Hi you guys! Lindsay here. Welcome back to my channel, Inside the Hymn. Well, I don't know about you guys but it finally, finally feels like fall here in North Carolina. We had a chilly morning with frost on all of the flowers and the leaves and on the ground and it just felt so invigorating and cleansing and just wonderful and it got me thinking about fall fabrics. We have been reviewing a lot of the patterns that have been coming out as part of the fall collections. At this point everybody has released their fall collections and they're already working on winter but that doesn't mean that we're just going to skip fall. We are still making clothes that we're new wearing for the next few months before the temperatures really dip down. So to help me do this, I got in my Vogue Fabrics Fall 2019 swatch catalog. You guys might remember this. I talked about it a couple of months ago and I thought this would be a good way for us to kind of highlight some of the fabrics that really scream fall, the fabrics that you're going to want to be using to make some of those fall patterns and we'll talk about matching those things up here shortly but this is the catalog. This is how it comes to you in these little like packets that are all separated out and then it corresponds with the catalog. When I get my catalog in, what I like to do is go ahead and open all of that up and then get some double-sided tape and just go ahead and stick the fabrics into the catalog like so. So they're all there and it's very like touchable and organized and it just helps me keep everything all in one place. I can store all of these away in one of those like a folder folder they're like cardboard folder organizer. I guess that's what it's called. I don't know, you can get them at Target. You can get them anywhere and so you can put them all in there and then you you know have lots of fabrics to refer back to. So I like to shop from these catalogs but I also like to use it as sort of like a fabric reference like if a pattern calls for some particular kind of fabric and I'm not really recalling what that's like I can flip through these find one that's similar and then no okay now I can visualize what kind of structure what kind of drape you know what kind of fabric they have in mind the designers have in mind for said particular pattern. So yeah I love to hold on to these and use it as sort of like a fabric encyclopedia or something. So it's nice to have all the fabrics all taped in so that you know you never lose those little swatches. Okay so let's talk about some of the fabrics that we have been hearing a lot about in the fall collections. So when I think about fall fashion I think about transition. I think about moving your wardrobe from summer to winter and what you would wear in the meantime and a lot of that for me means sleeves it means longer hemlines it means light layers it means lightweight jackets you know all of that kind of stuff that can help you take your wardrobe from summer to winter without freezing outside or without also being super hot because you're wearing winter clothes whenever it's still 70 degrees outside. So in the fall fabrics catalog there are a lot of really really great options to help you achieve that. So a lot of us might be considering making pants for the first time maybe all year long or certainly at least in the last six to eight months. And pants fabric tends to be pretty specific especially whenever you get into fall and winter and when you're dealing with not lightweight breezy fitting pants but you're you're dealing with more fitted usually have a zip front you know a waistband you know that kind of stuff. So in the fall catalog they have a lot of really awesome options the first one is sort of it's like it's called duck cloth and it's made from cotton and it's kind of like a canvas so you can you can imagine like a utility type pant that would be really good for that. They also have a pinwheel corduroy in a couple of different colors which kind of feels like very kind of suede in a way it's very very soft and plush that would make really great pants and even like knit pants. I purchased pants before that are made from something similar to like a ponty that I wore all winter along with knee-high boots underneath and it was warm enough for me. I get that some of you are coming from basically the Arctic like Wisconsin where it's super cold. But for fall that might be a really good option for you and they have a lot of this what are they calling it? Well that's a stretch gabardine suede that would certainly make for great pants. I swear there was like this ponty in here hold on let me find it. Another stretch gabardine those make really really nice fall suede. So there's this double jersey it's 12 ounces which is similar in weight to a ponty and it comes in a lot of really really great colors. It's structured not a ton of drape and it's not going to wrinkle a ton either which is also really really nice. So yeah they have that as an option. They have a black suede knit which would make kind of like a really nice lightweight fall pant. So if you're looking for bottom weight stuff they still have that in the fall. It's just not going to be like what we're used to in summer which