Daily Notes- January 9th

One of my carefully chosen Christmas Gifts from Now You're Cooking was this citrus squeezer.  I had no idea it was the very best of the best in it's class as decided by Bon Appetite Magazine.  The little thing furthest left is a "ratchet" that opens and closes to match the size of the citrus one is attempting to squeeze.  Lemon, lime or orange.

I am planning to use it to squeeze the orange I need when making my next loaf of the orange cranberry loaf.  Which is so yummy.  The recipe calls for one cup of juice and the rind of the orange.

Yesterday and today were good days.  Yesterday I read a book instead of watching the man who imagines himself to be President speak.  Glad I didn't waste the time since he said nothing.  And I learned something about the Constitution today on Nicole Wallace's hour on MSNBC--- After the President refuses to sign a bill sent from both Houses of Congress-- the House and Senate can then veto his refusal.  Why they haven't done that as yet is up to the Senator from Kentucky. Who is up for re-election in 2020.  A weak President isn't going to get Mitch re-elected.

Enough of that.   I also worked on removing and replacing the backing on a finished small  (15 by18) art quilt. In the Time before I was enchanted by hand dyed fabric, I had used a lovely piece of mottled pale (stormy) blue on the back.  In this Time and place, I wanted that blue for other things--like my squares project--I held the blue up to the already sewn squares-- and it was perfection--so off it came.

Then the hunt in the attic for another backing fabric that looked nice with the front.  And then squaring up the edges of the art work.  The first time I made the outline of the piece pretty wonky- only 2.5 straight edges.  And then trimming and folding the backing to make the binding.  I brought the backing up and over the edges.  Sewn while watching Home & Family on the Hallmark Channel.

The gal who was celebrating her 75th birthday loved the "art quilt" and emailed that it is hanging near her blooming red geranium and looks right at home.  Which makes me happy.  The subject of the quilt was a pale yellow footed wide bowl (my own hand painted fabric) holding five triangular tulip shaped flowers on a rose, pink, red batik bubbled background.  Green spiky leaves filled in between flowers and bowl.  I added lime green, gold and pink buttons to the "tulips".

While working on the piece--I marveled that I had made something so lovely to look at.  I'm sure the Time for that sort of artistic expression is beyond me now.  But maybe not.  We'll see won't we.  I am wondering if an image of that bowl of tulips is in the archives of blog posts somewhere????  It would have been 15 years ago, I think.