Out with the Old

Good morning, my friends. My yesterday started with a long list of to-do's. Unsurprisingly, I didn't get through all of it, but there was a good amount of progress. But first...out with the old, in with the new. St. Patrick's Day is history, and Easter is approaching. My first priority was to switch out my holiday decor. 

First, I hung the little Bunny Garden on the wall between the kitchen and dining room. If I'm remembering right, this was a free pattern from Lynette Anderson at one time. It's no longer free, but you can find the pattern right here.

This Bunny Go Round able topper is on our breakfast bar. This was a free pattern from Doghouse Designs.

On the dining room table, this Easter Egg table runner. This was a free pattern from We All Sew, but it seems no longer to be available.

Okay, and with St. Patrick's Day banished from the house, I could get on with my one housekeeping chore. With that done, I had to decide whether to walk on the treadmill or do more sewing. Which do you think I chose? If you picked sewing, then you'd be right. Ding, ding, ding! You win the prize! (Disclaimer: there is no prize.)

And with every day here at the Three Cats Ranch, no activity is complete until I've let the cats in and out half a dozen times. When I looked out yesterday, I saw Sadie with a bead on something.

To her left, Smitty was urging her on. These two have an arrangement. Sadie does the hunting, and she gives whatever she catches to Smitty for proper, um, "disposal."

And it's completely understandable because Smitty has grown to geriatric status. He'll celebrate his 14th birthday next month. (They grow up so fast.) A while back, we gave him a geriatric kitty pole. He can be on the top rung without having to jump so high. Also, he can use the window sill for a boost up.

So my next sewing task was to finish off September's block for A Year in the Garden.

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

That meant I needed to trace something new or suffer a stitching emergency. Happily, youthful, energetic Sadie was there to help.

Together, we traced out Block 6 for Le Jardin.

Setting that aside, I went back to my quilting. Probably I spent about 45 minutes on this before I decided to call it quits. With my shoulder still bothering me, it's a literal pain wrestling with this quilt as I make my way around it with a straight line grid. Here's how it looks so far. Probably, I'm a little more than halfway finished.

Here's a peek at the back.

Regarding my shoulder, I'm still waiting for a decision about whether an MRI will be authorized. Yesterday, tired of waiting, I called my insurance carrier. There's been no decision, and they told me it takes 14 business days. Counting out the days, that would mean I might need to wait as long as April 1st before anything more can happen. To say I'm irked by this would be an understatement, but it is what it is.

And from there, I settled into our recliner to make some more progress on the quilt binding. I've been stitching two lengths of thread at a time on this, and I've turned three corners.

It was getting close to the end of the day by then. While we watched the news, I took the first stitches on the newest block for Le Jardin. Mainly, I was just cleaning up the extra bits of floss from my floss bobbins.

This one has a new-to-me stitch called the Ribbed Spider Web stitch. Possibly, I've done this before, but I had to look it up anyway. I was using a lavender variegated floss for this.

You can watch Mary Corbet's tutorial on this stitch right here. And if you can't open the video, then click right here.

Okay, and that brought me to the end of my day.

Today will look much like yesterday except that I'm determined to get in a walk on the treadmill. No excuses. And if I'm going to fit everything in, I'd better get busy. We're approaching vernal equinox tomorrow. We can say good-bye to winter and Hellllllooooooo, Spring! I cannot wait!