Christmas planning & an assortment of tangents on a Slow Sunday

Hello - so how was your week?  Mine was pretty good... and I'm starting this month (okay I'm a little late but anyway)  with a new outlook... can't take credit for this thought but it has propelled me into some planning and hopefully productive action.

Half of 2025 has passed. The other half is a gift to do better every day.

As you know from reading this blog I always have plenty of things I want to do... lots of seasonal stuff because I love changing the decor in my home to fit the holidays and the weather... and you also know that I'm obsessed with the weather... LOL... and it is either too hot or too cold or too rainy or too dry... yeah I'm never totally pleased... except for those brief interludes in Spring and Fall when I can turn off the HVAC stuff and open the windows and tell Duke Energy to take a hike!   

Also I'm prone to tangents as you've just witnessed... ok back to the thought that has got me wound up right now... everything takes time... and while the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago...and the next best time is today... the time to work on Christmas projects is NOW!!  Sooooo I picked back up the Noel Sampler... here's where it was last time I released it from it's project bag...

and here it is now...

I had to spend a bit of time trying to figure out how to get this back on track... I made an error on the house...and then I counted lots of other motifs off of the house... and while some were definitely wrong others weren't... don't ask how I did it, I just did ... and the more I worked on this the more errors I've made... argh... it is a good thing that the motifs are spaced out....anyway  I spent a substantial amount of time with this last week but it is really coming along... the red on the front side of the house is almost done... then there is the brick on the side and the roof... but I'll probably move down to the next line of alphabet for a break... sooooo much red.... LOL... it needs to be finished in time for it to be framed by the end of November...oh and I think I've decided on the 3rd piece I want for the wall on Christmas... this is Blackbird Designs The Bells on Christmas Day from the book of the same title...

I might add a little turquoise into this and I want to stitch it on a green background  like the Feliz Navidad sampler I already stitched.... and yes I am being quite ambitious with my Christmas plans!

I thought about taking the Prairie Schooler Christmas ABC's to Hobby Lobby for framing... but that is as far as I got... just thought about it... sigh... 

Next on my agenda of stuff I want for Christmas is a new quilt for my bed and my current FAVORITE fabric collection is Tiny Christmas by Lizzy House... I've ordered a FQ bundle and some background fabric and a back but it hasn't come yet but OMG...insert happy squeals!!

there are elves and candy canes and stamps ... I LOVE LOVE LOVE the stamps... I collected them as a child and I still love them. As a kid I would go to the post office with my Grandma and she would ask to see what stamps were available and told them she wanted to see the pretty ones... and now I'm an old lady and  I do the same thing!!  I love that there are floral stamps and holiday stamps and stamps of people I knew of and people I have no clue about... in fact I purchased these stamps recently...

I HAD to have the dahlia ones ...

and I contemplated some tulip ones... and I'm getting ahead for Christmas with these... 

but I'm inclined to put Christmas stamps on lots of stuff that isn't even Christmas... cause they make me smile!

Anyway... that was another tangent... I'm looking at patterns for this Christmas collection ... I want something to show off these fabrics... but it has to be simple... cause that's all I'm up to these days and at the moment  this pattern that I've done that I've done before is in the running.... hmm... can't find a pic of this totally finished... but this is it... 

It is called Double Square Star from MSQC and you can find it here... I haven't done many quilts with pink in them but the last couple of years I've definitely been smitten with pink Christmas stuff... you may recall that I decorate the sunroom porch with a pink theme... and this year I want to do my bedroom in a pink theme... I'm could make those little sashing stars pink! 

And another quilt I'm considering is this freebie from FQS called Fat Quarter Cubes... you can see the pattern here... and I've already made a Christmas quilt with this pattern and the Heather Ross SugarPlum collection of fabric...and somehow I can't find a finished shot of this quilt either... but it is done...

Hopefully the  Tiny Christmas fabric will come soon and I can make a decision and jump on this.

