RSC

 Well, I have not been very productive with the RSC so far this year. I guess I have been concentrating on finishing up some UFO's instead of starting new things. I did get the 3 green Arkansas Traveler blocks completed and plan to make 3 in red this month.

I did get these green scraps stitched up last month and it included a few reds for February.

I had prepped these peels for the string of beads block. I cut out the background at 13 inches.... but I think I am going to change that to a 14 inch background for a little more wiggle room. The pattern say's it ends up at 12.5 inches, but I find the needle turned applique sometimes shrinks a little. I might try at this size and see how it goes but might swap the next ones to 14 inch blocks. 

I might have made a mistake cutting my Harmony block and now have these 4.5 inch blocks. I am not sure if they will become a new project or some reverse image white stars with red surrounding it. We will see.

The big progress has been on the Harmony UFO block. I have one seam to go on the last block. Then I get to stitch the 4 blocks together for a 57 inch top. This one is hand pieced. The original Harmony sew along information can be found here.

I'm linking up with the Rainbow Scrap Challenge on Saturday and the Slow Sunday Stitching on Sunday.

2 more long seams to go!

 I have 2 long seams to hand stitch before the 4th and last Harmony block is done. Then I can sew the 4 blocks together for a completed top!

This was Bear the other night while Aidan was watching an old F1 race from 2012. The new thing this week, Aidan got braces put on yesterday. He had them for a year when he was younger, but when you don't wear the retainer things move and his front tooth was getting pushed and crooked and his bite was way off. He is in a load of hurt today but went into it knowing what to expect. One year and then they will put permanent wires on the back of the top and bottom so it should last into adulthood.

Slow Sunday Stitching.

 Yes, it will be a slow stitching day for me! I have a 3 hour timeframe to sit at a Gold Awards workshop with Emily, so you can bet I will be stitching. I did a little prep work yesterday. I had to recut and mark some parts for hand stitching after I swapped the colors and stitched them up a few days ago! Mistakes do happen.

I'll be working on stitching the correct triangle in a square units (with the white triangles not red like I did a few days ago!). Those will be added to the flying geese I stitched last night.

They go in the middle sections.

Might this 4th and final Harmony block get completed today? We will see.

Just in case, I finally prepped one of the string of beads blocks with my consistent green and red for February in the RSC. I am debating if I do a green in the middle one or not. We will see. For this month, there will be 2 reds done I think.

I had posed a question on Facebook - the Celebrate Hand Quilting page yesterday. I have had my cat and mouse on the frame for hand quilting for a couple of years. I tend to use the hoop more than the frame right now, so I had asked about basting the rest on the frame (I really only did the bottom 2 borders and started on the mouse border for hand quitling) and taking it off to work on in the hoop in the living room. They assured me it should work, so my plan is to work on that this week and get that one off the frame and start working on it.

Linking up with Kathy and the Slow Sunday Stitchers.

Back to square 1

 

Wednesday night I cut out the needed parts for the rest of the last Harmony block. I hand stitched these 8 blocks and then pulled the directions to put them together. Attach at the big white triangles. Oops! I switched the fabrics. The red was to be the outer part and white in the middle. Back to the drawing board, or cutting board if you will. At least the flying geese are fine, but these will need to be cut and marked for sewing. 

Harmony - block 4

 I have been doing a little stitching this week. I have the four corners all stitched. I need to cut and prep the flying geese and triangle in a squares for the middle sections. I should be able to do that later today. 

No riding tomorrow as I managed to tweak my back and pulled a muscle. Good news, I was able to sleep fine last night and today it is not bad, but I'll baby it for a bit. Seems if you bend and reach across your body to grab something from the floor, you can pull a muscle in your back and ouch! I might have done it twice within 2 hours. The first time was not bad, the second I really felt for a while. I guess the hexagon quilt will not get pinned tomorrow, that would be too much bending and stretching. I should be able to play with the machine though! I need to work on my table scrap challenge project - green and snowflakes. It should be fun!

Weekend

Last Sunday's stitching got these into a top. I was planning a small yellow border then my black butterfly one, but I thought it was too bright. I went with a 2 inch light/bright blue instead. It will finish at 1.5 inches and then I'll add a 5.5 inch of the butterfly fabric around the outside today. I'd love to get it pinned for machine quilting, but I doubt that will happen today. Progress at least! I believe it will finish at 85x 97. 

