Keys...

When I was in Primary School I got a bit of a key fetish & started collecting them from all over the place.  I think it stems from my unquenchable desire to open locked doors & find out what's inside.  I still think a locked door holds the most interesting secrets.  Don't ever invite me to your house, I'll be snooping before you can say "cup of tea?"...


One of my fondest moments (and there were very very few) of high school is that at our Year 10 Farewell (that's Fourth Form, or when we're 16 for those of you who labour under the incomprehensible American high school system), I was presented with some cheap, nasty green and blue plastic keys from a baby's rattle.  No idea where they are now.  


Anyway, I made a key treasury the other day, which I thought I'd share with you, and also a picture of this beautiful key, which I bought on Etsy:

Too gorgeous for words, and infinitely better than green plastic.

Ciao!

Pussy cat pussy cat II

Perth. I've been to Perth.  I feel a bit ashamed, Gentle Readers, that I didn't advise you in advance that I was going to be off the air, or even off the planet, but I've given up my fabulously expensive Qantas Club Membership ($400/year is fabulously expensive, no?) as part of my regime to save money until I get a real job, along with the daily newspaper ($300/year), and various magazines ($150/year X about 3), and so I didn't do what I usually do in the Qantas Club lounge, which is use their free internet to update my blog with my 'going on holidays' post.  


Not being too thrifty, I do still buy two of the magazines, but I don't get them delivered any more.   I discovered that the English one, British Homes & Gardens, which I love, because it has fabulous furniture, fabrics and wallpaper in it, cost about $17.00 per issue when I subscribed.  It costs $9.95 in the newsagent, about 3 weeks later.  I can bear the wait.  Just.

Anyway, I did take my laptop to Perth, meaning to update my blog whilst I was there, but my lovely Ma & I fell into the Scrabble abyss, and spent most of our time making up ridiculous words according to the dictates of the dictionary on Facebook scrabble.  If any of you can suggest an alternative venue for online scrabble, I'd be thrilled to hear about it.


So, what did we do?  We spent a day in the clutches of the medical profession, the less said about which the better, we made two fabulous dressing gowns, using a McCalls pattern, and because we're both clever and thrifty, we made them from quilt backing fabric, which was 118" wide, meaning we only needed 1.75 metres - mine is almost to the floor, Lovely Ma's is to her ankles... and at $27/metre, that was a bargain.  Except, I just found a place in the States which has nice wide backings for $12/metre.... and people wonder why Aussies have taken to shopping on the internet with such fervor?

What else?  We visited the Hendys, we searched the local shops for an actual physical game of Scrabble (no such luck), we talked about the possibility of a holiday in Bali in July when all the medical madness is over for my Lovely Ma, we ate, I played with the dogs, did a spot of cooking (garlic prawns, yummy) & we pottered.  The perfect week off, really.


And now, Gentle Readers, as it's 1.48pm, I suppose I should schlep out of my fabulous new dressing gown & into the shower.  I am a bit jetlagged, so I don't want to rush it :-)...  more posts this week, I promise.  

Ciao!

Calico has no stretch

And so, Gentle Readers, the balls of my thumbs actually ache from the effort of trying to pull calico down over a layer of conglomerate foam:

Can you believe this image was found under 'conglomorate upholstery foam' in Google Images?  Which part of this foot and particularly unattractive shoe is foam, hmmm?


And a layer of linters, which is a cotton by-product used to provide the softness in your seat:

Yes, Google Images is excelling itself today...

and a layer of 20mm/.78" green foam:

That's so nicely green and foamy, isn't it?  All on the top of zig-zag springs...

Damn.  They found one!

Anyway, it's hard work and my thumbs are a bit sore from all the straining, holding, stapling, and digging out the staples when it wasn't quite smooth enough to keep the Upholstery Munchkin who teaches us on Mondays, happy.  