I've been in this house for 11 years come October... where does the time go??  I'm ready for a little update... and to that end I'm hoping to put down this carpet today with the help of Dan the handyman...

it is from FLOR and it comes in 17" squares... this is 4 of the tiles... no 2 are alike and you get a random pattern... I like the bits of rose and blue and turquoise in with the gold-y yellow... I've used this brand of carpet in my sunroom porch, my dining area and the craft room I call the green room... I like it because it colorful and highly patterned and is easy to adjust the size of the rug to the area you are dealing with... 

and along with the carpet I'm going to hang these drapes... 

a golden yellow velveteen with pom pom trim... I LOVE pom pom trim... anyway I think this is going to be very pretty and kinda girly and I've never done that before... at if I don't do it now when will I ever get around to it??  I'm going to get Dan to help me hang them  today and I can steam out the wrinkles tomorrow. 

And I got off on another tangent  this week... sewing one... I haven't touched my sewing machine in ages but this week I was smitten with a block kit I saw on Avalon Bloom.com ,.. kaleidoscope blocks made from Tula Pink's collection Untamed... and the particular fabric is Hello Dahlia in the Moonbeam colorway... I've never purchased pre cut blocks before but I love kaleidoscope blocks and I know how much time it takes to cut them out... so I was intrigued... now this block can only be put together one way so that eliminates the time and dithering about how to orient that pieces and it definitely makes the sewing go faster... the blocks come in sets of 12 and I got 4 set..I got carried away...LOL.. and I already stitched one set before I took this pic...

and here are the first 12 blocks I did...

and I LOVE them... now the kit included fabric for the corners ...you can see the fabric in the pic above this one... but this is brighter than I want... I'm thinking of going with something in a lavender... I've never used much of that color before but I'd like it...  I don't know if I will get any identical blocks out of the other packages.. I'm okay either way as I'm not sure how I will set this or how big it will get... 

So the weather guys lied to me again... we didn't get nearly the rain they said... in fact, as of writing this on Saturday we've gotten one nice downpour and one weak sprinkle... and with temperatures pushing 90 I've had to water the flower boxes and the raised beds and the pots... but I did figure out how to use the sprinkler system... actually I was pushing the right buttons in the right sequence I just wasn't waiting long enough to see the way it works... I was thinking ALL the sprinklers would pop up at the same time on the AUTO setting... wrong... they go off sequentially... zone 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. 7, 8, 10, 11... zones 1 and 9 are the drip irrigation and it also does it sequentially... and it has worked beautifully this week.  The outlook right now is almost identical to last week ... lots of rain forecasted... but we know how it actually played out... so my sprinklers will probably be used again... but that's why I bought them, right??

Next week looks pretty calm... Elliott on Tuesday and I'm sure there will be a lunch or dinner or two with friends. Now I really need to get the basement storage room cleaned up and the garage... but the weather is not going to be conducive to the garage clean up so perhaps, just perhaps I can do something in the basement. I know how I want it all to look when it is done but stuff is scattered here and there and everywhere... I need to get it organized... but it is work and there are much more fun things to do like stitch and sew and knit and nap... 

Hope your week is a good one... I'll link up with Kathy's Quilts... Dan the handyman is suppose to be here in a bit and I have a bunch of things I want him to help me with...

happy stitching-

carol fun 

Plenty of patriotic on a Slow Sunday...

Ok - I had a heck of a time getting this done... some photos would post, others wouldn't ... some would work as a smaller file, other's posted as a big file... so the quality of the pics are hit or miss... and it took all day to get it to this point. I didn't include any links for the cross stitch pieces as things got wonky and I got aggravated.   If you want to see some better pics you can look at my IG post here...

