Valerean

I designed a fat quarter via Spoonflower to print the poem I composed for my pink-only quilt, and it arrived on July 22nd. I thought I'd done the math correctly to get four repeats of the poem (extras in case I mess up with what I have planned for incorporating it into the quilt) but I have a bit of repeat runover on one side, which I will use, no problem. I'm taking a break from piecing the pink-only quilt now as I'm having trouble with my hands again, and want to loosen them up a bit with a small crochet project before I continue sewing. Stayed tuned to see what I do with that.

The British crime thriller series Dept. Q was getting a lot of favorable reviews, so I watched a couple of episodes before I had to stop. The acting is fantastic, and the mystery cold case seems to be very good. The entire series plot of having damaged people form a cold case task force is solid, too. I simply cannot watch another depiction of extended and vicious torture that is so popular in Western productions. I'm not hardened enough, and I don't consider that as entertainment. DNF.

The first watermelon in our garden was starting to turn yellow on one side, so although it was small we decided to pick it. Last year we lost all the watermelons we grew because the heat made them burst open before they ripened, so we had high hopes for this one. As it turned out it could have spent another week or two in the garden, as it was only a little sweet. But the crisp, cold taste of fresh melon straight from the garden is like nothing else. :)

My first project of July was this slighty wonky practice piecing on point mat (say that three times fast) made out of scraps. Still using scraps, I made a hand-quilted dog bowl mat. Also a little gift pouch closed with a brooch. I pieced this quilt top out of scraps, too. This and everything above were part of a one-day challenge to see how many things I could make out of scraps in 24 hours. My first mini-quilt of July was made with one of 14carrot's quilt tags and my thrifted/harvested beads. My second mini-quilt was a stitch practice piece with more bead play. Sewed, quilted and embroidered a bubble wrap alternative mailing mat with selvages from the scraps bin. My third mini-quilt for July was an embroidery and beadwork mindset prep for my summer art quilt project. I composed this poem for my pink-only quilt. My fourth mini-quilt for July was a heavily stitched piece celebrating the dubious achievement of reaching the age of 64. I crocheted ...