 

I love this butterfly fabric I found. I think it will be the perfect border. Yes, Bear was helping to hold down the quilt. He is really waiting on a walk.

I did get some surgery stitching in this morning with a dog snout through the kitty door looking into my sewing room to view the process. Bear's pickle, snowman and gingerbread cookie are all restitched from their gaping wounds from the tugging game with Aidan or ripping to get to the stuffing. They each got a beat down as soon as they were fixed. I think he is happy everyone is now in the rotation to play rather than being on top of the tv hutch waiting for surgery. The snowman and gingerbread were $5 finds right before Christmas. 

He has been snuggled in with either Greg or Emily this week in the evenings, so I shut their doors and let the cats explore the house. That lead to 2 kitties on me in the recliner. They were happy.

I pulled the parts for the 4th Harmony block. I cut and prepped the twisted triangle -the cream one - and got that stitched up this week. I started assembly but need to make one more of the 'house' units since it is hiding really well somewhere in the sewing space. I have the fabrics, so it is easier to cut and piece it at this point.

I plan to cut out some orange peels today for the String of Beads blocks I'll be working on this year. I got the background and it was a long decision on what consistent green I wanted. I had originally pulled a sage green, but then wandering around I saw this darker hunter green. I held both bolts along rows of various colors and decided the darker hunter green will make the selected colors pop more. We will see how it turns out! For a 60x60 wall hanging, I'll need 25 blocks. The inner 4 peels will be colors other than green. The green will be the outer 4 peels.

linking up with Slow Sunday Stitchers and the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. I did get the 3rd Arkansas Traveller block completed for the month of green. I wonder what color February will be?

Thursday update

 I spent much too much time working on my day off today. I did get my walk with the dog, my riding lesson and was able to pull Aidan from school for his orthodontist appointment. Not a bit of sewing or prepping yet today.  I'll add a few stitches into Harmony after I finish this post.

I decided I needed help coming up with recipes for meals this year, so everyone gets a week to come up with a few meal ideas. Some went with tried and true and some went with new things. 

Greg had his Birthday week which was back on the 11th. He mentioned tacos and my Mom's spaghetti meat sauce. I added meatloaf one night that week as well. A leftover night and a take out from Pig and Cattle (birthday boy choice).  I had gotten a roaster chicken Saturday at Sams that week after picking up a kid from volunteering at a robotics tournament. It was dinner that night and chicken chili the next night. There were no leftovers of the chili! I guess they liked it on a cool night. The corn bread disappeared as well!

This week was Emily's ideas. Aidan had picked out pork chops at Sams, so I have 3 meals of them sealed in the freezer and some were cooked Monday night with garlic mashed potato and peas. Tuesday was Emily's selection of Pepper Steak, which I had peppers that needed using. It was good and added to the rotation. I had gone to the Farmers Market Saturday and got some eggplant and brussels sprouts. I had brussels sprouts and bacon one day for lunch. Wednesday, I did an eggplant parmesan for dinner and Em and Greg made pasta and finished off the spaghetti sauce. Tonight, Aidan was a big help cooking while I prepped Emily's second recipe of the week - Japanese Chicken Curry. Who knew they did curry in Japan? I read up a bit on it and it turns out it is a common meal there! We even had the curry roux in the international aisle at the store! It took a good hour to make it and we had it with the recommended rice. We all agreed it was really good and we should make it again. Aidan didn't like the carrots in it, but I thought they were really good. There is enough for another meal. It is not spicy at all, more like a savory/slightly sweet stew over rice.  Aidan is looking at recipes from the Georgia/Polish regions. We will see what he comes up with. 

While trimming the skin on bone in chicken thighs for the recipe tonight, I threw those extra parts into the crock pot with some water, onion, carrot, celery and garlic with some frozen parsley stems. A little salt and pepper and thyme and it is in the crock pot for the night on low to make some broth. Some sort of soup will be made this weekend with it as a cold front goes through. I'm thinking potato leek, but we will see. Maybe a Zuppa Toscana? I'll see what I feel like tomorrow or Saturday.

Harmony - I cut and pieced these twisted triangles a couple of nights ago, the only tricky one to piece in this project. I had a set of 4 of the other parts needed, except one of the houses with the triangles at the top. One of those stacks only has 3. I made 4 based on my blog post in 2021, so I have no clue where he is hiding. I'll cut out another one tomorrow to stitch up this weekend. I can begin making the other 3 corners, so I'll work on that tonight. 

