Tuesday, October 31, 2017
Monday, October 30, 2017
Journal: Quilts and Cattails and Reminisces
Facebook does
strange things. I went from about 100 ‘Friends’
to almost 900 in about a month! I ‘allowed’
most of them, because all I use Facebook for is a place to post pictures of quilts
and scenery and quilts and cats and quilts – and I do get a bit of business
from my page. I have no idea why such a
flock of people wanted to ‘Friend’ me suddenly. I looked it up on Google, and see I’m not the
only one. I click ‘Confirm’ on most of
them, because I’m a curious person, and I like to see what’s going to happen
next. Most are ladies from Facebook
quilting groups I belong to, and since one group has over 75,000 members,
another 10,000, and the others several thousand each, I guess it’s not too unusual
that after I posted several pictures of quilts I’ve done, a large number would
want to be a ‘Friend’. I wound up with a
few oddballs; but, fortunately, it’s just as easy to ‘Unfriend’ someone as it
is to ‘Friend’ them, so ... no problemo. 😉
One young woman wanted
Larry and I to be her godparents. Must’ve thought we were millionaires. 😏 Another, a young woman from
India, want to ‘chat you every day’. I
don’t use Facebook to chat. I ignore
chat requests. But when she wrote
several times under a photo I posted, ‘Text me please,’ I did so, on the off
chance that she was coming to America with several thousand quilts for which
she would pay me $100 an hour to do custom quilting on.
She wasn’t. She wanted to ‘chat me’. I thanked her politely for writing, told her
I had no time for chatting, wished her well, and bid her adieu. She went on writing. She requested that I text her tomorrow. She requested that I set a special time to
‘chat me’, because she didn’t have any friends.
I knew better than that, because I’d clicked on her name, looked at her
page, and seen pictures of her with her friends and family.
I ignored her.
She launched into
apologies and requests for forgiveness.
I ‘unfriended’ her.
She sent a sad
monkey face.
I blocked her.
And that was the
end of that.
After that, I
decided to stop ‘friending’ people from the far ends of the earth. They aren’t going to be sending me quilts to
do, I don’t imagine.
Speaking
of texting, I’ve been getting phone texts from family members this week that
were sent an hour or two earlier – they floated around in the stratosphere for
a while before they found their way to my computer or phone. I told a few of the kids, “Maybe you’d better
use Pony Express or smoke signals for any emergencies; it’ll get here faster.”
Last Monday night,
I took part in a webinar by a lady named Kari Schell, who’s an award-winning
quilter, a pattern designer, an Electric Quilt expert, and a certified Art and
Stitch instructor. The webinar was all
about EQ8 – the new Electric Quilt upgrade.
The upgrade was on sale, and I bought it. I have a new toy to play with! All the designs I’ve created in EQ7 will
transfer to EQ8 without any problem.
There are some math
teachers and retired math teachers on some of the quilting groups to which I belong. We were discussing arithmetic... geometry...
algebra... And guess what was in the
comics Tuesday? You’d think they were
eavesdropping on our conversations.
Peanuts
Zits
Tuesday afternoon, I
finished my customer’s Americana quilt. I’m pleased with how it turned
out; the ‘Eagle with Stars’ made a striking pantograph. More photos are posted here.
That’s all the
customer quilts I’ll be doing for a while, other than one next month. I need to get ready for Christmas!
For the next three
days, I cut pieces for the Baskets of Lilies quilt. Wednesday, I cut diamonds for the ‘petals’.
I had about a dozen cut already, and by the time I quit for the night, there were
232 cut, which makes 58 ‘blossoms’. 17 more ‘blossoms’ to go – that’s 68
diamonds I still needed to cut. It’s not a very fast process, since a)
it’s scrappy, so there aren’t a whole lot of diamonds cut from the same
fabric, and b) the fabric from which I’m cutting the diamonds is
generally in smallish pieces already. Hence,
no long strips... no sewing of long strips together and then diamonds cut from those. Most of the time, I’m only cutting two
diamonds at a time.
And here’s one of
the blocks:
Depending on what
it looks like when I’m done, I just might try entering it in one of the bigger
quilt shows, such as AQS or HMQS.
You know...
you can say ‘AQS Quilting Show’, and that’s fine, because AQS stands for ‘American
Quilter’s Society’. But if you say, ‘HMQS Quilting Show’, you’re actually
saying ‘Home Machine Quilting Show Quilting Show’. heh It’s like
saying ‘ATM machine’, which is the same as saying ‘Automatic Teller Machine
Machine’. Or ‘just for your FYI’, which is the same as saying, ‘just for
your for your information’. Or ‘VIN number’, which is the same as saying,
‘Vehicle Registration Number number’.
heh heh
And that’s your
little grammar and English lesson for the day.
“All these acronyms these days make my head spin,” wrote a friend upon
reading the above. “Every time I turn around there’s a new one, and I
have to look it up online.”
“Me, too!” I
responded. “And sometimes, after I look one up, I have to then go rinse
my brain out with Lysol, in order to unlearn what I just learnt. 😲”
Thursday, the wind was
blowing at a steady 30 mph, with gusts to 55 mph. Roof shingles were
laying here and there around the property. It got up to 57° that
afternoon, but the wind chill was 40°.
Meanwhile, it was
-4° in Alert, Nunavut, Canada, with snow. That’s the northernmost town in
the world. And it was 93° in Khartoum, Sudan, and the temperature was expected
to rise to 102°.
See, we didn’t have
it so bad after all.
I’ve always enjoyed
weather forecasts... watching weather here and there around the world...
comparing highs and lows...
That day, I
finished cutting all the diamonds for the ‘petals’, then cut the green
triangles that will make the ‘base’ of the blossoms. Those were all the colored patches.
I washed clothes
that day, periodically clambering up the stairs to put a load into the dryer,
refill the washer, and fold and put away the things removed from the dryer. My sewing room is downstairs, and the washer
and dryer are upstairs. It seemed like a
looong way up there with these sore toes (which are quite a lot improved, by
the way). On one of my treks upstairs, I got all the houseplants watered
and the kitchen cleaned, then headed back downstairs to continue cutting.
Loren brought us
Subway sandwiches for supper – sliced roast beef with lots of vegetables.
Mmmm, mmm.