He's a lovely man, beautiful green eyes and a great store of knowledge and skill, but he loves a chat.  He gets started on something, and Bam!  he's off on a tangent and we're stuck 375 years ago when he did his apprenticeship, fondling coconut fibre and visiting Rapunzel in her beautifully upholstered tower...

In other news, Madam Late is so far behind the rest of us now she's almost still in the other room, and we can't decide if the root cause is 

a) self-medication (as in "she's zonked")

b) alcohol (as in "she's permanently bombed/pissed"), 

c) deafness, or 

d) she's just plain dumb.  

She knows how far behind she is, so she can't be that dumb, because she wanders round the room like Lady MacBeth sleepwalking through the castle, rubbing her hands saying "Oh, I'm so far behind", which means that her projects have become a bit like King Duncan, where she was keen to take them on, but a teeeeny bit regretful after the deed was done... "Out, damn'd chair, out I say".  She hasn't finished her second child's chair, her footstool, her two vinyl stool tops, or her drop-in seat, which is what we did yesterday.  Although, we have two days until the end of term, so if she can alter time, speed up the harvest and get teleported off this rock, she may be OK.  Use the Force, young Late.

My, aren't we a cultured Golightly this morning?  

In other news, Mr Golightly is at home today, slightly unwell, and all my damn' fine plans to go into town for a visit with the bank and lunch with Ms Creek are up the ... creek.  That's fine.  He's a bit 'in-his-cave' when he's unwell, a fact I may have alluded to in previous posts, so my plan is to ignore him completely, except for throwing food into the cave opening at regular intervals, and spend the day in my sewing room, coming out only to feed the animals, and put more washing in the machines.  It is raining, so it's quite justified to use the dryer for some things... honest.

I have an order for three doorstops made from this (and don't think I'm relying on Google images here, nosireebob):

and I made these for the lovely and glamorous lady who sold me (amongst other things) some new face cream:

Do you like the button accessory touch?  I know people tie things onto them like sea-shells and such, but I don't have a ready supply of those.  I think the accessorising button is quite a nice idea.  Hopefully BJ will too - she's going to collect them tomorrow... so I will report back.

And now, it's 9.00am, the office is open for business, and I must away to the shower, the laundry, and then, so exciting, the sewing room!  

Ciao!

Knife, Box, Inverted...

Any ideas?  Pleats, Gentle Readers, pleats.  This week at Upholstery School we learnt how to make a skirt for a piece of furniture (any piece, really, based on a little algebra [see, Mrs Imberger, you were right, I will use maths one day] - length of furniture (l), size of pleats (your choice, really), type of pleat [box pleats are calculated as size of front of pleat X 3] (s), divide l by s, bob's your uncle.  Got all that?  Good.


Actually, the technique is made easier if you make a template out of a piece of skinny cardboard which is usually used for backtacking (see previous post for description of backtacking, really, I don't want to actually bore you)... mark out the pattern for your pleat - for box pleats, the pattern is 'return, pleat, return', hence the calculation which forms (s).  Then you get your material, sit down with a suitable marking pen & the cardboard, and draw it up on the material.  Carefully.  A fine-point pen is ideal, because these lines have to be joined up with a pin when you come to sew it.


You also have to calculate how much material you'll actually need, and you can't do that until you start to mark it out, because the joins are not allowed to show in the front, they have to be hidden in a return.

This is a good example of box pleats, and you can see that they've gone to the trouble of making sure there isn't a pleat over the corner, which is not the case here:

So, you need to make sure your joins are all hidden, which sometimes means cutting the last bit of the fabric off before you might otherwise have, then sewing on your next piece before going on with the marking up.  It's a bit time-consuming.  Did I mention that?


Anyway, then when you've got it all marked up, you have to sew on the calico lining at the bottom, press it nice & flat, making sure all raw edges are even, then stitch it again at the top.  Then you get to pin it.  And pin it.  And pin it.  And pin it... then, when you're confident you've got it pinned right, you can try it on the piece of furniture to make sure it fits... then you go back & repin it until it does.


