Tessa's new beds

I have about eight different sewing projects in the works right now, so I've temporarily taken over the dining room.

When we need to use the table to eat, I move the sewing machine down under the ironing board. It's working out okay for now, but I really need to get the spare room on the third floor all set up with my machines and table space to work on.

A couple of the projects I've been working on are for Cal's room. I've taken one of his old Ikea curtain panels and modified it to be a roman shade lined with heavy blackout fabric. We're hoping that this will encourage both Cal and the dog to sleep a little later in the morning. The blind is all finished and ready to mount in the window. I just need an extra pair of hands to help me juggle the drill and the blind.

The other project I just finished is a new bed for Tessa. She sleeps in the family room during the day and up in Cal's room at night, so she has beds in both rooms. The one that she sleeps on in Cal's room was big and brown and ugly.

The top piece is 36" in diameter, which makes the squished-down bed almost 40" in diameter. It takes up a lot of valuable floor space in Cal's room so I decided to make her a new rectangular bed.

I bought enough microfiber to make the dog bed and to cover his new chair. In fact, I seem to have vastly over-calculated how much I would need and have a couple of yards of fabric left. Oh well, I'm sure I'll find some use for it. Perhaps another doggy bed for the cottage - she just sleeps on a blanket we throw down on the floor in Matthew's room up there.

The bed was really simple to make. I cut out one large rectangle that I wrapped around for the top, bottom and two long sides. I cut out two small rectangles for the short sides. I hemmed the two short sides of the big rectangle, and then just sewed it all together, leaving an overlapped opening on the bottom of the bed into which I could stuff the stuffing sack.

I reused the inside of her round bed, but you could easily use this bed cover with any old quilt or blanket. Old blankets that you can pull out would actually make it much easier to wash, and thus much more likely to get washed frequently.

I used an old down duvet for her downstairs bed. It was fraying around the top and bottom edges, so lots of little feathers were escaping. I had it out on the porch ready to toss on the next garbage day, but then decided to put it to use. I folded down the edges and ran a quick seam with my sewing machine, and then folded it up and put it inside the bed cover.

Down filled bed for a dog? Nothing is too good for the Contessa, you know.

The saga of the door

As the rest of the house started to shape up, our front door started to look worse and worse by comparison. I had really hoped to save it as it's original to the house, but it leaks air like a seive, and our contractor said that it would take them a week to take it out, fix it up and put in a new airtight frame and sill. Probably not worth the effort, as the single pane glass would need to be replaced, and the beveled glass is the most charming part of the door.

The inside needed some significant work as well. Both because there were multiple holes from old deadbolts and handles

and because Tessa did a job on it the first week we had her when she knocked over a large, heavy shelf in the hallway and then panicked.

Yes, that is the wood door frame dug away by the dog's nails as she tried to escape from the house. I was so happy to come home to that mess that day.

So in the spirit of continued job creep, we bit the bullet and ordered a new front door. It took five weeks to arrive and when it did, it was hinged on the wrong side, had the wrong finish on the hardware, and was the wrong size. Sigh. Oh, and our contractor almost cut off the index finger on his right hand when he was inspecting it at the door store.

They re-hinged the door on the other side, the contractors removed the brick moulding so that the door would fit into the rough opening and we decided that we would take the hardware it came with instead of waiting for the new stuff to arrive. It's satin nickel, so it matches much of the other hardware in the house.

The big install was today, and true to form with this door, it didn't go well. It's in, but it took a lot of fiddling, it has no handle yet and the deadbolt can't be locked from the outside. Gah! At least there's one more work day this week before we leave to go away for the long weekend. Hopefully they get it all finished up tomorrow.

Here's a picture of it from the inside - it's going to be a beaut when we get it all painted up!