Yeah it is Friday.

It has been a long and stressful week at work. I was told I have to move my office from the job site to the home office 15 miles away. I don't like working out of the home office, but there is only enough room in a tiny space for the superintendents - well, at least that is the story I am getting. Right now I plan on moving next Thursday and Friday unless the project manager tells me different. So here is a shot out my current window on the second floor.

I am taking vacation time today to get some errands done. As soon as I get home I am going to focus on getting some sewing done. Have a great weekend.

What's the deal?

I did get my leaf blower put together - it took all of 1 minute LOL!! I tried it out and it has a lot of power! It almost knocked me off my feet! The air blowing is adjustable, but when I have it on full blast I almost have to hang on to it with both hands. Right now it is just sitting on the garage floor so I will have to find a place to keep it. I wish I would have bought one years ago.

We got a dusting of snow last night. It must have been very wet because some of my ornamental grass was bent over with the weight on the frons.

Lately I have been lacking motivation to get anything done. What is the deal with that? I don't know why. Maybe I will try making a list of three little things to get done each day and maybe that will snowball into getting more done. I looked at my list of things to do around the house - I have a white board with the list by room of what needs to be completed - and the list is quite long! It will never get done if I don't work on it! I also pulled out my UFO list to report on Vicki's blog Colorways by Vicki Welsh my progress on my UFO list and that was just plain sad! LOL!!! Nothing much knocked off the list for this year. I need to get my act together.

Scarf is done ... again

I spent a lot of down time knitting this weekend. I finally knitted the last 13 3/4 inches and now the gray scarf has been re-knitted and is ready for winter.

Saturday I met family at a place called A-1 Japan; it is a hibachi restaurant. It is always a lot of fun. We were seated with a group of women celebrating one of their birthdays so our chef was cooking for 10. The food was so good as usual. Yes, there were lots of flames. No one was injured in the cooking of the food. LOL!!!

When you have a birthday you can buy this desert of ice cream and a brownie that is served on a spinning lotus flower that has sparklers. Also they play music and this person with a mouse head comes out and beats on a drum. It is quite odd, but people go there just to celebrate their birthdays because of this.

Before dinner I stopped across the street at the new Marc's store - it is a grocery store - and picked up a few things. My sister in Georgia had told me about a new Mike's flavor - Tangerine - and they had some! It is quite tasty!

The rest of the weekend I spend doing the usual jobs - laundry and dishes.

I am so glad it's Friday

It has been a long week. I did get more t-shirts hung up on the design wall and here is what it looks like right now.

I still have a few more I have to work in somewhere. I don't want to put them on the back. I think once I start sewing them together I will be able to work a few more in. This is going to be a big quilt!

My Christmas present to myself came. I will put this leaf blower to good use and save my shoulders which always end up sore after raking. I think it will be too wet this weekend to try it out.

Have a great weekend!

Next project

Although I am not done with the project I can't show you, I am already working on the next project. I had taken it off the design wall to work on the secret project so it is going back up! It is a t-shirt quilt for my nephew's cousin. The t-shirts are all cut up and interfaced so I am now arranging them. Here is what I have so far.

I still have a pile of them to figure out where and how I am going to incorporate them all!

I received a box yesterday with two more Christmas presents. This is the last of them except for a bottle of wine I need to get. Wrapped!

I watched my neighbor's house when they were out of town over Thanksgiving so they are watching when boxes arrive at my house this week and sticking them in the garage. We have never had problems of thieves taking packages, but I have several coming this week so I don't want to take a chance. Besides, this will make feel better that we are watching out for each other.

Relaxing, sewing, knitting, yard work, shopping

It was a busy four days! Of course Thursday was all about relaxing and talking to family. I finally got the top done for the project I can't show you. Yeah!! I got the backing sewn together, the batting cut, and cut out the binding. I will work on putting the layers together after work this week.

I had to take my car in for a recall repair. The dealership is across the street from a Home Depot so instead of just sitting, I went over to the HD got some steps in and picked up another item on my Christmas list. I still had a bit of time when I got back to the dealership so I got some knitting done on this scarf and later on while I watched TV - almost 4 inches.

Friday I started with the yard work despite the fact that it had rained and was still misty at times. I spent four and a half hours mowing, raking, trimming, and placing rocks. Saturday I worked in the yard another 4 1/2 hours and on Sunday 1 1/2 hours. I hauled 19 loads of sweet peat mulch up the hill from the backyard where I had stored it under a tarp

to the front center flower bed and for around the zebra grass.

Here is what the edging looked like before I finished ripping out the old plastic edging and placing the rocks.

Here you can see the contrast of the rich, dark mulch against the dirt. I had set the lavender plants high so that I could mulch them heavily so I needed to get them mulched before the ground froze.

And here is the center bed all done! I did have a big Shasta daisy plant that I split up to fill in the area around the Mugo pine. I should have lots of pretty white flowers next year!

I covered most of this bed with the black plastic I had on the mulch pile. The plastic will help kill the weeds over the winter. This bed has been a complete mess for years so it is time to clean it up.

As I hauled mulch from the back to the front, the deer were watching me.

Most of my shopping is being done online. It is great not having to deal with crowds! I got everything wrapped I have bought so far. I have a couple things still coming and I have to go get a bottle of wine, then I am done!

I did do some shopping for myself and I am very excited about one purchase. I will show it to you once it arrives.

Oatmeal cookies and a four day weekend!

The dust was really bad at work so as soon as I got home I hit the showers. I then headed up to the kitchen and made some oatmeal cookies for Superwoman at work. Superwoman is a lady who is a laborer for the company I work for. She works hard every day cleaning up the messes the contractors leave everywhere, directs traffic when needed, and all kinds of odd jobs. We try and help each other out, and she makes me laugh. When I was eating a biscuit yesterday, she asked me "is that a cookie?" I said no, and she said "where are those oatmeal cookies you said you would make me? Make sure you don't put any raisins in them. I can't stand raisins." I laughed and said I would make her some which was last evening. Here they are - some without raisins and the other ones with raisins and pecans.

I am so looking forward to a four day weekend. My plans are to get quilting on the quilt I can't show you yet, figure out what my next project is going to be, do some yardwork, take my car in for a recall repair, and clean out the garage.

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving!