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Thursday night I made dinner which was vegan pesto that I then put chicken into along with the cashew/spinach ravioli I got from TJs. My pesto is:
soak 1 cup of cashews in hot water for 20 mins
Drain, put those in food processor and blend for a bit, then add copious amounts of basil, a tidge of olive oil, garlic and onion powder, juice of one lemon and some S&P. Super tasty and easy but a bit of clean up on the blender/food processor. The ravioli were good but I over cooked some of them a tad. I added two cans of chicken that I diced up good and it was a very good meal with leftovers for dinner and pesto for bread.

I worked on the embroidery and got the the leaves all outlined in either stem/chain stitch in two different colors of thread.

Friday we headed up to Phx early and forgot things like our masks (thanks to maggie she had spare) and I forgot my ibuprofen which was saved by Shanda having some in her bag of holding. Anyhoo...we parked, walked to get breakfast at Morning Squeeze which had excellent food. We then walked to the Science museum which was loud with children but pretty informative. The cool thing is they had Power of Poisons traveling exhibit which was very lacking in children and super interactive and informative. I took okay pictures of it but it was low light.

We then headed over to quilt con where I needed a sit down while we waited for Maggie (aka Bertana) to get back from getting her badge from ehr hotel room. We didn't get badges just electronic scans on our phones which made me sad but it was a cool convention, Quiltcon. They used the 3rd floor of the Phx Convention Center, those familiar from Fan Fusion know this now as the Photo Op and Autograph area. Lots of attendees couldn't believe how big the convention center was and I giggled. Uh, this is just one set of the rooms they could use. Though I guess the classes were on the Symphony side which makes sense is a across the sky bridge. Anyhoo...we were there to see the quilts and I had hoped to Meet Chris from Rose City Originals. And we walked up to the Accuquilt booth (this is a thing I want but can't justify buying until I'm older and have more free time) but got to meet him, get a selfie and his STICKERS!!!

Saw a lot of teh quilts on display (or tried to there were a lot and my knee while better was cranky pants by the end of the day.) And shopping. I got some notions (needles, needle minders) from Rachel Rossi, stickers and a small bag from the MQG shop, stickers and a 1.5" iridescent ruler from Feral Notions, yarn/fiber/needle minder from Storyteller Stitchery who are local, and I got a pattern Called Splintered Spectrum from Lemon Quilts. I was surprised by Mel who got me a Lap App which I didn't realize I needed and have used the heck out of Sat/Sunday embroidering especially when I grabbed a clamp to attach my embroidery hoop. So effing handy. To understand how this works see The designer explaining it. Yes its expensive but its super well made, good materials and damn if its hella handy. Maggie had seen it with me and I couldn't' figure out what it was for and I went around to see something else on the next aisle. After I left Maggie got a demo of it and immediately tried to find me or Mel, found Mel first and he bought it for me once he saw what it did. I'm super grateful and super happy with it thus far. My only beef and I will call them is I would like to get the other heads for it to do the ipad stand and/or the bead table and not have to buy a separate thing? Maybe? I will use it and see. But I see this useful for all types of in lap hand sewing and I could put my third hand attached to it too. I will probably make a bag to carry it and have the caddy stuff. But right now i love it.

We had a wonderful dinner and drinks at Harumi (sushi) and then mel drove us home. My knee was on fire and we got home, I iced it, took more drugs and we we went to bed. Saturday I woke up and my foot and knee both shifted and settled more in place. The swelling had gone done a lot since the weekend and it was nice to have full extension on my leg. I was good and elevated it most of the day in-between walking around. I watched movies (Muppets Treasure Island --Muppet Haunted Mansion -- Eddie Murphy Haunted Mansion --Rosario Dawson Haunted Mansion. I love them all and marathoned those. I got the center of the rose done and I love how it turned out. Sunday was embroidery in the afternoon as we had errands to run for household things (harbor freight and ace hardware) before I sat down and got going on couching goldstyle thread. I got through the little leaves and almost finished the last petals that are padded. Here is where I finished up. I'm going to finish the padded couching and then I think its pearls around the outer edge of the petals and then its done? Its rather striking with what is showing now but I'm not sure yet. Gonna take it to scribal tonight to work on it and get some peer review on it.

