Nothing much...

Just a quick update, gotta keep up the readership, no?

We were up early this morning as there was a house showing from 10:30-12:30. I cleaned last night and finished this morning and we left and had a leisurely, early lunch. It isn't the custom for agents to leave their cards in this area but I know they were here: one of the males used my bathroom. Is is weird that this really bothers me? He could have put the seat down and I'd've never known. hmmmfffff.

I have my serger class this afternoon at G Street. The class is $85. How much for the fabric I find on THE WALL? Well, a girl's got to have something to sew on her new serger, doesn't she? Doesn't she? I need a loud "Hell, yeah!' here. Let me hear it!

And a sadder ending for the day's posing. My BFF's dog passed away this morning. She (the dog, not friend) hasn't been well this summer/fall and then slid fast this last week. She was much thinner and calmer when I visited earlier this month. It used to be hard for me to tell the difference between her 2 corgis, but this time it was sadly easy to pick Bridgett out. She still ran to the door to great you, but within a few minutes she was back under the bed. Then she was sick all night a few nights ago and has been with the vet since then. Karen had to go out of town so she was due to be boarded. My heart is with my friend who didn't get to say good-bye to her pet. I'm sorry, she will be missed.

Update

My son's surgery went well. The surgeon was able to put the cages in front of T11 & L1, as well as rods/screws from T10 - L3 all through a single incision in his back. A big incision, but only one. It looks much like the xray at the blog top. This was all made possible because he didn't have to worry about damaging his spinal cord. Yeah, whatever.
It was a big surgery, about 5 hours and yesterday was rough. He was doing better today, though. Ate breakfast and lunch. Got out of bed, talked to people. I spent Monday night in the single most uncomfortable chair ever created, and remember I'm a hospital sleeping veteran. Not my first night in a chair. I came back to his apartment last night and tonight. I'm too old for chair sleeping. I did discover that I can lay down in 2 chairs placed seat to seat. Quite a feat. And I'm a poet.
His roommate is a 49 year old heavy guy that fell 4 feet off a ladder a week and a half ago. Smashed his leg when all 350 pounds of him landed on his right leg. Broke all 3 major bones, damaged his femoral artery, broke his patella and broke the tibia in knee joint. He's had 5 surgeries, so far. Including skin grafts to close the other wounds because it swelled too much for the skin to reach. Moral of this story? Don't trim trees with your ladder on mulch. Oh, and loose weight when your wife tells you too. Apparently she's pretty mad at him about this whole thing. Interesting people you meet in hospitals. Not.
BUT I finished a PAIR (yes, that's right, a pair. 2. ) of socks. They're in the wash right now after me wearing them all afternoon. I'm quite pleased. A few errors but whatever. I'm happy. And #2 looks better than #1. Then I created yarn barf out of my next skein and spent 3 hours attempting to untangle it. Finally left it in the visitor chair and left. AKKK!
Well, I'm going to finish my glass of wine and let the Benedril do it's thing. That's a story for another day. Unless you're an allergist looking for a challenge. Then give me a call and we'll talk.

A different day.

Yes, I'm still bushed. But for good reason today. So we'll just start at the beginning, a very good place to start. And then wander off to other places.

My husband has his follow-up appointment today, "somewhere north of Baltimore, Luthersburg or something". Ok, he can't drive yet, but ya gotta do what ya gotta do. We swung by Starbucks and he put the address into Jill (our GPS) and off we went. I know how to get "somewhere north of Baltimore" so I didn't pay much attention until we got on 695 and I asked where we were going. ***** Falls Road, Luthersville. Hmmmm, now I know a nifty little Fabric Place on Falls Road, north of Baltimore. So after having his stitches removed, his foot evaluated, 2 new prescriptions written and a release to go to work - but not drive, I told Jill to take us to .... Michaels. Husband actually encouraged the trip and even (are you ready for this?) came INTO the store. And talked to Michael and Sherri. Commented "they're really nice people". What did he think? They sell fabric, ergo their fuzzy and nasty? Don't know. But they at least pretended to remember me, and CLEARLY remembered karent. (Sherri says "hi!, and when are you coming back?") Of course I found a few goodies and and some nice prices - for Michael's.

