Little House block 8

 I think this one took longer to pick fabrics than to sew it up! I debated on making the heart light but went with the purples.  This heart was fun to stitch. I could see this as a future Rainbow Scrap Challenge block =). 

Eight blocks down, one to go!

L

Linking up with Melva and Block 8 of the Little House Sew Along.

Binding time!

 I finally got back to the sewing room last evening and finished the machine quilting on this big BITA quilt. I did need to do some fixing, where the batting and backing were not big enough. Thankfully this was a big backing and I was able to cut off on one side and 'add' it to the other side. There was enough backing to make the binding. I did my math and was less than an inch off at the end. I just made it work. Very tiny seam to merge it and stitched it down. 

I brought it out and put it on the floor by my recliner last night. The dog came right over, sniffed it, looked at me with a smile, and promptly laid down on it and turned and gave me a grin with teeth! Silly boy, he was on a part of this all last night until I went to bed. So, only one strand of thread was used to start stitching it down before we snuggled up and watched episode 2 of Midsummer Mysteries on Roku. I'll be stitching on this in the evenings for a bit and should get it completed before the end of the month.

The kids are off to school, the dog has been walked and I made some french toast with old sourdough bread that needed using. Time to grab a shower and go visit my FIL, who does know how to use a phone! He called Greg Monday night and asked if the house sale went through ok. First time he has called us since being in his assisted living facility. Yes, the sale is through and Greg and I had a nice late lunch out after. Tuesday afternoon we had a social security office meeting. Today is a quick visit to see my FIL and then I'll be in the sewing room making the next block on the Little House Sew Along, then prepping the last 2 orange houses for the RSC to sew up while adding more Bear Paw blocks to the Graduation quilt. 

Happy Mothers Day

 Just another Sunday but I did get to go out for lunch with hubby and the kids. Grandma was not feeling well - low energy and begged off yesterday.  While out for the morning walk with Bear, I met up with a neighbor on the next street with 2 little dogs. We were chatting about vices (She likes BMW fast cars and I like fabric and quilting and crafts). She said, you want a sewing machine? I have an old one from when I was flipping houses. She gave it to me free! It is a Singer and I still need to see if it works. She was happy to get it out of the house as they are making room for one of their kids and their wife to move in for a year while he finishes his degree. I'm hoping to get it working and then it can become one of the kids machines for if they ever want to have one on hand after they finish school.

I've made progress on the cross stitch. I'm almost done with this page and can start on the next one once I stitch the last 'block' in the quilt and the pumpkin on the bottom left. Then the wagon extends to the left for the first page of the pattern.

This finally arrived in the mail yesterday. The Senior photo for the yearbook I finally ordered and got a yard sign as well. Just in time for Graduation in a couple of weeks. 

A little progress in the sewing room

I was able to finish another 2 bear paw blocks for Aidan's graduation quilt. I need to make a bunch more. I'll try and prep another 2 blocks tonight to sew up this weekend. He chose civil war style greens and blues with a darker creamy background. Each block is 14 inches finished, so I need to figure out how many I need. I'm thinking 30+ for a double bed size and this makes 12 I think. I'll start having to reuse fabrics after the next 2 blocks. I kinda went crazy when a site was closing down last year with all their fabrics like this.

While sewing the above I added a couple of orange houses. I'll add the last two when I do another set of bear paws.

I pinned this RSC quilt of Bird in the Air blocks that was sitting on my frame and not moving with any progress. It is now being machine quilted and I'm less than half way done on this 90x90 quilt. I like to think I learned my lesson and am taking breaks and not doing it all in one go this time. I should have pinned it better, I was so used to warm and natural batting that doesn't need much pinning to this Tuscany Wool that needed more. I'm doing a squiggle walking foot stitch every 3 inches or so down the quilt.  I'll work some more on this one this weekend. It is a lot of fun to see some old favorites of my fabrics pop up as I am sewing. 

I'll link up with Angela and the RSC on Saturday.

I'm going to try canning beans tomorrow. I have a pressure canner and have a 32 ounce bag of black beans and Great Northern beans. I'm going to soak them overnight in a couple of pans, boil for a bit in the morning and then pack them into pint jars and see how it goes with pressure canning. They should be done well before the time we leave for the Band Banquet at the school in the evening. Greg found a few boxes of mason jars in the shed when he was clearing out. I'll get them cleaned and run through the dishwasher tonight. I believe the boy is late today, with his Academic Club Banquet. 

