Almost there . . . - May 30, 2025

It's hard to believe we're at the end of May, already.  This year is flying by.  

Next month, we have a rash of birthdays to celebrate - Nanny, Son #2, and Granddaughters #1 and #3.  Last week, #3 asked me if I am going to make her a birthday cake.  When I asked her what kind she wants, she said, "One with fondant!"  I've never worked with fondant, don't know the first thing about it.  Probably should practice, eh?  And maybe watch some videos.  

Today, I am going to finish (mostly) the wedding quilt.  Just need to finish sewing on the binding, which I will do on the machine.  It would be technically ready for gifting after that, but I may play with some "big-stitch quilting," using some pearl cotton thread I've had for years, just to jazz it up a bit.  

Actually, that's a lie.  I'm not "jazzing it up" with the pearl cotton quilting, I'm hiding mistakes.  Because I am sometimes an idiot, I inadvertently quilted the top half of the quilt with horizontal lines and the bottom half of the quilt with vertical lines.  I did not realize this until I sewed the two halves together.  Maybe if I run some big, colorful stitches through the diagonal color pattern, it'll look so mixed up that the crazy quilting can be a "design element."  😉

I'll decide about the big-stitch quilting once I see how hard it will be.  

Mushroom Day - May 29, 2025

 

I wish you could hear the ruckus going on in my back yard right now.

There is a pair of hawks sitting in a tree, and one or more of their fledglings (I assume) flying around the area, all of them screaming their heads off.  They are loud!  I'm thinking all this screaming is the hawk equivalent of Life 360.  ;)  

And there's a turkey gobbling somewhere in the field behind our house.  I am beginning to think the turkey may be in a pen, for the sound always comes from the same direction, multiple times every day.  On second thought, I wonder if it's a high-tech turkey call, set to repeat at certain times.  

* * * * * * * * 

My sister invited me to breakfast yesterday with her and our aunt and uncle, at a restaurant less than 15 minutes away from me.  After breakfast, she planned to visit her daughter (also less than 15 minutes away) to tour her garden.  I was a slug yesterday morning and didn't make it to breakfast, but I did make it to my niece's house in time for the garden tour and a little visiting.

From my niece's house, I went to the grocery store.  (Big yuck.)  Both The Husband and I are in a food funk; we can't think of a thing we'd like to eat if we could have anything we wanted.  Grocery shopping is a challenge, and cooking seems like wasted effort.  

I came home, put away the groceries, made some breakfast muffins and a fruit salad - waaaay too much fruit salad for us to eat before it goes bad.  I bagged up a quart of it and took it to Nanny.  

Our vegetable garden is in Nanny's back yard, so while I was there, I checked on it.  The spot where I want to plant purple hull peas is a puddle (and it's supposed to rain again this weekend).  The tomatoes are bearing fruit, but their leaves are yellowing at the bottom, probably from all the rain.  The fruit may split if this keeps up.  The squash plants are a little yellow, too.  (I still can't tell if they're butternut squash or summer squash.)  The second planting of anasazi beans sprouted sparsely, like the first attempt.  I'd hoped the warmer temps would help them sprout better.  Maybe I should try them again it July.  

Our lawnmower stays in Nanny's workshop when not in use (we mow her yard, too).  After checking on the garden, I drove the mower home and mowed our yard.  

When I finished mowing, I came home and made a mushroom bed.  I didn't do it *precisely* the way the instructions said to do it, which was to layer cardboard, straw, mushroom spawn, and wood chips.  I chose to make the bed in a spot where, 30 years ago, I dug a hole for a fish pond that never happened.  For the past two summers, I've been throwing leaves, weeds, old potting soil, small sticks, etc. in the hole, trying to fill it up.  Yesterday, I dug out some of the debris, put cardboard down in the hole, and used the debris on top of the cardboard instead of straw.  This might have been a mistake, as the leaves were a bit "moldy," already.  If that "mold" is actually some form of pre-mushroom slime (I believe the correct term is "mycelium"), and if it sprouts mushrooms, I might not be able to tell the native mushrooms from the wine cap mushrooms.  Maybe I'll wait to worry about that when something actually sprouts, which may be 6 months, or longer.  The mushroom bed needs to stay fairly moist until then.  When monsoon season finally ends, I'll have to remember to water it.

* * * * * * * *

I haven't decided what I'm going to do today - work on the wedding quilt or do more yardwork.  The quilt is laid out on the sewing table, ready to go.  I should probably start there, then when the sewing goes sideways, I can work off my frustrations in the yard.

 

Birthday Shopping - May 28, 2025

The Husband and I had planned to take the Grandson out to dinner at 5:00 yesterday for his birthday.  A little after noon, The Grandson called to see if I'd like to take him shopping.  I agreed.  He picked me up about 2:00, and we headed out.  Our first stop was an antique mall, where he got a cassette tape to play in his truck, then we went to a video game store.  After that, we hit pawn shops, looking for unexpected treasures until time to meet The Husband for dinner at an Italian restaurant.  

