Struggling with the urge to replace all my boring buttons with shrinky dink buttons. The only thing that would make them awesomer is if I didn’t actually have to sew them on and could just will them to be part of my wardrobe. The button above was made using sharpie and other colored sharpie. The most important thing to remember is to punch the holes before baking so you don’t just wind up with a pin or magnet instead.

In most craft stores you will find two basic types of shrinky dink plastic. One is completely transparent, in fact it looks like transparencies that used to project your algebra lessons. The other is more translucent, it has one rough side and one glossy side. Go with the translucent, it will appear more greyish, but when you bake it the colors pop. It is also easier to color due to the “grip” of the rough side. Like all craft supplies, shrinky dink plastic is much cheaper when you want to buy ridiculous bulk online.

More BUTTONS!!!

Thinking of taking up a new sport? How about one pioneered by Agatha Christie?

And of course I am using “pioneered” in that I mean from the point when Europeans got involved to the point when they start taking pictures of it. And sending postcards from it and whatnot. Because that is a habit that is hard to kick.

Earlier I went to a lovely FDR-era park, and encountered all of its beauty and all of the creepiness that hangs around in parks. A mixed bag, parks are. A mixed bag of hipster and pleasant couples, drug deals, and troubling adult scout types. The pot melts hardest at our nation’s national treasures.