Storm Warning

Good morning, my friends. We had a lovely day yesterday. Our temperatures made it into the 70's. I'm not sure if that's the first time this year, but it was welcome either way. We had some errands to run in town, but of course, nothing could happen until I took the first stitches on my latest embroidery project. This is the 9th of 12 blocks for Grandpa's Bridges.

When my stitching time was finished, we headed into town to run some errands. With such nice weather, the kitties were champing at the bit to get outside by the time we returned home. To be honest, we were too. Mike took the opportunity to wash his truck. Weeds and deadheading were my tasks at hand. Smitty helped me with that.

As I made my way around, I made note of all the new shoots we're seeing. This is the red cardinal clematis. It's been in the ground about three years. Clematis are kind of iffy in our climate, and in the spot where this is planted in particular. I'm happy to see it has survived another winter.

We'll probably miss its blooms this year, but around July, it will look like this.

The Edda clematis, below had its best year ever last year, and so I'm happy to see new shoots on it as well.

When it blooms, it will look like this:

Also, the daylilies are coming up. It looks as if the deer have been dining on them.

Just to the left of the daylilies, all five peonies are putting up new stalks. This is the tallest of the bunch. These should bloom before we leave. There's a new one I haven't seen yet since we missed its flowers last spring.

Some sort of hyacinth is coming up here. I like it in the spring when the bulb flowers pop above ground and we have to guess what they will become.

Also, I put out the sundial. I used to leave this out all year, but the gnomon (the pointy thing) got broken by heavy snow one year. Now, it spends its winters in the garage.

There were some weeds to pull and three large hydrangeas to deadhead. It was a surprisingly taxing job, and warm in the afternoon sunshine. When I finished, I took my traditional seat on the garden bench and enjoyed a Mike's Lemonade. Yardwork cannot be completed without imbibing in a Mike's.

Sadie grazed on the grass beside me.

Okay, and there was still time in the day for quilting another row on Jericho's Walls. As I mentioned yesterday, some rows have five blocks and some have four. Where there are four blocks, there are also setting triangles at either end. So, I considered how to quilt these, and I wanted to do something that blended with the block motif.

So I lined up my ruler with the partial nine-patch on the right and put a white hashmark directly across from there.

Then I quilted a loop on either side and an ellipse in the middle. It's a little hard to see in this image, but I'm hoping you can make it out.

I've finished two of seven rows now, and I'll just keep going, one row per day until it's finished. I can feel it in my hands and my right elbow at the end of a session, but so far, it hasn't carried over into the next day. It seems one row is a good amount in a single day if I am to avoid hurting myself.

And now I've left it needle down right here, and I'll pick it up there today.

When I finished quilting, I headed across the hall to the bathroom, where I found Smitty soaking up the afternoon sun. If there is a sunspot to stretch out in, a cat will find it.

My last gasp of the day was to trace the next block of embroidery motifs for Raggedy & Friends. That makes four of 12 blocks finished.

Sadie napped beside me while I traced them. They were outside for quite a while yesterday, and they were pooped pups by the end of the day.

Okay, so today will be the same old same old. I'll do another row of quilting, some slow-stitching, a little housework, a little exercise...there's always plenty to fill my time. But here's something: The Storm Prediction Center (SPC) has issued a rare level 2 out of 5, or Slight Risk, for severe thunderstorms across parts of the Pacific Northwest from March 26 to 27, potentially impacting over 7.2 million people in major cities such as Seattle, Portland, and Vancouver. The threats include hail in excess of 2.5 cm (1 inch), wind gusts over 93 km/h (58 mph), and possible isolated tornadoes. The announcement came with this map. We're located approximately where I've placed a red dot.

We've lived in Oregon since 1978, and I've never seen hail that size. On the other hand, we've seen a tornado at least one other time...not where we live, fortunately. So, we'll see what happens. We'll make sure our cars are parked inside.

So with that cliffhanger, I'll leave you to your day. Check back tomorrow. If I'm not here, then you can assume we've been transported to the Land of Oz via tornado. What are the chances?