September Ends Beautifully

 This month has been a whirlwind of activities both with the weather & our events outside the province of New Brunswick.

I have not left the province since our son Mitchell's wedding to Nicole two years ago & now have been both in PEI & Quebec this month! And Fiona was devastating the Atlantic coast also this month when we were in Montreal for the weekend visiting Aunt Alice. Nick & Leslie were at the house to look after the furbabies & witness their first hurricane.

But now with the end of the month here, all is well in our corner of the world. The weather has turned into a cooler fall morning & evening giving way to warm afternoons.

These are photos that my girlfriend Deb took yesterday when we were doing a walkabout.

The garden is still in flower & looking good and so is that lovely asphalt painting that Bill did!

Blue skies & blue water, what a lovely fall day!

The neighbour's horses were also enjoying the sunny afternoon yesterday.

This is halfway up the laneway and the autumn colours are in full view. Fiona really pushed the season ahead & I don't think that the colours will be with us for Thanksgiving this year.

The woods are even displaying the colours of fall. We took the path into the woods to see all the downed trees from the hurricane, there's going to be a lot of firewood this year!

This was two weeks ago & all the flowers stayed upright during the stormy winds & have started to change to the pink/burgundy colour now.

I was having quite the morning last week with the fur babies! Rexton took to digging in my large potted plants!

What a mess to clean up!

I had given Bridget a bouncy ball, that would also float in water, to play with & she chewed it to pieces in her bed. This is all that was left! I remember thinking it is not even 10:30am & so much destruction had taken place. I need a coffee!!

The new cabinet has made its way into my sewing room & I love it there!

Bill is going to install custom cross-hatched bronze metal in the bottom doors. That way the fabric/quilts can breathe. Deb did a wonderful job giving the whole unit an orange polish drink & Windex on the glass doors & center shelves. Thank you!
 

Rexton is doing a lot of window-watching with the birds outside these days. She was making me nervous as I emptied cupboards of all the Bunnykins & Peter Rabbit china dishes to be washed for the new cupboard.

I need to install some kind of hanging for the mugs, I was going to use cup hooks but that is not going to work. I have got an idea & will show it later. Here are the mugs & porridge bowls.

More bowls, plates & money balls.

More Barbra Veron pieces & figurines that I've been gifted & collected over many years.

I do hope everything fits in!!

I also wanted the Beatrix Potter pieces in the cabinet too... many years of collecting with fond England trip memories.

I made this clear plastic holder for my rug hooking items help keep me organized on the road trip to Montreal last weekend.

I played with the font letters & numbers to write KYROTIME 2022. The capital looks like the T I really had to adjust to that with seeing the two together!!

Years ago my son Mitchell was working in Alaska & stopped into a quilt shop & purchased some batik fat quarters for me of ravens. I was going to quilt & make it into a pillow cover but loved this idea more and used it in the rug hooking carry bag.

I used my Game of Thrones - Winter is Coming key chain as a zipper pull.

I will be making more of these clear zippered bags for other projects!

I had a linen rug hooking piece 22'' x 22" & sewed black batik binding to it & drew on a pattern from Blackbird designs from Edgar Allan Poe's poem of the raven. I hooked going to Montreal & coming home & got a lot of it hooked! 

Aunt Alice was happy to see us & we enjoyed the day together.

She was not able to travel this Thanksgiving so we went to her & will zoom meet with her on Thanksgiving when everyone is here!

We were happy to see that she was doing well but the fall covid has started again & she had stress thinking about travelling to us.

She was happy to have us with her for that special weekend trip. Nick put us up at the Intercontinental Hotel, very elaborate & we had a couple of fun days too!

Our day went very fast with Aunt Alice.

And it was time to go back home to New Brunswick with our happy memories. But one more visit to the hairdresser shop next door to see Toni!

I met Toni, Alice's hairdresser, over 20 yrs ago & she stayed up to date with me via Aunt Alice & my blog!

She was so happy to see me again!!

And to see Bill again too! Then it was off for a farewell to Alice & a road trip back home.

It was another wonderful weekend away.

I've also started a new quilt project by Lori Holt called Prarie Meadow & have 5 blocks out of the 12 completed.

Each block will be 16'' x 16" when finished. I used the buttonhole stitch around them matching the colour the best I could.

I am really enjoying working with Lori Holt's designs & fabrics right now. It is so out of my primitive muted colour ways...

Each week is a new block design to sew together.

Thank you for stopping in & I hope you come back again to see the progress of the china cabinet with the vintage Bunnykins & the new block designs!

Have a wonderful weekend wherever you are!

Cynthia xXx

Pumpkins = Fall, RIP Queen Elizabeth II 1926-2022

 I made a pumpkin pie this week using the puree from last fall & have just enough to make another pie for the family gathering next month at Thanksgiving.

I love the orange colours of fall & that includes pumpkins!

OK, this is going to be a longer visit, so go get a cuppa & settle in for a great visit!

