Patti O'Shea's Blog, page 31

When It Rains

Months ago, I'd noticed a piece of drywall tape (or something?) hanging from the corner of one of my coffers on the ceiling of the family room. I didn't know why that happened, but I assumed it was a poor job of sheet rocking and that all it needed was a quick fix. And a contractor who would actually show up.

It's been dry in Atlanta. We haven't had rain in forever. And then a storm rolled through. It poured for a really long time.

And when I walked past the family room, I noticed something on the couch. In the center of a wet spot.

I was like, WTH? I go over to check it out and yes, it's wet. That thing in the middle of the spot is the sheet rock/mud/tape from the coffer. I look up. Yes, water is there. I have a leak in the roof. I couldn't believe it.

There's a bonus room upstairs, so I go up there and look around, trying to find out how the water is coming in from up there and going through the floor to the great room ceiling, only there is no water up there. Not anywhere I can see. But there is unseen attic area. It's pretty much inaccessible except for a panel that you need to use a tool to remove.

The roofer came out a few days later to look at it. Luckily, we were back to being dry again so no more water came in. It turns out that some nails came up and exposed the paper under the shingles (or something like this) and that's why the water was coming in.

The good news is that the spot in the roof is not over the upstairs at all--that's why I didn't see any damage. It's only over the level of the house that had the rain coming in.

The bad news? Can we say eek on the repair cost?

So roof repair and then sheet rock on the ceiling repair. Sigh.

Free for a Limited Time!

This post contains affiliate links. If you use these links to buy something, I'll earn a small commission. There is no cost to you.

Get your copy of Wicked Obsession FREE for a limited time!

From Oct 27 until Oct 31, 2022, you can go to Amazon and download a free copy of the first book in the Paladin League series.

Blue-Blooded Woman 

As an ambassador's daughter, Langley Canfield has lived all over the world, but she's never fit in—not abroad and not at home. She thought she found a man who loved her for who she is, but when it becomes obvious that she's the only one with deep feelings, Langley breaks up with him and heads across the country for a friend's wedding. 

Blue-Collar Guy 

Special Forces Sergeant Ryder Pienkowski knew that he'd never be able to hold on to Langley Canfield, that she was completely out of his league, but it still stuns him when she ends things between them. He's trying to get her out of his head when her father arrives and tells Ryder there's a death threat directed at her. Without hesitation, Ryder hops on a plane and flies out to protect Langley. She might not want him anymore, but he's not letting anyone hurt her.

I hope you enjoy Ryder and Langley's story!

This post contains affiliate links. If you use these links to buy something, I'll earn a small commission. There is no cost to you.

 

 

Tattoo You

Anyone who knows me well is aware that I have a huge aversion to needles. I also get bored easily and these two reasons are why I've never gotten a tattoo and don't plan to do so. But I've been eyeing temporary tattoos for a while.

Nothing I saw excited me. I'd look through the store, think things were okay, but I never put anything in my cart. Nothing spoke to me.

And then a couple of weeks ago on Facebook, I got an ad for temporary tattoos, but these were words. Words that spoke to me. Words that I could focus on and use to inspire myself. I went back to the website several times and dithered.

Maybe I should get one of the collections? Except in each collection I only liked a few of the tattoos and why spend money for something I won't want to wear?

I finally did some math and realized I wasn't saving any money with a collection, so I might as well go with the individual options I liked and curate my own collection.

I put the first one on my arm on Saturday. I wanted to start with an option I liked, but didn't love so that if I messed up, I wouldn't be angry at myself. I didn't mess up. The temporary tattoo went on easily. All it takes is a little rubbing alcohol to clean the area and a soaked cloth or sponge. Hold the wet rag over the tattoo for 30 seconds and there it was.

They're only supposed to last about a week or so, I think. That's okay because (as I already said) I get easily bored and I'll probably be ready for a new one around that time.

I also really like these word choices because they're positive and something I can focus on and repeat. The one I tested out was "Limitless." The one I'm really looking forward to wearing is "Head Up, Wings Out." I picked up a few others that spoke to me, but there are more I want to try. I'll see how these work for me first.

