FO #4 for my STP. This is a really lovely linen from... ummm... that online fabric store that specializes in linen.

The fact that I can't remember the name of the store indicates how long I've had this fabric.

My plan with the STP (Summer Top Project) involved buying a bunch of print fabrics at bargain prices and sewing up print tops to liven up my wardrobe for the summer. I have instead so far made one print top from the fabrics ordered for the purpose and three from solid colors I had hanging around.

Oh well.

This is Butterick 5470. It has this top, both in this short length and as a dress, plus a jacket and pants. I might make one or the other of those pieces, too. However, I must first make a print top.

I'm really happy with this one, though. I love to wear linen and it's a pleasure to sew with such a high quality fabric. It's a great color, and I did the major seams on the sewing machine but all the edges (hem plus top and armholes with self bias strips instead of a facing) by hand, so I was able to sit on the sofa like a great lazy sofa sitter and watch British comedies on Netflix instant watch.

Sure, I also spent some time working and did the grocery shopping, but mostly I was pretty lazy.    

#1 son's band played at a local watering hole for the release party of a new local compilation CD on which they have a track. #1 daughter went along to represent the family. She stopped off to talk for a bit first.

In the course of conversation she remarked that our company's Facebook page "looks like c***." She tends to be pretty scornful of the work we do, and I'd like her to get over it.

Somehow it seems like a problem that she has a low opinion of our stuff. Maybe not. She is a back office person, and I've met plenty of corporate back office people who seem to have only the vaguest idea of what their companies do, and no particular interest in it.

On the other hand, I'm getting ready to do a social media seminar for the local Chamber of Commerce, and if our company Facebook page really is rubbish, then I had better do something about that.

I'm trying to be lazy, though, so I'll be in the mood to start back to class on Tuesday. I have a couple of church services to attend, and then I plan to sew a print top. I might use the same pattern and this sage and brown charmeuse with a pattern of abstract palm fronds.

If I do the machine bit quickly, I can take the hand work out on the patio, where we have some nasturtiums. I have five pots of nasturtiums, and they're just beginning to flower. There are also roses and herbs, so it's quite a nice place to hang out.

Memorial Day weekend is a great time for sewing, and I plan to do  quite a bit of it this weekend. I had actually planned to take the whole three days off, but things interfered with my plan, so I still have some work to do before I can settle in to sew.

I am ready, though, as you can see. I have Netflix, sewing/fashion magazines, sewing tools, and nearly-completed projects.

One of the things that interfered with my finishing all the work before the weekend was an amazing piece of good fortune. I'm a member of a special beta testing group which is bringing all the members to Rome for a camp in October. They are paying for the trip, though I plan to save up whatever I can from the small amount left over after I pay tuition, so that I can play tourist a bit as well.

The reason this interfered is that I had to go get a passport, an expensive undertaking but also rather exciting.

Then I had to go to a bookstore. I have no excuse for this whatsoever, except that  I'm going to Italy so I needed to look at books about Italy.

I got back to work by 10:00, but then had calls from clients who were feeling very chatty, it being the Friday before a long weekend, and what with one thing and another I still have my Aussies and Brits to see to before the holiday begins.

I stopped work at very nearly the normal time anyway, and worked on item #3 of the Summer Top Project. This is HotPatterns  Weekender Sunshine Top  and I quite like it. I think I'll make another.

I start teaching again on Tuesday, so I hope I will be able to sew up a few more tops this weekend. I hope also that there will be some cooking out with the family or other jollity, but I haven't actually planned anything, so I can't count on that.

There has to be housework and grocery shopping, too, and of course there's still some work to be done, so there really may not be anything special about this holiday weekend at all, but there might be. Who knows?

A second FO for my STP.

This one has a nightgown-ish look and feel. It's a very soft rayon knit with pink flowers, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised.

I like it anyway, and I think that it'll look less like a nightgown when it's worn with a suit.

I have lots and lots of work today and I'm not even dressed yet.

I have a new desk.

This is how my office looked on an admittedly messy day with my old desk.

This was a kid's desk which was second hand when it came to us and then was attacked with a pocket knife. Both my sons received pocket knives from their grandparents, but they don't lead the kind of life that gives lots of opportunities for pocket knife use, so #2 son, whose desk this was, used it to carve up the desk.

