Drying in the sun

My rinsed out dye products, and my ovaries! My dye day went great, and I am very happy with the results, although I am slacking some on getting going on the next (needed) round. I stitched down my fused applique for Mending Broken Dishes, and am procrastinating on pulling out the batting (anyone else often get stalled out at this stage? How do you bust through?).

And I had another ultrasound and bloodowork this AM, and got the call (right after DH left for the afternoon without his cell phone, natch) that my cycle has been cancelled earlier this afternoon. Lots of money down the drain, but it was worth a shot. My estradiol levels are lower than they were on my baseline day, and that is after six days of injections at $90 a day, plus labs and appointments! They figure that it is just too soon after my flash-in-the-pan pregnancy, and, since I only stopped spotting yesterday, I guess I can see their point. Oh well. Trying this cycle got me through the time immediately following my miscarriage, and that was worth it all by itself. The dye day yesterday offically pushed me out of my funk, and now I guess I just have lots of work to do to get ready for my next cycle - in July! (I'm doing important stuff, but it just feels like killing time until I finally get pregnant - for real!)

I don't have a dining room btw, I have a studio. It has 2 6x6 foot windows on the south side, a windowed door and long 3x6 foot window on the East side, a French door opening into the living room (with DH, computer, TV and air conditioner!) on the West side, and a window and door into the kitchen on the north side. It is a hideous grey-lavender, but also has 4 skylights in the cathedral ceiling.

All of that natural light is terrific for my mental health here in northern Vermont, but NOT so good for my fabrics, obviously. I have the sun fading issue beat (closed doors and drawers, duh) but dust is another issue entirely. Also, my eldest cat, Spike (aka Booger) has decided that his favorite puke spot in the entire house is on the floor in front of my design wall. I try not to take it as a critique of my work, but that gets hard when my other cat, Hagar (aka Fu), tries to cover up Spike's puke by pulling my design wall fabric (grey fleece) down to cover it up. Sigh.

Two corners of my studio are a shambles though - I have those plastic storage bins neatly organized on top of a dresser filled with drek that needs to be sorted out/gotten rid of, and an old table in another corner that is just covered with all those oddments that have no homes - picnic basket, music stand, etc. I *always* dawdle on the dragging-out-the-batting phase, and I'm thinking that having a 'sandwiching' table might be just what I need - bolts (like my budget is up to that - HA!) of warm and nartural, timtex, WU, black and white fabrics etc, all in a sun and cat hair proof container that let me open it up and roll off what I need, right onto a cutting table. Yes, I am solidly aware of the fact that I am dreaming. Plus, I saw Freida's plexiglass dying/drying area on Melody's blog, and I am in lust for a space like that for my very own. Maybe if I can't figure out a really good use for the dresser space when the drek is gone, I could replace it with drying racks? Keeping the cat hair off those would be the biggest trick!

The space is excellent, and I could get UV film for the windows to help with the sun issue even more, but I still need to move house; if/when we ever get to have said often aforementioned baby, I can't climb the stairs to the second and third bedrooms. We are going to look for a split level ranch next year (hopefully), and, while I'm not counting on having as much studio space available in the new house (unless we win the lottery between now and then), I AM enjoying the idea of actually having access to my washing machine, since now DH has to do all the laundry - down the steep basement stairs!!!

Enough of my babble. Time to deal with the Batting Beasties. Enjoy!