My (perhaps controversial) thoughts as a "newbie" to CA.

Hi gang....

Oh boo hoo hoo...boo hoo..hoo...

I'm soooooooo sad...

I was working on the new glued boxes I made, putting the block toys in them, seeing how they fit.

They looked so cute--the boxes I designed, cut, glued!

Suddenly it happened:

the box snapped apart.

I thought it might have been because that toy was a little larger than the others--maybe because I'd painted one of the blocks a bit thickly...

Still, it still shouldn't have broken open...

I took the toys out of the others I'd done, holding my breath.

A good little tug--not extreme--pulled them all apart.

This happened at eight p.m.

I know that going out at night by oneself is not always a good decision.

But I do things like that.

When I'm DRIVEN!

Off I went, passing Camden Yards and the Orioles-Blue Jays game, all lit up like a Christmas tree..people by the hundreds in there, following their bliss..

Me, I was running mine down.

At the Home Depot I bought the item I'd researched way, way back when: the

Loctite Plastic Bonding System.

I'd passed on it as the JD Weld product had such great reviews and the package said....

OK, this is where I goofed.

The package said

"Bonds MOST plastics."

By now I know that these plastic sheets are made of a slightly different plastic besides PVC.

PET.

It's the PET that messes things up.

The Loctite System "BONDS HARD TO BOND PLASTICS."

OK!

Sounds good!

I bought four packages--they come in those little super glue-type tubes (the JD Weld is a big ole tube and cheaper by far....) ("Girlie," my father is saying, "you get what you pay for.")--along with a fine sanding block to roughen up the surface, as they recommend.

Oh, package instructions are, besides being written in this tiny print ("Get the girl to read it for you," mom is telling me) so boring to read!

(Yeah, boring until your boxes break apart. Then oh so interesting.. )

I'm giving this project my best, most mature self. If Loctiite doesn't work my plan is to take the 3" boxes I already have and get some of that cellophane you use to wrap Easter baskets and sheath the block toy in that, maybe make an origami box (easy to fold) to sit them in.

If they move around a little in the box, hey, they move around a little in the box--I'm not building a Lamborghini carburetor.

That's what I'm gonna do.

I will not spend $1,000 to have custom boxes made! I don't need 2,000 to 5,000! These won't fly off the shelves. Unlike a Lamborghini, my block toy won't have guys panting to own one. I think it'll draw people who have hand toy needs, grandmothers with antsy grandchildren every weekend, Asperger geniuses, art lovers, people who Google things like "avatars of the unconscious," compulsive shoppers, millennials with disposable funds conditioned to like small, compact, portable entertainments that draw their heads down in postures of thoughtfulness or sadness and that are ruining their upper spines.

So, OK, about half of the US population.

It's Loctite or 3" boxes.

Time for a little Kahlua and cream.

I feel good!

I have a plan!

(But boo-hoo-hoo.....boo-hoo-hoo...)

Thanks Molly5...I've tried a few boxes with this new glue and so far so good...I'd cross my fingers but they're glued together in strange ways....

JBeans, the K and C tasted great...but that the glue worked made me want to drink it....that's how relieved I was..

Yummy! Plastic Bonding System on the Rocks!

I, um, don't think I understand geocaching any better now than before--but, hey, if it's fun, do it--whatever it is!

Your group sounds fantastic! Young rowdy kids! Young rowdy HAIRY kids!

DisneyGirl--Yes! The Loctite is holding!

Tell me, how did you come by your user name?

Hi DisneyGirl16-- That's what I thought. I've never been to a Disney spot but loved the Mickey Mouse Show way, way back when Annette was the star. I can still hear the theme song.

I'll probably have a difficult time getting it out of my head now....it's already elbowing aside John Legend's All of You...

My name is Patricia but I soon, as you might expect, came to be called Trisha, or Trishie, later shortened to Trish. (In junior and high school I was called Pat--ugh--I hated it. I think a teacher did that.) One day my father started calling me Trill, or Trilly--I have no idea why. He had an almost debilitating stammer--on the order of The King's Speech's stammering King--and maybe Trill came easier to him than Trish. The 1943 is the year I was born.

