Oops - Forgot to add something

 I forgot to add my February Block Swap that I had done for my partner.  She got it and loved it.  I was so glad.  One never knows for sure if the person you are sending it to likes applique which is what I usually do.

Here's the picture of it.

The background fabric is one that has quotes and sayings about friends.

I am going to try and do themes for the month I participate.  For instance, for March I will probably do a shamrock.  April might be an umbrella with raindrops in the background.  May will be flowers since everybody knows April showers bring May flowers.  Not sure about June but July will probably have a patriotic theme to it.  August and September are also unknown with ending out the month with Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas.   That's what I would like to do.  Not sure if it will turn out that way.  :)

Thanks for reading my blog and have a great day.

January is almost over

 I would say that I made it through January 2023 but I don't want to temp fate and January isn't totally over with yet.

Today's temp is 32F at 11:30 a.m.  The lows for the next WEEK are suppose to be in this mid to high 20s!  Today it is supposed to be an ice storm with possible snow this afternoon.  For my Northern friends that is commonly known as "wintery mix".

I'm all set for it though.  I have cans of food pulled out from my pantry that won't need heating up to eat.  I pulled out my flashlights and candles.  I have plenty of water set aside to use for various purposes if the pipes freeze.  Hopefully I will have my spaghetti and meatballs done before/if I lose power.

I'm not sure how much crafting I will get done.  I like to burrow into my blankets if I lose electricity and go into hibernation mode.  I might get to do some more blackwork today.  I've decided that I would change up the border that I was doing and that meant, of course, getting out Jack and Jill (my trusty seamrippers) and unstitch a lot of what I had done.  This new border that I'm using I am much happier with.  It is easier for me to do so I am not as tense or frustrated.  I made this decision after setting Jack to work on the previous border 4 different times.  I'll do the fancier border sometime but right now this one will be better for me.  Here is a picture of what I have done so far.

The boxes will surround the square box and then a little bit added more before the next filler is added.  The next filler is due out this Wednesday so I hope to get, at least, the left side done so I have a good idea for placement for filler #5.  Wish me luck!

That's it for now.  I hope you stay warm and have a great day.

Keep on crafting!

Some UFO finishes - possibly

 January isn't over yet but I have still made progress.  That makes me feel good.  Feeling good is actually great since I've still got my cold,  I'll take my little victories where I can.

So my first progress picture is one of my blocks from my 2014 Rose of Sharon BOM.  My goal this year is to do one of the blocks each month and hopefully I will have them all done by the end of 2023.

My second finish is actually a current BOW done in Blackwork.  This is week 3 and I've kept up with it so far.  Here is  a picture of all three weeks.  Next week, after  I finish week four I might start doing the first border.  I'll have to see how it goes.

My last picture today is not one of my blocks but a block that I received from my partner in the January Block Swap.  I have signed up for the February Block Swap also.  I will post a picture of it when I get my partners name and it is in the mail.  :)

That's it for now.  I just couldn't wait any longer to say that I'm on track for my 2023 goal for crafting.

How is everybody doing?  I really do want to know.  I like chatting with my crafting friends.  Do you have any goals for 2023?  Let me know.

Until then, stay safe and warm and have fun stitching.

January 2023 is here!

 It finally arrived.  It is now 2023 and I'm still wondering where time went by.  Will 2023 be a better year?  Perhaps.  Perhaps not but it is still here and we can't do much about that.  So instead of spending time trying to figure out what will or what will not be, I plan to just wing it.  Yeah....good luck with that Bonni.  Winging it doesn't work well for me so when I don't wing this I won't be surprised.  LOL.

I do have a small plan in place so I'll see how it goes.  Most of my planning deals with crafting.  That part, I hope, is what I can control.  The rest of life is just take one day at a time.  I only have so much money to pay bills, groceries and craft supplies.  What to do with everything else?  Plan.  A loose plan.  One that can be adjusted.  

First up is the elephant on the blog.  The BOMs, BOW, and other patterns that grab my attention first thing in the new year.  Thee are so many.  This year, I am taking my journal and writing down the names and information of any BOMs and similar type pattern's that appeal to me.  Then I go through that list and write down yes, no, or maybe.  I'm not sure I will try to make any in the time it is supposed to be made but I will collect the patterns and then decide.  I decided to write no on the ones that I don't like or ones that cost money.  With my memory, I will forget about three months down the road but now I can look at my list and know if I wanted to do it or not.  That's the plan anyway.

