Category: Gardening in SC

Catching Up!

I’ve apparently been AWOL. But I’ve been…summering. And, yes, always, sewing.

First, look at my beautiful Crepe Myrtle tree. It just bloomed, and it’s growing and filling out now. It seems so happy.

On the gardent front, the grass is thriving from the rain brought by the thunderstorms we’ve had, and the Japanese Beetles are slowing way down for this year. I think I picked a thousand off of my roses and adjacent plants like the now-blooming Vitex (a drought resistent Mediterranean plant).

Second, my 16-year-old (almost 17) granddaughter starts TODAY sailing across the Atlantic to Spain from the British Virgin Islands in a 2-mast wooden boat–after a week of preparation and sailing refresher days that also included scuba diving in the BVI islands.

This young woman LOVES sailing, and this trip meets educational requirements that will serve her well if she pursues this interest as crossing the Atlantic in a sailboat opens all sorts of doors. The boat is the ARGO, and we can track the route online at seamester.com, which many family members and friends are doing. The “first stop” across the Atlantic is the Azores, which will be reached after 18 or 19 nonstop days. The students and crew will sail the boat, night and day. There is no “parking” this boat. The students will have harnesses on at all times (whew!) and have come equipped with all the necessary foul weather and foot gear.

Here’s the Argo at rest in the BVIs:

What an adventure! I am of course glued to the online interactive map of the Argo’s progress, reading the daily blogs, and looking at all the pictures. The students will rarely have access to their phones until they reach the Azores and, later, when they get to Gibraltar and then go on to the Spanish coast.

Three, “Dancing Kites” is now finished. It is a baby quilt for an upcoming little girl, arriving sometime in July.

I used a 5-inch Kites ruler, and I will be using it again. There are so many blocks one can make with a kites ruler–and they come in many sizes. The fabrics all came from my stash–but I did buy a backing fabric. I quilted with a pale pink thread, using the “Folk Hearts” pantograph (Urban Elementz: Beany Girl Quilts / Benay Derr).

For this quilt I wanted lots of kite movement, so I contrasted the groupings/rows of 4 kites of the same color with up/down “sashings” of single kites in downward rows of 4 kites and sideways rows separating the 4-kite groupings. Truly, these kites ARE dancing.

I am in total love with this Tilda backing fabric:

Could it be more fun or more perfect for this quilt?

I don’t think so.

Have a wonderful weekend folks. ENJOY summer!

Sunday Happy Moments

I finished reading a book gifted to me by a long-time friend when she discovered my favorite book in the whole world is Gene Stratton-Porter’s LADDIE–a book my mother read to me an my sisters more than once.

I enjoyed every minute of reading THE KEEPER OF THE BEES which my friend sent to me. This novel was Stratton-Porter’s last novel–written before her automobile was hit by a trolley in Los Angeles in 1924, where she was working in the film industry due to the success of her writing.

My friend and I were born in 1944 and 1945 during WW2, which was only a little over 20 years from Stratton-Porter’s 1924 publishing of THE KEEPER OF THE BEES. Her novel LADDIE was among her earlier books.

My friend and I were Air Force “brats” who lived in military communities that had strong ties to the world Stratton-Porter details in her novels. It was an era of patriotism, belief in God, strong families, sacrificies made for “doing the right thing,” honesty, truth, character, sturdy educations in the classics and reading, and so on. Her protagonists have very strong connections to nature, and she writes in a time when there are a lot of small communities where people are strongly connected to each other. In Stratton-Porter’s novels, bad men and women fail dramatically. And shame does not just affect a person who didn’t “do the right thing”; shame falls too on those nearby–on families, communities, the innocent, and so on.

I miss much about that world, that country.

My son and DIL gave me a camellia and a Texas Sage plant for my birthday this year. Both are planted now and are thriving. I went out to water the Texas Sage and its adjacent plants the other day, and it was COVERED with pink flowers!

I had some help digging out the liriope plants in this bed–planted before I bought this house. This bed gets direct, really hot morning sun, and the liriope was so not happy there. While at the nursery with DIL Corinne, I also got a phlox (Intensia) and a Veronica that hopefully will take the heat in this bed. The white pipe is the discharge pipe for my water filtration system. These plants will spread and fill up this space.

I am still playing with the Cat’s Cradle rulers. I wanted to see if the 4-inch and 8-inch blocks would play nice with each other.

They do. These 4 rows are sewn together and make a big block that will be 1/4th of a quilt top that will meaure 64 by 64, like the first top. Butting up the seams between the blocks has been an issue and I’m exploring whether or not I can press differently when sewing the block parts together. Can all those seams be pressed open?

