Thread beds done, cookies, thread, and a sunset

The matching thread beds are done for my sister. I have one more thing to finish and then I can ship all the project bags, thread beds and tote bags to her.

I had made the dough for Almond Butter Balls on Sunday. I baked them last night and took some to work this morning.

They are easy to make and taste so good if you have the right ingredients. Butter - Land O' Lakes and really good almond extract. Some almond extract is bitter and when you smell it, it smells awful. I had bought this almond extract years ago down in Amish country and it is so good! It can also be bought online.

The bulk food store I go to quit carrying this brand of extracts. The last time I needed vanilla I bought it online and yes, I bought a gallon! This company makes all kinds of extracts. Perrier Aromatics - google that and you will find them.

My African violets are giving me a show!

Superior Threads was having a sale and some of their cones of King Tut were 60% off! Odd colors, but such a great price. I know I will have a quilt that I can use these on.

Last evening's sunset

My sister's stuff, cookies, taco seasoning, cactus, and a site tour

I made good progress on my sister's project bags and thread beds. The project bags are done.  They measure 12" x 14"

These two thread beds are done except for the velcro closure.  These measure 10" x 13".

I had to make one thread beds all red since I used up all the Braves fabric. This all that I had left.

The other two thread beds need quilted, the flannel attached then the self-binding pressed and sewn. I did learn one thing; I added interfacing to the flannel. I like the way the interfaced flannel looks so much better. One of these is almost all the cream speckled fabric since I didn't have enough of the Braves fabric. They still match the project bags and I am glad I had enough fabric to add one piece of the Braves fabric to the zipper unit.

I was asked the purpose of a thread bed. Good question Vicki! Once you cut a piece of floss and pull a strand to use, you need some place to keep the other strands. That is where the thread bed comes in. You can stick the piece of thread to the flannel. The pocket is handy for keeping the skeins or bobbins of floss. You could also put your scissors in it. The green felt is good for storing needles. Here is my smaller thread bed for my John Wick sampler. I even used a P touch to make labels for the floss colors and drew what symbol they were on the chart; you need to keep your floss organized! The labels will peel off and I can use it for the next project.  See how the flannel is wrinkled?    Hopefully that doesn't happen with interfacing the flannel now.  

I picked this little piece of Christmas cactus up off the floor at the store. It was just going to be thrown away so It came home with me. After sitting around for almost a week, Wanda recommended I start it in water. I needed to find a something small to put it in and found this cap. It is getting roots!

I made a batch of chocolate shortbread cookies. I overbaked them, but they still taste good. Took some to work and they guys like them.

I made some taco seasoning to give the guys at work. I forgot to take a picture, but I filled four of these jars and three of the empty spice containers to give them plus the recipe so they could make more and the recipe for Salsa chicken.

Friday one of the superintendents took me out for a job site tour. I hadn't been out there for months. It was cold and snowy, but we were in the truck so no big deal. Here we are going south on the old northbound off ramp which leads up to the bridge. Those stacks on the left side are slabs of bridge decking. There is a aggegrate company right beside the job site. The guys built an access road so we can move the slabs over to their yard and they will then crush the slabs, remove the rebar, and resell the processed concrete.

Here you can see an area where the deck slab has been removed.  That is the new southbound bridge where the cars are driving.

Next we drove under the bridges. We are going up the hill. The guys made this access road for the crane that will be used to help demo the old bridge. They had to put in two switchbacks since the hill is very steep. We are headed up to where I drew that blue line.

Here we are at the top of the hill. The blue dot is where we were in the last photo. The bridge on the right is the old bridge for both the north and southbound lanes. The new bridge on the left is for the southbound traffic although it is now being used for both the north and south bound traffic until we get the northbound bridge built.  From the ground to the deck of the new bridge is 120 feet. 

Here is the crane that will be moved up the hill. Right now it is sitting at the bottom of the second switchback.

The northbound bridge will be open in early 2028.

Project bags and Thread beds status

The project bags and thread beds for my sister's friend are done!

Yesterday evening I cut out and prepped most of the pieces I need for the project bags and thread beds for my sister. It takes longer to do this than to sew them together!

Next batch of project bags and thread beds

I got started on the next batch of project bags and thread beds. I had to pay attention because the fabric is a one-way design. Don't want any upside-down bulldogs! I laid out all the pieces for each bag so I didn't get anything mixed up.

The first step is to sew the zippered units. I got a start on sewing the fabric pieces. Once I get all of those sewn, I will add the vinyl. This way I don't have to keep changing the zipper foot to the regular sewing foot.

My plans for the weekend it to get these project bags and thread beds done and bake some cookies. I am hoping the piece for my glasses comes in so I can get those fixed. We had two warm days and now it is back to cold and snowing. Have a great weekend!

Thread bed hidden pocket and pizza muffins

After work we headed down to a local bar for our project Christmas gathering. I forgot to take a picture of the giant potato, bacon, cheese tater tots. They were so good! By the time I got home I was tired so nothing happened in the studio. I did forget to show you another feature of the thread beds. There is a pocket behind the vinyl zippered pocket.

