Even worse, but less worse that it could have been

We discovered that an ambulance ride costs more than rent now.  In Millennial terms, around 400 Starbucks coffees and 150 avocado toasts.  I need to start making friends with drug dealers.

By the gymnastic grace of God, there was same-day treatment and no permanent damage.

ICE has been in our area, but I haven't seen any personally--that I know of.

One thing in my home that I've been appreciating lately is a tall narrow garden trellis that we picked up for free from a neighbor who was moving.  Similar to these curved ones, but with four top spikes that each end in a small ball.

It fits very well in an awkward gap next to an awkward corner in the bathroom, we can hang towels off the spikes, and the trellis keeps them away from the wall.

The Goodwill doesn't really take garden furniture, so it is often given away.  I switched to a metal flower pot stand for my nightstand, and set a wrought-iron-style napkin weight? for picnics? upside-down in it to keep small items from falling through so easily, while still allowing most of the dust through.  I don't put water glasses there because the mattress is frequently used as a trampoline; small house, long winters.

I managed to paint a large picture frame and an office stand that we had picked up at other times, using old toothbrushes as brushes.  Uneven paint coverage, but I think that could be an advantage when trying to simulate marble.  A clear varnish of similar reflectance to polished stone would make it more convincing.

Still pouring...

...and too utterly ridiculously to write about yet.

However, we still had a good Christmas.  I was crafting little presents up until almost the last minute.

The washer got fixed enough to be functional.  At one point I had a whole system set up with two sturdy plastic bins and a bucket.  The second bin is for having a place to move wet laundry to while getting water out of the first bin and out of the laundry itself.  The bucket is for bailing out the bins.  

It worked okay as a temporary solution, but for a longer term I'd want sturdier laundry tubs.  I don't need a binful of laundry graywater flowing across the floor.  We do have a legless utility sink we trashpicked once; it would need to have the drain hole plugged securely against the suction of the laundry plunger (Rapid Washer).  Currently it is a holding pen for dirty laundry.

I set up a drying rack in the bathtub, to let things drip-dry enough so they could go into the dryer.

We even went to the laundromat once.  Almost deserted, probably because of the threat of a visit from ICE, which was good, because there were hardly any chairs--to keep homeless people from camping there.  A sign on the wall said No Sleeping.

Finally feeling crafty

Last-minute Christmas projects, after yesterday's cookie-baking and caramel popcorn:  a book weight with a rock in one end and beans in the other; a sewing kit; individual quotations cut out of an unreadable gift book and laminated; a piece of fabric laminated; an upholstery fabric remnant sewn into a tote bag; a broken necklace that I double-restrung.

For the sewing kit, I took a small, ugly basket and covered it with fabric, gathering it at the inside bottom and stitching through the fabric and basket under the rim.  It was quick to put together, although I think the gathers will tend to collect dust and odds and ends over time.

Recently we were given an elderly woman's extensive stash of braided rug materials and tools.  I've made a good start on a braided rug, and I plan to work straight through my share of the rolled strips, so I don't need to find storage space for them.  It will be a series of smaller rugs.  There's also a bin of uncut fabric, which I will probably use in clothing projects.

Eldest child has reported difficulty in distinguishing the woolens from the synthetics, even with burn testing.  Perhaps some of the fabrics are blends. 

Some of the fabrics were rather musty, so I washed them and hung them out in the back yard--including throwing long, unrolled strips of fabric up into the trees.  For some reason my husband doesn't approve of the look.  The red strips look festive, the gray and tan ones not so much.

First things first

"This seems to be axiomatic--going ahead with the work makes the tools show up.  They also seem to come in threes....Determination is a magnet."  -- Roy Underhill, The Woodwright's Shop:  A Practical Guide to Traditional Woodcraft

I have been lacking determination to finish any projects, except for building a toy bin to go under a play kitchen.  The bin helps get the toys off the floor, but since it is mostly open on the front, they still look like clutter.  I might put a little curtain on it.  I'm planning to put a finish on the bin to visually unite it with the play kitchen.  They are joined with leather straps on the back, and I should anchor the whole thing to the wall when I'm done.

After that, aside from being sick and reading through a stack of free Christian historical novels from the library, I began working through deep-cleaning various household biohazards.  In particular, my eldest child and I cleaned the refrigerator.  It is an early-90's model that is extremely simple and reliable compared to the dysfunctional 2010's fridge at our previous rented house.  

