A Little Yarn On The Side

Here it is, the last day of April, and I haven't finished anything else.  I have, however, done a lot of gardening, been to see "Wicked" with my mother and Andy, been for my longest walk yet, and entered Middle Age: I actually wear contact lenses, but because mine are gas-permeable (rigid) rather than soft, I need time without them every day, and last week the ophthalmologist told me I would need to switch to bifocals by next year and my glasses were really in need of upgrading THIS year because they were 7 years old and the coating was peeling off and the lenses were in sad shape and no longer the right prescription, so I did it this year.  EEEEEK! Since I wear them so little, my frames were still in great shape, so I just left them there to have the lenses changed, and have spent the week with blurry mornings and evenings.  Unfortunately, when I'm really busy, the blurry times and time available for crafting coincided, which explains why this is still not fi...

I am getting closer! Meet Finished Project #25: and Finished Project #26:   which will actually be a lovely lace scarf once it has been blocked.  I've already been to the gym today, but will spend the afternoon with pajamas!  It's cold and rainy and will be for the rest of the weekend, so there isn't anything I even could be doing out in the garden, so there will be some weekend crafting as well.  YAY! Especially since the next ornament kit has arrived, and I haven't yet finished even one ornament from the first kit.  Oops.  This is fun, but I think they need a quarterly plan, or maybe I need to step up the pace.  There are 5 in this kit, and I'm quite excited about that cupcake, so maybe I'll get the sequined cross finished today as well so I can start on the cupcake....while wearing new snowflake pajamas, right?

Last night I ironed the red flannel to be ready for a morning of sewing.  As forecast, it is raining, which is a perfect time to make flannel pajamas.  It is also, however, the perfect time for a snooze on flannel.  Undeterred, I decided to start the day with some icicle ornaments. Though I've decided to not count any more of them for my 100 projects goal because the main goal this year is to clear up space and thread doesn't really take up any, I do love the icicles and love how they look on the tree.  Then it seemed a good idea to put away the ones I have just washed and dried, which Theo thought was a terrific idea as well--3 seconds after this picture was taken, he was chewing on the black one.  I did save the ornament, and after some armpit scritches, Theo had recovered from the shock of a screaming woman lunging at him. Some days it is awfully difficult to be a kitty. While he was safely snoozing, I washed more lace ornaments, including,...

Funnily enough, I had thought of the 6 gold/6 silver idea because I was more confident of my gold thread than of the silver, but after seeing the first one, I really like the silver, and thank to everyone's unanimous input, I went with all in silver and finished the last one just a few minutes ago, making Finished Project number 24.  YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Which leaves me..............behind.  Am I ever anything else?  To reach 100 projects, I should be at 33-34 at the end of April.  I am, by nature, completely delusional an optimist, but finishing 9 projects in 9 days sounds a wee bit daunting, even to me.  Tomorrow it's supposed to rain, so I won't be gardening and can spend the morning sewing, but in the afternoon I have an eye appointment, and after the dilate my eyes, I'm guessing all crafting will be over for the day because I'm never able to focus on anything after they do that.  You know, I really loathe the "women's annual wellness exam," b...

Meet Finished Project #23: Underneath the stabilizer is a towel for some friends of ours who host a Kentucky Derby party every year.  It's a terrific party, and after last year's party, I laid this all out in the embroidery software so I'd be sure to have it ready for this year's party.  This morning I did a bit of gardening--including my latest experiment: strawberry plants in the holes of cinder blocks.  I saw the idea on Pinterest , but there is only one cinder block because, as most of us have found out the hard way, people post a lot of things on Pinterest that don't actually work.  So, we got one block and two strawberry plants.  Wish them luck.  Guessing that shoveling probably counts as "a thing one should rest after doing," I thought it was the perfect time to embroider the towel as the party is in two weeks.  Double-checking the spelling of their last name, I hooped the towel, picked out the colors, and had gotten to the letteri...

The penguin pajamas are done!  And, while I might be getting a wee bit tired of flannel, it's supposed to be rainy today, so I've decided to go ahead and cut out the next set while I know how to work the pattern.  It will also finish off the 22 yards of flannel I bought after the spending ban ended in November, which will make me feel good.  Buying fabric that was used up quickly is much different than buying fabric that expanded the stash. And part of me is just a wee bit superstitious.  I've spent a LOT of the last 3 years in pajamas, and part of me sort of feels like if I were prepared to spend a lot of time in pajamas, then maybe I won't actually spend all that time in pajamas.  It's a very nonsensical theory, but the size of my stash doesn't exactly make a lot of sense either, so it works for me.  If I get them done this weekend, I'll have used up 22.5 yards of fabric this month, which DOES free up space in the sewing room and brings me much...