Another plan is to work on some of my UFOs.  I'm starting off with the Rose of Sharon applique BOM going back to 2014.  I will also be working on the cross stitch quilt blocks.  That gives me two UFOs that I will be working on.  I have to finish one block before I will allow myself to go and work on another block.  Even if I only work on one block each month, but the end of the year my blocks should be done.  Then they can be  put into another UFO stack...the one which includes tops that are done but not sandwiched, etc.  So far I am on track for that.  I will post pictures when I get the blocks done.  I have a new computer and not everything is readily accessible on it yet.  

I also have plans to keep up with some cross stitch projects.  Besides the HAED's that are always a UFO, I have those cross stitch quilt blocks that I mentioned in the above paragraph.  I did put a YES down for a Blackwork BOW (block of the week) and I am looking forward to that.  I have the first week done and tomorrow the second week's pattern will be released.  It will be stitched on an 18 count Aida cloth with the color being oatmeal.  Even though there are two different colorways given, I will be sticking to the traditional black.  Once again, I will post a picture soon.

Another plan I have is to get back into stitching blocks.  I signed up for a block exchange in one of my Facebook groups.  It is where you sign up each month so if you are too busy one month you don't have to sign up.  It is very flexible that way as well as leaving up what we will stitch on is up to us.  For February I am going to stitch a heart themed block.  Once again it will be applique.  That will keep me going so I don't get far behind but still keep the stitching bug active.

That's it for me for now.  I have to stitch down one of the hearts in my FB February block as well as work on a couple of the flowers in the Rose of Sharon blocks.  Soon I will be done with the Rose of Sharon block for this month and then I will pull out the cross stitch quilt block.  

What are your plans for being creative in 2023?  Inquiring minds want to know.

Closing out the Year

   Can you believe that 2022 is almost done with?  I should believe it since it is getting colder the closer to 2023 we get.  By the time the 22nd gets here our low is supposed to be only 2F.  For those of you who don't know, I retired a couple of years ago and moved to Arkansas from Illinois.  If I was still in Illinois I would still say it was cold but would expect it.  I'm not used to thinking of Arkansas that cold.  I will survive though and it is only for a couple of days.

   I was trying to think of what else to write about and then what should appear in my email box but a suggestion.  I thought I'd share it with you in case you too have trouble sometimes thinking of what to post.  Camille Styles sent the email and this is what she suggests for "journal prompts".

JOURNAL PROMPTS FROM A FAVORITE NEWSLETTER:

~How am I feeling through this seasonal shift?
~What has been taking way too much time away from my personal life, relationships, and those I love?
~What can I do to lighten my load and be more present?
~What are the three most impactful things I can do before the year ends?
~What are three things I can crowd out today that don’t need my attention?

   I thought these were great questions for us to ask ourselves. The one that stuck out to me to answer today was "What are the three most impactful things I can do before the year ends?" I know, I know. I can hear you thinking "But Bonni, you do realize that the year is almost over with?"  It is but I've never been known for planning out journal entries and other things too far in advance.  I guess I could say that I didn't think of it earlier and that would be true too.  The other problem with my acting on that question is how do you define impactful?  I'm not even going to go into trying to think of THREE things that are impactful.

   I would like to think that my blog has an impact on people but I really don't think it does to the extent I can claim it is impactful.  I'm ok with that.  I would like to say that my friendship is impactful but that is ever going on and not just a "today" type thing.  So I guess I'm just going to say that I am going to be making some food for a friend of mine (yes, Dan) for Christmas.  He will be coming over so besides the usual meal leftovers, I am going to give him "snacks".  They really don't have a common theme besides just being snacks.  I'm going to try to make some Oreo cream cheese balls, maybe some cookies as well as give him little things that I know he is always needing.  That would be a lighter.  That man goes through lighters faster than anybody I know.  He either uses them up (the small cigarette lighter) or misplaces them either at home or in his vehicle.  I usually give him one or two each Christmas.  I also have some Little Debbie's Oatmeal cream pies that I will give him.  That is something we have recently talked about and mentioned how it is a good "stocking stuffer".  I might make peanut butter fudge but only if I remember to pick up some cream cheese frosting on Wednesday.  If I feel REAL ambitious, I'll make a stocking for everything to go into.  I don't want to get too carried away though.  :)  How is this impactful?  Good question and I'm not sure if I have a good answer but I'm going to try.

