Monday, March 18, 2024

Bits of This and That Stitching

I'm late posting this morning.  I had an early morning doctor's appointment to go over the MRI results on my knee.  When I mess myself up, apparently I don't do anything in halves. Both meniscus in my right knee are torn. So that will mean surgery, probably later this spring. We'll see how long I'm out of the sewing room when we get to that.  For now, I'll keep working to finish off a few projects before I end up on restrictions. 

This weekend was a mixed bag on the stitching front.  I did a bit of hand stitching on the binding for Scrappy Butterflies (A Flutter).



  

I've turned 2 corners and have two more left.  So that's good progress. 

The rest of the weekend was spent on cutting additional parts for Indigo Way and making a start on the guild March BOM block.




I'm also working on getting the last border onto the 2024 Stay at Home Round Robin project. Two border strips are assembled and attached. I was almost done with border three when I found an error. So I need to spend some time with Mr. Seam Ripper to get that project back on track.  

So nothing exciting today.  I'm hoping to have a finished quilt and quilt top by the end of the week.  We'll see how far I get.  Linking up with  Design Wall Monday and Patchwork & Quilts.  

Sunday, March 17, 2024

Stitching Stuff: Week 11 of 2024


Half way through March already, which for this part of the state means it's Spring Break.  Grad Girl is actually off at a conference this week, so we won't go see her like we did last year. 

That meant it was a good week on the stitching front.  I'm working on a finish and trying to get the last border done for the SAHRR.  This week's numbers look good.  


  • 15 minute days/week = 7/7 days
  • 15 minute days/Mar = 16/16 days
  • 15 minute days 2024 = 76/76 days
  • Success rate = 100%

It's definitely been a really good year for stitching time. I've only had one other year where I managed to keep up the 100% success rate into March. 

How are you doing at working in your stitching time as spring ramps up?  

Saturday, March 16, 2024

Week 106 Photo Challenge: Lock(s)

So far we've been spared the strong storms that have slammed so many.  Hope everyone is doing well and wasn't impacted by the midweek storms.  We have family in St. Louis. They are all fine, their cars are not doing quite as well.  

When we pulled last week's card, I mentally scratched my head thinking how was I going to get an interesting photo of the chosen subject.  




I've been cleaning out the closet in Grad Girl's room and found a couple of interesting objects with locks.  After playing with both, the more challenging one to photograph won out as my photo for the week.


Kate: Reflective Lock Box


This pretty silver and clear plastic box was up in Grad Girl's closet. Clear surfaces are really reflective, so it took some doing to get a photo that didn't have a lot of distracting images dancing on the surfaces.  Grad Girl came home with this box after her stay with her  grandmother while we were looking for a house prior to our move back to Oklahoma from Texas.  It's held Pokeman cards, Game Boy cartridges, and once did time as a crime scene investigator tool box for one of Grad Girl's Halloween costumes. When I pulled it off the shelf it still contained the CSI badge I mocked up for her that Halloween.  

My Guy took a lot of photos for the challenge.  He sent me seven to pick from. 


My Guy: Tweedy


My Guy pretty much explored the whole house for his photo.  This one comes from his music room.  It's the case for one of his ukuleles.  It's a very pretty tweed, with gold accents.  He plays guitar or ukulele every morning before he heads to work. And usually plays a bit on the weekends when he can't get outside for a walk or bike ride.  

Grad Girl went with a more every day lock. 




It's the deadbolt to her apartment.  You can see Queenie just inside the door waiting for her to get home.  Grad Girl commented that the two pizza boxes by the trash can should give you a clue that it's a college student's apartment. 

I was concerned we would all struggle to find interesting subjects. Looks like that wasn't an issue.  This week's card is going to be a challenge.  



 

My Guy and I had a long conversation this morning on if we had any statues in this town.  We couldn't come up with many and looked up the definition of statue so we knew what might count.  We may well have to go out of town for this one.  That or do some deliberate sight seeing around our community.  Grad Girl works on a college campus, statues are not going to be a problem for her. 

