Busy Week Ahead

Good morning, my friends. My best laid plans for the week turned into better plans when Erik scored a campsite for our two camper rigs for later in the week. We already had a plan to visit the farmer's market yesterday morning, and so what started as a routine schedule for the week just got a whole lot busier. 

Before heading out for the farmer's market, I was able to stitch up the day's Tiny Treasure. This is Tiny Treasure #64. It has stem stitch, lazy daisy, running stitch, and French knot.

At the farmer's market, I was on the hunt for some of the carrots I know only by the name our CSA farmers called them: Nelson carrots. They’re the best carrots for my Spicy Dilled Carrot Spears...a family favorite. I like them for their uniform roundness from stem to root end. Here's a picture I found online.

They’re quartered the long way for canning, and so I end up with nice, straight spears. Also…they’re a short carrot, and so they fit pretty well into the 12 oz. jars I used in the canning process. 

Also, I was on the hunt for some beets to turn into Easy Spiced Pickled Beets. I was able to score both, and so that will keep me busy today and tomorrow. While I was with the kids, we talked about food for our short camping trip, and so I'll be making some things for that as well.

Back home, my first priority was to check on the green beans and continue my mission to train them to grow up their poles. They're doing a pretty good job so far. While I was out, I walked around to check on the flowers. The echinacea are reaching full maturity now with the petals that hang below the center. So pretty. They're one of my favorite flowers.

The buds on the suspected purple poppy get larger and larger, and it has about a half dozen flowers. Look carefully at the midde of the image below, and you’ll see two large buds side by side. I’m so excited for them to open.

Okay, and I thought this was going to be a yellow zinnia, but now I’m thinking it might be red. Maybe I’ll find out today.

Oooh! And lookie there! The first sunflower! The marker next to this one says “Infrared Mix.” According to Territorial Seed (where I get my seeds), its colors can range from the darkest to the softest reds, including many bicolors. You can see that this one has a red-tinged center.

Okay, and then I got back to my quilting. I ended up doing a sort of teardrop motif in the outer border. I wanted something easy that I could do fast. I’ve done this motif before, and so it was pretty easy.

Here’s a peek at the back.

And now that puppy is ready for binding. There were no binding strips cut yet, probably because I couldn’t decide on anything. For a while, I pawed through my stash, and came up empty. Finally, I decided to use the same fabric from the back. The books are a larger scale, and so they’ll be lost on a narrow binding, but the colors will be right for the quilt.

Before I can think about getting that binding sewn on, I need to finish these two blocks for the Northern Wilderness project. This is one of those projects where I end up with scraps and all sorts of crap strewn from “A to Izzard,” as we like to say in our family. (I married into that idiom.) Yesterday’s quest was to make the “Blueberry” block…this one:

First, I needed to make the background. The quilt block is a basket. I struggle with this configuration of triangles every time I encounter it. This one confused me less than previous ones, so I guess that’s progress. At my age, not many things get less confusing. No worries though. If I don’t understand it, I just assume magic made it happen.

I breathed a sigh of relief when that went together correctly. Then, I just needed to add the top, bottom, and sides, and the background was ready for applique.

Just the handle of the basket was fused down, and that pretty much took up the last of my sewing time for the day.

For dinner, I tried this recipe for Greek-Spiced Pork Chops with Warm Zucchini-Feta Salad. We found some nice pork chops at the bargain meat counter on a recent grocery-shopping excursion, and hey…anything to use zucchini at this time of year, amiright?

We actually liked this really well. The Zucchini-Feta Salad was especially nice. It’s served warm and flavored with shallots, garlic, sun-dried tomatoes and some other seasonings. We liked that well enough, I’d prepare the zucchini that way even without the pork chops. It would be good as a side dish for anything. I’d link to the recipe, but this is an America’s Test Kitchens recipe, and so you’d need a subscription to their website to be able to open it. If you want the recipe, just email me, and I’ll be happy to send it to you. No sweat.

Okay, so it’s going to be a busy day today. I need to hoe the garden, and I’m going to can the carrots today. While I’m working on those, I can roast the beets. They need to be roasted and skinned before I can turn them into pickled beets. That will be for tomorrow. If there’s time left this afternoon, I’ll work on the applique for the Blueberries block, and then both blocks will need to be top-stitched before I can say they’re finished. The binding will need to wait until then.

I know some of you have been dealing with smoke and heat. I’m hopeful conditions are improving. Summer is great, but it has its moments…like everything else in existence, I suppose.

