At least, I think they are. I’m not sure. Jess and Memere have both had good news and Petra’s been working her tail off.
Jess just found out that she’s been accepted into the cosmetology course that starts next week. Memere finally has a full-time job babysitting. Petra gets to earn babysitting money on Friday and I have a new lamp coming tomorrow.
Okay, so the lamp needs fixing a bit, but it can’t be that hard to fix a touch-lamp. At worst, I can redo it so that it’s a switch lamp. I think. I’ll have to take a look at it first, and see if I can find out what’s wrong with it. It’s a lamp that’s big enough to warrant needing two 9″ round panes of glass, so it’ll be a fair size, I’m sure.
I’m glad that Jess is going to be going to school. She’s been at our place all summer, but it’ll be nice to have some time to myself, without worrying about whether or not someone cares if I watch CSI or The Weather Network on TV, or spend hours on the computer. No one will care – except maybe the cats – that I decide to go to bed before 9pm or get up at 5am or whenever. No one will mind if I take a nap in the afternoon. No one will care if I decide to fall asleep on the couch watching TV or go up to bed at dawn. In a way, I suppose, that bothers me, but not really. If the weather holds, I can get some housework done, get some stuff printed out (more about that in a bit) and maybe get a few doll outfits put together.
And that’s the big part of my printouts – doll patterns. I have 184 pages of patterns, both knitted and crocheted. If I get them all printed out without difficulty, then I can start putting the outfits together. Most of the patterns I have use either baby yarn or crocheting cotton, both of which I have in plenty. I got the baby yarn from Pam when Mom died and I’ve never found a good use for it. I use soft yarns, but not baby yarns for my baby blankets and such. I’ve gotten some patterns done using Canadiana, but it gets boring to do the same patterns over and over again. I’m learning to adapt the pattern, but it takes time and I get too impatient and frustrated with the work. It’s going to be a pain doing all the sewing up, too. I’m not looking forward to that. Maybe what I should do is finish the patterns I have, without starting any new ones, and then move on to the new yarn and needles.
I’m not looking forward to using the crocheting cotton for doll clothes, in some ways. It’s easy enough to work with, but sewing it up is going to be a royal pain in the p’toot. I have trouble enough with darning the ends into doilies. The other thing I’m not impressed with is the fact that the stitches are, for the most part, single crochets. Those are going to be awfully hard to see if I have to work in rounds. I’m okay with double crochet stitches, but I can’t seem to count the sc properly. It’ll be good practice at counting them?
I just bought some new crocheting cotton, too, the variegated colours, purple, blue, pink, rainbow, and pastels, I think. There’s six balls altogether. I was going to use those for shopping bags. I might yet, and use the solid colours for the doll clothes. I have a gazillion balls, some from Mom and some I’ve bought over the years. It could end up that a doll has an entire wardrobe of ecru coloured clothes, or dark green or burgundy. I’m not sure what other colours I have. The box of cotton is at the bottom of the pile.
You know, that’s something I might do before the girls leave for their dad’s. I might put the shelves up in the basement. Or maybe on the long weekend after school starts. Then we can put the junk on the shelves and I can find my yarns more easily. That’s a thought, isn’t it? Getting myself organized. What an astounding concept!