I bought a new desk. I had been admiring it at Amazon for a year or so and the price went down to bargain basement levels, so I snapped it up. My husband, #1 daughter, her boyfriend, and I put the thing together on Friday afternoon when I should have been writing. It took about four hours, but it was fun. We'd see that something had been put on upside down and laugh in a jolly way and redo it, rather than cursing and taking a hammer to it, so I think that counts as fun.

Anyway, #1 daughter saw this as an opportunity to move all the furniture around, so here's my new desk in the mostly moved around office.

There is still a great big ugly filing cabinet to move, and the plan is to put the printer on top of said filing cabinet and to get rid of the little table that currently houses it. I think the weird little shelf next to the real bookshelf probably ought to go, too once I figure out what to do with the stuff that's on it.

The new desk is taller, so I should in theory spend less time hunched over while working, it has a cabinet for the CPU so I have some actual desk space, and we carried several bags of trash out of the room (old student papers, mostly), so there should be an overall improvement in my working life.

The drawback to this desk is that you have to leave the cabinet door open when the computer is on. I normally don't turn my computer off at all. I just put it to sleep. However, turning the computer off and shutting it up in its cabinet, and closing the keyboard into its drawer, may encourage me to create more of a distinction between my work time and non work time, which could be a good thing.

I did take some non work time yesterday. I went down to the farmers market and bought plants, and planted them with my husband so they're done right.

I did some sewing, read in the lawn chair amid the roses, baked banana nut bread, did the grocery shopping, and stopped by the fabric store, too. Then in the evening #1 daughter, her friend, #1 son, and I went to the symphony. Verdi, Rachmaninoff, Nino Rota's 1966 ballet "La Strada," and the William Tell Overture, which is one of the most thrilling pieces around, with bird calls at the beginning and  the whole orchestra going completely crazy at the end.

The town I live in is such a nice town. It's beautiful, for one thing, especially in May, and there's a surprising amount of fine arts action for a town this size. Quite a bit of night life in general, actually. Friday night, the young people went out -- #1 son's band had a gig and his sister and her friend went along and then they went on to karaoke.

But we also have strange people out on the street. Last night, for example, we were accosted by a crazy but happy stranger who talked and hugged extensively while we all looked at one another in wild surmise trying to figure out just whose friend he was. Then, on the way back to the car after the concert, we found ourselves confronted by a series of people holding placards. These were not well-designed placards with pithy sayings like, "Repent! The end is nigh!" They had long, long things on them that were hard to grasp in a quick glance. Things like, "Sex outside of marriage is fornication and marrying divorced people is committing adultery. God doesn't like this sort of behavior."

Some people were thinking that the end was nigh yesterday, I'm told. Apparently, the Rapture was scheduled to take place at 6:00 pm. This didn't happen. You can read about how it's calculated here, though the end of the world has apparently been rescheduled for October 21st.

I don't know how I can manage to have a hectic day sitting at a computer all by myself, but I did. Lots of calls and emails and clients and prospective clients and IMs and questions and stuff.

I didn't get as much done as I had hoped, but I did enjoy the day.

It's hard to Toggl on days like this. Toggl is a wonderful application for keeping track of your time. When you answer a call from one client, it takes just a second to toggl over to that person and then a second to toggl back when you get back to your project.

But today, there were calls on top of emails on top of IMs on top of projects on top of more calls, and even live human beings. I lost track and I know I was highly inaccurate.

In the evening, La Bella and La Tenora and I went to hear a wonderful chamber quartet playing Mozart and Ravel. Just beautiful.

All our friends were there. You know those older ladies you see at the farmers market and the string quartet concerts and the charity things?  Well, I am apparently one of them.

However, I'm also a computer guy. Which one is the one I am when I put my glasses on, I'm not sure.

This is the quartet we were listening to. Their website is under construction, and I've looked at their code so I can tell you it may be a while, but they are amazing and you should go hear them if you have an opportunity.

The bits of sewing here show one of the Summer Top Project tops, looking rather like a skirt. I'm nearing the end of my first week of the two weeks I had for the project, and I have finished only one. Ah, well, tomorrow is Friday. Maybe I can sew in the evening.

