Thanksgiving

Tomorrow is the big day. Turkey day! I can't wait to get up to put the turkey in the oven. It always smells so good while it is cooking. I have almost all of the pies done, I only have the banana cream one to do yet. The crust is all ready. I just have to cut the bananas and make the filling. I was going to make fruit salad too but I forgot to get the fruit. I got the nuts, grapes, and the bananas for it but not the canned fruit. Oh well I don't have room in the fridge for it anyway. Mom and Garry will be here to eat with us. They are coming early because Garry is working on the barn. I have to float the turkey in the tub. It has been thawing in the fridge all week and is still frozen solid. The tub is the only thing I have that is big enough for it. Nick gets a kick out of it and wants to give it a bath with soap and all of that. Last weekend I started sewing my flannel quilt but I didn't get very far, I had to make too many flying geese units. I got one border of the on it but now I have to make more for another border. I should have it done sometime this weekend. Then I have to get back to the retreat challenge quilt. Sometime soon I have to make some handmade christmas cards. We are exchanging them instead of gifts with some of my family. I just have to come up with a wonderfull idea for them. Now it is time for me to go for tonight. I hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving and remember that the Christmas countdown really starts now!!! Karen

Barn Bits and More

My update on my quilting barn is that my rafters are now braced up so that when we put in the drywall up my ceiling won't sag. I hate it when my things sag. Don't you?? I hope that this weekend Garry will put in my breaker box and wire my lights and put up the loft. I can feel it getting closer. My excitement level is getting up there again. To think that I will be able to leave everything out and know that I won't have little fingers getting in to everything and I won't have to worry about them trying to use my scissors and cutters. I won't have holes cut in sheets and pillowcases and no more quilt blocks cut in half!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I have both fatty, fatty quilt tops done now all I have to do is quilt them and the binding. They turned out nice I can see me making more of them. Every fabric that I used was Thimbleberries. I ended up with 4 blocks left over. Or a start of the next one. I had to go back to work monday morning. 5:00 came pretty early after having 5 weeks off. I should have been born rich! Or married money! I guess we can't all be wealthy. I know quite whinning and be thankfull for what I do have. I am.Nick's quilt is on the left and his is a twin size. Mine is on the right and it is a king size, a big king . It hangs to the bottom of the box springs and all of the way to the floor at the foot end of the bed. I remembered that I didn't put a pic. of the kids on trick or treat night. Here it is. Nick, Korey, Gabby and Nick's youngest brother with his mom Ashton. They look pretty scarey. Ashton is the coyboy.

I found out saturday that I won a prize from the shop hop that I went on in October with my aunt. I have to go to Birds of a Feather in Avon to pick it up. I think we will do that on saturday. I don't know what I won I will have to post that later after I find out. Happy Quilting!

Happy things!

Wow where to start? I guess I will start about 2 weeks ago when we went to a cancer benifet and I bought a tip ticket for a basket filled with stuff. I won! The basket really was a quilted bag that I have been looking at the pattern to buy it. Now I don't have to. The things in the bag was really nice too. Thats the only thing we won all night but I liked it. I have all of the blocks done for the Fatty, Fatty 2x4 quilt done. I goofed when I was cutting for them. I needed around 50 because I am not putting big borders on it. I cut enough for 94 blocks. Oops! So Nick will get a matching quilt for his bed which is a good thing because he doesn't have one to fit a twin. The next good thing is that I am getting the Barn wired.Yeah!!! My moms boyfriend started it on sunday. He has all of the plugs wired and will get my lights wired this coming weekend. I cann't wait. Its been a long time getting this far. It still might be next summer before I can move in it but its getting closer.I won't know how to act when I can have all of my fabric in one place and not hidden in the garage in totes. Then I can do some real stash busting. All of my quilts will be scrap ones then. I will need to use up all of the 1/3 yard cuts that I used to buy. Mostly cause I didn't know any better. Who knew that quilts took more fabric than that? Not me. But I quickly learned that I had to buy more of one fabric. And I do.