The second block is now organized, and I’ll sew it together later today and connect it to the first block. (On the left is the finished first top and its backing, waiting for the longarm.). Then it will be on to the other side and its two blocks.

One grandson is now home from his travels (Thailand). The other one landed in Laos yesterday and will be in Asia for the rest of June. My granddaughter leaves on her sail in a wooden boat to Spain this next weekend. Everyone else has their feet on American soil, LOL.

The Japanese beetles seem to be slowing down now. I have picked at least a thousand off my roses and nearby plants. Next spring I’ll put down something around the roses that the Japanese beetle grubs will hopefully eat–Bacillus Thuringiensis, which is a naturally occurring soil bacterium that is toxic to some insect larvae, but not to humans or mammals in general.

The weather is beautiful, though we have storms coming through again. We always already need rain here in the tropics. My grass got fertilized and is thriving. It is so pretty this year.

And now it is time for my main meal on the back porch, where I will start the next book in Jan Karon’s Mitford series: HOME TO HOLLY SPRINGS. I’m baking some cod and stir frying some spinach in butter with some garlic. The seedless watermelon has already been cut up, and my pears on the counter are almost ripe. There will be no starch today as I have picked up two pounds–from all the summer fruit of course.

Have a great week next week!

It’s Magnificent Magnolia Time

This is a picture of what is called a “Gem” magnolia. It stays small and is ideal for planting in subdivisions where one of the big magnolias–which grow very tall and have spreading, big, lovely crowns–would overwhelm small yards. Note that Magnolia blossoms are very fragrant too.

On a big regular magnolia, the blossoms would be bigger. But look at this pretty bloom, which is surrounded by more buds.

This tree of my back neighbor’s was planted 2 years ago, and it is loaded with blooms this year.

Seeing blooming magnolia trees reminds me of way back in the day–I was in high school–when I was maid of honor for a treasured first cousin’s wedding in rural Virginia. I flew from Omana, Nebraska, and was met at Dulles airport in northern Virginia (just west of DC) by the bride’s father, who flew me to their home in Lovingston, Virginia, (near Charlottesville and Lynchburg to the south).

My cousin carried a single magnolia blossom in the wedding that took place in a beautiful and old rural Episcopal church.

Memories…

A New Rose

Here’s a cute story for Sunday morning.

My neighbor brought me flowers for my birthday back in March. The beautiful, heavy vase was one of hers, and I thought one that should be returned to her. So on my next trip to the grocery store after these flowers were spent, I brought flowers for her, put them in the vase, and returned all to her.

Some weeks later, she returned the vase to me, chuckling, and said, “well, it looks like we’ll be passing this vase back and forth now.”

Around Easter, I had the vase full of flowers as two of my nieces visited and also brought flowers. My neighbor appeared with a handful of flowers Easter Sunday morning–three of these amazing orange roses with dramatic green centers and a spray or two of tiny white roses–and put them into the vase alongside the flowers already there. These large roses are so, so fragrant. I could even smell them with my bad nose.

I took a picture of the roses and showed it to my DIL later that day, and a friend of hers found out what they are:

https://www.rosaprima.com/catalog/mandarin-x-pression-rose

How fun is that?

Meanwhile, the geranium on my screened porch wintered over and is now FULL of blooms. It loves this cooler spring weather. (I did bring it in for a few days during the worst of the ice and snow last winter.) And it actually managed low 30’s temps just fine.

Who knew?

Have a great week coming up everyone!

The Flowers are HERE!

There is nothing quite like SPRING, is there?

It is a bit cold for us right now, but my red roses are spectacular. They curve around the porch, which I just cleaned as the deluge of pine pollen seems to be over.

The Asian jasmine vine has really taken hold. It’s not a true jasmine, but it will bloom in weeks to come. I’ve been told the blooms are very fragerant.

The white azeleas on the side of the house are so, so pretty. I transplanted them from the front of the house as it was way too hot for them in that spot.

The little yellow rose, gifted by a neighbor, is full of blooms. I put a weighted bucket over it for protection in the worst of our snow and ice last winter.

And in the front, the Drift roses have…drifted…and are now twice as big as last year when I planted them. The hollies are also thriving, and the local bees love their blooms, which will eventually turn into bright red berries.

Speaking of bees…

One of our homeowners has a huge bee hive in this dead tree trunk. They won’t bother walkers on the sidewalk, but neighbors are freaked out about their presence. There is no telling how much honey these bees have inside that trunk!!!

I don’t know whether or not our HOA will try to poisen them. My DIL just told me a man she knows who rehomes bees and saves swarms might be able to get this hive to relocate via using a pheromone bait.

