Puzzle Pieces

It was too hot to work in the greenhouse yesterday afternoon so I came inside and sewed for a bit. The back and one of the fronts of the jacket are assembled and ready to quilt. I’ll work on the second front and the sleeves next:

These are two-part sleeves with an elbow dart in one of the pieces, so they likely will have more background fabric and fewer (and smaller) stars. I am beginning to love how the jacket is coming together and it feels like I am on the downhill side of this project. Yay.

I think I have gotten quilted jackets out of my system for a while. Once this jacket is finished, I need to make a few more warm-weather tops.

Sarah came over for a bit last evening and we worked on organizing plants for the sale. I pulled the ones I started for my garden and set them aside. It’s supposed to cool off to the low 70s on Sunday—the forecast high for the day of the plant sale is 87F, ugh—so I think I’ll wait until Sunday or Monday to start planting.

I did plant some flowers and herbs in the herb garden yesterday morning.

What do you see in this picture?

There is a spot in the garden at the edge of the black plastic where the snakes like to hang out. The plastic covers a pile of rotting stumps and the husband thinks that serves as a snake condominium. I saw this snake out there yesterday morning. It was not small. The snakes usually disappear under the plastic as soon as they see me. I think this one was sleeping because I was able to get a decent photo.

My apologies to those of you who do not share my love of reptiles, but I’d rather have snakes in the garden than have to deal with potato beetles or tomato hornworms on my plants. I think snakes in the garden are the sign of a healthy ecosystem.

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The Sew Expo organizers sent out an e-mail yesterday reminding teachers that our Sew Expo proposals have to be submitted by August 1. I haven’t even thought about what I might teach next year. I’d like to teach my thread class again and maybe add one or two additional sewing classes. I just think it’s getting harder (and more expensive) to get people to take classes in person when they can take them online. But online classes don’t offer the best teaching setting for everything.

I’ll have to set aside a day in the next couple of weeks to work on class proposals for Sew Expo and for the quilt stores.