A giant skeleton chicken and fabric detours on a Slow Sunday...

Hello - well as I sit down to write this I realize that I have very little to say and even less to show... Was there actually 7 days in the last week?  I seriously think one or two went missing in my world... and I can't even blame it on a lot of appointments that took me out of the house. Just the normal stuff... working out, watching Elliott and dinner with friends... okay three dinners out with friends... but I had to eat either way and so I can't figure out why that sucked up so much of my time... but it did. 

Halloween was great here in SW Ohio... first time in several years that we didn't have rain or snow or cold or any combination of those weather factors. Temps were in the 40's and we had TONS of kids stopping by. We went through almost two HUMONGOUS bags of candy from Costco and I only got like 3 Almond Joys... they are my favs!  Now I finally got a chance to put out my skeleton chicken... it is 8 ft tall... I was waiting because I didn't want to have to move it when the lawn got mowed.  I put it right by the front door so I could keep an eye on it with my Ring doorbell...

I'm pretty sure this solidly cements my reputation among my neighbors as being a crazy old lady...LOL

As far as crafty stuff I just bounced from project to project to project... we had several days of gray and rain earlier in the week, perfect for hunkering down in my sewing studio but each project I started ran into a road block so I had to detour to something else. 

First was these snowball blocks...

this fabric was left over from the giant Lemoyne star quilt I showed last week. I had purchased a FQ bundle  of the Tiny Christmas collection by Lizzie House, and had cut out at least one if not two 10" squares out of each FQ which left a nice chunk to play with. I cut the remaining fabric into  5" squares and I'm adding 1.5" connector corners... except I'm running out of the corner fabric. More has been ordered... and then an email popped up which showed snowball blocks like this being turned into ornaments... you add a rectangle of a gray fabric to the top and then add more background around the other 3 sides... I thought I saved the email but I can't find it... but I think it would be a really cute variation... once I get more background fabric I'll see if it is doable. I did get 94 5" squares cut out of the leftover FQs... but I'd like to have 99... a throw with 9 blocks across and 11 down...  I have a piece I'm saving for pillow cases and I think I can squeeze it out of that fabric.

So since I'm waiting on additional fabric for this project another shiny object caught my eye... I saw this pattern ... 

and  you know how I LOVE hexagons. I thought this would make a great wall quilt for my living room... but it needs to be bigger than the pattern shows. Well I didn't buy the pattern I'm just winging it. I cut the hexagons from 5" squares. This fabric is Christmas Faire from Cathe Holden and I made this quilt out of it last year...

Here's where I am so far... 

by my calculations I need it to be 11 hexagons at the widest.... and AGAIN I'm running out of fabric but I found more on Etsy. It hasn't been delivered yet either. But  then I will have enough to do a tree that has 11 hexagons at the base. The background fabric came out of my stash...it has been there a long long time... and it has no identifying info on the selvedge... not that I'd be able to find more in any case. It is a random speckle that is a gold metallic with a definitely green-y cast.  I think I have enough fabric to do this ... I hope I do... there was about 4 yards ... fingers crossed it will be enough. 

I'm starting at the top and working my way down... if I run out I'll make the tree smaller ...and if that doesn't work out for the wall quilt I planned I'll make it again with some other fabrics and a background that I can get more yardage of. 

So since that project also got put on hold I broke out another project... this is the Dorothy pattern done in Momo fabrics. 

I started this in December of 2023 and it held my attention for about a month ... and then got put in a plastic bin to mature. I still like this a lot... and I have a ton of squares cut and ready to sew together... but lots of them are directional... and my OCD requires them to be in the proper orientation at all times... so I'm trying to sew ten at a time that read correctly horizontally and then ten more that read correctly vertically. 

I thought I had cut out all the squares that I needed, but in reading back in the blog I saw that I'm 34 units short... so more fabric needs to be cut... I still have a healthy stash of Momo so I'll be okay there. No need to wait for more fabric... shocker... LOL

Again this week I did very little cross stitch and I really need to get that BBD The Bells of Christmas Day done if I want it framed this year.

I did knit a little, but as was my pattern this week I ended up knitting on 3 different socks and none are complete. I'm also losing interest on the 2 of the socks I have on my needles...might have to start another project...

I'm hoping to take down the Halloween stuff today and get out the Thanksgiving stuff. We shall see if the spirit moves me. The weather this upcoming week looks dry and not too cold... and Dan said he could bring me the dump trailer mid week... so I can get started on cleaning out the garden beds. I estimate it is going to take Nick and I  several days to do this ... fingers crossed my knees hold up to the job. 

I've been seeing lots of cute Christmas cross stitch I'd like to play with... and some snowmen too... I like my snowmen as inside characters but I've watched several weather videos with long range forecasts for this upcoming winter and it appears we are going to have a cold snowy one. Not looking forward to that. I understand why people like to go to Florida in January and February... smart people... if I didn't watch Elliott every week I'd seriously consider being a bit of a snowbird... sigh... someday.

I'll link up with Kathy's Quilts today. Part of me wants to sit and veg but there is stuff I should get done. 

Hope you have a good week ahead... mine looks pretty standard for me... working out with Anna, Tuesday hanging with  Elliott, and a lunch or dinner out with friends I'm sure will happen. 

happy stitching-

carol fun

Oh wait wait... it is time again for my semi-annual rant about the time change... I've been railing against changing the clocks since I started this blog back in 2010 and my opinion has not changed one bit!!! Now I know this one is a bit easier to deal with than when we jump forward and lose and hour,  but I still detest it... it messes me up for two weeks... and I know I'm not the only one... you understand if you've ever had to deal with a toddler or a hungry pet... they don't operate on this arbitrary adjustment,  they are tuned into their internal clock...as they should be. If Arizona can stay on the same time year round what is the reason the rest of us can't do that?  I use to think it was just a giant plot to get you to buy batteries for your smoke alarm, but smoke alarms now days have lithium batteries that last like 10 years. I know they say to follow the money but I'm not sure who benefits from this, but I know it isn't me!! Okay, I'll climb off of my soapbox, carefully... don't need to fall. 

signed a cranky old lady