As my mother would have said: "Oh my achin' back!" I got all four of the tops I aimed for basted. Dresden Plate, top; more Drunkard's Path Turtles, center; Pinwheel Nine Patch, bottom. Not shown is a Tumblers bed/table runner that I am going to turn into a pillow sham for a bolster for my bed. I was so tired when I got to it that I forgot to take a picture. I am thinking that I will do that one first so I can get it done and get it out of my way and onto my bed.

I got this 20 yard roll of batting online and I am quite happy with it. It is folded double on the roll and so is a bit inconvenient, but not badly so. It's more easily stored that way and that is huge in my limited space down here. I took two quilts off of it and pieced the other two from my tub of scrap batting, almost emptying that tub. It pays to save the scraps though, I got the last quilt and the runner out of scraps and that saved quite a bit of money. I finished up just before the boys started getting home from school. Sammy has a thing about my basting pins and if he sees any I am not going to use he asks if he can have them. He doesn't quite understand that even if  I didn't use them this time I probably will the next. I should just buy him a box and wrap them up for a present.

The Dresden Plate quilt is the biggest I have ever made at 120 by 120 inches. It just kept growing. It will truly be quilt wrestling when I get to it. I intend to do the smaller ones first just because I don't have much space to put basted quilts in while they are waiting to be quilted. Then also, I can prepare myself mentally for the job that quilting will be on the big one.

For now, also as my mother would have said, "I'm pooped!" I don't even know if I will be up to any hand work, at least until after a nap.

 I am doing the long sleeved dress. I am not making it as long either, not only does it use less fabric I would be constantly tripping over it.

This is the fabric, it's a fairly light-weight knit fabric. I don't care for most knits, but this one is OK. I don't think that it will take long to make it, I'm just so busy with alterations for the next week. I will get time after that.

 This is the first skirt, and it was just a hem. The longest part was cutting off the excess hem and that was only because my scissors are so dull. I need to get them sharpened.

This leather coat needed a new collar. The old one was badly worn but the owner just didn't want to give up his coat so he said just cover it, but that's doing it the hard way and I just cut it off made a new one of fabric and top-stitched it onto the stub of the collar that was left it was fast and easy and my sewing machine has no problems with leather. Ambrosina's couldln't have handled and I have to say my Viking couldn't either. My Juki is one tough girl!

So that is where I am at this week. Tomorrow I will be basting so I can quilt. The tops are starting to pile up again!

They are installing duct work for the remodel. David hasn't felt good so he hasn't done a lot, he has the virus the kids had last week. I told him he had better not give it to me, but he will probably share, he usually does; I don't imagine that with everyone else having had it I will escape. But until I do I have plenty to keep me busy.

I feel like I am still marking time, but there is a little bit more done. I have some alterations to do for a client and that makes me happy, I will have a little spending money. I got a printer on Monday so I am back doing a Dear Jane block a day. It's been so long since I did one I had to stop and get myself organized again. I also cut out a dress for myself this morning, it takes a lot longer than it used to, I have to keep stopping and sitting down! It will be lovely when it is done, it is a turquoise knit. I will try to have a picture tomorrow.

These are the two I have finished this week, sorry if they are a little blurry. Ambrosina and I were invited to lunch today and we enjoyed ourselves immensely. After we got home she had work to do so I took my car (the heater stopped working Monday natch!) and went on to a yarn store:

I got a sock book, but the yarn is for a sweater, I wanted pink and gray, but they only had brown so I settled for that. I don't know when I will get started on the sweater, I have a lot of hats and scarves yet to go, but it will give me something to look forward too. I also want some wool socks because my feet get so cold and I hate acrylic or polyester, and I love to knit socks!

Tomorrow I hope to get pictures of my dress and I will show the latest knitting project I am on but for now I am gong to get started on my afternoon's hand work.

