kcwc fail

I've followed Elsie Marley's blog for a while now and have always been inspired by all those people who jump in to the kids clothes week challenge.  I've never felt I able to participate, though, until this spring -- the NHL playoffs are on so my husband is fully occupied, volleyball is over and fastball has yet to start I've got time in the evenings.  I've been planning what I would make, gathering supplies, tracing patterns, cutting stuff out for over a month now but it's looking like it's going to be a fail before it even starts. 

Last week I lost access to my flickr account (long story short -- we switched to bell and I didn't even think about changing my email address with flickr because I thought it was connected to my hotmail account.  Now I can't change it to my hotmail account without first signing in through rogers.  Which I don't have access to.) and I'm still waiting on help from the flickr people to reinstate it.  I could open a new account but . . .

And then I've been fighting with my sewing machine this week.  I thought it was just my state of mind (am I the only one who feels like I have to be calm when approaching my sewing machine or it senses my tension and reacts badly to it?) but I tried again today and it's still skipping stitches or, if I increase the tension, the thread breaks.  I've re-threaded it, changed the needle, used different thread, tried different types of material, and adjusted the tension but I think it needs a tune up.  In the 7 (or 8?) years I've owned this machine, I've never taken it in.  And it's got a lot of use in the last couple of years especially.  I phoned my local shop and they estimate it will take a week.  ONE WHOLE WEEK without a sewing maching.  It honestly makes me twitchy to think about it. 

So it looks like the bucket hat, circle skirt and sunday brunch jacket I had planned for this week are going to have to wait.  Sigh.