On the Rocks

Back in 2020, I began what I didn't know would be a multi-year (and ultimately expensive) process of diverting rain and snowmelt runoff away from our house to prevent our basement from flooding.

With the help of lots of friends, I terraced the steepest part of the yard. I put drainage pipes on the gutter downspout and sump pump outlet to carry water away from the problem window well. I dug flow trenches for the drainage pipes to make sure the water would keep moving. I replaced the gutter. I had the corner of the house professionally lifted with epoxy columns and had foundation cracks sealed. I had the window well professionally replaced. In June, I finally finished sloping the ground away from the house and finished replacing all the cretejacking-displaced rocks. This month, I finally was able to afford a plumber to redo pipes below the basement that were forcibly relocated by expansion and contraction of clay beneath our foundation.

A friend helped me dig up all the weeds beneath the Chinese maple in the far corner of the yard and cover the former tulip and iris area below the tree with two layers of cardboard and a pretty thick tarp covering before mulching the entire bottom. Because weeds from the greenway took over the space, and deer eat the tulips because that's candy to them.

Then the bears dug up all that hard work less than a week later! And broke more even more tree branches...

Sigh... I tried to cover up the base of the tree as best I could for now without starting over from scratch.

But I think it's time for a complete redo...

My back is tired! A bunch of landscaping still needs to be done. But Lizard is thoroughly enjoying his mini lavender farm. And, hopefully, all the leaks are fixed! We've had a wetter-than-normal year (which I absolutely love!), and so far, the window well has flooded again only once, after a record-breaking three-day storm back in May.

Please, let there be no more leaks!

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Barely Pink

I get so discouraged sometimes when I can't meet my own (sometimes ridiculous) deadlines. And yet, I need to celebrate what I -- what WE -- are able to accomplish, even if what I plan doesn't come to fruition. Lizard has been able to help me with some rock- and sand-moving in the backyard during the last week, and that's something he wasn't able to do at all last year. This truly is worth celebrating, not a reason to beat myself up for not squeezing everything I want to do into shorter (and cooler) days.

I'm still trying to finish a WIP quilt every month, and this quarter, my goal is to finish TWO WIPs each month (one is a November birthday present and two are Christmas presents). It may wind up that all I finish this quarter are the three gifts, and only because I will force myself to finish them. It may be that each of the gifts are finished after midnight the day they are to be presented. But for now, I'm still trying to cross six off my list by December 31.

This month's goal is Tickled Pink, the Sequel. Because this is October. I have two other WIPs that are ready to sandwich and load onto the longarm. But this is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. My second breast cancer-themed WIP list project has been waiting too long to earn my undivided attention. My first Tickled Pink quilt inspired this project back in 2014. (What a fun blog post to go back and re-read and re-live!) When I pulled the WIP from my project shelf, I discovered my self-cut charm squares (cut from scraps leftover a decade or more) for this project did not include the backing fabric for the original Tickled Pink as planned, which meant I had to dig into my pink stash to find a remnant somewhere.

This project includes the third mariner's compass I've ever crafted, also back in 2014. (Another fun blog post to go back and re-read, and my dear Lizard left a comment back then! He can't type now, so words cannot describe how wonderful it was to re-read his special comment!) Re-reading about the joy I experienced upon completing my first-ever nearly perfect compass REALLY makes me want to give another compass a try. I think I need to do one in green batik scraps. Blue snowflake leftovers would be awesome, too. And boy, is purple ever calling my name!

BUT!!!! No more new projects until I finish some of my WIPs!!! (Unless someone in the family announces a new baby or an engagement...)

End-of-the-month literally is just around the corner, and I'm never going to make it if I don't get off this computer!!!

In my own defense, I have been patchworking some almost pink... but not with fabric. My landscaping project has been on the WIP radar, too. I couldn't get anything done during the summer's heat, and some portions of the project must be completed before winter sets in.

I began this project three years ago with what started out as a rocky flying geese path.

Now I find myself hoping I can do a flagstone log cabin, and perhaps even a snowflake or mariner's compass! I tried to build a snowflake with red rocks in the garden the first year of my front yard garden, but my "flake" wasn't very big and didn't last very long.

I did a red rock windmill in the garden, too. It also didn't survive whatever I planted in the middle of it.

I've now finished the landing outside the back door, so we should be set for winter. Now I can get back to the real Pinktober goal for this month. I don't have a design wall, and this project is too big for the dining room floor. I don't have a spare bed to lay out the blocks right now, and placement is complicated. So I pinned all the blocks to an old curtain I made for one of my kids' bedrooms back in the 90s. Now I can work on the project whenever I have time without having to figure out the placement all over again. Charm square shadows are finally coming along!

Linking up with Alycia Quilts and Confessions of a Fabric Addict.

