We're home again, and a good time was had by all.

We made it in at about 10:30 last night after a good time out camping for the first time this year. But I must say it was COLD!! Winter is hanging on way too long in these parts. We saw some interesting things up in Grundy Lake Provincial park, including some of these:

Bear tracks down on one of the beaches. We never saw or heard the owner of these tracks. They were pretty small, so we think it might have been a very young one. But these were the only tracks we saw, none that were bigger that could have belonged to a mama bear. Oh, and those other tracks that are in that picture belong to moose.
After we picked Noel up from the theater in Sudbury, we headed off to Awenda Provincial park. Unfortunately, we didn't realize we were going in the wrong direction until Noel mentioned something about a sign saying something about the distance to Sault St. Marie. Oops........ After some map consulting, and some turning around in the right direction, we ended up about taking 1 1/2 hours longer to get to the park than we thought. That, unfortunately had us arriving after dark, in a completely empty park, trying to find a campsite that had the hydro post in a position that would work for our trailer and its 15 foot long plug in cord. We did find one, and then came the challenge of backing the trailer onto the site, in the dark, directed by flashlights in order to miss backing into the trees and the rocks. Noel did a great job of that, and we finally got all set up and settled and the heater on. One big bonus of the cold temperatures..... no mosquitos.
We spent the next 2 days visiting with Avery. What a lovely, sweet and happy boy he is.

 He loves Thomas the Tank Engine, and has lot of the railway toys and characters that go with them, and he can name most of them. There is a large square, Avery height table in their living room that has buildings and tracks on it for all his railway stuff. And under the table are all his trucks and cars that he loves to play with.

We went out to dinner with them for his birthday on Friday, and, for the most part, he was good as gold. He got a little restless at times, but nothing too bad. He spent most of the time playing with his car and fire engine and the crayons.
It was so good to see him again. It took him a while to warm up and get used to us again. But by the end of our visit he was comfortable and was freely giving out hugs and kisses. I get to talk to him again tomorrow on skype, and I'm sure there will be more Avery visits during the summer and fall.
Today was spent unpacking, although Scott did most of that. I find travelling, and sitting in one place in the car exhausting, and I'm not sure why that is, and have taken most of today to rest, and to go through all the photos and pick out the best ones. I miss him already..........

We're here....

And the first thing we saw when we pulled into the campground was a sign saying "active bears in campground" Oh oh, guess that means all food stays in the car and not in the trailer. The next thing we saw, but I wasn't fast enough to get a picture were a couple of young moose calmly trotting down the road of the campground. They stopped, and turned around to look at us as if to say, "Hey you.... what are you doing here on our turf?"

We found a campsite, not too hard at this time of year, we saw 2 other campsites in the whole area occupied, got set up, and went for a walk. There are trilliums everywhere!!

The whole area is carpeted with trilliums. They are everywhere. The pictures don't come close to doing them justice.

We walked down to the lake, and I'm pretty sure that's a loon. But we haven't heard it calling, so maybe it's only a duck. The picture is as zoomed as I could get.

It's about 15 past 9 at night, and so far we're not too cold. We have one heater going, and 3 quilts on the bed, with another heater, and more quilts available if necessary. I'm so excited to be seeing our son again tomorrow. And dare I say it, even more excited to be seeing Avery on Thursday. I wish we could stay and visit with Avery longer, but Noel has to be at his new job on Saturday, so it's a flying visit this time. But there's lots of summer left for more camping and more Avery visits. 

 Oh, and the sock?? The leg is done, and the heel flap is started. I have a couple of other pairs of hand knit socks with me, to keep my feet cozy and warm, and this pair should be done in the next day or 2. It's a good thing I can knit without watching what I'm doing. Once the rain stopped, it was such a lovely drive. Some of the trees are just starting to leaf out here, and they are such a pretty shade of fresh spring green. And there is something about the rocks of the Canadian shield that are just so fascinating, the colours, and the patterns. I want to get some pictures of them before we go home. I'm thinking that those colours, made up into some kind of bargello type pattern would be stunning. Something that would echo and remind me of the ribbons of colour through the rocks. Maybe using Stonehenge fabrics. I've been eyeing those fabrics, wanting to do something with them for a long time now, so this could be it. And, thinking about it now, we have the other computer, that has the electric quilt program on it with us here at the campsite. Hmmmmm............

We're on our way

On our way to Sudbury to pick up Noel. I have a sock I'm working on in the car as we drive. It will be interesting to see how much of it I can have done by the time we get there.

