Slow Sunday

It's nice to focus on slowing down and putting all the chaos out of mind for at least today.

And I can say I was able to. 

Today was a day of purposely being present and just loving the moment.

So spend the morning working on sewing some more masks for family. My sister in California asked if I could make her a few and also my eldest daughter, along with my youngest daughter

Tomorrow I'll finish them up and get them in the mail.

Speaking of mail I've notice there is practically no junk mail.. 

That could be the one thing I would like to see continues longer.

Then after lunch I enjoyed a nice nap, just love good a nap.

Later on was spent crocheting on the scrappy granny strip blanket

This is it's home while waiting to be worked on. Under the blanket are all the balls of scrap yarn. Which is baby yarn that has been given to me.

This picture show how much progress I have done since that last time I posted here

Doubled in size, the little dark dot in the middle is where I placed the progress keeper last month after I had taken a picture to post

The colors here are more true.  Need to measure it here soon to see how much more I should continue working on it.

Then came a relaxing evening watching the latest episode of Outlander. Such a good show but I do love the books more.

I hope you were able to relax and enjoy the day

Stay safe

Some WIP's

Hey there everyone, I hope you all are doing okay with everything that is going on in the world. I understand from the news that pretty much all of us are in a lock down of one form or another. Don't know about you but it has been a challenge for me. I can be very happy being home bound, it's just that I was watching too much news and was freaking out a little. So I'm not watching all the time now and my anxiety is better. 

Don't know if any of you are experiencing any thing like that too. Also for a while I couldn't seem to be focused, more than normal 

But  I'm adjusting and relaxing a little and feel like writing about some of what I've been up to these past few weeks

Well I started on new socks and this time I decided to do a plain vanilla pattern

Did a twisted rib cuff in a contrasting color with a German short row garter stitched heel. First time for doing this style heel and I liked it.
Says that it will wear longer

So far I'm keeping up with my goal of knitting a pair of socks each month.

Made a little progress on the crochet shawl
the pattern is from the latest issue of Pom Pom
and a easy pattern to work up.

I'm probably about a 1/4 done

Then my yard and garden are a diffidently a work in progress.

Today I was able to finally mow the yard for the first time. 
Boy was the grass/weeds very tall. "The Man of the Place" had to do the spring maintenance before I could use the mower and that took time. 

The grass is at least 12 inches high and was pretty thick.
Boy it was a beautiful spring day, so sunny and cool.

So nice to see everything turning green

The azalea in the front of the house was bursting in color which the bees were all over it.

  
Again this year I'm doing all my veggies in containers but like I said I hadn't been myself and that put me behind in planting.

Did get some broccoli plants transplanted, should of had those in a few weeks ago. Did put them in a spot that gets morning and early afternoon sun. I hope that will help when the temps get warmer.

But we haven't had too warm of temps this spring in fact we have had night low close to freezing so I hadn't planted the warn season crop yet. Hope to soon.

Well that's all now.

Be safe and stay home

Some finishes

I have some Friday finishes....shock...shock

Being home bound I've been working on a little bit of this and that so my finishing will reflect that.

I did get the first two days of Arne and Carlos mystery KAL

Had to take a break though because my wrist was starting to hurt a little. This weekend I do another one or two. I'm behind 3 squares

already.

For the longest time I have been meaning to cleaning out my little fan that I use every night. I just have to have a fan on me at night.

It sure collected a lot of lint and cat fur. 

Amazing

Took a little paint brush, in fact the same one I use to clean out my sewing machines bobbin case.

Looks like new now. I feel better too, I was afraid that somehow all that stuff could catch on fire. I don't know

if it really could but it would still freak me out at times thinking it could.

Sweet dreams now 

Then while still working in the master bedroom, the wall lamps I ordered a while back finally were mounted.

The "man of the place had a clip light on the headboard on his side and over time it chipped off some of  the paint on the wall.

Wasn't even sure if I had paint leftover to touch up the wall.

Yeah..... I did

But boy has it been awhile since I've painted the bedroom.

13 years

Dang time fly's

Looking good.

It wasn't to hard to mount the lamps to the wall, a lot easier than I thought.

Did it myself mind you

Looks so much better now.

I love this quilt, one of my favorites. I have only 2 so far that I've made King size, which our bed is.

Lastly is the binding is finished on ____ Kaffe Fassett quilt I purchased as a kit and have idea the name of it.
So soft and mellow for his style, really like it.

Till next time stay healthy and calm,
this all will be past us someday.
so

What's Up 3-18-2020 Sewing -KAL-Socks and baking bread

It's been a while since I had something to show that's up on the design wall.

Up on the wall is one of three tops.

When my stepmother passed away she had been trying to make a quilt for each of her granddaughters. She has 5 granddaughters and was able to complete 2 quilts 

and was working on the other 3.

I had cut out all the squares she needed because she was unable to. 

So I collected all the squares, partial blocks and completed blocks to go ahead and put them altogether

I had to frog some of the pairs due to the seams allowance was not correct. Mom was never a precise seamstress and as she got further along with the cancer her precision worsen but she would not let that bring her down and she kept going. That was comforting for us to see her do what she loved up to close to the end of her life.

I will get these done for her like I promised.

I hate to admit it but I started a KAL along with the knitting a pair of socks each month.

It's a mystery KAL that Arne and Carlos are doing.  
If you haven't heard of them I'm slipping in their intro that is on their website.

