Scrap Happy: management

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I have a lot of scraps.  Scraps in drawers, scraps in baskets, scraps I really like, and some I don’t.  Big ones, little ones, some minuscule too.  Some are from quilting, crafting and sewing and quite a few are from old clothing; specifically Bob’s old shirts.  He’s a basic plaid man for shirts.

These past few weeks I’ve seen the need to manage them all.

So as not to overwhelm myself I decided to begin on the cutting table.  You know, all the stuff I didn’t want to put away lest I forget about it.  No judgements now.  You know it happens to all of us from time to time.

I scooted over the wastebasket and immediately tossed the scraps I don’t like.  Then I sorted by type and size.  I began the process of cutting to common sized block sizes.  Inchies, 2.5″, 4″, 5″, but I left the strips alone because, no matter how you cut them, strips make really awesome project starters.

I have begun making inchies, which are cut to 1.5″ to allow for the 1/4 inch seams, from any bits of fabric that will allow a 1.5 cut block.  Smaller that that?  Saved for crumb quilting or straight to trash.

Bob’s shirts I began cutting to 2.5″ and 5″ blocks when I suddenly realized I was working too hard. Five inch blocks can be cut into 2.5 inch blocks!  Larger cuts give me greater future options.

The Kaffe quarter circles will remain as they are.  They can be sewn together into half circles, whole circles or appliqued as flowers or wreaths, or who can say what I’ll come up with in the future?

This is only some of my scraps, but they are labelled and being properly stored.  Probably organized into that basket of Bob’s old filleted shirts! When I’ve emptied it of course.

The 15th of each month is the day Gun in Sweden and Kate in Australia, host ScrapHappy, a day for showing something made from scraps.

Though ScrapHappy is open to anyone who uses or reuses scraps to make something beautiful and/or useful, they may not post every time.  Go take a look, because there is always something of interest there:

Kate, Gun, Eva, Sue, Lynn, Lynda (me),
Birthe, Turid, Susan, Cathy,  Tracy, Jill,
Claire, Jan, Moira, Sandra, Chris, Alys,
Claire, Jean, Jon, Dawn, Jule, Gwen,
Bekki, Sunny, Kjerstin, Sue L, Vera,
Nanette, Ann, Dawn 2, Bear, Carol,
Preeti, Edith, Debbierose

A little something to warm you up…

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“When the weather is cold, and never goes above 32 degrees, we are stuck in the mudroom all day just to avoid freezing our whiskers off. We’re so bored.”

 

You are not seeing double.  Kitty on the left is Pickle and on the right is Peanut.  They are brothers from a litter who arrived all the way from Tuscaloosa riding in the grille of a pickup truck.  That is a 2 hr 28 min or 169.3 mile trip.  When the driver discovered them, he extracted them and then took them to our local vet’s office. 

On entering, with Walker and Noodle in tow, I spied the assistant feeding them behind the counter and asked if they were available. They were.  

“I’ll take them both!” I exclaimed.  Bob cocked an eyebrow at me, but I held firm. 

Peanut has since become Bob’s favorite and Pickle is mine.  I do love a good Ginger cat and having two ginger cats is twice a nice.

Although, perhaps not so nice if you are a mousie or a vole.

Omicron and first snow of 2022

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I’m getting too old for this. 

At 68, when I consider all the possible outcomes and variants of this C19 virus, I’m glad it got to us after the cooled down version emerged.  It is, as claimed “like the flu”.  I’ve had some deadly flu in my life with temps of up to 104 that left me unable to even get up.   This virus with low grade fevers nonetheless leaves you listless and feeling weak.

Bob came down with it on Thursday and I came down with it the very next day, which was New Years eve.  We stayed in, laid low, kept bundled, took eight hour arthritis strength acetaminophen (for fever, aches and pains), drank a lot of water and sipped on homemade chicken soup.  To keep our lungs clear we used an inhaler and took Guaifenesin (expectorant).  Both of us battled waves of low grade fever and chills, and spent a couple of nights sleeping sitting up on the recliner.

