Building Muscles--One Brick At A Time

As I started telling about in an earlier post, I've been building a slate walkway from some stones leftover from a construction job site. Well, I've finished! As with so many projects, once you get started, you just have to keep going--in this case until the stones were all used up. And then, the finishing touch was to line the sides with grass sod--and hope for a drenching rain which hasn't come yet.
We have our house up for sale now (great timing, huh?) and have been scurrying around completing projects that should have been finished years ago (Isn't that always the way?). One thing that had been a major eyesore was a stack of bricks--4 feet high and 5 feet deep and wide--and all of it covered with a bright blue tarp. And did I mention that you looked right at it every time you looked out the window at the marsh? Really an enhanced feature to focus on while lauding the wonders of your house on the water.
Anyway, I decided that the time had come to move the stack--brick by brick. But I didn't want it to be a waste of energy while I was doing all that. So I decided to add a brick patio to the walkway I had just built. And here is the finished patio--after 10 days of digging out dirt to form a somewhat smooth surface, moving the brick, placing them and filling in most of the spaces between the bricks. It's not a professional job, but I love it and certainly wish that I had done it years ago. My husband built the adirondack chair years ago and it still sits pretty good so I hauled it over to the new patio and sat myself right down. It's in the shade and I can sit there and look out across the marsh. I'm happy.
What with all of the physical work going on at my house, there hasn't been too much quilting taking place. But I thought I'd share the first three blocks of my t.v./car project for this year. This was a block of the month by Susan Garman for The Quilt Show.com last year called Bouquets For A New Day. I'm doing it with the needleturn applique method and am enjoying it. Hopefully, in the next few days, I'll be doing some actual machine sewing--but first I have to polish all those brass doornobs and vacuum the rugs for the thousandth time. I'm really hoping that someone loves this house really soon!

Magic Mirrors

I taught my mirror class today at my house to a group of ladies/friends from Mt. Pleasant. I think it really went well and a large part of that was because the TTT Gang gave me such great feedback on the class I taught there last month. Today, each person--but one--went home with a finished mirror and that was exciting in itself. They painted, appliqued, quilted and glued--and what a result. I'm sorry for the quality of some of the pictures--I was moving around so much that I guess I didn't hold the camera steady.
Here is Nancy as we started out the day. This was a big deal for her to be able to walk up the steps into my sewing studio as she has been living with several afflictions over the past few years that had restricted her movement. So! She made it up the steps, ready to start her project. At the end of the day she was VERY tired but more than pleased with her beautiful finished mirror.
June was actually the first to finish her project and here she is with it "clamped-up" and then, at the right, unveiled in its full glory. And I guess you can see my reflection in the mirror as I'm taking her picture!
Pam and Chris used the same colorway for their mirrors and both did a beautiful job--although Chris did get a little over-zealous with the glue. You know, if a little is good, then a lot is even better . . .

And to round things off, Dee made her mirror with a blue color-way. This was the first time that I had met her and enjoyed spending some time with her. Annie didn't finish hers but it will be for her mother's birthday next January, so maybe that will be enough time (ya never know!) She spent some of her time going to Publix to get subs for the rest of us--so we didn't have to go hungry while we worked. What a deal.
As a teacher, this was a perfect day for me. Everything went well, everyone enjoyed themselves and most people finished. That's my kind of class.

How I Spent my Friday Afternoon

The weather has been so nice this past week and I KNOW the heat of summer is slithering in and will catch us unawares and we'll wonder what happened to Spring. So now is a great time to get some long-awaited chores done in the yard. No time like the present!
I haven't gotten too much done outdoors in the past weeks because my husband and I have been having a "discussion" about wheelbarrows. We have 3 of them and NONE of them work. He kept saying he was going to repair them but that day never seemed to come. And what's a gardener to do without a wheelbarrow? It was a stalemate. Well, the solution came this morning. I hauled the 3 wheelbarrows out to the street for the trash collectors on Monday morning and we bought a brand new one at Lowe's. And there was no time like the present to put it to use.
We were fortunate to have been given these slate slabs by my brother several years ago when they were left over from one of his jobs. We used them in our home in Snee Farm and then picked them back up and brought them with us to our present house. (Yes, we ARE gluttons for punishment). My husband built a beautiful entrance walkway with some of them and enclosed it with Belgium blocks (see lower right of photo). We still have quite a few left and I've been dithering about what to do with them. So . . .this afternoon, I built this walkway that goes into the backyard--with a platform to the left for the garbage can. And, yes, they are heavy--most of the slabs are 2" thick.
I have to tell you--I absolutely love doing this kind of work. When we lived on our acreage in the mountains I did all kinds of things like this. But it's just not the same living on a 1/3 acre lot in the middle of town, so I haven't done much of anything like this recently. It was a LOT of fun and very satisfying to do; however, I have a sneaking suspicion that there is a major case of soreness waiting for me in a few hours. I've already taken the Advil!

Decluttering

Last week, I went to Tennessee Quilts in Jonesboro, TN. What a great shop! If you're into Kaffe Fassett fabrics, this is the place to go. I couldn't help thinking of my friend, Alice, while I was there because she makes some pretty wonderful quilts with his fabrics.
We were in our home in Hendersonville, NC last week so it really wasn't a big deal to ride over to Tennessee. BUT the big deal was that I forgot to take my camera. The ride over there is so very beautiful--gorgeous vistas with wide valleys, thrift rolling down rock walls, forsythia brilliant as the sun. And me with no camera. Oh well, I guess I'll just have to go back.
When I got back to Mt. Pleasant, I was struck with the de-cluttering bug and the object of my bug was my quilting magazines. I have literally hundreds of them and when I want to look something up I have absolutely no idea where to find it. So, I bit the bullet and looked through EACH magazine, tore out the patterns I wanted and carted the detritus off to the recycling bin. When my husband picked up one of the boxes he was a little surprised at the weight of a container of magazines only--newspapers are sort of light by comparison.
This "Before" picture shows only the tip of the iceburg. And the "After" picture makes me happy.
I will have to admit that I did not exact the same carving up on my Quilter's Newsletter Magazines--they come under the category of a "Collection"--as least that is my excuse! I just couldn't make myself mutilate them.
NOW--here's hoping that I will keep up the good work and do the winnowing-out each month rather than every 6 years or so. What a concept!