabulous production. Unfortunately only Puck and I could sit together, but Maddie sat in the front row and got to see the show very close up. She enjoyed it immensely and did not care that she sat with strangers. They set the play contemporary, but the fairies were in fanciful costumes as well as the players when they did Pyramis and Thisbe. Our Milliner friend Michael made very creative masks for all the characters. Puck was not too thrilled about the modern costumes but it got me to wondering if during Shakespeare's time they would have dressed in Greek costume or contemporary Elizabethan costume. I do not know enough about the history of Shakespearean production. Perhaps someone can answer that for me. The house was packed and we gave them a standing ovation, something that Puck and I rarely rise to.

On a side note we have been listening to Virginia Woolf's "Orlando" in the car and enjoying it quite a bit. I have never read any of her books. I may have to listen to the tape again, but the language is beautiful, the story interesting and the reader is very good.

The weather here is hot, hot, hot and humid. Humid. Humid. The mosquitoes will carry you off if you stay outside for a second. It is good to stay inside. Today is the start of our local tobacco heritage festival and Puck did a bicycle clinic at the library. I just saw the sign and it says "Featuring Puck W., the coolest sub at the middle school" that made me laugh.

There was also a used book sale that the Friends of the library put on and Maddie and I stood in line waiting for it to open at 8:00 along with the book guys I have seen there for 9 years. We were missing a couple of the regulars. Maddie headed over to the mysteries and I went over to the books on tape and the videos. Frankly I am pretty well saturated with reading material and do not need the temptation to buy more books.

Maddie is a big fan of several mystery writers. Dean Koontz, Patricia Cornwell, Laurence Sanders, She made up a spread sheet of their booklists with her own collection marked off and printed that off to take to the sale. She filled up three cloth bags of books, mostly paperbacks along with 4 lps.

I found three books on tape. "The Reader" by Bernhard Schlink, "You Suck" by Christopher Moore, and Southern Cross by Patricia Cornwell. I am trying to avoid abridged versions of stories so had to pass up a whole bunch, but I think these will be fun.

I also picked up a mess of videos. they had a ton and it was difficult to wade through them. I may go back after they are better picked over, but I got Small Time Crooks","Introducing Dorothy Dandridge", "A Chorus Line", "The Hurricane", "A Murder of Crows", "The Cook, The Thief, his Wife and Her Lover" (this one I have seen and thought Maddie might enjoy)"Remains of the Day","Johnny Got His Gun", and "Chinatown" I also bought "Wocket in my Pocket" and a book of Movie Monsters. All this for under 10 dollars. Pretty good deal I would say.

Maddie and I went garage sale hopping since it was city wide sales today too. She picked up all manner of odd things including some old bottles (her downfall) some jewelry,a rather large hunting knife, a leather punch and some clothing. I bought some jewelry and some storage drawers. I showed great restraint LOL

Dyeing and Felting

Been spending most of my time since the show dying wool and felting wool balls. I got one nice batch of pinks and reds finished and they are now drying in the basement. I have dyed a lime green, bright blue, rust, purple, reg blue, and grassy green so far and hope to do a couple more if the wool holds out. The picture shows some of the colors I have done and my pile of decorator colors that I use to apply patterns to the balls. I have to do the balls now since they take so long to dry then it will be on to weaving again.

The other big project is one that I have been wanting to do for years. As I take apart old clothes I have saved the labels and now have a rather nice collections of clothing labels in an amazing variety. I have wanted to make a sign for my tent using the labels and low and behold when I got my new tent it has a plastic banner holder along with an awning which was another thing on my list of things to do.
anyhow I sewed labels onto a piece of canvas and then cut letters out of felt... I wish I could find good wool felt, but it is hard to come by so I settled for the craft stuff at JoAnn Fabrics. I knew the letters would not stand out on their own so I blanket stitched around each of them in black embroidery floss. My stitching is rather uneven and I stabbed myself pretty good trying to push through the canvas, but it came out quite nice. I even think it will show up on the front of the tent. Someday I want to make a sort of swing coat and cover it with my remaining collection of labels, but that must wait a while. Oh yes my business name is Web Works by the way



The other big news at our house is that Maddie finally got her drivers license. She has not driven the car since, but at least that is done!

Our raspberries have started producing but the mosquitoes are so terrible I hesitate to even leave the house. I think I will spray down and go out tomorrow to pick and hope I am not too late.

Well that just about covers things... we did watch a few movies over the past couple days. Yippee for the library. Finally saw Juno (really loved it and want the sound track, both Puck and I were so surprised to find that it was set in Minnesota) The Holiday (was ok love story, nothing too special) and No Country for Old Men (not really sure what the big hoopla was about that movie and hated the ending)

Well I guess I better go check my latest batch of wool or fluff up some more or wind up some more balls .. it just never stops

So I suppose I am due for an update

As I mentioned someplace I spent both my anniversary and birthday weaving like crazy to get ready for my Spring Green Show. That is all. Puck and I decided to get each other season tickets for APT in Spring Green where our friend Michael is a milliner. He can get us a discount so we ended up getting three season tickets for the family.

Puck loaded up the van on those two days and assessed our water damage, most of which was mildew. Some of that was pretty bad and for a brief moment we could not locate one of the side panels. I finally found it tucked under some stuff in the wheelbarrow. All the side panels and the canopy though are in terrible shape. I have been using that tent for 14 years now and it is showing it's age.