 Hello ... so are you as confused as me as to what day of the week it is?  Holidays are great but I get all off whack as to what day it is... Friday seemed like a Sunday...and then Saturday seemed like a Sunday and now today is Sunday... good thing my phone keeps me on track... had a quiet  4th of July with Nick... worked out in the yard a little bit ... stitched a little bit... and napped a little bit...ok maybe more than a little bit... but the recliner on the sunroom porch is very comfy. 

My knee is feeling better and better... I went out and did lots of watering the other evening and it wasn't until I was completely done that I realized my knee hadn't bothered me at all... yeah!!  Fingers crossed it lasts a for a good long time... doctors say you can get 6, 12 maybe even 24 months from one PRP shot... I like the sound of that.

As for decor well I'm enjoying all my patriotic pieces... and there are plenty of them... here's the big display...

At the top is Welcome Summer by The Drawn Thread...

On the first shelf I have July from Prairie Schooler..

in the middle is a portion of Liberty Dwells by WTN&T...

and Flag Folk by Notforgotten Farm...

Moving down I have a Blackbird Designs piece from the book Souvenirs of Summer and another snippet by WTN&T  from Summer in Baltimore...

in the middle Grand Old Flag by WTN&T...

and finishing this shelf is Wee One Libby by Heart in Hand...

Moving down another shelf I have  Star Spangled Spectacular by  WTN&T  and a freebie from Marly at Samplers and Santas called  Liberty Star...

in the middle I have a couple of selections from Red, White and Bloom by WTN&T...

and finishing up with Hurrah! from Pineberry Lane...

whew... quite a collection don't you thing?  Plenty of patriotic!!  But you can never have too much patriotic or Christmas or Fall or snowmen or chickens or birds which is why I have so much of ALL of them...LOL

As for crafty stuff I worked on a couple of things... I picked back up Little House Needleworks Farmer's Market...

I want this done in the next 2 weeks when I plan on changing out the patriotic decor for some Summer and garden and chicken decor... and I think it will look really cute paired up with this ....

a small Debbie Mumm cookie jar with a great garden look!!! I found this on eBay... yes I need to stay off of eBay... but when you find treasures like this can you blame me? LOL

On the 4th of July I started my project for the #america250sal on IG... I'm doing the American Sampler by Primrose Cottage... 

this one fills all my wants for a sampler... a house, a great alphabet and a good border... I like that this one has multiple different borders... no boring borders... and I'm happy with how the colors are popping on this linen. I dyed it with Rit Evening Blue... got a little bit of mottling ...  now when I first started cross stitching 40 years ago my plan was that every piece I did would have a house and an alphabet... I erroneously thought that would limit what I would stitch... ROFL... as of this year I've stitched over 100 samplers and the majority do have a house on them... not very limiting was it???   And I have an idea for doing a couple more patriotic pieces so next year I could hang them on the wall next to the Eagle quilt...

see where I mean... I also want to do 3 pieces that are Christmasy to hang in that spot ... I have one completed... 

Prairie Schooler Christmas ABC's...

and one started...  Noel Sampler from WTN&T...

and there are 6 months left so maybe ....just maybe... this is a goal I can reach.... we shall see... not sure what I want for the 3rd piece. But I'm always planning and plotting ... just need to be more productive.

My plans for cleaning out the garage or the storage room did not materialize... I tried working in the garage on Monday but the humidity was stifling... I retreated to the AC... and we went out to dinner two different evenings with friends... that was nice. It was another HOT week and I'm hoping for the rain that is forecasted... one weather app says rain M/T/W/Th... and the other says W/Th... I played with my sprinkler system a bit ... it has a program that as I understand I should be able to push a few buttons and it would take over... but I don't seem to be pushing the buttons in the correct order... I watched a couple of videos and I thought I understood, but it's not working the way I want. Hopefully the company I bought it from will swing back and give me another lesson... that was suppose to happen last week but no one came... oh well... 

