4 corners.....................

 I start hand sewing the binding a few inches before the first corner so I have 4 corners done before all of the stitching is done.  I have less than 30" to go so I better get the binding picked out for the second quilt today.

This was my garden yield yesterday.  The black raspberries are ripening.  Some were so small because of lack of rain that I left them for the birds.  One tiny Sun Gold cherry tomato and one golf ball size 4th of July tomato aren't quite enough for a salad.

Are you tired of seeing this plant yet?  It only had about 8 blooms the whole summer season last year while it was in a pot.  With lots more buds to open, it gets a little more exciting every day.  I'm wondering if the yellow flower will turn dark orange.

The blooms on the Red Coneflower are a deeper red than they look here.

The closer I got with the camera, the lighter the color looks.  It's really a more intense red but I thought you might like a look at the center of this variety of Coneflower.

It was another 90 degree day yesterday so I was inside other than watering plants and a short session pulling weeds at 7 p.m.  It has been staying in the high 70s overnight so there are new records for the low temperature of the day in Chicago.  6-10 day outlook is more 90s so it will be a record warm June this year.

Binding progress and other things...........

I finished the second side of the binding and am halfway done with the third side, no photo, it would just look like the one yesterday.

I had my first Early Girl tomato on my salad yesterday.  I have 2 tiny ones ripening on my windowsill right now.  I hope the others hurry up and start turning color.

The Creeping Bellflowers are starting to bloom.  They are darker purple than they look here.  The camera always wants to make them look pastel.

The Tiger Lilies are 5' tall and now have a few buds starting on them.  They usually bloom around the first or second week in July.

The native Purple Coneflowers have buds but no blooms yet.

I think this plant will look different every day.  It has about 20 more buds to open.

The Black Eyed Susans have buds that should open soon.

Crabgrass grows big and healthy when there is no rain.  There was a nice breeze yesterday but it was still very hot.

I don't need to decide whether to thin out the Zinnias.  Some bugs have eaten them down to skeleton leaves.  I haven't seen any Japanese Beetles but I know they like Zinnias.

 

Binding progress.................

The binding is hand stitched on one and a half sides now.  I did a little in the afternoon and more in the evening.  

I had a couple errands in the morning and then a repairman came to put a new fill valve on my dishwasher.  It had a slow leak.  When he gave me the quote to fix it I had to decide if I would just get a new one or repair this 18 year old one.  When he told me the problems with the new less expensive models and the price on the higher end models I decided to go with the repair.  It has a 1 year warranty on the part and any leak that might happen.  My refrigerator is 19 years old and the stove is 18 years old.

A lot of the blooms are opening on the red fluffy center Coneflower.  This is so exciting since I just planted it last fall.

The petals are the farthest open on this one.

The freebie plant from last year is starting to bloom.  The plant identifier on my phone just calls it Rudbeckia - Black Eyed Susan.  I'm sure it is in the Rudbeckia family but its leaves are fuzzy and the flowers a little more elaborate than the plain Black Eyed Susan.

This is the Hosta directly behind that plant.  It is sending up flower stalks already.  It got up to 93 yesterday and we haven't had any measurable rain for over a week so I watered the whole front garden.  There won't be any mowing grass for awhile because it is so dry.

 

Binding started....................

Only a small amount of hand stitching was done on the binding of the African and batik mottled 16 patch quilt.  I spent most of the day preparing more items for my destash of fabric on my WandafulQuilts blog.

A couple months ago DuckaDilly Studio had a good sale on their scrap packs of Liberty Lawn fabric.  It is quite pricey so I only buy it on sale.  I have a good stash of it started way back in the early 1990s and I want to make a quilt or 2 from it this year.  I have so much cutting to do for 5 quilts that I know I want to make.  This week will be a good time to work in the basement with the extreme heat outside.

 

Yellow

Only one new bloom outside right now.  This is the one that is identified as Smooth Oxeye or False Sunflower.  It gets about 4 feet tall.  I have lots of it in the back garden but it only has buds back there.  With our four or five 90+ degree days maybe a lot of it will be blooming soon.

The centers of the flowers eventually turn brown.  This is a prairie type plant and grows easily anywhere.