Progress

 Since this quilt was just sitting on the frame and not getting worked on... I decided to pin it for machine quilting. Note to self... this actually worked great to pin a quilt. Must remember that. I plan to start working on a nice and easy walking foot wavy line down every 4-6 inches of the quilt. Each block is 6 inches so I believe this one is 90x90. I think I might search for leftover binding and see if I have enough to do a scrappy one. This is Thursday afternoons project. I might see if I can make the frame a little smaller and throw the string of beads on there, or put the 1857 quilt on there and have string of beads in a hoop. Still pondering that decision.

Last night was the last symphonic spring concert of the year. These are well attended by parents and friends. She broke up the Jazz Big Band this year to a separate concert an hour earlier. Since it is the Seniors last concert, she gives the ones moving onto a music degree an opportunity to select a piece and conduct it. There were 3 this year of the 5 pieces played. Each did a great job. The director actually plays their parts with their instrument for them. She has her own mouthpiece. I believe she played French horn, bassoon and trumpet last night!

Aidan actually went with us to the concert along with Grandma. I guess he figured he should go see one of them! He knows a couple of the seniors in the band as well. 

Slowly moving on this Sunday

 I actually slept in until 9 today! My alarm is normally set at 6:30 and on weekends I usually get moving around 7. Not today! 

We had a cold front go through yesterday afternoon that gave us some much needed rain (3/4 inch) and a little cool down of the temps. It will be in the high 70's today... as opposed to the 90's and humid yesterday. 

Grandma and I travelled across town to see the 'fun show' for Winter guard. There were 6 schools represented, and most did their show for the season, then the kids scripted their 'fun show'. This was actually a great run through for my girls team and if they had done this at Championships, they would have medaled. Their fun show joined the two teams (JV and Varsity) and was set to Frozen. It was really well done for just 4 practices! I might have had to watch Frozen last night on Disney plus to get the songs out of my head!

I have not worked much on this cross stitch the last week or two. 

I should make some progress on it this week. I was busy doing binding on my grandmothers flower garden quilt finish. This was started in 2014 and hand pieced (not epp) of the flowers and then hand appliqued to the black background squares. I did machine piece and machine quilt it. 

Some final hexagons got stitched and are ready to be joined into a foursome so I can start stitching the last column of these together to add to the main quilt. I have 2 columns done and will pop this one in the middle, then add it to the quilt.

Since it is cooler, and my back is only slightly unhappy with me, I'm going to try and quickly till the garden area and see if some hot weather crops will grow the next few months in Florida. We will see. I'm trying cucumbers, zucchini, sunflowers, pumpkins and watermelons. I need to get the companion flowers for them this week and pop them in, but hoping to get this planted today. I opted out of setting up tables at a girl scout event, since I knew it would hurt my back. Tilling should not bother it... and if it does, I'm pulling a kid out to do it for me. F1 race today with the boy to watch and then Stanley Cup hockey to watch this evening. 

Have a great Sunday.

Linking up with Kathy and the Slow Sunday Stitchers.

Rsc in orange

 I snapped this squirrel on my walk with Bear yesterday. I might have taken the day off in support of the May Day protest here in the US. 

I did a little sewing and got a couple of Bear Paw blocks added to the Graduation quilt pile. In between I added this orange house block for the RSC.

I was tapped to drive Greg to his MRI on his back Friday and got some hexagons stitched in the car while I waited for him. We had cooked dinner that morning, so the ribs just needed warming and broiling to finish them off. We use the Alton Brown Baby Back rib recipe. An actual dinner at the table with all of us happened, which is unusual with the kids schedules. It was fun to hear about school, teachers and the happenings over the last week. School sure is different from when I went, as they know an awful lot about their teachers and their lives! 

Today is the Winter guard fun show about 35 minutes away from us. Grandma is coming up to attend that one with me. We have much needed rain predicted this afternoon. Aidan has an F1 sprint race and qualifying later today (Miami race) and they are getting the rain tomorrow, so the race will be interesting. Sunday, I'm helping set up a Tea Party event in the morning for Girl Scouts. I've helped with the setup the last few years and get the tables and chairs out and set up for just under 200 people with a few other volunteers. Then do the tablecloths, silverware and tea cups and saucers with paper plates. Sunday night I'll be watching the Lightning/Canadians game 7 of the First round of the Stanley Cup. My guys finally played well last night and scored in overtime to keep the series alive. 

Head on over to the link up and see what pretty oranges have come out to play this month.