Friday, March 15, 2024

Photo Play 2024: February Summary

I didn't do a lot of photography in February, my leg issues limited my mobility the last half of the month. But I do have a few images from earlier in the month.  

It was still mostly brown on my walks early in the month.  But even brown in the right light can be interesting.  I showed a lot of single leaf photos from my January efforts, grouped leaves seemed to be the favorite subject for February. 





It really is all about the light for these three photos.  Even all brown can be interesting under the right light.  My favorite of these three is the last one of the green leaves, the dead leaves on the ground is a close second.  

Sunrises are easier to photograph from the house, sunsets are harder, but I caught a pretty one on our way out for our Valentine's dinner. 




That's downtown off to the right.  

It snowed a couple of days before Valentine's Day. We ended up with about 3".  










The last photo is my favorite out of this set. It's a bit over exposed, which was a deliberate choice on my part.  It's a much more stark photograph, looks almost like a painting to me.  I'm getting better about using the aperture and the ISO settings to get interesting images without using Photoshop effects.  

The sunset was captured with my I Phone, all the rest of the photos were taken with the Canon 70D with a Sigma Telephoto lens.  I've gotten back to studying photography a bit. The book I'm reading now is by Henry Carroll. 




I found this when we went to Powell's City of Books last fall when we were in Portland, Oregon.  He uses photos by well known photographers to demonstrate various techniques and settings. It is available from Amazon.  It's a quick read and interesting, but I'm going to have to practice a bit before I get "great" photographs like what's in the book. 

Tuesday, March 12, 2024

To Do List for the Week of 03/12/2024

It certainly seems like March is moving along.  Friday is the halfway point of the month.  The end of the month marks the end of the first quarter of 2024.  There is still 3/4 of the year left, but boy does it seem like time is moving quickly.  

Thankfully I was able to make good use of the time I had last week so there was good progress on the To Do List. 


To Do List for 3/5/2024

1. Stay at Home Round Robin:  Finish border 5, work on border 6 ✔

2. Betty: Finish borders ✔

3. Malted Mystery:  Finish February clue - no progress

4. Wild and Goosey:  Continue making purple blocks ✔

5. Scrappy Butterflies: Print label, make binding ✔

6. Indigo Way: Continue as leaders and enders ✔


Five check marks and one no progress is a really good week.  Betty is a finished quilt top. So it will drop off the list for now.  I've plenty in the sewing room to replace it with.  Here is this week's to do list.


To Do List for 3/12/2024

1. Stay at Home Round Robin (Quilting Gail): Finish border 6.

I've made good progress on making the blocks for the border. Just a little over half the 36 blocks needed are pieced.  The final parade starts on Monday, so I'd like to have a finished quilt top by then. 

2. Scrappy Butterflies (A Flutter): Finish the quilt



The label is printed and is ready for pinning to the back.  The binding is made.  So I just need to machine stitch it to the front and finish the hand stitching to the back.  That should be doable this week.  

3. Guild BOM: Fix February block, finish March block.




Somehow I completely missed that turned piece in the upper right of the February block. That should be a pretty quick fix.  The March block isn't too complicated, so fingers crossed it goes to together pretty quickly.  

4. Malted Mystery (Meadow Mist Designs): Finish February clue, start March clue. 

I've gotten a bit behind on this one.  If I can finish the March clue, this project will move to the finished quilt top category on my list. 

5. Wild and Goosey (Bonnie Hunter): Continue making purple blocks. 




Purple is such a fun color to sew with.  One block finished and a start on two others.  I'm hoping to make good progress on these this month. I don't have a lot of purple blocks finished, it's the color I've the least of. 

6. Indigo Way (Bonnie Hunter): Continue making blocks as leaders and enders. 

I need to regroup at some point this week and see what component parts need to be cut.  I need to make two more A blocks for sure. I'll need more B blocks and side triangle blocks, I'm just not sure how many.  

Once the SAHRR and the Malted Mystery are quilt tops, I'm hoping my weekly to do list will shrink a bit. It's hard to make progress on six items each week.  Linking up with The Quilt Schmilt: For the Love of Fabric for this week's To Do Tuesday.