Block 22!

Good Evening Internet Friends!

Not sure where today went, but somehow it has gone.

My son started back at swimming lessons tonight, apparently Sherwood Park schools resumed today and so did extra curricular activities.

I did some knitting and tidying up of the house today and then this evening I managed to accomplish:

TAH DAH!!!

Meet Block #22 of my Churn Dash Challenge from A Needle Pulling Thread quilt shop.

Shhhhhh, this week is supposed to be Block 34......I'm a little slow as usual.

Tomorrow I get to go for lunch at Duchess Bakery with my dear friend Brandy and return her quilt that now has its label on it ☺  Then maybe I will actually make another one of these blocks ☺

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

Shhhhh, Monday's coming

Good Evening Internet Friends.

So, this afternoon we packed up from the farm and headed back home.

Before packing up though my son and I took the boat out on the slough....

We checked out all the various water foul homes, they just ignore us by now.   Lost a paddle for a bit in the weeds but carefully managed to maneuver the boat over and retrieve it.  

I also managed to finish the quilt top that I have been working on at the farm today:

And, here's a picture with the cleared trail to my son's hide out spots:

I have already booked to take this quilt in to be long armed later this week, so just might be able to get the binding done on it soon!

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

At the Farm again. ...

Yesterday morning I loaded up the car and my son and I headed out to the farm on an extended road trip.

We stopped in Ponoka, Lacombe and Blackfalds for of course you guessed it; Fabric!  I will post pictures  of my new stash additions when I get home tomorrow  or Monday.

Today I weeded  the garden some and dug up some of the veggies to take home and can or freeze this week:

After dinner I worked on my Jelly roll quilt.  I had the main part of the quilt done but thanks to a trip to my new friend Sharon's house earlier this week I was able to get a border from her awesome stash and the outer border fabric as well:

It's cat fabric!!!!

Okay, here is the quilt:

This evening we decided to have a camp fire as well:

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

A Whole Lot of Nothing Going On!

Good Evening Internet Friends.

So far this week I have accomplished a whole lot of nothing.  Today was probably my most productive day since coming off night shift Tuesday.

I have done a bit of knitting, some quilting, house cleaning, and baking, but nothing spectacular.  

Right now I have a shawl, a toque, and two sets of socks on different needles on the go.

Here is the Reverb Shawl that I am working on:

This afternoon I took a bit of time to make another of the Churn Dash Challenge Blocks:

Not sure how many weeks behind I am on this challenge, but maybe over the next week I can get a couple more completed ☺

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

Hello Winter!

Good Evening Internet Friends!

I could not sleep last night due to pain in some of my joints.  It almost felt like the pain I get in fall when snow is on its way.  So, I got up and did some sewing as knitting was too painful.  

Thanks to the middle of the night foray into my craft room I managed to complete:

This is a quilt kit that I got for my son and started on last winter but did not finish before spring.  I decided last night that since it was feeling sort of like winter I should get it completed so that I could get it quilted before winter arrived!!!

Well, if you read any of the news feeds or weather reports you will know that mid afternoon today winter did arrive here in Alberta.  As of yet I do not have any in my yard, however, there are frost warnings out there for tonight!!!

Late this evening I made another two log cabin blocks for my Raise the Roof quilt:

TAH DAH!!!

Now off to try and get a few hours sleep before getting up early to go back to bed later tomorrow afternoon so that I can work night shift this weekend.  ☺

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

Have I mentioned I LOVE yarn?

Good Evening Internet Friends!

On Saturday my son and I stopped by River City Yarns as the newsletter informed me that they now regularly stock Sweet Georgia Yarns which is probably my most favorite yarn right now.  I picked up another color way; Honey Fig, Party of Five and started on a Reverb Shawl:

I love this pattern and how it is working out!

Then because apparently someone (me) doesn't have enough yarn.....this was in the mailbox today:

 First month of this brand new Yarn Club.  If you can guess what was in it you will know why I subscribed:

Isn't it just PRETTY? !!!!!

Now off to get the banana muffins out of the oven and get ready bed, but I think I will take my knitting with me to relax.....

Good night and 

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

Playing...

Good Evening Internet Friends.  

The weekend has passed and somehow I managed to do a whole lot of NOTHING.

On Saturday my son and I went and did some back to school shopping, running shoes and jeans.  Normally, we would get these items on our annual fall Cross Border Shopping trip, but of course with the dollar being the way it is right now, it is cheaper to shop at home.  

We also stopped at River City Yarns because I decided that I wanted some new yarns for a project that just HAD to start.

Then we made pizza for dinner and watched movies.  

Sunday, yesterday, was my Birthday.  After sleeping late, and having pancakes for brunch we went to see Shaun the Sheep Movie.  It was a cute movie.

This evening after work and dinner, I spend some time playing with my Pfaff Quilt Expression 4.2.  I probably should watch the videos, but they seem too long, so I did the best I could with what little I could figure out and made a quilt label for my friend Brandy's wedding Quilt:

It sort of looks like those free cheques you get from the bank for your chequing account which is kind of appropriate I guess since one of them is actually an Investment Banker.