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Snowcatcher Mountains

I neglected to take a "before" photo, so I can't really show in detail why I built a mountain range, but I built my very own mountain range with our leftover flagstone!

The builders did not amend the soil in our neighborhood before building homes. The homes are built on clay. The front and back yards of each home (unless homeowners have amended) are clay. We have replaced about 18 inches of the clay in our front yard, and last year I terraced the steepest part of our backyard and coated it with dirt, landscape fabric, rocks and/or sand to prevent our basement from flooding. Mission so far accomplished!!! We have experienced no window well leaks since the dirt for the terraces was placed!

The back of the house had about a one-foot overhang, which my father-in-law said is often done to add square footage to (and thereby raise the price of) a home. That little overhang made a great hideout for snakes and skunks and other undesirable backyard pets. My neighbors helped me fill that overhang as best we could last fall with rocks. No critters can live in there anymore.

The porch on the front of the house has been slowly separating from the ground ever since we moved here. One evening, our neighbors informed us they saw something make a mad dash into that dark gap. They couldn't tell what it was, and it may have been just a bunny, but it put us on alert that we needed to act once again.

Many of our neighbors have dealt with this problem (the porch separating from the ground) by adding a wall of bricks, either curved or rectangular, around the front section of their porches, then filling the wall-to-porch opening with soil and flowers or xeriscaping. I thinned out my irises last year and shared them with neighbors who built such garden "boxes."

Some neighbors have piled rocks across their openings. A few are like us and haven't fixed the problem yet.

I had a bit of flagstone left over from my backyard project, which actually isn't done yet, but I can't do too much more on it until the rock shop opens on weekends again or until winter is mostly over. I decided the odd shapes of the remaining flagstone would make a great mountain range across our porch gap.

One day, we will have the driveway, steps and porch re-poured or stabilized because they need it. There are many home repairs awaiting our attention. They will happen as we can finish them. For now, I'm so tickled red rock with my newest artwork!

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WIPping Post

I debated sitting out this quarter of the Ravelry WIP challenge. Not only have I not had time to work on any of the projects on my list, I also haven't even touched base with the rest of the group the entire last quarter.

It's the tenth anniversary of the challenge, and the accountable part of me can't walk away from an anniversary challenge.

Between making masks, ongoing necessary landscaping, working full time and being a full-time caregiver, I'm trying to learn how to prioritize to-do lists and how to make time for me every once in a while. It's a very difficult lesson!

Even though I didn't finish a quilt from my list during the spring quarter, I did get quite a bit of work done on my green batik leftovers quilt-as-you-go project, which I'd hoped to finish so I didn't have to add it to my list.


I also started a new charm quilt in April because I wasn't in the mood to touch any of the existing WIPs. (Lizard's quilt is still on the longarm, and untouched, but perhaps after his next medical appointment next week, he might be up to quilting again one day...) Painterly Petals HSTs is another quilt I hoped to finish so I wouldn't have to add it to my list, but I decided it wasn't big enough. Snail mail these days really does move at a snail's pace. I just received the additional charm packs last week but have not assembled the HSTs yet.


I have enjoyed quilting with non-fabric mediums the last couple of months. I've recycled about 15 jars now into decorative vases, which I fill with flowers from my garden and leave on the porches of my neighbors.






The pièce de résistance is the emerging flagstone path I'm building in my backyard. The story behind it is a soap opera, or at least a water opera, and I will share the details at some point. For now, I'm so tickled pink to be building flying geese out of red rock!


This quarter's quilt WIP list is longer than last quarter. I don't know if my time constraints will change, and I don't know if I will be able to squeeze in challenge cheerleading. They say you shouldn't make major life changes when you've gone through something traumatic, so I decided to go ahead and join this quarter's challenge and just see what happens. Having a long list doesn't necessarily mean I'm never going to finish one of these babies. It just means it will take me a little longer than I hoped.

Here's my quilt WIP list for the summer quarter:


1. Hawaiian Punch


2. Lizard Toes


3. Hexie Booboo


4. Tickled Pink, the Sequel


5. Teal Shadows


6. Goodbye Hollyhock Road


7. Snowflake Strip Bar


8. Green Floral Batik Postage Stamps


9. Lavender Sunrise


10. Giant Dahlia


11. Showcase


12. Snowbike II


13. Autumn Splendor


14. Time for Me to Fly


15. Venetian Squiggles


16. Moda Blockheads


17. Tiny Triangle Leftovers


18. Matthew's Quilt


19. My Little Angel Owls


20. Charming Painterly Petals


21. Green Batik Leftovers Quilt-As-You-Go


22. New Grandbaby Due July 19 Quilt
Linking up with Alycia Quilts and Confessions of a Fabric Addict.

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