Checking in

August 1st.  In some ways this year is whizzing on by and in others, dragging.  Whizzing by because I am busy most of the day either inside or outside.   Dragging because it is 6 months to the day that my dear husband departed this earth.  Growing older and doing it without the love of your life is the pits, just got to say.  I'm trying---all you can do, right?

I have the chevron quilt half done but did not even sew for two days this week.  We had a bit of a cool down weather-wise and what a gift that was!  One day it was sweeping inside and out, dust mopping, mopping, vacuuming and even dusting in spots that it had never occurred to me to ever dust.  You know, the "don't look up" philosophy?  Well, that framework around the kitchen pass through, and around the windows flanking the fireplace----ugh.  Dust accumulation, big time.   I dust around the doors of the bedrooms and bathroom but I don't know why I didn't think about the windows!  Well, after all that floor stuff was done, I drug the vacuum outside and cleaned out the car and then hand washed it.

The next day it was cook ahead.  Poached some chicken breasts and browned some ground beef with chopped onions for later dishes.  Then I cleared out the frozen bananas piling up in the freezer door by making banana nut muffins for coffee break time.  Then since I dislike any of the available pizza choices around here, made my own ham and cheese pizza.  Most of that is up in the freezer too.  Now the freezer is stuffed full again and the cycle repeats, LOL.   There is not a whole lot of room out in the chest freezer either.  Not with more freezer containers and varieties of bread and vegetables out there too.

So here is sort of where I left off with the quilt except that loose row you see.  That is row 8 and I sewed that at about 3 in the morning this morning.  Yeah, awake again at the magic hour of 2 a.m. and not going back to sleep.  Row 9 is pinned and read to feed through the machine.  The top half rows are joined and folded on the hanger.

I did mess up on two counts with this.  First my drawing was incorrect as I had 13 sections in it and there are 14.  That part may not have mattered so much until I tried to flip the table cloth over and upended the drawing.  I had to re-pin what remained but it didn't look like the picture.  I figured it out then.  14 on hand, 13 pictured.  DUH!  Debating about re-drawing it. It was laid out right from the other direction.  Forget just flipping it.   I took the finished part off and pulled the cloth up as I still need to keep Skyler away from the sections and possible string pulling.   I put row 8 back on the hanger once the picture was taken.  He's napping on the perch now and ignoring it.

My other goof?  I kept thinking that I had misplaced some of the pieces when I took them down off the tablecloth.  13 sections, where is that other green tone on tone???  Looked and looked again,  retracing my steps.  When the next row, the polka dot, was short 2 sections the light bulb finally when off.  You already sewed it into the preceding rows, you goofball!!

Does seeing this laid out straight how just how this thing goes together??  Simple block sections and you should see "L's"  all across the row.  If you don't then you have turned the piece incorrectly.  I pin the sections as I pull them off the design wall flopping the section on the left over the one on the right with the pin indicating where to stitch.  So far I have not messed up that part though I did need to re-cut the right upper corner.  Again, that drawing thing messed me up.  Most of it will get trimmed off in the end anyway so this is just to aid in the piecing.

Wanna see the latest pictures of the little recipient? Lily is now 3 weeks old.  The quilt will be one our little peanut can grow into, LOL as it is looking like it will end up more like lap quilt size.

Her Nana, my sister Diane sent me these.  I know her Mama is humoring Nana with that pink business.

Nana said she fell asleep in her arms

And the critters?  Some of you have told me that you like reading stories of their antics.  Oscar is a bit in the dog house, literally as he has had to have a bath two weeks in a row as he has picked up some fleas.  I thought the scratching was a bit better with the advantix (dang but that stuff is pricey!) but he is back at it.  I even bug sprayed the section of yard he frequents the most as that is what the neighbors who had him before said to do.   Two bottles later, he is still scratching.  Anyway, both times after his bath when I was in picking up the wet towels he has taken a dump on the floor.  Peed too, once right by his food dish of all things!!   He is fairly calm about the bathing part but the minute my back was turned.  Ohhhhh bad, bad doggie.  So, is he mad at me?  Trying to get even in some manner?  Stressed out?  My fault for not making sure he did his business before I gave him a bath?  He had been outside for a few hours at that point and had plenty of time to do it in the appropriate spots.

I have allowed him to romp and play in the living room about an hour or so before he heads to the crate for bedtime.  He enjoys it and we get some snuggle time in.  Don't let him in and he just whines and jumps against the gate.  He must have done a bang up job jumping the other night as I came out of the rest room to find it knocked over, and he was tearing into the cat food on the other side.   Skyler just looks at him, like " you are insane, man"  hissing at him if he gets too close but more or less, just watching to see what he will do next.  Last night, Skyler was top of the couch at one end, Oscar right below him and me on the other end.  Maybe there is hope and I can take the gate down.  I caught my foot on it the other day heading into the kitchen and fell banging up my right knee.  Really surprised I don't have a bigger bruise.

Mz. Mouzie,, the door stop Christmas stuffed mouse he "stole" from Skyler bit the dust and I got him this duck complete with crackly stomach and a squeaker though he has not really elicited the squeaking yet.  As you can see, it is not going to be long for the world either.  Half the beak is gone already.  I pulled some more stuffing out of the head so I could sew it closed.  He tore a hole in one of the wings and about tore it off.  I patched it and sewed it back on.  The tail feather section is torn.  He is missing a couple of "toes" and one leg is about off.  It was hanging by a few threads so I took it off the rest of the way.  Still he is having fun with it.

Friends has told me that I need to look at garage sales or thrift stores for toys as they will not last long with those tearing up teeth and the pulling they give the toy.  I had pictures of both of the boys but they must still be on my phone.  I was goofing around with that setting yesterday, LOL.

I boogered up my Singer trying to sew a pocket on the vinyl table cloth.  It was not happy with me and I've probably thrown off the timing or some such thing.  Big bad loopies on the back.   I am waiting for Mr. Haynes to call me back about making hand off directions.  When I called late yesterday afternoon, he told me he was possibly headed towards my little town today but was unsure of a time since he had another client's commercial machine to deliver too.  I did drag out the Brother to finish up with top even though I don't like switching machines in the middle of the job but I did check the machine settings with the Perkins Dry Goods Perfect Piecing Seam Guide that I had used to set up the Singer.   Get back to row 9 after lunch. I do have  an errand to run and just know he will phone once I leave the house.   That is also why I haven't walked Oscar in the park yet today.  It will ring to my cell but still, there are areas of poor reception.

Guess that's it for now-----thanks for stopping by to see what I am up to.