Rugged Sunday....

OK.  I have settled on the boarders for the Gypsy rug.

Starting at the center of each side and working towards the corners, I did a five row zig-zag in gold.  Then going towards the center I did lines of light red, dark red and blue.

Going away from the center I did the reverse.  blue, dark red and light red.

I decided that the outer border should be more geometric.  I started at the corner and worked out from there.  The stripes are 10 stitches long.

To work the pattern out, I threaded a needle with each color.  It is easier to just pick up a needle and keep the rest out of the way than it is to re thread the needle every time I need to change colors.

I went with gray that meets the corner of the other boarder.  I worked that out to the edge in both directions.Then I did two rows of blue beside it.  Next, one row of gold.  then one row or light red and one for dark red.

Not to confuse you, but working from the gray row, up one side of the rug and across the bottom, I am doing a six row pattern...Gray. Dark red. Light red.  Gold.  Two rows of blue.  Then back to gray and repeat those rows until I get to the center point.  Then I will reverse the order.  That way, all of the corners will match.

I am going back now and cross stitch my little fingers to the bone.  I want this done.  I am liking it.

See you tomorrow.

More Curtains, More Rug...What Else is New?

Still plugging along on the curtains.  While they dry, I work on the rug....Notice I said "I". 

The Terrible Two only show up when photos are being taken now.  They are both as bored as I am with all of these pins and needles. 

They can run away.  I can't.

The first thing I did this morning was change the top piece inside.

I definitely like the orangish red better than the dark purple.  I am still not sure about the tie dye either...

I unpinned the top of the right outside curtain from the pin board and realigned it in the pin board, so that the bottom of the curtain didn't have to be made separately.

This is another one of those "cheating to win" things.

When the top half of the curtains is on the straight of goods, if you bend it to fit the bend in the building, You can just keep going if you work it right.

I wanted this to be one long piece so that it would drape well.

I can't glue it in until I get a couple of other front pieces cut and pleated.  This one goes behind the others, but this is the one that will be the most noticeable.

Now that I know that this one works, the rest will be comparatively easy to do.  This is the only one that bends in the corner at an odd angle.

I still have to pin and spray the puddle at the bottom.

I have been going back in time and watching Jennifer Garner in "Alias" on Netflix whilst I work this morning....Lots of dialog, and in English, so I can follow what is going on without much looking at the screen.

While the curtains dried, I got lots more of the rug done.  All of the gold in the motifs is finished and I am almost up to half the background.

I also cleaned the stove and several drawers in the kitchen....And....It's not even noon!  That's what I get for getting up at 4:30AM.  I think I deserve a nice afternoon nap now....

See you tomorrow.

Cloudy Skies...Headache Weather...

It's a warm, cloudy day here and my sinuses don't like it at all.  Most irritating.

I finished installing the back draperies this morning and I am not really sure if I like them.  the last two colors that I put in are not pleasing me...  Maybe it's just the dark purple at the top that really bothers.

I strung in a lot of the rayon ropes here and there.  I kind of like those.

This photo does give you a better view of the under, antique pulled work I love that part.  I imagine it took someone a rather long time to do that.  I am just glad that I could put it to use.

The piece that looks blue up in the left corner, is really more lavender. The only reason that I mention this piece is....See the nice fringe at the edge?  That is the selvage of the material...I didn't have to do anything at all to it. That's the way it came from the bolt.

Last, I did get more done on the rug.  All of the gold is done in the medallions and the three at the left are done, including the background.

I am still trying to decide on an outer border...I still have a few days to think about it.  It will take me that long to finish the inner portion of the rug.

Sorry this is short.  I am now on my way to find the aspirin bottle and a glass of water.

See you tomorrow.

Soft Furnishings...

I got more done on the rug last night.  I cross stitched until I couldn't see straight.  It is coming along pretty good.

I filled in more of the background to see what it was going to look like.

In the motif at the bottom left, you can see where the gold stitches go.  The two middle ones are all filled in.  I put a darker red in the four L shaped sections. I went all the way around the outside and up the center lines with the gray.

Then I started working out one of the boarders....

I will probably put at least two around the outer edge.

Tessie finished the rest of the motif outlines after I gave up.  Now it is more or less like a coloring book.

