Monthly Archives: February 2016

2016
02/17

Category:
farming
Garden
Life
Shopping

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A little gardening, a little canning, a little shopping

I froze grapes in gallon bags last fall because I just didn’t have time or energy to make grapes then. Also, I find the raisins easier to dehydrate once the grapes have been frozen and thawed. So this morning I canned 6 pints of grape juice from the thawed raisins.

After coming home from gym, I sold my first spinning wheel to a man who has taken one lesson on the same type of wheel. It’s a good wheel and he should enjoy it.

After lunch, I went out and worked on one side in the greenhouse. It’s amazing, even baby carrot seeds dropped last fall have started growing. There were these carrots left in over winter. They are a bit short as I need to dig down farther to give them more good growing soil and less hardpan. Not only were carrots starting to grow, but the weeds had a great start. Tomorrow, I will put down the preplant nutrients and water well. This weekend, I’ll start sow some cool weather crops and hopefully get some tomatoes and pepper seeds started in the house. (Need more hours)

We retrieved the sewing machine that had to be serviced and made a stop at Costco, which is rarely cheap. We had $55.00 in rebates off this, so that helped ay for the extra dog treats. We should be good for another year of treats now.

I certainly don’t want to forget that Beau wants to be a house dog, and therefore has been climbing the fence. That would be okay if we could trust him not to leave when the gate opens. We can’t so he has to stay behind the fence. He weighs about 120#, but fortunately walks well on a lead. So, in the dark and driving rain, we ushered him into the quarters he shares with the sheep at night. Now I wish you all a good, restful night, knowing that tomorrow will have new challenges.

2016
02/16

Category:
food
Life
Shopping
spinning

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Busy, but not accomplished

Some days are just too long for the energy I have and too short for what I want to achieve. This was one of those. After walking half an hour this morning (I’m doing 10,000 steps a day now), I rested my legs by spinning on my electric spinner. Then it was time to go to the medical appointment to try to avoid knee surgery.

Lunch already! Ok, we decided since we were close to a Whole Foods, we’d pick up some bread we especially like and put some in the freezer. Since they only had 2 loaves left, we didn’t fill the freezer. However, we decided to eat there, which won’t happen again soon.

Home again and another half hour of walking which gave me about 3000 steps. Then it was time for a webinar on replacing zippers – continuing education which I enjoy. After that it was time to feed and put the animals to bed. A few more steps to complete my day and oh, yes, another batch of grapes on the dehydrator that weren’t drained enough made the smoke detector tattle on me again. This time I was right there and saw what happened. So this was a day, plenty happened, but nothing gained in the studio or in the garden. And tomorrow I start over again with the steps and the gym which I am grateful I can do.

2016
02/15

Category:
Life
Sewing

COMMENTS:
3 Comments »

Elephant babies

Mary came over today and we went through some boxes of fake fur. I hung much of it up to not only get rid of more boxes, but to have it out where we could see and use it. These baby elephants are from a Carol’s Zoo pattern which I cut out a few years ago. The mother elephant had already been made and gifted, so these wee ones are on their own. We enjoyed making them (with embroidered eyes) and now will decide where they should go. Or maybe we’ll wait until we have made a few more animals. There was quite a bit of fur in those boxes.

2016
02/14

Category:
Life

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7 Comments »

Smoke alarm

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I believe I said “we don’t do boring” here. I was sitting here spinning wool, minding my own business when from the laundry room smoke detector came a terrific racket . There was also a bit of smoke, but we didn’t figure out from where it came. I am dehydrating grapes into raisins, but that didn’t seem to be the source, nor did the dryer. So it remains a mystery until we can figure out how to repeat it.

Beau seemed today to have forgotten that his job is protecting livestock in the pasture and preferred to get out and protect the house occupants. Lacey received the treats for staying in the pasture and DH spent several hours mending the fence that Beau smashed. (No, we don’t do boring)

There was some sewing time – the Psalms flimsy is finished. It seems the tops are piling up faster than I’m quilting them, so I placed it in line to be quilted. I want to finish it and get it mailed off before Mother’s Day.

