The 1860 Democratic Convention

Posted on August 29, 2012 by civilwarrose5

Last week I discussed the 1860 Republican Convention and the nomination of Abraham Lincoln for the presidency. I thought that this week I would tell you about the Democratic Convention that occurred that same year in order to determine the Democratic nominee for president.

If you remember your American History you will recall that Lincoln didn’t get a single vote in any of the southern states, but yet he still managed to win the election. How was this possible? Well, it all seemed to start with the Democratic convention.

Unlike our current conventions, in 1860 you didn’t know who the presidential nominee was going to be until after the convention was over. The delegates from each state would head to the convention and then it was anybody’s guess as to who they were going to vote for on the ballot. Some delegates would head to the convention with a person in mind, but as the voting went on they would often change their votes if it looked like one person would win over another.

The Democrats in 1860 were not a united group. Before they even started to vote for their nominees they were trying to decide on the party platform. At this time in our nation’s history the biggest over-lying issue was the question of slavery. There were the moderates, like Illinois Senator Stephen Douglas (the same Douglas who participated in the Lincoln-Douglas debates), who felt that it should be up to the territories as to if they would be slave states or free states when joining the Union. Then you had the pro-slavery crowd, mostly from the South, who wanted to make sure that the party platform included the plank that would protect slavery in all of the territories. This one issue would split the Democrats into essentially a North/South discussion.

The Northern states refused to adopt this plank, so a portion of the southern delegates walked out and refused to take part in this convention. Despite the fact that these delegates walked out, the convention chair people decided that in order for the nominee to be chosen they would need to get 2/3 of the vote of all delegates (counting the ones who walked out) and not just 2/3 of the delegates who were present during the voting. If you recall from last week, the Republicans had three ballots when Lincoln was nominated. The Democrats went through 57 ballots and never settled on a nominee. Senator Douglas had the most votes on all of the ballots, but not enough to actually be declared the winner. It was decided to meet again a few weeks later in Baltimore to try one more attempt at nominating a presidential candidate.

In Baltimore, despite the fact that more delegates refused to attend, they decided this time to go with whoever received more votes. They overturned the ruling from the previous convention saying that the nominee would need 2/3 of the entire delegate count. When all was said and done, Senator Douglas became the official Democrat nominee for president.

 

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Job Hunting with Celiac Disease

Posted on August 28, 2012 by civilwarrose5

The last time that I was looking for a job I hadn’t yet been diagnosed with Celiac Disease. You wouldn’t think that having Celiac Disease would be a big deal when job hunting. I discovered this last week that it’s definitely something that you have to keep in mind.

I am a cost accountant, which means that I deal a lot with manufacturing and how things are produced. There was a job posting for a general accounting manager at a local company that makes a lot of bread products. Now, the general accountant won’t have to worry too much about possible cross contamination. As a cost accountant, though, you’re usually involved in inventory counts and job processes. Even if they were offering me a ton of money I don’t think that I could be comfortable taking a job in that company. I would never actually be able to partake in any of the products that we made. Also, if I had to help with inventory counting I would have to wear a hazmat suit because of the amount of flour that is more than likely in the air and settled on surfaces.

Another job that I was looking at said that it required a lot of international travel. Yikes! I have a hard enough time traveling in the States without worrying about if I will find something to eat. I can’t even begin to imagine what it would be like to attempt to find something gluten free in a country where I may not even speak a common language, or try to smuggle food onto the airplane. I don’t do well with stressful situations that I’ve never been in. Especially one where if I make a mistake then I’m going to end up feeling VERY sick in a short amount of time.

 
I think that it might be a bit difficult finding your first job as a teenager with Celiac Disease, too. Think about it… you would most likely want to cross off any restaurant or fast food joint on your list. You can work retail, but you might want to be careful about working in grocery stores or bakeries. It’s amazing what you have to think about when just the slightest bit of gluten can make you severely ill.

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To Make Myself Feel Pretty…

Posted on August 27, 2012 by civilwarrose5

Tonight I had to stop at the local beauty supply store so that I could buy more hair dye. Yesterday I told you that I’m turning into a grumpy old lady, but I don’t want to look like one! I like to dye my hair to a color as close to my natural hair color as I can get. I think that I look good with my dark hair and really have no desire to try a different shade. However, I can easily spend a TON of time browsing in the beauty supply store.

