Update rainy Sunday afternoon

First things first. 

Miss Daisy seems to have picked up. She played around a bit with her ball in her baby bed and fussed to be liberated. I let her out to walk around but when she took a few stairs, back she went. Her spirits have improved enough for her to be annoyed with me, which is welcome.

My son's Bordie Collie, Birdie, who is with us while Ben works in a project in Texas has been a prince. Always the gentleman Birdie has been staying by the bed Daisy is in and every time she looks at him she wags her tail.

Speaking of Ben I have been on the phone with him on and off all afternoon. Someone dumped a mangy puppy on the job site (Ben is doing quality assurance at a huge windmill installation) and since he was at work I have been making the calls trying to find a no kill shelter in southwest Texas for him. Not an easy job but in the end Ben found a woman who is running a private shelter and specifically dealing with the local outbreak of mange. She has agreed to treat this puppy and Ben is going to visit every day to follow up and give her a donation to cover all costs. Apparently an excellent, bright little dog and hopefully they can find a decent home for him.

Ben is my child who so far I can say has most inherited my feelings for animals. When he was four, and our first dog had died the spring before, I found Ben sitting on the front steps with the old dog's leash in his hands crying. Such a small boy and so sad. Needless to say there was a new dog in the house within the week.

My other news is that the flower girl dresses are done.

I kept waiting for something to go wrong on this project. 

You know like cut a hole in some bodice by mistake. Spill tea down one front. Burn a sash. When a job really matters it is my experience that I am going to do something like that.

However nothing went wrong and no one was more surprised than myself.

The basic pattern was pretty standard but I adapted it to match a picture the bride showed me so the skirts were very full and there was a very wide band at the front and extravagant bows with long ties that fell to the hems at the back. I made four in slightly different sizes working from two standard sized muslins I made in the RV in the winter in Florida.

I was able to try the  muslins on the two sisters who are going to be in the wedding party when we were visiting DC at Easter, and did the same with my two granddaughters when I came home.

Of course that was then and this is now.

I remember only too well how much kids can shoot up over the summer, so all of these dresses have good hems I can let down at the last minute in the days before the wedding - but of course I sincerely hoping the sewing gods continue to be with me and that will not be necessary.

Here are the pics, taken carefully staged as all my shots are, in the bathroom:

All four dresses, you see why I am going to take a steamer with me.

Back view

Front view, I hope you can see how wide the band at the front is - it has actually been sewn into the seams.

Other news is, as I mentioned in passing, my husband is home for a few weeks from the North Pole, and yes he is now going to spend our anniversary helping me make blueberry jam.

He actually brought my anniversary present with me - Narwhal ivory earrings (I think they are in the shape of polar bear claws) made from the tusk of the Narwhal.

This is what the Narwhal's look like, this really is a strange part of the world and my husband is lucky to be able to see parts of it most people don't:

Now of course Narwhal are protected, and I am as aware of that as you can imagine, I mean my dog is in a Pack and Play, but the Inuit are allowed to hunt them because the Inuit actually eat whale meat as part of their standard diet up there and the tusks are a by-product.

So here are my earrings, which I am pretty sure are not something you see every day, not unlike the man who gave them to me.

So that was my day.

Time to decompress and make something fun and easy next to cleanse the palate, I am thinking Louise Cutting's Ageless and Cool pattern, looks to me as if it will go exactly with Narwhal earrings. I am going to do the shirt and if I feel sufficiently ageless and cool try the pants, although they are not my usual style. What do you think?