Trick or Treat (part 2)

My friend R calls Halloween her Christmas.  She starts decorating her home on October 1st and often needs that much time to get everything up and running.  She even has an extra storage unit to house all of her Halloween paraphernalia.  Her boyfriend even threatened to end things one year if she bought anymore Halloween decor.  When she realized that Halloween was on a Saturday this year, she pulled out all the stops.  We found this balanced on the top of our mailbox one evening when we got home from work (Mr. flyskim thought I had ordered something even though I was not supposed to be shopping at the time).

Unfortunately, R didn't think to require the finger for entry.  Here's the view that greeted you walking in the front door.

 

And the living room.

 

Yes, that's a giant eye on the screen.  Unfortunately, I didn't get a picture of R's most recent addition in her studio because she had tarot readings going on in there, but it was a life-sized human figure wrapped in spiderwebs and suspended by his feet from a giant web complete with huge spider.  There were portraits that changed as you walked by them, crows perched on the curtain rods and bats hanging from every ceiling vent.  And I'm so used to the bathroom, that I forgot to take a picture of the dismembered corpse and the sound activated rat in a trap behind the toilet. I did, however, get a great picture of R in her Black Widow costume.

And of our friend M as Wonder Woman and sister-in-law V as an angel.  Brother-in -law G-man )(not pictured) was a Ghostbuster.

And here's Mr. flyskim at the buffet.
 

Behind him you see Jack Sparrow's younger, better-looking brother.  At least that's what we were told.  I should have taken more pictures.  I usually do, but we were having too good a time.  Next year, R is talking about getting a low-lying fog machine.  I guess it's never too early to start planning.  I hope you all had a great holiday.  Now, onward to Thanksgiving!

Trick or Treat (part 1)

So, marked lack of updates around here, but there has been work accomplished and visible progress.  And a vacation, if I'm being generous.  But I'm getting ahead of myself.  The really big news is that I finished something!!!  A couple of somethings, and just in time for Halloween (which is good because when else could Mr. flyskim and I freely walk the streets as Alice in Wonderland and the Mad Hatter?).

 Aren't we cute? 

(Please ignore any accidental resemblance to Alice from The Brady Bunch on my part.)

My dress was a combination of McCall's 5800 and the sleeves from Simplicity 2854.  I used a blue polyester suiting in a linen-like weave that I got at Joann's on sale.  There were some fitting issues because I figured that this was a costume, so it didn't need to be perfect, but that was my first mistake.  Then again, I'm not short, but I'm not particularly tall, either, so how was I supposed to suspect that the pattern waistline was 1 1/2 inches too high?  By making the bodice of the dress, trying it on and admiring my new belly shirt, that's how.  So I added a waistband and problem solved.  I also had to take in the shoulders 1 1/2 inches, but by the time I made that decision, I had already installed the bodice lining and my fear of damaging the loose weave fabric (or laziness) prevented me from taking it out when I fixed the shoulder seams.  As a result, the excess bodice lining is just tacked down.  Seriously?  I had to take the sleeves out to make the shoulder adjustment (don't think I didn't try to avoid that, too) and was already panicking about how I was going to put them back in, so the lining was a minor consideration.  And it didn't show from the outside which was a bonus.

And don't talk to me about the zipper.  I'm usually pretty good with them, but I made the mistake of trying to wing it instead of following my usual instructions and had to take out the first attempt (super messy).  However, I had shortened the top of the zipper, so I couldn't key it properly when I put it back in, and the top doesn't line up and the waistband seams don't match.  I did mark the zipper where there were seams, but that didn't work out so well for me this time.  If this had been a real garment, I would have taken it out as many times as I needed to get it right.  Scout's honor.

The pinafore, Butterick 4087, was relatively straightforward with a few minor changes and was completed at 1:44 a.m. on the 31st.  I haven't inspected my work on it very closely because I was a little loopy from the lack of sleep when I made it, but it didn't fall apart and looked right, so I consider that a win.

And these are the best Alice boots ever with their topsy-turvy buckles.

