August Quilting Goals Review and Two Lock Visits

 How can it already be the end of August!  It must be.  We celebrated my sister's birthday recently and I'm seeing back to school posts from my US cousins.  

The binding did get added to my Longtime Gone quilt so its now ready to go on the bed as soon as we have some cooler weather.  

I'm so pleased with how this turned out.  The binding is also a variety of blues from the quilt.  I tried to use mostly the mediums and darks but had to add the odd lighter one to get enough length.

I also got all the flower petals and leaves traced for my Moondance Quilt.  There are 43 flowers to be appliqued on the quilt.  The centre of each flower has a little star shape with a small circle in the centre.  So I spent a few zoom calls appliquing all the centres into the traced star shapes.

During Monday's Sewing session, I got the first of the 43 flower units appliqued to a background square.  The first leaves are pinned in place for the second unit.  Some of the applique will overlap seams so the plan is to applique what I can while the quilt is still in its blocks.  Then to sew the quilt into four patches and add the pieces that overlap seams and to continue to build it up and applique shapes while keeping the top as small as I can for the current applique.  

I'm pleased with the progress this month.  Especially as there were a couple of short trips and a few paddleboarding outings.  

At the beginning of August we came home from my Dad's a slightly different way so we could avoid a left turn onto a busy highway at a stop sign.  It was a long weekend Monday and the turn can take a bit.  It took us past Kirkfield Lift Lock which is the second highest hydraulic lift lock in the world.  We didn't know we would be passing the lock but did a u-turn and had an unplanned break in the drive watch boats lifted up and down.  When we went back to Dad's recently, we stopped at the locks for lunch and got a picnic table near the edge of the lower lock and watched them as we ate.

That was so interesting my sister looked at the maps and found the Big Chute Marine Railway which uses a railway track to move boats from one lake to another!  There's a youtube video about it here.

Loading the boats.  One sling in place

Starting to move onto land

Cross the road and starting to the hilltop

The waterfalls that join the two lakes

Coming down the hill (an earlier group of boats). Once the boats can float, they drive off the railway car. So fun to watch!

Thinking about how many flowers (and dragonflies) I want to get appliqued in September.  But I'll worry about that in a post later this week.  Linking up with Patty's One Monthly Goal