Ancient Echos from the Past : It's All About Me

Yesterday I was getting all my information together for my next two upcoming posts when a thought flashed in my head, it said, Xzanthia why not post your hobbies, what you do on a daily basis, what you enjoy even don't enjoy, and put photos, so that future generations will see what I loved, and didn't love doing. So here it goes.

I've had a total fascination for beading, either earrings, moccasin's, wand staffs, if it can be beaded I'll do it. Here are some of my pieces that I've beaded in the past.

I did a lot of beading for pow wows for a while, people would commission me to make them either breastplates or dance fans, and sometimes jewelry.

When I was a little girl my mom bought a new Singer sewing machine, and when it arrived there was a surprise in it for me, it came with a mini sewing machine that I could sew by turning the handle on the right side. I still have that little sewing machine. I actually made a few things on it. My mom use to make our clothes sometimes, and also winter coats. so I learned to sew as a child and still love sewing. My grandmother and mother both could crochet and knit, and my grandmother use to do tatting. I didn't learn how to do tatting but I did learn how to crochet and knit of the two I like crocheting the best.

One time I decided to crochet a sweater, my first project that big, I got the sweater pretty far along when I realized that I had messed up one sleeve, it was way longer than the other side. I had to take out all those stitches and go from there. It turned out fair and I never made another sweater again.

My other hobby is oil painting. As you all know I have artists in my family my dad, my uncle, cousins and brother, I only had a few painting lessons and realized that the teachers weren't teaching me what I wanted to know, so I have just been dabbling in it on my own, using DVD's and online sources on YouTube .

Here are a few of my paintings.

I still have a huge amount to learn with oil painting but it's fun, relaxing. As you notice I was using my married name in the African man painting but I'm removing that and going back to my maiden name for my art work.

Cooking is another hobby, growing up in my house my mom, dad , grandmother and brother could cook. each person had their own special way and flavors that they liked doing. My mom loved to cook curry dishes, my dad liked to cook soups, my brother cooked wonderful rice dishes and my grandmother was the baker and biscuits maker, they all loved to cook and had many talents in different ethnic foods. So needless to say I love to cook, My favorites are Indian, Middle Eastern, Asian, African, Mexican.

Here are some of the foods I've been cooking.

Pumpkin & Basil Cannelloni

Chocolate Cupcakes

German Pancakes

Puerto Rican rice and beans, plantains, guacamole

Homemade Spinach Noodles

Butterscotch Sweet Bread

Apple Sage Creamy Lasagna, Marc Siever's recipe

Black and White Cookies

My cousin Marc Sievers wrote a cookbook and the Pumpkin & Basil Cannelloni and the Apple Sage Creamy Lasagna recipe are from his cookbook. Information about his cookbook will be in my sources below. So many great cooks in our family.

My whole wheat bread

I really enjoy cooking and baking much better than actually eating, I like to taste and eat a little amount but I love to just cook. I could cook all day and have people over to just eat it, then I'll cook more.

Making Soy Milk

I am a vegetarian, former vegan but now getting back to mostly vegan again. So when I find a recipe that I like I adapt it to meatless, most of the time the recipe turns out good, some things just can't be changed to meatless though and that's okay.

Then there is the gardening and canning:

Our Greenhouse

This is where I start all my vegetables and trees , herbs and flowers. It was a huge success this year.

Produce from my garden

Collard Greens from my garden

Also some of my canning items.:

Homemade cucumber pickles

Canning Apple Sauce

Apple Sauce the finished product

I usually can everything from vegetables to fruits, from A to Z. Plus I like all vegetables and fruits.

My parents gave me piano lessons from age 6 until I was way into my teenage years then more as an adult. I'm teaching myself to play the guitar and I also play the hammered dulcimer. I've taken Ballroom dancing, and I love to dance Latin dances and African tribal dances. Dancing is just in my blood I hear music I want to dance...LOL
I'm interested in UFO's the paranormal, metaphysical stuff, remote viewing, Ghost Hunting. and I like the Goth fashion of clothing. Halloween is my favorite holiday, I usually decorate the entire house and put up a grave yard outside with tombstones and coffin, I'm still adding to that graveyard and improving it every year.
Halloween is the only holiday I celebrate, the other holidays don't interest me at all.

Some of my headstones in the yard for Halloween

Horror movies, western movies and mysteries are some of my favorite things to watch. As far as music goes, I like Motown, Jazz, R&B, Latin, African, Native American Flute,classical, Opera is okay if a man is singing it but I don't like to hear women sing opera. I don't like country in any way, shape, or form.

I've started Finger Weaving a new strip for a new hat for winter.

Finger Weaving for my new hat

Cleaning the house is something I love to do, I like to go food and furniture shopping but shopping for clothes or shoes I don't like at all. I'd rather just buy clothes where they can ship them to me but unfortunately I have to try on everything, so I usually wait until my clothes are pretty much shot before I'll go get new stuff. When my mom was alive she would mail me clothes because she knew that I'd probably never go get anything new. I've always been that way too, I'm probably worse now. It probably stems from my mom always dressing me up as a child and us having to go clothes shopping, as soon as i got old enough to make that decision I gave it up and didn't shop anymore.

Now I can go to a kitchen gadget store, or shop for cooking items then I love that. Or shopping for jewelry findings and beads, sewing materials also that's all okay for me to go shopping.. just don't ask me to go buy clothes.

Cathedral Quilt, I just started this all handsewn

I don't like any kind of animal in the house, my dad always said that animals belong outside living in the wild not in the house with people and I feel the same way. It's even hard for me to go to someone else's house with animals inside, they make me nervous, plus I don't want to eat anything with an animal in the house.

Another thing I don't like doing but I do it anyway is driving a car, I'd be totally happy to use a horse and buggy. Also I don't have any form of religion, I've never read the bible, don't have any interest in anything like that. One of my favorite hobbies is genealogy, and I love to read. I believe in Euthanasia and belong to some group promoting that. I feel that it's my life and I'll do what I want with it, it's no body's business but mine, I don't believe in letting someone suffer when they are sick just to keep them around if they want to go. they should be able to die with dignity, and apparently it's okay to put an animal to sleep to put it out of it's misery but humans are suppose to stay here and suffer, well not in my book that's totally selfish and crazy in my opinion.
I have a very unique way of thinking compared to most people I've noticed, but I don't feel uncomfortable expressing myself about how I feel or what I think. Not too many people think like me or I haven't found a lot of them but it doesn't change me any, I stay true to myself. I couldn't change just to be like everyone else.
I'm probably a carbon copy of my dad, I took so much after him in his ways, his way of thinking.

So I'll probably have to do a part two on It's All About Me another time.

Update:

I've made another quilt top, I will post the photo below, it's a stained glass quilt top. Now I just have to quilt it and it will be ready to give away.

The next is a quilt square, it's going to be a Tribute to Prince, it will be a quilted Throw, shown below, it will have six blocks representing things from Prince. This is a 12" square when it's finished

My latest painting, I really love doing portraits, I just wish I had a teacher to help me, I'm still doing this all on my own. A teacher would be great, but in the meantime I will continue to plug along teaching myself.