It was one of those crazy days where I don’t feel a lot was accomplished and yet it was. There is just a lot more to do. So let’s start with explaining about the socks.
In the photo at the left, you can see I loop the new yarn around the needle and knit it into the next stitch.
Then the next 5 or 6 stitches, I knit with both pieces of the new yarn. When finished, I weave in the yarn that I dropped when changing yarns. This is just my made up way to do it. I don’t know how the professionals do it.
See where each loop is – there are three. Those are places where I changed yarns. I hope that makes it a bit clearer.
We spent the morning putting up curtains and taking many of the excess items out of the new guest room. These are the fleeces that have been repackaged and are ready for me to make some decisions on what I will do with them. At least they are sorted and in one pile instead of overflowing the closet and the corners.
And the drapes are now up and the shade is working. Tomorrow, I will get the rugs and trash can. I ran out of energy today.
I decided to hang this on the screen to cut the view of my very messy table that at times is used for potting plants and other times to trim quilts.
And this is the end of the hall. Now, it looks a bit more like a home instead of just a basement.
I did get the binding cut for the circus quilt. Now to find time to quilt it.
I wonder how people get their houses to stay clean. We use the entire house and there are always areas that could use “spring cleaning”. Tomorrow my list includes yoga, getting the rugs for the guest room and it’s bathroom, sheets for our bed, picking up my sewing machine from the “hospital”, picking and cleaning maybe 6 gallons of greens, fertilizing the hoop house (DH will do the big garden) and watering, mopping the floors downstairs, cleaning the wall the dogs wiped their coats on last winter, and then do a tidy up job on the shelves in the bathroom and cleaning it. I will ask DH to pick up the chairs that are at the chair “hospital” And you know what, it won’t all get done, but it is on my list. Maybe that’s why it seems I’m always playing “catch-up”. Oh, and if/when all that is done, there is a circus quilt waiting to be quilted.
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This little 36″ square quilt is now quilted and bound. It will hang it in our room for a bit before a baby gets it as DH likes it. And it’s nice to be appreciated. Several of my readers also liked it. It’s a strange thing – one never knows what someone will like – this is not one of my favorites.
This morning I decided to dye two shirts that I really like, but are a bit tired. However I forgot to check the fiber content and because they had 40% poly, they didn’t take the dye. So I popped some fleece into the kettle in three increments so that I will get a heathered affect. It is dry now and sometime in the future, will get combed and spun. It is off my first female Cormo sheep so will be soft.
Then there was a matter of someone needing a large patch and this is what I found for her.
Sometimes one just needs a dessert and we still have 6 packages of frozen strawberries in the freezer, so shortcake was made.
And because my brother is coming in Tuesday evening and I don’t want to look totally unprepared, we ran off to Lowe’s and purchased a shade and a curtain rod, both will be put up on Sunday. I still would like to get a rug and may do that on Sunday as well.
I am so happy to get this top finished as there was so much applique. It is one technique with which I’m not very good. I’m not ready to quilt it just yet.
This morning, I picked and washed leaf lettuce, kale, endive, romaine, and Chinese cabbage for a wonderful salad. There were three gallon bags full.
This is hummus that I made this morning. The basic recipe is
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1 can (I used a home canned pint) garbanzo beans
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1/2 teas garlic salt
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3 T lemon juice
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1 t Braggs liquid aminos
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enough liquid to be able to blend it.
Today I added roasted peppers and hot sauce which made it redder. You could add various other ingredients to personalize it.
I love walking past the table and seeing the flowers and cards. I know the flowers won’t last long, but I’ll keep them here as long as possible, and then I’ll still have the memories.
The label is on and the quilt is on its way to a new home. I did something a bit differently this time. Do you see where the pocket is just above her name? I placed one of each fabric in that pocket, then sewed it shut. It there is ever a tear or something needs replacing, there is a scrap of each of the fabrics in that pocket. And as usual, the quilt was washed and dried before sending off, because I would rather have problems show up before the quilt is gifted.
After shipping this quilt, we fertilized and watered both the big garden and the hoophouse, both of which seem to take a long time, but the weather was perfect for working outside. We fertilize weekly and the new seedlings need lots of extra water, especially when the week promises to be hot.
We are already enjoying eating some of our produce. For lunch we had a salad of Chinese cabbage and the other half will be used in stir fry.
Now that I have arrived at the 3/4 century mark, I am middle-aged. I have so very many blessings for which to be thankful—in fact, too many to mention and then I have all of you as friends. I am very VERY blessed.
We didn’t do much before noon. Then DH wanted to take me out to lunch so did that. When we came back, I decided to get some of this applique done. I can’t find the block I showed you last month, but these are the ones I have done this week. There are a total of 9.
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And this is what happens when supper time is at 6:30 and you are still getting the dog food ready at 6:35. I can assure you that animals arrive having little clocks inside those bodies.
The May day gift I received this morning was these two darling little ewe lambs. They are so tiny, but then so is their mother, weighing about 50# Dad weighs is a much larger sheep
I am so far behind my goals, but I’m going to blame it on surgeries – both foot and eye and now it’s gardening time. It may be that I don’t catch up this year. And if I don’t, that’s okay. Without goals, I get nothing done.
Used this Week: 16.00 yards
Used this Month (April) 30.00 yards
Used year to Date 36.00 yards
Added this Week: 0.00 yards
Added Year to Date: 0.00 yards
Goal: 300.00 yards
Yards to goal: 264.00 yards
New Yards to quilt goal: 264.00 yards
Net Used 2016 36.00 yards
Applique goes very slowly, so this much is done. Will work on the other blocks next week.
This is the quinoa salad for Mother’s day lunch. It has tomatoes, broccoli, orange pepper and seasonings.
Aren’t they just the cutest little lambs.
They were born last Sunday and will be nursing for some time yet, however, they were eager to try the weeds that I gave mom. They are so tiny that I need to fix an outdoor place they and mom can get some greens where they don’t get run over by the big sheep.
I love the way this quilt turned out. It is 36 x 39 which is a great size for a new baby. I used a flannel with an owl print on the back.
These iris are from a cousin. They are just starting to bloom and so beautiful. Another wonderful thing about them, is that once planted, they can stay there for two or more years.
This was our view as we ate lunch outdoors today. The weather was beautiful! The extra dark “bushes” are really nettles that the sheep won’t eat, so we will have to weed whack them.
We went to Yoga this morning, but I did get this quilt finished this afternoon. It is small – only about 38″ square. I mostly did stitch in the ditch on the straight lines and added a few clouds.