All we have to do is fill in the rest of the rug one color at a time.

I got up this morning with the intention of finishing at least the inside back curtains.

Here are the last three pieces...Yes....I braved the workroom to find the larger bulletin/pin board.

I lined it with graph paper and then with a layer of waxed paper.  Saves some of the mess with the hairspray.  Easy clean up that way.

I couldn't resist a bit of tie dyed fabric.  You can't see it very well in the photo, but it has gold lines printed on top of the tie dye.

While I am waiting for the curtains to dry, I am going to go back and help Tessie with the rug... I have to keep her occupied.  she keeps wanting to pull out the pins to see if the curtains are dry yet.  She could just reach down and touch them, but that would be too easy, and besides she doesn't like sticky fingers.Back to cross stitching.

See you tomorrow.

Rooflines and Rugs....

 As usual, I am fighting with this thing about where I want the photos and the text to be.  Maybe some day I will learn this system....So far, it's about 50/50.

It only took three trys of removing the photos and trying again. 

Oops! Make that four!

I got the trim around the front more to my liking, whilst the Terrible Two tried to make heads or tails of what fabric we are going to use for the rest of the curtains.

Still undecided.  Making something look miss matched, but still pleasing is harder that one would imagine.

So...While they were arguing, I started a rug to fit under the table. Plain green doesn't cut it in a Gypsy parlor.

This is an easy way to come up with a rug that looks complicated, but isn't.

I designed this little motif on #24 congress cloth(aka petite canvas). 

Not complicated so far, right?

Next, I decided on spacing.  I could line them up like little soldiers, but it is more pleasing to the eye to stagger them. 



So, I lined up the end diamonds with one another with the motifs alternating above and below.

I left five spaces between the sides of each diamond shape.

The tiny pencil mark gave me the center point, so that I could start the next diamond above in line with the first one.

At this point, I have not decided how long I want the rug, so I am just doing them a few at a time.

To establish colors, I first outlined the repeat with a contrasting color.  If you look closely, you will see that I filled in the part that I wanted to be green, lightly with pencil.

When it is finished, the rug will be the diamond motifs with a solid green background. 

Here you can see that I have worked out the color way. It is hard to see in the photo, but there are five colors in all...Very simple.

Light red, darker red, gold, gray and green background.

Up in the top left, I have started establishing where the border will start.  I have no idea, right now, what kind of boarder this will be.  Stay tuned to find out.

See you tomorrow.

A Little Bit to the Right....

 OK.  The Terrible Two were working early this morning....In fact, they woke me up. 

It's hard to sleep when a tiny voice is shouting...."No! Not there!  A little bet to the right(or left)."

As you know, Tessie is really good at ordering other people around...The words Drill Sargent come to mind.

She was sitting on the roof, telling Zar where to put the tassels when I first heard her.

I took a quick photo with the flash.  Then I went back to sleep...Mind you, they were working in the dark with a flashlight.  Most annoying.

When I next awoke, every light in the room was on and Tessie pulled up my right eyelid and asked, "You don't mind if we turn on the lights, so that we can see better, do you?"

I growled at her and went back to sleep with a pillow over my head.

I peeked out and saw that, to my surprise, the gold was back on the front.

They braved the workroom mine field and found the gold embossed paper.

It looks pretty good, but I am not too sure about the plain old straight stuff at the top of the roof....Boring, to say the least.

At least it will be easy to change.  If I want this stuff to stay put, I will put a sealer over the whole mess to hold it in place.  That's when I gave up.  Tessie was shouting again..."A little more to the right!!!"

If I hadn't rushed to the rescue, Zar would have been on the floor, about four feet down from where he was working.  That's about four stories of building in mini speak.

I have the booth sitting on top of my jewelry chest/embroidery supply chest...Not enough jewelry and too many embroidery pieces started. What can I say?  Some of the drawers were almost empty and the embroidery drawers were overflowing.

Anyway, I did one more of the many swags that I have to do.

Tessie and Zar pinned that up to see how it would look.

Only three more pieces to go on the back wall....Then I start all over with the front wall.  I may not do much to the side walls.  They will not really be seen much.  Maybe some shelves or something.

I still need to do more to the Chinese table too...I had better get back at it now. 

