Happy 4th of July!

SUNDAY POETRY: "DISTANT COASTS"

DISTANT COASTS

by John Gould Fletcher

      from Japanese Prints

 A squall has struck the sea afar off.
    You can feel it quiver
    Over the paper parasol
    With which she shields her face;

    In the drawn-together skirts of her robes,
    As she turns to meet it.

(Top photo from here. Bottom photo from here.) 

Link Love No. 59!

I just came back from a family picnic where we watched fireworks. The big fireworks show started around 10 pm, but we go to this really nice park (and it is the perfect spot to see the fireworks) to eat and play while we are waiting for the show. It has been several years since we started doing this, and I guess it has became one of our family traditions. My kids always talk about the special Fourth of July picnic.

What we do is, we take a bunch of food, bubbles, Frisbee, balls and other outdoor play things and play. After dark, we do our own fireworks, and we bust out the glow sticks. When the show starts, we just sit in our chairs, or lay around on the blanket to watch the beautifully designed lights in the night sky.

It was lots of fun! Watching their smiling faces made me forget the hectic day for getting ready for this picnic. I wonder if this picnic would be one of the fun moments from their childhood memories.

Did you do anything special? Or do you have any plans for July 4th?

If you have any parties planned, these would be nice party favors. Homework shared these fourth of July rocket favors using the lyrics "Firework" by Katy Perry. It is a cute decoration for a party but the words on the rockets make this project more than that.


I have been drawn to simple bracelets lately. Those simple yet beautiful bracelets by Yellow Blackbird caught my attention! She shared a step by step tutorial on her blog, this must go on to my "to make" list.


Show Tell Share shared this unique pin tuck wave pillow with us. I love the color combination and how the waves make the pillow more interesting.


Oh my gosh, I think if I see lemonade stands like this I would have to stop the car to by something (and I can take a closer look)! Every year my kids ask me if they can do a lemonade stand, but we live on a street where there is hardly any traffic, so I kept saying "nah". I might say "ok kids, let’s just do it!", just so I can experiment and build a fun lemonade stand. :) Head over to The Pixie Lane to see all the pictures she posted. The details she put in are so adorable!


I have been eyeing different types of wall decor lately. I think this one shared by Tam from Sew Dang Cute is very fun and pretty! It is also a great way to display your favorite fabrics on the wall.


Thank you everyone for sharing the awesome projects. I will see you at the next post!

Birdsong Bows Giveaway Winner

And the winner(s) of the Birdsong Bows Pattern Giveaway are............

Congratulations to you both!!  Please email Lindsay at thecottagemama[at]gmail[dot]com with your contact information and we will get these patterns out to you as soon as possible.  Thank you so much to everyone who entered! 

We've got a great PDF sewing pattern giveaway scheduled for this next week from one of our new sponsors, Tie Dye Diva Sewing Patterns, so stay tuned.  If you are interested in becoming a sponsor of The Cottage Home blog, feel free to email me for rates and more information.

ATTACK OF THE COOKIECUTTER SHARK!

Cookiecutter shark. Via FMNH.

*Warning: graphic images below.*

Ouch. All bite and no bark. The first ever recorded instance of a human bitten by a cookiecutter shark is described in a paper now online in early view in Pacific Science.

An unfortunate human swimmer on a 47.5 kilometer/29.5 mile haul across the Alenuihaha Channel between the Hawaiian islands of Hawai‘i and Maui got nailed twice by this fearsomely ninjalike denizen of the deep, Isistius sp.

Two cookiecutter shark bites in a pomfret. Credit: PIRO-NOAA Observer Program via Wikimedia Commons.

If you've spent any time at sea outside polar waters, chances are you've seen the toothwork of this gnarly little predator. It leaves deep round scars on whales, dolphins, tuna, billfishes, squids, and other larger marine life.

