Goodbye May ! Take your April Vibes with You, as You Go.

 

Hi everyone! It's been an odd week, I'm trying to be positive here anyway. Back to my little quilt called Whatnots--she is all set and ready for a sunny day with just enough wind to blow the gnats away. There are dense clouds of gnats on rare still days. I  have to pull my tee shirt over my face. They bite so bad, esp wrists and ankles that maybe are exposed. But!--before I talk about WhatNots, I must show you my first harvest. So excited, a radish and a few baby lettuce leaves.

Whatnots has been fun but did require focus. I copied all the tiny images. Largest is maybe 3"

  Then I cut them apart and wrote on each the color and style of the fabrics on the dark and blurry pattern photo. Went to my stash of repro fabrics and clipped 4" corners of possibles, stacking each motif w its maybe fabrics.

Yes I went a little brighter.

I don't print directly on the fusible [tho you can]. I am always confused by which side the sticky part goes on, do I reverse everything or what. Can never get it right. Add in that at least 5 of the Nots are drawn reversed on the patters. I fixed most but you can see the Lady is wrong, and one of the cats. Oh well.

Then I just pin the copy paper image onto the sticky backed fabric and cut it out with my lovely micro serrated KAI scissors. [spring sale if you want some Kai]. Despite these efforts I still had to recut all the leaf branches. 

You can maybe see that the branches have to go the correct way. That empty right lower corner gets a four patch block I since added and an embroidered name of the quilt.

I decided to use the batik for the background. It blended best and is mostly covered by the Nots. 

Carefully transferred to the ironing board and pressed in place. Tah-dah, hand sewing pile added to.

Remember they are just fused at the moment, they will be hand stitched at leisure, then borders added etc.

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Meditation scroll. You guys may recall how I can take the littlest thing on a project and make a whole big deal about it. Backings! Bindings! Hours, days, mulling, mulling. So it is with this scroll.

An inspiration little drink coaster I made last summer:

Larisa whose blog is doing the scrolls at the moment is so kind and she has personally messaged me with hints and encouragement. Her You Tube How tos are great too. So I found a poor pretty tea towel to chop up and washed it in Quilt Restoration powder here so it's bright and white. Then :Spools. I now see that I casually collect spools. Larisa's Blog    Larisa's You Tube Please be sure to look at her darling scrolls and other projects. 

I save all my empty thread spools now, gives me a feeling of  accomplishment? But they are plastic.

Then I have  old wooden spools of many styles and sizes.

Isn't this chunky small silk reel unusual and so cute.

And a giant spool from Home Goods, held Christmas twine. I soaked off the label, sanded the glue, sealed with beeswax, polished.

In the end I chose these two, a fresh clean wooden spool or an oh so pretty blue plastic spool. To be decided.

I again went to the shelves for small swatches. I can now see a drawback of not collecting swatches. Tho I do collect selvedges.] But my mental/ visual recall is set for knowing what fabrics I have where, and so I can easily find the pieces I need. A bin of scraps would paralyze me, I think.

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I stopped prepping hand work to make  a doll dress for my little friend. she had texted me her design. Please remember she is only 5! Not one of my better efforts, but i tried, only had about 45 minutes to make the pattern and sew it.

And now I have a pile of camp tees to shorten and tie dye and bling up. Always a big June project. Before that I'll do the binding on Silent Night [tomorrow?], but leave the wool applique Snowsuit kiddies till I am feeling calmer. Also must do the wooly faces prep for my Jackolantern quilt.

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Mo, guardian of the Crocs. Someone very unkindly said he is so fat, but he has lost 2 more pounds in two months. 

Have a good week.

love

lizzy

gone to the beach.....

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More on Mo for those who have kindly asked about him: He had his big vet checkup---the news is not the best, he will never ''get better''.We will never again have our long meandering walks, or run on the beach, or chase a scary tennis ball.

 He has age related osteoarthritis. We can only manage his pain and give him the best life possible. Gentle walks, gentle pets and grooming, cuddles by the TV, soft toys.  He also has chronic inner ear infections, with mild vestibular disease. I'll try to link darling Pug Lou Lou, she is also treated for that. LouLou So many pills, so many dollars. Good news--teeth are ok and chronic eye infection is well managed.  

