Sunday....

 This is what happens when I attempt to take photo's for the blog! Peanut thinks he needs to 'help' holding things down! Silly boy.

This is how far I have gotten on the BOM - Happy Little Things. I decided to hand piece this one as I have more waiting time than sewing machine time lately! I got the flying geese done in the car line. Lines are drawn and this one is ready to get pieced the next time I am waiting.

I grabbed the first 'clip' I saw. It was a binding clip. Great way to keep parts together.

 I also found block 1 from Save the Bees BOM...who know's maybe I'll actually finish this block sometime now that it is in the baggie of hand work. I might have found this while starting to go through things as I put things back in the sewing area!

 This is my take with me baggie of hand work. It contains the above 2 projects as well as my umbrella block parts for back basting applique. I think there is also an applique snowflake tucked in there from another project... just in case I might run out of anything to do!

I did have an issue on Friday. I had tucked my knitting needles and yarn into the car console. I have a bunch of stuff in there.... and when I tried to get it out.... I broke the tip off one of the bamboo needles! Bummer..... I love my bamboo needles. Since I have not 'found' the bag of knitting stuff, I opted to cast off this dish cloth half way. Hey - it will still wash the dishes just fine! Note to self - always buy 2 skeins of dish cloth yarn so I can make 3. One skein tends to make 1.5 dish cloths and I only remember to buy 1... so that second one is ...... colorful! I think instead of the console I'll grab a big zippered bag that I can tuck various projects in and just keep it in the passenger foot area. Must pack that bag up today and pop it into the car. I'll tuck the cross stitch and it's book in there as well. Never can have too many options available!

Linking up with the other Slow Sunday Stitchers. 

Saturday morning we split up a bit. I took Emily to horses while Dad took the boy to get a hair cut - out to lunch with some of his gift cards and they picked up some powdered sugar Emily needed to finish off the lemon frosting for her lemon cake she made Friday night. I heard from Aidan.... Dad was thinking she needed 5 pounds of powdered sugar (5 cups in reality) and was putting 5 bags of it into the cart! Aidan just looked at him and asked what he was doing? He realized his mistake and they got 2 bags and put the rest back on the shelf! Silly boys.  We did find out some great news. Emily's riding instructor had to move quickly back in June and relocated about 35 minutes from us and had to leave behind the covered arena. We are in Florida. It rains and is HOT.  It was feels like 97 degrees at 10AM yesterday. Em was dripping sweat and red faced when she was done at 10:50. Liz just signed a lease for a covered arena 5 minutes from us! I fear my girl is going to be having a second home at the barn helping out very soon.

Prince was waiting for her when we got there to get his rub down and then get all saddled up for riding.

He got a bath after and then she put him out in the field when she was done her lesson. 

Slow Sunday... and figured out a fix for not being able to leave comments!

First off - Happy Sunday!

I think I'll try and add a few leaves to block 1 of the Save the Bees sew along.

 I also hope to put a few stitches into the sadly neglected baby heart quilt that really needs to get finished and shipped to it's new owner who is almost 5 months old! This corner heart will get finished today...

Linking up with the other slow turtle stitchers at Kathy's Quilts.

Oh - I have not been able to leave comments on blogs since about mid October. (sorry about that, I have been reading just not able to comment using Safari when the only option is google account). I found this morning that if I use a different browser (I am on a mac so went with Opera) I am able to leave comments! Yea. I will try and visit blogs later today and actually be able to leave some comments again.

Saturday was our Light up Ocala Parade and my girl scout troop walked in it yesterday afternoon. We combined the two troops (my co-leader has a daisy troop with a few younger sisters) for making the banner and walking.
I'm so happy our girls got a first place ribbon! That was  a first for us... they tend to judge 3 banners at a time for 1,2,3 place. We usually get 3rd since we let the girls do the banner. One of our juniors (4th grade) came up with the idea and they all worked on it this year (Kg-4th grade). The theme was G.I. R. L. - Go Getter, Innovator, Risk Taker and Leader. They decided THEY were the G. I. R. L. and I printed out photo's of things we have done in the last year.  I am so proud of them. We had 15 walking in the parade in our troops and 216 girl scouts from our area. Emily and I ended up going out to eat after at the Golden Corral with my co-leaders family for dinner.

Today, they are headed to Grandma's for an overnight (they are off school this week) and I'm taking the hubby to the movies to see the newest Harry Potter film. I will also have plenty of time to play with my sewing machine and get some slow stitching in. As Kathy reminds us, even just a few stitches will help to relieve stress, remind us to breathe and slow down and appreciate all we have and our talents of what we are able to do. After all, it is Thanksgiving week here in the USA and we do have a lot to be thankful for.

Slow Sunday.....

Finally cooler temps today! I was thinking it would be yesterday with the highs around 78 or 79.... but no... I was a day off!Yesterday was still around 90 and HUMID! Aidan and I weeded for a couple of hours in the late morning heat. We went out mid afternoon and got some flowers for the front beds and then the kids planted them after dinner last night. It looks much better now! I went with blue and yellow which I know is not fall colors but these should last through the winter with some color in this front bed.

This has become Aidan's corner for planting. He added 4 plants yesterday and the two leafy ones last weekend.

Today... I plan to finally get the last row of hand stitching done on the green tumbler quilt top. I have 6 of the 20  tumblers stitched together. The end is in sight.

