An experiment and cleaning

I purchased two different kinds of Sharpie markers and I am testing which one will hold up the best. I ironed some cotton to a piece of freezer paper and wrote on them with the markers. I heat set part of the writing to see if it made any difference. I will now throw this fabric in the wash and see what happens.

I had to start cleaning up the guest bedroom as my sister from GA is coming up to help deal with some family issues. Here is what the bed looked like. It is such a great place to put stuff!

Now it looks like this. I didn't just take the stuff and chuck it into a pile. I did sort out some of the stuff. I have too much stuff! I wish I would have made the new window coverings.

So no more posts until next Tuesday.

The alteration that pushed me to retire, TDF wrap up, and the t-shirt quilt

Yes, I am retiring from doing any more alterations. Fixing this dress was a huge pain. Here the dress is on the lady before. You can see how she is grabbing a handful of the dress. You can just barely see on the shoulder of arm holding the phone how the neckline buckles a bit.

I worked on this dress on Saturday. I ended up taking four inches out of the dress at the back zipper and all the way down the back. In order to put the zipper back in I had to do a lot of hand basting. The underlining and the sheer gray top fabric was all silk and slippery.

I had to do a lot of hand stitching on this dress. The lining at the zipper, all the beaded sections that had been loosened, and I even made a loop for the hook out of thread just like the original. Here it is done after 6 1/2 hours!

I was exhausted, but the lady was happy. This dress broke my spirit of ever wanting to do another alteration again. I needed to be working on my t-shirt quilt!

The rest of my weekend was spent walking and working on the t-shirt quilt. I only have a couple of weeks to get this done. I now have 3/4 of the shirts with some time of embroidery added. I just added some quilting to the Pink Floyd shirt

For Lynard Skynard I did a blanket stitch around the edges and some quilting around the design

Added a border for the Stones shirt

Guns and Roses got kind of an open chain stitch for the border and I added some quilting stitches around the nose and eyes of the skull.

I watched the final stage of the TDF on Sunday. The boys were on the last lap on the Champs de Elysee and the satellite when out. Yes, you read this correctly. After three weeks of following the race the satellite went out due to a insignificant bit of rain. Can you even imagine how mad I was? I called DISH and told them exactly how I felt. I also had said I would submit to a survey and when that came in over my phone I told them again how I would never recommend DISH to anyone. I am also going to write them an email today. So I didn't get to see the sprint finish.

The satellite did come back on for the awards ceremony although they kept cutting in with a bunch of stupid NASCAR stuff as the TDF ran over the allotted time.

Peter won the green jersey. You should have seen the green flower arrangement they gave him. It was gorgeous! In fact all the flowers given throughout the race to the winners were fabulous!

Nairo Quintana won the best young rider under 25. Can you believe how little this guy is? Look at the podium girls in comparison to him. He is from Columbia.

Chris Froome won the King of the mountains jersey and the yellow jersey. They didn't show him getting the mountain jersey.

There were other awards handed out that did not get broadcasted or Chris Froome's speech since the network was in a hurry to show a NASCAR race.

Again with the t-shirt quilt and TDF

I outlined the KISS shirt last evening

and worked on a zig zag border aroud the Motorhead shirt last evening. I will be adding more stitching around the war pig.

I know this is a terrible picture, but it is one of the climbs the boys did yesterday. It had 17 switchbacks and was 3 KM long. Only today, Saturday and Sunday and the tour is over for another year. The last three weeks sure have gone by fast.

My big plans for the weekend are to fix that beaded dress, work on this quilt and watch the TDF. Have a great weekend!

Progress on the t-shirt quilt

Last evening was busy! Watched Stage 17 of the TDF, did a load of laundry, mowed and trimmed the front lawn, and worked on the t-shirt quilt. I put some stitching on the U2 t-shirt and sewed on the R.E.M. patch. I wish I had more patches. They add an extra layer to the piece. I have a Uhriah Heep patch that will go somewhere on this piece. I don't remember how I acquired it, but I have had it squirreled away for years. I have checked on-line and patches can get expensive!

My man Peter is still in the green jersey and he now have enough points to win the competition. He won't be slacking off just because no one else can beat him - that is not how he is made. He can at least concentrate on getting thru the next three mountain stages and try to save a bit of energy for the sprint on the Champs de Elysee on Sunday.

Progress on the t-shirt quilt and Oh what a alteration

I finished the embroidery/quilting on one more t-shirt.

Then I have this alteration to do. I am such a softy!! I don't really want to tackle this, but I am going to do it. This dress was bought at a charity shop and looks like it had never been worn. It was made in England. The beading is stunning.

Look at the inside. The lining was hand stitched at the seam between the skirt and bodice.

What I have to do is take the dress in at the zipper and all the way down the back a total of 4 inches. New this dress costs between $750 and $850 dollars. The lady got it for $30.00. The beading is on a backing then hand sewn to the dress which will make it easier to deal with it. It could be a nightmare if the beading was done directly on the dress. Wish me luck!

Oops I did it again

Hancock's was having a sale so I bought a few piece of fabric for my novelty stash. I have been trying hard not to buy any more fabric, but these averaged out to less than $4.50 a yard so how could I not buy them!

I have a couple of daylilies that are looking good since the deer are not eating the flowers.

My big dream project, the gig, and the t-shirt quilt.

My big dream project is me. I have tried hard this month to put myself first after slacking off the last couple of months. I even went walking last evening in a light rain, horrible heat and humidity just to get my steps in. I was hot, sweaty, and miserable, but I got my 10,000 steps in. I knew I needed to do something after sitting most of the day working on the t-shirt quilt. Here is what the graph shows for my steps for the year. I will keep pushing forward and get my steps in so I can end up in the green for the month.

Friday night at the gig was very warm and humid. The rain held off and Michael put on a great show. I sold 14 CD's and a half dozen shirts. This was one of the biggest crowds we have ever had. Here Michael is playing the guitar behind his head never missing a note. The band got at standing O at the end after playing for two hours straight.

At the venue there were food stands and there was one with elephant ears and funnel cakes.

For an elephant ear you can sprinkle cinnamon sugar or powdered sugar on it after it comes hot out of the fryer.

Powdered sugar usually goes on the funnel cakes. Someone was nice enough to let me take a picture of their cake.

I worked on the t-shirt quilt at bit at the show and then again on Saturday and Sunday. I have about 1/4 of the blocks now with some kind of extra stitching on them. My plan is to do an initial pass over the entire quilt adding some embroidery or extra stitching on each block and then if I have more time, I will go back and add more. I need to have this done in 3 - 4 weeks.

I am using a variety of threads to embroider/stitch with. I am finding #12 pearl cotton doesn't show up very well. #8 pearl cotton is too heavy to pull thru the faced t-shirts. Regular embroidery floss seems to be working great. I use either two or three strands for the big stitch quilting or the embroidery. And to think I almost gave my embroidery floss box away!

My man Peter is still in the green jersey for the sprint point jersey. He is a bit frustrated that he has not won a stage yet. He only has a couple more chances to win a stage. This week we go into the Alps and his job will be to help Alberto Contador make up some time on the yellow jersey still being held by Froome.