It's a Finish!

Star Junction

It's finally finished!  (and here it is, Sunday game day again and I don't have anything to bind!)  It's great to have this one finished.  My quilt holder is in the field, so I had to resort to the clothes line for the photo op.

My clothes lines really needed tightening.  (after seeing these photos, the hubs took care of it).

The clothes line is out behind the shed by the apple trees.  See all those gorgeous Granny Smith apples!  And that cute, clean and fluffy, puppy!  Willow and Kenzie both got baths last week.  And as washing something that's really dirty (like windows and cars) will do, it did bring on the rain.

It rained most of the day on Friday.  This is how Willow spent the day.  

I love to spend a rainy day sewing, but had to deal with these instead.  I have put enough tomato sauce in the freezer that I won't be purchasing it for at least a year.  And this was the harvest AFTER David pulled half my plants.

Since the hubs couldn't be in the field Saturday afternoon because of the rain, he picked the apples.  

There are 4 buckets of Jonathans and the rest are Granny Smith.  (There's one bucket missing from the photo and he says there are about 5 buckets worth left on the Granny Smith tree.)

Willow's rainy day inside was not without treats!  She got one of her frozen baby food treat jars and that made her day.

I did make it to the sewing room on Saturday.  This is Mom's Pixel Chain quilt.  (Remember, mine is still in blocks, not even sewn together yet.)

I did use most of the 2 1/2" squares in my box to make some 64-patches.  I'm renaming them 4-Patch Cubed.  At first I started with 1 1/2" squares and made 4 of those.  Then decided to sew them together to make a block the same size as the 2 1/2" blocks.  These will finish at 16" in a quilt, and I do have an idea about how to set them together.  I need at least 4-7 more of them though, so am going to wait to make some more when I have more scrap squares to use up.  

 You'll just have to wait and see how this one turns out!

Christi

Boots!

Boots has been hanging around the patio again.  You may remember that Boots and his brothers, Charlie and Wicket, arrived at our house in the late spring of 2020.  They were such sweet little kittens!

Wicket

Charlie

Boots

We had so much fun with them that summer.

And then............ Willow arrived.  And the kitties were bigger than this sweet little puppy.

They played together

But Willow grew much faster than the kitties, and the "playing" changed.  Eventually, the kitties left the deck and patio and spent most of their time at the perimeter of the yard.  David would report seeing one of them in the trees down by the hog barn, always just on the perimeter and away from Willow.  

Well, for the last couple of weeks, Boots has been on the patio every morning waiting to be petted and loved.  Willow still tries to give chase, but Boots is holding his own.  Hasn't he grown into a handsome cat?

Meanwhile, back in the sewing room, this same quilt has been on the longarm for over a week.

I was so proud of Esme for staying off of it until I spotted the batting hanging..........

And as I worked on it and rolled it up even further, I realized that she had created big holes to jump through.  I'm blaming Esme, although Cici might have helped.  Fortunately, I didn't need that section of batting and was just planning to trim it off to use in another project.

I am happy to report that it is finally off the longarm and in the hand binding stage.  The excitement at finally getting it off the machine.............

So much support in the sewing room!  I also finished all the blocks for my pixel chain quilt.  I (what was I thinking?) decided to make mine queen sized, and making the blocks took forever.  This was a sew-along with Sew Sweet Quilt Shop.  It's been fun seeing all the color combos of the same pattern.

And of course, we have been watching the Chiefs.  It had been my goal to have that quilt off the longarm in time to bind during the first game, and when that didn't happen, my goal was to have it ready for Thursday night's game.  That didn't happen either, so now it's ready for TV time this week.  I'm looking forward to the return of some shows I like to watch.

I did put together some cream cheese and bacon stuffed mushrooms to eat during the Thursday night game.  That game sort of snuck up on me and I didn't have much planned for snacking, so pulled out odds and ends and came up with this and some other leftovers.

Stuffed mushrooms for the Win!

Between piano students, work, tomatoes, etc.  life has been very busy.  David did harvest a couple of days, but is waiting again now.  Monday is pig weighing day, so I have to have food ready for the help.  I did make the decision to quit my job at the community center and museum at the end of the month.  Of course, they talked me into doing some of the bookkeeping on a contract basis for the remainder of the year, but I won't have to put in regular hours on Mondays and Tuesdays anymore, so hopefully that will leave some more time for sewing and quilting.

Christi

 

We're too old for kittens!

 

Remember this cutie?  I picked her up from the shelter on Friday afternoon.  She had had her "surgery", vaccinations, and passed her feline disease tests on Wednesday.  We had plans to meet Sarah on Saturday morning to deliver what had to be the world's cutest kitty to her new best friend and caretaker.  

Can we just say.........explored EVERYTHING!  No corner was left untouched, so I consider the house cobweb free now.

She totally loved being held, cuddled, and rubbed.  This upset Esme quite a lot.

Cici also showed concern about the love and attention being paid to the little interloper.

Of course, all this exploring, loving, and attention seeking effort was exhausting.

Now to explore the many ways to nap...........

Unfortunately, when it was time to go to bed, NAPPING was out of the question.  Finally, at 20 minutes to midnight, the hubster plopped her on me and said, "Get rid of this thing."  I took her out (purring all the way) to the bathroom on the back porch and shut her in there with her food, water, litter box, and a couple of stuffed toys for snuggling.  I didn't hear a peep out of her.  When I opened the door the next morning, I didn't see her anywhere on the floor.

There she is..........in the box of towels on the wall.  Note that this box is at my eye level, she must be quite a jumper.  

I think she was a little concerned about the leap down to the floor.  

She seemed happy enough to get back in the carrier for her rendezvous with Sarah.  We met in a parking lot, so my pictures of their meeting are all inside the car.

Both girls seemed very happy to be together.

Sarah sent photos from her apartment.  The kitty is now called Lara and is a city cat.

Sarah says it is really different being the total center of someone's universe.  Lara keeps close to her at all times and snuggled in the bed under the covers with her at night.

I think they have made a good match.

Cici and Esme seemed to be happier when we came home with an empty cat carrier.  I don't know what they will think when Sarah and Lara come to visit for the holidays.  It could be interesting.  

Christi

What about Cici?

It's been awhile since Cici was featured in the blog............. here she is in her favorite location in Sarah's room where she can look out the window to observe the world...........when her eyes are open that is.

Piano lessons have started, so that took the majority of my time the last couple of days.  That and tomatoes.  I managed to give a bucket of tomatoes to one of the piano families, but that still left me with a large bucket to take care of.  I have made lots of pasta sauce, some pizza sauce and yesterday I just put plain tomato sauce that can be made into fresh salsa or something else when needed in the freezer.  And, I dehydrated 6 trays of tomatoes.  

I did finish another embroidered barn block, Mariner's Compass.  That's #10, only 2 more to go.  I'm still not predicting a 2022 finish on this quilt.

And I put my next oldest (after the barn quilt) UFO on the longarm and am working on it.  It's about 1/3 of the way done.  I don't know if it will get done today, but I'd like to have it to bind during the Chief's game Sunday afternoon.  We'll see if that happens.  If not, I have a Halloween cross stitch to work on, but it's a little hard to focus on cross stitch during a Chief's game.

This quilt is called Star Junction.  It was done as a quilt-along at Sew Sweet back in the fall of 2020.  I have no explanation as to why it hung so long in the TBQ closet.

And of course, after lunch, you must have your afternoon nap.............

Cici, not being long haired, can lay directly in the sun while Esme lays just outside of it.  

If I could get sound on this blog, you could hear the snoring.

Christi