Then, finally, you sit down at the sewing machine, refill the bobbin which the last inconsiderate soul left almost empty (see, upholstery school differs not at all from the office, where the person who printed the 495 page document leaves you five pages in the  photocopier & you have to fill it up, not them), and very, very, very carefully, stitch it up.  Of course, if it's velvet, you won't get it right the first time.  Or the second...


Then, you try it on the piece of furniture again & see if it fits... and so on, ad nauseum.  I thought I'd get my second one (yes, we had to make two, one with instruction & one by ourselves) finished by lunchtime, but it actually took me until 3.00pm.  Phew.  Glad it's over.  


Next week we're going to do drop-in seats, which look like this:

You can bet your bottom dollar we won't be having nice Georgian chairs to work on, that's for sure... next week is our last week of term, and then we're apparently half way through.  Bloody hell.

In other news of paramount importance, I bought a new phone.  Don't tell Mr Golightly.  I got so tired of having my old one 'force close', which is mobile-phone speak for 'crash' that I splashed out on one independent of my provider, and spent a very frustrating few days learning how to get around the technical glitch which appears to have infected these phones worldwide... anyway, I did, it's working beautifully and I'm feeling very geeky again...

  I'm sure you get the hint.

Now it's the weekend, and I'm off to make doorstops for the lovely Belinda, but first... breakfast, possibly a shower :-) and maybe even out of my pyjamas.  Oh, the glamour.

Ciao!

Asians in the library

Racists in the halls...


I still have no idea how to make a link to somebody else's post and you, Gentle Readers, have comprehensively failed me in my quest to learn how to do this!  However, this link to the excellent "SueBob's Red Stapler blog" should provide you with everything you need to know about flashing your tits and your low IQ at the same time.  Oh, I said 'tits'.  Sorry.  Perhaps with my fine "american manners" I should have said "bosoms"?  I know Americans are a bit thingy about nudity and body parts, but not, apparently, about allowing people with no idea into University, which is, after all, about broadening your mind and challenging your assumptions, something that Alexandra Wallace has comprehensively failed on both counts.


In other news, the footstool is finished, but unmarked, so I can't bring it home yet, but there are a few very ordinary pictures:


Underneath, all neatly tied off:

A corner.  Velvet is very bulky!

The top - five large buttons instead of four small buttons.  Vive la differenza...

We spent a lot of time yesterday learning how to make pleats (knife, box and mock-box), using paper, and then marking it out on fabric.  Much frustration ensued and the day went, generally, pretty quickly.



On Sunday I made a pouch for The Bride, who wanted something to keep her meditation runes safe - in orange, of course.. and she chose one of my favourites:

and this lovely to line it with:

And I used quilted calico inside, which makes it all easy:

Hope she likes it!


And that's it for me - I am going into town for lunch with Miss Mary Mary, which should be nice... if the rain stops - which it looks like might happen.... Ah, Sydney Autumn.  Gotta love it!


Ciao!

Well, not much stuff has happened...

Let's see, Gentle Readers.  It's 2.28AM.  I went to bed at 9.30PM, pretty tired after a fairly busy day getting organised for a girlie family gathering, where the extremely glamourous purveyor of a well-known brand of skin care products came round to show us her wares, give the two 13-year olds facials and a little bit of make-up (they were so excited!) and sell us lots of (admittedly) lovely products... and then BANG!  I was awake.


Actually, I blame the leftovers I had for dinner.  It was a combination of lamb ribs (yummy) and indian-style osso buco (can you believe that even exists?) and I think it was a bit too much for my poor gut to cope with, so here I am.  I've had a glass of milk with Milo in it to slice through the heartburn, but there's no getting away from the wide-awakedness of it all...


Anyway, you're definitely due an update, Gentle Readers, because my last post was sketchy to say the least.  I was rushing out the door to something, don't ask me what.  Oh yes, School.  Child's chair is definitely finished, but the teacher didn't even look at them until Friday night, so no mark, no bringing home, and therefore no pics.  Sorry.


