What a difference a few hours can make

This morning I was happy and posting about the new dolls I'm making.

Now, just a few hours later, I am in tears because one of my penpals has died.

My friend, Jon, took his own life 3 weeks ago. He was in his 70s and would never have walked out of prison alive. He had the last word, true to form.

Regardless of what Jon did 46 years ago, in the 5 years I had been corresponding with him he had been a spirited, alert, intelligent and stimulating friend. We shared our hip ailments, and our criticisms of the political systems we both lived under. He wrote 2 letters to every one of mine, and loved to learn about British words and phrases and their meanings.

I will miss him, and my sympathies are with his family.

New project: Pixie girls

I like making knitted dolls, and I'm a member of a group on Ravely that is currently doing a knit-along. Our inspiration is "Ren Fairy" but as I don;t want to fuss around with wings, I have decided to make pixies instead. These will then be on their way to Australia, as gifts for 2 little sisters.

These pixies will be bigger than the dolls I've previously made. This is because I want to work more detail into their clothes, and that's tricky when the clothes are so small. They already have names: Ariel and Tinder, and their outfits will match their personalities. So, to start, here is Ariel's body, legs and head with ears. I'm doing Tinder's legs today and then on to the arms.

Humbled

As I've mentioned before, I have several penpals who are in prison in various states on the US. My pals and I have a steady and uncomplicated arrangement with our writing. We don't talk on the phone, as many people seem to want with their penpals. Even if I did want to, it would not be right for me while I cannot talk to my husband in that way. I also don't visit my penpals; the guys would definitely be off-limits while my husband is in prison, and while the girls would probably welcome a visit, I can only stretch myself so far when I'm over there. So we just write, once every 4-6 weeks or so, and talk about wtuff I do and stuff that they are all interested in.

Recently I have been discussing the pros and cons of some of the US states as places to live in with my older guy in Pennsylvania. I had mentioned that Idaho looked as if it had a lot of the things I was looking for, and he said that he enjoyed the fishing there.

A few days ago I received a surprise package in the mail from my PA pal. It was a book, a National Geographic photo book about the natural history of Idaho. It cost him over $10 to send and I was totally humbled that he had sent it. He gets paid a tiny amount for the work he does in prison, and is a very proud guy who will not allow me to send stationary or money to cover any. And yet he wanted to give me something that would cost him more than 2 or 3 weeks to pay for.

I write to inmates because I am interested in people and I like getting mail. I don't really have any other altruistic motives, or a desire to "save" anyone. I've never received anything like this from a penpal before and I am both humbled and also really happy for Jon that he could do something that made him feel good too.

I do more than knit....

Occasionally I make stuff in other ways too. Recently a friend told me she was going to Malta to attend a wedding and instead of a hat, she wanted a fascinator. For those who don't know, a fascinator is a concoction of net, feathers, lace, ribbon, flowers and sparkles generally attached to a hair slide or hair band. They've recently caused controversy at the Ascot race meeting, as they don't qualify as a hat for the Royal Enclosure.

It's amazing what you can do with a few feathers and a couple of hours.....

A little layette

We're waiting for my friend to have her third baby at the moment. For someone who was told 5 years ago that conception was unlikely, she's done pretty well so far with a boy and a girl, and now we are waiting for another boy to arrive :) In amongst all the other bits of knitting I've done recently, I've been making small things for the baby. A set of baby clothing is called a layette, but that's a term that doesn't seem to get used much these days, perhaps because relatively few women make the clothes their babies wear in the first few months after birth.

So what do you put in a layette? Generally it will consist of vests, pants (often known as soakers in America I believe), all-in-one babygro or bodysuits, leggins, jackets, and the usual mittens, booties and hats / bonnets. You can add a blanket if you have time. The key is to use patterns and styles that allow the baby to be dressed with the minimum of pulling of arms and legs, and that allow nappies (diapers) to be changed without removing the whole garment.

I've done 4 pieces so far, and I'm about to make a couple of pairs of pants as the baby will be in terry nappies during the day at home.

more dolls and more movement

Two things to blog about today, especially as it's been a good couple of weeks since the last post. First I'd like to introduce my newest pair of dolls, Abney and Teal:

 

These two have been a real labour of love! They are the characters from a Cbeebies animated show of the same name, and have been made for a friend's 2 year old daughter. You can see some episodes of the show here and decide for yourself how well I've matched them to the characters. I did have to make a couple of changes, to accommodate a 2 year old's fingers and temper in being able to dress and undress the dolls! I'm especially pleased with Teal's hair and her sneakers.

Second, the fall-out from my husband's momentary lack of judgement continues. On Sunday I thought I would start a letter to him using the Jpay email service, and when I hit the preview button I noticed that his housing assignment had changed.

This is something we had expected, but even so it was a surprise and not a welcome one. It means he has been moved from minimum security to medium security, and makes it more likely that he will have to turn out for hoe squad. And no, that has nothing to do with hookers.

So I've been waiting all week to hear from him, and as is often the case, the letter that did arrive today was written the day before he moved cells. It's a very wierd concept, living 2 weeks behind yourself all the time. And people wonder why I may get a little testy sometimes when I read forum posts from people who haven't had their morning/daily/hourly email fix from their penpal and O-M-G could it be that their penpal doesn't want to speak to them anymore or perhaps the penpal is laying in a pool of blood taking his (it is invariably a he) last breath.

As mother would say, some people don't know they're born.

This is why TDCJ needs to allow international phone calls by inmates

The best example of a real situation has occurred to illustrate the stupidity and missed opportunity of TDCJ and the Texas Legislature in not permitting inmates to make international calls via the new phone system. Inmates are permitted only to call those on their visitation lists who have a registered USA land-line with the phone company (excluding Hawaii and Alaska). And for those thinking that Skype would circumvent this issue, it wont. You have to provide proof of residency that matches the landline number.

There was a riot at my husband's unit last Thursday.

Normally I wouldn't be too concerned, because it is a big place and often he is nowhere near where the trouble is. I just wait for the letter with the details which usually takes between 10-14 days to get here. But this time, the circumstances are different:

The confrontation happened when the field crew were returning to the chow hall. I currently don't know if my husband has been given his old job back on food service (which would put him in the chow hall when the disturbance occurred) or if he is still assigned to the field squad and had to go out to work (which would put him in the chow hall when the disturbance occurred), or even if he is still not being called to work at all and just went for his lunch as usual (which would put him in the chow hall when the disturbance occurred). So whatever his assignment, the chances are high that he was there.

I've been told there were several officers and inmates involved, an officer has a broken jaw and injured hand (and I'm sad for them that they had to deal with it) and that tear gas / pepper spray was used. The unit was put on temporary lockdown, which was later lifted for all excluding the wing where the field crew are housed.

I am pretty sure that once the lockdown ended, many inmates got on the phones and were telling their loved ones that they were OK. Those whose loved ones live in the USA anyway. My husband doesn't have anyone to call because none of the family over there have a land-line in their name - like so many Americans and a growing number of Europeans. So he can't even call someone and ask them to pass a message on to me that he is OK. He fulfills all the inmate-related requirements for calls, such as not being in Ad Seg.

So I have to wait for around 2 weeks before I hear anything from him, even if he mails something out that very night. How is this fair on me, when others can receive calls? I'm not asking for special treatment, just equity with other friends and family of TDCJ inmates who are no better or worse individuals than I am.