The Studio

 I missed the floor joists and the sub-floor photos.  They are really not much to see, the walls are a lot more to my liking and show some real progress.  They have been moving right along lately.  Wish it could go faster, but that isn't the way building projects work.  It has been unbearably hot and I can't expect them to work on it day and night!!  Even though that would be fine with me.  

The second photo is from the corner of the garage, where I have taken a number of photos to document the building.  The area that comes forward in the photo is the north end of the studio where the storage area will be.  There is about 27' of wall on this end and it is going to be one of the focal points in the studio when it is completed.  That will come in time.
The hallway window is in the wall running into the the studio wall.

  The first photo was taken out the front door.  The new front door will be in the area of "Do it Best".  The window straight in front of me is the east window on the north end of the studio.

 This area is the hallway to the studio, which lines up with the current office, that also becomes part of the hallway and on the far side is a new bedroom.  It will have a small bathroom off it.  So now friends can come and stay and have their own 
private little suite.   

This photo shows the bathroom area.  It is also shared by the studio area.  I had a dream the other night that friends I have met from classes I have taken came and stayed at our home and we had a great time.  Barb from MI was here, along with the sisters from Maryland I met in David's class last fall, Ricky came from Canada, Keri from HI, Michelle from AL, Priscilla and Karen came from Texas and Hollis even showed up.  

This is a photo of the dyeing room.  I have to be careful when I say that and usually have to add "fabric" dyeing room.  I get some funny looks on occasion.  Joedy has the cabinets built for this room, has had them built for some time.  I have an awesome pantry type cabinet with numerous drawers in it where the dyes and chemicals will be stored.  On the wall shown in the photo there will be an opening for a small refrigerator to store unused dyed, a small 12" cabinet for some items, the sink and two other cabinets.  I will have 3' of one side of the sink and 5' on the other side of the sink to work.  I am not sure I am going to be able to handle that much room.  I currently have 17".  

The door going between the main studio area and the dyeing room will be at the end of the cabinets on this wall.  It is a special door as it came out of the original farm house that was built here.  When my f-i-l and m-i-l remodeled their house 30+ years ago, they took it out.  It has been stored and Joedy found it about a month ago.  I am very excited to have it be a part of the studio 


This shot was taken from the east side of the studio looking west.  I will have an awesome hutch that will hold my rulers and rotary cutters on the bottom that Joedy built.  The top is from the cabinets I currently have in my sewing room and it will hold books, it think.  Lots of decisions to make as to where things will go in the new studio.


This is the southeast corner of the studio and bedroom area.  The dyeing room is in the southeast corner with a door that will access the outside.  The rest is the studio area where some cabinets I currently have in the sewing room will be moved upstairs and set below the windows on the left hand side of the photo.  

They are putting the sheeting on the outside today and the trusses should be here sometime next week.  
We have a long way to go before the move in date, but we are getting closer. I did find the vinyl flooring I wanted, so that is one thing I don't have to worry about anymore.  That was a big consideration for me.  We did come across some really cool new flooring, but it is too much like the feel of tile when standing on it.  I am getting anxious, my dream studio is becoming more of a reality each day.  

The Garden

 The garden is doing well despite the onslaught of aphids on the cabbages and thrips on everything, particularly the tomatoes.  In short, our oasis has been invaded to largely to the drought and the fact that we are an oasis.  

This photo is looking back to the west.  We have green beans in the first bed, with carrots down the middle.  Then we alternate between tomatoes and peppers in the next five rows, with cucumbers in the far west bed.  

 So I have been smashing nests of aphids, then washing them off with water.  I have no idea what kind of cabbage crop we will end up with as they are going way down inside the leaves.  Have had to pull two cabbages due to the fact they were a total loss.  But I will prevail over the little *&^%$.

The sauerkraut jars might be few and far between on the shelf this year.  They don't seem to bothering the Stonehead cabbages as much as they are the Late Dutch and the Bourbons.  I don't know if it is the luck of the draw due to location or variety.  

I did get everything fertilized this morning with the exception of the green beans.  They are nice and green so will keep an eye on them if they need it later on in the summer.   


The cucumbers are doing well with the exception of the thrips working on them.  They are bothering the English cucumbers to a far greater degree than the pickling cukes.  I hope I have some dill left to make dills by the time the cukes are ready.  That always seems to be a challenge.  I am leaving little plants here and there throughout the garden in hopes there will be enough.  

The winter squash has really taken off in the last week.  I have five varieties of it planted, Rumbo, Long Island Cheese, Black Bellota Acorn, Early Butternut, Sweet Dumpling and Bonbon.  I hope they do a little better than last year.  I think the heat was more than they could handle.  I have not raised a couple of them before, the Long Island Cheese, Rumbo and Sweet Dumpling.  Very anxious to try them, especially the Sweet Dumpling.  There are so many different types of winter squash.  I have a lot more to try out.

My grandmother use to raise Blue Hubbard squash.  Those things would get so darned big.  She was a very accomplished gardener.  She would have loved the hoop house to keep the wind and hail off the plants.  