Seeds, Yarn, WhatNots and other May Miscellany

I notice much fewer ''looks'' on my blog on holiday weeks but I have my routine, so here goes.  Winter has returned to the beach, temps in low 50s, very windy. It's all my fault---yesterday I washed windows and put away winter clothes. Today was ''wash curtains'' day but no. Water is bad, the always dreaded hydrant flushing.

My seeds have been liking the rain and do not appear bothered by the chilly nights. As of Tuesday 5-20, ---so about one week?---ALL the pots have sprouted.

Even the Lime Zinnies, okay only 6 but they are notoriously hard to sprout and grow. So I am pleased

The sweet peas are trying, other seeds will take over soon.

Radishes and lettuce. Thrilled, tho the radish I peeked at and replanted the edible radish bulb was maybe the size of a rice grain.

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Knitting. You know I always like to have a knitting project esp in the summer. I can't just sit and vegetate, or even just sit and chat. 

This was a suggested yarn on Amazon. So pretty, so soft, affordable---but would I wear it? It's called Iris, has all the colors of beautiful Dutch bearded iris, not just purples.

This is the idea of the sweater I want to make. Why are all sweaters ''neck down'' nowadays? Fit? I'm intimidated by that but can learn, I guess. And too, what's with the i-cords edging, tedious!  If I get discouraged with a sweater I will return to learning sock knitting with circular needles instead, have lots of sock yarn. Keep in mind I am the world's slowest knitter, too. [etsy pattern]

Bad, bad, bad--late night shopping/ retail therapy. I fell for these yarns on IG, from Hobbii.

The price was right, I could afford to buy enough for a sweater for me. [tho  am pretty sure I'd need at least two more skeins, just eyeballing the amount sent.] But I am not pleased. The colors are not at all like the online pictures, not at all. The blue is dark storm cloud grey. Okay maybe--but not blue.

 Their photo on website: 

But the red🤢, I expected a pinky ''rhubarb'' rosy red. Soft. It is bright brick red. To be fair, their color name was marsala, but the photo was soft pinky red. And ''marsala'' is NOT bright red either.

Their photo: 

And both yarns are scratchy! Like harsh real wool. These are acrylic, $$$savings.

The bad news is yes they take returns--to Denmark. Denmark in Europe! Not Denmark in Minnesota. Costs more than the yarn is worth. Anyone want the red ? I'll mail it to you. Please. Or should I toss it?

Hobby Lobby's acrylics are more expensive but so soft and sweet. Think Mo's grey and Rainbows sweater or this skein [discontinued] of 10% alpaca/ 90% acrylic. Lesson learned, mail ordering yarn is not a good thing.

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I set aside snips of blues for my first try out Meditation Spool. Now I hope I can find my wooden spools. or is plastic okay?

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Screenshot from Instagram. I am trying to talk my brother, who gets to go to the big Springfield OH flea all the time, that we need to start collecting Civil War era clay marbles. So cool.

Whatnots is coming along nicely! I think I'll save it for its own post after the holiday weekend,.

It was so cold here I made matzo ball soup last night. Stupidly added the noodles too soon but it was still so good.

I know Lipton's seems odd and untraditional, but it is by far the tastiest boxed soup mix. The broth is nice, fragrant and simple; and the matzo balls are really delish, with deli-style bright yellow color. Not a fan of grey matzo balls like many mixes have.

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Mo had a spa day. The young new groomer is very gentle. Mo enjoys the attention of a ''guy''. He had a bad pain episode the day before but I did the groom anyway--those pug nails, yikes. Mo did well, but was very tired, got out his monkey blankie and napped afterwards, poor little man.

Have a good weekend! Back soon. (PS the sun came out! Should I re-wash the windows now or wait...?)

love

lizzy

gone to the beach........................

Memorial Day Airshow practice by the USAF Thunderbirds! They drew us a heart, so sweet.