Let's see..... the grey at the top is a Zegna cashmere blend. The blue window pain may be a Channel, but probably not. I think it will make a nice skirt. It's very textured, a wool blend - needs a navy trim. The polka-dot was my husbands pick - I KNOW! - it's silk. And the navy solid is a wool jersy - thinking sheath dress?? Total damage? $102, 10 yards. And I was doing so well sewing up some stash.....

Which brings me to this: Pretty much says it all.

Then we wanted to look at one the houses I saw on Saturday, so Jill thought it would be a good idea to take us on I83 which deadends into downtown Baltimore in the most horrific traffic jam I've EVER seen. And I've done my share of driving in my half century (yikes, kind of wish I hadn't typed THAT!) Over an hour to go the about 2 miles from I83 to 295. So instead of a nice lunch we had Chick-fil-a at 3pm. So now I'm not hungry for dinner and husband is sleeping away his busy day. But we do like the house and will likely make an offer. See if it's accepted.....

And I know you've been dying to see the fugly first sock. I'm sure the needles were too large, the cuff is saggy and if you look at the back/heel portion you'll see where I mixed up my knits and purls and couldn't see to tink it so I left it. Told you it was bad. But it IS as sock. And fits on my foot. I think it did some fun pooling, though.

The next pair is on the needles, much smaller ones (#1's) and is turning out much better.

I'm just tired

I spent most of today looking at icky houses. Tiny, tiny bedrooms and patios with the neighbor's pool as the view. 6 houses and only one that I finished looking at. And it's over our price range - BUT it's been on the market for a looonnnnngggg time and may be flexible. I hate looking for houses (but not as much as job-hunting, just sayin'). And in the rain, rain, rain, rain, rain. Pouring rain. Flooding rain. But none of the homes I saw had damp basements. And after 5 feet of melting snow and 4 inches of rain, that's a true test.

I have 2 new sewing projects lined up. A BWOF from Jan 09 (pretty sure 'bout that) in black linen-look rayon. Nice fabric from FabricMart.com. And a navy skirt out of a Jacquard (did I spell that closely? Seriously, don't care. ) I have 3.5 yards, but it's very narrow - only about 36" wide. Lyra-if you're watching, I'm using the BWOF pattern you sent me. Do you remember when it was from? An A-line "wrap" with double buttons on the front. I'm going to line them both with the same fabric from ??? G-Street????? I'll cut both tomorrow and sew on them as I have time. And I need to hem a pair of RTW, need to take up the waist, too. But it's faster to make new pants than fix purchased ones.

My husband has already gone to bed. I think he over-did while I was gone. He picked up the mail, started dinner, cleaned his bathroom. Walked up the stairs (5 stories) for exercise. Now he feels poorly and stiff and has retired and left me to HGTV and BWOF mags and a glass of wine. And Whine.

And now that spring is imminent, I'm remembering summer.

Lovely Summer.

Whew, what a week.

My husband had surgery last Thursday, it was a pretty big operation and he was expected to be released on Sunday. Didn't happen. Monday? Didn't happen. Tuesday? Didn't happen. Wednesday? Didn't happen. Finally we got home around 4:30 on Thursday. He was in Johns Hopkins up in Baltimore, we live in Northern Virginia. So I was spending 2 hours a day (at least) in my car, 8 hours a day watching a very drugged man snore, and trying to work. And, to make it better, I was very sick on Friday night. Very. Then after getting home last night I still had to go to the grocery store and the pharmacy and then fix us some dinner. He's still feeling a bit sore and slow but is improving and the biopsy reports were positive. My dog was glad to get sprung from the vet's.

ETA: As a response to a couple of comments, I meant "positive" in a positive way, meaning the biopsy was was negative and that's at good thing. Thank you all for your POSITIVE comments.

