172. Seeing Red

I've been so frustrated and angry today that I was seeing red while looking at blue.

It's several hours later and the curtains are not finished. We worked nonstop. Grr!

Once we made the decision that we were going to tackle the whole project this weekend/ today, we headed back to use the sewing machine that FMIL brought out for us. It's actually a few decades old and attached to a table that has had a bunch of plants on it for quite some time now. So, we figure out all sorts of cutting measurements and plans to go about piecing it all together and get to work slicing up the curtain and its blackout liner. Then, we're starting to figure out the tension in the machine and how to line up everything and pin it in place. Lots of trial and error, but that goes fairly well. That accursed machine, not so much.

It has a lever that is typically a side knee press but can be converted into the now typical foot pedal. To be kind, the lever has been quirky for quite some time. I want to just say it just has a lot of character and it's own personality, but I'm just going to say that it's a dirty ole sonuvagun. It was quite a bit of work and group effort to create the bobbins that go underneath and it would not generate enough force or whatever to push the fabric through. So, when it did work, I had to manually tug the fabrics through and pause every couple of inches to remove the place-holding straight pins. Oh, we also went on a little adventure to try to find straight pins too that also failed miserably. Luckily, after some digging around, we found more than enough.

We finally managed, after a decent amount of effort, two seams and one hem. Then it all went down hill. The needle refused to move automatically anymore and we had to force it if we tried to get it to go manually. After a while and dissecting the sewing machine, we finally figured out that one of the rubber belts had stretched out over time to the point where it would not fit properly on the gear. Just like in a car. It took another almost hour to piece everything back properly. Maybe by detaching it from the table and bringing it into one of those sewing machine-vacuum repair shops, it can be fixed.

Either way, We still have 7 hems, 30 tabs, and a few magnets to sew into place. It was almost a productive day. Almost. But I swear I knew better too. Oh well, what's done is done. And what isn't is the universe's fault. Lol.

I pretty much have nothing else to report or write about today because I'm still seething from this endeavor. So, see you tomorrow. <3