Sunday-9am

Good Morning!

We've had a few sunny, very-very-cold days up here.  It's 18 below this morning.  I thought I'd pop in this morning since tomorrow at this time I will be waiting for the senior bus to go to my yearly federal housing appointment.  I have a new girl and she didn't know to schedule me in the afternoon...so we'll see if I make it or not.  50-50 chance--LOL!  Mornings are not physically the best time of day for me...in many ways.  It's supposed to get down to 32 below tonight, so it will be friggin' cold in the morning, too--LOL!  Wish me luck.  There's not any break in the weather expected for a good while, so I want to just wear lots of layers and get this over with.  ;)

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I'm not done organizing yet in the living room art & craft area.  I was having trouble sleeping for the better part of the week and was so very tired--but couldn't seem to get to sleep until 2-3 am, regardless of how tired I was, and would still wake up in the morning.  (Reminded me of menopause--LOL!)  But I seem to be getting back on track now the last couple nights.  Whew!

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Yesterday I tried something I saw on a youtube video for putting together a book...  

...with just flat covers. 

Using coptic stitch to sew the inside pages together...

...and just kind of gluing the pages on to the covers.

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I decided to cover the back sides of the chipboard covers... 

...with some scrapbook paper.   

I sewed together the signatures with dental floss--which works pretty well (but caused a riff between Karma and I...especially because it smelled like mint).  

Then I just glued the first and last pages right on to the covers.  Not the sturdiest way to do this--could have run an inside cover piece of paper across the cover and first page--but I was tired.  I bought up a bunch of flat cover sets like this on sale at Joann's a few years back and I haven't known how I would actually make journals with them, so I just wanted to see if this would work.  I managed to get it glued together and placed it under heavy books for the night.

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This morning...  

...the book didn't look too bad.  I used business paper on the inside pages and this would be a writing journal. 

There's like 92 pages in it and it seems like it would hold together well enough for writing. 

Here's the front. 

Notice anything about the back cover? 

ROFL!!!

I didn't even notice until this morning that I glued the back on upside-down--LOL!

I'm still chuckling.

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Oh well, I will certainly still use it.  Might make more this way.  I also want to try punching holes through the covers to sew the covers on.  They're small books (if Karma wasn't sleeping on my lap I would get up and measure for you) and I always pictured them as a good size for little writing journals.  So, my unevenly glued, upside-down-covered practice run was successful.  I needed a creative break.  Now it's back to cleaning and organizing.  ;)

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Dagan and Leah stopped by briefly yesterday with the cord for the TV computer that finally arrived.  Guess what?  It didn't work--LOL!  I don't understand all the techie language, but apparently my TV doesn't seem to have an audio connection to this computer tower or something to that effect.  Since my old TV computer worked and it might just be the fan that went out, Dagan is going to see if he can fix that one.  Otherwise, I am stuck with the sound coming out of the computer tower and not my TV...but at least I have sound.  And they showed me where I can monkey with the sound level on the TV...to a degree, anyways...so that's a plus.  Well, it's still all working.  Just differently--LOL!  I needed it to be working tonight for the premiere of Downton Abbey!  ;) 

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I'm still definitely feeling off from lack of sleep and moving even slower than my normal snail pace.  I haven't been around to visit my blog family, either, for about a week.  Hopefully soon.

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All the while I am writing this Blogger is flashing up warnings to me that it isn't saving my post properly.  I learned the hard way years ago to always copy the entire post before I try to publish, so I will cross my fingers...save a copy...and try later if it comes to that.  Blogger must be feeling off, too, eh?  ;)

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Feels like it's a good year already, though.   

This winter I am especially grateful for heat. 

Been thinking about the American Indians and the pioneers a lot on these frigid days.

Talk about hardy survivors!

I'm just so grateful that I live in the era of central heating.

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I hope you are all finding this to be a good start to a year full of promise and opportunity.  :) :)  
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"O Great Spirit, I awake to another sun, grateful for gifts bestowed, granted one by one."

Twylah Nitsch

Seneca Medicine Woman