Yesterday was such a busy day – drive to mom’s takes slightly more than two hours. Then we go to lunch and shop for awhile – I think we hit Belk’s, Kolh’s, Ross, Penney’s, Christopher & Banks – more than I really like to – I’m not really much of a shopper. Mom was looking for a simple light weight cardigan – do they not make these any more! one store after another – nothing – finally the last store – Penney’s had one – success. Left and drove back to mom’s apartment with a slight detour –I wanted to check out the Rabbits Lair (quilt shop) didn’t know they had a new location – I really didn’t think it had been that long since I been there but I guess it was – the girl in the shop said they had been there a year. Normally I just do not have time when visiting mom to check out quilt shops too. They have changed a bit and I think I will need to make time in my visits from now on to check out that shop – it used to be mainly civil war repro’s of which I am not that into – now they are branching out and have a lot of other things and going crazy with all things Sue Daley – which I do love! I think they have almost all of her notions in the store and all of the paper pieces if you are in to EPP, I think they have some of the acrylic templates too – I will check next time.
I got just a little quilting done last night – just part of this section. Hopefully will do more today. Quilt group this morning for a couple hours then back home – will it rain or will it miss us? – my quilt group project right now is the Diamonds are Forever hexies – all in one small container and easy to pull out – all kept in one small box and nothing to get ready.
As far as the roses go – thanks everyone for the complements – I do nothing special with these roses. I throw some fertilizer pellets on the ground if I think of it – I spray them with House and Garden spray if they get aphids (keep your fingers crossed none for two years now), I dump dish water on them only when we have droughts and are on water limits which rarely happens – last year was special. I used to have about 10 bushes in an area very close to these red roses – they were horrible – black spot, fungus? aphids – you name it – the leaves fell off even – after 2 or 3 years of this and nothing worked I dug them up and burned them – now for the last two years these roses that I have left are just fine 
Roses for the most part grow very well in the south – in the north not so much – my mom had one rose bush in Wisconsin and I believe she cut the bush back in the fall and wrapped it up in burlap bags tied with twine maybe put some straw around it too – I’m not sure – until the weather warmed up and then it came back ok.
I love my very dark red roses. I have two climbers. They have been moved several times for one reason or another and have been in the current location for about 10 years I guess. They are doing pretty good this spring – the drought didn’t destroy them – I poured dishwater on them when we had a water ban and I collected rain water!
Looking over the deck down at them – lots of buds.
It looks like I’m going to have to pull some of them in closer to the wood again and tie them in to train them a little bit.
My other roses, Mike got me these a couple years ago, I was surprised they made it through the drought, I didn’t water them as much.
Little garden space here – 3 tomatoes, petunias, rhubarb (first year so not so big) and some zucchini down on the far end.
A new petunia basket that I bought yesterday.
Crazy yes, this is the petunia basket that I wintered over from last year – it is a little lopsided and has nothing on one side, but it is filling in and growing pretty quickly the last couple of weeks.
I got started on the applique block the other day – the purple part is coming along nicely!
5 blocks for the Carousel ready to sew
Gone for the day visiting mom – most likely no sewing will get done tonight when I get back – we will see.
A little of this, a little of that – but first don’t forget about the give away – I have trouble with my computer server now and then the last couple of months and it wasn’t working right last night for awhile so if you couldn’t get on my blog try again.
Enter the giveaway at this link and tell me where you are from. Last night before I shut down the computer I saw I had 44 comments on the give away already – lets see how high that number gets 
Everyone welcome – this is an international give away.
I cut some flowers for a cute little mug that I have that isn’t even 4 inches tall. It normally just sits on a shelf looking cute. But right now I have some cute little Lily of the Valley’s blooming and thought I needed a few in the house. In fact I had to put them right next to the computer so I can enjoy them.
I am really enjoying this new table of mine – it is working out great as a computer/sewing table and the topper looks just right on it.
It got up to 80 degrees yesterday! Wow – it won’t last though – would you believe it is possibly going to get down to 35 degrees on Thursday night or is it Friday – I will have to keep an eye on the news – of course I have my little garden planted yesterday, tomatoes, peppers and such – my rose bushes are covered in buds and here they are saying north of us at the county line between Arkansas and Missouri might get snow! Unbelievable. I will have to cover what I can and bring some things in the house. And here it was in the 80’s yesterday and for Tuesday and Wednesday as well. It will be back to windows closed, sweatshirt on and heat on to stay warm – I do not ever remember a spring like this and I have been here in Arkansas for 32 years.
