My Moda Block Heads Block 4, and Neighborhood Events

Not much quilting to report, and really not much else either this week.

Yesterday I decided to look into the Moda Block Heads Week 4 block.  I got my fabric selections made, and the freezer paper patterns for the bee skep designed by Jan Patek.  I've done very little applique in quite a long time, but I decided to give it a try today.  It really wasn't very difficult, thank goodness, but I'm not very good at it, and it certainly is not one of my favorite things.  If you are following or participating in this project, you know there was a bit of confusion at the beginning of the presentation of Block 4.  That really didn't bother me, but I would rather have had the block presented in the same format from Moda as the first three blocks were.  Maybe it was, but if so I missed it in the shuffle.  I just like consistency in the presentation, but then, that's just me, and it's not a real problem.

Someone had shown the block with horizontal red striped fabric and stars at the upper left, resembling our U.S flag.  I like that idea a lot, but didn't want to copy it, so I dug through my scraps, and here's what I came up with.  I've had the red/blue music notes fabric a while, but never had used it.   I thought it would make a good background for this block.  Funny, but I found myself humming "God Bless America" while appliqueing the block.

Last Friday I worked in the back yard about 2 hours, and Saturday I worked in the front yard 6 hours!  I cleaned flower beds, trimmed hedges, and raked up twigs blown down from the tree by last week's storm.  Thank goodness, twigs and small branches were the worst problem I had from the storm.  Anyway, I have 2 big lawn trash sacks full of twigs, leaves, and weeds for the trash pickup Wednesday.  Now after my son mows tomorrow (hopefully), it should look really nice around here.

I just had to take another picture of the rose garden also.  Haven't seen the little blue bird again.

 While working in the back yard last Friday, I heard a loud motor noise coming from two doors west of me.  After watching a few minutes to determine what was going on, I just had to grab my camera and take pictures.  There was a big truck, and I mean BIG, with a big crane and bucket behind that neighbor's house, in their back yard!  Here's what I was from the back part of my yard, over my next door neighbor's fence:

See the horizontal line?  That's the crane, bent down with a man in the bucket,
trimming trees off the power lines that go across the back of the property.

There's the bucket being brought back up.

Here, the bucket was raised and was being turned around to lower close to the truck
so the lineman could get out of the bucket.

I could not see how many men and small tractor/haulers were on the ground, but I could hear the grinder making mulch right there in their back yard.  'Twas quite an interesting afternoon for this old lady!

Therapy is still going well.  Today's workout was tough, with heavier weight lifting with my right hand and arm; I was glad when that was over!    

Hopefully soon I'll be able to get started with my ruler foot project, and also a couple of small projects I have in mind.  We'll see what develops.

---"Love"