A friend remarked, “They are very
selfish with the veggies at the Subway closest to me. So I just keep on saying more veggies please!”
The workers at
different Subways obviously have different trainers (or maybe just different
personalities)... because as we go from Subway to Subway (sounds like we stop
at every one we come to, heh) across the country, there is a big difference in
how generous they are with their ingredients. At the two Subways in our
town, the workers stuff the sandwiches so full, they can hardly get the paper
wrapped around them. 😋
Once when we were
in Raton, New Mexico, Larry’s Aunt Lynn took us to the local Subway. I
ordered a BLT ‘with everything’. The friendly Mexican man who was making
our sandwiches was also the owner/manager.
He skillfully built
three sandwiches at a time, layering everything artistically (and generously)
with fast-flying fingers. He glanced up at me as he neared the container
with the jalapeño and banana peppers.
“Peppers too?” he
asked.
I nodded.
He put a couple of
slices on. Paused. Looked up at me. “More?”
I smiled and
nodded.
He tipped his head
and gave me a cautionary look. “They’re hot!” he told me, and made a show
of fanning his mouth.
I laughed. “I
like hot stuff!” I said.
Then, with a
rollicking guffaw, “Good for you, my dear, good for you!” he exclaimed, and
tossed enough on to make a fire-breathing dragon out of me.
And then, as if
that wasn’t enough, when we got back to Aunt Lynn’s house, sat down around her
table, and began to eat, a number of my kiddos who had been trying to act Bold
and Brave with all their hot peppers, threw in the towel – and gave me
their peppers.
I put them on my
sandwich, and ate it.
You know, there is
such a thing as too many hot peppers.
When you not only
cannot taste the sandwich, but you also are unable to taste any food for
a couple of days thereafter, ... that’s too many hot peppers.
😲
I started cutting
the white background pieces. I got 75 squares and 150 triangles cut – and
then some... animal? bird? went skittering down the inside of the closet
door in my sewing room.
Larry, who is hard
of hearing, thinks I imagine half of what I hear. Well, if so, Teensy cat
imagined it right along with me! He was sleeping in the hallway just
outside the sewing room door, and he woke up fast, and stared with big
eyes at the closet door. It was open a few inches, because I’d been
getting fabric bins out, and then putting them back on shelves in there; and
there is a cord from a wall light that goes into the closet, with the switch
just inside the door, too. So Teensy and I both stared at that opening
for a few minutes to see what might emerge, and then I slammed it shut – and
stood there and listened for whatever else might happen.
Nothing happened.
I did what I do
best – I went for Larry.
He was having his
usual before-bedtime nap in the tub. But he obligingly finished his bath
quickly and came downstairs. I was in my sewing room at the cutting table
again, trying to make like a dragonfly and keep a 360° watch all around me.
Larry stealthily
opened the door and came sneaking in – and made me laugh, because he was
dressed all in black, with his riding gear on ----- and in one hand, he had his
high-powered pellet gun. hee hee Looked funny.
He conducted a
thorough search of my closet, and found nothing. No tracks, no claw
marks.
Every now and then,
especially this time of the year, I hear mice in the walls. That always makes
me stop whatever I’m doing, and rush around setting mouse traps. 😝
Whatever this was, it sounded bigger than a mouse. Maybe it
was in the closet wall, instead of against the inside the door and loose
in the closet itself, as I’d thought.
Ugh! The joys
of country living.
In case you’re
wondering, we’ve never seen any rats around this area. Mice... voles... chipmunks... ground
squirrels... moles... raccoons... opossums... squirrels... skunks... ferrets...
and the larger wild animals.
I set a bunch of
mouse traps – and have caught four mice since then. Maybe it was
just a mouse that I heard.
Friday, I needed to
take the box with my customer’s quilts to the post office, and was dreading the
moment when I’d have to put my sore toes into a shoe. It was too cold to wear flip-flops – only 34°,
with a wind chill of 21°, steady winds of 25 mph, and gusts up to 41 mph.
Another load of
clothes was in the washer. I ate an English
muffin... fed the livestock (three cats)... and then Hannah called, wondering
if I’d like some company.
Sure, I’d like some company! – especially hers. So she came out to
visit for a while that afternoon, bringing some of her quilling (paper craftwork – and she makes such
beautiful things) to work on while I edited photos. We talked as fast as ever we could, but simply couldn’t
get everything said that we wanted to say before she had to rush off to school
to pick up her kiddos.
When she headed
back to town, she took the box of quilts with her and mailed it for me. I appreciate my thoughtful children!
I posted the pictures from October 9th, the last day of
our trip to
Colorado. These photos were taken from Chadron to Keller Park State
Recreation Area north of Ainsworth:
Deciding it was the
perfect day for ham and butterbean soup, I threw the beans into a pot, cooked
them slowly for an hour, rinsed and drained them, and started them cooking
again with the chunks of ham, and then rummaged around in the refrigerator for
more ingredients. I found one lonesome
onion, sliced it up and threw it in... found some celery, sliced a few sticks
and put them in... and then I spotted a big zucchini someone gave us, so I
peeled it, removed the seeds, sliced and diced it, and put it in,
too. I hadn’t ever done that before.
Soon it was
bubbling away on the stove, sending up fragrant aromas, and making my mouth
water.
I tasted a little
spoonful after it had simmered for a few minutes, and mmmm, mmm, was it ever
good. I would’ve liked to have had some carrots, but there were none to
be had in the entire house, and no snowmen standing in the neighbors’ yards
from which I might steal the noses.
Thinking Larry
might be heading home by then, I sent him a text, asking him to pick up a
package of shredded carrots (the shredded ones cook a whole lot faster than the
whole ones).
But he was helping with
the construction of a big hog barn some distance to our north that day. It
was cold there, and Larry was glad he’d worn his flannel-lined jeans. There are many areas up that way where cell
phone service is practically zilch, so he didn’t get my message for a while –
and was late getting home, in any case.
He arrived with the carrots as I
was about to ladle soup into bowls.
“Wait!” he
exclaimed. “Here’s the carrots!”
“We’ll save them
for something else,” I told him. “The
soup is already done.”
“Can’t we just
pitch the shredded carrots into it and call it good?” he asked, looking
wistfully into the carrotless pot of soup.