I used the Threadbanger tutorial for my masterpiece, the Mad Hatter's hat inspired by Tim Burton's Mad Hatter.  The instructions were generally good, but I would like to add a couple of things for clarity.  For the base fabric for the body of the hat, you need to some stretch, so use a fabric that already has some or cutting your material on the bias.  It is never mentioned on the tutorial, and I lucked into figuring it out by accidentally starting to attach the fabric at the bottom of the hat rather than at the top as instructed.  In order to get the fabric to fully cover the hat, I had to pull it onto the bias.  Also, the top layer of lace (there are two) had some stretch (you can see this better below).  Without the stretch, you won't get the curved shaping at the top of the hat.  Also, use a fabric that matches your hat for the brim.  While the spray paint made the brim stiff, it also slightly altered the shape, and the stiffness of the brim meant the it wouldn't stay when it was reshaped.

Some additional details:  the hatband matches the base fabric of the hat, and the hat pins are beads and feathers attached to floral wire.  I also used floral tape on the feather pin.

For the rest of Mr. flyskim's costume, we picked up a pair of brown pants and an eggplant-colored shirt from Goodwill and a brown jacket with gold stripes and a patterned vest from Red Light Clothing Exchange on Hawthorne.  I shortened the pants and lengthened the sleeves on the jacket by adding brown corduroy cuffs and lace and embellished the jacket collar and lapels with leftover fabric from the hat.  The fabric I originally zeroed in on for the scarf turned out to be $119.99 a yard, and while I love Mr. flyskim with all my heart, this wasn't happening.  The fabric I used isn't a great substitute for the one on Johnny Depp, but I was going for an interpretation rather than an exact reproduction.  This also looked pretty spiffy with the rest of the costume.

Mr. flyskim decided at the last minute to do the makeup (he was too late making up his mind to also go for the hair).  This was the palest foundation I could find at the drug store powdered lightly with cornstarch.  The cheap stuff from the Halloween section just flakes off and makes you itch.  As you can see from the pictures, he turned out pretty ghostly.

So, this all begs the question, where did we have to be that we put this much effort into one night?  One pretty damn impressive Halloween bash at our friends' house.  Tune back in tomorrow for Trick or Treat (Part 2) for more details.

Observing Radio Silence

So, I thought this was quite the clever headline when I thought of it given my recent lack of updating, but it turns out that several other bloggers have used this title in the same situation.  And after looking up what this really meant (not transmitting so that your enemies can't find you), it doesn't exactly fit the situation.  There have been no updates because very little has been accomplished in recent weeks.  Just a little painting.  The good news is that our contracter will be over next week to reassemble our dining room window just in time for fall!  Yay!

In the meantime, I've purchased more patterns and fabric (review of upcoming projects will be the subject of a future post), and I've managed to Mad Men myself.  So, for the amusement of my as yet non-existent followers, I present ... myself!

I kind of look like Judy Garland. 

One Step Forward . . .

. . . and two steps back. You know the song. Everybody sing!

First, the good news. The stain on the kitchen doorway is fixed!!! It's all pretty and even. I still need to put one more coat on the whole doorway and a second on the board that caused all of the problems, but it's fixed and it's beautiful and I didn't ruin our house. Such a relief.

And I finished staining the window frame!!! We'll prime and paint the windows themselves this weekend, and then we can have our window put back together! Isn't it pretty and glossy? Lessons learned from all of this? (1) Don't rely on your sketchy memory of the brief lesson in staining that your father gave you a decade ago. Look at the directions on the can of stain, and if you have any more questions, look it up. (2) Don't try to eke every last drop of stain out of the can. Take your cheap butt to the store and buy a new can of stain when the old one starts to get gloppy. (I know we could probably just add lacquer thinner to the old can, but as simple as that sounds, I'm pretty sure that that's a learning curve I don't want to mess with. And I just got my nails done).

Which brings us to the bad news. You would think with having already stained the large doorway and the built-in, I would have figured out how to stain by now, but that turns out to not be the case. Once again, please note how glossy both the window and the doorway look. Now please notice how the finish on the large doorway does not have any gloss to it at all. Yeah, different finishes. That's kind of a problem. We used the same exact product on all the wood, but I changed my application method which has resulted in a glossy finish in some places and a satin finish in others. Both mr. flyskim and I like the glossy finish better, so that means in order to match the finish throughout the dining room, we have to sand down the two largest and most time consuming pieces in the room, the large doorway and the built-in, and apply a few new coats of stain. (If anyone who reads this actually knows what they're doing refinishing wood, please don't hurt yourself too badly laughing at me.)

