Bee Flimsy

It was a cold, snowy day yesterday. Geez. Every time it snows, we hope it's the last snow of the season. While I have friends who celebrate every single snowflake, we don't live here for the snow. We live here because snow is a novelty...not a season-long event. Ignoring our feelings about it, the snow came down hard and thick, in big fat flakes yesterday. At times it was snowing sideways, and I began to appreciate what it means to have white out conditions.

On the other hand, Saturday was lovely. The sun was shining most of the day. I was glad I took advantage of the relatively warm weather to fill the bird feeders. It looks as if this Northern Flicker has just about polished off his suet though. Might have to trudge out there this morning.

So all of that to say that it was a good day to crank up the oven and bake a loaf of bread. This is the same loaf of Artisan Sourdough No-Knead Bread I baked a few days ago. The first loaf disappeared so fast, that we needed another one...and soon. We're trying to prove that, in fact, a man (and a woman) *can* live by bread alone. 

The link to the recipe is back there, but don't follow it exactly. The proofing time is too long, and the oven too hot. Cut about two hours off the first proofing time and reduce your oven temperature to 450°F when you put it in the oven. My plan is to make this same loaf one more time because I'm having breakfast with Matthew on Thursday. I want to take him a nice fresh loaf of bread...and possibly pass along some frozen soup. Honestly, I have so much soup in my freezer that I'm starting to foist it off on friends and family. "Here...have some lovely soup," I say. "No, really. I'm afraid I must insist!"

So, with the bread safely cooling on the bread board, I got to work finishing up the Bee Loving quilt. First the honeycomb inner border.

And then that busy bee border. I'm so glad I changed my mind about the outer border fabric. I like the way it brings out the bee fabric in the sashings.

Of course, it still needs quilting and binding. I'm going to use the honeycomb fabric for the binding. The backing is cut, but I need to sew one long seam, and then I'll cut the binding strips and call it good for now. I'm waiting for Mike's retirement in April and then I'll get him to help me set up the plywood table in the garage so that I can sandwich the accumulating flimsies for quilting. 

There is still one more quilt in the pile to be turned into a flimsy...the Quiltmaker's Garden...and that will be all of the finished tops for now. Originally, I thought I'd work on that in March, but I think I'll put it off until April. For March, I'm going to focus on blocks for the WIP's I have going, but I'll say more about that soon enough.

For now, I want you to notice how Smitty is using ALL of his powers of resistance to stay off the quilt while I get a picture of it. 

Stay strong, little buddy.

Today is going to be another NBS day, although I do have one housekeeping chore to take care of. The next challenge is out for Project Quilting, and the theme is "A Well Dressed Man." Well, I'll admit the theme left me cold, and I thought I'd sit this one out. Then...I used my imagination and came up with a great idea. It won't take long, and so I'll get to work on that first thing.

Also, did you see the post from Quiltshopgal about the Precision Piecing Quilt-Along?

Check it out. There are five mini quilt blocks posted as free downloads from Craftsy. You can make one or all of them and then link up. There are prizes! This comes along at a perfect time for me because I have a yen to try a really tiny little mini quilt.

So that's the day I have mapped out for myself. Time to get to it.