Sew Busy Stepping on Pearls

 I've been busy.  Trying to get enough sleep.  Dealing with what life throws at me.

and the wedding dress project.  The lining is still enroute for all the dresses but it'll be here soon.  I'm not ready for it yet anyways, so no big.

Below is the glitter/pearled overlay fabric.  I woke up in the middle of the night and wondered if it was too heavy to be poofy enough for the bride.  I still don't know and won't until we get to that step.  sigh.  a few more sleepless nights in the works for me I imagine...

It sure is pretty though!  I've plucked the pearls off that are too close to where a seam will be and now my sewing room is littered with pearls and cast off glitter.  LOTS and LOTS of glitter.

Not to worry though.  It's not like we'll run out of the stuff.  There is still TONS on the fabric...  I'm sure JoAnns reseeds this fabric with more glitter every night...

Here is the organza that will be 4 layers of fru-fru gorgeousness between the overlay piece and the dress lining.

It's cut in huge ovals with a waist in the middle.  They're all sewn together into one huge piece with varied lengths and french seams.

The glitter fabric just has a couple more french seams to go before it will be too.

I have my sewing room closed all the time to keep the cats out so it's a bit chilly in here.  I can just imagine the mischief the cat's would be up to if they got in here.

The fabric for the bridesmaid dresses came and Meri shot off a photo of it to the bride.  It's a go!  So I plan to work on the dresses all day tomorrow.  Well, until I get sick of my sewing room and need a break.

So anyway, that is my life so far.

Have a grand weekend!

Once and Future projects

So the other day, I made the "infamous" whipped coffee.  I was so convinced that it was going to change my life and all my closets would get cleaned up and maybe if I drank enough, the garage.

The only thing I can say is, eh - iced coffee...  and (ok 2 things) I must be broken because I didn't do more than I usually do in a day.  and (ok 3 things) I think I overheated the motor in Jen's hand held immersion mixer.  The handle was smokin hot.  So I stopped before it whipped up as much as on the internet.  Threw it in the blender to finish it up.  It's harder to get every bit out but oh well.

It had kind of a coffee meringue consistency...  

I only used half of it as I didn't want to have a heart attack.

Here's the recipe in case you ever want to try it.

2 tablespoons instant coffee

2 tablespoons sugar

2 tablespoons boiling water

Whip it by hand, with a mixer or an immersion blender for a LONG time.  Some said for 20 minutes, others said 5.  

Then fill a glass half way with ice cubes and then with milk.  Put the coffee froth/meringue on top and drink the milk thru the froth.

I was getting too much coffee meringue on my upper lip, so I stirred it in.

Again, eh.  Not worth the hype.  Unless I totally did it wrong. 

How are you all doing making face masks?  After making roughly 40 and finding out that hospitals want a different type of mask or when the hospitals wash them in boiling water for extended periods of time, they will fall apart because I used poly thread...  I hadn't given them to a hospital yet so at least it wasn't MINE that fell apart...

So I'm done.

For 2 reasons.  I don't have just cotton thread and I'm out of elastic.  AND because (ok 3 reasons) my family and friends have enough now to hold them *hopefully* thru this period of Covid yuck.

I mailed off a couple packages of the DON'T BOIL ME masks yesterday so unless this drags out and my masks fall apart, I won't be making more for the next week or two.   

I'm actually so excited to sew something for myself that I don't know where to begin!!!

Do I finish the hem on the last shirt that I was making? 

Do I sew a few potato bags because I'm going to grow potatoes this year?

Do I start a new pattern?  

I just don't know!!!!

THEN I saw this...

But not only am I out of elastic, we're out of bacon too.

Darn.

Happy Birthday Dear Emri!

Ok...  I started sorting all my patterns and there is still a trunk upstairs full that I still haven't pulled down.

These are sorted by pattern makers.  McCalls, Simplicity, Butterick, Vogue and independent or random pattern makers that I don't have enough for a box of their own.  THEN they're sorted by pattern number.  If you're looking for a specific pattern, I very well might have it. twice.

I'm determined to use these patterns for all my sewing this next year.  I want to sew as many things from these as I possibly can, using my stash as much as possible.

To start, I made two tops for Meri for her birthday.  I had to preface her opening the gifts with "It's not done..."  or "it needs a bit of editing..."  I guess that's my pat phrase now and everyone expects it.

But I made her this top.  I've tried it on myself and like how it feels and looks!  It calls for a button for modesty, but when I tried it on and when Meri did, it's not necessary. 