As Kramer used to say: Nature, she is a mad scientist... and never more so than with the hunting technique devised by the cookiecutter shark. Here's how FishBase describes it:

The cookie cutter shark has specialized suctorial lips and a strongly modified pharynx that allow it to attach to the sides of it prey. It then drives its saw-like lower dentition into the skin and flesh of its victim, twists about to cut out a conical plug of flesh, then pull free with the plug cradled by its scoop-like lower jaw and held by the hook-like upper teeth.

Cookiecutter sharks live in the mesopelagic zone and below and swim to the surface to feed at night. Credit: Nicholas Felton via Mother Jones.

Cookie cutter sharks spend the daylight hours below the cusp of darkness—that is, below 1,000 meters/3,280 feet. They migrate to or near the surface at night, travelling 2,000-3,000 meters/6,560-9,840 feet on a diel cycle. That's nearly two miles a day for a fish that maxes out at 56 centimeters/22 inches in length.

They ascend and descend alongside a massive community of marine life known as the deep scattering layer. (I wrote extensively about this community in my Gulf of Mexico oil piece in Mother Jones last year called The BP Cover-Up.) 

Scars on a dead Gray's beaked whale, Mesoplodon grayi, possibly from cookiecutter shark bites. Credit: Avenue via Wikimedia Commons.

But here the mad-scientist design gets even madder. The skins of cookiecutter sharks glow strongly bioluminescent—reported to radiate light for as long as three hours after death—part of their underwater camouflage wherein they hide among schools of glowing squid. 

And no one likes squid better than many of the cetaceans. When whales and dolphins attack squid, cookiecutter sharks ambush the ambushers, darting out to steal a plug of flesh, then disappearing back into the bioluminescent background.

Bioluminescent squid. Via.

The human swimmer off Hawaii was attacked at night when the stern deck lights from the escort boat were lit and shortly after the escort kayak lit red and green bow lights. Here's what the Pacific Science paper says:

About ten minutes after the kayak's bow light was turned on, the victim was bumped by a squid. Over the next twenty minutes he was bumped by squid two or three more times in the shoulder and side areas at irregular intervals. At 2003 hrs, the victim suddenly felt a very sharp pain on his lower chest, and assumed it was a triggerfish bite. The sensation was instantaneous and localized, like a pin prick, and felt like a bite from a very small mouth. The victim yelped and swam over to the kayak, turned off the bow light, and was in the process of getting into the kayak with his legs vertical and "egg-beatering" to maintain position when he felt something bite his left calf. The time interval between the two bites was less than 15 seconds. The sensation of the bite to the leg was slightly more prolonged (but still very quick, less than a second), involved some pressure, and was less painful than the chest bite.

After extensive surgery, the deep leg wound was plugged, grafted, and healed. You can read the whole paper and see more images here.

Top photo: shallow chest wounds. Bottom photo: deep calf wound. Credit: Honebrink, R., R. Buch, P. Galpin and G. H. Burgess. Pacific Science.

Seems like FishBase will have to amend their listing for cookie cutter sharks. Currently it reads:

Not dangerous to people because of its small size and habitat preferences.

The Pacific Science paper concludes:

Humans entering pelagic waters at twilight and nighttime hours in areas of Isistius sp. occurrence should do so knowing that cookiecutter sharks are a potential danger, particularly during periods of strong moonlight, in areas of manmade illumination, or in the presence of bioluminescent organisms.  

Playdate Outfit Sew Along: Day 5 - Capris/Shorts

If you've made it this far, I want to say thank you for staying with me.  I've had a lot of fun sewing with you all so far!  And I hope you guys are having fun too.

So now we are moving on to the capris/shorts.  I decided to make the capris for my little lady, so I will be referring to them as such through this post.

First we need to add the cuff to the capris.  Place the cuff on top of the bottom of the pants, right sides together and sew together at the bottom edge.  Do this on all four pant pieces.  Press seams open and then press the right side as well.

If you notice, I marked my back pant pieces with a safety pin so I can easily tell them apart from the front pieces......sometimes it's really hard to tell.

