 Yesterday was a sewing day with my quilt club and I worked on this quilt that will be a veterans quilt. I got all of the HST blocks pieced and brought them home to arrange on the design wall. I'll piece this one at home because I don't want to take these off the wall and try to keep them in order. I have another kit to work on tomorrow.  I also finished to set of 35 surgery drain bags. That brings the total to 95 and I have 35 more to make. I promise you will see the end of this project soon!
 Yesterday we did more yard work. I watered and fed my new plants so that's a step in the right direction! Then we got out both saws and cut a lot more undesirable stuff. In the afternoon I finally got back in the sewing room. 35 more bags have loops now and are ready for straps to finish them up.  But today I get to do something else! It's sewing days with my quilt club so I'm taking 2 veterans quilt kits to work on. I'm really looking forward to 2 days of sewing.
 I really don't have a ton to report for myself and I totally forgot to post anything Friday. I've been doing everything except sewing. The weather has been too nice to be inside so I've been doing more yard work but also spent all day Saturday with a friend who was here from England for work. We walked around the historic Hollywood Cemetery in Richmond. I've actually never been there but it's a beautiful piece of property on the James River and you can walk for miles. It was established in 1837 so there are a lot of historical markers and it's still an active cemetery. It's the resting place of 2 presidents, 3 if you include the only president of the Confederacy. In the sewing room, I've gotten started on the next batch of drain bags. I have 70 left so put 35 in this batch.  One of the yard maintenance activities was to cut all of the lower limbs off this cedar tree. It looks so much better but it left a huce barren area underneath. Mom went with me to the nursery Friday to pick 2 Hydrangea and 4 lenten Roses. We're also going to add 3 Rhododendron. It will still be very barren but we'll start with this just to see if I can keep anything alive before investing any more money in this venture.  During football yesterday afternoon and evening, I worked on hats.
Today I'm working the early voting center all day so I probably won't have anything to post tomorrow. I'll be back Wednesday.  Yesterday started the same as the rest of the week, with massive yard work. I started clearing at the edge of the road and got half of it done. Then I came in and finished this group of drain bags.  I was packing them all up and remembered that I needed to label them so I tied on labels to all 60 that I've made so far. After that, Chris was ready with the "real" chainsaw to attack the big cedar tree. I was supposed to provide guidance on how many limbs to cut off. I really should have taken before and after photos because we cleared about 6 feet of the trunk of a huge cedar tree. Then we cleared all the limbs. It was a nice workout and now the tree is begging for something to be planted under it. Next I went to the chiropractor and she asked, for the first time ever, "how did you get so twisted?" She did adjustments that she's never done before and I was sooooo relaxed after.  The day ended with some football and crochet. I added a few rows to this blanket and it's about 25% done. I think it's going to be about 50" long. Too big for a baby blanket but a really nice lap blanket.
Today and tomorrow I will take a break from yard work. Mom and I have errands today and tomorrow I'm spending the day with a friend visiting from England.  I spent yesterday morning playing with my new pruning saw. A Holly, a Redbud and some Juniper all look much better now. I the afternoon I spent a little time as the safety officer while Chris powerwashed the back of the guest house. Once he was safely off the ladder, I came inside and spent the rest of the day in my sewing room. I finished off the first group of 30 drain bags.  Then I got the second group of 30 to the point where they only need straps sewn to them. I'll get on that today after more yardwork and a much-needed chiropractor appointment.
 Yesterday I went out in the morning to use my new pruning saw and made a good dent in the work that I want to do around here. Just for the record, and after only one day, that little battery saw is awesome! After lunch I got back to quilting and finished the two veterans quilts. Mom (Glenda) made this one.  Brenda made this one. She is also a longarmer and quilts about half of our quilts. But I needed another top to go on a gray back so she trusted me to quilt this one for her.  I used my new favorite pantograph, Macrame. When I ordered it I had it enlarged some to be wider so this one quilts up pretty quickly.  When I went outside yesterday I saw a Praying Mantis by the guest house steps. I know we have plenty of them around here but I haven't seen one in a long time. It did follow me around with it's eyes as I moved around it. I think they are pretty cool little critters.
 I should have, at least, finished quilting this one veterans quilt yesterday but I only got it half done.  The reason was because of the effort it took to get my newest garden too.....which Chris has already started planning his uses for.
