A finish at last

Over the weekend, I finished the last stitches in the binding, and Monday Norie took this picture of the quilt on the park fence. My plan is to give this to the church to raffle or auction off to raise money for the library ... what may be needed to get it back up and running ... and the rest to the homeless mission.

The last quilts with this block were quilted with big stitch - light on dark and dark on light with sashiko thread. Because the backing of this one was all white, I decided to quilt butterflies in the block side pieces. I used dark thread on the very light blocks and light on the darker areas. I liked the idea of butterflies in the garden of floral prints and it is the symbol for the "hidden Christians".  I made a stencil for the small vine in the inner border and used linked hearts for the outer border with the idea we are all tied together by the love of God.

I picked blue for the binding, as it matched the blue in the border print. Maybe I should have chosen a darker rose, but I didn't want the quilt to look too "girly". Anyway, It is ready to go to the church once the new normal arrives.

Speaking of church, we were asked to take a picture of out communion table and send it to the church website. An assortment of pictures were showed this past Sunday during the organ piece.

As one might notice,  I enjoyed some red wine ... and the bread here was made by my daughter. Norie.
The lovely runner on my coffee table was made for me by Tanya Watanabe. It makes me happy everytime I sit beside it
You may notice my guests in the background ... plenty of silkworms. They have all moved up to larger containers over this past week.

Days go by with slight changes in schedule. Monday homeless is the same except what I am delivering now is crackers rather than onigiri. Tuesday Sermon Lab is on Zoom. I can do that without leaving home. Monday, Wednesday, and Friday mornings, there is a community meeting. We have been joined by people in the states who were once members and a lady who has never been to the church in person but has been attending since services became live streamed.

Last night was training to join the virtual choir ... not sure I can do it but if I can get earphones at the 100 yen shop, I will try. Tonight, My cub scouts will have a campout. They have been preparing for the last few weeks for campfire entertainment. It should be fun. Maybe more so than the Scout Board training coming up on Sunday ... as a result of the training team meeting last Saturday. Honestly, I am beginning to feel rather zoomed out!

Every day I sweep our street from one end to the other. We have a number of very messy trees dropping leaves, flowers, and seeds parts. Between sweeping and pulling weeds in the park, I contribute several large bags to the trash collection. I did notice that, with people wearing masks, the number of cigarette butts I sweep up has lessened lately.

On the other hand, Thursday is collection day for glass bottles, cans, and pet bottles.

Normally, that square blue folding net container is set out in the morning. The neighborhood members are to remove the lids (those go into the "pura" that is collected on Fridays), and squash the bottle, putting it in the net container.

I did notice the squashing rule is less met these days, but....










Looking up the street, even if those bottles were crushed, there are now way too many .

It is interesting that the numbers have increased to so much.

Of course people are staying home and drinking there.
I don't even remember when I last bought a drink in a pet bottle. I get drinks like milk or yoghurt or juice in paper cartons that can be washed, flattened and recycled.

I carry my own nylon shopping bag. I use the bags left from onigiri delivery for "Pura" plastic from all kinds of wrappers, the fastest to fill up maybe twice a month to the pick-up-site.
Paper, cardboard, and milk cartons are recycled on Fridays. (for me, once a month or less). and burnable trash and garbage on Wednesday and Saturday. I put the bag of weeds out then but a lot are composted and the wastepaper basket small stuff like sewing scraps fills the slowest of all along with unburnable maybe once every two months if that much.

I wonder if the change in trash has changed in other places as well. I wonder if people stuck at home are drinking more. I do notice my coffee is going faster now that I am home more.