Spending Sunday Sewing

Sunday was going to be dreary and dark and dull and damp. We were forecast for some snow or rain or slushy sleet or whatever. Didn't seem to be a lot of fun.

Sooooo about 8 a.m. I got a text from some of the grandkids. They wanted to come over and do a little sewing. I had previously promised grandson Clayton he could bake an apple pie. I had also promised granddaughter Chelsea that we could do another project on her new sewing machine. Time to make good on those promises.

Their parents dropped them off, along with their gear, to come and spend the day with us.

We sat around the table in the kitchen enjoying a late breakfast. They assured us that they would be very good today and work on projects and do any jobs we needed to have done. How nice is that?

Clayton asked if he could have a chance to learn to sew too? I told him that sewing is not just a woman's pastime, that many fine tailors are men that sew beautifully on sewing machines.

He loves any kind of a machine that can go go go, plus it has a gas (foot) pedal, right?

He attentively picked out the fabrics and listened to the directions. We used a paper plate to trace around for a pattern. He understood about putting the fabric right sides together and sewing on the wrong side.

 I hold my hand over his to guide the fabric

and prevent any fingers from going under the needle! 

I set my machine on the slowest speed possible and helped him guide the fabric through. He did wonderfully well and was excited to turn the project right side out to see his accomplishment. We tucked in the raw edges of the opening. Now I taught him to top stitch around the edge of the entire circle. Because he had been so careful and getting used to the machine, I told him he was "graduated" to increase the speed just a little bit. So no matter how hard he tromps down the gas (foot) pedal, it only goes at the reduced pre-set speed.

Voila!! It's a soft doggy frisbee toy!!! 

Nice and soft for indoor play, and also washable.

Here is a YouTube of him explaining the process:

Then he sewed a second doggy frisbee toy. He took one home for his doggies and left the other one here for Finney and Binney to play with.

Now it was time for Chelsea to set up her sewing machine. She got it for Christmas and we had already worked on a project last week. While at home she had managed to figure out how to sew a couple of ruffled hair scrunchies, all on her own! When her mom asked her if she had a pattern, she said "No, I have it already figured out my mind!" She sure did!

At my house, she wanted to tackle something a little bit more complicated. She picked out some fabrics and some batting for in between the layers. From there we worked out an idea and a pattern on our own. We even used that same paper plate as the curved part of her pattern.

She carefully sewed under my direction, with her very safe sewing machine. No fingers under the needle and she keeps up well with the speed of the machine and feeds the fabric through.

Once the initial little purse with sewn, then we had to figure out the snap setting tool to finish it off. I confess, I goofed up both pieces of the metal snap, and we had to pry them back off with a pliers and start over.

We finally got it done correctly and her little purse worked with a flap in a snap. Then we added a black strap and she was totally delighted with her new creation!

Here is a YouTube video of Chelsea 

explaining how she made her purse:

She was pretty pleased with her project.

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We had promised Clayton that we would bake some apple pies. He knew we had some green Granny Smith apples in the refrigerator from when he was at the house on New Years Day. We ran out of time that day to bake the pies, so this was a perfect time to do it.  Both of the kids used the little apple peeler corer device to crank out the apple slices quickly.

I think they really just wanted to eat 

the long stringy peelings? 

Once we had the slices made, it was a quick dump in the bowl to be tossed with cinnamon, sugar, pumpkin pie spice and a little bit of cornstarch. We pre-baked the bottom crust so it's not so mushy.

After dumping in the apples and a few dabs of butter, Chelsea unrolled the top crust across the pie.  We cheated with store bought roll up pie crusts.

Next it was Clayton's turn to carefully use the knife to cut the slits in the top crust for air vents. Then they both sprinkled cinnamon and sugar on top for a delicious crust with a magazine worthy appearance!!!

Tada!!

Afternoon snack with pie al a mode ....  chocolate chip mint ice cream was all we had on hand.  It was fine with them, ice cream is ice cream, right?

The rest of the afternoon was spent fiddling around with a few other little projects, and Clayton took a little bit of time to go outside and run around on the ice in the backyard. A lot of our snow has melted, but the ice from the excessive amount of rain flooded the back and has remained in our yard.

We had made the news last week when the excessive rainfall created an ice jam in the city along the riverbanks. The river of course overflowed and into all of the houses and businesses all along the river on both banks downtown.

At our house, we were fine, being about 15 blocks north of most of the flooding. But the backyard is only a mile or so from the bay and the waters have oversaturated the ground across the whole swamp. There's nowhere for it to go. With the frozen ground, not a lot of saturation can happen at this time of year.

The storm sewers backed up and streets flooded even further away from the river. This is down the street from us about 10 blocks away. Ack!

