Out and About

                                               beach dresses, sidewalk sales

                                                                   = summer is coming!

Hi everyone! I hope you went out to see the big Pink SuperMoon. It's shining beautifully right now and casting a sparkly  path of rose gold sequins across the black ocean tonight. Maybe the Moon is a good portent, a harbinger of good, well--better?--days ahead? [below is from internet]

I've been venturing out more, my vaccine is effective Wednesday April 28.

I went back to Home Goods last week. I suppose it was almost a month, maybe two?, since our first adventure. The store was well stocked but not really with anything much I wanted. I did get more of the plastic? oilcloth shopping bags [blue pineapples] to piece together a top for my patio table that is in good shape---it winters indoors as an AC windbreak/ cover---but the top sheds a nasty red rusty patina, so ii must be covered entirely for sewing without staining. Note to self, next time get a glass topped table!

I saw a few cute items. I seem to have lost my shopping mojo and never come home with the things I liked. I loved these polka flower planters. How cute they'd look with my zinnias and marigolds. 

Only a bit of the hand blown glass was left, decorative flowers that light up. No Ladybug, too bad.

Afterwards we went to the health food market to get the vitamins and other supplements and elixirs I use. This is the store with the unusual and beautiful cut flowers. Cannot afford their flowers but I love seeing them. 

Brilliant exotic Proteas.

masses of orchid branches!

Armloads of fragrant cut freesias and hyacinths and deep blue out of season hydrangeas. 

Chartreuse pompoms of unknow variety. Sorry for the blur, but you can see the unusual color and get a hint of their cuteness.

A pint bottle of the iron elixir is over $40.oo. Yeesh.

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Yesterday to de-stress after a medical appointment, my friend L and I stopped into the Dollar Store in town. You may recall it replaced Pier One and when it first opened was a bit disappointing. Recently big For Rent signs are in the parking lot, so we thought the $ Store was gone, but No. Good news, it was open and had much better stock. The bad news it is is quite expensive, not a dollar item to be found.

The sidewalk was lined with racks of colorful clothes. Nothing says summer like masses of adorably exotic beach dresses whipping in the the breeze on a sunny day.

The dresses were great, speaking boldly of sunnier warmer climes, blue indigo hand-blocks, batiks, white Mexican wedding frocks, Lots of spaghetti straps and ruffles. Aloha sundresses and muumuus, flowing pants in Indonesian rayon batik. Even tiny toddler sized hibiscus Hawaiian print dresses for tiny beach babes. It all made me so happy, bringing back wonderful memories of trips to resorts in the Caymans, Guadeloupe, Cozumel, the DR. Good times.

Inside, aisles of tempting items, it was hard to stay frugal and choose.

....

I settled for much needed spools of ribbons, to tie up etsy packages, a new colander, a bag of marbles to reseed the sand next winter, and a yummy unheard of indulgence of a bag of M and Ms to reboot my flagging energy post doctor appointment. Total : $16.89, the ribbons cost twice what they go for at  Michael's.

                                   

I didn't get but a good find, they had small folding maple tables. 19.99 I have been wanting one for puzzles and winter hand sewing by the ocean window. I don't need one right now, but will prob go back and get one for next year. (This is not Dollar Tree, it's a NY chain that is called 99 Cents. Hahaha.)

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Of course I cannot resist online shopping. Leafing though a fabric store can be very relaxing, I find. On Hobby Lobby's site I found this wonderful tall lantern! It's huge, at 39" high, that's above waist height.

You may recall I am envying my neighbors' lantern on their front steps. I want one to display my tiny quilts. Theirs is a LOT cuter though.

And lookit that price tag! At HL! Pass.

HL also has the pickup trucks to use for table decor, or as a planter w seasonal flowers or succulents, fill with baby pumpkins, whatever. HL's was $49.oo so the nursery's price of 75.oo when lavishly filled with plants and decorations is not as absurd as it seemed.

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Back home, all April Mo and I monitored the slowly emerging bulb flowers, All seemed to be thriving, they liked the months of deep snow cover!

Snowdrops bloom late here, mid April.

Classic daffs, prob King Alfred. Showy and hardy in these salty conditions.

Not much flowering trees this year, though. Last week just as they were in bud and early bloom, we ha a hail storm with high winds. Poor pretties, all broken and lost. 

As the snow melted and the sun warmed the earth, we noticed the mossy fairy boulders are greening up and even have minuscule red and bronze ''feelers''/ tiny flowers? 

This rock intrigued us. Note the housekey left in a crevice. This is an a prominent walking area, in public landscaping. Someone is trusting. It remained for a week or so and then was gone.

Here are April's weird finds.

Monetary total is 47 cents, assuming the very thin indecipherable coin is a penny.

And as we travelled further afield, we said hello to folks unseen for more than a year, nodding acquaintances. Some new babies arrived during lockdown!

