Progress part2 February 8, 2010

Pictures of the progress

These pictures are all clickable but there were enough that I didn’t have the patience for today to load them all individually. More to come when the room is finished.

Progress February 7, 2010

So this weekend Jarell and I painted my craft room, built two new tables and put up shelves. I am so excited to see all my plans coming to fruition and just beyond blissful at how into it Jarell is getting. He keeps seeing things that would make things more convenient for me and suggesting them. The funny thing being that most of the things he’s suggesting are ones that I secretly want but didn’t want to ask for on top of everything else that he’s already done for me. So $200, 1 1/2 gallons of paint, two days and 1 headache later the room is finally painted. Trim had to be removed to put up the new tables and its such junky stuff (came with the house) that it broke so we’re probably going to yank the rest of the trim out and for the time being leave the walls with a white strip at the bottom. Sounds unfinished but it actually acts as a kind of trompe l’oiel making you think there’s white trim around the base of the walls and it looks better than the old stuff that was “wood grain” but flaking really badly.

I really am at a loss for word to describe how happy all of this work makes me. I just feel like the world is glowing (altho that may be the paint fumes talking lol).

I don’t have much in the way of pictures for you yet. I took a few preliminary ones yesterday but haven’t taken any more today because we were trying to get as much done as possible since tomorrow I’ll be on my own while Jarell is at work. After we get the big shelf out of the middle of the room I’ll try and get some taken to share with everyone.

For now I’m off. My head hurts and I’m going to watch a movie with my dear sweet man and then maybe later he’ll get lucky since he’s been so sweet to me this weekend. Au revoir cheries!

Craft Pictures February 5, 2010

So this is what I’ve been working on.

This is the mess partially cleaned up. Its a start.

This is a mushroom cannister that I bought blank quite awhile back and I finally got it painted in the primary colors that I’ve picked for my craft room.

This necklace was inspired by this post via oneprettything. My necklace doesn’t much resemble the other except for the blue silk dupioni but I like how it turned out.

This is a scarf made from felt circles that I’ve been planning on making since I saw a similar one on a rerun of Gilmore Girls. Not sure I like it yet but at least I’m finishing things, right?

Finally this is the shirt that I’ve started on using Gertrude to make my own pattern with. I am super proud of this particular one because altho it may not seem like that big a deal, it fits me perfectly and it is why I made Gertrude in the first place.

Please ignore the dirty mirror. That’s the teenager’s bathroom and it’s much harder to keep clean. So that’s my week. Tomorrow we’ll be going to get turquoise paint for the walls. The wonderful side effect of all this cleaning and organizing is that I’m seeing all my supplies and getting reinspired. I’m working on making a sewing book to hold supplies for on the go crafting. It’s only just started tho so no pictures of it. I have so many more ideas that are racing through my head and I love getting so many things done.

I’m heading out now- watching a movie with my sweetie and my dog. Have a good weekend folks!

I’ve been working on my craft room all the live long day February 5, 2010

And I’m going to have some pictures of some crafts that I’ve gotten done here soon but for now the real housework is calling and I have to go do some dishes… bummer. Be back soon!

Meet Gertrude February 2, 2010

If you are friends with me on Facebook there’s a chance you’ve already met her but if you’re not or you just aren’t on there that much here she is.

Gertrude is my new duct tape dress maker’s dummy. Not sure why I’m calling her Gertrude but I am. Maybe because I don’t want to admit that is my body sitting there in tape form. She will be playing my body double in the more dangerous areas of learning to be a seamstress. Mostly the ones involving pins and needles…. But don’t worry she’s not a drug addict or anything. Fortunately she’s already a multipe amputee so she doesn’t have to worry about losing any limbs. And she won’t feel much pain with her 1/4 thick duct tape skin.

She is a joint effort between me and my dear husband who very patiently helped me through not one but two taping sessions (we ran out of tape and had to wait a few days before we could get more. She’s actually a bit bigger than me due to the extra thick layer of tape Jarell used but that’s alright as she is more for the picky stuff that can be fudged a bit.