I'll be writing about sex education and industrial valves, plus the usual blogging. It should be interesting.

Our Bible study is jumping right in with distress. Fortunately, I had some distressing events on Monday, so I was able to get into the spirit of it. I'm fairly placid, and also pretty good at getting over stuff, so it was useful to have an immediate source of distress for this lesson.

I was reminded about a lesson I once studied on Hannah. You may not know the story of Hannah. She wanted a baby, and she prayed and cried and carried on so severely that the priest thought she was drunk. Once she explained herself, the priest assured her that her prayers would be heard, and she cheered right up. Shortly thereafter she had a baby.

This story is often used as an illustration of faith, but the speaker at the study I attended pointed out that Hannah prayed and poured her heart out to God rather than whining to her girlfriends or complaining to her husband. This changed my mental image of Hannah. I had always thought of her as a major whiner. In fact, she restrained herself from being unkind to her sister wife who had lots of kids and pointed it out regularly, or to her husband.

The psalms which are the subject of the study are filled with highly demonstrative prayer (that's the term the study uses for pleas to God to dash out the brains of babies and cries of "Woe is me!"). #1 daughter suggested that God had sent us the distressing events specifically in order to help me understand these things from my smug and satisfied perspective.

The distress was short lived. Yesterday I had a pleasant talk with Janalisa, setting up a workshop for the local Chamber of Commerce, and then a working lunch with #1 daughter where we talked quite a bit about accounting, and then a meeting with a local company that needs a new website. There was also much blogging, but I stopped at a reasonable time, cooked dinner, and continued with the Summer Top Project. Here is another Butterick 5354 with the tucks thread basted in the old fashioned way. I'm hand sewing them, too, because my machine sewing skills are limited.

My photography skills are also limited. I have no idea why the same fabric has such a hectic flush in this picture, but you can see that the tucks are coming out nicely. This one will also have sleeves. This is a much lighter weight rayon knit, very soft and drapey. I think the end result will look quite different from the first, hot pink one.

The fabric came from Fashion Fabrics Club, a good place for high quality fabrics at low prices, though you can't tell enough about a fabric from a photo swatch to ensure that you never regret a purchase from them.

I bought one summer blouse, on sale, for what really seemed like a lot of money. Then I got the idea for the STP and bought 7 lengths of fabric at FFC for the same price as the one sale blouse. If I actually succeed in getting the tops sewn up, it will represent a savings.

I bought all prints, not usual for me, but I figure since I'm not trying to match anything a slew of print tops will liven up my otherwise solid and neutral wardrobe quite a bit.

The Savarin, with blueberries and lemon balm garnishing it. 

You make a yeast dough, rich but not very sweet, and bake it in a ring. Then you make a syrup with honey, lemon juice, and rum. You brush this lavishly over the cake. Then you heat apricot jam and brush that on as well. Fill the center with fruit and serve it with whipped cream.

Sort of a shortcake.

#1 daughter came over to pick up my grade printout so I didn't have to drive up to the next county, bless her, and we had good talks about accounting. Good thing, since we had an accounting/paperwork crisis today. And then I had a call from an accountant/software engineer needing some content work for his website. So I was well prepared.

This is Summer Top #2 of my Summer Top Project in its preliminary stages. I'm using HotPatterns Weekend Sunshine Tops pattern, and some rather scratchy jersey I was given. The color is not one of this year's trendy colors, but it's beautiful anyway.

I made that last night, having worked all afternoon after church. I hope to get it sewn up tonight, although I do have a bit of work to do this evening still. No rest for the wicked, my mother always said.

This morning's Bible study point was that the psalms encompass all human emotions, from the joyous to the... hmm... is violently psychotic an emotion? Maybe not. Anyway, #2 daughter suggested that the psalms show that prayer can involve unpleasant emotions just as much as pleasant ones, and the psalms support that point of view.

The study asked us to consider what was exciting about our new ventures and what was scary. Good question.

Rough winds, we're told, do shake the darling buds of May, and here they are, being roughly shaken. The blossoms have mostly been shaken to bits, and we have some limbs down, too.

