Monday, March 18, 2024

Almost a finish

 


I always think machine quilting will just take an hour! It always takes longer. I did machine quilting around each of the colored kites. Then I did sets of 3 lines in the border. I used the cut off backing to make the binding and machine stitched it to the top. I started hand stitching the binding last night. The dog was in the study with Greg, so the cats came out to explore. Peanut did some quality checks. 
I see a quilt finish this month!

Sunday, March 17, 2024

Sunday

I have enjoyed a very lazy start to Sunday! I slept in past 9AM and then got busy throwing a corned beef with some potato, carrots and onion into the crock pot for dinner tonight. I'll grab a little of the juice to add to the cabbage which I will steam in the pressure cooker later tonight. I do love my cabbage cooked that way! The kids will be expecting some Irish soda bread to go with their meal this evening. Yummy!

The dog got a walk well after 10:30 and it was getting a little bit hot here in Florida. I believe we are expecting mid 80's and sunny today. The pool looks so much better after some attention at the end of the week. I just need to test the water and adjust the chemicals, but it is sparkling clear again.  

My plans today are to putter in the sewing room and machine quilt the scrappy kites quilt and get the binding made and attached. Stitching it down by hand will be my stitching this evening. I was able to pin it last night, so it is ready to go.

I watched a video this morning on how to color your embroidery projects.  Melisa at Pinkernpunkin blog has some adorable heart embroidery stitcheries she is releasing each month this year and I love the look the coloring adds. I have the first 3 hearts printed off and will start prepping the first one for stitching today. I think I'll start with the March block. Now to find the crayons!


I finally got a good start on the String of Beads blocks for the RSC this year. I saw a photo in an old quilting pattern book from the 80's and this is the layout. A little circle will be added at the middle spot, but I'll hold off on adding them as I am not sure if I want a sunny yellow for all of them or a shade of the middle colors. Plenty of time to decide. The two purples are done so I'm starting in on the reds from last month.


Linking up with Kathy and the other Slow Sunday Stitchers. It's after noon, so I'd better grab some lunch (I seem to have skipped breakfast!) and then head to my happy place to play with some fabrics. Enjoy your week.







Friday, March 15, 2024

RSC Saturday

 We are half way through the month and I have yet to make my purple AT blocks! That will hopefully be remedied this weekend. I did finally start the string of beads blocks in purple and got these two completed. The green outer peels will be consistent throughout the quilt. I have the peels traced onto the next background and the reds are ready to go.



I did a lot of digging and made a backing with leftover backings for this little quilt. I also dug through the batting cut offs and pieced 4 parts together to fit for a batting for this. Just need to get it pinned and some basic machine quilting on it this weekend and I'm hoping for a finish this month. 



Bear is doing a great job of holding the quilt down! He went to the Vet for his annual shots and got his new rabies tag. The boy is 85 pounds! 

Linking up with the RSC Challenge on Saturday


Wednesday, March 13, 2024

Progress...

 Work is at the waiting for the 'big day' so today was a clean-up time after verifying the test runs overnight. Sigh. A relief to be at this point with a Saturday 'go' day. I'm off tomorrow and will ride with Emily this week after we bring the doggie to the vet for his annual checkup. He gets some anxiety meds tonight and tomorrow morning. 

I had pulled out a package of boneless, skinless chicken thigh from the freezer yesterday and tonight they were baked with a crispy curry rub in one of my stone wear pans and served with some rosemary herbed roasted red potato and some buttered corn. Yummy!

I added a few stitches to the peels this afternoon and have one purple block completed!

I went out to toss some watermelon to the chickens since Aidan and Bear were out back. I got distracted while walking to get eggs and ended up brushing down the pool, which needed a clean, a shock and a quick clean run of the motor overnight. It should clear up most of it that I have been neglecting the last few months. A little more work on it tomorrow and it should be ready to adjust the chemicals and be ready for swimming for the weekend, if they want. I need to pop out and check for the eggs. 

Good thing I did! I guess I only got one or two yesterday morning and no one else collected since then! There are 3 greens, 3 light brown and one dark brown.  The girls are laying like crazy, and we are getting 4-5 eggs a day. I just put 10 in the pressure cooker for hard boiled eggs. I have 2 dozen regular eggs in the fridge and 18 in the round egg holder on the shelf. Since they are backyard eggs and not washed, they can be at room temp just fine. I picked up heavy cream when I ran to Aldi at lunch, so I think I'll be making some creme brule tomorrow, deviled eggs with those hard boiled ones and I'll have to see what other things I can do with some eggs. I'll ship 18 off to my MIL's friend Betty, the next time we see her. We usually send a dozen or two down for her and my FIL to have but we have not been going down with Andy in the hospital, and now in a nursing home rehab facility. 

While chatting with my Mom this week, I saw this bird out my window. I'm not sure what it is but it stayed long enough for me to grab my phone and take some photo's. 



Time to clear out the fridge and toss the paper shredding I was doing this afternoon in the office as it is trash night tonight. Then, some stitching while watching tv I think. . 

I'm really hoping to get my RSC quilt pinned for quilting tomorrow at some point. I'm on call Saturday, so just need to be home most of the day in case I need to log in and cover as I am backing up 2 people. That sounds like perfect sewing time to me!