Names are interesting and I think nicknames are even more so. My father's was Frank and he was called Frank T (for his middle name, Truman) by his family, but, as a child, Ta-Tee. We called him Dadda. My parents shared a mutual nickname for each other--Lamb or Lambie. The "Lambie" was pronounced by my father when talking to my mother "Lambie" as in the animal lamb. But mom pronounced "Lambie" with a long a---as in la-la-la-la....

Right now I'm about to place my order for stickers to go on the little boxes....can't believe how many hours this has taken, most just learning their graphics program....then more boxes get made...the Locktite is still holding...

M- I - C- K- E- Y......la la...la...la......

Hi DisneyGirl--

Am so happy to hear you had a great weekend with your daughter! That must have been wonderful!

Glad to hear, too, that you forgot about cancer. I forget about cancer all the time...

The boxes are moving along, and thanks for asking. Thankfully the Locktite is working. So far it's been holding, but it's a tricky process gluing things with it. The tiny flap that gets clued to the box to form the cube is about 2 inches by 1/2 inch and when I used their activator--made for tough-to-bond areas--it disappointingly left a cloudy area...the glue itself was nicely clear, but the damned activator ruined it. So I tried using just the glue and no activator and that was much better. I held my breath that it would still hold without the activator and it seems to be OK. it still requires skill in that it bonds the VERY INSTANT the two sides touch--no repositioning. I lost two great little boxes because I got the glueing off a bit and there was no going back....

The stickers have as their background a shot of Amish quilting's Tumbling Blocks pattern. I tweaked the colors and then blurred the image and over this floated the word "cubism" and my name under it. I got a domain name and need to set up a simple website and I had a sheet of stickers with "trish rawlings.com" made. Will try to get a photo of the stickers and will attach it here when they arrive...

OK, that's the latest. Happily not much drama, although it is fun writing about the drama!

Forget about cancer! That's an order!

Fondly, t

Hi DisneyGirl--

I'm sure you'll want to kiss the ground when you exit the place where you have your radiation done after that last "session"! It must be grueling. Necessary--doable--but grueling. My heart goes out to you and all those experiencing treatments that span the weeks.... I only did the surgery thing and dealing with yucky and pesky drains but then they were out and that was that. I hope that's ALL, of course, but who knows? Life has been, and always is, really, a day-to-day affair but even more so when you get diagnoses such as we've been handed.

The latest on the boxes. I wish I could write that exciting things have transpired but it was just Pantaloon and I on the bed all night, lamp pulled up close, hair a mess, teeth unbrushed, disheveled--me, not her--she's always pristine and perfectly groomed--the bed strewn with plastic sheets, gluing supplies, used paper toweling, completed boxes. Every now and then I'd get up to go to the bathroom or get something to drink and when I returned the light raking across the bed would catch the dozens of little glittering pieces of trimmed-off plastic scattered over the spread. And they're all over the floor..

I stayed up till eight this morning, just decided to dig in and do them and get it over with. Instead of cutting out six or so and then gluing (or trying to) that batch, I just went ahead and cut, creased, folded, fit together and glued in one go. By the time I'd done a dozen I could have done them with my eyes closed. Well, not really.

The thing about stiff plastic is you only get one shot at creasing and folding. No do-overs. It's the same with the glue--one shot only. I locked myself into a trance of cutting and folding and gluing and just kept going. I'd toss the failures to the floor, just let them go, telling myself not to get sentimental over them. But it was hard to see them--cut just right but scored or folded a bit off.

It's like when I made a quilt years ago---in, of all things, the Tumbling Blocks pattern--and was piecing the three parts that make up the three-dimensional-appearing blocks. I found that even a little bit of a goof at block one by the time I reached block ten was no longer "a bit." I'd have to go back and start over. Besides some nerve damage to my fingers from pushing through the needle I got a small quilt out of it.

