Nearing a Finish

Good morning, my friends, and thank goodness it's Friday! I'm getting my hair cut today, and there's just one other item on my list of to-do's. Aside from that, it'll be a mostly sewing day. We're going to see some nice weather over the next couple of days...always appreciated when I need to drive into town for any reason.

When I left you yesterday, Smitty was just settling in for a morning nap.

I was heading downstairs to take the first stitches on the next three blocks for "S" is for Sewing. These are kind of fun to stitch.

As I sat stitching, I noticed the bird feeders were empty...again. Such piggy birds. Outside, I noticed the Riot Daffodil has bloomed. This is one of my favorites.

And it's easy to find the bird feeder now. The squirrels have worn a path. I saw them collecting rocks so they could build some cairns. You wouldn't want to get lost, you know.

Back inside, I made good on my threat to quilt the last two border sides. It's such a big quilt, I can't get a good picture of it. I asked Mike to hold it up, but his wingspan isn't wide enough. I ended up taking this picture of it from the side. Hard to see the quilting. You'll have to take my word for it. It's ready for binding now.

The area in front of our living room windows is the best light for seeing the quilting. Flipping it over, I still can't see the quilting on this busy back. You can see it where I've joined the yardage together with a black strip, but that quilt block fabric hides everything. Even on close examination it's hard to see.

So it's folded up waiting the next step in my sewing room. I'm going to have to do some cleaning up to make way for squaring it up. Right now, I have scraps of fabric spread from A to Izzard. These are being used to make borders for The Story of My Day. All those off-white strips in the middle are left over from when I made the quilt blocks. I'm approaching the finish of the left side border, and so I'll probably pick it all up then to make some room for Jericho Walls.

Smitty was Johnny-on-the-spot for sewing yesterday. After a good morning nap, he was raring to go.

Sadie is working under the table for the time being. It avoids income tax on her earnings, doncha know.

Getting to work on the border, I had help from Big Foot. (And you thought Big Foot was brown, didn't you?)

First, I needed a large and a small windmill for the next large section.

And then I made another smaller section with a small windmill.

Since I'm doing the blanket top-stitching as I go along, I'm having to switch feet on my sewing machine from the quarter-inch foot for piecing with the larger foot that accommodates the side-to-side movement of the needle for the blanket stitches. It means trying to do this somewhat efficiently by doing as much top-stitching as possible before going back to piecing things together. (I hope that makes sense.) When I finished yesterday, I had this much of the border finished. You can see it framed in green on the left side of the image below. There's just one more section (and one more windmill) to complete, and then I can sew it to the rest of the quilt.

Back upstairs, Smitty rewarded his day of hard work with an excellent afternoon sunbath.

Okay, so I mentioned I'm getting a haircut today. It's also a baking day. I'll be baking a Carrot-Walnut Loaf Cake for our morning snacking pleasure. Don't let that word "cake" fool you. It's really more of a quick bread. Later this afternoon, I should have some time to get back to my sewing.

And now, my friends, I should tell you that I won't be blogging tomorrow. Allow me to get on my soapbox to tell you why.

Mike and I are going to do something we've never done before. And I suppose that could be surprising given that we grew up in the 60's when protests over the war in Vietnam were commonplace. Mike would have been a young teen. I was 11 when my dad deployed to Vietnam for the first time, and so it was a confusing time for me. I believed then (and I still do) that my dad's service was honorable, even if the war was not. So the protests puzzled my youthful innocence. And all of that to say that this will be the first time either of us has participated in an organized protest. 

We'll be taking our MAX light rail train to Waterfront Park in downtown Portland. There are at least five protests happening within an hour's drive of us tomorrow. By riding MAX, we can avoid having a car parked downtown.
 

"Hands Off!" protests are occurring all over the country tomorrow. This map was taken from a post by Robert Reich. I can highly recommend his post for the wealth of information it provides. 

If you're wondering about protests in your area, I'm linking to a list of protests happening all over the country. They're listed in alphabetical order by state. Look for your state, and you might find something nearby. Also, I cannot recommend highly enough the helpful information provided by the 50501 Movement. I'm following 50501 Oregon, and I have no doubt there is a group for your state too.