After I grab my hair dye, then I walk up and down the aisles looking at all of the interesting things on the shelves. My mom is a beautician and worked in a beauty shop when I was younger. These tools and products are familiar to me for that reason, and I really have no intention of using most of them, but I can’t help looking at them. I look at the hair brushes and marvel that there could possibly be a reason to have so many different shapes and sizes. After all, you’re just brushing your hair! I look at the different barrettes and pins… so many different types.

What really captures my attention, though, are the manicure and pedicure supplies. First off, my finger nails are not very nice. One of the lovely things that go along with Celiac Disease is brittle and weak nails. If they manage to get to a decent length they don’t stay that way for long. *sigh* Yet I love to look at the different nail polishes, the designs, the colors, the little manicure tools… they fascinate me.  My cuticles would make a manicurist cringe. I use my hands for a lot of household chores such as painting, caulking and sealing, and tearing things down. My nails don’t stay pretty for long at all. Yet I can’t help it. I dream about how beautiful my nails would look with this blue and then that black crackle finish over top. I drool over the polishes with the sparkles in it.

As I sat there tonight, looking at callus remover, I realized something. I will spend a lot less if I buy the supplies and can pamper my feet at my house (I don’t treat my feet very nicely, either), but where’s the fun in that? The part that I enjoy most about a pedicure is the fact that I get to soak my feet in bubbly warm water as the massage chair works on my back and the nail technician works on my feet. Yes, I could save money by working on my own calluses, but I would completely miss out on the whole ‘spoiling’ myself thing. Sometimes you have to spoil yourself and this is my way of doing it.

I’m just glad that Mary Kay doesn’t have retail stores. I would be in BIG trouble! I love flipping through the catalogs and seeing all of the interesting things that are out there to make myself feel beautiful. If it only worked! 😉

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I’m A Grumpy Old Lady

Posted on August 26, 2012 by civilwarrose5

It’s official. At the ripe, old age of 32 I have turned into a grumpy old lady. Usually I would like to think that I’m pretty easy-going and not usually prone to cussing out strangers. At least when I’m not driving, that is. I will admit to a *tiny* bit of road rage when somebody pulls out in front of me and then proceeds to crawl. That tends to upset me a bit.

That’s not what I wanted to confess in this post, however. I realized this weekend just how much of a grumpy old lady I am turning into. Per usual, I was at Jay’s this weekend. One of the houses across the road from him is being rented by a group of college kids. Unfortunately Jay lives near a college campus, so there are quite a few rental houses in this neighborhood where college kids are living. These aren’t the variety of college kids who keep to themselves and are busy working part time jobs and studying. Nope. These are your stereotypical college kids who have parties every weekend. Yeah!!! <insert HEAVY sarcasm here>

Perhaps I’m being a bit unfair to these young kids. They are just trying to live it up and enjoy their years at school. However, while they are living it up I’m just trying to live my own life and they are infringing upon my sleep and my parking spot. Friday night they had a party. Luckily I already had my parking spot in front of Jay’s house before their friends started to arrive. We had the windows open for the fresh air that night and I must have woke up at least two or three times because the kids were being loud as they walked by Jay’s house. I know, how dare I be upset that they were just having fun while I was trying to sleep during the early hours of the morning!

I was more upset Saturday night, though. Granted, I don’t actually live with Jay. I just live there on the weekends so I guess that I don’t have too much of a leg to stand on regarding this issue. I have to park in the street because there’s not any room for my car in Jay’s driveway. No problem. My problem that I have, though, is that I want my spot in front of his house and next to the driveway. I feel that I have the right to that spot. Last night when I got back from shopping with a friend there wasn’t a single space to be had in the direct vicinity of Jay’s house! The college kids were having ANOTHER party! I ended up parking halfway down the block, which I know that I shouldn’t complain about, but it’s the principle of the thing! Jay and I are tax payers. More than likely half of these kids who are hogging up my spot aren’t even paying their own way through college! They are inconsiderate, too. There are times when Jay finds empty alcohol containers on his lawn; last year I had to go out and clean up glass that had been shattered by my car tires; and then this spring somebody threw a glass of pop on my car so I had to wash the stickiness off of it. If these were respectful college kids then I wouldn’t have an issue, but they aren’t. And it makes me grumpy!

