jes stuff

I have a package of doll eyes stuck in USPS. Currently the tracking number says it was last tracked on Saturday and will be here Monday - last Monday. Not nice. I buy eyes from Etsy. It's amazingly difficult and time consuming to cut nice circles out of felt. I can buy a machine to do it for a couple of hundred bucks OR I can pay this nice lady in San Jose to do it for me. She charges me $3 for 100 eyes. I know the stuck eyes will get here some day so I placed another order and explained why and she got them shipped extra quickly. Unless USPS horks these, too, they will be here Saturday.

I think I need to revamp my mornings and get to the pool earlier. I've been leaving here about 6:55. This puts me into the pool at a good time (not too many people) but by the end of my hour, it's too crowded. So I think I'm going to try and get out the door by 6:45 or earlier. And I think I'm going to hold off on coffee until after my swim. Coffee is just taking too much time. Time to make but mostly time to cool off and drink. I'll start tomorrow. Which will be a win because Fridays are never crowded anyway.

I am on track to make 50+ dolls a month. I do not have enough living room seating to accommodate them all (the bears get their own chair). It seems a bit out of control but I really enjoy the process and it's not too expensive and they are each so adorable. At one point in the sewing, I have the head and arms attached to the body and I sew it back to the front and then turn it right side out and "meet" the new doll for the first time. It never fails to delight me. And then I can't wait to meet the next one.

I watched the latest Downton Abbey last night. There is only the final episode to go. I am really going to miss that whacky crew.

I started the laundry before I left for the pool so it's well on its way to being done. I have some financial stuff I need to do and then it will be doll time.

Today's Basket

Previous baskets

Thursday

Yesterday, I wrote an email via the USPS site about my lost package of eyes. Today I got a response that said I have to call. Ugh. So today I called. And actually got a very nice lady who looked at the tracking number and said "oops!" she said she'd look into it and get back to me and I said no need. I was just happy that someone was on the case.

Then I spent a long time trying to figure out a way I could make nice eyes here. Fail. I could get a 1/2" or 3/8" die and manually slam it one by one but it's an ugly thought. They make machines that you roll stuff through a press under a die cut and if I could find one cut that did a 'page' of circles at a time, that would do just what I need but, again the idea of setting it all up and then cutting one at a time for 120 times every month... nope.

At least I have Etsy.

Apropos of nothing, I realized today that I am no longer embarrassed to tell people I'm retired. For the first year and a half, it always felt horrible to say. Now, I'm totally cool with it. I don't think I have many hangups but the ones I do have are just weird.