Wednesday, August 24, 2016

I made great progress on my cards today. I have four done; two of them are quilted and just need binding added. It certainly helped to have four patterns printed and fabric chosen. I may be on to something with this prep day. I’m still not done September cards though so I can’t ease up just yet.

I signed up for a class at the University this morning – no, I’m not looking to advance my career but they are offering a course called The Contemplative Stitch Series. There are a total of five classes but I’m only interested in one – Boro and Sashiko – I guess that is two but they are both taught in the same session. Luckily I was able to register for just the one class. Boro embroidery appears similar to the Sue Spargo stitches I’ve learned but a refresher will be good since I haven’t finished the project I started with that class.

Tomorrow is office day and it would be wise to use the rest of the afternoon to get a head start – I know there is a lot of Cranberry Hall work to do. But wise is seldom the most fun so I think I’ll grab my book and read on the back deck until dinner.

Tuesday, August 23, 2016

Remember last week when I mused that because I had all the fabric cut I might be able to get four Celtic Crystal blocks done today. Well that didn’t happen. It was past lunch before I finished my first block. I knew there wouldn’t be time to finish another one (unless I stayed until dinner time) but I was okay because I had the other placemat to put together.

The problem with working with your own design is that there are no directions on how to put it together. I had a middle section and two outer borders to put together and the first time around I put the pieces in the wrong places. No problem – short seams and a quick take apart. Next time things went together perfectly but when I went to add the borders to the top and bottom the centre was three inches too short – I did the math wrong! I calculated the pieces by adding the quarter-inch but when I was adding them up to equal 18″ I didn’t take into account that the pieces in the middle were smaller. I can fix things by adding larger side borders but I didn’t have any of the fabric with me so I packaged it up and left for the day.

Writing the Guild blog was easy as I forgot to take my camera with me – maybe prepping too far in advance (e.g., the day before rather than the morning of) isn’t the best idea for me.

Monday, August 22, 2016

Today was a prep day and I’ve got enough kits put together to last me several weeks.

I packed my Best Press so I’m set to go with my Celtic Crystals tomorrow. I also kitted up another placemat that will be a quick finish. Wednesday is for cards and I have four of those kitted – I’m still working on the September list so I’m not ahead of the game yet. I’m way ahead on my Farmer’s Wife plans; I printed the paper-pieced patterns for seven more blocks and pulled fabric for each of them. At best I can get three done on a Saturday so I can probably skip them next prep day. I got the basting stitches all removed from my Blossoms and hope to finish the appliqué on Sunday.

I’m determined to make Finish-It-Up-Friday work. Although I didn’t look in the bin my plan is to get at least one more top ready for quilting; I know I have a couple of quilts in there that just need the border added. If I decide to quilt my projects from France I’ll have to make a trip to the fabric store – never a chore! Once my Blossoms are finished I will set aside Friday, Saturday and Sunday to quilt. Some of the projects are small and once I get at them they will probably be easy enough to get done in a day. For the larger pieces, once I start quilting, I don’t want to be interrupted with other projects so I may have to skip my Farmer’s Wife blocks for a week or two.

On top of all that I managed to sort through some scraps; some got cut into smaller pieces, some were cut for my Leader and Ender project, and some went into a bag to give to Carola. She uses the tiniest scraps to make crumb quilts!

I think I’ll do a bit more hand stitching before supper. I finished up a knitting project so I’m back to basting pieces for I’m a Farmer’s Daughter in the evenings.

Sunday, August 21, 2016

Pat and I watched the Tragically Hip concert last night. I, of course, had heard of the Tragically Hip but wasn’t very aware of their music. Maybe they were becoming famous in what Diane and I called our “lost years” when we relied on CBC for music and if it didn’t involve throat singing, Dene drumming or a country fiddle we didn’t hear it. Or maybe I was aware of their music in the early years and just didn’t care for it; I didn’t really enjoy the concert and not a single song was familiar.

It didn’t take me long this morning to appliqué the two Blossoms that I had prepped for today’s sewing. I had time before lunch to prep and stitch two extra blocks. Hopefully I can get the remainder prepped for next week and then I’ll be ready to start sashing and stitching the blocks together. I’m really liking the way this looks, although I question why I’m using a white background. My Hubble uses a white background and I’ve managed to keep it clean but I may give this one away and white could be a problem.

Pat picked another batch of apples so after lunch I made an apple spice cake – a new recipe but it uses a spice cake mix so it wasn’t difficult. It took longer to bake than the recipe said it would but I think the juice from the apples might have had something to do with that. While the cake baked I did a little more of my hand stitching; I’m still not done everything but the pile is gradually shrinking.

We have a Cranberry Hall board meeting tonight but I prepared everything on Thursday so all I need to do is pack it up so it is ready to take with me. Until then I’m going to go back to my cross stitch.

I love a day when I get to do a whole bunch of different projects – and make some progress on each one!