Before you say something along the lines of, “You have to give them a little leeway. I bet that you acted in a similar manner when you were their age.” I can assure you that I did not. My first two years of college I spent working during most of my free time. My last two years of college I was busy studying and having the kind of fun that didn’t infringe upon anybody else. Friday nights were spent doing laundry and Saturday nights were usually spent playing a board game or watching a movie with friends. I can remember only twice that I actually went out drinking when I was in college. No, I wasn’t a ‘goody two-shoe’s. It’s just that I was there for a reason and it wasn’t to party. I paid my own way through college and so I wasn’t going to just throw away the education. Silly me, I was actually a serious student! I still managed to have a lot of fun with my friends, but I never stole another resident’s parking space. Or woke them up in the middle of the night when they were trying to sleep. Of that I am certain!

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Book Study – 7: Chapter 1… Food

Posted on August 24, 2012 by civilwarrose5

I originally purchased this book because I was interested in reading Ms. Hatmaker’s lessons she had learned about eliminating waste from her life. She wanted to clean out the extra, unneeded clutter in order to make more room for God. A very noble undertaking. I seem to collect stuff so I thought that this might be a good exercise for me.

I’ll admit that after a friend told me that she had left a two star review for this book on Amazon I was a bit worried about what I would be reading. After all, our tastes usually run parallel when it comes to reading. We both wanted to slap Scarlett O’Hara for being so spoiled and short-sighted, and neither one of us could stand the simpering Jane Eyre. So when she told me that she hadn’t been impressed, I was worried. I had just spent good money on this book and now it might possibly have been a mistake. Oh well. Perhaps this is one time where my tastes will differ from my friend’s.

After reading the first chapter, I’m not so sure that this book is truly what I thought it was going to be. The author wants to clean out the excess and teach her children that life isn’t about materialism. As a nation we have a lot of stuff and so many other people around the world would be happy with half as much as what we are used to having. Thus the author, and her group of friends, decide to embark upon this journey. They started with food. This is where the author and I would have differed in our angles of attack.

Ms. Hatmaker chose five foods that she would eat all month. She did a lot of reading to make sure that she wouldn’t mess her nutrition up, but the five foods that she chose were the only ones she was allowed to eat. She didn’t even allow herself the use of condiments. She managed to get through the month for the most part, only cheating a few times when the rules were bent for a couple of odd situations. I give her credit for sticking with it for so long. My issue, though, is that after the month was over she went back to eating as she had before. I’m not sure that she really cut a lot of the waste regarding food out of her diet. Maybe she did learn some lessons and just didn’t bother to expand upon them. If she wants a challenge with cutting food out of her diet, she should go on a gluten-free challenge for three months. Let’s see how she deals with that scenario. And absolutely no cheating allowed.

Perhaps this topic hits a little too close to home for me. I had no choice in what I’ve had to give up when it comes to food. You have no idea how much I miss eating a Burger King Whopper. Or how sometimes I would love to be able to bite into a thick crust pizza from the local pizza shop. Or even just being able to stop into Subway for a vegetarian sub. Do you have any idea how much I miss those things? But I can’t cheat and I can’t go back to eating them after a month. Let’s just say that I had very little sympathy for Ms. Hatmaker’s self-imposed limited diet.

That was my main impression after the first chapter. I’m hoping that it gets better, but I somehow doubt that it will. On to Chapter 2…. clothes.

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The Beloit Mindset List

Posted on August 23, 2012 by civilwarrose5

The Beloit Mindset List has been released for the college class of 2016. I’m sure that many of you have heard about it from the media this week. If not, here are a couple of things regarding the class of 2016:

– They were born in 1994

– They can’t picture people carrying their luggage through airports rather than rolling it.

– They grew up, somehow, without the benefits of Romper Room

That’s just a smattering of what was on the list. I was curious to see what was on the list for my college class of 2002. Yes, I am dating myself, aren’t I? But you have to admit that in 1980 I made for a VERY cute baby! 😉

First off, after having read the list I have no idea where the person who wrote it thought that we all grew up. Half of the stuff on the list that I wasn’t supposed to have ever experienced, I did! Okay, so maybe it didn’t help that I grew up in a rural part of the country where you continued to use things until they didn’t work, or you didn’t run out and buy the latest and greatest because you couldn’t afford it. Let me just list for you some of the things that I took exception to on my list:

–Atari predates them, as do vinyl records…..  Not true. We had an Atari game system that my dad had purchased when it first came out. My sister and I played Space Invaders, Pac-Man, and Pong. As for vinyl records, my sister and I had a handful with childrens’ songs on them that we would put on and dance around the living room. We even had one of Bill Cosby’s comedy albums that we loved.

