Houses and (Cross) Roads...

No matter what we do or think, life moves along.  And, unfortunately, it usually moves at a faster pace than we would like, hey?  Life here in Canon City seems to move slowly...yet, here we are almost at the end of March!  

As usual, I have been busy sewing.

I am still building houses for the #sewingavillage party on Instagram.  It's so much fun to make them...and to see what everyone else is doing...different fabrics and individual touches.  There are 16 weeks to this sewing party and we are halfway through.  Here are the last 3 weeks.  

Week 6

Week 7

Week 8

I've completed a few small projects...

Trying out a napkin with fringes.  

Ya know...cloth napkins.

Julie did the embroidery and I finished this pillow cover.
Purple grunge for the backing.

Jill knitted a scarf and asked me to do the fringes.

I have a few more things completed, but am not able to show them, yet.  

And, of course, I started a new quilt.  Another scrap-busting one.  Here are 4 of the blocks laid out together...

Scrappy CrossRoads

I am following a tutorial by Lori of Bee In My Bonnet fame.  The blocks finish at 16" and, once you get a bazillion 4-patches put together, the blocks go together very quickly and easily.  

I have a list of several projects coming up.  You know that I am never at a loss for something to do.  

That's it for today.  Hope you're having a good one.


"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.". Jeremiah 29:11

The One About Happy Mail...and other stuff.

Something special arrived in the mail the other day.  A box from my almost birthday twin, Lindy.  I am a bad friend...I have yet to send her a package of happy mail.  Soon, Lindy.  Soon.

More fabrics...larger than fat quarters.

Crewel embroidery.  February.  Cuz, you know.

2 yds. Grunge in Onxy.  Made by BasicGrey for Moda.

I love packages of stuff.  Thank you so very much, Lindy!,

I have been keeping busy, as always.  The list is longer than my arm!

The #sewingavillage party on Instagram continues.  And, I continue to have fun making the houses.

Week 4

Week 5

Those small houses measure 5 1/2 x 7 1/2 inches.  I am working ahead, but this is how far we are in this party.  So much fun!!

I finished my 4th SBB Heart Builders quilt!  I received the butterfly fabric and about 1/8th yard of orange with white dots fabric from SBB and I added in the other dots and the solids from my stash.  It's always interesting to see what I come up with.  This quilt top measures 46 1/2 x 64 1/2 inches.  Somewhere, there is a little girl who loves butterflies and bright colors who will be very happy to receive this.  The next step for me is to mail it off to my team leader.  She will see that it gets quilted and then it will go with many other quilts to this quarter's charity. 

Almost a month ago, I finished making blocks for my plus quilt.  I finally sat down and sewed the blocks together.  I LOVE this!  It measures about 60" square, so it's small enough for me to quilt myself. 

There are two special parts in this quilt top...

"I see you", said the owl.

A little thought of the brown dog.

I am a Silver Sneakers member now...there are definitely some benefits to getting older!  I no longer pay a gym membership and am able to join any gym that honors the program.  So.  In addition to working with the strength machines and walking on a treadmill at Anytime Fitness, I started going to a different gym that offers a restorative/chair yoga class.  My attendance has been a bit sporadic, so I need to make a commitment to going every single week.  It feels good when I go, both physically and mentally...but there are days when I just don't want to interrupt whatever it is I'm working on.  I need to get over that.

Me Mum is doing okay.  However, she fell again the other day.  Her BP fluctuates and she has orthostatic hypotension (decrease in BP when she stands from sitting or lying down).  Because her doctor was going to be unavailable for a few days, she was sent over to the ED to be checked out.  We are getting to know all of the staff there (and we like them all...they're so good to Mum).  Everything checked out, but the ED doctor told us that it looked like her wrist had not healed.  So.  We shall be going back to the ortho doctor to have that checked out. And, Mum agreed to wearing a helmet to prevent a serious head injury.  I told her we could decorate it! 

We will be playing cards with Mum today.  Tomorrow is my day off of everything.  What are you up to this weekend?

Post Birthday...

Thank you one and all for the birthday wishes that I received via snail mail/email/Facebook/blog, etc.  You helped make my special day even more special!  I had a nice birthday.  No partying...no whooping it up.  Just spent time with family.  

Late in the afternoon, I received a call from the nursing home...letting me know that me Mum was on the way to the ED because she had fallen and hit her head on the bathroom sink.  She had quite a gash.  So, I spent 3 hours there with her.  She is doing okay and the staples (10 of them!) come out next week.  

On Saturday, I took my homemade angel food cake over to the nursing home and spent more time with my sisters and Mum.  (The cake was so good!)

I have been working on my 4th charity quilt for SBB Heart Builders.  The blocks are done...I just need to sew them together and then get the quilt top into the mail.

The #sewingavillage party over on Instagram is in its 3rd week...so to be on track, 24 houses have been made.  I am trying to keep ahead of the game by making a few every day or so.  The total number of houses for this village quilt is 132.  That makes for a lot of planning and cutting and sewing.  Mine will be mostly scrappy, but scrappy AND random is sometimes difficult for me to do.  I have so many scraps...and I am trying to decide what other scrappy project I can have in the works as long as I have scraps everywhere I look in my sewing room!!  Here are more of my houses...  

Week 2 houses

Week 3 houses

Remember the polka-dot quilt I showed a few posts ago?  Well, I was calling it the Dot quilt.  Funny story...Jill (recipient of the quilt) decided that, since Dot is an oft-used nickname for Dorothy, she would call her polka-dotted quilt, Dorothy.  But, then...where was Toto?  So, I made a Toto pillow cover for her!!!

Toto pillow cover

I also made a few more cloth napkins for my niece, Michelle (Jill's daughter), whose birthday was the 21st.

So, that's what is going on here...how about where you are?



"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.". Jeremiah 29:11