finishes to WIP stages

it seems that quite a bit in my life is WIP.... house, quilts, knitting.... heck, even me (although, we should always be a WIP ourselves).  i'm most excited about the exterior of my home.  

we had original 34 year old masonite panel siding until the past week.  it held for a good long time, with issues here or there over the 8 years i've been in the house.  but the past 3-4 months it has started to rapidly deteriorate.  touch it and you could pretty much put your hand through it.  time to replace, even though we were quite ready for it.

but today, i did the walk through and handed over the fat check.  then took this quick pic from my car after they drove the dumpster out of my driveway.  i have to do some yard work now that they're done and some tree trimming after all the crazy rain we've had.  i'm so happy at least the siding is secure and hurricane season started 8 days ago.  whew!

my black and white circle quilt has been chugging along and a baby quilt started.  my brother machine decided it no longer wanted to hold tension.  again.  so i brought out my featherweight to help with the piecing.  baby shower was last weekend... it didn't get finished in time....

that also meant that i got to learn to sew circles on the featherweight.  she stitched like a dream.  for some reason, i didn't get a photo of the quilt top once the blocks were all sewn together before i put this WIP into the closet with two UFOs... 

in the meantime, hubby surprised me with purchasing a bigger and very fancy computerized husqvarna machine.  i'm still trying to figure out how to use her and am foregoing the freemotion quilting for straight(ish) line quilting with the walking foot on the baby quilt.  picture later of that.

more updating to the house!!

and then there was siding to update....a little work inside and some major work to the outside.  it's been a looong time coming and this was the time to get it done.

i loved this green when it was first painted.  it faded, but not too much it looked so different.  but the 32 year old panel siding had outlived it's life.

instead, we're getting lovely new plank siding.  i don't even mind the "primed" look...

as of last night, most of the entry way was done with the exception of some minor trim, and the back of the house, plus one side (minus a window box).   i've got to powerwash the brick now!    

once they're finished and the house is painted, i get to go back to working on the gardens and the yard.  right now, they're a huge mess.  the redhead has it cut out for him on mowing.  maybe he'll be the power to the washing of the brick.  :)