Thrift shop find makes nice summer dress

This lovely blue dress I got for a few dollars in the local Goodwill Thrift shop last year.  And, inspired by the Refashionista , I fidgeted with it on the sewing machine and this is how it ended up!  Unfortunately, I forgot to take a photo of what it originally looked like!          But it had blousy elbow-length sleeves, hung down to around my ankles and was way too wide or basically hideously hanging on me.   It was probably a Medium size and needed a slash down from me.  But I loved the almost periwinkle blue color and its pattern, the V-neck, the shiny shell like buttons and how light and summery the fabric felt.  So I chopped the sleeves and made them into little cap sleeves, took in the side seams about an inch each and hacked about 6 inches off the hem.  That piece I turned into a belt that you can see tied around the waist.  I think it came out all right!   It's easy to wear in the summer heat and washes and dries quickly as the fabric is some sort of light weave. 

Baggy Brown 80s dress Gets a Make Over from Size 12 to Size 4

It must have been the floral print on the brown black background that got me. As well as the shirt front neckline and the buttonholes down the front with self-fabric covered buttons, all nicely worked and hard for me to have sewn myself (as if I could be bothered!).  I snagged this dress at a Salvation Army store and, inspired by other sewing queens on Pinterest, I felt compelled to buy this dress -- a Size 12 --  which is way too big for me,  for $3.99 and challenged myself to see if I can do the Tim Gunn "make it work" refashionista thing and to turn it into something I would actually wear out of the house, that is, into a Size 4 summer dress.  Basically it was a  massive hack-down: I slashed 2 inches out of each side seam and cut off 6 inches off the bottom and hemmed it. I also took in every one of the four vertical darts another inch or so to get the volume of the dress down even smaller and give it more curves! The piece that got cut off the bottom became a self tie belt.   I ripped out the lumpo shoulder pads and snipped out the sleeves completely, then shortened the two shoulder seam widths by about half an inch and hemmed the arm hole openings.  After a jolly good ironing, I tried it on and hey presto chango, had meself a new dress.  I've gotten a few compliments wearing this out as it has a dressy look but is very comfortable, machine washable, and cool to wear! 

Embellishing Old Blouse For More Use

After stitch witchery

Determined to use up some bits of old white and black lace and a shiny ornament, I went into my closet to see if there was some blouse or shirt that could use some embellishment to get me to wear it again. I found a somewhat worn white and grey printed blouse that I hadn't worn for two years and thought this was a good candidate for some scraps. It turned out I had just enough bits and pieces to make a fairly pleasing square shape out of the strips of lace. I stitched them on with the machine but hand-stitched the metallic diamond shape as I might have damaged it with the presser foot.  I think it came out all right and I've worn this a few times this summer and got some use out of something I might otherwise have cut up into rags or something.

What blouse looked like before

Ever Changing Wreath on Front Door

I'm really into re-use, reduce and recycle so for my front door wreath I used an old twisted twig wreath form that I got years ago in a Michaels Arts and Crafts store and that I update seasonally.  This summer I used red and yellow fake flowers that I found thrown out in someone's trash in the alley (thank you very much!). First I cleaned them up a bit, cut off the extra plastic twiggy bits and then stuck them into the wreath.  The plaid green and blue ribbon I also found in the trash, someone had tossed the unfinished roll out, and you can be sure I spied it and commandeered it for re-use. The ivy leafy vine wrapped around the wreath I got years ago also, probably at The Dollar Store,  great source of cheap arty crafty bits and bobs. I'm quite glad how this colorful wreath brightens up my front door for these late summer days.  Soon, of course, I'll be changing out the flowers for the autumn, that is, once I gather some orangey yellow bits and pieces together.....

Geraniums in February!

It's no secret that I bring indoors all my porch and deck flowering plants every winter. The trick is to keep them alive with enough light and not too much water until I can put them back outside again, usually in early April, when there's no danger of snow. I usually lose at least one plant during the cold season due to not enough light or I over-water and it rots or I forgot to water and it dries out.  This year, I'm doing okay with two potted plants on the radiator in the upstairs den (hubster's man cave), the jade in the downstairs bathroom, two poinsettas in the living room window, and a petunia in the kitchen window.  Everything else is on the basement kitchen counter that has a big window where I've added some plant lights focused on them (with timers).  There's a coleus, another jade, some purple ivy that I don't know the name of and a large pot into which I crammed about three geranium plants in November when I brought them all in.  In fact, this group of pots is doing so well that the geranium which bloomed throughout summer seems to think it's in California and has been putting out lots of lovely blooms!  So, it's February and I've got the loveliest pink geraniums, so I picked some and put them on my kitchen table. Such a delight to look at when there's snow outside!