I had planned on purchasing side panels after the show if I made any money, but they were so bad that I started searching online to see what they would cost. I finally ran across a site that was having a closeout sale. Of course they advertised that the sale was going to end at midnight that night. I have not gone back again to see if that was a scam. I was tired and frustrated with all the problems and Puck could tell. It turned out that buying a whole new tent complete with canopy and side panels was cheaper than just buying the individual replacement parts so he told me to just go for it. It was good of him to acknowledge my frustration. I do get positively inhuman when a show is coming up.

I ordered the tent and felt a great weight lifted.

Maddie and I went down to Spring Green on Friday to set up the display. This is the first year they have allowed us to do that and despite the extra gas it was much better than leaving two hours earlier in the morning and having to wrestle our way into our spot to set up. We got it done in record time and secured and weighted all the canopies. We walked down to Michael's house to fill some jugs with water to weight down the tent a little more and Maddie showed him some of the projects she was working on.

She is just getting into Steam Punk and had picked up a fantastic real beaver felt hat dumpster diving at the college theater. The crown was separated from the body of the hat though and she needed some advice on how to properly repair it. Michael had lots of good ideas. She also had some other things she had designed and wanted to know how to make.

We got our water, weighted down the tent and made plans to meet him in the morning when we finished setting up.

Next day was good. Got everything set up and business was brisk. It was my first day ever accepting credit cards and that was a harrowing adventure for me. You really need a lot of information when you are a small business owner who only has a Knucklebuster to rely on. Puck had gotten me an old one at one of the bike shops that was going out of business. Thank heavens my customers were patient. We had intermittent rain throughout the day, but people were still shopping and I had my best weekend ever. Yippee!!

Maddie's boyfriend came to see her at the show so they were off wandering for a while and by the time they got back I really needed to pee :) His folks came back a little early because of weather warnings and a little hail. The wind picked up so much that Maddie and I both had to hang onto the tent for dear life. I went over to the hardware store and bought some rope and zipties and tied the tent to the display.. The rugs are pretty heavy thank goodness. A couple potters had the wind catch their displays and crash them. When that happens at an art fair you can hear the sympathetic groans from every vendor in the place and there were almost 200 of us. Michael said he had heard that 15 vendors were unable to come because they had lost their stock to flood damage. We have been hard hit in the area.

Sunday was cool and a lot less windy. I had my best Sunday ever with steady customers all day. In total I sold 40 rugs and over a hundred wool balls. A very good show for me. Maddie and friend Michael and I packed up in record time and headed for home. Good to be done with that first show of the year

The next day the tent came in. Maddie and I set it up. I have been trying for years to figure out how to make an awning for my tent and lo and behold this one came with one. That was an excellent surprise. It also came with a clear plastic sleeve to put a banner into. That was another thing I have wanted to do for a long time. I am very happy so far with my new tent.

Spent a few days trying to get my credit card purchases entered, but after three days of talking to customer service people we finally got things straightened out and they went through. What a hassle!!

Wednesday I had a lunch appointment with some friends to celebrate my birthday. We all met at the Olive Garden and had a roaring good time. Several times the wait people commented on how much fun we were having. I did a little Goodwill shopping and bought some plastic bins with my birthday money from my Father in law .. I am slowly trying to get all my fabric and costumes in clear plastic bins so that I can keep better track of things. I figure I have another 6 years before that job is done.

The next item of business was cleaning. My step-mom and best friend Jan (she is only three months older than me) was coming for a visit and needed to sleep in Maddie's room.

Maddie has been doing steam shovel cleaning since school left out, but there was much yet to do. She ended up hauling four large trash bags full of garbage out of the room and we put 6 of those computer paper boxes of mementos and beanie babies up into the attic. There were also three or four large trash bags of miscellaneous things that went to the Outreach.

I took care of the downstairs and that was enough. Jan drove down on Friday and stayed until Sunday. Friday Maddie was singing with the Beloit Symphony orchestra for a fourth of July thing so Jan and I went down to that. The concert was good. Maddie was part of a small choir which only sang with a few numbers so she came out and sat with us for the rest of the concert. They ended with the 1812 overture and then the fireworks went off. It was very cool and a fabulous display. There were fireworks going off in other locations in Beloit too so we were sort of surrounded.

The park is right on the overflowing Rock river so there had been some question about whether it would be dry enough there, but it turned out beautiful.

Friday night Jan reminded us about the card game Hand and Foot, which we used to play with her and dad and all our friends way back when we lived in River Falls. She refreshed my memory of the game and we taught Maddie to play. That was so much fun.

Next day Puck was added to the mix around noon when all those people got up. I have always been the first one up to make the coffee and check my mail. Puck got a call from work that he was not needed so we played a marathon game of Hand and Foot. Puck won one game and I won another. Maddie left the game at 10:30 to go to bed and the three of us played until almost 2:00 am. It was a blast.

We all went to bed exhausted. Maddie had to work at 6:00 am so she was out of the house and coming back home just about when we were getting up. We visited for a little while and Jan left for Minneapolis a little after noon. Later in the day Maddie's boyfriend came over and I made him learn the card game. Maddie slaughtered us and I stupidly wanted a rematch later. She killed me twice more. I humbly and a little crabbily went to bed.

Whew... now I am back to weaving and felting for the rest of the summer. My last three shows are in August.