   I like to think that I make an impact in his life.  We've been friends for almost (wait until I pull out the calculator)...25 years.  I've always been there when he needed somebody to talk to whether he was deployed or just at home.  Today he will be traveling back to Aransas from Tennessee, a 5 hour trip, and I will be on the phone with him all the way.  He lives by himself and he knows that somebody is there for him, even in spirit, for him to talk things through and just to keep him company so he doesn't get road rage etc.  He also doesn't cook much (although he could if he wanted to) so by sharing food with him I know he is getting something besides just what comes out of a can.  Yes I will be giving him "snacks" but it is Christmas time and he can work on his losing weight (yeah, right) after Christmas.  Besides the Elf in me says he has to have sweets to enjoy the holiday with.  

   The other thing I just noticed was the wording on the last helpful journal topic.  "What are three things I can crowd out today that don't need my attention?"  I think that I will just stop with the first part and say "What are three things I can crowd out today?"  If I am going to do them, then they get my attention for no matter how long I am doing them.  So my three things today are:  do a blog entry (YAY...That is getting done as I type); work on stitching on a UFO block, and cook and clean up immediately afterwards.  I really hate the clean up part so I am trying to get better at that.  I have a UFO block that goes back to 2014.  They are from a Rose of Sharon BOM that I had signed up for.  For a low fee of whatever it was, I received the pre-fused patters.  I had to buy the Rose of Sharon boo by Sharon Pederson but I didn't mind that.  I have some of the blocks all stitched down but have a LOT more that aren't.  So my goal is to pick up a block from a UFO and keep stitching on it until that block is done and then get another UFO block (from a different project) and work on stitching that.  I will rotate to a different UFO pattern after finishing one block and that way hope to get more than one UFO finished in 2023.  I'm not sure if I will get the whole quilt done but at least the top.  I'll take a picture of the blocks once I finish hand stitching them (blanket stitch).  It's funny looking back at the ones I have completed already.  I used two strands of DMC floss on them so I have to continue for the rest of the blocks.  If I was starting them now, I'd use only one strand.  Funny how our habits or thinking changes over the years.

   It is time for me to get some breakfast so I will stop here.  I hope you all have wonderful and safe holidays and I'll see you in the next post.

    

What I've been up to and Thanksgiving Prep

 I know I've said this one or twice before but....where has the time gone to?

I've been sewing up some tablecloths and napkins for the holidays and here are my groupings.  

The red napkin with the raven embroidered on it is for my feast gear for my SCA events.  The raven stands for the Shire of Ravenshold.  I made two others but one is destined to  be given to somebody who is in our Shire and just was recognized by our local court and is destined to become a Knight.  It's a big thing in the SCA.  The other one went to Dan for his feast gear as part of his birthday present which is two days after Thanksgiving.  The other part of his present was a draft stopper.

He chose the longer one (made out of African fabric) and I gave it to him early also since we had some cold and windy days.

Speaking of Thanksgiving, I've started to gather up ingredients and group them out for tomorrow's holiday food.

I've also set my table and changed out some of the quilts that I hang up.  Before Dan leaves, he has promised to help me change out the quilts again for the Christmas and winter ones that I want to hang up.  I can do it but he worries about me being clumsy (he's learned that over the 25 years we've been friends) so he said he would do that tomorrow.  Between his long arms and my stepladder it will be a breeze.

Now I have to get back to seeing what I can make ahead of time and plot out my time.  My kittens/cats and I wish you all a Happy Thanksgiving.

Today's sojourn into Walmart

 October is finally here and soon the holidays and holiday meals will be upon us.

