My husband knows nothing perks me up like a sunset! We took a short drive over the Gandy bridge before coming back home for dinner. It’s easy to feel shut in these days but if you look for them, there are safe options for getting out.

Carol asked about the two quilts seen in the photo I posted the other night in our library. They’re Autumn inspired quilts and I use them year around. Both were made while we were living in Marietta so they’re at least 15 years old!

The first one that was on my lap is a Log Cabin quilt from the book Best of Black Mountain Quilts. Mom liked mine so much she made at least 3 versions herself … 2 to give away and 1 to keep.

The one that is thrown across the arm of the loveseat in the photo is a Pineapple Blossom quilt, from a free pattern found on Bonnie Hunter’s site.

I was a little nervous of having it done while we were gone but the painting has been finished on the Big Canoe house. Our inspection found wood rot and some pealing paint on the trim of the house so even though the house didn’t really look too bad … we needed to address the issues. We debated whether we wanted to just deal with the trim issues or do the whole exterior and in the end we decided to paint it all.

This is the before photo

And this is the one the painter sent today. I told Keith he could pick the new color and after reviewing what was allowed … he decided on staying with the same colors although the shades might be a little different. The green is a little darker than I expected but I think there had probably been some fading over time too.

Overall, it looks really good in the photos and I’m anxious to see it in person.

Funny thing is they’re painting our townhouses here too but the Big Canoe house was finished in 4 days and they’ve barely started here after 2 and a half weeks! Of course, there has been a lot of rain here and there are 21 units plus garages and a pool house.

I’m not going to start debating politics with my commenters but I will tell you all this – you DO NOT get to dictate the content of my blog. You DO get to choose whether you visit or not.

I think it’s rather interesting that comments supporting my beliefs for the most part have not had to be approved meaning you are regular visitors who have commented before while the negative comments have required approval meaning those people haven’t interacted with me previously. I have chosen to approve those comments even though I personally do not agree with them. I think they demonstrate why we should be worried about the state of our country.

And now I wait and pray that Trump is voted out. I can’t (and don’t want to) imagine how much more damage he’ll to do to this country with another 4 years.

Did I tell you that October’s precut was Fat Quarters? I had a set picked out in GA and a plan to start the quilt before I broke my ankle. The plan for the 2 weeks at home was to quilt 5 or 6 tops … but plans changed. I will be working on not 1 but 2 fat quarter quilts and I’m going to try to quilt 2 small Strippie quilts.

I love Plus quilts and have been planning to do another one for a while so after considering some different options, I decided on a positive/negative Plus version. After making my first group of blocks I realized that I didn’t like the print blocks combined with the tone on tone blocks so I decided I’d make two quilts. The smaller one will be 45 x 63 and I think I have enough of the prints to make a larger version.

I’ll obviously have more variety when I get more blocks made but this is where I’m going with these.

Luckily, I have plenty of the background fabric for both quilts and the 9 inch finished blocks are quick to make.

I’ve got to run out to the dentist now to have my broken crown fixed but maybe I’ll work a little more on this tonight.

The good news is that we made it home safely and had a good trip … the bad news is that my ball of yarn is a tangled MESS and I really DON’T want to cut and reattach it. I’m just about 1/2 of an inch away from starting the decreases on this hat.

It’s been a long time since I’ve gone 2 weeks without any quilting or piecing. Nothing going on but family, fall, and yarn stuff but I’m hoping to jump in on Monday with a new project. In the meantime, I’ll share this little wallhanging of Mom’s. I found the pattern last year when she was visiting and we pulled fabric from my stash. She pieced it and I quilted it and she gave it to my sister a few weeks ago and said she really liked it. Mom does such nice appliqué!

Pattern is Autumn Motifs and we modified it a little to suit our space and tastes. You can find the pattern at this link.

The laundry and packing are done, the house is straight and the beds made back up after the kids’ visit so Finn and I are relaxing this afternoon.

The ripple blanket is about 2/3 finished so it’s a little bigger than I want to deal with in the car and since since I can’t drive at all … I’ll need something to occupy myself! I decided to cast on another blue hat. I’ve got enough left of the skein to make one more and I’m thinking that one of the others might be a little small. I’ll send all 3 when they’re done and if any of them don’t fit, I’ll have Mom send them back and they can be donated … but hats are very stretchy so with luck all 3 will fit.

• Pattern is Classic Cuffed Hat – found free on Purl Soho
• Needle size – 8
• Yarn – Lion’s Brand Mandala Ombré
• Cast on 72 stitches

You can see I did find one small circular needle here … the Magic Loop method worked well for me and I won’t hesitate to use it again if I need to and possibly even for the crown decreases on this one but it does take some extra time each round switching needles so for the bulk of the hat that is knit before the decreases it’s definitely quicker to use one small circular.