Category Archives: Arts & Crafts

Irregular ren-ditions / 2

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A collection of links and information from recent journeys through life and the internet. Irregular describes the schedule and the path.


A Century of Dining Out – So if you miss eating out as much as you did pre-pandemic here’s a treat. Peruse menus from 1841 – 1941. You can admire them for the art or for the dinner faire. There are menus for restaurants and banquets. Be sure to check out the Broiled Squirrels a la Maitre d’Hotel at the Fifth Annual Reunion of the Railroad Conductors’ Life Insurance Company. For a deeper dive check out the other Grolier Club Online Exhibitions. Thanks to Paul for sharing a link to the Magazines and the American Experience Exhibition which I originally intended to highlight here.

All Aboard! –  get these free sample train coloring pages from the Dover Coloring Book series. I used to sell lots of the nature related ones and the best thing about them was they usually included a permission statement on the first page for copying for personal or classroom use. You can sign up to regularly get these samples somewhere, but you’ll have to explore the Dover site for that. I have saved far too many of these files by right clicking on the coloring page and saving it to my computer. You can just print the .jpg file out or paste it into a Word page so you can easily manipulate the size. You can get more at http://www.coloringbookday.com/ .

Audubon’s Birds of America at Bowdoin College – One of the silver linings to the COVID disaster is that fascinating on-line opportunities have proliferated from colleges, non-profits, and individuals. Bowdoin college has these and some pre-covid recordings to watch in it’s page-turning events. It’s probably enough to say I was attracted by the idea that each event shows a page of Audubon’s double Elephant folio (that’s a BIG book), but what got us there on March 5 was an opportunity to hear our friend, Scott Weidensaul share the story of the book, Birds of Maine. His presentation will appear there if it hasn’t already.

Emerson and his Friends – The story went something like this when a customer noticed the Emerson pins available at the Walden Pond gift shop where a friend of mine works. He asked, “How about pins for Lake and Palmer?” With all my study of Emerson lately I completely forgot about them. Seriously, the link takes you to a Royal Albert Hall performance. I missed one of their performances at the Rock Festival at the Pocono Raceway in 1972 (I do have a limited double album vinyl press their performance released in 2019). My girlfriend at the time took me as a graduation present but storms and technical problems extended the concert to well past when we could stay with ELP playing at dawn the next day. I finally got to see Palmer a couple years ago after both Emerson and Lake left us. He played a short set before Todd Rundgren and Yes and I would have rather he kept playing rather than Todd for sure and even Yes. You can get an inkling of his performance starting at 1:01:48 in the Albert Hall Performance. Funny, my favorite was always Emerson, but I have a new appreciation for Palmer as well as Lake through his performance in several concerts available on youtube and his solo of one of my favorite ELP songs, You Turn Me On.

Irregular ren-ditions

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A collection of links and information from recent journeys through life and the internet. Irregular describes the schedule and the path. It’s a sort of occasional Magical Mystery Tour that helps me share these links as well as preserve them for myself.

Fasnacht with cup cheese. An annual specialty for me from my great grandmother’s traditions.

Today in History, February 17 – The House of Representatives, breaking a tie in the Electoral College brought an end to one of the most acrimonious presidential campaigns in U.S. history and resolved a serious Constitutional crisis.  I learn lots of things from the Library of Congress. Most come by way of email lists I have subscribed to or the inevitable rabbit holes they lead me down. Since there is a somewhat, I believe, false lull in the political turmoil (at least by comparison of the past four years, this link struck me. It sounds too much like today though it refers to 1801. You’ll have to click on it to see who the declared winner was.

Virtual Woodworking Show – In January of 2020 I finally got to travel to the Woodworking Show in Timonium Maryland after missing it because of work even though I worked in the area very close to when it was held. I traveled with Mike and his wife Lois from our scrollsaw club unaware that he would die just two months later. It was a good day. This year the show is virtual and stretches over all the weekends in March. Visiting the vendors is the best part and free. Classes cost a little something but are worth it.