I enjoyed our outing, but I expect that The Grandson was glad to be rid of me after dinner.  As a driver, he is fairly inexperienced, and he is not very good at observing speed limits.  I nagged him the whole time:  "Slow down!"  "Don't get so close!"  Etc.  But he took it like a champ.

He's a good kid.  Young man, rather.  After dinner, he told The Husband and me, "I appreciate y'all."  

* * * * * * * * 

The wedding quilt is just a wee bit away from being ready for the binding.  The two halves are joined.  There's a little bit of quilting left to do in the center of the quilt where the joining occurred, and the edges will need to be squared up before the binding goes on.  I've decided to keep the binding simple, since the quilt is so "busy."  I could finish this quilt by the weekend if I'd get cracking.  

I'm itching to move on to something new.

My BFF sent me a kit to make wire-wrapped jewelry.  I've fooled with jewelry-making in the past and never was very good at it.  Maybe this kit will improve my skills.

Today I need to make a bed for the wine cap mushroom spawn that came in the mail yesterday.  

 

Rainy Memorial Day - May 27, 2025

It's a good thing we did not plan a cookout for Memorial Day.  It rained, off and on, all day.

I spent the day working on the wedding quilt.  

Job #1 was to sew the two halves together.  I'd already sewn the backing seam, trimmed the overlapping batting, and glued the top seam in place.  All that was left of the joining process was to run that top seam through the sewing machine, which would, in theory, also serve as the final quilting line.  

It was hard.  The quilting line came out crooked as a snake.  Worse, the needle didn't catch both seam allowances in some places.  It just wouldn't do.  I spent most of the day picking out the machine stitching and re-sewing the seam by hand.  This morning, there's about a foot left to stitch.

While I had the quilt laid out on the worktable, I realized that the quilting lines on one half of the quilt go north and south, and those on the other half go east and west.  How I managed this feat of idiocy is a mystery.  

There is no way I'm picking it out.

There's also no way I'm adding more machine quilting to make the two sides match. 

It is what it is.

Rainy Sunday - May 25, 2025

We had a hard time getting a head count for how many folks were coming to The Grandson's birthday celebration, so we ordered enough pizzas to feed everyone we'd invited.  The Husband wanted wings, so we ordered those, too, first adding 12 wings to the pizza order, then, to be safe, adding 18 more.  The additional order of 18 somehow didn't make it on the order, so The Husband picked up 2 dozen fried chicken strips from the grocery store deli.

Of 15 possible guests, only 5 showed up.  I sent food home with anybody who'd take it.

The Grandson was a little late getting here (he's a working man, now, at least for the summer), and I had to hide the oatmeal-raisin cookies he'd requested to make sure there were some left for him.  Nanny gave him a photo album with pictures of him and his family.  I was heart-warmed at how happy the gift made him.  After everyone left, he got out the album and went through it again.  We dragged down a box of pictures from the closet shelf, and he selected a few more to add to his album.  He even asked for copies of photographs on shelves and walls at our house.  It was touching.

He went home with what was left of his oatmeal-raisin cookies. 

I worked on the wedding quilt yesterday, getting that last section ready to quilt.  Inserting the batting was a little troublesome.  Basting spray was my friend.  I did not start the quilting because the sewing machine needed to be moved from the sewing cabinet to the worktable to give me room to maneuver the quilt.  But I expected kids at the birthday party and didn't want to string extension cords around the room.  I'll finish the quilting today.

Because I screwed up the quilt-as-you-go method I'd intended to use, I'm likely going to be stuck hand-sewing the top half of the quilt to the bottom half.  Six months ago, this would have been unthinkable, but making Granddaughter #3's quilt by hand upped my confidence and my sewing skills.  It's do-able.  

It's time to start planning the binding. 

Rainy Saturday Birthday Party - May 24, 2025

The Grandson's birthday is near, and we've invited the folks on the hill over for pizza this evening.  I should be in the kitchen, making oatmeal-raisin cookies (the Grandson's favorite) for the party, or at least making a list of things I need from the grocery store.  Right now, it's raining (again!), and I don't want to go to the grocery store.  

(I just checked the cookie recipe against the pantry; no trip to the grocery store will be necessary.)

I really want to be in the sewing room, working on the wedding quilt.

Yesterday, this quilt nearly gave me heart failure.  