Scandinavians Arne Nerjordet and Carlos Zachrison are highly regarded designers, textile artists and authors. They are best known for their original, colourful and visually striking designs as well as their craft books. Their work is highly influenced by their Scandinavian background and their everyday life in rural Norway. They work under their artist name ARNE & CARLOS, which they established in 2002.



In 2010, ARNE & CARLOS’ first craft book, Julekuler (55 Christmas Balls to Knit) became an immediate Norwegian best-seller and consequently went on to become a best-selling book in North America, Europe and Asia. Today, ARNE & CARLOS have published 10 books, which are enjoyed by people from all over the world. Their books are available in Norwegian as well as English, Danish, Dutch, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Icelandic, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Russian, Spanish and Swedish.

The two Scandinavian designers have collaborated with many prestigious international brands, including Urban Outfitters (2009) and high-end Japanese fashion label Comme des Garçons (2008). Today, they design for and work closely with Rowan, Regia and Schachenmayr yarns.

ARNE & CARLOS’ creative base is located 170 kilometres north of Oslo, Norway, in the mountainous region known as Valdres.


I have the Christmas Balls book and have made a few. I enjoy and learn something each time I watch their YouTube channel.
On Monday they talked about how they are quarantine and thought up this idea to help others who also are like them with something fun and creative to look forward each day during all this madness.

This is day 2 block and day one is being blocked. 
Need to do the same with this one.
I haven't done much color work and figure this was a great way to get in some practice.
  

Using some DK yarn out of my stash

Here is a link to their blog with all the information you need

Arne and Carlos KAL

I would love it if you let me know in the comments if you're doing it too.

And this month socks are coming right along 

so close to being at the toes..
Not much longer.

Also needed to let you the know the bread turned out delicious.
Soft and tasty.  

I used some flour I had in the freezer so I think that had something to do with it not rising as high as it should of.

The recipe is from the book I showed in the last post

It's definitely one I will make on a regular bases.

Okay I think that's all for now.
Hope all of you are following the advise of the health professionals,
keeping your distance, staying home if possible and checking in on our older citizens. Calling to make sure they are okay and if the need anything.

Stay safe and healthy.
I am so lucky to have you to help me keep up my spirits and I can only hope I'm doing the same for you. 

Till next

Sourdough recipes

Yesterday I needed time to calm down from all the craziness going on in our world  

Yes we are all in this pandemic together and we need to take heed to what the experts say on how we can help ourselves and others.

So I'm taking their advice but I also have the luxury of being able to stay home and hunker down.

Yesterday I needed to stay busy and decided that cooking was going to keep me away from watching the news for at least the day.

I know I can get too absorb in it all.

Saturday I took the sourdough starter on hand and fed it all without using or disposing some of it.

That meant I ended up with 4 jars of ready to use starter

First jar went to a double batch of waffles

The recipes is from Emilie Raffa website The Clever Carrot

It's called Cinnamon Sugar Waffles which she also has in her book

Like I said I made a double batch which I put all of the extras in the freezer for another time.

And this where I'm getting the recipe for a new try of a sourdough bread  

Second jar was made into Banana Bread 

Found the recipe at food.com

This is a keeper, moist and very tasty. I would of never thought of using starter for a bread like this.

Even "the Man of the Place" loved it..

The third jar went to making the crust for our pizza we had for dinner.

Oh my goodness, it was so good and so quick and easy

After looking for a crust recipe, which most took more time or instant yeast which I didn't want to do. Remember I've been cooking and cleaning all day. Came across this one and thought What the Heck

and gave it a try

Again found on Food.com

It is again a recipe I'll keep with rest of my sourdough recipes I have and keep adding to.

Here in a while I'll get to finish up baking the bread from Emilie's book.

Trying her Soft Honey Whole Wheat recipe.

I'll have to get back on how it's turned out.

And sorry about not posting this last night as I stated on Instagram

Once I ate and started watching Outlander, I became pretty tried and couldn't  concentrate enough to write and make sense of it.

Till later

Slow Scrappy Sunday

It has been a very nice slow Sunday. The "man of the place" has been at his dads all day so I have had the house to myself. 

I decided this morning that I was going to purge and declutter my scraps of fabric. I have accumulated so much over the past decades, seriously decades. 

As you can see I have quite a bit of scrap fabric. I have divided it up over time by color and that had worked really well for me. But my love for quilting isn't quite what it used to be and I have literally hundreds of yards of fabric that I should be  using, so I’m going to pass on my scraps to a group of ladies that make quilts to sell for extra income. So today I bagged it up and will take to the a person who will deliver the bags.

 I have started a crochet scrappy granny blanket which I am using also some scrap yarn that I had again accumulated over time. 

I’m using what is considered baby yarn and I just put it all in one tub, because I really didn’t have a use for anything else. 

It’s turning out rather cute. I’m really liking it. 

It’s been a very pleasant day but we have had some very strong winds here.  While I’m out on my walk I came across what I believe was a birds nest laying in the driveway but when I gave it some more intense looking at I realized it was actually a web worm nest. Nasty things when they are alive, hundreds of them in the nest, yuck. 

Then I also came across the first Dandelion I’ve seen this year.

 Odd thing right there in the driveway in between some rocks

So pretty, such a bright yellow.

Like the daffodils that are up and blooming

For my birthday one of my daughters gave me a new waffle maker seeing how the one I had was over 25 years old and starting to fall apart.

Made up some batter using sourdough starter which taste so good.

The recipe comes from the Clever Carrot

Great way to use up some of your extra starter.

I've notice this past year using sourdough is all the rage, which is good because there are a lot more tasty recipes I have come across.

I'm all for that.  

Well until later

Linking up with Kathy