Plain and Practical

I Have Reached the Diskcommbobbulated Stage

Even for people who move as often as we do (and some moves are smoother than others, you know?), there is about a week in there where you still have a toothbrush and towels in two bathrooms several hundred miles apart but you don't know where your cord is that connects the camera to the computer (hence you-alls get no picture today).  Yes, the coffee pot is still making coffee in the morning on one end of your planet but there's no spoons yet on the other. 

I made a map of the new home and decided what furniture will fit and not, and yesterday gave up on finding a dinette set tiny enough for the new kitchen after visiting seven thrift stores.  So I returned to one shop, bought a $10 four-foot long wrought iron plant stand that was half off, went to Lowe's and got a magical already-made table top for $9, and two stools and two round butt-biggerers for the stools and screws and wood trim to fit onto the bottom of the table top to fit it onto the plant stand, and voila, soon as I am done painting and clear-coating I will have a delightful perfect-sized table and two stools.  Woot.  Total cost was about $70, mostly because of the two new stools, but I have a large husband and didn't want a wiggly secondhand stool.  These are very sturdy.

Also restained and resealed the church bench because it's going to live outside on the roofed porch, and am painting four wood bookcases my grandfather made for me years ago.  And packing boxes, again, but this time being more careful to pack with giant labels that say what room they go in!  And we'll police the movers to insure that the boxes get all the way to the rooms they belong in, this time!  Found two very large baskets for $3 each, will paint white today for the porches, and also splurged and spent $15 on a nice wood pedestal, which got primer'd this morning before six a.m.  I am picturing it on the front porch with a big beautiful boston fern on top!

Also got a piece of wood--it was a cabinet door from the re-use place that sells construction supplies to help out Habitat for Humanity.  $1.  I'll primer it in a few minutes and make a sign for under the mailbox that says "the Hibbards."  I am all excited about making a new home that supports my husband, he is working very long hours and travelling all over the country for work, getting little sleep and eating meals that are not at all good for his diabetic diet.  Within a week or so, he can lay his head on clean pillows and sheets, go to work in a shirt I iron "with prayers included" for him, carrying a proper lunch of his favorite foods.  Dinner and a foot rub awaits his return!  I love to spoil my husband.  Without him I just don't feel complete, everything seems to fall apart.

Oh, and ordered the garden seeds.  Dreaming of the future garden as I sleep at night.

Too Much of that there Excitement Stuff

Dramma, drammmmmaaa.  Woke to find house full of smoke and as I stood up the detectors started going off.  I said a bad four-letter word, out loud and with feeling.  Remembered that the downstairs tenant is in a wheel chair and saw it was 3 a.m. and didn't hesitate, called 911.  Then as the operator was yelling at me (no brownie points for jabbering out the correct address in the middle of the night in a new home) because I wasn't outside the house yet (I was getting the cat, I was not leaving without Boo, and you can think whatever you like about that, I don't care).  So I still beat the fire trucks by ten minutes, with Boo in his cat carrier and me a coat and sitting on the tailgate of my little truck, and called husband in tears, to find he had turned his phone off while at work in Seattle.  My butt was wet from snow and it was snowing and cold and the firemen were here for two hours.

The previous renter's child had dropped toys down the vents.  A few rattled down into the furnace, where the firemen finally figured out the problem and removed the smoldering ruins.  I told husband, "Everything you own, including your wife, smells like melted plastic."  But as the day went by we all aired out, no heat until at least Tuesday so Boo is happily employing his heating pad and I'm all layered up and glad for electricity.

Headed down to see Husband on Tuesday and apply some serious elbow grease to finding a rental home in the Columbus area.  Thank you Lord for our safety, it being a fixable problem, and a chance to see my adrenaline gland is still in perfect working order.

A Product Made Expressly for all those Quaker Alcoholics . . . ?

 It was recently brought to my attention by the Conservative Friend newsletter-news site, that the Rex Holdings Company of Wisconsin is bottling and marketing a beer for GLS Sales, called, “William Penn,” which has the name of my religious affiliation, “Society of Friends” on the package under a picture of Penn.  It also advises you drink this beer “with Friends” and yes, capital F.

 Even after a Quaker visited the store and pointed out to the manager that this product label was offensive, the store (Festival Foods) is continuing to stock and sell this product.  More information is available at

http://www.conservativefriend.org/newsandevents.htm

 If this also offends you, here are the appropriate addresses.  If you feel a leading to write, the store number is Festival Foods #2714, in Marshfield, Wisconsin:

 Wisconsin Department of Agriculture

Trade and Consumer Protection

P. O. Box 8911

Madison, WI  53708-8911

 

Wisconsin Department of Justice

P. O. Box 7857

Madison, WI  53707-7857

 

Festival Foods

2415 Westowne Avenue

Oshkosh, WI  54904-7776

 

“Speak Truth To Power”  George Fox

 

Imagine a new line of medications called Seventh Day Adventist Pills, or some pork products called My Jewish Ham Sandwich Meats.  It's so offensive I find it hard to even joke about it.  Hopefully someone with the Power will find a way to explain it to Festival Foods, and in turn to the bottler and distributor, that offending the public is NOT how you increase sales for your store or products.

