Summer Is

 Summer is about gardens.

 And visitors to the gardens.

 Flashes of color brighten the world.

 Summer is for growing good things to eat.

 And keeping the bunnies away from the good things to eat.

 Summer is watching the birds build their nests and raise their young.

 Summer is for relaxing.

 Summer is for working.

 Summer is for reading.

Summer is for projects that are not pretty but necessary, like new plumbing.

Summer is too short.

Quilts, Books, Book Club, and More News

My Little Red Ridinghood quilt is completed. It is hand embroidered and hand quilted. I used 1918 Redwork patterns and 2019 fabrics by Riley Blake. I am eagerly awaiting Riley Blake's new fabric line Dorothy's Journey featuring the Wizard of Oz!

My weekly quilt group has decided on doing a group quilt project. We are making blocks for a teapot quilt. My block is hand appliqued.

My weekly quilt group had the challenge to bring in your first quilt. I brought in my second quilt, in which I used my mother's painting smocks.

I have two quilts hanging in the Blair Memorial Library. Morning Glory is hand appliqued and hand-quilted, my second applique quilt, from a Quiltmaker Magazine pattern. It used hand dyed and commercial fabrics.

Years ago I signed up for a block of the month to make a bed-sized stained glass look quilt. I only finished six blocks! So I made this wall hanging now in the library.

Our library book club's June book selection was The Last Ballad by Wiley Cash. Wiley visited our group via Skype. Everyone enjoyed the book and learning the history of the Loray mill strike. It was especially interesting to hear Wiley talk about how a writer creates a compelling narrative out of historical fact. Read my review here.

The Troy, MI library hosted Drew Philp for his last author talk before beginning a new job and writing project. Drew's book A $500 House in Detroit drew a good audience of people who were fascinated by his story. Read my review of his book here.

My husband ordered me a book for no reason except he thought it would appeal to my interest in history, biography, and the history of cooking. Abraham Lincoln in the Kitchen: A Culinary View of Lincoln's Life and Times by Rae Katherine Eighmey is enjoyable to read--and it has recipes.

Since I last shared my TBR shelf it has grown! 

Wickwythe Hall  author Judith Little, a novel set in 1940 based on history 

14th of September  from author Rita Dragonette, a novel set in 1969's antiwar movement 

Country by Michael Hughes from LibraryThing, the Illiad reimagined in Northern Ireland

Threads of Life: The History of the World Through the Eye of a Needle by Claire Hunter, the history of how women expressed themselves through sewing

The Rest of the Story by Sarah Dessen from The Quivering Pen blog debuted at number two on the best-seller list!

 This spring we are feasting on the lettuce we grow in our garden.

And the enjoying the beautiful flowers, like the Pink Drift Roses below.

and the little teacup rose that I thought would die outdoors but which is brimming with flowers.

Our lavender and daylilies and hydrangeas in bloom.

Our grandpuppy Ellie had her six-month anniversary since adoption and the end of puppy mill life. She has really blossomed! We puppysat her and she spent the day snooping the yard hoping to scare up the rabbit she had seen last time. She was rewarded--before she went home she got to chase the bunny.

The bunnys were back the next day.

WIP and TBR

Spring has come to Michigan! We have nesting birds in the yard, wildflowers have sprouted up, and the herb garden is green and flourishing.

Wild Violets

It has been a busy spring. After my two cataract surgeries, my husband underwent his second knee replacement surgery! I am super busy handling his chores along with my own.

But I am still keeping up with my quilt projects and reading!

I am hand quilting the Little Red Ridinghood quilt.

I am deciding on the borders on the Winter Houses quilt.

And I played making a quilt with some wool birds from the quilter's group free table and am nearly done with the applique. I will do more embellishment after they are sewn down.

I am now reading:

• LibraryThing win ARC  Make Me A City by Jonathan Carr about the history of Chicago.
• The Ministry of Truth by Dorian Lynskey about George Orwell and the writing of 1984.
• Why We Quilt by Thomas Knauer shares snippets on the quilting life.
• Jared Diamond's Upheaval. I have read about Finland, Japan, and Chile so far. What is so cool is that when I was a senior in high school my family hosted an exchange student from Finland. I became close to the exchange students from Japan, Chile, and Germany during that year. 
• Cesare by Jerome Charyn a love story and thriller set during WWII

On my TBR galley shelves:

• The Violent Century by Lavie Tidhar
• Women from the Copper Country by  Mary Doria Russell
• We Are All Good People by Susan Rebecca White
• Out of Darkness Shining Light by Petina Gappah
• This Tender Land by William Kent Krueger
• The Book of Science and Antiquities by Thomas Kenalley
• The Vexations by Caitlin Horrocks

On Kindle:

After reading her new book Gold Digger I purchased Rebecca Rosenberg's novel Mrs. Jack London. My review on Gold Digger will appear on my blog soon.

I have Amy Stewart's Miss Kopps Midnight Confessions and Miss Kopp Just Won't Quit on my Kindle which I hope to read soon as the next volume Miss Kopp on the March is being mailed to me via the Kopp Sister's Literary Society.

Another book to come is Archaeology from Space by Sarah Parcak which I won on LibraryThing this month.

Upcoming Book Clubs:
Next month the library book club is reading Wiley Cash's novel The Last Ballad, which I read as an ARC. Wiley will be Skyping with our club!

The Barnes and Nobel book club is reading The Guest Book, which I also read as an ARC.

WIP, TBR, News

It has been a hard few weeks. I haven't been able to see properly! I have had cataract surgery and decided to pay extra for fancy lenses to correct my astigmatism. So for two weeks, my 'new' eye has 20-20 vision but was farsighted, and my 'old' eye was nearsighted and needed correction for astigmatism. I couldn't see with glasses or without them, or with reading glasses.

As you can imagine, this has put a crimp on what I have been able to do.

I have done some reading on my tablet, enlarging the typeface so I can see it--blurred without glasses or with readers--but I could still do some reading. I have watched some movies but it tires my eyes. I tried to listen to audio books but I fell asleep or my attention wandered.

I took a lot of unnecessary naps! I couldn't trust myself walking in the snow. I couldn't judge distance very well and I was clumsy. I have been BORED.

Because my new sewing machine is self-threading, I tried making some blocks for my Winter Houses quilt. The pattern is from Bunny Hill.

Things went fine until I accidentally hit the computer controls and changed the settings. Then I struggled to read the small print in my manual to correct it. And when I ran out of thread I didn't notice. I managed to make a half dozen star blocks.

Quilt in progress!

And no way could I see to thread a needle! No hand work. I have the applique block ready for when my surgeries are done.

The Winter Flurries fabric line I am using was from Connecting Threads and is on clearance now.

Thankfully, I could listen to the Detroit Symphony--in person at the Berman Center for the wonderful Vivaldi Four Seasons concert with conductor, violinist, and contratenor Dimitry Sinkovsky. And also I listen to the webcasts.

Now the surgeries are over and I am ready to hit the ground running! Books and quilts are waiting!

Today we see our grandpuppy Ellie. Here she is at my son's house with her sister Hazel, looking out the back door at squirrels.

My surgeries were on Tuesdays so I missed my weekly quilt group, but in between surgeries I was able to go and show my finished Fiona Block quilt, which I hand quilted before my surgery.