So, I'm still not accomplishing a lot right now. Or, at least I don't have a lot to show for what I am working on. What will happen is I will finish a lot of things at the same time. My sewing corner is due to be torn up on Thursday because they have to run the vent for the bathroom down here up that corner of the dining room. The vent has to be above the highest drain in the house which is the bathroom upstairs. The bathroom wall will have to be broken into also.  Things are going slow because David isn't up to much these days. With tact I have to suggest that he go down and work for ten minutes and then if he still doesn't feel good he can always go lay down. He usually feels well enough to work for a couple of hours. What I didn't say was that I am sick of him sitting around feeling sorry for himself because he doesn't feel as young as he used to. Maybe I am learning wisdom in my aging years! I told that to Ambrosina and she laughed and said that he wouldn't have taken that well even though it may be true.

I have learned a new knitting technique called brioche. It is double sided and makes a soft, squishy fabric. It wouldn't be good for garments, but for things like scarves it's really nice. The above pictures are the reverse sides. It's fun to do but takes longer because each row has to be knit twice, once with each color.

There are a lot of patterns that I want to try, and since I have decided to knit scarves and hats for the whole family I will get plenty of practice. I can knit a hat in an after noon but the scarves take longer. I have been on the current one for four days but I have been working on a lot of other things at the same time so that has to be considered in. I do about 8 inches in an evening's knitting. It uses a lot of yarn too.

With one thing and another I am keeping busy although I don't yet have a lot to show for it. My printer stopped working and I have to get another one payday, so I will get behind in my schedule for paying off some bills so we can get a new car. I did factor in unexpected expenses when I made my plans because things always come up. Our lawsuit has been dropped and so our lawyer is helping us fill out the papers for debt forgiveness since they are doctor bills and we always qualify. We finally got David's first hip paid off from 12 years ago. Now we are working on his heart attack in Washington four years ago. We have never in our entire life together haven't been paying on doctor's bills, I don't know how we would feel if we ever got them paid off! It would be nice to find out.

Well anyway, that's where I am at in this point of time.

Motivation hasn't been strong these last couple of weeks. With everything torn up down here and most of my stuff outside under the back porch, under tarps, I can't get at anything to work. The loom is under plastic in a corner, under the stairs and I don't dare take the plastic off because of the dust. Things are piled everywhere here in the finished part of the basement. These are not complaints, I am quite happy that I am getting a bathroom down here, just an explanation why I am not feeling particularly inspired right now. It's more like I am marking time until things start up again.

 So this is the framing pretty close to done. This is Anthony's room which is in the southeast corner.

This is the northeast corner, the door on the left is the mechanical (furnace, hot water heater) laundry room/dye kitchen. The door on the right is the bathroom. I'm sorry the picture is blurry, I must have wiggled while I was taking it and didn't realize. There is not going to be a lot of room left over there so I am in the process of deciding which pieces of furniture have to go to new homes.

I have filled up another box for Goodwill, and the trunk you can barely see in the left hand corner is now going to Timothy and Rosa. All in the family. Getting rid of stuff has always been hard for me, but is character building, I suppose.

I haven't been working on Dear Jane because the printer isn't working, no surprise there it is over ten years old, and I haven't been able to print out the patterns. Something will have to be done about it, but we haven't decided what yet.

 These are the current hand work projects. I am making knitted hats and scarves for everybody.

And to satisfy my desire to make lace I alternate some crocheting with the knitting. This pattern is from that old Workbasket magazine that I made the doll sweater out of. The patterns assume quite a bit of experience and skill. One has to fill in between the lines and look at the pictures to figure out what they mean. I am not sure what I will do with it because lace doilies are not in style and nobody uses them any more, but I find it relaxing while I am sort of between projects.

Not earth shaking I know, but it's these sort of things that make life pleasant and enjoyable.

Anyway I thought I'd catch up, and now I have!

Crazy quilt Al Beasly's ties. It's not a very big quilt and I kept it simple. The blocks themselves have to be over 25 maybe 30 years and I felt it was time to get it done. I quilted some by hand in quilt-as-you go but decided to go a different route because I was never going to get it done. So now it's ready to quilt.

 If you can't read the date on this magazine it is August 1950, older than me!

Sometimes I get a hankering to make baby clothes, and I had some baby yarn that had been sitting around for quite a while. I really enjoy looking through all those old vintage magazines I have and this caught my eye. It took about a week to knit and now Grace has a sweater set to wear.