The garlic are starting to mature.  I will probably start digging some at the end of July.  Another thing I am anxious to test.  Should be much easier since I have them labeled this year so I can keep track of them when I harvest them.  I am going to print out the labels on Tyvek and tie them on as I dig.  I know it will stand up to anything as I use it to label fabric when dyeing.

Another post will be dedicated to the progress on the studio.  It is coming right along too.    

Moving Along

 Things are moving along again today.  Had a rain event, which at this point in time anything is welcome.  It did slow things a little yesterday, but I am not complaining as we need the rain!!!
  
    I am sure those in the upper Midwest were wishing that the rain would just stop in CO for awhile instead of heading their direction.  It is hard to watch the news and see their fields flooded back there and know they are having another tough year.  

  The photo above is how it looked on Tuesday morning.  It wasn't long before it was a beehive of activity with 5 wheel barrows moving the concrete to the footing area.  They managed to keep all the wheel barrows upright and didn't have any wrecks.  
  
  So the footings are poured, had only one minor mud slide onto the concrete.  They are here today to put up the forms so they can pour the crawl space walls, I think tomorrow?
  I enjoy watching the process and learn something new about building each time we have done it.  I am glad the guys that have built for us over the years have been able to read my plans, even though they aren't always quite the way they should be.  

  Things are looking good so far and it will become more of a reality today, once the forms are in place.   

   

June has arrived along with the WIND!!!

The wind has been blowing for 4 or 5 days now and I know for Eastern Colorado that is not an unusual thing, but I am tired of it!  It is starting to remind me of last year, which I would just as soon forget!

The studio is moving forward.  The crawl space has been dug out, footing forms are being put in place as I write and the concrete will be delivered this morning at 10:00.  

This is the hole and no we don't have much front yard left, but then we seldom used it anyway.  I think the trade off is a good one.  
  Joedy saw the hen turkey standing at the edge of the hole Friday evening, peering over the edge, looking a little lost.  Since Wed. they have lost their roosting spot, the electrical wire that hung across the back yard, and now their grazing area is a big hole in the ground.

This is what it now looks like out the front  door.  Not much of a view at the moment. 
I am finally getting excited about the end result, it is all the stuff in between that is going to be the pits.  Such as tearing the office apart, moving it and setting it back up, tearing the office walls out, and moving everything from the current studio over here and everything from the sewing room in the basement up to the new studio.  It really looks bad in writing.  

We did purchase the lighting fixtures yesterday that will hang over the cabinets on the south end of the studio area.  My big issue now is finding the proper flooring.  I need to make some phone calls and hopefully the flooring people will be forthright in their answers to my questions.  One always wonders if they just want to sell their product more than they want it to be what the customer is needing.  


  

May is Gone!!!

Not sure where the heck this month went or 5 months in 2013!!  Time seems to be moving faster each day.

The garden is planted and everything is doing well.  This is one of our bed of cabbages.  Some of these will be used for sauerkraut.  They survived the transplant much better this year as it wasn't blazing hot.  We have Stonehead, Pixies, Bobcats, Blue Dynasty, Blue Thunder, Bourbon, Late Flat Dutch, Red cabbage and Caraflex.  There are shallots and peas in the bed behind the cabbages.

  Looking from the east gate to the west end of the hoop house.  The tomatoes are doing much better this year as well.  Our paste/sauce varieties this year are San Marzano, Viva Italia, Margherita, Daiquiri (these are real varities), Plum Regal, Martinos Roma, plus a few others.  We are trying a couple of Heirlooms this year, Black Krim and Costoluta.



The garlic has made up for lost time when it was frozen back in the deep freeze we had go through here in early April.  Some of it didn't make it back, in particular one of the Creoles.
We have a number of different varieties, trying them to see which ones we like the most.  A few are Siberian, Chesnok Red, Tuscan, German Red, Spanish Rojo, Italian Late and Duganski.  I even remembered to mark the rows and keep a copy of the plan, where I can find it.

 Our major project this year is an addition to our home.  This is the before photo and after waiting 5 months to stat, the process is underway.  We are turning the current office into the hallway, the extra bedroom into the office and adding a bedroom and my dream studio.  I will have everything together under one roof when we are finished.  It will be wonderful!!!  Joedy has all the cabinets built for the dyeing room.

This is how the house looked this morning after they were out here two days.  They have removed all the bricks from the front of the house, with the exception of the garage. The addition will be built on to the west wall that extends out.  So much for having both ends equal one another, but I can live with it.  There was an ash tree in the middle of the grass and it was removed several weeks ago.

They broke ground this morning, digging out the soil for the crawl space and footings.  I am finally getting a little excited about it.
We have looked at a lot of stuff, I have finally decided on paint colors for the cabinets, we found some brick we like for a couple of the interior walls, have the sliding doors figured out, found an old door from the original farm house that we will use between the dyeing room and studio area, so we are happy to be underway.  More to come as we move along with the project.  

Spring!!??? and Buttons

I have been trying to figure out if spring is here yet or if it isn't going to bother showing up this year.  There are a few remnants of the last snow storm which was on Tuesday or Wednesday.  We have had more snow in the last 30 days than what we did all winter.  A few have actually been beneficial for the crops.  The deep, flash freeze the first of April was not.  The only positive thing about that night was that all the tiny little weeds coming up in the garlic bed died.  Along with the daffodils and anything else that was up.

