It’s delicious.

I don’t want to say much about it yet, but if you’d like to read the first chapter, you can find it at The New Yorker. Another chapter was also published in The New Yorker, but I don’t know that it stands on its own. Just buy the book. And then set aside as many long sessions of reading as you can manage. It’s hard to put down.

I am currently suffering from that unsettling mental state that occurs after closing a book that’s occupied you for some time. Despite the fact that the characters lean towards the officious, self-involved and occasionally downright absurd, I already miss them. Fortunately Barnes & Noble was kind enough to send me an email today with a link to a video interview with Franzen, which has scratched the itch. Here’s twelve minutes of Franzen on writing for your viewing pleasure:

Franzen on Freedom

Interwebs Randomness and Other Inspiring Tales: Super Bowl Bacon Cheese Turtleburger.

via Humerus, via Editorial License

File under “I wish I’d thought of that!”

swissmiss | Calendar Scarf.

On my to-watch list is this documentary about artists and scientists who are professional origami masters. And the film’s website has a quick little quiz that shows you an unfolded piece along with three possible outcomes. See how well you do!

BETWEEN THE FOLDS | Quiz: Match the Origami Folds | Independent Lens | PBS.

Click for a closer view

You know what I loved as a kid? Shrinky Dinks. I think they were second only to stained-glass suncatchers as a crafty activity. Why was I so drawn to crafts that required melting stinky plastic in the toaster oven?

Many years later, I’ve discovered Shrinky Dinks again, thanks to Etsy and the blogosphere, although now that I’m a grown-up I’m probably supposed to refer to the material as “shrink plastic.” These Etsy sellers make lovely rings, and these two sites demonstrate how supposedly easy it is to make them. Can you see where this is going?

I have now spent three two-hour naptimes playing around with shrink plastic (in addition to several hours sourcing materials and scouring the web for tutorials), and this is what I’ve learned so far:

• Grafix inkjet shrink plastic does not work very well.
• Shrinky Dinks brand inkjet shrink plastic works considerably better. I bought the opaque white.
• Neither is much fun during the shaping process. You have about four seconds to work with the hot plastic before it hardens, and it’s nearly impossible to get any control if you’re wearing oven mitts. So I took them off. Plastic gloves were useless. One could probably use the thin cotton gloves used in darkrooms, but I can’t find ours. My fingers feel just the tiniest bit burned.
• Take off any metal bracelets before you go sticking your arms repeatedly into a hot oven.
• A toaster over would probably be easier, as it contains the heat in a smaller area and you could work on the counter right in front of the oven. But we have a pop-up toaster.
• You can reheat your project a few times before it gets discolored and cranky. The Grafix shrink plastic showed more damage quickly and the image deteriorated.

Click for a closer view. That's my fifth-anniversary ring on the bottom. It's wood and titanium.

Even under the best conditions, my rings did not end up smooth and round and lovely. Even when all the parts lined up properly and I was able to form the ends quickly around a wooden dowel, the rings look wonky. If you look at the shrink plastic rings on Etsy, they tend to look great from the front and uneven from the top. They are also really light and feel like, well, plastic. This makes them fun, but not really sale-able. I had been hoping this would be my quick-and-easy craft for my annual local craft fair, but that is just not going to happen.

If you’re feeling experimental and resourceful, however, see what you can make from your scraps. I had a box of straight sewing pins nearby and discovered that little flowers make charming pin heads! I had much more fun drawing these little freehand flowers with a sharpie and coloring them in with colored pencils. They bake up in seconds and require no shaping. I also tried printing flower images onto the inkjet plastic; those are the larger ones. They’re cute, too, but I like the freehand flowers better. So there’s my silver lining.

pins!

If you have ideas as to what else I can make with my shrink plastic, please leave them in the comments! I have a few more sheets of the opaque white inkjet and 10 sheets of frosted non-inkjet. (I plan to sell/trade the rest of the Grafix inkjet sheets, so if you’re interested even after my lukewarm review, let me know. Maybe others have had great success with them?)

Two weeks ago we visited friends at their country house upstate. This upholstery fabric just kept saying “table runner,” and something about “country house” insisted “table runner” as well, and so I made this lovely table runner with matching coasters. It’s about 4 feet long and the panels to the left are all blues.

Another custom order of two pincushions became three because that’s what you do when your mother likes your stuff. (In general, I tend to include little presents in with my orders.) I’ve started packaging them in handmade origami boxes and plan to update my Etsy listings with photos of the boxed pincushions. I still love this design and would make nothing else…except they aren’t selling. That’s okay – I will use them!

Also completed: one green striped cotton knit hat, one mustard and teal striped wool knit hat, six tassels and a bunch of quick capes for preschool. As fall approaches, I’m starting to knit again. Can’t wait to finish a pair of gloves (Ravelry link) – for me!

One can even purchase a complete stationery kit for tarting up your own beautiful correspondence with the charming Carrotflower font.

You can check out her web site, Tart Workshop, or her blog, where she displays some of her custom illustration work.

And look at this sweet little signature she sent me. Thanks, Tart Workshop!

The September issue of Martha Stewart Living arrived this weekend, and I’ll confess that the first thing I do is turn to the Crafts section. This month: one tiny tutorial for tassels. And here I am with a bag of yarn ends and neglected novelty yarns languising in the closet. So I’ve made six tassels today: two in green bamboo, two in rayon ladder yarn and two silk (if I recall correctly – this was one of the very first yarns I purchased seven years ago. It’s lovely stuff, but completely useless for knitting).

Now what am I going to do with them?

Roosevelt Island fascinates me. Currently a car-free community to about 12,000 residents, this small island in the East River has previously housed a prison and an insane asylum, but now serves as home mostly to Manhattan office workers.

Wired has a fascinating photo essay on the pneumatic trash system used to keep the island free of garbage-collection trucks. The only other system of its kind in the U.S. is used at Disney World. Europe and Asia, of course, are full of such progressive systems.

New York City’s Trash-Sucking Island | Gadget Lab | Wired.com.

Some of the listings in my Etsy shop are expiring soon, and so I’ve put them on sale. If they don’t sell, they will be going to Petunia as well, and I expect they’ll be priced much higher there, so consider this an insider tip!