Sizzle Sewing

Good morning, my friends. The promised heat wave has arrived in our area. I don't know how hot it was yesterday. I stayed inside for most of the day, taking one short walk around the house before calling the outdoors part of my day finished. We're expecting another hot day today. It was a pretty sunrise this morning. You can't see it in this image but, to the right, I could see Venus shining brightly.

Yesterday started in the usual way. We had breakfast, and then I went to work on my slow stitching. The last thing I needed to do when I moved my hoop was this little reddish cast-on flower. Cast-on stitch is my nemesis stitch. I still have to watch the video on the Crabapple Hill website every time before attempting it. Yesterday's isn't the best I've ever done, but it isn't the worst either.

So, I breathed a sigh of relief at having that done, and then moved my hoop. You can see there is just a little bit more to do on the left side of the piece. I expect to finish this off this morning.

Knowing I'd have that finished soon, I decided to trace out July's block for Joy in the Ordinary. 

Now it's hooped up and ready to go. This will be my "short" embroidery project for this go-round. I'll also finish stitching the final two names and places for the Shop Hop quilt.

After that, I took a walk around the yard. The lavender is in full flower right now. It's time to consume some more of those Bees Knees cocktails before it finishes its bloom for the season. I love lavender. It's my favorite fragrance.

Check out this intense blue hydrangea. The poor thing wilted in the afternoon sun, but I expect it recovered overnight.

I was happy to see the poppy near the greenhouse made another bud. It only produced two flowers this spring, and they have both gone to seed. I was kind of surprised to see this making such a late appearance.

The Andromeda is producing its red foliage now. Eventually there will be white flowers as well. It seems late this year, but it could be my own timing is off. Missing the entire spring while we were traveling has caused both of us to feel a little confused about seasons of things here at home.

Back inside, I went to work on the Lightframe quilt. Smitty was my helper cat.

Those of you without helper cats...honestly, how do you get any sewing done without excellent help like this?

Without too much time or difficulty, I made the six blocks for the first of eight rows.

This quilt will be made one row at a time, and I'll sew the rows together as I go. Here's the first row.

And that brought me to the bitter end of my WIPs list...bitter because I can no longer avoid making the final "When Quilters Gather" block. All I can say is that I'm glad it's the last one. It's going to be a cool quilt when it's finished, but these blocks have been a PITA.

This is the one I'll be doing. It's called "Fondling Fabric."

So I taped the pattern and some freezer paper down for tracing, and then traced the lines onto the shiny side of the freezer paper.

Then I flipped everything over, labeled the pieces and marked the sections, and then I added "tick marks" to aid in piecing.

And then I cut all the sections apart. They wanted to roll up, and so I'm flattening them out with a plastic page protector.

There was still a little time left in the day, and so Sadie helped me pick out fabrics.

Today I'll start piecing it together. Probably I won't finish it today, but maybe by tomorrow.

Also on today's agenda, I have a couple of houseworky things to do, and I'll need to water the annuals. (Better get at that before the day gets too hot.) When those things are finished, you'll find me in my cool basement sewing room. Summer has arrived at the Three Cats Ranch.