lisaviolet's diary

Wednesday, June 07, 2017

craftstuff
07:43 AM - 06/07/2017

The topic: Moar stuff I’m excited about
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Printing my own paper!

Yeah, yeah, I know, I've been printing my own cardstock for a couple of years, but I was never overly excited about the vibrance of the colors. The paper is inkjet, but the brightness just isn't there.

Earlier this year, I found We R Memory Keepers punchboards. I bought a couple of them, one for making envelopes. Playing with them, I realized regular paper will work nicely with them for regular envelopes. I have some paperpads that I've gotten in the past, and I can use those, the pattern side in and the blank side on the outside.

But, you know me. I like things to match. So, I went in search of paper that I can print myself to better match whatever cardstock I use. I ended up on B&H Photo and bought a roll of Epson enhanced matte paper. It's twenty-four inches wide and one hundred feet long. This would make two hundred 12" x 12" sheets. Well, it got here and unfortunately, it's heavier than I expected. So, I ordered a roll of Epson single weight matte paper. This one is 24" x 131'. That will make lots of paper for envelopes.

The problem now is that I don't think I'll want to pull out my big paper cutter every time I want to trim down a sheet (remember, these rolls are two feet wide). So, I checked out Amazon and found a nice trimmer. (Geez everything I got has sure gone up in price in just a few months!) It got here and I was thrilled, until I went to use it. It's for quilting! I can't just slide the paper in and trim it, this sets on top of the media and slides. It needs a base! Fortunately, I had purchased a huge cutting mat back when I started doing shirts. I was sure I had one, it was just a matter of finding it.

Brian drilled a couple of holes in it for me and now it's neatly hung up with my other stuff in the garage. I cut a couple of sheets of the heavier paper and printed out a couple of digital paper designs I'd gotten on Etsy. And they're perfect!

Yeah, I can hardly wait to be back up to speed. So many ideas! So many options!

making my own craftstuff

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This is the best I've felt in over a month.

I'm taking one of those 800mg Ibuprofens in the morning with food. Yesterday, my Advil PM got here from Amazon and I took two of those last night. My sleep cycle has been all messed up.

For some reason, I was only sleeping about an hour at a time, then I'd wake up, needing to urinate. Drag myself down to my bathroom and I didn't full on urinate at all, it was, as my mother would call it, a piddle. Like, why even bother? But the urge was there. So, I didn't get much decent sleep for the past month.

Monday night I slept in bed for the first time in two and a half weeks, I was under the covers. I had nightmares, one being my legs were paralyzed. I tried moving them and I couldn't and I almost woke Brian up it was so scary. What the problem was, what the problem has been for years is Mario and Rory. They get so close to either side of my legs that I cannot move them. And with how iffy my back is right now, I couldn't just start kicking them off of me. Which I've done in the past.

My fix is not to get between the sheets, but sleep on top of the spread with a couple of lightweight fleece blankets on top of me. For some reason, moving a cat away from me is easier this way. But it was a truly scary feeling.

So, last night, around 8:30, I took the two Advil PMs, we went to bed at nine and I actually slept for three hours before I woke up. To the bathroom, back to bed, back to sleep for another couple of hours. Sleeping more than an hour at a time is awesome. I have a bunch to catch up on, but this is a start.

My right butt cheek is still sore, but each day it's a little less.

Looking forward to being pain free.

And catching up on housework. I have lots of laundry to fold and put away. There was a load of shirts that need to be folded (Brian did his, bless his heart) and there are towels and blankets that need folding. I ran the Botvac yesterday, the floor is absolutely nasty. But I need to run an actual, full sized vacuum and get under furniture. So much to do.

But Brian will stop me before I overdo it. He's my hero.

sciatica

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June 2017