I discovered, through the advanced-level technique of reading the owner's manual that the previous owners thoughtfully left for our landlord, that the drain tray underneath is supposed to be cleaned monthly, instead of never.  There was a whole ecosystem in there.

I also cleared out some rotten onion "mush bombs" in the basement, and cleaned out the utility sink and both of the bathroom sink drains.  I have a length of wire with a little loop at one end like a fishing pole, and a handle at the other which keeps it from falling down the drain, for fishing out clogs.

Next on the deep cleaning list is the second fridge, which is a stupid little apartment fridge that frosts up badly; simple, but not in a good way.

Laundry bags and mattresses

Last year, I turned two skirts into laundry bags, by sewing the bottom edges closed.  One was a skirt I didn't like the feel of, and the other just needed to be retired from my wardrobe.  The fabric is strong enough.  One bag has a drawstring and the other has a zipper, which is nice because otherwise it is rather difficult to get the laundry out.

Another project from a couple months ago was to turn a double-sized mattress into a twin size.  It's an inner-spring mattress that's two or more decades old.  The innards turned out to be very similar to the twin box spring I took apart one time; just no wood and less steel, and more padding.  

I cut through the fabric and padding, and used a small screwdriver and pliers to pry off the metal clips holding the springs to the edge, and then wire cutters to cut the spiral wires connecting the springs.

The heavier steel edging was a little harder to deal with.  I didn't want to cut it and then be left with no way to reconnect it.  I came up with a scheme for bending each edge over to the other side--which didn't work because the width I removed from the mattress was greater than the thickness of the mattress, so they stuck out too far.  I let it sit for a few days, and eventually figured out how to take up the extra with additional bends.

Then I started clipping things back together, crimping the clips I had removed back on with pliers.  This went okay for the springs, and less okay with the rings that had to poke through the padding.  They probably have a special tool for that at the factory.

I finished by sewing up the fabric with sturdy buttonhole thread.  The mattress is a spare for now, and is currently on a free-by-the-side-of-the-road metal daybed frame, under another mattress.

I also, roughly a year ago, repaired a seam on my own mattress.  I was thinking about replacing the mattress entirely, until I realized that it would be silly to replace the most popular bed in the house.  I sleep well enough on it.

Back from break

I'm going back onto a semi-regular posting schedule.

Eldest child is doing well.

I finally have No! Children! In! Diapers!!  And they can all buckle themselves in, on their own or with a little help from a sibling.

I also have Multiple! Teenagers!!  I can go for a walk whenever I want, and we can easily go through two gallons of milk in a day.  I didn't have to hire a random stranger to babysit when I had jury duty last year.

I did a lot of stocking up on books, tools, and supplies, which has turned out to be timely, because there is apparently some law of the universe where my family's finances can only flourish under a Democrat administration.  I don't mistake the money economy for the real, real economy, though.

I've also been writing a teenage-level fiction book, which has been a lot of fun. 

Locally

Charges have been dropped against State Police Officer Ryan Londregan, who fatally shot black man Ricky Cobb II, as Cobb was driving away from an arrest while Londregan and another officer were leaning into the car.

I happened to be going into the Government Center for jury duty on a day that Londregan had a hearing, and I saw some of his supporters setting up in the atrium, but I didn't realize what they were there for until later.  There were also counter-protesters angrily shouting slogans like "No justice, no peace!" for a while.  

The atrium you can see in the picture in the article extends up the entire height of the building between the two towers of offices and courtrooms, and the protesting was very audible even on the top floor, which is where the jury office is now.  It used to be in the basement under the street that the building straddles.

I was surprised that protesting was being allowed inside the building.  There is a large paved space outdoors on the north side.

-------------------

Closer to home, it is yard sale/estate sale/spring clean-up season, with two especially interesting finds.  The first is a pair of pliers used by cobblers, which incorporates a small, square hammer head, so leather can be pulled taut and nailed at the same time.  One of the handles is bent, so I'm going to have to figure out how to straighten it.  The other item looks a lot like a golf club, but it has a ridged horizontal metal blade, and is apparently an old-fashioned weed-whacker.  It has been very handy, as we have been getting a lot of rain and the weeds have been growing at high speed.

