I made this skirt from some yardage I had in my stash, bought years ago in a thrift store. The lining fabric was also from my hoard, as was the interfacing and thread. I did have to buy the zipper – for 75 cents.

I used a Burda magazine pattern but because the panels were too large for my fabric I drafted a version with 6 smaller panels instead of 2 large. That worked out really well. I alternated the grain direction and the fabric hangs beautifully.

I can’t decide whether the skirt looks cute or like drapery. M likes it; my jury’s still out.

I was woken by the sound of rain during the night, and this morning dawned gray and dreary. M had on the local news and the weatherman promised clear skies by midday, but I didn’t believe him. On a rainy morning it is impossible to believe in sunny afternoons; they are too opposite.

The weather is thankfully immune to my faith in it and this afternoon was blue sky and leafy shadows.

As I’m typing I can hear the imam’s call to prayer from the mosque up the hill. This morning, as I made the bed, I heard church bells. Not opposites, despite how it might seem these days.

The best way to spend a Sunday.

Or any day really.

I have lovely news to share; I just shipped a grouping of my jewelry to Jerry Szor Contemporary Jewelry in Dallas, Texas.

My designs have been in stores before, but as part of a design partnership. This is the first time that a buyer has chosen my work purely on its own merits. I’m absolutely delighted, and feel honored that my work will sit alongside jewelry by several of my favorite designers: Gabriella Kiss and John Iversen.

If you live in the Dallas area, check out the store!

I made a second pair of pants with the pattern in Sew U. Green again; the softest corduroy this time.

Please forgive the prominence of my behind in this picture; I’m exceptionally proud of the buttonholes on the faux pocket flaps. And the poor lighting is due to my demanding to have a picture taken right now. (You were right, dear, there was too much glare.)

My sewing machine is a vintage Singer cabinet model from the ’40s. It’s a workhorse, and a gorgeous thing, but it only sews straight: forward and back. When I bought it (for $25) the drawers were full of extra parts, including a monstrous-looking buttonhole attachment in its box with its original manual, copyright 1946.

The thing works! It shoves the fabric side-to-side and then reverses back on itself to make the buttonhole.

It’s insane. And glorious.

I was meeting a friend uptown and arrived early so I walked a little along the reservoir in Central Park. There were lots of skinny people in high tech running gear, talking on cell phones, their ipods in their other hands.

The sky and water looked glum, which is how I’ve been feeling. Like I’ve fallen down and lost my way a little. I know that my mood will change, same as the weather; I want it to happen soon.

When I stepped out for lunch yesterday, this is what I saw:

I’ve been feeling challenged by our new neighborhood. In New York you can move a couple of miles and be in a different world. And I am.

Our part of Crown Heights is mainly Caribbean and the corner stores carry unfamiliar foods: stacks of dried fish, pickled meats in open buckets, eight kinds of yam, as well as roots I don’t recognize. Things smell strange to me, and I don’t feel at home.

Last Saturday we were plopped on the couch, watching TV, when we heard gun shots. I turned to M and said “There’s nothing else that sounds like that, right?” When we looked out the window there were people hanging out on the street corner, chatting. Some cops ran by. Street life continued. End of story.

When I traveled in Italy, I kept trying to figure out whether the people yelling in the street were fighting. I’m doing the same thing here, struggling to understand what the street life dynamics are. I don’t so much feel unsafe as unskilled. I don’t understand what’s going on around me, I can’t read the signs, it’s as if I don’t know the language, and I can’t quite relax.

A friend told me that in every place she’s moved to – “EVERY place”, she repeated – she has felt like she’s made a terrible mistake and simply won’t be able to tolerate living there.

I don’t feel that way. I love the apartment, and there’s no question that it was the right choice to move here. But I can’t stop vigilantly attempting to understand what is going on around me. I want to make the pieces of this new world fit so that I can file them away and stop paying attention. I think it’s going to take me a while, like learning a new language.

A few things are seeing the light of day.

I’m enjoying my familiar objects, even while they’re stacked up waiting to find their proper place.

I reaaaaally want to make something, but all my stuff – beads, yarn, fabric – is in boxes. And that would entail unpacking, which would require moving furniture into place, which is heavy and frustrating and feels like that game where you move the little squares around to make a picture. Pfft. Forget that. I’ll just weave through the piles to get to my computer and read happy crafty blogs all day.

Today’s find was the nerd and the needles, and yummy pictures of traditional Norwegian mittens.

I want to knit those little people soooo bad. Might have to go unpack a box…