Slow Sunday.....

It has been a very slow start to Sunday so far. I slept in.... and coffee was made when I got up!
Greg is off to work at the grocery store - with a mask for safety. The kids are home in their rooms - they each have some reading to do and Aidan has some homework to do that is due tomorrow. I let Greg explain to Grandma why they can't go over now that we are in a Stay Safer at Home order in Florida as of Friday. I made sure Emily called to let her know before Greg left for work...yes, she wanted to talk to me and I told Emily to hand the phone to Dad instead. I figured it would be easier for Greg to explain our reasoning to his Mom.

I really don't have too many plans today. I do want to go through the pantry closet and organize a bit today.... and see what I have so I can plan meals for a few weeks! It is fully stocked.... cause I always have a stocked pantry and freezer. It is just in my DNA I guess!

I will get some hand quilting in on my cat and mouse quilt. The butterfly's are done so onto the cheese in the light teal border.

I hope to get the inner circle of my EMD block appliqued down and then I'll back baste the outer ring.

I pulled fabrics for another EMD block yesterday and I'll plan to start EPP on those today as well.

I think it is time to pull out a puzzle to have out for everyone to work on. We have a few to choose from so I'll make a pile of the puzzles and see which one we will have out to make first.

We missed our daily hoops session yesterday.... so I'll have to get in a few rounds of HORSE with Aidan today. So far I tend to win the majority of the time!

I think we might try this bread recipe today too.

Linking up with the other Slow Stitchers as we are all working on social isolation.

RSC Saturday in light and bright BLUE...

Well, it took me forever to find the completed star blocks that I knew I had somewhere in the sewing room. Turns out I had 8 of them instead of 6! I created some nine patch blocks to go with them and managed to get these 2 blocks made before I logged into a family Zoom meeting tonight. Seems I needed help from the kids to get the microphone working... but then it was nice to see all my siblings and almost all of my nieces and nephews. A big thanks to Kristin (my niece) for setting it up.  My parents managed to figure it out too! I have a feeling we will be meeting again soon.

Linking up with the Rainbow Scrap Challenge.

Louisa - Book Club block #3

I had some time this afternoon after braving the crowds at Sams to prep and make my block today.
The kids had a better day 2 of virtual learning. They got their 50 minute PE session in tonight with me. I took them on a walk for 30 minutes and then we were playing hoops....probably for another 30 minutes or so. It is the second day in a row I have reached my 10,000 step goal. It has been a while since I have reached it.

Before dinner I was listening to my audio book of Jane Eyre and prepping the parts for Louisa. I got her halves done.

Then finished her off before starting dinner.  Linking up with week #3 of Book Club.

I had pulled out pork chops from the freezer yesterday and then made some zucchini fries with some zucchini before it went bad. No leftovers.... good thing hubby was at work tonight!

Some April Fools Day! and EMD weekly update.

Ever feel like you are in the movie Groundhog Day... and every day is the same? Let's hope today does not repeat tomorrow.

It was day 1 of virtual learning. With a little effort we got Emily onto her Zoom conference call (someone might have written the wrong code down!) with her class for 9AM. She got to see her classmates and teacher and they went over their new work, got their assignments and were good to go. Her two teachers have put their assignments for the week up. She spent Tuesday organizing a white board of her tasks for each subject and created a plan to work through them.

Lots of emails and reminds came through from Aidan's teachers last night and this morning. Let's just say his were not as smooth. I think it was mostly user error and lack of patience.... someone does not deal well with change and this is a big change..... but with a little help he got connected to 2 of his teachers or their work assignments. He has 6 teachers so a little more coordination. His robotics teacher has assigned them Code.org lessons. Greg and I were chatting last night and figured that would be how he handled robotics. Aidan is familiar with that platform since they used it in his gifted class in elementary school. He just needed to scroll down to see where to enter the initial code..... the little oops smirk was common from him today after I had him try a couple of things.  He has a lot assigned but 2 weeks to do it. I think he also did science or math today. We will see how tomorrow goes. I should have more patience since I won't be juggling work and kids.

Ella Maria Deacon.... I finished off this block on Sunday. I only have 1 outstanding block from previous months left.

So I started month 7 and got one of them completed! I finished the inner circle after work tonight. I did back basting and needle turn applique for this one. 

I took a walk last night and nearly got blown away it was so windy with the cool front moving through. I am looking forward to my walk tonight - temps around 70 instead of feels like 88! Much nicer. I wonder if I will see the wild turkey's again?