Tomorrow I will sew it on and then the quilt can go back to its proper owners.

I got a really cute card from Karina for my Birthday:

And thanks to everyone else who sent a card too!  

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

Friday Fun Day!

Good Evening Internet Friends!

It is Finally Friday!!!  This has somehow been a realllllllly looooooooong week.  Not exactly sure why, but I am glad that it is over.

After I picked my son up this evening we headed out to Sherwood Park with the intent to get my son a hair cut and to have dinner at Smashburger.  My son calls these Friday evenings when daddy is away and we go out for burgers Friday Fun Day.  Our plan is that we will try all the burger venues in and around the area for the next while.

After getting home I made Block 20 of my Churn Dash Challenge:

TAH DAH!  Only 11 more blocks to catch up for this week ☺

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

Squirrel!!

Good Evening Internet Friends.  

No my post does not actually involve Squirrels (cute as they are) tonight.  I just most accurately describes my Crafting Attention these days.

After work and picking up my son we headed out on a mini road trip to Sewing With Class because when I was last there I had noticed that they had the entire collection of Downton Abbey Christmas fabric.  I had been thinking about doing the quilt along for this quilt but with shipping and the Canadian Dollar value these days the quilt would have been prohibitively expensive.  After seeing the fabric line in a local store I signed up for the quilt along and this evening I picked up the fabric:

"Sew" excited to start this, maybe even this weekend ☺

After dinner and getting my son off to bed I managed to accomplish:

One more Churn Dash Block for the Churn Dash Challenge over at A Needle Pulling Thread Quilt Shop.  I believe this is week 31 and for me this is my week 19 (I think) block.  Might have to work a little harder on these, but....oh wait.... I found some yarn which I am taking with me to settle into bed with tonight ☺

This is most likely the reason non of my projects get completed.  I might try working on that someday.

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

Hey, Look What I Found...

Good Evening Internet Friends!

"Sew" as many of you know I have been on this house cleaning, de-stashing, and all around minimizing of stuff for the past month.  The only problem with that is that sometimes I get "weak", for lack of a better word and instead of adding some treasure I find to the Fabric Relocation Program, I decide it is so awesome that I must do something with it immediately.  I run to my not so helpful in this case friend Google and look to see if by chance there is something I could do with my treasure, and of course there always IS!!!

Yesterday while I was supposed to be cleaning the craft room I found a brightly colored package of Tonga Treats (every time I say that word I get hungry...) that I just could not part with.  I decided that I could make a Jelly Roll Race Quilt.  

TAH DAH!  

Seriously, this did not take very long, maybe an hour or so and I had a completed quilt top!  Well, almost. I plan to add a small border and then a bigger border to make sure that this quilt is big enough to cuddle under because I can't think of anything better than curling up under this in the evening to knit.

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

In the Dark...

Good Evening Internet Friends!

Yesterday was one of those days where I tried to pack as much as possible into the day.  I was up by 0730 (even though it was Sunday) to get all my vegetables taken care of.

I pickled all the cucumbers, all the yellow beans, blanched green beans and carrots all before 2 pm.  Laundry and some more general house cleaning were included with the festivities.  Then my son and I headed out into the river valley riding 28 km in the river valley:

The weather was hot and it was a great ride, and the city looked pretty.

We got home had dinner and while my son started his bedtime preparations I thought I would get a batch of blueberry jam made and that could process while I read my son his bed time story.  Two minutes away from the jam being ready to jar the power went out.  U^&*()_)*(&*^%%$^&*!!!!

Seriously.  Worse yet, it did not come back on.  A check on my phone of the city's power web page let me know that a power line was down and it would be at least 2 hours before power was restored.   At 11:38 pm the power came back on.  I had to re-boil my jam, get the canner back up to boiling and process my jam.  Bedtime at 1 am.  Somehow I have dragged through today and am still up....

Here's my first batch of pickles:

The first batch of veggies:

As of this evening all veggies are bagged and the pickles are on the shelves.  Can't wait til the pickles are ready to try...

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

Saturday Fun!

Good Evening Internet Friends!

This morning after 4 hours of sleep because I stayed up to work on a quilting project until almost 0200 hours my son and I got up and went to a Kids Building workshop at the Home Depot.  My son had a blast!  He made a chalk board frame and got to hammer and glue, and screw and stick stickers and voila:

This was such a cool idea that we signed him up for next month.  He got an apron with his name on it, the tools are supplied, and on completion he got a pin for his apron, and a certificate of achievement!  Growing up my dad used to work as a Finish Carpenter and so my brother and I always had lots of small pieces of wood left overs to hammer and saw and nail.  Sometimes he would even help us with these disasters to "tidy" them up.  We always thought it was great fun.  Seeing my son today I realized I have been re-miss on this for him.

While at the Home Depot I found an awesome shelf for my craft room that was on sale so we lugged that home with us.  We assembled that after a nap (cause I was up til 0200 and I think my son is going through some pre-teen thing, tired and grumpy).

