New Starts

My second new quilt start happened this week with yet another block-of-the-month class. This one is based on a pattern called "Cream and Sugar" by It's Sew Emma. I've decided to adopt the lower-contrast neutral palette as illustrated; I think it will be pretty and a nice way for me to experiment with value, it will be fun. One of the class participants expressed that she thought beige quilts were so "blah". I laughed to myself because I was thinking the exact opposite; I'm looking at this one more as a "palate cleanser", sometimes it's nice to create a little breathing space, color-wise. I find it to be calming and very soothing. 

Here's another new start, or maybe this could be termed a fresh start! When my MIL passed away, almost six years ago, I brought a few of her houseplants back to our home, one of them was this scraggly Christmas Cactus. It survived, over the years (albeit barely). This spring I decided to release it from it's too-small pot prison and replant it, with fresh soil, into a larger pot with room for its roots to spread and grow. The transformation in the plant's vigor and vitality has been amazing after a summer on the porch. I'm super-excited about the prospects for this one come blooming season, fingers crossed.

More new plants, new starts: out with the overgrown geraniums and in with fall Pansies. I've taken those overgrown geraniums inside, trimmed them and boxed them up, bare-root style, for wintering-over. I've done this before but it's always a concern: more crossed fingers and high hopes. We'll see!

Last week Mr. Goodneedle and I hit the road and headed for the mountains, another mental health day. The weather was great and the foliage color on our route didn't disappoint. 

We discovered this winery along the way, a great find and a completely relaxing afternoon; one that's good simply for recharging!

Here's a recent shot of our patio. The leaves aren't the only things falling! You'd need a helmet or a hardhat to sit out here lately. I thought this might be an ominous predictor of what kind of winter we're in for, but, apparently all that this profusion of acorns signifies is a substantial mast crop. Okay, we'll see. 

And sew, here we go again; new starts, new beginnings. I'm excited to see where this goes.

What new starts are your brewing up at your house?

Life is Good!

Out With The Old...

... in with its replacement! This photo is of my hand-warmer mug, it's as much a part of my morning routine as brushing my teeth and taking a shower. I received it for Christmas a few years ago from our daughter and her family. As someone who's perpetually cold, this mug offers as much hand-soothing therapy as it does a perfect cup of tea to start the day; I couldn't imagine my mornings without it (nor did I want to!). Well, you probably know what's coming next. One morning, a few weeks ago, I was drying my hair with my trusty mug of tea nearby on the bathroom countertop when I noticed a puddle underneath of it, I thought that I must have bumped the mug, cleaned up the spill and went back to what I was doing. Another puddle immediately appeared. My heart sank-- yes, on closer inspection, there was a hairline crack all the way down one side. I muddled through with a substitute teacup for a few days and made the decision to bite the bullet and order a replacement. Of course, even with lots of color options available, I wanted one exactly the same (I don't like change!😉) as the one I had before. I placed the order and received the replacement thanks to great service!

This box appeared on our doorstep the very next day!

Okay, that's going to leak much worse than the cracked one I had. 😬

Again, the wonderful customer service at Mast General Store saw to it that this would be made right. 

Back in business, a replacement for the replacement arrived almost immediately; the tea is hot and my hands are warm (and dry, no more leaks!); all is right with my morning routine once again!

When we visited Quiltville Inn back in November, Quiltkeemosabe and I were both in love with the provided sewing chairs that Bonnie had positioned at every station.  They were small enough in scale to move easily, super comfortable and easily adjustable, height-wise. My friend received one just like we had used there from her husband for Christmas for her re-vamped sewing space. I decided a new one was on the horizon for me too; I always take my own retreat chair (except to Quiltville Inn where everything is provided!) and the one I have used forever for that purpose had stopped playing nicely in that ever so important height-adjustment capacity. Quiltkeemosabe brought hers over to Chez Goodneedle for show and tell at a recent sew-day here. I was sold; (I had already researched the affordability, and when I found out that this was available in red!) it was a done deal. Out with my old worn-out retreat chair, in with the new. This arrived in two days, thanks Amazon Prime (Boss Office Products Perfect Posture Deluxe Fabric Task Chair)!  It won't replace my everyday sewing chair but it will fill in quite nicely as a second chair and will accompany me on sewing road trips!

Life is Good!

Up next: Stitching Up A Storm!

Tea Time

As I had posted, earlier, I have been on a search for a perfect scone recipe. I have been trying to recreate the English scones that we had on a recent cruise, pictured below.



My version, from Lynnleigh's and my tea party last week, is shown at left. It turned out a little crumblier than I would have liked but the flavor was wonderful; I am going to keep making adjustments for texture. The recipe can be found here. I can't find clotted cream, so we used unsweetened, whipped cream; a healthy(!) slathering of that with a dollop of raspberry jam and it was ready for the official taste test.

Yes, this will do just fine!

Life is Good!

Bye-bye, Sundance!

Sundance has left the building; not to worry, it's all good! There are changes afoot at The Strawberry Patch, stay tuned for further updates. Sundance has served me faithfully and well for the last six years; I had the unique opportunity to sell her, locally, to a phenomenal sit-down quilter who is ready to take to her feet and expand her own quilting horizons, I am so happy for Laura. I hope Sundance is enjoying the rest today, even though disassambled, she won't be collecting one bit of dust at her new home... she'll be busier than ever!

 I've been busily preparing graduation quilts for tying by the Quilt Ministry. Working in small batches, four were ready this past week. My part of readying them is to cut the fleece backs to size, embroider the church logo onto the backing and then layer them with the batting. I stitch through all three layers (envelope style) before turning them right side out and top-stitching the edges all around. There's a lot of crawling around on the floor during these various stages, I like to think of this as my new daily work-out. Whew! We did some recent calculations and figured that, counting this year, we've sewn up eighty of these quilts to present to our congregation's high school graduates; we began with the class of 2009, what a meaningful tradition this has become!

I'm happy today... as happy as if I had just opened a case full

 of "Christmas Morning"!  Oh wait, that's exactly what I did...

Life is Good!

What's In Your Wallet?

 There's nothing worse than a converted coffee addict; now that I have switched to tea I need to have my tea stash with me at all times. Using the instructions I found on this online tutorial I stitched myself up a tea wallet to keep in my purse (and a few more for gift giving). The step by step (linked above) was simple to follow and the finished products are oh-so-cute! So, what's in your wallet?

Life is Good!

Stocking Up

I love this coffee from Trader Joe's, I stock up on it whenever we visit the Capital City as we don't have a store locally. My husband understands, he doesn't say a word when I leave the store with six cans at a time; in fact, I might be influencing his shopping habits. A couple of weeks ago I mentioned that I would like a box of Chamomile tea, he's always looking for things to do during the "wait" time when his mother has her hair done; there's a store nearby her salon that carries my favorite brand. He came home empty-handed though, when I asked about the tea he told me that he had ordered it. Oh? Yep, it came in this week. A case each of two different types! Tea anyone?

Life is Good!