Turned around

 

Have you noticed as you get older that your body reacts differently to different things? I used to have zero issues with scents. The strongest scents wouldn't faze me at all. Then I noticed that I cannot have my clothes washed in ANY kind of scented laundry detergent. Just can't hack it. So now we have two boxes of laundry detergent - the scented and the unscented. Once the scented is gone - there will be no more in our house. Why do they make this stuff so strong? I can be walking outside and smell when someone is drying their clothes with scented products, and it's not pretty!

So the other day, M was burning some incense. The first day, I'm OK. The next day she burned something different - not sure I want to know what it was. My nose went into overdrive and ran like a sieve the entire day. Our house still smells and badly and well ----- there will be NO MORE incense in the house. I can feel a heaviness in my chest, and we do NOT want this to progress to anything worse.

I can handle a candle burning as the scents are very subtle, but the incense is INTENSE and no way can my system handle it. My nose is fine today, but I've been sucking back Claritin to prevent another day like yesterday. I'm sure there will be more changes as I get older, but hopefully, all can be accommodated!

But let's move onto more pleasant things. I'm not sure if I posted this picture, but this is what you can expect to see in Northern Ontario. Rocks, trees, and water! All three of them in one picture! 

Typical scenery from Northern Ontario

This is the same highway (there's only ONE) that I rode my bike on when I rode across Canada in 2013. Notice how narrow that paved shoulder is, which means that, at times, you're riding in the live lane. Yep - with all the transport trucks, the RVs, and the other crazy drivers on the road. 

And this is the scene from this morning. AH -- those shoulders are so much wider and much more fun to ride along. I posted this picture because I remember stopping here. I think we had ice cream and sat on the swings that they have out front. It's near Pancake Bay Provincial Park, and it's called Agawa Crafts. 

Agawa Crafts

It's weird because this picture is taken looking west when I'm walking eastward. That's OK because unless I rotated the picture, I wouldn't have known that I was at this spot. Normally you wouldn't know this, but I've caught it in other photos as well. I'm not sure why, but that's OK. 

This brings back so many memories! I do remember that being a very long stretch as we rode through Northern Ontario. KM after KM with nothing. Well, I guess that's the same thing we experienced when we rode past the Arctic Circle. KM of NOTHING. At least on that trip, traffic was sparse!

So, the other day, I had a few repair jobs to do. These are my blocks from the "Long Time Gone" quilt by Jen Kingwell. I had quickly sewn them together, but I wasn't happy with them, and I wanted to get some good closeups to send to the group. So, back to the sewing machine and the ironing board. And here are the three flying geese blocks that we had to make. Yep - that's a LOT of flying geese. 

Flying geese block one

Flying geese block two

Flying geese block three

Those blocks are all fine now, and despite the number of seams and lumps and bumps, the blocks are very flat - thanks to some great pressing tips that I passed along to the class. 

If you want those same tips, you can always sign up for one of my ongoing classes!

But as I was looking at the show and tell that I had posted, something was amiss. I went back to try and figure out what was happening and why people made the same mistake. Oh my - there was an error in the book. 

There's an error in this block

 

I decided to check my block to see what I had done. Two half-square triangles were causing some issues in the pattern in the book. The picture of the quilt was fine, but not the diagram. After checking my block, I see that I made a mistake on one of the HST units. Seriously???? I never noticed it. Well, it's fixed now. And it has nothing to do with color; just one unit was rotated. 

The block is fixed now

I decided to put all my blocks on the wall to see what they look like, and oh dear - one square was shouting at me. I don't like shouting, and I had to rip that square out and fix it.  

One fabric is shouting

Now everyone is happier, including me! I'm going for a semi-random look here. It's something new for me, so I'm going to continue on. 

All is calm

Then it was back to the Quilter's Patch where the seams on one block were bothering me. They didn't sit properly on the back, so that got fixed as well. 

Quilter's Patch block

I have a customer quilt that needs to be quilted today, so I'll focus on that. It's a custom one, so I'll be with the quilt all day. Thankfully, it's not big. 

But when I take a break, I'll be working on my Cherrywood Challenge! I know - it was originally due July 1, but the deadline got pushed to December 31st. I hadn't started it when the deadline got pushed, and of course, I've had 6 months. Well, now I have two weeks! 

Cherrywood Challenge

It's a challenge working with the limited palette of four colors, one of them is white, and the other three are shades of pink. But I've got a design which was worked out months ago. I have to say that I changed the coloring around a wee bit to get maximum contrast. Let's just say that it's going well. I still have a LOT of work to do, but I'm very pleased with the results so far. 

And this is the hired help. Just hanging out - not too helpful, but cute! 

The hired help

There's a Virtual Retreat this weekend! Yeah!! I've got stacks of stuff cut and ready to piece! I'll post the link for Sunday tomorrow.  Note the new time - I'm going to keep it in the evening only on Saturday. Sunday morning will start at 10 AM and run until 8 PM. 

Saturday, December 19, from 6 PM - 9 PM.  

Join Zoom Meeting https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82830374208?pwd=NFA2d1hOaFFwcEdhNFoveWlWeCs3QT09 Meeting ID: 828 3037 4208 Passcode: 150354

On that note, I'm out of here. I have a bit of paperwork to get done, and then it's down to Studio B for a fun day of quilting!

Have a great day!!!

Ciao!!