The city had to hire a barge company from Sturgeon Bay to come across the Green Bay through the frozen winter waters.... to come in our harbor and chop away at the ice to get upriver,  They had to bust loose the ice jam to get things flowing again. They worked round the clock for three days to get the ice jam freed and things moving from under the bridges. I feel really bad for the people who have had flooding in their homes and the New Year holiday rudely interrupted by evacuations and basement cleaning.

Let's hope things can get back to normal now as the temperatures drop again. The river should freeze over smooth and have a normal flow under the ice out to the Green Bay.

Late afternoon, the kids curled up with me for a while on the bed and we rested/napped a bit while Grandpa kept an eye on the playoff games on the TV. It really was a lazy day while the snow was falling outside.

It was getting close to supper time, and those two little stinkers had me text their mother to find out what was on the dinner menu at their house. They compared it with what we were going to make, and decided to just stay right here!!

Clayton was catching up on his favorite YouTube show while Chelsea and I cooked up a delicious supper of beef stew from leftover roast beef, potatoes and carrots from the night before. Chelsea made up a big salad and we sat down to eat at the table, complete with candlelight. (at the kids' request).

They really didn't want to go home in the evening, but it was time for them to get back into their routine and get their baths and bedtime for school the next day.

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Today the mail arrived and I've got some cute little sets of LED strip lights to put in my sewing machine throat. The bulb in my Janome 8077 is not very bright, so this added strip of LED lights really helps.

BEFORE       AFTER 

I ordered three sets in all, one for my larger Janome 1600P DB mid arm machine, and one for little Chelsea's sewing machine which doesn't have any light at all!

Steve has been putzing around, cleaning up some of the electrical connections and re-routing some circuits in our house. He added another outlet to the other side of the kitchen island today. Separating the leads so they are properly wired individually to the outlets.

No more popping breakers if I have the pressure cooker or crockpot going, and accidentally turning on the microwave or coffeemaker.  Now the outlets on each side of the island are separate from each other, as well as separated from the ones along the wall of the counters and cabinets.

Now it's all Dapper Dandy Do!

Wonder what our next project will be??? 

Farmhouse Projects - Windows Fail, Matchsticks and our TV

Now what would these three things have to do with each other?

Nothing.

It's just three separate things I want to write about today.

Windows Fail:
Yesterday Steve was perusing the Facebook Marketplace ads as he is wont to do. Because we are always looking for building materials to improve our house. Being on a fixed retirement budget, every penny we can save is worthwhile.

We know that sometime soon we should be replacing windows on the house. He found a contractor with four used windows that were the right sizes for our home! They appeared to be very nice replacement windows with the multi-pane mullion grids sandwiched between the thermopane glass.  At the bargain price of $40 each, it was worth it to take a 60-mile jaunt one way to get them.

We set up a time to go there this morning. As soon as we gulped down our coffee, we hooked up our little trailer behind the Tracker, gathered a bunch of extra padded wool blanket pieces and strapping, and headed on out. Stopped at the ATM to pull out enough cash and then we hit the highway, anxious for a new acquisition to continue the improvements on our National Folk Farmhouse.

Upon our arrival, we were very dismayed to find out the windows were TAN! The photo very erroneously let them appear to be white. We didn't even think to consider to ask what the color of the windows were... and in all fairness, he didn't state any color in the description of his ad. They just looked white in the photos.

But when we got there,
they were definately tan/beige
and NOT white.

We turned away empty-handed. 

Dangnabbit.

But we made lemonade out of our lemons. We took a jaunt over to Sherwood and stocked up on a bunch of the good quality locally grown meats at Dick's Family Foods. We always shopped there when we lived in Chilton so it was convenient to hop on by and load up --- with a lot of good sale prices! More bang for the buck.

From there, we swung by Fleet Farm on our way home. Pops Pfundtner had given us a gift card for Christmas.  We were able to pick up some of our favorite Magnum Blue Mountain whole bean coffee from Jamaica. It's the only kind of coffee I like, and they are the only local place that carries it. We also grabbed a big bag of birdseed and Steve stocked up on some of his favorite Christmas chocolate sponge candy that was discounted after the holidays.

On our way back north up the highway, we swung into a new little shop that carries the Dobbers Pasties from Escanaba and Iron Mountain, Michigan. Being a transplanted Yooper,  these are in my opinion, some of the best pasties made in the U.P. of Michigan. They are beef, potatoes, rutabaga and onions wrapped up in a crust in the old Cornish England tradition.  We stocked up on six of those to bring home and put in freezer as well.

here is a link to their shop
on Hwy 41 and Lineville exit: 

http://oldeworldpastriesplus.com/

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The next thing I want to write about are matches. Long long ago when Steve was a lad, his family had this little cast iron matchstick holder by their fireplace in various homes as they moved around the state. A few years ago, as Steve's dad was preparing to move from Waupaca up to Sister Bay, and we were cleaning out the garage. Steve ran across this little matchstick holder laying out on a shelf in the cold garage. It was a little rusty but otherwise not really too worse for the wear. He asked if we could take it home with us. He cleaned off the rust, wire brushed it well, and I gave it two coats of flat black paint. I looked up the figurines on it and it said it's Venus and Cherubs.