It is a trickster!  Bob was feeling like he was on the downside of the beast, and then suddenly he got another low-grade fever and chills.

We would like to have been tested, but due to the holiday weekend, and the mass of sick people, well, you simply can’t get in for DAYS.  NOTE:  I was finally able to get in on January 5th and found that I did indeed have the C19 beast.

Wishing you all a Happy New Year and good health in 2022

❤

 

Mother Nature sent us snow for the New Year, and it was beautiful!  However, it was the wettest snow I have ever experienced.  It filled the fences, stacked up 8 inches high, and ripped the limbs off of my Dogwoods and the giant Holly trees here! (Trees were felled everywhere in our area.) I will share the photos and also say that I was glad this all happened in the night.  It was sad to see the carnage next morning, but it showed us a very dangerous flaw in the giant holly tree!!!  The largest branches and the crotch of the tree are ROTTING inside.  The lovely old lady will have to come down and we will be looking for another small shade tree  to replace it. Pictures are clickable, but I am having a bit of trouble with the editor again today.  sigh….

beautiful…

But dangerous!

An Unconventional Scrap Happy Post

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I have spent the past (almost) two years working in my garden.  No quilting, sewing or blog posting.  This means that I haven’t found my way to posting for Scrap Happy posts either.

Today I break that silence, albeit unconventionally, and bring you alternative scraps which I have made into useful items for my garden…

and my mud/laundry room!

*I took one old table, removed two legs, cut the edge off, and attached it vertically to the cut edge of the table.   This provided an old fashioned look, but more importantly it camouflaged the uneven wall plaster.  The newly modified table was then leveled and screwed to the wall. I now have a long needed laundry folding table!

But I didn’t toss those extra legs!

By drilling a half inch hole into each of the centers.  Then, using a 2 lb. mallet,  I drove in some leftover 1/2 inch rebar into the holes.

With these two table legs, and four others from an old topless table frame, I was able to make functional hose guides for in the garden and orchard.

I haven’t actually measured, but I think the garden and orchard areas are equal to about 1/4 acre.  It takes two 100 ft hoses to get around everything.  One is connected to a hose station with quick connectors on the backside to facilitate the primary hose from the house.  House hose gives me N & S access, and the hose station gives me E & W access which keeps my poultry in water.

A 100 ft hose has a lot of drag when going around corners of the raised beds and my blueberry bushes.  These oversized hose guides won’t budge even with the a 200 ft combined length!

I should probably paint them all,

But I couldn’t decide on a solid color for all of them, or if I wanted party-colored for fun.

This one is guarding a new blueberry bush.

I also had some old planks from the walls inside the 1840 cabin at the Mountain Farmlet.  I could never decide what to do with them.  So I went with functional and attached them to some left over cuts of galvanized electrical conduit.  I now have barriers to keep the ducks and (maybe) the chickens out of any newly planted and conventional beds of vegetables.

NOTE:  These legs will need to be shortened!  It was very hard to remove these barriers until we’d had a good soaking rain!

Scrap Happy is sponsored via Kate and Gun. The participants use/reuse leftover fabric scraps to create new and wonderful items.  I have done a similar thing with my wood and metal scraps to share this time.

Please do visit these other creative participants and see their lovely work!

Kate, Gun, Eva, Sue, Lynn , Lynda (Me),
Birthe, Turid, Susan, Cathy,  Tracy, Jill,
Claire, Jan, Moira, Sandra, Chris, Alys,
Claire, Jean, Jon, Dawn, Jule, Gwen,
Bekki, Sunny, Kjerstin, Sue L, Vera,
Nanette, Ann, Dawn 2, Bear, Carol,
Preeti, Edith, Debbierose and Esther

Thanks for visiting and I hope this post inspires you to rethink using the landfill!

*GIVING CREDIT WHERE CREDIT IS DUE:  While the idea and design was mine, I did need the help of Bob in the muscle work.  Carrying, leveling and attaching the new folding table to the wall.  I wouldn’t be able to do it without his help.  ❤