Triple Bleep

 
I'm having the whole inside of my new house painted. Unfortunately I picked the wrong contractor. He's a very nice guy, and his crew is very nice, however I don't think (with one exception) any of them have painting experience. They have worked five days and there is not one room that is 100% finished. (Insert bleep here.)

I don't know why I unpacked, with the painting my sewing room had to be dismantled, all the closets emptied, and a lot of stuff was moved out to the garage which is now a mess again. Most of the furniture is covered in plastic.

(Insert second bleep here.)

Remember my showing these two pictures last week...

(Insert third bleep here.) The two pieces that are circled are the two I wanted to turn. They are not the two pieces I turned in the second picture. I'm not taking it apart again.

 

While I've been babysitting painters and watching paint dry, I did get caught up with the black work stitch along and have about half the frames stitched. Wednesday will be a new filler design.

Sorry about the language, hopefully next week will be better.
 

(Bleep)

I know I'm not suppose to use that kinda language, but I can't believe I triple checked, and looked at the picture for days before I realized I was missing a stitch in my blackwork square...it has now been fixed, week two is done, and week three is in process...

I'm picking colors at random. The blue is a little pale but I still like it. This is so much fun!

I finished piecing the rails for the sampler quilt...

I added more of the bright pink. I hope it toned the pink block down a bit - hmmm, maybe not. I really didn't like the look of this block even though I made it as the pattern directed...

So I changed it around.

Not my favorite block but better. I don't know how much time I'll get to spend sewing this week - and why I still haven't unpacked fabric - I'm getting the whole interior of the house painted and I can't decide on a color. Doesn't help that they will start painting Wednesday.

One is two dark, two are too white, one is too pink and another is too peachy. I have two more samples to put on the wall tomorrow. I love the color names: pure white, nano white, heavy cream, white mocha, new house white. I'll test swiss coffee and cottage white tomorrow.

This was my view last Thursday...

I got about 3-4 inches of snow. I had two paint contractors out for bids on Thursday, both had to put their trucks into four-wheel drive to get up my driveway. Both my car and truck are two-wheel drive, so I didn't go anywhere. Most of it was gone by Friday afternoon. Love living in Oregon. ;o)

Making Progress

 
I have all of the blocks finished for the Land of Lincoln Sampler...

Oh my, that pink is bright! The rails are cut out; I need to get them sewn together but I've been a little distracted...

This is the first block for the first week of the blackwork SAL I decided to participate in. This one was pretty easy. I'm a week behind, and according to the Facebook group participants, the next block is a little bit more challenging. I'm hoping to get it done tomorrow. New block designs are released every Wednesday morning. I originally pulled floss colors similar or  close to the designer's colors chart but I think I'd rather it was more colorful so will probably chose a random color every week. Should be fun.

Well I didn't get my fabric put away but I did rearrange the stuff in the garage and all the Christmas decorations are now in plastic bins and stored in one area of the garage. I also have all my stamping / craft stuff grouped in one area and power tools in another. Productive afternoon.

It is supposed to rain, and possibly snow, for the next five days. This should give me lots of time to put away fabric, sew and stitch.

Pretty Quiet Here

 
Hmmm, not much on the camera and not a lot of sewing done. I finished quilting and machine binding the guild donation quilt.

Where the strips are joined I stitched in the ditch and took the diagonal line either up or down one row. I also added a meandering loop in the border. I found an orange that I thought was much better binding. When I got the quilt it was already pinned, I didn't really look at it too closely when I started quilting it...until I had problems quilting it. It wasn't pinned very well and the backing fabric had never been ironed and had lots of off-the-bolt wrinkles if you know what I mean. I tried my best but there are some pretty good puckers on the back. Overall it's not too bad and since it was on my UFO/WIP list I'm counting it as my first finish in 2020.

Other tidbits...

...I had a major case of home sickness on New Year's Day...I always trim my roses and pick the last of the lemons on January 1...boo hoo, no more roses or lemon trees.

...I read somewhere that when you write the date for the current year that you shouldn't use the abbreviated year of 20 as it can be changed to a prior or future year. Use 2020.

...Did you know Missouri Star Quilt Company has an app that includes ALL of their YouTube tutorials? Yeah, I downloaded it, and lost about three hours viewing videos on my phone.

...Here is Bella pretending to be a lap kitty. Don't let her fool you. She's mean and bites.

...Every Wednesday and Saturday the local needlework shop has a sit and stitch. Lee of Unique Lee Yours has a room with lots of comfy chairs and you can work on whatever you want. I've been going on Wednesdays. The ladies in the group are all very nice. We all went and saw Little Women last week. I liked the movie, it had a bit of a different twist to it. Maked me want to re-read the book.

...Since I've been cross stitching again I plan on joining Peppermint Purple's year of blackwork. It is a 52 week free stitch along. If you like embroidery, cross stitching or blackwork you should check out her web site, she has some fun patterns and some free patterns.

...Technically I haven't unpacked my fabric yet. That is my goal for this next week. And to find a spot in the garage to store all my Christmas decorations.

...that's it. Can't think of anything else. Have a nice week.