Well, first of all, thanks everyone, for all your guesses on what might be behind the wavy paneling in my sewing room. I actually didn’t mean for you to guess, but it was fun that you did. Let’s see, we had guesses for old newspapers, piles of money! (I wish), skeletal remains, burned electrical wires, chewed wires and a 1946 penny. None of those things were found but I’ll show you in a minute what it was…
First Linda asked about my blue stenciled cabinet in the picture…
…she wondered what I kept in there. It used to be an old TV cabinet but was twice as big… It was like a refrigerator, so I asked my hubby if he could cut it in half, and he did! He put a back on it and now it’s a nice sized storage cabinet for all my tulle and slip making supplies. I also keep my hat straw in there too… I painted and stenciled it a few years ago…
A few people asked about my thread rack…it’s just one of those wall hanging kinds that came from Joann’s. I have a long one and one that is about half that size. The spools just sit on dowel rods spaced evenly apart. Actually, I have something else in mind, but that’s another post…
Rebecca’s room isn’t finished yet. She’s been ordering things a few at a time… she got a rug the other day and yesterday her new bedspread came… I’ll take some pictures when everything comes in…
Poor Susette had her fabric for new masks stolen. I’m so sorry… that’s just mean!
Laura mentioned “A mess is a sign of a creative mind!’ Well, all I can say is my mind must be on overload… because it’s a disaster in my sewing room. I know it won’t be like this forever, but it sure drives me nuts!
And lastly, Julia, said she believed wavy or warpy paneling is a result of dampness! GOOD CALL Julia… I’ll tell you about it in a minute…
So let’s get going on today’s adventure…and believe you me, it IS one! The funny thing is, about 3 days ago, I was laying in bed and thinking to myself, “I think I could do this job all by myself… tear off that crummy paneling, replace it was a few new sheets and do some painting…” HA! Clearly I didn’t have a clue!
If you missed yesterday’s post, you might want to read it first… you can see it HERE.
Okay, yesterday, my hubby was peeling away the trim at the bottom of the paneling and now I’ll show you what was behind there…
Surprise, surprise…it’s siding from the old part of the house. Nothing exciting, but at least it wasn’t totally rotten. I forgot to mention, but most of you already know this… our house is an 1892 and we were told my sewing room was added on… so the siding you see is what used to be the outside of the house…
I don’t know why some of my pictures turn yellow and some are white… but it’s white… Uh… WHITE WITH MILDEW AND MOLD stains on it… but the whole wall all around the window and over the door was the wood siding. Here’s a panoramic view of the wall…
Please don’t worry about the mold and mildew…it’s old stuff… dried on there from years ago… I was scrubbing on it today to get it off…and plan to Kilz it! And my room doesn’t smell either… it’s just that corner problem we have to fix…
Here is the corner that caused all the trouble…
So as my hubby pulled the brittle and crumbling and totally worthless paneling off the wall, and saw the siding, he said, “Please tell me you can live with this?” I looked at it for a minute, thought about a million things… like needing new flooring, a new roof, new paint, and burst out, “Sure, I can live with this.”
Then I really looked it over… there were splits, a million nail holes from the paneling being nailed on, cracked wood, etc. and got a little nervous…
I thought to myself, SURELY, there must be other ladies who have “outside” siding “inside” their house…right?
I was waiting for a response from my hubby, but he looked at the wall and said he had a plan… he said if we used the same trim as we did in Rebecca’s room and cut out the area in the corner, and fit the trim in there, it would finish things off… then we’ll have to put another piece of trim on the wall my windows are on…
Can we really fix this?
We thought that might work, so he took a piece of the trim, laid it on the wall, in the corner and marked it with a pencil all the way from ceiling to floor, grabbed his saw and began cutting out that awful corner stuff…
It created a horrible mess… I mean horrible.. there were these little sheet metal corner pieces that had to be pulled out…
As he got to the bottom I noticed a tiny little spot of what looked like the outside… could that be grass?
Oh dear, yes it was GRASS!!!
It was about this time, I started to cry… and it wasn’t the only time I did yesterday either! I felt sick… my idea for a sewing table had turned into a paneling fiasco, a ceiling dilemma, a corner problem, a hole in the siding problem and wait for it, wait for it… now a roof LEAK problem.