Who knows what else they are trying to finish?

Did I mention that Tessie is now trying to hire the nameless gypsy that resides on the second floor of the Witches Warehouse to work in the booth....She already has a couple of other projects in mind....She told me, "I can't spend all of my time looking at the lines on people's hands, the bumps on their heads and tarot cards.  I have better things to do!"

It's just a good thing that this is a quick project.  I think that Tessie's attention span is getting shorter than mine!

See you tomorrow.

Monday Madness....

Actually, a lot of this was Sunday afternoon madness...

When we last parted, I had the life sized drawings of the  curtains on graph paper.

After you left, I got to work with card stock and cut out a "pattern for each piece.  You can't really call these pieces patterns.  They are really only layouts of the shapes needed when I finish pleating.  I have to know that everything is going to fit together nicely....Fingers crossed a lot during this period.

I marked each piece with part, where the go and overlaps.  So far, so good.

The hardest part of this whole thing is going to be picking fabrics that work....they have to not match, but I don't want them to turn my stomach either.  A happy medium is a mixture that clashes well together....

I used my usual method of pinning the pleats in and spraying them with unscented, extra hold hair spray.  I won't go into details.  There are several tutorials elsewhere on the blog using this method.

I started with the inside back left curtain.  I used two of the pattern pieces in black and off white, tiny, checkerboard. 

Then I decided to break it up with a swag that would wrap around and tuck under the edge of the top.

Starting at the curved edge of the pattern, I pinned the fabric around.  I just kept going, pleat after pleat, until I covered the pattern.  It gets trimmed afterwards in this case.

It was a little tough, because two of the pieces had to fit in the curve at the ceiling.  But Tessie held her tongue in the corner of her mouth just right and it worked. 

I trimmed the top of the green piece and folded it over the checked one at the top.  Then I wrapped it around the checked piece and pinned it at the bottom under that piece. 

I found that the piece that I cut off of the top of the green looked like the tail of a swag.  I tucked that under the checked piece and will marry the two with some of the ropes or other trims.

Three pieces down.  About ten more to go....maybe more.

The white fabric that I hung on the back wall is a piece of reallllly old pulled thread work.  someone went to all the work of cutting little slits in the fabric in rows.  Then they tied tiny loops around each piece of fabric between the slits, connecting the whole width of the fabric from one edge to the other. 

I am not sure what it was to begin with.  It has a hem and a seam in one spot.  Whatever it was, someone thought enough of the hand work to save a large piece of it.  I got lucky and found it at the bottom of a bag of old lace that I bought at an antique fair.

Lastly, here is a photo of the top half of one of the outer curtains....See?  It's not going to be so dull after all!

Between this and laundry, I will manage to keep occupied for the rest of the day.  It goes pretty fast with Tessie handing me the pins. Head first. One at a time.  She is anxious to get this done so that she can go into yet another business....

By the way!  I didn't find my pin board yet....Or the rope to tie around my ankle, for getting out of the workroom safely.  I did find a small cork bulletin board close to the door...Hey! It was within reaching distance.  I wasn't going to take a chance and go in any further.

I am happy to report that the cheap-o bulletin boards from Walmart make excellent pin boards.  There is a frame around them....Less chance of losing pins.  They hold the pins nicely.

If I were really brave, I know that there is another larger one behind the closet door.  I will have to think about the journey into the darkest depths of the dreaded workroom to find it....Am I that brave?  Not sure...

See you tomorrow.

Close Enough For Jazz....

...or templates for difficult shaped curtains....

And we did all of this before breakfast...

You saw the drawing of the asymmetrical curtains in an earlier post.  When I do something this irregular, I need a place to start.

This is how I do it, with a little bit of help from my friends...

I took a piece of graph paper and lined up one edge with the inside edge of the cage front, making sure that I had it all of the way to the top of the opening.

Then I creased the edge with my fingers.  It is hard to see, but there is a bend where the edges of the inside are in the first photo. 

I then went over those with a pencil.  It is not an exact science.  I just wanted something to go by.

Then I added more paper to the other side and lined it up with the other inside edge. I overlapped that one with the first one, matching them up. 

I stuck the two pieces together with tape.  That covered the opening, except for a small corner on the left side.

