The Best of Both Worlds

Well, I said I'd decide if I was going to garden or quilt once I got up today. After checking e-mail and watching a little TV this morning, I went outside and Russ was tearing out the last of the monkey grass bordering our front flower bed. We started tearing it out last summer, but it eventually got so hot that we quit with about 12 more feet to go. This pretty much made up my mind on what the day would hold for me. So, I jumped in the truck and went and got soil amendments for Russ to till in to prepare the bed.




I then did my best to support the independent garden center economy. You don't have to worry about me losing my mind and buying fabric - it's plants that I go ga-ga over. The household budget really takes a hit in April and May at Chez Allen.



I wheeled around the corner on my way home from my 2-1/2 hour plant shopping spree to find this....we had a red oak that died (probably from the drought) and Lumberjack Russ had cut it down and chopped into little pieces. He left the stump for now - maybe I'll put a platform on it to hold a potted plant and add a little height to the bed. It sure does change the landscape - we've had this tree for over 8 years. Before it died, it dropped enough acorns to feed the entire squirrel population on Tucker Street and many of them rooted. We're going to leave a couple of them in the bed to see if they might grow up to be real trees. Sure would be much cheaper for us if they did!



Had to clean up and run some errands and close down a class at the shop this afternoon. We went out for great Mexican food for dinner and hit Home Depot for flower bed edging (and just a couple of more plants!). Spent some time puttering in the yard, but was too full and lazy for all out planting - we'll do that tomorrow night after work. About 8 I decided to take a picture of my Liberated Piecing (AKA crumb or mile-a-minute blocks) so that I could prove that I have actually been sewing this week. Then I decided to suck it up, piece the back and at least get it loaded on the Gammill. Once it was loaded, I figured I might as well quilt it. By 10, I was all done! I'll take it to work tomorrow to trim and I'll get the binding on it tomorrow or Tuesday. The colors in the photo are not as vivid in real life; the background fabric is black with poison green mini flowers and vines, and the inner border is lime green. I even put blocks down the center of the back to make it wide enough - don't you just hate it when a quilt top is 44" wide? I'm too cheap to run the yardage the other way. It's easier to split it on the fold and put scraps or something down the middle.



So, it was a very successful day with flowers, good food and quilting.

And Merle had a good day too. He discovered the catnip.......




Have a great week,
Susan