what a mess!!, AJ

Michael was up at 6 AM on Monday (5/14) and I followed just before 7.  He made his usual omelet before leaving for Old Sycamore for golf, while I got my blog out and played with Cookie & Lucy & Ethel.  Just before 9 AM I headed over to Anne’s house…she will be going away for a few days in the future and Michael and I are taking care of her kitties while she is gone.  After that I hit the library…and talked a guy out of taking a book out!  I saw him come up to the desk with a Louise Penny book….but it was number 6 or 7 in the series….I told him he really should start at the beginning…so we went back to the shelf to see if the first book was there…but it wasn’t.  I gave him one of my cards (because it has my email address on it) and told him if he would send me an email, I would send him a list of the books in order as well as the website I use to find that out.  (By the time I eventually got back to my computer…I already had an email from him...he said he didn't realize what a delightful time he would have at the library!)  I stopped on the way home to meet Paula’s new neighbors…made breakfast when I got home (I was starving) , had a delightfully LONG talk with Jan (so unexpected and nice!) and finally made it back downstairs at 11:30.  I continued quilting and decided to tackle something that has been bugging me for a long time.  These days, as I finish a project I cut my leftover fabric into a number of different shapes and sizes, ready to go into a future scrap quilt, but it wasn’t always so.  I was doing mile-a-minute quilts….and so as I ended a project I just chucked my leftovers into a basket under my table.  Then there was a second basket.  Then there was just an ever growing pile of odds and ends spilling out onto the floor on the cutting side of my sewing tables.  Well….no more…this mess is getting taken care of now (and I’m sure over the next several days/weeks).  Here’s just some of the pile:  

and of course it didn’t take long for ‘someone’ to make themselves at home in it:  

By the time I went upstairs to watch TV with my honey after dinner, here’s what I had started:  

These are called string pieced blocks and I do them on a muslin base.  This is how I created our current bed quilt….completely out of scraps:  

I got at least 2 strips sewn on each of 30 muslin squares (the very last of my puzzle fabric will be the center strips on each block), so that will make a Clinton sized quilt (I'll have to add some borders first) once finished.  I think I’m out of muslin now and I refuse to buy anymore until I go to FOUST in August….so other string quilts will be long term projects, but I will work on them until all of that MESS under my tables is gone!  I have 3 different xerox box lids (thanks Mary Jo!) for these kinds of quilts…one has patriotic fabric, one has batik fabric, and one has everything else.  If I run out of ‘under the table’ fabric, I’ll start in with the appropriate box lid :~).  That’s why I want to buy a bolt of muslin when I go to FOUST.  It will not count as part of my ‘fabric inventory’, since I will always be using it as a base with other fabrics.

My honey came home at 3 PM…totally wiped out from golf.  It was so hot that he didn’t even play holes 17 & 18.  He took a quick shower and we headed up to the vet’s with ALL of our furry kids for routine appointments.  We were beat when we got home around 5:30.  Lucy has another (or a continuing) respiratory infection, as well as a skin infection…she got a shot of antibiotics to hopefully get rid of both.  They both got the second session of inoculations as well as de-worming stuff.  It was a quiet evening, with both of them sleeping for most of the time.  They were absolutely not themselves and were obviously sore as well, which was worrisome…but this AM they seem more alert.

Weight Report:

                    Ethel               Lucy

                       

13-May     3 lb 9 oz           3 lb 15 oz

6-May       3 lb 4 oz           3 lb 10 oz

29-Apr     3 lb 0 oz           3 lb 5 oz

22-Apr     2 lb 13 oz          3 lb 2 oz

15-Apr      2 lb 7 oz           2 lb 11 oz

8-Apr       2 lb 6 oz           2 lb 8 oz

1-Apr        2 lb 3 oz           2 lb 4 oz

Daily Dose of Cute:

isn't this a beautiful pic of mother and duaghter?

I don't like this one as she looks SO grown up!

But this brings us back to the appropriate age  :~)

She is just too cute!