“Aaaauuuggghhh, NO!!!” I exclaimed, clapping the lid back on
for fear he’d haul right off and do it.
“Why not?” he
asked, poised to tear open the bag.
I made a face. “Just, no,” I said.
He laughed and put
the carrots into the refrigerator.
So the ham and bean
soup had no carrots, but with salt and pepper and a dollop of butter, it would
do. It would do very well indeed.
That night, I
finished all the cutting for the Baskets of Lilies quilt, and then glued all
the stems onto their background pieces in preparation for appliquéing
them. This time, I used an Elmer’s Repositionable
Picture and Poster Stick. More often,
especially for little finicky pieces of appliqué, I use watered-down Elmer’s school
glue in a little bottle with a long needle tip. It’s pretty much the same
ingredients as the more expensive Roxanne Glue-Baste-It. It doesn’t get
stiff, washes out fine, and doesn’t discolor the fabric.
The next day, I
checked the stems, and they are all soft and pliable. The poster stick
works! As soon as I get these all appliquéd
down, I’ll be ready to piece the rest of the block.
I like to do things
‘assembly-line style’.
((...pause...))
Sometimes I then
rip things out, assembly-line style.
Yup, yup, a test
piece is a jolly good idea.
One of my favorite
points in quilt-making is right when everything is all cut out, and it’s time
to start sewing.
I used to like that
point in garment-making, too. I’d get a couple of outfits cut out for
each of the kids... have a tall stack of the fabric pieces that would make up shirts,
pants, skirts, blouses, dresses, nightgowns, pajamas... and then I’d put away all
the fabric I hadn’t used, sit down at the machine, pick up the first pieces, and
launch into the sewing.
A customer wrote to
ask, “I have several baby-sized quilts to send you in the near future. Would you prefer to get multiple at a time,
or as I go? Or does it matter?”
I answered, “It
doesn’t matter to me; you can send them in whatever way works best for
you. Maybe not all at once, just in case...” and I told her the following
story:
In the years I’ve
been sending and receiving quilts, nothing has ever been lost. But I
always hold my breath until they arrive safely. One time a box arrived
from a customer, and she hadn’t used much packaging tape – and the entire
bottom was sagging low, partially open, with quilts sticking out at the
sides. Aiiiyiiiyiii. They weren’t damaged, thankfully. I told
her about it, and suggested she use more tape the next time, and put the quilts
into a bag.
She did.
One piece.
Just o.n.e...m.o.r.e...p.i.e.c.e...o.f...t.a.p.e.
The box was falling
apart that time, too, but at least no
quilts were sticking out.
Frugal lady!—she
didn’t want to waste tape! Eek.
I like to ‘watch’
those packages, through the tracking websites, as they travel across the states.
‘Ground’ puts them on funny routes sometimes, though. They wind up going
the wrong way for awhile... turn around and head the other way... overshoot the
destination... and eventually come back. Sometimes they stall out in a
sorting facility close enough to your own house, you could go there and get it
in an hour or two – but it’s still three days out, by USPS standards. I
think ‘Ground’ actually means ‘The Scenic Route’.
Larry bought a tractor on the Big Iron Auction online –
and it’s in Dove Creek, Colorado. That’s way over in the southwest
corner of Colorado, some 900 miles away.
I think he looks
for things to buy some distance away, especially in Colorado, so that he has an
excuse to go there!
And it was a good price, of course. He also assures
me, “It doesn’t weigh 19,000 pounds, either.” (referring to the scissor lift we
picked up in Missouri.)
He can’t take off
work right now. However, over the
Thanksgiving weekend, he gets two paid holidays. We’ll go get it then, if the man will wait
that long for us to pick it up.
In 2004, we went to
Poncha Springs, Colorado, over the Thanksgiving weekend for a big load of
lumber for our house. Caleb and Victoria went with us.
My only digital
picture of Victoria is blurry. I did get quite a few pictures with
my good Minolta film camera; those pictures are in albums somewhere.
Gotta scan them... gotta scan them... These pictures are all taken with
my first digital, a little Vivitar.
We picked up an
antique clawfoot tub at a messy little antique store in Matheson on the way
there.
After the lumber
was loaded, the people at the lumber company used their forklift to put the tub
way up on top of the lumber.
We headed
home. Here’s what it started looking like as we headed back over the
mountain passes with our big load:
We decided to head
north toward I70 to get away from the storm, which was blowing eastward and
beginning to look like a blizzard – with a band of ice leading the way.
We stayed overnight at a motel in Sterling – and the storm took a northerly
swing, caught up with us, and grew worse and worse all the way home.
The next morning
there were just a couple of inches of snow on the ground – but it would
continue to get worse as we drove on into Nebraska. We saw dozens of wrecks and vehicles that had
slid into the ditch. As we headed into the breakfast nook in the motel
that morning, we saw a little boy staring out the window at our pickup and
trailer, loaded with lumber, the tub perched up on top, partially covered with
snow.
Then, in great
amazement, he exclaimed, “Look, Dad! A submarine!!!”
I took this shot from
our 2nd-floor window.
Below are a couple
of the many, many wrecks we saw. We even saw police cars, wreckers, and
snowplows in the ditch.
Let’s hope our travels this year won’t put us into a
big snowstorm. That can be a bit of a
nightmare, driving the mountain roads with a loaded trailer – especially when
one must share the road with idiots who are evidently from somewhere near the
equator, and have never seen snow before in their livelong lives.
Speaking of nightmares... do you dream? Well, I suppose most people dream. But many
forget what they’ve dreamed.
I have big ol’ psychedelic dreams. (And I don’t
even eat pepperoni before bedtime!) Sometimes if I wake up abruptly
enough, I can remember them (the dreams, not the pepperoni). Sometimes I
remember them through a mist, as it were, and the harder I try to grab the
details, the more they recede into the mist.
Did you ever wake
up after a dream, think, Well, that was certainly ridiculous and
absurd. ... then you fall back asleep and the silly dream starts up
right where it left off, as if there was no interruption?
If it would just be
productive and resolve all the questions and matters I’ve pondered during the
day! heh
Saturday, I ate a
toasted pumpkin spice English muffin with lots of butter and honey... started a
load of clothes... and headed downstairs to quilt something for my
sister-in-law, Annette, who was recently diagnosed with ovarian cancer and has
started chemotherapy treatments. It’s a
wholecloth printed quilt, and I planned to quilt around the paisleys and swirls
in the print.