I patched that in with what I cut from the top...Did I mention that I cut around the lines that I just traced? I did.

After that, I drew the lines for the outer curtains on one side.  Then I flipped it over and did lines for inner curtains on the other side.

These are just tentative drawings.  I will adjust as I go.

I darkened the edges with a permanent pen.

I will cut these pieces out in card stock.  They will be my guide for the different sections of curtains. 

Since they are going to be lots of different fabrics, I can pleat them separately and then, when they are all done, layer them in the finished piece.

I think that you can see it best in the second photo.  I will start at the bottom and work up.

The curtain parts that touch the floor will be first.  I plan to let them puddle, so they will be pinned in an L shaped piece of foam core.  Then the top of that section will be done from the same material, but a separate piece.  That way it will be easier to make a droopy drape.  No pulling and tugging like I would have to do if it were all one piece. 

The first layer would be the left bottom curtain. The next layer would be the center section at the bottom of the house shape.  Then the right hand top of curtain.  Last will be the one that goes in the center of the roof peak.

Has anybody seen my pin box?   I fear that it is somewhere in the dreaded workroom.... Where's the piece of rope to tie to my ankle?  Oops...I think I saw that somewhere in the workroom yesterday...

Now that the instructions are all clear as mud, I am off to eat breakfast and go back to work. Wish me luck! I'm going to need it for this! Tomorrow there will be photos...


See you then.

Dollar Tree Delight!

When I finished grocery shopping this morning, the Dollar Tree store was just opening.  Let the groceries melt...

A couple of weeks ago, somebody on one of the forums mentioned that the Dollar Tree in their area had some tiny glass bottles full of sparkles and glitter for nail polish.  Eight for a dollar!

I went over there the day after I heard it and nothing.  Not all Dollar Trees get the same merchandise, as I understand it.

Anyway, I decided to take another look.  Jackpot!!! 

See the eight tiny bottles that Tessie is holding?  One Dollar!!!

They are real glass.  The stoppers leave something to be desired, but those can easily be replaced. 

An extra added bonus?  A lot of the contents are usable for minis!  How cool is that?

You may be asking, why the photo of four watches at the top?

I also found a hanging rack of Sunbeam brand batteries.  The watch batteries that I usually pay about $5.00 for three on a card at Walmart/Kmart are the same thing....I got 4 for a dollar!.  I am not sure how long they will last, but I will let you know.  At least all of them are running right now.

OK.  I know you want a report on the booth.  I spent yesterday afternoon making fancy ropes and tassels to match...I think that I may have nearly enough now. 

For some reason the watermelon red rayon photographs as pink.  It's not.  Maybe it's just because I photographed it against the black surface, in the sun.

I think that I am rayon-ed out now. 

You can do the same rope trim with embroidery floss.  All you have to do is tie two colors together at one end.  Then, with the knot in the middle just keep twisting the thread in one direction until it wants to fold back on itself and twist. If you grasp the knot in one hand and the two twisted ends in the other, it will automatically form the ropes that you see in the photo.

If you are going for speed, you can tie one end to one beater of your electric mixer.  Don't put two beaters in.  Hold one end or tie it to a door knob.  With the other end tied to the beater, turn the mixer on LOW!  Almost instant gratification that way. 

I did it by hand yesterday.  I was in the mood.

The piece that Tessie is tangling with is just plain old crochet chain, done with a #0 metal crochet hook.

I am now going to join Tessie in gloating over my find of bottles.  You wouldn't believe the array of things inside.  Some are tiny flat sequins of various shapes.  Others are fine glitter.  Some are itsy bitsy hole less beads.  I have a feeling that some are going to find their way into the fortune telling booth...

See you tomorrow.

Millions of Tassels!

"Here a tassel there a tassel, everywhere a tassel, tassel."

That's Tessie, singing a happy tune this morning.

Being a gypsy tent, it must have tassels everywhere....Tessie said so.  So it must be true.

When April was little, I found these rolls of un-spun rayon at Pic'n'Save....That turned into MacFrugle's...Then to Big Lots....As it went through the different phases, it lost a lot of it's charm and a lot of the unusual products that it used to carry. 

