49 Years

What do you do when your phone lines are out? What do you do when your internet is out? How did we ever live without being connected to the world? They are connecting great-grandma to the internet so had to dig a trench down the lane, across her lawn, and into her house. However, my underground phone line got cut and it took 3 days to get a service guy here to tell us we have to wait for another 24 to 48 hours to get a crew out to dig a new trench to bury a new phone line from the road to my house which is about 1/4 mile long. Now about the internet, it does not have lines but had been out since yesterday. After 3 weeks away, the girls are home but cannot watch their shows. It should have been quiet, but the girls decided to play really noisy, boisterous, loud games in the living room. That until the tears came and they got sent to bed. 

I have been listening to lectures online, doing some hand applique, and working my way through a test. This should be easy, after all, this is the seventh course I am doing this way. But, they forgot to send me the first 2 lectures so it was a bit confusing. Got that all sorted out until no internet. Also, I have been visiting with quilters here and there online. I love doing this! I can wear my pj's and don't have to pack my stuff or drive anywhere. I just stay here in my quilt room and carry on. 

Two friends connected on Facebook and one of my other sisters came over so the three of us got to hang out and talk quilts.  And speaking of quilts, Emily has a completed quilt. She got it back from the longarm quilter the other day and has it on her bed. I joined the FNWF (Friday Night With Friends) here all day Friday. I have been plodding along with this Ella-maria-deacon-quilt block for a while now. There are 32 of those arrowhead pieces. With the back basting of every other one and turning no less than 3 points on each one as I needle-turn hand applique, it is taking me at least 15-20 minutes per piece. Only 14 more to go. Just for fun, we put up the fabric I have for the setting triangles and the sashing strips to see what this is going to look like. I like it. 

The little girls, who got out of bed this early Sunday morning and went out to the barn to feed baby calves and kittens, are in and have discovered that the internet is back on and my Sweetie is in from morning chores so it must be breakfast time. We celebrated 49 years of marriage to each other this week and are planning a party for next year. 

Blessings,

Chris

linking with: slow-sunday-stitching. party-patchwork-quilts-  

quiltingismorefunthanhousework. design-wall-monday.  wednesday-wait-loss-  midweek-makers-  off-wall-friday.

Quilt Retreat at Home

So what's been happening here at the farm? This is the week I would have gone to Shipshewana for a quilt retreat, but, alas, we are not allowed to leave the country, so, I decided to do my own retreat. I cleared off 2 tables and moved the desktop computer to the other side of the room so I could participate in some online quilt-a-longs. This way, I have so much more table space for working and playing at the same time. I met with some of my friends on Facebook to stitch and chat over the past 3 days.

I joined Chookyblue for an international stitching party. Our host calculated all the timezones and sent us a link to join the party. She opened the zoom meeting at 6 AM Saturday her time in Australia and my time was 4 PM Friday. I joined the party for about 3 hours (after a quick nap) Friday night then after a delightful sleep, rejoined at 6 in the morning for a couple of hours. This was a lot of fun chatting with quilters in other countries.

And what did I work on? This is last week's block from Sentimental Stitches 3030 Quilt. I had to think about the 1/8th inch stems. I ended up cutting a bias strip 3/8th wide and appliqueing it in place. A bit wobbly, but have you ever seem a perfectly straight flower stem? Neither have I. There will be a large applique center medallion but I will not get the pattern until next week. I am really enjoying the novelty of these Thirties prints. 

Last week the little boy grandchildren came over and we slept in the trailer in the front yard. I had to have something to work on out there. I took out a lamp and sweater and sat under the a/c fan for 4  nights. I promised them I would not leave them out there alone. I think the temperatures were hovering around 30C outside. I have those 8 arrowheads to stitch down and them I can back-baste on the final 8. I think I will make them aqua. This block has taken umpteen hours to this point. Looking forward to seeing it completed. 

This is another Ella applique block. I prepped several back in April when I allowed myself to start a new quilt. The first in 2 years. Those dark petals are a purple and I am using a 10-inch layer cake from Betsey Chutian's Susanna Scraps collection. There is lots of variety but not lots of fabric. I am certainly enjoying hand stitching with yet another Moda fabric. I am back basting every other melon. 

