Recognise this?  Do you have any of them?  I have 6 of them.

It's a bra bag.

Made by TIDE, I got mine at Zellers..in the closet organiser section.

I wash my bras in the washer, dry them on a rack.  But if you wash your bras in the machine and you like to wear underwire bra, the machine can snag them. The wires can will break or tear through the sides of your expensive bra.... the wire can tear through and get lodged in the holes in your washer drum..and chip the enamal...ask me how I know that!                                                                                                                                       

With these little bags, you can safely wash your bras, or your other unmentionables in the washer.  The bag will hold 2 bras. If you have a large bra, then just one.     I don't know how many panties.                                                                               

Put in and zip em up and toss them in the washer.  Don't have to worry about snagging other clothes with the hooks , either.   I could use a large delicates bag, but I usually have T-shirts in it.       

When I have small pieces of fabric that I want to wash I use one of  these bags.  Excellent for that too.  When I cleared out my mother's house I wanted to wash fabrics that I brought home ( her cat had a VERY  bad flea problem), I used these bags .

Monday   is a holiday here in Canada ...we call it "Canada Day"...original, eh?  It used to be called "Dominion Day"....because we are the "Dominion of Canada"...but the politicians in Ottawa decided that "Canada Day" was better . ....There I go ...digressing again...off on a tanget...                                                                                                    

                                                                                    

               What I want to say is...no blog on Monday!

Have a great long weekend!

                                                                                    

My daughter gave me a bunch of nice king size sheets..she didn't want them because they are too crisp for her, and she now has a queen size bed.
The mister and I like our sheets crisp...so I took them.  I decided not to alter the bottom sheets, just tuck them in...oh...like we used to do.  I made the top sheets on some smaller.  Now that was a real pain.  Those sheets are SO tightly woven it was hard to sew them.  Some of the sheets I am giving to a friend who has a king bed.

My daughter cleaned out her whole linen closet and along with the sheets were these little pillow cases.......

The first one is one that I made 45 years ago for my first baby.  I used an old sheet and embroidered these little flowers by hand.  Pink and blue..back then we didn't know the sex before hand.  I sewed that whole pillowcase by hand.  Crap, thinking back, I even made a pillow.
A few years later when I convinced the mister I needed a sewing machine, I resewed it.

Over the years it grew a little smaller as I had to take in the seams as the corners wore out. Eventually I serged it.

The second, I made a few years later...hand cross-stitched and also sewed by hand.
My kids used these for pillows in their carriage...hmmm...remember them?

I saved them, an afgan my grandparents gave me, along with a couple of little outfits for my grand children.

Even though I gave them to my daughter to use for the granddaughters, I don't think they got used much.

So now, I will put them away for my great grand children. (OH BOY!)

ohhhh!   I can add to the "collection" with some more embroidered pillowcases done on my embroidery machine.

reno part 2

As I said yesterday, the lower level has been christened by flood before we even got the furniture back in.
Everything is now cleaned up..and I love my room.  It was two rooms before, the mister used one for his office and I used the other as my tv and the grandkids playroom.
Now, it's one big room...warm and inviting
I have some cabinets separating his side from mine..when he retires (soon), they will be turned flat against the wall and we will use it as one large room.

And of course being a nice new room, I notice...watermarks on the ceiling?????what?
of course...where is the laundry room?  on the first floor, in the back hall, at the back door and the bathroom.....
So what's leaking now? the washer of course..stand pipe is too small..water is backing up and spilling out.   The floor is getting wet and mouldy.   A few years ago, it was the hoses splitting.

The laundry room/back hall is taking on a funky smell.....I recognise that one!



these were in the back hall...foam is to deaden any noise of the machine when the mister is in his office..



So...again...after much agitation...the mister agrees to move the washer and gas dryer downstairs to the  furnace room.  The furnance room is huge...it's the size of my living room and dining room...and largely unused!



my folding table and dye cart



Wait...remember I said that dryer is gas!!!  So I gotta call a certified gas installer and ....and a plumber...my friend, the electrician.  The mister and I carried the washer and dryer downstairs...BOY! they were HEAVY!

Now I have a huge laundry room, where I can easily sort clothes...I have my dye stuff here under my folding table and our friend installed lots of lights for me.

So what about the spot where the machines were?



my back hall now...yes there was a washer and dryer AND a sink in there...but  no place to sort or fold clothes...ever tried doing laundry with everyone in and out that door?



We ordered 4 large pantries from one of the mister's customers..installed them ourselves...that was an education!  The walls and floors in this house are not square or level ..and no, I am not surprised..

AHHH!! I am now ahead of the trend! I have a large, beautiful, walk-in PANTRY!

And I am not going to jinx my self by saying they are no leaks, watermarks on that new ceiling....





Now, if I can only convince the mister to take out a wall between my sewing room and the next room .......I'll just keep agitating!..lol



