Sewcation Derailed

Last Friday, I was so excited that I could spend the weekend completing my McCall's skirt.  DH was late getting home and I had gone grocery shopping after work so that would reduce my time to do that chore on Saturday.  Once DH was home, we ate a light dinner (supper) and watched a little TV.  He decided it was time to take a shower as it was close to 9 PM.

While watching TV, the floor lamp light near where I set, flickered a few times and I thought then I really needed to get some new light bulbs.  When DH went to take a shower, the power went out, then came back on, then out again, on again and finally out for the night.  We were able to sleep through the night in spite of the high temperatures. Saturday was suppose to be close to 100 degrees.

Saturday AM-still no power.  We decide to go out for breakfast.  Let me say that power surges and outages are somewhat typical for our neighborhood; no rhyme or reason to be given to us from APCo for this in the 9 years that we have lived in our house.  So not having power did not truly phase us until we go out for breakfast and see the storm damage all around us.  Tree limbs broken-new and older trees.  One tree limb laying across power lines on the road that leads in and out of our neighborhood.  Fortunately the tree was only blocking one side of the street and power lines were still intact but could have easily snapped.

Two of our favorite breakfast places were closed due to loss of power.  Several other chain restaurants were open but crowds and waiting time was 45 minutes to an hour.  DH proved to be the smart one and called a hotel to make reservations for us to spend the night based on what we were seeing, hearing and briefly reading about, this was no typical storm that came through.  When checking in, wait time for checking in was over 30 minutes due to long line of people that were in the same situation as we were-no power.  While standing in line, DH called reservation 800# and extended our stay for another day, smart move and smart man.

As it turned out, we have been without power since last Friday, a week ago.  The stay at the hotel has been extended several times, power came back on last night and we will be back in the house tonight.   Today I spent time washing clothes, and scrubbing out two refrigerators as we lost all of food.

Many of you who may read my blog have experienced some of this as the storm came through WVA, Southwest VA and into DC.  I am grateful for the other states (NC, Florida, Indiana) who have sent power crews to assist in this repair and restoration.

I have always felt empathy and concern for others when they have undergone Mother Nature's wrath; I have learned you can not fully grasp how difficult those situations are until you go through it yourself.

I am thankful that I know I will have some more sewing days ahead; sometimes life just takes a different course and derails your plans.

Where did last week go and what's ahead

I hardly spent anytime during the past week in my sewing room.  Completing one wadder and one top last weekend was the last sewing I did.  Things were crazy at work with a colleague leaving to take a position in another state.  It was like a week of cramming for an upcoming exam.  There was a lot I needed to finalize with her before she left.

Next week-a stay/sewcation.  Yes.  This AM I spent time adjusting a pattern for another knit top/tunic.  It is a McCall's pattern.  I hope I did not flub up too much on the pattern adjustment.  I had to make a FBA of about 2 inches and I wanted to get rid of the resulting dart.  I followed a technique that Debbie Cook posted about and have used it several times.  But I think I may end up with an issue with this one. 

I plan to use a knit fabric that has been in my stash for several years to test it.  It is one that I was not overly crazy about after purchasing, thus if outcome is negative, I want be overly concerned about the loss of this particular fabric. 

I also downloaded the free pattern from Collette Patterns for a sleeveless top with front pleat.  I printed and pasted all the pages together and plan to trace this pattern for fitting and sewing also.

I also want to make a few more dresses.  I purchased these two Simplicity Patterns yesterday while out doing some shopping chores--Simplicity 2145 and Simplicity 2146.  I fell in love with red/black dress on this pattern and recently saw this dress on some TV program.  In black and cream.

Updates later.