I was so inspired by the scrappy orange pumpkin design of Lori Holt & did those 56 pumpkins!

I purchased Tim Holtz fabric for the first time at Bev's Edge Square Quilt Shop & loved the uniqueness of his design, not to mention the black in it! So I encased the whole quilt with his design & loved how it turned out! The background fabric was one I've had from Connecting Threads 2008 & you can't see it but it is an aqua toile pattern.

What a cool design!

This will be my September/October quilt for the bedroom & again those yellow velvet drapes compliment the bright pumpkins!

I will put a dark brown binding around it like the dark pumpkin stems, it was the Northcott Canvas design & I like the modelled texture to it.

Use it up! These are the 1 1/2" half-squared triangles from the pumpkins' corners!

I put the two orphan blocks on each side of the orange pinwheels for a table runner.

How happy is orange?! I only used one of Lori Holts fabrics & it does speak the loudest in the pinwheels!

I started this rug back in June with Donny's unicorn quilt, you can see the center aqua blue & strips that are 1" are crocheted into the rug.

And the scraps that don't make the cut are then bagged for the SPCA dog beds for stuffing.

I did a little decorating in my sewing room with pumpkins! I plan on using the truck bed for a pin cushion at some point. 

The seams pressed open really do help a quilt lay flat with so many little pieces intersecting!

This is a cat mat for Rexton, she loves a quilt to lay on!

The late afternoon sun floods the great room & she has her naptime then. 

Here is the finished wee cat mat, I did a small border the same as my large quilt & added a homespun gingham border to it.

I made these funny pumpkins last month. They are wool on cotton with a vintage look with the rick rack. It was a small hanging that I have wanted to do for years as it makes me laugh with the 'pick me!'.

It gives this dull corner a shot of colour & personality! 

I had a milestone birthday this week of having the privilege to turn 65 years old!

Nick & Leslie gifted me with this Jim Shore cupcake! It is so sweet & I love it! xXx

Bill made me a dozen chocolate gluten-free cupcakes & a marinated lamb dinner that was delicious!

This was the photo from my 40th birthday. That was my worse birthday for whatever reason I did not want that birthday. I cried when I woke up & cried all day long. Here's Bill consoling me with a gluten-free cake & reassuring me it is going to be OK. I would soon find out that I was suffering from thyroid disease creating a large goitre in my throat & depression. Medication fixed that & it is a lifelong medication that has levelled me out, physically & mentally. 

Look at the classic chambray shirt I'm wearing...

Bill gave me a surprise party when I turned 60 & again...look at the shirt I'm wearing! It is the same shirt that I wore for my 40th!

So in keeping with tradition here it is again on my 65th as I'm talking to DIL Nicole! lol

The next day was a sober one as that is the day Queen Elizabeth II passed away after a 70-year rule at the age of 96 years old!

She is the only queen I have ever known.

I 

Here is Bill preparing to bring our flag to half-mast.

It was a sad & sober day indeed. RIP  1926-2022.

I know she is at peace & in good hands now but it is still sad. 

As she once said 'You must have grief if there was love.'

Bill did some forging in the ditch & came home with some cranberries for Thanksgiving this year.

Bill also brought in a few of the last stalks from the rhubarb patch!

I put them in a bran muffin mix for the last taste of summer.

I love this platter that I got from Sandy for my birthday. She was very brave shipping in the mail but it made it here in one piece! I've never seen anything like it for my Halloween dishes! xXx 

Borders are now on & it is off to be quilted! There are 81 - six-inch blocks to this mystery beauty!

I fill a nappy dish with bird seed for the cat's entertainment to watch the wrens have a feast.

The deck is located outside the sunporch which is one of her favourite spots this time of year.

I've been gathering up the summer quilts & she is like the princess & the pea resting on top. She's trying to tell me something?

And Bridget & Baxter think that she's calling them!

Bridget loves to kiss the kitty.

And she will tolerate a lick or two but after that, there's going to be trouble...

Enough was enough & Rexton left.

I'm enjoying the table cloth I made from the napkins last year & pulled out the April Cornell dishes that compliment the fabric.

The William Morris placemats are also a part of it now & doing the cranberries the colour is bang on! I really had to look for the cranberries if they rolled off the platter! lol

Nine large napkins were taken apart & then resewn into a tablecloth!

It adds brightness on cloudy days, it is like having sunshine in the room all the time!

Rexton in the basket, what is it with cats & baskets?!

The sunsets have been incredible this month & I was sewing one sunset & this is the view from my sewing room window. That is also the gnome tree that I view during the day.

Even when I'm alone, I am never lonely.

 It is so beautiful here & each season has its own beauty to display.

Well, thank you for stopping in for a visit.

I know I kept you a little longer but there was so much to show you in the colour family orange! lol

Pumpkin season will soon be upon us.

Thank you for visiting & do come back to the northeast coast of  New Brunswick.

Stay healthy, wishing you the very best, wherever you are!

Cynthia