First is Last

Good morning, my friends. We had four stops to make yesterday, but we were still home before lunch time. It left plenty of time in the day to finish off the other things I was hoping to do. Of course, I had to do my slow-stitching before anything else could happen. I’m working on the 2nd Santa now. I stitched his boots first, and now I’ve moved my hoop to encompass the rest of him.

Our first stop was to pick up some medicine at the pharmacy. After that, we went to the feed store to get more birdseed and some slug bait. (We refer to slug bait as slug "candy" around here.) While there, I got a chuckle out of this display.

After that, we dropped off our ballots at the ballot box. We're vote by mail in Oregon, and we love it. Finally, we could get busy purchasing groceries to get us through the week.

We had lunch and naps, and then we got busy outside. We wanted to get my little poppy starts into their forever barrel home.

The squirrels like to dig around in my pots, and so we erected a fence to keep them out at least until the poppies are large enough to fend for themselves.

And…wouldn’t you know it? It rained hard all night long. I haven’t been outside to survey the damage yet, but I’m worried about these little guys.

After that, I took a little walk around. I am beyond excited about the blueberries. We are going to have a bumper crop. I’m already plotting what I’ll be able to do with them.

The Joker peony has fully opened now.

There are lots more flowers coming. There are lots of flowers coming on all five peonies. If they all bloom together, it’s going to be gorgeous. And, after so much rain last night, I’m worried about how these did. I’ll get out early this morning and see if I can help them by emptying any water out of the flowers. If not…well…here are still lots of buds.

There is still one lush poppy barrel on our patio. I’ve been sad not to find any buds on it…until today. Even after inspecting it, I missed this big bud off to my right side. When I watered the other annuals, I noticed it. Yay!

Just below it, there’s another bud. I’m hoping we’ll see more, but two is better than none.

The dark purple rhododendron is starting to open.

It’s neighbor across the sidewalk is in full bloom now.

While I was inspecting the rhodies, I noticed Smitty stalking one of the oscillating sprinklers. You have to watch those things every second of every day.

Back in the greenhouse, I watered the seedlings. I was excited to see sprouts in 11 of the sunflower pots. They’re hard to see in the image below, so I’ve circled the ones I can find.

Also, two of three pickling cucumbers.

We spent some time sitting on our garden bench and drinking our Mike’s lemonades. We reward ourselves with Mike’s lemonade when we’ve worked out in the yard. 

It was late in the day by the time I was able to do any more quilting. This is Block 2 of the nine in the quilt.

There is just one block left, and then the borders. I left it needle down in Block 1. The borders will be for another day.

There was still time in the day, and so I trimmed the Hawksbill Honu piece to a manageable size.

When I purchased the Sashiko kit, I bought this fabric to finish it off at the same time.

I wanted to give it a stop border, and so I settled on this mottled purple from my stash.

When the two borders were added, it looked like this. It ends up at 21 x 24 inches.

I’ll use that same turtle fabric for the back, and I cut binding strips from the mottled purple.

Now that will move to the “Small Quilts to be Quilted” portion of my white board. It won’t have to wait long because it’s the only thing listed in that section. From here, I’ll start working on my list of WIPs again, starting with the Stair Steps project. These are the blocks I have for that project so far.

I’m making this quilt one row at a time. I’ll be working on the fifth of six rows this time around.

Okay, so Mike is having his first cataract surgery today. They’ve scheduled it at a civilized 12:40 p.m. You can be thinking about him at that time if you’re of a mind. We’re expecting to be at the doctor’s office for about two hours, and hopefully everything will go smoothly. We’ve heard from many, many, many people that they’re happy with the results of their own cataract surgery, and we’re confident Mike will be equally happy with his. We’ll have to return for a post-op appointment early tomorrow morning, and so it’s unlikely that I’ll blog tomorrow. If I can accomplish anything today, then I’ll be back tomorrow. If not, you can expect to hear from me again on Friday morning.

And with that, I’m off. But then, you probably already knew that. Have a good day, Everybody.

Busy Day

Good morning, my friends. There wasn't a minute to waste yesterday if I was to get everything done. After writing my post, I headed straight to my slow-stitching. (Priorities, people.) And then I went outside to check on things there. My first stop was the greenhouse. With so many seedlings in pots, I'm checking the water daily. There, I was happy to discover sprouts in two of the three zinnia pots.

Also, the poppies are large enough now that I think it's safe to plant them in their permanent barrel outside the greenhouse.

We're planning to do that today, but we'll also have to erect some sort of fencing to keep the squirrels from digging around in the soil.

Back inside, I took a walk on the treadmill and then did a little housework. It was after lunch time when I was able to get to my quilting. I had just an hour to spare before I needed to leave for PT, and I spent about 45 minutes quilting Block 3 for the Merry, Merry Snowmen.

There are just two blocks to go. I left it needle down in Block 2, and there should be plenty of time for that today.

When I arrived home from PT, I checked on the peonies again. It was a warm (not hot) day, and so the Joker peony was about half open. I expect we'll see this open all the way today.

Also, I marveled at the Lavender Whisper peony. 

It's flowers are monsters!

The bumblebees and other bugs are loving them.

Back inside, I found some cats enjoying the afternoon sunshine, double-decker style.

It was a dramatic sunrise this morning, and the start of another busy day.

As I've mentioned, Mike is scheduled for his first cataract surgery tomorrow. We don't yet have an arrival time for that, but we're expecting them to call today. His post-op visit will be Thursday. (The second eye won't be until mid-June.) And with those two appointments, it seemed like today was the best day to do our grocery shopping. We'll do that first, and then we'll work on the poppies. I expect to get back to my sewing sometime this afternoon.