Time to stitch!

Slow Sunday Stitching

 Sunday is the day we are encouraged to slow down, take a deep breath and do some slow stitching. I want to thank Kathy for encouraging us every year by hosting this wonderful Slow Sunday Stitching link up. 

I took the final stitches last night on the third hand pieced Harmony block, from a sew along back in 2021 with Patty Dudek and Kristin Esser. 

This is the first 3 blocks all together. They each finish at 28 inches square. I did find some of the parts for the last block and have them moved to their baggie. I need to cut out some parts that are missing so it will be all set to pick up this week and make some progress. 

A new project for me this year with the RSC (Saturday link up with Angela), is doing some orange peel needle turned applique. I did this quite a few years ago (2015+2016) and made this one that I call hugs and kisses. Needle turned applique and hand quilted. I had a lot of car line time! I could get a few done each day!

 This time I will be doing a block called String of Beads. I saw a quilt of this in green and purples back in the 90's and loved it. I think I will use a consistent green in the outer 4 peels and then the color of the RSC Challenge for the 4 inner peels each month. I'm thinking I want a 60x60 quilt to hang on the wall, so I'll need 25 blocks for a square... or more for a rectangle. My template fits the photo perfectly!

I've been working on getting this one ready for assembly. It was hand pieced (not epp) and hand appliqued down to the black background back in 2014 and 2015. I finished the last block I needed for a 12x14 layout this week and laid it out for machine piecing Saturday. 

So a little machine work and then prep work for the last Harmony block is on my agenda today. Oh, I need to search for a green for those string of beads blocks as well. I have a fabric in mind, but I'm not sure I have enough for the year. Plenty to keep me busy on a 3 day weekend! 

Assembly time!

 I got a little sewing time in on Thursday. 

I was able to mark these 8 flying geese for hand piecing and got them pieced together into their sets of 2 for the final parts needed to assemble the 3rd Harmony block. I also found parts for the 4th Harmony block. I have a little more work to get that one assembled. A few parts are missing, so they need to get cut out and pieced. I was happy to find the majority of the parts and the extra fabric that goes with them. I think this one will get worked on until it is a top at this point.

I also found a black background for the hexagon, and that got stitched down yesterday as well. That means that quilt can get machine stitched together on the long weekend. Turns out the kids and I both have Monday off for Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. day. 

More hand work

 This is the Angel trumpet in bloom out back.

The girls - they all come running when I go out back.... or even walk through the living room! They have great vision. 4 of the 5 are laying. Two greens (Poppy and Eggnog), a light brown (the black and white ones - DC is laying) and a dark brown (Buttercup the Rhode Island Red). The other black and white one - Maple, seems to still be having issues with her shells. She is one of the 3 year old ones, so she will just live out her life happy here. They are more like pets after all!

I was laying out the blocks I hand stitched the last couple of days to make the star in the center. Bear needed to help out.... sigh, with dirty feet from a soccer match outside this morning after his walk. Oh well, it will wash out.

I just need to mark the 8 flying geese units I need to stitch up to finish up this block, then I can assemble it. I'll have to go searching for the 4th blocks parts. I am thinking that one was not as far as the rest were, but we will see. Those are hanging around in the sewing area somewhere.

I have horses later today and am waiting to see if work needs some help this morning. If not, I'm going to be playing with the Arkansas Traveller blocks to figure them out. I have 2 patterns in my cart for purchase that might be other RSC blocks this year. I am still thinking on it.

A stormy day

 The kids will be home today with the storms that will be going through Florida. They cannot run the busses with winds over 40 mph, and the gusts are to be 45-55 mph. We have a wind advisory from 4AM through evening. It appears it is going to be going through with all the rain right when the kids would have been getting out of school, so that is nice. Both are enjoying sleeping in today. Teenagers! 

I got a little hand stitching in last night and got the four corner pieces of Harmony stitched together. I'll be marking the sewing lines on the next parts later today. Always good to have hand work ready to go, just in case we lose power later.

