Lots of Sewing

Good morning, my friends. There was plenty of time for sewing yesterday. We mopped the floor in the morning, and I checked in on the garden. While there, I harvested two more zucchini and three more pickling cucumbers. The cucumbers need to pick up the pace a little. I only have about half what I need for a batch of pickles. As for the zucchini...I will do battle with them today.

With the morning stuff done, I could get busy with the quilt binding. I've turned two corners on the Kittens quilt, and I'm very close to the third corner.

There was time for lunch and a nap after that. Also, I got a head start on dinner by making some Asian coleslaw. Banh Mi was on last night's menu, and the Asian coleslaw was a good side for that. I've linked to the recipe there. I make the dressing from the recipe, but I use bagged coleslaw mix for the rest.

By early afternoon, I was ready to start on thread painting the lemurs. I started with the black thread. Pretty quickly, I decided to switch to a smoky monofilament in the bobbin. The clear monofilament was leaving little sparkles wherever I changed directions. A little dot of black Sharpie ink took care of that.

Also, the eye pieces were small, and they were coming loose as I maneuvered the quilt around. So I rethreaded the machine with gold thread and stitched all the eyes first. After that, I could return to the black thread.

When all the black was done, I switched to the darkest of the three gray threads and stitched the darkest of the grays. In a few places I wanted a darker gray than the fabric I'd used, and so I stitched in those spots too, darkening the color just a bit. 

After spending two hours on this, I'd had enough. When I stopped for the day, I had the machine threaded with the medium gray thread, and I'll start on the medium grays today. Here's where I left it yesterday. It doesn't look so different from when I showed it to you in yesterday's post. The thread work is mainly for texture, and a few of the details.

So, today is going to be a busy kitchen day. My morning will be spent in the kitchen. I'm making some Zucchini Garden Pepper Relish. It will lay waste to a lot of the zucchini, but there is still plenty more to deal with. Once the veggies are chopped up for that, they are salted and left to drain for a full hour. 

During that waiting time, I’m going to use at least one more zucchini to make a Blueberry Zucchini Cake with Lemon Buttercream. The lemon buttercream frosting is to die for in this recipe. I’ve given you the link. Just know that I only make half the recipe, and I bake it in an 8 x 8 baking dish. Also, we’ve eaten the last of our current batch of Granola Cups, and so I’ll bake some more of those. As long as we keep eating them, I’ll keep baking them. 

Despite my busy kitchen day, I should still have some time for sewing. I'll continue on with both projects today. I'm hoping to finish the lemur grays and maybe get a start on the tans. Probably I'll stitch the white parts last. Also, I'll continue on with my quilt binding. For sure I'll turn the third corner today. If I'm feeling really energetic, I might get it all finished.

Okay, then. Lots of kitchen tasks ahead. Time to get moving.