Good morning, my friends. It was a rather unproductive day yesterday. A lot of my morning was spent sitting on the couch. My treadmill and Bow-flex workouts have been completely abandoned over the past month. I tried unsuccessfully to talk myself into a Bow-flex workout yesterday morning. Even when I speak sternly to myself, it’s hard to overcome my level of stubbornness. After more than 50 years of cat ownership, it’s completely understandable that I would adopt their attitudes in my daily life.
Instead, the bird feeders needed filling, and I wanted to check on the vegetable garden. The garden was too wet for hoeing. It was still worth checking though, because I needed to stake up two of the tallest sunflowers. They were leaning over after the recent rains.
This morning, I'm aiming for an early start to my hoeing. It's also the day for my monthly pedicure, but I believe I'll have time to hoe before I need to leave.
Back inside, I spent some time with my slow-stitching. After a time, I realized I was dragging my feet getting at my sewing. No worries. I could still procrastinate a little while longer by baking some Chocolate-chunk Oatmeal Cookies with Pecans and Dried Cherries for Two. I'm still on a quest to use up some ingredients that are approaching their "use by" date. We didn't eat these. I froze them for future cookie emergencies. You just never know when disaster will strike, and our very survival could depend on the availability of cookies. (And, honestly, aren’t we all in a state of emergency all of the time when it comes to cookies?)
Okay, so after lunch, I forced myself to get a start on the quilting. Since I’m not a terribly confident quilter, it’s sometimes hard to get myself over the hump when I’m starting something new. As I mentioned in yesterday's post, I was trying to decide between two "fillers" for the pieced blocks. I ended up doing the one that seemed harder. It's pinned in my Pinterest files and identified as a "Meandering Comma Curl." You can see a video of how it's done right here.
Okay, so that seemed easy enough. I committed it to the middle row of blocks on my quilt. This is the third of the three blocks, and the muscle memory was pretty well set by then.
If there's time this afternoon, I'll start quilting the bottom row of blocks.
From there, I really started dragging my feet. The blocks for the Stair Steps quilt are a pain to make because there is so darned much cutting. And since they're all scrappy, I end up picking through my bins a lot. Even Smitty was looking askance at this project.
This is the final row. I needed ten of each of the neutral “stair step” pieces.
Remember that these blocks have a color diagonal running through them. The first block in the row is a blue block. I needed eight blue 2-1/2 inch pieces for that.
And then I needed 32 scrappy 2-1/2 inch pieces. I have some left over from the last time I worked on it, but not enough.
So, I picked through my scrap bins and pulled out pieces large enough to cut more squares. They’re pressed and ready for cutting.
While I was picking through my bins, I remembered something I wanted to do outside. Think of it as a squirrel rescuing me from the drudgery of all that cutting.
So, I’ve been watching some wild foxgloves growing along the roadsides and along the driveway we share with our three closest neighbors. Some years ago, I purchased some foxglove seeds, hoping to get some started out by our hot tub. They are mostly shade-lovers and there’s an open space beneath one of our Japanese maple trees where I think they would thrive. So, I planted my purchased seeds, and they were growing. Then, Mike mistook them for weeds and sprayed them with herbicide. He knew instantly what he’d done, and rinsed them off with water from the hose. It was already too late, and they all died. (Sigh.)
Okay, so fast-forward several years to yesterday, and I had in mind the wild foxgloves were far enough bloomed out that I could harvest some of the stalks for their seeds. As I walked down the driveway, I noticed one of the newly-arrived spotted towhees at our feeder and tried to get a picture. My picture didn’t turn out, as I’ll explain in a minute, but I found this one online. I like watching the birds return to the feeder seasonally.
Okay, so here is where I tried to take a picture of our own bird, but he moved around to the back side of the feeder as I took my shot. I was some distance away, and so I was looking through the viewfinder to try to get good focus…
When what to my wondering eyes should appear
But a sneaky black sunflower seed stealing deer!
Well. Doncha know she was just waiting for me to move along so that she could empty our bird feeder. This seems to be a thing now. After 24 years in this house, the deer have never done this before.
As I started to continue walking down the driveway, she moved closer to the feeder. You little stalker, you.
Well, I chased her off before I moved along. That bird seed is kind of expensive, and I’m not putting it out for the deer. [Loud Harrumph, as I walked on.]
At the end of our driveway, I noticed this. I’m told this is called “goats beard.”
These little asters are about the size of a dime. Cute.
There were lots of these little wild violets.
And these . . . Oregon blackberries. The berries are good to eat, but man, the plants are invasive, and thorny, and hard to eradicate. When they pop up anywhere in the landscape, we dig them out immediately.
Okay, and so here was the object of my desire…nearly bloomed out wild foxgloves.
Walking up the hill just a few feet, I found some white ones too.
So I looked for the longest stalks with the fewest living flowers, cut them at the bottom of the bloomed out seed pods, and then carried them home in a paper grocery sack. I’ll let them dry for a while. As they dry, I’ll shake them some to dislodge the seeds. The grocery sack is lined with parchment to make it easier to collect the seeds when the time comes. This might not work at all, but I’m hopeful. Fingers crossed. If I don’t get viable seeds from these, I’m going to buy some. Life is short. Grow the foxgloves.
Okay, so that was the end of my day. As I mentioned, I have a pedicure this morning. I’m kind of determined to get out early and hoe the garden before I go. When I get home, I’m going to try something new in my slow cooker. I’ll tell you about it in tomorrow’s post. If there’s still time left in the day, I’ll get back to my quilting. Quilting is my first priority these days. If there’s time left in the day, I’ll try to make some progress on Stair Steps. I keep claiming that I like the Stair Steps quilt, and I do. Still, it’s one of those I wish I’d never started.
All right. The garden awaits. Enjoy your day, my friends!
1 comment:
My "won't power" is often stronger than my willpower, too. Never thought to blame it on all the cats, though. Dot in NC
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