It wasn't a total loss, though. I learned to knit socks. I'd wanted to run down to Fibre Space last week for some yarn for a new project but didn't have a chance. But I did have some sock yarn in my meager stash and some size 3 dpn's. And a lot of time on my hands. I spent the time he was in surgery casting on and making the shortened cuff. I was too impatient to start the sock process to make a full 6" cuff. I used a combination of patterns/directions found on Ravelry. Following the link will take you to my project page. I used the Silver Sock tutorial to assist me on the gusset construction. While there are problems, including the cuff being too large, it IS a sock. It took me 2 days. On my way up to the hospital on Monday I went to JoAnn's for smaller needles - the pattern suggests 1.5's. They had 1's and 2's. I bought both and used the 1's. And bought more yarn. um, yeah. Using smaller needles and making a full 6" cuff is slow going for me. After 5 days, I only just started on the heel. I must learn to knit faster.


I worked from home today, I didn't think hubby was ready to spend the day alone. And then did a few clean up items in my sewing room, including cleaning it up. I hemmed the BWOF green skirt, and did a couple of repairs and finished a pair of panties. It looks better in there. And in my closet.


Tomorrow I'm off to do some house-hunting.


BUT, IT'S SPRING!! OFFICIALLY! I saw forsythia and a cherry tree blooming today and all the snow is gone from Old Town. So now I need to do some spring sewing. I do love me a nice warm day! It was rainy, but that's very spring-like so it was fine.


And since I don't think that it's fair that you had to read this whole, whiny post with no pictures.

No, I didn't die.

Or drop of the face of the Earth, or run off and join the circus (don't tempt me) or get sucked into a black hole or have a computer failure or break my right hand. But life did intrude very rudely into my life and it was immediately followed by a big blue funk that I'm still struggling out of. I had sincere plans to update my Novi Expo adventures that Sunday. Instead, I spent most of Sunday at the ER, my son totaled his car about 4:30 that morning. I wasn't even aware he'd left the apartment and I got "One-of-those" phone calls. He was unhurt, but because he has no feeling below the waist and was quite confused we went to the hospital. And since they were very busy that night - apparently my son wasn't the only idiot out driving that night - we had quite a wait. Made it home around lunch time. What this has signaled is that there are some real changes coming and amoung these are a requirement for me to spend a lot more time in Detroit. And yes, I have a day job. I'm not happy about a lot of things right now.
On an up side, I am still going on my mini-vaca. Leaving tomorrow (God willing - and he hasn't been very often lately - and the creeks don't rise, a better bet - the rain has stopped) for San Fransisco. Wine country, Chinatown, Golden Gate Bridge, seafood, snoop-shopping. Quick trip - probably as much traveling time as vaca time. And not without it's own worries.
But I did get a new tote bag JUST IN TIME. I won Laura's ghost story challenge and she sent my wine-themed tote bag that arrived today. Nice size, beautiful work and a cork as a zipper pull. Does it get any better? Yes, I'm a little geeked. Live with it.
I do have a few photo's from the Expo. I took them, I downloaded them. I may as well share them. Well, next time. Blogger isn't cooperating and allowing me to post. Sorry. But maybe I'll be in a better posting mood and you'll better shots. And San Francisco and the farmer's market from the early fall.

RIP

Farrah Fawcett

Michael Jackson

A rough day. It's just odd to know that neither of them are part of this world, now. They've always been there. Both were a little quieter in recent years, but were always there. May they both find peace and health.

Sew-sew

My son went back to Detroit this morning, I know he was ready to go home. But, when he got back to his apartment he found that his PS3 had been stolen. The maintenance crew at his complex is a key suspect. I suspect he'll never take another vacation. Nothing else was taken, not even some major meds that he has on hand.

