Come Stitch With Me

I was eating lunch with a former coworker yesterday at the Hudson Grille in Midtown when Mr. Patterson decided to open fire in the Northside Medical offices. We were literally two blocks away from where all the action unfolded. I knew something was up on my way home because the traffic along 10th Street was crazy due to several northbound routes being blocked by police cars, but I had no clue as to what had transpired. My friend called me about 15 minutes later to tell me what was going on.

But the excitement didn’t stay in Midtown. Mr. Patterson stole a truck and escaped up near where I live – to the Battery/Truist Park and where the ATL Braves play. My local middle school was placed on lockdown because of the manhunt due to Mr. Patterson allegedly being in the area. The gunman was eventually apprehended about 3 miles from the middle school at a condo complex near the Battery around 8 p.m. last night. Suffice it to say, we stayed in last night and breathed a sigh of relief when we heard he’d been captured.

Today, the deflect the blame game began. His mom was interviewed by the media and stated her son was mad because the doctor didn’t prescribe the exact medication he wanted. Claims were also made about the lack of sufficient mental health care services provided by the VA and now the VA higher-ups are frantically trying to cover their assets. The mayor and several politicians blamed “the guns.” It was also reported in the media that Mr. Patterson had served in the Coast Guard, so I assume weapons use was a part of his training.

Novel idea here: how about placing the blame for what happened yesterday squarely where it belongs – on Deion Patterson? He did it.

About five weeks ago, I restarted Weight Watchers. I joined a 30 Day Spring Weight Loss Challenge on FB hosted by Sarah at The Holy Mess. The challenge lasted the entire month of April. The accountability piece is what I wanted needed and accountability is what I got! We were expected to track everything we ate using the method of our choice and share a picture of our daily food log with the FB group (some 200+ participants BTW). We had weekly live coaching sessions with Sarah, filled out trackers and shared our reflections on our progress over the month. We will have monthly follow-up sessions in May and June.

Like some of the other participants, I am a little apprehensive about the challenge ending, but I certainly now have the tools to keep going! I’ll delve more into features in the WW app and my health insurer’s online wellness incentive programs to help with accountability.

Five things I learned in April:

Weight loss is a heck of a lot harder and slower this time around.

WW is a useful tool for tracking, but I don’t always agree with the daily/weekly point values allotted and some of the point values assigned to certain foods. On Week 3, half of my weekly points disappeared for some reason. Point values in the app are sometimes all over the place for the same food. I choose the middle value or use a rule of thumb of 1 point per 50 calories and track it that way. I’m going to hunt for my WW Freestyle (blue version) program notes and compare them to the current version. The two programs are supposedly very similar; yet I remember having more daily points and fewer points being assigned to certain favorite foods.

Summary: I’m back on track and will keep building on the progress I’ve made over the past month!

What is the one activity, hobby, or interest that the bulk of your time and extra money go toward?

Me?

If you said sewing, crafting or quilting – you’d be correct!

My quilting skills have certainly improved since retirement. I’ve had the time and energy to take classes, watch YouTube videos and practice, practice and practice!

Today, I took a Walking Foot Wonders class with Christa Watson. My quilt guild invited her to be this month’s special guest teacher and lecturer. I’ve anticipated this class for months. It was so worth it! I can straight line quilt and do basic diagonal cross-hatching just fine. I get hung up on more decorative designs using my walking foot. Even on my smaller “travel” machine, I tackled wavy lines, “organic” cross-hatching, angular designs and spirals. I’ll soon be putting my new found skills to work with a wavy spiral quilting design on a charity quilt. I’ll be using my Janome 8900 for that to take advantage of the 11″ of throat space.

Christa Watson will be teaching at several events over the next year, including QuiltCon 2024 in Raleigh, NC. I highly recommend taking one of her classes if you can.

Now, it’s time for dinner!