I went into the sewing room expecting to sew the two lower quadrants together on the sewing machine. I had finished piecing the top, but I had not cut the backing or the batting for the lower left quadrant. I BARELY had enough backing left for the left quadrant, and had to splice a chunk in the batting.  Luckily, before I sewed everything together, I remembered that I wanted to embroider the couple's names and wedding date on the backing.  This required taking off the walking foot, changing to an embroidery foot, and installing the embroidery unit onto the machine.  My niece had brought over a jacket for me to embroider her company logo on, so while I had the embroidery unit on the machine, I did the logo before taking off the embroidery equipment and re-installing the walking foot.  

It was about 2:00 before I finally got around to sewing the left bottom quadrant to the right bottom quadrant, using the quilt-as-you-go method I'd seen in a video.  The left quadrant backing goes right-side-up underneath the already-quilted right quadrant.  The left quadrant top goes right-side down on top of the right quadrant.  The seam is sewn, then left quadrant backing and top are folded out, batting is tucked between them, and then the left quadrant is quilted.

That's how it was supposed to happen.

To be on the safe side, I initially basted the two halves together.  Good thing.  I'd left out a row of blocks on one side and added an extra row to the other.  (The really sad part is that I'd caught my mistake earlier and had made a note on the diagram to fix it before moving on.)

The weird part was that the color pattern of concentric diamonds was correct.  It took me an hour to figure out where the mistake was, and another hour to correct it.  By this time, it was close to margarita time.  The two lower halves are laying on the sewing room table, clipped together and ready to sew (baste!).  Assuming I've got it right this time, I'll add the batting and do the quilting while the cookies are baking.

In other news, some birds have finally discovered the fancy-schmancy bird feeder installed earlier this week, and pictures of their visits made it to my phone, as do pictures of me in my nightgown if I step outside for some reason.  I am not sure I am comfortable with this feature.  :)

On the gardening front, we still haven't planted the purple hull peas and other things I intend to grow.  I may have to plant in mud if this rain keeps up.  We haven't put the first dent in the pile of wood chips the tree-cutters dropped off.  It may be compost by the time we get to it. 

On to the sewing room . . . .

Calculating - May 23, 2025

It was a mistake to take out the fabric for the new quilt (which we will call "the lavender quilt" from now on) to photograph it for yesterday's post.  It was still on the worktable when I went back to the sewing room, and I ended up fooling with it, in one way or another, for the rest of the day.

Let's look at it again for reference.

There's only a yard of each of these fabrics.  I bought them several years ago, thinking I might make zippered cosmetic pouches, so there's little chance of finding more.  I've gotta work with what I've got.

I absolutely love that top piece.  The "lavender field" part of the design is 5.5" tall and repeats 4 times across the width of the fabric; I can get 24 (finished) 5" squares from it (not enough for a full or queen quilt).  The 1" tall stripes repeat 10 times, and the 2" tall daisies repeat 5 times.  If I cut them apart, I can get 360" of the stripes, and 180" of the daisies.  

I spent all day yesterday calculating and drawing, trying to figure out the best way to use the various parts.  Eventually, I came up with something like this, a framed "lavender field" block alternating with a dresden plate block:d

In the process, I realized I don't have enough of the background fabric to make the quilt as shown.  

Back to the drawing board.  

Or the fabric store.

The Birds - May 22, 2025

What's today?  Thursday?

By now the local birds should have discovered the fancy-schmancy birdfeeder that The Husband and Son #2 installed last Sunday, but I'm not getting any pictures sent to my phone and I've not seen a single bird land on the perch.  Until yesterday, when it sent me several pictures of the back yard for no apparent reason, I worried that either the camera wasn't working or my phone settings were wrong.  Now that I know it actually can send pictures, I'm worried that there's something about the location that the birds don't like.  

Yesterday, I got excited when I saw a bird land on the rim of the ruined basketball goal, but it flew away without investigating the feeder.  I'm convinced that if just one bird will find the feeder, it will tell the others, and there'll be a perpetual bird party in the back yard.

* * * * * * * * 

I can't decide how to proceed on the wedding quilt.  The top half of the quilt is pieced and machine-quilted.  The bottom right half is pieced and machine-quilted quilted.  The bottom left half is pieced but not quilted.  I could do the quilt-as-you-go method to finish the quilt if I hadn't quilted that bottom right section.  I considered removing the quilting stitches, but that would take forever.  I considered continuing with the method that requires hand-sewing to join the sections, but that would take more handwork than my arthritic fingers want to do.  I considered re-making the bottom right section and moving forward with the QAYG method, and even went to the fabric store for more fabric, but I dread all that cutting, so I'm stalled with indecision.  

Maybe I'll ponder it for another day.

While I was at the fabric store, I got fabric for a new quilt, this one intended for my bed.  Or maybe a spare bed.  I bought fabric to coordinate with three other fabrics already in my stash.  I only have a yard each of the other three fabrics, and one of them is directional as well as "sectional" and won't lend itself well to just any old pattern.  I also have some black print fabric in my stash, if it turn out that the design needs a darker dark than the purple.

