Again?

Our school district is in the middle of $0.165 billion worth of construction work--which the voters approved in 2017 by an overwhelming margin. I had a hard time understanding why it passed on the first try, and finally concluded that it came down to Property Values.

Now they are back asking for a combination levy renewal and increase, for operating expenses. They have been obscuring the hard numbers, but that's okay, I can make an estimate from the few numbers that they did give. My estimate comes out at an increase of $0.168 billion dollars over the previous levies--this is over the ten-year period they are asking for. Their brochure suggests it might be more like $0.120 billion dollars, but it's hard to put things in context when they are hiding the baseline.

Now that I've found the actual text of the ballot question, it looks even worse. They are proposing to MORE THAN DOUBLE the existing levies.  Also, to index it to inflation. And, it is based on a per-student rate, so if enrollment increases, then so does the amount that they collect.

In the brochure, on page 3, there's a graph that is worth looking at. Just recently I read several of Edward Tufte's very interesting books on elegant graphical displays of information. So when I look at that graph, what I see is how elegantly it both shows and obscures the doubled levy request. At first glance, it looks like two streams merging and continuing together with the same total quantity, because the top and bottom heights don't change, but on the right side of the graph, the middle is filled in, with the increase in shaded area representing the 108% increase in levy.

One fact to know about this school district is that about 1 in 10 students come from outside the district, through open enrollment. They've closed this in the lower grades, for lack of space, so the proportion in the higher grades is even higher. It is also apparent from the things that they brag about in their media, and the things that they don't, that they are heavy on reputation and impressive-sounding activities, but not as good as they ought to be on academic quality.

In 2017 there were highly-coordinated efforts to get the bond request passed. In 2019, I am seeing more of the same; we have received multiple mailings.

The local newspaper was uncritically supportive of the 2017 proposal, something that I did not forget when the paper was asking for voluntary subscriptions. I was just about to donate, but then I changed my mind when I remembered their coverage of this issue. These past few weeks, the paper seems to have gone inactive. I can't say it's a clear case of cause and effect, but I suspect there's a connection.

Costume bits and pieces

I haven't done a lot with children's Halloween costumes this year, partly because years ago my mother-in-law bought my children well-made dinosaur costumes, which have only needed minor repairs since then, so we keep on re-using them.

I did sew one costume piece for a child. It was partly fun, and partly challenging.  Fun, because it didn't need as much finishing work as a regular garment would, and challenging because it's shape and structure required some rather fiddly sewing. But it came out well.

One child wanted an astronaut helmet. I kept forgetting to check the bakery section of the grocery store for products sold under clear plastic domes, but eventually I thought of cutting the top and bottom off a clear plastic 2-liter pop bottle, and then making a slit up one side and uncurling it a bit. They put a lot less plastic into packaging than they used to, and it opens up far enough for a face shield fairly easily. I am thinking of wiring the top and bottom edges so that it stays open by itself, though. The rest of the helmet we are going to fake up from fabric or something.

Another child wanted to be a bird. I figured that I could use different colors of chalk to draw feathers on his clothing, and then use hair spray as a fixative, so it would last the evening, but still wash out afterward. But then he changed his mind.

Fixing a rip in a suede boot

I used a glover's needle and some brown waxed thread, but an embroidery needle and dental floss would have done all right too--except for the color of the dental floss.

For these kinds of bringing-the-edges-back-together repairs, I prefer to use what I call a "Frankenstein stitch". My needlework reference book (a reprint of de Dillmont's very thorough volume) calls it an "antique seam". There's a slightly darkened version of the illustration here; it is one of the lesser examples of the hundreds and hundreds of beautifully-done engravings in the book.

Anyway, the way the stitch is made is to always bring the needle up through the material, first on one side, then the other, and repeat.

Minimalist country style

While on vacation, I read a book called Country Wisdom, by David Larkin. It is a collection of interesting tidbits, not a comprehensive guide.

One of those tidbits was that thatched roofs were really only practical in damp climates; the moisture was needed to keep the fire risk down. That is why the American colonists didn't use them much.

Another one, that I have been thinking about off and on ever since, is that early American country interiors were much more sparsely furnished than most of us believe. The idea of them being cluttered came from a collector, who crammed as many items from his collection as he could into interiors to be photographed. I want to say that this was in the early 20th century, and that the guy's last name started with B, but I'm not sure now. From records of property made at time of death, it can be shown that people's household goods were functional and not plentiful in those days.

The children design a fall craft

Three-dimensional paper pumpkins:  crumpled paper on the inside, surrounded by orange paper--possibly thickened by folding to form the "ribs" of the pumpkin--with rolled green paper for a stem, and green pipe cleaner tendrils at the base of the stem; all held together by a layer of clear packing tape.

They figured almost all of this out by themselves. I did steer them toward the crumpled paper filling, and away from cotton balls, and I let them into the big box of office and art supplies that is usually off limits; toddlers, pipe cleaners, and electrical outlets could be a bad combination.

A deeper mitten basket

I had two baskets for mittens, one at the front door, and one at the back. Both were made of crocheted strips of cotton fabric, mostly old sheets. Since I've been trying to establish a single Coatroom Zone, I needed a single, larger basket, instead.

So I unravelled one of the baskets and re-used the strips to extend the other one and make it deeper. There was more than enough.

Then I cut down on the number of mittens and gloves a bit, so they would actually fit in the basket. I should do another round of this, as it is still quite full. I want the children to dig through it, not throw everything out so they can find something.

Punch needles

I've had the book Hooking Rugs:  New materials, new techniques, by Gloria E. Crouse for a while. It is an older book,  and it is interesting not only for the punch needle techniques that she used, but also for the ways that she used adhesives and other materials to make mixed-media rugs and wall hangings--she's tried everything--and for her tips on how to design, start, and finish a project.

There are basically two ways to make a hooked rug.  One is to use some sort of a hook to pull yarn or fabric strips up through the backing material.  The other is to use a tool to push the yarn or fabric strips down through the backing (from the back to the front)...usually this tool is a punch needle.  This needle is a slit tube with a hole near the pointy end, set in a handle. The speed needle version is mounted on a set-up like a non-electric egg beater, which moves the needle up and down as the handle is turned.

I went to an estate sale recently, and I found a little box of punch needles for $3. When I got it home, I found that it contained three:

First, an inexpensive basic needle, non-adjustable. I had one of these once, but it didn't last long before it broke, because of how the needle and handle were joined.

Second, a similar needle with several depth-of-loop adjustment notches. The needle is mounted inside the handle instead of outside, which makes it much sturdier.

Third, a Columbia Minerva needle just like the one in the book (besides her trusty speed needle), with two sizes of needle tip. It has ten depth settings and a little slide to keep the needle where it has been set. In the book, she tells how she modified hers to get three more possible settings out of it.

I've been playing with it a bit--with something like one hundred hours of work left to do on my other rug projects, I'm not starting another right now--and it is indeed fun to stab through the fabric over and over to lay down lines of loops. The needle is a little tricky to thread, but there are some hints in the book. I used a small embroidery hoop to hold the fabric taut; for a rug, I'd want to build a frame.