Getting Back in the Swing of Things

 Turns out I didn't escape Covid after all. That being said, the only day I felt really bad was the day I tested negative. My main complaints have been canker sores and clogged ears. I don't even have many sinus issues, just a slightly runny nose, so I'm surprised my ears clogged, but I have a long history of ear infections. My first bout with Covid the only symptom I had was cold sores, and I haven't had any this go around, but canker sores inside my mouth, yup! 

Since I only had one day of feeling sick, I've still been getting quite a bit done. 

I framed out these blocks I had made at the hotel from bonus HST's. Now those bonus HST's will make yet another throw sized quilt, which is the size of the original quilt they were from. 

I've done a bunch of cutting, so I've got plenty of piecing to keep me busy, but I'm also back to assembling quilt blocks I've had hanging around way too long into quilts. Last night I pressed rows for four quilts, and today I'll start sewing those rows to each other. 

I finally got my Janome all set up for FMQ. I hadn't even plugged it in since I got back from being out of town. I have to finish the quilt I was working on when we left town, and getting back into a quilt that's half quilted is somehow much harder than starting to quilt a new one. I know that about myself, which is why I'm going to make myself finish the half quilted quilt before I can start quilting another one. I only have one more quilt basted after this, so I need to work on basting some quilts as well. 

Although I do enjoy FMQ now, sometimes I still wish I had a longarm that was computer guided, just so I could load a quilt and then let the computer do the quilting while I piece. That's way outside of my price range, so it's just not going to happen, but hey, a girl can dream right? I'd still FMQ some quilts myself, but I make a lot of quilts with donation in mind, and those would be nice to get finished faster and on their way. 

I've been thinking about my next basting spree, and with the dogs here, I'm not going to baste any big quilts in the living room. I can baste up to a twin size on my cutting table with a minimal amount of shifting the layers around, so I think I'll just try to get several of my smaller quilts basted and ready to quilt. Seeing a pile of basted quilts that won't take long to quilt might be all the encouragement I need to dive in and start finishing up the backlogged quilt tops. I can keep the dogs out of the basement so that's a better solution for now. 

If I'm going to be basting a bunch of quilts, I need to buy a roll or two of batting. I've got a roll of Warm and Natural, but I'm out of poly and 80/20. I don't often use Warm and Natural for donation quilts just because of cost. I do use it sometimes, but replacing it is so costly, I'm not keen to do it often. I'll have to do some shopping around and see what I can find. Any of you have any favorite places to buy batting without spending a fortune? I like to buy queen sized rolls. 

Covid in the House

 What a week! On Sunday DH got sick, and I mean really sick. He was shaking so badly from high fever that he was really miserable. I kept taking his temperature, 102, 103, we were giving him Tylenol and Ibuprofen and weren't really having any luck keeping it down. In the evening he was acting off, and I took his temp. 106.3! I was in disbelief, so I took it twice more, 106.3, 106.4. Even if our thermometer was off, it was really high. I told him hospital or shower. He opted for the shower, which I knew he would. He was acting a bit weird, but not seizing or delirious, so I figure our thermometer was reading high. I was pretty worried at any rate. We knew he had been exposed to covid, so we tested him. Positive, crap. He had to get a PCR test for work, and that was positive too.

I've read lots of first hand stories of how people's covid experience went, and DH's has been different from any of those. He ran high fevers for the first two days. Then he got all achy, he had one day of diarrhea, and now he's got a minor cough and runny nose. For the most part, he's only had one or two symptoms at a time. Thankfully he's had no breathing issues at all, and he's feeling much better than earlier in the week. 

I've been sleeping in a different room, and washing my hands constantly. Yesterday I felt pretty lousy, but I'm not sure it wasn't just lack of sleep. Today I feel fine with the exception of a slight cough, but my covid test was negative. It's allergy season here, and I have pretty bad seasonal allergies, so it could just be that. 

This wasn't a great week sewing wise, since I wanted to be near if DH needed something. I have been cutting quite a bit this week, so I've got several projects ready to go. 

I did manage to finish all the blocks for clue three of the Ruby Jubilee mystery in Quiltmaker magazine. I did quite a bit of ripping in the basket blocks and the blocks on the lower right, for some reason they just weren't making sense to me. I wasn't getting a lot of sleep this week, so that probably had a lot to do with it. I've been sewing on several different projects, but now that I've got clue three finished, I stuck these blocks in the project box with the other Ruby Jubilee blocks, and that can stay put away until I get the next magazine. 

