Current Mood : Smug in the victory...

Spent on yard sale blank shirts for Dearest Son : 50c

Spent on an 'I survived the week' lunch : $4.73

 

I did it, it's done. The mountain of clean laundry is gone. It's all stored in various closets and cabinets and drawers, finally, alleluia, Amen. Three Mal-Wart sacks of Dearest Son's outgrowns in good shape are going to his school next week, since the lovely nurse there occasionally needs them for accidents. Another bagload is getting cut up for rags and potential sewing experiments, since they're both outgrown and partially wrecked. A smaller pile is in a basket for ‘house use only' - stuff that still fits, but is too stained or damaged to wear to school. I did all that before tackling his clean-clothes mountain - and while I put away mine and Beloved Hubby's in 45 minutes, Dearest's clothes took over an hour to hang up and put away. The closet culling took an additional half-hour. Kid's got quite a wardrobe...

 

Did my last day of test proctoring. Wow, these kids are good. The test was scheduled for two hours, but they were all done in 45 minutes. It was so nice to meet them, and know what Dearest is facing next year at this time.

 

Since I got out early, I hit a yard sale, GoodWill in our town and the Dollar General next to it. Scored two t-shirts for Dearest, a green one and a while one for 50c, perfect for embroidering on, but otherwise nothin'. Well, I promised m'self that, if there were no good finds, I'd take me out for fried chicken at the good chicken place - conveniently across the street from GWill - so I did. Yum. I like indulging me sometimes. And I'm thinking of adding two hours of volunteer work a week to the goals. I feel good when I do that. Keeps me from feeling too guilty when I tell the charity telemarketers we're broke.

 

Had a good one today. He asked for Beloved Hubby, who wasn't here. He then asked for someone who could make decisions in the office. Nope, no one here for that either. So he asked for an employee. None here ! This confused him - wasn't I an employee ? No, I said. It was hard to keep from laughing. He sarcastically apologized for taking up my time and hung up. Score ! I always feel like I've won if they given up first.

 

Went out with Beloved on a job bid, to keep him company after Dearest left with his Grandfather. I knew I'd be sitting around a while, so I brought one of Dearest's damaged t-shirts along. Figured there'd be time to remove the patch I'd put on it, to cover a couple holes made by a freebie toy Sherrif's badge pin, and I even had time to start taking the shirt apart. The front's really wrecked - paint, ink, and holes - but the back's near new and very soft, so I saved it for stitching. The front got cut up for rags, the collar webbing got saved for future projects, and the patch will be installed on a pair of khakis with a knee tear. It's so nice to have my laundry baskets back, I've filled them back up with dirty laundry (sigh), new fabric, and repairs !

And get rid of some of those blasted Happy Meal toys, ya never play with 'em anyway...

Current Mood : Falling over tired

 

Got all the new fabric cheap-serged, and it's in the wash. Last load. Whew. I swear, we generate a load a day, and sometimes, I recycle clothes if I haven't worn them all day. Also put in three hours in Dearest Son's room, generating two Mal-Wart sacks of small-toy donations and three bags of trash. And I'm still not done. This was mostly getting stuff off the floor, and enabling part of the carpet to be seen, and walked without risking an ankle or shin. I haven't gone through any of the toy boxes or touched the closet yet. I'm saving some of the fun for later !

 

So today was pretty busy. Didn't get to any sewing, and the rain made it kinda hard to do much besides sit and work from there. All the dampness makes it hard for me to breathe sometimes. Got the socks sorted and stored while waiting for the bus, and ran out of day before I got to the dishes. But at least the place is looking habitable. Still cluttery with cobwebs, but no longer a health hazard.

 

Sorry the entries have been more like a SqualorSurvivors.com recovery page and less like Yard Sale Doll Haven, but it's what's been going on, and maybe this helps someone else. It's kind of embarrassing how much just a bit of effort gets done, and how many times I've had to relearn that, but it's true. Fifteen minutes of doing dishes every other day is certainly better than two to three hours ! And the kitchen doesn't smell nearly as bad, and my attitude is much better, when I don't feel like I have to make sure no one sees how badly trashed the living room is.

 

Anyway, in an effort to bring at least some doll content in here, let me share a find from CraftBlog.com - this crafter made a dress from Barbie skirts ! Also some Barbie hair and a couple of heads. It's pretty cool, I think !

 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/elizabethn/3433478690/in/pool-craft/

 

April is the cruelest month...

