Busy! Projects! Sewing!

 So, what have the Pollocks been up to?

 Besides work, which is going just fine, we've been pretty busy!

 I've had the past couple of Friday nights off, so we spent last weekend camping. The weather was perfect for camping and just right at night- no freezing this time.

This weekend was nice of course as well- because of General Conference! It was so nice being able to listen to the prophet and receive council from the many speakers.

We've also been involved in projects around the home, which has definitely been keeping us busy- with awesome results! As you know, we've been in this place for a few years- and over time, things start to build up. Sure, I tidy up and do my best to clean, but stuff happens. Gary has his full-time job and I have my part-time, a little under full-time job. Gary has been a tremendous help when it comes to chores and keeping the place clean. He vacuums and mops the floors daily, cleans and scrubs the bathroom most days, and does a lot of the smaller deep-cleaning areas around here (he's scrubbing the tub right now- I told him to stop and take a break!). I can't tell you how awesome it is to have help like that. I do the main laundry, dishes, keeping the place tidy, dusting, etc.  And Gary, being a perfectionist, does a really good job and spends way more time on cleaning things than I ever do; unless I actually plan to devote that much time (which I don't).

So, what projects have we been doing? Well, Gary suggested every Saturday we deep clean an area of the apartment. Two Saturdays ago we cleaned out our walk-in closet. I mean, we really deep cleaned and reorganized the whole thing, clothes included. This included 4 black lawn bags and 3 normal trash bags to Goodwill- not to mention the many things we threw away. It's like another world in there. Yesterday, for another project, we focused on the deck and storage closet outside. We cleaned out our entire storage and reorganized (another Goodwill trip there), and deep cleaned the patio. Now there's so much space out there! Gary even swept and mopped the patio floor. We dusted down everything out there, cleaned and shined up the grill, and trashed items as well. Next week? We're cleaning out the front inside hallway closet and reorganizing and going through all of our documents. This includes our filing cabinets and other documents we have sitting around. We're going to get ourselves a new filing cabinet since this one is old and the handles have broken off. Another Saturday will include the bookshelf in the bedroom, the bookshelf in the living room- you get my drift. Not only is our place looking so much better, it's enjoyable to be doing such teamwork together. It's really bonding and nice. Plus, when we do decide to move out, it will be way less stressful.

Speaking of projects, we're also starting up something new together- sewing. This might be rather sad, but Gary knows way more about sewing than I do (probably because his mom does a lot of it). My knowledge? I can kind of sew a button- at least it stays on, right? I really didn't know what I was getting into, but I agreed it would be a smart decision. It really is a valuable thing to learn- something that can save us lots of money. So, yesterday, we purchased our first sewing machine and materials. We took the little desk we had sitting out on the patio and put it in an empty corner of our bedroom- that's our sewing area. Gary doesn't just want me to learn, but he wants to learn it all as well (probably more so than me- but I just need to convince myself I'm capable of learning something so foreign to me).

Husqvarna E20 Viking. We got a good deal which comes with a 10 year warranty. So if anything malfunctions for any reason, we get it fixed at no cost. Not from the manufacturer, either, but from the store we bought it from (a little sewing place here in Valencia). There were too many good reviews from those around town and online, so we went for it.

And here is our sewing corner in the bedroom.

Mr. Handsome working away

 Anyway, we'll see how it goes! Hopefully my skills will improve with time and practice.

But, that's about it for now! Enjoy the next week!