Red Sky at Morning

Sailors take warning. There's a change in the weather coming. It isn't really as ominous as all that, however. We're just going to go from sunny and cold to rainy and warmer. That's how it is in our part of the world. We get sunshine with the coldest temperatures...rain when it warms up.

But remember when we took our tree down, I said I thought we might be able to see Mt. Adams again? Well there it is.

When we bought our place, we had a three mountain view, including Mt. St. Helens, Mt. Rainier, and Mt. Adams. Over time, the trees grew up so we couldn't see Mt. Adams from the house. For that, we had to go out into the field. It's good to see it from my office window again.

So, you know we've been on diets for about 300 years. One of the gifts from our diet is Oatmeal Pancakes. They're made with quick-cooking oatmeal and nonfat buttermilk, and so they're low in fat and also low in sugar (not counting the syrup). We like them so much that we have them every Sunday. (I add some frozen blueberries to mine.) Mike tells me that he wakes up Sunday morning with pancakes on his mind. So it gave me a chuckle when I finished my blog post yesterday and went downstairs to find the place settings ready for our pancake breakfast. And even if you, like me, find pancakes too heavy for breakfast, these are very light and nice. The oatmeal gives them a nice texture.

So after breakfast I trudged back to the Wind in the Whiskers quilt. It looked just like it did when I left it, no quilting elves having come in the night.

The quilting started up again at this cat.

After that, I did the daisies to its left and the bee above its head.

The top-stitching is also serving as the quilting, and it's looking pretty good from the back.

After that, I took a break to make a dessert for last night's dinner...this Sticky Cranberry Gingerbread.

Now remember that Proclamation from a few weeks ago about First Friday Desserts? Well...never mind. We asked our neighbor to join us for dinner last night since he's alone and we had way more food than we needed. And so I'm amending the Proclamation to exclude holidays and nights when we invite someone over. Dessert is required on those nights. Am I right about that? I knew you'd agree.

So, I didn't take a picture of the inside, but I borrowed this one that accompanied the recipe in the New York Times. (I'm going to return it as soon as I'm finished with it.)

(image credit: Andrew Scrivani for The New York Times)

I made this for the first time two years ago, and it's so good. You make a sort of cranberry sauce and then plop it over the top of the cake batter. The cake bakes up and envelopes the cranberries, which end up on the bottom of the cake. So, so yummy. I served it with a little dollop of whipped cream.

Mike was out yesterday to get the oil changed in his car. He had to pick up some sugar too since I'd used up all of mine when I did the canning yesterday. While he was out, he picked up an amaryllis bulb. Amaryllis is one of those things I love, but I never get one for myself. I only get them for other people. Mike came through with one for me, and so I'm showing you its little green shoot here. 

If you've never seen an amaryllis grow, then you're in for a treat as I document this one's progress.

So that was a nice little interlude, but (sound of whip cracking) let's just get back to that quilting, shall we? The next step was to quilt in some hills...maybe a few too many, but whatever.

And then the merciful cat paid me a visit. I couldn't quilt with him standing there, and so I loved him up some, encouraging him to stay.

He really just wanted treats, and once I'd dispensed those, he was gone from the scene.

And then I started on the section above the hills. It was getting close to time for getting back to my dinner, and so I didn't do much more beyond this.

When I got up from my chair to finish for the day, I was horrified to find a flower on the floor and to realize also that some other pieces were missing. I found all of them, but this is the thing I've been most afraid of with this quilt. The very detailed and tiny applique pieces are coming loose as I maneuver the quilt around. Now, I'm pinning any loose ones, and hopefully I can get through this process without losing any of them.

I've had some problems with thread breakage. At one point yesterday I decided to change my needle to see if that would help. It didn't, but in the process I consulted the machine's manual to reassure myself I was putting the needle in the right way. While looking through the manual, I noted that it said 80/12 needles were available. I'd searched for needles once before and the smallest I could find were 90/14. Enter the love of my life, Amazon.com (♥♥♥), and I found some 80/12 Groz-Beckert needles there. They should arrive on Tuesday, and that will help a little.

So today, there's nothing on the agenda but sewing. I'm hoping to get well along with the quilting. Fingers crossed about the applique pieces. If I get through this without losing any, it will be something of a miracle.