7/1/2022

 The center of the quilt is done I have two borders to add to it and then it will be completed an ready for me to find a backing and get it off to a quilter. 

I really like the center of this top it came out really fun as it takes the 4 block and the sashing to make the center star. The top so far has gone together like a dream no issues that I can see so far even after taking a photo that usually makes a mistake pop out.

Yesterday was Chemo Day and it had an interesting twist a couple numbers in blood work were low so we ended up having to wait for the nurse to make a call to LaCrosse to see if I could have Chemo or not. It took a while as my regular oncologist was off. We all need a few vacation days. So that meant the Dr. nurse in LaCrosse had to find the on-call Dr that was covering to find out if they should proceed or not. 

After the wait that was not really awful in medicine you learn to be patient that is for sure we got a green light so hopefully the numbers don't keep dropping they have reduced the amount of in the dosage as it is starting to mess with my feet and hands, I am getting a tingle in then that is hanging in there for the week. A sign that we are watching as if it gets too bad, they will probably have to stop or reduce things even more as I don't want this symptom to be a permanent thing and that is a possibility. 

The other side effect that is not being nice is the metalic taste. Nothing really tastes good and that makes eating a real not fun thing. Plus, my favorite beverage tastes awful not diet Coke in my future for a while and chocolate is another failure to eat.  Things with lemon in them seem to cut the taste a little but not for long. Oh well only 4 more treatments to go and then a 4 to 6 weeks of recovery from the Chemo and we schedule the mastectomy

So, in the meantime I work on my quilt top and have been watching some videos of the new Tabletastic from Doug Leko and really thinking I may want to try my hand at making the 20 table runners in the book they are all interesting to look at and it would be a fun challenge maybe also the challenge is going to be to see if I can make them completely from the stash. There is a lot of fabric in that closet. I think the Fat Quarter shop has it on sale, but I do have a fair amount of thank you gift money from the Picket Fence in PDC wonder if they have the book. 

Granted I should be working on a couple other projects I have tops done and I am thinking about quilting them myself. Oh, what to do what to do.  Welcome to leave a comment and help me decided. 

June 7

I am back again so soon you may ask today has been a good day. I spent a fair portion of it in my sewing room cutting out some blocks for Reflection. I have not worked on that one in a while and this next set of blocks takes a whole bunch of half square triangles. 

So I am cutting out triangles to be sewn together I have 24 to do with tow fabrics then another 24 of another two prints and then  32 and 40 these will make up 8 blocks that go in the corner of the quilt so a bunch of cutting to do. No real picture yet hopefully once I get them cut an laid out in the next day or two I will have a picture to share. 

May 1

 Happy May Day

Last Friday was my last double drug/chemo and then after two weeks I will be starting a different Chemo that happens once a week for 12 weeks. That adventure will start the 13th of May, in LaCrosse and then if all goes well, I will continue treatments in West Union at Palmer Hospital. 

I finally got all the i dotted and t crossed for insurance crap that was not a fun ride but just took some nudging and keeping on top of it. Calling people to look into the situation and figure out where things went astray. It didn't help that at the beginning of the year the company I worked for was purchased and we keep our tenure but because of the switch in systems it took a while to get everything squared away as not all the paperwork showed up in the usual way, so HR had to do some switching between systems and when it is not the normal it takes longer. 

I do not give the short-term disability company a lot of kudos either as the case worker I had did not seem to communicate well. I would call and get voice mail wait for a call back and nothing call again get voice mail and nothing or just call and get whoever answered the phone and that person could not do much. 

It did all happen and so now I have that controlled until the next round when long-term disability kicks in. Hope that ride goes easier than the first one. 

So to find something positive I have 6 out of 7 more blocks done for reflection 

Saturday after running out of the background print earlier in the week Fred drove me to Merry Stitching in rural Jessup to get a bit more. Always good to have a driver.  Not sure why I did not have enough but that is life and not something I am going to fret over as thank goodness the fabric was there and available for purchase and not sold out. Always a worry when you run short of what you need for the blocks. 

I do love how my M7 stitched the Fan blocks down I used an invisible thread and it worked well 

When at the Merry's Stitching I picked up a Patchability pattern for "Dragonfly Garden" to make up as a couple wedding gift this summer. This is one of her designs that has been digitized so I am going to try stitching it out in the hoop on my embroidery machine. The design comes on a small credit card type USB Memory stich rather interesting to work with it. 

As it is getting late and I am on week one after chemo napping and sleeping are what seem to happen right now. That is not an awful thing to let this chemo do it job and then flush it out of my system so I can build back up for the next round. 