Meri tried it on for me this morning and I can see where it could be a bit longer.  The front panel is one huge pattern piece, then twisted, but I guess I could add more in the middle of it to make it longer.  It hurt my head to make it work for this one and I put the pocket on the wrong side.  But I do want to make more of them.  

She's ok with the length for now and said she'd wear some high-waisted pants with them.  

So I just need to finish it up with hemming the sleeves and some handwork inside.

She also gave me a jumper that she wore on the cruise that she wants me to make into separates for her.  The instructions were pretty clear, so that'll be a snap.

Her party last night was a lot of fun.  For her birthday dinner, she requested my carrot and pork stirfry, riced cauliflower, popcorn for dipping in queso, texas garlic toast and chicken suckers.

The menu was pretty random...  but she did say where to find chicken suckers.  It's not as gross as you think.  They're mango flavored candy suckers in the shape of chickens.  However the Mexican grocery store she said to find them at was out.  shoot.

AND we got her an ice cream cake as she doesn't like cake.  I called the DQ to order it and gave her name's spelling to the gal there.  I spelled it out and she said, "mm  that's an unusual spelling, how do you pronounce that?"  Meri, short for Meredith.  "Oh!  Yeah that makes sense now!"

Robb went to pick up the cake an hour later and the cake said, "Happy Birthday Emri".  mmmm no.  Please fix.  The lady there insisted that that's how I spelled it for her!  He insisted they correct it.  They did.

But when we sang Happy Birthday to her, I sang it, "Happy Birthday dear Emri."  

Robb and Meri got the joke.

Afterwards the kids sat at the table and talked over each other into the night.  Leon had to go to bed so he missed out on some, but he'll get to go see Meri this afternoon and visit with her new kitten.

OH the new kitten!!  Meri went to a party on Saturday night and came home with an unusual party favor.  A three month old kitten that she's named Ranch.  It looks like a Holstein cow, but it's Ranch.

I was over at her daycare yesterday helping her out a little.  After about ten minutes, she noticed that Ranch had disappeared.  She looked all over and even had the kids calling "Ranch!" "Ranch!"  It was the baby's first word!  They looked ALL over and Meri checked every room in the house, twice.

At one point during the search, she said, "This smacks of something so-and-so might have her hand in..."  So after a bit, we noticed so-and-so had been sitting on a toy tub during the entire search and was calling out Ranch's name from her perch.  I went over to her and said, "So-and-so, can I have you stand up for a second?"

She answered, "Ummmm no."

So I removed her from the tub and out from under popped Ranch. LOL!  Ranch was just fine and Meri and I chuckled about that one a lot.  

I am reminded of Elmyra from Tiny Toons...

Anyway - I better get back to what I was getting at before this.  Have a great day!

Sew Needing to Sew

Sewing: I've got my maxi skirt done except for some hemming.  But I'm waiting for my good sewing machine to be put back into place for that.  My old Brother (no offense Mark) just was not cutting it and every seam I put in with it made me want to swear.  I think it's the needles.

My MIL's machine started doing funky stitching and she needed to finish a quilt top for one of her grand-daughter's graduation gift so I loaned my Janome to her.  The quilt is done so my machine is slowly making it's way back to the correct table in my sewing room/bedroom.

I've also started another shirt out of the same flowy pattern that I love so much.  It's a see through white.  

It's the one on the left with a few tweaks to make it longer in the back.  AND it's got the sleeves of another pattern so the sleeves are a bit longer. I don't know where the sleeve piece to this pattern has gone...

Note to self - make a tank top after that.

I have visions of wearing it with a pair of pale blue satin skinny pants made from a prom dress for the cruise.  Wouldn't THAT be something?

If you just rolled your eyes, then ... huh!  I don't need that kind of negativity in my life! ;)

Well, everyone needs a LITTLE negativity.  and feedback.

It's ok, be honest.

If it all turns out terrible, then at the very least I'll have an entry for the State Fair. or three.

I'm trying to make things fair quality these days.  That means finished seams, decent hems and a tag that says "Made with blood, sweat and tears by McValkrie".  

Oh no!  I'm OUT of those!  Oh well.  so they WON'T have those tags...

On to my day.  Enjoy yours!

Never Enough Garlic OR Time to Sew

Last week, Leon attended a "strings" event at the local library.  It was an introduction to stringed instruments and he decided that he likes the violin and the cello.

I'll have to pull out one of my old violins for him to try out. 

In the afternoon, the library also had a pixels craft project.  Cool!  Leon loved it so much that he came home and dug into the pixels that his great-aunt gave him a few weeks ago.  Wow, he loves them!  As soon as he can figure out my iron, there is no stopping him.  At this point, I have at least one of his projects that needs to be ironed together before someone else knocks it off the counter and the pixels go flying.

He did it over breakfast.

Anyway, the weekend... what did I do? hmmm

Friday night I scrambled and made a navy top that is identical to my black flowy top.  I needed something to go with my crazy pants that Meri didn't want.  I'll find a copy of a pic that someone took of me at the sewing meeting and chop my head off the photo.  I'll tell you why in a minute.

Saturday morning, I stopped by Meri's work and showed off my outfit.  Reject MY handmade clothes, will you??!  She admitted that she liked how the outfit turned out.  Well, she can't have it.

After picking up a pop and some fence screws to go, I headed to my ASG sewing meeting.

I've been there all of once since I think November.  It was great to see so many new faces and other friendly ones.  I had a few friends ask me what I've been up to and what I've been sewing.  

"Um... I'll get into that at share time."  that seemed to appease them.

So I stood up in front of everyone when it came my time to share.  I'd brought my cell phone and two patterns that I've made over and over and love.  I started out saying, "Ok, you all know I'm weird.  Look at these pants!"  Then explained why I hadn't been there for such a long time.  "Well, in January we found out that my mom was dying."  and that's where I lost it.

Shoot.  I'd practiced the whole way there with what I was going to say and didn't calculate in tears.

Well, they came anyway.  darn.  I finished my story with as much control over my quivering chin as I could and tears streaming down my face.  Don't fight it.  Explaining my sewing projects of two coffins and tons of tops and leggings to keep my mind busy.

I had given out my cell phone with pics of the coffins and it made the rounds around 5 tables of women and I got lots of hugs afterwards.  Those women are great.   One of my closer friends of the group lost her husband a week or so before Dad died.  Another one said that one year, she lost 5 members of her extended family.  "please God let's slow this down a bit more!"

It's going to take time and even then, you don't know what is going to trigger grief.  The other day I was working on my puzzle...  sigh.  I did get one of Dad's puzzles about the attack on Pearl Harbor so maybe I was thinking about starting that after this one.  don't remember.  But it hit hard.

Anyway, Father's Day was another hard one.  I kept busy though.  After church, we drove a ways and had a great lunch at a restaurant when Ryan's Jen works weekends.  We hadn't been there before and they have a Ms Pacman and Galaga game in the corner...  Next time we'll bring more quarters!

Maddy called us on a DUO call on the way home!

We've GOT to plan a trip out to see them soon!

Came home and worked on prepping for Father's Day dinner that night.  Had to debone a bunch of chicken I made a couple days ago and froze some in bags for future use.  Then made bone broth in the Instant pot with the remnants and several cups of water.  I also cut up an onion and some celery and tossed it in too.  I set it for 60 minutes.  While that was cooking, I pulled up a bunch of rhubarb and made a rhubarb crisp and then packaged up the rest in 3 cups baggies for the freezer for later.  I need to do that again.  The patch is getting big.

Then while those things were cooking, I left Robb and Leon in charge of pulling out the rhubarb crisp when the timer goes off and I went to look at houses with Meri and a realtor.  She's looking to buy a house!  It's NOT going to interfere with her dream of moving to California as she plans to rent it out while she's gone.  We visited a couple, then stopped in to see Ada and her hubs for a few minutes before the last one.  

Whew!  The last one was full of animals and smelled SO strongly of cat urine.  Yikes...  It made my eyes hurt.  They're going to need to bleach that house a few times before they catch a buyer.

It won't be Meri.

Then I got home and the bone broth was done.  Pulled that out and then put in frozen chicken tenderloins and set it for 10 minutes.  While that cooked, I got lots of desserts done.  I made several cups of chocolate and white chocolate mousse (meese?) (mice?) from a box mix and got them stuck in the garage fridge.  Then chopped up an onion and after cleaning the instant pot again, I put in a little oil and set it on saute.  Fried up the onion along with about a 1/4 cup of minced garlic.  I don't know if that is equivalent to 2 cloves of garlic (or to the 2 bulbs of garlic that I accidentally made this with the first time, 30 years ago) but it turned out good.

Here's my recipe.  It started out as a Better Homes and Garden cookbook recipe on page 301 30 years ago, but it has been tweaked since.

Chicken Cacciatore

Cooked chicken (however many you think you need) (I used the rest of my tenderloin packet of probably 8 or so.)  (Probably 3-5 chicken breasts would be good)  Once cooked, cut up into chunks and set aside.  It can be fried.

Saute a chopped onion and however much garlic you can handle. (see above..  According to Robb, I could have put in more.)

Stir a lot.  Once that is translucent and smelling up the house REAL good, turn off the saute button.

BTW: This was my first time using the Instant Pot for this.  Usually I do it in the crock pot or on the stove or oven.  depending on my mood and how much time I've got.

Add a 15 oz (approx) can of chopped tomatoes in sauce.  

Add a large can (probably around 24-30 oz) of crushed tomatoes or tomato sauce.

When you wonder if this is enough to feed the crowd with, add another can of chopped tomatoes.

Then add a teaspoon of salt, basil and oregano.

Add a few shakes of pepper and one or two bay leaves.  If you don't fish them both out at the end, then whoever finds one in their dish wins a prize.  We had to explain to Leon that there isn't really a prize.... It's just the honor of finding it.

Chopped up a green pepper and tossed it in too.

Then tossed in the chicken chunks.

Set the Instant Pot to 15 minutes or whatever you think.  It still takes 10 minutes or so to bring it to pressure, so that gave me almost 30-40 minutes to finish up everything else.

You're supposed to add 1/4 cup of white wine when the cacciatore is done and then cook it for a few more minutes, but I didn't have any and usually make it without.

Did a quick release on the Pot when it got done.

I made rice in a big pot on the stove.  If I'd had a second Instant Pot, I'd have made it in there.  Oh well.  1.5 red solo cup of rice to 3.5 - 4 red solo cups of the above mentioned bone broth with a little water.  Brought it to a boil, then set it to low with a tight lid for 20 minutes.  Not opening it until the 20 minutes was up.

The chicken mixture was served on top of the rice.

I also boiled up some baby carrots to serve along side.  

If I'd had a third Instant Pot, I'd have made use of it.

With the kids help, we set the table with china and served.  Everyone was stuffed.  Good.

Robb got an air fryer from Meri and they're plotting out when they'll play with their next toy.  

Ryan got a Best Buy card from Leon and plotted out what he was going to buy with it.

Leon gave Ryan and Jen some of his pixel creations and they loved them.

I was so exhausted I left ALL the dishes until this morning.  And when I came downstairs this morning, I found Ryan and Leon doing them!  Not all of them...  there were a lot.  But a good chunk filled up the dishwasher and I did the rest by hand.  The kitchen has been reclaimed!

So that's my weekend.  I hope to get some sewing done this week.  I'm working on a maxi skirt out of the L.A. fabric and wondering what to make to match it for a top.  It has the potential to be cruise clothes...

What'd you do this weekend?

Blah Blibbity Blah

Want a good recipe?

me too.

Last night for supper, we had a repeat Thanksgiving.  Well, not with the works...

This was Thanksgiving in Wisconsin last November.

After the actual Thanksgiving, Robb and I deboned the turkeys and packaged them up in sandwich baggie sized packages and they've been in the freezer.  I took one of them out on Wednesday and stuck it in the fridge to thaw.

So last night, Robb made some toast and I cut up the turkey and mixed it with some mayo and voila.  Turkey salad sandwiches!

Sounds good to me.

Today, I'm having lunch out.  I'm attending the retirement luncheon for our pastor's wife.  I'm so jealous that she gets to retire!!  I look forward to having time to putter and sort things out and get rid of a lot of things, because quite frankly, when else will I have the time?

AND I'll get to sew.  I'm really looking forward to that.  

Of that top that I made last week, I've been able to sew about 3 more inches of the hand stitched hem.  *yay*  3 more yards to go...  

Maybe it will be done by cruise time.  in September.

Not sure what we're doing this weekend.  I might go see my dad but I should probably get things done around the house.  Every time I take the dog out, I see something outside that needs to get fixed.  Oooh yeah... that fence will need work...  

and ooh... a rake.

It'll happen.  

I'm in a weird mood this morning.  As Robb would say, "compared to what?"

Caffeine it is then.

Have a great weekend!

Making tracks and other things

The tuxedo jacket now has the interlining in place, edges serged and ready to roll and take shape.