I also need to get some laundry done (like my war stuff) and finish the deep clean/declutter/destash/organize of the studio. Finding things immediately when I want them is fucking fancy as hell and then there is the filing cabinet to deal with. And I have this weird thing where I want to wear a new dress to Cassandra's elevation and I will have like 10 days to make one....doable but necessary?

The weekend made me inspired and needing some that with the world being dumb right now. Just want it.

Managed to get some of my to do list one. It was over ambitious as usual but I wasn't sure how long things with the quilt were going to take, what my motivation was going to be but I wrote things down and if I get time this week to check more things off that list than fine.

Friday I worked, took a lyft to pick up the car from the shop, and then enjoyed a beer while spinning and hanging out with Benton. He had had a fun water day at Camp. Mel had gone to see wander and get lumber for the ramp he and Jeff will be building. It was hot though and both Benton and I just didn't want to go anywhere or have the soup mel made...it was too hot. So I made us grilled cheese. (Mine was dairy free). It was comforting and tasty. Saturday we had workmen arrive at 6am (it was going to 108) and they continued to work on the trenching in the front yard and getting rebar ready. Mel had left at 8am to the event up in Thatcher for the Incipient Shire of Vallis Aeris's first event. I got working in the studio about 11am. Benton was going to a sleep over so I dropped him off about 1pm and then headed to the quilt shop (Quilter's Market) since it was just on the way home. I needed new small snip scissors since my gingher snips are too bulky to snip quilt seams. I found a cute pair of ghost scissors and a couple of patterns and a ruler I just had to have.

I got home, finished up putting a thick edge on the quilt block and then spaced out the memoriam calligraphy. I then got out my embroidery kit and was super surprised to find my embroidery scissors which I didn't remember owning in the kit...so I didn't need new scissors after all and the universe was being funny. The embroidery took forever cause I did about half and hated it cuase I used two strands and it was fuzzy. So I cut that off and then did it with 1 strand and it came out nicely...not perfect but nicely. Mel got home while I was embroidering and watching TV. He was hot and tired and hungry so I got us an order from Graze which included a dairy free vanilla shake for me! OMG!! Woot!

I then got the quilt block placed on the back of the quilt while Mel and I watched a movie. I've been on an archeology/adventure kick for things since I watched all of the Indiana Jones movies (except the new one), National Treasure 1 and 2. We finished up with Jungle Cruise which Mel had not seen yet and he loved the fun romp it is. Poor Willow was very confused at why Benton was not home and in his room in his bed. I let her in his room to sulk.

Sunday I woke up later than I planned but got going and dressed in my greek mumu for virtual classes for the Atlantian University. I'm 3 classes from getting my Bachelor's degree there which is kind of cool. that means I've taken 26 classes over the last few years. I'm hoping to teach this fall at the virtual one. Me and the SIL had a side discussion on one of the classes and I had more questions about that class than answers so I think I will teach the portion of it I do know (Northern European Beads). Becca encouraged me to teach it.

danabren may know the lady that did a large overview on beads but didn't have it very organized. Though I did get pointed to a resource I hadn't seen which is Medieval Beads which is quite fun. Things to peruse there.

Once I was done with classes I changed into modern clothes and was supposed to take Benton shopping for shorts and he didn't want to go anywhere. So I decided I would hit Hellmart without him. I detest Hellmart but he's growing and I needed basic shorts that he will trash this summer and then we will need new for school again. I also got some other necessities and managed to find dinner (beer brats) cause it was damn hot and I haven't used my grill in a while. It was tasty with a spinach salad and some potato salad I wasn't too allergic to (mustard seed). Then I spent the evening watching TV with Mel and spinning. I'm about 1 ounce away from finishing my silk merino I started December. Its laceweight so its taking me sometime but I got into the rhythm. Hoping to finish that this week so I can get to not so thin things. I have plenty of stash to spin thru.

On the book front I'm almost done with Sir Patrick and will be finishing that tonight before I sit down to put text on my last scroll commission I had still open. I have scroll assignments for some back logs but this was a commission that has been too long over due. It will get delivered at Fabric War and I need to find the signatures I need for it as well. But that is easy. I can make it happen tonight.

