Finally a moment

It has been a busy day and I finally have a moment to post. Last evening was all about getting little things taken care of. I got the mail, and it wasn't mine. Our mailman is a real goof. I took the mail to my neighbor's house and texted them that I put it in the garage. Then I walked across the cul-de-sac to pu another neighbor's mail since he asked me to because he is out of town on business. He has I swear the world's smallest mailbox and nothing much fits, so I have to go get it every day. On the way up his step though I got a wonderful surprise. This azalea is in full bloom. It is hidden by a huge bush and unless you walk up the steps you cannot see it. I will look forward to seeing it every day this week!

So then I stripped the bed and washed the sheets, uncovered the condenser in case I need to turn on the A/C, got some dinner, and stitched a bit. I am working on another Seize the needle piece. I will make this into a little pillow and give as a gift.

The weekend was catching up to me and I was getting tired. I did get some strips matched up for the 9 patch blocks for that baby quilt. Now that I think about it, I messed up, but at least they are not sewn together. I will rearrange them tonight.

A busy weekend

Running errands, cleaning, and a little fun stuff sums up the weekend. Fun stuff first. I finished stitching the Seize the needle piece

I fully finished this piece I had stitched not too long ago.

and I finished the birthday card and got it mailed

Saturday, I had an appointment for an oil change that took way too long.  I had brought some stitching so at least my time wasn't wasted just sitting.  What they did find was I needed a couple filters changed too. They thought that a mouse had been nesting in my engine compartment because there was all this fuzzy stuff in the filters.

So, after the car stuff was done, I ran a couple errands and headed home to get started on cleaning the garage to see if I could find evidence of mice. The garage was a hot mess after just dumping stuff in there thru winter. First thing I wanted to move were the boxes of carpet squares I bought late last year. I opened the packages and left stacked them in the garage to off-gas. After cleaning out a couple spots in the utility room I moved 20 boxes then took a break before the other 16 were moved. I did not see any evidence of mice, but there was fuzzy everywhere from the carpet. I think that just the engine sucking air drew the fuzzy up into the filters.  Getting the carpet out of the garage made it easier to start getting things back where they belonged. 

I also did a fair amount of vacuuming to try out my new cordless Dyson. It did a great job finding dust bunnies and only a couple pieces of thread got caught in the sweeper head. It was designed for pet hair to not catch in the sweeper head. It has a nice big catch bin so I could see all the stuff it was sucking up. The bin is real easy to empty too! I found the balance to be a bit awkward at first since most of the weight is in your hand, but after using it a while it started to feel more comfortable. I don't have to change anything when I go from hard floor to area rugs either.  The machine adjusts automatically. 

The last thing I did on Saturday was mow and trim the front yard. It was dark by the time I got done. As I was cleaning on Saturday, I decided I needed new rugs to go under my chair in the sewing room so on Sunday I got those. The old one was made of carpet samples from one of the school jobs I was on years ago. I had taped the squares together and it served me well, but it was disguising so out it went. Here are the new, flat, machine washable rugs.

I also couldn't help but bring this little fellow home with me. He only cost $2.57. At the fancy garden center, it would have been at least $6.00. Menards had a whole bunch of succulents and it was all I could do to just bring one home.

I made a lot of progress in garage; I got 1 1/2 hours in on Saturday and two to three hours in on Sunday. I stopped once the trash bin and recycling bin were full. One of my neighbors is out of town for the week so I may check to see how full his bins are and add to them. On Sunday I did cut out strips for a baby quilt I need to have done for June. Yes, I know I still need to finish the Harley quilt. While I was cleaning and putting stuff away, I went ahead and pressed this whale fabric I had washed then cut it up for project bags.

So my plans for the week are to continue straightening up and using my new vacuum as I get an area cleaned up. I think I need to name my vacuum. I want to continue to work in the garage to straighten out another section and try to get back to the Harley quilt. I don't have any appointments this week and the weather is going to be decent. Rain is forecasted for Tuesday, but I can still work in the garage.

Yeah it is Friday!

I've have been busy with this and that. Not much to show for it. I decided at the last minute I needed to stitch a birthday card for someone. I need to get it in the mail tomorrow. I am pretty close to having it done. I started it last night.

Last evening I dug up some of the Lenten Roses for a couple fellows at work. Here they are all ready for me to load up in the car which I did this morning.

I have an appointment to get the oil changed in the car. I will probably hit the grocery store while I am out and of course the post office to mail the card. Other than that I plan on staying home and trying to get something done. I have about a hundred things I would like to do, but I know that won't happen. Have a great weekend!

Been busy

Work has been busy so by the time I get home from work I'm tired. I have stuff I need to get done so I think I need to remind myself as soon as I walk in the door what I need to focus on and get it done! I think I will make a list and post it where I will see it as soon as I walk in the door. I found a little cross stitch design that says Carpe Acus seize the needle that I want to make into little pillow to give as gifts. I started on the first one and it has been fun to stitch.