Some ideas are forming.  I should go sketch them before I forget them.  :)

Quilt accompli - May 21, 2025

Granddaughter #3's quilt is finished and washed and dried.  There are faint chalk marks that didn't come out.  I might wash it again.  Or not.  (They'll rub out eventually, I imagine.)

It would not win a ribbon (or even "place") at a quilt contest, but I am happy enough with it.  Now that I see it in this picture, I kind of wish I'd added a white border - those outside motifs look a little close to the edge in relation to the white spaces between them - but it'll have to do.  Ain't no way I'm taking off the binding.

While this quilt was in the washer, I worked on the wedding quilt a little more.  As I've explained in previous posts, I screwed up the quilt-as-you-go process by dividing the work into quadrants and quilting each quadrant, including the backing, before attempting to attach them.  Three of the four quadrants are pieced and quilted.  The fourth is partially pieced.  If I quilt it as I did the others, some hand sewing will be necessary to join the four quadrants.

I could eliminate the hand sewing by re-making one quadrant, which will allow me to do the quilt-as-you-go process correctly, and I've about decided to do that.  It will require a trip to the fabric store for a little extra fabric, but I don't mind going to the fabric store.  ;)

* * * * * * * * 

Yesterday afternoon, while the wife and kids were gone to gymnastics class, Son #2 walked over to visit and ended up installing the bird feeder I got for Mother's Day.  He and The Husband attached it to the metal basketball goal post that managed to survive the tree that crashed around it during a storm last month.  I did not have any "loose" bird seeds to put in it, but we hammered a bird seed cake into bits and put it in the feeder.  So far, the birds haven't discovered it.  When they do, the camera in the feeder is supposed to send pictures to my phone.  How cool is that?

Speaking of birds, I'm hearing a turkey gobbling in the field beyond the gulley.  

* * * * * * * * 

Last night while watching TV, to have something to do with my hands, I pulled out the hand embroidery kit that I bought to do on a road trip last month.  I'd tried it in the car, but the bumpy roads made precision work nearly impossible.  Plus, this kit may be a little above my skill level.  To finish it as pictured, I will need to master some fancy stitch types.  In an effort to up my game, I've been watching hand embroidery videos, and now I've got the embroidery bug.  I'm itching to draw and embroider my own designs.  Gotta learn how to embroider, first.  ;)  Fortunately, I have loads of embroidery thread to practice with, if it hasn't dry-rotted since my counted cross-stitch days, nearly 40 years ago.  

I did this in 1987!

Rainy Tuesday - May 20, 2025

Yesterday morning, a tree removal service was cutting limbs away from power lines on our road.  I asked for their wood chips, and they delivered a whole truck load, which they dumped at the edge of the field across the road from our house.  It's a big pile, and it's a long way from the garden where it will eventually be used as mulch for weed control.  This will give The Husband an opportunity to drive his tractor AND use its bucket.  When he came home from work last night, I said, "I got you a present!" and showed him the pile.  I hoped we could start moving it this evening, but it's raining again, and the garden will be soup.

This is the second time in my life that I've come into a truck load of wood chips.  The first time was at least 30 years ago, in early fall.  At the time, there were 5 puppies running around our yard.  They loved to lay on top of the wood chip pile, and I could not figure out why until the pile began to smoke.  I guess it was warm up there.  Back then, we didn't have a tractor, and probably didn't even have a wheelbarrow.  Fearing the pile would actually ignite, I moved it the whole pile (which was the size of an old Buick station wagon!) with a shovel to mulch flower beds and pave a path through the "nature area" I was trying to build, which somehow never quite took form.  

After the tree-cutters dumped the new pile, I did some you-tubing to see if it was a good idea to put the raw chips and leaves on top of the garden soil.  (You may remember that I ruined the garden soil for a year or two by tilling un-decomposed leaves and wood chips into the garden soil in an effort to fill a low spot.)  A garden guru said tree-cutter debris makes terrific mulch and compost, especially when it contains green leaves as well as wood chips.  We won't till it into the soil until next spring.

* * * * * * * * 

Granddaughter #3's quilt is close to done.  The binding has been sewn to the back of the quilt and is folded over to the front and clipped in place, ready for the final stitching.  I'm going to stitch it on the machine.  I don't have the skills to do it perfectly, but it's not going to be entered in a quilt show.  This time next month, #3's cat will probably be sleeping on it and sharpening its claws on the embroidery.  

Rainy Sunday - May 18, 2025

It's an intermittently drizzly day.  According to my weather app, we're between two big clouds; the top of one is upon us, and the tail of the other might catch us later in the day.  The bottom of the second one looks like it means business, so we may get a storm, which will utterly piss me off, for I planned to work in the vegetable garden today.

