sewing - i miss you!

I have something to tell you all and it's not good.....I haven't sewn since before Christmas. GASP!

I know, I hate it.

I can understand not sewing from January to maybe April, because of the whole moving 3 hours away/buying a house thing. But there really isn't a good reason for not now. I don't have my sewing room set up yet and that's probably why it's not in use. It just wasn't anything that needed to be unpacked and with every bedroom needing updating, I felt silly unpacking everything and then just rotating rooms when one is completed. But now since it's been so long I feel that it just needs to be unpacked or I'll never use it until the house is done, which is expected to be Summer 2025. :)

Since Mike is going to be out of town this weekend, my plan is to take over my newly finished dining room and SEW! I know I could do this any other weekend while he's here, he would have no problem with it at all, but I feel better doing it while he's gone. I won't be making myself proper dinners that need a dining table this weekend, just soup.

I'm going to definitely make myself a new purse. I've needed wanted a new purse since December. I bought some fabric for myself when I bought for Christmas presents and it's still in the box. :(

I just want to get back in my groove so to speak. I have other projects I want to start: Christmas tree skirts, stockings, that dang quilt I've been talking about for 6 months, etc. I also want to try my hand at baby clothes. Since I have my serger now and know how to use it, I want to make presents for people. There are a couple of girls at work that are pregnant and I think it would be cute to make them part of there present. I guess we will just have to wait and see.

chimney work

A couple weeks ago we had our chimney worked on. It was something we knew had to be fixed when we bought the place and it was the main thing the previous owner told us he was going to fix before he sold the house to us. Well, we all know how that story went, the owner did not hold up his end of the deal.

Sadly, I don't have any before shots of the chimney. The workers kind of surprised us with when they would start working on it. They just called Mike one morning and said they finished a job early and asked if they could start on our a week early. Mike said 'of course', and I found out when I came home for lunch one day. But to give you a visual, the top bricks of the chimney weren't connected anymore. They were just laying up there; all the mortar was gone.

So the plan was to remove the bricks down to the roof line and rebuild. They would also grind away the mortar throughout the entire chimney and re-mortar so it all looks uniform.

showing how much they ground out.

bricks removed.

finished!

It took about a week, and was pretty painless for us (except in the checkbook!). We really like how it turned out. It was a little nerve racking doing our first expensive thing to the house, but I'm sure the next ones with will be easier. :)

dining room

before....

after!

before....

after!

before....

after!

Here is the dining room all painted! I'm so glad we decided to tint the blue a little darker. I would not of been completely happy with the lighter blue that was the first coat of paint.

I seriously can't believe the change. That mustard/mcdonalds yellow was so bad. And let's not forget the fruit wallpaper border with clashing floral curtains. :)

The only thing left to do is refinish the floors and add shoe molding to the bottom of the baseboard. Well, and of course decorate! I told Mike last night that it's time to start shopping for some art/pictures and things to go in the built ins. He hates nic-nacs, so this is definitely going to be a challenge to find things that we both like. I don't want to fill them to the brim with crap, but I don't want them to look bare and empty.

what i'm doing today

The only thing I told myself I have to accomplish today is painting the second and final dining room built in.

So I'm making it look like this......

and I started with that.

The thing that keeps me going is knowing the next step is decorating! I can't wait. :)

question: where are you going on vacation?

answer: weddings.....

Since I started my new job at the bank after the new year, I was only given 5 vacation days for the year. I wouldn't have been a big deal, but we have 4 weddings this summer/fall....all in Indiana, which is now 6.5 hours away. So all my days off are being used for the Fridays before the weddings. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE weddings, it's just I don't really love using all my vacation on them. :) Our first one is in a couple weeks, but where it gets tricky is September; we have a wedding and then a reception in Indiana, then a reception in Missouri, and some where we HAVE to fit in our anniversary.

We had a chance to go to Michigan for Thanksgiving to see family. I used to always go there as a child/teen, but we haven't been in 6 years. So, I changed all my Fridays before weddings to half days, and we get to go! I'm really excited to take Mike where I celebrated as a kid. I guess my real "vacation" is going to be this Michigan trip. My great Aunt and Uncle we are visiting have lived in this old haunted Victorian home (yes, I said haunted) and they are going to retire next year and sell the place, so this is the last Thanksgiving there. It will be sad, but I'm glad to go one last time to really soak it all up.

As a kid, we had a vacation every year. It wasn't always a big one, but my Dad work's somewhere where there is a 2 week shutdown in July, so we always had time for one. I love vacations and really miss having one since being out on my own and now married . I know I was spoiled with this...Mike is doomed. :)