The greenhouse is thriving, a little slower than years past, largely due to lack of sunshine and cold weather.  Nonetheless the little plants continue to demand more space and larger containers!  Unfortunately for some of them it is not happening fast enough.

I revisited a hobby I have had for many years, collecting buttons, but have never been very serious about it.  Just sort of a hit and miss thing for the most part. I would pick some up at quilt shows now and then, some from my husband's grandmother, some I purchased at an antique store in Colby.  My button collection is slowly coming together.  My source has been ebay and Etsy, no place around here to find the type of buttons I am seeking.

I think Shelia, who delivers our mail, might be getting a little tired of my small packages.  I do think she might like the little ones over the larger ones I was getting when I was buying Geo Trax for the boys.  Another advantage to the buttons is the postage, not the factor it was with the Geo Trax.

Back to the buttons.  I have acquired  some nice cards and right now I have a lot of loose buttons floating around the house that have been sorted.  They are in little piles here and there.  I can see a need to get them gathered up and stored for the time being until I get some frames purchased and know what size to cut the mat board so that I can mount them.

Tiny, small, diminutive, whatever you want to label them

This card came from some lady's estate in New Hampshire.  A number of buttons I have purchased come from back East.  I have received some great ones from Wisconsin, of course Alex would tell me what do you expect.  And then California, some of my favorite ones have come from there.

I have found that some people displayed them in some very unique ways, like the group above, which has a title in the orange, "SUN".  There are rays radiating out from the center circle.  I have seen many different configurations, paintings or drawings on the cards, labeling in some unique way.  It has been an interesting journey on several levels.

I am not a hard core collector, as I just collect the ones I like, which seems to be increasing the more I know about them and the more I see.

  I like metal/brass/steel ones, which there a number of different types here, but I am attracted to the floral variety on these for the most part.  Diminutive buttons, didn't know that word was associated with buttons until I really got into them.  I like glass, metal, mop, you name it, I just like tiny buttons!!  Then there are Depression glass buttons and the ever infamous Bakelite, which anyone selling a plastic button on ebay at the moment likes to attach that label to it and most of the time it isn't that.  There are vegetable ivory buttons, never knew about that stuff, but I have an awesome button with a dragon fly on it.  Horn, composition, whistle buttons, cricket cage, I have come across many different and interesting types of buttons and I know more about buttons now than I did a few weeks ago and I am having fun!!

Bakelite Buttons, yellow ones known as "apple juice"

And or course there are items to check out there that go along with buttons, thread, needles, needle cases, bodkins, baskets, etc. I have decided the best antique sewing items come from Europe.  I have seen some beautiful pieces listed and they usually come from Europe at some point in time or are still in England.  Of course there are the beautifully carved needle cases and items that come from the Far East.

My husband has commented on the irony of buying something that was once given away.  Little mending sets, needle cases with business names on them, packets of needles, button hooks with a business' name on it, are now sold.  There are some fun little items.  

This is just like the one I had growing up

Viewing sewing baskets has really aged me.  I found out that I am 'vintage' because I had one of those 'vintage' pink, round sewing baskets with the hard lid that had the floral decal in the middle of it.  And then it had a little ledge on one side where the spools of thread would sit.  Both my sister and I had one.   I saw one that looked quite similar to mine the last time I remember seeing it, pleated on one side.

I think I am getting pretty good at telling when a sewing basket has been emptied out and the good stuff taken.  I am not sure I have seen one yet that has been sold in tact.  There are always a few wooden spools of thread, maybe a card of ric rac or bias tape, sometimes both, a packet of needles, maybe a darning egg or tracing wheel, now and then some DMC thread or perle cotton.  Some crappy, old scissors they found someplace else in some junk drawer they purchased.  If you sew, you know exactly what I am talking about when it comes to scissors!!!  

  My mom collected buttons when she was growing up and had a wonderful button collection, I have seen it one time.  I guess that is one of the things we have in common, a love for buttons.  I use to pick out the buttons first when I was making something, then the pattern and fabric to go with the buttons.  I still do that, except I have a heck of a lot of awesome buttons, but don't seem to make anything anymore.  Maybe they will just have to become part of the collection.

Texas

Coming to Texas actually started when I went to Paducah, KY.  Strange how things work.  

I took a dye painting class from Hollis Chatelain, in April of 2008.  Little did I know what I was getting myself into when I took that class!!!

The photo to the right is one of the pieces I painted in the class.  It still needs to be quilted, maybe after this year's class, I will tackle the thing.  There is a turtle hanging on the design wall at home begging to be finished as well.  

I am about to embark on year 8 of Hollis's Master Series class.  Yes, year 8, when all I wanted to do was learn how to dye paint.  

It has been a journey to say the least.  I made two trips to Silverton, OR for two classes and introduced one of my friends to the classes.

Time will tell what becomes of some of the fabric I posted last week.  Hopefully it will be a good thing.