Thanks for reading along

April 21

 Well, I have been missing for a bit but decided to come back tonight. I had chemo on the 15th and then it was Easter weekend and visited with family friends on Friday evening and Saturday and Sunday. It was a good weekend but busy. Maybe too busy or maybe Chemo is just catching up to me. Thank goodness I am not having any of the really awful side effects of being nauseous and just not feeling well. On Monday I was just whipped probably because of doing more than normal on the weekend or Chemo is just kicking me in the but. So, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday were just kind of a lost days tired and having this awful metal taste in my mouth for the last few days. Most of this week has been spent in naps and just not doing much. 

Today I have been feeling some better so catching up on laundry and just doing a few chores around the house nothing to strenuous plus a little time spent in the recliner this afternoon.

I did spend some time working on the next set of blocks in Reflection we are up to the Dresden fan blocks so they are all cut, and the tops stitched. Then they set the rest of this week on the sewing machine waiting for me to feel like doing the pressing and stitching them together to go on their background fabric. I am not sure I really like the colors that these are coming out to, but I am just going to go with it as I bought the yardage to match the pattern and if I deviate, I am worried I will run out of fabric. There are 8 blocks to make in this round. Maybe the ironing and starting to stitch them together will happen tomorrow. 

So that is the weeks adventure so far I am feeling some better tonight so maybe a little time spent with the iron is next on the agenda. Hopefully pictures of next block will be coming soon. 

April 11

This is the 4 blocks for the outer corners of the quilt. The blocks are a pain to put together and so glad I only have to do 4 of them I think my next blocks are log cabin blocks and then this quilt is getting a lot closer to being done. 

I really love the colors in this fabric line and how they are going together. I also did a turban hat today out of some scrap t-shirt knit not sure I am totally in love with it but for the first one and really it only cost time to make. Plus I can work on the pattern a little bit and see if I can make it a little bit easier. 

Sewing org

April 1

 I am setting this blog post up to happen early so here are the pictures of the blocks I have done on Reflection so far.  It seems like the last few blocks I have at least one section I have had to redo as I stitched the block together the wrong way. So, jack and I have been friends lately taking apart at least one of the blocks to fix it. Hopefully I have caught all the oops. 

This is the center of the quilt 

The next pictures are of the blocks that will be put around this center 4 blocks 

These are the blocks that are done. I am debating about going ahead and making more blocks as I have a lot of time on my hands right now as I am not going to far to stay away from any of the bugs out there. 

Had a change in plans on the cancer front saw my oncologist on Wed. and he wanted me to do the chemo treatment on that day instead of waiting until Friday when Fred was off to be my chauffer. All my blood work came back great and so I agreed that would be ok for this round to put them closer together in the two-week cycle. That we would set the next one up for Friday. April 15th. 

Texted Fred to let him know and all went just fine that day a little bit of a headache but that was the same last time. Got a Tylenol to help that and all went fine from there got home as was tired so took a nap. Thursday is going fine took my anti-nausea pill that is recommended for two days after and drinking water. So, I move the chemo out again. I foresee a nap in my future today but that too is what my body seems to need/want so that is what I will do follow the feeling guide and pray these drugs keep going the way they are supposed to. 

March 30

 Ok hopefully I did not make the suspense to hard on you or to long but here is the fabric I spotted and purchased for the project.

 These are the fabrics chosen for the quilt I selected them using the fabric color chart in the PDF trying to make sure the values and prints were similar. Though not exactly the same they seem to be working out. I have made the center 4 blocks and the next 4 blocks 

March 29th

 Ok today has been a good day I got a second Quilt of Valor first round of binding put on so that will be my project next week after 2nd round of Chemo that is to happen on the 1st of April no fooling. Tomorrow, I have the pleasure of seeing my oncologist and I don't foresee any earth-shattering news there as I feel fine, and my cold is pretty much gone have a little cough but that is pretty normal for me after a cold for a little while. 

So, I started a new quilt at the beginning of the year with a group of friends it is a pattern by Kaye England and is called Reflections. Several in the group ordered the kit as a block of the month. I didn't really care for the color way not that is was awful but just didn't strike me. So I started messing in EQ to draw up the design and that went well but then for some reason I started wandering on line and found the pattern as a free download on Hancock of Paduca site  . 

Now this is a wonderful quilt in pretty colors but not what I wanted to do. So, my original plan was to dig around in my stash and find some fabrics that would work. the quilt takes 19 fabrics and that was just not working and before Christmas I was at Merry's Stitching a show in rural Jesup area and saw these daisy prints and just kind of thought that would be interesting to make the quilt with. At the time I did not have the yardage figured out as I did not have the pattern found online then. After Christmas I did have the pattern and decided that I was going to go and get the fabric for this project. Check back to find out what I selected.