Relief...

Dad's home from the hospital! He's still gotta take it easy, but he's home! The relief is...there are no adequate words.

Now I feel as if I can somewhat go on with life. There are still the biopsy results to wait on, & Doug's mom had her own yesterday on some lumps, so the prayers are still needed, but the imminent danger is past.

A quick revamp: summer dress to work appropriate dress

 Dress from Goodwill: $4 :)++

Knee length: ++

Browns and neutrals coloring: ++++

Plunging neckline that shows off your choice in bras: :( bad bad bad

very light cotton that floats on the wind easily: not so great in super-windy Wyoming

(no joke, moderate winds can take out a cinderblock wall)

So I got 2 yards of very cute trim from the clearance bin at Wal-mart ($4 total), dyed it with tea so it wasn't harsh white to match the more natural look of the dress, and did a very poor but serviceable run of basic stitches around the edge of the liner layer to give it a hint more weight to resist flipping up. (I have yet to master basics of my new sewing machine. Those fancy-pantsy double needle tricks will come later. Probably much later.)

 Then I used a short bit to cover the boobage area. Admittedly, this is still just pined inside with several safety pins. I ran out of ooph and hooah when the heat arrived sometime in June. And I didn't have a matching thread to hide the stitches until recently. But it works, and some day I will pester myself into knocking out those final stitches. 

So there ya go- $4 almost exactly right dress becomes just right in less than $5.

(ps. If you are going to stand on your bed in order to photograph a piece of clothing that is somewhat larger, and therefore awkward to photograph, you should make sure not to stand under the ceiling fan. It has no mercy on ponytails, or dignity)

DIY Butler Bag insert

(note: it's late, I can't sleep yet, but I'm getting groggy so this will be bare bones until...sometime)

I refuse to pay $100 for a purse with all the pockets. I can't even stand the thought of spending the $40 or so that Avon sells them for when I've experienced the way the Avon ones fall apart so quickly.
But I hate carrying a purse because this is what it looks like on a GOOD day.

So I decided to go back to elementary school crafts and make my own divider to go into a purse I already own. That's right- bust out those plastic canvas sewing skills!

 I just went the lazy route and picked up a three sheet pack for about $3 at Wal-mart when I was already there for groceries.

 There wasn'ty much in the planning this thing out department- I guestimated the bottom piece, and then started figuring out the sides and compartment pieces one by one. Then I heard Karen's voice in my head telling me to think about what order to put it together- you don't want the last bit to be you trying to shove your hand inside the smallest compartment.

 So I started with the little corner bit to hold pens- got the two inner pieces that would attach to a corner and whip-stiched them together.

 When you reach the end of a bit, just run the yarn back through a few stitches so you don't have knots sticking out everywhere.

 Then I stitched the bits to the end piece.

 See? It almost looks like a something! More stitching of small bits to sides and/or other bits...

 and maybe this is starting to look like something.

 Nit-pickers may notice that one section isn't as tall as the rest- I used only one sheet for this, and that's the piece I had left for this one bit, so it's good enough for government work in my book.

 Then I made sure to go around the top edges so I don't scratch my hands on any less-than-smooth plastic.

And approximately 4 hours in real time, or one hour of crafting mixed in the middle of yelling at the dog to leave the damn squirrel alone, answering the phone, getting a snack, some random bouts of cleaning, yelling at the damn squirrel to leave the dogs alone, more phone calls, bathroom breaks and general not-staying-on-taskery, I have a semi-pro looking organizer for my purse. The hardest part was threading the needle with the yarn. Seriously. Fourth grade level skills here. :)