I had a haircut appointment yesterday afternoon. I had a few minutes before my appointment, so I walked over to the Polish pottery store. I always head to the 50% off shelves. The pottery is expensive, but it is so pretty! I bought the large oval dish two weeks ago and last night I bought the small oval and the round bowl. It is microwave and oven safe so it's fun to cook and eat out of a fun dish.

When I got home there was a package with my order from the Kitten Stitcher. She had some Blackbird Moda fabric marked down to five dollars a yard, so I bought two yards of three colors to make project bags.

I am going to pair them with the tan/goldish bolt of fabric I bought a while back.

You might not know that Blackbird Designs is a huge name in the counted cross stitch industry and their designs are beautiful. They have done a few reproduction designs and do lots of orginal designs. I wish I could afford to buy all the softcovered books they have published.

Project bags and Lenten roses

I needed some project bags. I gave the majority of mine to the lady at work that took them to the retreat to sell so I had kitted projects all over the place needing a bag. I got 8 large bags and 8 small bags that were partially sewn together finished.

The rest of the weekend was going on a road trip to get my prescription sunglasses that had to be remade, laundry, cleaning, cooking, and cross stitching this tiny carrot for fun.

Whenever I went upstairs to the kitchen I checked to see if the zucchini needed turned. They have really grown. I can see some of them are starting to get their second leaves. Here what they looked like Friday and what they look like now.

I did weed for only about 15 minutes last evening just enough so I could show how many Lenten Rose seedling have popped up. There are hundreds of them! I think since we had such a warm winter more survived. Now I have to figure out what I am going to do with them.  They are everywhere!

Bands are done

It was a bit fiddley, but I got the bands sewed together. The glue worked out perfectly to hold the elastic together while I had to stretch it to get them sewn. I also made the boxy pouch to put them in. I'm glad that job is done!

When I first got home from work I decided to cut back the ornamental grass I had planted along the property line. Here is what that looked like.

This is looking up the hill after everything has been cut.

This is looking down the hill after I did the initial clean up with the leaf blower. I still need to give it a good rake; everything is still muddy so I will wait until it dries out a bit so maybe this weekend.

This morning I went into the kitchen and was surprised on how much bigger the zucchini seedings had grown overnight. I have to keep turning them because they do bend toward the light in a matter of hours. Here is what they look like on Wednesday and what they look like this morning.

I need to get back to the Harley quilt this weekend. Other than a quick trip to pick up my prescription sunglasses that I have been waiting on the corrected pair for a month, I plan on staying home. Have a great weekend.

Hit the ground running

There was no messing about when I got home from work yesterday. The elastic for the bands came. Yeah!

But the first thing I did was to plant the zucchini. They are now sitting on the kitchen table. I did push the table closer to the sliding door so they would get the morning light.

After I got the mess cleaned up from that I headed out to meet a coworker for dinner. She is the lady that took the project bags to sell and works out of the office 2 1/2 hours away. She was staying in town for meetings so I offered to take her someplace for dinner. She was hungry for Italian so I took her to a local place. She had baked spaghetti and I got a pizza big enough for leftovers. Here is what was left of my pizza.

When I got home from dinner I needed to get a start on the bands. I cut the lengths of elastic 5 1/2 inches and marked a line at 4 1/2 inches for my overlap.

These bands are so small I knew there would be no way to hold the layers in place while I sewed them. I decided to run a bead of glue in the overlap area, fold the elastic over, and clamp it with a binder clip. I didn't know if this would work, but I went ahead and did all twenty I needed to make.

This morning I had a few minutes to try and sew one of the bands and I was successful! It is a bit fiddley to get the elastic under the presser foot, but it didn't take too long to sew. These just seem so small, but they are elastic and they need to hold the wireless transmitted tight to the guitar strap.

I decided to quickly cut out and prep fabric and interfacing to make a boxy pouch to put the bands in. Much better than using a plastic bag in my book! I will whip that together tonight so I can hand these off to my brother tomorrow (this would be another brother not the one who needs the bands).

In my package from Wawak with the elastic, they tucked in a sheet of stickers. This is the first time I have ever received these. This is the same place I bought that thread and zippers for the project bags.

I had to stick the SEW one on my Yeti I carry every day with my water.

Still busy.

I had an appointment yesterday afternoon so I did a couple errands afterwards so my evening was short. I did get a bit more stitched on that little sampler

I need to get my zucchini seedlings planted. It has been only a couple weeks and they are going crazy in their plastic bag greenhouse.

I promised one of my readers that I would post pictures of the yarn winder my Dad make me. She knits beautiful sweaters and had shown on her blog how she loops her yarn around a thread cabinet so she can make the hanks into balls. I don't even knit that much so I feel like this winder is a waste on me! I bought some yarn a few years ago with intentions of knitting myself a sweater so I grabbed one of the skeins to demonstrate how the winder works.  The X piece turns as the yard is pulled. 

I got a message that my elastic has arrived for the wireless bands. Yeah!