So my idea for getting the pajama sleeves cut out didn't work, so  after Theo gave the project and I some well-needed time apart, I ended up sewing the selvedge edges together on the side that hadn't been cut,  and the sleeves have a great big seam down the center.  This is not a trick for an OCD person, because the dot to line up with the shoulder sleeve is slightly to the front, so the seams can't match.  I'm not even OCD, but that almost killed me.  However, the pajamas are done, I'm currently wearing them, and another 5.5 yards of fabric, which takes up this  amount of space, is used up from the fabric stash.  Of course, the snowflake and penguin prints were purchased at the same time as the others, so it was all stash acquired this fall and not deep stash , but at least it isn't on it's way to BEING deep stash.  I washed the snowflake and penguin prints, and decided to try the version of these pajamas with the shorter shirt with ...

My favorite flannel pajama pattern is wrong on the yardage and layout.  I discovered this the first time I used the pattern--even getting out a tape measure and doing the math to prove that their proposed layout doesn't work for anything except the extra-small and is wildly off for a medium--but had extra fabric so I was able to make it work.  So, when I bought the music and roses flannel, I planned for the error and bought extra yardage.  Five and a half yards, which is theoretically the amount I was able to make work last time.  And, even breaking every sewing rule by flipping the back of the pattern, I can't figure out how I got it to work.  I double-checked this blog in case I'd left myself any helpful notes, but I didn't.  I am guessing that this fabric shrunk more than the other one did, because this did work somehow with the other fabric.  I have now made a note to always buy SIX yards of flannel for these blasted pajamas, but that doesn'...

I am a slow, slow learner with the back thing, but even I have realized that I probably can't seven days of a sewing vacation in a row.  Channeling common sense I don't normally possess in these matters, I'm also thinking that walking in the pool 2 days this week was a stretch for me, so walking in the pool today might fall into the "too much" category, so I'm going to walk over to the gym, lift weights (lots of reps, lowest weight) and walk back.  That will be about 3 miles, so a decent walk but not as hard as walking in the pool.  After that, we'll see.  We have a birthday party to attend tonight, so I won't do any gardening today as I haven't found "moderation" in gardening yet, so I'm not sure what else I'll be doing today.  Maybe working in the greenhouse.  I might be able to finish cutting out the new pajamas, as that falls in the "relatively safe activity" category, and would prepare me for a second sewing day tom...

So, last night going to bed at 5:00 won out because I was really tired, but this morning I was up bright and early and by 9:00 AM, Andy's pajama top was finished!  I'd almost forgotten what a finished object looked like, hadn't you? Then I moved on to cutting out the problematic pajama bottoms, and after being really careful to cut them out right side up and to get the pieces correct, I sewed them together wrong.  I don't know why, exactly, but I somehow just assumed that if I cut the music print pieces out with the pattern right-side up, they would end up on alternating legs. Why I assumed this is anyone's guess, but that wasn't the high point.  After ripping out both seams, I got the music prints put together correctly, but put the black ones together on the wrong side, ending up with two of the same legs.  So, after making a HUGE chalk "x" on the right sides of the black, I finally got them put together correctly, and they are now awai...

Both sets of taxes are finished and mailed! I walked a full hour in the pool today AND lifted weights. Our big solid wood front door has been oiled. The front of the lawn has been given weed & feed AND iron. And it's now 5:00 pm.  I'll admit, I'm equally torn between "start sewing NOW" and "go straight to bed." 

Yesterday I went to the gym and lifted weights (lowest weights, long reps) and walked in the pool for 40 minutes.  I'd have liked to do an hour, but my muscles were done.  I'll go back tomorrow for another 40 minutes, and then build my way back up.  Then I came home and worked on our taxes--getting as far as I could without the instructions which I managed to misplace. This morning I'm off to get new instructions, get groceries, and finish our Federal taxes.  I'll tackle state tomorrow, then I don't have anything that has to be done, so I am hoping to take a few days to sew as much as I can.  Because of the sitting problem, I can't just sew the entire day, but I could do it in little bits.  I'm hoping to finish Andy's pajamas and maybe the green jacket, which has been started but has a long way to go.  Maybe I could even make a pair of pajamas for me since I've already washed the fabric.  Just those 3 projects would use up over 13 yards of f...

In different circumstances, I might be upset that I ended the first quarter of the year with only 3 yards of fabric used and 19 projects finished.  However, how I really ended the first quarter was with a fever and the stomach flu, so being a bit behind was not the biggest problem.  I wasn't feeling really better until Friday, and still wouldn't be up for Mexican food or tuna fish just yet, but I'm definitely better.  Yesterday I even started sewing Andy's Valentine pajamas, and discovered that a mannequin of even the wrong sex makes pinning facings like this almost easy.  Luckily Andy is a very secure man and won't be troubled that I'm using a female dummy for his clothing.  And he's not likely to complain about finally getting his gift almost two months late and when it's almost warm enough to not need flannel pajamas. There is always next year..... I also made some lace ornaments yesterday.  The French horn is part of the ornament set I...