An Expensive Week!

    It's been a very expensive and educational week here at Sugar Meadow. Things are breaking right and left, and home insurance, car insurance, even the AAA Gold membership we have paid for over the last 30 years covers none of it, as the various bureaucracies informed us. If you have ever thought that it's all and only about sewing here in Blogland, you are mistaken. But one of the benefits of being older (there are many) is that you can shrug off bad news fairly easily-- we've done it all, haven't we? No one is hurt and we've been able to get out of trouble as quickly as we've gotten into it. And the best news-- my sewing projects were only slowed down a little!

    Back to the happy world of Blogland... this happened over the weekend!

   A Ribbon Runs Through It is a completed top... all 5,000 pieces. The requisite amount of time pinning and groveling about the concrete floor has been served... my knees loved every minute!

     If I may say so, I did a beautiful job piecing this quilt... those little squares are 1/2"! I always took the time to go back and pick out seams where my points got chopped, or sew a seam a little tighter where they missed. The finished size was supposed to be 99-1/2" x 99-1/2" and it came out exactly that. I think history will judge me very kindly as the maker of this quilt. <3

     The instructions by Lynne Wilder of Sew 'n Wild Oaks were very well written, and special thanks to Fat Quarter Shop for offering this sew-a-long. You all got me through my mom's illness and a stressful move as I secretly did a little sewing each month at night.

     I'm looking at another Lynne Wilder pattern-- The Country Charmer-- or maybe I'll finally switch over the the Barn Sampler... it looks easy now! (No, she's not standing on the quilt.)

     The quilt fits perfectly on our queen size bed-- I can only attribute that to pure luck, because I never check the size of a pattern before buying it, do you? I just go by looks-hehe. Hoping to get it sent out for quilting by the end of the month-- even if my longarm was assembled at this point in time, it wouldn't fit!

     I finished my February Sew Sampler box in four days-- it still has to be quilted. These boxes are easier to complete than I thought. I'm really looking forward to having a stack of gift pieces ready to go. With the extra time before the March box, I went back and started my Cupid Box. In addition to the monthly boxes, Fat Quarter Shop does four special boxes a year-- you don't have to subscribe, so it's a good place to jump in if you just want to try one. The pattern was a striped heart on a gray background, not my favorite, so here I am in left field again, making up a jelly roll pattern for the provided strips as I go along. I love it!

     This is as far as I got with the 20 jelly roll strips provided... I broke another promise to myself, and ordered more of the Heatherlee Chan XOXO fabric. I think my stash is getting as fusty, dusty old as I am-- I tried to add from it, but none of the colors matched, none of the patterns were fresh enough-- I had the same problem trying to add to the February box. My son's fiancé would love this-- he's a mechanic and there's red trucks and other vehicles throughout-- perfect for a late engagement gift. So that's what I heard in my head  as I pressed the order button for about six more yards.

 It has been a ton of fun, like a puzzle-- I love a puzzle, and I might even write a pattern for it on my Etsy shop. Here's what I'm working toward:

The big outside border is this beautiful watercolored floral and brings the size of the quilt to a respectable 54" x 54." I will definitely have this done by the time the July Liberty Box comes along!

In other happy news, Sugar Meadow has produced it's first maple syrup! That's our Sugar Shack in the background-- what a process to turn 40 gallons of sap into 1 gallon of syrup. 

    The artist-in-residence and her fiancé have figured it all out on their own. The kids put it the syrup up on their Etsy shop and the entire first year's estimated production is sold out-- there's a waiting list at this point!

    Finally, the meadow has a porcupine! Another cute Winter Twist animal, or a varmint that destroys acres of forest each year?

     At first, we thought he was a real cutie pie--he moves only slightly faster than a sloth and appeared to be waving at us from the trees. Even better-- he was leaving me the gift of "sewing needles" everywhere!

    Then, we noticed he ate the bark off an entire tree! Even if you only take the bark off a tree in a small ring, the tree dies-- sap can't flow up and down to nourish the new leaves. After that discovery, it then became war, as we Googled up ways of getting rid of him-- trapping, coyote urine, pepper spray... lethal force is not recommended, as then you have a spiny body to get rid of!

So far, he's made a total fool out of us.

    So that was my week. It's "Spring Forward" Sunday, but I have to confess the past few days sucked any spring I had out of me. I'm ready for some warmer weather-- but not before a few more long winter's naps.

xox

Carol