Washington, Eggs, & Quilts

We've had a rather eventful week here. We enjoyed getting random texts and photos from my daughter while she was in Washington, D.C.  There were 10 participants in the NF Young Adult Leadership program this year, and between them they visited every single member of both the Senate and the House of Reps' offices in two days. 

She witnessed a January 6 protest and much larger counter-protest in front of the Supreme Court. There were officers guarding Congress and the Rotunda and lots of barricades, particularly as the week went on. The kids (all legal adults, but kids in my eyes) were not able to watch any of the votes, but most of the offices had C-Span playing and a common theme amongst the staffers was awe and disbelief and a bit of annoyance. Also lots of worry over whether they'd get paid or even have a job if things didn't get settled. I kept telling her she was witnessing history.

Some of her comments on the various offices are as follows. Todd Young (one of our Indiana senators) had a Wheaties box with his picture on it in a glass case in his office, but you couldn't take pictures. Ted Cruz's staffers were the rudest (eh, probably no surprise there). Susan Collins (Maine) had very large wooden bobbers all over her office. Bernie's office had lots of syrup and each secretary had a crocheted Bernie in the mittens and mask on their desk. Many of the offices had packages of peanuts. She came home with quite a collection of peanuts and other snacks that she received in each office. 

She took a picture of George Santos' office sign--the kids figured that might soon be a relic. There were apparently always reporters hanging out by his office. She also took a picture of Kevin McCarthy's office sign. LOL. She met Don Davis (NC rep) and said he was very nice. She also met Gwen Moore (WI), Bill Foster (IL), Jake LaTurner (KS), Mike Gallagher (WI, one of the co-sponsors of the Congressionally Directed Medical Research Program (CDMRP)  bill, pictured below). Side note, Wisconsin is one of the few states that enjoys bipartisan support of the CDMRP bill. She said Gallagher was taking selfies with all of them and then needed to run. Next thing they know, they see him on tv nominating McCarthy. 

My daughter was traveling on the same flights with another girl from Indiana. Their return flight was from Reagan to Charlotte and then back to Indianapolis. They got to the airport and discovered that their flight was already delayed 30 minutes, which was most of their layover time between their two flights. So we had to get them rebooked. We could get both of them into Cincinnati, so they changed their flights, but it was going to be tight. Then we found that they could fly into Evansville instead and that had a longer time between flights and also was an hour and 20 minutes closer than Cincinnati. It's good that we got them switched onto the Evansville flight, because they sat on the runway at Reagan for quite some time and they would have barely made the Cincinnati flight. 

So. The Evansville flight arrived around 10:30 at night. Amazingly my daughter's suitcase made it with her. We were impressed that it was routed correctly after all the flight changes. We got home well after midnight and hosted her new friend for the night. Overall it was a really good experience for them.

The next morning my husband and son were off to another robotics competition. They moved up from fifth to second place in their league, so that was great. 

I spent Monday driving to IKEA and back, trying to get more pieces for our future closet re-do. We've been waiting on some of the parts since last April. They told us to get on the text alert list and come as soon as we get a text. So I did, and they didn't actually have that part in stock after texting me to tell me they did. 😡 Luckily they did have one other part we were missing (also, I never got a text about that part despite signing up for them), so it wasn't a totally wasted trip, but really, it was so annoying and the lady working that counter was so unwilling to help me. She seriously told me that I need to come to the store every single day at 10 am to see if they got anything in. Um, I work and it's a three hour round trip. 😤 The lady in line behind me was way more helpful with tips and such than the actual employee.

Thanks for humoring me with the tales of my daughter's travels and our life stuff. Let's get to the sewing, shall we? I got the January clue for the Melodic Mystery completed. Here are all of my pieces so far. This month's units on top, all the units below. Next month's clue will be the assembly instructions.


Oh, and I finished off a cone of Aurifil. I started using it in January 2021. Definitely a good value.

I also managed to get all the pieces cut for the Board and Batten QAL. I will be making lots of HST at my earliest convenience. Hopefully that is some time this week since that's the task for this week.

I'm also making progress on my OMG. I have all the rail fence blocks made now and just need to assemble them into a a top. And add borders. And quilt and bind. I forgot to take a picture.

I'm trying to take a bit slower pace with the quilting this year in an effort to avoid feeling so stressed and burned out. So far, so good. Here are the quilts I worked on.

Sally's quilt, quilted with Starlet. Sally's moving away soon and I sure will miss her. 

Paula's Alice quilt, quilted with Blood Orange Peel. This particular quilting design takes a good bit of fiddling to get everything to line up correctly, so I took my time and spent two days on it. I am very, very pleased with how it came out. Also, look at those teeny tiny star blocks--each little HST finished at 1/2"!!

Christi's baby quilt, quilted with Toss Up. She really loved how the cover photo on her pattern looked, so I borrowed her pattern and hunted down the quilting design so we could replicate it.

Finally, Janice's quilt, quilted with Flirtatious. Beautiful quilt, and one of my new favorite quilting designs--I used this pattern last week too. Maybe Stipple won't be most popular design this year? 😆

Over in the chicken coop, my husband found a product called Rooster Booster that they've been feeding to Henry mixed in with some cooked oatmeal. It seems to be helping because Henry has actually come out of the coop down into the pen a few times! He can't get back up the ramp, so someone has to put him away each evening he's out, but it's encouraging. Beaker and Peanut, the partridge colored hens, keep trying to escape any time the doors are open, so we've had to really watch it. 

We now have nine eggs. I think that two of the hens are laying now, and my suspicion is Beaker and Peanut, but I don't know for sure. When my son and I got home yesterday, there was an egg right in the coop opening. Usually they're further inside the coop.

See how tiny it is? That's why I think two hens are laying now. I think the tiny one was the first egg for one of them. And my son found the second egg in one of the usual spots. Another fun chicken moment is that one of them ripped a chunk of contact paper off the wall in the coop. They brought it down into the pen and the hens were chasing each other around to try to capture it. They are so weird.

Have a great week!

Linking with For the Love of Geese/Quiltery and My Quilt Infatuation.

2 comments

  1. It sounds like your daughter and had a lifetime experience in DC! Glad you could get her into Evansville, those long drives late at night get old! The quilting looks so nice on all the quilts but I especially like the orange peel design. I have that on one of my quilts and I enjoy just looking at it. Happy stitching!

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  2. That sounds like a fun trip and one Kelly will remember. Congrats on the second place! I love your blocks, the green and blue fabric is gorgeous.

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