Monday, March 9, 2020

I must have been behind before setting out for my weekend of sewing; how else can I explain how far behind I am today? There is Hall work, Guild work, Hospice work and we have two shows coming up next week that I need to prepare beds for.

I got a little bit of work done this morning but I still have 14 items on my “To Do” list – most of which have been sitting in that list for a week. I had to get a package out in the mail today so, since I was going out anyway, I made an appointment to have my hair cut. I’ve been looking and looking for somewhere that would accept donated hair but the only places I could find were for kids wigs and they certainly didn’t want my grey strands.

I checked the mail at the Hall even though it wasn’t my usual day because someone told me they would have their paperwork in by 9 AM. Apparently that didn’t happen because I was there at 2 PM and there was nothing for me. I hate when that happens. I have a deposit that I’ll get ready for tomorrow and I may or may not return to the Hall after sewing tomorrow to see if the money has appeared. There were a couple of motions for the Hall that needed to go out via e-mail. I see I have some responses so I’ll see what has been agreed to.

I’ll keep working through my list for the rest of the afternoon. First up will be to find something to work on at the bee tomorrow.

Wednesday, March 4, 2020

There were a few things I needed to get done today so my next few busy days would be a bit lighter.

At our mini retreat we are working on a group project with panels; we all picked a different panel but we are using the same treatment on them. I got my panel sliced up this morning before moving on. It won’t take all weekend for the project but the nice thing is that we come home in the evening and don’t start until mid-morning so I should have time to pick up something else to work on.

Next up was a grocery shop for some of the cooking and baking I need to do; I changed my mind on a couple of the menu items so needed a few different ingredients than the ones I purchased earlier in the week. On the way to the grocery store I stopped at the thrift shop to drop off some fabric from our Guild weekend. While I was there I picked up a few cotton shirts that I want to use in a couple of scrap quilts I’m making. After the groceries were done I stopped at the library to return a book.

After lunch I got down to the business of “making”. I have soup in the crockpot that I’ll reheat for lunch on Friday. We’re also having a fruit salad for lunch that day; I’ll prepare that on Friday morning before I leave. My plan is for Shepherd’s Pie for supper on Friday; while I was making that Pat suggested I make one for supper tonight so those are done.

I’ll make butter tarts tomorrow morning for the Guild meeting tomorrow night. After the meeting I hope to have time to make Easy Lemon Squares from Mum’s cookbook; they will be for Friday night’s dessert.

I won’t have time for posting anything between now and Monday but you can rest assured that I’m having fun and eating well!

Tuesday, March 3, 2020

I certainly didn’t have the best sewing day on record but I accomplished a little on a few things.

We were making lanyards for an upcoming event and after I got the lesson on how they were done I got started. The hardest, or most tedious, part was changing thread colours for each one. Everything was going will until I got to the second last one; my top thread kept breaking. I rethreaded the machine, I rethreaded the bobbin, I repositioned my thread from horizontal to vertical and still it kept breaking. I decided it was either rotten thread (although it isn’t very old) or my needle. I changed the needle and things worked fine. Just as I finished up the last one one of the organizers changed her mind on how they should be done – I threw mine in the collection basket and pretended I didn’t hear them.

And then I moved on to a card top. I’m trying to finish off the blocks in the Splendid Sampler book but what I’ve realized is the few that are left are ones I purposely didn’t do because they looked hard. Well now I have to do them, hard or not. The first one went relatively well; once the pieces were attached to the background I realized I didn’t have the right colours of thread to finish the appliqué. So that card top got set aside.

Next up was a pieced block with some appliqué. The appliqué portion will just be incorporated into the quilting so I should have been able to get it done. I had to use a template to cut some of the pieces; I know I cut them yesterday but I only had half of them in my package. So I packed up and came home.

Well not exactly home but off to do my errands. I stopped at the fabric shop because I needed some coloured thread to do the quilting on the three quilts I brought home from the weekend. Several of the colours will be perfect for that first bit of appliqué I needed to do. I’m home now and I’ve found the missing pieces on the floor under my cutting table so I guess I can continue on – after I unpack and clean up a bit.

Monday, March 2, 2020

Tomorrow at sewing we are working on a specific project (lanyards) for an upcoming event; I spent some time this morning digging out solid fabrics in bright colours and then cutting strips. We need to make 200 of them; I found fabric in different solid colours to make five. I’m assuming that if we need more I can cut another strip off each piece but at this point I thought donating for five was enough.

Then I moved on to getting some packages of cards ready. My UFO Challenge for March is the Splendid Sampler blocks. Those are the ones I use for my cards. My goal is to get all the tops done first (but probably not this month) and then when I need cards I can pull them out and do the quilting.

I promised Gail that this afternoon I’d come over to her place and help her clean up her studio for our mini-retreat this weekend. I sometimes waited for her direction and sometimes I went ahead and did something on my own; if she doesn’t like what I did she can change it. I did the vacuuming before I left. The table tops aren’t cleared off but she says she can take care of that on her own. I really think she needed someone to help her get started. If I can help clean up a friend’s sewing room why can’t I seem to get mine cleaned up – and keep it that way for more than a day?

On my way home I stopped for some groceries. I’m responsible for treats at the Guild meeting on Thursday night and for lunch and dinner at the retreat on Friday. I have my menu planned and I’ll do most of the preparation on Wednesday. There will be some last minute stuff to do Thursday morning but we don’t start until after lunch.

While I wait for someone to come to the door for show tickets I’ll try to get another card package together.