The fabric is a brushed
cotton/poly/rayon, I think, in shades of pink with touches of aqua and yellow. It feels soft as silk. It was with my clothing fabrics, and I think,
though I’m not absolutely certain, that it was purchased to make a blouse to go
with a piece of pink linen I once made a suit jacket and skirt out of. I
believe I was copying an expensive outfit I saw in a catalogue somewhere.
But the more I
looked at that fabric, the more I didn’t want it for a blouse, and I wound up
buying a different length of fabric for the purpose. I kept wondering
what to do with it.
Not too long ago, my
brother gave me some bins of fabric and sewing things that used to be
Janice’s. In one was a piece of thick, snowy-white
fleece. It occurred to me, That would
make a fine and dandy backing for this paisley, swirly, stuff, and then it won’t need any batting.
I loaded the
fabrics, cleaned, oiled, and threaded my machine, and was off and running. I hoped to finish it that night, but along
about 11:00 p.m., my feet decided they wanted to go to my recliner, and when
they went, they took the rest of me with them.
Sunday morning, I
got up and prepared to go to church – but I couldn’t get my foot into any of my
good shoes, and hurt my toes trying.
“Why am I doing
this?!” I demanded of Larry, hopping on one foot until I could get the
offending shoe off. “This is stupid!”
He nodded in
agreement. “Just go sit down and take it
easy,” he told me.
I did, as soon as I
put my gazillions of shoes away. How
many shoes did Imelda Marcos have, and am I about to catch up? Hmmm... Oh.
She had over 1,220 shoes. Well, I
guess I have a ways to go, then.
I later found some
flats that will work, but by then the poor toes had swollen and turned colors
again from getting crammed into a tight spot of which they disapproved.
That
afternoon, I finished Annette’s quilt so Larry could take it with him when he
went to church that evening. One of
Annette’s daughter would then give it to her mother.
When I
was sewing the binding on, I sent Hester a picture that included the quilting
clips she gave me for my birthday, writing, “Lookie, the clips worked perfectly
for this job! So nice, not trying to sew
a rosebush (dozens of sharp pins all the way around the quilt), and finishing with
my arms looking like I’d had a wrestling match with a porcupine. The fold-it-to-the-back,
stitch-in-the-ditch-from-the-front method will always require pins – but the
fold-it-to-the-front, stitch-it-down-with-a-fancy-stitch method will now be
accomplished with quilting clips! They
are very nice clips. Thank you!”
A couple of people
have remarked that the fabric looks like it has a ‘baby-theme’ print. But it’s an optical illusion. It’s paisley swirls, flowers, feathers and
suchlike.
Speaking of optical
illusions... a few months ago, I was painstakingly creating what I thought were
lovely designs on a customer’s quilt.
When I was done, I
saw that all the designs along one border looked exactly like bug-eyed, angry
gargoyles.
A lady on a
quilting group sent a link to a tutorial on making rag quilts from old blue
jeans. That reminded me...
I once saw a lady at the Goodwill or Salvation Army
gather up an armload of jeans, choosing various colors of blue and navy, and
head for the checkout stand. Another lady tsk-tsked and scowled
ferociously at her, after hearing her say something about a rag quilt.
Well, lady, there were plenty more jeans where those came
from, and the lady was paying for them just like any other customer, and last I
checked, this is the U.S. of A., Land of the Free (sorta, most of the time),
and one can buy as many jeans as one wants, any ol’ day of the week. It
wasn’t like she grabbed them out of the other woman’s hands, after all.
((...rolling eyes...))
Then there was the time I went to the Goodwill for the
express purpose of buying shirts. I had four boys in the house, and they
were all growing like weeds. School was just starting, and they were in
dire need of shirts – long sleeve, short sleeve, and sweaters, too. The
hand-me-downs for the little guys were threadbare. Larry, too, needed shirts.
He wears his out quickly, with his job in construction.
Since shirts were on sale that day for $1.99, I chose
about ten shirts for each boy and for Larry, and a couple of sweaters for each,
one for everyday, one for dressier occasions. My criteria for choosing
clothes at the Goodwill is... they must look new.
That made 50 shirts and 10 sweaters. $120.
Not bad for that much stuff. That would be enough to keep the boys
shirt-clad for a year – and there would be newer and better hand-me-downs next
year.
The cart was full. It’s not unusual to see people
with full carts at the Goodwill, especially on sale days. There’s enough
stuff at our Goodwill that it would take an awful lot of full cartloads rolling
out of that store to make any sizeable change in inventory.
I happily pushed the cart up to the checkout stand.
And then I saw the elderly lady in a nearby aisle glaring
at me, shaking her head, clicking her tongue, ... She actually shook her finger at me, like a
disapproving old schoolmarm!
I looked at her for a while, trying to decide if she was
kidding... or not.
When the scowling and tut-tutting didn’t stop, and I
heard her mutter something about ‘people who take more than their share’, I
concluded she was not kidding.
So I grinned at her and said (just loudly enough for all
those who’d witnessed her censorious little display to hear me), “Would you
rather I sent my family off to school and to work in their bare skin?”
She didn’t expect that. She looked surprised, and
then when everybody around us laughed, her face turned red.
The clerk laughed
along with everyone else, and told me, “You’re fine, you’re fine,” as she
started tallying up my things.
Some people go around trying to police everyone else,
without ever bothering to find out their stories at all, and get away with it
for so long, they’re totally convinced they’re behaving exactly properly!
Ugh. I don’t appreciate bullies.
Anyway, I don’t know if she quit bullying anybody else,
but she did quit bullying me. I was not about to be
intimidated for buying things for my family, things they really needed.
All
around the countryside, cattails are going to seed, the fluffy down from their
seed heads blowing hither and yon.
Did
you know that these plants have been used for rush-bottom furniture, baskets,
and mats? The downy seeds have been used
to stuff pillows and mattresses, and during World War II were used to stuff
life jackets. Native Americans were experts
in using every part of the plant, not only for stuffing or the waterproof
qualities of the leaf, but as a reliable food source. All parts of the cattail plant, from the roots
to the flower heads, are edible. The
rootstock can be boiled or roasted, or dried and ground into a powdery flour. The center of the stalks is thick and starchy
and the flower heads can be roasted for a nutty tasting treat. Cattail plants have industrial uses as well. Plant parts can be distilled into ethyl
alcohol for antifreeze or an inexpensive solvent, and the stems produce a
sizing for shaving cream.