On Saturday morning I decided I wanted to make BWOF April 101, this skirt: so I tossed this fabric into the wash and started tracing. Then I laid out my fabric, put the pattern pieces on the fabric and just stopped. Bleck. Boring. Dull. Drab. Back to my sewing room to ponder on this for a while and my eye fell on this. From Fabric.com just a few months ago, when I bought some quilting fabric. I loved it on the 'net, but when I got it home and unfolded it, I was stumped to what I could ever use it for. The repeat is distinct, large and there's a large white line in the center. It's was listed as a cotton stretch sateen, but it's pretty matte - no sheen. 2% lycra, so just a tad stretchy. So it was folded away, brought out, refold, repeated a number of time,s I was afraid it would end up in the "what was I thinking" box. But there it was, peeking out from under some black wool. Just the thing to cut into 6 gores + yoke. It's a clean white with sage/olive (more towards sage - NOT the grey it sort of appears in some photos)

I started to try to figure out what BWTF (thanks, Cidell - had to use this!) was trying to say about how to do the yoke. Then I just make the yoke with the lap, put in the buttonholes, and attached to the front center. From there it was just piecing it together with an invisible zipper (I got to use my new Inv Zip foot, nothing like a new toy). I thought hard about adding the pockets, even made them (one of them twice - I just didn't like the fabric placement) but in the end decided not to. They would have to be top-stitched on and I didn't want just the pockets topstitched and I didn't want to topstitch the skirt - that would be too casual a look. Here's the full front, I wish I'd been more random with the pattern. and the back, which I actually like better: Oh, and I used my blind hem foot. Not wild about the result on this fabric, but it's blinder in real life - the flash really picked it up. And it worked like a charm. Fast and easy. So 2 sewing toys in one project. This is really a very easy skirt to make, I took my time and it was a 2 day-er with a lot of interruptions and some extra time laying out the pattern. And the time spent trying to decipher BWOF instruction before "just doing it".

And, since all I had to do was put on the buttons and hem I thought I'd start another project. Kicked around some new PJ's with some clearance fabrics from Hancock's. Nah. How about BWOF #111 from May (sorry, no picture, I can't find it on their site). Pants with no waist band and slant welt pocket (yeah, I was going to leave out the pocket - I'm so ashamed). Traced it out and placed it down on some navy/cream lightweight wool that was only about 50 inches wide, not 60. No way. **sigh**. How about some shorts? From the new June issue? I've had some raw green silk that's been wanting to be shorts for 2 years. Drag out the tracing stuff again - actually, never got put all the way away. There's a lot of "extra" stuff to cut on this one, btw. Carriers, facings, "belt". And you guessed it. Not enough fabric, A-gain. **sigh** So back to the sewing room again to ruminate and think about PJ's again. And I found this: from last year's late summer shopping at Fabricmart.com when I panicked and thought I was running out of fabric. (yeah, pretty funny). White and dark navy stretch twill. Probably a better choice than the silk for this pattern. I left the cutting board in for size reference. I got it cut out (yea!) and bumbled through the first of BWOF's set of instructions to realize that I need some belt buckles for the belt. And I have none. Not sure if Hancock's will have any, either. Errrr! Foiled yet again. This is getting tedious. I think I'll go look at my green skirt some more.

Good night.

Home again, again

After 4 days of testing in the hospital, we are once again home. Ahhh. Tonight I will sleep in my bed. Not a chair. And no one will awaken me (I hope) at 4:45 for blood pressure checks. I will have coffee in my cup and go to work in the morning. They tried everything they could to force a seizure on him, and it was no go. The techs and doctors seemed dissapointed, but I was fine with this. The end result was to put him back on his med and discharge him. He'll likely go back to Detroit this weekend - he wants to go home, too. There's less than a month before he has surgrey that will take him out for about 6 weeks. What a summer.

Still Home and that's a good thing

First, thank you all for your kind words and support. I was surprised by both the response and at how much it helped. Thank you. This is the second hardest thing we've ever had to do and I don't know what we'll end up doing with all this. It's a real game changer for all of us. I guess it's a good thing we hadn't bought a house yet, this clarifies some of our requirements.

We had a boring and uneventful day. And that was good thing. I got the nerve up to take him out and get his hair cut, run by the grocery store and he waited in the car while I ran into PetCo for poop bags and a new collar (pink). Too much info? Or just bizarre info?

In some sewing news, finally, I really liked the 3 pieces of silk I got from FabricMart.com. 2 are browns/golds - my fall colors. And the other is black and burgundy. Maybe I'll get around to some photo's soon. I could have done this today, but didn't. I may make some blouses with these, they are a nice weight - not too flimsy.

