Fashioning My Cyber Microcosm: The Seamstress of Spooky Things.

For many of us, Hallowe'en is an important time.

It's sometimes as simple as the time of year to deck out or pads with things that will remain up for the rest of the year.
For me, it's a little bit of spiritual, a little bit of decorative flair, and lots of fun!

Unfortunately this year I feel like I haven't lived up to the "Halloweenie" title that has been bestowed upon me by my family and coworkers.

I haven't bought anything but Hallowe'en fabric this year, and the decorations that are up (the meager ones at that) were very last minute with a very small budget-- we're talking $20 at Dollartree, kinda budget. I didn't even get a pumpkin to carve...

I was working on a pretty exciting costume that I likely wasn't ever going to wear; first because I've never in my life been invited to the kind of gatherings that require dressing up, secondly I don't think there is a place in this new town that actually does something adult friendly that I could just waltz into.

Regardless of all those things, I was very excited to be working on a costume for once, but my machine had other plans... plans of not working properly anymore. I was forced to stop, pack 'er up and ship it away to get repaired. Thankfully it's only costing me the price of packing supplies, as it is still under the extended warranty.

So, I wanted to participate in Professor Z's monthly assignment, but the only place that is Halloweenie in my home is my creative laboratory, and even that is a work in progress.
Without further ado, I welcome you to my newest lab of excitements...

Here we have the view as you walk in. You might notice that I have the crappiest curtains ever to befall a place of creativity... that's going to change when my machine gets back to tip top shape. The only thing helping those awful curtains is the paper bat I purchased at Target, and some spooky windchimes I got at Dollar General.

Turning to the left you'll see my nook where my fabric, ironing station, scraps and other miscellaneous are kept.

You're quite lucky to be observing a closer look, because I've only just recently bolted all my fabric up and organized it by theme. I fear that if it had stayed in its past chaos the impact might not have made an impression. Each bolt carries an average of 2.5 yards-- the most holding 12 yards. I worry that one day that shelf will collapse under the weight of all that fabric... and this is a baby stash by many seamtress' standards. The taller bolts are shoved into the left cranny which cannot be seen clearly from this point of view. The boxes on the right carry more fabric, but are the ones that have very little use for my daily purposes. I ran out of bolts before I could finish the rest, thus the very top shelf is just neatly folded into meticulous piles, averaging about a 1 yard a bundle.

Most of it is, as you might've guessed, Hallowe'en themed.

Turning to the right wall, we can see my small stash of patterns, my various wood pressing aids, and a mini altar. It may sound like I'm bragging, but a genuine "trouble" (if you can call it that) of mine is my persistent flow of ideas, I have to temper it with meditation, thus I light an incense on my altar to create a sense of peace and focus whenever I am in there, because it is all too easy to get overwhelmed by all the things I want to make. Upon the altar there is various part of a deer (antler, vertebrae, skull) that were collected for me; to me the deer represents wisdom and tranquility. There is also a small jar of black riverstones that represent temperance and patience. It might not be the right representations, but they instill that within me and ultimately that's all that matters. I had all these in the past, but it never until moving here occurred to me to build an altar in my creative laboratory-- the place where it seems to make the most sense!

Moving along the wall, past my machine(s) table, we have the other side of the wall shelf. There is no altar upon this wall, but in some respects not any less special to me. Many of the trinkets and items were small gifts from friends and family all together adorning the shelves that hold many of my tools of the trade. You see that dalamation plush at the top there? That's Charlie, and he's as old as I am, and he still barks after all this time-- I can remember talking to Charlie as a child, whispering my wishes into his ear. I still do, from time to time.

To the right again, we see my handmade scissor shelf. sporting a few of the things that I bought/made/have been given. Below it, is a pegboard I framed in order to hang my bountiful array of rulers... but neglected to take a good photo of.

Next we pan out to see the right side of the room, which isn't much to discuss as it it simply a shelf for stabilizers, paddings, and whatnots. A shelf for all my sewing books, and of course my cutting table (which is really my dinning table that has been recently confiscated by me). You can't really tell but those lights lining it are litte purple bat lights.

You can see the lights just a tiny bit better from this photo-- these were given to me by my good friend from back in AZ. But you do get a good shot of two of my recent decorative purchases, the jack o'lantern rug procured in Target and the bat towel on my chair from K-mart. I put my knit hood onto the chair to make it that more batty... the material of the chair made it impossible to be comfortable, so that's really why I covered it all over.

Now that I've made this sufficiently long and windy... I think I'll end this post here, and hope that your Hallowe'en was a fabulous one!