Melon Patch Rows is a Completion!

Third finish for the year! It was supposed to be finished up by the end of April if all my planning would have worked out. Unexpected company arrived for a long weekend and that was that. Apparently this is the year for the 'Oh well! What will be will be' happenings! 

It's a finish!

I am so very happy to see this Melon Patch Rows {Jubilee} quilt brought to a true-blue finish! It's an odd quilt probably to some, but it gives me all the feels.

Such a feel good quilt

It makes good use of some abandoned parts from a previous quilt attempt and joins them up with a declaration that just so happens to deeply resonate with me.

Always love the look of words on quilts

The colors in this quilt didn't want to be true in the photographs, but hopefully you can get the overall look and feel from all the of the pictures together.

Really pretty quilt in the right lighting

I found the perfect binding in the totes. I'm sure it's been there for well over 15 years! Really helps lift the quilt with a lighter, happier vibe than a solid would have. And bonus--it's not something that I ever really cared to use in a more commanding spot in a quilt.

Who says old fabrics can't be beautiful!

I'm always interested in how the hand stitching comes through when viewing the backside of a quilt. Does it have a good look throughout or does it just look choppy and disconnected? This one passes muster for sure! Every time I wonder why keep hand quilting? Something like this convinces me to keep on making the effort.

Loving the stitching texture

Next up in the hoop is 'Ode to Joy'. I've been diligently applying myself to the hand quilting ever since returning from our sons wedding. Closing in on the centerpiece here pretty soon! It has been a bit of a pain trying to decide on what pattern to quilt, but this looks okay so far.

Next up in the hoop!

Next up will be quilting the pear blocks and in-between fabrics. Still trying to decide if I want the thread color to pop or if it needs to blend in. So far I'm blending the thread more than I expected to, but that's what the quilt seems to want.

Ready for the pins

We took off for Oklahoma for our sons wedding and were gone about ten days. First we drove to Portland, Oregon to our eldest sons home where we spent the night. Early, early the next morning I flew out of the Portland airport with our DIL, the three granddaughters and her mom. Our granddaughters have never met a stranger {plus have boundless energy}, and so are a LOT of work in the airports. It took both of us moms to help corral them for the two flights to Oklahoma and back a week later. 

The happy couple with me and my husband!

Then, later in the day, our guys jumped in a truck and drove straight through to Oklahoma. They decided to drive out so they could rent a U-Haul trailer and bring back our new DIL's stuff. Us girls hung out at my daughters in Tulsa for a couple days and then met our guys in our DIL's hometown nearer to the wedding. 

Our youngest son is married!!!

Lots and lots of fun visiting, helping to decorate, and of course celebrating with all the family and friends the day of the wedding! The bride and groom were very happy and looked quite handsome and or beautiful! We are feeling very blessed to have a new addition to our family. Both of our older granddaughters got to be flower girls and while they both did an awesome job, this little gal stole the show! Reagan never took it too far, but let me tell you, it was hard to concentrate on the bride and groom when she was busy blowing flower petals off of her fingers etc.

Reagan looking super cute

Lucy has been a flower girl a couple of times before, so she wasn't quite as excited as her younger sister. On the first flight home though, she got her moment. One of the stewardess's asked Lucy and me if she'd like to meet the pilot? And next thing I knew, there she was, sitting in the pilots seat and pretending she could fly a plane! So thrilling for her! The pilot was very sweet and generous about it all.

Lucy having the best of times!

Mom and the other grandmother had went on ahead to their seats and didn't realize what was happening behind them. They had an anxious moment wondering what had happened to us, but all was well. No one was kicking us off the plane! 

That last flight home was rough though. All of the I-pads had ran out of battery charge due to a long layover and the littlest granddaughter was absolutely done with the entire adventure. Thankfully we sitting in the very back of the plane so hopefully not annoying too many people. Except for one flight attendant. She was having a really crabby day and kept taking it out on us. Probably didn't like fussy kids, but hey, she did things like make us wait a long time after serving everyone else their snacks before giving ours to us. Or serving the little girls drinks without the lids and straws on like all the other planes had done previously. Who does that on a plane? Not giving us napkins. Plus, she wouldn't let us sit in the very back row, we had to sit one row up because she said the seat was 'messy' when all it had was a box of gloves in it. Later we figured out that she must have been saving the seat for a friend and then got irritated when it didn't work out because the plane was full? and her friend was late? That's what we managed to piece together. But we survived and nobody got into a brawl.*wink

So happy to be home safe and sound and back to the regular. Took eons to catch up on all the laundry of course. And it's been hard to get back into the sewing/quilting routine. My husband has been constantly wanting me to go with him when he has to make a building material run to Home Depot etc. He says he enjoys my company, but I'm thinking he just wants a nap while I do the driving. haha  

Also, I've been trying to get back into my yoga routine, something that I started up after being so sick this winter. Was a little bit hard after taking almost 2 weeks off to travel, but I really like being in better shape than I've been in decades. Still have a longs ways to go before I'm very good at it, but it makes me happy even when I'm wobbly and/or pathetic at poses. Yoga is a low-impact exercise {Ugghh to the high cardio plans!} and actually very relaxing/soothing to me. Plus I've dropped another couple pounds. Yay me! Our life gets very stressful at times and it's well worth the time it takes to fit this into our busy schedule. I never thought this would be me, but I'll go do Yoga instead of quilting if that's the choice I have to take. Crazy. What is happening to me? But really, I just hated being so sick and feeling like an overcooked noodle afterward. Being so wimpy. Some people get into shape to run a marathon when they turn 50. Evidently, I'm doing Yoga. Who'd of thunk it?