After dinner I started making pickles.  I should have started on this earlier in the season, but with work and such this is my first opportunity, so as of now I have 12 jars of dill pickles done and am starting on the bean pickles.

Here is the project that I worked on until 0200 hours this morning:

"Sew" this is the center block.  I might try to finish this quilt now, but of course no thanks to the designer of this Block of the Month who decided to change the center on me and I had to figure out the center configuration for myself.  Still mad about that  / : {

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

Paper and Pencil....

Good Evening Internet Friends!

I do use technology and somehow I get by, although there are days when neither my son or husband can figure out how I manage to do the things I do and or just not understand how to use technology.  Even at work staff always joke about my using paper and pencil for math if I can no longer visualize the sequence in my head.  I hardly ever use a calculator.  

If you have been following my blog you will know that I decided to participate in the a Block of the Month program that last week the center block got changed.  Now,  I have quit making the quilts by this designer due to the numerous mistakes that frustrate me.  I figured that if the participants knew what the quilt looked like going into the quilt there should be no room for error because you could always look at the picture and fix the error now rather than finding out when you are almost done and out of fabric and find out OOOOOppps, you need to go make some more blocks. / : {

Well, the center block got changed and on first glance it looks like something that the grandparents "backpacked" Europe from 1941 - 1945 to stop.  No instructions were provided on how to make the original block just excuses that the block would be too hard, but if you wanted you could make another pinwheel block and put a border around it......hmmmmmm. NO.  

"Sew" this evening I got out my paper and pencil and figured out how to make a 7.5" unfinished Ohio Star Quilt Block which is what the center block originally was:

This is my "test" block and it does measure properly.  Not sure if I will do a real one or just keep my test block and carry on with the rest of the quilt.

Here are my measurements for this 7.5" unfinished Ohio Star Quilt Block:

4 corner blocks cut at 2 13/16"

1 Center Block cut at 2 13/16"

Star points:

1 (white) Block cut at 3 9/16" and cut on the diagonal twice to yield 4 triangles

1 (orange) Block cut at 3 9/16" and cut on the diagonal twice to yield 4 triangles

2 (blue) Blocks cut at 3 9/16" and cut on the diagonal twice to yield 8 triangles

TAH DAH!!!

Now off to finish canning borscht.  ☺

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

Too Tired to Sleep

Good Late Evening Internet Friends!

I have finally reached the end of my very long work week.  It has turned out to be a 10 day stretch rather than the 11 because I think someone upstairs (literally, the second floor) felt sorry for me and re-arranged my schedule to have tomorrow off ☺ ☺ ☺

I was feeling tired at lunch so took myself for a walk in the park across the street.  I am really hoping that someone can explain this to me; it is August 06 and look what I stumbled across in the park:

Taking my son to camp this morning I was almost certain I saw a yellow hue to the trees but decided it must be the diabetes acting up in my eyes (that's my excuse for everything) that was turning the trees yellowish.  Apparently NOT!!!!  There were even dead leaves on the ground!  Seriously, it's not even my birthday yet.  Better go see if the cat is growing his winter coat...

This evening I came home from work and this is where I believe the too tired to sleep has kicked in.  I made dinner, unloaded and loaded the dishwasher, washed, dried and folded two loads of clothes, dusted and almond oiled the wood blinds in the living room and dining room, vacuumed the entire 976 sq feet of the main floor of the house, then decided the floor did not shine so orange oil washed the 900 square feet of hard wood including the stairs in the back entrance.  Then I washed the tile and took out the toothbrush and washed the grout between the tile.  Since that still was not clean enough I even moved the stove and refrigerator and vacuumed and washed under them too!

Still not feeling tired I went to the craft room and completed my June 2015 Paper Pumpkin Kit:

This just might be the first time I have actually completed an entire kit and done it within a reasonable time frame!  ☺ ☺ ☺ True to Kathy fashion though I did not actually watch the video or read the instructions so by card 4 I was running low on pieces so the last card is filled with the pretend wood banners!

Now I think I shall go try and knit myself to sleep...

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

Sprinkles of Life...

Good Evening Internet Friends!

Long time no blogging for me.  I am now Day 9 of my 11 day stretch that I agreed to (yes, it's my own fault).  Did have to come home this morning though as late last week there was a sudden change in programming decision made for the clinic and that resulted in everyone having to attend a meeting this morning.  Well, we got to the meeting with the "Big Wigs" only for me to get to smell their markers and all the papers with "vision maps" that they had smelling up the room!  Instant Asthma Attack for me!  After my breathing stabilized I got to go home.  Spent the rest of the afternoon and most of this evening sleeping.

A friend of mine had a birthday a few weeks back and I made a card for her.  I drove the GO GO GO Toyota today and found the card still sitting on the seat.  Oooops forgot to mail it.  So, when the recipient of this card gets it in their mail; HAPPY BIRTHDAY.

These are the four cards I made:

TAH DAH!!!

 I used the Sprinkles of Life stamp set and coordinating punch, 2015 - 2017 In Color Card Stock and Cherry On Top Designer Series Paper.

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy