Day 7 - Vintage Sewing

Will you make me an apron?

It was a strange request coming from our hard-working daughter. Not the one to wear an apron or be much concerned about housekeeping or baking or cooking, she isn't the apron-wearing type. But she, like so many other people in American, has been laid off due to COVID-19. (Kudos to Kohl's for paying their employees two weeks' worth of pay.) To keep herself occupied during her empty days she's decided to focus on her home. (Kudos to her as well.)

That's where I come in. Any time an item of clothing needs repairing she calls on me. Need a wallhanging or pillow covering or appliance cover or quilt or something she saw on Pinterest? I'm on it. While I've gotten rid of so many patterns (not even close to what I had here!) I did find I still had a few apron patterns in my collection. After several back and forth texts and me sending pictures of the patterns and different fabric choices, she settled on one.

A vintage one. Like 1950's old. A falling apart, barely held together old pattern. Boy, following the directions in an old pattern is hard! It didn't help that I needed to add additional fabric to make up for the difference in female figures between then and now. And not surprisingly, kiddo requested the pockets be big enough to hold her cell phone. So an adjustment here and an adjustment there and just like that, she has a brand new apron.

She came by this afternoon to pick it up. We wrapped up in blankets, sitting under the carport while maintaining our 6 foot social distancing separation, as the wind blew and snow spit from the sky. Brrr, it was cold! We visited just as long as we could. Long enough to hear all her stories she's been holding onto since the last time we saw her. Long enough to even hear the story behind why she wanted an apron. During her time off from work she's being a tradwife. But without the submissive part. Huh? Tradwife? “Trad" as in traditional. This old lady had never heard of it before. It sounded like it's basically a stay at home wife. Rebranded by Milennials. Go figure.

I learn something new every day, and so glad she could explain it to me in person today. Because just a few minutes ago, Idaho has become the latest state to issue stay at home orders, whether sick or not. 21 days. Starting...now.

So thankful for being able to see our daughter when we did.

Make an Easter Egg Fabric Hotpad -Tutorial Tuesday

For today's Tutorial Tuesday I'm up with another Easter-themed project. It's somewhat similar to these Easter Egg Scrap Fabric Coasters I made earlier this month. While this hotpad uses a bit more fabric it goes together just as lickety-split fast.

For this project you will need:

• 4" x 8.5" cotton fabric for middle, cut 1
• 2.5" x 8.5" cotton fabric for top and bottom, cut 2
• 1.5" x 8.5" contrasting cotton fabric for stripes, cut 2
• 8.5" long piece of rick rack, cut 2 Caution...rick rack has polyester - it'll melt under high heat
• 8.5" x 10" piece of backing fabric, cotton
• 8.5" x 10" piece of cotton batting
• 8.5" x 10" piece of Insul-Bright
• Egg template downloaded from here
• Pins or Clover Wonder Clips
• Iron
• Sewing machine
• Matching thread
• Rotary cutter
• Cutting ruler
• Cutting mat

Disclosure: Deb's Days is a participant in affiliate advertising programs designed to provide a means for me to earn fees by linking to affiliated sites. This means that, at no additional cost to you, I will earn a small commission if you click through and make a purchase. Your purchase helps support my work in bringing you new sewing and crafting content.

Looking for something else? 

Check out some of my other Easter sewing and crafting projects!

Ready for the directions? You can find the step-by-step how to tutorial for the Easter Egg Hot Pad sewing project right here:

Day 5 - What a Weird Day

Just as we always have toilet paper and paper towels on hand, we usually keep a well-stocked pantry. Rain or shine, summer or winter, we have plenty of food in our cabinets. We like being prepared for Idaho winters so we do our big pantry stock-up before winter and then do another after winter when our cabinets are again bare. With winter over it was time to stock up again.

Maybe it was a mistake in times like these.

Other than my disposable cup run the other day, we haven't been to the grocery store in a couple weeks. Yeah, I've read things about grocery stores on the Internet and have heard unpleasant stories from our daughter about what life is like in the stores now. Guess it had to be another one of those you have to see it to believe it things.