I know that I took a picture of my barn after I painted it red but do you think I could find it. NO. I have to wait till tomorrow when I can take one when it is not dark out. Happy Quilting Karen

Started A New Quilt

Well I did what I said I wasn't going to do, I started a new quilt yesterday. I am doing Thimbleberries Fatty Fatty 2x4. I spent yesterday and today cutting and cutting. I am using all of my leftover fabric from TB kits that I have done. So that means that it has a little bit of everything in it from Christmas to whatever. I did have to cut some fat quarters too but not many. I had lots of strips left from a sweatshirt workshop that my quilt club did last year and used the ones that where wide enough. I think that I have enough cut that I won't have to put any borders on it. The pattern for the king size has borders only on the sides and not the top and bottom. I didn't like that. If I am going to put borders on a quilt I am going to put them on all four sides. I think that the quilt looks undone with them only on two sides. I know that some of you don't like to do scrappy quilts but I think the more fabrics the better for some quilts. I do like and do some planned quilts but right now I can't buy any fabric so I am doing a little stash busting on my own. Gotta go sew so I can get this done.

Brittany got her senior pictures back. She is just beautiful. Of course I couldn't get them to move around this like I wanted them to, But they can still be looked at.



We chose the big head shot so when she goes away to school we can still look at her face almost lifesize or we can use it to scare the mice away. Its hard to imagine that she is this old already. It seems like she should still be that little tiny baby that she used to be. Now I have to get frames so I can get her on the wall. And yes she did have a dress on in that picture. It has tiny straps on it but her hair is hiding them.

2009 raffle quilt

Milan Quilt Builders have started the raffle quilt for next year. I have almost half of the blocks finished [by members of the group]. I gave in and left them take some of them home to work on. When they come back to me all we have to do is lay them out and sew them into a quilt. And put the last of the sashing on and the borders. I want to run off with this on. I really love the colors and the pattern that I designed on my quilt wizard. I have pictures of Kare's three blocks that she took home to do. They are at the top of the page. I have to take pictures of the ones that I have here at home. I have been laid off. It was to be for two weeks but I got a call this morning that I will be off untill Nov. 3. What am I going to do? I guess I better get the sewing maching going. Its not like I don't have anything to work on. My Aunt Rita and I will be doing the road trip shop hop on Friday. Butch is going along for the ride. It is only 6 shops this time. The last one we went on was 12 shops[I think]. We did that one over two days. Shop hops are alot of fun, but they can be quite costly. I will have to watch my spending this time. While I am off I want to get my retreat challenge quilt top finished and work on my snowman flannel quilt top. I know that we will have 3 of the littles on the weekends and that cuts into my sewing time. Nick would rather be here than anywhere else. He is getting so smart. Brittany was here on Sunday. She is so busy that we don't see her much anymore. Getting us ready for next year when she will be away for collage. We will miss her.

Another week in my boring life

Gosh it has been a week since I've posted and I have pictures. Not much went on during the week cause we don't do much with me having to get up at 3:45 every morning. That means I go to bed early. These two pictures are of our space at the Milan Mellon Fest. You can see how big our quilt is. I can't wait to see who wins it. Our banner shows up really good, and how could you say no to buying a ticket from the smiling faces behind the table.

Nick really enjoyed the rides after my time in the booth selling tickets, He wanted to ride everything and wanted one of each to eat and drink. He did not get his own way. This is what I have been doing. I am making 7 tote bags for my family quilt group. They are all the same. We use them to give our secret sister the gifts that we get them. Our gifts are usually something small and quilty. The table runner is from a kit that I bought on a quilt shop . My next quilt is going to be a flannel on that I bought the fabric last year or the year before.

It is not that dark in real life. I am going to use Thimbleberries pattern My favorite flannel throw. I am not using TB. fabrics but I just love the snowmen. My grandchildren will probably fight me to use it. I am hoping to use it on my side of the bed this winter. DH wanted to know why I was taking a picture of fabric to post because " Its just fabric" . He just don't understand.I just had to take a little break to catch an act on America's got Talant. Brittany's friend John Burkin is on twirling his fire baton. He did a great job tonight. I have to stay up long enough to vote for him. I always enjoy watching him anywhere he twirls. With all of that going on I guess my life isn't all that boring right now. Have a great day tomorrow and remember to keep quilting.