Mary is coming over tomorrow. In anticipation, I was looking for a “silk” fabric that I want to embroider to make a tapestry. That won’t happen tomorrow as I didn’t find it, but I did find the Sunbonnet Sue blocks for which I was looking when I found the kits for the Psalms quilt and the giraffe quilt. Now, I need to go looking for something else and that poly silk that I saw last week will turn up again. I have found a number of items that I didn’t know were missing until I went looking for something else and the missing are slowly getting done. Another thing that turned up were large boxes of fur fabric. I haven’t been into making stuffed animals the last few years, but maybe I need to make some to clear out some of those boxes. With all this, one would think there would be holes on the shelves where these items were. No, not one hole on the shelves! But this fur is taking a share of the floor. I haven’t been purchasing either. But then a friend did send me some pieces that I need to use, so they are on my list to be used before summer. I’m thinking of something like a ‘hole in the barn door”, with a special motif in the center. Yes, by the time it happens, that may morph.

I think I should open this place up for those of you who would like to come over and sew or quilt. (I have a guest room) Then maybe with more hands, I’d get more projects done. Just let me know when you’re available. Ideas, patterns, and fabric along with equipment are here. No, not a bit of gardening was done today.

2016
02/13

Category:
Life

COMMENTS:
6 Comments »

40 days

40 days and 40 nights (or so it feels). Please send acacia wood and pitch.

2016
02/12

Category:
Life
quilts

COMMENTS:
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Never bored

Boring is rarely in our vocabulary. Usually we use it to say that we would like less going on. This was today’s not so boring activity. I came home from the gym and was making lunch when there was a loud noise and the dogs took off, stopped suddenly and just looked. They apparently didn’t think the neighbor’s tree falling across the fence constituted a threat, so wandered back to their cover as it was raining very hard. This photo was taken in the daytime, but the skies were just that dark today.

I was able to get a few rows together, then noticed that the Psalms were not printed to exactly match the blocks around them, so there may be a few seams changed when I put the rows together I’ll put e other 4 rows together and then see what needs to be done.

2016
02/11

Category:
quilts

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Heavenly Psalms

This is the current quilt for which I found a kit hiding in a box (Honest, they are reproducing) It is now cut out These 18 blocks are put togetherThese are sewn and will

press into 31 of these blocks which will then need to be trimmed the smallest amount.

2016
02/10

Category:
Knitting
Life

COMMENTS:
4 Comments »

Pink n purple socks

Finished! I started with 68 stitches on #3 needles, but they seemed a bit small, so actually followed the pattern by using #5 needles. While the leg is so stretchy, there is quite a bit of leeway, the foot, had to be taken down a number of stitches to make it small enough. This is an 8 ply wool, I purchased in Australia, so is a bit thicker than I usually knit. They will probably be very comfortable in my boots.

2016
02/09

Category:
quilts
spinning

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Quilting old and new and a festival

Finally, I chose a flannel backing and have mounted this ready to quilt – which won’t be this week. All these trips are taking their toll on my time and me. I am getting much less done, because after all this driving, I’m to tired to tackle anything big. Now the legal work is done and we only have to sign the house deed over to our trust when that paperwork is done. So happy we don’t have to think about dying any more, I can get back to living! I still have a few more treatments before I know if the work he is doing to avoid knee surgery is doing the job.

Isn’t this a beautiful piece of fabric. It will become a part of my next quilt, which will be pieced without any applique. I have pressed the pieces and will cut them tomorrow.

This was my first spinning wheel – the one upon which I learned. It is a wonderful wheel, in fact, it is still being made today by Clems and Clems. They are now charging over $800 plus $30 for each extra bobbins. So on Craigslist it will go this weekend. Can I call this downsizing? Hopefully, someone who doesn’t want to float a loan will have the opportunity to learn. If I had to pay that kind of money to learn, it wouldn’t have happened. By the way, if you live in the Seattle-Tacoma area, the big fiber festival is Thursday (and free). You will find it by googling Madrona fiber festival in Tacoma. I have not been before, but I’m planning to be there this year. I will be checking everything out – not taking a class this first time. And of course, I’ll try to remember photos for those who can’t go.