The upholstered footstool is also almost finished, remind me when I'm running my own upholstery shop to put up a big big sign saying "no velvet, no stripes, no checks".  Big lessons learnt this week about how hard it is up make nice box pleats using velvet...


Anyway, it looks like this:

Except mine is a nice pale blue velvet with a fairly '80's motif rather than that extremely nasty brocade, has five buttons in the top and only one lot of piping.  Here they've used the first row of piping to make the foam block look like two smallish blocks instead of one big one.  Ours really are two blocks, held together and in place by the buttons which are on mattress twine, which is then pulled through both blocks of foam to the underneath, and tied off using a slip knot - the buttoning needles you use to do this are incredibly long and sharp and could kill you:

 Here's a selection of the tools we use everyday.The buttoning needle is the second one from the bottom, and it's 12"/30cm long.  

The bottom tool is called a regulator, and it's also known in our class as 'The Enforcer', 'The Terminator' and 'The Force'. as in "Use the Force, Luke".  It's extremely handy for shoving material into tight spaces if you're wussy about hurting your fingers (oh yes!) on the backs of chairs...

Where was I?  I just fell into an upholstery-tool-lust moment & had to go & look on eBay to see what there was... Anyway, the skirt is made up of piping & a very long piece of material, into which you have to fold pleats that sit right on the corners, and then you have to stitch the pleats.  They're allowed a tolerance (how much it's allowed to be off the corner) of 1mm, or .039".  Yep, .039".  That's not a lot, really.  I had three goes at sewing it together before I got them to sit on the corners to the teacher's satisfaction, then I had to do the skirt & piping, which is why I never want to sew anything with velvet ever again.  My respect for Upholsterers continues to grow...

Anyway, all that's left is to staple it on, back-tack it (this is the process where you take cardboard strips and insert them right under the piping, then drive them into the wood using your staple gun - it stops the piping from falling down when the piece is finished..) and then cover the bottom with calico, and bam!  Upholstered footstool, anybody?  I'll be (hopefully) bringing it home on Monday night, so pics.  Honest.  No, honest.

In other news of unparalleled excitement, the quote for the gutterguard arrived.  No issue with that... but they wanted $4500 to supply & install a water tank which costs $770 in the shops.  I'm pretty sure I can rope Mr Golightly into doing all the work they included in the price, which would take no more than one day to do - even if they were charging $100 an hour for labour, that's only $800, plus $770 for the tank, maybe $1000 for parts (unlikely, it's a tap, some hose, a first flush water divertor to keep all the crap out of the tank [probably no more than $250, according to this site]) and a concrete slab for the tank to stand on, that's $2700.  Where does the other $1800 go?  The staff Christmas party?  I so don't think they'll be getting our order...

And of course I've been having such a lot of fun making Treasuries of vintage clothes on Etsy - if you haven't ever looked into the vintage side of Etsy, it is amazing.  There is everything from hat blocks (I saw a beauty yesterday for $65.00...) to shoe lasts to hats, bags, shoes, jewellery, kitchenware, you name it.  I found a beautiful purple suede Liz Claiborne shopping tote which had had 600 odd views, at least 25 hearts & was an absolute bargain as far as I could see, but nobody had bought it!  Anyway, I couldn't resist, even though it wasn't you-know-what colour (red, Red RED!), so I'll report back when it arrives.

And now, Gentle Readers, I feel like I might be ready to go back to bed.  The Milo has hit the spot, and my eyelids are drooping.  So, Buona Notte!

PS Happy Birthday to the very lovely MIss Vetty!

Ho rifinito, ancora!

Yep, it's done.  Pics tonight.  I'm knackered, I have to say, and I've been up since 4.50am.  Don't ask.  


Also, where is Del Mar in California, and who are you, Gentle Reader?  Please pop in to say Hi!


That's it for now, off to the shower, then school, to finish the upholstered footstool.  Things are moving apace.


Ciao!