NotSoThoreau

A long time ago, I used to have a treadle. I loved it. It was German made, turn of the century. I had it in the schoolbus, but when we moved into the Airstream, there wasn’t room. There was condensation in the trailer and I was afraid it would be ruined. I found a good home for it in Walla Walla.

I’d been talking to Lon about treadles and showing him pictures of them. He likes antiques and was fascinated by the decoration. I had a post from the Vintage Machines group on Ravelry with a link to a Craigslist ad in Seattle. It was the back of the machine and you couldn’t make out a lot. I sent the link to Lon. Then a day later, he told me he’d made the deal for it and she would hold it for us until payday. I used a vacation day yesterday and we went to pick it up.

This is a 1891 Singer VS2. That means is has the vibrating shuttle (long bobbin) instead of the more modern round bobbin. My old machine used a shuttle like this too. Singer calls this the roses and daisies decal. It’s one of the prettiest machines I’ve ever seen. It needs a belt, but she said it sews fine. It also has the “puzzle box”, as folks call these folding attachment boxes.

I’ve ordered a belt for it and will try and do a little work on it over the next couple of weeks. I’m just amazed to own this machine.

Spent most of Sunday at the river. It’s nice to have the kids there. Very nice weather and I did some knitting outside. We are cleaning up the old bird room, so I am trying to stay out of the house when the clean up is being done. After washing down the walls, we’re going to do some painting. It should help. I am feeling better after this last round of prednisone and am planning to cancel the bronoscopy my pulmonologist wants. If it means I have to go with another specialist, I will. The only bad thing Sunday was that Loretta knee-capped me while trying to get away from the puppy. I went down and banged up my foot a bit. It’s okay today, but I wish that I’d known she was behind me.

Quinn and Shanna have been down all week. They are getting a temporary spot set up, to move down to the river. Shanna plans to go back to school at Clark. We’ve made a couple of trips to the Rebuild it center for windows.

As part of the move, we needed to get George and his girlfriend moved out. George made an agreement to pay the electric bill and to stay in his own trailer. It’s what we agreed on and he violated those both. He’s also been agressive and abusive, when we’ve talked to him about it. The cops made it easy for us, as they were in the process of tracking him down. George winds up in jail because he won’t follow through on the conditions of his release. And so he is back in jail. His girlfriend is in jail, because she told the cops he wasn’t in the trailer. They told her they wold take her in if she was lying and so they did.

Quinn and Shanna are starting to settle in. It’s nice to have Quinn’s friends down there again. It’s extremely nice to think of the Wells family using our own property for a change. You have no idea how frustrating it is to have a nice place on the river, scramble every year to pay the property taxes, then come out and see a bunch of people you don’t know enjoying themselves on your property. It will be nice to clean it up and use it ourselves.

I have been sick the last few weeks and we are trying to do a major house cleaning. Lon wants to paint the old bird room and move most of the things out of the office into that room. I’d like to see better use of it, as I like the French doors. It’s just not a room I’ll feel safe going into without a respirator. I have a sweater that I started from yarn stored in the office. I washed most of the yarn, but started out with a couple of unwashed hanks. I started getting a reaction to it and had to wash my work in progress. Of course, that meant that I ordered more yarn and started a new project.

I have sick kitties. Fanny has an upper respiratory infection. I am treating that and I think Oblio is getting it too. I hope Fanny gets better soon. She looks so pitiful like this.

This is the latest broach. I’d like to have the gold version, but I think I have enough broaches for now. I did pick up a bracelet, and will post pictures when I get it. It’s always hard to tell yourself that you have enough.

We have a functioning truck again. Picked up a rebuilt tranny and had it put in. Seems to work okay and it’s very nice to have reverse again. Now all we have to do is get past the property taxes.

Quinn is planning to move down, so we are trying to get things cleared out at the river. Will be nice to have him nearby.

This is a new obsession. The company was originally called Renoir and made copper jewelry in the 50s. They added some enameled pieces and called that company Matisse. It has a modern look to it and I can’t say that I like everything they made. But…I do like most of the brooches!  Here’s my collection so far, and I picked up two more this week. I know they are not spindles, but they make great shawl pins. And I’ve worn the green leaf on my new red sweater. (The sweater is not quite ready for a prime time picture.)

And there are sewing machines. Since I took pictures of these last week, I’ll post them here too. Am still working on the Singers.

This was one of Lon’s machines. It came through the fire, and was missing an electric cord. I have that, but it’s got tension issues. I’m going to have this one tuned up.

This is a machine I rescued. It was missing the presser foot and needle holder. I pulled that off my other machine. It seems to work okay.

And this is my Viking. I have been doing some light sewing. I want to set this up and start sewing for a bit every day. I have some projects in mind.

This time, it’s Chuck. I got Chuck before Petey. I’d had a cat I really loved killed by a car. Jeffrey was at the gas station and they offered him  a kitten. And so I wound up with Chuck. He was always problematic. He peed on things and I couldn’t break him of it. When we moved into the Silver Streak, he started peeing on Jeffrey’s bed. Couldn’t bear to have him put down, so we exiled him to the unheated travel trailer, with the cockatiel. We had them separated by a screen and they did fine while we were there. I tried having him in the house for a long time here, but he continued to be a problem. It started to cause too much friction between me and Lon. I wanted Chuck to be over in the shed, but Lon was sure he’d be okay outside. And he was, for awhile. For whatever reason, he wound up in the front part of the property and was out on the road last night. He couldn’t hear well and as an inside cat, just wasn’t aware of cars.

Lon and I are getting married at the Solstice this year. We normally have our Messabout at Quinn’s Cove during the solstice, but it’s been hit or miss the last few years. Quinn has promised to work on the dock and get everything in order. It won’t be a big or fancy wedding. So there you go!

