A Beary Small Start

Good morning, my friends. Before I sat down here, I needed to top off my coffee cup. I have a lot to tell you today. It's going to require a full cup. Since yesterday was the reveal of my Tula-Tu quilt, I'm a day behind on the usual goings-on here at the Three Cats Ranch. By all means, everything that happens every minute of every day must be fully documented. I'm sure you understand. 

First, thank you to the many of you who left such kind comments about Tula-Tu. If you missed her, you can read the reveal post right here. A couple of you asked about the teflon pressing sheet, and so I'll answer it here before I forget. This is the one I have, from Bear Thread Designs, and they come in at least three different sizes. I have another larger one, but I prefer the one I'm showing you here.

When I make these collage quilts, I first do all the fusible portions on the pressing sheet. For Tula-Tu's quilt, you can see how everything is pressed and fused to the pressing sheet. You can also see my gridded ironing board cover underneath.

You can place your hot iron right on top of it, just as you would if you were fusing the applique to fabric. It's also transparent, and so you can place your pattern underneath for help with placement, if needed. When all the fusible is done, your piece can be peeled off the pressing sheet with the fusible still in place on the fabric, and nothing left behind on the pressing sheet. It's clean for the next time around, although you might find bits of residue that can easily be picked off with your fingers. Then, you simply iron the applique to whatever background you've used and voila! 

Regarding "fusible," I think I've tried them all, and I prefer Heat 'n Bond Lite. Others may have a different favorite. They all work the same way with the pressing sheet. So, I hope that all makes sense. Please don't hesitate to ask questions. I'm happy to pass along what I know about this process. If you want to know more, you can also check out this post where I was making a different quilt using the same method.

Okay, so let's back up to Wednesday morning. We've been enjoying some beautiful weather the last couple of days. Wednesday was a day to get out and do some yard work. First, we had to clean out our greenhouse that still had dead tomato vines from two years ago. We didn't grow any tomatoes last year because we were traveling, but...I confess...we never cleaned out the dead tomatoes from the year before. And they sat all last year too. Finally, too ashamed of ourselves to continue with our slovenly ways, we cleaned it out. And now, it is a cleanhouse, tomato ready, but no tomatoes for us this year. Maybe next year.

Also, I had a little planting to do. I replaced my nearly-dead thyme plant in the culinary herb garden. Actually, the nearly-dead one is still there, but I gave it a neighbor in hopes that it would be influenced to shape up.

Also, some rosemary because our rosemary never survives our winters.

And then I re-established the Gracie Memorial Catnip Garden. I do this pretty much every year.

The little stone there says "I came, I purred, I conquered." Yep. That was our Gracie. She loved her catnip. (Sniff.)

From there, I took a little walk around to see what else was going on. The first flowers have appeared on the blueberries. The deer usually help themselves to any blueberries that come along, but we keep hoping they'll leave some for us one of these days.

Also, I noticed some baby cherries on the cherry trees. This is the Black Tartarian.

The Bing is still blooming and producing flowers, but some of the older flowers are already showing some cherry action. We'll miss these this year, but the neighbors can enjoy them.

Another rhododendron is starting to open.

And this peony continues to tease me. Open! Open! Open!

The lilac is putting on its best show right now. You can see the blooming dogwood tree over its shoulder in the image below.

I caught this Anna's Hummingbird slurping from the feeder. Looks like I need to fill it.

I was pulling dead stuff from the whiskey barrel that holds our mint in check when I noticed this guy. It was hard to get a very good picture of him in the bright sunlight. I've seen these guys before, though. I had a good picture of one from many years ago, but I can't find it anywhere.

Here's another one I found in the public domain. It's a Goldenrod Spider (Misumena vatia), and completely harmless to humans.

(Image credit: "Goldenrod Spider posing" by Carplips is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.)

Yesterday morning, I had breakfast with Sue. She bought my breakfast because I have a birthday coming up next week. Thanks, Sue. She also brought me these pretty flowers from her garden.

When I got home, I noticed the Violet-Green Swallows swooping around, and so I brought out my DSLR camera with the longest lens I have and captured a couple of them. This one is living in the house behind it.

This is a different one in a different house. At least two of the four houses are occupied now.

This is a third house. You can see that someone is building a nest there too. It's fun to watch their activities at this time of the year.

Back inside, I finished off Block 10 for Grandpa's Bridges.

Here are the ten blocks I have for this quilt so far.

And that meant I had an impending stitching emergency. Happily, Jennifer Reynolds released the fifth block for The Sewing Room yesterday, and so I traced that one for stitching. I'll start there this morning. It probably won't take long, and so I'll have to trace out the final three designs for "S" is for Sew today.

This pins block has some beads working as pinheads (not the pinheads in government...shame on you). I found these little hot fix nailheads to do the work of the beads. I'll add those when the stitching is finished. For scale, the little blue heart is about 1/4-inch at its widest part.

And, finally, I made just a little bit of progress top-stitching the bear family. Just the dark brown on the two right-most bears is finished. I have a long way to go with this.

Also, I pulled some fabrics to use for the rest of the quilt. Smitty was guarding them with his life. With bears running around the sewing room, he was being extra vigilant.

It was such a nice day yesterday, we had dinner outside. Smitty stood guard there too, keeping an eye out for any marauding squirrels. A cat's work is never done. With those dirty paws, ya gotta think he's been digging somewhere.

Okay, and so the kids are coming for dinner tonight. We're celebrating our spring birthdays: Matthew's in April, and Mae's, Mike's, and mine in May. Also, it's probably our last get-together until this fall since we'll be traveling for a good part of the summer months. I have much to do to get ready. Mike is going to grill some steaks, and so I need to get those going in the marinade. Also, we're having my version of Cottage Fried Potatoes, and a Spinach Salad. Yesterday, I made some Lemon Cheesecake Mousse for our dessert. Also, I want to make some lemonade, and there's all the other stuff that goes with a family dinner. So...a busy day ahead for me. Time to get on with it.

Oh yes, and it's time to choose a goal for May's 

My goal is to finish the quilt top for Sweet Dreams, already under way.