Progress and Dreams

 I made some good progress on my Everyday Embroidery last week and plan to continue that daily.

And I figured out how to put together the rescued Card Trick blocks to make a baby quilt flimsy which I will donate.

I didn't get to the My Cozy Kitchen wall hanging at all, so that will be a goal for this week. I want to lightly hand-quilt it and hang it in my cozy kitchen.

Another goal for this week is to go through my flannel fabrics and get back to making receiving blankets, bibs, and burp cloths for our local baby pantry. I enjoy crocheting a nice border around flannel receiving blankets. February is our church's month to "love your neighbor" through various donation drives, one of which is the community baby pantry. So I'll be buying some diapers, too, to donate.

I've also started a new project, of course. 😏 It's going to be a gift for my long-time friend's birthday in March - a cross-stitched piece. Being technology-challenged, I have to do my designing with graph paper, scissors, and washi tape. 😁 It works. Tricia and I have walked some very hard roads together {still are} and I so appreciate her friendship and encouragement and her letting me try to encourage her back. Though she lives about 2.5 hours away, we try to get together monthly, sometimes here, sometimes at her place, sometimes somewhere in the middle, sometimes quite out of the way for a big adventure.

I'll also work on my RSC blocks and will get at my month's UFO. The Chookshed Stitchers say that February's UFO number is 8, so I'll excitedly be working on my experimental strip quilt. I've been wanting to do it, but felt like I needed to finish other stuff first. But now I have permission from on high 😄 to go at it.

Of course I have to share some of our great amounts of snow. That blue thing in the middle of the picture is a regular-sized metal chair {as reference for how deep the snow is}. This is not an unusual amount for us over the course of the winter; it just seems to have all come early and within a short amount of time.

One of the perks of waking up at 4:00 a.m. {not intentionally, but trying to see the silver lining}, is getting to enjoy the super-bright moonlight on the snow.

Pastor has been encouraging us with the concept of Sabbath rest, or Shalom, of living in the presence and power of God. We can rest in the knowledge of Him - His person, power, and characteristics {attributes} such as love, goodness, justice, peace, and constant presence with those who have acknowledged Him as Savior and Master. Since we're just frail humans, that peace seems to come and go as we don't always sense His presence, but He's there and so ready to envelope us again with that peace. Look in faith to Him and His Word.

May your week be a blessing to you and to those around you.

Back Again

 I just got back from another 6 hour (one way) trip to my mom's after having made the same trip two weeks ago. So, I'm enjoying being at home, catching up on this and that as well as trying to plan ahead a little. 

My siblings and I are starting the process of moving Mom to live with my brother and his wife and we're trying to help out our aunt who is bedridden in a nursing care place in the same city as Mom with congestive heart failure. So, that's why all the back and forth. 

And of course I took some handwork...

Pattern by pinkernpunkin

Before I went this most recent time, I tackled a project that kinda intimidated me so I'm relieved to have it done and well-received. A friend had asked if I could fix a quilt made by her husband's grandmother quite a few years ago. It had gotten damaged in storage, probably by mice and she wondered if I could fix it. I said I'd give it a try.

This was one of the three damaged areas on the front and there was a long frayed area on the back. I started by pinning the edges of the tears to the batting in position and then took long stitches to draw everything together.

Then I hand-appliqued a long strip of blue fabric over the holes on the back and machine appliqued some stars on the front, using a zig-zag stitch to make a start to cover a tiny hole also.

She was happy with the result so I'm happy (and relieved!).

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Another friend and I got to go to the Tulip Festival in Holland, Michigan on the 7th and despite the rain and most of the tulips being past peak, we had a great time. We really enjoyed the quilt show and took far too many inspiring and intimidating pictures. 😉

I will quit there lest I overwhelm you. 😄

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When I was home, I enjoyed getting to work outside, even if it was unglamorous work like spreading rabbit manure around the berries and fruit trees.

I also finished and mailed/gave three birthday cross-stitches to my kids.

And my kind Lovey gave me this for my birthday.

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This week's goals:

Homemaking:

* Catch up on daily chores

* Finish washing windows and install screens

* Clear clutter at bottom of stairs

Homesteading:

* Make new garden bed out front

* Build wire rabbit nesting boxes

* Smooth out new rabbit food plot area for planting

Machine sewing:

* Fix Melanie's machine tension problem

* Piece stars for Christmas quilts

Handwork:

* Finish Summer stamp 

* Find pattern for next birthday cross-stitch and start

Reading:

Continue: Renovation of the Heart - Dallas Willard

                You Art Not Your Own - Alan Noble

 Bemoan the probability that I left my novel at my mom's. 😑 I'll have to start a different one, I guess.

Well, I hope your week is delightful and full of the blessing of the Lord.

Back to Blogging with Monday Musings and Plannings

 I usually do my blogging on Mondays as I plan through the upcoming week, but the last two Mondays have been away from home. We got to visit my mom, maternal aunt, two daughters, paternal aunt, and two cousins all in a whirlwind trip through Ohio and Indiana in four days. It was good and fun.

Then the next Monday I visited a friend downstate who is going through a very rough time of tearing down her life because of divorce and trying to build a new life while undergoing permanent health difficulties and uncertainty about how much money she'll have to live on. We had a nice visit anyhow and, though tears were shed, she's trusting God to work things out. I prayed a lot on my drive home. 💗

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In between those Mondays we worked some more on our homestead, adding some meat to our freezer and making plans to put a drainage hole in the Critter Corner.

