Happy March Y’all!

I am just giddy that March is here… I have enjoyed winter … but Spring… OH MY!!!!

You see we are still seeing THIS …..

 SNOW!!!!

 A look back toward where the above pic was taken… Rick is doing this on the golf cart to test out how it handles on snow…

This tree we call the “popsicle tree”… not sure of it’s type but it held this wet snow well!

 Here is a photo Rick took of the flag in front of our home…

We loved this photo of the flag flying…

 Even the cabin we keep an eye on for the owner got a scenic view!!!!

We even made a video of Rick doing donuts in the yard… on our golf cart that actually traveled on the snow quite nicely!!!!  I tried to add the video here but Blogger doesn’t like it! lol

So besides enjoying Mother Nature’s last hurrah of winter…. I have done some journal keeping and quite a bit of sewing too ❤

working on the base stitching layer of the crochet blocks to be…

Sew when I have the chocolate and purple block done… there is just 1 more block and then I can look in the bag and dig in the closet to find the rest!!!  I can’t remember if I have more ready 😀  I play these games though so that I will see FIRST if I can stay consistent with a project…

Today I may focus on these little squares.  I may ALSO spend some time at my frame though too!!!

Look at this cool shot I took as I stitched this week….

And >> I rolled Appalachian Delight yesterday… I took this photo before rolling to share my progress…

and this close up…

 And this view here looks GREAT rolled down some doesn’t it ❤

The snow made it very bright through the windows so I cropped most of that brightness out! lol
Linking this rolling progress to Kathy’s Slow Sunday Stitching gang HERE <<<  Come visit her blog and see all the benefits hand stitching can do for you too ❤

I am also pondering a new quilt … it won’t be ready for quilting for a while!

Here is the layout….

 It has 72 snowballed blocks and 71 pieced blocks… all the white centers will be ivory…

I am going to you 2 layer cakes… I need to get 1 but have the other…

The one I have is this one here…

 The one I think I want to add for it’s medium tones is this in a layer cake….

 The great news is after some quick calculations I did buy enough of the background fabric… 6 yards and I need 5 for this quilt! whew!!!!

So I won’t be starting this yet… but you will see the Shelbyville~Lancaster Quilt starting soon here 🙂

I have straightened my sewing room so that I could use the cutting mat and cut out & made some reusable cloth dish towels made to be used in place of paper towels… I like them but don’t love the way I made them… I will make some this week and share that photo… but me and Jannessa bought some toweling and now I need to make some proper used rags from it that coordinate with our kitchen and look presentable too.  I will say what I made cleans and washes well though!

Molly has adopted this chair with this quilt in it to nap on when we are in the kitchen… she is soo cute!

 Here is a great shot of sweet Ellie….

 Here is some placemats that I desperately need a plan for quilting…

And now I bid you adieu… I hope you have a great first week of March and don’t forget….

Have a blessed week… Lion or Lamb 😀

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Happy Sunday January 2020 ~ Ringing in a New Week!

January is an odd month… comes on quick but last a looong time as you adjust your vision to include new things or jump start lost habits.  As for us… we buy a fresh bulb flower in January…

This past week was a real roller coaster but we made it through and my honey even surprised me and bought a miniature daffodil plant to enjoy for now and plant later… AND he bought the Raggedy Ann an Andy partner that looks like he is from the same era she is from … mid 1960’s !!!

I really needed these boosts this week… now to give sweet Ann a new outfit and some new striped socks too… those will be a project you see coming up in the future… Andy is a smart dresser so Ann needs to step up her game a bit and get a rejuvenation session … Jannessa will help me she promises!!! ❤

Last Sunday I enjoyed slow stitching alternating with block making for the Beads table runner I planned to make…

 Here is a close up of 1 block… made with strip sets is how Donna Jordan shows it made… I didn’t use her sizes but made mine smaller blocks to make a more desirable sized finish for my needs…

 And for the table in our kitchen… a couple of smaller placemats were pieced.

 By working through the week when not slow stitching… I got all but 1 seam and the final border completed…

Friday I had it all together & handed this flimsy runner with batting and backing to Jannessa.  She is going to fmq it for us to enjoy ❤

 I will use that deep burgundy for the binding… our kitchen is mainly the barn red and creamy tan colors… but we have a quilt in there (my spiral log cabin quilt) that this will look perfect close to.

Friday when Jannessa came over to pick up the table runner we took time to let her pup Max visit with Molly… we also made coordinating bracelets pooling our resources of glass and nicer plastic beads!!!

My honey had found the 2 silver hearts (one in each of our bracelets) in the fish vendor cart when  we got it home.  Jannessa loved them as much as I did so we made them a stand out on our bracelets 😀

I am definitely blessed with good friends… my blog prize winner from December was Penny or as other readers may know her as Little Penpen.  She loved the winnings and then proceeded to make me this sweet thank you gift….

 I received it on Saturday and promptly called and thanked her and caught up with her too ❤  It is a pattern by Kathy Schmidt and is a Hare and Needle… so stinking cute y'all!!!

I then signed it for her with initials and year… and sewed circles to the back for hanging…

 Look how beautiful it looks in my room !!!!

 Thank you Penny for making my day with your sweet hand stitches just for me!!!!!

Molly got a groom and a photo shoot earlier in the week while we ran to Asheville for doctor appointments at the VA for my honey….

She looks so great scissor trimmed and nails ground short.  She is so good for the groomer too we are told!!!

Most every day I wake early and spend the early morning hours hand quilting… this is my zen and my fave place to be… I enjoy machine projects intermittently and it gives my hands something different to do as well.. but I never get bored hand quilting!!!  Appalachian Delight is no different!!!

 Pictures I took this week as a spritzed away the blue markings once quilted and let it dry… giving this great texture to the outer border of this quilt…

 Here is where I will be today… getting the corner done…

 Here is a look back at where I have been….

 And a close up of THIS MORNING….

 And my set up that lets me tiptoe around in the mornings without waking anyone as I stitch with my headphones on…

 this week I finished this book on audio books from the local library.

 I thought since the service is free I could listen and quit if I didn’t like it… so I did and you know what… Michelle Obama is a wonderful speaker and had lots of great info to share in this basically nonpartisan look at what it was like to live life in her shoes.  And what an interesting life she has lived thus far y’all! 

I have kept up with my calendar this week… I am planning to switch to bullet journaling in February when I can get myself a dot paged book that is small enough to not take up much room to keep handy.  Or maybe I should keep printing these sheets and put them in a notebook… 

Any calendar fanatics out there have a preference????

At Jannessa’s request I joined a 9 patch a day club on facebook.. it is quite an international group and has me pondering 9 patch variations like this one for a possible future quilt …

 Hoping to find the pattern for this one but look at that quilt closely.. the light and medium blues give you an awesomely intricate background pattern in the quilt… friendship stars… churn dashes… all kinds of patterns within patterns and basically it is 9 patches with some hst’s and solid squares too to make it come out so mind bendingly cool!!!

I did one of those silly things on facebook yesterday… it is like reading a horoscope or something 😀  This hits quite close to home for me though!!!!

This has been a chatty post .. hope you have enjoyed it … so much hand work here I am linking it to Kathy’s Slow Sunday Stitching… my fave blog to visit on Sundays >> right HERE <<

I will chat more next Sunday… for now I sing cheers for a cap on a very busy week and a hope that the coming week that looks busy will be relatively quiet in reality.

Next Sunday I should be into the next phase of quilting … the blocks !!! Come back then!!!!