Progress on QAYG Hexagons

 Last night was spent at school watching these below kids from 8 local schools perform their Winter Guard routines. 

Sunday, I spent time stitching these hexagons into twosies. They need to get sewn into groups of 4, and then I'll start making my column to add to the existing extra ones I've done already. I obviously need to add a bunch more colors to the mix first through! Looks like I'll need to prep more of these this week at some point.

Joy kindly reminded me I need to work on my Winter UFO quarter projects. Sigh. I don't like the next stage - prepping and pinning for quilting. Alas, I will get it pressed and pinned today after work. That will allow me to do a little quilting on it Wednesday evening and Thursday, fingers crossed. I'd like to get that old nine patch UFO finished off this month. I was hoping for a finish each month this quarter.... we will see how the next month and a half go! The calendar is pretty full with kid events, but I tend to do better when I am busy... since in my mind I only have this slot of time to do something, so I do it... rather than putting it off until later!

Sunday - a day of rest and stitching?

 I'm still recovering from a Winter guard competition chaperoning (I really don't do anything - just another adult there and I get in free!). We got to school for 8AM and got home after 10PM. The competition was a couple of hours away and we had the added bonus of a handful of the kids were preforming that morning for Pre-MPA for show choir across town. We picked them up after the performance and the school bus booked it to the event. We arrived 20 minutes before the JV was to preform - so no warmups, but they did great and placed 3rd in their division of 9 at the event. Not bad considering 3 people have dropped out - the most recent 2 after winter break so the show was rewritten a few weeks ago. Em is a co-captain this year.

the start of the show.

Em is on the right.

Progress has been made on the Cross Stitch this week.

last Sunday Feb 1

This morning Feb 8.

I just have a small stack of tall houses to glue baste for the current cut parts of Brimfield Awakening. I was able to get a good stack done while the kids were getting ready before we left for the competition. I also stitched closed a hole in one of the snowballs for the performance.

This week the boy turned 18 on Friday, and we will see if he wants to do his 'birthday dinner' today or another time. Friday he was full from a baking contest the Academic club had after school - lots of sweets were eaten! Yesterday Em and I were gone all day and he did his annual birthday lunch and shopping with Grandma. He wants to do Indian at the local restaurant to check it out. We will see if he opts out since it is Superbowl Sunday here in the USA. I'll watch the game and do some stitching while listening. I'm not into football but will watch today. We do streaming services and not cable.... so I ordered Peacock (NBC) here in the USA so I can watch the Superbowl and the Olympics for the next couple of weeks. 

Linking up with Kathy and the other Slow Sunday Stitchers. 

Must go walk the dog, who did not get walked or go out much yesterday while I was gone. 

Happy 18th to my boy today!

 This kid is officially an adult today! Yikes, seems like just yesterday we were taking him home from the hospital... and then back to the hospital twice with high jaundice levels. It was a fun first couple of weeks with him. We are not too big on birthday's in my house, but I did get a few balloons and made a banner that hung outside his bedroom door this morning. Then I blew up orange and blue (Florida UF Gater colors) balloons to have in the hallway as he walked to the kitchen. Emily might have tossed a couple at him as well. 

His Dad made the requested cheesecake with raspberries as his birthday 'cake' yesterday. We will enjoy that later today.... although after school his academic team is doing a party with surprise baking entries and a few blind testers. He made something to bring in, and it will be interesting to see the results. I hear 9 are baking something for the challenge.

I seem to be enjoying the cross stitch and just working on that lately. I finally have a leaf of the 'quilt' nearly completed. Progress! No stitching happened while watching the Tampa Lightning game last night. Way too exciting. That reminds me... need to see if there are any tickets available later this month while we are over that way for the Indy Car races.

Brimfield Awakening

 I have had trainings online at work this week and finally remembered to put my BA stuff near my desk. I was able to glue baste these stacks during one training this morning. 

My tip so I remember - I started on the right side of the house top and went counterclockwise all around. That worked best for me.

I am hoping to have a good stack of at least the big house and the short ones to start stitching sets of 3 on the Winter Guard trip on Saturday. I said I'd chaperone and feel much better this week so should be able to go. Another long day - 8AM to 10PM is the schedule and the competition is a good 2 hours away. Stitching time on the bus is a possibility. 

Cross Stitch

 Cross stitch is a good cold weather project! I've been adding stitches on the inside of the quilt area but since they are white and light creams, they don't show a lot of progress. 

Someone thinks it's cold, and lets his girl cover him up. Anyone else, and he immediately gets up and lays on the quilt. Emily, and he snuggles down and sleeps!

Chilly Sunday in Florida

 It was 23 degrees and feels like 14 in north central Florida this morning around 8AM and it won't get above freezing until 11AMish. We are similar temps  tonight as well. Thank goodness for all the quilts in the house to keep us toasty!

Last Sunday I posted my cross stitch at this stage.

I've been doing a lot of stitching this week! I need to start alternating the colors with the background white and lights of the quilt area so I can make progress there. It is just more fun to stitch the colors as you can see the patterns emerge. 

I suppose I need to go break the ice on the chicken waters. The container for Bear (the dog) on the porch was covered in ice when I let him out. 

Linking up with Kathy and the other Slow Sunday Stitchers.

Stay warm out there.

Saturday...

 We lost internet around 1PM yesterday. Seems it was part of an outage in NC,TN,GA,FL, etc for 23 hours. Thank goodness hubby and I grew up without internet and can cope, but it does make you think of how dependent upon it we are. A little unnerving to think 'someone' could just turn that off and how would we get any news of what is happening in the world? 

That led me to miss my last hour of work. The kids were not happy when they got home... and since the phone signal is horrible at my house (we use the wifi) we were kinda stuck. Since we could not order food for takeout.... we headed to Red Robin for dinner. It was a nice family dinner... and one week before I have my oldest turning 18! I got the mushroom burger and garlic parmesan steak fries. Very yummy. Good family conversation which we have not had in a while with the kids crazy schedules. It doesn't allow for family dinners much. I still have a DVD/VCR player and pulled out the movies The Pacifier and The Great Outdoors to watch last night. 

I was listening to a downloaded audio book while doing some cross stitch yesterday afternoon.

Then I stitched up the prepped bear paws for Aidan's graduation quilt. I really need to get back to that one! This is 3 sets of 4 paws in green.

Today I measured the blue UFO quilt and it measured 67 or 68 x 81. I figured I need about 300 inches of binding so cut 8 strips to make the binding which matches the outer border. I pulled a 3 yard cut of light blue from MSQC sale a couple of months ago and need to press it and get it pinned for quilting. 

I downloaded a few free books from audible.... just so I have something to listen to! My Libby app was not cooperating to give me titles, so the internet is still a little wonky. Emily is complaining she can't do her homework. I think I'll listen to my new book and add some floss to the cross stitch this afternoon. Maybe make some zucchini bread. I made blueberry muffins this morning and a no recipe homemade potato and ham potato casserole for lunch. Its 53 in Ocala... the high for the day before it dips into the 20's tonight.

Stay warm, wherever you are!