...7.29...W.I.P. Wednesday...

...well after the little making break that I took to quickly make a Pickles replica...I had a lot to get done to get my July box off to Alaska...of course Pickles went by herself to comfort Big Sissie...

...I'm trying to take full advantage of this little window of Dolly-Love...so I wanted to make Big Sissie a Tae Kwon Do outfit for her dolly...as Little Sissie has a complete ballet outfit that she can dress just like her dolly...I wanted Big Sissie to be able to dress her dolly for her chosen activity too...

...so I downloaded a few patterns...

...the dobok trousers were easy enough to make straight from the pattern...but the cross over wrap top of the dobok was going to be a little more challenging...

...I took a couple of different top patterns...I lengthened the front piece of one pattern to match the back piece of another one and added the wrap portion and I'll use that slanted piece for both sides of the front...the back I just used the shirt pattern...and then I lengthened the sleeve to make a long sleeve...and cut it all out of a nice stiff white cotton...

...zig-zagged the edges so they won't fray and stitched it together...I'm pretty happy with the look...

...next I added the thicker white band all around the front collar area...

...and stitched a couple of straight rows on the band...for some detail...

...and added a belt which is just a tube filled with interfacing and also stitched with a couple of rows of straight stitches...

...and the dobok was complete...

...I have no idea why all these photos are sideways...

...and here's my model dolly wearing the new dobok...

...but our TKD girl has her first yellow stripes...so I coloured some fabric tape with a yellow sharpie and added those to the belt...when Big Sissie gets a new stripe...they can just peel this off and I'll send them some appropriately coloured tape to match the new belt...

...I'm just as tickled as I can be with how this dobok turned out...

...all packed up and ready to go...

...and for Little Sissie...I wanted another dress alike outfit...to match this one that I'd gotten for a few dollars from Amazon...(sideways again)

...I found the somewhat matching leggings at Stuff-Mart...and Our Airman left a bunch of white t-shirts here when he joined up...

...and again...I'm sort of hodge-podging together a top...from the leotard pattern that I used for her purple dolly-matching leotard...so I cut that out to make a sleeveless top...and cut a couple of little ruffles from the t-shirt sleeves to add to the top of the tank sleeves to match the ruffles on the dolly's shirt...and then I've got quite a bit of the t-shirt left to make the peplum bottom piece...

...I just turned under the edges like I did for the leotard...but I didn't add any elastic...oh...and I added a placket down the center front for the buttons...

...then I gathered and attached the peplum bottom piece...

...and gathered and attached the little ruffles at the tops of the shoulders...and since I'd cut those pieces from the t-shirt sleeves...I didn't have to hem them...

...and the little top was finished...I didn't even have to hem the bottom...as I was able to use the existing bottom piece of the t-shirt...

...the dolly's shirt has shiny sort of diamond buttons...but I couldn't really find any to match...so I got these gorgeous flower ones with just a hint of pink that I'm just sure she'll love...and they don't actually button...they're just for decoration...

...and another matching set is on it's way to my girlies in Alaska...

...what's in your workbasket this week?...

~Have a lovely day!

...5.27...W.I.P. Wednesday...

...y'all have already seen the athletic sock update in my lap in the car...but I had made Sissie a new dishcloth...just using the leftover yarn from those tan socks I'd made a couple of years ago and had to buy a whole skein of yarn to finish them...so it's kind-of an odd colour for a dishcloth...

...and I found a nice hefty mug with her initial on it...and got out the traveling card...

...what's in your workbasket this week?...

~Have a lovely day!

...5.23...Dinner with Family...no movie...

...we woke up to rain...you can even see Mills Knob across the river...

...and it rained and rained all day...

...my sweet sissie came up for a visit as well...so we celebrated her birthday...I'll show you her little pressies in a bit...

...and we were planning on having a family cookout...and my baby brother did do the cooking outside on the porch...but because of the rain the dinner was moved inside...this is the dessert table...and you've already seen my offerings..

...I cut up a lovely yellow tomato that the Man had gotten at the Farmer's Market...

...and this was my delicious vegan plate...tofu, broccoli salad, tomato and cucumber and corn on the cob...and I'm drinking some old sweet wine from the top of Mom's fridge...haha...

...and I had brownie bites for dessert...but you can see the pineapple upsdie down cake in the background...Mom was telling us that it was Granddaddy's favorite dessert...I guess that's why we had it so often when we were little...

...my nephew and his family came over for a visit as well...so we spent the evening just hanging out and talking...

...and one of Grandma's angels fell off it's perch and broke her wings...so I glued those back together (the other one had already previously fallen off) before bed and left them to 'set' overnight...

~Have a lovely weekend!

...5.22...Friday Update...from Mom's...

...we got up early and headed out of town...and it was already daylight...which was nice...and most of the traffic was inbound and we were outbound which was also nice...

...the mountains coming into view in the distance...

...and the near-summer view from the homeplace...

...I had not had breakfast yet...so I had a quick bowl of oatmeal with walnuts, flaxseeds and fresh blueberries...and tea...of course...it was delicious and really hit the spot...

...after visiting for a while...Mom said she had a few things that she wanted to do outside before the rain started...so she swept the pool...

...and I checked the ph etc...and added chlorine...

...and we checked on her box garden...everything is doing really well...

...and since we were having sammies for lunch...and her lettuce needed to be thinned...I plucked a row of little tiny romaine lettuces to top our sammies with...

...a nice little bowlful of tender tiny greens...

...gathered the ingredients...tofu, baby lettuce, tomatoes, tofu mayo, and mustard...

...and Mom had baked a beautiful loaf of sourdough bread...

...and she has a slicer almost just like mine...and probably about the same age...

....the bread was perfect...

...and we got it all sliced for sandwiches...or toast...

...I peeled an orange and cut up an apple too...

...and we assembled our sandwiches...I do LOVE a good sandwich...it's one of my favorite things to eat...

...and then it was time to tackle the 'indoor' to-do-list...we put double sided tape all around this gorgeous rug to keep it from bunching up and becoming a trip hazard...

...we spied a small herd of deer beside the pond...but by the time I got my camera most of them had already jumped across the branch into the old horse pasture...

...Mom had some candles that had burned down but left quite a bit of wax...so they really just needed a new wick...and of course the word-wide-web of information knows just how to do that...and I happened to have some appropriate cotton yarn in my bag...so we boiled some salt and boric acid together and dipped the yarn in...et voilà...a wick was born...

...so I tied it around some tiny tacks to weigh it down and added a few to the wax...it works perfectly...and it was fun...

...and then we started the BIG job of the day...Mom wanted to take down all of the curtains in the dining room...she said maybe she'll replace them just with a valance...so I removed all of the old hardware...

...and cleaned the windows...

...took down the hardware and cleaned the door and it's window...then took down all of the glass ornaments and washed them and put them back...

...then the 'hard' part...we got a ladder and took everything off the top of the fridge...and rehomed most of it...and cleaned the walls and shelves and the top of the fridge and put back only the souvenir Mexican trays and a cookie jar...we left a couple of serving items there as well...but Mom was happy to have the clutter cleared away and added to her donation stack...

...and finally I washed the wall and patched the holes and we checked that job off the list...

...then we took the winter insulating film off the picture window...

...cleaned the window and filled the bird feeders...

...and then it was suppertime...we got out Mom's new chopper/grinder thing-y...she'd been having some trouble getting it to suction to the table so we figured that out...and made a batch of coleslaw...

...and a small pot of thrown together chili...because it was chilly...haha...

...and a loaf of cornbread...and we had a cozy and delicious supper...

~Wishing you a lovely start to your weekend!