Most years, I would just be starting the garden, but I got an early start this year and planted tomatoes, onions, broccoli, and anasazi beans in March.  There was one night in March when I worried that frost might kill the tomatoes, but it didn't frost, and now they're bearing fruit.  The 4-year-old Great Nephew (at whose request I planted the broccoli) has already nibbled on a small head of broccoli.  Onions are doing fine (I planted more yesterday).  In March, I planted a row of anasazi beans, but fewer than 10 plants came up.  Thinking maybe they simply did not appreciate March temperatures, I re-planted part of the row yesterday; maybe they're sprout since it's warm and they're getting a little moisture today. 

I planted 4 hills of crookneck squash in March, intending to plant more later.  This morning, I found an open pack of butternut squash seeds in the seed store bag that the onions came in, and I fear that I planted butternut squash instead of yellow squash.  It's a good thing I left room for more squash.

We've been using cardboard and mulch for weed control between the rows, but we don't have enough of either to fully cover the ground, and weeds have sprung up.  Fire ants have built a mound near one of the tomato plants.  Yesterday, I weeded and tilled and ant-baited for several hours, and I'm feeling it today.

Just as I was leaving the garden late yesterday afternoon, The Husband showed up to re-till the rest of the garden, which had grown up with weeds since the original March ground-breaking.  The soil was perfect for planting purple hull peas, but I was pooped and decided to plant them today.  And now the garden is probably too wet.  If I weren't so lazy, I'd walk down there to check it.  There might be time to plant the peas before the next round hits.

But I'm pretty lazy today, so . . . . 

I may work on The Granddaughter's quilt today.  I abandoned the binding work when my niece asked me to make the thank-you cards.  Time to get back to it.

Graduation - May 16, 2025

The Grandson is now a high school graduate.

The graduation took place on the football field.  We arrived in a light drizzle an hour before the ceremony was to begin, and the stadium was already packed, home and visitors, with people lining the fences on foot and in lawn chairs.  Two nice ladies squeezed together to make room for The Husband and me on the visitors' side, but there were no seats left for Son #1 and his family.  We gave them our seats halfway through the ceremony.  

The crowd was not allowed on the football field, which has a new synthetic turf that must not be ruined.  When the ceremony was over, instead of being allowed to rush the field as used to happen, the crowd was instructed to meet the graduates at the front door of the school.  It took us a while to find The Grandson amid all the jostling, but we found him and took a couple of pictures with him.  He is associated with a barbeque cooking team, and the last I heard, he was planning to join them at a bbq contest after graduation.  He seemed anxious to get going, so we did not dally.  

He is an intelligent young man, and I had so hoped that he would go to college this fall.  He has decided to join the military.  I'm not particularly happy about this; I cannot stand to think about him being sent away to parts unknown.

This morning, I'm picking him up to go with me to renew his car tag.  If he's not in a hurry to get back to the bbq cooking contest, we might have lunch somewhere.  We may not have many more opportunities to hang out together, now that he's "grown."

* * * * * * * *

Yesterday, I finished drawing/painting enough thank-you cards requested by my niece to call the project officially done.  I may make a few more for good measure.

My niece is volunteering at a local festival (the same one in which The Grandson is participating); the thank-you cards are for her assistants.  The cards feature a pig with the Memphis bridge in the background.  When I texted her earlier this week for clarification on the size, she was busy with preparations for the festival.  Her response was that she trusted my judgment.  "Just nothing vulgar," she added.

My response to that was, "So I guess the 'thanks for humping it' idea is out, huh?"

She said, "Well, maybe make one or two.  😂"

Cards - May 15, 2025

The pressure is off; I have completed five thank-you cards for my niece, and a couple more are in progress.  I did 4 in colored pencil and am doing 4 more in ink & wash.  Unfortunately, the ink that I thought was waterproof is not waterproof.  It will be necessary to drag out the Speedball pin and ink to re-draw the ink & wash cards.

Then I've got to get back to The Granddaughter's quilt.

Tonight, The Grandson graduates from high school.  If it doesn't rain, the ceremony will be on the football field.  If it does, it moves to the gymnasium.  My fingers are crossed for fair weather!

This makes me think of my own high school graduation.  I was 16 years old and bound for college in the fall.  My friends were planning to get together to "throw down" after the ceremony, and I desperately wanted to be with them.  My mother, a modern-day Puritan, would not let me go.  (She knew what was up.)   I had two choices, come straight home with my parents after the ceremony, or be taken to dinner by a dude with whom we attended church, who my mother thought was the ideal boyfriend for me.  Didn't smoke, didn't drink (anymore), had a job.  He'd already cleared it with her, promising to take me "somewhere nice."

I'd already been on a couple of dates with him and had nicknamed him "Slug Lips."  He was several years older than I, majority age, even.  All of our dates had consisted of a trip to McDonald's, followed by video games in the back room of another burger joint, but I went out with him after graduation, since we were going "somewhere nice."  