 

Current Mood : Tired

Spent on stuff : $1.08

Spent on Wall-E embroidery designs : $4.50

 

For those of us in the US, it's Tax Day - it's due if you haven't already sent it in. Ours went off today as part of this morning's Errand Run - got gas, dropped off recycling, returned the last library book, mailed off taxes, dropped off snacks and supplies to Dearest's teacher, drove the vacuum cleaner to the Approved Service Center for repairs in Nearby Town, and hit their GoodWill, for kicks. And was still home in time for lunch.

 

Found a nice craft frame for 50c, and a 50c heart-shaped coffee mug from a pharmaceutical company. I was hoping to remove the ad, but no go. Oh, well. To me, it's funny that a heart-failure patient is drinking from a heart-drug-rep mug, so I'll just wash it out and use it as-is. When it gets boring, I can always donate it back.

 

You may be sorta proud of me - the money I deposited in PayPal for a month's membership on an embroidery site so I could download another butt-load of designs cleared the account today... but I didn't buy the membership. Instead, I bought some nice designs - of the Wall-E logo, and of EVE and M-O. Cost about the same, but the reward should be quite nice, since I know Dearest Son will love what I plan to do to his hoodie with ‘em.

 

I lucked out, since his class earned a reward, and they chose a Pajama Day for tomorrow. I already found them and his robe, so his hoodie'll remain home, and I can get it washed and get the sewing started. M-O has about 20 stops, and I know the Wall-E I already have takes about an hour to stitch out. It probably won't be complete Friday morning, but I'll try. I hope to at least get our leading ‘bot and companion on there before he gets home.

 

(sigh) Well, I would have if he hadn't left the hoodie at school. Que sera. Guess I'll cheap-serge the new fabric, maybe do a test-sew tomorrow instead.

 

My vacuum used to suck...

Current Mood : Wiped out !

Spent on fabric, stars, and kaleidoscopes today : $2.90

 

Busy day - I'm about to fall over ! But I got a lot done.

 

‘Test proctoring' basically means I sit in a classroom for two hours, and sign a document stating that I saw nothing unusual. No teachers giving answers, no kids passing out, nothing of note. So it wasn't bad, but I really got bored. I can't do anything else but observe, so watching kids take tests isn't that thrilling, but I was glad I could help.

 

Turned in two of our last three library books, including the still-useless-to-me Digitizing. I was glad to dump that off ! Most of the designs I liked on the CD-Rom were too big for my Brody ! Of the 25 designs, only about ten were usable. And, of course, the only way to find the sizes is to download the whole set, and look at each file, one by one. You'd think ‘Mr. Digitizer Supreme' would know that most folk kinda need to know the pattern's size. Baka. This afternoon, I found our last checked-out book, and I'll return it tomorrow, nearly a full week before it's due. I am so good...

 

Got the groceries done, and picked up my prescriptions. Darn it. Next month, I have to see the Nurse Practitioners, so they'll renew my ‘scripts. I'm hoping we'll be a bit better off next month. I'm a little worried. Kept the groceries down and made up a menu before I left the house. When I ask what everyone wants for dinner, nobody knows what they want, just that everything I suggest is unappealing. When I make up a ‘we're eating this' menu, nobody whines. And it keeps us from going out to eat so much.

 

Even stopped in at GoodWill - and I did a sorta bad thing. Found a great kaleidoscope (50c) and a Lucite star (25c) that evidently once had perfume or panties inside, given the ‘Victoria's Secret' ribbon decorating the top. Replaced that with a silver cord I had lying around the sewing desk, and hung it on the Wall of Stars outside the Lab. Neither of these are bad things, even though I really didn't need either. What was bad was the $2. bag of fabric...

 

I was so proud of using most of the fabric I messed up trying to make the dining area curtains last year, on everything from doll clothes to Brody design stitch-outs. It was great fabric for what I was doing, too - that sort of oatmeal-colored unbleached muslin was so easy to work with. Still, I was glad I used nearly all of it. So why I went and bought more of it (admittedly, it was part of a big bag of similar material ) is odd, and kind of silly. But I'm glad I have more of it !

 

There's about eight different kinds of fabric in there, just about everything from what feels like soft bedsheets to some stiffer olive-drab scraps. No prints, mostly white and off-white colors. I'll probably empty a spool of thread cheap-serging it all !

 

Still got my three tasks done - but it wasn't easy. Still, having a clean living room, clean fridge, clean hallway, and vacuumed floors is really nice. Too bad I broke the vacuum. Seriously. The one Beloved Hubby just bought last year. It's a canister vac, a very nice one, but the hose that leads from the cleaning heads to the canister pulled out completely from the nozzle that joins them. With the vacuums I'm used to, you'd just pop it back in place, but this thing's electric all the way - there's wires coming out of the hose !