 

 

Split the Day, Work and Fun

So the dining room is completely prepped, I removed all the hardware, took down all the plaster that was loose and punched out/pulled out the plaster between the laths so the new would take.  Removed old suspicious wiring, removed not-working security system hardware, mysterious nails, hooks, and a glob of something gross and unexplained from the ceiling.  Swept and re-secured the plastic on the doorways and then went and stripped and scrubbed myself down, blew all the black out of my nose, and put on jammies at 3:30 in the silly afternoon.  Felt terrific.  The room is ready to plaster tomorrow.  My orbital sander and I want to play as soon as it dries!  Grrrrrormmmmmrrmmoooomrmmrmrrmrmmmmm!

Here's the postal lady's delivery today.  I ordered some grab bags of bindings from Home Sew, 1-800-344-4739, three of them, at $3.50 each.  I think I'm about to order three more, what a good deal!  They will be nice embellishments on my aprons and sunbonnets, I don't use it the way you are supposed to, I trim with it in other ways.  Adds a little color:

And here is my public thank-you to my friend Michelle.  She said she didn't mind my drippy dose and we were out thrifting and having lunch at Culver's on Saturday.  Michelle is the kind of friend that you can just hang around with and vent and swear if you feel really upset while talking about something and she justs gets your head all together.  By the end of the day, I had resolved about ten loose ends in my life, mostly just because I could lay out why something was a problem and we talked through the positive and negatives and more or less reassured me that the path I was thinking about was perfectly okay and here's why, a., b., c., d.  She is just so logical!  So we grabbed up vintage stuff for her and grabbed up and aprons and apron fabrics for me.  10 laundry loads of fabric for me.  Washed and I am about to put in a movie and sit with Boo on the futon and cut up men's plaid shirts for the rest of the evening!  Thanks for being such a good friend, Michelle.  Everybody should be so blessed.

Sunbonnet Time! And Good Aprony News!

  My wonderful husband bought me this antique slat bonnet for $25. on Ebay, and I've washed and ironed it and made a new pattern from it.  Trying a white linen model this morning, and if that works well then will start cutting out calico ones (the white prototype is for me if it works).  The wide brim is supported with interior slats, which I researched and found the best substitute is the extra-wide 3/4 inch "craft sticks" (tongue depressors).  You get 500 in a box for less than $8.  Looks like maybe, um, 12 to a bonnet but will keep you posted.  The strap you see attached to the side, goes around and ties in the back, and the strap you see coming out of the middle, ties under the chin.  It is a delightfully simple, easy to construct garment that has such potential for modesty, comfort, and sun protection.

And more aprons.  Sorry about the green sheet, but as friends know, I'm living out of boxes over here and variety is in short supply since I packed 1/3 of the studio for storage and packed another 1/3 in stupidly impossible-to-reach stacks under furniture and more boxes.  Columbus is looking better every day, I can tell you!

That white bodice piece was a table runner with two stains I couldn't get out, but cutting it twice and using a little God-given frugality, it made a dandy front for this green vintage tablecloth, quilting scraps, and yo-yo's to become a pretty lady-like apron.

  This one has a machine quilted bib, I did several versions of this, and a few yo-yo's help silly it up.  How do you like that giant pocket?   you could lug in a club-sized zuke from the garden in that!  or hold all your clothespins!

Prayers for Good Husband today, he is flying to Houston, Texas for work duties, and has a cold that a CVS nurse practitioner is helping him cope with.  Thank goodness for those CVS clinics, when you are new somewhere or traveling, and you have no health insurance, they are a kind blessing available to those who are sick and weary.  Thank you, Nurse Dixie in Columbus,

Passion for Aprons! I've Caught the Fever!

So, have made eight aprons, playing with styles and methods and the yo yos (of course, must have yo yo's, and rick rack, and doilies . . .) with numbers nine through fourteen pieced and ready to sew.  I just took out the sunbonnet my Good Husband got for me on Ebay and it's been soaked and washed in oxyclean and is drip-drying in the shower.  Soon it will be pattern pieces!

Here's some aprons,

 

 

 

all are with doubled fabrics, doubled seamed pockets topstitched into place, the middle one used to be a vintage dress but had a couple of rips and stains in it so now it's an apron.  No flimsy string ties, no open seams to fray, all material machine washed before sewing, and the button box hasn't even been opened yet!  yay, what a barrel of possibilities.  I think this will work, just doing aprons, sunbonnets, head kerchiefs, and the hot pads, everything flat to go in post-office-provided envelopes, everything lightweight, no hardware or velcro to buy, jus' me and my sewing machine and my mountain of fabric.