I did call Emily's horse academy and got her a riding lesson yesterday. Good thing I did - Florida is going on stay at home (which we have been doing - the only exception is they go to see Grandma and this riding last night - only 2 people in the ring on horses) effective tomorrow night. I was able to prepay some lessons and a little extra toward horse care for Liz. She rode Prism yesterday and after a few weeks out of the saddle she was cantering.

Before riding she needed to brush him down.

A bath after his workout.

I suppose it is after 5PM... and no one is making dinner.... so I guess I have to come up with something! I did sheet pan chicken last night with potato and green beans. I think it will be fish and french fry's today.... Unless I can talk someone into picking up from Mojo's.....

April OMG....

Do you ever just feel like working on something? No? Really?..... Guess it is just me then.

I am in the mood to work on this UFO from 2011. I went to the Vermont Quilt Festival without the kids (who were 3 and 2 at the time) and decided to pick up the booth hop blocks from 12 vendors. I had done the blocks and got the finishing kit and then it sat in the waiting drawer. What... you don't have a chest of drawers that have the UFO projects waiting for when you feel like working on them? I knew these were in there. I went back and found a few blog posts about them as well...... here, here and here.

This is where I stand. 12 Blocks Completed.

A black and white photo of the finished quilt.

Fabrics from the finishing kit.

We will see what happens! My goal for April is to get this to a top. It would be lovely to get it completed....but I'll shoot for a completed top first.

I'll link up with the April OMG once it opens up. If anyone has made a quilt from these blocks, please share a photo of your completed top.

Slow Sunday

 Today I have a full day .... all by myself! To do whatever my little self wants to! Hubby is headed into work at the grocery store and the kids are being picked up by Grandma for an overnight. (Yes, she is insisting and knowing that neither the kids or her have gone out in the last 2 weeks we will risk it I guess). The tree guy is going over at 8AM tomorrow to take down a tree and she thought the kids would like to see it. Hubby is off work tomorrow so he can pick them up while I am logged into work. The advantage of not being in school - they can just do their school work in the afternoon. Virtual school starts Wednesday for them.

Yesterday Emily wanted a technology free day so I was allowed to link up yesterdays Rainbow Scrap Challenge post then nothing.....the house actually got vacuumed and living room rugs were steam cleaned! Must not let that happen too often! Bathroom cleaned and kitchen cleaned and mopped. (She relented in the afternoon..... her room was spotless and rearranged and she wanted to play on her iPad.) I also got this Ella Maria Deacon block stitched. There is a little bit for the middle left to stitch. I also hope to prep the month 7 blocks today. We are pretending it is a perfect circle =) Use your imagination.

*** Updated and done!

I finally started hand quilting this week. I plan to add a few hours today while watching a few Ms. Maisel episodes. Butterfly's and then cheese triangles in the light teal for the cats and mice to chase!

The crochet got pulled out this week too. Good mindless pattern when you can't concentrate. It works up so pretty too. I have 3 skeins to add to this still.

I'd like to finish off the first row of sheep on Aidan's pillow but that takes concentration. Maybe I will have some in a quiet house today?

Linking up with the other Slow Sunday Stitchers. 

Finishing up teal...

This last Saturday of March has snuck up on me somehow! Thank goodness Thursday is my day off and I finally got a little sewing time during the afternoon to pick out, cut and sew these 10 Sweet Confetti blocks from Sunday Best Quilts. 

Then I moved onto the nine patches and stars.... I managed to finish off the orange one I had started last month and make a couple of stars..... then the bobbin thread ran out so I was done for the night.

Friday afternoon after work, I had to 'fix' the orange one - as a star had a wonky wing, and managed to get both of the teal blocks done. They are finishing at 12 inches by the way. I think I'll just make 2 each month as that will give me 20 blocks - in a 4x5 setting of 48x60 for a nice throw size..... unless I decide to make 3 each month (and make another orange and teal) and have a 5x6 setting for a 60x72... since the kids are growing taller than me already...... we will see how the weekend goes!

I made a list on my white board in the office of the blocks I am making this year.... since I keep forgetting each month! I had 4 of the stash buster blocks in light and dark green. I made 2 in teals. I'll probably make a couple of orange ones tomorrow and maybe a bright green one... or two. These are fun to make and if my scraps had a 3.5 strip I could really have fun with this. We will see how distracted I get after making the orange and green ones... and how much AC time I need since the temps this weekend are going to be in the mid 90's in Florida!

I'll link up Saturday with the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. I do wonder what color April will be?