Time Warner Cable

It happened again our cable went out around 7:00pm friday night and I called them. No luck they couldn't come fix it till thursday. Do any of you have a DH like mine? The man goes nuts without tv. It was just out three weeks ago for almost a week and now they tell him that he has to go another week, lucky me. I even tried to pull the wheelchair and blood thinners needs the phone for that. Did not work. After 6 calls in 2 days I gave up. He got tired of watching vidios sunday afternoon so he called, low and behold he got them to come today. Talk about a suck up!If TWC would have fixed it right the last time it would not have happened this time. They didn't bury the cable the last time and my neighbor tripped on it this time and pulled it out of the box. That would not have happened if TWC would not have run the cable across 2 back yards to get to us. We really had a quiet weekend, the grandkids went home friday and we had no tv phone or internet. I did do some sewing but I can't tell in here in case my family reads this cause I am making the family quilters something. Its a good thing that I'm not making anything big cause I get bored making more than one of something and I have to make 7 of these all the same exactly the same. I have to go so I can call Nick and Brittany, tomorrow is the first day of school for them. LKBye Karen

2009 raffle quilt

I figured out a way to post a picture of the raffle quilt design so here it is. My camera program wouldn't let me upload from it so I had to take a picture of my screen and download it to that and then I could post it. Maybe some of the colors or blocks will change but this is the general idea. I had fun doing this and I might do one for myself cause I won't win this one. The blocks will change where they are . I just stuck them in anywhere for now and we can move them around till they suit us. My hand colored one looks nothing like the colors in this version. My very first queen size quilt was a sample which is not quilted yet. I don't think it has its last border on it yet. Where is our rain? I am adding water to the pool to keep the pump from sucking air and burning up. Most summers I don't have to add a lot of water because we get enough rain to keep it full. Not so lucky this summer, I have added water a couple of times already. All of the kids are gone. Even Shawn, he had to work tonight. The grandkids all went home yesterday. It has been quiet for us today. Sometimes we need that.

Quilts and quilting

I have been busy last night and today. Last night I worked on a new table runner and got about half of it done before Nick kicked me out of our room so he could go to bed. After that I got on the computer and my quilt design program and drew up the raffle quilt for next years raffle. I tried to post it here but the formation of it couldn't be put on here. Bummer! So anyway I am almost out of colored ink so I printed the outline of each block and I am coloring them by hand. The colors are not how I have them drawn but they will show the blocks and how they will look in the quilt. The quilt is done in darker colors with a few light ones thrown in . I think it really looks good. I would like to have it for my bed but I say that every year cause I hardly ever see a quilt that I don't like and want. As soon as I am done with this I am going to work on my runner again while I try to figure out how to get into Kare's suitcase. She is going to Las Vegas and on a quilt shop hop there. I sure would like to go with her. Some of us get to go everywhere. Not me, I am stuck at home with DH and Nick and NO MONEY. At least I am where they love me. I think they do anyway. Time to go sew more later.

Bits and Pieces

I don't know how the kids do it but when I got home from work they were in the pool. The water temp is only 76 and us adults know that feels pretty cold. They were like frozen ice cubes when they got out. Nick has been in every day and he wants me to swim with him. I have to tell him that old people can't swim in water that cold. Butch's tomatoes are starting to get ripe. Its a good thing that he only plants 2 plants. We always have a bunch of them. Nothing taste better than a home grown one sliced up with a little salt on it. Yum! I started something new on sunday. Shame on me, I wanted to finnish some of my things. I went on a shop hop 2 years ago and bought a kit for a table runner at one of the shops. The main fabric is green with white daisys on it and the rest of the fabric is green with one yellow. Just right for summer. I might have it done for fall. I have been really slow at taking pictures of things, I still haven't posted one of my pink and brown quilt. Our cable is fixed and working fine now. The electric co. was doing some work out here and cut our cable. At least TMC gave us a good discount. You don't notice how much time you spend on the phone, on the internet, or in front of the tv untill you don't have it and then you haven't got anything to do. I think DH got tired of watching movies.

What do you do without Time Warner Cable?

Last saturday we lost our cable phone and internet and anyone that knows us knows how much time I spend on the net and how much time DH spends in front of the tv. It was out almost a week. When I called they couldn't get anyoue out here until thursday. Talk about boring! Butch watched movies 24/7 and I just did nothing. I know I know I could have gone in and worked on a quilt, its not like I don't have any thats not done but it was better to just sit and complain about not having the net. I tried to tell TMC that we needed the phone because of DH being in the wheelchair just in case something happened and he needed to call out. Didn't do me any good. The raffle quilt is quilted and is beautifull. Lisa does a great job on them. All it needs now is the binding and I am going to start that today.