Old Washington Tree Cut Down But Stump Remains

There used to be a tree at the top of Adams Street on North Capitol Street NW at the #80 bus stop. I know this tree was pretty old, probably about 85 years. I'm just guessing that it was put in the ground when the nearby houses were built, likely between 1895 and 1920.  But due to damage and disease what was once 20 foot high has been cut down and a huge almost triple trunk sized stump is left. In a previous blog I  

Little mushrooms growing in bole

wrote about the amount of rot and fungus that was starting to erode the tree after some car crashed into it.  I've always liked this tree as it provided so much shelter at the bus stop, whether from the scorching sun in the summer where it gave a lot of shade, or if it was raining, it was a huge umbrella, or if just a cold wind blasting, you could huddle on one side and not get too blown.  I expect they will ground out the stump in the spring and then plant some skinny skimpy pin oak, but I do miss this old familiar thing.

Wild Yard at Shaw Public Library

At first I didn't like the "weeds" growing outside the Watha T. Daniel DC public library branch building in Shaw at the intersection of Rhode Island and R Streets NW, but, upon a moment's reflection, I decided I liked this seemingly unkempt yard space alongside the sleek modernity of the new glass building. Not only do these grasses and plants smell nice in the summery heat but they also make for pleasant mirror reflections. There's something very country-side about these three foot high grasses and that made me think of fields and river banks.  I had no idea if this planting was intentional or not but the idea of letting  plants grow a bit wild in a confined space, just to see what happens and how it looks, appeals to me. I just hope that rats and other nasty critters don't make this their home too! A garden is a garden, isn't it, even if it's not really planned and doesn't look like what you'd expect. And surely there's intention in that.  I've researched a bit further now (July) and discovered that these plantings are intentional. That is, the aim was to plant things that need minimal water, help purify the air (don't all plants do that?), help reduce soil erosion (don't all plants do that?) and limit the need for pesticides. This is according to a nice little plaque tucked away near the library front door which gives the reasons for the design.  The plaque also lists the plants growing there and which have lovely names:  Prairie Dropseed, Weeping Brown Sedge, Northern Sedge Oats, Kiwi Weeping Sedge, Giant Fescue, The Blues Little Bluestem, Liriope Big Blue, Lily Turf, Snowy Wood Rush, and Greater Wood Rush.  Who knew?

September 11 Garden Update

Monarch on clematis

Begonias, geraniums and myrtles

Roses still blooming

The Creator has been at work in the front garden again!  It is still flowering with begonias, geraniums, marigolds, myrtles and some colorful things whose names I have forgotten. And, there's that amazing rose bush that gives us an unlimited supply of tiny red scented roses as long as I give it gallons of water to drink each week. Now that the weather  is cooler, we can sit on the front porch and notice our other neighbors.  There's a family of monarch butterflies living in the scented wild white clematis and there's some bright yellow and some white butterflies also flitting about.  There are some very giant bumble bees busy doing the nectar thing and for once, the mosquitos and flies seem to have abated. I've also caught sight of some humming birds hovering among the blossoms too, also having a go at the nectar from the Roses of Sharon and the wild clematis. As a basically lazy gardener, I believe the secret to having a garden full of flowers is to only plant things that you can take care of without too much aggravation and that are "easy." It's worth checking out what the neighbors are able to grow as soil and local climate have a big impact, especially on what kinds of trees and bushes are possible. Then sun and water are the main considerations.  I usually bring all the geraniums and begonias in over the winter, sticking them in one big pot each and leave it in a sunny window and water them moderately to avoid root rot during the no-grow winter season. They limp through the winter until I'm able to get them outside again in early spring. I've learned to take cuttings and root things, so I can always have more of what I've already got and I accept all donated plants! And of course, anything that seeds, harvest them and keep over the winter in dry spot in a brown paper bag so you can plant them in the spring, Every year the garden resurrects and it's different every time!