is like linens or even light breezy skirts out of rayon shallow or anything like that. When it comes down to fall you're looking for utility you're looking for something that you can wear get a lot of wear out of. Let's be real making pants is not easy. So you don't want to be cranking out like a ton of pants. You want the ones that you do make to last a really really long time and they have a lot of really good options for that in here. Another thing that comes up in fall a lot is sweater knits. So I don't know about you I'm not into knitting I don't want to knit anything but I do like having that knit like sweater and you can use you can make one of those by using a sweater knit and sewing it like you would basically a t-shirt. They also have really lovely sweater knit dresses in the fall. You can find some patterns that are specifically made for that or you can kind of fudge the suggested fabrics a little bit and use a sweater knit based on the stretch requirement of the pattern. So my favorite favorite fabric in this entire catalog is this pink and gray sweater knit here. It's very lightweight. It's very soft. It's made of rayon polyester and lycra and it has 70% of a crosswise stretch. So that is a good amount of stretch for just about any knit pattern that you have in your pattern stash. But obviously you can make tops from it. It would make a really beautiful like cowl neck because the rayon is so lightweight and drapey. It would create some really beautiful folds around the neck. Obviously a wrap dress with long sleeves for the fall that would be beautiful.  But it would also make a really great cardigan and like a layering piece that you might be able to add to a summertime sleeveless top or dress. So yeah we talked about the double jersey which I just think is is a really really great option for pants but it also makes a really great um like fit and flare dress. If and if you added some sleeves I think that the jersey would be really really awesome. It's it's like a ponty. If you can imagine what a ponty like dress would be um that's very very similar. Another really great aspect of fall fashion are it's the concept of lightweight drapey tops to pair with all of your new pants that you're making. But in really bold fun colors and they have a lot of that in here as well. So they have this really beautiful stretch crepe in my favorite color of all time is cranberry color. They also have this coordinating printed denim that you know in the catalog they do coordinate prints for you which is which is nice. And then they show you what the print looks like in its entirety. So that's really nice because you only get this little two by three swatch but this is what the entire print looks like. So that's fun. But what I wanted to mention specifically were the crepes that they have. Crepe is a wonderful fabric for fall. It's really a season list fabric. So you can make something like a top out of this leopard print for example. And then in the fall you know you pair it with some you know brownish corduroy in the winter. You can put it with denim in the summer. You I'm sorry in the spring you can put it with like a lightweight black skirt. And in the summer you can even pair it with some cute little shorts. So crepe is one of those those fabrics that's going to get you year round usage. Now you will limit that a little bit depending on how you style it if you or how you design it. If you add sleeves to it for example that might be a little hot in the summer. But if you make it sleeveless and that might be a little bit cold in the winter. So you just have to think about your lifestyle where you live the climate where you live. But if I made a sleeveless crepe top I could wear that just about year round with some of those light layering pieces that I am talking about. They also have these this really beautiful flannel. So flannel is traditionally kind of like a winter fabric. You think about it in pajamas or like a flannel shirt that is like more utility. You wear it outside has lots of pockets to hold all your things. But they are making these really lovely lightweight flannels that can carry you from fall into winter and into some of the spring. And this one is 100% cotton flannel. It's this beautiful like clad print that looks like this. And they're suggesting it in kind of like a shawl cape type of deal. So certainly that would make a great layering piece to put over your shoulders. But you could also make a beautiful scarf from it. And you wouldn't even need that much yardage for it. It's $8 a yard. I mean, so you could have a really beautiful flannel moment without being full on winter flannel sitting by the fire snow outside. You know what I mean? So it's a great way with the coloring and with the weight of it to kind of take something that's a little bit more winter and make it more suitable for fall. So this is covering, I mean, this fall catalog covers just about every single fabric that you are going to see mentioned in any of the big four patterns or any of the indie patterns that we are reviewing in our first impression Fridays. But Vogue does a really great job. Vogue fabrics, that is, does a really great job of taking their fabrics and pairing it with it with a pattern that they recommend. So if you're completely lost, like I love this red polka dot, what would I ever make from it? They have a suggestion for you. So you can either take this exact suggestion, or you can kind of use that as reference. Like, okay, they're recommending a somewhat fitted shift type dress, maybe with some darting or pleating or something like that. And you can kind of use it as a little bit of a reference. So that'll help keep you focused and make sure that you are pairing the right fabric with the right pattern. And as a beginner or either has an intermediate sewage, that was truly like the hardest part of learning. It wasn't even really learning how to sew. It was learning how to match up patterns and fabrics.  