Machine sewing appliqué on Bloom.  Ten petals and two flower centers to go, then it'll be ready for hand quilting.

A dodgy photo (I was sitting down and just held it up)  of the quilt that's being hand quilted.  I like the "wrinkles" very much.  

Collected a small bundle of the white tone on tone when the scrap box was emptied.  Plus, there's plenty of the background fabric left.   I have an idea for a pomegranate appliqué based on a Turkish Otterman design of a pomegranate I saw online.  It'll be a mash up of that and an old Laundry Basket Quilts appliqué wall hanging I made years ago.

Yarn barf while car knitting.  Grey was heading out to get snake supplies, so of course I had to keep him company in the car.  The yarn barf was gingerly untangled while he was in Pet Smart.  The big yellow ball in the sky (I've heard rumors that it's the sun) was shining down.  

I'm the crazy lady who takes photos of pretty colored lichens and fungus/fungi??? on fallen limbs.

 

My inner squirrel has been overjoyed at the amount of jumping between projects.  lol

 Most of the appliqué pieces for Kim Delhi's Five Cent Fairy Garden have been cut out.  

The last blocks of the twice abandoned four patch project has been repurposed into hexagons.....many, many hexagons lol There's some cardstock "papers" already cut out for these, so they'll be glue basted.  I find cardstock a bit too thick for thread basting.  

That has me wondering what else is in The Pit of Doom aka long term wip box.  There's a few orphan blocks in there, doing absolutely nothing, so they can start being repurposed or binned.  They were originally going to be made into some kind of sampler quilt, but they're all different sizes, which would mean using more brain power than I'm prepared to use on that kind of project.  There are at least three orphan blocks that can be repurposed into the front of a knitting tote.  The only knitting "rule" I have is....each project needs a bag.   It's always good to have a few spare bags for Startitus.

The heel flap is coming along for this sock.  It's a different pattern than I usually do.  Rows 1, 2 and 4 are knit.  The 3rd row is knit 1, purl 1.

Adding thumbs to a pair of fingerless mitts.

Yuletide by Plum Street Samplers is coming along.  

 The stitching is finished.  

I decided it would be a good idea to have a practice run on attaching another cross stitch piece to foam core board before Grey's, as I've not used that technique in quite a while.

This was a small, quick stitch and ready to be finished as something different than a pillow.   I'm all pillowed out just now.  lol

I did a cube finish on a small box.  Grey gave me 20 something of them recently.  This is the first time I'd used one.   I'm pleased with how it turned out.   

Also pleased to use some more of the pink fat quarter.   It came in a bundle and there really isn't anything in the stash that really goes with it. There wasn't much choice, as there's very little pink left in the stash. There's less than half a fat quarter left now,  so it's been cut up and put into the pink scrap bags. 

The grosgrain ribbon held a small blanket together.   A scrap of lace ribbon finished it off.  The only problem is, I didn't check to see if it sat flat.   It doesn't,  so it will be leaned back on something in a "stylish" manner. 😉  Or....I could glue a few buttons together to make little feet.  Apparently, Aleen's Tacky Glue sticks like cement if more than a dot is used!

 

I love tulips.  I didn't love it so much a few years ago when I planted 100 bulbs and they were all dug up and eaten!  lol

This pile of dog treats should keep them going for a while.  They've all been cut in half, bagged up in small amounts and popped in the freezer.  The dogs love them.

While the oven was on, I whipped up a persimmon loaf.  The weather continues to be cold and rainy.  Yummy smells from the oven always make the house feel cozy.

It's delicious.  The recipe is James Beard's Persimmon Bread.  I halved the recipe and baked it in an 8 inch square pan.  It's supposed to keep for up to a week, but it's probably going to be gone well before then.

The recipe is on davidlebovitz.com 

Jenny was completely unmoved by all the goings on in the kitchen and decided the best thing to do was lie in the middle of the den floor.

 

Yesterday's progress.  The stitching should be finished today.  It's going to be finished as a little wall hanging.

I need to drill a couple of holes in the backing wood.  The bench in the basement is too high for me.  If I try to use a hand drill, my elbows will be up around my ears.  So, Grey is going to show me how to use this beastie tomorrow.

 

Back to Grey's wolves.  The wolf on the right may need a bit of brain surgery, as it's forehead doesn't look quite right.

Not the most glamorous photo, but it shows the true colors.  One thread a day is working really well.  I'm terrible at guesstimating when something will be finished, so I'm not even going to try!

Eventually ripped out the sock gusset and reknit it after tinking back the same rows multiple times.  If I'd done that in the first place, it would probably have been finished.  Sometimes what seems to be the easy way to do something isn't.

Ripped out the offending shoe on Smell My Feet and got a bit over enthusiastic when I started on the letter r.  

I've been driving myself bonkers tearing up the house looking for the pattern of You Are The Bacon To My Eggs for nearly two weeks.  The pattern and color key are on two different pages and after I'd printed the pattern. the original was missing.   After searching the house with no luck.  It was in the printer.  The only place I didn't look!  Scatter brained come to mind!  lol. Now all I need to do is finish it before Sunday! 😳  

Grey's latest FFO....these bowls started as flat pieces of metal.  He's made them for his team at work.

They were dull before being buffed and....

being torched.

It was quite a process getting them finished off.  He tried bees wax first.....which caught on fire.  I spend quite a few hours soaking them in vinegar and scrubbing with a scotchbrite to get it all off.  Thank goodness for audiobooks!  lol

Squirrel!

I was walking through the den when I heard the siren song of this book....right after I pulled out a Chook Shed pattern!

Since I have the perfect fabric already pulled (for another of her projects) I could do nothing but start it.

This is the fabric I'm playing with.  The top one isn't as light as it looks.  The appliqué pieces are on fusible webbing and ready to cut out, apart from the circles, which will be run through the die cutter, once I decide on the size.

Bailey is only 11 pounds, so his jumper is a human adult hat sized project.  lol

It's ready to separate for his front legs.  I've been keeping notes so if it works out, I'll be making him more.  

The stitching is finished on Crow Berry Sampler by Bent Creek.  I squeaked in with just one short thread left of the red.  I was very happy about that, as it meant I didn't have to dye any more.  It won't be going out until fall, so there's plenty of time to finish it.  

I'm thinking about mounting it and making it into a flat fold with cord around the stitching and going for a rustic look.  There's a ball of bakers twine in the finishing box which may work for making twine.  Matbe make up a batch of dye and dyeing it.

The trim situation is dire.  I don't like to order trim online and I won't be going to Hobbylobby any time soon, so I need to get creative, as untrimmed ornaments will just not do!  lol 

I ordered some red and white, plus green and red bakers twine from Amazon recently to use on Christmas ornaments.  

There's plenty of beads (I need to learn some beading techniques) and buttons, plus I can add embroidery, too.  Just have to think outside the (finishing) box. 😁

The stitching on Love by Hands On Designs is finished.  It's going on the top of a paper mache box.  The box is going to be painted pale pink if I can get the mix of white paint and red Rit dye correct.  If not, it will either be made into a little pillow with pompom trim.  

Smell My Feet by La-D-Da is the current 30 minutes a day long term cross stitch WIP.  It's one of my favorite designs of hers.  It had been put to one side because I'd stitched most of the left boot 5 stitches wider than the right....no idea how it was that far along, either!  Or why the right boot was stitched first.  I always start in the center, stitch the top left quarter, the bottom left, then the right.  When it's been unpicked, I'll go over it with a bit of sticky tape to remove the floof.  

Frogging needs to be balanced with stitching, so Yuletide by Plum Street Sampler was stitched on.

Groundhog Day.....Kinda

Last Sunday was mostly spent studying and occasionally  looking out at the window watching the sleet/freezing/rain/snow coming down, so my forecast was only partly accurate.  The appliqué pieces for Daisies For Love were prepared and that was it!   It was fun playing with all the little pieces laying them out later on in the week.

Purple is my favorite color and there was just enough fabric to squeak out the daisy petals and binding.  It was a bit hairy for a while, as all that was left was a few strips.  Nothing as wide as the daisy petals.  They're in one piece on the pattern.  I cut them up and put them back together again, as none of that will be seen under the flower center.

Seems I don't seem to be able to do anything "big" without going round my hand to get to my thumb.  The exam I sat on Wednesday was for a different sterile processing certification than the one I did the course for last year.  I'd been studying like crazy for the certification exam since the course finished in December, The two courses have very different.  I'm really happy that I passed and I'll be (officially) certified when the paperwork goes through! ☺  

The 1/2 inch hexie box was pretty full, so. I've been glue basting them on and off since Tuesday night.  They were glue basted to use up a partial glue stick which was close to drying out.  I don't have a preference for how I baste.  I'm just as happy glue, starch or thread basting.  It depends on what's on hand.    

There's no particular project in mind.  It's just fun cutting, basting and sewing flowers.

There's not much left to do on this. Pondering ideas on how to finish it.  I have a couple of ideas that need to be sketched out to see how they look.

Dug out this partial pattern and the colored pencils.  I've been looking at it to see where to go next with it.  It's been so long I can't remember where I was up to! lol It's not an original idea.  I saw a partial quilt on Pinterest about 10 years ago.  It took a while to go through the repins to find the original.  I sent a message to the quilter, asking if it was her design or a pattern.  Turned out that she had seen a pic of it and made her own from there.

There's two copies of this pattern.  One with the word photocopy on it.  It took me a while to figure out that was a working copy of the original  not that the other has errors in it!  I'm blaming a fried brain on not noticing one was on graph paper and the other was on photocopy paper. 

I'll need more than what's in this modest pile to make it!  lol.  The ruler covers project has run out of steam, so those squares will be run through the die cutter to add to this pile.  It had begun to feel like a chore.  When the mood strikes, I'll make the covers out of yardage, as it's not a project I want to spend a lot of time on.

The first block of The Civil War Love Letter quilt was made.  The sashing is going to be left off and it will be a lap quilt.  

This block was foundation pieced on photocopy paper and it quickly reminded me that the paper is too thick for my liking, so I'm switching to graph paper.

Made some progress on the nine patches for Hugs and Kisses at the same time, so I don't lose momentum.  Which made me think that's the way to go with the long term WIPs.  

Picking out fabric and printing the pattern is the only progress on Judy's Flower Patch from the book Scrap Quilts by Judy Martin.  Keeping my fingers crossed there's some dark green fossil fern fabric in the stash for the stem and leaves.  Not sure what color the background will be.  I'm just going to make one flower. 

 

It will be a hand pieced cover for a smallish pillow that's been sitting in the cupboard since The Goddess was a girl!  I'm out of practice and it's just the right size to get me warmed up for hand piecing Dear Jane.

Today kinda feels like last Saturday.  There's another storm front coming through tonight and the same amount of snow is in the weather forecast.  I've been rummaging through Chook Shed and cross stitch patterns again looking for  snow day projects.  I'm at the same place I started last Saturday with the sock, as I had to tink what I had knit.  That's what I get for not checking my notes!  It's ALMOST Groundhog Day because if it does snow tomorrow, I'll be spending the day looking out the window and playing with a variety of projects and NOT studying! 😁