Rabbit Trails

Friday, while Harvey was approaching the coast of Texas, I started to clean up my sewing room. *Somebody let it get messy.* The above picture is a huge old kitchen pantry from a sale.  It holds yarn, embroidery patterns, holiday fabric, sewing patters and crochet hooks.   The bird bag you see is the bag I take along in the car on long trips. I fix embroidery projects. I don't get car sick, so it's a fun thing to do while driving. It's better than crocheting because when I pull the thread up, I also look up. With crocheting, I never get to look up to see the country side. To the right is where I keep all my embroidery thread. I do have lots, but I do lots of embroidering. It's a low cost hobby and I love it. The top can is full of variegated thread. This is the table my sewing machine is on. It was formerly my Pastor and Wife's kitchen table. It's kind of special. The fabric on the left are hopeful aprons....

  You know how the book goes....if you give a mouse a cookie...... It happens more than you think, to real people. I bought an old kitchen cabinet to use in my sewing room, so I sold the dresser that I've been using for my *stuff*, then I had to clean the sewing room. (this is the topic of the post btw) With the money I made from the dresser, I bought a Lazy Boy recliner. Then I bought a couch to match the recliner. I sold the couch AND love-seat so I could get something to match the recliner and couch. So, we're looking at another rocker recliner. Green. I hope it matches the couch and recliner we do have.... so I can rest. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  So, the top picture shows a middle shelf in my newly fixed up sewing room.  Scissors, glue gun, and old clothespins from my Great Grandmother. My sister put mint oil on them, so they smell really good. The little box in the clothes...

When I chose the pattern, I didn't know it would be SUCH a twirly dress. I meant to make them a little too big.... they turned out to fit just right.... which I guess is better than too little. Hannah's doesn't twirl... shhhh. She doesn't realize it. Hannah in black and white. What a blessing it is to have little Grand-daughters..... little Grand-daughters that have moms that love dresses...... fabric and patterns. I love to sew. What do you love to do?

This is what I have been doing lately.  I found some good wash rags......not all wash rags can be crocheted around.  These were just right.  These are as fun as making doilies.......and maybe more useful.  

I love to crochet.  I remember my Great Aunt Freda would sew two wash cloths together then crochet around them and make a pillow.  I was brought up in a world of pillows.....not ones you buy from a store though.  Seems like everything we owned was crocheted around the edges or hemmed by my Granma, or made by my Granny.   Young married girls are bored and don't *enjoy* being a *keeper* of the home.  I think these things help.  Projects.  SOMETHING to do.  Something to start and something to finish.  Make things to give away........for presents........to decorate their own home.   We will all like different things........just do SOMETHING. I would like to can/jar something.  I'm going to look in to Candied Jalapenos. What are you planning on doing someday?  What are you doing today?

My Granny made rag rugs and sold them for $2 and $3.  I remember her sitting in her rocking chair tearing up old shirts and other pieces of old clothes.   She was always in sort of a puff of fuzz. Her house was dusty because of her craft. I had nice pieces of fabric to use to make strips for this particular rug. I have cut up old clothes to make rugs....... to the point that my kids would ask me if I was going to cut THEIR favorite clothes up.  The clothes they actually had on....... You gotta start  with a ball of fabric strips.  It takes a little bit of time to tear them and then tie them.  It's a fun craft.  I enjoy it because I know my Granny enjoyed it. I learned some things with this rug.  If a rug starts to ruffle............STOP. Don't keep crocheting like it isn't happening. It can't be fixed.   Almost every rug I've made that is any size at all, has been ruffled. It won't happen again. I had this rug practicall...

  Well.  I got the dress done. But it isn't exactly what I planned. The fabric I chose for the dress was long, but very short in width. In other words, it was a strange piece of fabric. Long and skinny. So I had to choose different fabric. It's close to what I intended,,,,, then the pattern I wanted to use just didn't sing.   So, the dress got done with a few switch-a-roos.    In blog-land, you can say whatever you want, take pictures of the clean parts of your house, make your kids look like angels, your pets perfect....... you can appear to fix supper every night in a  spiffy-clean kitchen. You can make sure to take pictures of your clean vehicles, your family gets up at six, feeds the chickens by 6:10, churn the butter, your favorite things to bake are sourdough french braided sesame seed bread and scones. Scones with berries you picked last evening before the meteor shower. You can have big thick books on the tables, vases of flowers, table-clot...

I want to find a dress pattern that works. I am liking Mom Walton and the way she dresses. Just a plain dress in pretty fabric. Why don't women want to look feminine? It's such a glorious thing. To look nice, pretty, and feminine. So, I got the pattern at Hospice thrift store....and the fabric at SPCA thrift store. I think that's what I will do tonight. Sew myself a dress.

I see squares in squares. I see stars. I see pyramid triangles. I see boxes in boxes. I see little triangles around squares. That is why I like this simple pattern. You can see so many things. What do you see?