COVID-19 Chronicles - Sunday and Monday

SUNDAY

Our Sunday was more leisurely than Saturday, starting with a nice sleep in due to the end of daylight saving for the year.  It's nice to be a bit lighter in the morning, for now at least, but we will miss the long evenings.

Mick was looking for something to do, so played with his Mum's sewing machine.

Yes, another Elna that came to live with us at the end of last year, when Mick's Mum entered aged care.

I dated her to 1978, which was pretty much the end of the run of this style.  My Mum had a very similar machine.  Hers was the Supermatic with the blue top and took the discs for different stitches and dated from 1968.  This one is the next model down with a smaller selection of stitches built in.

She was looking rather tired, but has seen a lot of use.  When I first met Mick, his Mum used to always have this machine out, making clothes for herself.  It hasn't been used for quite some time.

Mick got into her guts, expecting to find lots of fluff and dirt, but it was surprisingly nice and tidy and well oiled.

He gave her a good wipe down and a polish and she came up really well.  Yes, there are scratches from pin, but what do you expect after so much use.

I plugged her in and she ran like a charm, nice and smooth and quiet.

I didn't stitch anything with her, so haven't checked tension and the likes, but I see no reason why she shouldn't sew well.  These are great machines.

Mum sold hers to my cousin in 1980 to update to the next Elna, which is now in my sewing room.  I really should ask him if he still has it.  Yes, it went to a male cousin of mine.

This Elna thing is rather addictive.  I have six now.  They are certainly my favourite brand of machine.

We went for our afternoon walk, once again up the country road.

Such nice views up there, but so much windier than down at our place.  You don' realise how nice and protected we are.

We then kept walking around our neighbourhood as well.

Some kids had been having fun decorating their driveway for Easter.  As we were admiring the artwork one of the girls came out with her Mum.  I think she was chuffed that passers by were enjoying what they had created.

Another house that has one of the best Christmas light displays in town has ventured into Easter decorating this year.  I wonder if this will now grow each year.

Of course, we continued to see lots of teddies.  Such fun to look for.  I know, big kids.

I did venture into the sewing room for a while.

The plan was to work on the Rainbow Scrap Challenge blocks with light and bright blue.

I did get them cut out, but then got carried away, cutting the squares of each colour required for the rest of the year.  Now all I have to do is the final cutting and piecing each month.  No, I didn't stitch them.  I need to psych myself up for all those curved seams.  It will happen soon.

While I was playing I decided to pull fabric for the latest Block Heads 3 block, that was released last Wednesday night.

I got most of it done yesterday.  

MONDAY

This morning I finished off the block and am happy with the results.  I must say that I'm rather pleased that I chose to make the twelve inch block, as a smaller block would have been a tad fiddly.  I take my hat off to the ladies who made the four inch version.

Other than that I went to work.

Mick picked a nice lot of raspberries, which are now in the freezer.

He then did something rather radical.  He started to work on the motor of "Marilyn", his Rickman motorcycle.  He has owned her since 1979, when he was a young whipper snapper.  She started to give grief in the early 1990s so got wheeled to the back of the shed after he bought "Sophia" the Moto Guzzi.  He pulled her apart in 2012 and hasn't done any more.  Maybe she will be his Corona Project.  We'll see.  She needs some serious internal surgery.  You can see photos and read about her here.

On the official front, the government hasn't announced any further restrictions at this stage and the number of new infections is decreasing.  The Ruby Princess cruise ship is now docked at Port Kembla so that sick staff can be treated and a criminal investigation has started.