I
remember gathering up a nice ‘bouquet’ of cattails when I was little, and
installing them in a place of prominence in a large, heavy vase in my room. I was so amazed when I came home from school
one day, and found ‘fluff and fuzz’ all over my room. I didn’t know those things did that! 😯😮😄
Amy
called a little while ago to see if I needed anything from the store. I have sweet, thoughtful kids and kids-in-law!
Here’s
what just happened:
Tabby
begs for food. I set his saucer with
soft food down for him. He nibbles. He quits.
I don’t notice, and Teensy moves in and makes short work of it.
And
Tabby is at my feet again, begging for food.
It
must not have been ‘fresh’ enough – I opened it a whole 3 or 4 hours ago, after
all. 😝
The toes are
getting better. They wouldn’t be complaining quite so much if I’d quit
bumping them into things! There’s something about limping about in an
ungainly manner, trying to protect one’s appendages, that makes one more liable
than ever to bonk said appendages into things one normally avoids with
ease.
And now... it’s
time to take them to bed.
,,,>^..^<,,, Sarah Lynn ,,,>^..^<,,,
Monday, October 23, 2017
Journal: Broken Toes and Explosions (and Quilts, of Course)
Last Monday, my
brother brought me a box full of pieces of craft felt, large and small. He’d found it with my late sister-in-law’s
sewing/ crafting things. She was always making things for her nieces and
nephews, and several of the felt pieces had designs drawn on them (little
Christmas trees, animals, etc.).
I’m considering
giving the whole works to one of the granddaughters along with a big nice book
on felt crafts, and maybe some supplies to go with it (glue, and whatever else
one uses for felt crafts).
Loren asked, “Have
you recovered from your vacation?”
“Ha!” I retorted.
“That was no vacation. That was a TRIP! There’s a difference.”
He laughed at that.
Tuesday, I did a
bit of housework, paid some bills, then went off to Hobby Lobby for batting for
a customer’s quilt. There are evidently
a lot of quilts being made around here, for Hobby Lobby has a hard time keeping
their racks of batting stocked.
Home again, I got
back to work on a customer’s 30’s Mini Bow Tie quilt, finishing it late that
night.
Wednesday, I
prepared to load another customer’s quilt on my frame – and discovered that the
top measured 76” x 86”, while the back measured 77” x 88”.
That doesn’t give
me enough leeway to attach the backing to my frame.
So, after inquiring
into whether my customer was willing to pay me an extra $25 for the service, I
attached 4-5” strips of muslin to all sides of the quilt back, using
water-soluble thread.
I also discovered
that both the front and the back of the quilt were pieced; it was a double
quilt. I can never guarantee that any
pieced backing will be perfectly centered behind the quilt front, though I try
hard to make it so. To see why this is the case, pick up a thick magazine
and roll it tightly in your hand. See how the pages slide and move
against each other, until they no longer meet at the edges? That’s what
happens when I roll quilt, batting, and backing together. Also, the quilting itself may take up
slightly more fabric either on top or on bottom. It’s variable.
I’ve put together a
number of ‘double quilts’, as it were, and while I’m better able to guess at it
and get them centered well than I was when I first started using my quilting
frame, it’s still a bit of a guessing game.
And now, here’s my
Tip of the Day:
Don’t sew extender
strips on the sides of a quilt back with water-soluble thread in the bobbin –
and then press it with steam.
You’re
welcome.
(Fortunately, I
remembered right when I pulled the ‘steam’ trigger, and jerked the iron away fast,
just as clouds of steam came billowing out. The strip was
still intact.)
I even remembered
to remove the bobbin with the water-soluble thread as soon as I was
done. I keep the bobbin tucked inside the cone of soluble thread, and
both are inside the plastic bag in which it came. Imagine sewing a dress with that stuff by accident
– and then getting caught in a rainstorm.
😲😱😬😯😨
Here’s something I’ve
long had a penchant for doing. It started with little girls’ dresses and
those long, long strips of ruffling. I skillfully switched over to long
quilt rows, sashes, borders, and bindings, in order to keep up the fun.
It’s this: I
cut a long strip. I sit down at the machine. I start sewing the strip
to other strips/the rest of quilt/the garment/whatever. Halfway through
the seam, the entire works gets violently jerked sideways, messing up the seam.
Huh?
I’m sitting on the
end of the strip.
After those backing
kafuffles, it was nice to pause with the quilting and go to our midweek church
service.
Victoria sent some pictures
of baby Carolyn that evening. I found
them as we were driving home from church, and started to write back to
Victoria, “She’s the cutest little thing,” but my tablet thought ‘turtle’ was the
better choice, so I left it: “She’s the
cutest little turtle.” hee hee (I did
explain what happened.)
Victoria, as
expected, wrote back, “I like it. 😆😆😆”
Home again, I got
back to the quilting. I had three more
quilts to do, and then I was saying ‘no more until after Christmas.’ My
goodness, I’ve been swamped with customer quilts since June!
I have rugs to
make... quilts for the kids... kitchen chairs to reupholster... Oh,
well. At least I’m making a little money, I get to stay home whilst I’m
a-doin’ it, and it’s something I enjoy, though it’s been sorta hard on
arthritic neck, shoulders, wrists, knees, and even feet.
I told the lady in
Washington state that I’d be able to help her get hers finished (after the
first of the year) – and then I found out she wasn’t kidding when she said she
had 150 quilts that needed to be quilted! Aiiiyiiiyiiieee.
She sent me a nice
picture of her brother with the quilt she made for him, the Golden Days of
Hollywood quilt that I quilted for her recently. I wrote back, “Isn’t it fun to give people
things, when they appreciate them? My brother still talks about the quilt
I gave him (using blocks his late wife cross-stitched), and shows it to
visitors. Makes me happy I did it for him.”
Thursday afternoon,
I took a quilt to the post office and shipped it back to my customer. It cost $26.32 to mail it. I always underestimate
the cost of the bigger, heavier quilts.
