How to Grow a Cat

This morning's post has to be quick. Mike and I are taking his truck in for some kind of recall service. I don't know what...some things aren't worth asking about. I just do as I'm asked. And then, it must be my day for driving around town because I have to go into downtown Portland (shivers at the thought of it) to see my dermatologist. The last time I saw my dermatologist, things were going along just fine, pandemic aside. (That's a big aside.) But then, I had to get a painful Moh's procedure done on my nose. 

That was November. It was still sore a month later. Then I broke my shoulder and forgot all about my nose. My brother always told me the quickest way to get rid of a headache was to have someone kick you in the shins. It wasn't the exact same scenario, but I think my brother would have approved of how I healed my sore nose. And...I'm not saying it's my dermatologist's fault that I broke my shoulder, but I'm suspicious of what set all that in motion. 

And then there are the cats. When I went downstairs after writing yesterday's post, Smitty had relocated himself from his morning sun kitty pole position to the cool floor of the hallway. Apparently the morning sun was a little too much for his delicate furs. Besides, he didn't want to end up with a Moh's procedure on his beautiful pink nose.

I was on my way to starting the final Dancing Chickens and Flying Pigs block. This one doesn't have a whole lot of stitching on it, and so I should be able to finish it up pretty quickly.

Mike was busy cutting this oddball piece of masonite in order to block off Sadie's access to her impenetrable hidey hole above the kitchen cabinets. 

You might recall she got left behind on our last camping trip when she hid in this space from which she could not be retrieved. This is how that space looked to her then. She jumps up to where I've placed an arrow and then into the space above the cabinets and behind the crown moulding.

Little stinker. Up until now, it has looked like this to her:

The next time she tries to jump up there, she'll be confronted with this dead end:

That oughta fix her little red wagon. 

Okay, and since I know my current slow-stitching piece won't last me very long, I decided to go ahead and trace out the next block for the Heartland Barns quilt. Now this one is ready to go.

And then, I got back to my sewing. I was getting ready to sew the bow-tie to the newest Ties & Tails cat block.

And then I sewed this front portion of the cat together.

And that was all well and good until I discovered I'd used the wrong fabric in the spot I've circled in the image below. I was using background fabric, when I should have used the cat fabric.

Okay, so it was more annoying to fix it than it was difficult. It set me back about 15 minutes, but there you go. That makes more sense.

About then, my little helper cat showed up.

She must have heard the bird chirping.

Mmmmmm...I love birds. They are so appurrtizing!

Once the bird was finished, the rest of the cat went together pretty easily.

From there, I added the eyes and stitched in some details.

This is the sixth of nine cat blocks. Each one has a black flange, and so I added that next.

And these blocks are sashed together with red 2.5 squares from my red scraps. For this one, I only needed reds on two sides. When the blocks are sewn together, the pieced sashings will complete one another.

Here are all the blocks I have for this quilt so far. Also yesterday, I added one more row of red to the right side of the tall cat in the second row. I should have done that last time, and so I fixed it while I had the reds out.

Okay, and so next, I'll be getting busy quilting the Dream Big panel. 

I said I was going to get started on this more than a month ago. Now, I really, really, really mean it. There are a couple of tasks on today's to-do list: watering flowers and one housekeeping chore. I don't know if I can fit all that in with my running around town today, but I'll give it a good try.

And now...my time has run out. Have a good day, my friends.