Flora's Bee Crazy Quilter - Seite 2 
I finally did it
The culprit Don't get all excited, it's nothing good, although it had a good outcome.So at 55 I have finally sewed myself to my work with the machineUnghI have always been cautious about this eventuality as most of the women in my family sew in some capacity and they all have "War" stories about putting the needle through a finger.And I distinctly remember having to help my Mother, pull the needle out of her thumb with a pair of pliers, when she did hersSo I knew this was a possibilityIt is quite a shock when it happens you thoughAt first I couldn't understand, why had the machine stopped?What could it have possibly hit?There was no pin to hit therePro-tip: don't try to yank your hand away, it's attached.As I realized what had happened, at first I was astonished, It hadn't yet begun to hurt.Then worried about the piece I was sewing, no blood YAY!, Yet.Unscrew the needle from the machine, look to see the damage, Wow! good machine it went clear through the finger, thread and all!poke it, ow, OK don't poke itGrab a pair of pliers on the way to the bathroom, find the bandaids and the gauze, now where did I put the damned things?Try to pull it out myself........................Herngh!.........................nope it's stuck*Sigh*Go look up the nearest urgent care facilitycall doctors office and see what they can do, go tell DDHwho react's like It's baby time, It's just a needle honey, Icandrivemyselfdon'tbesilly. Needless to say I did not drive myselfBy the time we got the "so sorry we're booked you need to go to the urgent care facility"20 minutes had come and gone, we were already on our way down the hill, and the finger started to hurtI'm adding the gory details for those who are interested but if you are at all squeamish, don't look.you have been warnedYep that's the tread I was usingOOOwuie!The two dots down by the knuckle are from the lidocaine shot, much better.Good thing I'd taken off my Wedding ring the day before to clean it and hadn't gotten around to putting it back on yet! Otherwise it too would be stuck and I was informed they might have had to cut it off!The nice doctor and nurses fussed over me for about an hour and a half giving me a lidocaine shot.AAHHHHH! Much better! It ended up taking two of them to pull the needle out, with hemostats (Not the tool for the job) turns out my pliers would have been better! Then got my hand x-rayed 4 different ways to make sure It wasn't through the bone, it wasn't.Bones are surprisingly sturdy things, I love my skeleton!Anyway, back home again, with a bottle of hydrocodone which now that the initial trauma and swelling are gone I don't really need. This morning you can barely see where it happened and it doesn't hurt unless you poke it hard, so don't do that!Just a little bruised, poor thingIt's that dot on the 4th finger
The sun is shinning and the bunnies are bouncing, the earth is awakening to the spring, blessed be!
RSC Pink
Geese don't migrate in April, do they?All I know is I'm going to have a ton of them by the time this year is overI all sorts of glorious colors! Woo-hoo!and enough birds to make 2 quilts, maybe more.One never knowsI have no real plan other than I like the patternAnd there you have The impetus behind most of my projectsI want to! Says the inner brat-child, and so it is done.Then there are the end pieces that are to small to do much with so I sew them together those upper left blocks are now 2" square and big enough to actually do something withI make them from the smaller part of all the HST I get off the birds,since they are made from 2" squares by sewing down the middle of a color and a background it's much "easier" to sew the smaller HST before you cut off the end. other wise your WASTING FABRICOMG!Can't have that now can we?And since the ends are only a bout an inch or so they aren't useful for anything else all by themselvesAm I being silly? Quite probablyThey are for me in that grey area of, to small to use and too big to throw awaySo I appease my inner OCD "waste-not" hoarding freak, by doing this.Don't judge! It's not nice to make fun of the mentally challenged!And last but not least the spoolsFor a wonder I actually have a plan for theseIt involves some applique and fiddling though.I'm still thinking on it
Why am I so exhausted?
I was thinking about this all last night. I am Fatigued. Not in a First world sort of "Oh me oh my" sort of way, but in more of a trying to sort it all out, sort of way. I realize, I am a white woman of privilege and I am not obligated to fix any of what is broken, but I can't help but feel I should at least know what the hell is going on.There is so much going on in the world and trying to keep track of it or even keep it in some sort of order is crazy making. I want to be informed but the more I try the more knackered I get. Then I don't pay attention and I feel horribly uninformed. Trying to keep a balance between my peace of mind and staying abreast of what is going on is getting harder and harder. It was bad enough before Putin invaded Ukraine and started killing everyone. The news is heartbreaking and there is so much suffering we can't do anything about, it puts more pressure on the pile of things, I can't do anything about. "Just throw money at it" seems inadequate but what else to do? I can't just disengage myself, turn off the news, be less informed and still look myself in the mirror and like what I see. Am I doing this to myself? Yes, probably. It doesn't help that the news is a fire-hose of badness. So how to overcome the feeling of helplessness? The feeling that I don't do enough but what can I do? If I ever find out I'll let you all know. For now it's time to play in the dirt. Dirt don't care, neither do worms.I can take my frustrations out on the weeds, so there is that.