Yesterday's lunch was VERY productive!  

I ate at my desk...

Speaking of food...  My bestie's husband is still a bit under the weather with his cold, so at Robb's request, I made Maddy's favorite chicken noodle soup and Robb ran it over to him yesterday after

noon.  Mike loves it too and now he's got a gallon of it for whenever he wants.

Chicken Noodle Soup recipe

Cook some (3-4) chicken breasts or whatever chicken you want in a crockpot  all day.

Make sure it's deboned, if it's not already.

Pour 2-3 quarts of chicken broth in a large pan.  notice how exact we are?

Add 1 packet of onion soup mix and 1 packet of Knorr's Vegetable soup mix

Add the chicken, torn into smaller bits.

Bring to a boil and then add about 1/2 to 1 packet of egg noodles.

Cook until the noodles are tender.  Serve!

Easy peasy.

THEN also yesterday, Meri was planning on going to a potluck dinner with her entire jazz band at the director's house.  

I'm guessing dinner was over for this shot. Taken from FB...

She was going to make either boxed mac and cheese or Ramen noodles.  REALLY?...  So in his spare time at work, Robb whipped up a lasagna for her to take.  He brought it home and I baked it in time for her to meet up with the other kids to car pool.  

The above picture was her breakfast, made from the leftovers.  Robb makes her breakfast every day during the week so she'll eat SOMETHING before going to school.  And she hates normal breakfast foods, so it's tricky some days.  But lasagna is right up her alley!

And today, it's leftovers...  again...  Ryan just said that he's going to make everything you can with hard boiled eggs today.  

Egg salad sandwiches

Deviled eggs

Scotch eggs

Potato salad with lots of egg in it

Sliced and served with salt or paprika or mustard

Cut up and mixed with mayo, horseradish, etc

Plain with or without salt.  I say with...

I rattled off several options and he's still peeling the eggs.  

Maybe he'll make something up totally new.

Off to be creative!!!!  How have you been creative lately?

SEW Last Sunday

On Sunday, Robb and I cooked all afternoon for our annual Norwegian Christmas dinner with my bestie and her husband.  They arrived and just as we were sitting down to eat, Ryan and Jen drove in. It turns out that Jen is part Norwegian too and loved EVERYTHING including the melted butter over the works.  Who knew?!  I thought she was 100% Irish. 

I didn't get a single pic of the wonderful food!

My lefse was a hit!  At least that's what everyone said.  Robb said that I need to make more for this weekend's feasts.  And I still have some batter left over so I guess I could.  But only AFTER my big sewing projects are on done.  So I'm thinking Saturday.

I'm SO glad it's Wednesday already!  But I'm also thinking, Yikes!  It's Wednesday already!!  With any luck, I can finish two of my sewing projects over my afternoon breaks.  Then I'll just be down to two big ones for the rest of the week.

AND I think we'll be buying another car by this weekend.  Not sure yet.  Things are crazy.

Ok, enough gabbing.  I need to get back to work.  Have an awesome Wednesday!

Defective Goals

Do you know how hard it is to track down a doctor after they leave one office and your kid only wants THEM?!  

I didn't read all those Nancy Drew, 

Trixie Belden

and Vicki Barr books for NOTHING! 

 I tracked the good doctor down, found her on Facebook and sent her a message. 

"HEY...  Where are you AT these days??!"

AND she responded.  We'll be making an appt soon.  My kids really like and trust her.  She's actually a physician's assistant, but she really can relate to my kids.  Apparently she was a hippy type in college and knows how these kids think.

Speaking of being a detective.  I made my own sign to hang on our upstairs door when I was a kid.  Val's Detective Agency, with my home phone number.  My sister took a pen and made one little swipe to make it Val's Defective Agency.  

ha.ha.  She's SOOOOO funny....

In an attempt to get Leon coaxed off the computer without a fight last night, I sat on the floor next to the piano bench with two boxes of dominoes.  I started setting them up for a good tumble.  He happened to notice and ran over to TAKE over.  We made a few figure 8s and then built towers to see who could build theirs the highest.  The ones I built with fell first.  He made sure of that.  

Leon has an eye appointment today in prep for school starting next week.  Whew!  The last minute rushes are the worst.  We should have done this in July...  Oh well.  Only his dentist check up won't be before school starts.  That should be ok. 

But pretty soon, the house will be mostly quiet during the days (I'm trying to make myself feel better) and I can do whatEVER I want over my lunch breaks! BWAHAHA!

