One block, two blocks

 Hello everyone! Well, the first week of school is in the books, and it went pretty well, if I do say so myself. The students seem pretty much up for Zooming, and they actually showed up for class, so it's looking good so far. This is a huge relief, and I feel so much better now that the first week is behind me. The planning takes a long time, but it certainly pays off. My only trouble right now is getting library materials, but they are reopening on Monday, so that may just work itself out as well. Yahoo!

This week I got started on the Phoenix quilt, which turns out to be the best therapy ever. I know that Saturday is the day for posting for the Rainbow Scrap Chellenge, but I made no RSC progress and we're kind of living in a topsy-turvy world right now, and I want to show my blocks, so why not?  Here are the first two that I made:

Those look a little wrinkled, but aren't they pretty? And they did get a little damp, too, because you can tell that it was just finished raining, but they pressed dry just fine.This pattern is by Sharon Holland, and you can get the pattern HERE. Like I said, it's a really therapeutic pattern to stitch up when you are very stressed. Once you're done with the cutting and counting, it's pretty much autopilot, which is exactly what I needed.

 

I spent a nice couple of hours over a few evenings cutting everything, then another couple matching things up and marking and whatnot. This was remarkably peaceful. So I have everything cut, but I've only stitched these two. Somehow it worked best for me to make two at a time, so that there was never a time when I had to cut the threads. Yeah, it's the little things.

 

In other news, they made real progress on our renovation this week. Construction is so strange. When I have something to do around the house, I want to get in and get it done, but here they'll work for a few hours, then leave, then some other people come, then we wait several days for the electrician, who looks at things and leaves, then someone else comes. It's all strange, but the work is outside, so it's not bothering us too much yet. If it were inside we'd be climbing the walls, but it's outside for now, so it's okay. Loud at times, but okay.

I did one other good thing this week, besides teach a bunch of classes, and that was this:

 

I bought a second iron! Is it weird that it makes me really happy? I now have one at the big ironing board and one next to the sewing machine. It only cost about ten dollars, but I dithered over it for far too long. Here's the best part: I had both of them on, plus the sewing machine, AND the TV, and the power was just fine. It was amazing and felt miraculous. Like I said, it's the little things!

I hope you all are having a good weekend! I plan to rest my brain and clean the sewing machines, then maybe baste something else. I unexpectedly have some extra batting, so I'd better put it to good use!