I trimmed both quilts that came back from the longarmer and decided on the lighter of the 2 fabrics I showed yesterday for the binding on the 16 patch quilt.  I didn't have the energy to press it so I'll press and cut today and get busy on finishing that one.  I haven't decided on a binding for the Kaffe one yet.  It's a good thing I have a lot of finishes already this year because I feel like I'm entering the summer slump.....and it isn't officially summer until later this week.

Last evening around 7:30 I took my big clippers around the back of the house and cut off a lot of low branches on the lilac bushes.  I also cut off anything that stuck out and hits me in the face when I'm mowing.  I checked out the tomato plants and made sure the "arms" were sticking out of the proper places on the tomato cages.  I saw a few new tiny tomatoes so there are over 30 green ones back there now.  Two of the plants in the front by the driveway don't get as much sun and I only see blooms on them.

Squirrel or chipmunk?

I had to leave early yesterday morning for an appointment and this is what I found when I got home.  I suspect a sqirrel looking for a place to plant a walnut.

I got 2 quilts back from the longarmer so now I have some binding in my near future.  The top one will have a Kaffe fabric and will be hand finished.  I'm not sure on the one on the bottom.  The backing and half of the fabrics on the front are batik.

I found 2 that might work on the 16 patch.  I don't have very many African fabrics with enough inches for the binding.

Here are more blocks next to the 2 choices.

This is the batik backing.  Only less than 1/2" of the binding shows when finished so I think they are both still contenders.

I picked another tomato a couple days ago and it is turning red.  It was pale orange when I picked it.  I put the can there for perspective for size of the Early Girl tomato.  I also had one yellow Sun Gold cherry tomato ripen and I picked and ate it.  There are 29 green tomatoes on the 8 plants in the backyard.

My little neighbor girls were able to pick one Early Girl tomato off their plant.  The other one I planted for them is the little Sun Gold cherry tomatoes.

An everything else day..................

I left a message earlier this week on my plumber's voice mail and yesterday they finally called back and said they would be here in 10 minutes.  I was pretty sure it was the dishwasher line that was leaking.  He put on a new hose but it was still leaking so he suggested calling an appliance repair person.  I called and they are coming next Tuesday.

The photo is my Veronica which is looking prettier every day.

Good news, the shaggy red coneflower is showing red.  90 degrees and very humid yesterday.

All of the Coneflower buds were facing up to the sun.

So on to the rest of yesterday.  I had 10 minutes to grab a little lunch after lining up the repair person and then my friends arrived to hang a new ceiling fan and caulk my bathtub.

I went out around 7:30 to cut some volunteer trees and limbs on the Forsythia bush.  A front was coming through that would drop the humidity.  We didn't get one drop of rain from the predicted "possible severe storms".  I will need to water plants today.

Hard work.................

I can't believe it took me almost all day yesterday to prepare 2 huge backings and cut batting.  Well actually I didn't start until after lunch.  This was the larger of the 2 and the backing pieces were 91" long, to press, seam, and cut the excess backing fabric off.  Then press the seam.  The batting was cut off the roll and then refolded the other direction so I could trim off the excess.  The only good part is my Fitbit thought I was walking as I was flinging my arms to keep moving the backing while ironing it, so I call them bonus steps.

Repeat for quilt number 2.  They will be heading off to my longarm friend since they are large.

Yesterday someone said there were several Wanda Hanson accounts on PayPal and she didn't know which one was me.  That lead me to do an internet search for Wanda S Hanson and see if any other ones came up.  Well, I was in for a surprise.  No there weren't any more but there was one thing in the search that intrigued me, "Vintage handmade quilt Wanda Hanson" so I had to click on it.  It was an Etsy shop and the quilt pictured had already been sold.  Now just in case you are going to look this up, remember there weren't quilt shops in the early 70s so quilts were made from scraps on hand, in my case from making clothing for my daughter and several other people when I was a custom seamstress.  Also, be sure you know the current slang that the young folks are using: the word sick is a high compliment.