I have been wearing long skirts for a full year now. (I did wear pants a few times when they seemed appropriate.) I am going to continue wearing my long skirts. There are a number of benefits.

• Warmer in cool weather. It works like mittens versus gloves. Mittens are warmer because  your fingers are all together. Having your legs under two layers of material is warmer than wearing jeans.
• No more “sausage” effect. When I wear jeans now, I always feel like I”m squeezed into them. These skirts are kinder to full figures. (And I’m talking about the Folkwear Walking skirt here. It has a flat gored front and light gathers in the back. And it’s cut for your true waistline – shorter in front and longer in back.)
• Comfort. This skirt is comfortable. It’s cool in the summer and warm in the winter. It’s not restrictive, although I have to adjust it when I get into the truck.
• Simple construction. I can make these out of cotton material and it’s easy to sew.
• Elegance. I think I look dressier than I would in pants.
• Different reaction in public. When I wear skirts, people react differently. When we went to the dump, I got help from the workers in emptying it. People assume that I will respond favorably to help and I do. You may not need it if you are younger, but I have limits on my endurance and what I can lift these days.

Disadvantages

• It’s harder to climb a ladder.
• I have to lift the skirt going up stairs.

I have worn my long skirts when digging, so it doesn’t limit me there. It’s just become the way I dress now. I have material for a flannel petticoat and for another long skirt. And I still have plans for making that Gibson Girl blouse. My first two skirts have been worn to pieces. They are getting stains and tears. It’s time to retire them and make something new.

Lon has been talking about shaving his head for several months. Guess he got tired of asking me to cut it. He finally did it on New Years Day.

He went to a local barber today to have it all smoothed out. He says he doesn’t want to do it again but is glad he did it once.

So we had a major wind storm yesterday. We were in Portland when it happened and it was blowing leaves up and down the street in a very impressive way. After many years in the Gorge, I am not usually impressed by wind in Portland.

The house is fine. But things were not so good down at the river. George had some heavy plastic over the top of the Aqua Home and it was acting like a sail. The boat was listing heavily towards the dock, so George managed to cut the plastic loose. The main trailer and the travel trailers were fine.

The old chicken house was not so lucky:

We also had damage to the pump house and something hit the top of the power box. The power was off last night, but we had them shut it down at the river for now. We will need to replace the power box and make sure the electric cable to the trailer is repaired. It will need to be inspected first, of course. George has a small generator to use, so they are managing. I’m just glad no one was hurt.

The other nice thing..George had recovered my old aluminum canoe. It had been stolen, and I was happy to get it back. I had some good memories with Jeffrey in that canoe. The canoe had been in the wire portion of the chicken house, but he’d moved it outside in front of the trailer. It wasn’t damamged, but it would have been in the old spot. We’d planned to rebuild that chicken house, and now I guess we will really need to do that. But first, we need to get the electricity back up.

I’ve been reading about every day carry over on a forum. It seems to be a guy thing, as most men use tools on a regular basis. I liked the idea and thought it would be nice to have a special set of tools. The picture above is my current set. I have an old Boker pocket knife. I bought a key shackle set to clean up my keys. There’s a multi-tool on it now. The lighter is from Ebay and I really like it. The FourSevens flashlight came in this week. I thought I was crazy to spend so much on a flashlight. It’s extremely bright and has six different function levels. When I have light at the highest level and point it to the ceiling, it’s as bright as our regular lights. I like it a lot.

And I forgot the other piece, my new to me watch. It’s a Lady Elgin from the 1940s. I got this on Ebay. It had been belonged her grandmother. It does keep time, although it needs to be wound several times a day. It works fine for me.

Yes I’m happy about it. The country is definitely on the wrong track. I’m not impressed with a party that wants to tell you what to eat and how to think. Who needs that? I worked the Ace of Spades Decision Desk for Kentucky. Let’s say it wasn’t the most exciting race. It was interesting and fun. I plan on doing it again.

Spent most of last week sick and still am not 100%. I never know if it’s the flu or a reaction to the birds. I think this was the flu.

We have a new cat. This was actually one of Kate’s Scottish Folds. It’s been missing since before her death. They’d microchipped it and reported it missing. Someone took it in to deal with the fleas and they found the info on the scan. Of course we took it back. He’s been an outside cat and is having problems adjusting to being inside and dealing with the other cats. He is a handsome cat so I hope he can adjust.

Most of my updates have been on the Spindlitis list (and not much there either.) We are just battening down the hatches for winter. George came out and helped with the yard cleanup. We still need a dump run to get rid of it. Weekends have been slow and lazy. I’ve been doing a lot of spinning, but now am on a knitting kick. I need some lightweight warm clothes for this time of year. The things I have are for much colder weather. I’ve tried to finish up my knitting projects for other people. I don’t plan to do any Christmas knitting this year.

I’m going to take Election Day off. I’ve volunteered to work with a conservative blog. They are trying to get a system of volunteers to pull together election results, with an eye towards calling races faster than anyone else. I’ll be working on the East Coast elections. The more I thought about it, the less I wanted to be distracted by work that day. So I’ll take a break.

I have still been stocking up a bit. It makes it a lot easier to get from check to check. I really don’t like shopping of any kind. There’s no organization though, so I sometimes have problems finding ingredients. I’ll have to work on that.

Petey, my polydactyl cat is still in poor health. I think the only reason he’s still going is the steroids. I’ve been giving him a small dose of my pills and it helps him breathe. I am running out of pills and I suspect that my pulmologist won’t give me more meds for my cat. As long as he seems to get around okay, I’ll try and keep  him going. He’s terribly thin, despite eating many times a day.

Picture of the river from last week, before the rain set in. Water level has been very low.