Dirty Dozen

Mary Etherington at Country Threads Chicken Scratch has a Dirty Dozen gathering that begins in July and runs for 12 months (projects that need to be finished).  I have watched what fellow Blog followers do and found it interesting.  They complete things.  I decided to join this year and made up my list.  I don't have 12 quilts to finish but I do have knitting and embroidery that also needs to cross the finish line.  I added them to my list.  Today the Dirty Dozen begins, and she called number 7.  OH NO!!!

Back about 1999, I saw this blanket in the Family Circle Easy Knitting magazine.  I sent for the kit and then my sister in Texas sent me a kit for my Birthday.  So, two kits, two blankets.  

All the blocks and the borders have been knitted.  I just never put it together.  It has stayed in this box and basket: just waiting.  I added it to my list thinking its number would come up in the future.  That future was today!  It is on my list as number 7!!  The fiber world is telling me something.  

So, this week I will block blocks, hopefully all of them.  I only have maybe six blocks blocked of about 30 blocks for the two blankets.  

More information in a week.

There is some slow stitching for the evenings.  This is the scissor fob that goes with my sheep bag.  Two of these will be stitched, finished and NOT added to the list.

Here is the pincushion that goes with the set.  A hoop was used for this.  Usually, I use a frame as I don't like to move the hoop and see the hoop marks.  Crazy, I know.  It also will not be added to the list.

You all have a wonderful week.  Thank you for the visit.  Linking up to Slow Sunday Stitching at Kathy's Quilts.

 

Unenergetic

Gibbs was mad at me the other day while I was vacuuming.  He went into my cave and was quite comfortable on my Heartfelt Quilt to be.

I have not been super energetic.  We are still having a very cool, grey and at times drizzly spring.  Right now, we have warmed up to 57 and it is dripping outside.  We are supposed to have sun in about an hour.  Shall see.  

I need to get outside and do more weeding.  But the grey and wet make me unenergetic.  That slides over to my house and hand work inside.

I was caught by a squirrel.  Another project bag from Shepard's Bush in Ogden, Utah.  My stitching buddy showed this to me and now the bag is done except for the button decorations.  I need to get set up to stitch the pin cushion and scissor fob.

Our annual town meeting was held on Tuesday.  This is where the town budget is reviewed and voted on.  There were also 29 warrants to review, discuss and vote on.  (We are a town of 3038 people at the 2020 census.)  We have 2193 registered voters, 130 showed up for the meeting.  It can get rowdy, but this year was nice, quiet and behaved.  

Before the town meeting I made one motif of row 11 of my tatting. Eight more were tatted during the town meeting.  More were made on Wednesday during a trip to Boston.  Yesterday I was sitting in a waiting room and tatted a ring.  Then un-tatted as I counted wrong.  Glad I caught it before I closed the ring.

My Heartfelt Quilt has two borders on it now.  Removed and redid part of the HST border as I was not happy with it.

I like this border and corners better that the pattern asked for.  In the pattern the red of the HST is next to the cream border.  I like it flipped.  Also, I like my corners all the same, so I have made the goose area to flip the HSTs.  

Talk about lazy.  The next two borders have not been cut as I have to measure how long to make them.  I measured for the next border when I took this picture. I will make the next side borders, measure and keep going until it is done.  

Jo at Jo's Country Junction had a "Stitch-A-L0ng" for early June.  My stitching is done.  This week I need to have some finishes.  Enough of being lazy.  (I have written it, now to do it.)

I will be linking up to Kathy's Quilts and her Slow Sunday Stitching.  May you enjoy your threads today.  

 

Errors

I have been working on the yard this week and last.  Not a lot of piecing, quilting or hand work was done except for tatting.  Even then I felt like I was doing more un-tatting then tatting.  

This picture is one of many errors that I did.  I had finished working in the garden for the morning and was sitting on the deck listening to the birds and tatting.  On the right I had twisted the group of three rings.  (I should have changed my jeans before the picture.  Took the pic with my phone.)  I was so frustrated with myself.  It was un-tatted. 

This is from last night.  See that loop at the tip of my shuttle?  I just didn't snug up the thread as it must have been twisted and then it popped loose.  Again, I un-tatted.  It takes longer to un-tat than to tat.  I worked on this for one and a half hours.  I could have just cut the thread, fussed to rejoin and move on.  But I do like the challenge.  Really??  Only when it is a quick un-tat.  This one drove me nuts.

It also drove Ziva nuts.  She wanted my chair as it was past her bedtime.  She did take a couple of swipes at the shuttle which she usually ignores.

Error was fixed, tatting was put aside, and I went to bed.  So did Ziva.  The minute I put the blanket on my chair she moved in.  

I will be outside in an hour.  Have another weeding job scheduled to do this morning.  We had rain yesterday, so no weeding or clean-up was done.

Until then I will try to finish off this row of tatting.  I have two motifs to finish.  I hope for no un-tatting on this last bit.  This row has been a trial.  Not hard to remember the pattern.  That is probably why the errors.  My mind wanders.

Linking up to Slow Sunday Stitching at Kathy's Quilts.  Enjoy your threads.

 

Something was done.

Some work has been accomplished this week.  I have been cleaning up the plant beds, but we had three frosts this week. No planting.  Tomatoes are either in the garage or outside under the holly bushes.