I've been sort of between quilts for the last few days and haven't been able to decide which direction to go. My printer isn't working so I haven't been able to print out any Dear Jane patterns. Don't know what is wrong with it but it's over 10 years old and I have a feeling it's ready to be replaced.
Well this quilt has been a long time in the planning and I have collected tons of lace over the years, and since everything was at hand I decided to give it a go. This block didn't take long so I don't think the quilt will take long, but I will only use a small part of the lace I have collected.

With the downstairs in such confusion and everything packed away, I feel like I'm sort of just marking time right now. I know that I have gotten several things finished but it doesn't really seem like I have accomplished much. Of course, the time change last weekend doesn't help much, everybody seems tired and listless this week.

However I need to get a grip on myself and start making some progress on something this afternoon. I can always decide on a new knitting project and that is always fun! There is nothing I enjoy more than starting a new project. I just don't want to add to the UFO tub when I am supposed to be emptying it!

 I am naming this quilt Al Beasly's Ties. Many years ago I had a long running joke with a friend of my husband's family about making his wild ties into a quilt. After he died I got his ties and made a start, but never finished. This UFO is at least 30 years old if not older. I was doing it all in hand work, but I will never get it finished that way.

 I got this row done in quilt-as-you-go fashion but I don't like doing it that way. I did a lot of hand embroidery on it so I am going to bind this finished row and make it into a table/bed runner. I have 30 blocks that I am putting into a top and will machine quilt that.

 I also have four blocks hand quilted and hand embroidered that I will turn into pillows because I just don't want to have to try to work them into rows. It's time this project was ! I could still do the hand work, I just want to focus on other things now and I don't want it sitting around any more gathering dust.

This is the first ply of my latest spin wound into a center pull ball ready to ply. I am afraid the picture doesn't do the colors justice. Tomorrow I will start the second spin. I am trying to do what is called a "fractal" spin but I think that I don't have enough different colors.

"A fractal is a pattern that repeats no matter how far you zoom in or zoom out. Its a pattern within a pattern. The Fractal Foundation has this neat little gif that sums it all up. But don’t look for too long."

This is a quotefrom Roving Crafters which gives a far better explanation than I ever could, but I don't think it will work so well when the colors are as similar as mine. It's very interesting and I thank them. It's fun trying though. When the remodel down here is finished I will have a place to do my dyeing and I will try hand painting a roving to try it on.

So now I am pretty well up to date on what is going on. I don't seem to have much energy right now and I am not getting a lot done and I don't seem to feel like doing much. I hope it's not the winter doldrums setting in early.

David went to the doctor this morning and she said that they will have to wait until it happens again before they can do anything more permanent. Can't wait, oh boy, the things we have to look forward too!

I have not been having a lot of time these last few days to get much done. A couple of Dear Jane blocks, but I am out of ink in the printer to print off the next paper piecing blocks so that will have to wait until payday.

 E-7 Bread Basket, for some reason the top left corner looks off in the picture, but it isn't, go figure.

E-8 Mama's Maze

E-9 Quilt Jail

So, yesterday, I was down here in the basement almost ready to go to meeting when Ambrosina comes running down and tells me dad is up in the bathroom and he needs me. Well, for her to do that means that it is something big so I go dashing up the two flights of stairs and there he is in the bathroom with his ankle spurting blood. I've never seen that much blood and that includes when Matthew cut his foot open with an axe. It looks like there has been an axe murder. I put pressure on his ankle and Ambrosia called 911 because it wasn't letting up.
Turns out he scratched his ankle and he has varicose veins one of which ruptured, this was a ten inch long steady stream under pressure, of course, so they got the bleeding under control and we went to the e-room. This is not all that uncommon in men his age and it is just one more of those ageing things we have to deal with.

The doctor said he is not surprised we came in and told me how to deal with it in the future, because if it happened once it is likely to happen again. Does add a bit of excitement to the afternoon. We are going to have to put him in compression socks. He goes to the doctor on Wednesday to check that all is ok and we are going to see if there is a long-term solution to the problem. He is fine although very tired from work on the basement and he took yesterday (naturally) and today off and is planning to start framing the walls tomorrow. We'll see.