As I mentioned after attending Senator Jeff Merkley's town hall back in February, just being there helped me to feel less isolated and alone with my personal concerns about how things are going in government. Being in a large crowd of like-minded people was reassuring in and of itself. At the time, Mike and I agreed that we want to do more of this when the opportunity presented itself, and so we are. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little nervous about this. We've given ourselves permission to leave if we feel unsafe. Peaceful protest is still legal in this country, and so we're hoping it will be that...peaceful. 

Of course, I'll be back on Sunday to tell you how it went. Probably I'll have some pictures. For now, back to my slow-stitching and some breakfast. Tomorrow we'll rouse the rabble.

Both Sides Now

Good morning, my friends, and welcome to Thursday. There's not much on my agenda this morning. Just one housekeeping chore. The weather was looking promising a little while ago. Now, it's clouded over again. If the sun comes back, I might get out for a walk. There are lots of blooming things in the neighborhood just now.

There was plenty of time for sewing yesterday. I quilted the second side of the border for Jericho Walls.

With just two sides to go, I believe I'll finish this today. I've been taking it slow to avoid making my wrist and elbow hurt. If I can finish the final two sides today, it won't matter if my wrist and elbow flare up a little because the quilting will be finished. So I've left it needle down. You can expect the quilting to be finished by tomorrow. 

It's kind of a good news, bad news sort of thing because finishing the quilting will mean machine-sewing on the binding. As I'm sure you can appreciate, machine-sewing a binding on a quilt this large is a pain. On the other hand, sitting for hours sewing it by hand can be very relaxing. And when you're finished, you have a finished quilt! This was my Rainbow Scrap Challenge quilt for 2022, and so it's been in the works for some time.

Earlier, I stitched the 9th block for Grandpa's Bridges this far. I might have kept going, but I needed to get myself around and do some other things.

No worries because I finished the last of it while we watched the news last night. Now the Sticky Fabri-Solvy has been washed out, and it's nicely pressed, and Ta-Da! There it is. Number nine...number nine...number nine...is finished. (You have to be old to get that "number nine" reference. Which of my friends will claim to be old enough?)

Here are the nine blocks I have for this quilt so far.

Knowing I'd be finishing that, I wanted to trace the next three blocks for "S" is for Sew. 

These are small blocks, and so they won't take long. 

There are only nine blocks in this small quilt, and so when these are finished, I'll be 2/3 of the way there.

Sadie's contribution was to look adorably comfortable.

Okay, and then I went to work on the left side border for The Story of My Day. It started with these pieces. I cut all the largest pieces from the fabric I had left. Even though I started with the full amount of yardage listed in the pattern, I ran out of the background fabric. Fortunately, it's a flat off-white Kona solid. I was pretty sure I had something else that would work. You can see the color is just slightly different, but for this quilt, it hardly matters. There are pops of color throughout, and so I'm going to be satisfied with that slight color difference.

The largest pieces will include appliqued "windmills." I'll do them as I go in order to reduce the pain.

And I'll top-stitch them as I go too. I'll use the same color thread I'm using for piecing. It will be easier to top-stitch as I go than it will be to do them all at once.

Then I added the next pieces to what I had. It was getting late in the day by then, and time to stop. I'll start today making one large and one small windmill to add to the large space on the right of the image below.

And then, I'll just keep going until I have a finished quilt top. Finishing up the quilting for Jericho Walls will mean this project gets my undivided attention.

For dinner last night, I tried something new. This is Spiced Salmon with Sugar Snap Peas and Red Onion. We really liked this. The combination of the red onions and the sugar snap peas was very tasty.

The salmon is rubbed with a spice combination (I used garam masala), and then it's browned in a skillet. The salmon is moved to a plate, and then the vegetables are sauteed until they're softened. After that, the salmon is added back to the skillet and finished off in a 400° oven. (Make sure your skillet is oven proof.) The recipe recommends using a nonstick skillet. None of my nonstick skillets are oven proof, and so I used a regular skillet sprayed with cooking spray. I had no problem with anything sticking. So, I've linked to the recipe back there. It's from the New York Times, but I've given you a gift link. If you have trouble opening it, feel free to email me, and I'll be happy to send it to you in a different way.

Okay, so that's all I have for you today. I'll be taking the first stitches on "S" is for Sew this morning. But first, breakfast. Using fingers that are trembling from hunger is no way to start a new embroidery project. And thanks to those of you who responded so favorably to my new "Soapbox" section. I don't have anything to rant about this morning, but I'll have something for you by tomorrow. 