RSC Yellow
Here is what I have gotten done for this monthIt's not for a lack of Yellow scraps thoughjust no time to sewI did do 4 spools in total I didn't get picturesbut you get the idea, spools are easy and usually done last to use up the inch or less Striping scraps from the ends of thingsThere will be more but the will probably be finished next monthmostly because i haven't gotten around to cutting anything for the other patchesI could go spelunking in stuff I have already don and store away till I need them but that would be cheatin,g wouldn't it.I was able to get a bunch of geese off the groundHave I mentioned how much I like sewing geese?there are a whole flock of yellowand then there are the birdsI have more but they too are parts yet to be completedI still have no Idea what these will become but they are fun to make
Candytuft fairy finished
Flower spray with added blingRemember when I said"that bit should stay relatively unadorned" ? I thought about it and I thought it needed some more blingbeforeand a bird AfterI also asked Cathy Kezerian what she thought about it.Her advice was the web needed to look like it attached to something, not just hang in the air. so I extended the yellow flower spray from the other side of the spiderAdded white iridescent sequins to the green trimWhich makes it look less like that nasty fake easter candy people used to use for decorating cake when I was a kidYou know, the spongy stuff that's "edible" but tastes like disappointmentAdded clear iridescent sequins and white beads to the white seam treatmentI originally made an embroidered bird for this spot but it ended up being too big, which made room to gave this little fellow a homeIt's made with bullion's and 2 kinds of tubular net ribbon for the wings head and tailThis added just enough to make it more but not too muchIt just goes to show when your are unsure, ask
Feeling Scattered
The news just keeps getting worse so I have turned it off.This week has been the kind that makes me feel randomized.Like I have gotten nothing doneLike I have to start from the beginningand will get nothing done ever againWell that's just silly.We had 2 days of bright sunny weather that were warm enough to go outside and work in the gardenSo I got a bunch of needed things done there. I fixed the broken raised bed and made a new one. Turned the compost bin and started to move the old one into the new one and scraped the moss off the concrete around it, Yes that's a thing around here. Started to clean out the garage so we can fix the leak, that has developed in the roof, over the winter.Taken my MIL to an appointment a day all this week. they got all piled up together because a few needed to be rescheduled when someone in the office got covid. ugh. They couldn't do it all on one day and get it over with? She's 90 this year and slowing down quite a bit but still going, on sheer stubbornness. I wish she would ask for help before things go pear-shaped but she "Doesn't want to bother us, dear"The car had to be taken in for oil and filter service and a computer update, so we won't see them again for another 6,000 miles. I love my Hybrid!So I have been running around getting groceries and other chores done, between picking up and dropping off, since I can't "just sit there". sound exhausting yet? Meanwhile, I have gotten a few little things prepared for doing.Yellow scraps for the RSC, little stuffed velvet birds birds for Mary Jo Heiney's class, finished fa few more orange peel blocks for an applique project. and finishing the last little side of the candytuft fairie CQ block. There are things in flight, as always, that need gathering and prep, before I start on them everything needs to be organized or It all feels out of control.
Candy Tuft Fairie
Isn't she fun!?!OK I know a big shiny spider is not what most people call fun bUtShes so pretty!I'm still working out this corner of the blockso It's not entirely done, done yetThough in the whole scheme of the block it may not need moreLike I said I don't know yetMaybe that bit should stay relatively unadornedto give the eye somewhere to restThe more I look at it the more I like that IdeaI just know I need to think about it for a bitThe yellow SRE flower spray came out nice And this bush of Orange flower beadsI added a few Beesand one who went visiting our girl
Small Beaded pin
It's just a little bitty thingA pinA requestTook almost no time but so satisfying
Little Brown Jacobin Finished!
So here is the last little bit of sewing left beforeand after I used three different greens on the left for that little bit of woven leaf, some green overlaying the yellow in lattice stitch on the right And its done!Finished!Or That way?this way?At home on the wall