Sewing Palm Update

About a year ago I made a pair of sewing palms. My intention was to get a custom fitted palm, and not have to spend the farm to get it. It has turned out to be my most popular post. In fact I just had a question asked the other day about it, so apparently its still of interest to someone. What I really wanted to do though was take another look at the palms and see how they have held up after all the sewing they have had to do since last spring. Which included making a new mainsail, and a new staysail; whipping ropes, and a mess of other sewing projects.

What I have found is that they have turned out way better than I ever anticipated. They have broken in famously, forming to the specifics of my hand.

 I thought for sure that the regular sewing palm would have been the most useful of the two, when I originally made these. Of course I defaulted to Emiliano's recommendation and made both. And, as it turned out, the roping palm became the most important and most used of the two. It is amazing the amount of pull you can get on the thread when it is wrapped around the leather on the thumb. In fact, I find that the only time I use the regular sewing palm is when I am doing very light stitching, where I normally would use a thimble.

 The other thing that I have noticed, is that after repeated use over the last year, the palms have become very easy to use, to the point that I don't even think about it. The needle just fits where it is supposed to, and the motion is second nature. Which is nice to see, because when I first made these, they were very uncomfortable to use. The motion wasn't well, and the needle always felt like it was in the wrong place. So, if you have made these, and are unsure about the fit, use them for a bit first.

The only thing that I should mention, is to keep the area around the thumb a little loose. If it is tight at all then you will get a lot of fatigue in the thumb muscles. And, it after using it for a while, it doesn't become an extension of your hand, make a new one, don't give up. Sewing with a good palm is an incredible experience, sewing with a poor fitting one is an exercise in sado-masochism.

So, definitely one of the more useful things I have done with my time. In fact I have decided to keep some spare tooling leather on the boat, should I ever wear one of these out. As long as I am sewing, I will have a pair of these. By the way, if anyone has made them, I would love to see some pictures, or hear about your experience in the process. I figure with the traffic the post has gotten, someone must have tried it.

Cheers and fair winds.

7 Weeks Until "H" Day

"H" day meaning homeless day. Okay,,, I guess technically 7 weeks from tomorrow is homeless day. Give me a break, people are always so critical...

We have burned through 4 1/2 weeks of the 11 1/2 we had since shoring up the deal on the house. And although I know things have gotten done, it is starting to feel like nothing has yet been accomplished, and everything is left to do, ughhh!!! The garage sale went off with a blast. Its hard to believe that something like that would be that popular when its cold and snowy out, but we got rid of almost everything, and put another $1k in our pockets. Family members cleaned up most of the left over scraps, at the friends and family discount, (free), and the small little bit remaining went to the second hand store, so that someone else may find a good use for it. We still have a few things left, but they are needed for the transition, the boat refit, or are headed to the dump once we are done with them. Its hard to believe that in 6 weeks when we toss our mattress into the dump, that we will be moving into our camper, especially when I look out window and there is still a foot of snow on top of it. I guess its a little late now, but I am starting to wonder if the end of May might have been a tad bit warmer for moving out of the house???

So after the sale, it took a couple of days to get the shop back together, get rid of the left overs, and load the furniture that was going to my Daughter's place in Ottawa. Silly as it may sound, we also had to take everything that we had sorted out that we wanted to keep, and sort through it again. One to make sure, and two, to figure out where everything was going, boat/camper/storage/dump/etc.... That took as much time as getting ready for the sale in the first place. Then we started changing our address, did our taxes, made more lists, listed stuff for sale on Kijiji, and on and on and on.....

Oh, did I mention that I got my sewing supplies in from Sailrite. Thanks Colin, you are the man... I also bought more zippers to make more bags, made a list of all the things I have to make, and the weather is warming, so I'll be at the boat working soon. Just 4 more weeks in March oh Lord, I promise not to squander it like the last 4......

My daughter is a busy person, with somewhere between 3 and 5 jobs going on all the time, she works very hard, but that means that putting up with us lounging around her house is very inconvenient for her. Added to that, that we are never comfortable staying at someone else's house, we stayed in a hotel. And thanks to my sister Tish, we got the friends and family discount at the Marriott again, sweet! Spent Friday shopping, and Saturday being entertained by our Grandson Duke (a.k.a. Squirrel).

