Another Home Update

This one is probably even less interesting to anyone else, but I have to brag a little and I don't think I've done it yet.

Our little house is on the lot backwards, so instead of walking into the living room, guests have no choice but to enter at our laundry room. This is not ideal, but it's nothing we're able to control right now.

Initially, the laundry room was two side-by-side machines and a single open shelf -- which collected a bunch of our stuff, but was disorganized, ugly, and just a mess to welcome people.

Before:

Ugh. I do not miss that look.

For a few months, we lived with a temporary fix that in retrospect wasn't too much better...

Yeah. We just covered it with a curtain. Okay, it was a little less messy to walk into... but it still wasn't good.

After a few months of hunting, we finally turned up some stacking machines in our price range (thank you craigslist) and did a machine swap. This gave us basically half the laundry room for machines, and half for a new storage cabinet.

After/Now:

My amazing father built this storage unit from one of my rough sketches and it is perfect. The three upper cabinets each are just large enough for a laundry bin (one for baby stuff, one for towels, one for our clothes), with room to store things on one side as well as behind the baskets. There table portion you can see just at the bottom of the picture is on glides and actually rolls back into the cabinet when we're not using it for folding or stain treating. Under that is a big cubby that holds the litter box and a trash can.

(True, entering the house to a litter box isn't the nicest feeling either -- but this means we were able to get a dining table, so for us the trade off is worth it. It also means we clean it more regularly, which I'm sure the cat is appreciating too.)

I'm in love with the storage unit -- and I'm managing to fold the laundry directly from the dryer, so no more massive piles of clean laundry just waiting for attention. This has been a complete change in how we do laundry, but it is such an improvement. Thanks Dad!

Later
Having lived with this a few more months, I'm even more in love with it. The clean laundry isn't getting folded quite as quickly as it should be, but this still keeps us organized, and gives a central place for keeping clean spit rags and swaddle blankets for the babe. The curtain is still balled up at the top of the shelves -- only because I haven't had the time to take it away. There is just enough room between the machines and the shelving unit to store our air drying rack -- on the rare times when we put it away; these days it spends most of the time outside drying diapers! 

I thought I was making the laundry room better for the sake of our entryway looking better, but now that I'm doing 2+ loads of laundry a day, I realize that I did it for me. Fortunately, it worked out for both looks and functionality. Woohoo! 

Wonky Star Compilation -- Celebration

I thought I had shared these a couple weeks ago... but I don't see them now. No surprise -- these days I don't know if I'm going or coming or somewhere in between. I can hardly keep track of myself, much less anything I'm supposed to be doing.

After way too much time, the Wonky Star quilt my local group made blocks for is quilted and washed and ready to be given away in November.

Everyone in the group contributed at least one wonky star block to the top -- with some people stopping at one and others contributing several. It's a lot of fun to look at the variety of degrees of 'wonk' -- and the variety of fabrics -- and try to guess who made which star.

I took on the process of puzzling it all into one quilt, as well as quilting and binding. Those two steps got a bit of a short-shift, since my free time took a big cut recently -- but the end result still looks good to me.

The quilted lines are a challenge to see, but I chose to go with 'random' lines across the body of the quilt, and rather than using a stark/contrasting white thread, I chose a red/blue/green/yellow thread for both the top and bottom of the quilt. The result is nice, but actually more subtle than I'd intended.

I had planned to do a thicker binding, but I fell into the familiar pattern and wound up with the same width I always use (a 2.25 piece folded in half) -- something I only noticed when I had already ironed it and attached it to half the quilt. So, although it wasn't quite as intended (and as usual, my ability to 'catch' the binding the second time around wasn't good), life is too busy to undo it now.

We've come a long way since October/November 2014 -- from a stack of blue fabric and a bunch of scraps, to this beautiful quilt:

It was a blast to see come together, and like I said, I love seeing all the different stars and different personalities working together in one gorgeous quilt.

This one took longer than any of our previous quilts -- mostly because it was waiting on me to get things done! -- but I can't wait to see what we come up with this year. The first couple business meetings are out of the way and we'll be getting back to sewing and quilting in October.

Progress

Wonky Star Compilation Quilt -- CQG

Recent Progress: bound
Now: in the washing machine

Our Bedroom Quilts (take 2)

Recent Progress: Top 1 is finished, Top 2 is finished
Yet to do: Make 1 back, baste, quilt, bind,

Scrappy X Plus Blocks / Quilt

Recent Progress:
Yet to Do: baste, quilt, bind, wash

Half-Square Triangle Quilts (Saturated/Black and Muted/Brown)

Recent Progress:
Yet to do: Cut solids (half done), piece tops, make backs, baste, quilt, bind, wash


Embraceable Quilt

Recent Progress:
Yet to Do: bind, wash, give away

Black and White and Panda All Over Quilt (for Baby)

Recent Progress: basted
Yet to Do: quilt, bind, wash

Waiting to Start:

• Selfish sewing project

August Goals & Wrap Up

August Goals & Wrap Up

Continue surviving. -- Obviously accomplished. Some days are much easier than others, but we are all still here, and managing to eat and shower (most days) so I think that's about as much as I can hope for right now. 

Hopefully:

• make some progress on quilting the Wonky Stars quilt for CQG -- I'm cutting the binding as soon as I'm finished here, and hope to get it attached tonight. 
• make progress on the new mini quilt -- I managed 3 more pieces. If I can print off the pattern, I'll take this as my project for Thursday's quilt group. If not, I have another plan in mind. 
• start cooking meals (at least 1 meal a day) -- Hahaha. No. Partly because it is hot. Partly because the moment I start something un-stopable (like a work phone call) is the moment baby transfers from sleeping to screaming. 

Pack a couple lunches for Greg on long work days
2+ doctor's appointments -- One accomplished, but not the one I intended to have. Hurrah for (what the clinic tells me is) De Quervain's tensoynovitis. 2 weeks of thumb brace. So far, I'm doing a bad job at keeping it on, but there are just some things that are more important and can't be accomlished with it on. Yuck. So, still need to make and attend 2 more appointments. I'd better hurry up and get those on the calendar. 

Also managed to read 1 book (a reread from earlier this year), and am close to finishing 2 more. 

In less exciting news, we also took baby out of state for the first time, attended 2 family reunions and a funeral (thus the out of state trip), and are full time cloth diapering. 

I hope that as we get more used to being parents and baby gets more used to being here, we'll be able to find some kind of schedule and I'll be able to do more than just take care of baby and self -- but I think that's probably another month or so away from being more than a fond hope. Still, I'm doing better with sleeping (or not sleeping) than I was last month, so I'm optimistic for the future. 

July Wrap Up

Let's see... I know my goal was more or less to survive, but I did accomplish a little.

Except apparently I didn't hit 'publish' on this last time I was logged in -- about a month ago! Whoops! 

July Reading List:

• "Ella Enchanted" Gail Carson Levine
• "BeastKeeper" Cat Hellisen
• "Beneath a Marble Sky" John Shors
• "The Sin Eater's Daughter" Melinda Salisbury
• "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" J.K. Rowling 

Basted the panda quilt 

Started on a mini-quilt -- but haven't finished (more on this later, I hope)

Baked a blueberry upside down cake

Cleaned my house (except the 2 bathrooms)

Got back into some pre-pregnancy pants

At this point in my life, accomplishing a load of laundry each day is about as much as I manage, but I am not only surviving, but managing laundry and a few other things -- so I'll call that pretty good!