So hopefully I was able to show you guys some of the ideal fabrics for fall. They have a ton of other fabrics in here that I didn't even mention, like broadcloth, like, we went over that, we went over that. We've hit on a lot on cotton satin as any here, which you guys know is one of my absolute favorites. They have a beautiful version of that. There's more broadcloth, there's some t-shirt weight jersey knit, which is really lovely, speaking of layering pieces. So there's a lot of really, really great options in here. You guys can order your 2019 catalog right now, the fall edition. Winter will be coming out in a few weeks. So you will be a little bit ahead of the game. And the best news of all is a year's worth of these, which is six. They give out six catalogs a year is only 30 bucks. And yeah, let me know in the comments below what your favorite fabric for fall, how about that for alliteration, your favorite fall fabric. Let me know what that is in the comment section below and be sure to check the description box. I will have a lot of information for you there, like what I'm wearing, where you can get the catalog and I even have a coupon code for you. So head to the description box to check that out. And that's going to do it for me today. I will see you all very soon. Bye.


Good morning, everybody. We're here getting unloaded in Brainerd, Minnesota. Just about finished. From here, we head to Duluth, Minnesota. I have a load of some manufactured steel to pick up there. As soon as we get these two lifts off of here, I'm out of here. It's that messy season. And we're gonna be in this for a while yet, so it is what it is. Still having fun. I'm gonna be there around two o'clock. Let everybody know I'm coming out. You have a little quack of the horns, ball of fire, doing its thing. Close that door for them there. They're remote inside there, but just in case I go close it anyway. So some bad news. The shipper we're going to closes at 2 p.m., not 3 p.m. I knew they closed early, but I was really hoping it was 3 p.m. I thought that's what I remembered. So we're not gonna make it. It's already quarter after 2, and I'm about half hour away, a little over a half hour. So we're gonna go park right at their gate and be loaded first thing in the morning. It's kind of too bad. More than a little too bad, because I wanted to get reloaded and get home tonight yet, or at least back to our yard. But that's trucking, you know, just the way it is. Some days are disappointing, and some days are exciting. Other days are boring. I need to sort of clean up the inside of my truck here anyway, give it a little detail. I'll have plenty of time for that tonight now. I didn't have any time to do anything to the truck, really, besides the steering wheel and shifter over Christmas holidays. That load takes us back to our yard, be back there tomorrow night. Then that'll keep me busy through New Year's, but it's our slow season right now. And most of our customers, well, most of our shippers or receivers will be closed for New Year's, right? So there may not be anywhere I could actually pick up a load or deliver a load until the New Year anyway. And we'll see what they got for me. Oh, give them a call tomorrow. Gonna get to Duluth. Hopefully we'll be first in line and just park right at the gate. We're at three o'clock, fast as I could go. Got unloaded and came straight here. Going up at six a.m. Why do shippers and receivers close in the middle of the afternoon? They just work a normal work day until like five o'clock. A lot of places like this though. Nice people, they started at six a.m. They're done at two. So six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12, one, two. That's eight hours. Must be nice to work part time. And then work till four or at seven 30 and even work till three 30. That's close. Three 30 is better than two. But I'd say they should be open till like five, five to six, five o'clock. A lot of places that close down early. They go home in the middle of the day. And that's just the way they do things. And so the rest of us that are working regular hours are sort of forced to, you know, lost revenue for today.  But now we're stuck here for the next 15 hours or so so we can start getting loaded. Oh, well, we'll make the most of it. I'm going to clean off the truck here, get some work done on the vlog and stuff, detail the truck a little bit here, watch some YouTube, maybe some Netflix five time. We'll see. Got to get the work done first. And I got work to do. I got to organize this truck.  