Day Interrupted

Good morning, my friends. If you read yesterday's post, then you know I had an early appointment with my PCP. Everything went fine there. It was an annual physical, and I had no concerns. We talked about my recent severe asthma attack, and she's recommended a different inhaler for me. Aside from that, everything was routine. Before I headed for home, I had to fill my gas tank, and I was home around 11:00 a.m. Any trip into town always wears me out for the rest of the day, and so I didn't get as much done as I'd hoped. Oh well. Today is a new day, right?

Before I left, I was able to stitch Tiny Treasure #63. Having time for slow-stitching improved my mood considerably. This one has stem stitch and lazy daisies.

When I got home, I had some lunch, and then I took a nap. When I woke up, I dragged myself into the quilting room to try to figure out what to do in the space between the rows of books. I fiddled and traced things with my fingers, and I couldn't figure out anything I liked. I ended up just doing a zigzagging line from one side to the other. This seemed to be the favorite design among the finished "Book Nerd" quilts I saw online. If you click on that link to the pattern, you'll see that even the designer did something similar.

Here's a peek at how that looks from the back.

All that remains on this is the outer border. I don't have any particular idea how I'm going to do that either, but I'll figure out something. There are lots of border motifs in my Pinterest library. I'll settle on one and then I should have this quilt ready for binding by day's end. Maybe.

In the sewing room, I found my sewing cat awaiting my arrival.

There were a few more pieces to make for the applique on the "Glacier" block. When I had them fused and cut out, I assembled all of the applique onto a teflon pressing sheet.

When I was satisfied everything was where it should be, I fused it to the background block.

All the time I've been working on this block, it has seemed familiar to me. When I was finished with my sewing for the day, I went in search of some of the photos I took of the Matanuska Glacier we saw near Glacier View, Alaska. Does this image look similar to you?

That link above will take you to my post about that section of our trip, and more photos of the Matanuska Glacier. It's the largest glacier in Alaska that can be seen from the road. Each of the blocks in this quilt is sparking some memory of our trip, which makes it fun to work on it.

So, I’m hoping for some sewing time today. We had dinner with the family Thursday night. While there, we made last-minute plans to go to the farmer’s market this morning. It’s been months since we’ve been to the farmer’s market. Everyone has been too busy. I’m on the hunt for some carrots and some beets for pickling. We’re also gearing up for a short camping trip next week. I’ll say more about that as it gets closer. But all of that to say that some other things are going to be vying for my attention over the next few days. I’d still like to get the Shop Hop quilt to binding stage. It would be a good take-along project for the camping trip.

Okay, so it’s another trip into town this morning, which means I need to be on my way. Several of you have told me about the heat where you are. Try to stay cool, okay? And be sure to drink plenty of water.

Heading Northward

Good morning, my friends. My day got all turned around by the weather yesterday. Thunder and lightning and rain in the morning put all of my gardening plans on hold. This morning I'm seeing my PCP for my annual physical, and so the garden is going to have to spend another day without me. 

My first stop on yesterday's agenda was to stitch up Tiny Treasure #62. This one has satin stitch, French knots, stem stitch, and fly stitch. This morning’s Tiny Treasure will probably have to wait until I’m home later today. (It’s a sad morning when I can’t get my slow stitching done.)

Heading out to check on things, I was happy to see the green beans under this pole structure have all followed their leader and are climbing their poles. There are several plants in each pot, and so I’m still watching the shorter tendrils. The ones to the rear and outside the frame still have some work to do, but I’m confident they will cede to my wishes eventually. 

Oooh…and there’s color on this zinnia. It looks as if it will be a yellow one. (I think I planted a mix of colors.)

The sunflower is opening more each day. 

Here’s an eensy-weensy pickling cucumber.

Another color of  poppy has bloomed in the bee garden.

And whoa! I was so excited about the one tomato I thought might be turning color in yesterday’s post, and I completely missed the one that is actually turning red. Look at that!!!

Okay. Well seeing an actual red tomato nearly gave me the vapors. I decided to go back in the house and sew. Now all five rows are finished in the Shop Hop quilt.

Here’s a look at the back.

If there’s time for sewing today. I’d like to get a start on the horizontal sashings. Again, I’m stumped about what to do there, but I’ll figure out something.

In the sewing room, Sadie was there to help me with the next two Northern Wilderness blocks. She’s been to Alaska. She knows all about this.

These are the blocks I’ll be making for this round. I’ll start with the “Glacier” block. And this is another one where they’ve used black for the mountains. Mine are going to be a deep blue.

