Recently, my grandmother decided to get rid of her sewing machine. I decided to take it because I figured that I could use it for upholstering the furniture Brian makes. It turns out that her sewing machine is this kick-ass black cast iron number from the 1950’s. It’s so cool. I haven’t sewn anything since 7th grade home economics. Doing the math, that was 23 years ago, so I thought it might be a good idea to buy a book on the subject. The book has a few cool plans in it that I’ll probably attempt for practice before trying anything major. And, if anything happens to come out, they’ll probably be doled out as gifts this Christmas.
I was leafing through a Pottery Barn catalog the other day and saw a sideboard in there with a runner on it. That sounds like a good idea for a first project. Not only did it look great, but it will also help protect the top of my sideboard from the “claw of the doberman”. So now I’ll probably make myself a runner for my sideboard if I can find material that I like.
Then, damn that Pottery Barn catalog–I found some drapes that I really liked. They would be perfect for our living room and dining room. Unfortunately. they don’t come in the sizes that we’d need. I happened to be leafing through my sewing book to check out the runner plans and lo and behold, they also have plans on how to make drapes. So, that’s another thing on my “to do” list. I doubt I’ll get to any of this till fall, though. I’m just too busy in the summer with the garden and “exterior home maintenance” and whatnot.
Over the 4th of July I mixed up this concoction called “Lemon Drop Liqueur”. I had to buy some canning jars in order to make this. This got me to thinking about canning vegetables from my garden. Brian would love if I’d can tomatoes. Then, he could have pasta with fresh tomato sauce “all winter long” or so he says. I’m still on the fence about this concept. It seems like freezing stuff is an easier route to take. But, it does have some merit for certain items, I suppose. To add to the madness, I was telling Steve about this yesterday and he was highly encouraging the activity as well. So, this might be another thing for me to try. I’ll admit, a bunch of canned vegetables sure look a lot nicer than a bunch of bags of frozen, blanched vegetables. And, they’d be easier to store as my freezer tends to overflow at certain times of the year. I probably won’t try it this year. But, if I end up with a bumper crop of tomatoes, who knows? More likely, though, I will research this over the winter and plan on it for next year.