I did not receive any compensation for this post and paid full price for the temporary tattoos. I was just excited about the manifestation possibilities. It's like having a word of the year on my arm every day so I can look down and send out that energy.

If you're interested, check out Conscious Ink.

Hello Wicked Persuasion

I can finally officially reveal the cover for my next Paladin League book, Wicked Persuasion!

Special Forces Captain Decker Nguyen doesn't usually make big mistakes, but he really messed up when he made love with the woman who'd been his best friend. And then ghosted her.

Now, years later, he sees Francesca again. In Puerto Jardin. While he's undercover as a mercenary. And on a high-risk op to bring down an international arms dealer.

Francesca "Frankie" Lewis believes she put Deck out of her head and heart. Until she sees him again. But she's not falling for him a second time. Not when it took so long to put the pieces back together after he disappeared on her.

Besides, she's working. The Paladin League sent her to Puerto Jardin to locate the Lost Treasure of Trujillo. But her team isn't the only one searching for it and there are those who will kill to get there first. With her life on the line, the only person she trusts to keep her safe is the one man she wants to avoid.

Deck is determined to win Frankie back. If he can keep her alive long enough to convince her to give him a second chance.

Available for preorder. Official release date is August 2023.

It's In the Bag: Part 3

I had no plans of writing Part 3, but the saga continued longer than I expected as I put together the smaller pouch.

As I mentioned, I ended up with the pieces for two bags because the zipper I put together was too long for the pattern. I cut longer body pieces to use that zipper and used a different zipper for the pieces I had.

I had some of the same challenges with this one as with the first one. I need remedial sewing-zippers-in training because I'm really bad at it.

There were also a few wins, too. For example, I used a seam guide when I was sewing around the perimeter which made it more even.

And then there were the fails.

I forgot to put the foot down when I tried to sew on the handle and ended up with a mess I had to pick out of the bag. When I cut out the lining pieces, I tried to maximize the fabric and cut part of the piece in the white selvedge--which you will be able to plainly see in the pictures. But the biggest fail of all involved one of the instructions.

Make sure your zipper is open as you sew around the exterior.

I saw this part after I had the thing all pinned up. I thought about unpinning it, opening the zipper, and then sewing, but then I thought: Why do I have to open the zipper anyway? What difference does it make?

My friends, it makes a huge difference. I'm blaming my faulty thinking on it being later at night on a busy day. It didn't take me long to learn why the zipper must be open.

With all the edge sewing completed, I reached in the gap in the seam and began to pull the interior of the bag out. And this is when I learned the reason why the zipper must be open. It is impossible to pull the exterior of the bag free with it closed.

I put it aside for the night. I didn't want to deal with it.

I delayed dealing with it for a while on Sunday morning, too. Eventually, the caffeine kicked in and I wondered if I could move the zipper from the back without having to rip out stitches. I decided to give it a try.

It wasn't easy because the zipper kept catching, requiring me to move it back and forward, forward and back, but I was finally able to get it open.

Behold, the second pouch.

 

This one ended up being more even than the first one, but I've decided I don't like the thickness. The foam is overkill for me. I'd like to try a different pouch pattern, one that doesn't use foam and one that has a video tutorial. There were a few things I was iffy on and took my best shot.

Overall, though, not bad. I'm using the big pouch to store some of my zippers and the small one holds my sewing clips. I might change purposes later, but it's good enough for now.

Lesson? It's cheaper (and easier) to buy pencil pouches or just plain old regular pouches. Will that stop me from making it myself in the future? Doubtful.

It's In the Bag: Part 2

When I left off on Tuesday, the zipper had just been imperfectly installed into the fabric.

Let me take a moment to say that this pattern wasn't quite beginner because the designer left off a few pertinent pieces of information. For example, at no place in the pattern does she tell me to trim the zipper tab to the width of the zipper.

Oh, there a pictures that appear that it's been trimmed, but I had no idea. I had to search YouTube to find another pouch video and hear that person say trim the zipper tab. There are some assumptions made that the sewist would have some idea what to do without explicit instructions. Not this sewist.