Also, this "Blueberry" block. I can't say I remember seeing blueberries in Alaska, but we did see a bear or two.

So, I'm starting with the Glacier block, piecing together the background. This is the quilt block. It looks a little wonky in this image because the sides wanted to curl up.

Then, I added sides, a top, and a bottom, and I was ready to start on the applique. What you see below is fused and cut out, but not fused to the background. There are still a couple of pieces missing. In any case, this is one I'll want to fuse to a pressing sheet first to make sure I get all the overlaps overlapping where they need to be with no gaps. Doing it on a pressing sheet allows me to reposition things before committing to fusing them all together.

Okay, so I need to eat some breakfast, and then I think I might have enough time to start on my slow stitching. At the appointment with my dermatologist earlier this week, he took three biopies. I’m hoping today’s appointment will involve significantly fewer needles and blades. Fingers crossed.

More Blooming Things

Good morning, my friends. It was a busy day here, as usual. Not everything got finished, but most everything did. My first trip outside was to take a look at the garden to see if I could put off the hoeing for another day. It looked pretty good to me, and so I'd planned to do that first thing this morning. Then, I awakened to the sound of thunder and flashes of lightning. It rained for a bit, and then the sky turned this weird shade of pinkish red.

It’s hard to know how much rain fell, and the forecast shows this “storm” short-lived. So, maybe I’ll hoe. At this point, who’s to know?

As for the garden, everything is looking pretty good, although I'm pretty sure something has been munching on some of the leaves of the zucchini. I blame rabbits for this newest outrage.

As I’ve mentioned, I’ve been trying to get the green beans to climb the bean poles, rather than their protective fencing. Each morning I direct them where I want them to go. Within a few hours, they’ll be back where they started. Finally, when I went out yesterday morning, one of them had succumbed to my wishes. Hopefully, this one is their leader, and they’ll all fall in line. What are the chances?

A little more of the sunflower is showing itself.

And yay! The Bumble Rumble dahlia has bloomed. It looks a little beaten up…not sure why.

Also, the echinacea is blooming. 

Soon it will be covered in flowers and bees. It’s a good thing because the bees’ favorite, lavender, is nearly bloomed out for the season. They’ll be happy to have a different flower where they can take care of their bee business.

In the greenhouse, I’m seeing two sprouts of the second round of red leaf lettuce. These little window boxes can accommodate five seeds, and so I’m hoping the other three will show themselves soon.

Now, maybe it’s just me, but does that tomato I’ve indicated below appear to be changing colors? Does it have just the faintest pink blush? Maybe it’s just wishful thinking. Maybe it’s Maybelline. Who can say?

Whining about the lack of ripe cherry tomatoes in yesterday’s post seems to have worked out for me again. When I looked yesterday morning, I saw several ripening cherry tomatoes. These are the Sungold cherry tomatoes. They turn orange when they’re ripe.

Okay, but let’s just back up a bit, shall we? Before heading outside, I stitched Tiny Treasure #61. I’m hoping I’ll have pickles to can soon, and so this seemed a good place to start. This one has straight stitch, satin stitch, stem stitch, and French knots.

After lunch, I quilted another row of the Shop Hop quilt. There’s just one more row, and then I’ll start on the sashings. 

It’s always hard to see the quilting from the back, but here’s a peek anyway.

It was left needle down on the final row of blocks, and I’ll start there today.

In the sewing room, Sadie agreed to help me top-stitch the applique on Kate Carmack’s block.

It took most of the rest of my day, but it’s finished.

These are the three blocks I have for this quilt so far.

Next, I’ll get back to work on the Northern Wilderness project. These are the blocks I have for this quilt so far. There are 20 blocks in all. I’ll be working on blocks 13 and 14 this time around.

We’re meeting up with the family for a dinner out tonight. I’m looking forward to that. There is at least one housekeeping chore on the day’s calendar, and I’m still hoping I’ll be able to hoe the garden. Aside from that, it’ll be a mostly sewing day. 

As I’ve been writing, the storm has been waning. One wonders what got into the weather gods this morning. It’s been lovely, if a little warm, but we’ve been able to open the windows at night. The pink color has faded now, and it’s just looking a little gloomy. The forecast doesn’t show the sun making an appearance until later this afternoon. 

Okay, so that’s all I have for you today. I’ll just carry on with my hoeing and sewing. (Did you see what I did there?) Please feel free to carry on at your end too.