What Are Quilters Blogging About Today?

 We escaped the tornadoes and the flooding that hit Illinois and Wisconsin last week but there was a lot of rain.  It's the third-wettest April on record.  My basement stayed dry (I had the landscapers add a bank of soil around the problem corner of the foundation) but apparently there's a roof leak.  It's always something . . . 

Top: Peeping Beauty School of Cosmetology; Frida; No Mistakes, Just Happy Little Peeps (Bob Ross). Center: from the Racine city dept. of development; Arthur; "Peepal Conclave."   Bottom: Don Quixote; The Scream.

Of course I liked "They Read Banned Books."  

  The top left and center right are Polish (or Polish-style).  Upper right:  Japanese.  Lower left:  I think ...

I am glad to hear I'm not the only one who lived through "hardships" as a kid. Life was certainly different if you lived in the country or a small town, and probably also the geographical location. I think it developed a certain resiliency in us!!! 

Also, I do not expect everyone to be able to stand up and sit down without using their hands at this point in time. Maybe you are recovering, maybe you are building your strength, so you have to start small and build up your strength in your legs, your core, and your upper ...

I'm glad to know I'm not the only space nerd who also enjoys quilting. We live in an amazing world. People like my parents went to school in horse-drawn cutters (like a sleigh) and wagons, or they walked several miles. No electricity for my parents when they got married in 1954. No TV, no running water! And now, from the comfort of their Lazy-Boy chairs, they are watching the Artemis 2 circle the Earth while we hear everything they are saying in crystal clear voice communication. 

The last 100 years have been amazing. 

Not to disappoint my students ...

I got sidetracked big time yesterday!! I was supposed to be downstairs sewing, but the night before, I started reading a thriller, and well, I needed to know what happened. So while I did get some things done, I finished my book before I went to bed last night! 

And you know what? Every once in a while, we need to do that! The book was called "A Death at the Party" by Amy Stuart. Oh boy --- an interesting concept! Now today, I need to get some work done!

I grabbed a few pieces of paper from the floor beside ...

I chose the purple batik for the sashing almost without thinking.  I used nearly all of it (just 4-1/2" x 18" left over).  I auditioned a couple of batiks for the setting, my limitation being what I have in yardage (rather than FQs and scraps). The peach won out.  I made the float extra-large. I'm going to keep it that way and skip an outer border. 

5-3/4 yards used for the flimsy.    I still have 1-1/2" scrappy HSTs and a lot of 1-1/2" squares.

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An epistolary novel is one written as a series of letters ...

It's been a week of attending to a number of things.  On Monday my sister and I met halfway between our respective homes for a little retail therapy and lunch, and I was finally able to give her gift(s) for her mid-February birthday.  Tuesday I met with the trust attorney to get the ball rolling (belatedly) to retitle Stevens' car in my name (a different process when the vehicle is inherited).  Tuesday evening AAUW met in person with a really informative program about recycling.  (Among ...

Ah -- the weather! Yes -- it's pretty amazing how different the weather can be, even in nearby locations. Those different weather conditions have given our sewing group a chuckle from time to time. Because we all live in different locations but are somewhat close to each other, we can forecast what is coming to the others! It's especially neat during a thunderstorm! OK -- that's when we are on a call. 

Most of our snow disappeared yesterday, even though it was only zero. The sun was out for a bit, and that sun is mighty powerful! One had to ...

In case you are wondering, Lexi and I did some real tree hugging along the walk. Why not? The trees are right there. We both got a chuckle out of it and wondered if anyone was watching. It's hard to miss me in the forest with my bright orange jacket!

At the moment, I'm reading three books - one audiobook, one ebook, and a physical book. I don't do that often, but it just worked out. All three are completely different genres. The ebook is about our brain at rest, and I have to say I agree with ...

Someone asked for a side-by-side comparison of the Visual To Do list --- January 1 and now. Let's wait until the end of this month, and then I'll share it with you! That list watches me, and I watch it!! A few things on the list are almost done and just waiting for a label or a phone call, so I'm going to wait to share them with you! But all is good!!!

Something extremely unusual happened yesterday, and it was absolutely wild and pure luck. A bag of items was on the Pony Express, and it was ...

What's the opposite of batting 1000? Lots of things happened yesterday - things that were related to my update list from yesterday, but NO progress was made on anything!!!

I had my call from Microsoft, and I think I mentioned that my Classic version of Outlook had frozen. Nope—it hadn't frozen. It's in the process of syncing all the folders, but it's taking a long time. Why? I suspect because the computer goes to sleep 5 minutes after I leave. So now I have set that to never, and hopefully, it will sync a bit faster ...

THANK YOU -- I didn't get a chance to cut up those photos, but I will today! I needed that wee push — I shouldn't even have needed that, with all my newfound philosophy on decluttering and getting rid of things, but sometimes — you just need a push. 

It's Monday Sewing today, and I have a LOT of tidy-up jobs to do, which is perfect to do while chatting. I have quilts to trim and bind, photos to cut up, and I might even be able to remove several items from the Visual To Do list. 

BUT let's ...

I made flying geese for round 3, "animal."  They're set as a ribbon.

I made four little drunkard's path blocks for round 4, "curves." They're the orange and black corners.  This is a wallhanging and I don't want it to get too big.

Round 5, "two colors," was hard to interpret. I chose a strip of orange and a strip of blue.

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There are so many thoughts going through my head this morning. I heard some disturbing things yesterday. You've been in this situation - you might have been on a train, at the grocery store, in the airport, at the dinner table, and what is everyone doing? 

They are on their phone! And what are they doing? Endlessly scrolling through countless Social apps -- Facebook, IG, X, Pinterest, Facebook, IG, X, WhatsApp, X, Pinterest. It's ENDLESS scrolling. 

The sad thing is that you are devoting YOUR PRECIOUS hours left in your life to being entertained by total nonsense! What are you ...

OH MY!!!!!! When I sit down to write the blog, I have to come up with a title, and some days that's a struggle because nothing super exciting happened. But there are days, like today, when I have many titles! I called it "The Best of both worlds," but "Happy Dance," "Exciting update," and "The email saga continues (part two)" would have worked as well. 

It was a good news day all around, so I'm excited. 

The knee update is all good. I did a short walk with the girls in the morning. While I feel perfectly fine ...