Last night, after I had dinner, I began stitching on the, I swear, final block on this project. But in the afternoon, I cut 1 1/4" strips of the fabrics I'd chosen for the framing and made a beginning on that. Below are the four center blocks. The rectangular ones go on either side of this center as well as top and bottom, and in the corners are the other 6" blocks and all of those blocks have to be surrounded by fabric strips as well.I like what I've got done so far, and hope to have time to do some more on it this afternoon.
I realize that I've skipped a couple of days of blogging. Sorry about that. I have no excuses. I just didn't feel as though there was anything to write about. To catch you up, Jo came over Saturday and we had a really good visit. I made up 3 meals of the braised short ribs, mashed potatoes and green beans for her to keep in her freezer. For these "tv dinners," I use plastic take out containers from the Chinese restaurant. I also made the Buffalo Chicken Soup for our meal together. She liked it a lot and there was enough left over for 2 meals for her to take with. A few years ago, when I was still working, I bought half a dozen Corning mugs with lids that I used to keep leftovers in the freezer. Chili, soups and stews, casseroles, and so forth. All went into these mugs and then into the freezer. Before I went out the door for work, I just grabbed a mug and by lunch time, it was fairly well thawed and ready for a couple of minutes in the microwave and Voila! Luncheon is served! I never labeled the mugs so I never knew what I'd have for lunch until I took the lid off. One time, I ended up having chili everyday for the entire week!
If you don't have these mugs, consider getting some--they are the best thing since sliced bread!
Jo and I watched "The Finest Hours," the movie I'd watched in Gulf Shores with many interruptions. It was good enough that I wanted to see it again, and Jo liked it too.
Yesterday, I sat down and made the second draft of the commission wall quilt I'm making. This is just done on graph paper with crayons for the color but the crayons are a pretty good match of the fabrics she chose. I sent her an email to see what she thought of this design, but had to resend it this AM with the picture attached. Duh!
Also this morning, which was very busy with an appointment to meet a committee of people to chose a quilt to display in the reception area of their offices, a trip to the paint store to get some samples for my bathroom project (I've decided I will go ahead with the walls first and then decide if I still want to paint the oak vanity), and finally a trip to the hair salon to have my shaggy head cut and tamed a little, I stopped to check the new flower bed that I created last fall. I thought I'd saved a photo of it but now I can't find it. We had a huge half dead maple tree in the middle of the circular driveway that kept dropping limbs whenever there was any kind of wind or storm, so we had it cut down. Instead of planting a replacement tree, we decided we liked the openness of the front yard and turned the area into a circular planting bed. We saved the large rocks that were already there, planted 3 winterberry bushes (a northern species of holly) and before the snow came, I filled the bed with tulips, daffodils and crocuses. I was hoping the squirrels wouldn't dig them up and relocated them around the neighborhood, and I think I was lucky. Look what I found this morning! Daffodils! Peeking up at the beginning of March! That's unheard of for this part of the country! Usually we have to wait at least until April for any kind of blossoms. I also saw what I think is a tulip but I'm not sure and I don't want to bore you with pictures of my dirt.
The biggest excitement around here, tho, is that my son has been offered a job in his field in Olympia, Washington, and he has to be there to start work on April 1! I'm sad that he'll be so far away from us, but I know he was in a dead end with quicksand in Milwaukee and they were sinking fast. This is a great opportunity for him, and I offered to share the drive out with him and he seemed grateful to have a travel companion. I plan on taking the Amtrak back to St. Paul, so I guess I'll be packing up a bag in the next few weeks. I'll have to have another embroidery project ready to work on during the train ride back--it's about 1 1/2 days and I don't want to be bored.
Now, I'd better wrap this up and get back into the sewing room to get more work done on Among the Pines.
Oh what a sinking feeling to realize you weren't done after all. Hope you've made good progress on that last piece. We have the same Corning Ware soup bowls. They see a lot use in this house too.
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