Growing Pansies

Except for one housekeeping chore, yesterday was pretty much an NBS day. I kept plugging away until I had another section finished on the pansies. Now it is 60% finished.

I'll just keep plugging away at it day by day until it's finished. With so many fabrics and little bitty pieces, I have to keep going to the bitter end. Yesterday, I perused my stash looking for border and backing fabrics, and I'm happy to say I have everything I need.

While I was working on the pansy, I hemmed the fabrics from Guatemala where needed and then washed and dried them. They performed very well in the wash with minimal bleeding and very little fraying. Now they're ready to go into the quilt I have planned for them.

One of my favorite quilt shops sent me a discount coupon for my birthday, and so I'll head over there on Thursday. I'm on the hunt for some homespun fabric in a solid black, navy, or burgundy. Possibly they won't have any homespun, but I'm confident I can find something that will work.

The "Stitch" sampler is well under way now. I haven't attempted any of the more challenging stitches yet. For now, I'm sticking with the low-hanging fruit. I'll have to take the piece out of the hoop to do bullion stitch or cast-on stitch, and so I'll do everything else first. When I'm ready to move the hoop, I'll try those.

With my morning stitching finished, I set free the cats. They always start out right here...checking out the field for anything interesting. They're on vole patrol right now, but they also enjoy hassling the squirrels.

In the greenhouse, one of the sunflowers has germinated. I'm watching everything like a hawk right now.

The weather has been sunny, but cool, and so I'm keeping the greenhouse closed up for now. It can get very warm in there, and with all the little pots covered in plastic, I need to be on top of them when the seeds germinate. One weekend, we left some newly planted lettuce seeds covered. The temperatures got really hot that weekend, and when we came home, the poor little lettuce seedlings had boiled in their own juices. For now, I'm checking every day and uncovering any new growth.

It was nice enough last night to eat outside for the first time this year. You might remember my friend Wendy sent a gift of some black rice from Minnesota. She suggested salmon to go with it, and I just happened to have a fillet in my freezer at the time. So I fixed that last night, along with some roasted cauliflower. The rice was so good...kind of nutty. I didn't do anything special to it...just cooked it, and we ate it. So, thank you, Wendy. I believe we can get black rice here too, but I don't think I've ever eaten it outside a restaurant. The salmon recipe is one on our diet, and that was quite tasty too. You can find the recipe for Salmon with Roasted Cherry Tomatoes right here. Super easy and yummy.

Today's agenda looks a lot like yesterday's. A little bit of housework...more sewing than anything else. The kitties are having their morning sunbath, and I'm just about to join them for my morning dose of slow stitching. We're expecting weather a little warmer than yesterday. I keep saying I'll get out for a walk. Maybe today I'll actually do it.

No pictures, please

Ringo and Lucy aren't interested in getting photos taken of them.

Sunny Sunday

It was bright and sunny yesterday, albeit a little chilly and windy. Nevertheless, it was a nice day for getting out in the yard for a while. There were still annuals to plant, after all. After setting free the cats, I went straight to work.

My first job was to check on things in the greenhouse. I noticed the red leaf lettuce is starting to germinate. I first saw this one little seedling.

Then, I started seeing more. In all, four out of five seeds has germinated. That's a good start.

Everything in the greenhouse was given a little drink of water, and then I planted the remaining annuals in their shiny new pots. Since I'd planned to do this a day earlier, I hadn't watered the linaria, and it was looking a little wilted. It perked up by day's end.

This guy was none too happy about me intruding into his domain. He scolded me the whole time I was there.

After that, I took a walk around to see what was blooming. One of the rhododendrons is beginning to show its color.

These are the volunteer pansies that are growing in the pot with the cherry tomato. They remind me of my current quilt project.

The lilac is covered in flower buds, although nothing has opened yet.

The apple tree has some flowers on it. I wonder if we'll get more apples this year.

The Gracie Memorial Catnip Garden is looking good. I've seen Smitty imbibing quite a few times.

Also, the clematis is close to blooming.

After that, I got back to work on the Pansy Mosaic. I wanted to say something about these projects. They're less tedious than they might appear if one stays organized. Depending on the pattern, I mark off smaller grids from the larger one by choosing a common divisor for both vertical and horizontal rows of pieces. When I did the Cardinal Mosaic, the grids were 6 x 6. Only 4 worked for this pansy grid, which is 28 pieces across by 40 pieces down. I'd prefer to work with more pieces at a time, but the pattern has other ideas.

So I mark off a 4 x 4 grid on the pattern. The colors are identified by the background shade and the letter. (Those with no letter are blue by default.) In this case, I'll be working with just yellow and blue pieces.

The fastest way I've found to do this is to first lay out all the "whole" pieces and leaving out the HST's temporarily. This Quilter's Cut 'n Press mat works well for this. It keeps my pieces organized, but it also makes a nice little "tray" that I can easily move to the sewing machine.

When the whole pieces are laid out, I make and add the HST's. Those pieces are what make these slow-going. When I first started this, I was making them one at a time, which took forever. Now, I'm looking at the colors I'll need and making them all at once. (They really can't be made ahead of time because there are too many different color combinations.)

When I have them all laid out, I chain piece them together from top to bottom. Rather than cut each column apart, I just finger press them open and then sew on the next piece until I have them all sewn together. In the image below, the threads are still connecting them. I have a small cutting mat on my ironing board, and I can cut them apart with my rotary cutter.

Then, I sew the rows together.

