my dad should be proud

not because of the upside down quilt picture, but because I got myself out of the clogged sink yesterday.  It only took about 8 hours, on and off working to get it clear.

I tried putting drain cleaner down, the plumber said not to put it in the garbage disposal side, so I put it on the other side of the sink and let it sit for an hour or so.  Nothing.

I opened the drain from outside and tons of water poured out.  Then, I used the snake and pushed it as far as it would go, which was about 3 feet before it hit the clog.  I had put way too much stuff down the garbage disposal on Friday and knew it might clog up, but thought since I had run a ton of water and there wasn't a problem on Friday I would be ok.  Nope :)

Then, after unclogging a bit and running the hose as far as it would go with water blasting, closed things up and tried again, nope, not fixed.  I let the hose run for about 30 minutes, thinking it might just loosen the clog.  Nothing doing.

Then, I ran the snake again, this time I was able to get it all 25 feet into the drain and was sure I had fixed things, but sure enough as soon as I put the plug in from outside the house, the drain clogged again.  I remembered that when the plumber was here, gunk came up out of the downstairs shower so thought I'd see if the clog was before or after that drain.  I ran the shower and sure enough, it clogged up.  I pried off the drain (ew, gross hair there) and then ran the snake in the shower and after a few good plunges, got the drain to go!  So exciting that my hard work paid off.  And I learned to scrape plates into the trash, not the sink :)  Just hope the dogs leave the trash alone, or we will have to take the trash out every night.  A much quicker fix than dealing with the drain again!

I should have learned

Remember back when I had to call out the plumber to unclog my kitchen sink?  Yeah, that was about 3 weeks ago.  Well, yesterday I cleaned out the fridge and put a bunch of leftovers down the drain.  Things were going along well until this morning.  But now that I know how to fix my own troubles, I've been working all day to unclog the drain.  Ugh.  Lesson learned!

Oh, and I got these three quilts done today too :)  Just the quilting you know, but three more towards my goal of 100 by the end of the year.

Big Plans for today

I loaded a really long backing piece onto the quilting machine this morning and quilted up this really cute flannel top that was donated and have several more that will go with the backing piece.  The goal for today is to get through the backing fabric.  There are 30 days left before I have to go back to work and if I could reach my goal of 60 quilts by the end of today, I'd be way ahead of schedule and could double my goal before going back to school.  That would almost clear out the quilt tops that are waiting around here...I think.  There may be a bucket of quilt tops waiting in the garage, but I'm a little afraid to go looking :)  I will come across them as I clean out the garage, a yearly summer chore.  I'm not sure how the garage fills up every year, but somehow every summer I spend a lot of time going through buckets of 'stuff' and getting rid of things we no longer need.  This summer I'm purging with a vengeance because of what we went through at my mother in law's house.  If we haven't used it or needed it since last summer and I can't see a use for it in the near future, it is going to a new home at the local thrift store.  Our thrift store supports the homeless shelter in town so it makes me feel good to support them with my donations.  I love to shop there and know they need things to replace everything I buy :)

But first I must run to the hardware store and buy the stuff to fix the kitchen sink.  I am not a plumber, but I do try to keep the house going.  Thanks dad for teaching me to fix things or at least give it my best shot before calling in the experts :)  I hope I can pass along some of what I've learned to my kids.  My older son loves to try and fix things and he is getting pretty good and helping me out.  We fixed the broken garage door and it has held up for a long time.  I know it makes him feel good to be able to use his brains and hands to make things better.

Now it's the kitchen sink

When it rains, it pours around here.  Today, my head is feeling better, but something else has to go wrong.  After they delivered the fridge, I noticed the sink was clogged.  I figured no big deal, I would just use the plunger and get it to unclog like I always do.  No such luck.  I dumped drano down and nothing.  All day I kept going back and plunging and running the garbage disposal and working at that sink.  Finally, I went to the store and got more drano.  Nothing.  I figured somehow something must have made it past the disposer and really plugged up the sink and I would have to take it apart.  Well, I finally got the sink apart and now it leaks something awful.  I will have to go to the store in the morning and get an new seal for the pipes.  And I don't think I unclogged whatever was stuck either.  I'm going to have to get a pipe snake while I'm at the store.  Do not call me a plumber!

But, I did get 4 quilts quilted today :)