Ah, Fall

When the thoughts of someone lucky enough to live in an old house turn to caulk. And expandable foam. This is the third fall I've spent looking for and sealing off drafts, and I am STILL finding places where I can see daylight. To be clear, these are places that are not windows. SOOO shocking to find them, soooo satisfying to seal them off.

River Bound

Based on the ten day forecast and my upcoming schedule, today might be my last chance to take advantage of the faaaabulous swimming hole I discovered last week. This river/creek is COLD y'all, and if it's not 80+ degrees, getting wet is not all that pleasant. So I'm packing up my thermos of ice water, my towel, sunscreen, collapsible chair, crappy book, hat, sunglasses etc. and heading to the water for a chance at summer.

Doing it creek-side

I'm not sure if the Gold Fork is technically a river or a creek, but this time of year it's so low it really doesn't deserve the label of a river. But it is still very very pretty, no? Yesterday I packed up my sewing supplies (this tea cozy is being entirely hand-sewn), a folding chair, and a picnic and headed down to the creek. I forded the stream and set up on a lovely low shelf of rock in the sunshine where I ate lunch and slowly worked on the cozy. It was a really beautiful afternoon, blue skies and temps in the mid-70s. I dipped my toes in the glacial water now and again and watched enormous dragonflies and tiny butterflies buzz the flowers on the banks. I was pretty sure that things would end in misery, that I would slip on a slimy rock and dump everything in the water, or the wind would pick up and I'd have to chase my cozy into the drink. But it wasn't a disaster at all; it was a perfect afternoon.

It's been an odd summer, cooler and damper than usual. It really feels more like late September than mid-August, and we've had several days in the past few weeks where the day's high didn't break 60 degrees. That, to put it succinctly, is fucked. But there are surely more nearly perfect days to be had before winter settles in, and I'm going to try harder to enjoy them.

Inspiration strikes

I finished my totally jacked apron yesterday! Woohoo! Maybe I'll post a photo, maybe not. It's pretty bad. BUT! I broke through the sewing barrier. It's a very simple half apron with ties and a pocket in a contrasting fabric. I did all sorts of things very stupidly because I wasn't following a pattern, but that's how you learn, right? The next one will look much better I'm sure. (Zach has requested that I make him one, and it's going on my to-do list.) Last night I actually went to bed with three quilting books just sort of browsing and seeing what I might want to do. What I really really want to make is a crazy quilt of assorted wools scavenged from hideously out-of-date clothing picked up at thrift stores. Ambitious much? No, first I must finish a few small projects and work up my confidence level a bit. I have a few ideas . . .

The tea cozy I made last winter is (unsurprisingly) all tea stained and gross. It's perfectly usable, but it would be nice to have another one. Today I'm going to start making a crazy quilted tea cozy with scraps from some of my other adventures in craft. It's a very small project, but I'm planning to do most of the sewing by hand, so . . . wish me luck!

Whoa, where did the time go?

So I mentioned that my fabulous Aunt Jean gave me all these great quilting materials right? And before today I'd done basically nothing with them other than pet them and play with them and look on them lovingly because I'm scared as HELL of my sewing machine. I was brutally traumatized by my first sewing machine, which was broken right out of the box. But now I have one that actually works, and this morning I braved it. I wound and set a bobbin and threaded the needle and so far I have successfully sewed two hems on my first project: an apron. Ok, they're wonky as hell, but the fact that I did so without breaking my sewing machine or losing my mind feels like a HUGE accomplishment. Perhaps not the domestic equivalent of passing my first bar exam, but DAMN close.

Greedy Bastards

Salvage

Things that redeemed an otherwise frustrating and kind of ridiculous day:

(1) Iced tea flavored with fresh lime, sweetened with simple syrup, stirred with an actual iced tea spoon and consumed just at the point when I was about to descend into epic levels of low-blood sugar induced grumpiness. (Private note to Mom: remember that day in Switzerland? I was about to be that.)

(2) Fresh strawberries and home-made vanilla pudding.

(3) Watching Freckles carry around her favorite toy ever, an old sock filled with catnip and another old sock. We're all making do, but some of us are doing it more graciously than others.

(4) Working through the frustrating bits to finish a project that's been deviling me.

(5) A beautiful frilly daffodil the palest shade of real butter in a small brown jar by my bed.

(6) Sunshine.

(7) Knowing that when this day finally ends, it will be in a fluffy bed, between sheets freshly dried by (6).