We hate to shop, but with our life in a constant transition over the last 3 years, retire/build house/refit boat/sell house, etc..., it seems that all we do is shop. And, again, we are buying stuff for our new life afloat. The highlight of the trip was our new snorkeling gear. I couldn't imagine going to the Bahamas and not having a good set of snorkeling gear. I am a part time fish; but I have landsman's eyes and fins, and have not yet mastered the breathing under water thing, so snorkeling gear it is.

As in most things, the quality of the gear is directly related to the quality of the experience. Now that doesn't mean paying to get gold plated is worth the cost, but there is a level at which the quality doesn't change much, but the price does, and we like to stay just below that level, maximizing quality while maintaining a reasonable price. Saying that, the stuff in this photo came out to $525 clams, including the weights for the belts that are still in the truck. Unfortunately, what we know about snorkeling, you could write on the head of the pin with a large font, so we refer to the experts. We usually find that the people working at a shop have the right expertise to help us in the selection. Of course, you never want to try this with a computer geek, because nothing but top of the line seems reasonable to them. And then there is the car salesman.......

Everything else we bought was just little bits here and there, a pair of pants, collapsible water jugs, spice containers, sleeping bags. Its hard to go crazy buying stuff for a little boat, with little spaces.

The real excitement last week though was that our Garhauer came in. Ohhhhh Baby.....

What a deal this was. The stainless steel boom vang, and 3 cheek blocks for the mainsail reef points on the boom, cost about $525. Well worth it when you consider what these things normally go for, and the amount of control one of these babies gives you over the mainsail shape. The only problem was the fitting for the boom was the wrong shape. I had given them the spec sheet of the boom, but they used the top instead of the bottom. An honest mistake considering that I didn't specify which was which. The good news is that I had a little talk with the 3/16" thick piece of stainless steel, and it decided that it should modify itself to the shape I needed it, perfect. I am so glad that I made the leap to pick this up. It was the one thing that all the experienced cruisers convinced me to get.

That's about it for now. We are headed to Kingston tomorrow. I have a $2200+ order to pick up at Marine Outfitters. They have been absolutely awesome to deal with. I ordered almost everything I could think of that we are going to need to finish the boat, even if I didn't need it yet. At the boat show one of the stainless fabricators told me how to bend my own steel tubes for our bimini, so I am going to give that a try. I ordered all the stainless tubing I need for mounting the solar panels as well, whisker pole, more polycarbonate wine glasses, just a ton of stuff. But today its going to get to +10 degrees, so a long walk must be in order. We can't work all the time, jeese.

Later......

The Garage Sale

9 weeks and counting until we're homeless. Its not a lot of time, regardless of how long away it feels. We decided to get the first yard sale out of the way, because we are swimming in stuff, and it is getting progressively harder to get any real work done on boat projects. I don't know how well a garage sale is going to go over with 3 feet of snow on the ground, but it is at least indoors. We decided to go for 3 days, Fri - Sun, just because we can't get all of the stuff that is for sale, into the garage at once. I am not looking forward to this, but I guess it is a necessary evil.

I had originally intended to finish up what sewing projects I had going on, which I did, then do some wood working projects, which never happened, and then get ready for the sale. But what I came to realize is that there is so much sorting, and pricing, and organizing, that I am barely going to have enough time to get ready for the sale.

I should notice a pattern developing here, during this project, in this blog, and from Serena telling every single time, that my projects never seem to go as plan, or on the schedule that I think they will. But I guarantee you that I will make the same mistakes next week. Live and NEVER learn, my Pappy always used to say.....

Anyway, you can probably guess what I'll be doing for the next week. I have an order coming in from Sailrite the following week, so there will be a boat load of sewing to do then. But, yard sale first. Sort, clean, price, organize, drink beer..... Tomorrow repeat....

I tell you, I'd much rather be cruising.......

The Winter Blaas

Its that time of year again. The picture is out my front door, about 2 mins ago. Even the birds and squirrels are hiding on this -22 deg C. morning. And although I know that that white stuff out front of my house is a form of water, its not the kind that Vita will float in. I don't know why we get this way. Some blame it on a lack vitamin D, others on that "couped up" cabin fever, but obviously it happens everywhere. Because nobodies bloggin, what the hey!! I follow about 10 blogs religiously, and they have been so slow that pretty soon I am going to have to start reading the news with my morning coffee. And we know how depressing that can be!

