April 8, 2012

Crafting & real life: the great balancing act

So the practice is starting to pick up a bit! Yay! I had several new patients last week, and so far, at least a few more scheduled for this coming week. Hooray! I'm so far behind in administrative tasks, though, that it's not even funny. I'm headed into the office for a couple of hours today (Sunday) to see if I can put a small dent in some of the paperwork. My work to-do list is literally over 1 page, typed in 11 point font. And that's not counting the personal life to-do list. I need about 5 more me's and an extra 10 hours added to each day, preferrably ones I can stay conscious during.

On the apartment fiasco, the carpeting and pad in the bedroom have been replaced. Of course, the apartment complex has yet to do anything to prevent the water from just coming in again and ruining the new carpet just like the old one was. *sigh* I was told by the office manager that she's going to have a contractor out sometime to see where the water pools outside and quote her a price for putting in a drainage system. I've tried to reach her a couple times since hearing this, to see where we stand on the situaiton and if, indeed, anything is actually going to be done to fix the problem, but she has yet to respond, and it's been over a week.  Currently, there are flags out and paint sprayed on the ground marking the electric lines outside our apartment and across the parking lots to some of the other buildings. Water lines have also been marked across the parking lot. A hole has been dug a little way away from our apartment, but there's no indication what it's for, and I know it's not where the water pools. I can only hope this is the early stage of the drainage system project, but who knows. I just keep hoping to avoid any major downfalls of rain, or several days in a row of rain. The new carpet is nice. I'd like to keep it that way!

Crafting has been resumed, but it's not my idea. Anime convention season is quickly approaching, with the first major con being April 27th. Here's the costumes Brian decided we'll be making & wearing this year:
Nightmare, from Soul Caliber V:  http://images.wikia.com/soulcalibur/images/1/18/Nightmare_Soul_Calibur_V.jpg
Pryha Omega, from Soul Caliber V: http://www.videogamesblogger.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/soul-calibur-5-pyrrha-omega-artwork-646x597.jpg
I told Brian multiple times that I wasn't going to have time to work on these costumes. Turns out I actually don't have the time, energy, or patience for them, either. He still refuses to man-down on these, though. And due to the time-crunch, he has them at the top of his priority list. They're far from even on my radar as far as my priorities go, but I'll be plugging away at them as best I can. We do what we can to keep the peace in our relationships, right? Here's hoping we get these costumes done, and done well enough that the fiance doesn't whine the whole time at the conventions. And that I don't die of exhaustion or depression in the meantime.

March 19, 2012

Busy! And wet!

It seems I'll be starting most of my blog posts with an apology for there being so much time in between them! One of these days, the chaos of life will calm down enough to let me do fun things & tell you about them. Here's hoping!

So the newly opened practice is keeping me rather busy. Business itself is still pretty slow, but I've been busting tail getting groundwork laid to let the community know about me and how I can help them, so things should start picking up soon. :) Currently, I've been scampering all over the county to various networking meetings and Chamber of Commerce events, on the phone with insurance companies trying to get in-network so that it's easier for patients to see me, and planning some networking events coming up. Unfortunately, that hasn't left much time for crafting, which is making me just a tiny bit crazy. :P

This weekend, I intended to be Ms. Super-Productive, and put a serious dent in my professional and personal to-do lists. (They're getting scary long!) Instead, though, I spent most of my Saturday dealing with this.

https://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=705313459730


(I couldn't get Part 2 to load into the blog directly, so facebook video links will have to do.)

So yay. This was the second or third day in a row of rain, so the ground was soaked and the additional rain water had nowhere to go. Also, the area outside our apartment has horrible drainage, since we face into a hill. Add those to the cracks in the concrete foundation (we're directly on the slab), and you get a whole lot of water in the bedroom. Joy. We'd had a little water get into the bedroom Friday night, but not this bad. At least all that got wet of our belongings this time was the pile of dirty laundry that I'd planned to wash on Saturday anyhow. After washing the wet dirty laundry, I strolled over to the main office to let them know we were having water issues again, and that they'd never fixed the issue after the first time it happened back in June of last year. Fortunately, I spoke with the same person this weekend that I did back then, so she had an idea of what was going on. They said they couldn't get anyone out to look at anything until later on this week. Ok, fine. Not 15 minutes after getting home, the skies opened up with the above torrential downpour, bringing in more water into the bedroom than I've seen in there before. I went back to the office to let them know I wouldn't be able to make it until later on this week. A few hours later, they sent a guy over to suction out the excess water in the bedroom, but it's still wet--not just damp. Not sure if the apartment complex will still be sending someone over sometime to address the reason WHY the water is coming in in the first place, but we'll see. I've got numbers to contact if they take more than a few days. The apartment already reeks of mildew, and I can't sleep next to that for long before my immune system surrenders. Can't afford to get sick now!


I'll sign off by leaving you another quick tutorial I left on my friend's sewing blog. I'm still hoping to get some actual craft projects posted soon! In the meantime, enjoy! My friend had sewn up a couple things, but was really disappointed after they fell apart in the wash. She didn't know about finishing off her seam allowances, so I offered the following quick pointers:

After I finish stitching a seam, I go back and put a zig-zag stitch over the raw edges of the seam allowances (there's a setting for zig-zag stitches on my machine). If the seam allowance is pressed open, I'll zig-zag over each seam allowance separately (single layer of fabric). If the seam allowances are pressed to the same side, I'll zig-zag over both of them at once (two layers of fabric). Fray check also helps. For those with sergers, you can serge the edges, instead of doing the zig-zag over them. When you trim down seam allowances (sometimes you don't have to, like on a straight skirt, for example), make sure you leave at least 1/4 inch of seam allowance from the seam stitching. All of these measures will help minimize of eliminate unraveling.