Two Projects

Good morning, my friends. It was a pretty easy-going day yesterday. When I started my walk on the treadmill yesterday, I was thinking I had one more walk left to finish off the documentary I was watching, Ken Burns' "The West." When I reached the end of Episode 7, it continued on to Episode 8! What?!? Okay, so I guess I'm not done yet. It'll encourage me to keep walking, I guess. It would be good to finish it before we leave.

So let's talk about what else is going on. I took the first stitches on May's block for A Year in the Garden.

And that motivated me to get outside and see what's going on in my own garden. Smitty accompanied me as I walked.

I didn't plant any annuals this year, but some pansies volunteered to fill in the empty pots.

And look at this teaser. Now it's just being mean. Maybe today.

We didn't plant a garden this year either, but the bee garden has filled in the empty space nicely. I noticed some color there yesterday. This is Dame's Violet, also known as Hesperis. It's the only thing I noticed, but I was impressed at the lupine that is coming up. Its leaves give it away, but there are no flowers yet.

Back inside, I went to work quilting Joyful Journey. I'm started with just the blocks. It's hard to know what to do with these since the embroidery takes up most of the space. I gave the bird some feathers, and then I stitched a meandering flight path for the bees.

On this one, I gave the squirrel some fur and did another meandering bee flight path.

There were no bees in this winter scene, but I added some plumes of smoke and some snowflakes in the sky. Then, just some snow drifts at the bottom half.

I might have done more blocks, but I could feel the muscle between my shoulder blades (the rhomboid muscle) tightening up, and so I stopped there. It was feeling better when I started. Walking on the treadmill and swinging my arm as I walked helped loosen it up. Since I didn't want it to tighten up again, I stopped there. It has given me no more trouble.

Instead, I went into the sewing room and began sewing together the center embroidered sections for the Girls' Getaway quilt. I sewed the bottom half together.

And then I sewed the top half together. Thankfully, those sashing strips fit perfectly. No fudging.

And then I could sew the top and bottom half together.

From there, it just needed borders.

Next, I'll start sewing the pieced blocks around the outer edge. That was enough sewing for one day, though. 

Instead, I got distracted working out what I'd need for the next project on my embroidery dance card. With all the blocks for "S" is for Sew finished, Mr. Random selected a new project for me. This is Crabapple Hill's "Home is Where My Flock Is." It's all about sheep. I purchased this pattern just as Meg Hawkey was closing her business. Everything was on sale, and so I grabbed this one last pattern from her shop. 

Just now I checked her website. It's gone. All gone. (Sniff.) Thankfully, she left her videos up on YouTube. She has some good videos explaining how to color on fabric with crayons and colored pencils, and she also has some good demonstrations of some of the more difficult stitches.

This new project uses just five colors of Cosmo floss. I had some of them (or else a DMC equivalent) already in my stash, but I ordered a couple of skeins online. Already I have plenty of white fabric for the background. Probably I won't get started on this until fall, but it's good to know I have everything I need.

Heading back upstairs at the end of the day, I found some happy mail from a friend who has requested anonymity. It's a thread "Advent Calendar" from Aurifil. I've never seen these before. This one happens to be Le Alpi, and you can read about it right here.

When you open it up...indeed, it's an advent calendar.

Each little box has a different color thread. The colors are inspired by the scene on the box cover. You'll have to read the story at the link to understand the meaning of this yellow. If I'm understanding it, it represents the morning sun.

So...cool! I'll put these to good use. And you know I love thread as much as I love fabric. Thank you, Friend who shall remain nameless.

All right, so here we are at Saturday. I'll get back to my sewing, which will look a lot like yesterday. I'm hoping to get two rows of blocks quilted on the Joyful Journey project, but I'll listen to my body and stop if it starts complaining. Also, I'm hoping to get at least one side of the blocks sewn together for the Girls' Getaway quilt. This being "Sewturday," there's nothing else on my agenda. It'll be a day of rest and sewing. But the icing on the Sewturday cake will be dinner at Erik and Mae's place this evening. We're celebrating Mother's Day, but it's also Mae's mother's birthday, and I believe she'll be joining us. I haven't seen her since Thanksgiving, and so it'll be good to say hello and happy birthday to her.

Now here's something: Shouldn't there be a name for someone who is your "co-mother-in-law"? I'm Mae's mother-in-law, and she's Erik's mother-in-law. Shouldn't there be a word to describe our relationship to one another? Mother-in-law to mother-in-law? It could work for fathers-in-law too. These are the things that keep me awake at night. I probably need a nap just from writing about it and asking the question. Who needs stupid government with these weighty questions looming?

So with that, I'll let you get on with your day. Try not to give yourself a headache as you consider the answer to my important question.