Thoroughly Thursday

Good morning, my friends. It's a foggy morning here at the Three Cats Ranch. I'm heading out later today to meet up with Matthew. We've been trying to get together at least once per month. He lives on the other side of the river, and so we're about an hour's distance apart. You might recall when we went walking and had a tea party a couple of months back. The day started out rainy, but then cleared in the afternoon, and it was lovely. 

Pretty days like that have been few and far between, and so we've canceled plans more than once. I've been on the lookout for things we could do on a rainy day. Recently, I came across the Portland Puppet Museum. Until I read about it, I didn't know it existed. Neither of us has been, and so that will be today's outing. Sounds like fun, huh? So with that on today's agenda, it won't leave any time for sewing. A day off probably won't hurt me. Besides, days spent with my kiddos are the best days.

Backing up to yesterday, I'd nearly finished the latest Raggedy & Friends block when I quit for the morning. Then I had time to finish it up while we watched the news last night. I might have shown you a picture except that...

Okay, well I convinced her to move, and I was able to get a shot of it then.

This one won't get sewn into the quilt until the next go-round of this project. Instead, I was making a block from the previous embroidered block...the capital "A". These were the pieces I'd need.

And that went together pretty quickly, as I knew it would.

Here are the blocks I have for this project so far. 

All the embroidered blocks were traced to take along when we made our trip to Alaska. I'll take them along when we head south at the end of the month. Also, I've put it with the rest of my projects to turn into a kit. I'll do the rest of the cutting for the pieced blocks, and I can probably finish all the blocks on the road. (My list of projects to turn into kits is getting frighteningly long.)

I was nearing the end of my sewing day by then. I selected fabrics for the last block for the Kittens in Cups. Here are the blocks I have so far.

These are the fabrics I'll use for the last block...gray for the cat, green for the cup handle, and jelly beans(!) for the cup. I'd completely forgotten about that jelly bean fabric. 

I got as far as cutting all the pieces. With all of that, you can see why these blocks have been a PITA to make. I might open a bottle of champagne when I've finished this last one.

So I left it just like that. That will be at the top of the list for tomorrow's sewing.

For dinner last night, I made another recipe intended for using up Thanksgiving leftovers. It's not particularly photogenic, but this is a portabello mushroom filled with leftover vegies and stuffing.

The image below from the original recipe is more appetizing.

I've linked to the original recipe back there, but my version is adapted to make it even easier. I did the mushroom as indicated in the recipe, but I used four cups of leftover stuffing and two cups of leftover veggies...in this case, sweet potatoes and green bean casserole. Then I gave it a sprinkle of parmesan cheese. The cheese is more decorative than anything else. And that pretty well used up all the stuffing and veggies. Also I've deboned our turkey now, and so we'll have turkey for about five different meals. Coming up, I'll be making turkey noodle soup, turkey tetrazzini, and stuffed poblano peppers. That will be for next week, though.

Okay, and that was the end of the day. The only other thing I did in the sewing room was to trace out August's block for A Year in the Garden. It was a free pattern when I acquired it, but it's still for sale in her Etsy shop. This is the block I'll stitch next.

It's almost impossible to see that. Here's the image from the pattern. I'm using colors a little different from hers.

So that's where I'm heading next. I need to eat some breakfast, and I'm hoping to have enough time to get in a Bowflex workout. I need to leave early this afternoon to meet up with Matthew. I'm hoping they'll let me take pictures at the puppet museum. I'll tell you about it in tomorrow's post. And with that...off I go. Busy day ahead.