Semi Quiet Sunday

I have been taking it easy quilting-wise this past week.  I finished a block for a Bee group I'm in.  I shortened a long sleeve shirt to short sleeves for Pat.  I've read a couple of novels.  Nothing too strenuous.  Until today. It was dog morning around here. Raggs has thick, soft, and baby fine hair.   Generally we pay to keep him groomed. We generally have him shaved down for the most part but it has been too long since he was groomed. Pat decided to give it a try today.  Let me say that the fur was flying!  Between me with the scissors and Pat with clippers Raggs has been some what shaved down. 

 We were at it for several hours. Pat thinks there was another dog-worth of hair in the plastic bag we were trying to keep the loose hair corraled in.  We ended with a bath for him outside.  By the time we did it it was pretty darn warm in the sun so hopefully it felt good.  

And, if Raggs was clean, Kona would be too.  She was Furminated and then had a quick wash. During spring she sheds her undercoat which surprisingly enough is light-colored.  We've been keeping her brushed so there wasn't that much coming off but it was nice to hopefully get all the loose hair off her.  She wasn't really sure about having water sprayed at her but she was good about it.  Both dogs got chewies to work on inside after air drying.  

Do you know what these are?  Yep, solar panels.  In mid March we had these panels installed to take advantage of all the sun we get here in central Virginia. We didn't put them on the roof because we have some plans for the attic someday and would like to put shed dormers in it.  Unfortunately this side faces away from the house and we (and our next door neighbor Jennie) sees the metal poles holding the panels up.  Not so attractive.  Pat has planted holly bushes to hide the sight.  He's also put up some green screening so it looks much better. 

Here's the great part.  We are making energy like crazy, at least on sunny days.  Any energy we don't use ourselves goes straight to the grid so we have quite a credit with the electric company.  We are saving the earth from the C02 that is normally a by-product of electricity production.  We're hoping to not pay any more electric bills but there is a slight chance we'll have to during the summer with the air conditioning running all the time.  I'll keep you posted. 


It's time I got back to either piecing or quilting.  I have two quilts ready to load on Ruthie both of which I want to take up to Maryland in a couple of weeks.  So time to get going after my post dog grooming break.  


Happy Quilting All!