And then onto the sections already made.

As I finish each 4 x 4 section, I highlight that portion on the larger grid so that I don't lose my place.

And this is how I torture myself on a sunny Sunday. Yesterday, I got quite a bit done. I finished the fourth section.

By day's end, I'd finished the fifth section too. And now the piece is half finished.

Of course, I had lots of company for this task. Smitty is enforcing the no-flying-fabric rule. It's a cushy job.

Today I have a few housekeeping chores, but then I'll probably spend most of the day sewing. I'd really like to have this top finished before May 1st. Probably, that's a tall order, but I'll have it well along by then.

Is this lap taken? No matter

Benny: Oh, I see Sadie is already between your legs.

Well, no matter. I have another idea. . .*walks closer*

Just a little closer. . .

Ah, perfect.

So Saturday

It was a lot of fun heading off to the farmer's market with Erik and Mae yesterday. The market is only just getting going for the season, and there were about half as many vendors as we usually see. Even the folks selling food were in short supply, but there were some interesting and yummy dishes available. Erik, Mae, and I split this enormous omelette three ways, and we also shared a plate of bacon-wrapped asparagus. The omelette was stuffed with vegetables and pork.

One of the vendors was a baker of dog treats. These cracked me up.

I ended up getting a pork loin for our dinner tonight. We're really hooked on the pork loins for the moment, and Mike will do that in his Trager grill tonight. Also, I picked up some beautiful asparagus. There was a recipe in the NYTimes a few days ago I want to try.

Also, someone had samples of "Cowboy Candy." I've wanted to try it because it's something I can make and can at home. Working with jalapenos is downright treacherous, however, and so I wanted to taste it first. It turned out to be really good, and I bought two jars. I'm still not convinced I'll want to make it at home. The fumes from jalapenos are killer when cooking with them in high volume. Anyway...these are good. They're a pickle, but somewhat sweet, while maintaining the heat of the jalapenos.

Before leaving home yesterday morning, I stitched real fast and finished off June's heart.

Here are the three I have so far.

When I got home, I walked around the yard to see what was blooming. The second cherry tree, the Black Tartarian, is all in bloom now. Both cherry trees were alive with bees...always good for the fruit.

A few of the azaleas are ready to burst forth. They are the real stars of the garden this time of the year, and we have several different colors.

Also, the new tree from last year, the Dappled Willow, is starting to "dapple." I can't wait for this to put on its show. I'm actually not sure if it will have a flower or if the leaves are the real show since I've only ever seen them from a distance. They are wonderful, however, and so I'm excited to see it. Of course, I'll keep you posted on its progress.

It was a little too chilly to be outside yesterday, and so I opted to hold off on any gardening until today. The weather should be warmer and sunnier today. Instead, I did another five 4 x 4's on the pansy mosaic.

I still need two more 4 x 4's before I'll be able to sew the fourth section to the rest, but I laid out what I had. The yellow pansy is really starting to emerge now.

When I went upstairs, I found Mr. Smitty lying in the afternoon sunshine. It's just another day in purradise.

With the three hearts finished, I'm ready to start on the "Stitch" sampler from Crabapple Hill Studios. Fingers crossed I can pull off some of those fancier stitches. It's hooped up and waiting for me downstairs.

Also waiting downstairs, Mike loves his Sunday blueberry oatmeal pancakes (I like them too), and so that's where I'm headed next. Today I'll be spending some time gardening, doing laundry, and a couple of small housekeeping chores. I'm hoping to get that fourth section finished on the pansy mosaic too.

Homecoming

It was good to see Matthew again after his Guatemala adventure. He'll be here for just a few days before he makes good on a many-years-long decision to move to Las Vegas. It'll be sad for us to see him leave the area permanently. Fortunately, we visit the Las Vegas area frequently, and so we'll see him often even after his move. Also, as we discovered with his Guatemala trip, he's only a phone call away.

We had a good lunch of Korean food, and he brought some beautiful hand-dyed and hand-woven fabrics from Guatemala. I took them outside to get a good picture of their colors Look at how pretty these are:

This next one has a metallic gold stripe through it.

I wasn't able to capture it with photography, but it has some sparkle (about an inch wide) where I've indicated with an arrow in the image below. You can make out the strip of lighter threads, and those add some sparkle to the piece.

Already, I know just what to do with these. I'll probably get started on it as soon as I've finished up with the Pansy Mosaic, which is currently taking up all the space on my sewing table. First, though, I wondered what y'all think of this. Being hand-died and hand-woven, they aren't like manufactured fabrics with a tightly woven selvage. The edges are hemmed on some, and on others, left kind of raw, like in the image below.

Since I'll want to wash and pre-shrink them in the washing machine, what would you do to protect these edges? Pinking shears? Stitch a line of stitching? Enclose in a mesh bag? All of the above? None of the above? I'm curious to get your input about this.

The only other thing I did yesterday was to finish off the third section of the pansy mosaic. Here, the greens have been introduced.

Now the first three sections are sewn together. The purple pansy has just a little bit left at the bottom, and the yellow pansy is starting to appear.

This morning, I'm heading off to the Farmer's Market with Erik and Mae. I'm not really sure what fruits and veggies will be available so early in the season, but it's always fun to meet up with Erik and Mae and enjoy a good breakfast. I'll probably spend a good part of the afternoon in the garden planting the last of the annuals, and I must check on things in the greenhouse. If there's time, I'll get back to my sewing.