I met my
own brother at the post office. He’s
still friendly as ever, and people still like him just like they always
have.
Victoria sent more pictures of baby Carolyn, this
time clad in a little sundress we gave her. It was hot that day – perfect day to wear a sunny
little sundress.
Later that evening, Victoria sent pictures of Malinda and Carolyn
together in their matching Little Mouse outfits.
They're just the sweetest little things! 😍
Malinda
almost always has a little thumb in the mouth.
Usually, she makes a chubby little fist whilst she’s a-slurpin’ on it.
I like to say, “Slurp, slurp, slurp, slurp, slurp!” to
her, and make her lose suction because she can’t keep from grinning at me.
Malinda
was born June 19th; Carolyn September 2nd. They’re only about a pound different in size.
By bedtime that
night, I’d gotten Larry’s work clothes – including coveralls and sweatshirt –
washed, and was about half done with my customer’s Halloween quilt. The
pantograph is called ‘Halloween Bats’.
As you’re sewing or
quilting, do you ever think about those new-fangled features on our machines
that we get so used to? I’ve been using a
knee lever to lift presser feet since I got my first Bernina in 1978.
Ten years ago or
so, I got a serger.
I serged a seam...
took a swipe at the knee lever with my right knee – and nearly tumbled off my
chair, because sergers don’t have knee levers, and there was nothing
there to catch me. 😆
Friday afternoon, it
got up to 70°, and was bright and sunny.
I had a couple more loads of wash to do, plus the cat beds. The cats, picky things that they are, stop
sleeping in their beds if I don’t wash them (the beds, not the cats) fairly
often, even though they have nothing but a slight dusty-cat aroma. It’s their own fragrance, Kitty Eau de Félin
Cologne, for pity’s sake!
One of the cat beds
was air-drying atop the dryer, and Teensy could often be found sitting in front
of the dryer that afternoon, staring up at the bed. If he determines it’s
dry, he leaps right up there and makes himself at home.
There was the
possibility of rain in the forecast that night, so I hurried to wash clothes and
towels, and hang them on the line.
At 20 after 3, I
got a text from Amy asking if I could pick up the children at school – she’d
gone out to the van with the little ones, and discovered it locked. With the keys inside.
Four-year-old Grant had locked the keys in
their van. Again.
I hurried off to school, and got there just
before the children got out. On the way
home, they sadly told me that a kitten had gone missing – but I no sooner
pulled up in the drive than one of them spotted the kitten up by the house. The kiddos in the middle seat got so excited
over Kitten Come Home (did you ever read that story in the Golden Books when
you were little?) that they bailed out and took off on a dead run, totally
forgetting to release the seat and let the little tykes in seat #3 out of the
vehicle. 😃
“They’re tired of you, and hoped I’d take you
home with me!” I explained to Josiah and Leroy.
They grinned.
But Li’l Losted Kitten was home again, and
there was great rejoicing in the land!
I posted some
photos from October 7th: From
Georgetown, CO, to Torrington, WY
My mother-in-law,
Norma, called that evening to tell
me that her brother, Clyde, has a brain tumor. He has an appointment with
a neurologist, and will find out what the next course of action is. They found the tumor because he kept passing
out, and couldn’t keep food down.
That night, I broke a couple of toes – or at least I
thought at the time it was just a couple; by last night it was clear that all three smaller toes on my right foot are
broken. This, from kicking a doorjamb in
the kitchen. 😲 😬 Waa waa waa
And I had just a
couple more rows to go on my customer’s quilt before it was done! Botheration!
Since it looked
like the toes were in place, I elevated the foot and used a gel pack on it for
a while, swallowed a couple of ibuprofen, then collected the cane I acquired
back when I sprained my ankle in 2008, and hobbled down the stairs to my
quilting machine.
I recommenced
quilting, muttering to myself, I think I
can, I think I can, I think I can... (toe
hurts, toe hurts, toe hurts)...
Those last two rows were a pain.
Literally.
At about 11:30 p.m.,
there was a loud, crashing boom that rattled the house. I brought my quilting machine to an abrupt stop. Was that thunder? The quilting machine is noisy enough, I
couldn’t be sure. I slid the window open
and listened.
Nothing. No rain, no more thunder. Had Larry dropped his phone or tablet,
upstairs directly overhead, as he is oft wont to do? I didn’t think so; the boom had rolled on a
little too long for that.
I started quilting again,
a question mark hovering over my head.
I heard a text come
into my laptop from Hannah, and went to read it.
“Huge
explosion-sounding bang just happened!” she wrote. “The kids could see a flash out their south
windows. The house rattled, and the
floor shook.”
“I heard it!” I
responded. “Wonder what on earth it was! Our house shook, too. Natural gas explosion? Are any homes in
town heated with natural gas? Do you
hear any sirens?”
A couple of minutes
passed, then Hannah wrote, “Street lights are out. I see flashing lights close to Cubby’s (gas
station). A lot of smoke.”
Another minute, and
then, “It’s at Gehring’s (our friends’ ready-mix plant). Possibly a cement truck on fire there.”
A few tense moments
went by while I wondered if anyone had been there when that explosion occurred,
and then Hannah told me, “No one was hurt. The fire is out now. It’s one of the trucks that has a natural gas
tank.”
By the next day, we
would learn that when that gas tank exploded, the truck’s water tank, as big as a stove, flew sky-high and hit the power lines overhead and brought them down, taking out not just street lights, but all the electricity on a good
portion of the west side of town.
Can you believe
this thing used to be a cab??!
Three cement
trucks, including the one that blew up, were totaled, and three others
seriously damaged, including my brother-in-law John’s cement powder truck. It got so hot in his cab, the hood of his
nylon jacket that he had over his seat melted.
One of the men jumped in it (must’ve been hot) and backed it up
without waiting for the air pressure to build – just slid the back tires. There was sand on the concrete, so the rear
tires weren’t damaged. Tires on the side
closest the fire blew out, however.
No, I didn’t take any ‘selfies’ as I was about this
ungainly operation, so if you can’t figure out how I managed from my
description, it’s too bad, so sad.
Saturday, I launched
into the morning bath/shampoo ritual, trying not to bump those toes on
anything.
Then, to add insult
to injury, I walked out into the kitchen to make myself some coffee, and
discovered that Teensy had dispatched of a none-too-small rabbit, with the resulting
colossal mess. Aaaaaauuuuggghhh.
