Rainbow Scraps: August's Orange

Yesterday morning, I finished off the remainder of Block 8 for the Heart & Home quilt. The correct name for this quilt is Home & Heart, but I kind of like the words switched around better. Here's the eighth of nine blocks. Just one more to go.

By all rights, the Snow Globes quilt blocks should be up next, but I'm going to finish the Pumpkin Pie block started during Meg Hawkey's class last weekend. It's just one block, and I don't want another unfinished project sitting around. It's anybody's guess why I started stitching in the middle of the block. Whatever my reasoning at the time, I've decided to move my hoop to the northwest corner of the piece and start where my OCD brain tells me to.

This block has a few fancy stitches in it, including the dreaded bullion stitch. Meg showed me how to do it in class that day, so we'll just see whether this old dog can learn a new trick, won't we?

There were a number of errands to run yesterday. First, I got my hair permed. I'm so much happier with my new hairdresser. I've been seeing her for about a year now, and she's worked a small miracle with my hair...not that it looks significantly better, but at least I'm happier with it. She's very attentive to my comfort level while she's doing a perm. Getting a perm is still unpleasant, but it feels less like torture than it did previously. After I finished there, I felt good enough to head out to the grocery store, and so that's done for the next few days too.

The air quality was terrible in town. It was bad enough when I left home, but driving into town with increased traffic and exhaust fumes made it worse. I have mild asthma that rarely requires me to use an inhaler. Nevertheless, I used it twice during the 3-4 hour trek into town. When I got home, I could actually see the valley below.

Remember the picture I showed you a few days ago?

There was still some time left in the day, and so I got to work on the orange blocks for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. I finished sewing the oranges together and then trimmed them to size.

Then I laid them out with their black and white counterparts:

And then I sewed them together. I was getting ready to take a picture when...uh-oh.

Purrdon me...there is a purroblem with the condition of my catnip bowl.

Purrhaps you could be purrsuaded to fill it, and then you may return to your regular purrogramming.

So, I plied him with some catnip, and then I was able to take my picture. Sheesh. Bossy.

There was some excitement yesterday when he and Sadie brought in a very-much-alive-and-feisty chipmunk. Sadie had it in her mouth and dropped it when I scolded her. (Scolding...as if.) The chipmunk was quick to escape. Those little suckers can jump! Fortunately, Mike was working from home and was able to help me catch it. I corralled the cats in a separate room and then gave chase to the chipmunk. When he jumped onto some aprons that were hanging on the wall, Mike was able to carry him outside, still clinging to the aprons, and set him free. Evisceration disaster averted.

Yesterday evening I went out to do some watering. While I was out, I checked the plums. Lookie there! Those are starting to turn. It will probably be at least a week before they're ripe, but they're coming along.

The wind came up a little by evening, but the tell tale red sky was still evident as the sun was setting.

When I got up this morning, the valley was still mostly obscured in smoke again.

Checking my phone, I noted that we were still under an air quality alert.

It seemed a good idea to give my lungs a break, and so I canceled my morning walk with Sue, which was kind of a bummer. We've missed our walks for several weeks running. I blame myself.

Today I'll get back to work on my embroidery, and then I should have some time this morning to try a new recipe for Small Batch Tomato Jalapeno Jam. I have enough tomatoes from our own plants to make this, and I have several jalapenos from our CSA shares. I cannot get enough tomato jam, and this year there have been enough tomatoes to try several different recipes. For now, my favorite is still Amy's Tomato Jam, but I'm open to testing each and every recipe until I land on the perfect one.

This afternoon, I'll be dropping my quilts off at the Oregon State Fairgrounds. The fair starts next week. This year, I'm entering the Quilting Snowladies...

and Quiltmaker's Garden.

Quiltmaker's Garden was finished just this past May. The Quilting Snowladies were finished a couple of years ago, but I missed the fair that year. We were traveling or something, and so I didn't enter anything. Fingers crossed my quilts will win ribbons, but that isn't the reason for entering. It's just so much fun to see your own quilts in a show, and that's reason enough to take the plunge.

So, it's an action-packed day as always. I'm going to try to breathe easy as I go.