–They may never have heard of an 8-track, and chances are they’ve never heard or seen one… Again, not true. My dad had an 8-track player in his truck at one point and another one in the hay barn. When he would go out to work on the tractor he would often put in either CW McCall, Patsy Cline, or Dolly Parton. I think that he might have had a Merle Haggard 8-track as well.

–They cannot fathom what it was like not having a remote control… You’re looking at my parents’ first remote control. We lived out in the country and the cable company refused to run poles down our road because there weren’t enough people there. The only TV that we had until I was around 8 was NBC and PBS. We lived at the bottom of a hill so those were the only channels we could get with the antenna. Do you remember the box with the dial that you would turn in order to move the antenna? That rurring sound sure can take you back! We even had our TV in one of those old wooden console things that had doors that rolled around and closed in the front. When I was around 8 my parents got the satellite dish, one of those giant metal ones that you used to see in yards. That was when we got our first TV with a remote. Don’t laugh, but that’s the very TV that I’m using now in my house. It’s over 20 years old, but still works like a champ.

There are more of those and I could go on and on, but I won’t bore you with my simple country up-bringing. We had a rotary phone until I was 14. That was the year that we got off of the party line and finally had our own phone line! We no longer had to worry about hogging up the phone line when somebody called. You wouldn’t have to listen to grandma pick up the phone and tell you to get off because she had to make an important call. It was great!

As an aside… I like to check my blog stats to see how people are running across my posts. It will often tell me what search terms they are using to find it. Well, I was a bit surprised when I saw that the following search term was used today: “making meth with calamine lotion.” What??!! First off, why in the world would you think that you could use calamine lotion to make meth (I’ll admit that I have no idea how you even MAKE the stuff so maybe to a meth head it’s obvious why you would use it), but secondly, why would it lead to my blog? Then I realized… last year I was VERY angry because I had needed some more allergy medicine, but I couldn’t buy it. The government seems to think that if I buy too much of it then I will produce meth and either blow up my house or try to sell it. My post was all about how keeping me from getting my allergy medicine (and making me happy) wasn’t going to prevent somebody from making meth if they really wanted to do so. As you can see, the criminal mind is quite resourceful!

If you keep a blog, have you had any interesting search terms come up?

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1860 Republican Convention

Posted on August 22, 2012 by civilwarrose5

This year’s election is a very important one for our country. Depending on which candidate is elected our country will either start on the road to recovery or else it will cease to exist as we grew up knowing it. Since this is Civil War Wednesday I thought that I would enlighten you about another election that ended up changing the course of our country’s future. We all know that Abraham Lincoln won the 1860 presidential election, but do you know how he got there? After all, today in order to be able to win an election you need to have millions of dollars to spend on campaigning. If Lincoln was alive today he would not be able to afford to run for president. Is that a sad fact or what?

In 1859 Lincoln had lost the election for the US Senate to Stephen Douglas, despite his good showing at the Lincoln-Douglas debates that had taken place all over Illinois. Even though he had lost the election, that series of debates helped to make Lincoln a recognizable name and face to the rest of the nation. As Lincoln returned to his law practice people would ask him about running for president. One of his many replies was, “I shall labor faithfully in the ranks, unless, as I think not probable, the judgment of the party shall assign me a different position.” After John Brown’s raid on Harper’s Ferry, Lincoln became even better known because Senator Douglas blamed this type of lawlessness was due to Lincoln’s ‘House Divided’ speech. Lincoln traveled to Cooper Union in New York City where he gave a speech regarding our moral, social and political responsibilities in regards to dealing with slavery. This brought the audience to their feet and surging to shake his hand. He then gave another series of addresses in New England which were received just as well. Names were beginning to be nominated for the presidential ticket, and it was finally decided that perhaps Lincoln would allow somebody to enter his name.