I did get my HST set out to sew up into the second border for Heartfelt.  Also decided on the material for the third border.  When you change your mind on the sashing and first border, it changes the plans for the third.  The last border is unchanged.  Shall get this to the flimsy stage this week.

I did get the ten napkins hemmed as our youngest asked.  Shall get them mailed off and it is up to her to wash and iron.  If they fall apart, she can have me redo.  I usually wash first to make sure they stay together.

Row 9 has been completed on my 2018 Doiley by Renulek.  I have three rows to do and then it will be done. 

You can see that the rings were not attached to each other.  That will happen in the next row.  Lots of rings to be made. That will be my slow hand work today, to get that begun.

Yesterday was rain and it is grey and drippy now.  Maybe I can get outside for the afternoon.  I have a 4x8 raised bed that I am totally redoing.  Pink lily of the valley has become invasive, so I need to totally dig out the bed.  A few peonies are left there, and they will be moved.  Then sunflowers will be planted there for this year.  

Enjoy your threads.  Linking up to Kathy's Quilts, Slow Sunday Stitching.

 

Not much

We have been gone for almost two weeks so not much to share.  My husband and I with, our youngest and her husband, went to Ireland on a tour.  It was a wonderful time.  Such a beautiful country.  Like many people in the United States, I have ancestors from Ireland (both of my parents' lineage).  We traveled the southern area; my ancestors were from the central areas.  

Some handwork did get done.  Row eight on my tatted doiley was completed.

Applique was also worked on.  The last two leaves at the end of the branches were stitched.  Berries were also begun.  In my travels, four of the middle size were lost.  I wonder what the person thought who found them.  More will be made today, stitched on and then the six littlest will be stitched on.  The littlest I did not lose.  The berry pieces will then be done.

The vase and apples are next.  With the pieces being bigger it should move faster. 

Linking up to Slow Sunday Stitching at Kathy's Quilts.  Enjoy your threads.

 

Tatting

In 1973 I was an RN in Rochester, NY.  A good friend that I worked with had a Grandmother who tatted.  I asked if she would be willing to teach me how to tat.  She was and taught me how to make the Double Stitch and turn it into a ring.  (I still have the shuttle she used to teach me.  One of my treasured possessions.)  She told me that was all there was to it, the Double Stitch.  I made lots of rings, but I knew there was more.  

In the early 2000s I was thinking, what will I do with my hands when I retire?  Would quilting, knitting, embroidery be too expensive when I retired.  What would I do to keep my mind and hands working.  I re-found tatting.  Watching the internet helped but I found a great intro book:  Learn to Tat with interactive DVD by Janette Baker.  The Double Stitch is still mainly all there is to tatting but it is what you do with it that makes it amazing to me.

Renata Niemczyk (Renulek) has a tatting Blog: Frywolitki,Tatting,Chiacchierino.  Every spring she offers a doiley pattern in rounds, rows, on her blog.  Ziva is on the 2018 doiley that sits on the back of my chair as an antimacassar.  I had put the doiley there to look at it and Ziva hopped up.  It remains there to this day.

Antimacassar: a small cloth placed over the back of a chair or sofa.  A washable, decorative fabric blotter.  They were used to protect the chair sofa material from the hair oil that was used by men in the Edwardian and Victorian times.  I just love that word.

 The 2018 doiley was made with a Size 20 Lizbeth 6-cord cordonnet thread.

I like this pattern a lot and decided that I would tat it again but in a Size 40 thread, finer in weight.  I started it October 2022 and then after 6 rounds there was a pause.  (Darn squirrels.  I don't even know which one it was.)  Renata has put out her 2023 Spring Doiley pattern and I decided I wanted to tat it.  Well, I cannot until this one is finished.  So, I will finish. 

Here is my tatting box.

The doiley and shuttles at the beginning of round 8. 

The inside of my tatting box: tiny crochet hooks, little scissors, picot gauges, and filled bobbins to go into the shuttles.  Also, orange stick, red material circles, thimble and small finger pin cushion.  Hmmm, why are they there?  Let you know next week.

Enjoy your threads.  I hope to link up with Slow Sunday Stitching at Kathy's Quilts.

 

289

That is how many seasons that I have been here on earth.  (I like marking my life by seasons.  It is experience richer than years.)  You would think that being around for so many seasons I would remember things.  Not so.

My 1985 Quilt had a wool batting.  Wool batting of 38 years ago is different than wool batting of today.  Not as washable for sure.  

1985 Quilt has been taken apart and so much happier.  I could feel it relax as I unquilted it.  The next three pictures show you the batting after it was taken apart and placed on the block it belongs to.  

You can see how much it shrunk!!!

The batting used to go all the way to the outer edge of the block border. 

I am not a person who labels her quilts, but I have changed my mind.  (Terrible way to learn this.)  All of my quilts will now have the type batting listed and washing instructions.  

1985 Quilt has stayed together very well as I was taking it apart.  It was all hand pieced and quilt as you go.  I need to get a new backing and will use wool batting, 2023 version.  It will once again be hand quilted.  The quilting will be easy as the stitching marks remain.

Heartfelt Quilt center is now done.  I need to measure and place a 2-inch border of the sashing material.  Then to make 148 half square triangle blocks using the border material and the left-over reds.

I am supposed to be documenting my slow stitching.  Does tatting count as slow stitching?  That is what I will be working on when sitting today.  Shall show it to you next week.  Enjoy your threads.

Linking to Slow Sunday Stitching at Kathy's Quilts.