This morning I made a batch of pizza muffins. This was the first time and I made one big mistake. I should have divided the batter into 9 muffin cups instead of 8. They rose during baking and it was hard to get them out of the muffin tin with the cheese melting everywhere. They still tasted pretty good even though they were messy looking. I have a couple still left for my lunch so it will be good to see how they taste after they have sat a while. I will probably put them in the microwave just to heat them up a bit.

The guys at work ate them, but then they will eat anything! LOL!!

Thread beds done

I spent some time cleaning up around the house before I got to the studio to finish up the thread beds. I needed a set, meaning a project bag and thread bed for a gift today so I needed to get them done!

I will send my sister one set; she likes dragonflies. The other two sets I will have just in case. Here is a size comparison to the ones I previously made. The new ones are 10 1/2 x 12" when they are open.

I can't believe next week is Christmas! I am not ready - again! LOL!!

Progress on the thread beds and another NOEL

Sometimes you just have to clean house. I spent about an hour and a half cleaning up the bedroom. Wash sheets, vacuumed, dusted, and picked up all the dirty Kleenex that were overflowing the trash receptacle. I went thru a lot of tissues with the cold! I am feeling much better today! Yeah! I did get the self-biding pressed on the three thread beds. I will finish those up tonight.

At lunch yesterday I worked on the NOEL cross stitching. I got another letter and a half stitched. I am getting faster at stitching these. After this one, I would like to get three more stitched. Next year, I have to plan better!

Project bags, thread beds, another NOEL

My cold is much better and the optometrist was able to order a new bridge nose piece for my glasses which will be in Tuesday or Wednesday. I still was feeling lousy over the weekend, but managed to get a few things done. First, Friday - we had the company Christmas lunch. There were lots of people there; this company has been growing. I did not participate in the ugly sweater competition.

I did buy some raffle tickets. The money goes to a charity every year and this year's was the Ronald McDonald House. There is one of those located here. I was surprised that my name was called and I won a Ninja blender. This will be going to my son since I have a VitaMix and his blender is old.

When I got home, I started working on the pillowcase. I had just enough fabric left over that I made a boxy pouch to go with it.

Saturday morning I headed to the post office to mail the pillowcase and pouch. I decided to go to the Verizon store to get some help with my phone. I had an iPhone 8 SE and it would not accept updates and only had 5GB of storage. Well, you know what happened. I ended up with a new phone - a 17. That is quite a jump from 8 to 17! Still have to work out the kinks so it works like I need it to. For kicks, I took all my old phones for them to see. My first phone is older than the young lady that took care of me!

It snowed Saturday and by Sunday morning there was enough that I needed to shovel. Before I got outside to shovel the neighbor came over and had started shoveling my driveway! I helped him finish.

I had to run an errand and then stayed inside to work on project bags. I got four done.

Then I started working on the matching thread beds. There are a lot of steps to make these and I was running out of steam. I wanted to get one made as a review since it has been a while since I made these.  Three are almost done and the other one just needs a little piece of velcro on it to hold it shut.

I watched the Browns get beaten badly by the Bears, did some laundry, and on Saturday I did get one more NOEL stitched.

Another NOEL done, retriever fabric, and broken glasses

I spent last evening finishing the stitching on the red NOEL. I was feeling kind of crappy so I just sat in front of the space heater, watched TV and stitched.

My brother asked me to make a pillowcase for someone and he wanted golden retrievers on it. He found this fabric and had it mailed to me. I will get that made tonight so I can get it mailed to him.

One of the nosepieces on my glasses broke off this morning. Yesterday the glasses were sitting kind of weird on my nose but I never thought to look at them.  I have had these frames for a very long time. I hope they are still available. I can still wear them; they just sit a little crooked on my nose. LOL!!

Have a great weekend! I am feeling better so I have plans to get a lot done. Besides the pillowcase I need to get some project bags sewn together and stitch a couple more NOEL so I can get cards in the mail.

Project bags, thread beds, and another NOEL

I took as sick day yesterday. I hurt all over when I woke up and decided to burn one of my 17 sick days I had left for 2025. I gathered myself together, took some Excedrin and other OTC symptom relievers, and headed to the studio. I turned on the space heater, sat there for a while, and thought about what I could do. I decided to cut out project bags and thread beds. I need to get these done so I can get them mailed. I cut four project bags and two thread beads out of the Georgia fabric for my sister's friend. I had to think about how I cut these out since the fabric is a one way design.

Then I cut out four project bags and four thread beds out of this dragonfly fabric.

I would iron and cut a little then sit a bit. This picture shows the pieces needed for a project bag. The outside fabric, the inner fabric that is interfaced, a piece of vinyl, and two pieces for the zipper - one is folded in half and the other is pressed with each half folded to the center. The thread beds have one additional piece of fabric for lining the pocket. There is a lot of prep work that goes into these! The prep takes so much longer than sewing the bag together!

I also got half of another NOEL stitched.

I am feeling better today on day 7 of this cold. As long as I take the Coricidin pills, then I don't cough which for me is the worst part. Yesterday it was freezing rain and wind. The city was out spreading salt and the main and secondary roads were in good shape. We only got about a half inch of snow after the rain turned to snow.