One Day of Summer

Thursday I felt kind of melancholy to leave work - some people you might never see again, and then you have a big wide open in front of you to fill. Last summer I was busy doing curriculum writing. I am still working at Sylvan this summer, but I haven't signed up for classes or district work.

Yesterday, I went back to bed after fajr prayers, then was just kind of laying around when I got a call from my always-busy brother - he is always doing something, he never rests - unlike me! He wanted a ride to the hospital because his wife had gone there from work not feeling well, and he was helping a friend move and his car was already packed with stuff. So, I got dressed and went up to Memorial and sat with my brother and his wife in the ER for a few hours chatting while she waited for a room. (She's okay, don't worry.) My brother and I are not much alike, and we hadn't talked in awhile, so that was good - we do have some things in common - teaching, family history, certain aspects of politics, but our personalities are quite different.

Then, I drove to the cemetery where mom and I planted flowers at her parents', aunt's and grandparents' graves last week and checked on the flowers - they're doing well. I have some flags to put at the graves for my dad's side of the family and other of mom's family sometime this week, insha'allah. Mainly the point is just to visit the graves.

Then I stopped at a new one of those discount grocery stores that sell overstock etc., that is in my neighborhood and found a few things and ran a few other errands. Then I came home and got on the roof and hooked up my swamp cooler because it is starting to get hot. At first, the line leaked where it connects in the house but I managed to get that to stop and managed to set the level weight inside the cooler trays so that it would fill high enough to wet the mats but not overflow - basically everything worked this time, alhumdooleluh, so I could do it myself.

I went to my mom's house and got her to cut my hair shorter for summer, then we saw Robin Hood. Today I am finishing reading a book I have to write an article for later today, and I am baking a concoction to use whatever I had from Door to Door Organics - this is a made-up casserole with eggplant, potato, tomato, zucchini, with salt, pepper, olive oil, garlic, Italian seasoning and swiss cheese. I had some sweet potato, too, but that just didn't seem to fit with the theme. I'm not a cook, so we'll see if it ends up being any good. I think it will at least be edible, most likely. Got some dishes washing, and contemplating painting a room in my house this month - something I've never done before so I'll have to figure out how to do it.

Make a t-shirt bag - world's easiest sewing project

I think I found the world's easiest sewing project online that actually makes something practical. And it recycles - no need to buy fabric. It should take only a few minutes - say 15 minutes or less. A child as young as kindergarten age can do this with supervision and will have fun and avoid frustration that often comes with trying to learn to sew. It requires only one straight stitch and a few cuts, and two more straight stitches are optional. Adult beginning sewers will also enjoy being able to make something with ease. Some youth groups make these and sell them for charity projects.

Materials needed: a t-shirt, scissors or rotary cutter, thread & needle or sewing machine ready to sew a straight stitch.

Step 1. Find an old t-shirt and turn it inside out. It must be jersey material (standard t-shirt material).

Step 2. Set up your sewing machine (or you can hand-stitch if you prefer.)

Step 3. Turn the shirt inside out.

Step 4. Sew the bottom of the shirt closed right above the existing hem using a standard straight stitch or any other stitch you prefer. If you want to be careful, you can pin the two sides together first. If you use a straight stitch, go back and forth at the very beginning of your line and at the end of you line to help lock the stitch in place. Jersey stretches so you may accidentally pull your fabric and end up with a stitch that is not completely straight - sewing slower can help that, but for this project it really doesn't matter - your bag will still look great even with a wandering stitch like mine shown below. You can repeat/go-over this stitch to make it stronger if you like.



Step 5. This step is optional. Reach inside the t-shirt and open it a little, then pull the two sides apart down near the bottom of your inside-out bag, so that you can create a bit of an opening. Lay the fabric that you just sewed together so that you have a triangle on the end as the picture below shows. Sew straight across a few inches in (as in the picture) and this creates some depth to the bag so that it sort of has a bottom instead of just closing to a line. This is called a gusset, I think. The further you sew this in from the end, the greater depth you give the bag, but that triangle above where you sew will be inside your finished bag just kind of hanging out in there, and you probably don't want it to be really really big.

Repeat this stitch making the triangle corner on the other side of the bag bottom about the same distance in. You can measure if you want to, but it really isn't necessary - eyeballing it will work just fine. If the two stitches are very different distances in from the end or are very crooked, it could be a little noticeable in the final product, but your bag will still function just fine.



Step 6. Using scissors or a rotary cutter, cut off the sleeves by following along inside the seam that attaches the sleeve to the shirt, so that the seam is no longer on the shirt body. Cut off the collar the same way. After cutting off the collar, cut the neck a little wider or deeper if you want to, but be careful not to cut into any cool design/pattern that might be on the shirt front, unless you don't care.




Step 7. Turn it right-side out. You now have a flexible and surprisingly sturdy tote bag that can be used for grocery shopping or anything else. An adult t-shirt makes a huge bag. The one pictured was an adult large, I think. Child shirts will make smaller bags.

Irises and Spanish Broom blooming

Sewing Today

First time I've sewed in like a year - made two oversize pillowcases and a bag today.

Western Tanager

Saw this beautiful bird on the corner of Uintah and Chestnut on the way home from work.

And Jupiter lost its southern equatorial red belt - it disappeared in the past few weeks - fascinating!

State of the Yard

Photos posted here.

Mystery

I think my favorite type of novel is a serial mystery. Serial because I have to care about the characters, and mystery because the possibilities are endless, they're a little bit dark, and there is something to be solved. I've read every Sherlock Holmes mystery, every Leaphorn/Chee mystery, and am well on my way through the Inspector Lynley mysteries. I've read a few of the Wind River mysteries, but I'm not as impressed with them - I don't like the characters as well - they're not as deep - and something rings false about Margaret Coel writing those books anyway, an "expert" on the reservation and tribes, yet she being white and living in Boulder - in a way that didn't ring false with Hillerman. It seems like making a dollar on their backs to me, somehow. I don't know how they see it, though. Let me know if you can recommend any good mystery series.

I decided to whittle my scarf drawer down to about 20 main scarves (not counting things like underscarves) and I did that this weekend along with general cleaning of the closets. It doesn't look like many now, but 20 is still enough to wear a different one to work every day for 4 weeks - which is definitely enough! I now have managed to get almost all of my clothes into one closet, only a few non-hangable items like socks are not in there.

I also planted some seed this weekend, but it may have been too early - still freezing at night here sometimes. I put some watermelon seed and marigold seed and some miscellaneous Colorado wildflower seed my mom gave me down. I doubt the Colorado wildflowers will bloom - they tend to be very picky about soil, light, etc., and the seeds were from late last season, meant to be planted last year.

I might be getting a new roof - an inspector said he thinks I need a new one - we'll see if the insurance adjustor agrees. On a note that is related in my mind, but probably not to anyone else, I might be changing trash companies. The one I have is one of the cheapest, but there are other companies that offer a whole second 64 gallon bin for recycling, and you don't have to sort. I think I might be much more successful recycling that way. We'll see.

Yesterday I saw an awesome episode of Nature - it was about Kilauea. You can watch the whole thing here - it's worth it!