I cleaned up the
majority of it, decided it was too painful (literally) to complete the job, and
left the rest for Larry. I’m a good wife; I share all the unpleasant
tasks with my husband. Ha! I even
called him and told him my tale of woe, and he, like a good husband (why did
that phrase make me start singing the State Farm jingle?), promised to come
home shortly and finish the chore.
Finally getting the
desired coffee, I limped back to the bathroom to curl my hair. Standing at the mirror with all my weight on
one foot got tiring pretty fast, so I pulled up the clothes hamper and sat on
it, resting my battered foot on a little space heater.
“Now, if the hamper
lid doesn’t give way,” I remarked to Teensy, “everything’s cherry!”
It’s one of those
Rubbermaid hampers. I sat as lightly as possible, and tried not to make
any rash movements.
The hamper valiantly
held me up, and ten minutes later I was coiffed and ready to face the world (or
house, as it were). Or at least hobble out into it.
I tried this broken-toe
escapade once before, some 23 years ago. It didn’t feel so good then, and
it doesn’t feel so good now.
A friend, upon
hearing my tale of woe, wrote, “I’ve broken a couple of toes over the years,
but never two at once! It’s much easier
to deal with one broken toe than two!”
I don’t know why that would be, exactly, unless two or
three broken toes doubles or triples the pain. Maybe if each foot sported a broken toe...
I responded, “Well,
I was very efficient and broke two side by side, so that whilst I’m a-babyin’
the one, the other gets babied right at the same time. Wasn’t that clever
of me?”
Another friend
wrote, “I’m sorry to hear about your toes.
Will you be seeing a doctor?”
“Naaaa...” I
answered, “the toes look straight enough. They’d probably tape them and
tell me to stay off it, elevate it, apply something cold... I’d come
home, untape it, and follow the rest of the advice.”
That other time I
broke a toe, some 23 years ago... Well, here, I’ll just insert this
excerpt from an old journal of mine:
I did
an extreme stunt this morning.
It was a triple back flip.
Or at least, it felt like a triple back flip.
Though I could be mistaken.
(Sometimes, just getting out of Larry’s tallll pickup
feels like bungee jumping from the Auckland Bridge. But I digress.)
The supposed triple back flip was executed accidentally
in an heroic attempt to avoid putting a foot squarely into the middle of sweet
little Tabby cat, who has never realized that, because he blends so nicely into
the living room rug, he should therefore NOT lie there.
In the end, as it turned out, the supposed triple back
flip was entirely unnecessary, because. . . . it was not Tabby.
It was a little stuffed puppy that just happens to be the
identical color as Tabby.
I’m writing from my hospital bed where I lie in traction.
{Not… really.}
I broke
a toe once. No, not triple back-flipping. Rather, Hester and Lydia
(ages 5 and 3) and I were having a pillow fight. I was dressing Caleb,
age 1, and they came sneaking (as well as two little girls can sneak,
when they can’t quit giggling) down the hall, pillows in hand, and let fly at
me.
I exclaimed, which made Caleb giggle, too, helped him
down, grabbed the pillows, and went flying out the door after two running,
giggling, screeching little girls.
Only one toe nearly got left behind on the doorjamb.
Momentum carried me some distance down the hallway before
I could get stopped, even though I was hopping on one foot. The little
girls, near the front door at the far end of the hallway, assumed all these
theatrics were for their benefit, and laughed so hard they were bent double.
The trouble was, our Christmas program was in two days –
and I had to play the piano! Furthermore, I had a new purple satin suit –
and new purple pumps to match. One must wear one’s matching purple heels,
no matter what. Right?
Right.
The night of the program, after spending the afternoon
with my foot propped up, making cassette tapes for the children in my Jr.
Choir, I got dressed, gritted my teeth, and
p.u.t...t.h.a.t...s.h.o.e...o.n...m.y...f.o.o.t. The room swam. I
regathered my equilibrium, set my chin, and marched off to church. And I
played the piano, using the foot with the poor broken toe on the sustain pedal
valiantly. The foot had grown somewhat numb by the time the program was
over, an hour and a half later. The children exited the stage as the
organist played softly. I stood up.
I sat back down.
Scooping up what shreds of fortitude I had left, I stood
up, set my jaw, and followed the children down the stage steps.
A.A.A.A.A.u.u.u.g.g.g.g.h.h.h.
When I got home and pried those shoes off my feet, the
room turned psychedelic for a few moments. I sat down in a recliner,
lifted the foot rest, and let everyone else do all the rest of the Christmas
work – making soup, letting in the company, doling out gifts, etc. I sat
and took photos and opened gifts and yelled “Watch out for my foot!” at
periodic intervals.
The toe was getting better about three weeks later, when,
as I was standing in the kitchen behind Larry’s chair, he scooted back without
warning, lifting his chair before reseating himself. One chair leg landed
on that toe.
Everyone in the room heard it crack.
I gasped – and closed my mouth. One mustn’t
frighten the babies.
But Larry had fingerprints in his shoulder for days.
We now return you
to your regular programming.
I ate an English
muffin slathered with butter and blueberry jam for breakfast, sitting with foot
propped up on my tapestry footstool, with the gel pack underneath my toes. I inquired into whether or not the toes would
agree to starting on my customer’s second quilt, Americana, or if they preferred
that I work on pictures or cross-stitching. They were getting quite
colorful. (The toes, that is.)
The toes tried to
answer, but my shoulder drowned them out, as it was hurting worse than my toes
at the moment. I’d injured it, hanging onto the railing the previous night
as I went up and down the stairs a few times, trying to keep weight off that
foot.
And then it occurred
to me that I didn’t have batting for quilt #2. The toes told me (rather
loudly and rudely, I thought) that they did not want to trippity-trip to the
far side of Hobby Lobby, where the batting is kept.
So I rummaged
around in my batting pieces, found a fairly large piece of cotton batting that
felt like the batting I had left over from the Halloween quilt, butted them
together, and used a 9mm zigzag to connect them. One is Warm &
Natural and one is Warm & White; but the fabric is dark, and it will never show. Under the dense Eagle with Stars pantograph I’m
using, the batting joint will never be noticed, either.
The customer is
happy, because it saved her a few dollars.
