Life and Sewing Updates
Mar. 7th, 2013 07:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bethzyllaIt's been a little while since I posted so I thought I'd better check in. I'm still here! I haven't gotten around to getting detail pics of my Safari at the Zoo outfit, so that'll have to wait for another post. ;) That's the only interesting project I've completed recently, so instead I'll talk about general life stuff.
I applied to and was hired by Home Depot. It's a part-time position as a sales associate in the plumbing department. Big shocker there, right? This is strictly supplementary income since I'm still working on an as-needed basis doing plumbing work for Ben's company. The money crunch brought on by all our renters moving out is what really brought this on. Incidentally that situation has fixed itself in the form of a single reliable (so far) renter. He couldn't have come along at a better time! Now the mortgage is covered, the house is watched over and looks lived-in which is good for showings, and I have some additional income to add to our safety net and pay off some bills. The only downside is that it eats into my homemaking time.
Which leads me to the garden! So far I've got some seedlings (grown from seeds I started) mostly thriving inside. Some of the tomatoes I was really looking forward to just refused to grow, and some of the seeds I bought last year and didn't store in any kind of heat/humidity controlled environment grew like crazy! I just threw those into peat pellets for the heck of it. I definitely didn't expect this kind of success rate! Funny how that works. The herbs I started outside are a mixed bag. With the crazy random cold spells and below freezing nights we've had, only the hardy stuff is thriving. I'll probably re-sow the more tender types in a couple more weeks when the danger of frost is truly over. We also got the tiller started and it's running fine, so I need to add some compost to the plot and start thinking about an irrigation system since I'll have less time to spend watering due to work.
I can't remember if I mentioned in any previous posts that we incubated some eggs in early January. They came from our backyard flocks (though that's kind of a strong term for two breeding pairs!) and our hatch rate was about 65%. Not bad for the first time, and it yielded us 6 more chickens. Here they are just after they hatched:
Two turned out to be roosters, so they were re-homed. The remaining four hen chicks stayed with us and got transferred from our brooder inside to the bantam coop outside earlier today. Three will stay there permanently as they're banties, but our lone full-sized chick will be moved to the big coop once she's grown some more. I'm getting more eggs than I can use, so very soon I'll be giving the neighbors my extras. I'll have to start incorporating more egg dishes in our routine!
Ben is dealing with a recurrent health issue that's got us stressed out. His heart randomly goes into atrial fibrillation for no reason, and this latest bout has lasted about three weeks so far. This is the fourth time for him, so he's learning how to cope with the situation but it still really sucks. For about the first week he's tired and winded all the time, and it's hard for him to do much because arrhythmia like that is very distracting. He's been in contact with his cardiologist and is on medication to slow the rhythm down and to help prevent blood clots, but it's anyone's guess as to when (or if) the rhythm abnormality will correct itself. In the past it has randomly reverted on its own, but some people stay in a-fib for years. It's a condition that might be surgically correctable but due to the finicky nature of the heart's electrical system the surgery is generally only 60% effective the first time around. Two or three surgeries seems to be the norm for most people with the condition. For someone who's paying all medical costs out of pocket, that's not a very encouraging situation. Right this moment his only option is to live with it and hope his rhythm normalizes sooner rather than later.
Needless to say, I'm super excited about the Picnic with the PIxies this month! I decided I'm going to finish my Aes Sedai dress and style it as a fantasy queen's outfit. I'm looking forward to making another wire crown. I found some supplies that got misplaced right before I made the last one:
I want to try some new ideas on the frame (maybe bigger and bolder?) and with those supplies I uncovered it'll be totally different and hopefully really cool. Now if I can only get that off the brain long enough to finish the couple of commissions I've got on my sewing table right now, I'll be in good shape!
I applied to and was hired by Home Depot. It's a part-time position as a sales associate in the plumbing department. Big shocker there, right? This is strictly supplementary income since I'm still working on an as-needed basis doing plumbing work for Ben's company. The money crunch brought on by all our renters moving out is what really brought this on. Incidentally that situation has fixed itself in the form of a single reliable (so far) renter. He couldn't have come along at a better time! Now the mortgage is covered, the house is watched over and looks lived-in which is good for showings, and I have some additional income to add to our safety net and pay off some bills. The only downside is that it eats into my homemaking time.
Which leads me to the garden! So far I've got some seedlings (grown from seeds I started) mostly thriving inside. Some of the tomatoes I was really looking forward to just refused to grow, and some of the seeds I bought last year and didn't store in any kind of heat/humidity controlled environment grew like crazy! I just threw those into peat pellets for the heck of it. I definitely didn't expect this kind of success rate! Funny how that works. The herbs I started outside are a mixed bag. With the crazy random cold spells and below freezing nights we've had, only the hardy stuff is thriving. I'll probably re-sow the more tender types in a couple more weeks when the danger of frost is truly over. We also got the tiller started and it's running fine, so I need to add some compost to the plot and start thinking about an irrigation system since I'll have less time to spend watering due to work.
I can't remember if I mentioned in any previous posts that we incubated some eggs in early January. They came from our backyard flocks (though that's kind of a strong term for two breeding pairs!) and our hatch rate was about 65%. Not bad for the first time, and it yielded us 6 more chickens. Here they are just after they hatched:
Two turned out to be roosters, so they were re-homed. The remaining four hen chicks stayed with us and got transferred from our brooder inside to the bantam coop outside earlier today. Three will stay there permanently as they're banties, but our lone full-sized chick will be moved to the big coop once she's grown some more. I'm getting more eggs than I can use, so very soon I'll be giving the neighbors my extras. I'll have to start incorporating more egg dishes in our routine!
Ben is dealing with a recurrent health issue that's got us stressed out. His heart randomly goes into atrial fibrillation for no reason, and this latest bout has lasted about three weeks so far. This is the fourth time for him, so he's learning how to cope with the situation but it still really sucks. For about the first week he's tired and winded all the time, and it's hard for him to do much because arrhythmia like that is very distracting. He's been in contact with his cardiologist and is on medication to slow the rhythm down and to help prevent blood clots, but it's anyone's guess as to when (or if) the rhythm abnormality will correct itself. In the past it has randomly reverted on its own, but some people stay in a-fib for years. It's a condition that might be surgically correctable but due to the finicky nature of the heart's electrical system the surgery is generally only 60% effective the first time around. Two or three surgeries seems to be the norm for most people with the condition. For someone who's paying all medical costs out of pocket, that's not a very encouraging situation. Right this moment his only option is to live with it and hope his rhythm normalizes sooner rather than later.
Needless to say, I'm super excited about the Picnic with the PIxies this month! I decided I'm going to finish my Aes Sedai dress and style it as a fantasy queen's outfit. I'm looking forward to making another wire crown. I found some supplies that got misplaced right before I made the last one:
I want to try some new ideas on the frame (maybe bigger and bolder?) and with those supplies I uncovered it'll be totally different and hopefully really cool. Now if I can only get that off the brain long enough to finish the couple of commissions I've got on my sewing table right now, I'll be in good shape!