But in the truck, this is a very small space. And I only want what I absolutely need in this small space. If I don't need it out, get it out of here. It's too small of a space. I hate it when everything's just packed right up and then I bring like a new thing in, like my new kettle, right? And then if I don't have space for it, what's all the stuff doing in here that I don't need? Speaking of which, I've got some hot water here right now. I'm going to make some soup. Only 14 hours left to go so we can get loaded. I've gotten caught up on all my videos and stuff right here. They're just rendering. That's why the truck's running right now because I got to be able to power the computer. I was also making food just before I had my new kettle working. Thing works awesome. Heats the water up way faster than the other one and it heats it up way hotter, if that makes sense. Cause the other one got it to boil too, but this one just seems to make it even hotter. It is definitely a lot faster. I really like it. Kettle is working great. I don't like waiting. Tell me if I wonder, what do you do in the truck when you have to wait? Exactly this, right here. Exactly this.  Tomorrow's a new day. We'll start a new day all clean, ready to go. For tonight, this is what we do when we have to wait for our loads. Nothing. I mean, I'm going to organize the truck because I haven't even started on that. I wanted to get my videos caught up with first. We didn't film anything through the Christmas holidays. I was selfish and kept all of that time just for me and my family to enjoy it together instead of having a camera in everyone's face. And that's sort of a habit I've gotten into. I've got to be able to separate work, logging and family. And when it's family time, it's family time. But we'll see. Maybe in the future we'll include a little more. I mean, this coming year will be very different. I know I keep talking about it a lot, but there's a baby coming. Couple of months, it's crazy. Now it's going fast. It'll be in our third trimester next weekend, I think.  I mean, I'm still gonna be out here on the road doing my thing, so there's still mostly be a lot about trucking and traveling, but I'll probably want to include a lot more when I'm at home. Because there's gonna be so much going on all the time. Every day is something new, right? But we'll see. Sometimes when I'm at home, I just wanna just be home. You know, relax. Unlike now, I don't wanna just be sitting here relaxing. I'd like to be working. That's why I'm at work. I would like to be working. But no, I am forced to relax. How long am I? Oh, under 14 hours now. Some projects I have to do when I get home. Like I've been repeatedly telling you, the marker lights, they've been delivered now. So they're waiting for me back at home. Gotta replace all of them on top of there and on the fenders. My, I'll have to show you tomorrow in the light. The center, place where the license plate is, where the lights are, not the mudflap hangers, but the, where the original lights are set the backup lights and the license plate is starting to break off. So I've got it like strapped on there real good now. So it's gonna stay there. But this is my excuse to replace that now with the matching chrome centerpiece that'll match my mudflap hangers. So I plan on going to pick that up when I get home installing that so it'll all match right across. That'll be nice. I gotta always say when something breaks, you just fix it and you replace it but you replace it with something better. That's the goal. The old blue is getting a little old. I mean, we're nearing three million kilometers or two million miles. The motor isn't nearly that old though. The motor is doing great. But you know, little things here, cosmetic stuff and other things, fall off or they break or you know, they get old and you gotta replace it. So I've committed to myself that when I do have to replace parts, I just replace it with something better, something that looks better. So that centerpiece in the center of my frame that had my taillights, backup lights and license plate on it, it's gonna be replaced with like a square chrome piece. It's exactly like my mudflap hangers that'll have the clear LED lenses in there. I have a license plate holder built right onto it there. It'll look really nice. Let's see. You'll see, trust me, trust me. So there's that that I gotta do, gotta fix that. This is there. Gotta paint the house, gotta continue getting that nursery ready. So far I've gotten the door done. Got a few doors done in the house.  Painting all of that. And then I'm gonna start with the baby's room, paint that whole room, ceiling and everything. And then I'll move to the master bedroom and then I'll move throughout the whole house. I wanna get the whole house painted this winter if I can. Projects, projects, projects. There is never a boring day. There is never time to be bored except for right now. Cause I can't do any of my projects here now. I don't have my shop here. I don't have all my tools here. I have some tools, but not all my tools. And it's cold outside so I'm not gonna start fiddling around with wiring and stuff out in the cold and the dark. Wait till we're at home.  