My dog ate my....

Good morning... let's play this again.  Exposed was such fun!!  I loved all the clever responses! Thanks for playing along!

My dog ate my....

my dog loves to snag any fabric that he can and last week he grabbed a 6" block I was going to appliqué--the stem was sewn down but not the leaf yet...so my husband grabbed the block out of his mouth but the leaf was GONE!!  GRRRR

I sewed more appliqué blocks for the Corinne et Céçile sew along ... I only have a couple more and I'm going to start putting it all together!

These were fun blocks to piece and appliqué down.  It's going to make a great quilt for the baby!

I've mentioned my dog to you many times--here's a chance to get a perspective on his size. There's a purple leaf in there somewhere! VBG

Hope you have a great week.  Did you watch the Super Bowl?  We enjoyed the game (can't say we're big football fans, though) and the food (!!) !~

Take care, stay healthy and SEW!

xxxx

What does exposed really mean?? And a GIVEAWAY

 I'm in a playful mood this weekend.  We were in Virginia, helping to care for our three young grandkids.  The middle son (only 2) was sick with a cold, fever, cough...yup--what would you think?  My daughter in law got him and the baby tested right before we left and only the baby tested positive.  So, we were exposed. YIKES!!  What to do? 

I honestly felt like a leper.  We flew back on Wednesday and I had to cancel my social events (always have to plan social events whenever possible!!) for the rest of the week and ISOLATE myself.  UGH.

We got ourselves tested just in case and both tested negative, but both my husband and I came down with horrible head colds.  I usually have a cold for maybe 24 hrs and then I'm good.  Not this time. I'm thinking that since I haven't had a cold in at least 3 years, my immunity was down.  

 We were hoping to see the other 3 grandkids this weekend but my daughter didn't want us to infect her kids with our cold germs. I get it.  They already were exposed to Covid..my oldest grandson was positive a couple of weeks ago.  Oh well.  We got to catch up and get organized for our return up to Oregon tomorrow!

So I did get some sewing done this weekend. WOOHOO.  Trying to finish the appliqué blocks for the Céçile et Corinne sew along.  I have most of the pieced blocks done already.  I'm going to put them together into a quilt for the new baby in Virginia.  The pieced blocks are being made according to the Jessica Dayon sew along. Colors are purple and aqua!!

I have three other blocks prepped and plan to sew them on our drive tomorrow.  Coming along.  These blocks are from Jo Morton's Prairie Flowers Encore.

So, what does exposed really mean?  I'm feeling silly, so bear with me:

From my days as a Public Defender, we used that term frequently in cases involving my clients who may have exposed themselves.  Then there is the problem when printing photos and they are over-exposed.  Of course, there's the problem of being exposed to Covid.  My fireplace is surrounded by exposed bricks. When I am out on a lake, I am often exposed to lots of sun and wind.  In the political arena, there are a number of politicians (who will remain nameless) who have been exposed as dishonest. My grandkids are attending a Catholic school and are getting exposed to very rigorous academic standards.  Ronan Farrow from the New Yorker exposed Harvey Weinstein's misdeeds (putting it nicely). When the tide is out, there are huge rocks exposed at our beach in Hawaii. 

Have any other ideas??  I'll send out a giveaway pattern to a random winner if you submit another play on exposed.  Just respond by Friday Feb. 11th.

Have a great week! Enjoy the Olympics!

January mini etc

 I have been busy--knitting-- rather than sewing.  I was preparing for our trip to help take care of our 3 grandkids in Virginia while my son does his marine reserve weekend.

I decided to knit hats for the kids.  I'm pretty sure I already showed you the pictures of the  2 Sesame Street hats.  My oldest, Eli, ripped off Elmo in about 2 minutes so that required surgery!

I finished the adorable baby hat for the 7 month old Leia.  And I'm calling that my January mini (I even cleared it with the "boss", Wendy...VBG).

My knitting skills really leave a lot to be desired and the baby's hat was too big and fit the boys whereas the boys' hats fit the baby.  :-(. I can't tell you how many sweaters I've knitted that are too short. I do enjoy knitting; I'm just not too great at it.  I will stick to scarves and washcloths I think!

Here are the 3 kids modeling their hats, temporarily anyway!

I did work on my first appliqué block for the Céçile challenge but I haven't pressed it so I'm not going to show you yet.  I sewed it on the plane to DC.  I'll share it once I'm back in California on Thursday.  I have done my pieced blocks already.  I prepped another block to sew on the plane going back to California.  Prepping appliqué work is always pretty time consuming!

Before I left, I was walking with some friends and took some pictures I thought were charming.  It was a foggy morning and the ducks were very happy!

Hope you're having a great week and staying healthy!

xxx

Time for a cleaning

 I think it's a sign that it's time to clean out a drawer when you can't open it, right??  So when our "junk drawer" in the kitchen got stuck, I emptied it all out and found the culprit (a rice server was blocking the drawer).  Well, that motivated me to clean out another drawer... and guess what I discovered?  

25 spatulas!  And another 6 in another drawer!  YIKES.  off to the Goodwill!

As for sewing, I have been working on my Jessica Dayon blocks, slowly:  They're going to be purple and aqua!  I intend to make them into the baby's quilt once I have enough.  I'm also using them for Céçile's sew along, in case you are participating in that project.

I have been knitting a bit.  We are going to Virginia next week to visit our son and their kids.  So I decided to knit hats for the boys and one for the new baby girl.  So cute!  These were "kits" and you sew on the Sesame Street "heads" after they're done!  It's pretty cold there now so hopefully they'll love them!