Next line up a front and back piece, right sides together and sew down the long center curve of the pants.  Press seams open.  I opted to use my serger here because the pants were not lined.  If you don't have a serger (which I'm sure a lot of you don't), then just be sure to use your pinking shears to finish the edges to prevent fraying.

Open the pieces you just sewed together.  Line up the front and back pieces with one another, right sides together and sew around the crotch area.  Press seams open.

Now you have what pretty much looks like a pair of pants.  Stitch both side seams, right sides together, but make sure to stop before you sew the cuff as the pattern instructs.

Next, press the cuff to make the seams for the side slits.  Pin in place and stitch according to pattern directions.  I'm not 100% that I did this correctly, but it seemed to work out well.

Above is what the cuff side slits will look like after you have stitched them into place.

Next we need to hem the capris.  Turn the hem up 1/2" and then another 1/2" towards the wrong side of the pants and stitch into place.  This is where I love to use my hem gauge - it comes in very handy for this step!

Now we move onto the waist-band.  Stitch the front and back of the waist-band, right sides together, at the side seams.

I don't know if you recall, but I think the back waist-band piece (H) was labeled incorrectly as front waist-band, so don't let this confuse you.

Press your waist-band side seams and then press your waist-band in half.

Open your waistband back up and sew your elastic into the back waist-band piece at the side seams.  Make sure to stitch this back and forth several times so it is nice and secure.  Again, this is another spot where I think I did what the instructions called for, but I'm not 100% sure.

Once you've sewn in the elastic at the side seams fold the waist-band back in half.  Place the raw edge of the waist-band in line with the raw edge of the top of the capris.  Stitch into place and press seams open.  I found this to be slightly tricky with the elastic already sewn in, but just work with it and it will turn out just right.

Here is what your waist-band will look like once you have pressed your seams.  It will be nice and flat on the front and gathered with elastic on the back.  A flat front pant gives a really nice look on a little girl because it reduces any of the bulk in the front that elastic might cause.

So, that's it!!  We're done.  If you have your own labels, now would be a good time to sew one into your garment!  And now it's time to try your outfit on your little lady and be proud of all your hard work.  There is nothing better than having my girls LOVE one of the outfits I've made for them.  It makes all the time (and sometimes frustration) well worth it!

So here's my completed outfit for Miss Savannah Rose.  I added a woven trim at the bottom of the top just to add a little interest.

Thank you guys SO much for joining me on this sewing journey.  I hope you had fun and maybe learned a little something along the way.  I know, I did! 

And don't forget, click HERE to add your pictures to The Cottage Home Flickr Pool to enter The Cottage Home "Sew Along" contest.  Next week I will reveal the finalists and then the readers will get to vote on their favorite look.  The prize is a $50 gift certificate to Fairytale Frocks and Lollipops to use on anything in the shop - who wouldn't want that, right?

Shabby Apple Summer Sale

To see the pictures, head over here.

Hi all, just a quick shout out for Shabby Apple!

Beginning July 1st they will be having their summer sale! Use coupon code SUMMER20 to save 20% off, Site Wide! The only exclusion is Amalfi Coast Swim Wear.

This is their biggest sale EVER because EVERY dress is on sale! And the best news? The sale runs the entire month of July!

Wow, every dress is on sale? (You know me, I LOVE dresses). Hmmm... Something to think about.

Roamin’ Holiday is one of my favorite collections; here are some of my favorites...

Piazza Navona: Isn't this a gorgeous dress? The color of the dress is sophisticated and grown up, but the ruffly neckline and how the skirt flows make this dress more dramatic!

Aurelia: I love the simplicity of this dress. The corsage on the waist line completes the look. How adorable!

Baciami!: What a brilliant design! I always loved skirts with borders, but I have never seen a dress like this. The color red gives a playful aspect to this sleek dress.

What do you think? Aren't they gorgeous? Head over to Shabby Apple with coupon code SUMMER20 and enjoy shopping!