So, if there's time in the morning tomorrow, I'll be back for our morning chat as usual. If we need to be there at the butt crack of dawn, then probably not until the afternoon, if at all. We're not expecting any surprises, but sometimes these things take longer than expected. All of that to say that blog-wise, I'll be playing it by ear tomorrow and Thursday. If you don't hear from me sooner, then for sure I'll be back on Friday. Until then...carry on, my friends.

A Little Finish

Good morning, my friends. I'm hoping y'all had a lovely Mother's Day yesterday. We had a good day at this end. Our bunch meet-up wasn't until 11:30 a.m., and so I had some time in the morning to do a few things. It started with a pretty sunrise.

The Stanbro Men enjoyed a morning relaxing on the front patio.

Mike has been gnashing his teeth trying to get our automatic sprinkler system to work. He set this all up several years ago in anticipation of our trip to Alaska. And don't go getting any ideas about this being anything in-ground or fancy. Our sprinkler "system" is hoses, rainbirds, and oscilating sprinklers all controlled by an electronic "hub" that plugs into the regular electrical socket inside. (I don't understand all of this, but I'm sticking with my usual explanation for all technological gadgets: Magic.) Mike can operate it from an app on his iPad, and so he was able to turn it on and off while we were traveling in Alaska.

Fast forward to today, and the "hub" was giving him trouble. He finally ended up replacing it, but it still wasn't working right. Finally, finally, finally he got it working yesterday, and so all's well.

While he and Smitty figured that out, I took some time to sew the binding onto the Vintage Valentine. I figured I could do the hand sewing in the afternoon. I used that same binding fabric in some of the quilt blocks.

 

Okay, and then it was time to go. Mae's mom selected the restaurant in Northwest Portland. We'd never been there before. There are at least two of these in the city of Portland. It's a pastry shop, but it's also a Japanese-American fusion menu. The chef is a woman of Japanese heritage.

Everything in the restaurant was pink...the walls, the lighting, the menus...and so you're going to see that all my pictures have a pink cast. And would a Mother's Day brunch be complete without Mimosas? I think not. We could flavor them with a hibiscus-strawberry juice, black cherry juice, or orange juice.

And look at these desserts...little works of art, all. You can probably zoom in to read the labels.

We started with our main courses. I had the French Toast, which was a little like having dessert for breakfast.

Mae and her mom shared a serving of the souffle pancakes. These took a full half hour to rise, and so they were ordered in advance.

Erik had some Bao Bao Buns. They were a little like a taco in a thick soft shell. Mike had the tempura shrimp. I didn't take pictures of theirs. 

For dessert, I chose the chocolate caramel cake. This was a small cake...about donut sized, and it had a mousse-like interior, rather than cake-like.

This is a chocolate pine cone with marionberry filling inside.

This was called Mango Tango. It was a mango mousse with banana and passionfruit filling. This seemed to be everyone's favorite. (Of course we tasted one another's.) Those colors are true. I have no idea how that's done.

Erik and Mike ordered the Oreo Lava Praline Cheesecake. This was really yummy.

And here we all are postprandial! That's Mae's mom on the right.

It was lovely, and I was happy Erik and Mae thought to put it all together. Thanks, you guys.

On our way home, we passed by this red clover field all in bloom. We're seeing these all over our rural area. The clover puts nitrogen back in the soil, and when it's bloomed out, the seeds are harvested and sold.

Back home, the kitties were champing at the bit to get outside.

I didn't even pause before walking down to check on the Lavender Whisper peony, and IT OPENED!!!!! It's more pink than lavender, but it's very fragrant.

There are several flowers on this one plant.

I'm hoping the Joker peony will mend it's teasing ways and open today, but I haven't checked on it yet.

Before we left in the morning, I'd taken some items out of the refrigerator in preparation for baking some cookies. There are three pint jars of homemade sweet cherry pie filling in our pantry that are getting old and need to be used. With more cherries coming, the time is now. The night before, I'd inquired of The Google what I could make with cherry pie filling that wasn't pie. The Google came back with (among other things) this recipe from America's Test Kitchens for Cherry Cheesecake Cookies. And I had a partial brick of cream cheese I wanted to use, so that seemed the obvious choice.

There were mixed up, and then refrigerated for half an hour to firm-up the dough. Then, I rolled them into balls and rolled them in graham cracker crumbs. Then, I used a tablespoon measuring spoon to create a little dent, and three cherries were added to each. When they came from the oven, they looked like this.

So those are tasty. They're a soft cookie. I baked them for the maximum time listed in the recipe, and they were browned around the edges. I have a feeling they might have benefitted from a little more time in the oven. I'll try them again sometime. I've linked to the recipe above the image, but you'll need a subscription to America's Test Kitchens to open it. If you can't open it, and you really want the recipe, email me and I'll be happy to send it to you. I scaled the recipe down to 1/3 the original. The original recipe calls for three(!) cans of cherry pie filling, and I only wanted to use one.

So, while I was waiting for those to chill and bake, I finished hand-sewing the binding for the Vintage Valentine. It ends up at 16-1/2 x 18-1/2 inches.

Here's how it looks from the back.

It was a good day...busy and tiring. Later in the day Sadie was channeling my energy level.

So, I didn't get any more quilting done, but I'm hoping to have plenty of time for that today. It's a PT day. I had to reschedule my usual Wednesday appointment to accommodate Mike's cataract surgery that day. I'm also hoping to get in a walk on the treadmill. There's some housekeeping to do, but my top sewing priority will be to get another quilt block finished. If there's still time in the day, I want to sew the Hawksbill Honu into a finished quilt top.

When I bought this kit, I also bought some fabric for finishing it off, and so it's just a matter of cutting and sewing it all together. 

So...that's a full day. Fortunately, we have leftovers for dinner again tonight. And with so much going on, it's time for me to be on my way. Enjoy your Monday, Everybody!