 

And I couldn't see how it'd go back together, even with the thin manual. So I called the long-distance Customer Service number, and yaaay ! According to the serial number, it's still under warranty. Wasn't made until June '08, and I don't think we bought it until the end of August last year. Tomorrow, I'll drive it up to the town where DM&FIL live, our nearest service center, and let them fix it. Bill goes to the manufacturer ! What a relief ! When I looked it up on their site, a new hose is $43. !

 

Also, Dearest Son's latest toy, the U-Repair Wall-E, arrived today. And he is in love. It's bigger than I thought, and the swap-around parts are magnetic. No exposed magnets - they're all well-buried in plastic, with maybe part of a silver orb showing on the arms - and there's a ‘trash' compartment, pre-loaded with garbage ! Here's the one we bought.

 

http://disneyshopping.go.com/disney/store/Product_10002_10051_1229983_-1_14039__Toys-WALL-E-Deluxe-Action-Figure%3A-U-Repair-WALL-E

 

So far, so sturdy - and much more detailed than the little action figure and the birthday cake figure were. About on par with the ‘iDance' Wall-E. The hand joint is really tiny, though, so I'm not sure how durable it will be. But it's so cute when Dearest joins Wall-E's hands together, tilts his head to one side, and says he's thinking of EVE.

 

For the interested, the packaging and sales info says 20 parts are included -  but I'm not sure where. In ours, there was the body ‘cube', a panel that covers where his head normally originates, two free-wheeling tire treads, four arms, and his head/neck assembly. It's well-articulated and delightfully poseable, but unless the hands detach (along with other parts), I still don't know how they got a count of 20, unless they include the box, the liner, the tray, and the tape pieces that held the box shut.

 

But, in the final analysis, who cares ? Dearest loves him, and that's what matters. The eyes on this one really melt me. The others were painted plastic, and it's obvious, but this one has such a deep gaze, it's hard to not look at him, and say, ‘Aaawwwww...'. Even out loud !

On the draggin' wagon...

 

Current Mood : Hopeful

Current Image Notes : Don't own this, but I would have to be hypnotized to enjoy housework, that's fer sure ! 

 

Since the ‘do three things' housework plan worked so well last week, I'm gonna keep it going this week ! It'll be a bit of a challenge because I'm doing test proctoring for third grade at Dearest Son's school on Tues. and Friday morning. Just for a couple hours. I'm also gonna try to volunteer two or so hours a week.

 

Today's tasks were the weekend's dishes, some laundry, and cleaning the kitchen counters and stove top. While the last job doesn't sound like much, it was the most labor-intensive, and took nearly an hour. But the whole kitchen looks much better. Even got the dishes put away while I made dinner.

 

I actually felt compelled to get it all done ! So maybe this new habit will take root. At least on weekdays. Had no problem sittin' on my round rump Saturday and Sunday !

 

If there's one thing I've learned - the fastest way to a depression is to stay sitting around. Fastest way out of one is to get up and move around ! Even if it's just Mp3 music or finally getting to the crusty dishes, inactivity is the killer. More you move, the less can settle on ya, and weigh you down !

I stupidly stayed up late, but I finished reading the manga series I began this weekend, Boys over Flowers ( Hana Yori Dango). I feel really stupid for buying even used manga, when most popular series are available as ‘scanlation' (page scans with translation filled in with graphics editing software) online for free. Of course, you can't read scanlations in bed, but it sure saves some cash. F'r instance, Boys runs 37 volumes. Even buying used when you can find ‘em, and using our comic shop's ‘buy four, get one free' promo, it'd cost $140. to snag ‘em all.

I also call it stupid of me, because towards the end, it was really getting bad. Stabbings, amnesia, kidnappings, deserted tropical islands... all in the last two or three volumes ! I'm glad I got to read the whole thing, but I'm not that much into soap-opera style plotlines.

Gotta love a LOLCat !

 

Current Mood : Enjoying...

 

Dearest Son loved his Wall-E-themed Easter box. He told me he wanted me to keep his Wall-et safe, so he could use it for Popcorn Friday ! Gleee !

 

His grandparents bought him a huge basket, with a king-size hollow bunny, a cute little stuffed talking one, and enough candy for the Third Regiment. Amazingly, when he gets a ton of candy, he'll overindulge for a day, then pick at it for a few weeks, until it's gone. We may still have this stuff until school's out. He's not much for jellybeans. One year, he got so much Easter candy, we were still eating it at Halloween ! They've been more conservative each year following...