I’m thinking about if I should contact this man to see what he thinks. Otherwise I’m sure poison will be used…

 

A Friday Update

It has been a productive week in the quilt studio.

The 4th quilt top in my series of 4 using the Hurty ruler designed by Latifah Saafir is done. AND, the math on the final border MATHED. I’m calling it “Gradations.”

The backing should come in the mail today. But I have to quilt the quilt presently on the longarm, the yet as unnamed “Scrap Cabin” from Rachel Hauser’s recent online sewalong.

Grandmother duties took me over to Bryan and Corinne’s, where I got a picture of the white camellia now blooming in front of their house. I think a white camellia is in my future. Their pink camellia has been blooming for some time now.

One of our new neighbors stopped by with a little gift for me. They bought a house here some months ago and are exploring this region.

This new neighbor’s mother sews quilts, and my neighbor follows my blog. She made the covering for this mug using a Cricket machine. That’s new technology for me. I can’t even…

What a sweet and thoughtful gift!

It is bright and sunny and cold here, after a big storm front went through earlier this week–significant enough so that they closed the schools. But we got some much-needed rain and escaped the possibility of tornadoes. There have been big fires north and west of us as the state is–or was–very dry. BIG fires.

Have a great weekend everyone!

My Design Wall Is Very Busy!

And, the scrappy log cabin quilt done during Rachel Hauser’s Sitched in Color online sewalong–Scrap Cabin–is on the longarm. I haven’t named my version of this quilt yet.

And, the block for the online class Blocks 2–month 6–the final month–from Tara Faughnan dropped March 1st. It’s called “Grid Work.” What a very fun year this class has been.

And, I’m sewing down the binding on the improv quilt I made called “Improv Sandbox.” (The mural background below is the Ravenal Bridge which is famous here in Charleston, SC.)

Here’s the very busy design wall:

The wedding ring quilt (month 5 of the Blocks 2 class) kind of speaks for itself. I’m entranced with it. I have one more row to make it 60 by 60 and have the fabrics for that row organized. I would like for it to be bigger, but… I’ll likely call it a day on this one as 80 by 80 means another row plus 4 more end-of-row blocks.

The quilt on the left is the 4th and last of my series on the half-rectangle triangle ruler made using Latifah Saafir’s Hurty ruler: “Gradations.” The outer border is working well–all the pieces are cut and sewn, and I’m really liking the fabric choice. So far, the math for this border is…mathing. Whew! I’ll sew more of that final border later today. So, this quilt will be off the design wall soon.

Above the wedding ring quilt is the start of a scrappy something–using the smaller Cat’s Cradle ruler’s 4-inch size. The sewing and cutting are proceeding as leader-ender blocks. The big block up there is made using the bigger ruler at the 8-inch choice. Not sure where this one is going…just playing and using up a LOT of scrap pieces in my stash.

Yesterday I went to Home Depot to get a folding lawn chair that isn’t one of the “beach chairs” that are so low to the ground. I want to sit in my driveway or back yard to get some sun. I, came home with plants and wearing a shirt that got dirty while carrying the plants to the cashier as I didn’t get a basket along the way.

Pansies and a red cyclamen.

Spring is almost here. The birds are all singing again. And the grass is trying to green up.

Tonight we will have thunderstorms and, hopefully, some rain.

A Cold Thursday

We are having a period of freezing weather that meant I had to cover my camellias again yesterday and drip water last night. Kalanchoe and the thriving geranium came back inside yesterday. There will be two more nights of this freezing weather here, with tonight being the coldest.

We were getting spoiled with some beautiful sunny and warmer days. The grass was starting to turn green. But, it IS February, and back in Maine, those folks are getting a lot of snow.

Kalanchoe’s floral gifts are still madly ongoing. She’s a crazy lady, for sure. And she brightens up every space she occupies.

Son Bryan covered his camellias with our last freezing spell and was rewarded with these beauties last week.

Camellias have the prettiest foliage too. The leaves are so glossy, green, and sturdy looking. His white one hadn’t opened yet, and I am now coveting a white camellia. That plant is full of buds.

I mounted another block on stretched canvas on Tuesday. It’s 10 by 10. I wanted to play with the Cat’s Cradle ruler. The block size here is 2.5 inches, but this ruler goes up to 4 inches and down to 1.5 inches. Yikes that little one would be…little. I think there is a bigger ruler for this block available now. Hmmm…

I’ve never seen a line of diagonal little squares that I didn’t like, and I wanted to play with that arrangement. Now I’m making 4-inch blocks from scraps–as a scrap buster project–as I have a lot of smaller scraps I can use.