Before we started closing everything up in the corner, I thought maybe we should try spraying some water on the roof and make sure it wasn’t leaking in. We didn’t think it was leaking now… but had just been damaged from the past. My hubby had already fixed the leak once before and thought it was okay.
Well, when he sprayed the water up there, I was inside watching for leaks…and it started with a dribble and then it was like the faucet was turned on low and came through in a steady stream… (she cried again!)
So we went back to Lowe’s to get some roof patch and hopefully we can fix the leak until we can get a whole new roof. I’ll leave you with this beautiful sunny day and my hubby up on the roof patching the roof over my sewing machines… I love him!
…and apparently he loves ME too! :o)
Oh, and it’s supposed to start raining here about 3:00a.m. Friday morning, so any prayers would be appreciated! :o)
See you tomorrow,
Blessings, Jeanne
I’ve seen those thread racks in JoAnn’s, but I don’t really have the space for them, so I have the covered plastic boxes (FOUR of them!) that hold lots of thread. Since they are covered boxes, they stack nicely and don’t take a lot of room. I keep them under my sewing table so they are away from light, and my thread has kept very well over the years.
Oh, my goodness, Jeanne, those are Not the kinds of surprises we like!! I hope and pray George was able to patch the roof sufficiently to prevent any leaks! A few years ago we had water coming in thru the fireplace chimney and down into the basement, where we had a little “pool” under the aptly named “pool table”! Once our chimney was tuck-pointed, that took care of that particular problem!
Hope tomorrow’s “surprises” are of a much more pleasant kind!
Jeanne, this is the stuff of those home improvement shows! They always run into problems when redoing old and not so old houses, so cheer up! It always ends happily ever after!!
I know, you are itching to get back to your sewing, and we all are waiting for it too, but we can wait a bit longer. If your sewing machine is a portable, can’t you set it up on your table, like I do?? Of course, it always has to be cleared off when we sit down to eat, but it’s better than nothing!
Wonder of wonders, I managed to find the Kodiak mix at Dierbergs! The had several different varieties, and first I picked up the muffin mix, that had chocolate chips in it, but then saw the flapjack mix, which you used, so took that instead. I am wondering if you used muffin tins versus the cupcake tins that I have. Aren’t muffin tins bigger? Since I don’t have those, I will use cupcake tins and see if I get more than six muffins. Of course smaller tins means that baking time will be shorter. I’ll wait to see what size tins you used.
Good luck on tackling your newest project!! ;-(
Hi Linda,
I just used full sized silicone muffin cups. They aren’t the jumbo and they aren’t the mini’s…just the regular size muffin pan…I don’t have any metal muffin pans anymore, except for my jumbo ones…
Thanks Linda, hope you enjoy them….
As they say, “When it rains it pours!” So sorry, but that really needs to be fixed. If it were my room, I’d rip off that siding pronto. I’m sure it is brittle and will come off easily. Then you would have a nice surface from which to work. One wall of sheet rock can not be that expensive. You can tape and texture yourself. Again not expensive at all. I’ve done it numerous times. With the siding off, new electrical outlets/wiring can be added too. I would be very leery of using your machines in that old plug. As to the great outdoors, that is an outside fix. Maybe a new piece of siding to cover the critter entrance. And of course the roof. But, that is for another day. Looks like your room hasn’t much pitch. That may be the cause of the leek too as well as where it is attached to the main house. But, I’m sure George knows all of that. I think fixing the room right is the key issue. You don’t want to live with all of that moisture rolling down inside the walls. Not healthy. And while you’re at it, how about doing the floor as well. Then you’d be all set. I know that isn’t on the books, but hopefully in the near future. You deserve it.
Can’t wait to see Rebecca’s room accessories. I’m sure it will look wonderful.
I have the pinafore part done of my sew along and am working on ruffles for the shorts. Why these things always take so much more time than planned, I don’t know. Maybe because of the tiny pockets or double sided ruffle to make it reversible or no measurement for the ruffle length or someone with big hands who has to wear two pair of glasses to see the stitching. 🙂 Hoping I’ll be done today, but you never know.
Be thinking of you and George and the new project. I’m sure it will look lovely when it is all done. 🙂
Good thing George is so talented…that project could get $ if you had to hire it done! When I saw that hole with the green leaves on the other side peeking through it made me remember our 1895 farm house. This fix will be great…no little critters will be able to get in now.