 

Today we just took it easy. Ate leftover pizza for dinner, and did whatever we wanted to. Beloved Hubby read several pages of his new Wall-E book to him at bedtime, and all were happy. And I'm darn sleepy, and regret to say I did jack squat all day.

 

It was nice....

I made a Wall-Et !

Current Mood: sleepy

 

Had a busy night after I posted. DFIL brought sandwiches from his restaurant for us, which was so sweet - so we didn't go out. My delicious Herbie (roast beef with provolone) was so tasty, I was feeling a bit energized. I was toying with the stuff on my desk while goofing off online, idly. The Ken shirt/jacket I got with Jebin (a former blue-fez Aladdin) was there, awaiting thread-clipping. It went through the wash twice, but the dye from the bottom blue part remained on the upper yellow, in an interesting sort-of tie-dye mottling that's a neat few dozen shades of green. I rather liked it, so I decided to keep it, and while I was clipping loose threads, noted that part of the right underarm seam was gone. I mean it wasn't ever there. It didn't pull or tear, the stitches didn't come out. The stitches were never there to begin with. And folks wonder why I don't trust Mattel's quality with a $10. doll these days, much less a $200. one...

 

This is the shirt/jacket all-in-one that came on 1996's ‘Big Brother Ken and Little Brother Tommy'. I once lost every doll-clothes auction lot I bid on to score one of these shirts, now I have three, including this unique one. Much as I love yard sale season, sometimes I fear it, because I get out there and buy everything. At least until my cash is gone. We're in trouble if garage sales suddenly begin accepting credit cards...

 

Anyway, I soon fixed that, and was bored sitting in front of the computer. I was wondering what to do next when I decided to page through my embroidery designs. While I wasn't much interested in embroidering for some reason, I found the Wall-E design and remembered that twice this week, I've picked up the fabric scrap I stitched it out on. I guess the bloom is off the rose between it and Dearest Son. Can't really blame him, a scrap of fabric, even with a favorite character on it, isn't much of a toy, or really anything. My recent search for Wall-E fabric had turned up $15./yd fleece in a choice of lime green or medium blue background colors, but nothing else. Not at Mal-Wart, Hancock Fabrics, or Hobby Lobby. There was plenty of it online, for $10. a yard. Simple woven cotton, $10./yd. You can get woven brocades for that - and some silks ! Sheesh...

 

 Not that I'm turning up my nose at fleece, but by its nature, any prints made from it are fuzzy and blurred-looking, not what I wanted. Plus, we're heading headlong into summer, so I doubt even the biggest ‘bot fan will want to step out in a fleece t-shirt in our upcoming triple-digit days.

 

It occurred to me that Dearest really needed some sort of change purse or wallet. He's lost the hand-me-downs from Beloved Hubby and the Dollar Spot Transformers one I got him, but having quarters jingle in his pocket in anticipation of Popcorn Friday at school just meant he soon lost them. Lightbulb ! Was there enough fabric in that Wall-E stitch-out to make a little zippered pouch ?

 

Yes ! And I had tons of zippers in every color imaginable. At first, I thought to get black, since that was the color of the outgrown-sweatpants cutaway I stitched Wall-E on, but that might be hard for him to see. How about a nice yellow or orange ? It'd be a good contrast, and would ‘go' with the character's colors. A few minutes of digging through the might that is my sewing stash, and I'd assembled all the necessaries. I consoled m'self with the knowledge that, if I totally booted it, I still had lots of leftover sweatpant, and could just sew another ‘bot, easily.

 

Well, I sort of booted it - I'm waaaay out of practice with zippers - but I did fairly well, and it's usable. I just didn't sew the zipper to the seam allowance straight enough, so I had to do an extra line of stiches on each side, to keep it flat. On the whole, it's not bad, and it's certainly not something everyone in Second Grade will have. I forgot to sew in a ‘Made with Love By' tag, so I glued it in this morning. Wheee ! Something cool for his Easter basket tomorrow ! I made a Wall-et !

 

And while there are directions for using your embroidery machine to sew in zippers (sigh), I used KJ. That felt good, too. I have no idea why folks want to keep shoehorning basic sewing into all-in-the-hoop embroidery, when it's easier and faster and cheaper (fewer pricey supplies) to just use a regular sewing machine -  and regular sewing's something most home embroidery machines do, too. Not everything has to be an embroidery project on an embroidery sewing machine. But I guess ya can't tell some folk that.