The 1860 Republican Convention was held in Chicago, due to some forward-thinking political wrangling by one of Lincoln’s supporters, in a building that was referred to as ‘The Wigwam’ and could accommodate a crowd of 10,000. None of the actual candidates attended the convention because at this time only the delegates attended. However, the other candidates who were on the ballot were William H Seward of New York (Lincoln’s future Secretary of State), Salmon P. Chase of Ohio (Lincoln’s future Treasury Secretary), Edward Bates of Missouri (Lincoln’s future Attorney General), and Simon Cameron of Pennsylvania (Lincoln’s future Secretary of War).

Going into the voting, Seward was the favored candidate. He only needed 233 votes to secure the presidential nomination, and he had a large portion of that in the delegates that he had from New York. It would just take some wrangling to gain votes from the other states, but Seward and his campaign manager felt that this would be possible by offering Lincoln the Vice-President spot on the Republican ticket. Little did Seward know that the Illinois delegation was doing their own bit of wrangling and promising.

Lincoln’s managers were busy making deals, promising positions, and scratching the backs of the delegates in order to secure their votes. They were lining up the numbers that would be needed in order to steal the nomination away from Seward. There was one little problem, though. In a wire that Lincoln sent from Springfield, where he was holed up and waiting for the ballot results, he told his managers, “I authorize no bargains and will be bound by none.” This statement was ignored by his people, who continued to press the flesh and make promises in his stead. Lincoln’s managers also did a couple other things in order to make his support seem stronger than Seward’s. It was arranged for the New Yorkers to be placed far away from other delegations with which they could collaborate and make deals for votes; Lincoln’s managers printed up counterfeit tickets for the convention and gave them out to Lincoln supporters with instructions to show up early so that they could displace Seward’s supporters. Finally, they planted a few men in the crowd with big voices in order to lead the cheering for Lincoln.

The day of the voting arrived finally and there was excitement of all kinds. Seward’s supporters wound their way through the streets of Chicago, led by a brass band, singing and celebrating. They arrived at The Wigwam only to find themselves locked out! All of the Lincoln supporters with their counterfeit tickets had taken the New Yorkers’ seats.

On the first ballot Seward swept the ticket with 173 of the votes, as compared to Lincoln’s 102 and Cameron’s 51. On the second ballot Lincoln gathered more votes from other States that were happy to have a candidate to rally behind on the ‘Stop Seward’ train. The second ballot brought things up tight for Seward and Lincoln. Seward won, but barely, with 185 votes as compared to Lincoln’s 181.

As the third ballot was cast Lincoln began picking up more votes, and Seward was losing them just as fast. As the last vote was cast everybody realized that Lincoln had 231.5 votes, just a vote and a half short of securing the nomination. As the hall became hushed, Mr. D. K. Cartter of Ohio stood up and announced, with a stutter, that he would like to change four votes from Chase to Lincoln. With that Lincoln had secured the nomination!

Dirty politics is definitely not a new invention. Games have been played to sway elections from the very beginning of time. Thankfully, in 1860, these games nominated the man who would go on to win the presidency during one of the bloodiest and horrible periods of our nation’s history.

References:

“How Lincoln Won the 1860 Republican Nomination” by Gordon Leidner

Wikipedia – 1860 Republican National Convention

The Civil War: A Narrative by Shelby Foote

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Being A Good Spotter

Posted on August 21, 2012 by civilwarrose5

Have you spent a lot of time at a flying field? Do you do a lot of flying or a lot of standing around and chatting (the main activity at a flying field)? Then I’m sure at some point you’ve been asked to act as a spotter for another pilot. The first time that you’re asked your mind freezes and you wonder if you are good enough to be a spotter… whatever that is! Well, calm your fears. If you have not yet been asked to spot for somebody then please sit back and soak in the knowledge that I’m about to give to you.

Let me answer a very important question that has probably just popped into your head. No, just because you are acting as a spotter does NOT mean that you have to wear spots. This is not golf where one of the rules is that you must dress in a goofy manner in order to be allowed out on the grass. I would suggest that you not wear a loud Hawaiian shirt, though. After all, you don’t want to distract the pilot that you’re supposed to be helping.