In other news my dress making deal fell through. The poor girl who wanted the dresses is no longer getting married as of this morning when we talked so she doesn’t need the dresses. Having been there myself I hope things work out for the best for her and in the meantime I’m not quite willing to lay this dream to rest. It feels so much more right then so many of the projects I’ve tried before to make money working from home. I love sewing but don’t want to try and produce something that no one wants to buy. Rather I would like to find a need and fill it which is something I could do with a custom sewing business. So I’m going to do some more research and see where I can put some business cards and some things like that. I’m not sure exactly how to go about this but I’m going to take it slow and see how things go. Wish me luck and as always anyone with thoughts and suggestions please let me know. Feel free to leave a comment or send me an email- my email is somewhere in the sidebar

What have I gotten myself into! January 27, 2010

I use Facebook fairly often. Okay to be honest its one of my homepages and I’m often on it for several hours at a time. Today it may have gotten me in over my head but I’m really excited about it.

A girl who I graduated from high school with is getting married in June and has been trying somewhat unsuccessfully to find someone to make her bridesmaid dresses. Today she mentioned in her status that she was worried about getting them done (those of you who know me can probably see where this is going) and so I commented saying that depending on how hard the dress pattern was that I could probably help her out. This started a conversation between us that continued through several emails through FB back and forth till we had gotten most of the details sorted out.

The details being- 5 dresses made with Simplicity pattern 3823, style D, made with bridal satin, finished in time for her June wedding. Here’s a picture of the pattern.

The teal bubble skirt is view D.

I am freaking out a bit now that I have realized the enormity of the task ahead of me. Measuring 5 girls and keeping those measurements sorted out. The pressure of not ruining someone’s big day. The excitement of knowing this will be (if I don’t screw up) my first paying job for seemstress work. (at $30 a dress)

I have made several dresses and shirts now and learned very quickly from my mistakes but I’m still concerned about the outcome of all of this. I think the bodice will be the tricky part and I’m really hoping that her bridesmaids are all average sized and not hugely busty like I am because that really affects the fit of ready made patterns. Because of my concern about the bodice I plan to make a muslin of the full dress once and then muslins of the bodice only for the other 4 dresses so that I know ahead of time where the problem areas lie and can get them fixed before I cut up that expensive fabric.

Despite all my misgivings I am really excited about the idea of creating something that is going to be seen by so many. I’ve got a daydream running in my head where someone (or several someone’s )will fall in love with the work and want me to make dresses for them for whatever occasion. This is a huge part of the reason I wanted to get into sewing as it isn’t something that everyone does anymore and when you want something special custom made is the way to go.

If things go well with this batch of dresses my plan is to reinvest the money into more tools for my sewing so that I’m better prepared for the next opportunity that may come along.

With that in mind I would love to have any thoughts and suggestions from seamstresses out there watching from the wings. I have read reviews of this pattern online and it seems to be relatively pain free. A couple of people who made it said it ran small in the waist but other’s didn’t mention it at all making me think that the measurements were off somewhere or the problem was in the seams. My biggest fear is working with satin- I hate it with a passion and am always so worried about seams fraying and pulling loose. I do have a serger now (Jarell’s present to me for Christmas) but I don’t know how much good that will do me. Any pointers on using a serger for formal dress construction would be greatly appreciated.

With that final thought I’m off. My craft room currently looks like it got hit by a hurricane because I can’t move a shelf that needs to be in a different spot but I don’t want to move everything else back till the shelf gets moved. Go figure right?

Back again- twice in one month- oh my! January 25, 2010

Life has gotten interesting for me in the last 5 months or so. It started out with an instant message from an old friend and progressed along strange pathways that I’m not at liberty to discuss from there. It has actually left me wishing some days for the normal boring dullness that I had become accustomed to prior to August. Who’d have ever thought that August 3rd would become a day that would live on in my mind for such simple stupid reasons? A date that somehow marks a huge domino effect of changes that, while seemingly unrelated, were linked by tiny coincidences culminating in my life as it stands now.