I went to a store yesterday and bought one of these. At checkout I was given a discount and I found out it was because it was an "open box". I almost returned it right there but the discount was attractive. You will not be surprised that when I got it home I discovered that the th eknob to remove the blade cover wouldn't budge. So all the way back to the store where I returned it. When I told the checkout guy what was wrong with it he said "yeah, I noticed that when it was returned but I assumed I was doing something wrong". I seriously wanted to punch him. I then drove to Southern States where I bought it from my cousin's lovely son and had a nice visit with him. We charged it up and took it out for a test drive and love it. I'll be really busy this morning outside but this afternoon I will be quilting for sure!  I have to admit, this weekend was about chores! I did lots of yard maintenance and did a much needed deep clean on the stove and also a lot of laundry. The weather is so nice now that it's hard to talk myself into being inside. I know the good days are going to end soon so I want to be outside as much as possible. But I did get the next 2 veterans quilts loaded and I WILL start quilting them today.  There was also a lot of football watching. On Saturday, I added a few rows to a shawl and on Sunday I worked on hats. Tonight it will be the pink blanket's turn.
I did spend some time thinking about Christmas card designs so I'm starting to get in the postcard making mood.  Sooo, yesterday, as soon as I finished posting the blog post, I was perusing Facebook and came across a post for a local group needing help to load trucks going to North Carolina. It was close to where I live so, after lunch I headed over and spent the afternoon sorting through TONS of donations and helping to start loading the trailer. This delivery was organized by two guys who once lived in a remote little town between Boone and Asheville. They have kept in touch with their neighbors and friends and discovered that this area hasn't yet received any help so they left this morning at 3 am with two truck/trailers and another pickup FULL of supplies. They were offered a free tractor trailer truck and had a volunteer driver but were told that a truck that big would not make it through some of the roads. The organizers were OVERWHLEMED, and totally joyful, by the amount of donations and they were still coming in when I left. I left shortly after this photo was taken because we were at a stopping point waiting for the second trailer to arrive. They had enough volunteers, mostly their friends, to finish the loading. When I arrived they were just starting to organize things to put like things together. We had a tower of vienna sausages, a tower of canned chicken and tuna, tons of soups and canned spaghetti and vegetables. There's a massive amount of water, Gatorade and Ensure along with an entire pallet full of pet food and supplies. There was every kind of cracker and snack and a boatload of peanut butter. There were also loads of baby supplies, cleaning supplies, hygiene supplies, clothes, 2 giant tubs of tarps, a box of ropes, chain saw oil, fire starter supplies. You name it, someone probably donated it! It was cool.
As always there were a few cringe moments where we found three separate donations where people obviously cleared out really old crap from their cabinets, including one with USED deodorant! But in the total volume, those were just 3 small grocery bags' worth. It was a fun afternoon. Everyone was working so hard that I can't tell you the name of even one person who was working there! Apparently, the community that will receive these items will be getting together at the local fire station today for a pig roast that was donated and hopefully, this delivery will arrive while they are enjoying a hot cooked meal. Today I will be back to my own yard work and, maybe, get some veterans quilts loaded for quilting.  Yesterday was mostly about yard work. We have about 3 of the 10 acres that require some sort of maintenance all the time. I borrowed my brother's electric trimmer and am working on the bushes and edges of the yard. Next will be weeks of leaf blowing. We also delivered a load of firewood to a friend. After that I did get in the sewing room and work on the drain bags a bit. I finished 18 of the first batch of 30. I'll do more yard work today and will likely finish the rest of this batch later today.  Last night, during football, I picked up the crochet again and added some rows to this blanket. I think this is going to be too big to be a baby blanket but I'm sure the charity will find a good use for it.  I forgot to share that I've been steadily working through the bulky yarn. I made one of these hats before we went to Asheville and 3 of them at the river last weekend. I expect there are 7 or 8 more hats to make from the bulky stash.
I like to rotate my crochet projects so next will be the wheelchair shawl and I'll be back on the hats probably Sunday. Right now, I need to get back out to the yard. Weeds don't wait. |
FeedsTo subscribe click the RSS Feed button and copy the URL of that page into your blog reader.
In Bloglovin you need to search "Colorways By Vicki Welsh" to find the blog. About Vicki
I'm Vicki Welsh and I've been making things as long as I can remember. I used to be a garment maker but transitioned to quilts about 20 years ago. Currently I'm into fabric dyeing, quilting, Zentangle, fabric postcards, fused glass and mosaic. I document my adventures here. Categories
All
Archives
April 2025
|
RSS Feed