A lot of the blogs that I've been lurking on for the past several years (scared yet?) often post pictures of their wonderful and delicious looking meals, so I thought I'd take a page from that book and show you our dinner (so monkey see, but I don't care). Fish sticks!!! Actually, these are last week's fish sticks, but we had them again tonight. They were both yummy and convenient. Come fall, I promise to do something much more impressive food-wise, but our kitchen gets direct sun in the afternoon, and the quicker I can put something together and get out of the kitchen, the better.

My (Former) Best Friend's Wedding

I was internet stalking a formerly close friend at lunch today, and I discovered that she and her long-time boyfriend got married a couple of months ago. I got all nostalgic because I was supposed to have been her maid of honor, and she was supposed to have been mine. Unfortunately, about six months before I got married (please see photo above), we had a major falling out over flea control for my cats. I'm not kidding. And it's probably for the best that we continue to have no contact with one another.

But all things aside, I'd like to wish a heartfelt (although a little belated) congratulations to the recently married Mr. and Mrs. Duffield. I tuly wish you a long and wonderful life together.

Don't Do This at Home

-or-

How Not To Apply Wood Stain

We had a small setback on staining the kitchen doorway this past weekend. The picture to the right is the doorway in it's halfway corrected stage, and it will stay this way until this weekend. So, what when wrong? I tried to fix a problem with half set stain and ended up with some pretty horrific blotchy areas on the top portion of the right side of the doorway. The left side was looking so nice that I got a little overconfident. Combine that with a desperate need to be done with something (anything), and there lies the path to big, giant FAIL.

After I finished crying and had a glass of wine, I calmed down a little. A little. So on Saturday, I'll finish lifting some of the color off the bottom of the right side of the doorway, re-sand and re-stain. It will look pretty. It will! (Insert foot stamp here.)

Which means that there has been no knitting or sewing here in the last several days. But you know where there has been some sewing? At my sister-in-law's house. About a month ago, she asked me how hard it would be to make curtains, and two weeks ago, I taught her how to use my sewing machine and talked her through some simple panel curtains. She's been going gangbusters ever since.

Neither Quick Nor Easy

But so is the way of progress. Finally. Since the weather started to cool off, I've dived back into the staining of the wood. Right now, there is only one coat on the window frame and on the doorway, but that's 20% done! At least with these two items. I'm anticipating that both the window and door will be done by the end of the weekend.

There's a white strip in the left-hand window frame (that's not a picture of it, so don't worry if you can't see it), and we can't figure out if this was just a non-stainable wood filler or if somebody decided to fill the crack in the wood with plaster. Don't laugh. We've already had to chip plenty of plaster out of the kitchen door frame, so it's a definite possibility. There was also some flexible caulk like what you would use on a tub or a sink filling a larger crack in the frame. I'd like to call these creative solutions, but the part of me that's got a stick up my ass is still a little stunned that anyone would cut a corner like that with such a beautiful piece of wood. Anyway, I haven't figured out what to do about the white vein in the frame, but the lazy part of me that thinks I'm too rigid has seriously considered using nail polish. What this really tells me is that I have a bit of research to do before addressing this problem because I strongly suspect that beauty products are not the answer.

Here's a picture of mr. flyskim (left) starting the kitchen door at the header. We stopped after this piece was done to remove the last of the paint from the cracks where the parts of the doorway were joined. On the right is the doorway with its first coat of stain completed. When both the window frame and the doorway are done, I can prime and paint the windows themselves. We'll probably also make a trip to Rejuvenation Hardware this weekend to pick up new window rope and weights and new hardware. It'll be a joy to have both of the double hung windows in proper working order. We've been propping the left one open with a volume of Shakespeare's collected works almost since we bought the house three years ago.

And even though the heat officially broke a week ago, it didn't become really livable until yesterday. Over the weekend, it was still all belly, all the time. That, and looks of pure misery and hatred because, you know, the hot weather was all our faults. But now that everyone has cooled off, things are getting back to normal with the exception of a slight escalation in the ongoing kitty domination war to make up for lost time.

