Rounding the last curve and heading down the home stretch

Yesterday afternoon we started putting the center island together. Note the operative word - started. This was a LONG process. Especially when yours truly didn't examine the picture directions quite well enough. When everything was finished except for the drawers I discovered I'd put all the drawer pull panels in upside down. This meant dismantling quite a bit of it, turning them right side up and then reassembling. What a giant pain! It also meant we had to take the back off - and since it is little more than heavy white cardboard it looks just a wee bit worse for wear if one looks closely. I decided that didn't matter - I'll just cover it with the posters that I took off the walls! I put together one drawer and decided it was just too hard on my hands. Fred started putting together the next one and finally - after all we've already done - borrowed a drill screwdriver bit from the neighbor so it would go faster. Once he did that he whipped though putting together the drawers in no time. This morning I installed them in the cabinet. Sure works beautifully! Those of you who remember how crowded this room was will know how much I'm enjoying having this much space to move around in.

I still have lots and lots of fat quarters to refold, plus stacks of other stuff to find room for - either in drawers or in pretty containers to put on top of the cabinets. I still have my work cut out for me for the rest of the day, but I think I'm in good shape. If I don't finish folding all the fabrics they can sit quite happily on either the island or the big board with it's fresh, new canvas cover. I'm up against a deadline - tomorrow is cleaning day so I need to have everything either put away or up and out of the way.

Which tells me I should get back to work!

Progressing well

All the shelves are together and bolted to the walls. Aren't they beautiful! The white looks so pretty against the green walls, and the room is so much lighter and brighter.

All the large pieces of fabric are put away. All that's left is refolding the fat quarters - hundreds of them. At least I'm doing it quickly. I decided not to iron them again - in spite of my compulsive A-type personality - and they look just fine. I'll have to iron them again when I use them anyway.

This afternoon we'll clean the carpet when Fred gets home from golfing, and then we'll put the center island together. It's getting there!

I needed to put together this corner so it would start feeling like my own room again.

All the larger rulers have moved to the closet wall, and the narrow, long rulers next to the cabinets in the closet corner.

Sewing room redo progress

A short post for those of you who asked for pictures of my progress. I think we did pretty good considering everything. We got two of the large cabinets with doors put together as well as the bookcase without doors. We are now MUCH faster at this than we were when doing the first one. Don't even need to look at the instructions. We got this much done by about 5:30 last night when it was time to head to Rick's and Rebecca's for our weekly get together. When we got home about 9:00 I couldn't resist taking time to put some fabrics away just to see how they'd look. I love the result! I did discover one thing, however, that will really stretch out this redo. Even though the depth of the cabinet was listed at 11", the shelves themselves are only 10 1/4" deep. My fat quarters all hang off the front of the shelves the way they are currently folded, so I will need to fold them all again so they measure about 9" x 5" instead of the current 11" x 4 1/2". I wanted to resort them anyway - separating all the reproductions and the primitive-folk art designs from the rest of them. Just means I'll be spending more time getting reacquainted with them!



Because we live in earthquake country, and for general safety, we are bolting all the shelves to the wall. I certainly have enough fabric that I could suffer significant damage if one of the shelves collapsed on me!


In case anyone is curious, I took an accurate measurement of the room while it was empty. It's a skinny 8' 8" wide and 13' 8" long - just over 118 sq. feet. It was my daughter's bedroom until she moved upstairs (into the room that currently holds the longarm) when she was in junior high school.



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Gratitudes:
1. A successful trip to IKEA.
2. Another hand-and-foot win for the girls!
3. Vacations
4. Cool mornings
5. A happy, helpful husband





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Back from Ikea

We both woke up early thanks to a dog that wanted out. Fred turned on the local 6:00 a.m. news, and reported that the freeway looked clear with no Ikea traffic jam. So we decided to grab a fast bite, dress quickly and head over. We left about 6:30. Should have been a 15 minute or so drive, but it took us quite a while to find our way in. The store is right next to the Portland airport and the police had blocked all the roads we thought would take us to the store. After driving in a circle a couple times we finally asked a police officer which road was actually open. I think we got in line about 7:30. Parked close to the pick up area so that was especially nice. They had Swedish dancers, trampoline artists, jugglers and more to entertain the people in line, as were passing out lots of free things like water bottles, fans, toys, hats, and more. Time went quickly and we passed into the store about 20 minutes after it opened. We checked out the the "real thing" to make sure it looked as good as I thought it would, then headed to the self service pickup area. Took as long to tie down the truck as it had to shop! We were out of there by 10:30 and home shortly afterward. Thought you'd enjoy seeing a shot of the truck ready for unloading.

The rest of the story . . . .

Right after I was hit, I jumped out of the vehicle and so did the driver of the car in front of me - another CRV but a slightly older model. It was a boy with long curly blond hair of about 18 or 19. When I asked him why he didn't look behind him and just backed straight into me, he replied in a very vague, dreamy voice, "I'm just so sorry mam, I just so very tired, so very tired, so very sorry." I asked him why his friend wasn't driving if he was so tired, and he replied she couldn't. As I was inspecting the front of my vehicle to determine the damage I looked up to say something else to him - to see him getting in his vehicle and driving off. It happened so fast I could get even part of a license plate.

I wasn't hurt at all - just very, very angry. I reported the accident to the police and the insurance company. Thank goodness for a lower deductible due to hit and run - just $100. It's taken them 15 days to get it fixed because of all the things that were damaged. Luckily no frame damage - just hood, radiator, air conditioner, bumper, and other stuff. Almost $4000 for repairs. My guess is he drove off because he was either uninsured or was driving his parents vehicle without their permission - or maybe both. It'll be so nice to have my "Blue" back. I've been driving Fred's truck - a stick shift. Luckily school is out, so he's been able to ride his bike everywhere he's needed to go.

