OTA Mingle || Stitch & Bitch

[can_fight_ugly]

WHO: Anne
WHERE: House 53
WHEN: Forward dated to Saturday
OPEN TO: OTA - but specifically those who expressed an interest in joining Stich & Bitch
WARNINGS: Stitching & Bitching. Should be a fairly tame log but will update as needed

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Network Post Here

The first thing Anne had done was make a mental list (since she couldn't make an electronic one - or even a pen and paper one) of the kind of space she was looking for. Open floorplan, fireplace, multiple rooms, yardage. Eventually, she'd settled on House 53 - a soft yellow bungalow with three bedrooms, a fireplace, spaced farther from its neighbors than some of the other housing units, and with a sizeble plot of land behind it before it butted up against the houses in the next street over. Check.

Second, she would need chairs. She borrowed whatever furniture she could move from the surrounding empty houses, marking the underneath of each one in order to return them to their proper houses afterwards - if that was necessary.

Chairs arranged in a loose circle in the house, she went out to borrow a hatchet and go out to collect some firewood - this took the most amount of time, because she wasn't exactly built for this kind of labor. She's been working at it over a few days, though, and she knew that necessity would mold her far better than any CrossFit or Krav Maga class ever could. She spent enough time on this endeavor to ensure there'd be enough wood to last them a bit, then returned the hatchet. She'd have to ask Tony for one of her own at some point.

It doesn't matter if you're the first one here, or if things have been under way for a couple hours and you're just rolling in; Anne greets everyone as they arrive, already near the door or getting up from her chair to offer a warm handshake and introductions.

Today's inaugural session was meant to be a little more free-form, and let it grow from that organically, but at some point when a number of people have gathered Anne will stand to get their attention;

"I wanted to thank you all for coming. Unless I've somehow missed you, you know I am Anne Weying; I can teach knitting, and I would like to learn how to spin.

I know we're all from different worlds with different levels of technological advancements, but here we're all on the same footing. And that footing's about to get cold if we can't knit a sock, first. This idea was born from a practice in my world called "Stitch and Bitch", where people would gather to knit, and crochet, and generally complain about things in their lives. Here, I think it would be important if we used this time to share our skills and help each other establish a line of production in order to harvest and spin fleece and knit it into usable goods - or weave, or crochet, what-have-you.

We're definitely not in a tropical climate, and without knowing just how cold it can get here, I think it's best if we start preparing for a cold winter now."

She sits down and takes a look at each of those gathered around, "So; what can you teach, and what would you like to learn?"

Comments

[can_fight_ugly]

Anne picks up a book on knitting starts flipping through the pages, wondering if it would differ much from anything she might have found at home.

"I think the more people we have cross-trained on various steps of the yarn production process, the better off we'll be. I know there are a few people interested in learning how to spin."

She nods with Billy's suggestion about the Alpacas. "And - admittedly, this might be a stretch - I've been wondering if it would be possible to procure and establish a herd of those big guys, the gruffalo. Their fleece might not be as fine but they've got a lot more surface area to harvest fleece from. Do you know what they're like, at all? Can they be domesticated?"

[demiurgency]

The books seem mostly filled with standard stuff, even if some of the garments seem meant for slightly odder body shapes (he's pretty sure he saw a sweater with wing holes in it). At least, he didn't spot anything too far out of the ordinary, but considering his world that's not all that strange.

At Anne's question about the gruffalo, Billy perks up a bit, sounding more confident. This, at least, is definitely something he knows. "They can definitely be domesticated, and they're pretty easygoing," he tells her. "I don't know how good their hair would be for clothes, it's a little scratchy, but it's worth a shot. I know someone who has one. Do you think there's space for a herd? I mean, they're kind of like cows, I guess, we could probably set up a big pen or something. I could ask Frank."

[can_fight_ugly]

"Good for outer layers, certainly. We could start small with one or two, see how they manage. We may not need many more than that, unless we want to look into milk and meat production." But that would open up questions about extensive land use and that, she felt, should be a village-wide decision.


"I've got some space behind my house, if there's no better option." She'd originally chosen that location with thoughts of one or two of the cute zalpacas, but she's willing to be adaptable to offer the greatest help she can to the village.

[demiurgency]

"Yeah. I mean, one or two sounds like a good idea. Frank and Kamala have a gruffalo and a zalpaca in a pen behind their house, they do pretty well together," he offers. "I mean, if you're interested in setting up a pen and trying to get one or two for yourself, I'm sure he'd help. He's really good at this stuff. I've been learning a lot." And it'll be nice if he can finally find something to offer, himself. Maybe knitting can be that thing. Not like he can do much else without his magic.

[can_fight_ugly]

"He's helping me with some knitting needles, I could see if he can give me some gruffalo husbandry pointers as well."

So there's currently one gruffalo and five zalpacas that she knows of altogether. That's not bad.

"Are you looking to get an animal of your own?"

[demiurgency]

"What, me?" Billy looks surprised at the question, maybe more than a little uncertain. "No, I mean, I don't know. I've never even had a pet before, unless you count that one winter break in fifth grade when I took the class hamster home and took care of it for a week. My mom's allergic to cats, so." That answers nothing, Billy.

"But, uh. It might be kind of nice to learn more about them. I talked with Alex about the peacats when I first got here, and it seems like there are a ton of animals here, even if you don't count the weird ones that don't exist back on Earth. Once I know more about them, maybe I could help take care of them."

[can_fight_ugly]

"I think it makes sense here for people to have animals - because we're able to have ones that serve a purpose. We can't just - pop off to the corner store to grab a gallon of milk, but if there are two, three bovines available ...."

She stops and thinks, this world is considerably different than her own, "Is gruffalo milk potable? I mean I imagine it would be, but I guess I shouldn't assume ..."