Today is also my monthly trip to the Food Bank and out to Walmart to get groceries.  Dan brought over some of his extra food when he found out the Food Bank in his area REALLY cut back on what was handed out.  It is good to have such a good friend.  This time, I didn't give him much from my pantry but I don't think he minded.  We go through what we get and exchange what we know we won't use.  That explains why I have 24 cans of mixed fruit since Dan can't have preaches (severe allergy),  He did give me some cans of tomatoes, cream soup, some hamburger and Stouffer's Chicken and Dumplings.  He also bought a turkey at Walmart which I have in my freezer.  We will eat that at Thanksgiving.  Now to figure out what else to have.  :)

The prices have gone up at Walmart and at the gas station.  Not a surprise but still I wish it hadn't happened,  The cat food that I normally get as out and the backup was not in the size I wanted.  The toilet tissue was also REALLY low.  Some things stayed the same like their brand of soda, bread, and Bar-S hot dogs.  No Imperial Margarine in the stick form but did have some in the soft form which was in tubs.  So what went up?

Eggs.  On the 1st, 18 count large eggs were $3.45 but today they were $5.02.  Oh well, so I don't get a 60 count (which was over $15) and settled for an 18 count container.

After getting home, Dan helped me put on a SCA tabard that I am making.  he took a picture but it hasn't shown up yet in my computer feed.  When it does I will share them.

Time to get off the computer and rest my eyes for a little bit.

Everybody have a safe and wonderful day.

Huggses,

I'm tired!

 Yesterday my body went on strike.  It was a bad allergy day and between 3 doses of Benadryl (not taken all at once), 1 dose of Zyrtec, 4 doses of Ibuprofen and 1 dose of headache medicine, I didn't do much,  By evening my aches were gone but since I spent so much time resting, I didn't sleep well.

Today I am doing better and only have taken my Zyrtec and one dose of Ibuprofen,  I am sure I will need more Ibuprofen later because I decided to go out and do some pruning. 

My hands are already telling me I did too much but oh well.  Now I need to call Dan and see if he can help me doing some more pruning.  I need his saw.  Of course that means he will do it for me but it won't take him long,  I'll make him some food or cookies or perhaps some fried tortilla chips to take back home.  :)

Before I stop working,  I  will get some more stitches in on my second Christmas ornament.  I am 3/4ths the way done so I will be picking out a new cross stitch ornament to work on.  I am putting my more detailed cross stitch projects on hold until after the holidays.

I found this meme and would like to share it with you.

So remember that no matter what we are going through, we are all strong women.  Of course this also pertains to strong men,  I know I have one or two who read my blog.

Have a wonderful day my friends!

Mid month report

 Wow  It is the middle of the month of September,  Another month where I don't know how it slipped by me.  What have I been doing?

Cooking:

I would like to say that everything that I made turned out right,  Unfortunately if I did that I would be lying. This month I think I have had more mishaps than successes!  Some of the good things I made were:

  Fried Tortilla Chips - Using premade tortillas and cut them into 8ths and then fry on the stove in approximately 1/2 - 1 inch of oil.  That turned out well enough that Dan, who is my guinea pig for food, decided that he would buy me another pack of tortillas so that I could make him more,  LOL!

Creamy Burrito Casserole - I just made this and it turned out good,  Dan will get his sample to try on Wednesday,  It is pretty basic with ground beef, onions, taco seasoning, refried beans, flour tortillas, cheese, etc.,   I did substitute or leave out a couple of things that either I didn't have or didn't like.

Crinkle Coffee Cookies - Dean REALLY liked these.  You don't use much instant coffee in it,  If I remember right it is only a couple of tablespoons that you mix in with a couple of tablespoons of boiling water,  Still they made a nice soft coffee and a good sized one at that.

Things that didn't work out...sigh.  Cheese sauce that was so thick I never used it.  I an barely even look at it so it will be tossed out when garbage day comes around,  There was another casserole that I made that seemed a bit too loose,  Dan took some home so I'll see what he thinks.  It really doesn't matter what he thinks because I know I'm not going to make it again.  LOL,  There were around three other recipes that didn't turn out but I forget which ones now,

Quilting:

I wanted to make a wall hanging of the Ravenshold (SCA group) device,  It has been fighting me from the very first cut,  It doesn't help that I don't have a pattern for it,  The banner cannot be taken apart so I have had a hard time getting measurements.  My house doesn't have a good place for me to lay out the banner and make a copy.  I finally have gotten the background put together after putting it aside for almost a month in frustration.  It is smaller than the banner is so now I have to adjust the applique that I will be doing on it,  It is on my design wall so I won't forget it but I am still mad at it so it is just "hanging around",