 

Ya gotta admire those sweatpants. We only paid $5. at most for them, at least two but  probably three years ago. They got patched when they tore and recombined when they got outgrown and tore in new places - and they're still part of a pair of wearable pants, and now, there's an embroidered change pouch made from the scraps. And there's still more of that fabric. Pretty amazing, when ya think about it.

 

I stuffed the finished Wall-Et under the printer - it's heavy !- to press it during the night, and hit the ole hay. Slept like a rock until my internal clock basically panicked me awake. It was 20 after 5am ! I'm normally already awake at this hour ! Sometimes my circadian rhythm needs a blasted snooze alarm - and a calendar. It's Saturday, ya idjit ! I soon went back to sleep until 8:30. Much better.

 

Beloved's not been sleeping well, his arm and shoulder still hurt. So he was up before me, but tucked back in while I made breakfast. Luckily he hadn't fallen asleep before his All-Fried Doubles breakfast - two hash brown planks, two over-easy eggs, and two sausage patties - was ready, so he got breakfast in bed. It's so nice to have a clean kitchen ! Of course, it's not so clean now, but...

 

Lest you think I'm Miss Unselfish with all this crafting and cooking, I did something for me while eating my All-Fried Doubles plate. Decided to go ahead and get a month's subscription to that one website I so thoroughly researched, and arranged a $5. transfer from Checking to PayPal. Funds should be in April 15^th , and I'll probably sign up for it that the same day, and start downloading what I have listed. I figured that, if I was staying in on a darn-near perfect day for yard sales, I could do that instead. And it's probably cheaper !

 

Oh, and here's something that burnt my biscuits last week - forgot to tell ya about it. In an increasingly annoying effort to seek out new and potentially usable ME designs, I've subscribed to a raft of e-mail newsletters from various embroidery businesses. Most of the time, they're just sales tools - ‘big 2 for 1 sale !' ‘New set - only $25. !' - but sometimes, there's tips and ideas. With April Fool's Day coming, I got one from a dealer warning me of several potentially dangerous computer viruses (virii ?). After reading the six lines in the e-mail, I clicked on the provided link... and the rest of the article was for paying members only ! Guess that sort of information was for paying customers only. Of course, I was able to find it elsewhere, but it seemed as though,  if you're not paying us, we don't care about your computer. So I unsubscribed from that one. It was mostly for the paying subscribers anyway.

 

Anyway. Made Dearest Son's Easter box tonight. Yeah, it's silly, but every year I've gone all-out on the basket, it's been ignored. So this year, I used a pretty box, and cut up colorful school flyers as ‘grass' inside. It then got loaded with his ‘EVE' eggs, containing bubble gum eggs, candy, and wedding bubbles. He loves those when he gets ‘em as rewards from school. Also a good chocolate bunny, a Wall-e book, and the Wall-Et. I even did an EVE egg- poorly, but there it is, in the photo. She has a ‘Daddy and Mommy love you' note inside, and I tucked her in the Wall-et. Hope he likes it all.

 

And I hope your spring isn't as troubled by bad weather ! We're in for a big storm tonight, I can see lightning. So I'm gonna shut down, just in case.

What a nice week this has been...

 

Current Mood : Friday tired.

Spent on dolls today : $3.

 

Sorry yesterday's entry didn't get posted in time - we kept losing power. Probably due to our lines getting blown around ! Had to retype my entry three times, and darn if it didn't go down again ! So I shut down early and we goofed off to a movie and a pizza last night. Of course, once I was away from the computer, the power didn't flicker once...

 

We were very lucky. Not an hour from here - in an area where Beloved Hubby frequently works - there were fires that damaged over a hundred homes. Nearby states got tornadoes, and there's more dangerous weather coming. Our winds have slowed today, but we're in for a soaked weekend. Fine with me. I'm just glad I had Brody unplugged during our frequent power outages. Some of these surges apparently took out our Wii, so I have to see what's wrong with it this weekend.

 

Got to hit the flea market, and while there were lots more dealers, there was also a ton of more crap. Seriously. One ‘vendor' didn't bother to display anything, he just set stuff out any which-way. Normally, even this wouldn't deter yer dedicated second-hand shopper, who has no problem sifting through boxes and piles, but his stuff was all in trash bags and Mal-Wart sacks tied shut. No way was I diggin' in any of ‘em. Who knows what a bare hand might encounter ?

 

I decided against the copyright-challenged Marilyn Monroe armless and headless ‘dress form' jewelry holder - it was quite ugly. Paint out of line everywhere, and I really don't think she posed her legs like that on the famous subway grate. I smiled when I saw a Talking View Master with some reels, I had one as a kid. It disappeared one day, and if I remember correctly, the entire line was recalled as a fire hazard. Shame, those transparent plastic records on the backs of the reels were pretty cool. But it was about $10. more than I had on me. Ditto the 50s-60s era child's embroidery set, incomplete, it was little more than a box and a square of stamped, stained cotton, but the vendor wanted $12. for it. At least the View-Master was reasonable !

