Embellishments

Here are my finished felted slippers. Very warm and cozy, and I love how they shaped to fit my feet exactly. (Sorry, I forgot to take a 'before' picture. I finished them late at night and was too anxious to get them into the washing machine.) I felted them in a front-loading washing machine with a squirt of dishwashing liquid and a pair of my husband's jeans. They did great. Dried them stuffed with plastic bags.

Note the pom-poms. These are attached with safety pins so I can remove them for washing the slippers. Though the slippers were attractive enough without the pom-poms, my love of embellishment demanded an extra touch.

I am a person who loves embellishments -- pom-poms, tassles, ribbon, lace. I've been known to remove plain bone buttons from a blouse to replace them with fancy pewter buttons. When I make jewelry I use fancy clasps even on the necklaces, even though no one can see the clasps beneath my hair. I know they're there.

This love of fancy stuff does get me into trouble at times. Rather than knit a plain pair of socks, I must have cables. Complicated patterns. Anything that is guaranteed to take more time than I ever imagined. Right now I'm making a quilt that is composed of seemingly hundreds of tiny pieces of fabric. I'm beginning to think I will never finish piecing this thing. Always in the midst of a project like this I think "Why did I ever decide to do something so complicated?"

Hmmmm -- come to think of it, I often moan like that in the middle of books as well.

I think people are either into embellishments or they are not. My mother was a plain person who delighted in simplicity and elegance. She didn't like anything 'fussy.' While I recognize the value of restraint I definitely did not inherit my mother's love of the plain. Given a choice between the elegant, understated package and the one with shiny paper and a fancy bow, I'll go with the fancy bow every time.

And wear pom-poms on my slippers.