Life in the New World

This week included new doggie friends. 

We were invited into the small dog section of the dog park at Ponderosa Park, which will be only a few minutes' walk from our new home. It's nice we can visit the small-dog section if there are people there, but we can also join the big dogs int he other section. Dusty needs lots of play time. We found some big dogs to play with on Saturday, when we walked to the dog park for the first time, rather than to go by car.

The pups have a appointment on Thursday to meet their new groomer and get new haircuts. They are starting to look a little scruffy and maybe not so clean anymore. DBIL is very tolerant of having them on the bed.

Our house inspection was on Thursday. No new roof needed, and the structure is sound, but not much has been done to the house since it was built, other than small cosmetic items. I guess we have a house. New to our list of needed items: two new windows, as one of a pair of matching windows won't close, and both were crank-type windows, not quick to open in an emergency. The fireplace and garbage disposal were not working, but the seller lit the pilot light on the fireplace and got the garbage disposal to work, so I think those things are good. We have a new garbage disposal in our shipment anyway, one we never installed in the old place. My 1982 Maytag washer and dryer will be in our shipment, and we will need to install gas in the laundry room, which is upstairs, a good location but more expensive to reach with the gas line. I don't mind having stairs, but I don't like carrying a big laundry basket down the stairs at my age. Having the laundry upstairs will make a laundry chute (like that in our old house) unneeded.

Here's a look at my new "fiber studio" with all the furniture removed. If it looks a lot smaller in this photo, it's because I don't have a fancy wide-angle lens, like the real estate photographer.

The alcove is 6' wide X 5' deep. I think my sewing center will go there. The loom will have to fit into the large open area, which is about 11' X 10'. There should be plenty of wall space for fabric and yarn storage units.

Here's the "spacious" closet.

I'm visualizing shelves in there. We'll see.

We checked our voter registration online, and we are registered to vote. We are scheduled to receive ballots at our current location. Our new home will be in the same precinct, but we can change our voter information up until 8:00 PM on election day, so I think we're good.

This week's story introduces Mariah. You can read it here. My favorite photo from the story is where they all realize that their right hands are all the same, with two fingers stuck together.

I made a bit of progress on the Spring Flowers quilt. There is only one half-star to quilt, plus the background in the upper two corners, across the top (in this photo) and partway down each side, so not too much.

I was surprised to see the Coastal Skies Shawl much bigger.

It seems as if the yarn has hardly gone down at all. I have to sit on one of the dining room chairs to knit or quilt, because all of the furniture here is so huge. Maybe that's what inspired this week's story, where Mariah tours the house and finds everything so big.

What's on my needles: A few rows on the Kisu Cardigan, a couple of rows on the Coastal Skies Shawl.

What's on my Sparrow 15: Still sitting in our bedroom at DBIL's house. I think the next time I use it will be on the steeks for the Kisu Cardigan.

What's in my hoop: Still the Spring Flowers quilt, actually made some progress this week.

What's in The Doll's Storybook: Welcoming the Newcomer, the first episode with Mariah. I'm scheduled through October 5th, the deadline for closing on our new home. 

What's on my iPad/iPhone: The Innkeeper of Ivy Hill by Julie Klassen. I've made some progress with the story.

What's in my wine glass: Lindeman's Cawarra Shiraz Cabernet 2017. Surprisingly good for a big bottle of fairly inexpensive wine.

What's my tip of the week: Good lighting is important throughout your home for safety and to make tasks easier to do properly. LED light bulbs are a little more expensive, but they use much less electricity and provide a lot more light than normal incandescent light bulbs. A Wikipedia article says "The luminous efficacy of a typical incandescent bulb is 16 lumens per watt, compared with 60 lm/W for a compact fluorescent bulb or 150 lm/W for some white LED lamps."

Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals or dolls were harmed during the production of this blog post.

Dolls on the Runway

You may remember that someone from Therapy Animals of Utah saw the clothes for the Habitat dolls on Facebook and asked me to dress a doll for their silent auction, too.

Zoey came to live with me until I finish making her some clothes. I'm using some of the outfits I had already made, but I had to make her some PJs. I thought the paw print fabric was appropriate for Therapy Animals of Utah. I tried a few things I had already made on her to see what she could take with her.

I thought she could use this dress, because it goes with the shoes she arrived in. (She will also receive some boots for rain and winter, a pair of sneakers and some dress shoes that go with everything, probably black.)