When I clicked on it the search title I found photos of the quilt and the review from the person who bought it and a reply from the Etsy shop owner.  Click on the little photo of the jacket under the seller's response and read the whole review (the buyer was so excited!).  The buyer gave the Instagram name for her shop so I was able to read the comments and her replies to her readers about the jacket.  She also made a second jacket and used the red convertible block on it.  (I know some of you don't have Instagram accounts so you won't be able to see her entries.) The seller had purchased the quilt at an estate sale in IL.  I always wonder what happens to the older quilts I made.

Whittled down....................

I went through the 2 stacks of bold and beautiful that I showed yesterday and whittled the pile down to about half which was 65 floral prints.  Then I went through that pile and whittled it down to 50.  Now I'm ready to start pressing and cutting.....50......fabrics........It will be awhile before I start designing this quilt(s).

Last fall I planted my second try at a red coneflower with a shaggy center.  This one came up and looks healthy.  It also has a lot of buds.

My only concern right now is the lack of red in the buds.  I hope I will see some change as the bud develops into a full bloom.

I pulled out the tag to show you what the blooms looked like last fall.

One Stella D'oro Lily is blooming in one of the backyard gardens.

I planted some Zinnia seeds in a pot.  I hope I won't kill them when I try to transplant some of them.  Or maybe I should just leave them in the pot, saving time and worry.

This year my van, washer and dryer have birthdays ending in 0.  The van is 20 years old, the Maytag dryer is 40 and the Maytag washer is 50 years old.  We bought the washing machine 2 years after we moved into this house.  It has had a few repairs over the years but not many.  My son just put new hoses on it so I hope it lasts a few more years.

Sorting and cutting time...................

I could make it a lot easier on myself and just choose 20 fabrics for a quilt, but I know how bored I would get making it.  I have been sorting my floral fabrics (no Kaffe collective) for a few days.  I'm sorting 2 blanket boxes full into 2 groups, bold and beautiful and soft florals.  They won't work well together in a quilt I have in mind.

While I'm sorting I'm also pulling out the pieces that are too narrow to cut 6" finished triangles.  Most will work for 3" triangles though.  I need to divide this pile into the 2 categories too.

I ended up with 2 tall stacks of the bold and beautiful and put the soft florals back in one of the blanket boxes. They filled about 2/3 of the box.  There was one more category which was prints that weren't florals and not appropriate for my project.  They went into the box with the soft florals.  These 2 stacks will now be sorted again into 2 stacks, one that I think is what will really work and the other pile of will maybe work.

The Annabelle Hydrangea blooms are turning white now and then they will go back to  lime green later in the summer.

Yesterday was the first day of not pulling any weeds after a string of one or two sessions a day for about a week.

I bought a couple medium size containers of flowering plants to set in front of the Pansies.  The flowers in one of the pots doesn't have any blooms right now but I'm hopeful.

Every year I plant Begonias in 3 clay pots to set on the pavers by the downspout extension.

The Zinfin Doll Hydrangea is just starting to produce flowers.  They are small now but they will be so big and beautiful soon.

We had a nice cooler day yesterday but it is going to heat up mid-week and then a string of 90s is coming starting Sunday.  Tomorrow sounds pretty nice so maybe I'll do a little more weeding in addition to watering plants.

 

First quilt top for June 2024

Now all of the seams are sewn and it is officially a quilt top.  It is 40" x 60".  All fabrics are Kaffe collective.  All it needs now is its staystitching around all sides.

Here is a reminder of the pattern which was a larger quilt.  It calls for a jelly roll but I don't buy them so this quilt came from my stash of rotary cut strips.

This is the freebie plant from my local garden center last year.  It had about 6 leaves on it when I got it.  It was in a pot last year and in the fall I planted it in a space where I had removed a Hosta.

It has lots of buds.  It had more than one color flower on it last year.  I forgot to check and see if it was 2 plants planted together last fall so it will be a surprise this year what I get.

The Veronica a/k/a Spike Speedwell is starting to bloom.  I used to have one in the back garden and it was tall and floppy,  I think maybe this one is going to be a shorter plant.

I decided to just move my new yellow Columbine to a larger pot instead of putting it in the ground.  I will probably plant it in the fall.

I put a second de-stash post on my wandafulquilts blog.  I didn't get as much sorted as I wanted to yesterday.  I had to clean out an area for a plumber to come and fix a problem.