This stuff was seventy nine cents a spool at the time.  I found a tag on the red spool.  At the time, I was hesitant to buy all of the colors.  I wasn't sure what I would do with it.  Now I am so glad that I did.  And I wish that they had had a few more colors.  I got white, black and six colors.  It will take another hundred and forty nine years to use it all, but I am trying.

I grabbed the red and went to work on the tassels, while Tessie started experimenting with crocheting it for braid.  Sometimes she is very smart.  In all these years, I have never tried it for anything but tassels.

I have done this before on the blog, but it won't hurt to repeat it.  I also make these tassels with embroidery floss.  The only difference is the amount of thread used.  It depends on what you are using them for.

In the second photo, starting to the left, here's what you need.  a bunch of thread at least twice the length that you want the tassel to be.  Matching sewing thread is used to make the hanger and neck of the tassel...

Cut the thread bunch.  Tie two separate slip knots in the matching thread. 

Slip one of the slip knots over the center of the bunch of thread and pull up tight.  Tie a single knot with the two tails over that to keep it from slipping.

Then slide the other slip knot down over the top of the tassel and pull it up where you want the neck to be.  Again, tie a single knot to hold it.  I also add just a tiny bit of glue on both of the knots just to be safe.

Smooth the ends down and trim.  That's it.  Simple.

After that, I have to take them away from Tessie.  She keeps insisting that they would make grand earrings.

After she got a length of crocheted chain done, I took over and glued it on top of the thread lines in the bamboo blinds for the side roof.  The end of these will hang down over the side of the building and the tassels will then be attached to the end of each braid.

This morning I found three more fat quarters that we can use in the tent drapes.  It's not going to be just these three...I have lots of other fabrics picked out of the stash...

Please don't ask how the workroom cleaning is coming along....I don't wish to talk about it.  It seemed to slip my mind, just a little bit after I reported on it yesterday.  That's all I am saying on the subject...other than....I can't find my pin board to do the drapes...  This is not good at all. 

See you tomorrow.

Guess What I'm Doing Today?

Here's a clue....I will give you three guesses as to how I am spending my time this afternoon, and the first two don't count.

It must have been a wild party.  The Terrible Two say that they have no idea what happened... and it couldn't have been my fault that the workroom looks like this!

Before I started cleaning, I made a quick run to Jo Ann's Fabric and Crafts.  I had coupons.  What can I say?  I had to go.

I found a new type of X-acto blade that I haven't seen before.  It is called a "Z series" blade.  It's coated with zirconium nitride, whatever that is... It can't hurt to try it...Or, on second thought, maybe it can.

I will let you know if it is sharper and more durable like the package says(as soon as I see how it slices through wood and other organic material....Like fingers?

They were 3.99 for five blades, but I had a 40% off coupon. 

Last, but not least, I found the green moss clumps that I usually have to go to the model train shop to get.

Jo Ann's is in the middle of a "toss up" type remodel...In other words, they are rearranging everything in the store, just to confuse people.

My theory is, when they do this, they are forcing people to wander around the aisles to find the thing that they came into the store to buy....While wandering they will find other things to buy that they don't necessarily need.  I didn't "need" reindeer moss or X-acto blades, did I?

Their dastardly plan is working!

Anyway, I am off to lock myself in the dreaded workroom now...

See you tomorrow.

A Day to Think About It....

Look what I found on my front porch yesterday afternoon!

It was fun, because I ordered these from HBS a couple of weeks ago.  They sent me an e mail ad telling of a sale on House of Miniatures kits.

I like these kits because they can be bashed in a number of different ways.

HBS had five different kits on sale for the phenomenal price of $1.00 each.  I must have been one of the first people to order.  I ordered four of each of four kits and got them all.

 The next day on one of the forums, somebody said that they were all gone.

I paid, with shipping, $22.50 for all sixteen kits.  They will get used.  I usually find them at garage sales and the 22 st. Antique Mall.  The cheapest I ever found them for was $2.00 each.

My supply was pretty much gone.  Count me in as a happy camper.  The funny part was....I was reading e mail yesterday afternoon and found a letter from HBS saying they had been delivered!  I never heard the door bell ring.(Fed Ex)

I went and looked and sure enough, the box was sitting out in the open on the porch, where anybody could have picked it up.

