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Sunday, January 21, 2024

Sew & Tell ~ January 22, 2024

It's been a week... and what a week it's been!

The record low temperatures over the Martin Luther King holiday weekend shattered record lows of 90 years.  It caused a freeze in a 4-inch water main in the small water system that serves our small neighborhood.  Small as in only 60 or so houses are on this system.  Dave is the president of the board as well as the head maintenance guy for the system.  

The "fun" began early Tuesday morning with a text message stating that a residence had no water. Uh-oh... bad news.  As other residents began their days more calls and messages came in.  It became clear, very quickly, that there was a serious problem.  
After determining the location of the freeze (a section of line that crosses a deep cut where railroad tracks once existed) the team of professionals and volunteer residents were able to separate the system so that the 15 houses without water would once again have water service restored directly from the system's pump house.  The remaining residents were unaffected (including our house) since we were supplied by the direct line from a water storage tank.

However, because there was no way to refill the tank, we would need to conserve water.  This means no long showers, dish washers, or laundry.  Dave was gone most of the days, though still nearby, so I had extra time for quilting and sewing.  

And, honestly, I never realized just how much time is taken up with doing laundry!  As was not typical, I had just done all of the laundry just before the freeze... (God's timing and wisdom is just amazing) So, we are doing fine with not needing to go naked... yet. With fingers crossed and our prayers spoken boldly, we hope to have water full, yet temporarily, restored by Tuesday.  But... as things have progressed, it has been determined that there are multiple leaks within the system in both sections. **sigh** 

Enough of my whining... here is what I got done!


I completed the custom order of a table runner that looked like the Colorado flag as well as a set of 4 soup bowl cozies.  You can read all about them on the Red Letter Day story.


I prepared my semi-annual supply of file holders to be sold to gunsmithing enrolled in the program at the local college. These help the students to protect the pricey investment of files they need for gunsmithing and allow them to be contained in one place for easy transport.

And finally, I quilted our grandson's Denver Nuggets quilt.  How fortunate that one of the jerseys I included in the quilt was "15"... and Tyshan turned 15!  
The all-over grid spaced at 4 inches went quickly.

What will the coming week hold, other than water woes?

I am preparing to announce a sew along!  I'll be piecing blocks, determining layout options and writing patterns.  The announcement will be made when I host TGIFF ~ Thank Goodness It's Finished Friday.  Be sure to come back and plan to join that party as well.


This week's Sew & Tell feature is Brenda at Songbird Design.  She shared her pretty little batik bird sitting atop a spool of thread as her center medallion of her Stay At Home Round Robin quilt. Lovely!  I've included the link to her post with the details of the event.  Check it out!

Keep Piecing,

Melva

Linking with:

m


9 comments:

  1. Water troubles are the absolute worst! At least the weather has turned more normal, hopefully that will help. We went two weeks with no hot water last summer, and it was a pain, but not nearly as bad as no water, though we have quite a bit stored in the basement. Praying it is fixed soon!

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  2. Ohh Water Woes are serious!! we had heat wrapped all our livetock tanks - and put in tank heaters - but the cow tank still have 4 inches of ice on it ( where the heater just couldn't heat) I feel for you - but YAY to no laundry needing to be done !!! Love your sewing projects!! that quilt for your grandson is awesome

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  3. So sorry to hear of your water problems. We don't realize what we have until it's gone. Glad your laundry was done. God's timing is perfect! Thanks for the feature this week!

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  4. I sure know how to conserve water from boondocking times! It is amazing how much we take water for granted isn't it. I hope the problem gets solved soon for everyone to get back to normal. I bet your grandson will love his new quilt.

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  5. We depend on utilities! Hope all gets back to working order soon. (Today it's 30 degrees warmer than it was a week ago. Positively balmy.) Great Colorado project.

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  6. I love those little file holders you make for the kids at the college. What a helpful idea! Always neat to see unusual ways to put our talents to work. Hope the water issue is solved quickly. Nothing like an issue to make us appreciate our conveniences and to remind us how good it is to stay on top of things. My parents--farmers--always said "Never put off for tomorrow what you can do today".

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  7. Lovely runner! Your grandson is going to love his new quilt. How fun that the number 15 is included and that he's turning 15! Thanks for sharing on my weekly show and tell, Wednesday Wait Loss. I hope you entered the giveaway too!

    https://www.inquiringquilter.com/questions/2024/01/24/wednesday-wait-loss-364

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  8. I filled a couple of bottles with water just in case. We've not had such a bitter cold winter in quite a few years.

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  9. That sounds so awful, sorry to hear about the water woes. Love your projects, thank you for linking them up to Put your foot down.

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