Mood:
caffeinatedNow Playing: "I'm Only Happy When It Rains" - Garbage, on the MP3 player
Had a sort-of good/sort-of nasty surprise this morning. For the last two weeks, I've detected an odd scent around the porch. Couldn't figure out where it was coming from. Today, when I moved the stepstool toolbox, I found out - dead mouse. Ick. Tuna may have stashed what was left of a hunting-trophy snack there. Got it taken care of and cleaned up (then the cleaning tools got disinfected) after Dearest Son left for school, and the smell's gone. Sometimes I wonder if women have a stronger sense of smell in general, since the mess was about three inches from the lawn chair Beloved Hubby sits in nearly every morning !
Wish I could sniff out where Tuna is. Snack or no snack, I haven't seen her since Sunday morning. If she's gone for another house, I wish her well - mostly, though, I just hope she's not hurt, and that she's OK. Poor kitty.
Today was a sort of ‘puttering' day. But I'm amazed at all I did. Attached the ‘I (heart) Me' and ‘Flawless' buttons I bought on markdown to the sewing machine cover. So far, it's a sort of brief scrapbook of my sewing. Cheated on the buttons, though. Cut small slits in the cover, treated ‘em with FrayCheck, and pushed the shank through, anchoring it with plastic cotter pins from another pack of buttons I bought in a flea market baggie lot. If I keep something long enough, I'll eventually find a use for it !
The woodworking magazines I snagged from a thrift store for Beloved have also yielded a goodie or three for me. Namely, the subscription cards ! Yup, I even have uses for those ill-favored things. Since they often have a tiny replica of the magazine they're stumping for on ‘em, they make great doll magazines ! (TMI* Tip : A year's subscription to Playboy yields enough material for dozens of mini Playboys, as well as several adult DVD covers !) When the replica's too close to the edge of the card to simply do a foldover, I just tape more subscription card to what I did manage to fold over, then attach more folded bits of the card inside, for pages. Then it all gets cut to the cover size, and you end up with a fairly decent-looking miniature. For free - if you don't count the cost of about six inches of tape ! Our Mal-Wart has a community billboard that's usually overrun with subscription cards, or I find ‘em scattered around where magazines are sold. You'd think doll magazines would picture their magazine on their subscription cards for us, but it rarely happens.
After that, I went to store the outfit ‘Laura' was wearing before I went out on a limb with the Fashion Fever outfit. Fished the musical-score on purple box liner from the trash and put it back in. Much better than the bare grey cardboard, and there's a place for her props, too. I like storing her stuff in her original box - certainly makes it easy to find, and I like having a reason to keep it - but there were two things I didn't like. One, the ‘Try Me !' feature is, of course, accessed through a hole in the plastic window. While most of her clothes won't go through that, her wand and shoes might. Two, the thin cardboard doesn't stay closed very well. Hmm...was a new, pretty cardboard box from Dollar Tree in order ?
Well...no. I dug in the ribbon and lace box and came up with a lovely length of orchid-lavender ribbon. A short piece and some glue stick blocks the hole. Four more lengths were affixed to the box with good old Elmer's White Glue, to act as silky ties to keep the box closed. I'd thought of using Velcro TM, but the thin cardboard would have torn eventually. And the ribbons and bows look so much prettier ! The ribbon came from a $2. pre-packaged ribbon grab-bag sold at Hobby Lobby, Garden Ridge, and Hancock Fabrics ... purchased at half-price, of course !
I also removed Laura's batteries. Dead batteries can only corrode and damage dolls, so why keep ‘em in there ? Kept one, and attached it to the wrong side of the box liner, in case I ever want to hear her talk and I've lost her directions sheet. Some highlights from that : ‘Do not aim toy at others. Do not strike others with toy.' ‘How to Play with Toy : Attach props as shown.' Thank Everything I found that in the box liner Monday ! I mean, what might happen if I attach her broom to the wrong hand ?!! I wouldn't know how to play with her !
And then, for kicks after lunch, I used some of the non-slip foam stuff - I don't know what to call it, it's sold at dollar stores and is used as shelf liner or to keep things from sliding - on my ‘cutting table'. I say ‘cutting table' because it started out as a long, kinda thin hamper Beloved Hubby made. It now houses most of the printed-out patterns inside and the top is about right for my cutting board and rotary. But it slips sometimes. Not anymore ! I bought the roll at DTree, to keep the silverware tray stationary. The cutting table use just about finished it off, but I think there's enough there for doll-photo ‘carpet'. Maybe even ‘lawn', since it's a dark shade of green.
Muttered around the computer for a while, then gave myself an ultimatum : either clean something or create something. Guess what won ? Decided to finally finish Rio, so he could go sit with Jem after I did photos for the main site. Got his shirt all cut out and treated with FrayCheck before Beloved and Son were home. Didn't get to sew it until about four hours later, but it came out great !
It's kind of hard to see, but it has a cuffs and a nice collar that I got right on the third try - remember, this is a Swedish or Finnish magazine pattern without directions I can read. And I was too lazy to go find directions from a similar pattern in English, so I went by memory. Looks like it worked OK. Had to redo the left sleeve with a smaller seam allowance, it was much too short. In fact, I'm starting to think the seam allowance on the whole project is probably smaller than ¼", but I could swear what few directions I could read said 6mm. But, heck, I've been wrong before.
The fabric was a gift from Carol, of Perestroika fame, given so long ago, I don't wanna think about it. I think it looks great on him. I'll take a photo of him and Jem tomorrow, after I sew snaps and buttons on. But here's a quick snapshot for now. I'm actually rather proud of this shirt. He's posing by the Sound Cube, wearing the second pair of jeans I made for him byOn altering a pattern from the same magazine. There's also a neat vest that'd probably work up great in UltraSuede, but I'm not sure if I'm gonna sew that tomorrow. I kinda want to do some girl clothes for a while !
Beloved Hubby did some work for another doll fan, and while talking, she told him she loved sewing for her dolls, too, but Barbie scale was just beyond her. (giggle) That's what I said, five years ago !
*TMI = Too Much Information