A little house cleaning and then some quality time in the sewing room. A nice walk in the cooler temps today should happen once or twice as well.

A little applique tonight on the first save the bees block should be a nice relaxing end to the weekend. I need 2 parts in the middle of the flower - the yellows will cover that and then some leaves.... and the bee on the side of course.

Linking up with the other slow Sunday stitchers.

A little of this... a little of that.....

Monday afternoon, I worked a little on Emily's triangle quilt. We got a few rows sewn together and found the last 2 rows of triangles.... were missing a few (6!) and cut out a few more so we had the needed 34 triangles. I have 2 sets of 4 rows and one set of 2. It is 17 triangles across (using 6 inch strip and 60 degree ruler) and 12 rows for a nice size lap quilt. This is replacing one I gifted away which someone was not happy about!

Tuesday... the boy jammed his fingers at gym or recess catching a ball.... which made the guitar playing hurt so we put off the lesson a few days. Instead he helped me make two pillowcases - he picked out fabric on Monday for it. One for his pillow and one for his smaller 17 inch pillow. I hear they worked well last night!

I also got a little stitching in on Save the Bee's block 1 while Emily was reading her Myon lesson. I was not allowed to be on the phone or my computer...but she let me stitch! I back basted the light purple and then needle turned it. I had already done that for the dark purple and started needle turning that... before I had to start dinner - Taco Tuesday!

I attempted Aidan's requested dish cloth - he wanted blue and green (we got yarn Monday) as 4 patches... but when I started knitting it in the car line today I had an opening between the green and blue - cast on 40 - did 20 in blue then tried 20 in green.... but there was that opening. So.... I searched a bit and convinced him to like this pattern - changed slightly so it will be blue, green, blue and then the second one green, blue, green. That took concentration, so I just took pink yarn with me to an area girl scout meeting last night and started my standard knitting dish cloth, no thinking needed. One of the people from Tampa council always remarks on how much I get done in the meeting... which was really maybe 30 minutes once it started! I guess I had done the same thing the last time I went to that meeting in February!

Once I get Emily's to a top (She doesn't know it but she is going to walking foot quilt it!) .... I need to really start on Aidan's quilt. He decided he did not want to sew it... I could since he got so frustrated with it. His is Hopscotch Butterscotch in teal, orange and grey. 

Better get off here and log into work.....after I throw dinner in the crock pot. Stew beef with cream of mushroom soup, lipton onion soup mix, brown gravy packet and 1 cup of water.. with lots of carrots and an onion. Recipe from Grandma. Will serve over mashed potato (Aidan) and noodles (Emily). It will work... since we have horses today at 5.... right at dinner time! Emily also has her KCL (Kindness, community, leadership) club after school today until 3:15... so that means a little one on one boy time for me between pickups.

Sunday.... Save the Bee's block.

Well, I technically joined in the Save the Bee's quilt along that Jacqueline Steves is hosting.... but have yet to finish a block!

The first two were applique... I did start the first one but it is not finished. I have the stem sewn down and back stitched the big part of the flower.... that's it!

I have a feeling block 3 will be the first block completed. I picked 8 yellows earlier this week and made my template and marked the sewing line.

 I am sewing these together by hand, then will turn the edges under (maybe basting like Kathy W did) and then will applique that to the background.

I had cut the 8 squares out... and then just did a scissor cut of guessing 1/4 inch. Yup... should have used the ruler to cut that but it worked.

I got 7 sewn together... and for the life of me I can not find the 8th one! I cut another one out this morning and marked it... so you know it will turn up shortly!

I plan to attach the last hexagon today and while in the sewing room later will use the iron or the herra marker to turn that edge under so I can hand stitch it to the background.

First... I need to run to the girl scout store and purchase a few badges. We took the girls to the Fire Station for a refresher on first aid, emergency situations... and what the fire house guys really wanted.... to play with the water and fire hoses! Each girl got to hold the hose and spray water.. then they put the one from the top on and got almost all of us soaked! Yes, we knew it was coming and had prepped the parents and girls.  This is what it looked like! We are in Florida... so the temps were still in the 80's or upper 70's that evening while we were there.

We will finish up their badges tomorrow with a little more review, making a first aid kit and reviewing the last couple of things for them to earn their badges and pins.

Emily was in charge for a minute - a big shout out to Craig and his crew at the Fire station for inviting us over. We went 2 years ago and I hear there was some pouting since we didn't go last year... =) We scheduled him right off to make sure we got a chance to go over there this year.

Sharing a photo I snapped this week after dropping the kids to school. Yes Mom, I pulled over to the side of the road to take the photo!

Linking up with Kathy and the other slow stitchers.

Save the Bee's BOM - Starting point.

There is a Free BOM (4 blocks!) from Jacquelynne Steves called 'Save the Bee's'. She sent the first block instructions out on Monday and will release one block per month over the next 4 months. I  finally looked at some fabrics and decided to use up some of the hand dyed or batik scraps I have hanging around from a few quilts I have made. I know I have more somewhere... but these were in a basket just asking to be used! I think I will have a purple flower for the first block. I'm still deciding colors for the outside... time to break out the coloring pencils and see what I come up with and what fabrics I can find to make it work!

Have you signed up yet? There is still time and for ideas you can visit a few of her testers who have already completed their first block. This will be my first attempt at embroidery - wish me luck.