Three trips

It's time to paint the bathroom. And, it's time to do some shower repair. One of the problems we have is that our shower is about the size of a postage stamp...okay, I can't lie. It's really the size of a telephone booth. But, unlike the TARDIS, it is not bigger on the inside. Anyway, the shower jet hitting the corner means that corner is in a constant state of being repaired...a couple of times a year. So, I decided that maybe it would be better if the shower jet didn't hit the corner, but rather hit the floor or a wall. Only took me 13 years to figure that one out.

Anyway, I decided to replace the shower head with one that had more flexibility. Maybe a handheld. So, off to Lowe's Sydney and I go. We get home and I try the hand held and if I used the braket that came with it, it would only spray into the same corner that I was trying to stop spraying into. But, Sydney loved it, so she got that one as a new shower head. And, since our shower was out of commission, I got to try it and it was fabu in her tub/shower.

So, we went back to Lowe's. I couldn't find anything I could get happy with, so I basically replaced the pieces I was taking out with the same pieces, just aiming them at the floor. Would'a worked. But, as I was about to screw the pipe into the wall, I noticed that I had 9 1/2 inches above the pipe that I could take advantage of. And, I remembered this rain shower head from Lowe's.

So, we went back to Lowe's. Haven't gotten to try it yet. Another hour and a half until the grout is fully dry.



Now, when I shop, I shop slow and steady and don't get flustered. But, yesterday, I was with the kid and every time I made a mistake, she stepped in and helped. For example, we used the same self pay register every time we went. I couldn't get the credit card in the pay slot right, despite the picture they put on the side of the machine (and apparently despite the fact I'd just been there). So, she grabbed it out of my hand and took care of the transaction. I got flustered at some point of the day and never got back my gracefulness. I was uncoordinated and clumsy all morning. But, she was cool, calm and collected. Probably made me look like some elderly dementia patient as this child helped me out. But, I don't care. She liked it and we got through the day just fine.

I'm nearly done with LD's quilt. I'm working that narrow orange border now. Already down one long side. But, I've got a couple of NY Eve projects to complete so I'm up and moving.



Washing those dresden plates went swimmingly. The wash water and the first two rinses were disgusting. Truly disgusting, brown. The wash water looked like I'd brought in a handful of mud and swished it into a sink of dishwater. Yuck! No wonder they were making me feel sick. Then, I layed them out to dry and I've got most of them apart as far as I wanted. The white cotton thread she used is tough as nails to get out, tho so it's slow going to try and cause as little damage as possible to the fabrics...which are in FANTASTIC shape. Stiff cottons and feedsack and a few dress fabrics.

Some plates, I'm just replacing one or two wedges. Some I've broken into pairs of wedges so I can put them back together with other pairs of wedges. Odd thing, there are 18 wedges to a plate. I'm used to plates that are divisible by 4, but these aren't. Hmmm. That could make for some very interesting re-construction dilemmas as she seems to have made the plate as big as it came out and then when she joined the last two wedges, she just made them as big or as small as she needed to get it to lay flat.

Secret time. I haven't done that in a long time. But, based on the old methods of handpiecing and scissor cutting, this was a very effective method. And, what tiny stitches. These were clearly put together by somebody that knew what she was doing. Except for the colors. That's so weird.

Take care and have a great New Year's Day. I've gotta get to the grocery so we can have our black eyed peas tomorrow and remember what it was like when our people were poor. Yes, we still do that. And, we each got an orange in our stocking, too. But, they were oranges from MY TREE!

Lane