What is that on my deck?

Nick and I took our nightly dip in the pool after I got home from work and after about an hour I was ready to get out. I was ready to eat. As I climbed up the ladder I looked up and there was this thing staring at me. It was not the prettiest thing I have ever seen. Nick said that he had one outside his bedroom window and it kept staring at him through the window and crept him out. I think that he was a little scared of it. I knew that I had to get it on my camera so I hurried in to get it. By the time I got back out there it had climbed up to the top deck. Moves pretty fast. It does have some good traits Like after sex it kills and eat the male. And it eats bugs in my yard. Can you guess what it is?

It is a praying mantis. It was not a full grown one. I hope that I don't have to fish it out of the pool tomorrow night.

Happy Summer and Birthday

This is a flower that is in my garden. It was really pretty this year.I have these in about 4 colors. I used to have lots of flowers in my garden and then my DH decided to take over my beds. Now I have alot less because he thinks that he has to pull everything up by the roots.Ryan came over a couple of weeks ago and spent the night with Nick. The boys wanted to swim. Ryan was scared a first but I showed him that the floaty suit wouldn't let him go under and then he was ok with it. Ryan is Shawns second son. We don't get to see him very often. Of course Nick is like a little fish in the pool .This is the first year he hasn't had to wear a floaty. He is tall enough that he can touch without one.

Nicks birthday was on the 18th and he was lucky this year. He got 2 cakes, one on his day and one last saturday when we had a little party for him. He wanted Batman things so we gave him money and Mom gave him a gift card to Walmart. Shawn and Jamie gave him a Hot Wheels crash em up set.

I had to post this picture of DH. I looked into the living room one night last week and this is what I saw. It was soo funny that I had to take his picture. Don't tell him that I posted it. He might get a little mad at me. I just had to do it.

I haven't done any sewing this week but I did draw out 4 mariners compasses that I want to do someday.I don't want to do a big quilt just a small one as these blocks are only 8" . I need to draw out a couple more, maybe. Gotta go. I want to have some popcorn and I can't eat and type at the same time. Its not like eating icecream. Karen

My good luck

I haven't posted for a while so I decided to do that tonight. Nick's birthday was yesterday and we are having his party at a later date. It was going to be next saturday but he is going to New York with his family. Now I ask you what an eight year old want to do more have a party where you get cake and presents or go to a yucky wedding where you have to dress up? Last tuesday they drew my name out for the Eagles 712 club and I won $25. Today I did a craft show in Bradner with my friend Pat and while I didn't sell alot I did sell a small quilt and a quilted mat. While I was there I bought one raffle ticket for a 50/50. When I got home Butch and I went to the eagles to pick up my money from the other day and when we got home I had a message on the phone that I had won with my one ticket. I won $110.50! Hows that for luck? Shawn's girlfriend said that she is going to let me pick her lotto numbers.Our house is quiet tonight, no kids. They all went home this afternoon while I was gone. I haven't done any sewing this week. None! I have been really lazy but then when I start to go in to sew I can hear my raft calling my name and I end up in the pool. I know, what a life! It is nice but usually I have some kids in there with me and I don't get to laze on my raft like I want. They always want to play. Nick is getting to be quite the swimmer and the other two do really well with their floaty suits. They can zip all over faster than I can. Ryan was here for a couple of days and he was scared at first untill I showed him that his suit would not let him go under. He was ok after that but he hasn't found his water wings yet. This was the first that he has been in our pool.

Wow time gets away from me fast these days. I can't believe its been two weeks since I posted. I haven't had much going on. Just to work and back home. I have been doing a little sewing. I put the last seven blocks together for the guilds raffle quilt after all of the blocks where found. The last row is on its way to Lisa and she is going to sew it on the quilt. Now the quilt will be 108x96, nice size for a full to king size bed. I also got all of the center blocks done for my retreat challenge quilt. I still have to do the outer pinwheel blocks that go around the blocks that have the sayings in them. I did all of that insead of watching the fireworks. I have been working on the design for Brittany's quilt. She wants one for Hi-Society. Purple and more purple. Yuck!! For some reason I am not fond of purple. I use it but not a lot. Other than that I haven't been doing much. A little swimming once in a while. The water has been cold. It started warming up and then the rains came yesterday and now it is colder again. I will have to get back to this later and I have some pictures to post.