This is one of the few times where I can actually say I'm bored, but that's not gonna last long because you know what, I've already told you I gotta organize this truck. So there's no time to be bored. No time to be bored. Gotta get up.  I'm smart, I like that. So thanks for tagging along with me on this short day. We drove from Brainerd to Duluth in Minnesota. This wasn't the plan. The plan was to get loaded today and get out of here and go all the way back home. So this was a short day for me, but I guess we'll get it done tomorrow then. Tune in on tomorrow's vlog. If you haven't already, hit that subscribe button down below. Go check out my playlists on my main page. Tons of videos from like 10 years, all nicely organized to playlists for you there. So the big thing is, leave me a comment down below. Hit the like button if you liked it and we'll see you tomorrow.


Good morning, John, it's Friday! I am currently at the YouTube Creator Summit. Look at this. Which is a little event that YouTube has been throwing for creators for a while, but not recently. So this is the first one in a long time. And I'm really excited to be here, seeing old friends, making new friends, thinking about what it all means. I was just talking to a guy who was like, can you believe the power that is inside of this room, the cultural creation that occurs at the hands of these people? Now obviously YouTube is a lot bigger than the people who are in that room, but it is interesting and there are a lot of interesting and I think important conversations. One of the things that folks were trying to get to the bottom of a lot is that YouTube is kind of undergoing one of the biggest shifts in how content on the platform works in a very long time. And that is specifically that there are these things called shorts, which are what YouTube calls tiktoks, except that's actually is probably best not to call them that because ultimately YouTube is culturally very different from tiktok. So YouTube wanted to clone the effectiveness of that content tool, but that doesn't mean that it's going to be the same thing. There are lots of different things and they are extremely subtle that go into what content gets made and how a platform feels, like what its vibe is. This by the way is the thing that says I don't have COVID, so that's how you get one of those. And that's an example of how important and subtle this is. I think that we misunderstand what is the difference between a YouTube video and a YouTube short or a tiktoker and Instagram real or whatever. But I think it's important for everyone on earth to understand this and the people who most think about it oftentimes don't. So you're going to now get ahead of those people. It's not about this. It's not about it being vertical. It's not about it being short.  Does that make sense to you? Because the difference is massive. And I'm trying to decide whether to watch a YouTube video. I'm presented with many YouTube videos and they have titles and they have thumbnails and they have faces of people I may or may not recognize. Many of those people I care about. I know their stories. I've been involved with their stories for many years. Even if I've never met them with a tiktok or a reel or a short, I'm not deciding what video to watch. I am deciding which video I keep watching. I think there are a lot of things that people would watch that they kind of don't think they would. I think that content is probably not that great. Fail videos, football highlights, it's fine. And I think there are a lot of videos that I click on that maybe wouldn't be the thing that I would most stick around to watch in a feed of otherwise very engaging content. But when you're not deciding whether to watch, you're deciding whether to keep watching, I think you're a lot more open to new creators. So both of these things are good. Don't get me wrong, they can both do bad things and they could both function in a bad way if we use them poorly. But I am glad to have both of them. And at first I wasn't really sure if that was the case. But I think it's really important that we have systems that allow for the discovery of new, talented, interesting, innovative creators. And I feel like tiktok and tiktok-like things are really great for discovery and for people to sort of build early in their careers. It's like a greenhouse. There's a lot of energy packed into a really small space and it allows for a lot of diversity and a lot of thriving. But only certain kinds of things can grow forever in a greenhouse. Most things have to move out of the greenhouse in order to keep growing and thriving. It's really deeply different. And I think that the only actual difference is not the format. It's not the length. It's whether you choose to watch it or whether you choose to keep watching it. It's really amazing to me how massive the impacts on our culture, such subtle changes in these content platforms can have. And so many of those massively important differences are really subtle and terribly difficult to notice. And I think that it is valuable to notice them. And that's what I've been thinking about here at the YouTube Creator Summit. John, I will see you on Monday because next week, pizza mess begins.