Hope springs eternal. Did you know pregnant moms can be vaccinated!? And then the infant presumably has some immunity too. A miracle.

More soon!

love

lizzy 

gone to the beach...

Mo on night deck, looking for the pink moon.

today's photos are courtesy of Nicky in SA, via blog friend Penny.

April Quilts etc~ so far

 Hi on this sunny but frigid Friday! Baby Mo and I are staying in and keeping warm! 

The wind is howling, despite the brightly deceiving Mr Sunshine. Just look a these wind chills yesterday.

All the lavender hearts and some other good things are now listed on etsy, link on right sidebar. My main quilt projects have stalled as I waited for fabric to be shipped. The good news is the blue shibori dot, for Blue Pineapples, was shipped today! And a few days ago the solidi red and cheddar came for Cartwheels.

I think the new solids work. 

Not perfect but okay. [my camera exaggerates reds and can be misleading, as the red I used for sashing is a very close match in person.

Anyway the new red is very good I think. I don't plan to wash this quilt ever, I feel the spokes of the wheels are too fragile. But just in case I ordered a jar of Retayne to set the red dye of the modern fabric when I prewash it. Retayne is available on Amazon and websites like Joann's.

The orange is as close as I think I will get. It's a smidge too modern and clear. It is prewashing with a bunch of black tee shirts even as I write this. Hopefully the black tees and the murky wind-whipped water I have this week will take that overly brilliant edge off the orange without ruining it.

To keep busy I made two small quilts that will be for a small  Christmas exchange. {I do hate that word "swap", reeks of car parts and guys in wifebeaters on a 100* day]. So even though I don't think my friend reads my blog I better not show you that project yet.

The exchange challenge is to use our TQC postcards to make a small quilt and then that will be our gifts for Christmas '21.

My project was really fun! But I made it the day of my second covid shot and following at-home days afterward, and oh boy, did I make a LOT of mistakes. I think I picked out almost every seam.  I 've been saying ''no side effects'' w my Pfizer shot [except a big bruise] but maybe brain fog a little?

The TQC postcards are darling but the pictures are somewhat obscured--- that didn't help.

This is NOT the swap quilt I made, but oh, isn't it traditional and precious. Maybe for my next 

Lucky* series mini?

[ps I cannot find the red horseshoes fabric*, what the heck?!].

No picture but I started prepping the Pear for Cheri's Christmas quilt. That could take years, no rush. And I am still mulling over Morning Has Broken/ Blackbirds colors. I really need that one made, for my bedroom late winter, when I see the skeins of geese and ducks, the flocks of marsh blackbirds, filling the sky about now. A photo from internet, NOT my color palette.

                                     

Another long term project is a 25 block quilt, pattern by Geri Kimmel, c. maybe 1990s?

I was telling blog friend Nancy that I do not use and abhor the use of so-called scraps, but I admit that for the past two or three years I have put  suitable cutaways, that will fit 2 1/2" squares, in a little basket by my sewing machine. For this quilt. And during the height of the covid fear last year, when all I did was hide indoors and make masks for everyone, when I was so terrified I was almost immobilised...I'd sit down and cut a stack of little squares each day.

(If my remembered fears now seem silly or overblown t you all, please keep in mind I was told that, due to 11 years of immunosuppressant IV therapy, the doctors said if I got Covid, I would die. And no one wants to die in insolation like that.)

So anyway things improved, the basket sat. So when I got my vaccine i celebrated by finishing cutting all my saved bits and pieces.

Here is a card from TQC, that is NOT the project but has a similar feel.

I am pretty sure I will use this vintage chrome yellow as the background, may have to sub in some similars. 

A blog commenter told at one point how old and out of date and 80's ugly this print is---but I love it and it's vintage.  And it is my quilt project. No rush on that project , it is a fill in. 

It's called "It's Yellow", and so it will be.

 book page: 

Next, I took a picture of my ragged blue quilt that I use and love. It's a flea market rescue. I decided I must finish the binding repair. I was saving it for busy work when I have tedious company at the beach---but now I'd be thrilled to have anyone come, no such thing as boring. A lesson learned. Again, my camera is throwing off the colors, even within the original piecework. Pls overlook the apparent mis-match.]

]

Looking forward to Next Winter! I have my eye on this full sized quilt. 

It's a sampler, I could use all my collection of modern bright fabrics! A few blocks each week, like the very fun TQC Sampler from a few years ago, but bigger:

And this caught my eye, maybe on IG? Is it not the best, so wildly charming. How fun!

And if it's a rainy or cold weekend, prep work on Silent Night's needle turn border is next on deck--for deck time with Mo. In, hahaha, probably July! Christmas in July? 

Have a good weekend!

love

lizzy

gone to the beach....