Our open 24 hours a day bag your own groceries store Winco, where we usually shop, didn't look like it did just two short weeks ago. Barriers at the door preventing more than a couple people through the door at a time. Someone counting how many customers were heading in. We didn't even have to ask why she was counting - the big huge sign outside told us no more than 200 customers could be in the store at a time.

Then even more signs once we got inside the second set of doors. So many it was a bit overwhelming.

Signs for new store hours and senior and vulnerable populations special hours. Social distancing reminders. Limits on purchases. A no-return policy for certain items. Another only 200 in the store notice. Notices about what they didn't have in stock. (We went first thing in the morning so the "out of the following" sign hadn't been updated for Monday.) The additional large bold sign about sanitizer tells me it must be an ongoing issue.

Once inside we saw those empty shelves we've been hearing about. Thankfully the type of things we were buying were plentiful. Fresh and frozen fruits and vegetables. Canned goods - beans and tomatoes and chicken and tuna. Pastrami and turkey breast and bacon. Greek yogurt and Special K and Stevia. And mayonnaise.

I hate mayonnaise. Like really hate it. Can't stand the look of it, the texture of it, and especially can't stand the smell. But Ed uses it as a base to make his salad dressing so we had to pick some up. Twice. Sort of. Once when I put it into the cart and the second time from the floor at the checkstand. As I was bagging the mayo it slipped onto the floor and busted. Splattered everywhere. Across the floor, up the side of the checkstand. And up and down my pants. Did I mention I can't stand mayonnaise?

Between the mayonnaise incident, the weird out-of-the-ordinary grocery store experience, and the plumber who paid us a visit to fix our shower (with a $1,600+ estimate), today was just downright weird.

Tomorrow will be Tutorial Tuesday so it just has to be a better day than today.

Day 4 - Sewing Room Sunday

I used to spend my Sundays - and lots of other days - doing sewing projects for charity. 203 different days worth, at least according to my blog. Just like anything else you do to the extreme, a break is sometimes needed. I've been on break since last August so I guess I should get back at it, but I'm dragging my feet.

I read these stories about the virus and soft surfaces. The virus and cash. All the unknowns about how it is spread and how long it lasts on surfaces has been keeping me from moving forward. I even stopped the Encouraging Words Project this month. While I still believe wholeheartedly in the project I don't want anyone to be worried about picking up germs from me. Or from anyone else who may touched something after I left it.

So now I have:
no sewing projects for others on my to do list.
no Encouraging Word money pockets to print and stuff with money.
lost 90% of my income for the next six months.
too much negativity to read on the Internet.
no kitties to foster because Simply Cats is closed.

Which makes it a great day to change up the sewing room to give me a better chance of compartmentalizing my work/home life. This past year I had things set where I had both the computer and sewing machine within easy reach of each other. A quick swivel of my chair and I was onto the computer. With the computer always being on and very close by I found myself on it more than I needed to be. Doing too much travel agent work and wasting too much time reading junk on the computer.

But that is changing today with a new sewing room set up. Now if I want to get to the computer I have to physically get up, walk around my cutting table, and sit down in a separate part of the room. I'm hoping I'll just decide to stay put at the sewing machine instead of making my way to the computer.

Fingers crossed for more sewing!

Day 3 - A Pizza Picnic

I may have mentioned this before, but when we're home we are in money-saving mode. No dinners out, no takeout, no cable TV, no going to the movies. We very rarely ever purchase anything new. All the fun stuff is saved for when we cruise. Things like eating out every day. Watching movies out by the pool and on the on-demand TV system. Heck, we even spend money on food and drinks in port. But not at home.

Which made today even more special. With no trips in the immediate future we actually spent money for a change. (A whole $12, including tip!) On a beautiful, sunny, still-a-little-chilly day we had a picnic in the backyard. Everything is still put away for winter but Ed scrounged some things out of the shed.

• A small metal table.
• A couple camp chairs.
• Add in a couple paper plates.
• Throw in a 50% off pizza delivered by Domino's. 

All set up in the grass that's now beginning to look more summer green than winter brown.

Such a nice out of the ordinary treat on a Saturday afternoon. How lucky am I to get to do something new at home?