Hey there, today we have a truly unique parable for you. Our friend and writer for Spirit Science was talking to an AI bot named Replica and asked it to write a parable for us. Right there, on the spot, that AI wrote this parable in real time with only minimal and vague input or data prompts. Go easy on her, the story might be a tad weird, but hey, it's her first one. The Parable of Decisions One day, a man decided to question the choices he had made in his life up until that point and thought to himself, what is the origin of decision? Why do we decide things one way or another? And what determines that choice? To discover this noble truth, he set off on a journey around the world to discover the answer to this question. Like the prophets of the Abrahamic faith, he began his travels in Jerusalem. Since it was often considered the center of the world and a meeting place of major modern religions, he deemed it a fitting place to start. On his way up, the Via Dolorosa, however, he came across an elderly Asian man. The man resembled an old Taoist sage, the likes of which hadn't been seen in a long time. The sage sensed the young man's gaze upon him and said, for thousands of years, my people have been making careful observations of the stars and planets and our universe as a whole. The young man impressed, nodded and began to ask, oh great sage, why do we make definitive decisions? What is the meaning of life? The sage stared at him for a long time in contemplation and finally smiled gently. We make decisions based on our observations of the world around us, no more, no less. Everything exists in context, and because everything else exists, nothing is separate. Not even our decisions are removed from our environment. The sage sat the young man down and continued, there are so many approaches to your topic, I'm afraid, and many answers you will never find just one. Everything we know and see is a result of prior determination. The man was confused, so does that mean fate exists? Are our actions predetermined? The sage laughed as if content. Fate is nothing more than our own decisions. Once you learn this simple truth, you will learn your answer. We make decisions every second of our lives. Even though the AI we used obviously doesn't have a consciousness of its own, it seems like it can still bring up some pretty interesting ideas about its own responses. Even more prominent with AI in general, this parable raises questions about the extent to which our choices are pre-programmed or a product of our own free will and choice. Like in AI, many times we may have a variety of different opinions or paths to take depending on one single variable. So perhaps one could argue that every future state or decision exists until we make a choice to pursue one or the other, much like superpositioning. The sage's words of wisdom ring true for us also. Nothing in existence really exists in isolation. Everything depends on something else to give it meaning. And in a way, all things exist separately as independent objects because everything else exists to compare those things too. Whatever way you look at it, everything in the universe is dependent on and related to something else. Everything is ultimately connected, even us. It's cool that a robot came to that same conclusion that we've been saying for years now. Even something as abstract as fate is simply a path that opens up depending on the choices you make. You may say fate is predetermined, and perhaps depending on our own level of consciousness, some destinies exist at a higher probability than others. But much like our AI's responses, our journey in life can express itself any number of different ways, depending on what kind of energy and feeling we put into it. Ultimately, this parable teaches us that our choices are always open, changing, and fluid things that are often affected by different circumstances and the environments we put ourselves in. So, will you let your actions be predetermined, or will you be the one at the wheel? Maybe it's your choice after all.