The Fix

 I hand quilt.  How many times in 30 years have I cut a thread?  A million?  How many times have I 'slipped' and nicked the appliqued piece?  None, until day before yesterday.  Why couldn't the nick have happened before the whole quilt was layered and basted? 

After giving some thought to what I was going to do and even if I was going to send it out to be machine quilted, I started by outlining each petal.  Then...nick.  No excuses other than I was tired.  So. Stare at it for a day and think what would be involved to fix it.  It wasn't more than a couple of threads but you can't feed a washing machine a weak spot. (The quilting looks kind of clunky here but it isn't in person.)

A bee!  Bees love sunflowers as much as Adelaide does!  I like bees!  I have some fabric with nice bees on it!  Applique a bee over the nick!  It worked.

My reading days at school are over.  The teacher whose class I read to for years retired and rather than find another teacher, she said she wants to do what I did with her grandchildren's classrooms - follow them through as they progress through the building.  Good for her! It was a good ride but it was time to move on to something new.

Before covid my daughter had a program at the museum for tots.  Once a month young moms could bring the littles for a crafty morning. Daughter had in the back of her mind to reinstate that.  I had put the notion in her head of including an appropriate to history story to school groups that come.  We put the two different thoughts together and came up with reinstating the tots craft morning with a story or two.  I told her I'd run it.  

We will start in October.  October is pumpkin time (do you remember our conversations last fall about the difference between what you call a pumpkin and what we call a pumpkin?)  Since our craft morning will be in the very beginning of the month and the holidays are at the end of the month and these littles don't have a sense of time yet I decided to go with pumpkins but not Halloween. 

These are the books I chose and the craft.  Two books, one craft, coloring the pumpkin (which won't have staples) and making a stick puppet.  But you can't do the beloved rhyme Five Little Pumpkins without finger puppets so I made some and got a little carried away.  They are primitive, but so are pumpkins that are carved by a 3 year old.   We are reinstating a program that was stopped six years ago so till word gets out there may be one child or ten. Plenty of pumpkin finger puppets to hand out.

Once I get the flow of working with 2-4 year olds under my belt I will have a better idea of what crafty thing works. I am not even considering this will go smoothly. But all kids like a story and choosing which ones to read will be the hard part.  There are too many good ones and not enough time.

Ginger

 

This time of year absolutely everything is flavored pumpkin.  There isn't a choice, it's everywhere.  We had this discussion last year so I won't repeat myself here.

While I enjoy a piece of pumpkin bread or a muffin I don't love it enough to have it flavor everything in my life. I don't even like pumpkin pie.

What I do start thinking of this time of year is gingerbread.  Those deep, rich, sticky flavors of gingerbread are my thing.

Ginger is very hot - like peppery hot - and if you use a lot of it in something you can set your tongue to tingling. But I always say, "if you can't taste it, why eat it?"

I bought this book.  Luckily the people I know, know me well and gift me with gift cards to bookstores so I can shop and indulge myself when I see something I want.  Usually if I buy a cookbook I have to look at it in the store to make sure there's more than one or two things inside I'd be interested in. Then when I bring it home I read it carefully.  This book had lots of goodies. 

The first thing I made was this.  It's stem ginger and even though I made it, I still don't know what it is or how to use it but the house sure smells good.

The recipe was confusing only in the size to cut the ginger.  I ended up chopping it into small pieces while the sugar syrup was cooking down.  One of the recipes called for using two ginger balls but there was no talk of balls in the recipe.   I'm not worried.  I improvise more than I follow directions.

It will be interesting to see what comes of this.  And yes, she has recipes in the book using it. 

And isn't this pretty?  Peaches are a luxury this year.  A late hard frost took all of the peach crop in our area so if you want them you have to search farther afield and pay dearly for them. Well, it isn't summer without a peach and I made this crisp to take to friends for a fun day.

Three Tables

 

It took three tables pushed together to get this completely flat for basting.  Actually, that was a nice surprise.  In the past I put PH's puzzle table and the dining room table together but I really, really needed this quilt completely on a surface, no fiddling with "almost."  Out of the corner of my eye I saw the accent table next to the window.  I put it in place and it was exactly the right height, size and boy was I happy.

I really needed this taut, lined up, and still.  

I figured out by chance that I could cut just an inch or so off the sides of the back fabric and it would fit exactly the dotted fabric on the front for size.  So I measured and measured and waited a few days so I could look at it, circle in, wait for the attack. 

Finally, I cut the yellow over size for overhang on the edges.  And this is where it needed to work. I wanted to match corner seams on both front and back, run my fingers along the seams and pin to match. I pinned and pinned but didn't have enough safety pins because my stash of safety pins for basting are holding three other quilts in the que.

    Then I thread basted.   And it's ready.

The Back

 Next stage: the back.  Adelaide chose this beauty from my stash.  It's been hiding in there for years. I always loved it too much to cut into it so it works here for sure. And it gets to stay whole.

