Pushing On

So Betsy is pretty much finished. I might do something with her necklace but I am not sure what so I am leaving it. Buttons look kind of amateurish somehow. If it is meant to be something will come to mind.

Here is the start of Kate, chiffon on top of upholstery fabric.

Trimming away the chiffon after preliminary stitching

She is down and ready to start stitching. At JoAnns the cutter wanted to know if I was re-doing a footstool. Um not hardly.


The cast is off but I took a shower and now have an open blister type thing on the bottom of my foot, trying to stay off of it and I will wear the brace to help. Old age is sooooo much fun!

New House Guests

So this girl has shown up. I found the fabric in a remnant bin at JoAnns.

Since my foot has kept me home and the doctor is in no hurry to de-cast me, I have been working. The foot is healed but she wanted one more week of the cast to make sure it is "hardened" off.  Her week is like football minutes, 7 days is actually 12 days. So totally frustrated that no one heard me going "NOOOOOOOO!" I actually got up at 3am,  because I couldn't sleep and drank a whole wine cooler! I don't drink but I finally was able to sleep. And they wonder why I hate to go to the doctor, ha! I told my regular GP that statins make me feel like passing out and he told me "No they don't." Um ok, I guess you know how I feel better than I do. I haven't taken a statin since then and funny thing I feel a lot better. I wonder if he feels better?

Whine, whine, whine. No one cares.

So anyway this girl is a found girl, from Minnesota, her name was going to be Beth but Lizzie keeps popping up, then again maybe she is a Trudy. The fabric was a lucky find, I didn't have her with me and just threw it in the basket as a maybe and it was perfect. You never know.

Sarah is almost done. I added the antique lace but I think I need to cut some more of her dress to revel the background. Onward!

Yeah and Bobby wants a walk. Good luck with that Bob, you will have to wait for those football days to pass. I think I need another wine cooler.

Christmas at Our House

             I was just checking Santa was OK!

Inventory

Being stuck in the house has brought home the old scout motto "Be Prepared"! Accordingly I have taken thread inventory. I always seem to run out of thread at 10pm. It's a total bummer I am getting into the stitching and whoops no thread!


I primarily use Guterman thread since I bought my Bernina and was told not to use the "popular" thread brand (you know who) on the Bernina. I usually buy Guterman on sale, stocking up on colors I use a lot of, like 110 grey. I used to keep a list on a post-it note, but decided to find a chart on the internet and create a check list. Lots of numbers and I found I have a fair amount, not including the machine embroidery thread I have been using lately. I wish Guterman would print the number on the side of the spool, I add it by hand before I put the spool on the machine and destroy the the top label, it helps to maintain consistent thread color.

I have been working on Sarah, my great grandmother, whom I know nothing about except she lived in Pennsylvania, had 4 children and was Irish.

I found some variegated rayon thread that is working well as the hair. Love to stitch the hair!

Leave a comment and I will email you a copy of the chart. Now I need to find a use for the plastic spools. I decided to save them just to see how many I use, they are adding up. I don't think they are recyclable. But they should be! Guterman are you listening?

Really Trapped!

Yeah, diabetes sucks! If you get a sore on the bottom of your foot it is hell trying to get it to heal. So after a month of bandage daily changes antibiotics and an ultrasound of my veins (things are flowing well, thank you) it was decided to cast it so I am not stepping on it.

Ever try to operate your sewing machine with your left foot? Mr. Left does not know when to quit pushing. Evidently he is slow to comprehend Mr. Brain. And Mr Right cannot stop trying to press down on the pedal. LOL They will figure it out eventually.

To keep myself amused I went to JoAnns while I could still drive and invested in some fabric for a new piece, Sarah my great grandmother on my paternal side. I know she was Irish, Sarah McLaughlin Irwin, she lived in Pennsylvania.

I will stitch her down and the trim off the white (unprinted) part of the fabric. I am imagining light brown, copper and gold in the hair. But you never know. She printed out well, I had to add dress and lace on the bottom of the photo as she was in an oval frame.









Fred W II is finished, this was the print on cotton, I added bits of lace in his beard and along the hair line. It's pretty much experimenting at this point. I enjoy messing with techniques and finding a new path along the art trail.

I colored some of the
fabric with Inktense pencils and sponged them down with a bit of water, it looks like a hand colored old photo.

Trapped!

This week was all about the doctors. I had an appointment with the retina specialist Tuesday. This involves dilation of the eye. Not a difficult thing but you are sent to a darkened room with an assortment of other people. Of course, we are all pretty old. Sigh. Sitting there waiting, there are old magazines, but the room is dark and you can't see anyway. The TV is going with some mid afternoon gossip show, um ok, I really don't feel too sorry for people who live in Malibu in 4.5 million dollar homes who got burnt out. Sorry, really don't care, go collect your insurance and drive up the rates for people who live in normal size houses.

Just when you think it can't get worse, there is breaking news, active shooter on a hospital site! Yikes. The local TV station is right on the scene reporting the "news". All of it rumor but they keep stating it over and over, then they show the view out their helicopter, scenery buzzing by the landing part of the copter, um, yeh, that's informative, back to more rumors, a sketchy map of the hospital, view of 20 cop cars in front the hospital, a woman whose "baby" is in the ER (her baby was her 19 year grandson who was in some kind of altercation and need stitches). A patient has barricaded herself in a room with another patient and a nurse, so scared her first thought was to call the local TV station. OK, well, I needed to hear that. Oh yes she sent a picture of a hospital bed against the door, personally, how lucky was she to have a nurse there, most of the time you are waiting an hour for a bedpan (just saying). 45 minutes later, this is still going on and I'm figuring the dilation will have worn off before the doc sees me. All this time the TV people are repeating all the rumors, finally I see the doc, which takes another half hour of fooling around because he is overbooked. Finally I get the eye resolved and we leave. The whole story was a hoax. What a job, talking for over an hour about nothing! They will probably get some award for their reporting.

Wednesday I went to the wound care doc, foot is mending well, culture come back that I have a flu bacteria in my foot, um, ok. Nothing to do about that, keep changing the bandage, stay off it, see you next week. Out the door in less than 20 minutes.

Today it is raining, sleeting, just being plain miserable. At least I can turn on the sewing machine and amuse myself. I'm free! Not trapped in the hell hole of a waiting room. Thank God!

Great Grandpa Fred

My great grandpa Frederick Wilhelm Gilgenbaugh was born July 20, 1839 in Koblenz Germany. He emigrated to the US in 1848. He lived in Western Ohio where he married, worked on a farm and had 11 children. He died at age 71.

My grandfather William F was born in western Ohio, married had two children and moved to North Ridgeville, Ohio. They eventually had 9 children. My mother bought property across the road from their 100 acre farm and that is where I was raised.

I found this photo of Frederick W and had it printed on cotton and chiffon. This is the print on chiffon over a multi-purpose upholstery fabric. The print is in sepia tones, I added the color with copper and gold rayon thread.

I started to remove some of the chiffon so the fabric shows through. Fun effect I want to explore more.


Such solemn news lately. I am a conservative person and believe in the sanctity of family and life. My advice is summed up by one word. PRAY.

Center yourself and take charge of your own life. If we all lived by being kind, caring and fair to each other we wouldn't need government to tell us what to do. Make wise choices. Thanks in advance.