Day 154 – September 8, 2014

It is Monday and I am home making hats. This hat making answers the question of what I would do for free if I had the time. Hat making may be neither useful, nor lucrative, nor pushing the frontiers of science, but it is what I want to do. I am home building so much these days.

In January, I saw the Edwardian ball an aviator with a small pair of white wings behind his ears. Could I reproduce the same look of white wings but light them up? My version ended up ten times larger than the aviator’s, so large that a gold fabric helmet holds the wings aloft. These earwings recall Thor or Hermes. I wore my earwings for the first time at Oakland’s outdoor Friday evening art crawl called Art Murmur. A girl of three and a mother of sixty accosted me for wonderment.

After the earwings, I am fitting a second set of light-up antlers on to a better hat. The antlers mashed my skull on the original black fur hat causing a morning headache. To expedite, I cut a hat pattern.

I have two triplet brothers so I need three sets of antlers just in case both brothers visit at the same time. I do not have enough beds for them, but at least I have enough hats.

I’m starting soon my Halloween costume. This year, I’ll be a glowing seahorse, my most elaborate light-up outfit so far. Ms. Deb tells me that her nephew named his glowing seahorse Bookshelf.

About five years ago, I sewed a Great Coat over a six-month period. I sewed a heavy black fur coat and lined it with fifty eyeball Christmas lights. For each light, I soldered control and ground electrical lines and connected the strands to shift registers. Trouble was, the heavy coat fabric severs wires turning off eyeballs. Now that I know how to program durable, full-color strands of LEDs, I want to reline this Great Coat with modern eyeballs.

At best as I can, I’m trying to use up the fabric and materials I have in the house instead of buying more. I have enough fake fur, shiny linings, and wires to make a dozen hats. My Father in Boston is using up small scrap boards to make bookshelves. I’m doing the same with fabric to make hats.