Perseverance – Seeing a live space event, like the landing of the Mars Lander Perseverance on February 18 can still bring tears to my eyes. Being a part of these great explorations is pretty amazing these days watching it live from the Jet Propulsion Lab control room via my iPad. With this link the adventure can continue as you can virtually follow the rover around mars. I’m sure there will be additional Reflection links for the Mars Helicopter that rode along and of course pictures.

Bang – Whether they truly were “America’s answer to Black Sabbath” or a misfire, Bang was a Philadelphia group I discovered browsing the LP bins in the early seventies when an interesting dust jacket would result in a purchase. I rediscovered that they still have an internet presence with some free ringtone downloads if you’re into that kind of thing. Maybe it’s time I abandon the old man ringtone I have… a ringing phone. And on YouTube there are some songs from the album like The Queen.

Emerson’s Complete Works – In 12 volumes that you can read online or download from the Internet Archive. This search gives you a complete matching set from the Boston Public Library.

Common Press Model

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I finally finished repairing the Common Press model that I bought on eBay. When I purchased it there were some pieces missing and it was assembled incorrectly. Actually it was designed incorrectly with the frame being reversed. The leg to the far left was turned to the right and intruded into the space where a printer would stand. When I looked up pictures of the same model on the internet this was the way all were assembled, so I assumed it was perhaps the design of a press I was unfamiliar with. That part was broken loose from the rest of the press and I even glued it that way at first, but became less and less happy with it and decided to break it loose and reverse it to be assembled as shown. The finish on it is inconsistent, but rather than restore it fully by removing the finish and starting over I decided I liked the “used” look instead. I did much of the retouching and the staining of the new parts I added with a brown magic marker which I even described to the Scrollsaw Club members as cheating, but the result worked in the end, I think. I reversed the screw a bit so that it doesn’t actually press on the tympan, but there was some damage present because the small range of motion prevented it from being fully withdrawn. The last part was to tie the strings to facilitate cranking the bed back and forth.

RR Tracks Background

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Another photo you can use as a background on your computer. I’m using some of my creative time to clean out a very crowded folder of these that I have on my computer.

Railroad tracks in Christiana, PA. Photographed by me 10.28.19

To use this yourself click on the image to open it full size in a new tab. Then right click on it and select “save image as…” to your computer. Then just install it as wallpaper to your desktop as usual. Remember to click on the Backgrounds tab at the right to see the others available.

Cats & Mouse

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Cut this simple puzzle as a gift. Eliminated one of the cats in the pattern, which originally had another small cat within the one on the right. The one is was going to only has two cats, Waylon and Willie. I also added the tail to the mouse.

Wall Background

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Wall background for your computer

I’m often finding things to photograph to use as a desktop background. This wall is in a cemetery in New Castle, Delaware. It leaves space for folders and toolbars and as all the photos I choose turns my computer into an interesting scene to work against different from the usual panoramic landscapes that usually distract more than inspire. To save the full image to your computer click on the image to open the full file in your browser and then right click to copy it to your computer. Click on the BACKGROUNDS tag at the right to see all that I post. I’ll add more.

Bongo Cajon

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I completed this at the end of last month, but haven’t had an opportunity to post it. It was an easy kit from Meinl who offers many ready-made versions for not a whole lot more money… and it probably wouldn’t take a lot to make one from scratch, but the kit was easy and fun. I added the wren and drumsticks using some “borrowed” art as a pattern and burned it with the woodburning tools I bought Jolene a few years ago.

Paper Trevithick

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A paper model of the 1804 Trevithick Peny Darren. A Welsh locomotive that set out to haul five wagons carrying 10 tons of iron and 70 men over 9.75 miles. It was too heavy for the rails, but did complete the journey, winning a large bet for its owner. I completed this from a book of 50 supposedly “easy-to-make” models.