A Morning to Catch Up

Home again, safe and sound. It was good to see Mike and the kitties. Today I'm excited to get some sewing done on the Adirondack Chairs, but I had to get myself organized before I can even think about that. There isn't a bit of food left in the house, and so I'm going to need to make a trip to the grocery store. Of course, that means planning a menu and creating a list.

Before I could do that, however, I needed to get things unpacked. It's the worst part of traveling, and this trip was especially bad because of all the fabric I took along. It all had to be sorted out and put away along with the new stuff I bought during class. Not to mention all the pencils and markers...and the pictures...and my project...and my sewing tools. Yes, lots to do.

The first order of business was to feed the birds. Their feeders were empty, and they were all standing around the feeders, tapping their little birdie feet, looking toward the house, and discussing how downhill the service at this restaurant has gone. Geez. So, they're all fed and happy again. As long as I was out, I took a walk around to see what was new. The last of the tulips are blooming. These are such a dark purple they look almost black.

Also, the prettiest of the rhododendrons is in bloom now. I'll tell you it's the prettiest until the dark purple one starts to bloom, and then I'll be telling you that one is the prettiest. I'm very fickle about the flowers.

Look at how the Gracie Memorial Catnip Garden is filling in! It's starting to bloom now too. The bees like it.

Also, the white iris are starting to bloom. There are about a dozen of these. The other colors are just barely heading up, but they'll be following along soon.

In the greenhouse, the sunflowers have all germinated now. I'll wait a week or so, and then plant these with the rest of them.

The original echinacea seeds I planted are both germinated now. It took about three weeks. Obviously, they are slow growers. I checked the remaining four seeds I'd planted last week. One is germinating, but the others have yet to show themselves.

The lettuce is almost to a place where we can begin to pick leaves off of it. The one on the right is a butter lettuce. In the middle is a red leaf, and on the left is a green leaf. Not all my seeds germinated, but there's plenty of lettuce here for two people. Also, the CSA will be starting up within a week or two, and so we'll have lettuce galore.

After that, I moved into the sewing room to try to get organized. I still needed to sew the pieced borders onto the Mumm's the Word quilt. Since I needed the space for my Adirondack chairs, I finished that up. It's my first finished monthly goal for May. No flies on me.

Whoa...are we back to sewing again? Let me just take a look here...hmmm...

Now, this is my kinda quilt. Look at those cats!

And having cleared a space, I could lay my project on my work table. It's all pinned to a foam board, and so I was able to get it home without losing anything...at least nothing that I know of. This is where it stands now. I've kind of decided to bag the rocks in the background and so I added sky above. Ann wanted me to put some in the lower corners to balance and "anchor" the design. The rest will be done in a combination of sunny lemon yellows. As I look at this, I don't think I'm liking the piece below the red chair, and so I'm probably going to switch it out for something else.

When I finish writing this post, I'll head off to the grocery store, and then I'll be ready to start sewing when I get back and get the groceries put away.

Remember this quilt Ann Shaw showed us during class? It's a quilt created from a picture of her husband when he was three years old. 

And, if you'll recall, it made me want to make a quilt from a picture I have of my brother, Richard. This is the picture that jumped to mind immediately. He was about five years old at the time...two years before I was born. My dad took this photo. I was a little sorry it isn't in better focus, but I think it's good enough for my purposes. 

There's another one (below), but I like the one above better since it shows his shoes. There isn't much detail in the face, but the Ruth McDowell method is to leave details off the faces...much like Amish dolls...and so it won't matter.

Being a glutton for punishment, I've already put my name on the list for a class that will be held in the same Vancouver, WA, location in March of 2017. In the meantime, I want to read Ruth McDowell's books and see if I can accomplish this on my own...this, or something simpler. I'm very excited about the technique. Ann made a comment on the last day of class about something she'd heard another art quilter say. She said that quilters often told her they wanted to make art quilts, but that many quilters (me included) don't feel as if they are good enough artists to pull it off. This method makes art quilts "accessible" to so-called non-artists. It was exactly what I thought when I was first introduced to the technique.

So there's still a lot to do if I'm to have any time for sewing this afternoon, and so the grocery store is next on my list.