Wednesday, August 2, 2017

The haze in the air is definitely smoke. The sunset last night was several degrees more red than we’ve seen it this year. Although you only occasionally smell smoke in the air we can barely see the Island, and even Savary and Harwood Islands are in a haze.

I was up early and had a card quilted and ready for the mail by just past seven, and by eight I was back upstairs getting ready for the board meeting tonight. There wasn’t much going on at the Hall this month so the reports were relatively easy to prepare. Pat and I were both waiting on telephone calls and we both needed to go out to run some errands; Pat went first and my call came in when he was gone. Once he was home I headed out.

I have my O Canada project spray-basted and ready to quilt. It is smokin’ hot upstairs this afternoon so I don’t think I’ll start the quilting today. Depending on whether or not a motion passes at the meeting tonight we may be making a quick trip to the Island tomorrow to pick up some lights for the Hall.

I think I’ll spend the rest of the afternoon in front of a fan and work on a bit of cross stitching.

Tuesday, August 1, 2017

It’s hot out there today and there is a haze in the air; I’m not sure if it is from the heat or we’re getting smoke from some of the fires. I managed to get a lot done today but very little stitching even though I was at the bee.

We got posters in for the Cranberry event so I dropped one off at 7-Eleven on my way to sewing. The church where we sew doesn’t really have a bulletin board where that sort of thing would be welcome, but I showed the poster to my fellow quilters. I expected to get all of the unsold Guild library books to bring home but one of the ladies suggested we leave the boxes at the Church and allow them to sell them as part of their current fund-raising project. I was surprised that the pastor agreed but I was glad not to have to pack them all back home. After the first meeting in September we’ll donate any remaining books to the Kiwanis Club for their book sales.

I took lots of projects to work on but first and foremost was a card that should have been in the mail last week; in fact it is the card that I worked on last week at the bee. Finally the top is finished and I hope it will be a quick turn-around for quilting and can be in the mail tomorrow. At the perfect moment a fellow quilter reminded me to leave the outside edges unpressed or I would lose my seam allowance; I would have realized that eventually but it was easier to correct before it was all sewn together. When I pressed the piece the iron leaked dirty water or stained the white fabric so before quilting I’ll have to see if I can remove the stain.

It was after lunch before I finished the card top so I packed up and did some work in the library for the rest of the afternoon. It is beginning to take shape and I have two shelves set up. The books are arranged (more or less) by subject and some of the books are taller than others so I need to move shelves up and down to accommodate them. I feel a bit panicked about getting it set up but I have the entire month of August to work on it. I’ve yet to find the box with the cards for books that are on loan but I found some books without their cards.

After leaving the bee I stopped at the market by the airport and dropped off a poster. From there I went to the accountant’s office as I had to sign some papers; in fact the papers have been waiting for my signature for a month but we were away, had company, and were away again and then I forgot! From there it was a short trip to the liquor store where I put another poster on the board; I bought a couple of bottles of Townsite beer before I asked about adding the poster to their board because I thought it would give me a better chance at a “Yes”.

Now that I’m home I have the usual blog to write, my bag to unpack, and that stain to remove.

Monday, July 31, 2017

It’s been a good day. I should have been outside weeding this morning but I had a couple of Cranberry-related things to do so I stayed inside. Pat used his super-sprayer to spray vinegar on a bunch of spots in the yard. With the weather in the high twenties and maybe into the thirties this week I’ll have lots of picking to do when I head back out.

First up was testing one of my recipes for the concession at the Cranberry 75th celebration – a cranberry bundt cake. Although the berries seem to have sunk to the bottom it works out okay as when it comes out of the pan it flips over so the bottom becomes the top. We had someone from the Board stop in this afternoon so we did a taste test and we all agreed it was worth offering. I’ll make four of them because I think I can get at least twelve (if not more) slices from each cake. We have no idea how many people might attend so I’m winging it no matter how many I make.

While the cake was baking I did a bit of cleaning and a load of laundry. There is no breeze today but I hung everything out anyway; with the heat the water just evaporated. It was close to noon before I made an appearance upstairs. My biggest success of the day was getting Gavin’s Kellogg’s spoon ordered. I wasn’t able to find a second box of cereal with the spoon offer so I called Kellogg’s, begged a little, and was given a second code. After the three boxes of rice krispies I already have in my cupboard are gone I’ll continue to be a Kellogg’s fan!

I was getting close to having the top of my O Canada project finished and I’ve just now put the final borders on the piece. I was afraid Pat wouldn’t like it but it seems to be a success. It isn’t very big and have no idea how I will quilt it; I think I can safely say I’m just a day or two away from having it finished though.

Every surface in my studio needs to be cleared off but I’ve no time for that now. I’ll be off to the bee tomorrow so I need to find all the projects I took last week and never finished. I know I should spend my time working on the library but I’m late on a card so I’ll try to finish at least that one thing.

Sunday, July 30, 2017

We had a nice couple of days on Texada but decided to catch the first ferry home this morning. We had intended to stay for a couple of acts at the festival today but the group we really wanted to see weren’t on until later in the afternoon which meant we’d likely have ferry waits to get home. Since we were up early we decided to skip the festival and head straight home.

I puttered away most of the morning and I’ve been working on some accounting this afternoon. That is done now so I’ll get back to my O Canada project. After being so confident that I could get it done easily I’m beginning to worry just a bit that I’ll still be at it at the last minute.