{"id":918,"date":"2013-03-22T20:45:51","date_gmt":"2013-03-23T01:45:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shirlsu.com\/?p=918"},"modified":"2013-11-02T23:54:50","modified_gmt":"2013-11-03T04:54:50","slug":"i-know-i-know-its-been-a-long-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.shirlsu.com\/?p=918","title":{"rendered":"I know, I know.  It&#8217;s been a long time."},"content":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">I know it&#8217;s been a long time since I&#8217;ve posted and I have a hundred excuses (none of them noteworthy).<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Our much loved Nugget developed cancer last year.\u00a0 We chose to care for him until his pain was no longer manageable.\u00a0 When his quality of life diminished, we had him put down.\u00a0 It was a hard decision but one I wholeheartedly believe was most humane.\u00a0 He is buried with his quilt in his favorite spot of the yard.\u00a0 I think of him and miss him every single day.<\/span><\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_924\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"width: 437px\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.shirlsu.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/03\/Between-Quilt.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-924 \" title=\"Between Quilt\" alt=\"\" src=\"http:\/\/www.shirlsu.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/03\/Between-Quilt.jpg\" width=\"437\" height=\"328\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Between Quilt &#8211; finished 09\/13\/12<\/p><\/div>\n<p>I<span style=\"color: #000000;\">n September, 2012, I finished the &#8216;Between&#8217; quilt.\u00a0 It has a 2&#8243; black inner border and &#8216;piano keys&#8217; outer border with rounded corners and is backed with beige squiggle wide fabric. It is hand quilted in a lattice design and now resides on my tall, queen-sized bed.\u00a0 It hangs 4&#8243; from the floor all around and is wonderful as my newest bedspread.\u00a0 I&#8217;m enjoying it!<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">I decided to learn English Paper Piecing in making my next quilt top.\u00a0 It&#8217;s a &#8216;Grandmother&#8217;s Flower Garden&#8217; without stones or paths.\u00a0 The main part of the top is finished but I&#8217;m undecided if it should have borders.\u00a0 It&#8217;s patiently waiting for a decision.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">I&#8217;m now working on two quilt tops.\u00a0 The first is an English Paper Pieced &#8216;Tumbling Blocks-Star Layout&#8217;, made exclusively with batiks and black Kona fabric.\u00a0 It&#8217;s striking and I&#8217;m enjoying hand piecing it as I watch movies at night.<br \/>\n<\/span><\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_1033\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"width: 442px\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.shirlsu.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/Between-quilting.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-1033 \" alt=\"Quilting prior to binding and washing\" src=\"http:\/\/www.shirlsu.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/Between-quilting.jpg\" width=\"442\" height=\"264\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-caption-text\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Quilting prior to binding and washing<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">For my February birthday, I purchased a Singer 301 sewing machine manufactured the same year I was born &#8211; <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">L O N G<\/span> ago.\u00a0 I absolutely LOVE it!\u00a0 I&#8217;ve been sewing away on it as I&#8217;m making 144 segments for a &#8216;Split-16&#8217; scrappy quilt.\u00a0 The blocks are finished and I&#8217;m currently sewing them together and deciding how I want it to be bordered.\u00a0 I&#8217;m anxious to get it into the frame for hand quilting.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">I&#8217;ve managed to sneak in a little travel since last posting.\u00a0 My brother, Jim, and I took his shiny new red Hyundai Tucson to Big Bend National Park, Big Bend State Park and to McDonald Observatory in the Davis Mountains.\u00a0 I was able to map a route that did not include any freeway &#8211; a nifty feat when traveling from east to west Texas!\u00a0 We saw lots of small towns and countryside and thoroughly enjoyed the stress-free driving trip.\u00a0 We will do it again!<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Jim and I recently went on a short eating\/gambling tour of southwestern Louisiana.\u00a0 We both love Cajun and seafood and Spring is the perfect season to enjoy these fresh delights.\u00a0 We took advantage of complimentary free rooms and gaming at L&#8217;Auberge and Coushatta Seven Clans casinos.\u00a0 While crawfish are still in season, we are planning to return in a few weeks.\u00a0 Crawfish Etouffee, here we come!!<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Shirl<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; I know it&#8217;s been a long time since I&#8217;ve posted and I have a hundred excuses (none of them noteworthy). Our much loved Nugget developed cancer last year.\u00a0 We chose to care for him until his pain was no longer manageable.\u00a0 When his quality of life diminished, we had him put down.\u00a0 It was<span class=\"more-excerpt\"><a class=\"more-excerpt-link\" href=\"http:\/\/www.shirlsu.com\/?p=918\"> (continue reading&#8230;)  <\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23,14,10,29],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shirlsu.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/918"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shirlsu.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shirlsu.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shirlsu.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shirlsu.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=918"}],"version-history":[{"count":24,"href":"http:\/\/www.shirlsu.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/918\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1809,"href":"http:\/\/www.shirlsu.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/918\/revisions\/1809"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shirlsu.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=918"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shirlsu.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=918"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shirlsu.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=918"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}