The Gracie Cardigan in "Cyan" looks good on her and goes with the dress, too. 

Then there was this outfit, a little too low-cut for her crepey neck caused by her cuddly cloth body, but with her blue T-shirt, it looks OK. (The sneakers are borrowed until she gets her own.)

The fabrics were discontinued samples from a fabric distributor. Some of them were very small pieces, but they did work well together and are good for doll clothes. Zoey still needs a coat or jacket, but I have until the end of October.

Sometimes you need very little, as for this T-shirt I made for Mandy out of the scraps left over from Zoey's PJs. The pattern for the T-shirt is a free one from Pixie Faire. (It's always free, not a "Freebie Friday" pattern.)

The leggings were made from girls' XL leggings, cut and pieced according to the patten from Lilli & Fleur Couture, the new pattern company I'm test-sewing for. I made another pair of leggings and another T-shirt, this time using the hem at the bottom of the leggings legs (to coin a phrase) for the hem at the bottom of the T-shirt. I have a couple more pairs cut out and ready to piece.

I discovered I could make a tank top by leaving off the sleeves and making the shirt a little shorter.

The pants are improvised to go with the pajama top pattern I used for Zoey, but altered to fit Mandy. The pattern alterations still need some work, but here she is, at least able to sleep in PJs.

The group of Lilli & Fleur test-sewers (as in people who sew, not as in the drains removing the waste water from your house) received the fourth and final pattern to make before the company goes public. It's a sun dress. The pattern can also be used to make a crop top and skirt. We all started on the dress. Here's mine.

If you look closely, you can see that there are pockets in the skirt. Here's a look at the back.

It's a lot of fun, getting patterns for free ahead of everyone else. Mandy needs a sweater. It will start getting cold here soon. When can I knit? I'm always sewing.

One reason I'm sewing is on Saturday I picked up all the quilt blocks from people who donated blocks for Habitat for Humanity's silent auction at the Overall Ball here in Park City later this month. (In last week's blog post I showed the block I made and the one I had already received.) I offered to put them together with sashing and borders. Here are the blocks with the sashing.

I got a discount on the fabric for the sashing and border fabrics from Davidene's Quilt Shop, and she will print the label for me. A good friend donated fabric for the backing. In this photo, the upper fabric is for the borders and the lower fabric is for the backing. (Both fabrics have a grey background, unlike the colors in the photo.)

The person who donated the backing has offered to do the hand work on the binding. A machine-quilter is donating the batting and the quilting, and will sew on the binding. 

Habitat for Humanity also helps tear down and rebuild after storm damage. It's likely they will be helping in Houston in the wake of Hurricane Harvey.

Our Rocky celebrated his 13th birthday with us last week. It was on Thursday. We went for a hike in the Run-A-Muk Dog Park, which is part of Basin Recreation's series of trails and dog parks.

We were happy to see that water in the spring-fed stream was still available. It always tastes so much better than the bland water from our canteens.

We're so happy Rocky remains in good health and enjoys life.

What's on my needles: Still the Gracie Cardigan in “Cotton Candy” for Vroni. Very close to done.

What's on my Featherweight: Still clothes for the Therapy Animals of Utah doll and still more test-sewing for Lilli & Fleur Couture.

What's on my loom: Still waiting.

What's on my wheel: Stanzi is now awaiting her next task. 

What's on my iPad/iPhone: Finished listening to Why Shoot a Butler, a mystery by Georgette Heyer. Then listened to The Christmas Quilt by Jennifer Chiaverini. Now listening to Emma by Alexander McCall Smith, being a modern-day retelling of Jane Austen’s classic novel. On the Kindle app, I'm reading All She Loves by Amy Corwin. The author gives them to me for free, and I tell her where the typos, grammar errors, etc., are for the next edition. When I find one in bed late at night, I take a screen shot, then the next day, I reread the page, if I need to, and add an arrow to the photo to send to her when I'm through.

What's in my wine glass: Crane Lake Malbec. I could say, "Same old, same old," but it's still good.

What's my tip of the week: If you prewash your fabrics before sewing, you often find your clean, dry fabric tangled in a nest of threads when you’re finished. If you clip the four corners off each piece of fabric before you put it into the washer, it will minimize the raveling. I line up all four corners together and cut them off all at once. (Usually, your fabric is a square or a rectangle.)

Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals were harmed during the production of this blog post.

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