But seriously, some of these people are even in the islands as I write this, some are in southern regions where it is nice most of the year, but never -22. How come they aren't entertaining me, regaling me with there fun and adventures. I console myself with the belief that they just have better things to do. They are so busy having fun and enjoying life, that they just don't have the time to write a quick blog entry to tell me about it. Lucky bastards. At least now you'll have an understanding next February when this blog gets a little slow.

For now I will continue to trudge along with my sewing projects. Today I finish up a friends dodger, new zippers and some restitching, then I can move on to a little woodworking for a bit. Our hope is that next week we can start setting up for an indoor yard sale. It would be nice to get rid of some of this stuff, because lets face it, Mar and Apr are going to be a complete right-off. Especially if the warm weather comes. Tomorrow is apparently going to be at +1 deg C. Maybe that will help bring back my hop and giggle.

Stay loose, spring will come, it does every year.

Terminal Overload

Phew, the excitement of the house selling has finally subsided. Now comes the daunting task of sorting and organizing all of our stuff. We are pretty simple people, our house doesn't have any clutter, in fact others have asked if anyone actually lives here, because there is not much in the way of tchotchkes or other paraphernalia. Even so, it is amazing how much crud a couple can accumulate over 20 some odd years.

Every single item has to be debated over, boat/camper/sell. To go on the boat it has to fit into a certain criteria, must be small, must be usable for two purposes, and must not make the pile of stuff too big to go in the boat. And, I know we will have to go through that pile 5 or 6 more times before it is down to a reasonable amount. The camper stuff is a little less critical, but there isn't much space in it either.

Our house has started to morph into a warehouse work area. Below you can see where the dining room table sat, before it was given away to Serena's parents, their gift for watching our mail. Now turned organizing centre/office/etc... Every piece of paperwork that can be scanned and kept electronically, will be, because there just isn't room to keep it all. Music and videos need to be sorted, and all electronic files have to be backed up. We currently have all of our documents, logs, and other personal paperwork online in the Google cloud, which is great, because we can access it anywhere in the world, except on a boat with limited internet access. So now all those documents have to be recreated locally on the computer and backed up.

Then there is all the boat stuff. I have seen what a boat looks like when everything in it does not have a storage space of its own, and most of you who have a boat will know what that looks like. Because, lets face it, how much organizing effort goes into it when you only spend a couple weeks a year on it for vacation and a few weekend sails. But living on it is much different. Not too mention that there will be more stuff. The picture below shows just my sewing supplies, and I have another order coming from Sailrite.

Mind you, some of this stuff has already been cut from the lineup, but not as much as should be. By the way, that table is a 4' x 8' sheet of plywood. Its a lot.
Can you imagine what the boat would look like if this stuff was laying around, or thrown in a few plastic bags and stuffed into whatever shelf had the space?
I sorted the stuff into specific uses. There is a daily use kit, which includes hand needles, regular thread, some heavier threads, a few small tools, and my palms. Then there is the small kit that has just items, tools, and manuals for the machine, (although I should scan them too), but that kit will stay in the box with the machine. Then there is the heavy duty repair kit which includes all the thread, velcro, webbing, spares, etc..., and the final kit which is just hole punches, grommet sets, grommets, snaps, etc... That makes 4 smallish canvas bags that need to be made in order to carry these things. The theory being that on a boat, there are lots of storage places, but few that will take large items. Break them down into small batches.

Which brings us to the reacher. I do not want to give up this sail. It is a beauty, colourful, and extremely useful in light winds. We get to sail when all the white sail sailors are motoring. The problem is that it is big. The bag that it comes in, is 20" high x 16" in dia. There is no where on the boat that is comfortable for this bag to sit. The cockpit locker is plenty big enough, but the hole to get to it is only about 9" wide, "square peg into the round hole".

 So I made a bag that had a narrower diameter, but 40" long. The sail fit, but it was so tightly packed that it was more like a missile than a sail bag.