Bus Rides in Summer

This morning, I got off the Route 80 bus at the bottom of North Capitol street to switch to the DC Circulator bus as the noise in the Route 80 bus was just too loud for me. Everyone was having extreme cell phone calls at 8:45 a.m. in the morning, telling off their kids or screaming at their spouses or demanding something from somebody or telling the dentist they were going to be late, or things like that. Plus the bus was crowded; even though I got a seat, I found myself jammed into an inside seat by a very large man who, of course, was yelling into his cell phone the whole time the bus meandered its way down North Capitol street from my street to the Post Office at the corner. And everyone was standing and lurching into one another at every stop and looking like they could bite someone if you looked at them the wrong way. At the Florida Avenue intersection a very drunk looking older guy was yelling at the bus waving his fist, looking already like he was over-heated and quite dehydrated. Even more people piled onto the bus so, feeling more than just slightly claustrophobic, I got off before the Massachusetts Avenue turn to transfer to a nice uncrowded Circulator bus which pulled up almost immediately. Since that's the beginning of that route, there were only three people on the bus and I got a wide seat all to myself. This lasted until 7th street when a huge crowd got on bringing gusts of hot August air in with them, turning the bus into another hot, human-filled metal container. But no one was making loud cell phone calls; instead they all seemed to have plugs in their ears attached to those IPod music things so they couldn't hear anybody and clearly didn't want to talk to anyone. The bus got caught in traffic and took ten minutes to go from 11th to 14th streets due to some tie-up involving an out-of-town car backing into moving traffic just to drive the rest of us crazy in the heat in the summer. Bus rides can be a humbling experience! Lord, get me through today!

Love them Summer Roses!

While my front yard does go out of control in the rambling columbine vine department, and there are a number of other mysterious things growing there that I swear I never planted, the pot with the bright pink red roses hasn't failed once this summer. From the day I planted this rose bush two months ago to now in the sticky mid-August heat, this little bush just keeps on budding and flowering and blessing me and every passerby with its small and lovely flowers.  I forget the name of the rose plant but if they have them on sale at Home Depot or Lowe's later this month, and if they are in white or yellow, I think I'll go get a couple more. This is the kind of gardening I like! Just plant 'em and water 'em when I remember, shake a little plant food occasionally, and off they grow, sharing their little flower faces with us! What joy!

Sounds & Sights of the City at Solstice

You'd think things would have quieted down about 8:30 pm on this summer solstice eve but I just sat down on the porch and listened to a loud assortment of sounds. This is the front porch on this glorious evening in the city. Firstly, there's the dull roar of the NORAD planes up there in the sky over Washington DC doing some drills. Now a helicopter makes its blade-noisy way over to the nearest hospital. A motorcycle just roared by, slowed down by the Fedex truck groaning along looking for the right house. A bunch of birds are tweeting somewhere and a bunch of others are making coo coo noises while a few seem to be cawing and squeaking conversations about the street's residents. They're probably sated from the large assortment of bugs flitting about annoying us humans. Then there's two batches of cicadas grinding and clattering away in chorus at either end of the street. It's always hard to tell which tree they are in or where they are located but they usually all stop at the same time. Quite mysterious. Somewhere in the distance a siren goes off, perhaps it's police or an ambulance and one wonders momentarily what the disaster is, and then, martini in hand, I just forget about it as I'm distracted by some fireflies lighting up the myrtle. And with every breeze -- and there's more than a few -- wind chimes on people's porches are jingling and dingling in the erratic breezes sending soft tinkles out. Closer to where I'm sitting on the porch is the roar of my electric fan -- set up to blow away any flies or mosquitoes that dare trespass in my personal space. Some neighbors have someone banging on their door and the dogs are barking, not recognizing it's the owner's sister visiting. Every once in a while a car does it double toot as the driver locks it up automatically and double clicks the key. A porch door slams tinnily as someone goes out to work the night shift. I can even hear the noise of the TV as someone else watches the World Cup game tonight. Earlier, there were some little girls giggling on their way from the car to their house with their dad telling me how pleased he was that they made it through the first day of summer camp. Thank God for giggling little girls.