Nature's first green is gold, Her hardest hue to hold. Her early leaf's a flower; But only so an hour. Then leaf subsides to leaf. So Eden sank to grief, So dawn goes down to day. Nothing gold can stay.
-- Robert Frost
Although weather-wise, The Onset is probably more appropriate.
Written at:
2/26/2006 08:57:00 PM
A little bookkeeping stuff today. Blogger problems persist so archives are incomplete and posting is erratic. Despite it all, I managed to update the links at right to include the newest quilt, current postcards and a link to my folks' website.
Meanwhile in the kitchen is brewing some really excellent beef mushroom barley soup. Tonight -- some postcards perhaps if I can figure out how to do the stitching part. Or if there's not any instantly apparent answer there, there's always the piecing to begin.
Today was pretty bright, cold and blowing here in upstate NY. Pretty wintery feeling. Guess March will be coming in like a lion, eh?
One thing about mindless, often boring television: it gives you lots of opportunities to do something else. In my case, it was laying out all my squares. Now some would pooh-pooh this as an even bigger waste of time, but I think it lets me choose what specific fabric square I want and see how it's going to look as I go along. Anyway, without further ado:
As promised, here are the rest of the players in the new quilt.
I have about two-thirds or more of it cut into squares now, so it's looking a little tidier than it does here. Here's a properly-oriented look at the strips.
Do I get extra judging points for having two fabric-related posts in a row?
CNN reports on the big wind that we had here Friday and, to a lesser degree, today.
the National Weather Service reported a wind gust of 143 mph on Stratton Mountain, had about 7,000 customers without power, and about 1,800 customers were blacked out in Massachusetts.
There were some small branches down in my yard, which probably accounts for the banging that the cats and I heard throughout the night. The neighbor's guinea hen was out and around this morning looking for some stray sunflower seeds. When I filled the bird feeders, I found two lovely feathers: black with white spots.I debated what to do today. The Dance Flurry was cancelled since there's still a lot of areas to the north that are without power. I feel bad for the organizers. What happens when you have a lot of spaces, teachers and musicians lined up and Mother Nature intervenes? Although the web site said there would be very limited events during the day today, tonight they apparently had a benefit swing dance and concert somewhere. That sort of thing is what keeps event organizers awake at night.
People still talk about the tornado that came through the Albany area the Sunday night of NYQuilts! one year. Although we had a small flood and had to huddle in the basement hoping that the quilts wouldn't blow away above us, it was nothing compared to the extreme damage done 30-40 miles away.
I remember driving home that night in the remnants of the storm: downpour, lightning, thunder... Got home and no power. Sat in the dark, starving, exhausted. Full of all the things that could have been.
My thoughts are with the Flurry folks!
After a yummy dinner I went up and pulled out a lot of fabric. OK, my sewing room is a disaster, but I'm closing in on having my new quilt's stuff chosen. Who knew I had SO few browns? Don't I have more olives? What's up with that?
I don't know, but since it's been in the low teens for hours, playing with fabric seems like a great idea. Much better than driving around the breezy freezy countryside.
Quiet day at work today after an un-planned for day off yesterday. I had a very nice day yesterday, doing a couple of important errands and then having dinner with the folks. Tonight I did exciting things like pay some bills, put the backs onto my postcards and wrote in my titles. Virginia will get a nice little package of postcards from Mom and I and hopefully the April fundraiser will be a success.
I spent some time at lunch today thinking about the next quilt. I have a couple different ideas both on general idea and construction ideas. How's that for vague?
I really enjoyed the sky on the way to work this morning: very high feathery clouds mixed in with some nice repetitively-lobed ones. And there was this strange thing. This morning while I was brushing my teeth, a bright area appeared on the wall in front of me. When I looked outside to see where the light was coming from, there was the really big bright light in the sky! I'd sort of forgotten what it looked like.
Finally, dear Susan informs the world about the newest star in the punctuation world. I'm thinking I'll keep working on using the old ones correctly.
Written at:
2/15/2006 11:54:00 PM
Quiet day at work today after an un-planned for day off yesterday. I had a very nice day yesterday, doing a couple of important errands and then having dinner with the folks. Tonight I did exciting things like pay some bills, put the backs onto my postcards and wrote in my titles. Virginia will get a nice little package of postcards from Mom and I and hopefully the April fundraiser will be a success.
I spent some time at lunch today thinking about the next quilt. I have a couple different ideas both on general idea and construction ideas. How's that for vague?
I really enjoyed the sky on the way to work this morning: very high feathery clouds mixed in with some nice repetitively-lobed ones. And there was this strange thing. This morning while I was brushing my teeth, a bright area appeared on the wall in front of me. When I looked outside to see where the light was coming from, there was the really big bright light in the sky! I'd sort of forgotten what it looked like.
Finally, dear Susan informs the world about the newest star in the punctuation world. I'm thinking I'll keep working on using the old ones correctly.
First and foremost, Gus is my total hero for having caught and dispatched the wee brown mousie we saw the other day. Brazen little thing, but it proved no match for the mighty Gus.
Second, go here for the first group of postcards that I've made for Virginia's next FiberArt for a Cause fundraiser in April. These are scanned images, so it's hard to get them well "groomed" but you get the idea.
Whoa. I got tagged by none other than Derrick over at Obsession with Food. He assures me that even A-listers are doing this thing and so, without further ado, here are my "Four Things." (And Derrick, how are those quilts coming along anyway?)
Four jobs I've had:
Explainer of the then new idea of a single line for service in a bank
I won't name names, but I'm counting on my regulars to pick up the challenge and tell us here in comments that you're doing it. Come on - you know who you are.... It was fun to do. You know you want to.
Another rainy and howling wind sort of night. Mudslides down in Columbia County. Around here it's just worth keeping an eye on the kinderhook and hope that the power stays on.
Did I mention that Wednesday night, the power went out at some point? I came home from my guild meeting having noticed how very dark it was along the way. All my good planning paid off: flashlight in car, candles and oil lamps and matches at the ready. Of course the oven doesn't work without electricity but it's possible to light the top burners. So, a cuppa hot tea, a few candles, and a few cats and I was good to go.
The cats were amusing. One by one they kept coming to me. "Lady, there's something.... it's dark and cold! Lady!" I'd give them a nice skritch and remind them that THEY were the ones with the nice fur coats while me, the fur-less one was burrowed under the covers trying to read a bit.
So much for the electric blanket, eh? But hey, quilts, blankets, fingerless gloves, hat and shawl and I was quite comfy. The power came back around 2 AM and when I went down to turn off the stray light the thermometer told me that it was 46F inside. yeah. Not all that much colder than normal, but down there a few degrees make quite a bit of difference. But a few minutes later I was back in my nice warm bed.
Other than that the normal. Some pizza tonight, and some ciabatta tomorrow. I'm working on some postcards for Virginia's fundraiser in April. Gus is on mouse alert (we both saw a wee brown mousie!). All is well inside. Outside, it's dark, raining and howling.