reno part 1

Since I haven't done any sewing or quilting at all lately and I am still trying to organise my fabric ...still not all folded and put away, but getting closer to the end, I thought I would tell you of our renovations in recent years.
When we bought this house, ages ago, the basement was finished.  I use that word loosely.
  It was dark, dated and somewhat dank...and cold.
Dark fake wood panelling on the bottom half of the wall...no insulation, no vapour barrier.  I could smell the must,(mould) no one else could, But I could.
Top half of the wall was drywall, insulation and vapour barrier...still nicely folded up...enough to cover the lower half of the wall..hhmmm  why didn't they unfold it?
Red carpeting ....
No wonder I could smell mould. Because the vapour barrier wasn't unfolded , moist warm air was hitting the cold wall.
Funny, too, because my furnance room is not finished, is warmer and doesn't smell mouldy!
After much agitation, I convinced the mister we needed to redo the lower room.
So we did..with the help of a friend, we tore out everything and rebuilt, rewired and redid the heat ducting.
It wasn't easy because the mister didn't take time off work and he still sat at his desk  down there, sometimes working as the friend also worked on the room.
The guys finished and went off for their annual golf trek ..and I painted..
We had new carpeting installed..put some of the furniture back...and off the mister went for a business trip to Montreal.
The grandkids are here now because school has finished..we are outside playing in the pool and I can hear this funny ticking sound...big hmmmmm
So with the daughter watching her kids, I came in to see what it was...
OH MY GOD....can you even guess what that noise was? 
did you know the water pressure coming into the toilet tank can lift the lid and make it dance?  and tick!    the ballcock had blown in the tank.
sooo...how long did I hear that? ten maybe 15 minutes...how much water can pour into the newly renovated basement ?..Lots and lots..
I quickly turned off the valve under the toilet, then ran downstairs and turned off the watermain..
Thank goodness DD was here...she took over the phone..called a plumber who was here in a few minutes..followed closely by an insurance adjuster..who had recovery people here in just a few more...
The mister arrived home later that evening, he was greeted in the driveway by the insurance adjuster, who told him.."It was okay, everything is taken care of and under control"....hehehe..he didn't know a thing about it...yet!

Not too bad for the beginning of the first long weekend of summer.

Needless to say, it was one of  the hottest weekend on record that year..and we had 5 heater/dryer/blowers going and we told not to use the A/c with them going. Boy did that put a blip in the hydro bill.
Amazingly, everything but a couple of ceiling tiles was recoverable.  And my new room was in service!

Last week I was reading the paper...I read the paper everyday, but this day there was an article in the paper written by Kathy Rewald.  She has a gardening show on HGTV and she often writes gardening columns for the Hamilton Spectator.

Any whoo..she wrote about another TV personality who has a blog...Karen Bertelsen and her crafting and how much work she puts into her blog.

So...I checked out her blog..."the art of doing stuff"
http://www.theartofdoingstuff.com/

...funny lady...great blog..I started following her.. I spent hours reading all her posts..and I picked up a great hint...

If you have black marker on a surface that won`t come off...try magic eraser sponge (Mr Clean or noname) and ...TADAH...Windex and it will remove the ink.

Having the grand daughters here after school, my coffee table in the family room takes a s**t kicking...I`ve replaced it once because I couldn`t get the marker off the surface and I had used a magic eraser. The coloured marker came out, but not the black permanent ink.

So when my neighbour put out a really nice table (actually 2 of them) I grabbed them and passed one on to a young mother who had a call out for furniture and kept the other for myself and passed the one I had, on to a niece.  I don't know if she got out the ink.

Well now, the new (to me) table is marred with ink and pencil crayon.

So I thought I would try it...can't hurt...and it took off the ink!..then I went to the garage door...there were little blue finger prints that wouldn't come off...they came off...I went to the front door where there was blobs of red ink....that came off....I ended up going over the whole first floor looking for fingerprints and grunge...cleaning it all with the windex and magic eraser.

I found that there was only one thing it didn't clean...A couple of years ago I had ants in the kitchen...they came in around the window casing, to get rid of them, I sprayed RAID...it stained the white wall and I have never been able to get it out.  I guess  I need to repaint...

Oh dear...Last night was family dinner night .  The girls come home from school and then mommy comes to have dinner.
I told one of my neighbours that we did this and she started doing it too.  It's a nice idea for midweek...keeps the weekends free and we also have a less formal dinner than we would on a Sunday...but...I digress....
Dear daughter showed up and was a bag of dirt..I had talked to her earlier and knew she wasn't feeling well.....she was in a lot of pain, nauseous...just like a gall bladder attack!  But she had that removed last November!
I insisted she go to the hospital, so after dinner that's where we went.  And we waited for 3 hours..it wasn't too busy when we got there, but boy was it busy when we left.
They think she might have more stones..so she has gone for an ultrasound this morning.  If she has more stones, she my need a scope ...after that??who knows? time will tell!

  Quilt Guild again!  And again the last meeting of the season.  And it was HOT in the room...they turned off the AC in the afternoon because the room was cool....DUH!  it's still hot out and there will be a room full of hot women..hotflashing and sweating!  we never did get the temp in that room below 80.
We have a potluck with this guild in June also, I  think I will stick with devilled eggs again...I know the mister didn't mind me making more!
I loved all the yummy salads and desserts..
I really missed all the salads at my other guild (we had appetisers and desserts).  I think a lot of people missed salads.  Don't get me wrong ...I enjoyed the appetisers, but ones that should be served hot were cold...that did spoil some of the taste....but beggars can't be choosy..
We always have soooo much food!   and even more desserts!  We quilters love to cook  eat. And tonight was no exception..there was a lot of food!
No one has stepped forth to take over Social...if no one does take over, there will be no tea or coffee...no one to co-ordinate the snacks...

It's been over a week and I have not even been  in my sewing room let alone sew, or work on the FWSQ.
I hoped to, but didn't...I did clean up my fabric stash and made a horrendous mess in doing so...I  didn't realise I had SO MUCH fabric. (gotta stop buying and start using!)  I didn't get that finished and the mister was back...next day, my sister is here for a few days.  We spent some time shopping and she likes to see all the changes to the area we grew up.... areas that were farmland are all houses, there is a new hospital being built..schools rebuilt...many changes!
She spent a good deal of time with her daughters and granddaughter here...
One afternoon her GD stayed with me while the others went out shopping.  I don't know why she wasn't in school, but we had a fun afternoon doing some crafting' and playing at the park with Thing Two after school.
My GD's , Thing One and Thing Two, enjoyed seeing their cousin again....