And my shirt I was working on, the fabric from Fabric.com, is a real wadder. The neckline just turned out horrible. Awful, terrible, would need work to become a Hot, home sewn mess. I'm disappointed - I like the fabric. I just need some work on knit necklines. I put a line of clear elastic in it and then folded over to finish. And it got squiggly and wonky and puckery and ugerly. I need to find a tutorial on this. I just struggle with this and tired of making wadders.

I'm making another BWOF shirt, I think. Or some more pants. A skirt, even. WOV-VEN WOV-VEN!

Home

We made it all the way this time. With a handfull of new prescriptions. He's scheduled for some more tests next week and then we'll discuss when/how he can go home. Pretty scared to send him home alone. I know he wants to go, but we'll just have to see.
Frankly, I'm not sure how many more of these surprises I have left in me.

Still here

We were almost outa here yesterday evening. Discharge papers in hand, kid in the chair, wheeling down the hall. And as we got into the elevator he started acting funny, confused again. I turned us around and went right back to the nurses' station. They readmitted him, put him right back in the same bed. Thank God they did. He rapidly got less and less coherent and then started seizing again. About 2 hours to get it to stop, poor drug management. He even told them they weren't doing their job. Totally out of it all night and still pretty wacky. Gets TV and reality mixed up.
They're transferring him to another hospital for some additional testing as soon as a bed opens up. But his EEG wasn't encouraging. This means some real changes in all our lives, as he can no longer live alone.
Honestly, this is almost more than I can handle. 4 years ago we did this, and in the last 4 years have dug out of that pit and created a new "normal". How much more will be thrown at him? At us?
On the bright side, I'm probably 8 pounds lighter than I was Saturday morning. Bad joke, I know. And I have a box from Fabricmart that I haven't even opened. It has a sild bundle in it that is still a surprise.

Swearing off Mother's Day

Not a sewing related entry, so if you're looking for pretty updates, today's not your lucky day. The shirt I cut on Friday is still hanging on a dining room chair, my DH is afraid to touch it and he's been the only one home this weekend.
2 years ago on MD, at 12:01 am, my father passed away. It was quite expected, welcome even at that point. But MD is still and will always be the day I ceased being a daughter forever. My mother died over 20 years ago 2 years before I became a mother.
Last year we spent the day driving from Michigan to DC in that torrential rain/storm that encompassed the NE for 2 days. We arrived soggy and exhausted to discover our apartment leaked and was also soggy and exhausted. It was mid-July (yes, July) before they finished fixing that mess.
Yesterday morning my son, visiting, had a seizure. We're still not sure why, but we think it was a drug reaction, more by a process of what it isn't (most of which are good NOT to be), so yesterday and today was spent at the hospital. He's still there tonight.
So next year I will be the Jew at Christmas. I'll go to a movie and eat Chinese food. Keep your sappy cards and macaroni pins, your brunches and carnations. I'm just done with this holiday. Pick another day, some time in the summer and name it "We love Beth day" or something, and take me out to dinner and buy me golf stuff. Just don't tell the fates when it's going to be or make any reference to parenting. I have a friend who has forsworn a much more major holiday, Thanksgiving, so I know it can be done. It will difficult at first, but much easier than putting up with this crap every spring.
For the rest of you out there, Happy Mother's Day. I don't begrudge you your day, you earned it, you deserve it. And I hope it was wonderful, filled with family and frittatas and maybe even some sunshine.

End of the week from hell.

I had high aspirations of finishing Marlene pants #2. Didn't happen. Didn't even set foot in my sewing room this week except to iron for work, until tonight.

I made a little progress tonight, THANKS ELIZABETH!, I finally got the stupid-simple pockets put together, and the side seams and inside leg seams. One leg isn't good, so out it will come tomorrow. If I have time. I still have a ton of work to do this weekend. And I have a boat-load of alterations to do. Not my fav by a long shot. I have 2 pairs of pants to hem and 3 jackets to take the sleeves up on. It's not easy being short. But I will love having some new stuff to wear for fal.

