Tuesday, January 2, 2018

I’m back to my routine today and I’m glad; by the end of the holiday I was ready. I was back at the bee today after a quick stop to drop books at the Library and get a parcel mailed. I’m trying to do as much running around on Tuesday as possible, but I decided that the recycle and bottle depots would have to wait until tomorrow (or later if I take too long getting meeting reports ready). I neglected to take my camera to the bee today so my blog post there will be a bit shorter (and less time-consuming) than usual.

I’ve started the New Year by working on a UFO – I’ll keep at it on Tuesdays until I finish it. I rechecked my pattern a few minutes ago because I thought I had only eight blocks (two or three of each) to finish. Sadly I see in the final step I need 120 half-square triangles; perhaps I’ll still be working on this when we turn over to 2019!

Today I thought I’d share some of the things that made me smile over the holidays.

• The Christmas concert on the 23rd – lots of favourites as well as new-to-me songs. They closed with a version of Silent Night that was the nicest I’ve ever heard – each verse was set to a different tempo. I must find out who arranged it – perhaps our own Walter Martella? I had Pat check with Walter and it was based on the version that Pentatonix do; I purchased the CD and listened to it all day yesterday while I cleaned up my sewing space (well half of it anyway).
• The drive from the ferry to the studio on the 24th – was it frost or had there been snow at some point? Whatever the cause the trees and ditches were beautiful. We don’t get a White Christmas often and it is even better when you are settled in and don’t need to go anywhere. There is still snow on the ground today and I’m ready for it to be gone. Rain is expected later in the week and that will take care of it.
• As we unwrapped the Christmas boxes we received in the mail it is apparent my girls learned at least one thing from me – how to tape a parcel so it is indestructible!
• The things we forgot. Cream cheese was on sale so I bought three different kinds, as well as two different kinds of bagels. The bagels made it into the packing but the cream cheese was forgotten. One of the meals we planned was a Tortiere – the filling and pie plate came with us but the pie shell remained in the freezer in Powell River. Fortunately the market opened after Christmas and we were able to buy another pie shell and some cream cheese.
• Organized floss bins. It took all day but I wound all my skeins of floss onto bobbins. I had a few extra floss bins so I went from four bins to six and each of the bins have room should I find any colours I don’t currently have, and need. I even wound all the skeins of floss for my current project. I had lots of time to work on that current project, as well as start a massive book – the complete works of the Bronte sisters!

Monday, January 1, 2018

Here’s my list for 2018!

• It really is time to get something done with my boxes and bins of photos. I probably have just as many photos stored digitally too.
• We’ll continue with the House Concerts – three more scheduled for the Spring. We don’t have to make a decision until the summer as to whether or not we will sign up for another year. They are a lot of work but people enjoy the shows and Pat enjoys being involved.
• I’m already committed to another year with the Guild Library and I can’t seem to get out of writing their blog or monitoring their Facebook page. My time on the Cranberry Hall Board could end in April, but I’m planning to volunteer for another year – I hate to give it up when I kind of know what I’m doing!
• My needlework for the next year will likely be finishes rather than starts – although I have lots of starts waiting. I currently have two cross stitches that are in plain sight in the studio on Texada, with another two sitting in one of the cupboards. Dad’s cedar chest is full of UFOs and a few new kits so perhaps I’ll be able to make a dent in some of them.
• I’m going to continue to try and use up my yarn supplies. The Prayer Shawls have been very helpful with this and I’ll continue to knit for the Salvation Army.
• One of our challenges with the Guild this year was to try to get six UFOs finished – I have four left on my list so maybe I’ll concentrate on getting them done. I was in charge of the member’s challenge this year and I still don’t have my own done. We do a scrap block of the month (which I’ve kept up with) and a row by row of the month (I’m one behind right now and, as of January’s meeting, I’ll be getting two more).
• I don’t know if Goodreads will have their challenge again but I’m going to go out on a limb and suggest I’ll get 35 books read this year. Getting rid of my books continues to be a challenge and one that I don’t have a good solution to (although I think the Texada library will accept books).
• Although I’ll cut down on the number of cards I make this year I still hope to send some. I’ve started to use some of my other projects as cards (watch January birthday posts to see what I mean) so being more diverse might make it more interesting and less like a “have-to”.

That’s enough don’t you think?

Sunday, December 31, 2017

It’s that time of the year to look back and see how I did on my resolutions.

In the reading category I did very well. My Goodreads challenge was to complete 20 books and I doubled that. I’m currently working on my 41st book and it just may be done by the time you are reading this. We also managed to see thirty movies over the year, although the movie going next year is likely to be cut down by trips to Texada.

My hope to finish one quilting UFO a month didn’t pan out very well. On the plus side though I managed to finish quite a few needlework UFOs since we moved to Texada. I didn’t keep up very well with all the the Guild challenges. I finished the member’s challenge in time for the quilt show and I did both the Spring and Fall retreat challenges. I only finished two blocks for the Guild’s Block of the Month mystery quilt – I’ll finish it some day! I managed quite a few other quilting projects – four quilts and about ten smaller items.

My fabric cards take up a lot of my sewing time. I was unable to keep up this fall when I had my surgery and I’ve decided to cut down on the numbers. I made 44 cards last year, not counting the ones I made for Christmas.

My yarn stash is almost as big as my fabric stash – and I’m not counting the trunk full of yarn in the shed! I made a sweater for Christy, and I taught Emma how to knit when she was here this summer. I’ve started making Prayer Shawls for the church where the Guild meets and I made a large donation of knitted items to the Salvation Army.

I finished two large cross stitches – the Antique Gardener and my Canada 150 project. I’m focusing more on cross stitch when I’m on Texada; it is so very relaxing and I have so many projects already started.

I expected to finish with the Guild Library in June but I found myself being convinced to stay on for another two years. Cranberry Hall duties kept me busy between Board meetings, concerts and visits to the bank. Cranberry Day was a huge amount of work but it was really appreciated by the residents. We’ve increased our membership from about 5 to almost 90 so the extra exposure worked. Our shows have been selling well too and this fall we found a couple of very willing volunteer members to run the concession.

We finished off the Spring House Concert series in April and have hosted another three this fall. Most of these shows are sell outs, which mean we have anywhere from 33-35 people for the evening. The highlight for me (and I don’t think it will be any better ever!) was having Karen Savoca and Pete Heitzman “in the house” – literally.

I seem to have given up on the Ukulele. I don’t sing so playing chords isn’t very interesting, and I don’t make the time to practice in order to learn any picking. We may take the keyboard over to Texada and, if that is the case, maybe I’ll play a bit more music.

I think I may have mentioned doing something with my photos – that didn’t happen at all, unless you count moving the photo bins from one side of the room to the other. I did a bit of a Guild archive for one of our projects so I may be able to make that idea work for some of my own photos.

I’m sure I hoped to do more than this in my posting from last year, and I’m hoping I perhaps did a bit more than I’ve reported on!

Happy New Year!