 As for the thinking about it in the title, I am having Wednesday Witches Mini meeting here today, so I don't think that I am going to get much done.

So I pulled out some of the trim pieces that I have and stuck them up against the booth.

So far, I either like putting plain basswood on the front and carving designs on it or painting on the wood that is there.

I like the rope stuff.  I have had it for a very long time....I never can bring myself to use it.  It just seems a bit heavy and out of scale.

The stuff I have on the edge of the roof looks like something that you would find on a Swiss Chalet. 

So....I am going to think about it for the rest of the day whilst I cook.

See you tomorrow.

Pick a Card....Any Card....

I filled in the cracks of carving yesterday.  I sanded them down and painted over them this morning.

I couldn't do any more to that section until the paint dries.

So, off I went to the wallpaper bin to find something to cover some of the panels with.

I still have some vinyl wallpaper samples, torn from books a long time ago.  April and I got very good at going out and raiding dumpsters behind the paint stores that carried wallpaper.

On one occasion, I went into the Sherwin-Williams paint store and the guy gave me 17 books....And he even helped me load them in my car!

Anyway, back to the subject at hand.  If you want to cover foam core panels, this is how you cut the paper.

I glue it down to the foam core with a glue stick.  Then I trim around it about 1/2" to 3/4".  There is a trick to cutting it so that the corners are covered right...Note the bottom corners.  I cut a line straight up from the bottom even with the edge of the foam core.  Then one in from the side that lines up with the bottom edge. 

After that, I cut a diagonal across the corner away from the foam core, the same width as the thickness.  That way the edges meet exactly at the corner. 

I want as little thickness as possible, since these will be fitted into the spaces between the wood.  The top gets slashed and then Vs are cut just down to the thickness of the foam core.  That makes it cover the edge and not overlap the back.  As you can see, the old paper, at the top was not done this way and there is a lot of extra thickness.  I removed that before I glued the new stuff down.

I decided to do a matchstick blind kind of roof.  After all, Tessie might want to roll up the blinds and get some sunlight between customers.

I did this by cutting a piece of foam core the size of the opening and painting it black....I am out of black foam core now.

Remember, when painting foam core, do both sides at once to avoid warping.

I glued the foam core to a matchstick blind that I picked up somewhere and then cut around it to match the foam core.  Then I simply slipped it in place.  I might want to change it later.

Here are the first three panels.  I used some of the vinyl.  It's not really stars, but could pass for them.

Tessie had to try out one of my tables in the room.  It was already painted black.  Doesn't look very gypsy like.

I am thinking maybe a bright red, with some other fancy-ing up.

There are a couple of other table choices, but she likes this one because it has room for several people if she wants to hold a seance.

She swiped the crystal ball and tarot cards from the Witch's Warehouse.  They won't miss them.  They have plenty more...Besides, she is part owner of that store.  What can they say?

I am thinking that the top side panels need to be "starry" too.  Back to the glue pot.

See you tomorrow.

Fixing the Holes.....

Somebody stop me!!  The next time I get a hare brained idea like....Hmmmm, some carving on the front of the cage would look good.

I should have known better.  These cages aren't made out of the best of wood.  I should have just tried it on a little bit of the back.  Should have....

I started at the peak of the roof and worked down.  I am a pretty good wood carver.  Why didn't I stop?  I guess I was just in the mood for woodcarving... I'm not anymore.

The wood on this cage has to be the worst wood I have ever been in contact with.  It was very hard in spots and some of it had grain and other pieces were just plain hard.

After I got a basic design carved, I decided that maybe it would look better if I hit it with a Krylon gold pen... Just when I though it couldn't get worse...It did.

Sooooo.....This morning I went over to Walmart and got some wood filler. 

I filled all of the carving in.  Now I am waiting for it to dry.  Then to sanding.

Originally, I had thought to paint it with gypsy like designs....That wasn't such a bad idea after all...

It's either that or cutting out some basswood to fit the front of all of the pieces, carve that and glue it on...I really would like some carving on the front...

Meanwhile, Tessie and Zar are laughing, pointing and singing an "I told you so!" song.

I will be cleaning and laundering and trying to decide what to do, if anybody needs me.

see you tomorrow.