I'll probably sew more.

Sew Sew-ee with Parchment

Here's what I've been sewing.  I've mastered this skirt pattern, I think.  

The welted pockets were a challenge and I could NOT understand what Burda was trying to explain in their instructions so I took to Youtube and found a tutorial on how to do welt pockets.  It took three tries on samples, but I finally figured it out before jumping into this tan skirt.  

It's not something Maddy will be wearing in Colorado as it's just a smidge too heavy of fabric for summer, but it will be good for fall.

Then I made a second one with the recommended ties, but they haven't been attached yet.  

Maddy sounded gracious and tried to come up with what colors to wear with it.  So... she may not be too keen on my choice of fabric. :)  Oh well.  It does seem shiny with the flash on...  When she's home she can pick out the fabric that she wants and I'll make it again.  I've got a nice thick wool...

TUTORIAL TIME

I've been agonizing over how to attach the lace cutouts onto the skirt of the wedding dress that I'm making.  I've tried various types of fabric glues and even Elmer's glue but they always ended up way too stiff and/or crunchy.  So I went back to JoAnn's and asked for the lightest weight wonder-under type double sided fusible interfacing that they have and explained my project.  They were very helpful and recommended one.  And at this moment, I can't tell you what kind it is.  Ask me later when I've been back upstairs...

So here is the deal.  I had already cut out lots of flowers from the lace and was hoping to not have to trim around the fusing again.  Here is what I did this morning as a sample.

I placed the lace bit on a bit of the fusing.  Placed a sheet of parchment paper over the top and ironed it for 8-10 seconds, counting long.  

Let it cool for a few seconds.  Peeled off the back paper of the fusing and pulled off as much of the excess fusing as possible.  Easy...  This is going to be slick.

Then placed it on the chiffon.  The iron has been burning the chiffon just a bit as it's delicate stuff so I placed a piece of parchment on top of the chiffon with lace bit and then ironed for 8-10 seconds.

The lace bit started coming off a bit so I ironed again for 8-14 seconds.  Parchment paper is my new best friend!  THEN it stuck.  and REALLY good too.  You can't pick that lace bit off at ALL.

And it's still flowy and not stiff one little bit.

YAY!  This part of the project won't be as bad as I thought it might be after all!

Now... just 29 more easy steps until that wedding dress is done.  And it may or may not be at the fair in 2.4 weeks!  But we'll see...  I've got permission to enter it if I can.

SEW on my toes.  I have to be...

Made and Missed Opportunities

 Here is a bit of my sewing from last Saturday.  I know it's hard to make out just what this is...  BUT, this is the overblouse for the dress.  I intentionally left a large swath of fabric on the bottom that I will cut around and be able to gradually merge down onto the grecian skirt.  

I need to move the skirt up the satin bodice about a half inch too.  

But I've got a list of things to do and will get to it as time allows.  

As for the rest of the photos...  I picked up a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle costume last weekend and Leon loves it!  I didn't know why the brown strips of cloth were on each sleeve and assumed the turtles liked fringe.  Leon knew what to do with them though...  

Last night, Meri and I attempted to take Leon swimming at 7pm and unfortunately the swimming lessons have begun...  The pool closes to the public at 7.  There was much wailing and gnashing of teeth stemming from that so I took Meri home.  And Leon too.  

We dug out the water balloons and since they were the old fashioned kind 

and I didn't have the proper tools to make a hundred in a minute, I made them ten.

And after Leon threw the last one at me, 

I realized ten was exactly the right number.

Robb's Dopp kit got waxed and thrown in the dryer this morning.  It's going to be pretty slick!  I just need to attach the handle.  That Highschool Musical pillow case is toast though with wax bits inside now.  Probably a good thing.  The kids were with Robb when he saw that set of queen-sized sheets on sale for $5 and bought it for me for Mother's Day one year.  Ryan said that he wanted to live with me after the divorce.  BUT no divorce and the sheets were actually used!  All that's left of that set now are the pillow cases.  And NOT even those anymore!!!

And this is Leon's project that he did for Ryan for Father's Day this coming weekend.  I bought a cool framed photo at the Salvation Army for a pittance.  Took the print out and flipped it over.  Leon painted his masterpiece and after it was completely dried this morning, I put it back in the frame.  This photo was still when it was drying.  It looks so nice in the gold frame!  I'll show you after Sunday.  I wrote a small label on it so he'd know when, for what and by whom it was made.  Leon DID write his name on it also... Just not his age.

