Whew! What a week. It might have been a day shorter, but it sure seemed a day longer. I won't go into details, but a couple of weeks ago I had to have one of those serious "sit down, this is going into your personnel file" conversations with a very talented worker who yet keeps letting her various personal crises interfere way too much with work and has left some very important things undone - one of which was not sending in recredentialing papers for one of our insurance carriers on time, which meant that the doctors can't be preferred providers again until the paperwork is done. Not a good thing at all. It's a minor carrier with whom we have very few patients, but it should never have happened. Anyway, she's doing better on the surface and there's not any specific or tangible thing to speak about, but I think she's going here and there in the building whispering. Next week there will have to be another conversation.

We keep having rainy spots and teeny bits of thunderstorms. This is looking out from our front porch a couple of weeks ago, and the leaves are even fuller and lusher now. Our weather this spring has been more like England with frequent but not torrential rains and lower temperatures - hence the heavier than usual blooming of pretty much everything from irises to bushes to trees. The honeysuckle fragrance is especially heavenly right now.

I've finally decided what to do for my hand-piecing project - I'm going to dig out the Quilt Patis that I bought a few years ago and try to do a small grandmother's flower garden project!

Beth is making good progress with her begining effort. I haven't seen it yet, but she's got all her blocks together and rows together and ready to do the border. She just did simple 3" squares to mimic an old scrap quilt like MeeMaw used to make, and started with a table-topper type size. But for a girl who's never had the remotest interest in doing any hand sewing of any kind - pretty impressive! She's been looking through some of my quilt books and has decided that the idea of strip piecing has definite merits, although I personally can't imagine doing that by hand. We're going to get some batting for her today and try to get her quilt sandwiched so she can start hand quilting. She wants to try using my hoop.

I'll leave you with another view of the interesting old quilt I got at the flea market that I think I won't be able to cut.

Enjoy the weekend!

Ah, the luxury of two days in a row at home! (Took Friday off to have a really long weekend.) One goal was to rearrange the computer/piano/fabric/cutting table/craft/junk room. Wellll, when Beth finished with school at lunch yesterday she came out so we could get started with pool time, so . . . er, I'm nowhere done with the room. However, Beth and I had a great time at the pool sunning and swimming (even tho the water is pretty chilly at 71 degrees!) and working on plans for the drama production we hope to do at school next year - Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. We're thinking of using the 60's for our "look" because you can do all sorts of things pretty easily. We'll have to do the play in the gym more or less theater-in-the-round style as the stage is way too small. I've been co-director for 2 productions of it already, and she and I were both in one of them as singers. If you've ever seen it, you know it's a really fun show.

We talked about some other things, too - quilting and hand piecing! Beth's never been interested in doing handwork of any kind, and while she loves quilts she hasn't wanted to actually make one. Well, she's just finished reading the first 2 books of a new series Judith Pella has out that incorporate quilting into the story. We joined forces to buy the books because we knew we'd share them. (we read lots of the same things and swap books back and forth) I read these first and passed them on to her. Well, the books are set "way back" and though a few of the women have sewing machines, most do not - so there's lots of hand piecing as well as hand quilting. Beth has decided to try out some piecing by hand on her summer break and suggested that we have our own 2 person sewing circle - work along at home and compare progress, etc. on the weekends when we're at the pool. So I may try hand piecing, too. Got out these kind of loud fabrics above to think what I might want to use. Haven't a clue what blocks to try.



Obviously I need to do some arranging of fat quarters - shirtings with bright stuff??


Anyway, I'm looking for inspiration. Maybe instead of looking at the fabric I should get out a quilt book or two to see if something grabs me and looks like it might lend itself to elementary level hand piecing. Doesn't sound like too painful a task, does it, to browse through quilt books?

So I guess maybe I'll do just that. We've got planned leftovers for supper and I've already cooked a roast for Sunday dinner. Tons more chores need doing, but I'm on a self-declared holiday after all!

I hope everyone is having a safe and enjoyable holiday time with family and friends.