Progress

Well, here are my weekend progress pics. And no, unfortunately, I don't mean weight loss progress. That is slooow going.

This is the top I made with some old Amy Butler fabric I had in my fabric stash. It seems that the easiest clothes to make are ones that aren't fitted, so I feel like I look pregnant, again. Oh well. It's still a fun weekend shirt. I used this belle epoque tutorial, but had to take it in a LOT. It was pretty huge, even though I used my measurements.


Onto the real weekend progress - our full bathroom. We bought a cosmetic fixer upper - as you will see below. This picture does not due these tiles justice. The wall ceiling tiles (that's right, tiles on the ceiling) are beige with brown speckles, with some yellow-with-white-splotches tiles (aka the reverse popcorn jelly belly tiles) as "accents". Horrid. With a yelloweygreen toilet AND tub. Fabulous. Hubby wanted to leave it as is for a while, but I put my foot down. That was many moons ago, but we're picking up the pace again. Like that wallpaper?



Most of my calories burned this week have been slaving over these evil 2in white hex tiles. Eventually, I'll fill in with gray grout.

And the hardest task so far has been replacing the ceiling, which we did very badly. I spent two weeks working on correcting our bad installation with a ginormous (sp?) tub of joint compound. I had retiled the shower a few months ago - but I love the glass mosaic tiles we have running around. We have yet to put in the woodwork (molding around the ceiling and white beadboard with a chairrail on the walls to cover where the wall tiles had been).

Though messy, I'm actually having fun fixing up this old house. Especially since it earned me tons of activity points. YAY!

Today I did well, even under the "nomoreflexpoints" horror from yesterday. I ate 21 points, worked off 5, and have no flex for tomorrow.

Dress, take 1

So it was horribly hot yesterday and we had a bunch of friends over so I made that summer dress that I'd been thinking about making. I was very happy to see that I didn't have to alter the pattern to make up for my pearyness - I'd read the direction wrong the first time - you add 20 inches to the chest measurement. My hips are not 20 inches wider than my chest. Not yet. Anyways, I was worried the dress wouldn't turn out well, so I used some spare fabric (actually, it is a "man" sarong from Thailand that my mom gave to my husband - he was happy to see it turned into something he'd never ever have to wear).

I followed the online directions, except for all of that pinning "preparation" stuff - I'm lazy. I also used 8 elastics not 6, and made the bottom elastic two inches shorter than the rest, to minimize the "isshepreggo?" look. I also made it smaller than the directions - I stitched the back a few times, b/c it was too big and billowy, probably shaving 3 inches or so off of the original. Anyways. It super comfy! and very cool for the these hot summer days out here. I'll probably make another, with fabric that I like more. Something flowery!

I spent the afternoon slaving over the drywall ceiling in our bathroom that we installed a while ago. It's in SIX pieces (that's a lot) and our joists were uneven...so my joining/skimming work is really hard to do. I've done a full sanding/skim on it, and its starting to look a lot better. Anyway, caloriesperhour says I burned 500 calories. And I believe it. It's hard work...the sanding and skimming and wiping...ouchers.

Today, I didn't do my pilates as planned, so I won't call it an SVD. But I ate 20, exercised 5, and have 14 flex remaining.

URGH...large hips = large clothes

otherwise known as "Bri's rant #2". So I'm all geared up to make this super cute dress out of some cotton saree fabric I have. Then I realized after almost getting run over on my bike this morning (see below), that I'm going to have to change the pattern because by butt is so wide. damn pear shaped arse. Where are the large-assed crafters? It says I should cut the fabric for the dress to be 6 inches bigger than my chest size. Um, 36+6=42=Bri's hip size! NOT ATTRACTIVE. I'll have to measure some of my store-bought dresses to figure out how many more inches I'm going to have to use to conceal my pear-shapeyness. Suggestions? Sigh. Must lose weight NOW. Meg, should we start another blog called thecraftypear? ahaha.

And, I almost got run over this morning. I suppose I should have been more careful about making assumptions about slowing cars at crosswalks. But writing this makes me feel better:

Dear newshinygrayPriusdriverwhotriedrorunmedownthismorning,

Did you take driver's ed? Remember that part about yielding for bikes and pedestrians at crosswalks at major commuting bike paths? And that part about signs telling you to stop for bikes and other people crossing the street?

OK good. I'm glad you remember that now. Because when I stopped my bike and looked at YOU and you slowed down, it meant that you should be STOPPING. When I looked the other way, it was to CHECK FOR CARS IN THE OTHER DIRECTION. This was not me waving you to go while my head was turned.

When my wheel hit you car, did I scratch it? If it did, I'm not sorry since you tried to run me down. Maybe you should stop driving your little "electric" car around and ride a bike for a while, then you will learn to stop at crosswalks. or at least to not slow down and fool innocent bikers into thinking you should have stopped!

Disgruntledly yours,
Bri