An old UFO off the to do list

My 10 year old Sashiko project is finally completely done and can go out on display!

I stitched in the ditch around the navy part and then did three rows of quilting in the border.  The binding is on.  I didn't do any quilting in the sashiko panel--I could still add some if I decide later that it needs it. 

The backing is a fat quarter I had in my stash. 

I had a chance to knit several times in the last week and added another 5 inches to my scarf.  It is 56" long now. 

I finished the stems on my pitcher plant rug hooking project and did more of the brown at the bottom of the picture. It's coming along!

The scrappy flannel baby quilt also had some attention this week.  The centre part is sewn together but the selvage borders are not sewn to it yet. Yes...there will be partial seams on this one. 

The flowers in our gardens are bursting out in lots of pretty colours. Here is my Serbian Bellflower.  It doesn't bloom for long, unfortunately. 

My front porch is shady so I have a pot of begonias by the front door.  They do very well in the shade. 

This is a Blue Jay Columbine, a little past its prime. 

I noticed that our neighbour's tulip tree is in bloom when I was out for a walk this week. 

We went to visit our daughter and Finn last weekend.  They planned a mystery adventure day for us to celebrate both Mother's and Father's Day.  It included breakfast at an interesting cafe, a hike at a conservation area, an outdoor quilt show, a stone 5 arch bridge, a stone oven pizza and salad picnic with a view, ice cream, a textile museum and poking around the shops of a small town where several Hallmark Christmas movies have been filmed. We all had a great day--the weather was perfect.  Finn was very tired that evening!

The "Gear" exhibit was fabulous!  If you live within driving distance of this museum in Almonte, Ontario, I highly recommend that you try to see this before it closes mid July. 

I will link up with Kathy and Frederique. 

Have a great week!

Orange Month for the RSC

Orange is the colour for June for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge so I dug into my 2.5" squares bin and pulled out all of the orange squares.  I cut a few from my orange fat quarter bin to add some variety before making 6 orange hollow nine patch blocks. I am getting quite a stack of these blocks!  When I run out of the centre squares, I will put the blocks together to make a quilt. 

I continue to knit away on my scarf when the mood hits me...Maybe it will be done in time to wear it next winter.  It is now 51" long. 

Ten years ago, I bought myself a Sashiko kit and completed the hand stitching.  Since then, it has been sitting on a shelf, waiting to be finished.  I recently purchased some Japanese woven fabric to use for borders and binding.  I added one border this week and would like to quilt this to make a small wall hanging.  My question--do I just machine quilt the border or should I quilt the hand stitched part too?  The hand stitched part is 12" by 12".  

I finished off the last two selvage strips for a scrappy flannel baby quilt this week. I will work on getting my scraps sewn this week to fill in the middle of the diamond and the corners.  This will be a square baby quilt.  Of course, the flannel scrap and the flannel selvage bins don't even look like a dent has been made in them.  

My husband's birthday was in April.  His gift from me was a three night getaway at a bed and breakfast near Orangeville.  There are several places to hike in the area and we chose two ...Mono Cliffs Provincial Park and Island Lake Conservation area. Mono Cliffs is a popular hiking spot and can be quite busy on the weekends and during the summer.  Since we are retired, we were there on a Monday and there were very few other people around.  Such a beautiful spot and the breeze kept the mosquitoes at bay.  Island Lake was formed by damming the Credit River to control flooding downstream.  There is an accessible 8 km trail all the way around the lake which we hiked on Tuesday morning.  Here are some pictures from our hiking adventures.  The highlight was a close encounter with a porcupine beside the trail at Mono Cliffs.  He quickly climbed a nearby tree when he saw us. 

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The next few pictures are from Island Lake.

Don't you just love the spring green colours this time of year?

We found some interesting local restaurants for dinner after our hikes and indulged in these decadent desserts at Mrs. Mitchell's restaurant in Violet Hill. My husband had carrot cake and I had tartufo.  Both well worth the splurge. 

When wandering around Orangeville, we came across their library and went in to check it out.  It is in an older building--a Carnegie library--which has been completely gutted and renovated into a beautiful, accessible hub for bibliophiles.  The local theatre created some giant books to create an entrance to the story room in the children's department.  We were very impressed!

Speaking of bibliophiles, here are our daughter's crocheted book squares and books for the month of May. 

Finn and our daughter had some great weather for being outside this past week.  

I will link up with Kathy, Frederique and the RSC folks this weekend. 

Flannel Selvages

I dug out my bin of flannel selvages this week, (yes--I have sorted all my selvages by colour but the flannel ones are all together.) and top stitched them onto a strip of lightweight non fusible interfacing.  These two strips and two others will be used in the scrappy flannel baby quilt that I am making. No matter how hard I try, I never seem to run out of scraps. 

The binding is on the quilted Advent calendar for the church bazaar. I added a ribbon to the top of each of the little ornaments and now I am adding buttons to hang each ornament on as the days go by in December.  I have 15 more buttons to sew on and then it will be done. 

The leaves are all done on my pitcher plant rug hooking project and I have started working on the background at the bottom of the picture. 

We had a busy week--My MIL turned 95 on Friday so we had a birthday picnic with her that day. Dessert was butter tarts--her favourite! Earlier in the week, we planted flowers in pots outside her window...geraniums in a hanging basket (Mother's Day gift) and begonias in patio pots (Birthday Gift).  She likes to look out her window and see the flowers.  We are still working on our own yard as well and still have a few more jobs to do out there.  I noticed my clematis vine is blooming this week.  I think this is the most flowers it has ever had. 

My daughter has read a lot of books this month and has made a granny square for each one for her book blanket.  I will post pictures of the squares and the books she has read in May next week.  For now, here is a sneak peak. 

And here is Finn, out for a walk this past week.  Finn is happiest when he is outside lying in the sun.  Here's to lots of sunny days ahead, Finn!

I will link up with Kathy and Frederique, as usual.