A timely table

I have been thinking for a long time about replacing our kitchen table with a larger, less decrepit, and more washable one, and I had gotten so far as to reject the idea of building a table, and to save up funds for a new used table, and even to write a time to go shopping for it on the calendar.

Then we all got sick, and there were a lot of church activities and things going on, and around the time we were mostly recovered, my husband called and said his boss had a table he was giving away.

He gave me the measurements over the phone, and it was just the size I was looking for.

After various exertions, he got it home and we got it into the house.  The chairs came with it, but they are definitely oversize for the room and I am mostly using our old chairs with it.  

The table itself is just about as big as will fit there.  When fully opened, the fridge door comes within an inch of the table. I am not above taking my drawknife and shaving some wood off the table legs and the bench I made before, to gain an inch or two. The fridge could be moved back a couple of inches also.  Happily, none of those things are necessary.

Theoretically, we can all squeeze in around it, if enough of the smaller children sit on the bench--which hasn't happened yet.  

Another thing I did recently was to unravel a finger-crocheted chenille scarf that I had been given some years back, and re-crochet it into a little mat for a chair seat.  The colors go well with our living room, and it is good to have the scarf being used more.

I have been somewhat surprised to notice that I have not been doing much crafting at all during this sabbatical.  Just more music, more puzzles, and more reading.  I did get a bunch of mending done as I've been watching movies with the elder children.

At one of the church activities, I was talking with an older couple from another church, and it turns out that they were homeschoolers back in the Eighties, before homeschooling was explicitly allowed by law in Minnesota.  They said they had to keep a low profile, and that friends of theirs were investigated by the state.  Later on, one of the larger homeschool co-ops started up, and they were involved in that.  

Heritage

Child is home from the hospital, much improved.

Inheritance these days is mostly nonlinear/nonlineage.  I made it to an estate sale over the weekend.  Husband reported that their sign said they would be charging half-price in the afternoon.  I got there just as they were changing their sign to "Everything free".  Clearly the old person's children didn't want to deal with it any more than they had to.  Most of what was left at that point was furniture, not of interest to me at this stage, but I found a couple of bags of useful items, a desk lamp that a child needed, and a large wooden drying rack.  

I also found a vintage wooden sewing machine case at a yard sale; no machine, just the case.  I bought it for the hinges that the machine slides onto, to replace one for my great-grandmother's machine that was lost sometime after the last move.

The hinges turned out to not be the right depth for the sewing machine cabinet, but the case was a close enough fit for the sewing machine, and now it will be a lot easier to store it somewhere besides on the library desk.  I think I can make the hinges work for the cabinet later on by putting in a new piece of oak where they meet.

Hard at work

Lots of projects going on around here.  I built a long, rustic bench for kitchen table seating.  I planned it down to the last inch to fit the space and the things I wanted to store under it, then had to root around in the depths of the garage to find all of the wood and hardware that I needed.  The seat is a plank from a waterbed frame.  Several of the other long boards were previously salvaged, attached to stakes, and used as flower bed edging at our old house.  Those needed washing, and were somewhat warped. 

I never did find the box of nails that I was planning to use.  I improvised with bolts and screws that we already had.

I used our drill press to drill some of the bolt holes, and used hand tools for everything else.  There was a pause of about a week with pieces of wood stored under the kitchen table while I thought about how to make a back for the bench.

In the process of building the bench I learned, or re-learned, that I could use nails as easily-removable probes and alignment pins when I was having trouble lining up the pilot holes for screws.

The bench still needs some kind of a finish, particularly on the seat, but I am waiting for warm weather and good ventilation.

--------------------------

I have also been doing a lot of mending of pants' knees, still have two or three more pairs to go.  Some of the pants are lined, so I can't do my usual method of attaching the patch to the leg seams on the inside, and then stitching the ripped area to the patch.

--------------------------

I made a belt for a child, complete with a buckle made from coat hanger wire and some sort of a legged spring that I salvaged at some point.  That involved some work with a metal file, not just rounding off the sharp ends, but also filing a deep groove into the wire as a way of cutting it.  I like file work a lot, and I should find an excuse to do more of it.