Sewing:

The other aggravating thing is my trying to make a  sideless surcoat,  I took apart a garb that mostly fit me but then discovered that I don't have enough fabric to make it,  I don't normally get a lot of large yardage since I mostly make wall hangings,  I figure that I will have to get approximately 4 yards of wide fabric to make it,  Once again I am frustrated at this since I will be going to an weekend event next month.  I have two "loaner garb"  outfits that I "can" wear but would have liked to have one that was with my fabric etc,  Oh well,  I will be going to more events so I will have time to look for more fabric,  This is were having my income get cut by more than 50% puts me at a disadvantage in retirement.  Still I will muddle through and eventually get what I want.  :)

Cross Stitch:

I worked a bit on the cross stitch owl,  I put it away for a bit (again) so that I can work on some cross stitch ornaments for Christmas.  They will be able to go in the cards so that I can mail them later,  Obviously I won't share the pictures until the recipients receive them.  I will do the cross stitch first and then closer to the mailing time I will finish them,  I have one ornament all cross stitched and have started on my second one,  

That should catch you up on what I have been working on,  Wish me luck getting them done!

Rainy Day Organization

 It's raining today so I decided to organize my floss.  I had separated the floss by numbers and so it wasn't too hard to refile (?) them back in. 

Of course that is only my stash.  I also have individual containers which hold the floss that I already have pulled for individual projects.  I've tried different methods but this one seems to work best for me.

That's about all that I have done today.  Well that and eating butterscotch cookies.  I have to hurry them up and eat them because they turned out yummy.  Butterscotch is one of my favorite flavors so I am having a hard time stopping eating them.  I finally froze about a dozen of them,  Perhaps with them being frozen and out of sight I won't be as tempted to eat them.  Then I pulled around 8 and bagged them to give to Dan the next time I see him.  

I hope everybody has a great day.

Adventures in Baking

 What a start to my day.  I decided to make a new cookie ( new to me anyway) and everything was going ok until....

I'm getting ahead of myself.  Let me backtrack a little bit.  I decided to make Butterscotch Cookies today.  It sounded easy and I had all of the ingredients or so I thought.  As I was going through the ingredient list:

sugar

brown sugar

butter

egg

vanilla

flour

baking soda

salt

cream of tartar

Oops.  Cream of tartar?  I didn't have that so I went to good ol Google and search for substitutes.  I found that if the recipe calls for BOTH cream of tartar and baking soda, you can substitute baking powder for the cream of tartar.  For every teaspoon of cream of tartar you substitute 1.5 teaspoons of baking soda.  That was an easy substitution so I preheated my oven to 325 F and started to put everything together.

It was a standard recipe where you cream your butter and sugar and then add the vanilla and egg and cream it again then add all your dry ingredients and mix.  I was on a roll.  You roll out teaspoons of dough (like with peanut butter cookies) and then roll them in sugar and put them 2" apart and bake.  

SIGH!  I thought the mix was a little "loose" but it wasn't until I took out the first tray that I realized my mistake.  Instead of 2 1/2 cups of flour, I only put in 1 1/2 cups.  OOPS!  Those cookies will be eaten by me.  they tasted good but just wasn't holding their shape.

So now what?  That is when I realized my mistake with the flour.  I wasn't sure how much to add in for the rest of the cookies so had to play it by ear.  I didn't do too bad and the rest of the cookies kept their shape.

Lesson learned  Double check your measurements and don't keep a conversation on the phone with a friend (Josephine) while measuring.  It sort of made me remember the old scene in the original One Day at a Time where Valerie Bertinelli's character was mixing up browning while chatting on the phone and she lost count how many times she had stirred the mix.  Back then if it said to stir it 200 times, you stirred it 200 times.  LOL.

I will make the recipe again and am totally happy to munch on the misshapened cookies that had less flour in them.  Actually I kind of wish they didn't taste so good.  My waistband would appreciate it I know.  LOL.

Time to munch on some cookies while the rest of them finish cooling off and I decide how I will store them (and not inside of my stomach),

Have a great day!