Anyway, that's what's going on around here...  My sister won't come for her visit until tomorrow afternoon instead so the house was clean for no good reason.

Sorry she'll have missed it...

SEW Marriagey

Even though we survived the BIG SNOW of 2015 (It will be forever remembered as such) on Saturday, we realized on Sunday morning that there was no way we could get the cars out wiht 10 inches and counting piled up behind them...  The snow blower was out of gas and we had to *gasp* DIG a path to get one of the cars out so we could get more.

After we got more gas, we were able to clear out paths behind the cars at least.  We decided to send Maddy and Leah back to college in the daytime instead of getting a later start by attending church with us.  We also left Meri home with Leon and Ryan.  Robb and I started out but didn't get far.  The county roads were very treacherous and the snow plows hadn't done a good job of clearing them yet.  So we ended up back home.  First time EVER that we missed church because of the weather! 

I used the time to make a sample wedding veil for my niece.  She had priced some that were simply serged around the edges and thought Auntie Val (say that quickly and out loud) could make one easier.  My pleasure!!  I had picked up some tulle a few weeks ago, but I don't think it's what we're going to go with.  I'll meet with Amanda later this week and we'll select some together.

Reminded me of the quick job of whipping up a veil for my own wedding almost 27 years ago.  It was a few days before the wedding.  I didn't do it the night before, because the night before I was busy attaching trim to my wedding dress...   

I had this veil done within 30 minutes...  EASY PEASY!  I used a big platter to round the corners of a couple yards of tulle, serged the edges with a rolled hem.  Then folded it in half, basted and gathered where I wanted to attach it to the comb, hand sewed it onto the comb and voila!  

It brought all the girls to the dining room. 

 

To try it on of course!

 

Here is the comb and my quick job of whip stitching it into place.

Oh!  In my haste, I sewed the comb on backwards... I corrected that.

 

Example of the rolled hem.  It kind of needed to be pressed first.  Oh well, it's just a sample!

 Found out later, that Amanda had already asked for it to be elbow length so oops!  

No problem!  I know how to shorten it!

It hangs in my office now waiting for Amanda to come over and see it.

And away from the girls so they'll quit playing dress up...

Sew What I Like

I'm making this.  Not the sailor suit, because according to the Burda mag, it's privately owned.  No pattern in here for that.  Darn.  I think my hubs would look sweet in that!! :)  He even asked about it!

If you've never worked from a Burda magazine before, here is the deal..  Almost every design pictured in the magazine has the pattern included inside that magazine.  Here's how they do it. 

You find the design instructions in the grey pages and then find the corresponding pattern pieces in the traceable sheets attached.  Then if you have tracing paper, trace them out!  The trick is that you have to add the 5/8 inch seam allowance to the pattern pieces yourself.  They're not included on the sheets.  

I never have tracing paper on hand, so I typically use tissue for wrapping presents for my tracing paper.  You can see through it to find the right lines!  However someday I do want to invest in one of those huge rolls of the real stuff and find out what I'm missing...

Like a sleeve or something...

I looked through my fabric stash and found a couple in the blues that would work.  I'm down to the bare bones on the dark blue and after Meri tried it on, I realized that I don't have enough blue to add more on the side.  It did look great on her, a little snug tho and maybe a wider band at the bottom than I anticipated.  It's supposed to be a tunic, but wow is it long!  Not long enough to be a dress

, so maybe she can just wear it with leggings and go with it.

And it wrinkles something fierce when you wad it up and store it in the steps basket...    sigh.  I may need to rethink this.  Or this will just be a sample dress.  Not sure yet.  But it's SO easy to put together!  And all the seams are finished so far!  I might keep it for myself and make her another one with something else.

I also bought 2 very thin knit fabrics.  I've seen those long maxi skirts with either elastic waists or yoga bands around the waist and want to make some for the girls.  They look so comfy!

What do you think of these two fabrics?  Maddy said she wanted one of each so I let Meri pick first.  She picked the stripe.  I'll tackle that maybe this weekend if not sooner.  As I need measurements from Maddy for hers.  I forgot to get that when she was home on Monday.

She got back to the dorm safely and probably just in time as I'm sure her roommate was about to replace her for being gone the first long weekend back to school...  

Talk at you later!  Lots going on this morning!  Have a super Wednesday!