Plans for this week have Elliott on Tuesday  and a haircut on Wednesday but not much else...I'm good with that.  I picked up a couple more plants on Saturday to stick in the places where stuff didn't grow or where the deer made a meal out of a plant... just a little pick me up for the garden. It would help if it rains as that would make the ground softer.. fingers crossed that at least one of the weather forecasts is correct.

I'll link up with Kathy's Quilts and after looking around over there I'll see if I get anything productive done today... I started strong on Saturday but pooped out around 3pm... I'll blame it on the heat even though I was inside... oh well...

happy stitching-

carol fun 

Improvement & an abundance of sock yarn on a Slow Sunday...

Hello - well this will not be the 3rd week in a row that I open with whining and moaning... I have seen improvement this week with my knee... not totally pain free but much better... stopped taking the Tramadol as it made me sleepy and feel like a zombie...  and I'm only using Tylenol once or twice a day... and yesterday I walked 6000 steps!!! I think I'l  be able to do my 3 miles/7000 steps by the end of this week!!  And a less painful knee has improved my mental outlook and given me the motivation to put the Spring decor away (finally!!) and break out the red white and blue!!

Now I took my time... I spent a day just putting stuff away and then over a 2 day period I got all my patriotic stuff out... and here's a look at some of it. 

This is my favorite patriotic quilt... my own design... the background is all Ohio stars sorta joined together...don't remember where I found this eagle but he is handsome... all the fabrics are Debbie Mumm and this is so old I quilted it myself...in the ditch... it use to be wider and taller... I had to re-work it to fit into my smaller house so I took off the borders on the top and sides... and I've re-worked those leftover border pieces into table runners... oh so thrifty on my part...LOL (if you know me, you know "thrifty is not a quality I possess)... anyway I always love seeing this on the wall...

and the tier tray is decorated with the best patriotic houses from Melisa at Pinkernpunkinquilting... along with a teeny tiny Uncle Sam.

This is Freedom Saltbox...

This is Sarah Jane's 1776 Saltbox ... and she has more patriotic pretties on her blog and she generously give them away free... what a combination!

and this tiny Uncle Sam is from the Stitching with they Housewives chart called Proud to be an American...

On the back of the sofa I have one of my flag quilts (I'm up to 3 so far)... this one came from the book County Seat Quilts ....again all in Debbie Mumm fabrics... in fact ALL my patriotic quilts are in Debbie Mumm fabrics... I was a fan girl of hers from the very beginning... love her fabrics and her dishes and her knickknacks... they always make me HAPPY!!

I spent some time cruising eBay this week and was surprised how much Debbie Mumm merchandise I saw... and one piece kept calling to me and I decided it need to come to my house... it is this panel...

now back when this was first printed, I had oodles and oodles of Debbie fabric...in fact,  I bought yardage of this panel at a bargain price... and then I used it as a BACK!!  It is the back on the Eagle quilt on the wall!! But now I want to have the panel and hang it in my back hallway... and so I will... it should be here next week...

And I decorated the sunroom porch with patriotic stuff for the first time!  Not sure why I haven't done this before but I very happy I did it now...I did pick up a couple of new knickknacks for this display... I'll point them out...

It is looking quite nice, if I say so myself and I do!

Up top I have my latest FFO... Marcher of the Flag from Melisa at Pinkernpunkinquilting and  the other little lady waving a flag is from Chessie and Me, Lady Liberty... I substituted a chicken for the cat that was graphed... 

oh and the little statue of the gal waving a flag is a Debbie Mumm piece and...

 it is signed by Debbie...

 got it off of eBay a year or so ago... 

and the gal in the wagon is a snippet from Pineberry Lane Hurrah!... the wagon she's sitting in is a new knickknack I picked up at Michaels... 

Here is the bottom of the little shelf unit.... 

