Busy, busy

A lot has happened in the last couple weeks.  The person I liked in the interview process was hired and I'm going to be her mentor.  That's a good thing because one of the reasons I recommended her for the job is that she's going to be difficult to work with for a few months until she settles into what the job really entails.  She thinks it's going to be exciting every day, conquering foes and helping customers, but most days it's just adding 6 + 4 all day.  I have another co-worker that someone took a chance on that I've watched go through the same.  He's been the job about a year and is doing great and I'm hoping my mentee does the same.  I'm excited about what I have to offer to get her started.  

The supplies came in for the double wedding ring quilt.  

And, I got it pin basted.   Supervisor Bella was making sure I got all those lines straight.  I hope to start quilting next week.  I was going to get the machine set up, but I have a lot of stuff to do in the sewing room first.  I've set up my piecing machine in the way of my quilting machine without realizing it.  (It's been too long since I quilted anything big, I guess.)    

I didn't want to move things around because I'm also customizing some inexpensive drapes I bought.  The inexpensive ones seem to all be 52" wide and that's more than I need so I've bought them and am cutting them down to the sizes I need.  More about that later.  It's been quite the adventure and I'm going to end up with some beautiful custom drapery.  

I also took a break over the long Labor Day weekend to put this together.  A while back, I lost all control and started piecing a bunch of little quilts.  Then, that steam ran out this has been sitting in a to-go salad container in my sewing room for a bit.  (Salad containers are great for storing projects!)  Anyway, it's together now, Y seams and all.  Now I can move it from the stack of unstarted projects to the stack of unquilted tops.  The adventure never ends.  As I look at this picture, the colors are better in real life than the photo.  I wonder why.  That's not usually the case.  

There must have been millions of these little kits made.  I still find them once in a while on eBay.  It came with everything except the backing, including a square of poly batting that I plan to use, because why not?

This little shrimp plant is blooming.  For some reason, it's the only one.  The other one doesn't look like it's going to bloom at all and I can only assume it's now in too much shade.  It's the color of a cooked shrimp but this one is pale green and pink.  It was in too much sun and I moved it this year.  I swapped it with a yellow lantana that was in too much shade.  They were both nearly dead, but this year, they're recovering and both have bloomed.  They're still small, but I have high hopes for them next year.  

My sweet Bella.  Nearly blind, almost deaf, but she still enjoys food and wandering around outside and playing with Dottie.  I watched her trip in the back yard the other day, fall, roll on her back and wiggle around in the grass and then stand up and look around like "I meant to do that."  I love this picture.  She just couldn't be bothered with climbing the rest of the way into the bed so she slept this way most of the day.  

We filled the CRV with gas the other day and it takes a couple miles to adjust the MPG when we do.  We watched the MPG climb and at one point, Rob even coasted down a hill to see how high we could get it.  I think it got all the way to 113 before settling down to the 39.6 that we usually average.  I wish I was getting 105 mpg.  

Okay, that's about it for me today.  Trump bragged about declaring WAR on Chicago.  Then when a reporter asked him about it, he turned TACO.  Said he didn't say the things he'd said and belittled the reporter.  RFk jr said the same thing in his hearing last week.  Do these monkeys not understand how cameras work?  When you're recorded saying something, you can't pretend you didn't say it.  There are facts.  And, there are lies.  

There are not alternate facts.  

The fact is that there are at least 4 cities in the U.S. that have higher crime rates than Chicago.  But, they're safely in red states where it's okay...almost encouraged...to carry guns to kill one another.  Believe me.  I live in one of those red states and I know what I'm talking about.  

It's getting harder and harder for them to keep up with the lies.  Just like every liar, they're getting tangled up in their own web.  Twisting only makes it tighter.  

Everybody have a great week!  Watch your back, but also spend some time looking at the flowers.  All we can do is hang on and try not to get thrown out of the ride.  

Lane

C'mon baby!  Let's do the twist.  C'mon baaaby.  Let's do the twist.  And it goes like this!