#because it's neighborly! and also I want the neighbors to think of me fondly in case I ever need an emergency ride to the hospital

[tj-crochets]

Hey y'all! I have a question idk quite how to word, but have you heard of memory bears as a distinct thing from memorial bears? Like, instead of a teddy bear made of clothing from a loved one who has passed away, it's a teddy bear made from baby clothes of a baby who is totally fine, just grown up out of the tiny baby stage and into like toddler mode And if you have heard of them, do you know what price point they usually sell at? I have a bunch of neighbors who want me to make them and I am struggling to come up with a fair price because I normally deliberately price things low for neighbors (since this is not my main source of income I barely ever take commissions these days), and when I thought they were memorial bears I priced even lower, but fussy cutting each individual piece is a lot of effort. Also, baby clothes are tiny, and they vary a lot in levels of stretchiness, so I am having to factor that in as I sew in a way I think is, uh, an uncommon ability to have? From what I was reading, it seems like most patterns tell you to use interfacing to make the clothing all non-stretch, but I have a strong aversion to interfacing so I am just sewing it as is, and I think it will be a softer finished bear sans interfacing

[elysiuminfra]

louisiana is a state you die in. i think of it fondly, it’ll always be home, but it really is a state of death. you either move away or it kills you. if poverty doesn’t, cancer does. if cancer doesn’t, addiction does. if addiction doesn’t, your hospital does. and if your hospital doesn’t, something else kills you. and everyone knows someone who’s gotten killed by that state. but we live and love there. we go to the bar, we go out to the lake. we have our crawfish boils and sing and dance and live despite the soil begging us to return to it. i don’t live there anymore, because it would’ve killed me too. the summers are brutally hot and humid. the air gets so thick you have trouble breathing. the government has always been incredibly corrupt, from state to town level, corruption runs in the foundation cracks and eats away at any kind of hope for a better future. but we live. people make it anyways.

after hurricane laura, when the power was out to most of my town, people went out on their four-wheelers and trucks and searched for people stuck in their houses. we sat outside and talked to the linemen in the days after and offered them water for their work. people went out and got supplies, groceries, and gave them out to people who needed it. we cleared each others yards. we fixed each others houses. we checked on our neighbors and asked, “what do you need?” because you just can’t rely on anyone else to do it. everyone was out on the streets, asking, “how can i help?”

it’s a state you die in, but it’s also full of people who care very, very deeply about one another. because who else will? all we had was eachother. it’s a state that wants to kill you, and all you can say is “not yet. not while i can help.”

i live in michigan. it’s very different. people aren’t neighborly. people don’t show up when people need it a lot of the time. people make up problems with eachother. and the south does that too, don’t get me wrong, but ive never felt more misunderstood by strangers. in the south, willing the person isn’t bigoted (which is a problem) you never meet a stranger. kindness is always returned. but people are mean up here in ways i never anticipated. people assume you’re out to get them, to fuck them over all the time, just by saying “hello. you doin alright?” and i try very hard to be kind in spite of it. there’s no sense of community. not really. not in a way that matters. and it puts me in a mood. in louisiana, you looked out for eachother, for total strangers, because that’s just what you did, because no one else would. and i took that for granted.

anyways. good morning.

i could write (and have written) pages and pages of poetry about louisiana but nobody understands. nobody understands where i grew up. and i really want to make something that makes people care