In the middle  I have my favorite patriotic shelf sitting, Lady Liberty, a purchase from Michaels a couple of years ago... and the little pillow is from Sew Emma's Patriotic TypeFACE ....

in retrospect I should have either changed the background color or stitched the words in a different color thread... it reads Lady Liberty -  Land of the Free -  Home of the Brave  - Red White and Blue... and that little bunting piece is a leftover from the Eagle quilt border... oh and the patriotic cow plate is a new addition... another Debbie Mumm purchase off of eBay... and I got a companion plate which is on the bottom shelf... 

who doesn't love a flag waving chicken??? and the cross stitch piece is Flag Maker  a freebie from Notforgotten Farm. 

I'm thoroughly enjoying this display from the comfort of my recliner out on the porch...

As for crafty stuff, remember when I said the 90 degree temperatures made me want to play with wool?  Well it has been upper 90's every single day this week and I've been knitting away... and shopping... how many times have I mentioned eBay so far?  I fell into it and the only way I could get out was to purchase stuff... and this time it was an abundance of sock yarn... 

I picked up these three vintage skeins of Opal Handgefarbt Pulloverwolle... manufactured circa 2010... 

They are hand dyed and they knit up with a pooling color pattern when you knit socks... like this pair I made back in 2013... 

I have high hopes that they will also pool nicely ... and if they don't I'll knit something else with them. 

And then I got this skein off of Amazon... 

and I paired it with this skein that was in my stash...

and I alternated the yarns every row and  this is how it turned out...

and I LOVE it!!  Now some people would have made changes so there wouldn't be that large swath of turquoise in the middle ... but not me... I really like it... kinda arty "negative" space... not sure that will happen when I knit the second sock but that will be okay too... my goal is to make as socks that are un-matchy ... each a unique creation...LOL... I'm crazy... but it's not the kind of crazy they can have you committed for... at least not at the moment... anyway I'm having a lot of fun knitting these as I have NO clue what it is going to look like till I get to the end. I decided to go with the lime-y green for the heels instead of  turquoise  which was my first choice... another "arty" decision on my part... 

Now this sock in all its glory is the sum total of my craftyness this week... I put a couple of stitches in that patriotic turkey but not enough to really matter. I felt like it took a couple of days to get the Tramadol out of my system and I was moving slow... and couple that with more social stuff than I anticipated ... which resulted in sitting and resting and knitting a mindless but colorful and intriguing sock...when I knit socks like this, alternating two stripe-y yarns it is like reading a book...you keep turning pages and  knitting rows cause you can't wait to see what is going to happen... I'll rewind one of these balls before I knit the next sock so there shouldn't be any repetition of pattern... another new story...LOL

I need to  dye/paint  some linen for the Primrose Cottage American Sampler I want to start on the 4th of July ... which is this coming Friday... where does the time go??? I got the fancy flosses for it and this will be my project for the SAL #america250sal on Instagram... 

Again... where does the time go?  The year is half over... someone I follow on IG who's birthday was June 25 gave her annual reminder that Christmas was exactly 6 months from that day... and in a blink of an eye it will be here ... next week is looking kinda open for me... Elliott is off with his parents to a reunion in Chicago for the week... Nick and I have plans to meet friends for dinner once or twice and I'll go work out with Anna... but no doctor or dentist appointments or unpleasant stuff... now I should take a day and either attack my messy garage or my messy storage room... but I'm not making any promises...and there is some work to be done in  the garden if the heat  breaks. We've got a forecast of a couple of rainy days and while I whined and moaned when it was such a  rainy rainy rainy Spring, right now I welcome any rain... I still have plenty to water... window boxes and pots... so even with the new sprinkler system I've been out in the yard for a considerable amount of time... and my water bill shows it... I never consider that everything I plant is gonna need water...lots of water... but they do... can't let them die after I paid for them and planted them, now can I?

I'll link up with Kathy's Quilts and see what pretties are posted over there... I hope you have a good week and a great 4th of July!  Fireworks are legal in Ohio now so there will be plenty going off in my neighborhood and I can usually see parts of different municipalities displays from my yard... no lack of red white and BOOM!  

happy stitching-

carol fun