I also started growing my microgreens in a different way - with re-usable clay pebbles instead of soil and a cool way of self-watering invented by Mike VanDuzee of Keep On Growin' on Youtube.

He makes and sells bottle and jar lids that help the jar stand upright but have little holes on the sides so water will dribble out into the pebbles as needed. You can also buy the pattern and print your own if you have a 3D printer. I may enlist my daughter and her friend to do that for me since they co-own one. 

I'd like to have several bowls going, but not have to spritz them several times a day like I do with this bowl of pea sprouts. We'll see.

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The fun of learning cheese-making continues. So far my Farmhouse Cheddar is turning out more like Parmesan - quite sharp and hard, but we both like it (though I would prefer a little less sharp), so I continue as is, making the process a little more effecient as I go. Maybe I should just call it "Parmhouse Cheese" and be happy. We are eager to taste the latest two batches because I mixed in dried, minced garlic and onion and they sure smell good!

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Another recent and quick project was to make drapes for our favorite his and hers chairs that have been unbeautified by a naughty but loveable kitty.

So, I did this...

I wanted to do both in the buffalo checks, but they didn't have enough of that fabric, so I went with the gray. I bought those clips with elastic between them for holding sheet onto mattresses, but they just didn't work with trying to keep them hidden, so I ended up with four safety pins per chair and they're pretty hidden. So far we're liking them.

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This week's goals:

* Finish organizing the sewing room. I moved furniture in and out and reset up some stuff on Saturday,     but it is far from organized. I also want to improve the lighting in there.

* Neaten the bedroom. I have a similar situation here in that I cleared my corner desk, but just plopped     stuff on the floor so now I need to sort through it and organize/trash stuff.

* Move canning jar shelving to the storage room that's cooler and more suitable.

* Bind the Christmas wallhanging that I hand-quilted. 

* Fix a friend's boyhood quilt that his grandmother made him. It seems to have been attacked by mice       and I hope to applique over the holes.

I have other hopes, too, but I tend to have gandiose plans that I can't meet, so I'll try to tame myself. And, of course, I still have my ongoing cross-stitching in the evenings (that may have to command a greater portion of my time so it can get finished in time for birthday gifting).

Oh, and I just remembered that it's coming to the end of the month and I haven't done much of anything on my Chookshed Challenge. Yikes!

I hope your week is productive and enjoyable!

Adventures Galore! and Hopes and Goals

Well, the day after my last post, my car was violently rear-ended by a woman who didn't stop when the rest of us did for the car turning left in front of us. Fortunately, there were no injuries.

I was able to drive home where my husband pronounced the car undriveable till he could replace the mufflers and exhaust pipe and we ended up needing a new tire too because the muffler had rubbed against it so much that it was ruined. Sigh. I wish I'd thought to try to bend the muffler away from it.

The woman's car was totalled. Still no injuries.

 Being an older car, the cost to repair the dent damage would be more than the car is worth. 😕 So, I'll be driving a dented car for awhile. But all this has taken a bunch of time because of Michigan's silly no-fault insurance law. So, to get reimbursed for even just the repair work to make it driveable again, I have to chase all around Robin Hood's barn for estimates and talk to insurance people and may have to go to small claims court. Sigh.

I've also been occupied with the homesteading work and was tickled to harvest my first nectarine - so juicy (downright dribbly) and sweet!

Green beans are producing well, and the tomatoes are ripening up. Yay! Salad greens were attacked by some teeny bugs that really bug me. I harvested the least messed up ones, washed them thoroughly, and have some drying for powdering for smoothies.

Progress has been slowly made on the "Critter Corner" where we plan to raise quail and meat rabbits while also hoping to let the rabbits forage somewhat.

BEFORE:

Miss Pretty-pretty like to help

AFTER:

This is the first quail cage which will be divided into three parts to house three "clutches" - five hens and one rooster.

This is the cage for two mama rabbits which still needs a divider and more zip ties for sturdiness.
The cages will hang from the ceiling while also being hooked to the wall so they won't swing.

 

And, when you spill some blobs of paint on the floor, used your non-existent art skills to try to make them look like rabbits. 😊

I've also gotten to press some flowers and leaves for card-making, or candle jars, or ??? and stored them in my new 7 Elements drawer thingy.

I also spent a day and a half visiting my brother's family a couple of hours away while my mom was there for a few days.

So, it's no wonder that I haven't been in the sewing room much, or blogged much.

I did finish one block of Joy's Christmas in July Quilt (the child-themed version). Progress!

And I started this cute fall mug cross-stitch from Kate Stitcher Cross-stitch Designs on Facebook.

So, goals, dreams, hopes for this next week:

On the Homestead:

* Get remaining supplies to finish Critter Corner

* Learn more about perennial onions

* Harvest oregano and comfrey to dry for feeding rabbits

* Prepare to raise fodder for rabbits and quails

In the Home/Kitchen:

* Preserve beans

* Bake cookies for church fellowship

* Prepare lunch for friend fellowship on Thursday

In the Easy Chair:

* Continue making premie hats for New Life Pregnancy Care

* Start a baby afghan for NLPC

* Work on fall mug cross-stitch

In the Reading Nook (which is anywhere):

* Continue "Soul Revolution" by John Burke (slowly marinating in this one)

* Continue "The Seven-Step Homestead" by Leah M. Webb (lots of good information here)

* Continue "Under the Lilacs" by L.M. Alcott

* Lots of other books in the works, too 😁

I may have jury duty on Friday. I wonder if I can bring my handwork. I'll try, of course.

May your week be full of wonder, happy surprises, and glimpses of God's great love for us.