I figured it was time to get it mounted in our new home, since we are now focusing on fixing up around the fireplace and hearth.

I took out a special blue tapcon screw which is designed to go into concrete. First, using a permanent black marker, I covered the blue head so it would appear black once it was screwed into the brick surface.

We figured out the best place for it and mounted it by the fireplace. It's really a decorative item because we are not going to light any wood burning fires in this fireplace in the near future. The chimney is questionable. We are going to convert it over later to a gas log fireplace. Steve got out his big hammer drill that is able to drill into cement, mortar, brick, etc.

I put some matches in the little compartment under the flip door, just for decoration. It's good to have a few real matches on hand to light candles in case of a power outage. Did you know that they no longer make "strike anywhere" matches anymore?   I actually have to hide a little piece of the graphite strike material from the box to be able to light a match.

The little top trough is made for the used matches until they cool off. How cute is that?

Bit by bit the livingroom is coming together. Maybe tomorrow Steve will finish the grout and trim on the fireplace hearth.  We set the leaded glass screen back in front of the fireplace doors now that the hearth tile mortar is dry.

~~~~~~~~

The third little household improvement we made today's was that we mounted our TV in the living room on a bracket on the wall. It used to set on a side table which was kind of in the way as we walked from the master bedroom out into the living room. Since I changed my mind on having my big brown ottoman down in the she shed, I wanted the ottoman back up in the living room for additional seating space.

I figured the ottoman would go nicely right where the side table had been. All we needed to do was mount the TV up on the wall on a bracket.

Using a level, and some drills and big lag screws, we soon had the bracket in place and mounted the TV.  This makes a lot more space when coming from the bedroom, and extra seating in the livingroom for grandkids etc.

I bought this piece of plastic housing to hide the cords between the TV leading down to the wall outlet and the cable inlet. Seems a waste to spend $10 on this 6 ft long plastic piece when I only needed about a two-foot length of it. I might figure out something else, or get Steve to make a little wooden cover piece that I can paint to match the wall. It can hide the power and cable wires. Then I will return this other long thing and get my money back. Every penny counts, you know.

 Now we can watch it comfortably from our chairs, or swivel it over towards the couch if we want to.  Once we cover the wires, it will be safer for the grandkids to sit on the ottoman.

Oh, after our grocery shopping today, I popped a big beef roast in the pressure cooker tonight. Steve peeled up taters and carrots that I added during the last 15 minutes. The house smells so good! There's enough left over to make a pot of stew tomorrow by adding some gravy and chopping up the potatoes carrots and leftover meat.

~~~~~~~~

Well --- Steve is watching the playoff games this evening on football, and I was working on a quilt. He likes hanging out in the she shed while I am doing my thing.  So do the dogs!

It's so comfortable to sew in the she shed and have all of my tools and materials right at hand.  I think what I especially enjoy the most is that I don't have to pack things up from the dining room table and put them away each evening to make room for the next day's meals... or make space for other activities. This room is all mine and I can leave things set up mid-way through a project.

This one is ready to be loaded on the quilting frame....

I also wanted to say we had a very nice visit yesterday was Steve's older brother Mark and his wife Ann. They were headed through on their way to pick up some logs from the U.P. of Michigan, and stopped to see our house. From there we went out for lunch together at Mickey Lu's BBQ in Marinette. What a treat!

Back to Projects in Our National Folk Farmhouse

Now that the holidays are over, it's back to working on projects again in our National Folk Farmhouse.

The she shed was officially done before the holidays. Steve finished up the corner closet, added the door and trim and I got it all painted.

By putting it on an angle, it doesn't block our views out any of the big french windows looking out over the backyard.

