This 'n That

That's a great title for a Thursday post without pictures. I'm blaming the no pictures on Sydney because she distracted me this morning. I have taken pics. I have them in the camera. I planned to upload them after Breakfast.

But, at the breakfast table, we started today's chore list and despite everything from yesterday, she started crying. Because she needed to dust 6 pieces of furniture in the dining room and continue to wash more windows (which she's getting paid to do).

All I could do was laugh and go on with my chores. Doing my chores gave me time to think. When I was headed back in the house, she was headed outside. So, we sat at the table on the deck and had a bit of chat. Okay, I chatted. She just sat there and looked surprised. Here's sorta how it went.

Nothing in life is free. You do chores to pay for the priviledges you enjoy that come from living with us. Priviledges are anything that doesn't keep you alive or further your education. That means that TV's and games and phones are all priviledges. If you keep griping about those chores, you give up all those proviledges. Your choice. But, I'm tired of listening to it...and tears do not faze me. Oh, and by the way, were you asleep when I told you I'd pay you to wash windows???

We'll see how it goes this afternoon. I suspect that all those chores will be completed and completed well because that girl does love her TV. But, she could decide to push it. After all, Aunt Flo is in da' house this week and that means there's no predicting what she'll do. Sheesh, I never new Aunt Flo caused such turmoil on her monthly visits.

Okay, so if I had pictures, what would they be of?

Well, there would be the Afghan I finished for Linus.

And, since I finished one crochet project, I decided to crochet a rug. Probably not my best idea, but it's really cute and I always wanted to make a rug. So, now I'm doing it. My original thought was to make a braided rug. Then I read all I'd have to do for that and am thinking that it might be a better idea to sew my tiny strings together and crochet them into a rug, maybe. Maybe. One day.

I transferred all the marking from Sydney's muslin to my paper pattern. That's exciting. Next I can cut her shirt out and maybe she'll have one more by vacation.

And, I started the muslin for a pair of shorts for me. I feel like I'm conquering this whole clothes making thing. I'm putting the waistband in now, so don't know if they fit as well as they look like they do. I did get the zipper in. It's only my second zipper and certainly went better than the first one. But, because it's a muslin, it's just a zipper I ripped out of a pair of shorts I cut down for my denim quilt. I tore the zipper tape, so it will never work right, but hey, it's in!

Other than that, all my focus is on vacation. What will I take, what do I want to take, can I leave the kid at home? Okay, not really that last one. But, I do hope to get a bit of sewing done and have two quilt tops kitted up. One of them, I'm taking the batt and the back, just in case I run out of stuff to do and end up with time to start quilting one.

And, finger work for the car...a new pair of socks to knit and an attempt at filet crochet and the perpetual hexagon quilt project.

Still working in the yard. I'm surprised at how much work it is to get the beds ready to be left alone for a week without losing everything. But, what I do that's good for that is also good for water conservation, so it's all good. Just lots of work and time. And heat! Sheesh, it's hot around her. We go from the house to the car to the office and don't stay outside long enough to break a sweat during the week.

This weekend is my drop-off to Linus. I opened the newsletter this morning to find out where the drop is for this month and saw that the south Austin group is still remaking donations from school and scout groups. That's why I stopped going to the monthly meetings. I object to redoing other people's stuff...it's enough to redo my own. And, the only reason they need to redo it is because they won't give clear instructions to the donators. For example, they let Sydney's school donate blankets made from two pieces of fleece, tied together around the edges. Then, they spend a year taking those blankets apart and turning them into two blankets. Why? So that the kids will donate two pieces of fleece and Linus can end up with two blankets. Why? They already had to dump a ton of stuff that people had donated because they lost their donated storage space. And still they spend time remaking donations instead of making new stuff to donate.

You're right. I shouldn't be critical. My solution was to stop going to meetings and spend my weekends working on my own donations. I'm pretty sure everybody's happy with that...except I miss Miss Minnie's chicken salad sandwiches that she brought to every meeting.

Okay, that's enough of both this and that and even a bit of the other.

Take care and have a great thursday. Maybe tomorrow, instead of words, I'll just post pics of the stuff I just described.

Lane