Since DH had Covid, my dishwasher is still broken. I had to cancel the repair appointment. I was really wishing I could wash the dishes on the sanitize cycle, but that wasn't an option. I just used as hot of water as I could stand. My mom used to put a capful of bleach in the dishwater if we were sick, but I didn't have any bleach, so that wasn't an option either. 

DD#2 offered to do a grocery run for us, but I usually keep the house fairly stocked with food, so going a week or two without groceries is doable, even if I have to get creative. I did end up getting a couple things delivered, like shelf stable milk, because I knew if I got sick it could be a while longer. I didn't even end up cooking much this week, and instead just pulled a couple meals from the freezer that I cooked previously. I've always been big on freezing some meals ahead of time, for when life gets crazy.

We were supposed to be hosting a birthday party on Sunday for one of our granddaughters, but that's been postponed. We don't want to be spreading the virus. 

Since I feel fine today, and DH is feeling better, I'm trying to get caught up on the household chores I let slide. I'll be doing quite a bit of laundry today. I'm also hoping to finish cutting out a log cabin quilt. I prefer cutting the logs to size rather than sewing longer lengths on then trimming. I find the blocks stay square better if everything is accurate from the beginning. 

Expensive Days

 Life has been expensive lately. I found out the dishes I got for wedding gifts that we've been using for 38 years have toxic heavy metals in the designs. I searched all over the internet for something I'd like to replace them, and I finally settled on Corelle Cherish.

I decided since the designs were what were problematic with my old dishes, I wanted no paint on my new dishes, but I didn't want something too plain, so I went for embossed dishes. DH and I went around a bit on how many place servings to get. I wanted a service for 12, he thought a service for 8 was sufficient. I always use paper plates when I have a houseful, but if I only have one family and maybe an extra or two, I use real plates. Since one of my daughters who is in state has a family of six, once you add DH and I we are already at 8, and if they come often my MIL or my sister are here, so I made the case for 12 place settings (which is what I got). 

I'm still looking for an all white tea set. Prices nowadays are ridiculous on everything! All white suits me fine, because I have a milk glass collection, so now my everyday stuff more closely matches that. 

Besides replacing all my dishes, my dishwasher broke! I had donated my dish drainer in the big purge last year, so I needed a new one. I looked at Amazon and saw most were running around $80!!! I wasn't paying that, so I checked Target. They had a tiny one for $10, but most of the larger ones were in the $40 range! DH and I went to Dollar General, and I bought the only one they had, which was $8. I also bought a couple drying mats for $5 each, since I knew the dish drainer would work for dishes, but not for pots and pans and such. I've got a repairman coming on Monday, and while he's here I'm going to have him check to see if the ice maker in my freezer can be fixed. That broke a couple years ago, and I've just been doing without. If I'm going to be paying for appliance repairs, I may as well see if they all can be fixed. 

My Bernina still hasn't gone in for servicing. It's still sewing just fine, but it's overdue for servicing, and I mean way overdue. As soon as I get over the sticker shock for the appliance repairs, I'll see about getting it to the spa!

I have proof my Bernina is sewing OK. Today I made outfits for two of my grandsons. The other day they were over and had gotten their shorts wet. They wanted to change clothes but I didn't have any spare clothes for them. The five year old chimes in with, "You can make us some, come on brother, let's go pick fabric for the clothes Nana is going to make us!" He grabbed the three year olds hand and marched them both downstairs to the fabric room. All you grandmothers out there know you've been assigned a task at that point. 

The younger one chose motorcycle fabric. He turned three today, so I put three motorcycles on the shirt. I happened to have two red t shirts in their sizes, so I just appliqued on those. 

The older one wanted VeggieTales fabric, so I did what I could to make the shirt look like Bob the Tomato. 

As far as quilty sewing goes, I'm piecing on my Singer 201. I've sewn a couple quilts into rows while finishing up my Modern Technology blocks. I find assembling rows a pretty easy leader/ender project. Sewing the rows to each other is not great to do as leader/enders. I've also been working on clue three of the Ruby Jubilee mystery in Quiltmaker magazine. I'm not finished yet, but I like the stuff I've made so far.

One of the quilts I'm assembling is just a little one made from units that were hanging around. I snapped a photo when I stuck it on the design wall.