Despite or maybe because of all of this I have neglected this blog, my fitness goals (that had gone so well) and a great many other things in my personal life left me trying to determine where up was and if north was still North on a compass or just another meaningless letter on a map that didn’t get me where I needed to go.

Life doesn’t come with an instruction manual per se. If I were more devout I would say that the bible was the only manual we need, but as I feel somehow that I have fallen from grace I don’t necessarily think the bible will be of much use to me now. And if these ramblings seem like mopey and woe is me dramatic bullshit, well you’re probably right, but I never know who is out there listening today. I deleted this blog from my Facebook to prevent family from seeing more than they should but there are some things I’d almost rather tell to complete strangers who might judge or be secretly envious but to whom I would feel no need for explanation and absolution.

In the case of my blog however I consider those of you who stop by regularly, whether lurking in the shadows or screaming in the sunlight, to be my friends and so even from you I keep my secrets. Let me clarify that whatever it is you’re thinking, it’s probably not that. Nothing so bad that it can’t be forgiven, just things I’m not proud of, actions unbecoming to the person who I am supposed to be. The perfect wife, daughter, sister, niece, cousin, granddaughter or whoever it is I am supposed to be today. Things that haunt me in my dreams, confuse me in the waking hours and are in general constantly on my mind.

I’m getting back to fitness again. It’s a start that I often make this time of year but last year I was so impressed with my results and now so upset by my backsliding that I joined a couple of groups to keep me on track. One monitors my food and activities each day. Not necessarily to count calories but more so I can’t lie to myself. That’s the hardest part of this journey is not lying to myself- that was half a cup of potatoes not a whole one, I only had a little soda, etc. I’m sure that there are thoughts saying that I don’t have to be skinny for others and the truth is I don’t want to be skinny. I just want to be healthy. I look at the losses my family has suffered in the last 10 years and of the three women closest to me on my mom’s side of the family all three are gone. My grandmother was not over-weight and did not die of cancer but rather congestive heart failure at the age of 82. I can understand that. But my aunts had both battled weight their whole lives just as I have and they are gone much too soon. 42 and 66 are not numbers that I want to consider when it comes to thinking about my life and how long I want to be around. Because of this I plan to fight to become healthy and I know I will falter but I am going to do this so that I may have that one small advantage when the possibility of genetics catches up with me.

The other group gives me workout routines and fitness tips for the Wii fit that we bought last May so that I have something to make all the endless excercise chores more bearable. This I hope combined with some work on myself will get me where I need to be right now in my life. It’s a start for what it’s worth and we’ll just have to see how it goes.

This is the girl of the short attention span signing off.

Lucy I’m home! January 22, 2010

So I’m back again! For awhile until the next shiny object catches my attention anyway Til that time lets see what kind of an update I can do here. My last post was New Year’s Eve and that was a piece of a short story so it hardly even counts. Now that the holidays are over I’m beginning to feel like I can breathe again and that makes things much easier. I had a wonderful birthday on New Years day. (yes I’m a New Years baby- first born in the Kokomo, IN hospital in 1986) Jarell took me out to dinner at my favorite ever Indian (dot not feather to borrow Dana’s terminology) restaurant where I had the most delicious dinner of Lamb Vindaloo. We came home stuffed like Thanksgiving turkeys only to find that my brother in law and his girlfriend had showed up with cake and ice cream. I was so happy I could have cried- last year was kinda haphazard and last minute but this year didn’t feel like that at all. It was by far the best birthday I’ve had in years. We played Apples to Apples with Jarell’s brother and his girlfriend, J11 and her boyfriend,  and a friend who is in the band with Jarell and his brother. A really nice relaxed fun evening.

