We Do Have Ice

  Woke up early to ice falling, which it is still doing as I type this. It is suppose to "rain" ice all day and then turn to snow. So far we have a lot but not as bad as some areas in Missouri and other states. There is a dusting of snow on top of the thick ice.

  I wanted to feed the birds seed and their suet but the screen door is iced shut. 

I took a couple of the flag-frozen straight

At least the lake has not started freezing -that could be possible in a few days though with single digits coming in. That is always a concern for docks and boats praying that does not happen.

Early this morning I started filling up big pots with water-just in case. This is the first home in over 40 years that we don't have a back up. This is an all electric house-ugh. We always had woodstoves for heat and for cooking if needed. and my 10 burner wolf was an old one so did not need electric to turn the gas on.  So I am staying hopeful we do not lose our electric. I think we are in the middle path of this storm-much worse above and below us. The big cities in Missouri are getting hammered with more ice and lots of snow.

I got out all of my hand dyes and the gifted ones from my friend, and ironed them all-so will be ready to use on the next bags. This photo is a bit dark as it is a dark room.  And I have not taken the time to figure out settings for better photos. (These will enlarge for better viewing)

   I am finishing up my first bag, but was having trouble with it looking nice-I changed threads so hoping to get this one finished soon. I am not crazy about how much the pattern left open to sew after turning  (there is a lining inside)  On the next one will change that

Stay safe all of you in the path of this arctic storm

Good Morning Sunday-Slow Stitch Progress

 Good morning Friends,

   It has been very windy here, so not working outdoors this weekend. Today we warm up to the 80"s but still windy.

  Congrats to the KC Royals baseball team for making it into one of the wildcard spots for the year's championship. They have had  some injuries, lots of new players, were so close to getting in and then they started losing lots of games-so I stopped watching them. over the last couple of weeks. Watched the game that would get them in and they lost-ugh, but another team lost so they got in haha.  First in 10 years since they got in the playoffs.

  I think I have more time in pinning my slow stitch project than sewing so far. I had bought some short applique straight pins as the instructor I am following really likes them. So, I was online hunting some down-they are hard to find.  I did find some I really liked and two online shops had them-but for both the shipping and taxes were higher than the pins-ugh. So I scoured Amazon-found one company that had them the review was good.  When I got them-I liked that they were short, but these were Not sharp at all-so no good for this project.

  I went back to the silk pins my Mom bought me years ago-they are thin and veryyyyy sharp and long pins-perfect for quilters.  I started to sew and kept getting  stabbed by these sharp pins that will draw blood as well. So ok now what to do??  I went through my bag of sashiko items that I bought two years ago-and found two little boxes of small no coil safety pins. These are sharp and will work-but what a job to change it all. These will be a pain to move around as I sew, but at least I won't get stabbed and the patches are now secure.

I changed the pins after sewing this little bit.  I had to keep taking out my stitches as they were too small-being used to hand quilting stitches. Not even, but I am not going to worry about that-as this project is to be fun and hopefully relieve some stress I used a stick of white chalk for a rough line to follow.

I did finish up the second wolf block-stitched it per the pattern this time. But instead of everything being one color-I used different colors for the outline stitches. I think I am liking this better than the first block. I may just turn these into pillows. I am thinking of a tea or coffee dye to get rid of all that white though. Those of you that have followed me for awhile-know I do not care for white. I have not rinsed out the blue pattern as of yet.

  I did search online for a good price for Melania's new book. I watched an interview about her book, and decided I wanted to read it. The prices are all over the place along with shipping added. This morning I checked out Thrift Books-they had the best price with free shipping. It pays to "shop" and look around for best price.

Happy Sunday and have an awesome new week.

Bag Update & Linking With Rain's Art Date

   I spent this morning making another bag pattern and then cutting it into pieces for the fabrics. This is working out easier to figure out the piece's layout. I will see how this one sews up, and then can always cut it up differently.

  This first bag includes fabrics using: Procion dyes, rust dyes, Pebeo sun paints with salt, natural mimosa dyed-the pretty yellow piece.  The book suggests adding 1/4' to 1/2" on all the sides of the patterns-I chose the 1/2''. This allows for the pulling in of the stitches and also to make sure the cloth underneath is completely covered.

I have always loved fall colors so most of the bags will reflect that

I always loved the beautiful yellows one gets with the mimosa leaves. Much prettier than dyeing with goldenrod-and the goldenrod is tricky-have to pull the cloth out at just the right time The triangle piece next to the yellow was dyed with Pebeo sun paints and salt

   So now I will take a break and then lay these fabrics out correctly for sewing. The book suggests using glue stick for that-who knew?  Never would have thought of it.

  Happy Monday

Update: Wednesday-linking up this post for Rain's Art Date  Thinking these hand dyes could be considered art.

T Stands for Tuesday

 Good Morning Dear Readers,

     Welcome to the weekly T event where we gather together with friends and link up with our hostess Bleubeard and Elizabeth. Many share their latest art or crafts with the required drink related photo.

