Binding progress and Violets

I now have the binding one long side, one short side and half of the other long side done.

The two violet plants were in the same pot, but the husband seperated them so I got two pots instead of one. The pot is a two piece unit. The inner pot sits higher so the botton of the pot in not in the water, and there is a cord that sits in the water that is in the bottom of the outer pot which waters the plant as needed.

I was suprised this morning when I went to take these pictures at how much bigger the one plant looks from just Sunday! Here is what they looked like Sunday

and what they look like now.

Can you see the difference?  Pretty cool!

Baby quilt and another gift

Yesterday was the day from h*ll - company meetings all day. All this day does is piss me off. When I got home I got something to eat, turned on To Catch A Smuggler and fell asleep. LOL!!  I think I was still tired from my trip.  I was very windy on my drive home so I had to keep both hands on the wheel to fight the wind.  I did get the baby quilt trimmed after I woke up so now I can start the hand stitching

When I was packing my backpack for work this morning I found another gift I received this weekend. For lunch on Saturday we had wedding soup. It was made with this soup mix and frozen mini meatballs. It was so good! I was then gifted a bag of this soup mix that is made in Pennsylvania. How cool is that!

Wanda, I have never had African Violets either. The ones gifted to me are in special pots for African Violets so their roots don't sit in the water. I was given full instructions on what to do and what not to do so I have been fully trained. I was told if I kill then, he will just give me more as he starts new plants all the time. Vicki, yes we did get some sleep! I never thought we would get thru all the fabric I brought, but with me cutting the chunks of fabric and Cherie running the die cutter we made a lot of strips very quickly! On Sunday morning after we finished up cutting my fabric, Cherie picked out fabric and we cut strips for a 16 patch she wanted to make.

Office upgrade, cutting strips, a winning team, and snow

The guys came Friday to expand my cubby at work. Here is the before and after. I now am not trying to navigate around my chair because the space was so tight.

We also had a visitor, Maui. She wasn't happy that she was confined to one office.

After work I left to go visit my friend, Cherie, and her husband Dale in Pennsylvania. I am glad I drove on Friday rather than waiting until Saturday. The weather was perfect on Friday and I made it in two hours. First thing we did was to go to the Elk's for dinner and trivia night. Family members and friends arrived, and we had 10 on our team. There were 8 or 10 teams - I don't remember. Let's just say I was no help whatsoever! LOL!! Our team did win. The prize? Six drink chips. It was a lot of fun and the food was good. I took this picture early before a lot of people had showed up.

Cherie and I spend all day Saturday in her studio. Look at this wall of cabinets for fabric storage. How fabulous is that?!

She has an accuquilt cutter and boy did we cut strips!

I had a pile of hand dyed FQs that we cut.

Then we worked on cutting 2 1/2" and 3 1/2" strips for my bunkhouse quilts. Look a this pile of strips!

I also was gifted two meanuring cups to add to my collection

A bunch of quilting magazines

Some left over Halloween flannel pieces

I am going to help out by finishing two quilts. These were made by a friend of her's and the lady passed away. The lady was making each quilt in halves and quilting them. There is still some quilting that needs done and then I will have to figure out how to sew the halves together. It will be an interesting project.

I taught Cherie how to sew a mitered corner so she sewed all four corners on that baby quilt. I will get it trimmed and finish sewing the binding.

Cherie's husband likes to grow plants and he gifted me two African Violet starts. We had a lot of conversations about plants and the deer eating our plants! Once spring rolls around I will mail him some Lenten Roses. He says he has the perfect spot for them - the spot where he planted the hostas that deer ate. I won't forget about you Vicki; you will be getting some too!

I also got to see the worm bed. Cherie has worms to take care of garbage and to use their casings as fertilizer. I was very cool!

I left around noon on Sunday and my ride home was a bit dicey once I got closer to home. It was raining when I left PA, but in Ohio it was snowing. It was light at time and heavy at others. There weren't many cars on the road which was nice. About 25 miles before home there was an accident with a tractor trailer in the median ditch and several cars scattered in various ditches. There was some slush on the road so we all were slowing down. Over all the roads were in good shape. That just must have been an area that got some heavier snow. The streets in town were messy, but ok for driving. I had to shovel when I got home. The snow at the botton was soaked and wet.

Next baby quilt

I decided to keep working on the baby quilt tops that I had sewn together sometime last year. I got the backing pressed, the batting spread, and then the top laid out for the next one.

I am glad it is Friday. Today at work the guys are going to be alternating my cubbie. It wasn't my idea, but I could use a bit more space. I will show you before and after.  The General Superintendent also got me one of those hydraulic lifts for my computer so I can stand while I work.  This weekend I will be visiting a friend. She has a die cutter and so I will load up the car with fabric that needs to be cut into strips. I don't think the snow will be an issue. Have a great weekend!

Step one of the Binding is done

I got the last of the quilting done then started on the binding. There are several steps I go thru to do the binding. The first step is to sew it on each side stopping 1/4" from the corner. You can do a search for binding tutorial on this blog and see how I sew on binding.

The second step is to miter sew the corners. I didn't sew the corners last night. I am going to a friend's home this weekend and one thing she asked me was how I sewed my corners. I now have a quilt that I can show her firsthand on how I do it. I started sewing my corners after my Mom gave me a hard time about just folding my corners square. I had got my Mom quilting and taught her what I had learned, but now she was mitering her corners using a folding method. I needed to step up my game! I don't remember how or where I learned how to sew the miters. I did buy a tool which was just a rectangle piece of plastic with a 90 degree point at one end. It came with directions, and I forced myself to learn how to do this. I haven't found that the tool is available anymore, but a small square ruler will work. I would guess I have been sewing miter corners in my binding for 35 - 40 years.

Baby quilt progress

I am 80% done with the baby quilt's quilting.

I have already cut the binding. I will try to work on that a bit tonight if I have time.

Baby quilt progress, crunchies, and daffodils

I got one third of the baby quilt quilted.

I ran across an recipe for South African Crunchies. A fellow who lives in Paris writes cookbooks and blogs about his food adventures.  He took a trip to South Africa to escape the cold in January in Paris and one of the treats that the guides brought were crunchies. He had a link to a recipe. I had most of the ingredients so I made some last evening. I overbaked mine, but they still taste good. They remind me of a granola bar. I will have to make then again and adjust the time so they are not as dark as mine got. They are made with flour, baking soda, butter, oats, brown sugar, and coconut. The coconut does not overpower the bars. I didn't have any golden syrup so I used some agave nectar. I can see adding nuts, pumpkin seeds, or raisins to these. Maybe a touch of cinnamon too.

On my way to the mailbox last evening I noticed that the daffodils are starting to come up already. They are located in a micro zone and it is a bit warmer in this area next to the house. The brick absorbs the southern sun's heat which keeps this area a bit warmer.