I had made some sugar cookie dough about a week ago and I finally baked them off on Sunday. I was planning to do snowflakes but darned if I could find those cutters in my sewing room. So, I dug out all the cutters - I have a box of Christmas and a box of Fall/Halloween and then have acquired various other ones over the years. I decided to grab a whale and did 2 sheets of those. Then I found a crab and turtle for the second batch of cookies. I hear Emily is tapped to frost them today, but they are pretty good without as well. The recipe is in my recipes tab about half way down the page. I half it when I make it. 

I can see the branches moving on the trees as I look out, so I guess they are correct about it being windy today. I guess I will fill up my drinking bottles with water just in case. We have a well, so no power then no water!

Slow Sunday Stitching in a new year

 A new year is a great time to regroup and start new projects and finish up some old ones. This year I plan to add a little more counted cross stitch and crochet or knitting back into the mix and some needle turned applique. (Orange peels!)

For today, I'm sharing an old project that is a hand piecing quilt block called Harmony. It was a quilt along back in 2021 from Kristin Esser and Patty Dudek. I opted to use some red fabrics and decided to make 4 of the 28 inch blocks. Well, I got one done in 2021 for the final link up to the sew along. I pulled the parts for the second block at the end of last year and got the second block completed. I had some parts of the third block completed and pulled them out this week and made some progress. I stitched the 4 parts in the lower right hand corner together and then added the white rectangle on the left side yesterday. I'll be adding the top HST/rectangle to the top of each block today. I know I have the next parts cut, but they probably need their sewing line drawn and then will be ready for their assembly into the flying geese and triangle in a square units. I added a photo of the completed block so you can see what this will turn into. 

Linking up with the Slow Sunday Stitchers and a big Thank You to Kathy for encouraging us to slow down, breathe and stitch. 

First Finish of 2024! Bear Paw is completed!

 When I don't have an animal laying on me, I am able to get a little binding stitching in!

The binding is completed on the Bear Paw. It decided the hand quilting in the HST's was not needed and it is happy as is! 

Started in 2000 with a class at Yankee Pride in Winooski Vermont, waited for hand quilting skills and is finally finished in 2024. Machine pieced; hand quilted. Finished size 35.5x53. It still needs a washing and drying so it might shrink up a bit.

I took Emily to the dentist yesterday. Note to self, bring the drug store glasses for close up to thread a needle or find a good needle threader! Boy, my eye's were feeling their age trying to thread needles! I did get these 4 parts sewn together on the Harmony block #3 though, before I gave up. I have all the parts ready to make these 4 corner units for the block. Then I'll have to stitch the flying geese and triangle in a square units for the middle sections.

Ending the day with heat in the house is a nice feeling! I woke up to a chilly house yesterday. Turns out the thermostat unit died! A service call and a new unit and my feet are much happier today sitting in my office working. I had to dig the wool socks and slippers out yesterday while working!

Stay tuned.... the second binding is about halfway done on the Green Tumbler quilt! I also pulled and counted the black hexagon blocks from the 2014 RSC. Looks like I need to make one more hexagon flower and applique it to the black background to have all the blocks needed for that quilt. When the finishing bug hits, you run with it!

Sunday

I was able to finish this Harmony block this week. It is hand pieced and finishes at 28 inches. This was a 2021 sew along with Patty Dudek and Kristin Esser.  This is my second block of 4 to make the 56 inch quilt. The reds and tans will be different in each block.

This is the first block finished in 2021.

I took the bag with me to horses Saturday after marking all my stitching lines on Friday night. All the parts for the corner sections are stitched. At horses I was able to add the HST to the rectangle while chatting with other parents for the lesson before.

 

They were down to 2 horses with the others gone to a show and 2 others left behind lame this morning. Poor Reba and Ellwood got the brunt of the lessons. They were both in western saddles, so Emily rode western yesterday instead of English. 

 I had lots of prep work on Friday cleaning walls and prepping for painting. Then the kids went to Grandma's to help her Christmas her house. Since that was my tall person for the high parts (I dislike heights), I delayed painting by a day. The first coat took over 3 hours.... I had Emily helping a little then Aidan came out and did the high parts. The second coat went quickly in under an hour with Aidan's help. It looks so much better now with 12 years of scratches and wear against the main walkway into the house. Now I can hang my quilt hanger onto this wall just in time for Christmas decorating today. That will happen after the F1 race and we do need to go visit my FIL and check on him. A busy day but stitching will happen!

Linking up with Kathy and the other slow stitchers.

Harmony block #2 is completed!

