Groundhog day

 It's only been a week, so I'm not bothered by the fact that I just feel like I am having a perpetual day off. It still feels very much like a temporary break and I occasionally find my brain reminding me of minor office tasks that are no longer relevant.  Even though there is just an empty corner in the study where my workstation used to be.  It's probably because instead of a hard stop from commuting to a physical job, I've had 18 months of working-from-home limbo so in effect I am still living in my 'office'.  I think I also feel slightly cheated because instead of the uninhibited do-whatever-the-heck-you-want lifestyle stereotype of the newly retired, I still have long to-do lists and mundane chores to get through.  Except now I have more time to do those then get to my own fun stuff.  So not complaining.

This week I finished the Lowarn bag from Country Cow Designs that I was making with her sew-along. It's a bit wonky but I'm pleased with my first-ever bag rivets and because I learned some new techniques.  The design results in tremendously bulky seams in the final step when you are attaching the end pieces to the tube of the main bag, and subsequently covering the raw edges inside with binding.  This was extremely difficult to do neatly and my machine really did not like all the bulk.  So my inside end seams are a bit of a mess and the end pieces are not symetrical. If I do it again, I will have to modify the pattern to reduce the bulk in that final seam.

I gave my new-to-me stream press a good clean then fired it up.  It works, which is good news.  I used it to fuse the stabiliser to Block 6 of the Australian BOM which turned up last weekend and it worked a treat.  This was a quicker block to do without so much embroidery, so I finished it last night.

I also tried using the steam press for some of my normal ironing with mixed results.  If the fabric isn't too wrinkled, then the stream press flattens it brilliantly.  But if the fabric is very wrinkled, like say a cotton hanky that was all balled up, then the press will just set the wrinkles.  I watched a few Youtube videos and it appears the method is to dampen the wrinkled fabric with sprayed water so you can smooth it out on the bed of the steam press and then press it.  It just feels quicker to use a normal iron on things like that.

After tidying up my sewing room a bit, I put together a little Trim-its kit for a poppy brooch.  I've made a few of these little kits before for various xmas decorations, they are very affordable and surprisingly good for the money.  This made a rather large poppy with a beaded centre, with a brooch pin on the reverse.

Some gratuitous photos of our very strange cat writing in ecstasy in a plastic bin bag - apparently she has a plastic fetish. These types of bags have an unpleasant chemical plastic odour even to me, heaven knows what they smell like to a cat. Perhaps she is getting high on the fumes.

We are going to go give our caravan a bath today, to leave it all clean for over-winter storage.  We're just waiting for the temperature to warm up a little, not looking forward to working with a cold water hose when it's only 9 degrees C out.  It would have been better to have done the bath a few weekends ago but what with retirement gallivanting this is our first free weekend.  I've been watching Youtube videos and reading online posts about what to do to put a caravan into winter storage, unsurprisingly there are many different opinions and contradictions ("Use WD-40 to protect your electrical connection pins", "DON'T use WD-40 as it attacks plastic and makes it brittle", "Use dehumidifer packs to keep the inside dry", "DON'T use those dehumidifier packs, they just suck moisture in from the outside" etc. etc.)  So I've made a list by looking through our caravan manual and trying to walk a middle road through the minefield of recommendations.  Wish me luck.