The reason I persisted was because the first little quilt I'd made I'd been admonished for by my aunts for machine-stitching the blocks and not doing them by hand, though I did hand quilt the whole thing when the piecing was done. So the second one had me pulling all-nighters to get the blocks right by their standards.

That was a challenge but I don't think even that one was up to the challenge of these little plastic boxes. Boy! I almost quit after tossing yet another otherwise perfect box to the floor because I'd goofed in the scoring or the folding....

It's Hump Day. Hope your rest-of-the-week goes smoothly. You're halfway there!

t

Hi DisneyGirl--

Ha-ha! Love that image: "boxes glued to my forehead!"

And with this extremely tough glue they would have STAYED glued to your forehead!

I finally got that sleep, plus a few more hours. After dinner I just zonked out last night with my clothes on this a.m. and woke up to three Spanish-speaking fellows here to install my cabinet doors in the kitchen and bathroom. That job was left un-done as the doors were on back-order and five floors of my building have lacked cabinet doors the past month during the renovation. I was bleary (I'd been dreaming about being back at home and hunting for a missing Pantaloon...) but VERY glad to have my clothes on because Maintenance let them in and here they just were---three husky fellows and the doors and all the accoutrements of their work, ready to get the job done....now I'm looking at lovely doors but also wood shavings all over. As we had no warning they would be here today--well, they couldn't warn us because they had no idea when the doors would finally be arriving--these guys had to empty all my drawers to get the drawer fronts on and my sink is now filled with timers, spatulas, potato masher, spoons of all sizes,etc.....

I'm embarrassed to say that after all my do-do about box-making, I only came out with ten. But, hey, that "ten" was really twenty if you include the otherwise-perfect-but-slightly-off-at-the-end ones that ended up on the floor. I was gonna take six to the museum shop, with an extra to leave out as a sample (the boxes will be sealed with little adhesive disks and hopefully won't get opened by curious shoppers...), but four grouped with one on top looks neater. I just spoke to the gift shop gal and told her I'm still waiting for the stickers to arrive.

But it was all worth it. The boxes look great, I have to say. The clear plastic lets the colors come through and the tautness of the box makes it feel custom-made. Which it was! I think--hope--the stickers look OK. Then the little gold elastic band will go around and that's it.

I have to admit I'm gonna miss the project. I love working with my hands.... and it's been so rewarding: finally getting the right glue! I need to take a final photo of them before they go; if it turns out OK will attach a photo so you can see what all this nonsense has been about....

JBeans, you get me laughing! Touche (spellcheck doesn't know from touche, do you spellcheck?)! And thanks for the well-wishing--t

Hi DisneyGirl--

Yes, I wish those cabinet installers had come with Dustbusters....I'm still finding shavings scattered about!

Well, I did a "rough" selection of blocks initially and figured those would be my final choices in the end. But yesterday I went ahead and took out all the other blocks that I'd packed up during the renovation. I'd not seen the entire group laid out since I'd bought more groups of blanks and painted them. I also wanted to get a final count. The total came to 2797. That number doesn't include those I've sold, tentatively set for use in the Tumbling Blocks toy, or can remember giving away --which amount to about 350.

Anyway, when I was laying those out on a long canvas strip (54" x9') I kept seeing nice ones and started setting those to the side. Now I'm looking at them and feeling thankful that I didn't tape that first group as these latest look even more interesting. It turns out that the special tape I use to tape them runs $4.95 per strip (was $3.39 back in the winter, now $4.95!!) so my price will have to come up from $50 per to $75. That should cover the tape, plastic, glue, and sticker....my profit margin won't be huge but I'm not doing this to make beaucoup bucks. I'm also gonna have a minimal website set up by the time I run these to the museum shop next week so will affix the sticker with the "trish rawlings.com" on it....

Whew. It's been a long, winding, and sticky road..... Every time I walk into the living room and see those 2797 lying there I picture them on the black-painted floor up at Evergreen.....exciting...

I don't know how the weather is where you are but here it's cold! What happened to spring? It's 52!!