New Link

Dear Reader,
I have added a new link to my list just in time for the Oscar broadcast on Sunday. He is the Manolo the Super Fantastic Shoe Blogger. Manolo has the taste of the fashion and will amuse and enlighten you the reader, and encourage your increased use of the article the.
While you are visiting his many sites and fantasizing along with him over the David Hasselhoff, I will be working on making my studio presentable for visitors.

I have received an email from a gal who lives here in my small town of Cary IL, who is interested in becoming a quilter, and she has some girlfriends who are also interested. They are crafters, they say, but they like stuff that I like and they like my stuff. I am going to invite them to my house tomorrow and show them my stuff.
I always say that your work is your ambassador and it appeals to the sort of people who would like you and whom you would like. This will be the test.

I am always open to sharing my work and encouraging newbies. I am also delighted to connect with gals that live at this end of the valley. I live North and all my friends live South. I have to drive through the narrow traffic zone of Algonquin IL to visit my friends. They so hate this bottleneck that they find every excuse known to woman to avoid having to come to my house. I have to trick my friends into coming here by offering them elaborate gourmet lunches. Sometimes even that doesn't work. I know my friends love me, but only so far as they don't have to make that drive.
It would be nice to have friends close enough to walk to.

There is a house half way down the next block that has a large quilt hanging in its enclosed front porch. It is a traditional bed quilt, and I have considered knocking on the door and introducing myself.
"Hi, I'm a quilter and wonder if you are too, since you have a quilt hanging there on the south wall facing the blazing sun and getting more faded every minute that it hangs there." Hmm. Not a good approach.
How about, "Hi, I'm a quilter and see you have a quilt hanging there, uh, and I wonder if uh, you are interested in quilts that are not bed quilts?"
Geesh. How lame.
Or "Hi, I am a quilter looking for friends who live close enough to walk to."
Could I sound more desperate?

It's no wonder that I know no one in my neighborhood after living here for 16 years. I am the weirdest person that could possibly inhabit this town. I have no kids, so no connection with zillions of young families here, I am not going to any of the churches here, so I won't be meeting the flocks who attend, I don't have a dog, so there won't be any casual conversations at the park, I am a devoted Democrat living in the most conservative county in IL, the only one that actually had a majority for Alan Keyes, would you believe it?

I am lucky to have the girlfriends I have. And I am lucky to have you dear reader.