    I also wanted to mention Food Wednesdays here at the top of my post. Our next Food Wednesdays will be next week on July 6th where I will also be announcing some very exciting news about our link up event. I am very excited about the new direction and will announce the news on the July 6th post and link up. Hope you all will be as excited as I am. 😀

  Towards the end of last week, I worked on my bag project-going through my hand dyes etc, and spent a few days cutting out pieces for 10 bags. if interested in the process more here   So now that I have a blank "canvas" for the front design I will be going through my bags of rust dyes, sun dyes and my hand dye pieces and cutting up pieces to cover the fronts-similar to a crazy quilt  Then the next stage is to design the sashiko stitch patterns I want to use.  I am still waiting for a couple stencils and also the washable marking pens. I hadn't realized that these were coming form England when I purchased them, but they had the best price with free shipping. So hoping they will arrive by first week in July

  Being in my mid 70's now it's way past time to start using and creating with these fabrics. Hand dyeing fabric has been very rewarding for me-I did allot with natural materials from our woods home, really enjoyed rust dyeing, sun painting-dyeing, and even flower pounded pieces.  I think these bags will be a fun project to enjoy my pieces and to learn something new as well. The most rewarding of this project is using them finally-instead of being stored in bags-and shared. So a win win for me.

  Sunday we finally got lots of rain and most of all a cool down. The cool down just feels so good after weeks of mid to high 90's F here in the Ozarks. We will be in the '80s F for a couple days before it heats up again.  

 The "deck duck" (Valerie named her) visits most every day. Larry believes she is a mallard duck.

  This photo came out interesting so I  kept it

Sorry below a bit blurry but it was raining a bit at the time-and taken from indoors through the glass

We have many different bird visitors-many small birds, lots of woodpeckers, doves,  cow bird-very fun to watch them early mornings (I put the seed out around 5 am)

  Over the weekend we had fish and french fries.  This was the catfish and crappie that I had fried when our Wisconsin friends came to visit. I had lots left over and this fish froze so well. I froze them on a cookie sheet first, and then placed them in a big freezer bag once frozen. I heat them up in the oven with the french fries and the fish tastes like it just came out of the fryer.  

For my drink share, I searched my cups for my favorite Yellowstone coffee cup-inside the cup is the map of the park. It had gotten pushed way to the back of the cupboard. (we have allot of lime here in the water as the filter shows after I wash it) (and to keep the coffee maker running well I use distilled water to keep the coffee maker clean and it makes good coffee too)

Happy T everyone, enjoy your new week

Happy Friday & Bag Project Updated

   Hi Everyone, 

 Wow we are nearing the end of June already. It's been so hot here every day that it seems like it is going slow but here we are at the end of the month next week.

  We had our 6 month doctor visits this week, the family doctor we had been using since the move to the lake, we both were not crazy about and had been thinking of switching to the other doctor in the office-and then I got a call that ours was retiring so I could easily switch. He is the only doctor in the clinic now, young from Russia and we both really liked him allot, and very professional and on top of things unlike the other doctor. So we have eliminated a stress situation-a good thing.

  Since I needed to get off the allergy pills a couple months ago, my head just feels like it is in clouds haha.  I took myself off of them, because I have been on and off of those since I was a child and I just needed a break and my extreme leg cramps are mostly gone now too.  So with that and this continuous high heat with humidity has me feeling tired most of the day-ugh

  My garden plans have been halted do to this weather, we will see what fall brings us.

  Today I wanted to make the little purse pattern so I could start cutting out the fabric. The little bag is reversible too, so I can showcase hand dyes on both sides.  I shared this in another post that comes from the Sashiko and Boro book I picked up.

  I was happy that making the pattern was easy for me, something I just don't grasp sometimes. The instructions in the sashiko book were very clear. I am working on the wood flooring so I can spread out.

  At first I was wanting to use the packing paper that I have lots of but it was not quite wide enough and piecing it together was not accurate. So then I grabbed parchment paper which is working out well. I copied the page from the book for the instructions on how to measure this out.

I had a couple pieces of this one that I never cared for. Forgot what happened but I never liked these purple blotches-too tie dye for me haha  They will work out for these little bags though. This is a good quality kona cotton so it can be used finally

This following piece is more to my liking, and I have three green pieces too  I need to cut two of these pattern pieces. I will switch up the different fabrics so each bag will have two different hand dyed fabrics.

I will be adding patches to one front side and then practice with the sashiko stitches. I think this will be the perfect small project for slow stitiching.

   I did want to mention that since my T post  I have learned there is also a difference in the teas labeled for iced tea and for cold brew tea. 

    I tried the iced tea that I have on hand so I can get it used up-and it was not very flavorful. I contacted the Luzianne tea co about this and she said No the labeled iced tea will not work for the cold brew method. She told me the cold brew teas have added natural flavorings that will cold brew into a good tea.  This is true because the iced tea bags I made with the cold brew tea method had no flavor very blah haha.

Happy Friday and weekend!!

Update:  I thought I would add this here since it goes with this post.  After cutting out around 10 pieces I went back and re read the instructions again-and I missed something.  I had it my mind of what I wanted to do, but after re reading a better construction method to go with the instructions that I missed. 

   I had it in my mind to add just a few patches here and there and slow stitch on those. but then there is the issue do I want the patch to be raggy on the edges or turned under?  

  The instructions which I hadn't caught at first, is using a piece of cotton as the base and then totally covering with patches-instructions how to do that so no raggy edges. This will give a cleaner look too, so I would not want to use my hand dyed fabric for this as it would be totally covered.

  Ok so I went into my quilting stash of fabrics and found a big bag of allot of yardage of good weight muslin-one I would have dyed first and then used for a back of a quilt.  So I probably should have put this through the rinse cycle and dry to get more of the wrinkles out-but I steamed pressed it a couple of times tonight. It will be ok to cut out the pieces-tomorrow

 So instead of having pieces cut for 5 bags I will have pieces cut for 10 bags-using this muslin for one of the 2 pieces for a bag.  I had planned on making 8-10 bags so all is good.

  Ok I think I have this all sorted now--my mind works slow til I get it all figured out-always been this way haha