Dreams and Projects

After a lovely vacation Christmas with some of our kids and grandkids in the warmer climate of Pennsylvania, a tour of George Washington's boyhood home on the Potomac, and yondering in southern West Virginia, 

we're home to snow, snow, and more snow.

Mom is with us for awhile and got rather sick with a nasty cold, so I've been tending her and haven't really had time for sewing yet. But she's doing better now, so I hope I can spend a little time downstairs in the sewing room. That's somewhat dependent upon how well Lovey is doing, too, since he caught the nasties.

So, here are the tentative goals for this week:

In the sewing room

* Sew as many white borders as possible on diamond blocks for this baby quilt for granddaughter due in February:

* Do a hopeful 20 minutes per sewing session of taming the scrap piles

In the knitting basket

* Finish the current dishcloth (for myself)

In the embroidery box

* Prep fabrics for Jennifer Reynolds' Sewing Room BOM & trace pattern

* Maybe even finally draw the lines on the old Everyday Embroidery that has been in the goal planning so many times but sadly neglected. 

For the Home

* Get back to using a menu

* Start little-by-little decluttering and dusting in bedroom

On the Homestead

* Collect quail eggs for incubation

* Attach feeder to new quail grow-out cage

* Maybe send some quails to freezer camp

This may be an overly ambitious list, but "nothing ventured, nothing gained." So, I'm off to see what I can do.

Have a beautiful week!

Christmas Projects, Snow, and Simple Goals

 After a little break, I'm back to report on some project progress, share my upcoming crafting plans, and wish you all a very merry Christmas!

My biggest project lately was making Christmas tree doorknob hangers for my kids' gifts and discovered that money does grow on trees! 😁

The lined and batted blocks start at 8" square, then go down to 7", 6", 5", 4", and 3". The tree trunk is a cheap ruler covered in fabric and hot-glued on to give stability. The squares are folded about a third of the way up, glued, and a little decoration also glued on. Then a ribbon hanger is attached. I might make myself one now that I have the time.

These clothespin dolls are part of what our gift to our 3yo granddaughter. I put them and some other little things in a Hello Kitty lunchbox I found at Hobby Lobby. I hope she has fun with them. {Note: the tips of the pipe cleaner need to be folded back so they're not too pokey.}

My friend and I also had a fun crafting and jabbering day recently while we worked at covering styrofoam Christmas tree shapes.

The tree on the right is covered with yo-yos of various sizes and topped with an "angel" made of hymnal music, an ornament ball head, and ribbon wings. The torn strip fabrics tree was the one I worked on this time.

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I don't have a lot planned for this week since I'll be making cheese to take to some of our kids that we're visiting next week as well as getting other stuff ready for the 14-hour drive. So, here's my simple goal list:

On the hook:

* Navy blue baby afghan for pregnancy care center. This will come in the car with me.

On the design wall:

* The diamond block baby quilt I cut out and started ages ago, now planned for new granddaughter coming in February

In the sketchbook:

* Keep teaching myself to draw by doing a little sketch every day

* Keep experimenting with watercolor pencils

In the hoop:

* Draw the lines for finishing Everyday Embroidery (yeah, I know I've really neglected it)

At the desk:

* Finish making pages for my personalized planner & maybe even get into the "big city" to get it spiral bound at Staples

On the homestead:

* Clean the animal quarters and write up instructions for nephew's family to care for animals

* Keep rejoicing in the growth of the quail flock and more eggs

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

We've been hit with a LOT of snow in a relatively short time, so I'll leave you to enjoy some pictures of northern Michigan winter...

May your Christmas be filled with the joy and peace that Jesus came to bring, no matter your circumstances.

💖

Adventures and Plans - November 5

Adventures

As usual, lots has been happening around here, though I won't describe the cleaning of the rabbitry and quailery. Nobody needs that, though the animals and I appreciate having it done.

Lovey and I took advantage of being able to vote on a Saturday because his work schedule wouldn't otherwise have enabled him to vote. So we're thankful for the early voting option.

I've continued to make jams, jelly, and apple butter for the upcoming craft fair.

On my semi-plan from last post, I'd hoped to work on Scrappy Spools when my friend came for a crafting day, but I'm blaming her for side-tracking me into a new project. 😉 We had both previously bought the following book, and decided to start a small something from it.

She started cutting tiny pieces to make leaves on a tree, while I went simplistic and started with these:

In my defense, she'd done this before and this was my first time. 

I got a kick out of making the lighthouse light with this bicycle wheel from fabric I'd used for a dress.

So, now I need to do the topstitching/quilting on each 8"x10" piece and then frame them.

I also got to make three more crocheted pumpkins and sneakily left them on my sister-in-law's side table while I was at her house this weekend. 😇

Another project on which I work while watching TV or Youtube is these cross-stitch ornaments for the craft fair. They're involving more time than I thought they would, so I'm happy that I'm kinda multi-tasking to make them.

