Stitching and Gardening

Good morning, my friends. We have a full day to prepare for our vaccines. We've both marked a sick day on our calendar for tomorrow. Our appointments aren't until 5:00 p.m., and so there's plenty of time to get some things done today in preparation for huddling under quilts tomorrow. Also, we have a box of Lipton Noodle Soup. It's our go-to sick person dinner. We make it just like the box says, but drop an egg in at the end and swirl it around with a fork. It makes the perfect meal when one isn't feeling like much else.

Backing up to yesterday, I arrived home a little after noon from getting my pedicure. I had some lunch and then took my seat to continue hand-stitching the quilt binding. Smitty gave me a stern look for starting without him again.

Purrhaps we should review the rules.

After stitching another three lengths of thread, I'd turned the second corner. Now I'm gaining on the third corner. If I'm very energetic, I might finish it up today.

By then, I decided my toes were dry enough for me to put on shoes and socks. My first priority outdoors was to whack the peonies to the ground, and to dig out the heartbreaker peony. Mike helped me with that. We were amazed at how enormous the roots had grown on that plant. It seems it puts all of its growing efforts below ground rather than making those pesky flowers above ground for the gardener's enjoyment.

Then, we dug a deep hole to plant the new peony. This one is called "Lavender Whisper." Obviously, I don't have a picture of it yet, but here's how it will look when it blooms.

(Image credit: Origami, CC BY-SA 3.0 <http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/>, via Wikimedia Commons)

Listen up, new peony: Don't go breakin' my heart, with apologies to Elton John and Kiki Dee.

From there, I pulled a few weeds, and then took a walk around. The cherry tomato is still producing clusters of green cherry tomatoes. 

There were a few ripe ones recently, but the heavy rains knocked them to the ground where the squirrels snatched them up. I'm hoping we'll get a few more tomatoes out of this plant, but not really counting on it.

My second first priority was to stake up the remaining two dahlias. I staked this Firefighter dahlia right away when we got home from our trip. It was the heaviest and had the most flowers. I staked the other two yesterday.

Also, I heard from the local grower where I purchased my tubers that I should cut them back and store them two weeks after the first hard frost, or else by mid-November. Thanks. That makes it easy. I'm told while they are still blooming, the tubers are growing and gaining nutrients for the winter ahead.

Also, I was surprised to see two flowers on the Edda clematis. This is only its second season, and it's been pretty scrawny up to now. It's been a good bloomer this second season. This one was down low on the plant.

This one was up higher, near the top.

There are still some bedraggled echinacea blooming.

And there are still flowers on the purple hydrangea. All in all, it's a surprising bit of color this late in the season.

That seemed like enough gardening effort for the day. I'm hoping to get out and pick a bucket of weeds today, and then I'll feel as if I've done enough for the yard until next year.

Back inside, I had just a little bit left to stitch on Block 10 for Domestic Affairs.

And that prompted me to trace the next one and choose my floss colors. This is a free stitchery from Anni Downs at Hatched and Patched called "Hanging the Christmas Lights." Mr. Random Number Generator selected this as my "Short" embroidery project this time around. It seems like a good choice with the holiday season approaching.

Choice of colors was up to me, and this is what I selected from my floss stash. 

I've worked with those DMC Diamant metallic flosses before, and they are an absolute pain to thread in the needle. I'm hopeful these will be somewhat cooperative. There are limited sources for true metallic floss, and none of them are easy to work with.

So that's next on my agenda. I'll take the first stitches this morning, and then I have a little housework to do today. Also, I want to get in another workout. So far I'm one for one on my new workout commitment. Can I make it two for two? Certainly, I wouldn't want to mess up my perfect workout attendance, now would I?

All right, my friends. Let's go start our days. And let's make it a good day today.