Tuesday, March 12, 2024

A little applique

 I got a little hand applique in this week. I had added the final light purple to this one.

Then I moved onto the next one and got the dark purples appliqued down. 



After another episode of NCIS on Netflix, I added two dark greens to this one. 


Hopefully the rest of the green leaves will get added this week to the string of beads blocks.

Aidan got his braces tightened today so we were home a bit late. Emily made us fried rice for dinner and it was really yummy. I pulled some frozen chicken out for dinner tomorrow night. We will see what it turns into.



Monday, March 11, 2024

Race weekend

 I did not take too many photos. Aidan did let me get a selfie of us in the stands and we got a photo of us on the track after the race. He even brought home some tire bits. He got quite fried with the sun on Saturday, and I imagine having the sun hit that sunburn on Sunday was not fun. Me - I looked horrible but I didn't get a burn with the floppy hat and the 'fishing' long sleeved lightweight shirt over my t-shirt. 




We did have a great weekend in St. Petersburg. The city was very organized, and everything ran smoothly. I hear they will have the streets opened by tomorrow and the airport back up and running by the weekend. 

We parked at Tropicana field and used the free shuttle to the track. Aidan had picked seats on the first turn, and we did get to see some fun action. Overtakes and some runoff misses. I think it will be a weekend he will remember!



The kids are on spring break vacation this week. Greg has school and I have to work so nothing major planned for us. Aidan has an ortho appointment to get his teeth tightened on Tuesday. Wednesday he is eligible to go get his license. You have to have your permit for a year in Florida before being able to get your license. He has done the hours of driving with us over the year. Emily might do a riding lesson during the week to check out a new facility and the dog has a Vet appointment Thursday morning. I'm thinking I might see about a spring training game next Sunday, but we will see how the week goes. I'm on call Saturday for a work project. 
 I hear my step-FIL is still in the hospital and they are waiting to release him to a nursing home. His heart is just failing, (90 and multiple heart attacks, surgeries over the years) and not pumping enough blood to his brain which is causing the hallucinations. His lifespan more than doubled his twin, who died in his early 40's. 
I'm hoping to get a little sewing in this week and maybe some painting in the front rooms. We will see how that goes!

Thursday, March 7, 2024

Another crazy week in my world....

 Work... is getting closer to a deadline but.... I did not work (actual work) today! I didn't get much done on the sewing front, was not feeling it.... but I did get to go ride a horse and chat with the ladies in my group! We were running a bit late today, so I went directly from horses to get the kids from school.

I did make some progress, though. I had started applique of the peels for the string of beads block this month in purple. I think I just could not see it in red, so was happy purple came up this month. The original quilt I saw was in green and purple ages ago. It made purple easier to start for this block. Lets just say, my normal way of 'winging' it did not go well. I did a few YouTube videos and saw someone who drew the outline on the fabric to applique and on the background. Why didn't I think of that? So... today I grabbed one of the white print squares for the string of beads block and drew the 8 orange peel shapes onto it. I also grabbed a scrap of darker purple and traced and cut out 4 of them. I unstitched the 3 lighter purples from the original background and started over on the traced block. Yup, that went a lot better and now I'm over the hurdle on that! 

I was able to get these 3 stitched before I headed to horses. I'll add that last one on tonight and then will add the dark green to the outer edges. 


Wednesday after school, I picked up the kids and headed across town to get to the area for the dedication ceremony of the Silver award lending library the girls made last fall. There was a bit of paperwork to get it placed on the county property. 3 of the 4 girls were able to attend. 


Her brother stayed in the car and started reading a book assigned for school. It is called Tuesday's with Morrie and he said it is a great book. Makes you think. I'll have to check it out.

This guy has found a new spot he likes. The sun hits here in the morning - it is right outside my office and looking out at the side yard. There tends to be a wild bunny and some squirrels and birds to keep him entertained.


It has been another 'fun' week of hearing about hospitals. My step-FIL was in the hospital for a few days last week then released for the weekend. Things were ok- crazy changes in bp and other issues, until Tuesday when they got weird. No energy, hallucinations, etc. He waited until Wednesday morning before going to the ER. He was admitted and things are not going well. He is 90 years old, had a major heart attack 20 years ago and his cardiologist has been very surprised he is still alive the last 5+ years! So, we are just trying to support my MIL as best as we can. I swear this man has about 20 lives so far with all his health problems, so we will wait and see what happens. Just to throw another log on, my Dad was at his cardio rehab and they didn't like a number on the machine so they wheeled him to the ER on Wednesday too! It turned out that it was ok, and all other numbers were normal for him, so they let him go home pretty quickly. Maybe it was too much celebrating my Mom's 85 birthday on Tuesday!

 Sunday, Aidan and I took a drive over to see my FIL (Greg's Dad) and drop some things to him. His hip is doing better, and he is getting around ok. Greg and Emily will head over this weekend to see him. Aidan and I will be in St. Pete watching cars go around the track for 2 days. Let's hope the rain holds off and the sun hides behind the clouds. It is going to be a hot one on Saturday! The kids have one last day of school before spring break. They don't go back to school until Tuesday the 19th.