Thanks!!

It's been quite a week. 

 I've just had to keep 

pushing forward.

A little bit of stitching,
a little bit of cooking + harvesting
and a lot of Nana duty.

Hanging out with my 16 month old grandson, Weston.

Chasing bubbles and
playing with wrenches to
help Papa put together the

new honey extractor.

Thanks Weston for keeping me
on my toes and hopefully young at heart.💙

****
That extractor, of course, lead to actually harvesting
some honey from our very productive hive.

Pardon the cliche,

but they have been very busy bees!

3.5 gallons of honey from 8 frames

with plenty left in the hive for the bees

to survive through the winter.

Thank you bees! 🐝

****

We have one small peach tree

that literally went crazy this year.

bending it's branches 

nearly to the ground. 

We picked well over 500 peaches

Lots have been frozen, shared and eaten!

That's been along with a couple of bushels

of apples;

Thank you fruit trees

for being so generous this year.

****

The tomatoes?

Well, enough for 

a couple of tomato pies

and being able to enjoying the simple BLT's.

Thanks tomatoes for giving 

a good effort.

****

The stitching has been minimal.

I've been working on the next border 

on my Di Ford Sutton Grange quilt.

 4 petals are being machine appliqued to a square.

I opted to sew the background squares together first,

 add the borders to the quilt,

and then applique the petals to squares.

The reason was because that I KNEW I won't be able 

to place and stitch those 4 petals properly.

I knew some would probably get sewn into the seam allowances.

There's no way I could have gotten all those

points to have come together as well as they did 

if I was concerned about the seam allowances.

Yes, it's a bit awkward handling this 

much fabric while machine appliqueing,

but for me, the results are well worth it.

Not all of them came out perfectly anyway,

but most did!

The good news is the pattern actually

has an appliqued circle over the centers.

Any issues will vanish!

Thanks, Di.  

****

Thanks to all of you

💗🧡❤️💙 

for taking the time

to read my blog and 

to leave a comment or two.

I appreciate it very much.

Until Next Time

Kyle

Summer Time

 Summer days have a way of quickly slipping away and

I remind myself that

it's a time to relax and enjoy the simple things.

The last couple of weeks have been filled

with small pleasures.

Like spending time with these two little guys

while tent camping last weekend in the mountains outside of Denver,

 something I hadn't done in decades,

but despite my aging body, ended up being great fun.

Then there are these two
little pleasures.

 

 Being a Nana is the best job I've ever had.
I know many of you totally agree.

The sewing has taken a backseat,
but I did manage to make a few hst's

for the my BOM designed by Sue Garman
for the Quilt show.
I used the magic 8 method and trimmed
up the pieces using the Bloc-Loc tool.
I had 160 identical hst's to make and this
combination of sewing and trimming
made the whole process very easy and accurate.

The other day I
discovered the robins were enjoying
all of the cherries from our little tree.

They're the sour kind.
I got them pitted and frozen.
There's a few recipes I'm hoping to try.
One being a sour cherry berry crisp.
 It sounds good.

Maybe in the next couple weeks
I'll have more sewing to share,
but until then
I think I'll just be sharing time

with those I love.
 

Until Next Time-

Kyle

"Old Glory"

This week it was time for me to switch gears.

I had been working on an embroidery

while I had been recently traveling.

In fact, it was a pattern from Crabapple Hill Studios

that I had purchased over a year ago while

attending one of Meg Hawkey's wonderful retreats.

 Now it's done.

 "Old Glory"

A patriotic design done in brighter

more contemporary floss colors.

The part that draws the most attention 

is the use of gold bugle beads to 

look like a sparkler.  

 Too cute!

I was determined I could find something

in my stash that would work for the pillow.

I eventually found the perfect back and cording fabric.

A piece that has to be about 20 years old, but 

it worked.

(Never give up your stash!)

Summer is the time for 

 flowers, fireworks and flags.

 

This little pillow is going to be enjoying

the summer months on my back porch.

Until Next Time-

Kyle

The Hazy But Not Lazy Days of Summer

In 1963 Nat King Cole

sang about the

 "Lazy Hazy Crazy Days of Summer

the days of soda, and pretzels and beer. 

