Preparing For Three Weeks Away

I leave tomorrow for Spokane for a three week stay.  My newest grandchild is due any day and I'm going to be there to help in any way I can.  I'll be taking care of Riley (now 15 months old),  cooking, cleaning,  fixing up a new nursery, and anything else that I can do.   I also found out today that Brandon is getting his wisdom teeth pulled next week and thought it would be a good time because as he told Diana, "My mom will be here to take care of me".   I'm looking forward to it all.  The hardest part for me is being away from my own home for that long.  I love to be in my home.  I have a feeling, though, that after three weeks with my son and his family it will feel like home there.  My Bob will come out to us on September 11 and then we'll fly back together on the 15th.

Tomorrow we actually just drive to Pittsburgh to the airport.  We live 2-1/2 hours from the airport and since I leave at 8:00 a.m. on Thursday, Bob and I like to go down the night before to have a nice dinner and a good sleep at the Holiday Inn.  It also will break up the drive for Bob, instead of five hours in one day.

I've been very busy getting ready to leave.  As with any trip no matter how far or how long, I have to clean my house before I leave.  Being gone for this long, there is no way it is going to stay clean until I get back, but I have to leave it as best I can.

Last weekend, my older son, Austin, and his two dogs spent the weekend with us.  His wife and three children were in New York visiting her family, so it was very nice to spend some time with Austin without the interruption and distraction of the kids. 

Isn't he cute?  It's been a long time since we've spent time with just him.  I so enjoyed it!

Next weekend, Bob is going to Cincinnati to pick up his 23 year old nephew to stay with us for a month or so.  He needs some big time help and guidance in making a decent life for himself.  His home life has not been great and I give him credit for at least realizing there is a better life for him out there.  Bob is going to try to help him get into the military, but we'll see what happens with that.  The selfish me is not looking forward to raising a 23 year old for an indefinite period of time.  The caring and nurturing me really wants to show him what a good home and life and job can be like. 

So, I needed to clean the guest room for Kyle, not that he'll know the difference, but I will.  Of course, I'm laundering every sheet, towel and piece of clothing in the house.  I have two more shirts of Bob's to iron so he has at least a couple of weeks without having to launder or iron his own.

Yesterday we had new carpeting installed in our bedroom.  It looks so nice, but that sure makes a lot of work.  While all the furniture was still out of the room, I gave it a good cleaning from top to bottom.  Then I did a slight re-arrange and junk clean up.  Very slight, but enough so that it feels like a brand new room.  We also got a new bench for the foot of the bed.  I've been looking for a bench for quite a while and we found this one in a small furniture store on sale last week.   This is it with my suitcase on top as I have been packing all day today.

I'm only taking one carry on suitcase and a carry on duffel bag.  I don't need to take anything other than T-shirts, shorts, some sweats and a pair of jeans.  If I need anything else I'll get it there.  Now I just need to throw in about three different colors of flip flops and I'm ready to go.

I finally finished sewing the second curtain for Riley's bedroom.  I'm ironing it right now.

This matches the first curtain and the quilt I made for her nursery. 

Then about three days ago, I decided I needed a bag/tote/purse that would be easier and more convenient for traveling.  I wanted a cross-over bag with lots of pockets that would work double duty as a purse and would also hold a small knitting project and a book.  I knew exactly what I wanted and how I wanted it to look, so I dug through my stash of fabrics and found an old pattern that I altered to my specifications and Voila!, here's my new  bag.

Perfect!  Don't you just love my artistic manequin?  My artistic son, Austin, gave it to me.  It's come in very handy in taking pictures of scarves, neckwarmers, etc. for my Etsy shop.

Here's a closer-up of the bag.

It has four pockets on the outside with velcro closures, and four pockets on the inside.  Then, of course, I had to embellish with lace, buttons, ribbon and charms.

This is the cell phone pocket. 

OK, my break is over and I need to finish my ironing and packing.  I'll be three weeks away from my computer and the break from high level communication probably isn't such a bad thing.  I did get a new cell phone, though, that I can e-mail and facebook from if I can figure it out! 

I'll be back in about three weeks with plenty new baby pictures!

Not Yet

I'm getting there, slowly.  I  have a lot to tell and a lot of pictures to show, but I'm just not up to it yet.  House is pretty much back in order, but I'm still wanting to get a little more caught up on our business bookkeeping and the ironing of My Bob's shirts is wayy behind. 
The last two days have been wonderful.  Bob has been out on the road so it's been calm and quiet.  Got my groceries a day early and it was hair cut day.  I always love hair cut day because someone pampers me for an hour.  Now it's 5:00 and I can't believe how tired I've been getting so early.  I feel like I could lay down and go to sleep.  That's very unusual for me, especially this early.  Besides the need to rest, I'm feeling good. Happy and content.  I just don't feel like writing any more than this right now.
Diana and Riley are coming to visit tomorrow, one last visit before they return to Spokane.  This means there will be more pictures of beautiful Riley and I'm asking for forgiveness ahead of time because I will be showing them all!
Now I'm going to take an early shower to get this humid stickinesss and little hairs off of me, getting jammies on, sitting to knit another baby hat, and watch So You Think You Can Dance and America's Got Talent. 
(Oh how I hope Bob isn't hungry when he gets home!!)

Things I Need To Do vs. Things I Want To Do.

I'm struggling right now between things I need to and have to do versus things I like to and want to do.  They are not usually one and the same.  Part of the frustration is coming from being so distracted by other life events over the past month that I've gotten behind in all my normal activities under both headings that I'm maybe trying to catch up in everything all at once. 
Under the heading of Things I Like To Do, this is what I've accomplished this week:

I took pictures of a really cute hat I finished knitting while riding in the car and sitting around at  hospitals.  It's knit from sheared mink that was woven into yarn. No minks were killed in making this hat!