Design Wall Monday, May 13, 2013

Another Monday, and still nothing new up on my design wall. I've been working on bits of things, but not enough to actually put up and show. I did start some of the paper pieced arc units for Cactus Rose yesterday. I have 8 of them partly done. I need 36.
Today has been spent doing our pre first camping trip of the year running around. We're heading up to the Sudbury area tomorrow to pick up our son, Noel, and to also spend some time with our grandson Avery, who turns 2 on Friday. It should be an interesting trip, considering the weather is calling for a low of 3 degrees Celsius tomorrow night. It was ice pelleting here yesterday. I'm wondering if there might still be snow in the campground. Wouldn't that be an interesting experience? There won't be too many people there this time of year, so getting a hydro site will be easy, which means we can have the heaters running, good thing. The rest of today is going to be spent getting stuff organized and packed into the car, so all we have to do in the morning is put in the food, the last minute things and then head out. I don't think I'll be taking any sewing with me, this time, just lots of knitting.
I'm linking up to Judy's Design wall Monday. Lots of interesting and fun stuff to see.

Stash Report week 19, 2013

I did more sewing this week, on the Lazy Sunday Mystery, which meant more cutting into fabrics. That part didn't amount to very much, considering the small pieces Bonnie Hunter uses. But if there are enough small pieces, it eventually adds up. Then, I bound a quilt, and made a backing for another. The backing made the numbers grow. And I resisted yet another ad from Thousands of Bolts for a sale on fabric for less than $4.95 per yard..... so far at least. *giggle*

Used this week:                                6.1 yards
Used this year:                                 58.7 yards
Added this week:                             0 yards
Added this year:                              131.25 yards
Balance:                                           72.55 more yards in than out.

I've been looking at the goals I set for myself at the beginning of the month, and have realized I'd better get working on them.

1. Catch up on Grandmother's Choice. The weather is getting nicer, so I can do some of the hand pieced squares that I'm behind on while outside. 
     - I started English Paper piecing one of the blocks, which was quite the challenge. But the weather has turned cold again, so outside sewing will have to wait. It was ice pelleting out there about 10 minutes ago!! I find I need the natural light these days to do hand piecing. Even the amount of light coming in the window doesn't quite cut it.
2. Paper piece 10 of the border units for Cactus Rose. Maybe if I break this down into smaller sections, it won't seem quite so overwhelming.
   -haven't touched it....... maybe today
3. Finish step 2 of the Lazy Sunday Mystery.  
     -working on it
4. Do 2 more blocks for Thanksgiving Quilt
      -haven't touched it
5. Quilt Endless Chain 
       -done!!
6. Bind Disappearing Nine Patch.
    -haven't touched it, but I did bind Endless chain, so maybe I can substitute? But I'd still like to get this done.
Maybe I should write this list out, and post it n the fridge where I can see it. That might focus me a bit.
I'm linking up to Judy's Stash Report

Endless Chain is finished

It's finished!! After checking back on earlier posts about this quilt - one of the many bonuses about blogging is being able to track progress on different projects - I discovered that I started this quilt in March of 2010, so it's been over 3 years in the making. This is a pattern that I originally saw on the front cover of a book by Emilie Richards, called Endless Chain. A number of years ago, at least 4 or 5, I found a series of books by Emilie Richards called the Shenandoah Album series,  5 books that follow a group of friends in a small community. Of course, quilts figure strongly in the books. If you have never read any of her books, I highly recommend them, by the way. All the books in the series are named after quilts, and when I saw the picture of this quilt on the cover,

I fell immediately in love with it, and sent away for the companion book to the novel that had the instructions for this quilt.  In the original quilt on the cover of the book, the coloured wedges were done with a striped fabric. I decided to make my own stripes, and string pieced all the wedges. I think this is one of the most challenging quilts I have ever made. The block units are all hexagons, so there were lots of set in "Y" seams. But I am so glad I persevered with it and got it done. This one is going to live on our bed.

I decided to keep going with the stripes theme on the backing, and pulled all the striped fat quarters I had for the backing. And them I used a diagonally printed stripe for the binding. All in all, a wonderfully satisfying feeling to have it done. And to make it better, I think this is my first finish for this year. I'll be linking up to Finish it up Friday and Can I get a Whoop Whoop for the first, but hopefully not the last time this year.

Charlene's Spinning Four Patch

I finished one of Charlene's quilts on Tuesday, but this is the first chance I've had to write about it. It's a gorgeous version of the Spinning four patch design. I love the colours she used, and how she framed each block with the beige or the teal blue colour. I used the pantograph Northern Star, by Patricia Ritter. I love the texture and movement this pantograph has. I've used it a lot lately, and it seems to fit in a lot of applications.