Feline Friday - 9/30/16

Mom!!!!!

He's on my table!

Sniffing at my window!

Outside my house!

Mom!!!!!!

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Feline Friday - 9/23/16

So - you've already heard that Momma had to take me to the V.E.T. on Monday. What you didn't hear was her mumbling that I need to get a job to compensate her for said V.E.T. visit.

Huhwha? I think **I** need to be compensated for said visit. Watch this...

Momma went on vaca for 4 days and left me here to defend the casa from interlopers. It's a tough job but someone had to do it!

Momma came home to this big abscess on my neck. She was all worried about me but did she notice the casa was safe???? NO!!!!!

So then she calls the V.E.T. to make an appointment and says she'll come home to get me at lunch time. I don't need no stinkin' V.E.T. - I just scratched at it until it popped. Ha!

She still bundles me into the P.T.U. and took me to work with her. Isn't that catnapping?

Finally she let me out and I checked out every chair.

Eventually I settled on Momma's chair to keep her company.

It was hard work.

At the V.E.T. I even sat on her lap to make sure she wasn't too worried. The tech laughed that they knew how I got my name. Yipp, I am good with the claws!

And I *had* to show the claws cuz they Shaved. Away. My. Beautiful. Furs!!! Can you believe it?! They even shot me with some anti-bionics.

NOW tell me who needs to be compensated??!! I'm lopsided!!!
No one is going to take me seriously.

I give up...

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Follow by Email

It dawned on me that some of you who follow my blog on Bloglovin' type feed services may not have been to my homepage lately to notice that I added a "Follow by email" feature.

You can thank Denise :)


Happy Fall Y'all!

Blue

Have you ever had something you wanted to do that just felt insurmountable? Climbing Blue Mountain has been my nemesis for the last four years. I'm game for climbing anything but...

Yes, the road does go to the left and DOWN before getting closer to Blue Mountain.

For years I've driven past THIS and completely talked myself out of climbing Blue. It's too high! It's too hot! It's too whatever!

Taken from ADK Museum parking lot.
Trailhead is 1/4 mile to the left.

Finally, last week when I knew I was taking one last camping trip for the year, I told everyone that I was going to climb Blue. I figured if I told everyone I couldn't talk myself out of it...even when I came down with bronchitis the day before my trip.

Oh, such a sight for sore eyes after climbing for 2 hours

The day dawned a brisk 36F which turned out to be very nice hiking weather. Blue is a 2 mile climb with the first mile very rocky and mildly steep while the second mile was very steep rock face "scrambles" that have been known to be quite damp and slippery. A bonus for a drought year is a completely dry hike!

And then, yes, I also climbed the tower.
You can see from the cement where buildings used to stand.

I felt quilt slow after taking 2 hours to huff and puff my way to the top but I've been told that I made pretty good time. I was the first person to summit for the day (9:45am) altho there was a worker at the top dealing with the radio towers. He rode up a brand spanking new $1,000,000 road on his ATV = cheater! It was fantastic to enjoy the view in near solitude for nearly an hour before heading back down the mountain.

Sun rays were an unexpected bonus

Now that I'd made it to the top of Blue I feel like I can climb anything I want to.

first building on left is under 1 of the comm towers - you can see the guy wires
building in middle is where a ranger lives in the summer
fire tower is top center
second comm tower is off to the right

I like to hike mountains and flat trails alike but lately I've been trying to complete some of the hiking challenges that are around the ADK. Most of the challenges offer a patch for finishing and I plan to sew the patches to the new woodsman quilt I'll be making!

remember the shot up above taken from the parking lot?
the finger points to the parking lot. eek!

One such challenge is for firetowers (I've now climbed 2 of the 5 mountains) and another is called the 4-3-2-1 Challenge (which includes an increasing amount of difficulty for the 10 required hikes but I've already completed 5 of the 10 if I can count hikes from 2015). They both include three of the same (difficult!) mountains and crossing off Blue has given me the gumption to plan on finishing both challenges next summer. It's going to take a lot of hard work but I've got a "few" months to up my hiking skills and I KNOW I can do it!!

Well...I think so any way.

Bwahahahaha!

Design Wall Monday - 9/19/16

I took one final camping trip this past weekend!! It was a good trip but a little weird.

Weird cuz the leaves are not really changing yet given the extremely dry weather...there was green and burgundy and nothing in between.

Weird cuz I have bronchitis (yeah, AGAIN, third time this year & 2nd time while camping which puts a damper on the mountain climbing).

Good cuz the weather was perfect - 36F Friday morning for my big hike and 60/70s the rest of the weekend, with rain Saturday Night which is perfect for sleeping.

