a finish and a reward

A finish to report----finally!  I mentioned the QOV top #3 as being my priority item for the week.  As I stated in my last post, life kinda intervened.

We had two days of rocky weather and trust me, that does not lend itself to piecing when  you have to un-plug.  I blew out on mother board to a power surge and I don't want to replaced another.  At one point on Friday my two computerized machines wound up in the shower.  I figured if I had to be in the bathroom with the hard hat on, then two of my prized possessions were going with me.

I fused down the cut away stars and machine appliqued the down to a 7.5 inch finished squares.  I had the rail strips already cut but didn't really start stitching on this in earnest till Friday and Saturday.  All that I needed to do today is the last border.  I had said that it was amazing that a girl like me that HATES to put on borders would do a quilt that is nothing BUT borders.  5 of them actually.  The picture I put up on FB might actually show the last border a little better but whatever----this thing is done now!  Ready for Show and Tell at Friendship Quilters on Saturday.

I have one more QOV top to piece:  a 3-D bow tie, navy ties on white background with red "knots"  I need 76 of them and the project is one that I started at the fall sew in at guild. (Read about it HERE .)  I will have to pull it out to see just where it stands.  Seems to me that I had some up to the center joining seam but how many?  BUT having said only one more for a total of 5 I was half considering what to do with the cutaways from the pieced rails.  9 patches on point arranged zig zag style maybe?  I naturally over-cut ( almost always do).  There is  fabric leftover from the guild member that gave it to me for the Land of Liberty panel thing.   Maybe.

I need a break from "hafta/deadline" sewing, even if that deadline is self imposed.   The veteran's home is opening in the summer and the tops need to be turned in for quilting.  I need a break from red, white and blue.  I am so ready for a reward project!

And here is what I have in mind.  I prepped this little stitchery from Two Blonde Mice about a month ago.  It has just been waiting for me but I did do a little bit of two of the flowers on Wednesday.  It should work up pretty quickly.  Linda C left this pattern to share when she moved to TN.  Because I was the one who filed the loose pages, etc in the notebooks, I spotted it first, LOL.  It is shown in their graphic, which I borrowed, as a pillow but I want a spring wall hanging instead.  Cute, huh?  I do not own any of the Mary Engelbreit fabric that they used in their sample so will substitute something else that I DO have.  If I have enough of it, I know just which one I will use!

My mom sent some basket fabric and a couple of friends have offered some from their stash as well.  Because of that I am holding off cutting out the March Button Up and whipping it as my reward.  I still would like to do a bias applique thing for the handle and the piece Mom sent would need to be seamed perhaps a little more than I would like.  It won't go to waste though. The May Button Up is a basket as well.

I am taking tomorrow "off" and concentrating on straightening up the house.  With having the windows open recently, I need to dust and definitely vacuum up the strings from the week's sewing.  I get busy and things just get stacked and I can't stand the clutter for long.  Then stitchery for sure!

_____________
Dishwasher saga update.  We thought they were coming Thursday to install the final dishwasher.  Remember we had gotten #2 a Frigidaire that was scratched and dented so it was not going to stay.  They called to say that the one at the store with our name on it looked like a forklift had backed into it.  They were going to get one from the Gadsden store but it would have to wait till Friday morning.  Okay, Friday comes.  They install it seemingly without a hitch.  Come Friday night about 830, I head out to the kitchen in my sock feet.  Socks get damp but I thought maybe DJ just dripped some water on the rug.  Few minutes later with my bare feet I realized that the rug in front of the dishwasher is soaked with water.  He shut off the water supply as well as the power while I fetched some towels to mop up the water and the phone.  Water was dripping off the supply line.  Loose connection or did they break the line?  Something had made me write down the plumbing contractors number off his van earlier in the day.  He came out yesterday morning and his helper had not gotten it tightened up enough or some such thing.  Seems to be fine now.  I pray that is the last of it---a journey of a month's duration.  Not all their fault.  DJ asked for an exchange after all.

We did have tornado warnings up on the north end of the county on Friday.  The weather dude was calling out our immediate area but there was no touchdown.  Present on radar but aloft, thankfully.  Some in the county were without power but that is minor compared to April 27th stuff.   Other parts of the country did not fare so well.  My heart goes out to the people in north Alabama who were just getting re-built from last April and are wiped out again.  The folks in Indiana and Kentucky, with loss of life.  E4's, I read.  It is just sad. It is going to be a long tornado season at this rate.

Our camellia seemed to rebound from the cold nights we had but tonight is another close to freezing night.  One of the azaleas is beginning to bloom and you can see hints of what is coming on the lilac bush.  The bradford pears are out in their full popcorn white and so lovely.  I get to enjoy my neighbor's pink dogwood from afar.  We tried three different times to have a dogwood only to lose them all.  DJ also pointed out that the yellow pollen stuff is starting to come around-----could live without that but it is part and parcel of a southern spring.

THX for stopping by------------