 It's so nice that we get birds, squirrels, deer and even a few rare ones like foxes and coyotes out in the back.  We turn on the spot lights at night and surprise them. 

~~~~~~~~~

I didn't write a lot over the holidays. Number one, because we were so gosh darn busy. Number two, just because it was all about family and decorations and festivities are really didn't have anything to do with house projects or traveling.

We gathered with most of our kids and grandkids the weekend before Christmas.

The she shed worked out very well for a family gathering place and many members congregated in there to visit and play.  We were also gathered up in our living room for present opening and around our dining room and kitchen for our large meal. I was very pleased to have a dining room big enough to have my dining table stretched out with both leaves and all eight chairs around it. The older grandkids sat at the round tall table in the kitchen while the two littlest wee ones at the play room table and chairs brought in for just the occasion. Our girls brought seafood!! Steamed crab legs, shrimp and clams while our son in law made a beef brisket. It was so much fun to be cooking in the kitchen with my two girls and having happy grandkids running around our feet, chock full of holiday excitement and sugar!

Erin and Waylen bought us all matching bear jammies! 

Then we kept all of the grandkids overnight for a sleepover.

Our Christmas holiday was delightful and we also traveled on Christmas Day up to the tip of Door County to spend the day with Pops Pfundtner. We brought a big ham dinner with all the trimmings to celebrate the day with him.

Now it's the New Year and time to get back on the project program with our house.

~~~~~~~~~

When we bought the house in April, we knew the red clay tiles of the fireplace hearth were cracked and loose.  We just put the larger oriental rug overlapping them to cover them up until we had time later to replace them. We decided the time was now!

While walking in the local big-box store Menards, during Christmas shopping, we saw some large 18 inch ceramic tiles that caught my eye. They were on special clearance of only 99 cents each. Can you believe it?  Enough of them came home with us to span the entire width of the fireplace hearth.

We invited grandson Clayton during his Christmas vacation to help do a little demolition. He was thrilled! Give a boy a little hammer and a screwdriver and tell him to go to work on some broken red clay tiles for our hearth by the fireplace in the living room.

Oh boy, did he have fun. He first started removing the broken pieces a chunk at a time. Then the big goal was to try and remove a full piece without breaking it. This was difficult because the tiles were old and brittle. He was finally successful and managed to get TWO complete tiles removed without any cracks! What a challenge.

He would remove a few tiles at a time and then put the pieces in the bucket. From there he would run the Shop-Vac and suck up any of the extra little shards. It was a very clean neat job and all of the mess stayed right at the fireplace hearth and not dragged around the room.

Pretty good job for a seven-year-old kid. He managed to remove all 33 tiles and only once in a while did we have to actually chisel one away with the pry bar and a larger hammer.

He also helped to swap around the rugs 

from the living room to the dining room.

He had a little mishap that he called a "technical difficulty" while unrolling the smaller one in the livingroom!

Once his job was all done, we offered to pay him. He declined, saying no he just wanted to be nice --- and besides, it was fun!

(I did tuck a five dollar bill into his pocket when it was time to take him home)


He also decided that since he had the Shop-Vac out, he would clean the the firewood cubby compartment. It was pretty dusty and dirty in there so he took care of cleaning that up. Then he used a sharpie marker and wrote us a message on the wall inside. What a great idea! I think I will let each of the grandchildren write us a message in there on the wall. We had done something similar to that while we built our house out on the Oconto River in 1997. We let the children write messages to the people of the future from the people of the past - and closed up the wall.  I think our grandkids writing in this cubby will be a cute time capsule.

Here is the message that Clayton drew for us. What a wonderful secret hideaway complete with his secret message.

(Clayton Lock, Jan 1, 2020   I love Grandma and Grandpa)

We decided to extend the span of tiles along the hearth to go the entire width of the fireplace. The original red tiles only went up to the little firewood cubby door. Steve carefully cut away at the rest of the hardwood flooring to extend the recessed areas for the tiles.

Once he had the hardwood strips removed, then he filled in the extra gap in the floor with some subfloor to make it level with the rest of the recessed space.

This morning Steve decided it was time to mix up the mortar and start to install the tiles. Carefully laying down cardboard and prepping his work area, I was his gopher and watergirl as he mixed up the mortar.

The first tile is always the scariest, 

so we made sure it was square and level with the wood floor.

Tile number two going down and matching up perfectly! 

Here is tile number three in place,

and it's looking SO good to me! 

Tile by tile, it is transforming the hearth into a beautiful new pattern.

Tile five is down and now he has to measure carefully

and cut the sixth tile to fit.

There is number six into place.... 

or should I call it five and half? 

What a change from the cracked old red clay tiles!

(the leg of my chair is holding the last corner level) 

I am glad we went the entire width of the fireplace.  Before the red clay tiles were only up to the firewood cubby door.  That was kind of awkward and unbalanced.  Now it's more symmetrical.

A bit of grouting and we should be done with the tile.  I think that I am going to paint the mantle to match the color of our furniture a bit better. We are going to replace the wood burning fireplace with a gas log one in the future. For now we will just put the leaded glass fireplace screen over it to cover up the old pitted brass trimmed doors.  (this is a "before pic" to show the screen)

Time to run now. Steve's older brother Mark and his wife Anne are stopping by in a bit to see our house and head out for lunch together.  Will write more about our next project tomorrow!