41 Years Ago Today

Good morning, my friends. It's a red letter day at the Three Cats Ranch. Please join me in wishing a very happy 41st birthday to this handsome young man.

Matthew is my youngest, but don't let his age fool you into thinking I'm old. See, I have a strategy for staying young. When I reached the age of 50, I started counting backwards. At this point, I'm just 30, and so it's something of a miracle to have a child older than I am. Yeah. That's my story. 

A couple of years ago, his birthday was the inspiration for the "Feelings" quilt. That was a good day.

We had grocery shopping to do yesterday, but our list was relatively short. We happened to hit our senior discount day, and so the store was full of old people. Despite being with a group of questionable shopping cart drivers, we were in and out well before lunch time. That left plenty of time in the day for sewing.

I've started rounding the borders for Jericho Walls. I'm doing a loopity loop design (technical quilting term), first with large loops, and then going over it again with smaller loops. It creates a secondary diamond shape in the middle. It's easy to stitch...always appreciated.

After stitching across this long border...twice...I decided one border per day was my limit. So far so good getting through this large quilting project without making my wrist and elbow hurt. There's no rush, and so I'm taking my time. I left it needle down at the second corner.

Today I'll stitch across the second side. At this rate, I should have it to binding stage by the weekend.

Moving into the sewing room, I had lots of kitty help. Smitty volunteered to trace the next blocks for Raggedy & Friends.

Sadie was more interested in helping make the scrappy inner border for The Story of My Day.

We started with the final two blocks for the Raggedy & Friends project.

Now it has its own two bins...a smaller one for the embroidered block I'm working on, and a larger one to contain the entirety of the project. (This is how I store all my projects.)

From there, I went to work cutting strips 1-3/4 inches wide to make the final two inner borders for The Story of My Day. When I had this many cut, I decided to start sewing them together.

Although I was certain I'd need more, I already had way more length than I needed. That was all well and good because I can use those scraps in the pieced borders to come. For now, I finished the day with all four inner borders attached.

Next, I'll start sewing together the four outer borders. My experience making the quilt blocks tells me that these will be a little bit of a puzzle to sew together. Here's the diagram from the pattern.

Here's a picture of the finished quilt.

You'll note I'm also including the windmills. There are two sizes of these. Yesterday, I copied the templates, and I'll use these to trace the fusible. If memory serves there were something like 12 large ones and 9 small ones. (I forget.) 

In any case, these four borders are going to take a while to sew together. And since it's time for goal-setting, I'm committing to sew The Story of My Day into a finished quilt top as my goal for

So I have a busy agenda for today. I want to take a walk on the treadmill, and I have one housekeeping chore to do. Since all the blocks for Raggedy & Friends are traced now, I can move on to my other embroidery projects. First, I'll want to create an embroidery block for April's "Sewing Room" project. These are the blocks I have for this quilt so far.

I'm coming down the home stretch with the ninth block for Grandpa's Bridges. It will probably be finished in the next day or two. That means I'll want to trace the next three blocks for "S" is for Sew. These are the blocks I have for that quilt so far.

Finally, I'll want to make up April's block for Kittens in Cups. April's color is teal. I'll be making another kitten with a tail, and so I'll strive to make this one look like Smitty. (January's block was supposed to be Smitty's block, but that was before I realized the second block had a tail. And Smitty's tail is so lavishly long and beautiful, it needs a place of honor on the quilt. Besides, Sadie's tail is already represented. Smitty's tail needs equal time. These are the blocks I have for this quilt so far.

Okay, so obviously, I won't get all that done today. It's just a preview of coming quilting attractions. Right now, I'm thinking breakfast sounds good, and then I'll get on with my busy day.

It seems a good time to tell you that I've considered a new way to get in my political digs in a way that allows those who disagree to opt out ahead of time. We're in unprecedented times, my friends. Since blogging is my way of writing a letter to friends, I've always included whatever happens to be on my mind on a given day. Like many of you, I wake up each morning wondering what the next travesty will be. Realizing that some would like to avoid controversy, I'm going to give a visual warning to anyone who wants to opt out. (And no hard feelings.) When the mood strikes on any given post, I'll keep it for the end of the day's writing. If I'm about to say something to which others might disagree or take offense, I'll warn you when I'm going to get on my soapbox with this visual:

Today I have just one thing to say: Thank you, Wisconsin friends. You've given many of us reason to hope.