More fun: I bought a zig-zagger for my Singer 201 from Ebay. This one really IS a ZZ-er. Unlike the hemmer sold as a ZZ-er. Ah well. The risk you take on Ebay. And it does work, in fact it's on my machine right now. But now I'm excited and can really Zig my Zag. It has four cams/templates, including a standards ZZ, a scallop, one that looks like a Christmas tree, and a "W" "M" like of thingy. If I have time - AFTER I hem my pants tomorrow - I'll play around and post some pics of my fancy-schmancy stitches. But I have the blind-hemmer on the machine and want to hem the pants before switching attachments. Yes, the Singer attachments do beautiful work. But they are kind of a pain to switch out. That's where the new machines do win. But I think the Singer's stitches are much prettier.

I still have a shipment from Fabric Mart coming. Hopefully this weekend. I called yesterday, because it was taking so long and they said it would ship today. One of the cuts was on backorder. Doesn't really matter, not like I had time to sew, but I do like to pet my new stuff. Guess I'll just clack around with my ZZ-er and switch out the templates. LOL.

Ok, I don't know how well this shows up, badly I think. It's an olive knit from Vogue Fabrics. With a loop - think soft stretchy loose terry? What to do with it? I need a pattern. Maybe cardigan? Wrap shirt? Ideas? It's finally fall here in DC, so I'm ready to sew for a new season.

Nothing fun today

Back to work.
And I lost my Wedding Ring. I know I put it on the dresser last night when I took a shower. It wasn't there this morning. We've combed the apartment, every drawer, the trash, the vacuum, the car, even the dog poo (DH did that - said if he found it, I had to clean it. Deal, maybe I'll use his tooth brush). Nothing.

In Memory

Last Wednesday, my son's best friend from high school died. The immediate cause of death was a drug overdose, and there is speculation that it may have been on purpose. Dan struggled with drug abuse for years, dating back to high school. This was a kid from the suburbs, his brother went to Harvard on a football scholarship. Dan could have done the same, but he took a different path.


When my son had his accident, Dan was there. He drove to Indy twice to see him, and he was only 17. Visited him daily when he transfered home. Picked him up when he fell out of his chair and carried him into friend's houses.


Dan, Rest in Peace. Thank you for being there for Kevin and we pray you've found peace now.


JONES, DANIEL ANDREW; age 21; of Rochester Hills; went to be with the Lord on July 23, 2008. He leaves behind a legacy of hope, faith and love. He is survived by his beloved family, parents James Jones III and Vicky Krause Jones; brothers Steven, David and Michael Jones; grandson of Clement Krause, Mae Alice Jones and James and Bobbie Jones; also survived by many wonderful aunts, uncles and cousins. Funeral Mass Monday, July 28, 2008 12 Noon with an In State time of 11:30 a.m. at St. Andrew Catholic Church 1400 Inglewood, Rochester. The family will receive friends Sunday 2 to 9 p.m. at the Potere-Modetz Funeral Home 339 Walnut Blvd, Rochester. Memorials to the family for a future memorial in Daniel s name. Online guestbook www.modetzfuneralhomes.com Ad provided by: The Daily Oakland Press

What I did on my relaxing day off.

I took Friday off to do some shopping, sewing and general nothing. I knew they would be working on the drywall in the apartment and wanted to be home to make sure they covered up the furniture and electronics, etc. The crew did show up around 10 - not MY idea of first thing in the morning- and hauled in all their equipment/ladders/plastic/mud/pans/scrappers/..... A big mess later, they were unclear on the idea of covering furniture, they got started dumping water around, spattering drywall mud and dusting with dust. I got an email telling me I hadn't done my timesheet - and believe me that's the reason I get up in the morning, so I haul out my computer in the corner of my plastic coated crowded room - I think about 6 people there - uncertain. Timesheet software times out, just gets slower and slower, tried to email for help, no go. The fire alarm in the building goes off. Now this is a common event - so far the building has failed the fire marshall's tests. Sooooo, still have 7 people (including me) piled in my living room, the fire alarm blaring, my timesheet locked up. One of the drywall guys noticed we had almost no water pressure - also not that unusual. Then one of them went out in the hall and came back in and said, very calmly, "did you see all that water?" WHAT WATER!!??!?!?!?!?!? There was at least 2" of water in the hallway floor right outside my front door and more pouring down the utility closet across the hall. I ran down the stairs to tell the front desk - where the heck's my phone!?!. They already knew and the fire department was already there. Apparently there was repair welding going on on the 6th floor (I live on 5th) and it got too hot and set off the sprinkler. Now, true to form at this point, the water pressure blew the sprinkler head off and broke the pipe. Enter THE FLOOD. No water actually flooding into my apartment that way, but we had a lot of water that seeped under the walls. Something ironic about seeing water puddled around the washer/dryer drip pan. Not so ironic is all the stuff out of the closet now piled in the bedroom. That closet is the main storage area of the apartment. We got a visit from the fire department, 3 HUGE fans, and a humidifier blocking my hallway. We also will get drywall pulled off the closet and replaced - yeah, that won't make a mess. And more new carpet. My son's coming to visit next weekend and this won't be finished. ARRRRGGGGG!

