Moving closer ...

... to having the Harley quilt quilted. I am now at 90% done with the quilting.

One of the guys at work became a grandfather for the first time, so I put a label on this quilt and have gifted it this morning.

Yesterday I had to go to the job site for the Owner's meeting. I toured the areas under construction and I thought you might want to see one of the areas close to being completed. This is the PACU where patients go after surgery. All those holes in the wall are for medical gas, electrical outlets, and who know what (I would have to look at the drawings). There are eight patient bays in this area and each will be divided off with cubical curtains.

On the other side of the room is the nurse desk. We need to turn this space over to the owner by July 15. The electricians have still a lot of wire to run.

I am taking tomorrow off so we will catch up on Monday. Have a great weekend!

Quilting and moving dirt

I am now 86% done with quilting the Harley quilt. I quilted this shirt and part of another shirt last evening.

There was a knock at the door and it was my neighbor inviting me to his birthday party on Saturday. He also asked if his guests could use my driveway for parking like they did last year. There is not much room to park in the cul-da-sac. Of course the answer is yes to the invite and yes to the parking. It did get me to thinking I need to clean up a bit in the driveway so there is more useable parking. So I made myself stop quilting and moved some dirt. The dirt was very wet so I could only fill the wheelbarrow about a third full. I am moving some of the dirt to the shade garden bed that is no longer a shaded bed since the pine tree was removed. Now that it gets more sun I am going to plant zucchini and yellow squash here and it needs dirt because right now it is just compost with pine needles on top of it. I got three loads moved. Here are the befores and afters.

I need to find a home for those rocks and try to move as much dirt as I can in the next 3 1/2 days. As long as we don't get more rain, I think I can put a good dent in that pile.

On my way to work this morning I saw a fox. He was crossing the road in one of the fancy neighborhoods. He stopped behind some low landscaping and watched the traffic go by.

Where do I begin?

It was a busy four days helping my brother, but I still managed to get a bit of quilting done. I went from 69% done last week to 83% done. I have 11 days to get this done and that should be no problem.

Thursday afternoon, Friday and Saturday I spend a lot of time along with other family member helping my brother clean up around the house and get rid of stuff. Thursday my brother and I tackled the yard - yes, more yard work! He cut back bushes more that I had done and we moved the rock edging. Friday and Saturday was all about sorting paperwork for shredding, pictures that needed gone thru, hauling out stuff for donating. A couple trips were made to the Goodwill with clothes and on Saturday a guy from a resale shop came with his van to pickup the stuff for donation. I filled my SUV twice with trash bags. My trash bin is full, but on Wednesday I will be adding to my neighbors bins! LOL!! I also spent some time doing some much needed cleaning my house.

I tried hard not to bring anything home. I certainly don't need anything, but there were a few things that found their way to my house. This patch came home with me which I promptly sewed on my R.E.M. wall piece along with several R.E.M. pin buttons

these little charms/key chains which I will use on a wall quilt that I have in progress

this shirt I saved for the fabric - such a crazy print!

my brother handed me these candles

and this tray was just too cool. I had a spot for it in my bookcases.

As everyone cleaned and sorted, I set up a box for guitar picks, foreign coins, and American coin currency. These were found all over the place - LOL!!! I now have a container that weights 7.6 pounds of American coins that I will roll. It will be fun to count up how much is in this container.

I did get my replacement pan this weekend. The bottom is flat like it is suppose to be. I will take the other pan and gift it to my son.

On the private drive at work there are two large ponds and lots of wetlands that attract Canada goose so you have to be careful because they are on the road all the time. This morning as I drove in I saw two Momma birds and their broods. The babies are so cute. The Moms prodded the babies across the road out of harms way.

Cleaning, not quilting

I spent last evening doing laundry and cleaning up the studio. The studio was just too much of a mess I couldn't stand it anymore. I didn't get it all done, but it is looking better. I still have this pile of fabric to iron.

I taking vacation Thursday and Friday to help my brother deal with his stuff. Have a great weekend!

What do you do ...

when you have nice neighbors and too many quilts? I was tired last evening after work. I didn't get home until almost 5 which made for a long day. I was eating dinner and I heard some buzzing outside. Here my neighbor was trimming my yard! I got it mowed Sunday but was too tired to trim. I knew what I needed to do. I dug thru my pile of quilts of which I have too many, and found one I thought they would like. She is a Halloween nut so I gave them this quilt

He is always helping me with stuff and she helped me with cutting up part of that tree that fell a week ago. Now I have one less quilt in the pile.

Busy times!

I still managed to get some quilting in despite trying to spend as much time as I could cleaning at my brother's house. When I would get too tired to clean I would come home and sew. I now have 69% of the quilting done. I have 18 days to finish which I will need a few evenings to put on the binding, but I think I am in good shape to make the deadline.

I did get a lot done at my brother's house. Another brother came over on Saturday to help with cleaning up the backyard. It was raining, but we went ahead anyway with mowing and trimming. Over the four days I trimmed the bushes in front

power washed the deck and front steps

fixed the downspout

dusted and swept the downstairs and upstairs to get rid of the spider webs and dead bugs, and cleaned the storm door and patio doors to let a lot more light in. My brother helped with changing the furnace filter, replacing light bulbs I couldn't reach, and cleaning out a gutter. Clean sheets are on the bed and the hot water heater has been turned on. The place looks better.

Sunday I quilted, continued the cleaning out my garage, and mowed the front yard. Can you say tired?!!!

I always forget about these little white flowers. It was nice to see them; they are so pretty.

Two of my lavender plants are not showing any signs of life yet. I will just wait and see it they come to life.

Remember the shade garden I was going to make last fall?

Since I had the pine tree cut down, it is no longer in the shade. I have decided to try and grow some squash there. I was at the store looking for yellow squash and they only had some bruised up and soft squash that was not worth the $1.99 a pound. I decided then I needed to grown my own. I will just have to cover them to keep the deer away in case they like the blossoms. I don't know if that is the case; I will have to do more research on that.

Great progress!

I made great progress on the Harley quilt last evening. I got four shirts quilted and have 40% quilted!

I may be taking a couple days off work to get some stuff done so if I don't post the rest of this week you will know why. It would be helpful if the rain would go away, but the forecast doesn't look like that is going to happen.