Lovely day......

It's been a lovely day - 70's with a stiff breeze...perfect for working outside and never feeling hot.  A lot of weeding happened today along the rose bushes, grapes, fruit trees and all the abundance of gravel we have in the side yards. We also hung old plates in the rose garden, and outside art on the house at the deck. Below is the garden as of this afternoon. Sam built the pvc structure recently to hold bird netting since I watched the birds eat every single seed and starter plant I put out there. Now they can't get them. We've got lettuces, strawberries and the tiny starts of radishes, beets, kale, spinach and green beans. There's space for tomato & pepper plants which I may pick up this week, maybe a cucumber, maybe not.......

Yesterday I was invited to ride up to the Umpqua Valley Quilt Show with 3 other fiber fans.  It's a much bigger quilt show than those down here - lovely exhibit, more vendors and they've even got full fledged classes over the 3 days.

Yes, this pic is turned sideways - not sure why when I take pictures with my camera if I don't hold it right the photos are sideways and there's nothing I can do about it.  I work on them in a photo editing program, they look correct but when they load onto the blog they're still sideways. Still kicking myself for not taking my camera. Always love a good Dresden plate...........



....and here's another......

....loved this, photo doesn't do it justice.....

....this was impressive, not sure how many pieces there are but they're teeny tiny......

....wool applique, something I want to learn......on a small scale......

Today I was sampling free motion quilting of gingkos for my wall quilt......very discouraged thinking I bit off more than I can chew since the only free motion quilting I've ever done was in a 1 1/2 hour beginner class. I'll do more sampling but I'm not sure if I'll be able to pull off the project - I may have to come up with a Plan B......

New......

 New toddlers behind us and are they ever vocal looking for their moms. We were on the coast for a few days and came back to find them yesterday. Older cows are being very patient and trying to show them the ropes but I did see what looked like a look of disgust from one at the constant moo'ing. One of the older cows did shoo away a tom turkey that was causing the toddlers distress - they haven't figured out yet that they're much bigger than the turkeys. I need to think up names for them - right now I just call them sweet boys when I talk to them - they are very interested in me talking to them but it only last for a minute or so before they're back to crying for momma.

 The gingko tree we planted last fall has leaves emerging - they're only around 1/4" right now, all over the tree, so glad it's doing so well, was worried about it during the winter.

I spotted this bleeding heart with thanks to another weaving for identifying it even without a photo. Around 2 weeks ago I almost pulled the plant out of the ground - it looked like a weed, only a few inches tall. I'm so glad I didn't pull it up, now it's around a foot tall and has many of these heart shaped blooms. From reading about them it sounds like it will go dormant come the heat of summer so I need to enjoy it now. I'll mark where it is so I don't accidently plant over top it.

A loss like no other.......

Bailey

1/27/07 - 4/12/19

This and that........

 I finished the table runners from the ASG Make-It-Take-It day. The purple one was quilted stitch in the ditch and then binding sewn on - wasn't as happy with the odd angle mitered corners on my binding as I wanted.  When I got to the gray/teal runners (buffet & table) I was using different directions for the mitered corners and I'm much more pleased.........still not perfect but much better. These runners were also quilted by stitching in the ditch.  I had some 4 patch squares left so I made 6 quick and easy quilted mug rugs/coasters.

Now I'm back to working on the wall quilt for over the couch. It doesn't quite fit on my work table but not too much hanging over the front & back for the photo. Yesterday morning I just decided I had to quit designing and re-designing and just go for it so I started cutting out 8" squares. I  laid them on the floor and played with moving them around, some I never used. So now the background is sewn and is around 45" x 52", give or take. I had Sam hold it up over the couch to see if this size is good and it's perfect. Of course this is over the old couch - we're still waiting for the new sectional in a charcoal gray - looks to be another 2 months. 

Yesterday afternoon I drew out gingko leaves, some using stencils. This morning I scanned them in the computer to make larger patterns, printed and cut them out. Here the paper pieces are sitting on top of the pieced background - When I'm happy with the layout I'll use these paper pieces as patterns to cut out the gold fabric for the gingkoes. A couple posts ago you can see the gold fabric that will be the gingko leaves. I'm thinking I'll fuse them to the background and then do a narrow zig-zag around the edges, or maybe even just straight stitching - I haven't decided. I'll be doing some sampling before I get to that stage.

Originally I thought I might also do some stenciling with shiva paintstiks but I'm thinking not, I don't want it to be too busy, it's already got a lot going on with all the different fabric squares. I have no clue what type of quilting I'll do - maybe free motion???  I'll need to practice that if I go that way. Maybe in the free motion some gingko shapes???  I definitely need to get some feedback before I go any further.

In the midst of the sewing the kitchen was torn out on Monday. The fridge, stove and a folding table are sitting in it at the moment, dishwasher is in the garage. Much work by Sam this week replacing drywall where the old backsplash was removed and most of the wall came with it. Plywood to bring the floor up to the wood floor height under the cabinets as that was never done when the house was originally built, electrical work and plumbing work. There's still a little bit of texturing to be done on the walls, then we're ready for the new cabinets which we're hoping will be finished this week. After that the granite guy will be out to do a final measurement to cut the granite. We still need to pick out backsplash but we'll do that once cabinets & granite are installed - will bring home samples to audition when the time comes. In the meantime we're eating very simple meals, take-out or going out.