He took me to Shoney's.  

I was home by 11.

And still pissed about it.  ;)

Distracted - May 14, 2025

My niece texted me a couple of days ago to ask if I would make 4 "Thank You" cards featuring a pig and/or the Memphis bridge.  I said I'd give it a try.

She wants four "originals."  

I sent her a screen shot of the proposed design.  She said it would do. 

My plan was to print out four 5 x 7 cards and then hand paint/color them individually.  I spent yesterday morning cleaning up the artwork and trying to get the image to print correctly on a 5 x 7 folding card. What appeared to be a perfect layout in the print preview was NOT how it printed on the card.  About lunch time, I gave up in frustration.  By mid-afternoon, my niece had changed her mind and wanted 4 x 6 postcards, instead. This size proved easier to place the image correctly.  But this morning she changed her mind again and wants folded cards instead of postcards, thinking that cards in envelopes might be more likely to survive the postal service than would a postcard. 

But printing the design has other issues.  The ink is not waterproof and will bleed if I touch it with watercolor paint.  And watercolor paper won't go through the printer, anyway.  This morning, I traced the outlines on 4 x 6 watercolor paper, using waterproof ink and will try painting the cards.  But the design includes text, which I'd rather not do by hand.  So I've also printed the design on 4 x 6" mixed media paper and will see how it looks done with colored pencils.

Time to do some experimenting.

The quilts are on hold for a day or two.  

Mother's Day Weekend - May 12, 2025

The Husband and I did yardwork all day Saturday.  I mowed our yard and Nanny's yard.  While I was mowing, the tree cutter came to take down the tree had that split during the storm a few weeks ago.  The tree-cutting left a pile of wood shreds and sawdust.  The workers would have taken it away, but I wanted it for mulch for the garden.   The Husband and I raked it up and put it around the tomatoes.  Along with the mulch, we transported a few dozen big black ants to the garden.  I hope they like to eat fire ants.

With the tree gone, there is now a spot in our back yard that will get sun for most of the day.  I'm seeing zinnias and other sun-loving flowers there.  

For Mothers Day, The Husband gave me a bird feeder that has a camera in it to take pictures of the birds that come to eat.  We plan to mount it on the old basketball goal post that somehow managed to survive when the tree fell on/around it.  I wonder how long it will take the squirrels to figure out how to get to it.  

Saturday night, I finished the hand quilting on Granddaughter #3's quilt.  This week, I intend to bind it, but I haven't even made the binding yet.  I've decided it to bind it in white, and maybe do some decorative stitching on it.  We'll see.

Last night, I did some hand sewing on the wedding quilt, but I am not going to work on it anymore until #3's quilt is completely finished.

Machine quilt-as-you-go experiment - May 9, 2025

While trolling the internet for tips on quilting a full-size quilt on a domestic machine, I found this video:

Quilt-As-You-Go Joining Method: JOIN & FLIP!

This seemed like the perfect solution for the wedding gift quilt.

I probably mentioned in previous posts that I intended to piece and quilt this quilt in sections, intending to join them later.  This decision was a mistake.  This is not what the video shows.    I should have precisely followed the method in the video.  

The problem is that once two quadrants are quilted, edge to edge, you have left no seam allowances and cannot join two sections invisibly on the machine. 

I realized this when I attempted to join the first two quilted sections.  It was necessary to take out enough of the quilting to create seam allowances.  I peeled back the top and the batting, laid the two sections back-to-back, and stitched the backing shut so that the seam was on the inside of the quilt.  Then I laid the quilt on the sewing table, ironed a 1/4" seam on one side of the top, and pinned it in place, overlapping the other section's seam allowance.  The intention was to stitch the seam allowances in place on the machine.  

Right.

I attempted this feat yesterday afternoon and made a mess out of it.  Even though I was using a walking foot, the quilt bunched up; the seam looked terrible, and there were places where the stitching didn't catch both sides of the fabric.  When The Husband came home from work and saw me taking out the stitches with a seam ripper, he just said, "Uh-oh . . . " and left the room.  

I'll end up blind-stitching this quilt by hand.  

But, for now, the wedding quilt must take a back seat in favor of The Granddaughter's quilt, which still lacks binding and a bit more hand quilting.  I intend to give it to her for her birthday, which is next month.  

Mother's Day Planning - May 8, 2025

I texted The Sister-in-Law yesterday to ask if she wants to do a Mother's Day dinner for Nanny.  I offered to bake a ham and make some sides.  

She said she'd bring something but added, "Why do the mothers always have to do the cooking???"

I said we could let The Husbands do it.

"They'd just grill hot dogs," she said.

I said, "I like grilled hot dogs."

