New Year's Aftermath!

This holiday stretch has felt like the longest in a long time!

Is it because Christmas happened on a Thursday and that Christmas morning we drove off to Tennessee to pick up Jason after his red-eye all night flight from Vancouver, Washington?

I have spent so many wonderful hours just basically “listening” to favorite movies while I relaxed and stitched.

I think I needed it!

Hexie quilts are not for those in a hurry hurry hurry. These kinds of quilts do not have deadlines. They are just *something* to have in my hands in the evening because even my sons know that “Mom can’t ever sit still.”

Like you all didn’t already know that!

I enjoy the slow pace of hand stitching in the evenings, and since I don’t have a hand quilting project going, some English paper piecing is doing the trick and I love watching these borders grow even if I stitch maybe only 5 hexies in an evening and fall asleep in the middle of a movie. It happens!

This morning I laid out the two borders to see how much more I had to go. They will be stitched to both sides of the quilt when the center is finished.

Actually, I could put on the left side, saving only the right side for when that remaining section of the quilt is finished.

There are also top and bottom borders to stitch, so I will be working on these for quite a while.

I’m leaving for my Craftours trip to Morocco on the 20th!! I’ve got hexie kits for more quilt center units already in my bog from our recent trip to Germany & Austria. Some units are easy to travel with, these borders? Not. They get too long!

The next trip coming up after this one is Romania in June. I’d love to have you join us!

Closer up of fabrics in the borders. Some wild wild neutrals in here – some dating back to my first fabric collecting in the 1980s. It’s all in here. Fabrics from the timeline of my life.

I had visitors yesterday!

While Jeff came to work some more on the spindles for the front banister at the inn, Casden and baby Stark (Yes, you can sing it to the Baby Shark song!) came to hang out with Bonana in the QPO Studio.

He is the sweetest puppy you guys! And he’s not going to get very big we don’t think. His paws are small.

He could have some cattle dog in him with that spotting of his coat.

I’m so glad that Ashlyn pulled over after witnessing his hit & run.

It appears one foot was run over – though it’s healing. He walks with a little “hitch in his get-along” and we don’t know if that is something that will resolve over time, or if it will just be part of his personality.

He is doing rally well on the house training! He goes outside on a leash and pretty much does his business on demand. All for a treat. Smart puppy.

It’s just so unconscionable that people will dump unwanted puppies. There is usually a shelter that will accept unwanted animals.

Though who could unwant this guy? He is precious!

And it is so sweet to see Casden in tandem with his puppy.

Meanwhile as they watched something cartoony that I couldn’t even relate to (What happened to Looney Tunes and Scooby Do and all the other GOOD cartoons?! The stuff now is weird.) I did something I promised myself for this upcoming year.

I want some designated blocked out time every week to just work on what I want to work on.

And that means digging in to some REALLY old scraps that need a place to shine. Stuff that has been passed by for years.

I mentioned doing another string quilt, and these will be the alternate blocks that connect things together. It’s going to be a fun one, and it’s going to take a lot of time, but I don’t want to keep pushing it to the background, so I’m going to work on it a bit each week in between other things.

And if you can see the little paper triangle still in the seam allowance – yes, I’m paper piecing these because the pieces would be a really odd size to cut otherwise.

Spindle update!

I can’t tell you what a huge difference this is making. All of those many layers of old paint are being stripped off and then the spindles are primed with 2 coats. and then we are painting them with a satin finish latex trim paint. No more glossy shiny that shows all the brush marks.

Today we’ve got the guy coming to take final measurements for our new back door for the back entry. The door likely won’t be here for a month or two, but I’m happy about letting that old heavy drafty door go.

The sun is rising on 2026 with so much promise!
Today – hair cut day. (hooray! I need it!) and then some more sewing time.
And likely more movie time with the guys this afternoon as this last weekend of our extended holiday break continues.
What do you have happening this weekend?