The Weekend Wrap-up

And what a fabulous weekend it was, too.  The weather started out more like winter, but it ended up very spring-like.  And it was a productive weekend, with a nice chunk of T-time.

Friday morning came dark and early, but the up-side was a longer day spent with my needle and thread.  I continue to make more progress on the quilting and will be going back to add some more quilting to accentuate the secondary design, in hopes to draw it out.  This quilt reinforces what I read over at Kathy’s blog that each quilt is practice for the one that follows.  I’ve learned some lessons with this quilt … even after quilting for 30 years, I still have a lot to learn. 



Saturday was a busy day.  After putting off some housecleaning, I finally bit the bullet and got some work done around the house.  I didn’t do *everything* that needs to be done, but I did make good progress at getting caught up … only to realize (once again) that with housecleaning, you NEVER get caught up.  <sigh>

I also baked the carrot cake for Easter, something I do every Easter.  I laugh every time I pull out the recipe because the description reads: “a moist, healthy and nutritious cake”.  Seriously?  What about the 2 cups of sugar and the 1-1/2 cups of vegetable oil?  or the 3-1/2 cups of confectioner’s sugar in the frosting?    On a side note, is there really any difference between frosting and icing?

While the cake was baking, I cleaned our hardwood floors.  And as the cake was cooling, I cleaned the bathrooms.  I know … I was a regular Susie Homemaker.  ha! 

But that wasn’t the only thing I did as the cake cooled.  I also cut and sewed together the April BOM selected by the Facebook quilting group I belong to.  It probably took me twice as long as it should have, as my seam ripper got quite a workout (I sewed two pieces together wrong – two times! Grrr).  This block provided another lesson learned.  While it wasn’t perfect, it turned out much better than I’d expected, especially my HST squares.  I’ll wait to reveal the block at the end of the month after I’ve shared it with the group, but I will share the fabrics I chose.  I’m hoping to be able to use that neutral in every block, with blues and reds from my stash … we’ll see if I have enough. 

While keeping DH company as he was cooking our dinner out on the grill, I noticed that our cherry tree had finally started to bloom.  It’s official: Spring has sprung!



We celebrated Easter with our favorite people.    We attended worship together, hunted for eggs while the ham and potato casserole baked, had a fabulous lunch and enjoyed the nice weather outside.  DSIL’s sister and her foster child (thus the photo editing) were able to be with us (her hubby was on the road for work and wasn’t able to be come up with them). 

We finished up our weekend, watching the Cardinals and the Blues win (yes, we switched back and forth ... and were amazed that we able to tune in to the Blues game in time to see both goals).  



And while neither one of these were delivered over the weekend, I want to share a couple of upcoming quilt projects.

This is a 45” round holiday wholecloth.  After seeing Kathi use colored threads on her wholecloth quilt, I saw wholecloth quilts in a new light.  No offense to any wholecloth quilters out there, but I always thought that they were rather boring … all the same color.  While handquilting is my favorite part of quilting, I want a pretty quilt when I’m done, so I’ve always preferred a patchwork quilt.  I’m envisioning this with green and red threads, with maybe a yellowy-gold for a few accents.  I think it might make a nice tabletopper for Christmas.

And before I took up quilting lo these many years ago, I did a lot of embroidery.  I’ve been seeing a lot more quilts lately that have been including some embroidery, and I decided that I wanted to make a quilt with embroidery.  It took me a while to find a pattern I wanted to make, and every time I’d search, I’d always find myself going to Crabapple Hills’ Over the River and Through the Woods.  I plan to use navy thread and fabrics instead of black … at some point I need to go through my stash as I have a lot of navy and see if I might need to add some more.



I hope that whatever you have planned for today includes a little something that brings you joy ... have a great day!
Kathy