Everything's Walking Distance if You Have the Time

Up until about 10 weeks ago, I though I was in pretty good shape. I went to the gym three times a week, walked on the treadmill, used the stationary bike, lifted some weights. The usual. I wasn't so delusional that I thought I was actually athletic, but I thought I did okay. Then mr. flyskim and I decided to train for the 2010 Portland Oyster Urban Adventure Race, and I had a very rude awakening regarding my actual level of fitness. (I know these aren't Rocky Mountain oysters, but did you really want a picture of buffalo testicles?)

For those of you who are unfamiliar, the Oyster Racing Series is a string of urban adventure races held in different cities across the United States. Think The Amazing Race but in a single city on a single day. What makes this race different from other adventure races is the level of athleticism required. For example, running is mandatory, and the full course is suggested for triathletes or people who run 10k races.

I don't run. Or at least I didn't 10 weeks ago. I still don't really run, more like walking with 2 minutes of running thrown in here and there. A friend who is an experienced runner is putting together my training plan, and I am still shocked at how hard it is to run at 5 MPH for 2 minutes at a time. I don't know how people do this, but my coach assures me that if I just keep at it, the periods of running will get longer and longer until I'm running actual distances. Hopefully, my butt will get smaller, too. (About one size. Not looking for miracles, just want to wear my skinny jeans again.)

My point? mr. flyskim and I went for a walk last Friday afternoon on fairly flat ground. Mostly sidewalk; about four and a half miles. I'm in better shape right now than I've ever been due to my race training. And our four-mile walk? Still kicked my ass (insert indignant tone of disbelief here).

At least we got outside the house because we haven't been able to do much outdoors because of the oven that was Portland this last week. And since we're not going anywhere on vacation this year, I took the camera along so that I could tourist it up a little in my hometown.

Did you know that the median strip on NE Ainsworth is an arboretum? I didn't, and I needed a book to tell me about it. Heck, I needed a book to tell me that there was a median strip at all.

And I don't think I've seen a slide like this since I was seven. I remember thinking that this kind of slide was so huge and just went round and round forever, and you would be going so fast that you would just shoot off the end. But one of the dads hanging out with his family went down the slide as we walked by, and he got stuck about halfway down. Am I just remembering it wrong?
There was something very Charlie Brown Christmas about this little sticky plant. In fact, it reminds me of something we did to our lilac tree a couple of weeks ago, and my fear that we killed it by cutting it to the ground in the middle of July instead of waiting until the fall. But it's sprouting now, so it's okay.
By this point in the walk,I was hot, hungry and tired, so pictures fell by the wayside. We had lunch at La Bonita on NE Alberta, and I've never been so happy to see a taco in my life. The fact that it was delicious was just a bonus.

Oh, and here's my blister. I didn't even know I had one until we got back to our car.

It's supposed to cool back down to regular temperatures in the next week, so here's hoping for some good progress on the project back log.

According to the Kinsey Report . . .

Every average man you know will tell you paint and stain dry much more quickly when the thermometer goes way up. At least, I know that paint does and suspect the same of wood stain (at least the one we've been using because it's dried fairly quickly in normal temperatures and our wood is porous). So this recent heat wave really threw a damper into my plans to have my way with our dining room window this last weekend. I was going to complete painting and staining of the trim, and given the non-existent state of my motivation for this project over the past several months, I was excited and energized because I was expecting to make great strides with a little extra time off work.

Here at chez flyskim, we've been restoring the many-times painted woodwork in our 1908 bungalow. We started in the dining room in January and have completed the built-in (above in its in-progress state), the large doorway into the office (the glorious "before" shot on top and the "after" is the bottom) . . .

. . . and the French doors (below), which are currently waiting for glass.

My original plan was take two days off and use my long weekend to paint and stain the window frame and the doorway into the kitchen. If I was feeling ambitious, I was also going to start on the crown moulding. Well, that didn't happen.

On Thursday, I got the primer on the window, but that needed eight hours to dry, so I didn't get to start painting until late that afternoon. Then I realized that my mad cutting in skillz (Please note the sarcasm. No one my age should ever use the phrase "mad skillz" without it.) were neither as mad nor as skillful as I remembered, and I taped off the windows and to-be-stained wood pretty quickly after my first mistake. But I ran out of tape, so I could only do a single coat of paint on two sections of the window. For reference, above is a picture of our window when we had just moved into the house: all white and bland and stripped of character.