Leon is going to take next week off because they didn't get as much done as they had hoped, which is never a surprise.

The new, bigger hot water heater is in, in it's new place and the sub-floor with rigid foam insulation under it is done. already I can feel a slight difference in the temperature down here. David loves doing framing he says he could do it in his sleep and they don't anticipate that taking long.

While I am waiting to get ink for my printer I dug out another UFO. This one is so old it wasn't even

in the UFO tub. A crazy quilt made of neckties. I squared up the blocks ready to join this morning. Some of the fabric is very beautiful, but made very ugly ties. More on this in a future post. I am running short of time and have a few more things I need to get done this afternoon. Hopefully I will have some time tomorrow to go into the history of some of the ties, and the plan I have for these blocks.

So until then...

Finished this morning. I named it "Ribbon Candy" because when I showed Ambrosina the top she said it looked like a bag of ribbon candy. This is a totally scrappy quilt and I think that some of the blocks lack definition, there is not enough contrast. It took me forever to quilt because of constant thread breakage. It is done though and I am glad!

This is the back. I tried to echo the ribbon candy effect in some of the borders by doing a back and forth pattern across them. I really like how the quilting looks. I don't usually do backs all one color because I don't often have enough of any one fabric, but I got a big roll of drapery fabric at a thrift shop. I hope to do it this way more often but we will have to see how the finances work.

In another finish this week, these gloves. I have never knit gloves before. I found they were fast and easy. They look better on than they do here where they are blocked and on a towel. When they are dry I am going to add some "bling" by embroidering some beads and sequins on the back. They are for a bridal gift for a winter wedding, for someone who likes bling. Ambrosina is doing the wedding gown so I know what the bride likes.

 So here we are on the basement project. The drains passed inspection this morning and they are framing the floor. The new, bigger hot water heater is going in this afternoon and they are trying to get that done as well as the floor framing so they can be inspected before the weekend. Our room down here is filthy from all the dust they have created, but once the floor is done I can get some of the worst dirt cleaned up. This is not a complaint, I am so happy to have a bathroom down here I would dance if I could do the moves!

Nearly ready to start work. Almost everything is moved out. The loom is going to be covered in plastic, I wouldn't risk it out under the porch. It has been a lot of work to get it to this point and I haven't had time to do much else.

This isn't going to get any better until the other side is done. I have put everything away that can be put away but there is a lot of stuff there from the other side that I will want handy while they are working over there. I guess as long as we can get through to the stairs we will be all right.

This is my next spin, it's going to be a long one because I am spinning lace weight. Or trying to, I think it would be better on the small wheel but it has now been put in storage until the other side is done so I am making do with the bigger wheel. I am trying a new technique and it is taking a bit of effort, but worth it as it will improve my skills. I love the colors in this roving, which I purchased because I fell in love with the colors.

I have been quilting a little every day but not a lot. Only about an hour or so a day, I've been so busy elsewhere. Still having trouble with the thread breaking so it's very slow. Maybe that accounts for my lack of enthusiasm.

We had snow yesterday and it's cold. Sigh.

I finished this scarf yesterday, it's knitted in a technique called entrelac, one of my favorite styles of knitting.

So I have had a very busy week, I won't be able to do much more down here in the basement, at least until it's time to do the finishing so maybe I'll get back into a routine again. It will be so lovely to have the whole basement heated so I can use it. And no more dirt the way it has been. Also no more trudging up and down the stairs for the bathroom. I am so looking forward to having it done, I can hardly wait!

I know I promised these yesterday, but I was so tired, as well as busy that I ran out of time. I am mostly packed up with the other side but it all has to be moved out under the back porch and covered against the weather. I have about two weeks to get done so I am doing pretty well.

 E-2 Merry May

 E-4 Buffalo Tree Hopper

 E-3 Paddle Wheel

 E-1 Aunt Essie's Phlox

 E-5 Rising Sun

E-6 Michelle's Medly

I haven't been doing a lot of sewing. I have been cleaning and sorting down here. That will be done in another week and then I can back into my regular routine. If I didn't have a definite goal in view I don't think I could keep at it so hard, my back and legs are killing me! It will be worth the work. I can't wait!