Muddy Spring

This is what it feels like I turned into this last week.

(Thanks to my young relative who can only be called Balloon Man for the picture)

My dearest and I took turns "maintaining" and being flat down sick.  It really puts things in perspective to have a week like that.  On a day when Tiny and I were feeling better I started a project I've been meaning to for quite some time.  I started cleaning up an old Underwood Manual Typewriter that my dearest has been carting around.  It's a Two Ton Tillie which makes turning it over a challenge, but it's sturdy.  What's even more exciting is I think (hope!) that once I'm done it's going to work.  It's an old newspaper typewriter so it has lots of ink on it.  My focus ended up being on cleaning up keys. Though I did spend some time on the type with a needle tool and dusting out the guts some.  I didn't take a before picture, but here's what it looks like after:

I couldn't see most of the white on the keys when I started.  I'm pretty pleased.  The fun part was having Tiny help me.  She'd dip a q-tip in some warm water and swirl it on the keys I wasn't working on.  Then she'd get tired of that and go bring me something hot from her tea basket:  like marbles in a cup.  "Is hot Mom!" she'd say as she'd hand me the cup from her hot mitt covered hand. 

I love shared projects like that!