However, half our state has been declared a disaster area, so I'm not complaining.

Yesterday and today we've had this very impressive scholar at our church teaching us about the Book of Revelation. He takes a completely different perspective on the book from anything I've heard before (though in this morning's sermon he admitted that it was a crazy book, which has always been my own view) and I'm looking forward to reading his books on the subject.

We sang Followers of the Lamb , a crazy-sounding song which seems more suited to being the sound track for a witch's dance over a bonfire than for a main line church service, so it was probably just the thing.

Here are the lesser-known darling lettuces of May. I came home and cut some leaves for our lunch. In a bit I'm going to go clean the kitchen, and possibly also  make a Savarin, because I have rum, fresh lemon balm (seen in the bottom of the picture at right). honey, yeast, and berries in the house all at the same time. How often does this happen?

Possibly all the time in well-ordered households,  but mine isn't really a well-ordered household, though I'm working on it.

I've made quite a bit of progress, really. I'm keeping to a good schedule and worked fewer than 50 hours this week. I'm aiming at 40 hours with no loss of income, with the assistance of highly organized #1 daughter. I've managed to get in exercise and cooking and recreational reading every day, too.

I also made the first FO for my Summer Tops Project, seen here in several of my rotten photos. It's Butterick 5354 and I used a nice heavy cotton interlock knit which I bought a couple years ago at Hancock's Fabric.

It was easy, and I think it turned out well, though the facing isn't lying flat, as many sewing bloggers have complained it doesn't. 

It's comfortable, it fits well with no alterations, and it looks respectable under a jacket. I plan to make more of these with different sleeve options. I may try binding the top edge of something to deal with the matter of the facing.

Today I plan to make, or at least start, top #2. That'll be after the cleaning and baking.

I'm also supposed to start a summer Bible study with #2 daughter. The book reached her building earlier in the week, but she has to work hard to get packages away from the office in her building, so we'll see whether she was actually able to get the book or not.

The study is by Beth Moore, who is a famous writer of Bible study materials for women, but a bit more of a fundamentalist than either #2 daughter or I. A bit more emo than me, for sure. We're open-minded, though, and this is a study for people making changes in their lives, so I'm looking forward to it. Also, it involves reading the psalms, which is always a pleasure. The last study we did together was on relativity, and it's been a couple of years, so I'm also looking forward to doing some study with #2 daughter.

Amid all these fun things I have planned, I also have to finish calculating my grades and get them turned in. This I am not looking forward to. I don't know why it is that I hate paperwork as much as I do. I enjoy calculating statistics and poring over data and stuff like that, but I hate this grading process so much that I think of quitting every time I do it.

It's like inventory. In fact, it's exactly like taking inventory. Possibly because there's no discovery involved; it's just taking data that already exists in one place and putting in into another, and what could be more clearly a waste of time?
 
I hope to get it done tonight, anyway, because I have a lot of other more interesting work to do this coming week, and I'd like to begin the week with pleasure, instead of by dreading the grades.

If I have a clean kitchen, the backlog of last week's work finished, and a couple of new tops to wear, I will surely be able to face Monday morning with eagerness.

I'm getting ahead of myself, though. There's quite a bit of today left to enjoy.

  Here are the fall forecast colors for 2011. I like these colors a lot. Overall, they're warmer and deeper than the shades for 2010 were. Last fall, your trendy brown would have been chocolate, and this year it's coffee with nougat.   Last year it was rustic green and this year it's cedar. Last year's sunset yellows have deepened to this year's bamboo.

The change is just enough to make you want to buy new clothes, but not so much that you have to buy all new gear, which might make you rebel and ignore the new color forecast. This way, you can still keep the old stuff without looking too dated, but the new things won't go with the old ones.

I began my Summer Tops Project today with a top from Butterick 5354, which you'll notice is illustrated in shades from last year.

However, I'm making it in Honeysuckle Pink, the 2011 Color of the Year (in the Northern Hemisphere. In the Southern Hemisphere, it's Tusk, a very pale citrus green a lot like the pale green in our colors from last year).