The little flowers on the left side of the picture is the lining fabric.

With the zipper in, I followed the instructions to sew the cutouts together. Again, the instructions weren't clear for me, but the pictures were good enough that I was able to piece together what I needed to do.

Things are going much better. And then I hit the part for the handle. My handle doesn't look like the pictures. Then I see the note: See Appendix A for handle instructions.

It involved ironing little folds into little pieces of fabric. I used steam. I burned my left hand with said steam. I also cut my right index finger on a staple (I had packages of never-opened sewing supplies) and bled badly enough to need a bandage. Three days later, it still hurts.

The handle actually ended up being easy once I recovered from the steam incident and then I had to sew around the bag. The side seams with that fusible foam were thick and the sewing machine foot didn't want to go over the lump. I forced it up and over. The opening I left in the lining wasn't large enough so it was an adventure turning it right side out. I also sewed a pretty lame inner seam in the lining after I had everything in the correct position.

One more story and then I'll share the finished pictures.

I still had all the other pouch material ready to go, so I prepared another zipper to make a second bag. I got fabric glue on my dining room table. I rubbed at it to get it off and it took the wood stain off! My table! ::sobs:: I need a sewing table and dedicated sewing space because my table can't take much more.

Bag two has yet to be sewn, but here's the first pouch.

No, you're not imagining it. The bag is wider on one side than the other. Maybe bag two will be better?

It's In the Bag: Part 1

After sewing a couple of T-shirts (which turned out sort of okay), some bowl cozies (which turned out mostly okay), and a few knot bags to use for sewing projects (also mostly okay), I decided to try to make a bag. A pencil pouch to be specific.

Clothes after be harder than a pouch, right?

The pattern was labeled beginner. How hard could it be? Well, my friends, you're about to find out. I think this is going to be a two-part story, too.

One of the early steps is to put the zipper into the zipper tabs. It said to cut 1/2 inch of the zipper away, but I didn't see any reason to do that, so I didn't. The zipper comes with these loose ends, and that looked as if what the pattern designer was going for, so it's already there.

So I glued them in with fabric glue as instructed.

I had the perfect zipper for the fabric. Purple and blue. I glued it in, clipped it in place as instructed, and waited for it to dry.

While I waited, I attached the fusible interfacing to the lining and the fusible foam to the exterior of the pouch. That went surprisingly well. Maybe this bag was going to be easy.

And then I ran into my first issue.

After sewing the tabs to the zipper, I discovered that the zipper was too long for the pouch. I guess I did need to cut away that section of the zipper after all. I weighed my options: Rip out all the seams and manage to work the zipper free from the glue or adjust the pattern, cut out new pieces, and make a longer bag.

I opted for the second choice.

I tried to use the first fabric because it's more my style than flowers, but I didn't have enough. Flowers. At least they're big, interesting flowers. And purple. You can see the zipper is the correct size for the bag now.

I clipped it to my bag. And realized I'd never sewn a zipper before and didn't know what to do. I did have a zipper foot that came with the sewing machine, but it was weird, hooking to the side, and I didn't care for it real well.

Sewing commenced. I wasn't paying attention to where I was and I hit one of the clips, breaking the needle. %#$%^ I'd never done that before. Luckily, I had an entire pack of denim needles and put in a new one. Sewing recommenced.

I ordered a different style zipper foot, one that matched what I'd seen used online in the tutorial videos I watched. I didn't realize it would require removing the apparatus which held the foot and attaching the foot directly to the piece that comes down, but I did that too.

And the zipper was in. I sewed crappy as hell, but I was not ripping out seams and starting over. This would have to be good enough.

Tune in on Thursday for the thrilling conclusion.

Gratitude Journal

This post contains affiliate links. If you use these links to buy something, I'll earn a small commission. There is no cost to you.

I bought a new journal recently, one specifically for gratitude and I plan to start it this month. As a perfectionist, I tend to focus on what could be better and forget to be grateful for what is. I'm hoping this journal will help me there.

While I could have used any of my blank notebooks or journals, I wanted one that helped me out and went searching for a dedicated gratitude journal.

One stood out. Gratitude: A Day and Night Reflection Journal from Inner World

With the caveat that I haven't actually started my journaling yet, here are my thoughts.

The journal has prompts for morning and evening. They're labeled Morning Meditation and Evening Reflection and are on pages that face each other. There are check boxes and places to make notes for the prompts.

The pictures are of my own book and cards, so I'll apologize for my less than stellar photography skills.

The prompts are the same every day. I'm not sure what I think about this yet. I'm sure an opinion will form after I use it for a while. On the one hand, having the same prompts every day helps focus my thoughts and it allows me to compare data from day to day. On the other hand, it might be nice to shake things up with a different set of prompts every day.

While I was looking at the journal, I discovered the same company made a deck of cards. Gratitude: Inspirational Card Deck and Guide Book by Inner World.

I have used the cards and I like the prompts written on them. The cards themselves seem to be of good quality (with the caveat that I haven't had them too long). The only issue I have with them is the size. I have smaller hands and I found it difficult to shuffle them. To compensate, I put them on the couch and mixed them up that way before gathering them up again and drawing one.

Gratitude seems like a good way to slow down, too. To let some of stress go. At least I'm hoping it has this additional benefit. I'm going to start soon and will post an update if needed.

This post contains affiliate links. If you use these links to buy something, I'll earn a small commission. There is no cost to you.

MIA: Hide and Seek

I'm usually a fairly organized person, but when it comes to my craft supplies, all bets are off.

It's not that I don't want to be organized. It's more that I don't have the right storage. And I have no room to put my yarn and sewing supplies. Not on the main floor anyway.

In the spring (I didn't realize it was that long ago!) I found a pattern for a pencil pouch that I wanted to try sewing. Maybe I should just call it a pouch because I was planning on using it for something other than pens and pencils. So this pouch required fusible foam interfacing to give the bag structure. I ordered some online.

Fast forward to Saturday. I finally had some time to try sewing. I pulled out my pattern, the cotton fabric, and the zippers I'd bought. Then I went looking for my foam interfacing. I couldn't find it.

I went to my order history and there it was. Delivered on April 30th in the same shipment as my zippers. The zippers were in my office, but no foam interfacing.

I searched the storage closet under the stairs. That's where most of my crafting supplies are jammed. No luck.

The hunt included checking the office closet, the drawers of my filing cabinet, and all the bookshelves. No luck.

I had my dad help me look. He checked all the same places and he had no luck either.

It wasn't a small thing either. It was 30 inches by 60 inches, and even folded, it had to be at least 10 by 10. I finally gave up and ordered a new package. It'll be here Monday, but I don't know when I'll have time to sew again. I'll probably misplace the new package by then.

I didn't plan on spending my Saturday playing hide and seek with a package of fusible foam.

Fourth Quarter, New Board

 

There's something exciting about starting a new quarter and a new book around the same time. Every three months, I clean all the Post-it Notes from my finished section of the kanban board. Usually, I'm mid project and have a messy To Do section.

But I've been making notes and thinking about Deck's story. I don't have everything nailed down yet, but I do know I'm close enough to put Wicked Persuasion up on the board.

This quarter, I also cleaned off some repetitive tasks. Like vacuuming and dusting. Those Post-its literally can never go to the finished section because it's like an eternal struggle. I decided to stick with items that actually can be completed and stay completed.

Some have been up there for a while and probably will be up there for a while longer. I need to rewrite the back cover copy for some of my paranormal and Science Fiction Romance titles, but it's low priority compared to writing Deck and Frankie.

The class I took which hooked me on kanban boards was about only putting out what you can accomplish in the quarter. Or plan to accomplish in the quarter.

I don't like that.

I want to see it all laid out so I have scope.

For example, I'm anticipating that Deck and Frankie's story will be 38 chapters long--about the same length as Wicked Deception. So there are 38 green Post-its up, each representing a chapter.

I like watching that collection in the To Do section dwindle as I write. I might not keep the finished notes up after the quarter ends, so I can't get my sense of accomplishment there, but watching the top section get smaller? Priceless.