She said, "Me, too!"

I said, "Nanny likes grilled hot dogs."

That settled it.  That's our plan for Mother's Day dinner.  

Don't judge us.

Garden Checkup - May 7, 2025

Frustration drove me out of the sewing room about noon today.  I came out to the back porch for some air and saw the little red garden tiller parked beside the porch.  Son #2's family had used it last week to till up the flower beds in front of their house.  I decided to push it down Nanny's driveway to the garden shed, to get some exercise, check on the garden, and get the tiller out of the weather.

Nanny's garbage can was sitting empty at the end of her driveway with the lid open, so I decided to pull it back to her house.  But I was pushing the tiller, too.  I thought about stuffing the tiller IN the garbage can, but I couldn't lift it high enough to get it in.  So it was (1) push the tiller and pull the garbage can or (2) make two trips.  

Option 1 worked remarkably well.  It was actually easier to push the tiller one-handed than to use both hands, and it was a piece of cake to pull the garbage can with the other hand.  However, about halfway down the driveway, the garbage can began to resist, and when I looked back, I saw that one of the wheels had come off.  I stopped and put it back on, but something was missing - a hubcap of some sort - and I expected that the wheel would come off several more times before I got the can back to the house.  

Sure enough . . . . 

To make matters worse, Nanny saw me coming and came out to help.

I'll spare you the details.  (You're welcome.)

Considering how much rain we've had for the past few weeks, the tomatoes, broccoli, peppers, and onions are doing surprisingly well.  Last week's squash seeds have sprouted.  But that's all we have in the garden so far.  

The unplanted section of the garden is wet and weedy.  It'll need tilling again before I can plant the rest of the vegetable seeds.  I was hoping to get that done this weekend, but it's supposed to rain today and tomorrow, so the ground will be too wet.

Cinqo de Mayo - May 6. 2025

It must have been Herman, the household trickster, who disappeared my seam rippers.  

He must have taken them Saturday, while I was working in the yard.  Imagine him snickering the next day, watching me search for them all over the house.  In the wee hours of Sunday night, hoping to prolong the entertainment, he hid them in places I'd already searched.  As I said in the previous post, one of them fell out of my recliner yesterday morning when I searched it one more time.  When I found it, I went straight to the sewing room to work on the wedding quilt.

Sewing was hard yesterday; things did not go smoothly.  The seam ripper worked overtime.  When the last row of the lower right quadrant had been pinned in place, I picked up that section to take it to the sewing machine and, behold, there was the other seam ripper, under the quilt section.

I said aloud, so he could hear it, "Hermey...you asshole," and quit the sewing room for the day.

On the kitchen table, there were three bananas that needed to either be eaten or used, so I made a batch of banana/nut/oatmeal/raisin muffins.  While they were baking, I stirred up a meatloaf for dinner.  About the time the muffins came out of the oven and the meatloaf went in, The Sister-in-Law texted to ask if we wanted to celebrate Cinqo de Mayo with her and The B-i-L at the Mexican restaurant.  We did.  

With leftover roast from Sunday night and the untasted meatloaf from last night, this takes care of dinner until Friday, our regular "Mexican night."  Woohoo!  The kitchen is closed for the rest of the week!  

I'm going to the sewing room to stitch that last row of quadrant 3 and start piecing quadrant 4.

And, by golly, there'd better be a seam ripper handy.

Weekend Warriors - May 5, 2025

The Husband and I lead sedentary lives for most of the year.  Historically, we've both held office jobs and had hobbies done from a chair.  Seasons permitting, we do a little yard work and vegetable gardening, but we are by no means go-getters in those departments.  We are both out of shape.  I've been telling The Husband that we need to stay out of the recliners and get some exercise.  

Saturday morning, The Husband said he was going to move around instead of sitting around all day.  So he got up, put his yard shoes on, and went out to saw off some limbs that have been impairing our view of the road from the driveway.  I had a couple of errands to run, but when I got back, I put on my yard shoes and went out to help.  By this time, he was chain-sawing on the limbs that had fallen across the back yard 3 weeks ago.  The tips of the limbs were small enough to run through the limb grinder, so I set it up and started grinding, filling the big yard wagon to the brim with tiny wood chips.  After that, I cranked the push mower and did some mowing, then I dragged the wagonload of wood chips down to the garden and spread them on top of the soil for weed control.

We quit the yard about 5:00, both of us worn out.

After breakfast Sunday morning, I went to the sewing room, still in my housecoat, planning to finish piecing the quilt sections.  I'd been sewing for about 5 minutes when The Husband came in to ask if I was going to attend the annual meeting at his work.  I groaned.  It is kind of a necessary thing, and it's not unpleasant, but I'd have much rather stayed home.  Nevertheless, I got up, showered, and dressed, intending to go back to the sewing room until time to leave.  Then I remembered that I'd planned to put a pot roast in the oven at 2:00, the exact time the meeting would start.  New plan:  crock-pot pot roast.  