 

Ended up buying Dusty up there from the car set dealer, mostly for her clothes and shoes. Poor thing. Dusty and Princess Leia (and also the 1978 National Velvet doll) share the same body mold, but Dusty came first, and they hadn't quite achieved the right balance of soft vinyl and hard plastic over at Kenner yet - most Dusty and Skye (her African-American friend) dolls suffer severe melting at the neck, arms, and hips. Often you'll see the end-line ‘Trade In Special !' Dusty dolls still in box, with terrible gluey marks at her leg/hip joints, visible from where the melt has adhered to the swimsuit.

 

It was much the same case here - I had to pry the clothes out of the melts, which is pretty darn disgusting when you think about it. This poor girl has great knee clicks, her hair's in good shape, and her face is unmarred at all, but with those melts, she's almost worthless. Her arms and legs don't move at all, and her head is stuck, too. I thought about finding an unwanted Leia and performing a head-swap, but you guys know I could never sacrifice a Leia doll.

 

To many, she's quite an ugly, masculine doll, but I remember her as a product of the times, from when Billie Jean King and Martina Navratilova were challenging how we viewed ‘women's sports' from dainty dalliances that never damaged the manicure to full-out all-or-nothing combat, no genders barred ! And all women wore that shag haircut, no matter how awful it looked on 90% of us. Even the kids. Kinda like that ‘Jennifer Anniston' haircut that 3/5ths of women in the 90s sported, regardless that it usually hung straight and floppy, and was hard to maintain - unless you were JA. We challenged a lot of what the decades before us accepted, and Dusty was a reflection of that.

 

Yeah, she ain't Barbie. She has a thick waist, a modest bust, and flat feet. But she was a choice, and it seems Mattel would rather not have that, now or then. I wish Dusty had weathered better, so I could show her off to future generations, but maybe she was more a product of her times - and was destined to stay there - than I knew.

 

This Dusty is also one of the end-run trade-ins - there's no waist mechanism and her wrists don't bend - even her leg ‘bones' are different colors. You can see via the feet holes (for her sports activity stands) that her right leg mechanism is done in ‘skin' color, and her left is nearly translucent white. I'm wondering if there's some way I can save her. I already know she can't sit, and she's gonna wreck any outfit she wears, but maybe if I make her a bodysuit to absorb as much of the leaking plasticizer as possible...let me give it some thought...

 

That's the funny thing about the doll car-set seller. All her dolls - not in car sets - are $3. If it's an older doll, she's usually too badly wrecked to be worth even that, and the usually-still-pristine newer dolls aren't worth $3. used, either - especially when you can score a brand-new one for $5. or less. She had a cute Malibu Francie, too, but between the wrecked hair, damaged face paint, chewed right hand, and non-bending leg, she just didn't seem worth it. I'd have taken a flyer if I had a replacement Francie body, but I don't.

 

Oh, and here's something cool I can share with you. I'm a member of Dover Publications' ‘Free Sample' club -it's an online freebie, and every Friday, they send you an e-mail link to a page of downloadable samples from their sale coloring books, new graphic design volumes, paper dolls, sticker books, etc. I'll enclose that link to sign up too, if you're interested. And this week, it was just great to be a member ! I got to see their newest ‘Repeatable Textures' book, and it's chock-fulla great stuff to use with dolls. Walls, floors, roofs...all useful images. You even get ‘em as .jpegs on an included CD-Rom. Well worth the $20., in my opinion. There's brick, and tile, and industrial metal, wood, so many goodies. Here's a link to the book - you can read about it, and see the other volumes in the set. The one I'm squeeeeing over is the first one on the page, in green.

 

http://store.doverpublications.com/0486990192.html

 

Today's free sample included that great stone design you see on the cover, on the lowest right corner. Imagine the fun we can have with that ! There were other goodies, like a page from a book of old travel posters. Oooohh.... Here's the ‘join us' link ->

 

http://www.doverpublications.com/sampler1/

 

Imagine that. Me savin' my pennies for something that has nothing to do with machine embroidery  !

