Current Mood : Weary
We had another major thunderstorm last night, and Dearest Son woke up with a massive headache and severe edginess. It was about an hour before he was due to wake up that he fell back asleep, so I called him in sick. Yeah, he wasn't bleeding or tossing his cookies, but some days, it's best to just rest. Besides, he only has two weeks and a day of school left - and one of those days is his field trip.
Between all the time at school and just plain slackin' off, the house is starting to look bad again. So I did five loads of laundry and got them all put away, found Dearest's missing Wall-Et, tidied up the living room, cleaned out the fridge again, and bussed dinnerware to the kitchen. Not much time to sew, between Dearest being still mildly out of it and the housework. And with my window still stuck down, no way to do groceries. I should have time if the weather holds after my appointment tomorrow, though.
I earned enough points, though, to get the new bookmark set from SiCK today. It'll be easy to leave off the ‘Happy Mother's Day Sis' stitching and use them my own way - the under-stitching is quite pretty. Plus, Free Standing Lace (or FSL) remains a technique I've not yet mastered, and having a new set should motivate me into trying again. Basically, you sew on a surface that washes away, and the stitches alone are enough to support the design. My first two attempts met with stitches tearing out of the washable stabilizer, with nothing being sewn, so I tried the same design on doubled dryer sheets, and it worked perfectly. I haven't tried again yet, but I've been studying.
I also have to restart the Sophie Sews tutorials. I got through #5, but it was a bit confusing, and I haven't gone further. So I'll work that one again, and hopefully finish the other three this week. I started a kitty design that may or may not work, so wish me luck !
I was looking at a certain stocked thread case yesterday - yeah, the Incredible Threadables cases. It's clever how they're engineered to store and dispense thread, but they're kind of expensive. Well, when you add up everything that comes with the case, it's actually a deal, but who has $130. sitting around that often ?
Well, Beloved Hubby saw it, and watched the video with me. I think I know what I'm getting for my birthday ! Still, it's rather expensive, and I already have a lot of thread... but I'd enjoy the heck out of it ! I also discovered that Brother has a ten-spool thread stand that would also keep most design's worth of thread ready for embroidery. Intrigued, I looked it up. $99. ! Plus shipping. Wow. I think I'll stick to my little 50c GoodWill rack, thanks.
But I did a little more research... and identical racks from other sites run about $30. to $40., usually with free shipping. Sheesh. I could understand a $10. or even a $20. difference, but an over 200% markup seems a bit much. Heck, I could probably fashion something similar from the rack I have, if I could find more thread caps. Embroidery machines use those to cover over the thread spool ends, so the thread feeds out as smoothly as possible, and won't get caught in the little notch in the top. Most embroidery-specific threads eliminated that thread-catch notch for just that reason, but their alternative methods to thread end storage are less than stellar. KJ, my previous machine, came with two of them, but I had no idea why, since the notch invariably was on the bottom of the spool when I followed their threading guide.