This repair is way more than you bargained for but don’t let it make you upset…it will be wonderful when it is done,(Hugs)
Happy Mother’s Day to you and all your lovely readers! 🌸🤱🌼
Dear Jeanne, oh my goodness. In the end, when this is all done and fixed and you sit in your sewing room, all neat again, you will smile. I know that you will.
It was awful to discover the mildew, etc but if you hadn’t, the problem may have been so much worse in the end. You are fortunate to have a husband who can fix things.
We are already 8 days into May. How did that happen?
I was afraid of that. ALL of it. I would cry too.
BUT!
I love your little chandelier! Does it hold candles? I have one that is out in my she shed. It’s made for a patio and is battery powered. Originally it was black with gray acrylic tear drops. Not very colorful. It’s still black but all the tear drops are now spray painted rose gold. I added real chandelier drops that I had and some I found in a thrift store. The thrifted ones are red and mine are crystal. I’ve also added strings of colored beads so now it is a boho chandelier. I change it just about every year as some ideas don’t work out. I painted the acrylic drops with fingernail polish once, but with time that gets dull so this year I broke out the spray paint! I have other bits and pieces of colored glass hanging on it as well. May go out to my Hen House (Name of my she shed!) today and do more tie dye experiments.
Oh Jeanne….It may seem like an overwhelming issue at this point, and it surely would feel that way for me too, but, but….you have George to bring the help you need at this time-thank goodness. What a blessing that he can at least make it right temporarily…until that roof is replaced. I’m speaking from outside of all of the emotion that you’re faced with (and $$) but like others have said, you will get past this. I’m glad you were able to find this issue before it got worse, we’re headed into better weather as the days go by and again, George is right there with you through it all.
Take care dear one.
It really helps to have a hubby who can do a lot of things. A few years ago we noticed that our backyard was filling up with water but we couldn’t figure where it was coming from. Our house is on piers and when we looked under the house we saw it too was full of water. It was coming from a broken water pipe – under the house. No way we could call a plumber. It would have cost thousands of dollars for them to crawl under the house to fix it. It was at the edge of the house but you still had to crawl under. Fortunately our youngest son was still small enough to fit under pretty easily. David bought him some waders so he would stay dry and he went under the house and fixed it while David stood in the yard and helped as best he could.
Bad as your repair situation is, once it’s done I know you’ll feel good about it. Another renovation made to the house. And your sewing room will be better than ever.
BTW I just preordered a new Fashion Friends doll. Stella Rockstar. I think she’ll be here sometime in June.
Congrats on Stella. I’ve been looking at her too. Can’t wait to see yours. Hope you can send Jeanne a photo when she arrives in June. 🙂
Hi everyone,
I’m taking a break to let you know, the leak my hubby repaired on the room is working. We had lots of rain through the night and. Most of the morning and not a bit came through. Thank you for your prayers and kind words!!
Back at it…
Blessings, Jeanne
Jeanne, Here are my answers to your questions. I wrote one letter but it disappeared, but it was also incomplete.
1. I have 5 AG dolls.
2. I have several dolls from Dianna Effner, or designed by her. Three Little Darlings, several others from Boneka, Maru and Samantha from Maru and friends.
4. I have a lot of Kish Riley sized, other 8” dolls like Tonner children, some Tonner fashion models, .
They anything that fits. I prefer dresses for them.
My sweet tooth is more for salty things. I try to avoid too many sweets.
I do enjoy seeing for my dolls. I have lots of fabric just waiting to be used.
Jeanne, Here are my answers to your questions. I wrote one letter but it disappeared, but it was also incomplete.
1. I have 5 AG dolls.
2. I have several dolls from Dianna Effner, or designed by her. Three Little Darlings, several others from Boneka, Maru and Samantha from Maru and friends.
4. I have a lot of Kish Riley sized, other 8” dolls like Tonner children, some Tonner fashion models, .
They wear anything that fits. I prefer dresses for them.
My sweet tooth is more for salty things. I try to avoid too many sweets.
I do enjoy sewing for my dolls. I have lots of fabric just waiting to be used.
Diana
Now I have two letters in the list. I don’t know exactly how that happened, but you can ignore one.
Diana
This will probably be the third one.
Sorry😭😓😷
HI Diana,
I just wanted to let you know, I got your comments and you made it just in the nick of time!
Blessings, Jeanne