The next day Jarell took me to a local art museum The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art where I saw some absolutely amazing art work. I was so very much in awe of seeing Monet and Georgia O’keefe and Thomas Hart  Benton larger than life not to mention the artifacts from all over the world. Definitely a wonderful lifetime experience. Of course to make a wonderful day absolutely perfect we went to Jo-Ann Fabrics afterwards so I could use the gift card I had gotten for Christmas.

Aside from all that fun, we had a white Christmas and the snow just kept going for the next 4 weeks. A friend of mine works for MO-DOT and he had to seriously bust his butt. I never gave much thought to how snow affected the workers but I sure will think twice before wishing for snow after all of this. Nevertheless I got some shots of the beautiful snow and of course I must share a few of them.

The waterfall all frozen up.

And with that beautiful snowy white note I leave you. Its muddy and nasty outside now so I have no urge to share that with you. Take care all and watch you’re step on the way out- its slick outside my house.

Dead Laptop January 16, 2010

In case anyone should wonder why I’ve disappeared its because my laptop power cord (that I bought in November) has already broken thanks to small children and clumsy adults (myself included) tripping over it. I have ordered a new one but don’t have my own computer til then. I’ll be back to my regular neglect of this blog ASAP.

Writing exercise December 30, 2009

A random writing exercise. Short. Ignore this unless you’re feeling truly bored. All of the below is completely fictional and came solely from my head so don’t get any funny ideas.

They first met at a friends wedding- two drunken members of the wedding party looking for, at most, a short fling, but more likely a one night stand. It stretched out beyond that- clandestine dates followed by passionate hours in his car parked on some back road in the dark into the wee hours of the night. He traveled for work so often that his wife never questioned his absence. She was a casual girl who rarely wore perfume or lipstick so there were never any tell-tale signs of these on his clothes and her husband never thought to question her actions.

When she found his little black book she was hurt, but she quickly decided to make the best of it. She had less right to demand answers from him than most and as little as she liked things the way they were, she knew that to give an ultimatum would be to sentence their affair to an early grave, and so she left things as they were.

He owned several small apartments around the state where he could stay for a pittance when business called for it and it was there that he took his conquests when the mood was right. His wife was only aware of two of them, having been raised in the old school where the husband took care of the finances while the wife kept the home. Theirs had not been a marriage of love so much as a marriage of convenience and social standing and she was happy to tend to her garden, her committees, and her children so long as the world saw a loving and devoted father for their child to complete the picture of domestic bliss. She was content in this role and he saw no reason to disabuse her of the notion when it allowed him to be so easily happy in his own way.

“Why don’t you take me to all the places you make love?” she asked him one day. ”Really?” he replied. He couldn’t read her eyes. Chunks of mascara whipped into them as her Mustang declared war on the road. He hated how people could hurt you like that- lying with their feelings, their expressions untruths. Her face was like that now; unreadable and clean when inside he knew she was seething. Her voice was even, but the trembling in her eyes gave her away.

He took her to the place that was truly his that first time. The only one he had bothered to personalize back when his intentions were still pure and true.  They were so wrong for each other from the beginning and they knew it but somehow that knowing made things alright. She laughed at the political cartoons on his bedroom wall. He told her “I think I might secretly be a democrat,” when she asked why they were there. Pen and ink sketches of the nations leaders in the absurd situations created by the politics of the day. A picture of his wife and children turned hastily face down as they entered the room seemed to give its blessing to the whole scene.

Her timid jealousy and brutal honesty were what drew him to her. She loved so quickly like a child with a new playmate, giving herself wholly tho they both had other lives. He could ruin her with a word or build her up with a smile and the power that gave him in his powerless life made him smile. He was inclined to play the benevolent god of love in her world tho after they had made a sacrifice on his altar he returned to the remote role of friend. This bothered her more than he knew but she had been acting on the stage of life too long to let it show. She played the part so well that even she believed it after awhile.

This is where I ran out of words. All of the above is completely fictional and came solely from my head so don’t get any funny ideas.