After I finished the belt, I picked up a leatherworking book from the library.  It turns out there are specialized punches for cutting the slot for the tongue of the buckle, and for rounding the end of the belt, and for making the other holes.  I used kitchen scissors and knives that I had, along with a nail for an awl, and an old preschool-level workbook as a surface that could be nailed into.  I also used waxed thread instead of rivets.

Setting up

It was time to enlarge the top of the improvised living room table to make it usable for board games.  I spent some time thinking about building out the cable spool end further, got stuck on how to support the new part from underneath considering the structure of the base, and then remembered that we had some boards that were the right length, and I could just build a whole new table top.  Putting the boards together went quickly; I only had to saw the cross pieces.  The surface is partially varnished from before, and I will probably throw a tablecloth over it when company comes over.

A while back I finished hemming a set of cloth diapers I had cut from a flannel sheet.  The sheet is from a set I bought at a garage sale for $3, and I think I got something like 13 or 14 diapers out of it altogether, including using the pillowcase for a cloth diaper as-is.

I also sewed a pillowcase to actually be used as a pillowcase, from fabric in my stash, and used up most of the thread that kept tangling up in my sewing machine.  It got better-behaved toward the end of the spool.

We had several chairs that needed gluing.  Happily, we have bar clamps now.  When I was done, I had leftover glue, and a pile of sticky bits of fabric I had been wiping up glue with, a wooden skewer that I had been spreading the glue with, and a sheet of paper I had been using to catch drips.  I kneaded the fabric in the glue, arranged it slightly on the paper, stuck the skewer into the center, let it dry, and now I have a fake flower that I can stick out in the window box in the spring.  I'm not sure how the glue will do outdoors, but it should be okay for a while.   

There was a story from one of the local news stations recently about a group that was teaching people how to turn milk jugs into mini-greenhouses:  cut horizontally most of the way around the center, punch a few drainage holes in the bottom, put in soil, plant seeds in it, then close it back up.  My husband has done this before.

Mat loom

Never saw one like this before. 

Continuing with the coat

There was a library book I read once by a popular maker of Western shirts, who said that she always made the shirts quite large, and then altered them in the direction of smaller to fit her client.  

It would have helped if I would have remembered that book earlier in this process.  I had to add width in several places, which was time-consuming as the material was too thick for my sewing machine, and each insertion required two long seams.

Now I am in the finishing stages of the coat...zipper, collar, cuffs, bottom edge, and pockets.  It is amazing how much labor and materials go into such a thing.  The outer shell and lining took almost an entire flat bedsheet.

I've been using my homemade leather thimble very heavily, and I thought I should describe it.  It's a strip of medium-weight leather almost one inch wide and long enough to wrap in a band--shiny side in--around my thumb with about an inch of overlap.  Three stitches of dental floss at the exposed end hold the shape.

The overlapped area is the part I use for pushing a needle.  Having the suede side on the outside helps the end of the needle not slip off.  Wearing it on my thumb lets me use my other fingers for steadying the needle even more.

The thimble is one of my essential tools.  I misplaced it at one point, and then had a miserable time trying to use a steel thimble that was among the sewing supplies I picked up on vacation.  Then I took a couple minutes to make a new leather thimble, until I found the original one again.  It needs new dental floss, but it is still usable as long as at least one stitch holds. 

I've also been using one of the mannequins as a handy coat form.  That helped a lot with the layout of the outer and inner layers.  I cut the pieces large, laid them on, and then I could see where I needed to cut and sew them.

Coat in progress

It seemed best to start from the innards, and work outwards.  I've been piecing together two layers of sweaters (acrylic mostly) and one layer of blanket into a thick vest.  Sleeves, collar, outer shell, lining, and zipper to follow.

The coat shape is a simpler, larger version of a shirt.

When re-using sweaters, it is best to stitch along the edges before actually cutting them, so that the knitting doesn't unravel.

The machine sewing is going about as well as usual.  I decided it was time to take a break when the needle fell way down into the machine when I was cleaning lint out of it.  I'm going to have to turn the machine upside down and shake it to get it out.

Laundry soap again, and a dustpan

I made another batch of laundry soap.  This is the second batch since my last post about it, and one batch makes two gallons, so we use about one gallon every two and a half months.  I use normal laundry detergent for cloth diapers and my husband's work clothes. 