 

In other news, I kept the housework thing going with dishes and laundry. It's nearly done - and I got the handkerchiefs from yesterday and Dusty's clothes clean. Only a couple melt-mark spots remain on her spring-time outfit, and there's a minor repair on the pants. The handkerchiefs are perfect, and after a few trials, I'll get them embroidered. It was just kind of a jolt at the flea, to see a pack of three embroidered men's handkerchiefs, with Uncle's initial already on them, for a buck. (sigh) I can only hope me doing the embroidering counts for something. Even if it's a small gift, I hate to give something that's near nothing, ya know ?

Yesterday's chairs - with a Melody !

 

Current Mood : Bemused and befuddled.

Current Image Book : When I was ready to do the chair photos, I thought a doll in them would be nice - and I don't think I ever posted one of Melody before, and I said I would. So, here's Melody, Ariel and Eric's daughter, from Little Mermaid 2: Return to the Sea. She's a rather rare doll, made as a TRU movie-tie-in exclusive by JakksPacific. Since the seller had no idea who she was, I got her in a lot of dolls for less than ten bucks. (smile) I retied her waist bow using a large-eye needle ! One day, I'll find her mermaid tail and pink dress, but MIB, she often sells for around $100. So she's content in Skipper and snug-on-Barbie Fashion Fever selections.

 

Sometimes - and I'm quite sure it comes off here all the time - the world of machine embroidery seems awfully obsessive. If not downright silly. I mean, I have probably nearly 2000 designs and gleefully say right here that I'm spending hours a day looking for more. And when I confess my shame at having more than I'll use in a lifetime, I'm met with, ‘That's all you have ? I admire your restraint !' messages. From the ‘serious' embroiderers. They're not in business or anything - this is just their bag. Amassing more. While there are quite literally thousands of designs out there for free, the ones most of us really like are a bit on the pricey side. Even with sales like the ones I've found, a collection can soon cost in the hundreds of dollars, which doesn't even take into account the search time, or the supplies needed to sew them all.

 

Still, even I was somewhere between amused and insulted when I was offered the Deduper today. Just in case I've downloaded (and presumably paid for ) the same design six or eight times, the Deduper will go through all my files and delete duplicates, even if they're under different names, or still in a zipped file. What's even more shocking to me - besides the $40. price - is that this isn't a brand-new program. Nope. It's been around a bit, today's message was announcing the upgrade.

 

The idea that this is a necessary product just lays me out flat. If folks have that many blasted designs, you'd think they'd also have a decent category tree in place, set by and designed by the person who uses it. The religious sewist may have several folders under an ‘Angels' subheading, like ‘lace angels', ‘fill angels', ‘Scripture angels', ‘quilt angels', ‘FSL angels', etc., while I have one folder for ‘Fairies and Wings'. It makes things much easier to find, and you know where you tend to put stuff. But anybody who seriously need a deduper may wanna consider easing up on all those downloads instead ! I pretty much know exactly what I have - and I enjoy looking through all the folders every so often, just to remind me of what I've already got. Having to shell another $40. to get rid of stuff I either paid for or spent time downloading seems so ridiculous to me... but for there to be an upgrade, there probably was/is demand. (sigh)

 

Anyway... this morning's work was to run to a nearby town to pick up the plate and title for ‘Bonnie', the blue truck we bought that DFIL is using right now. Hopefully, we'll get her back later this month, because his vehicle's going in for service. I wasn't looking forward to it, even though I'd be driving past the junk shop, because I didn't have written directions. Sure, I'd been there, but just once, and Beloved was driving, so I wasn't paying strict attention. I was just hoping I'd find the place.

 

I did. Got it done and stopped by the junk shop on the way home. Same dolls as last time, nothing I wanted. No new fabric, either - but I did score a package of six nice handkerchiefs. I'll probably embroider some roses and initials on them, pass them along to Uncle and Aunt. They've done so much for us.

 

Did a bleach laundry load and got the new napkins in there. Those were a bad deal, sort of. The first one looked nice, but the rest had stains and I didn't notice the jacquard Fleur-de-Lis design. Paired with the heavy border, any embroidery on them would just look overdone, and the bleach bath didn't take all the stains out either. So, it looks like I have a nice new set of kitchen towels. Or plain napkins. At least I learned this time, and I carefully examined the handkerchiefs before I bought them. No real stains, but they could use a wash.

 

Believe this or not - despite the 80-degrees and sunny day we had, I had to put the laundry in the dryer. The 30 to 40 mph winds blew whatever I put up down ! And often across the backyard, which meant I had to wash it again. Even a heavy bedspread flapped over my head on the line. I also got the living room picked back up this afternoon, all I need to do now is vacuum, but right now, I'm wiped out !

I got something else I've wanted...I just kinda wanted them human-sized...