I had a bunch of pinwheels, but most were brown. I decided to try a Trip Around the World setting, and I ended up with only about six to eight units left, not enough for another row, so I figured that was close enough. I have a couple fabrics in stash that would make good borders for this. I still have three rows on the design wall, I'm not quite done sewing rows. 

Slowly, but surely, I'm getting back into the groove of being at home without a houseful of people!

Trying to Get My Mojo Back

 April was weird, busy, but weird. I was really thrown off by the change to my routine. March I didn't have a regular routine either, I spent most of March in a hotel sewing away. I got a ton of sewing done in March. In April, not so much. The only sewing I got done in April at all was the 34 bowl cozies.

Now it's May, I wonder what May has in store.

The first good thing in May, is that DH was named one of the Fabulous 50 nurses in Tucson.

https://tucson.com/howard-rains/article_87ce67fc-c591-11ec-a113-bb063cab7a4a.html

I know he's a very good nurse, and it is nice to see him recognized for that. I am very proud of him! 

DH is now back at home, which is very good! He's done with the assignment at the other hospital, which is great! Of course, he was exposed to Covid his first day back at work here, so we'll be hoping nothing comes of that. Those three weeks we were apart were the longest we've been apart since his Army days. 

It's funny, when I got home at the beginning of April, I knew just which things I needed to do next in the sewing queue. Since I went so long without getting back to those projects, I'm struggling a bit getting back in the swing of things.

I did get my new Quiltmaker magazine, and I've cut out all the pieces for clue three in the Ruby Jubilee mystery. Cutting for sampler quilts takes SO much longer than cutting for a bunch of the same blocks. Since I have so few of each shape to cut, I'm just rotary cutting. I have really learned something about the way I work best when rotary cutting. I want to use the smallest ruler I have that will get the job done. I know a lot of people use a 6x24 ruler to cut everything, and if that's your style, great! I love rulers, and I have a LOT of them. I didn't buy them all at once, and I never buy a ruler at full price, but over the years I've accumulated a lot of rulers. I have so many square rulers, it's crazy. If I have to sliver trim units, which I hate doing, it's a little less detestable if I have the right size square to use for trimming. I have the EZ angle ruler in three different sizes. The Companion ruler in two sizes. I have four sizes of Stripolology rulers, one of which I would never buy again, but the other three I use. I have June Tailor Shape cut rulers in three sizes. Did I mention I really have a thing for rulers? It's true I like to use the smallest ruler I can for whatever I'm cutting. I find using a ruler that's too large, especially for cutting triangles, just makes the job harder than it needs to be. If you have a hard time cutting accurate triangles, try using a smaller ruler if you can, and see if it helps. 

This morning, I finally unpacked the tote I had at the hotel in March.

I threw this quilt up on the design wall. I made all of these blocks at the hotel, and it will be a fun throw sized quilt. 

I got some sewing done, and I got all the units done for another set of blocks for my Modern Technology quilt. At the hotel I was easily getting one set of blocks sewn per day, but now that I'm home, and I'm dog-sitting as well, there's a lot of interruptions. These dogs are not used to me being downstairs in my sewing room, so I'm going up and down stairs a lot to be the dog valet and let them outside then in. 

I'm trying to get back in the cooking every day habit as well. When DH was gone I ate sandwiches, or even cereal for dinner. Now that he's home and I have someone to cook for, I'm back to cooking. We're having chicken gnocchi soup for dinner tonight, yummy!

I caught up on the laundry easily enough, even though he came home with a suitcase full of dirty laundry. I'm one of those weird people who actually likes doing laundry. 

Our train trip will be coming up before we know it, and I've been looking for certain things we'll be wanting to take. We're traveling light, a carry on and backpack per person, plus a duffle bag if we need it. I bought new carry on suitcases. Ours were about 20 years old and not in the best shape. I've been told it's good to have a refillable water bottle on the train. I have a purple one I use regularly, but the other day at Tuesday Morning, I found this.

It will keep things hot or cold, so I may bring this instead! Now I'm thinking I may need to get my solid scraps together and make this pattern into a quilt. 

DD#1 not only has dogs, cats, a rabbit, chickens, ducks, and goats, now she's getting pigs! She ended up getting one more pig than planned. Someone she knew had a litter of pigs go badly, and the mama pig and all the babies but one died. Without a mama, the surviving baby was not going to make it. DD#1 has a goat in milk, and goat's milk is a suitable substitute for pig's milk. 

This video was taken when Hamlet was two days old. Isn't he a cutie?

That's one happy piglet!