But somehow in the midst of this I finished a sleep shirt for the Nightwear sew along on SG. Now I DON'T have pictures of this because I just plain forgot to take them this morning. I'll do that later. It turned out nicely.

I've started the McCall's dress, so far, so good. I don't think this one will be put in timeout, but finished this week. Here's the fabric: From Hancock's clearance. It's a really soft drapey cotton. It washed well and handles nicely. Has a little bit of an Asian feel to the print. I have a ton more of it. I think it would go well with K's planned JCC, if I recall the colors right?
Well, I'm off to take a shower, we worked in 9 holes of golf in the heat with sunscreen so I need to get that off me before I go to bed. It will be interesting to see what kind of mess I come home to tomorrow night. **sigh**

Oh, and I still haven't done my timesheet.

Not what I planned on posting

For those of you who've tuned in to see the details of my JCC, that just isn't going to happen. Overall, this just isn't going to be a fun post, but I really just have to do this. For me. And it's my blog. Sorry, that's just the way it is tonight.

Some (okay one) of you knows that a very good friend of mine was brutally murdered by her husband last year, right before Valentine's day. They apparently fought over her work schedule and beat her to death in their bathroom. He then hid her in the back of her Izuzu Trooper, took her to his dad's machine shop and dismembered her. That's the glossed over story.

The reason I'm on this today is that his father committed suicide yesterday afternoon. It just doesn't stop. Steve's parents were divorced and his stepmother died about 6months before he killed Tara. Steve's dad was very quiet during the entire, year long, ordeal. His sister was hideously vocal, but his dad was silent. Never on TV, didn't attend the trial, seldom visited Steve in jail while awaiting trail. He was very close to Steve, they worked together in the very shop Steve used to dismember his wife. I guess this was just too much. I have no concrete words for this, though apparently I have a lot other types of words. I think this is just too much for me.

The pieces I left out earlier: he killed Tara in front of her 2 children. 4 & 6 years old. The 6 year old little girl crawled towards her mother and touched her eyes to try and wake her up while her little brother shivered. They then hid while their father drug their mother down the stairs by a belt around her neck.

That very morning that same little girl walked into her parent's bedroom to find her father in bed with the nanny. She's a smart little girl, very verbal. Did she tell her mother? Did her father just think she did? Thus signing her death warrant?

Mom was never home. Never. She traveled 5-6 days a week for years. I'm not sure she ever touched the little boy after he was weaned - and most of that was pumped and bottled. He was a mistake - the result of a wrong medication. Was the strain of an expected child too much for them? For Steve? For Tara? She always traveled with a co-worker and it was a pretty common assumption that they were having an affair. She was young and way above where she should have been given her education and ability. That whole thing was really weird. Upper management had told Lou to cut it out and he refused. Too much for Steve's fragile ego?

Steve's life was a lie. Everyone thought he was an MSU graduate, that's where he met Tara and she had the degree. Reality was he only attended for 2 semesters and dropped out. Steve worked for his father - grooming to take over the family business. It was a 2 man tool & die shop for a dying industry. Tara was a rising executive who traveled for her job - or to be away from him?

