Sunday, April 30, 2006

Don't Drink and Sew

Happy end of April's Project Spectrum.

I'm not about to "power" through my socks. Carpal Tunnel is not one of my goals in life, after all. I don't know if I'll start my green project tomorrow either. I really do want to finish my socks :).

I'll have a picture later; my camera let me take exactly one picture before the batteries died and I haven't gone out to replace them as procrastination is running rampant at chez Tactless. The picture IS of 1/2 the desired aforementioned covers I was working on. LapMini is out of luck, I ran out of fabric. The printer is much bigger than it seems. Let me do some internet hunting to show you:
Here's the printer that I got "for free" from Apple. And I did! (Well, sort of, if we don't count the tax I paid on the purchase...) The check came and was cashed ASAP, not that I don't trust Apple or anything, I just needed the cash, you know, for such important things as going out to sushi.

Where was I? Oh yeah, my printer cover:


As I just finished telling Andy, the fabric was on sale at JoAnn's and kinda special. It's made by a company that puts money into Children's homes and programs...but I sewed up the actual name of the company and no I didn't write it down and as much as I love you all, I'm not ripping any seams to see what the name is. Maybe someone else has run across the same fabric???

So how does someone as anal as I run out of fabric? Extrinsic circumstances forced me to use more of the orange fabric to try making something else...and I think I've pretty much failed, for now...I'll try to fix it later. What was I making? Do you all remember those "lesportsac" bags? They were all the rage during the 80s in Westside LA (so if you've heard of them elsewhere, well, then I'm not alone). Anyhow, the company is still around and for a cajillion dollars you can still purchase their little purses and bags. I never did. I've mentioned in the past my mom was a janitor/maintenance person at my old private HS? Right, well, Lost & Found items ended up coming home with her after their 2 or 3 year stint in the box in the nurse's office. Most would go to my aunt (a nun) who sent them down to orphanages in Mexico, or to my family down in Michoacan (not orphans, just plain poor). Sometimes though, I'd go through and keep stuff that worked well as pencil cases and the like for school. Lemme tell ya, you never lack for school supplies when your parents work in the system.

Having been raised in the kind of household I was, I NEVER throw anything away. Well, until it's absolutely necessary. Just recently I got rid of the pencil bag my 1st grade teacher, Sr. Jose, gave us. Everyone had one, they were made from material she got from old suits or the samples upholstery shops used to give you. I know because when I was old enough and proved I could use her sewing machine, it's how I "paid off" my "Christian Service Hours", helping her make bag after bag for her newest set of 1st graders.

Tangent queen striking again, sorry. Anyhow, one of my more useful "Take Me Along" bags that "Lesportsac" no longer makes, is dying. Here's a link to the coin purse version of it. Yeah, that's right, $14.00 for a COIN PURSE made out of ripstop nylon. The things we do for fashion??

Well, I figured I had this extra fabric, and it's colorful, not hard to lose in a dark bag...so I started to make a replacement baggie. Right, you guessed it. Cotton is not ripstop nylon and to make it worth my while I've had to double and triple-line the bag so things don't "poke through." It's become an albatross and now I come to find that the zipper I bought is too long and the thought of shortening it is too much. I also don't own bias tape, but I do have the yellow matching fabric and it's a pain in the butt to work with in the width I'd need it to be. I've pretty much given up. I may try again if I can find a shorter zipper an some bright yellow bias tape. For now it's into my sewing bag and no LapMini dust cover.

I do have plenty of yellow fabric left over...I might do a yellow dust cover with bright scraps of "orange with colored poka-dots" fabric for accent. You know, kinda the opposite of the printer cover.

But not now. Now is cocktail time and I hope you'll all follow my title's advice, as alcohol and sewing machines DO NOT mix. Neither does measuring and drinking actually. I almost flubbed it bigtime trying to make the cover...tee hee...but we won't go there right now.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Throw something away, huh, I don't understand, what does that mean? I don't think I've ever uttered those words before.