What does a spotter do? Well, you are the eyes, ears, and mouth for the pilot. The pilot’s job is to have fun flying his aircraft. Your job is to make sure that everybody else at the field knows what the pilot is doing. For instance, as he gets ready to fling his airplane into the air you want to yell along the flight line, “Taking off!” When the pilot is going to do a low pass across the runway you need to yell out, “Low pass, left to right!” If there’s a 3D flip-flop plane hovering over the runway you need to make sure that your pilot is aware of this fact. You want to tell him something along the lines of, “There’s an Edge hovering a couple feet over the runway so you’re going to want to stay high until I let you know that he’s gone.” I do not suggest that you inform your pilot about it in this way <pilot’s jet comes screaming out of a dive and starts a low pass down the runway>, “Umm, there’s a plane hovering… never mind. You just ran right into him.” Also, if he asks you where another plane is currently located, it is recommended that you verbally say it instead of just pointing. You are a SPOTTER, not a POINTER. Okay?

It does help if you know the pilot you’re spotting for and their typical style of flight. Let’s say, for example, that there’s a pilot at your field named… Sam. Sam likes to fly planes like a Kadet Senior or a SIG Rascal. Again, this is just an example off of the top of my head. After having watched Sam fly his planes for a while you realize that he likes to fly high and slow. Maybe he does a loop now and again just to shake things up. If he asks you to spot for him you would mainly be saying things like, “Taking off!” “Sam, here comes Jay’s 16 from the left… wait, now the right… never mind, he’s coming straight up at you. Keep your course, he’ll veer around you.” “Be careful! You’ve got a Radian off to the right. He’s a lot faster than you, so keep to the left.” “Stay high because Doug is doing his loops.” “Landing! Right to left!” “Pilot on the field.” That’s a pretty good example of what you would have to do as you were spotting for a person named Sam, if he really existed.

Another responsibility of a spotter is to know where everybody else is in the sky while your pilot is up there. You want to let him know, “We’ve got a little Piper Cub floundering about at the end of the runway. Stay high until I can tell if he’s going to clear the field.” If you suddenly hear somebody yell that they have a dead stick, make sure your pilot knows. He might have been busy looking at how gorgeous his Stryker was when he did a pop top. He needs to know to not want to land until that dead sticked plane is down and out of the way. Also, if somebody yells out, “Landing… in about 10 minutes or so” you want to make sure your pilot hears that so he can join you in snickering about it. After all, just because he’s flying doesn’t mean that he should miss out on some of the goofy things that are being said.

As a good spotter your job is to make sure that the pilot isn’t uptight and stressed about what everybody else is doing in the sky. Your job is to make sure that he’s enjoying himself and can concentrate on his own flight. Feel free to enjoy the pilot’s flight as well, and be supportive. “Wow! That was a gorgeous knife edge!” “That was the best inverted pass I’ve seen today!” “It doesn’t look like your jet even hesitated as it ripped through Doug’s Sukhoi!”

Communication is the key when spotting. Make sure that your pilot knows your style of communication before he takes off. If he doesn’t know that your signal to stay high is to pinch his butt, he might be a bit upset after he crashes due to you giving him that signal. Communication is also important between you and the rest of the flight line. Just because your pilot can hear you, doesn’t mean that the pilot 20 feet away can as well. Inflate those lungs and be heard! Unless you’re trying to impart some important information to your pilot that the others probably shouldn’t overhear, “SAM! YOUR FLY IS OPEN!”

As you can see after a few basic instructions you, too, can become a master spotter. 🙂

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How To Make Wheel Pants

Posted on August 20, 2012 by civilwarrose5

 

Wing Walker Plane

Photo courtesy of Pixabay

Many airplanes have things that are called ‘wheel pants’ on them. Their function is to help with streamlining the surface area of the wheel that the air has to flow over during flight. They help to keep the tires from throwing mud and stones up at the fuselage and wings when taxi-ing. Also, they help to keep the plane warm when flying through the air. After all, you know how cold it can get when you’re wearing shorts instead of pants. That would not make for a good ride if you’re too busy thinking, “Gee, I’m cold!” instead of “Wow! Look at that view!”

In the R/C world the wheel pants are usually made of either plastic or fiberglass. Sometimes they are helpful, but other times they can be a pain in the rear. Especially if they are connected properly and start to flop around. The LT-25 that I fly doesn’t have wheel pants, though Jay’s Edge, Extra, Cub, and a few other planes have them. I didn’t want the LT being picked on because it wasn’t cool enough to have pants, so I decided to make some for it. They turned out really good so I thought I would show you how I made mine. Please feel free to take these instructions and make your own.