Problems. There isn't quite enough.  I don't have a designated sewing room/studio to lay out a quilt. I don't get down on my knees anymore...not if I want to get back up...so the floor as a working space doesn't work. If I lay it out on a bed it never lays flat enough to get a good measure if a good measure is what I need. When I was working I used the tables in the library. When I stitched with a small group in town I could arrive early and use those tables. So I commandeer the not-big-enough dining room table and PH puts his true Patient Husband hat on and doesn't complain.

The thing is, this back needs a border to extend the edges to fit. This is where the panic sets in. This is why I buy way more than I will need. I know me and I know I will fudge this somehow so I need extra in house.  I need to cut enough so the borders are even all around but if you look closely the sides don't need as much as the ends.

So it sits. Waiting. Someday I'll be brave and get the thing cut. Maybe this weekend.

Those of you who have a whole room with actual room to do your stuff?  Lucky you!

Fibers

 

Yesterday Friend Laurie and I made our annual pilgrimage to FiberFest.  FiberFest is the most tactile experience!  It's held at a fairground so the exhibition buildings are where the vendors set up and classes take place.  I've never taken a class, I go to run my hands through the yarns and fleece and sometimes we go to the animal pens and get blatted and bleated at. 

This time we were both tired from a busy, busy week and Laurie was preparing for another busy week coming up but we didn't want to let the weekend go by without at least trying.  I had one thing I wanted to look for - usually I have one thing I want to look for, it gives the sauntering through hot exhibition buildings a purpose.  Every year I'm looking for something different.

This year it was a nalbinding needle, maybe a book, but hopefully maybe talking to a vendor and seeing it done.  Nalbinding is ancient.  Older than knitting and crochet. There are discovered pieces dating back to 6,500 BCE. Some pieces attributed to both Denmark and Judea.  It's a single needle and a looping technique and you use short lengths of yarn, not single long lengths like in knitting or crochet.           

 Of course I want to try it. 

I did my research, looked up the possibility someone would have nalbinding supplies because if FiberFest didn't have it then who would?  I am a "show me, don't tell me" learner. I have to see it done then can do it myself. I didn't want to learn from pictures in a book, I need to SEE someone doing it, ask questions.  

 In the program online I found a booth, wrote the number down.  We headed for that first.   The woman at the booth said they don't have them, never did, and the people who make up the maps and brochures and lists never get it right.  Sigh. We moved on, headed for a booth I felt sure would have the needles and yes, they did.  This booth rarely disappoints.  But while they had the needles, I had only to choose which pretty felt nicest, they didn't know how to use the needles except to make fishing nets.  The woman suggested YouTube.  I don't know why I never think of YouTube first, always last.   I bought the needle, have yarn at home and checked YouTube and yes, indeed, when I'm ready to listen and learn there are options. 

We had to stop for lunch.  We always stop at the barbecue booth because these guys know how to do it.  I usually get their baked beans because they do them like I do, all gussied up, not just dumped out of a can and warmed up.  Well, this time we both opted for what they called "cow pie."  A way too generous serving of macaroni and cheese topped with barbecue.  Not one darned thing healthy about it but it sure was good! 

While we were eating in this covered area we saw this yurt.  Unfortunately, while we were eating the woman who made it took a break and we missed talking to her.  But here are some photos.

It really was incredible.  This felted wool was VERY thick and held on with woolen cords. You can see to the left where one sheet of felt was overlap seamed and held with the cord.

But the inside! While the yurt is portable, it's not easy or quick.  Just gorgeous.

Along with the nalbinding needle I did get a birthday gift for Adelaide and yet another tote bag.  It's huge. If you knit, crochet, spin, weave, dye, felt or make baskets, FiberFest is irresistible. 

Well, She Was Right

 She knew what she wanted, she took images from three different ideas, combined them and here we are.

I have to say, the border makes it.  I really wasn't sure at first but I used all of the colors in the flowers and the leaves - and then some - and just finished attaching the border.  I sent her a photo and she said it's perfect.  

Now to figure out how to quilt it.  I'll do it by hand instead of sending it out.  I'm a fan of cross-hatch quilting because I think it looks clean and keeps the spacing the same throughout.  Till I get the batting and figure out a back it's folded and waits.  She did choose a backing out of my stash but it won't be enough so will have to be pieced. 

Nap. 

Sunflower Journey

 After being gone for a couple of weeks and not stitching at all the week before we left, it took a little talking to myself to get back in the groove.  But get into the groove I must because there is still so much to be done.

I had made a pile of border pieces using all of the yellows in the sunflowers and many of the smaller pieces of greens that I had that were in the stems and leaves.  

The weather was rainy a couple of days this week so I had permission (from the weather) to start connecting and here we are.  Now I'm a little nervous but I will endure and it will fit and Adelaide approves.