this week

My work/life balance is all out of whack. I am so exhausted when I get home after a 9 1/2 hour day I have no energy to do any sewing. Last night I did vacuum the front Weather Tech floor car matts. They were full of dirt from work and hauling rocks. No pics. It was all I could do to get that done, a shower, and something to eat. I am not going to work at six anymore. I was leaving the other day and the project manager looked at her watch and said it's only 3:30. I said I had been here since 6. She said that was my choice to come in and do whatever I do when I get here. Really? I now don't come in until 6:30 and I am still leaving by 3:30. Today I had to move my office AGAIN because the contractors needed to get in the space to sand and mud. How is that for whatever I do!

guitar hook cozies

I was absolutely beat when I got home from work. I ended up running all over the place, dealt with issues that weren't my doing, had to move my office area again, and try to actually do my job. Here is my new office area - yes it is dark because there are no lights! We only have temporary lighting in the corridors.

I did get some guitar hook cozies drawn

They are almost done installing the copper in the MRI room. It is quite shiny in that room right now. The copper will be covered with drywall.

The weekend

I spent time this weekend working on the project I can't show you. I'm am close to having the top done, but I was slowed down because I kept nodding off. I did get the grocery shopping done, laundry, and baked pecan pie for my brother for his birthday.

I did a few hours of housework before my brother showed up to get his pie and hand over a sewing project. He needs me to make little covers for guitar display hangers.

He had a cover for one hanger, but he needs 15 more. My brother had some furry fabric in black and I had Velcro. While he was at my place, I stitched one up. Here it is inside out

And here it is right side out.

Only 13 more to make. They don't take very long to sew together so I should have this job done in the next couple of days.

Dresden plate - new fabrics added

I had a 10 hour work day yesterday and I was a whipped puppy by the time I got home. I was up early this morning and had some time to play around with the Dresden plate. I cut out one piece of each of the vintage fabrics from my stash to audition. I pinned them together and I like the way they fit in. Kaja, you were right about the large print!

My plans for this weekend are to work on the project I can't show you (my goal is to have it finished by the end of November), cut out the other pieces I need for the other 11 Dresden plates, and make my brother a pecan pie for his birthday which was on Halloween. I don't know that I can do any yardwork; it all depends if it dries out a bit from all the rain we have had for the last two days and the possible rain forecasted for today. Have a great weekend!

Fabric chosen

I was exhausted when I got home from work. I had over 11,000 steps and 55 active minutes. I ended up having to climb this ladder just to the point where my head was up to that temporary wood railing so I could talk to the roofer. I was left alone on the job site for about 4 hours so there were thing like this I normally would not have to do.

When I got home I did managed to make some biscuits and a pot of chicken, brown rice, and bok choy for meals for the next couple of days, wash a load of clothes, shower off all the dust from work, then just sit down for a little bit. I dug thru my scrap bins of vintage fabric and came up with some pieces for the Dresden plate. The pieces have the same tone to them - kind of like they have a light tea dye to them. I am not crazy about that larger print so I may look again and see if I can find something else. I am guessing these fabrics are from the 40's because that dull tone is what I have seen a lot from that period.

The next layer that goes on the MRI walls and ceiling finally is underway. Here is the ceiling. I haven't seen how this is being installed or the reasoning behind the parts that are hanging down. I might figure it out over the next couple of days.

Dresden plate problem solved!

Thanks for all your solutions to my Dresden plate problem. Before I read any of your solutions I had been thinking about what to do. You know the saying great minds think alike? Well, Wanda and I are great minds as we both have the same solution. To try it out I just pinned four more pieces together and now the ring is complete! I just used four of the same fabric to try this out.

The lady that had cut these out would have run into the same issue. I wonder what she would have done? The cardboard template for this Dresden plate called for cutting 12 pieces of 12 different fabrics. It should have said 16 fabrics. So now I will have to dig into my stash of vintage fabric and cut pieces to fill in the space.

Yes, my bins are a bit messy, but I do have yardage in there to cut from. I do love vintage fabric. I need to hook up with someone who would be interested in producing a fabric line with some of these vintage prints. Some of them would fit perfectly into what is going on with fabric prints these days and don't look dated at all.

Houston, we have a problem

I spent the weekend sewing. I sewed together the first Dresden plate ring and we have a problem. The pieces are not the right size so I cannot make the ring

So now I have to decide what to do. One option is to cut them to the correct size. I have a template that I bought and used a long time ago and was able to find it. Here is the template laid on one of the pieces so you can see the size difference.

Another option is to see if I added more pieces so I could close the ring. Or maybe I could just make half circles or quarter circles and then I would not have to trim all the pieces. I will have to see what might work best.

It rained most of the weekend.

The only time I went outside was after my neighbor knocked on my door so I could show him and his cousin the small tree that we had talked about a couple of weeks ago that they could cut down. They were cutting down some other small trees and his cousin was looking for more to cut down. Men and their chainsaws! I haven't heard from the tree company about when they will be over to cut down that huge pine tree.

I spent most of the weekend working on the project I can't show you. I now have 6 out of the eight rows done! This is taking me a lot longer than I thought it would, but I like the results.