Now for the pictures. These are very sobering, I think. Should be a cure for wanting to shop for awhile. I sure got my workout moving all this stuff. It looks like way more this way - spread all over the living room and dining room. I've put sheets over all the fabric near the window to protect against fading. I think I'm going to be doing handwork these next few days if I want to sew. Should have lots of time to catch up on my blog reading also.

To be continued . . . .

An empty room - more or less

It's now just a few minutes less than three hours since my last post, which I wrote just before I started emptying the room. I really never expected to get this done this quickly. I moved it all myself except for a little help from Fred when I needed to get things off the top two levels of the green shelf. I still need to take things off the walls because the new shelves are higher than what I had before. I imagine I'll have to move a few of the posters upstairs to Gandalf's room (my longarm - a Proto with the Stitch Wizard - named after the wizard in Lord of the Rings). I think I can still find room for the bulletin board and hopefully my ribbons. The green shelf will go out in the garage for storage - I need Fred to help me move that this afternoon. I'm not sure about the white bookshelf. I wish I could find room for it somewhere else in the house because I hate to get rid of it. The kids don't want it. I've not given up looking yet. The machine and the two sets of rolling drawers that hold the TV will stay where they are now, as will the filing cabinet. That's the only thing that will remain the same. I also have to vacuum well, and clean the carpet also by the looks of it. Guess that's what I'll do this afternoon.

We also have to go pick up our CRV from the body shop this afternoon. I don't think I've gotten around to mention that I was "rear ended" in the front of the vehicle the day after the Fourth of July. I know - sounds very strange. I pulled up behind another vehicle at a stop sign just south of the credit union branch where my office is located. The driver was not pulled up to the intersection, and was just sitting there talking to the girl in the passenger seat. Just as I was about to give a gentle toot of the horn to let him know he needed to move, as he was sitting in the middle of the street, he decided to back up. I sounded my horn as loudly and quickly as I could, but it wasn't fast enough. He backed hard right into the front of the CRV. Thank goodness it wasn't hard enough to set off the air bags - otherwise they probably would have totalled the vehicle. You may remember that we'd just paid it off a very few months ago.

See the next post for the rest of the story - I need more words up there to stretch out far enough for me to post all my pictures.

How I Spent My Summer Vacation - Part I

I feel like I'm back in school the first of September writing the first English essay of the year LOL!

Last night I finished pressing that giant pile of blocks-to-be. Today I cut them apart. There were 24 finished blocks in the stack - making a current total of 362 finished blocks. There is one stack that needs only one more strip to finish them off - that's the stack you see by the machine. There are two shorter stacks that need one strip in each direction to finish them off. Those two stacks have a very few that need more strips than that - probably less than 20 however.

I'm calling a halt for the time being now and starting to move stuff. Our hot weather is supposed to return tomorrow so I want to get everything moved out today while it's still somewhat cool. In Part II I'll post pictures of the result.

Vacation!

I start my week vacation tomorrow morning. Tomorrow I'm moving most everything out of the sewing room in preparation for the Wednesday trip to Ikea. So tonight I'm madly sewing Crumb Chaos blocks trying to finish these before I must pack them up for a few days. With this last round a few are finished, but most need either one or two more strips. Thought you'd get a kick out of seeing this stack on the cutting table waiting for pressing. It's probably the last picture I'll take of this gerryrigged cutting table. The next photos will be of the new stuff moving in. Stay tuned - I'll post pictures of my progress.

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Gratitudes:

1. Paid vacation days

2. A great weekend read

3. A camping trip with all the kids coming up soon

4. A few new quilting books

5. Flavored coffee creamers

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Coming up for air

As it turns out I did a considerable amount of sewing after all this weekend. I had just finished the fourteenth chapter of Harry Potter when the phone rang. It was my daughter calling to tell us Rick had loaded the last book onto his Ipod so he could listen more easily when driving, and they wondered whether Fred would like to come get the CD's so he could start the book also. I asked him, and was surprised when he said no. So I told her I'd come get them for myself so I could sew while I listened. So I've been in the sewing room listening to Harry Potter and Fred's been upstairs reading. I finished the book shortly before 2:00 this afternoon. I finally made myself go to bed at 1:45 this morning, recognizing that there was no way I could finish it in one setting. I won't say a word about the book as I know many of you won't have had a chance to even start it yet.

I decided I didn't feel like doing applique while listening - instead I was in the mood for more mindless sewing. I meant to get out either the 2" squares or the string blocks. Much to my surprise I went back to the crumb bin where there were still many smaller starts of mile-a-minute blocks. Apparently I'd not had enough of them after all, and am even more obsessed than I previously thought. I've been making more Crumb Chaos blocks - this time using up every last piece that was more than a single crumb. I've no idea how many blocks I'm in the process of making - they seem to go on forever. I've reached the stage where at least half of them need only one more round before they are finished. I'm happy to say I've now emptied one bin of strips. I'm looking forward to finishing these - I think I am well and truly sick of them by now. When I'm done I should have enough for at least a couple Hotel Hope quilts in addition to the quilt for our bed.

Tomorrow is my only day of work this week - Tuesday I start a week's vacation. I'll be moving most of the things out of my sewing room on Tuesday in preparation for my new furniture. I can hardly wait!

Counting the minutes

No - not until retirement. :-)

Until I can head to Barnes and Noble to pick up the newest Harry Potter. When I get home there will be nothing else for me except for reading until I get to the end of the book. I promise I won't give anything away when I'm done!