 

This Harmony block is 28 inches. Hand pieced. I believe all the parts for the next block are cut and in a baggie. I just need to mark some stitching lines and then I can start. I was selecting different reds and tans for each block, so I don't reuse any of them. The white is a constant through all the blocks... with the exception of the 8 flying geese in these but I had a similar white fabric, and it should not be noticeable. Let's hope it does not take 2 years to finish the next one!

Friday

We had a nice Thanksgiving day yesterday. My MIL and her hubby came over and it was a beautiful weather day. Temps were in the upper 60's which is a cold front for us, but I love these temps! That meant the annual game of HORSE after the meal. We followed it up with PIG and IT. I think I won the PIG and was first out on IT. Keep in mind, Grandma turned 80 in August. My FIL opted not to come over. He did not want us to go over later in the day either.... so we'll take the kids over on Saturday to do a cone pick up on his yard and visit and bring some food over to him. The church group should be dropping a meal off to him today.

After they headed home, hubby and I watched Mystery Alaska on Tubi and I got some stitching time in! One more seam all set to stitch to have the top section ready. You can tell, no pressing has happened yet! This has been a well-travelled project. A couple trips to Vermont, lots of activities and events and it finally got some attention. I believe all the parts for the 3rd block are cut and in a baggie. I know marking lines need to be added to them, but the hard part is done.

My plans for today - head to Lowes and buy paint! Today is the day to prep and start painting a couple of walls inside the house. It's been 12 years since we moved in and now that the hole (2020 Greg's head hit by the floor when he passed out from back pain) is patched and dried and textured, I am ready to get it done. Having a tall person home to do the high ceiling part helps. Once that is done (2 coats I know), then we can Christmas the house up!

I'll find a few moments to stitch that seam and pin and start stitching the bottom sections together, I hope.

Wishing you all a nice Friday. 

Wednesday

 Not as much stitching as I'd like, but a little progress. I did cut out the 8 flying geese I needed and have 3 of them stitched. It should go together fairly quickly... you know, if I actually pick up the needle and thread!

Sunday already?

 It was a long 24 hours with the kids! They both had a great time yesterday. One was volunteering at a robotics tournament and the other went to the FSU football game last night and returned back to the school around 2:50AM. Yea.... I didn't get much sleep last night! I also watched the F1 race in Vegas with Aidan from 1-2:20 when I headed over to pick up Emily. I have a feeling I will be dragging a bit today!

I did manage to pop to the grocery store and pick up a standing rib roast. I do love prime rib and it is so easy to cook at home. I tend to get them when they are on sale around the holidays, cook them to a rare/medium rare and then seal a meal individual slices for the freezer. I need to adjust my amounts this year as it appears the girl likes them now too and will pull them out for meals when she doesn't like what is offered. Thanksgiving, Christmas time and Easter are when they are on sale, so I plan accordingly. I ran out a few months ago. I also like to add it to my salads for lunches =).  I tend to do a recipe like this, although sometimes I just do salt and pepper for seasoning or add some fresh chopped rosemary and garlic. I've got a 7 pound roast I need to take out of the fridge in a little bit and put the turkey in to start defrosting. I have a 12 pound one of those. 

I did just a little in the sewing room yesterday and got a set of split nines done in light blues. I need 2 more sets to finish off this one I think for a child size donation quilt.

I pulled out some hand piecing and was working on Harmony from a hand stitch along in 2021. I need to make 4 more of these and then really search for the 8 flying geese I need to finish the block. I have them for the next block but the ones for this block are missing. I have the fabric, so I'll probably just cut more out and mark for stitching. I'm sure they will turn up as soon as I do that!

Not much progress on the Bear Paw but I have a feeling it will be a bit of a lazy day today so probably a movie and some hand work are on tap.

The kids are off for the week of Thanksgiving. I have appointments scheduled for them on Tuesday. Dentist and blood draw as a follow up on their physicals last month. Too busy to do it until now. 

We made the mistake of letting the dog out back last night during the race. I completely forgot it was Sunday and the auto irrigation was on for the lawn. Our crazy water loving dog found the sprinkler head by the fence and would not come in. Silly boy. Thank goodness Aidan knew how to turn it off. He eventually came in.... he was in hog heaven playing in the water and mud. I guess Greg and the kids get to check and fix that this week too! 

Linking up with the RSC quilters and the Slow Sunday stitchers.