I feel bad that her facade fell apart after her death. She worked so hard in creating it. In pretending that everything was perfect. I guess perfect isn't all it's cracked up to be.

Sorry for the not so light and happy posting. This is just bad. I still can't believe I know someone who did this. I had dinners with him, went to ballgames with him, he's been to my house. Just so wrong and even after a year the ripples continue to wash across the pond. And I'm sure they're not over.

Thanks for putting up with this, perhaps I'll be in a better sewing/chatting mood tomorrow.

http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/99999999/METRO/70305002/1003&template=theme&theme=Metro-TaraLynnGrant

No Sew Long Weekend

Well, it's the end of the Memorial Day weekend. First, Thank you to all the Service Men and Women around the world and throughout history that have given the ultimate gift to allow me to sit in my appartment and type this.
Next, lets move on to why my weekend was both long and no-sew. My husband was home all weekend and he just doesn't understand the need to sew. Not even a little bit. For him the apartment is a place to store your stuff, not a place to hang out in, so we were gone most of the time. We played golf (very badly) all 3 days, went shopping, had lunch, went to dinner, everything but stay at home. Now adding to the reason's for not staying at home was a major power outage. Around 12:40 on Saturday (according to my email) the power went out due to a subterrainian fire that caused a widespread outage. The widespread was quickly corrected BUT not in our apartment building. Apparently, when the power went out - or tried to come back on? - the generator failed to shut off and it burned up something, so the power couldn't come back on. It's the holiday weekend, remember?, so the manager must have gone to the beach without her cell phone. After 24 hours the generator runs dry and NOW we have no fire alarms, springlers, no stairwell lighting (DARK!) and no security systems. A little scary to say the least. Someone must have called the fire marshall, as they (FM) came around about 10 last night to check on each tenent. By then they'd gotten their Sh*t together and refilled the generator. And all the power was back on this morning. Our unit only lost power for the initial widespread period of about 15 minutes or so - units are metered separately. No cable, no internet sucked.
I know, short boring post after a long weekend. Maybe I'll be more witty tomorrow.

And later that same day

Most of my day continued to stink, butsepfer (in the words of a 3 year old I once knew) lunch. I had lunch with an Online friend from SG. Here we are at lunch, we were hoping for a third, but life got in her way and she couldn't make it this time. That just means we'll have to do it again. No worries.

I also have some pics of our apartment, including my sewing room, the really tiny "den", but it works nicely, the Ikea stuff fits well and there's room for everything I need and it's all close by. My only gripe is the ironing board, it just messes with the whole Feng Sui of the room, LOL. If you look closely, you can see me taking the photo in the mirror. All in all it's like a "Where's Waldo" photo.

There's even just enough room for my Singer 201, so it will get used again. I've even bought it a new toy: a new button holer as my first (and I'm sure not last) venture into Ebay. I think I'll get it the blind stitcher, next. But I need to check out it's wiring before we go too far. She's no spring chicken and may have some problems. That would be bad.

You can see her there, on the right, under the Ikea curtains, that I'm going to hand up in just a minute. My Pfaff is there on the white table hiding amongst the pattern pieces - all a result of my Monday night indecision. Some of the mess is gone, some is not.

I really want to make a dress from this fabric that I got from Fabric Mart. It's a stretchy knit, but I don't know what pattern to use. I had a cross top from New Look picked out, but the more I looked at the less I liked it. Strewn across the table is Butterick 5190, but I'm not in love there either.

The fabric is so cute, though and I really want to use it this season. Suggestions anyone?

And my last point for tonight is a picture of the black and white skirt and top I made from Hancock stretch cotton. Now if it would only warm up enough to wear the top. It's just too darn cold lately. I didn't line this skirt, I bought some stuff - at Wallyworld for a whopping $0.88 and it unraveled in the wash, even with the edge stitching, so I just tossed it and made the skirt anyway. C'est la vie, eh? I don't know how to say "you get what you pay for" in French, but it's appropriate.

If you come back tomorrow night, you'll be treated to the picks of the rest of the BeeBee domain. You don't know what you're missing - well, maybe you do, they're on SG already, whatev...