I switched the function on the mouse so I now right-click with my middle finger instead of left-clicking with the forefinger. It has been a bit to get used to doing it backward but my right forefinger is so sore and I found this option. 

I started working on a new course for my doctorate. It has lectures online and I was hand appliqueing a 3030 block and turned on a lecture.  I had printed off 11 pages of a test that is required for every course. But 30 minutes into the lecture, I still had not found the answer to any questions so popped in lesson 2 and the same thing, until I heard a word that was written up on about page 9 of the test and realized that for this course the test questions are not listed in order so now I have to spread out the pages and hunt for the answers. I can do this now that I know. 

I did not meet my One Monthly Goal for July. My OMG Goal for August will be to complete the above 3 applique blocks and maybe one or two more 3030 Blocks. Not too challenging a quilting goal as I plan to get some serious writing done this month, specifically this week as I have 6 whole days in a row with no children to interrupt me, or hug me, or ask for booboo kisses or ice cream or popcorn. It may be quiet, but I might even miss the darlings. 

Blessings,

Chris

linking with: Quilting Patchwork Applique  quilting is more fun than housework   sunday slow stitching

Wendyès Quilts  needleandthreadnetwork.  wednesday-wait-loss-183  midweek-makers-  

myquiltinfatuation.  wendysquiltsandmore.

Very Slow Stitching This Sunday

I have been working on this Ella Maria Deacon block for several weeks now. Not every day. But once in a while. There are 36 of those arrowhead shapes and I calculated that, if it took me 10 minutes to hand applique each one, then it would take me 360 minutes or 6 hours. But I had to first draw the shapes onto the back since I am back basting. That took a few minutes. Say about 30. Then I back basted on the corner bits and every other beige shape. I did all that last month. Last week, I basted on every other dark brown piece and every other light brown piece. Why every other one? To get the points in the right place without interference from the piece beside. I think I will change the light brown to an aqua since there is some aqua in the corner pieces. I am using Susanna Scraps by Betsy Chutian from Moda. I am trying to avoid using reds and green since I have several quilts with those colours in them, 

So the back basting took me about 30 minutes three different times. Are you adding up the numbers? 

However, yesterday I was stitching while visiting quilters on facebook and I got exactly 4 done in about an hour and a half. So, about 20 m minutes each. Needless to say, It will take more than 6 hours to complete this one 9 inch block by hand.

Blessings,

Chris

slow sunday stitching  quilt fabrication needleandthreadnetwork.

3030 Quilt

Gay over at sentimentalstitches is offering yet another amazing weekly quilt-a-long. This one you sign up for and pay $30 for the 30 blocks for 30 weeks. I am all caught up for now. But I understand there is a center medallion to applique coming soon. Maybe even this Friday. I hope it comes next Friday because that would be a very nice birthday present. And, I would not have to get it completed before the end of the month since my OMG this month is to keep up to date with this project. I am loving these colourful blocks. Some are done by foundation piecing. I have yet to remove the papers. Others are pieced the old-fashioned way by machine. And, of course, the hand applique.

3030 Quilt

I reverted back to the legacy blogger to see if comments will show up in my inbox. None of them did last post. And yet, with the new blogger, I did get notification of comments last month. We shall see.

Blessings,
Chris
linking with:  midweek-makers-236.  needleandthreadnetwork. quiltingismorefunthanhousework 
design-wall-monday  myquiltinfatuation.  wednesday-wait-loss-180  fortheloveofgeese.
wendysquiltsandmore.  off-wall-friday.

A Bit of Hand Applique

This is the first applique block for the 3030 Quilt.  

I am continuing to discover things about the new Blogger.

For instance, I enlarged the photo by left-clicking on the photo and hitting the + sign.

Last month I got comments in my Gmail inbox but not this week. 

I wonder what happened?

Linking with Kathy's Slow Sunday Stitching.

Now it is finished

blessings.

Chris

Friday Night With Friends

I tried. I really tried to get to some stitching today. But, alas, I made jam, drove into town to do some banking, picked up the mail a kilometer down the road, washed dishes at least 7 times, had a zoom meeting, paid some bills, paid off the bank credit line totally, for now. Did I say make jam? Only 3 batches today totaling 24 jars. I ate 3 lovely meals that someone else cooked, 2 of them outside. I could get used to this. 