Jay had a nasty pair of his work pants that I decided I was going to throw out (he had already purchased a few more pairs to replace them). Since I already had this material I wanted to use it instead of just tossing the whole thing out. Denim is a forgiving and tough material that will hold up to a lot of abuse. I figured it could hold up to my gentle flying style on the LT. As you can see, I had help.

 

 

 

Make sure that you lay the fabric out flat. You don’t want to get any wrinkles in it or spots where the fabric is less than perfect. You might want to get somebody to help you closely inspect the fabric, just to make sure that it’s good enough to be used as wheel pants. Luckily this one passed the strenuous quality control testing that Chester put it through. She gave me the paws up to say that it was good.

The size of the wheel pants is going to depend upon the size of the wheels that you intend on covering. I had forgotten to measure the LT’s wheels, so I had to guess. After you draw your pattern out on paper (make sure to leave extra to account for the seam), trace it onto your fabric.

 

 

This next step will require a bit of equipment. I wouldn’t recommend manual assembly if you’re using denim. It can be pretty tough on the fingers.

 

 

 

You will need four total pieces, two for each side. Put ‘outside’ sides together and connect them using your machine. Leave the legs and waist open. And don’t forget your seam allowance.

 

 

 

Once you have completely attached the two sides together you want to make sure to trim the excess as close to the seam as possible. Once you have done that you will need to reverse the pants. Pull the legs up through the waist so that you can turn them right side out. This will be a bit difficult and you might break a nail. If you do, just tear the nail off, file it down, and continue with the process. If you break the nail down too far grab your bottle of CA glue to do a temporary fix until you have time to repair it properly.

Once you have pulled them right side out and finger pressed the seams, cut another strip of fabric long enough to allow you to wrap the pants around the wheel’s strut. Attach the strip of fabric at the waist, and then adhere pieces of velcro to the strip so that you can securely attach the pants to the plane.

 

Installation is quick and easy; no tools required. Maintenance is easy as well. When the wheel pants need to be cleaned, peel the velcro apart and toss in the wash with the rest of your jeans. They won’t shrink and will continue to look great.

 

 

That’s all there is to it! In a few short hours you can make your plane into the most fashion-forward at the flying field. The other pilots will look on in jealousy as your plane goes zooming by with its wheel pants flapping in the breeze. They really work, too! This weekend I had the two best landings that I’ve ever had with this plane. I would like to think that it was due to the confidence that the LT had now that it was no longer naked. The Rascal and Senior were definitely jealous of the LT’s new accessories. The pants were a big hit at the field.

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Book Study – 7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess

Posted on August 19, 2012 by civilwarrose5

The other night while perusing my usual blogs online I discovered that a book had been chosen for the book club on the (in)courage website. The book is “7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess” by Jen Hatmaker. The ladies who run the book club record videos with discussions regarding each of the chapters. I’ve never actually actively participated in one of the book studies, but I do enjoy reading some of the titles that are chosen. When I saw this recent one it intrigued me.

I have enough going on in my life that I like to read about how to simplify and streamline things. Not that I’m good at actually doing it, but I feel that if I’m at least reading about it then that counts as making the attempt. Right? I’m actually my own worst enemy when it comes to this kind of thing. As a Gemini I tend to get bored with the routine, so if something new and interesting comes along I tend to jump on it and bring that into my tumbleweed of interests. Then I wonder how in the world I manage to get involved in so many things. Just as I start to clean things and free up some space, something comes along to fill that area. Thus I’m hoping to get some inspiration out of this book.

What I plan on doing (ha! we’ll see how that works out) is after reading each chapter I’ll post on here about it and what thoughts I may have on that topic. Perhaps even if I don’t get anything out of it you might be able to glean some handy info. Maybe. We’ll see. Either way, I have a feeling that it’s going to be interesting. Why?

I have a visual definition of irony. I ordered this book early last week and it arrived on Friday. This is literally what I found when I opened the box:

I had to laugh. A lot. The cats wondered what my issue was because they were excited about a new box in the house. Yes, the company used this giant box to ship me a paperback copy of “7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess.” 😀

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