I figured out what to do next with the 4th and final quilt for my half-rectangle triangle series project–made with Latifah Saafir’s Hurty ruler. I’m excited. This quilt is…bold.

The online sew-along project (Scrap Cabin) from Rachel Hauser’s blog Stitched in Color is done and needs to go on the longarm. Yesterday was Patchwork Gals meeting, and we heard about a new apartment project that will house homeless first responders (fire) and vets. I’ll be donating this quilt to those new occupants. The building will be finished in 2026, and the goal for area quilters is to provide 90 quilts, one for each bed.

This project is ongoing in other cities around the United States. And I’m so glad people are doing something about this homeless situation for our fire and soldier veterans. I sure hope it works to help them get restarted with their lives.

Design Wall Projects and Other Tidbits

First, the taller camellia (a birthday gift from my son and DIL) is BLOOMING! Five or six buds survived a fall drought and the freezing temps we had this winter. (Nationwide, this winter is the coldest on record since 1988.)

This bud was small and partially damaged, and I can’t wait to see some of the bigger buds open up. Isn’t it gorgeous? I think it is gorgeous, and I’m going to add 2 more camellias to my garden this spring by removing two gardenias that are so not thriving. The smaller, lower spreading camellia on the other side of the house turned to blooms in the late fall and only now quit opening up buds. It is a deep pink.

The top of my “Scrap Cabin” quilt is done. Thanks Rachel Hauser (Stitched in Color) for this pattern and for the online sewalong in January. Note: Rachel is going to have another sewalong in March if you want to check out her blog. Her new sewalong is a pretty quilt, and there is a nice learning method involved.

This “Scrap Cabin” quilt has chewed up a LOT of scrap fabrics, which was the point. And next time, I’ll not use the lighter greys in the neutral areas of the center as they dumb down the white areas, which are more flamboyant if kept to the white/light family.

Also, I made dumb mistakes while making that fabulous border. Each individual block unit measured properly, but the some border lengths were too long, and the outer edges were too big for the sewn edge. I knew the center was square. Anyway, I was sewing early evening, wanted to finish this top and didn’t measure the length of each border strip against the center before sewing. NO NO NO. I do know better. When I put the finished top back on the design wall, the borders were rippling in places along the edges and the quilt wouldn’t lie flat as one border in particular had to be eased in too much. Ugh! I was able to fix the problem with another long session of fixing the too-long border and tightening up the edge sewing. So I didn’t have to take off all the borders and start over. I know I got out of that mess lightly. MEASURE A BORDER AGAINST THE QUILT BEFORE SEWING.

Here is a link to Rachel’s finished top below so you can both admire it and see what I mean about these neutrals.

https://open.substack.com/pub/stitchedincolor/p/scrap-cabin?r=a3dgf&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false

My little hand-sewn improv blocks–which I installed into an improv quilt top with my domestic machine–is on the longarm. It’s not large–a small lap size–so this project will finish fast. And it is…cute. I love improv projects. And as you must know if you read this blog at all, I love hand sewing at night.

Waiting in the wings is Month 5 of Tara Faughnan’s online Blocks2 class. The ironed fabrics and all the templates are just…waiting. And the 4th and last quilt in my half-rectangle triangle series is waiting to be finished. And I’ve been making some blocks from Annabelle Wrigley’s “Prickley Pear” quilt pattern to try the alternative setting. I don’t know where this one is going–and maybe not far at all. Maybe, only to the stretched canvas frames. Maybe the trash can, LOL.

Have a great week everyone!

Another Snow Day

The water pipes are fine today, but we will have two more really cold nights, so I will drip water again tonight.

One of the “joys” yesterday was seeing the children in the snow, yes, but also the parents.

Out came golf carts to pull children on whatever worked–like the very thin boards that can skim retreating shallow waves at the beach. But there was a wide array of finding “whatever works.” And neighborhood dads participated in making sure lots of children had a try.

The local streets are still rutted with frozen ice where there was some melting and than refreezing. I wouldn’t take my car out on a bet, given that most folks here have no experience driving on ice.

This morning the detritus from all of yesterday’s play reminds us of all the fun in the snow. Most of our children were out all day, despite the cold. Whatever cold be used for snow play…was. Like these beach or tub toys.

My three youngest grands are still hard at it. The last video was them coming down a hill (hills are rare in this coastal plain) on single skis. It’s time for them to go to a ski resort I think.

And meanwhile, here’s another bit of joy from me:

Kalanchoe is now in full bloom!

And I have all four of my Wayward Arc projects finished. I so enjoyed hand stitching them.

I’m keeping the one on the upper left–it will go in my quilt room.