The thing with stitching Friday Night With Friends is that their Friday night in Australia begins at night but mine begins here in Canada very early Friday morning. But it is night now and I can sit back and relax with some hand stitching. The newest 3030 Quilt block was released and I have not yet pulled fabrics for that. I could do that now. Maybe.

It is the beginning of July and the year is half over and I was looking at my goals for 2020 to see if I was on track or totally derailed. Among other things, I wanted to complete the 2 Antique Wedding Sampler blocks that I started a couple of years ago. And I flipped through the book Primarily Quilts written by Di Ford-Hall, that has the pattern, drooling over most of the patterns. I think I might have enough fabric in my endless cupboard to make all of them at least twice in several colorways. Also, I cleared off, at least I tried, one of the tables here in my quilt room and put away patterns and fabrics and little girls keep passing through here and asking to play UNO. 

Precious little things. They are having a surprise birthday party for their Dad my son tomorrow at noon because they go to their mom's after lunch. and he knows all about the surprise party but not the real surprise. The girls have been learning to play the ukelele to serenade him. And he is paying for the pizza and all the workers in the strawberry patch will be joining us. But first, they are setting up a white bedsheet on the trampoline outside to use as a screen for an outdoor movie since it is dark now and I have not picked up a needle yet, and my computer was turned off most of the day. If I turn off the lights in here, I could watch through the window. But I could not stitch in the dark.  Not very well anyway. 

So I have had most of an hour here to myself without a needle in hand. But there is always tomorrow. 

Blessings,

Chris

July 2020 One Monthly Goal

We have been picking strawberries. Lots of strawberries. Okay, many more than lots. Our son planted 500 plants last year and for the past 2 weeks, we have been picking anywhere from 100 - 200 quarts of luscious, juicy red berries every single day. Okay, so I am not actually doing the picking. We have 3 girls out there along with our son and, of course, the little girls.

We have one small freezer completely filled with berries and I am trying to buy a new freezer. This is not an easy thing to do. Buying a new freezer during a pandemic. They are back-ordered until Oct. The really big ones that is. I will keep trying. I wanted an upright freezer since I have limited space in the house. We already have a 25 cu foot chest freezer in the back kitchen, but it is full. 

The girls completed their school year and each of them advanced to the next grade. That means no more home learning for now. At least not academics. They are learning to bake. and we can now change gears here and get them back to sewing on their I-Spy blocks. The lego is in time-out and so is the giant dollhouse and all its accessories. They need to be outside more. Not the dolls. The girls. There is now a trampoline and pool in the back yard. We will be making jam soon. Lots of jam. I have 250 jars and sugar ready to begin. 

I sort of did my June OMG but I cannot with a clear conscience say I completed it. It was to organize and bring order to the many small containers of quilting stuff. I did go through some of them. Then a couple of times I was looking for things for my newest project and sort of ransacked everything in the process. So it seems an almost impossible task. 

I started a new quilt. The 3030 Quilt. So far, I have 2 blocks complete and 2 in process. These are fun, colourful blocks. I paper pieced both of these. I have one applique block on the go. The new blocks are emailed to us every Friday. You can find the information here sentimentalstitches-3030-quilt.

So, I have had several ideas for a July goal parade through my head when I am working on other things. I cannot remember any of them right now. The RSC colour for July is dark blue. I have 5 blue blocks left to make for Bright Jane. I did not make any pink ones for June. Actually, I did not do a lot of any kind of sewing. What I did do was complete one more course for my doctorate. It only took me 5 1/2 years. I hope to get the next ones done a bit quicker. And poor Gaston the giant ladybug needs some major surgery. Devan brought it and the thread and a needle to my desk last night while I was making jam and she offered to help do the stitching. I guess that better get done. 

I think I will try to keep current with the 3030 Quilt blocks. I will aim to have the first 8 complete ready to show off for my July OMG

Blessings,

Chris

Linking with: My quilt infatuation.  Peacock Party  Midweek Makers