Three o'Clock in the Morning....

Actually, it was more like four thirty when I started drawing...I wanted to solidify in my mind what I wanted Tessie's prognostication booth  to look like...

I started out trying to make it semetrical and then realized that was just silly.  It needed to be asymetrical and off kelter.

This is what I came up with as a guideline...

It will probably change a lot as I go along.

After the drawing, I got a lot of the filler foam core cut to size.

I still need to do a few more.  It doesn't matter what the color is.  They will all be covered.

I still have to cover the curved part of the roof.

The back top pieces are the old ones.  I still have to cut new ones for there.

The terrible two pulled out a few pieces of fabric to play with.

These are not the final selection by any means...They have only been through the mini stash.  There is still a whole closet from which to choose.

I see another clean up job coming...

Tessie has already started a price list for her services.  I caught her on the iPad last night.

I am not at all sure where she is coming up with the prices for services rendered.

Some of them seem to be a bit questionable. Poke the photo to read properly...When I made the photo extra large, it was cut in half for some reason...

I suggested that she take the last one off...She countered with, "I want everybody to understand that I have no affiliations with that person!  He's a bad guy!". 

I take it that she intends to tell only good fortunes and hold seances with nice ghosts(highly paid but nice).

I don't think that she is finished with the list yet.  She is still paceing in circles and scratching her head.  At least with the iPad, she can just poke the keys and doesn't have do damage to the keyboard with her pogo stick.  And...Added bonus, it keeps her ammused for hours...Until the battery runs down...

By the way, if you are interested in looking for gypsy ideas, the one on my note pad above is a good one.
pinterest.com/gypsythreadco/.  Also if you put gypsy decor in your search box and poke images, you get a lot of interesting things too.

I have to go charge the iPad.  Then back to work.

See you tomorrow.

You Should Take a Break....

When Tessie says something like that, I know she has something in mind that doesn't include sitting down and doing nothing...

"You sit right here and I will go fetch things for you...".  When she says something like that, I know I'm in trouble...

Then she followed that with, "You worked so hard yesterday, helping me move, that you shouldn't have to work on the Tudor houses today."

Somebody pass the aspirin and a cold pack to put on the back of my neck...

I sat down. Big mistake.

Tessie disappeared.

I heard a lot of rattling and banging in the garage.  In she came, dragging this.

Then came the explanation.  She has heard me often say that I thought of something in the early morning hours and can't get back to sleep.

Copy cat. "I remembered this frame that you had in the garage.  It would make an excellent fortuneteller's booth.  It could have curtains, a colorful backdrop and lots of good stuff.  I could use it to earn big bucks.  I can see where we are going to need extra if I am ever going to get my Spiderwort Manor finished..."  This all came out in a rush.  I think that she was trying to slip some of it past me... Now I am wondering what new ideas she has for that one...I am not going to ask...

I was out of the mood to work on the Tudors anyway.  I need a break.  So I got out a couple of pair of pliers, some wire cutters, a hammer and a saw.  I have been through this before, so I knew what it takes to get one of these apart.  Lots of tools.  A few less fingernails and a lot of hair tearing.

It took about an hour to get all of the unwanted pieces out. The wires go through from the top to bottom.  That means pulling them out of the top and bottom wood and pulling them through the center beam.

All of that stuff down front is what I took out.  I sawed the center beam and half of the two top side beams out for an open front.

After getting those out, I patched all of the holes with spackling compound. 

Then I gave it another coat of black paint.

It is now ready for the fun part...

However, I am going to have to stop.  April and Amare are coming over.

Tomorrow Seth gets back from Africa.  Thank goodness he is not in the part with all of the trouble, but we will still breath a lot easier when he is home safe.

It looks like this is going to give me a few days vacation from the Tudors. 

Luckily, I saved the foam core pieces that I had cut for the back and floor panels the last time this thing was in use.  I have patterns for new panels.  For once I did something right.

Even the floor of the cage is wire.  Once I finish, all of the wire will be covered.  It makes for a pretty quick room box.  This is definitely more fun to play with than what I was doing. 

Hey!  I'm a grownup....I can do it if I want to!  And besides, I have a good excuse.  Tessie made me do it!

See you tomorrow.