The toes are happy, because it saved them some pain.
I loaded the quilt and got started.
Everyone thinks this panto is difficult – but the truth
is, it’s a whole lot easier than the Halloween Bats panto. That
one, I struggled with – mainly because of the large circles. My machine
prefers to do round-cornered squares.
I always enjoy
quilting designs with birds, especially when the pantograph is as pretty as
this one. It’s turning out good.
Victoria sent a
piece of pumpkin chiffon pie home for me with Larry that afternoon. She made it with coconut milk instead of
evaporated milk. I couldn’t tell any
difference. It was scrumptious.
Later, she wrote to
say that Kurt tried out for choir – and will be singing in the men’s
choir. So I sent her the lyrics of a
song we learned long ago from the Children’s Bible Hour:
♪ ♫ All God’s
chillen ♪ ♫ gots a voice ♪ ♫ in de choir! ♪ ♫ Some sing low, ♪ ♫ and some
sing highuh! ♪ ♫ Some sing outside ♪ ♫ on de tellyphone wy-uh; ♪ ♫ and
some just claps ♪ ♫ zare hands, ♪ ♫ or paws, ♪ ♫ or innysang dey gots now! ♪ ♫
I managed to get
one row completed on the quilt. Then I
migrated back upstairs to my recliner and worked on photos until bedtime.
I had the gel pack under my toes on the footstool. I had my choice of
piping hot coffee or iced tea on the end table beside me. Big ol’ Tiger
cat was purring nearby, and all I had to do to replenish his rumble if it
started fading was croon, “Nice old kitty!”
Yep, I had things
pretty good, sore toes notwithstanding.
I couldn’t put my
foot into a shoe, so I didn’t go to church yesterday. I wasn’t about to try what I did with the purple
pumps of yesteryear. Nowadays, age and
vanity are traveling in opposite directions on the bar graph!
Back then, ‘heels’
were 3- and 4-inchers. Now, ‘heels’ are, at the most, 2 ½”. I’ve
always preferred going barefoot, though. Hence the Toes-Versus-Doorjamb
Drama.
Not only did my
toes hurt, but so did my back, from walking like the crooked man with the
crooked cane on the crooked walk.
Several quilting
ladies suggested steel-toed boots. Larry offered me his.
However, I have
arthritis in my feet, and going barefoot feels best.
Unless and until I kick
a doorjamb.
Some have informed
me, “No, wearing shoes feels best on
arthritic feet.”
Look, I have shoes. Heels.
Flats. Sandals. Flip-flops.
Nice walkers with good support. I
know what feels best on my feet. You go ahead and wear what feels best on
yours; I’ll go ahead and wear (or not wear) what feels best on mine. Okay?
Larry tried out our wood-burning stove yesterday. Looks like his
caulking job inside the chimney is good! Smoke went up... out the
chimney... and warmth filled the basement. He let it burn for a while, so
the caulking could harden. He didn’t
turn on the furnace fan yet, so the smell of the caulking didn’t permeate the
rest of the house. All is well, we’ll be able to use the wood-burning stove again, and we have quite a lot of wood, so that’ll save us money this winter. The stove is connected
to the heat ducts, so the furnace fan blows heat throughout the house.
I posted more pictures,
these from October 8th: From
Torrington, WY, to Chadron, NE
Those are from the
day the transmission line broke.
Out in the western
Nebraska Sandhills, most of the windmills are very short and down in the
valleys, because of the constant winds that blow so strongly. If they are
too tall, they are soon demolished by the wind.
Larry told me that pieces of the cement truck that
exploded were found blocks away, in all directions. If anyone had’ve been nearby, they would’ve
been killed.
The explosion
probably occurred because a natural gas tank was over-pressurized and leaked.
Speaking of sore
toes and health and whatnot... as mentioned, I have moderately severe
rheumatoid arthritis. I hold it at bay by 1) exercising, 2)
keeping my weight down (I’d like to lose 10 pounds, but ... I like to eat), 3)
eating healthily, and 4) pretending I don’t have it (rheumatoid
arthritis, that is). heh Well, I haven’t exercised since Friday,
when I tried remodeling the house via toes, and I’m feeling decidedly
stiff. So... I’m exercising today.
Here’s a
fact: standing leg lifts, running in place (well, I’m only walking
in place, today), etc., make broken toes fuss and complain and swell!
There.
Nothing like giving a health report on almost every page of a journal,
eh? Mama told me that when people say, “How are you?” they’re giving you
a friendly greeting, not asking for a health report. I
should be more like my Mama. She suffered quietly and cheerfully.
Me, I don’t suffer in silence. I suffer LOUDLY! Vociferously!
“Make everyone else
suffer too!” – that’s my motto. :-D Or at least make ’em
laugh.
A customer was
planning to send another quilt today, and wanted a panto resembling bricks or
telephone poles or something city-ish and modern. I sent her a few possibilities, but also told
her that there just isn’t any way I can perfectly make those nice straight
lines in a pantograph, as my machine isn’t computer-driven. I can make
straight lines in custom quilting just fine, because I’m at the front of
the machine, using rulers. But from the rear... trying to follow a
pantograph with a laser light... Not so much.
So she will
probably take the quilt to her LQS; they do computerized pantographs.
Now I’m wondering
how much they charge... and if it’s so much that sending quilts all the way
from Tampa, Florida, to middle Nebraska is worth it!
Several have asked questions
about my machine: It’s an HQ16, and is not computer driven,
though it could be upgraded to be so, with the ProStitcher. The
ProStitcher alone – that’s just the computerized part of it – is
$9,495.00. I only paid $2,700 for my machine in the first place! It’s
a 2005, purchased used in 2010.
It has handles front and rear. I use the ones in
front when I am doing custom work – feathers and rulerwork. I use the
ones in the rear when I am following a pantograph with my laser light, holding
the handles and guiding the machine along the lines of the design.
We have a steady wind today of about 35 mph, with gusts
over 50 mph, and it’ll be like that for three or four more days. We’re expecting hard freezes the last four
days of this week. And our wood-burning stove is back in working order!
Okay, back to the
quilting, and back to a few ‘unstiffening’ exercises.
~ Sarah Po’, Po’ Me Lynn, trying to stay out
of the way of Larry’s chair legs ~
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