My rhubarb with a petunia by it. Good thing I didn’t plant all the petunia’s yet – I will hold off until after the weekend for sure now.
More of the Lilies of the Valley in the flower bed.
More quilting done on the Bow Tie – this was from Saturday.
This part on Sunday. I skipped Monday.
Last night instead of hand quilting I was hand piecing a block for the Patchwork of the Crosses and have this much of this block done, now the row of white around it.
I’m already itching to start piecing another quilt – I’m really bad sometimes! I think instead of a new top I really need to get the nine patch quilt basted and start the straight line quilting on that one instead – it is about 80 x 80 so it will take me awhile – that should satisfy the urge to start something new.
Last year I ordered two lilac plants that are supposed to be grown more easily in the south than the usual variety grown in the north. The plants I got are called “Josee Lilac” – one died in the drought the other survived and I have beautiful wonderful smelling lilacs – they smell the same as your every day lilac does.
As you can see the plant is still very small – I’m surprised I had blooms this year. I hope it continues to grow – I would love to see it full size 4-6 feet tall.
The dogwood is loosing its blooms, it was pretty while it lasted 
My roses are almost ready to open
This is the petunia that I wintered over in the house from last summers hanging basket – I am amazed to see I am getting flowers again on a plant that is supposed to be an annual – I did put fertilizer in it but I am still surprised.
The two Boston Ferns that I had last summer are still growing as well. I had put them up against the outside wall of the workshop (outside) and covered them up completely with leaves – a very thick layer – I had to trim off a lot of broken and dead looking leafs (fronds?) but I have new growth occurring. I don’t know if they will ever be as full as you normally see – this is an experiment – I will take another photo in a month or so and see what happens.
Here is the other one. Not thick at all, quite sparse.
really and truly this time. Look at these azaleas. I had a couple branches that had grown so tall last year much taller than most of the rest of the branches that I decided to trim them off for a table decoration. And I left them tall for fun.
And I moved the bird feeder after I took the above photo so the birds will leave the garden alone. Of course they have to find it now in its new location. I threw a cup of seed out on the ground to help lead them to it – no birds yet -
but the squirrels found the seed on the ground already and scattered when they heard me come out the door and ran up the nearby tree – you can see this one peaking out.
The first clematis blooms.
Rose buds by the deck.
More of the azaleas. 3 big bushes of dark pink, one bush of red and one of white. I planted two more that I rooted off of the red and the white but those are still small and you can’t see them in this photo. I also have one that is another shade of pink on the opposite end of the white not shown in this photo.
and the wild violets pop up all over the place and I let them – I really like them.
No quilting photos this morning. I was busy yesterday with outside stuff and never got around to any until late in the evening and didn’t get any photos. I got my garden planted yesterday – a small garden lets hope it grows. I added fertilizer, lets hope we don’t have a drought and heat wave like last year.
And here are the leaves on the trees! green grass that has already been cut once and will be ready for cutting again in a couple days. A couple of the trees are still pokey and the leaves are just buds but they will be open fully soon.
I got my box out with the William Morris in Applique fabrics and patterns. I have only 2 blocks completed from this applique quilt and had lost interest. I got the box back out to take a look and see what to do next with it. I do not really plan to get started today but wanted to look and remind myself what is here.
block #3 is the 2 shades of blue with orange on it next to the right corner – that is the one I will do next.
One color choice – I am mostly picking out my own colors for each block although some of them might be very close to what is featured in the book as I like them.
And another – I’ll decide later
So instead of nice and neat it is back to looking used!
I did get in more hand quilting last night – I hope I can stick to it and get this quilt done in the next couple months.
the dogwood is still looking nice and whiter than the last time I showed it – I doubt these blossoms will last long – rain expected on Thursday
I have been digging up a small garden space. This used to be a rose bed – the whole thing full of roses. Then I had a blight or something and lost a lot of them, I didn’t really feel like bothering with them and still have two on the very end and have used the area for various things since – for awhile it was a strawberry bed but it got too wild and I got rid of it. Now it will have some veggies once again as it did several years ago. This area has been covered in bird seed all winter so I expect to see some sunflowers growing in between veggies. I will be moving the bird feeder to a different location for the summer so the birds and squirrels won’t be bothering the plants. I might hang some tomatoes upside down – I have tried that before, some times it works and sometimes it doesn’t.
And speaking of roses here on the end of the deck the climbing roses are budding – this plant is close to 30 years old and has been in two different spots since I first planted it. Mr. Lincoln I believe the roses are called – a very deep red.