I still had a little time to sew once dinner was in the crock pot.  I sat down at the machine and stitched two rows together, but when I checked them against the chart, I discovered that I'd sewn them together upside down.  I spent most of the rest of my hoped-for sewing time looking for a seam ripper.  

I usually keep two seam rippers handy: one in the sewing room and one in a bowl by my recliner.  I seemed to remember deliberately putting one of them where I would be sure to see it later, but neither seam ripper was to be found.  I ended up picking out the seam with the embroidery scissors.  By then, it was time to leave for the meeting.  When I got home, I re-sewed the rows together (correctly), but didn't trust myself to start another row.  

The hunt for the seam rippers resumed this morning.  One of them fell out of my recliner when I turned it upside down.  But that's not the one I deliberately put somewhere to be found later.  

It's this kind of sh*t that drives me nuts.

Rain - May 2, 2025

It's dark and thundery and drizzly on the back porch this morning.  If I were doing anything fussy, I'd have to turn on the porch light.  

Looking out across the back yard is a little depressing.  The ground has been too wet for the tree-cutter's equipment, and today's rain will delay him further.  The limbs from the ash tree are still laying across the yard.  We've been mowing around them, but among them a meadow has sprung up.  The place is beginning to look abandoned.  Aside from the looks of the thing, we worry about the part of the tree that is still standing and the limbs that might crash onto our roof.  Every little storm makes us tense.  

I suppose I'll work on the wedding quilt today, once the coffee is gone.  The next task is to finish piecing the bottom left and top right quadrants.  The blocks are all cut out, and some of the repeating color patterns are constructed.  I'll make more of the repeating patterns - blue/green/yellow, blue/green/rust, blue/green/brown - and then get the "map" out to see what goes where.

Yesterday, I bumped the big black blister on my hand, and it started leaking blood.  I called the dermatologist office to ask how to care for the wound.  They said, "Put a band-aid on it."  I squished out most of the blood and put a band-aid on it.  The skin under it looks like a deflated beach ball. 

About 3 p.m., The Husband texted me that The Grandson had a band concert at 7.  He's playing bass guitar with the high school jazz band.  We'd known he had a concert coming up, we just didn't know when.  He was never sure of the date when we asked about it.  He said he'd let us know, which he did, yesterday at 2:59.  

Dinner was ready when The Husband got home at 6.  We wolfed it down and made it to the concert in time.  The event started with a performance by the flag team.  The jazz band played a couple of songs, then the concert band took over.

Watching The Grandson perform was a little like going back in time.  He looks so much like his dad.

 

All that stuff I said I might do yesterday?

My imagination seriously outweighed my ambition.

I did none of it.  None.

In my defense, I think I'm coming down with a cold.  Headache-y and snotty and "draggy."  Didn't accomplish a thing all morning except finishing a James Lee Burke novel.  Finally, around 2 p.m., I made myself get up and go to the sewing room to work on the wedding quilt, a machine quilt-as-you-go project.  

You might remember that The Granddaughter's quilt is a quilt-as-you-go project in which I quilted and joined the blocks by hand.  The procedure I used on that quilt is different from the machine-quilted method I learned from this video:  

Join & Flip Quilt As You Go - FULL QUILT DEMONSTRATION (including borders!)

The wedding quilt will finish roughly 81" x 81".  I decided to piece the top (3" x 3" blocks) in quadrants and then join the quadrants together.  The top two quadrants are pieced and quilted.  Yesterday, I attempted to join them together.

Oh, boy, did I screw up.  

I should not have quilted the top left quadrant.  The joining method described by the above video would have me first sew the backing and the top (but not the batting) of the top right quadrant to the already-quilted top left quadrant.  Then, I was supposed to insert the batting and quilt it.  But I'd already quilted it.  All the way to the edges.

I will skip over the host of problems that this presented.  My eventual solution was to hand-sew the two quadrants together, using the same method I'd used for The Granddaughter's quilt.  I took out enough of the quilting to free up a seam allowance, pinned the two sections together, and left the project on the sewing table for another day.

In the middle of the night, a solution presented itself out of the blue.

Here's what the quilt it supposed to look like when it's done (minus the scribbling):

During the night, it occurred to me that I might rotate the top right quadrant a 1/4 turn and use it as the BOTTOM right quadrant, at which point I could proceed on the sewing machine as shown on the video, without having to do any hand stitching.  The first thing I did this morning was to check the theory, and IT'LL WORK!

WHEW!

* * * * * * * * 

It rained last night.  Nix working in the garden today.  

* * * * * * * * 

Look at this place on my hand where the wart was frozen two days ago.  

Is that not disgusting?