Current Mood : Tired, but happy.

Spent on Doll Furniture : $1.08

 

You're gonna laugh, but I got the thumb-screw from Brother today, to replace the stripped one in my embroidery hoop. The box it came in - yup, it was a box ! - was big enough to hold six hoops, stacked, and UPS delivered it. I kinda felt bad bugging them about it, so if I strip it again (which is probable, I tend to over-tighten), I'll just hie m'self over to Ace. All that for just one little thumb-screw...

 

Had to run a quick errand for Beloved Hubby this morning, and I found a new thrift store. They're very nice, but don't have much stock yet. I think next time I'm out, they'll get whatever I can cram into Molly's trunk. Found two small metal chairs that used to be planters, but are perfectly in scale for Barbie and co. They reminded me so much of the metal chairs on Grandma S's porch, I had to get them. A cushion can hide the seat hole easily, and they have the same sort of weather-beaten look to them. I remember how the metal legs gave just enough to allow a bit of gentle rocking. I'd love to find those again !

 

Today was bathroom cleaning day, and boy, was that a job ! Took over an hour, and I'm still not done - the tub and walls and floor-scrubbing will have to happen later. But I got all the toys and trash and clothes out of there, and got the counter and toilet clean, and the floor swept. Much better ! I've come to figure out that an hour of housework before noon, another before Dearest Son comes home, and another about an hour after he's home is about right for me. I'm not worn out, I get lots of breaks to do fun stuff, and I'm catching up on the cleaning. Of course, while I'm busting butt on dishes and the bathroom, the living room's a mess and the laundry's piling up, but there's not much anybody can do about that ! Once I get to where things are easier to maintain, I can do more with less time. Right now, it's ‘wreckage recovery' more than routine housework.

 

I was kinda tired, but still had nearly an hour before I had to start bus-watching. So I put the new screw to good use, and re-hooped the wide white ribbon I had out. I really should have ironed it before I sewed on it, but I'm lazy and impatient. The first heart came out nice - in regular thread, too ! - so I decided to do a second. I wrote down the positioning numbers on Brody's screen, and positioned the needle for a new heart just above. Came out well... but was there space for a third heart ? I'm just glad I was sort-of paying attention in Algebra, otherwise adding together negative and positive numbers would have thrown me. Luckily, it's easy to figure that, if Heart #1 is at -1.44 and Heart #2 is at +.20, I should try to get the third at +1.64. Too bad I ran out of hoop, and had to put #3 at +1.44 ! So it looks a bit off, but I tried sequential designs today !

 

And now I know that satin-type ribbon needs a heavier stabilizer behind it. You can't really tell from the photo, but the design pulled the ribbon a bit out of shape, and it's puckering, too. Well, live and learn, and enjoy a new bookmark ! I think it's pretty and very spring-like, it's just too bad I finished Memoirs of a Geisha last night...

 

What I did with the bulk of the day, well, it'll probably make you laugh again. Y'see, even though I probably have about 2000 embroidery designs already, I'm forever on the hunt for more. But I have to like them. I don't just grab up everything that's free or a buck or two. With as many designs as I already have, I can be picky-selective about anything new.

 

So when I found a site that offered a new design for free every ten minutes, I looked in their catalog and found a lot to like ! And I also found another site that offered different designs, a freebie every ten minutes, too, and a third that gave away a whole set every three hours. I went through them all, writing down the sets and pieces I liked, then hit those sites in the morning, and continued on ‘refresh' when I thought of it. Scored a few, but not many. For some reason, all three sites are on an angel kick right now - nearly everything's had wings on it for the last week.

 

Of course, there's a membership you can buy to get everything all at once, no waiting. But I didn't know if that was for just one site, or all three. During my hunt, I found a fourth site that had some of the same designs, available free all the time. So I snagged those, and crossed them off the list (which spanned two Steno-size notebook pages, mostly single designs).

 

Today, I visited the main site, and took careful note of the sets the $5./month membership bought access to - and saw every last one of the designs I wanted somewhere. So, next time I have a few bucks and a long weekend, I'll join up, and snag it all. Luckily, it's not one of those automatic renewal sites, either. Only reason I'm not doing it now is because I feel rather glutted with what I already have. I mean, I haven't even had time to put that roller skate I bought yesterday on Brody. And I just burned a back-up CD last week ! So it can wait a week or so.

 

But it's odd, not to have a hunt or something like it going on. It seems strange now, to not keep an eye on the clock, and refresh a website every few minutes, or half-hour. Maybe now I can get off my butt, away from the monitor, and get some fun done ! It's easy when you have everything...