If you read the sewing blogs, you might have noticed that buxom seamstresses are liking 5354 and making it in multiples, while slender girls are saying it's like a tent. I like it a lot and will probably make more. I'm hemming it this evening, probably while watching a movie, and then tomorrow I'll show you a picture.

As I say, I like the colors for fall. The teal and the blue-green are the same color family as my eyes, and they make my gray hair look silvery, so those are always good colors for me. The thing is, when your good colors are in style, it's easier to find things in those colors.

However, even if the trendy colors happen to be favorites, you'll find that your older clothes won't look stylish. First, they'll be in different combinations. Last time we really saw teal, it was being paired with mauve and  burgundy. Nice colors, too, but wear them with teal this fall and you will immediately look old-fashioned.

No, this year you have to wear your teal with mustard yellow and warm browns, and I guess with spicy pink, though I'm finding that a hard combination to accept right at the moment.

Skirts are longer, and A-line, either full or narrow. Pants have longer legs. Sheath dresses are holding strong, with little A-line dresses as an alternative for those who aren't slinky enough to wear a sheath well. Jackets are boxier and simpler in shape, but there's quite a bit of draping and layering going on. Pleats and tucks are still popular, and I'm glad of that, but there's also a lot of metallic embellishment, which I could do without. Mixed neutrals, like caramel and gray and black, are popular, and some of us will add what people insist on calling "a pop of color." That's another phrase, along with "seamless" and "passionate," that I'm really tired of.

And I guess that lets me be sympathetic about the color changing. I'm quite sure that people who work with fashion color all the time begin to feel that they can stand no more chocolate brown, and will stab the next person who offers them anything in aqua with their scissors, just as I just can't think about any more seamless integrations of X with Y.

We had a wild storm last night which left the back yard smelling of honeysuckle. 

The honeysuckle was there before the storm, of course. We have honeysuckle and little wild dog roses growing along the fence. The scent isn't usually as heady as all that, though. You have to get right up to next to it normally to get a sniff.

The storm took all the trees and shook them wildly, and I guess that stirring up brought out the scent.

It's been a different sort of week for me. Monday I gave a final exam and then had a couple of clients in for a training.

I like these guys a lot. They're smart and honest and really passionate about their work (and if you have any idea how sick I am of that description, you'll know there's no other way to put it), and they deserve their fine new website. (I really am sick of that description. And yet, when The Computer Guy said of us to a client, "We're passionate about the web," I had to realize though with a jolt that it was true. Otherwise I wouldn't think that some people deserve good websites.)

Tuesday I worked hard to make up for the time I'd lost on Monday,  but Wednesday I had my hair cut and went to the bank and the bookstore. Yesterday I had to drive up to sign my contract and go to the dentist, and I ended up at the fabric store.

And yet, in spite of these extra gallivantings, I stopped work each day at 5:00 and took the dogs for a walk. I started each day with 30 minutes of basic Wii Step (2900+ steps). I stopped for meals and had balanced, cooked meals, too. I did some housework and spent time with my family. I practiced music.

True, I went back and worked again some evenings. But still, I'm doing amazingly well with the whole Systems and Schedules bit. I worked only 47 hours this week, and I have only a couple more hours to do this weekend.

I'm living a practically normal life.
Tomorrow I'm going to sing at a lecture on the Book of Revelation. Revelation never has made any sense to me, frankly, however hard I try.

The Dalai Lama came to speak here this past week. #1 son and La Bella both went to hear him. Neither could really understand him, either because of his accent or the sound system, but both felt that he was saying really wonderful things, and stayed entranced through the whole thing. This is sort of how I feel about Revelation.

Tomorrow's speaker is an expert on the subject, so I may be able to get the gist of it this time. We'll see.

I'm also going to work on this year's sewing project. I have a couple of weeks off between spring term and summer term, and in the summer I teach five days a week. This is not so much a big deal in terms of the work involved, but it is a big deal to dress like a grown up five days a week, so I try to prepare a bit between the terms. The first year that I did it I bought clothes. Last year I started a SWAP and managed one jacket, four tops, and a skirt -- half a SWAP, in other words. This year I intend just to sew as many different tops as possible. I have some jackets and pants left, even if they are a bit worn by now, so I figure that new blouses will see me through.