Ahhhh, a vacation

My family (Mom, brothers and their families) take a beach vacation to Hatteras, NC every year. We always go the week before Memorial Day, mostly because it's a lot less expensive for a house the size that we need. This year we were pretty sure that we would not get to go and were making plans to reschedule for the fall. Then we were surprised and thrilled to learn that the North Carolina beaches were opening May 16, the first day of our reservation!

We eat all but one of our meals in on a regular vacation and we were still able to do pizza night as takeout so, for the first time in 2 months, we all had a NORMAL week and it was fantastic. I've never needed a vacation more and we didn't even mind that we really only had 3 beach weather days. We enjoyed the rainy days with puzzles, books, shopping, games and just being near each other. My nephew introduced us to a fun card game called Phase 10 that's a variation of Rummy. I'm totally addicted now.

But now it's time to get back to "work". That started with a lot of ironing yesterday getting more kitchen towels ready for my local food pantry fundraiser, prepping quilt backs and new fabric for the shop tomorrow.

I didn't take any sewing to do on vacation for the first time ever! But I did take crochet and this pretty blanket was finished.

The pattern is called Wrapped In Love and I really enjoyed making it. You can get the pattern on Etsy. I've bought a few patterns now and the quality is just as random as sewing and quilting patterns. Some are great and some are awful. This is one of the good ones.

I think that this one is going to be gifted to the daughter of a friend instead of donating it. Sarah got a quilt with her first child but I think a crochet blanket would be a nice change for baby #2.

Then I got started on a new blanket using 2 balls of this Lion Brand Cupcake yarn. I've tried a few different patterns for this yarn but eventually settled on a close scallop stitch. I even learned how to do a foundation single crochet for this blanket.

I love the stitch, the yarn and the colors of this one! This is the first ball done. I worked the first one from the center out and I'll work the second ball from the outside in so that the colors reverse. I only did a few rows of the orange for the center. That ball is the leftover outside orange from the first ball. I'll tie on and add the outside orange from the second ball and use that for a simple border.

But after a week away from fabric and thread I'm anxious to get back to quilting. Yesterday I prepared backs for 2 quilts that Mom made. One of these should get loaded and basted today. Both will get simple pantographs. I'll also put out a call for my quilt group to bring veterans quilts for quilt. Virginia is opening so slowly that I don't know when we will be able to have a meeting again so I'll offer for people to bring me quilts. The VA hospital still needs and wants the quilts!

Good thing I have so many quilt kits cut out for veterans quilts! I'll continue working on those. The only other project that I have on the horizon is a quilt for SIL #3. The penguin and cat quilts were delivered last week. SIL #3 has asked for wild animal prints! That means that shopping is on the horizon.

The cat quilt brother and SIL weren't able to come to the beach but we stopped by their house on the way home to deliver it. Later Saturday night my brother reported that "the Princess" approved. That's all we quilters wish for.