Our unlucky streak continues

On the weekend, we went to watch the Rubber Duck Race. I know most other communities have long since abandoned these; the newspaper says ours is the last left in Ontario. Well, we’re slow to change I guess, or maybe we just find it really entertaining to dump thousands of rubber ducks in the river year after year. Heck, there were many spectators who brought lawn chairs and plunked themselves down on the boardwalk or in the park to watch, then complained when the winning duck hit the finish line in a mere 15 minutes (in years past, it has taken up to an hour for the lead duck to chart the course). Anyway, we normally buy two ducks each year, name them Liam and Mallory, and then hope against hope that the 12,000:1 odds will work in our favour (which they never have). We’ve never actually watched the race before, but we figured the kids would get a kick out of it, and the event was part of a larger sidewalk sale/farmer’s market/Tastefest event all happening at the same time. So we made a full morning of it – the race, did some shopping, and got in a nice walk downtown and back home again – something that we won’t be doing anymore in 53 days and counting.

Other than that, I spent a large part of my weekend (i.e. every waking-for-me, sleeping-for-the-kids minute) sewing blinds for the new house. My sewing machine came home on Friday after I paid an $80 repair and tune-up bill, which could have been worse: the root cause of my machine’s distress was that it was plugged up with glue. I am relieved that it was fixable at all. I feigned bewilderment to the salesperson, acting shocked that a sewing machine could be plugged with glue, but I think I do know exactly how it got there… a little project I worked on not too long ago. (The fabric glue was not holding the felt, so I ran it through my machine afterward.) The machine is back to working tickety-boo now, and it’s a good thing: I have (roughly) 23 blinds to sew. Time to get crackalackin’. I have two blinds each half done right now, one of which took me absolutely forever on account of the wild geometric pattern on the fabric that was printed crookedly. (Or maybe I just sewed it crookedly. Who knows.) Chad passed by the dining room where I have the blinds neatly folded, awaiting their Velcro/drapery rings/cording, and commented that if anyone saw them right now they would think we are moving into a clown house. Which is his way of saying that my fabric choices are a little busy, and yes, they are, but what can I say? – I am just not a neutral or conservative kind of person. He should have known that when he married me.