Yesterday the quail eggs from the incubator went into "lockdown" which is when the eggs are no longer tipped every two hours, but are laid down and left alone and the incubator humidity is raised to enable hatching. So, some might start hatching by tonight or tomorrow. It's an exciting time.

I now have five reliably laying quail hens with seven more that should start laying in about three weeks. It's fun to see my flock growing and I hope to be able to start selling eggs by the first of the year or sooner.

Plans

Happily making use of Joy's free planning page, these are my hopes for this week:

We'll see if my eyes are bigger than my tummy, or whatever.

{There may be some difficulty in binding the Autumn Jubilee quilt since Miss Pretty-pretty has made it her bed.}

Here's hoping your week goes well and you have many opportunities to give thanks for your many blessings.

ADHD Goal-setting

 No, I've never been diagnosed with ADHD, but it certainly applies to my projects. So, I'm just gonna go with it!

So, yesterday I dropped all other projects, kept body and soul together for me, Lovey, and the animals, and focused on doing some mosaic in the "Hobbit Hole," the egress area we built in 2020. I had hoped to do a bunch over the summer, but was nearly constantly busy with other stuff. When God gave us these two days in row of unseasonally warm weather, I decided it was time to mosaic some more.

I had previously used E6000 glue to attach the plastic letter blocks from an old Upwords game to some tiles to form the small words and then I used cut tiles and a broken Polish pottery plate to form the larger words. It's all still messy, but couldn't be cleaned up till the tiles were more firmly attached to the wall.

I was also able to make some flowers and other garden-related stuff including adding the water drops from the watering can.

It was such a delight to make progress on this neglected project. I hope to do more today.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*

I also finished the three pumpkins I'd been crocheting {pattern from BrianaKDesigns}. After I had started another set and then discovered that I wouldn't be able to sell them at the craft show because someone else in our shared booth is doing pumpkins, I decided to gift the first set to my friend who's coming to visit tomorrow. I can't wait! 😊

More finishes {see I can finish some things even though I wander off to others}...

...the second quail egg holder,

the fodder-growing system is back up and running for the winter,

Spiced Peach Jam and Cinnamon Jelly are made for the craft show,

and indoor gardening of shoots is started back up.

 So, since I'm gonna let myself lean in to my ADHD project plan {or lack thereof}, I'm not going to set a bunch of goals for the week. Just these...

* Make more mosaic flowers & figure out how to add an old partially broken glass mosaic to the mix. Clean up mortar messes.

* Make apple butter and blueberry jams for craft show

* Work on Scrappy Spools while Tricia is here for a sewing day. Maybe bind the Autumn Jubilee finally.

* Continue crocheting more pumpkins for myself during the evenings and when Lovey gets to monologuing. 😉 

* Read "The Fellowship of the Ring" by JRR Tolkein

* Enjoy autumn!

May your goals be met, but not to the exclusion of a sidetrack or two. 😊

Progresses and Goals - October 15

Hello from this little fellow! 

The past week has been a time of resetting up the routines of fall and winter - growing barley fodder indoors for the animals, starting up my microgreens, and doing some neglected cleaning.

It's also been a fun time of a new crochet project that looks like cable knitting, of which I am incapable.

And then there were two, one larger than the first, with an even larger third one in the works.

This is the yarn I've been using from Hobby Lobby. The pattern is from https://brianakdesigns.com/. She has quite a few beautiful patterns I might try.

 After a tasty breakfast of fried quail eggs on sourdough mini-loaf toast, I started collecting more eggs to incubate as I continue to try to build my flock.

The cuteness of the eggs continues to tickle me, but they are packed with so much nutrition, more than the equivalent in chicken eggs.

And of course the chicks are cute, too. I have to put them in an enclosed container to carry them from incubator to brooder because they tend to pop like popcorn. 😑 I now have 13 in the brooder and will start up the incubator this weekend for another batch.

Goals for this week

Homemaking 

* Can the rest of the carrots

* Continue total house surface cleaning

* Get back into regular cleaning routine

Homesteading

* Get cages ready for new quails

* Finish second quail egg holder

* Start incubator again

Reading and Study

* Catch up on Homesteading Monthly magazines

* Continue The Little Village of Book Lovers by Nina George

* Order new copies of The Lord of the Rings books now that I've reread The Hobbit

* Daily personal growth studies of Now That Faith Has Come: A Study of Galatians and weekly ladies' Bible study group

Crafts

* Finish third crocheted pumpkin

* Finish "Happy Fall, Y'all" cross-stitch - the stitching's done so it just needs mounting

* Finish last block(s) of Sew Scrappy Spools

* Start next Christmas wallhanging

* Bind Christmas wallhanging

* Bind Autumn Jubilee quilt

Whew! I'm tired out just looking at all that and that list doesn't even take into account the regular daily work/play. Guess I'd better get at it!

Have a great week!