Busy hands progress!

I don't know where the hours or days are going anymore!  I started this online dog training course which is consuming my time!  Yes, it's worth it but.....I can't believe how much time I'm investing in reading material for the course lessons (we have a lesson five days a week - each lesson should be completed up to 3 x's a day! - 5-15 min. sessions!).   I can't say I'd rather be sewing...I do enjoy the lessons but my day is gone before I know it!!
I do have three hand projects that I'm working on and decided on Monday to start the quilting for my peacock piece (Tiffany).  You can see my '3rd' attempt here!  I didn't get that much accomplished but it's a start.

I will be adding hand stitching on the peacock after I finish with the machine quilting.  Perhaps a few beads in addition to embroidery work????











Almost finished with this stamped piece I started last week.  

And in between the piece above, I've been working on the leaf background piece.


I've finished some of the borders (inside and out).  Still debating on the stitching I'll use for the plain red border.  All the black strips will have some type of feather stitch on them.

So enough computer time for now!  I've already walked Kalee and did one of our lessons...I think it's going to be an Applebee's Long Island night!!  Works for me!!  Then I get to take Kalee for a walk and do lessons (again) when we get home!  No wonder I sleep well at night...just need more than six hours of sleep...but that's another post!

Busy hands

Yep...keeping those old fingers on the move by doing some hand stitching.  It's one of the big golf tournaments so Bob's been recording them (starting around 5:00 a.m. for about 6 hours or more!), then he watches the match when he gets home from golf.  SOOOOO  That means I sit either outside on the deck or come inside and watch Netflix (House of Cards) on our tablet w/ear phones.   Works for me!!

This is a piece of my hand dyed/stamped fabric that I'm experimenting with.  I'll be adding beads (go figure!) in a mandala pattern in one of the cirles but I want to get most of the hand stitching finished first.  I did machine stitch some of the black points just to secure the piece while I stitch (yes, I still use a hoop to do my hand stitching).




When I get bored with one color, I go back to my leaf background piece I'm trying to finish before fall!

The wavy look on the right is due to the piece hanging up on my design board but on top of some other pieces with pins!  Looks strange but it's really nice and straight!

That's my story and I'm sticking to it!!

This is a closeup of some of the stitching.  I've been trying to keep  leafy or straight stitches in this piece.  The black leaves do show up well so I might put some more of those in one of the other plain red areas.

So that's it for today...yesterday was the quilt guild meeting that I attend when we're back home.  It's always nice to see some of the wonderful women in this group.  They were my inspiration when I first joined back in '99 and several of them played a huge role in teaching me so much about quilting.

After I went to farmer's market this a.m.  I picked up a book at our library that I'm anxious to read.  It's called Playing With Color by Richard Mehl.  Looked interesting...hope it is!  Always good to learn more about color, right!