And here's what it looks like with all of the windows down and most of the moulding taken off. Please also enjoy in this shot the beauteous Pip in the right-hand window taking in some fresh evening air.

I ran to the store for more tape Friday morning and completed my second coat of paint on all sections of the window between 10 a.m. and 11:30 a.m. The painted part of the frame is the trim that would be on the outside of the house if not for the storm windows. When we put our original windows back in, the stained wood will be on the inside of the house and the painted wood on the outside. The color is called Night Shade, and it's dark brown with just a hint of purple. It will look fantastic when we finally get around to painting our house pale green. But since we had the windows down for repair and staining, I figured why not go ahead and paint. There will never be a better time. It was in the mid-80s on Friday which is when I noticed that the two coats of paint put on the third section of window that morning dried awfully fast. Knowing that our house holds onto heat and that it was only going to get hotter over the weekend, I decided not to risk the staining. There's nothing worse than gloppy, uneven stain, and I'm not skilled enough at it to try staining under less than ideal conditions. It's supposed to drop to the low 80s sometime in the next 10 days, and I'll give it another try then.

And just to illustrate the current unhappiness in our household over the 100+ temperatures, here is a shot of our little man coping with the heat the best he can. The floor of our house has become dangerous territory over the past couple of days. You never know when you'll encounter a random kitty belly. Okay, running through the sprinkler now.

Exactly when did I move to Roswell?

-or-

The UnFinished Object Post

I'm great at starting things. In fact, there's nothing that I like better than planning a new project. It's the finishing that leaves something to be desired. So in order to keep myself on the straight and narrow road to productivity, I'm going to complete all of my current unfinished projects. Here's the whole, messy lot of them.

Butterick 5319

So far, this is the best dress I've ever made. I don't usually wear pink, but this fabric just spoke to me. I've done a lot of things with this pattern that I've never done before. The dress is fully lined (never lined a garment before), and I put in my first invisible zipper. Looks kind of pretty from the outside, don't you think? Well, aside from the blue sewing marker. Now for the ugly.

I need to slipstitch the lining to the zipper and the bodice lining to the skirt. It also needs hemming. However, I forgot to check the length of the pattern, so it's a little short, even unfinished. I have a beautiful piece of lace to tack to the lining to see if it (a) fixes the length problem and (b) looks good. If both (a) and (b) don't work out, I may have to learn to live with exposing my knees to the world. I may be looking for opinions later.

The Dollar and a Half Cardigan

This needs a little more work. All the pieces are finished, but it needs blocking. Those two lumps at the top are the sleeves. And then there's the putting it together. The last complete sweater I made was over 20 years ago, and I just pieced it together like you would a shirt, so I'm going to try to be a lot neater. Then I have to pick up the stitches for the button band. And get buttons. And sew them on. But it's nearly finished, I swear.

Juliet

This has been nearly finished since last year. Blocking, weaving in the ends and buttons are the only things left. I'm not convinced it suits me, but I'm going to finish it before I make a final judgment.

Trapeze Jacket

This is farther along than the picture shows. I've completed the body and am about halfway through the collar. Problem is, I was frustrated with sucking at short rows and stopped working on it, and now I can't remember where I am in the pattern. So, I'll have to rip out the collar and redo it, knit the sleeves and do all of the finishing work. This will probably be the last thing on this list that I finish.

Tangled Yoke Cardigan

I've completed the body up until where the sleeves are to be joined, and I've started the first sleeve. They're knit in the round, and I couldn't get that this was just the same as a sock, so I had to restart the sleeve three times before it finally took. I have to keep plugging away at this, or it will meet the same fate at the Trapeze Jacket.

Socks for mr. flyskim

Nothing to see here. Basic 2x2 rib, top down. He has really big feet, so I hope I have enough yarn.

And that's just the knitting and sewing. We have a couple of house projects going on, but that's for another post. Wish me luck. This will keep me busy for the rest of the summer (or longer). Then I can start planning all of the new projects . . . Oh, who am I kidding? They're already planned, but I can't start anything else before I at least whittle down the list. Anything more and I'll need a 12-step program, and I don't think there's a Crafter's Anonymous out there.