Finishitis

This pattern was actually quite fun to sew. The butterflies matched the blocks they were hovering over and did not appear until the backstitching was completed. Kudos to the designer.
So it's finished. I think I may have that longed-for malady: finishitis. It's the compliment to startitis. You know, startitis is when you must start projects and start projects and start more, which leads to seeing UFOs--Unfinished Fabric Objects. Finishitis means I am compelled to finish items, no matter when they were begun.
detail of Butterflies on Nine-Patches


And the Red Herring Purse has less than 20 rows of knitting left! All that's left is the embroidery and the finishing up.

Butterflies

A butterfly was reported seen in Helen's home ten days ago. That day I sat by her side, sewing on my butterflies on nine-patches and telling her secrets. Shortly after we left, she floated away. She was 97 years old and had adventures! During the depression, she knitted herself dresses. She rented a typewriter and taught herself to type so she could get a job. She worked for the government during WWII. She was a world traveller--I have a picture of her on a camel!--and she was in charge of her own destiny.

We've been clearing out her home and during the hour and a half drives, I've gotten a fair way on that Butterfly piece. I think I'll choose it a a grief catcher. I have done the same with other projects.

Changing of the Seasons

"Butterflies on Nine-Patches" jumped out of the cross-stitch box and said, "Sew on me!" So I did. Sew. I. Did. Get it?
It's a fun stitch: challenging when I want challenge (butterflies and sky); easy when I want something predictable (the quilt blocks). It's in a smaller scale than I've been working with: 18 squares per inch, so that makes it interesting, too.
Yesterday I worked on it at my mother-in-law's home, during Star Trek, and while watching black smoke billow across the I-5 freeway. That's right, it's fire season again in SoCal! People from other parts of the country often are under the impression that we don't have seasons here. Not true! Our seasons are just different from what you're used to.

Seasons in Southern California

Fire

Flood

Earthquake

Drought

I Finished My Socks!

That's right, they're done, wearable. What a relief to be finished with something started at least a year ago... and I'm already looking for a new sock pattern. Is this some kind of sickness?

Butterflies on Nine-Patches

(Just another cross-stitch UFO) I seem to recall starting this one on vacation in Hawaii... but I don't really know. I'd like to say I've been in a coma since and that's why I don't remember stuff, but I've always been that way. Note to daughter: don't put me in the home for that!

And these are Scrap Trick blocks. I'm putting 'em together for a prayer quilt. Nope, don't know who it's for yet.