Not all my ideas work. So this bag has been relegated to rope storage. There is 300' of 1/2" 3 stranded nylon line in it as I write this, and its not half full yet. I can see where that might be useful. As for the reacher, I think I will put it in one or our regular large sail bags, and stuff it through the cockpit locker opening. I am not sure if that will work, but I'll try it before figuring something else out.

I have also started making lots of other bags. The reusable bags you buy in the grocery stores are not tough enough for everyday boat use, so I made 4 out of marine grade canvas. They are waterproof, and have 3/8" polyester handles spliced into #2 grommets. They are tough.

 A couple of rope bags. The nicest one being the light blue one here. It holds 200' of 1/2" 3 strand nylon line, and has a nice vinyl mesh bottom to allow the rope to dry, should it be put away wet. I like this one, I am going to make two more. Probably want 10 by the time we get settled into the boat.

 Then there is my shower bag, with a toggle snap in the middle to stop my underwear from falling into the water on the way to the shower.

And of course, Serena's shower bag, which is much bigger, and has longer handles so that it can be slung over the shoulder. Honestly, the thing is big enough that it should probably have wheels. But don't say anything.

Onwards and upwards. I'll keep sewing and organizing for the next couple of weeks. Then I have to get some more woodworking done before we have our first garage sale. Indoor garage sale of course. Too much snow, and way too cold to do it in the driveway. I won't miss this next winter while we are anchored in the Bahamas.

On a more squishy note, yesterday we were having a coffee at the local hangout, talking to a couple of old friends of the family. We chatted about all kinds of stuff, including us sailing off into the wild blue yonder, when Warren said, "you guys are living the life that everyone dreams about." And it struck me, I don't know why this time was so different, but there was something so serious about the way he said it that made me believe it, for the first time. I know that it is not quite that simple, as everyone's dream is different, but we have inadvertently become ambassadors for a free lifestyle that keeps all of us moving forward. However intangible "the dream" may be for most of us, knowing that someone is doing it, is usually enough. The peanut butter that keeps the sandwich together, so to speak. I remember when I was younger, telling all of my single buddies that I was living vicariously through them. Now its my turn to return the favor. And, although I won't let it dictate my path, I hope that I at least live up to the expectations.

Live long and live free.......

We're Homeless

It's official, we're homeless. The final condition was lifted today, and on Apr 29 we will no longer have a home. Or at least not in the normal sense. We will still have our travel trailer, and of course our floating home.

What a weight lifted off our shoulders. Don't get me wrong, we love the house, but the idea of leaving it behind while we cruise was just too much for us to handle. Now we can move on without that stress.

It was so bad over the last few days, that we were physically ill. Ironically, 5 minutes after the real estate agent put the "sold" sign at the end of our drive way, my gas went away, my upset stomach went away, and my headache went away. It is amazing how badly the mind can screw up the body. Now I feel like a million bucks. Okay a little less than that, but free, definitely feel free, and that is priceless.

Now a flurry of activity to get the boat done, get all of our stuff sold, sort, and plan. And I thought I was busy before. Next post, not sure, but probably sewing bags, tool pouches, etc.. Time to get organized.

Later.....

OMG - I Think We Are Going Cruising!!!

This morning we accepted an offer on our house. We went from no traffic to gone. The offer is conditional, but the conditions are standard and at the risk of jinxing the deal, seem to be no problem. With any luck it will be finalized in about 2 weeks. The offer came in at our bottom line price, but the date of April 29 is what really clinched the deal for us. The weather will be warm by then, and it is two weeks before the boat goes in the water. It also gives us lots of time to sell off all of our stuff, and prepare to move onto the boat.

You can't imagine our excitement. We were so worried that we were going to end up staying another winter. Houses around here just aren't selling that fast. In fact, we are the first house to sell in our subdivision is almost 2 years. Primarily because the houses in here are priced outside of the local neighbourhood, and really need someone from the city who has a little more disposable income.

So now the blog starts to change a little. Before I was mainly concerned about Vita's refit. Lately I have been starting to move into the preparation phase, and now that will take over. Mind you, the refit still needs to be finished, but now its about more than just that, its finally about our new life.

Cross fingers that all goes well......