Elder Child and I were out looking for a broom and dustpan.  We both prefer metal dustpans, and ended up going in together on a cookie sheet, which I cut in half with tin snips, and smoothed with files and sandpaper.  I was planning to make wooden handles, but the ends of the cookie sheet are handle-like enough.

Cutting the metal with vintage giant-scissors-type tin snips was difficult, and required bending the metal a little to give the snips room to move along, so I had to straighten the cut edges afterward.  I believe modern tin snips make better use of leverage and are easier to use.

I also found out that a needle with the tip broken off can be re-sharpened.  I used the narrow side of a small sharpening stone of medium coarseness.  The needle was leaving little grooves in it, so this is not something I would want to do on the broad face.  

New diaper covers

Recently I retired some of our cloth diaper covers, the last of the ones that we bought for our first baby.  I had been extending them for the last baby, who had outgrown them, by pinning them on with the diapers, but the baby started escaping from them regularly.

To replace the diaper covers, I made several new ones:  two layers of fabric with a layer of plastic enclosed in between. For a pattern, I traced around a secondhand pocket diaper that we use as a diaper cover.  It has no elastic around the leg openings, yet it manages to achieve a decent level of containment.  

For plastic, I used ironed-together chip bags for one, and stole my bulk rice bag sewing machine cover for the other.  The rice is both tougher and more flexible.

The sewing procedure is very similar to making prefold cloth diapers, which for some reason I can't find any decent directions for, so:  take the fabric for one side, sew the innards to it on the "wrong" side, then add the fabric for the other side with the "right sides" together and sew around the edges--but leave a gap so you can turn it right side out, and then once it is turned, sew the gap closed. For diapers, I also topstitch around the edges to keep them from inverting in the wash.

For closures, I experimented with using elastic ponytail holders and large (coat) buttons, sewing on the elastics where the tension would keep the loops secure on the buttons.

In practice, this works fairly well, although it would be better to have two elastics per side, so that the back edge doesn't pivot outward and make a gap around the leg.  The buttons I used are large enough that no additional buttons are needed for this.

----------------------------------

Then I made a new cover for my sewing machine, using a nice fabric remnant that was handed down to me, that was too small for a pillow cover.

----------------------------------

I took some water bottles that were getting in the way, filled them with water and two drops of chlorine bleach each, and put them aside for use in emergencies and outings.

Buying chlorine bleach at the grocery store was annoying.  New versions have been introduced since the last time I bought any, in the Pre-Covidian Era.  Now there are fabric-preservatives and new scents added to most of them.

I also use bleach to turn black cotton clothing into brown cotton clothing, socks in particular.  The key is to use very little bleach in sufficient water, and to rinse thoroughly right afterward.

Mending and melding

I finally took a stab at my mending pile, and was able to adequately repair several items of clothing, one of which required serious darning/re-weaving where a button's stitching had ripped right out.

One of the things I did a while ago, and then forgot about, was to overdye a skirt and shirt in the washer.  The skirt had colors that were too bright, and the shirt was much too pale.  The skirt came out very nicely, and the shirt came out in a dull but tolerable shade.

I did a quick experiment with cutting a milk jug into narrow strips and then crocheting them.  Crochet uses up length very quickly, and it was difficult to cut very much of it because the scissors I was using tended to slide on the plastic.

Then I messed around with ironing the result, in between sheets of kitchen parchment paper. The plastic fused in some places and not in others.

I also tried ironing flat pieces of milk jug together to fuse them, again using parchment paper to protect the iron and working surface.  This worked, but since the plastic shrinks a bit when heated, you can't butt two edges together and expect them to stay there.  It also doesn't come out entirely flat.

At the playground, I found some stringy dead weeds that could probably be made into a rustic basket, if one reliably had their hands free for working.

I counted diapers going into the washer, and indeed as described in The Tightwad Gazette, twenty diapers equals one load of diaper laundry.  Cloth wipes are included in that, and really it is twenty diaperings rather than diapers, because I am putting a newborn-size diaper inside a larger-baby diaper at each diaper change.

And onward

I made a simple cover/sheath for a meat cleaver, from a piece of suede and some waxed thread.  The thread is extra-heavy-duty, and there was no particular need for a strong seam, so I made very large (one inch) stitches, and the sewing went very quickly:  place leather on an old phone book, poke hole with awl, make stitch, repeat.  I used my last glover's needle for the sewing, but an embroidery needle would have worked fine.

