Still kickin'

Well, it's been real... lol.  I find that in the spring, I need a little more downtime than the rest of the year due to the season-shift and the migraine-related consequences that come with it.  This year, with its whack-tastic weather has proved to be a little more difficult than usual and results in the frequent disappearing act.  It's not that I don't miss reading blogs and keeping up on the haps but this last little while, I kinda skipped the glare of the internet - my laptop sat abandoned - and my sewing machine gathered more dust from disuse than lint from overuse.  It's Easter break so I've had the week off but while I had big plans, I crashed hard instead. My productivity was more of the passive kind - I cleared tons off the PVR and watched almost the entirety of Game of Thrones. (I was also holding my breath approaching the NHL trade deadline... Phew! Dodged an unneeded goalie-sized bullet there!)

This was the first day of Spring 'round these parts.... Chest height snow. After the first two melts.  Yeah.

So, I'm a week behind on everyone's blogs if you've been missing my comments or hits on your site. Sorry, I'll get there. :-) (Oh, so very Canadian....)

I am working on a tutorial for the random piecing demo I did at the Saskatoon Modern Quilt Guild at our last meeting and I'm hoping to get it up before the end of the weekend.

The guild has a couple of challenges going at all times.  The one we just finished was the Ugly Fat Quarter Challenge.  We all brought an ugly FQ, dropped it into a pillowcase and took turns pulling one out. What did I get? A green/brown floral monstrosity.  I went pouch because I was mentally blocked and after experimenting unsuccessfully with some FMQ and mock-trapunto, I was running out of fabric.  I did manage to quickly design my own gnome-y accent for it though and it makes me happy.  My sister thought the pouch was cute and it now lives with her.

'Scuze the shaky photos - took them months ago.

Our current challenge is a Two-Colour Crayon Challenge.  You pull two crayons from a magical toque and those are the colours you're stuck with.  You can use only those colours, and neutrals if you really feel you need them.  I pulled yellow and white.  And as much as I'm happy with how it's going, it will also be living at Seester's.

I managed to get my Simply Solids Bee block finished.  Karen @ BungalowBayQuilts asked for Scrap Jar Stars and I was thrilled that I had tons of scraps so I could make it really colourful for her. Hopefully, colour was what she wanted because, boy, there's a ton in there!

The major project I had planned for the break was the quilting on a quilt that's sat waiting, basted and ready, since the middle of January. Well, folks, it's already the end of Thursday and this is how far I got.

10 minutes in...

But when HotWheels interrupt your projects, it's really hard to be annoyed at a lack of progress.  Nephew's learning about why we don't keep pushing the button with the scissors on it...

And since you may have noticed this, I'm not on Crackbook, I don't pin anything, I don't use Twitter or Instagram, and am kinda lame and inept at using Flickr.  Therefore, please understand how very difficult it was for me to do the following.   I am resentfully claiming my blog on Bloglovin'. (I am a curmudgeon, yes, I get that.)

Follow my blog with Bloglovin

Yeah.  I have no plans to use it - I'm happy with Reeder - but I know that I keep a pretty low profile and thought it might make it easier to find me, if you're looking.

Now - I'm going to send some overdue emails and get back to reading.... Have a lovely one!

Hot streak, cold weather, warm heart

I've had a run of luck the last few weeks.

I won an e-book copy of Modern Mix on Amy's Creative Side.  Can't wait to have the time to try some of the patterns, though right now, I'll have to content myself with the gorgeous photographs.

Then I won a book of poetry, Today's Special Dish by Nina Lindsay, at Both Fires...  It hasn't arrived yet but I delight in knowing that I will soon have a feast of words in my hands..

And then I won a paper-piecing pattern by Very Kerry Berry, on Live a Colorful Life.  I'd have posted about this earlier but I wanted to wait until I'd tried it. I've wanted to give this technique a whirl for ages but hadn't gotten around to it.  No excuses left this time!  For a first project, I'm thrilled with the results! The precision in the piecing amazed me, especially the teeny tiny parts. I still have a ton to learn but for now, I have a cute Winter Woolies set.

Clearly, I finished it in the nick of time because this is what I woke up to:

And now, I must depart the sewing machine and get back to marking.  The last night of the school play was Friday and, after all the rehearsals at lunch, after school and weekends  I treated myself to a lazy Saturday, thinking about what those talented kids accomplished on that stage.

For some reason, the gratitude of young people never fails to move me.

Swimsuit Cover-up

Not much to say today but I did have a knitting finish last week (and two knitting starts - seriously, what is wrong with me?).  It's almost too late for "lakeside" frolicking as the weather is starting (somewhat) to level out.  We've had rain Thursday, Friday and into the wee hours on Saturday but the rest of the weekend was dry.  (Yay!)  Of course, we're expecting another dousing tonight...

All 145lbs of Niece Dog wanted to help but she's useless with a camera.  Unless you need it to be eaten, in which case, she would be outstanding!  She was visiting this weekend and is a little clingy, which can be comical since she leans against you in "hug" mode and can push you over without meaning to do so.  Strangely enough, the above photo makes her look small.  She's actually standing 500yards behind me and had Tokyo for breakfast.  :-)

I'm satisfied with the fit but the linen/cotton blend I used had some unusual dye-shifting during initial blocking.  Once sewn together and and rinsed (Twice!!), I still can't seem to get rid of the odd saturated spot, but you can't really tell unless you're close up.  Now that it's washed, it's also quite stiff and needs to be taken down to the river for some old-school beating against a rock.  Anyone have any recommendations for softening stiff fibres?  I'm trying to avoid the dryer if I can...

Pattern from Vogue Knitting Summer 2010; I can't find the label from the linen...  It's been that kind of week.

Holiday Weekend at the "Lake"

Oh, how I dream of spending summer weekends at a cabin at a lake!  Trouble is, I don't have one.  This Canada Day weekend, the lake came to us.

Tuesday, we indeed got the storm predicted for the area.  It came with torrents, hail and a tornado watch.  The street flooded all the way up to the garage door of the house and into the cars of anyone unlucky enough to have parked in the street.  It's not that we don't have storm drains.  We have three on this corner alone (which is why the street is graded towards them) but we've had so much water this year (3 to 4 times normal), the drrrains, they canna' take it, Cap'n!!  Local farmers are considering changing crops to rice, bamboo, and freshwater algae.

Then came Friday.  That's when I took the above picture.  And these ones:

You can see one of the eddies.... there's a storm drain these somewhere...

Saturday wasn't too bad.  I baked.

I knit.

Sunday, it started raining again.  It hasn't stopped.  So I'm trying to enjoy the scenery.

In related news, the 'Riders won their home opener in an overtime squeaker.  Maybe seeing green reign triumphant isn't all bad...

Five minutes.

This is the start of the downpour last Wednesday.

This is five minutes later.

The rain here has the power to scrub away those pesky sidewalks.  :-)  SuperDeluge's sidekick Humid McHugsYouToDeath has been thwarting the hair rescuing efforts of straightening irons throughout western Canada.

I only mention it because it stormed again this weekend and we're "due" (ha!) for one tonight.  I predict a province-wide "Hat Day" tomorrow....