Pick of the block in situ and not: block and on quilt

Also, thanks to blossom we have the best photo of Ivan ever...there was a mobile home fire just outside the park wall and it had ammo exploding too...good times.
Ivan Spinning while the World Burns

Last week was kinda of weird. It was only a 3 day work week but it was the longest 3 days ever. It was supposed to be slow...and it wasn't. so much emergency stuff happening and people with their heads cut off and my muse was screaming at me that I should not be a slug...but it was hard. My brain was just toast but I had plans. Plus we had an invasion of the peccary variety. I family of javelinas had decided our backyard. They can be aggressive especially if there are babies so when they got into the birdseed at midnight. So we yelled at them and they ignored us. By morning they had seemed to move on but the actually had moved to teh side yard and then cause 2 sets of work men to not come in the yard. One was the gas company for the blue staking and the second was our landscaping crew. Our wall guy came that night and we got them to move along and shooed them out of the yard. Mel and I and Benton all did that with and without the hose and they have seemed to finally gotten the hint the yard is not theirs.
Javelinas

Pics from last weekends sewing fest are Sewing for Fiona

Thursday Willa came over to help me troubleshoot the Flair58. I need to really do a good preheat and I need to use dryer (non-oily) beans as well as a very fine grind. So I pulled a lot of shots which will become afternoon iced items or espresso martinis. But I pulled 3 good shots and that was nice. Got a lot of good advice on it and chatting with Willa was nice too.

Friday we all slept in since it was no school, no work...but I still did some work and then I got my studio set up for working on quilting. I ended up paying for the pattern and that was good though it was more a guideline and that was also okay. For my first quilt piece should I have done something without half and quarter squares? Yes, probably. The first book on beginner quilting I picked up had no half square anything. So yeah. The album I'm shoving things into is:
Gibson Quilt I will hopefully get the side binding on it Tuesday and then plan out my embroidery patch.

But Friday I only got the squares cut out and then had a massage while Benton played games and Mel was off teaching.

Saturday my plan was to get meds for Wander and pick up things to keep her occupied. That kind of worked. I hit the wrong pharmacy of the same name and then I spent a quick trip with Wander before getting the download to Megan and playing with Tilly. It was good to catch up and then I hit up Maguires to talk with a jeweler to talk about my mom's diamonds. On my next off friday I will go in and get things designed I hope. Then I hit up Sprouts for dinner fixings before heading home. I'm now learning the way of the land on the West side. I made home made hummus in the blender...which isn't as easy as food processor but it was tasty. I cooked up gyro meat and then got out stuff for sides like dolmas for a greek style dinner. Tasty.

Then Mel and I sat on the couch and I spun more on the silk/wool project and he worked on some plying while we watched updates from Time Team on YT. They have a new Sutton Hoo specials and its neat. I hit bed and my book #19 for the year and then read #20 the next day which was Poppy Done to Death and now I'm in #21 All the Little Liars. So I'm going to finish the Aurora Teagarden series before finishing up the memoir from Sir Patrick. Its just been so easy to hit "next book" in my kindle app. Its okay.

Sunday Megan and I ran errands and visited Wander. I helpe Megan get her big loom into the house so she could work in the AC. I got home and cooled off (yay tucson is over 100 now...bleah) and then got the squares sewed and recut and pieced together though I was frustrated with our internet repeater pod kept overheating and quitting which meant my tv kept stopping. Ugh. I know first world problems but it was annoying. And I was tired and hangry and then when I went to make dinner I couldnt' find anything I needed and Benton was being obtuse and ugh. My brain imploded....but I made pesto and we had a nice dinner. After dinner I got back to trimming squares and finally got the block fully assembled. It was still a bit wonky but way better than before. I squared it up just before I ended for the evening and reset my studio for a work day. Having sewing things out and teh cats is a recipe for disaster. I've left the ironing board up though since I still need it and I need to rearrange things that I shuffled looking for something to be able to put it back and I found a cute little pattern I had bought a decade ago to make sewing caddy and I think I will do that for when i'm sitting on the couch. Or for presents. We shall see how industrious i can be. I do plan on taking the 1951 machine to the norther house so 1) get back some space in my home studio and 2) having a machine up there is a good plan.

So yeah that has been the weekend and the reading and the crafting. Maybe next week I will have mojo to workout...cause my back is telling me all about things.