Winter Blahs

 Being in Lockdown, in the dead of winter, is particularly dull. The days are often grey, it is too cold to sit outside. On Wednesday, it was actually warm enough to stand on the patio, for a few minutes, and enjoy some sunshine, but it was short lived. Today, it is -16C and is not expected to get any warmer. 

Surprisingly, I have started reading again. In November and December, I had no interest in books, but I have been reading a lot lately. Most of them are mysteries or romances, nothing really heavy. I did read the Giller Prize winner for 2020, "How to Pronounce Knife". It was interesting, stories told from the prospective of new immigrants. 

I have also been knitting. I started a shawl, in early January, and I have been working away at it. I am now in the last section.

The yarn was a set of  2 skeins, from Zen Yarn Garden, that I received as a gift. I have just changed skeins, for the last section, and the new skein has some pink, and purple, as well as some creamy sections and more of the teal. Maybe I'll add some beads. The yarn has lovely stitch definition and a bit of sparkle.

The only sewing I have done is to finish a hand sanitizer pouch, that I had an order for. It looked like a bunch of others, so I couldn't see the point of taking a picture. I've lost track of how many I've done, but I must be close to 25, now. 

I have lots of ideas of what I might like to do, but I haven't settled on one. My sewing space is chilly, today, so I think knitting will be the way to go, this afternoon.

Done is Better Than Perfect

 I have finished my mystery quilt (well, the binding needs a bit more sewing.) There are a couple of things I'm not completely happy with, but it is finished, quilted, trimmed and the binding is sewn to the front. 

We had snow yesterday. Not unusual except that we have not had significant snow since November. I got up, yesterday and saw this.

They look like magical halos on the fence. They are actually the tomato cages we hang from the fence to keep the dogs from tramping on them in the snow.

In the dining room, we have a touch of spring.

It has lots more flower buds, so we should have flowers for quite awhile, yet.

Scraps

I again did the Project Quilt Mystery Quilt along at Persimon Dreams . 

I took longer than the time she suggested, but not as long as last year. This year I finished in the first week of January, instead of the second week of February.

Here is my top.

I am currently auditioning the grey border, and I think the answer is yes. It makes it look like the flower is floating in the grey background. The great thing about scrappy projects like this is I used fabrics with bats, spider webs, butterflies and flowers and it all came together.  Now to get it quilted and bound.

I am also taking part in the Just Get It Done Quilts Declutter Challenge. I missed yesterday (because I was otherwise occupied (grandparenting) so I started this morning. I have one corner of my sewing room that has stubbornly resisted my attempts to get it back. I am determined to succeed this time. I spent 15 minutes sorting stuff into garbage, recycling and what are you doing here. I suspect that I will have it cleared up fairly quickly. 

This sticker came in an online order from last week. It is now on my tablet stand in my sewing room, and I can remind myself to just decide on what to do with my stuff, not regret how the mess got there.

This is the order. I took a risk and ordered a mystery box of zipper tape and pulls from Zipper Valley.

 Look at all the gorgeous colours of tape and coils. There is also a large selection of zipper pulls, including a Baby Yoda pull. They still have some of the bright boxes like this one left. I don't think I will need to buy zippers any time soon. However, I feel as though my next project needs to be a zippered bag.