(no subject)

[totchipanda]

The weather has been on a roller coaster all season, so far. First snow was in November and since then we've had three distinct periods of Very Cold (but not Ridiculously Cold) with three distinct periods of Hey This Is Really Nice! The downside to these extremes are almost 30C weather shifts (-23C last Friday, +6C expected today), melting snow that freezes again and turns to ice, and potential freezing rain. Pick one and stick with it!!!

But going outside is much more pleasant when it is not Very Cold, so I will take this opportunity to leave the house to do my laundry. (As you may recall, the laundry room is in another building entirely.) I did a load of mostly "staples" yesterday (lingerie, socks, t-shirts, pajama shorts), today I intend to do sheets and towels, and then I have a load of "heavies" that I might attempt on Thursday. Not heavily-soiled, but heavy items like jeans and sweatshirts lol. Not committing to that yet, but committing to linens today because I don't have any clean washcloths and a stack of dishes to do. (It's dishes you might say, just use the one you have. Friends, I cannot remember when I grabbed it out of closet, and it is holding its shape when drying, plus I used it to wipe up a bunch of sugar glaze from my latest baking effort. It's past time.)

Yesterday I made pasta sauce while the laundry was drying, so I ended up running into the time that my local writing group was having an event, so even though I didn't get much writing done, I still tried. And then I put my laundry away! Crushing it.

Tonight I hope to sew a mockup of the Gertie dress bodice I printed off the other day. I'm intrigued to see how her drafts come together. I like that the high bust and full bust are included, as that should better fit my shoulders, but of course my waist is out of proportion to those. I'd also like to know why grading seems to assume that as you get wider, you also get taller. Ah well, I can work around that.

I also printed off a sheet from a 1961 manual about drafting a bodice block, and the manual goes on to show you TONS of things to do with that block to achieve different items. I've been eyeing this book for awhile now, so perhaps I'll get around to that in the near-ish future. There is a petticoat on page 38 that I like, which is so simple. I have fabric (poly taffeta, tulle, poly organza) that I purchased for a petticoat waaaaay back in my gothic lolita days, I can probably use that for a nice little oomph under these looks. When I find it again O_o

Comments

[marianme]

I once reinvigorated an old gross sponge at someone else's house by hand washing the sponge. They were like, "Where did you get that?" I'm like, "It's the same sponge, just cleaner."

It does seem more energy efficient to do a whole load of wash instead of using all the water for one item, though.

[totchipanda]

Washing sponges is not a terrible idea either. I have one but rarely use it, bc the kittens thought it was a GREAT toy when they first moved in. I also have lots of other things to wash with the cloths, so at least it will be a full load :)

[seraphicmachine]

An ex-coworker told me about how they had ONE laundry room in his building (housing owned by the city of Vienna that you can rent for REALLY cheap if you meet the requirements, as in poor, disabled etc etc), and I still cannot wrap my mind around the concept of only being able to laundry on certain days at certain hours.
(Mind you when I was a kid we were so poor that when we got a centrifuge it was a big thing.)

[totchipanda]

oh yikes, that sounds like a recipe for disaster! My last apartment was like that (and i lived directly across the hall from the laundry room), one room with four machines of each type for the entire building of about 100 units. At least in this place, the laundry can be done 24/7 should I ever find myself very awake at 3am with a hankering to do it, and there are 8 laundry rooms throughout the property.

Some day I will have in-suite laundry again, and I never need to worry about leaving the house.

[danabren]

Gertie bodices are wicked easy to adjust for darts, length, Sway Back Adjustments (SBA), etc, and the only times I have ever needed more than one mockup were for the Liz and Lamour bodices.

[totchipanda]

That is very encouraging!