I also took up my quilt project from more than a year ago.  The quilt just needed a few more blocks made, and then to be assembled.  The last step is sewing down the edge binding by hand, and that is half done now.

My most-used quilt was waiting for a replacement back, when I looked at the cotton batting that was hanging out of it, and realized that it would need new innards as well.  The top needs more repairs besides the ones I did a few years ago, but it is worth re-using.

I read about a woman making sleeping bags for the homeless from ironed-together chip bags, and old coats, and I thought of doing something similar for making diaper covers for cloth diapers.  Then I found a laminated woven plastic rice bag that I had saved, which is much sturdier than the chip bags I ironed, and I used that instead.  I encased it in fabric in about the right shape, and added snaps. It came out looking good, but it is very much too small in the waist, so I will have to add extensions.  I hang diaper covers up to dry after washing them, so I'm not worried that the plastic might melt in the dryer.

Other things I have used the rice bags for:  wet bags for the diaper bag and for swimming stuff, and a sewing machine cover.

A child and I watched a YouTube video of a guy attempting to make bulletproof armor from milk jugs.  He had a laborious process involving cutting the plastic up with scissors, shredding it in a blender, baking it in a pan in the oven, and taking it out frequently to try to knead it smooth.  Even then, he had air pockets in his block of plastic, and it certainly wasn't bulletproof when he tested it.  From our one experiment here last year, we found that an iron generates sufficient heat to laminate flat pieces of milk jug plastic together, one layer at a time.  That was a small piece, though, and I don't know how hard it would be to keep a larger one flat as it is built up.

Achievement

I finished building another elevated "loft" bed for a child.  This time I took a slower pace and had more assistance from children in sawing, gluing, and assembly. 

For some reason the 2x6 lumber that my husband bought for it earlier this month was of much better quality than the wood for the previous loft in the fall.  I don't exactly know the cost, but it was reasonable enough for a piece of furniture that is needed now and will be used for years and years to come, and possibly recycled into something else after that.

I made some improvements in loft-building workflow this time around.  It is important in my loft design to have accurately-drilled holes, especially where I have to drill into a 2x6 from each side and meet in the middle. I gave up trying to use our heavy-duty electric drills (discarded by an electrical contractor), and set up three hand-powered drills:  small bit in the eggbeater-type drill for a pilot hole, and then medium and large bits in two bit braces.  Tightening the bit braces is a Process, at least for me, that involves using large vise grips around the chuck, with an additional pair of pliers to tighten the vise grips just enough (without cracking the chuck). I try to avoid changing the bits in those.

So I was drilling each hole three times with three different drills, but each one was easy to do, aside from the largest (3/8") bit, which tends to dig in too quickly.  I often had to pull up on the bit brace while drilling downward.

When it was was all finished, I discovered that the box spring I intended to put up there was a few inches too long for it, so I had to dig around in the garage for a different support for the mattress.  The seat frame of our futon couch, which doesn't fit in this house, turned out to be a good size for the little Ikea mattress, which must be about a decade old by now.  On top of that I put a doubled memory foam mattress topper that had been handed down to us.

Preparations

I got my Christmas shopping more or less done, and most of it in one round of going into one store after another right before closing time.  I was blessed to be able to find some good things in the limited time that I had.

Last weekend we had 8+ inches of snow, most of which melted as the thunderstorms came through.  No storm damage here, although there was an unusual and oppressive feeling in the air as the storm approached.

I've done a few little experimental projects, aside from gift-making.  One was to flatten a peach can and play around with shaping the metal.  It was easy to cut with tin snips of the giant-scissors style.

Another was to do a quick little crochet snowflake using string, in the same style as this hanging, where the crochet is colored and stiffened afterward with paint.

I am planning to run some more scraps of fabric through the laminator, and perhaps to do some more woodcarving for gifts.

An embroidery I am working on is proceeding, although I've not put much time into it:  a little scene of a shack in the woods.  It will probably turn out well just because I am too busy to overwork it.

One child has ambitiously planned and made the gingerbread for a gingerbread village.  Another is preparing for a cooperative Christmas craft booth effort with friends next year.