Wednesday 25 February 2015

Homemade Doorstops and Floor Protection

I've found that inviting people over is a great way to push me to do those little projects I wouldn't bother with otherwise. It makes me sit down and do something I enjoy...once I get started.





One doorstop started with Bill's idea. At some point when the downstairs loo was being built last spring he put a milk bottle, half filled with water, where it would stop the new door from banging the wall and leaving a dent. That milk bottle remained while we were away on various trips and while I was doing my UK tax return. It wasn't until I'd sent out the Thanksgiving invitations that I turned my attention to making a bag to cover the milk bottle. I probably could have chosen an easier doorstop to make, but Bill liked his idea and I so tried to work with it.

The outside was a lush fabric scrap some crafting or sewing group had given me (as it, it would go to the tip if I didn't rescue it). The lining was some fabric I bought 20 years ago for a project I never tacked. I still had the receipt folded up in the fabric. I'm not that wonderfully thrilled with how the bag turned out, but it's completed and it's totally functional. Job done. Were I to tackle it again sometime, I wouldn't fit the bottom part to the size of the milk bottle, I'd just make a big squishy looking bag that had the drape I wanted (the first time) for the top part. I'm not very spatially competent, me.

The other place that needed a doorstop was to protect the corner of my china cabinet from the dining room door. Bill gave me a block of wood that was just the right shape and size. I proceeded to wrap it like a give. Then realised that I was just making another hard surface to put between the two hard surfaces, which wouldn't accomplish anything...duh. Starting over, I buried the block in several layers of wadding and then went back to wrapping.  The result is kind of silly, but I like it. The green matches the carpet and the chair covers; the dark blue matches the blue velvet curtains in the dining room.



The one innovation I was quite pleased about came about after Bill had installed the bamboo flooring in the extension. He was about to put my Grandma's sewing machine cabinet in the alcove opposite the loo but worried his new floor would be scratched. I've been saving milk bottle caps for Vivien for some charity that gets money for recycling them (we have some mad projects going on like that). I took four of those bottle caps, cut larger circles around them from dark brown fabric and stitched covers for each of the bottle caps. Bill put those under the legs of the sewing machine and it slid around just great!




Have you done any 'home sewing' lately?


1 comment:

Carolyn said...

That's really cute! I think I especially like the dressed up milk bottle. What a terrific idea! :)