Spring is climbing the mountains

The view from our front porch. I love to watch the progression of green up the mountains in the spring. In the fall, we can watch the colors come down the mountains, but it's not as dramatic. In the winter, when there's precipitation & the temperatures are close to freezing, we can sometimes see a snow line or even an ice line. I'm fascinated as only a flatlander can be.

The Eagle has landed

Finally, it's done...(Well, all but the handwork on the back.) I decided that I wanted a clean edge, so I took the binding completely to the back. Finished size is 41"x33. It is rectangular, but the picture was taken at an angle & makes it look trapezoidal.

The Box Wars

No, I don't mean the Boxer Rebellion. This is the territorial war between Petey & Shadow over the box from my new pair of Merrells. Petey, AKA boxcat & Shadow, AKA tentcat don't care about the shoes at all- the important thing is the box!!!

Constipated snake

Skip this post if the title is too disgusting.We didn't know that she was constipated. She normally eats 1 or 2 mice each week & she hadn't eaten for 2 weeks. Her skin looked as if it was trying to shed & we knew that shedding sometimes kills the appetite. We decided to give her a soak in a tub of warm water to help the shed. Peeping Tom, aka. Petey, decided to watch. After about 15 minutes, Tyke started to wiggle around & then expelled several white stones (kidney? urine) several turds, gas & more. My bet is that she will eat her mousie by Sunday. I'm just glad that she was in the bathtub & not the hot tub!!!!!

crab fondue or hot dip for Trina

I didn't forget that you wanted this recipe, I had misplaced it. Tonight, as I was looking for a recipe for Crab Imperial, I found the other recipe tucked into a cookbook.

Crab fondue or hot crab dip

8 oz cream cheese
5 oz jar of old English sharp cheese spread
7-8 oz crabmeat (OK, sometimes I use a whole pound)
2T milk
2T white wine
2t Worchestershire sauce
dash or 2 cayenne pepper
French or Portuguese bread cut into bite sized cubes or crackers

Melt cheeses over low heat stirring constantly. When melted & blended together, mix in remaining ingredients except for bread or crackers. Transfer to a fondue pot or chafing dish & serve with bread or crackers.

Any left over can be thinned with a little milk & served over pasta. Thinned a little more & it makes a great soup.

Enjoy

Mom's Birthday pin & postal service

Late, as usual, I mailed Mom's Birthday present by Priority mail at 2:30 Friday afternoon. The Post office delivered it to her door on Saturday! I sent cookies & this pin. The pin is approximately 2" X 3". Sorry about the quality of the picture. Somehow, it got saved in some weird format that I couldn't upload. I had to print it out & then scan it to convert to jpeg.

Bald eagle part 2

After layering my water fabrics, I stitched wavy lines to stabilize the background. I wanted this stitching to be very subtle, so I used very light gray nymo size 000 & a size 10 needle in the machine. It worked. The needle holes are more obvious than the thread & the holes should relax & close somewhat when I wash the final piece to remove the starch. I was very pleased that the machine handled the fine thread so well. Size 000 is about as thick as one of my hairs. I did discover that the bobbin should not be filled all the way, as the thread wanted to slide off sideways, but as soon as I removed about 1/8" from the bobbin, it behaved beautifully. I've got a 3 ounce cone of this thread & it's at least 3/4 full. I think that I'll be using it in the bobbin for free motion embroidery to cut down on bulk.
Next step was to spray glue my paper & stick it to some batting for a trapunto effect.

I trimmed the batting to reduce bulk & glued it to the back of my backing. I added a few pins to the edges for added security.

I then pinned a large hunk of one of my eagle colors to the front of the background, making sure that it covered all of the area that I wanted in that fabric.
Flipping back over to the back, I free motioned around the areas that I wanted to do in this fabric, using a short stitch to make sure that the paper would be perforated enough to come off easily later.
Back to the front, I trimmed the applique fabric close to the stitches. It's not necessary to trim real close in the areas that will be covered by other appliques. I repeated these steps with my second gray fabric.
On the back again, I sewed in the detail lines between feathers

Front view with the detail lines sewn. More to come.

New project-Bald Eagle

I've decided to bore everyone with a description of the working process on my latest project.

I was inspired by a picture of a bald eagle dipping his tail in the water. I enlarged the picture to approximately 33" wide, printed it on very lightweight paper, taped the sheets together & cut away some of the wasted background to reduce bulk.

I decided that there needed to be a reason for the eagle to be in the water & I found this fish print in my stash.

I cut out 4 fish with lots of background & starched them until they felt like typing paper.

I laid the printed eagle upside down on my background fabric to decide where to place the fish. It had to be upside down, because I'm going to be attaching it to the wrong side of my background to do the applique.

I put a stripe of glue stick glue on each fish for a temporary hold & stuck them down on the background.
I sewed around the fish, using a free motion foot & small stitches. (Bernina BSR-I love it!)

I trimmed close to the stitches leaving a tiny bit of background fabric.

Next, I used a fine nylon thread to do a narrow zig zag around each fish.

With fish securely attached, I decided to put "water" over the fish. This first layer is very irredescent & sparkly, but the camera didn't pick that up.

The second layer of "water" is a polyester chiffon. .

After trimming the water fabrics to match the cotton background, I ironed them all together & pinned all over to prepare for stitching to stabilize the background. More to come in my next post

Goldfinches

Jesus watches the finches & they watch him. Man!, those birds can eat! We've counted 24 Goldfinches & 2 Pine Siskins who hang out with them.

Beading

I haven't done much beadwork in the last year or so, but last month I felt the urge to play around a bit. I made 2 pins & gave them away without taking pictures & then I made these.

I should be working on the corderoy & sherpa throw that I started to make for Charlie, but it's at my least favorite stage & I've been putting it off. Maybe later today...

Hey! Don't I have another bead that looks like a vase...