2016
02/08

Category:
food
Garden
quilts
spinning

COMMENTS:
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Exercise, spinning and gardening

I started the day with exercise and then a knee treatment.

By 1 PM, I was ready for a rest. I spun another 30 inches of roving (I tore the roving into 30″ lengths – just 28 more of this particular one to do at one a day). When the roving is spun, I’ll ply it and look for a sweater pattern

Then to the greenhouse where I thought there might be some potatoes from last year that we missed.

This is what we found – about 1/3 bucket of potatoes and one single leek. Enough for a couple meals. There were a number of tiny potatoes, so we left them to grow new plants. I need to get someone to dig the beds outside as I have about 50 potatoes with 6-8″ long sprouts that need to be planted. Maybe what I need is a whole week of sun without appointments.

I looked again at working up these two kits and decided they need to go in a very back spot. The designer gave all the patterns and fabrics, but not much in instructions. And applique is not my favorite thing to do. Maybe when I get old………..I can drag them out again.

Meanwhile, I think tomorrow, I’ll go sign some legal documents, and by then it might be warm enough to go play in the dirt and I can get a few of these potatoes into the ground. And I need to buy peas and get them started soon.

Monthly Archives: February 2016

A little gardening, a little canning, a little shopping

I froze grapes in gallon bags last fall because I just didn’t have time or energy to make grapes then. Also, I find the raisins easier to dehydrate once the grapes have been frozen and thawed. So this morning I canned 6 pints of grape juice from the thawed raisins.

After coming home from gym, I sold my first spinning wheel to a man who has taken one lesson on the same type of wheel. It’s a good wheel and he should enjoy it.

We retrieved the sewing machine that had to be serviced and made a stop at Costco, which is rarely cheap. We had $55.00 in rebates off this, so that helped ay for the extra dog treats. We should be good for another year of treats now.

Busy, but not accomplished

Lunch already! Ok, we decided since we were close to a Whole Foods, we’d pick up some bread we especially like and put some in the freezer. Since they only had 2 loaves left, we didn’t fill the freezer. However, we decided to eat there, which won’t happen again soon.

Elephant babies

Smoke alarm

Beau seemed today to have forgotten that his job is protecting livestock in the pasture and preferred to get out and protect the house occupants. Lacey received the treats for staying in the pasture and DH spent several hours mending the fence that Beau smashed. (No, we don’t do boring)

There was some sewing time – the Psalms flimsy is finished. It seems the tops are piling up faster than I’m quilting them, so I placed it in line to be quilted. I want to finish it and get it mailed off before Mother’s Day.

40 days

Never bored

I was able to get a few rows together, then noticed that the Psalms were not printed to exactly match the blocks around them, so there may be a few seams changed when I put the rows together I’ll put e other 4 rows together and then see what needs to be done.

Heavenly Psalms

This is the current quilt for which I found a kit hiding in a box (Honest, they are reproducing) It is now cut out These 18 blocks are put togetherThese are sewn and will

press into 31 of these blocks which will then need to be trimmed the smallest amount.

Pink n purple socks

Quilting old and new and a festival

Isn’t this a beautiful piece of fabric. It will become a part of my next quilt, which will be pieced without any applique. I have pressed the pieces and will cut them tomorrow.

Exercise, spinning and gardening

I started the day with exercise and then a knee treatment.

By 1 PM, I was ready for a rest. I spun another 30 inches of roving (I tore the roving into 30″ lengths – just 28 more of this particular one to do at one a day). When the roving is spun, I’ll ply it and look for a sweater pattern

Then to the greenhouse where I thought there might be some potatoes from last year that we missed.

I looked again at working up these two kits and decided they need to go in a very back spot. The designer gave all the patterns and fabrics, but not much in instructions. And applique is not my favorite thing to do. Maybe when I get old………..I can drag them out again.

Meanwhile, I think tomorrow, I’ll go sign some legal documents, and by then it might be warm enough to go play in the dirt and I can get a few of these potatoes into the ground. And I need to buy peas and get them started soon.

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