You'll wish that summer could always be here."

We are in the midst of

 the hazy days.

 

 Most of this thick haze is due to 

wildfires to the south or north

depending on which way the wind is blowing.

There wasn't much time
to be lazy this week despite the hazy part.

I  spent several days helping

my daughter set up her second grade classroom

for the start of a new school year.

Last year she was in 4th grade, so once again, she had

to change classrooms and

 get ready with a new curriculum. 

It was good to have a helper with us to

 keep us on task.
"toot sweet"

Having been an elementary teacher
a looooong time ago, there's energy

 when the bulletin boards start going up.

****
I spent another day last week
being a "quilt judge" for the
local county fair.

It's an interesting and challenging task.

The quilt makers come to listen

 to your critique and comments both positive
and the suggestions for improvement.

You get to see a lot of fantastic work.

I did noticed the lonely little pile of 3 quilts
in the hand quilted category and nothing
was hand pieced.
It's an almost extinct area for 

some shows.

I know hand quilting isn't something I do as

much as I use to.

I did hand quilt my Mountmellick quilt last year.

(I'm giving myself a positive nod)

There was one hand appliqued quilt entered

and no hand embroidery quilts. 

Binding for the most part were

machine finished.

(There's a real skill to do that well, 

I'm just saying).

It all must be a sign of the times.

The slow quilting movement either needs

to pick up speed, (hahaha) or 

come to my area of the world

or those special categories will soon disappear. 

****

With all that work behind me

maybe this week will be the

lazy days of summer.

 

I can't speculate

 about the

crazy part.

Until Next Time-
Kyle

When Jupiter Aligns With Mars

 Yesterday was just one of those days.

No, no, not a bad day,

but a day where things went perfectly.

One of my favorite songs in 1969

was by the 5th Dimension,

Aquarius, Let the Sunshine In.

Anyone remember that?

 "When the moon is in the seventh house
And Jupiter aligns with Mars
And peace will guide the planets
And love will steer the stars"

It was a rockin' good day.

Everything was perfectly aligned.

I had a beautiful start

Photo by Jessica Redente Wolfe

when one of my favorite helpers came to play.

Then in the afternoon I simply

seemed to flow from one project to another

in a perfect rhythm.

I finished hand quilting

Mountmellick.

I had already made the binding and

decided there was no reason to wait sewing it on.

Oh, my gosh.

I'm so close to being done with this

mystery quilt designed by Di Ford 

that started in 2014.

The planets stayed aligned

and I knew there was no better time

to start the free embroidery pattern, "3 Cheers", that

 Crabapple Hill had published last week.

I decided to enlarge the pattern and 

will probably make it into a pillow.

It's a sweet design that reminds me of

simpler times of decorating our bikes and riding them

in the 4th of July parades back home

in Michigan where I grew up.

Meg's pattern shares

a successful way of using crayons

with your embroidery.

First, heavily color the areas 

that you're going to color with white crayon

and then add the colored crayons on top.  It makes the 

wax and colors smoother when

you use the iron to melt it into the fabric.

Also a reminder 

you have today and tomorrow 

to leave a comment in my post

"Happy Birthday to You!" 

Why?

Because you could win

one of these awesome fabric baskets

to help me celebrate.

 

 Everyone needs a basket

and one of these could be yours.

The day ended with a summer music concert

over at Colorado State University.

 It was simply a day to 

"Let the Sunshine In."

Until Next Time-

The Last Bits Of Summer

 Labor Day Monday,

for most of us, feels like the last

hurrah of summer.

It was no exception at Nana's

house this weekend.

Playing with bubbles,

using two different techniques.

Both ways work

until

soap gets in your eye.

It's even fun if you're an observer.

Maybe safer.

Next, it's never too soon

to decide what you're going to be

for Halloween.

Nana knows the best place to shop for costumes.

Still need more to do?

Then head off to the Farmer's Market.

And maybe add a little hiking

.

  and running with Running Man

or hanging out with Nana

,

or learning about raptors,

but eventually it's time to head back

because everyone's pooped

even Nana.

See you next year, summer.

Until Next Time-