Weekly Mileage #172 and All the Leather Projects

Monday I went grocery shopping, which tired me out. I'm going back to pickup/delivery as much as possible, then I'll only have to go into Costco and pickup at Kroger. Whole Foods and Target will deliver.

I did manage to do some work on the chicken coop so we could integrate the chicks in with the chickens. It would be better if they were a bit bigger, but they were getting pretty cramped in their little brooder area. I hauled a couple loads of mulch to the pen for them to scratch around in and it did me in. The combined heat of 91* and high humidity felt like 100* 😥

Tuesday I made two notebook orders made and shipped them out. The alcohol ink supplies I ordered forever ago finally arrived so I can do some more experimentation when I've got a minute.

The boys talked their sister into setting up the slip-n-slide for them and they had lots of fun.

Sunshine made a <late> Fourth of July cake. The colors didn't quite work, but she had some nice smooth fondant on the top (she skipped it on the sides, though). It was a good learning experience for her.

Wednesday I had planned to do a 10k on the treadmill (to knock out the last virtual race I signed up for), but I woke up with a migraine that got worse throughout the day. I was pretty useless and didn't get anything done- too nauseous and headachy.

Sunshine had a board of review and is now a First Class Scout!

Jeremy and I had our stake presidency temple recommend interviews via zoom. It was nice to catch up with him- he was the bishop of the first ward we were in when we moved here and were renting for a year.

Thursday I was still a bit headachy, but not nauseous, so I was much more productive.

My tote bag patterns are good to go, now I need to figure out how much materials I used so I can calculate costs and what I will charge for each one.

The medal for my 50k finally arrived.

I re-did the notebook cover- third times the charm, and I'm finally happy with it. The unfortunate thing is I used this cool brand on my first try, when I should have saved it for when I had a better idea of how it would turn out.

First try on bottom, second in the middle, third on top.

And the inside:

I started to mess around with the gather basket handle (I was going to double up the leather), but decided it didn't look good that way, so single layer handle it is.

I also did a sewn cover for music notebook, and machine sewed the papers. The edges aren't quite as neat as when I hand sew them (all in one group versus split into 5 groups), but I may start doing it this way- it allows me to sew a cardstock cover to the papers, which then allows it work in this style of cover (this has been a hangup all along). I realized this style cover should also work for spiral bound music notebooks, but we don't have one in decent shape in the house, so I'll need to go buy one to make sure.

I didn't quite get the dimensions of the cover right, so I'll re-do it, but so far I like it, and I can do a larger one for 12 stave notebooks or guitar tab notebooks, which I have received requests for.

Good timing on all this since those last two notebook orders I filled used the last big pieces of my good, expensive leather. All I have left now is smaller pieces that will work for smaller notebooks. I do have another roll of the good, expensive leather, but it's a lighter weight and doesn't work as well with the original notebook design. It works really well when two pieces are sewn together, though it definitely increases the materials cost of each one.

I'm not sure if I want to order more of the expensive leather or not. On the one hand, the notebooks are easy to make and I have a lot of 6 stave paper (I re-ordered a whole bunch right at the beginning of lockdown). On the other hand, I'm kind of bored making them and I'm not really satisfied with how I sew the pages to the covers, and the leather is about twice as expensive as the other leathers I've purchased.

Friday morning I took the kids on a hike, which was hot and humid, since it's always hot and humid now. We found two geocaches, tried to find another,  and then played in the river a bit before heading home.

Being brave and trying to cross the log:

And he's off:

Stop!                     (I'm not sure why)

The first geocache required me lifting River since none of us were tall enough to reach it.

The boys had fun jumping in the river.

The elusive teenager (she wasn't feeling great).

Cannonball into the shallow area

Great view!

We found more wild blackberries on the way out.

Reading Ocean's favorite book: Alexander the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.

I ran a couple errands with my medium tote bag.

Saturday I power washed the small shed by the cars. It's oddly soothing for ocd. We recently bought a new power washer and I wanted to make sure I knew how to use it- Jeremy doesn't have time and can only use it in short stints even when he does have time.

Then I made some waxed canvas and leather buckets. They're not quite right, but they're close, and overall I really like them. First time using waxed canvas and I'm liking it.

The left one has a double layer of canvas on the bottom, the right has just a leather bottom. The issue is sewing the bottom to the sides without leaving a lot of red under that lower leather strip. The leather strip needs to stay as it helps provide a bit of rigidity and shape and I like how it looks. On my next try I'll extend the lower leather strip all the way to the bottom of the side so I'm sewing two layers of leather together instead of a layer of canvas to a layer of leather. That will bring its own issues, so we'll see how it goes.

Why is red so hard to photograph? This one's a bit closer to the actual color- it's not nearly as bright as the other pictures might imply.

And here's the tote lineup. I will use a different, more rigid leather for the straps and I'll also experiment with different leathers, but I like the pattern.

I used cheap utility leather for the totes, gather basket, and notebooks since it made it a lot cheaper to try things out without worrying overly much about messing up. Now that I have some patterns I like, it's time to start using the nicer leathers. The leather I used on the canvas and leather bucket is a more pliable leather that I've used on a couple notebooks. The flexibility allows the bucket to squish almost flat for packing while still providing shape and structure.

Sunday Jeremy took Sunshine and River went to church for the first time, Ocean and I stayed home. Things went pretty well there, though whoever prepared the sacrament didn't put the gluten free crackers on a separate tray. The bread and crackers were placed in cups on the same tray, which might have been ok, except that the cups kept tipping over and everything got mixed together. Part of the learning process....

Weekly Mileage
Monday- 0.8 miles walked outside
Friday- 2.07 miles hiked
total- 2.87 miles

2020 totals

26 hikes towards #52hikechallenge
0 kayak miles towards #365milechallenge

161.99 outdoor foot miles towards #365milechallenge
11.00 indoor foot miles towards #365milechallenge
200.0 bike miles towards #365milechallenge
372.99 miles total