I finished 10 background bits,
whipstitched the already basted pieced hexies and
got a good start on the next Jefferson Star.

Good cuz after the hiking and the antiquing, there was time for hexies!!!

Bad cuz when I got home, the children hadn't been playing nice and Zorro had a big abscess on his neck.

Worse cuz before I could get Z to his vet appointment today, he had scratched open the abscess and bled all over the latest Jefferson star. It's not like I can wash the fabrics with the papers in them so I'll need to star that star over. I only had enough papers to make 6 stars...wish I could get more.

I think that's all the camping I can handle for one year...but I've already started planning my hikes for next year!! And, let me tell you, they are some pretty big plans!

HeLP for Hexie-aholics - 9/17/16

Holy cow it's time for another Hexie Linky Party - feels like the last was just a few days ago...

I've shown you the finished teal/peach Jefferson Star but I don't think I ever shared the purple and green star. I wasn't sure about the darker green but I do think in the end it came out perfect.

I picked the fabrics for the peach star by starting with the darker burnt orange and then built the fabrics around it. I started the purple/green star with that dark purple. If you'll notice, both stars have a multi-color fabric in the center and then the rest of the coordinating fabrics are mostly tone-on-tone. I'm trying to follow that same concept on future stars. The star I'm currently working on doesn't quite fit the pattern but I'm hoping when the quilt (?) is big enough, this little change won't stick out so much.

Photobomb!!!

I've got 3 more stars cut out waiting for spare stitching time. It does take a little forethought to get them glue basted on a flat surface before I feel like stitching on the go but I'm good for a while with these kits. Two of them started when I was trying to put fabric away and came across something I thought would work nicely. I don't think the fabric has been put away yet...

Oops - maybe I best put these kits back in their baggies before
the tail of doom dumps them on the floor!

And now, my friends, it's your turn to share your EPP projects. Just remember - any shape and any vintage project is free game to share - we are looking forward to seeing your projects!

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Feline Friday - 9/16/16

MOM!!!!!

**I** climbed the maple tree F.I.R.S.T. and that introoder followed me up here.

And now I can't get down cuz Blue won't move out of my way.

MOM!!!! Make. Him. Leave. Me. Alone!

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Feline Friday - 9/9/16

Awwwwww, Ma - stop worrying about me.

So I rolled off the bed 2 nights ago...I ignored that snafu, as all good cats do, by taking a bath...

So I stayed inside yesterday while you went to work...it was HOT yesterday...

So I stayed out until all hours last night...I came home eventually, didn't I?...

So I almost rolled off the top of the stairs this morning...I was trying to grab you...

So I stayed inside again today...to get high on 'nip!

It's. No. Big. Deal. I'm. A. Big. Boy.!

(yes Zorro, but you are a "senior" cat and it's Momma's prerogative to worry!)

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Workin' Wednesday

This is what I'm working on...

It's gently "piled" on  the coffee table when I am forced to sleep,
answer rescue calls (2 last night!) or go to work.
Luckily Z doesn't mess with it on the table.

Oh...what was that? You have no idea what I'm working on from that goofy picture?

This is approximately half the quilt - 11 of 23 rose stars. I need to finish attaching
these 2 large pieces and then make up a ton of the background bits.
This, spread out on the floor, is screaming Z's name to play with....

Is this better?

Thought so!

Bibliophile Files - 9/2/16

Hello and welcome to this edition of The Bibliophile Files, my monthly book report!!

Goodreads says I'm still 5 books ahead of schedule to finish 84 books by the end of the year so that's a good thing. I am hoping to go camping one more time this month so that might get me even further ahead with driving and hiking time which reminds me I best order another mp3 book for the drive...

FINISHED:
     Symphony for the City of the Dead - not what I was expecting but quite nice as an audiobook since it included music from the symphony
     Save me - didn't think I was going to like this one but there were lots of nice twists until it became a murder mystery
     Juba!
     Devoted in Death - a new series with 40 + books - I've got a lot of catching up to do
     Dead Ringer - another new-to-me series!
     On the Jellicoe Road
     The Last Mile
     Bone Gap - I think I spent half the book saying "Huh?!?" it switched around so much

IN PROGRESS:
     on my car stereo - Memory in Death
     on my home stereo - The Beach House
     on my iPhone - The Book of Unknown Americans


And now it's your turn to share the books you've read over the last month.
Remember - "books" includes novels, magazines, quilt patterns/books and cereal boxes :)

Feline Friday - 9/2/16

'Nuff said...

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