This 'n' That

It's been a fraught couple of weeks, filled with new challenges to lose sleep over (but ultimately meet successfully, while filled with dread at the newness of it all). I've found myself retreating not to my usual Killer Sudoku puzzles (Expert level, thankyouverymuch [she says smugly]) but to rereading fondly-remembered Dick Francis mysteries (fondly- but not always fully-remembered. The bad guy is often a surprise all over again!)

Still, I have done some sewing and will have four quilts and a block to present tomorrow at the Community First! Quilters' monthly meeting. The quilts have been discussed, but the block only mentioned briefly. I had the presence of mind to photograph it this afternoon.

The Chapel photo . . .

. . . and the raw-edge machine applique block I agreed to make (all the pieces already drafted by the instigator of this project, bless her!):

This will be trimmed down, so I hope the unfinished stone path at the left will be truncated in the final product. If not, the assemblers have scraps of the stone fabric.

I can go in, I can go out. I can go in, I can go out.

For those of you not well-versed in the TV show M*A*S*H, that's a line from Larry Linville's character Frank as he taunts Alan Alda's character Hawkeye, who's under "house" arrest in their tent. It was a show I watched almost nightly with my parents as I spent the last 16 months flying in and out of Oregon (2 months in, one month out/home). As of this month, I'm finally out of there and back in my home for good. (The parents have been settled in Assisted Living and their house sold. Mission accomplished.)

One would think (this one, anyway) that having been uprooted from well-established routines and carefully-planned projects, once back home I'd want to jump right back in where I left everything. That has not proven to be the case. Instead, I was at loose ends for nearly two weeks, unable to dredge up interest in nor settle down enough to work on anything.

I hated the feeling of wasting all this perfectly good time (and, at the moment, weather) and took some serious stock of what was keeping me from feeling all the way home. The feeling of being overwhelmed by stuff (a throwback to everything I'd been dealing with in Oregon, surely) and the need to get rid of anything superfluous was the greatest anchor wrapped around my psyche. After days of letting things simmer on my mental back burner, I finally decided that I don't want any long-term projects hanging over my head when I hit 70. 

There: a goal. A definable end point.

Unplanned planning

Yesterday's plans--to browse in three stores for large outdoor planters on my way to getting my second vaccination, then purchase the ones I wanted on my way back home--were dissolved by rain. The thunder, lightning, and steady rain didn't seem so bad to me, but the threat of tornadoes is probably what called off the appointments. I've been rescheduled for today (and all of the Modesta 2nd-vaxxers got moved to Monday).

So with a wet day ahead of me, I worked a bit on my mom's project. 

Inspiration from hubris

This is part of my view from my sewing machine:

I've been staring at these appliqued panels for years. I'd been thinking of turning them into pillows, but that idea never really took off. I'd also been thinking of sticking them on a back of a quilt, just to get them used, but that seemed a disservice to the hours of work I put into them.