No makeup on this day.                                                  

Also took picture of the red tweed fingerless gloves I knit, again while sitting in hospitals, to match the red tweed hat I made.

I've also been working on a set of three mini quilted pillows for  Spring to put in my Etsy shop.

I have two of them listed on Etsy and I hope to get the third one up today.  If you would like to see my shop, please go to:  http://charmingbynina.etsy.com/

That's another thing I've been working on this week:  Getting my Etsy shop organized and some expired listings re-listed and advertising again. 

Last night and this morning I worked on a fun project of exchanging our Florida time share for a time share resort in St. Thomas for the week of December 4-12 of this year.  The daughter of very good friends of ours is getting married there and we have been invited to the wedding.  We are looking forward to this fun event and vacation.  This is where we'll be going.

This will look and feel really good by December.

I also really enjoy working out on my deck and in my yard and gardens.  It's bothering me right now because the snow is gone and the sun is out quite a bit, but everything looks so bare and dirty.  I need to get out there and trim, cut, clean, etc.  This is all on my calendar for the month of April.

Now under the heading of "Things I Don't Mind " is cleaning the house, laundry, ironing, grocery shopping, and cooking.  I'm caught up on all of this except for the ironing.  The only thing I really iron are My Bob's dress shirts.  Every one of them is washed and hanging up, ready to iron.   I really have to get to this.

I Need To:  Get the taxes done, catch up on bookkeeping for My  Bob's financial planning business, set up a new web site for My Bob,  get mailers out for My Bob, well, you get the picture. 

Now that I put it all in writing I sound pretty selfish, don't I?  As Bob says to me, "which of these 'things to do' makes us the money so that you can knit, sew, Etsy, and go on vacations?"  I know, I know.  I'll get to it.

Oh - BTW, I really LOVE blogging about it all!

Now My Washing Machine Died

The funeral for Grandma on Saturday went well, for being a funeral.  Many out of town family members came into town for the weekend, which was so nice to see.  By Sunday at noon all the family had left to return home.  At 2:00 in the afternoon My Bob left for Pittsburgh airport to then fly to Orlando for a two day business meeting.  I was alone, it was quiet, and I thought I would spend the next two and a half days just resting, cleaning and doing laundry from the family guests, and then knitting and sewing.  Well, that was wishful thinking.
Sunday night actually was very nice, relaxing and quiet.  I was just so tired that I knit for a little while and then went to bed by 10:00, which is about two hours earlier than normal for me.  Monday morning I woke up with the intent on going with Mom and Dad to the cemetary to witness the burial of Grandma.  I threw a load of sheets into the washer and as I was getting some mail together to take with me to the post office I heard a loud screech from the laundry closet, then I smelled smoke.  As I walked toward the laundry I saw smoke.  I immediately called the appliance store where we purchase almost all our appliances and they said they would be out sometime during the day.  So I didn't go to the cemetary and I waited until they showed up around noon.  The diagnosis: the clutch had locked up and you can't just replace the clutch since it's enclosed in the transmission, so they would need to order a new transmission and then take the washing machine into the shop, take it apart, replace the transmission and put it back together.  How long was that going to take and how much was that going to cost?  In the meantime I wrung out the wet sheets as best I could and threw them in the dryer.  The pile of more sheets and towels sat there to my disgust. 
This morning my handy dandy appliance man called to tell me the cost to repair would be a little over $300 and he could have me a brand new washer by this afternoon for $450.  So that's what I went with. 
Then my DIL called and she was coming into town for an appointment.  I told her over the weekend that the next time she came to town, or I went to her house, we would make a trip to JoAnn Fabrics to pick out the fabrics for a new baby quilt for Leanna, due in July.  We agreed to meet at 11:00 so that I could be back home by noon so I wouldn't miss the delivery of my new washing machine after noon.  The colors of her nursery are pink and chocolate with teddy bears,  so this is what we chose.

Won't this be cute?  The pink puffy flannel on top will be the back.

As I waited for my new washing machine to show up, I was cheered up some more by the UPS truck dropping off a package for me.  It was my Pajama Jeans that I had heard about and ordered on line a month ago.  I was so excited.  I unwrapped the package and read the attached tag that said, "Wash in cold water before wearing because of the dark blue dye."  You really realize how much you need a washing machine when you don't have one.  I tried them on anyway and instantly fell in love.  They look like blue jeans, but feel like sweat pants.  Exactly what I have been searching for!   They fit and feel so good. 

I took my own picture so it took several takes to get this.  Love Them!

Finally, the big present for the day, my washing machine arrived.  It's just a nice, but very basic white one.  I only have a small space so I can't get anything big and fancy and bulky.  But that's OK.  My laundry room is actually a double closet in my hallway right outside my bedroom.  I love it there as it's so convenient.  I fixed it up to look as much like a laundry room as possible. 

I made the little mini quilt on the right to cover up the knobs and tubes.  The little laundry hanging above the cupboards was actually a wallpaper border that I fussy cut around each little piece of clothing and then hung it up so it actually looks like it's handpainted instead of walllpaper.

After I cleaned the floor and carpeting from the mess of the appliance men, I was back in business.  My new Pajama Jeans are washed, the sheets are now all clean, and the quilt fabric has been pre-washed.  It ended up not being such a bad day after all.  I would have rather not had to spend the money for the new washing machine at this point, but what was I to do?

Now I kind of wish that My Bob was going to be away for one more day  because I think tomorrow I would have been able to finally relax a little more.  But he's due home very late tonight so tomorrow will be back to work.  For some reason when he's home it's just a lot more work --- as much as I love him!