And the baby girl hat isn't quite done yet but it's coming out really cute; love that the yarn is striping!

My biggest news, though, is that I had to have my gall bladder removed!  YIKES!  I have not had surgery since I had a c-section 34 yrs ago!  And that was it.  It was relatively easy and I'm recovering quickly!  I went for a walk today and have been taking my pain pills to avoid being uncomfortable.  I figure it could've been so much worse!  It's not life-threatening, right?

Anyway, that's my news for 2022.  More to follow, and hopefully more exciting!

Stay well!

xxx

Randy

Be careful of grandkids~

 Happy New Year to you all!  I hope you had a wonderful holiday season and are looking forward to a superb 2022.  I certainly am optimistic!

I mentioned last week that I am doing the Jessica Dayon mystery quilt, which has 6" blocks.  It initially started off with blocks every day but it's now slowing down.  I was able to make a few more blocks.  I'm doing them in aqua and purple, which is going to be a quilt for little Leia in Virginia.  Here are my blocks that I've made here in California (I left the others in Oregon)

I'm having fun with these blocks!

We had our grandkids stay over this weekend, and that was of course fabulous.  My 12 yr old grandson loves to sew and usually grabs scraps and just starts sewing.  This weekend, though, he decided it was time he tackled my Accuquilt and he found a die with rectangles.  I showed him how to do it and then left him.  This morning, I found the remnants of his playing with other fabrics and the die!

I think he ran out of time so didn't have a chance to sew them together but I thought it was so funny to see which fabrics he grabbed.  Mind you, they were no where near each other in my sewing room!  Asian fabric and batiks??

My 9 yr old granddaughter doesn't sew but she's very interested in art so she draws constantly.  This weekend we had a project we'd been planning--we made a ModPodge box using horse fabrics (she loves horses).  I need to figure out how to get the fabrics to be smooth (I tried sanding with wet sandpaper but that didn't work too well!)  Any experience with these things so you can help me perfect it??

Hope you're having a great first week of 2022.  Today is my mom's birthday and she's 94!!  Pretty amazing!  She's grateful to be alive, even living in a memory care facility!  

Take care!

The real December mini plus other blocks

 I finally finished the binding on my December mini, which you will recall was made using Janet O's scraps (with the condition that I only add one or two fabrics!).  I did only add a light and the binding.  Otherwise it was all Janet's scraps.

I think this is called a bar quilt.  I forgot to wash off the markings for the quilting patterns ...sorry.  This was a fun project, especially using someone else's scraps, which I always think are more attractive, right??!!  Thank you Janet for sharing your leftovers!

I have started a new project (note that I'm not working on something I already started or identified! That would be too easy).  I started doing this block a day being published by Jessica Dayon.  I'm going to do it in purple and aqua for my new granddaughter, Leia, who is living in Virginia now.  These are just the first two. You can join in at her blog:  jessicadayon.blogspot.com.  I think the blocks will slow down after New Years.

When I took the picture of the mini, I realized I had some fun things to share on my sewing table. It's kind of an international collection!

I love the clock.  I ordered it from Moda.  So cute.  But the strangest thing is that when I hung it on the wall, it didn't work.  Didn't keep time.  On my sewing table?  Worked great.  Hung on the wall?  Not so much!  STUMPED

The little star pin cushion was made from fabric I bought at the quilt show in Nantes (France) several years ago.  I love it.

And the Hawaiian "box' in the back is my "trash" holder which I found at a quilt store in Kauai.  I've bought them for all my friends!  It's perfect and even folds flat!

One closing picture of my Zeke, which gives you another idea of how large my dog is!  Here's he's "standing" at the window seat looking out the window where he thinks he sees some people snow-shoeing out back of our cabin.  He does this all the time at our kitchen counters, scanning for something to sneak!  The sweetest dog but oh so strong!! He's been loving the snow, too!  Buries his face or just plops down in the snow banks!!

Hope you are all healthy (this new variant is scary!!) and having a great holiday.  I am sending you lots of love and hugs for a wonderful new year 2022!!

Much love to you all!

Being productive, sort of

 This past month I've tried to work on my December mini, using the scraps that Janet O so generously gifted me, with the challenge to make something using only her scraps plus one or two other fabrics.

I've just about finished my mini (still sewing down the binding) and followed her instructions.  So you'll need to wait a day or two for that reveal.

But I had many more scraps leftover and decided to use them to make a little something:

Any ideas what it is?  I used a fabric I bought in Virginia that's Bernina fabric!  FUN!  So, what are you thoughts??

I have two machines in my sewing room and the second one needed a cover (have been using a pillow case~! YIKES) and thought it was the perfect project for the leftover gold/blue/light scraps plus I added a bunch more.  Of course now I have more scraps than I started with!

There's no pattern for this;  I just made it up as I went along.

We've had lots of snow in Central Oregon this past week and it's quite beautiful.  My poor birds (I've become a bird feeder!) So much snow that the top of the bird feeder had about 4" as did the water bowl (which is completely frozen)

I need to refill the feeder but I'll need to put on my heavy tall boots to have to climb over the snow to reach it!!

Here's the view out my back!

The snow is perfect for snow shoeing this week, although it's VERY cold.  Hasn't gotten above 22* and nights are in the teens (or lower).  BRRR

Hope you're having a great week and recovering from Christmas.  I'll be back in a day or two with the December mini all finished.

Big hugs,