I had a great weekend!

This was a great weekend for me. Friday I didn't do much of anything, I couldn't I didn't get up untill 1:00pm. I do sleep late sometimes but not that long. My late is around 10 or 10:30. We went shopping for things that we needed for the cookout on saturday. The family quilters were coming to my house. We cooked chicken legs and thighs on the grill. We quilters exchanged our secret sister bags and they had birthday presents for Aunt Carol and I since our birthdays are in June. I got cows, fabric, and some tools to use with my quilting. My stepdaughter called while everyone was here. She forgot my birthday on the right day and was sorry. Brittany brought my present over later that afternoon. More fabric and buttons and a giftcard for Joann's. All things that I really like. We had our fat quarter exchange and I can't figure out what I want to make yet. I know that it will be a quilt but I don't know what pattern or how big it will be. When we are all done with the exchange we will have 84 different fabrics. At least we hope they will all be different. The last time we did this I made my bearpaw quilt. Last year we did scraps. I haven't used all of mine. I made some tiny bowties with the first scrapbags I got.I don't know if I liked exchanging scraps I can make enough of my own without getting them from someone else. I like doing FQ's or blocks. I bought Quilters home mag. today, That man sure can make me laugh! It seems like he knows each and every one of us. And coments on all of our bad habits. While I was shopping at Joann's today I found a bright colored stripe fabric that I think will work with my retreat challenge quilt as the outside border and a solid purple that might work as the binding. I will have to wait till I get the quilt done to that point. I could change my mind. It has been really quiet here this weekend Nick is on vacation with his mom and Korey and Gert went home yesterday morning. Nick called a little while ago and said that they are on the way home. Going through Dayton at that time. I was going to sew today but I never got past putting my new buttons away and cleaning up Nicks mess in there. I wish the barn was done. It still has no power. I have been tempted to run a heavy duty cord out there and using it that way. If we could get it wired I would move out there. The man that was going to wire it has been sick for awhile now. We went to a farm market today and got fresh from the field strawberries. Short cake tomorrow night, yum! I could keep on going but I have to get ready for bed 3:30 comes early.

Is this our summer?

Where did the sun go? I get the pool opened and cleaned up after being closed all winter and the sun goes away. It took Nick and I three days to get the dirt and leaves cleaned out and to get the water sparkly clean so I thought that he and I would get to swim and play last night and tonight but it is way too cold to swim [its not heated unless the sun is out]. Nick leaves tomorrow for vacation with his mom. I am almost ready to turn the heat back on in the house. If it does not warm up for the weekend I hope I can get some sewing done. Nick won't be here to kick me out of "his room" . Saturday is the family quilt get together. That is always fun. Nothing like a day of eating and gossiping. And oh yea quilts! Thats what it is all about. It also keeps some of us in the family in touch. The last three quilt blocks for the raffle quilt has been found so it will be bigger than it was in the picture. Like we have been looking for them for about 2 months maybe longer. Today is my 50/th birthday. It has been a very uneventfull day. You would think that something would happen. Something good I would hope. I don't feel like I am 50 or that I am smarter than at 49 but maybe that will come later. The day just comes and goes like every other day. Bummer I wanted fireworks or something!!!! Butch and Nick did bake me a cake today.

I think I am ready for the meeting tomorrow morning. I have my notebook and my sewing things ready along with my machine and quilts. I also baked 2 cakes so Joanne will be happy. My grandkids think it is someones birthday cause I don't bake cakes very often. They will think that they died and went to heaven when I bring the leftovers home. I started to do block 2 of my retreat challenge quilt and found that I cut my pieces too big but I can work with that it is better than too little. We had 3 of the littles here today. Lucky us. They just can not get along. You know how it is with kids. It was ok till this afternoon when it started to rain and they had to come in the house. This house just is not big enough for the three of them. Nick went to bed at 9:oo so he can be up to go to quilt club with me in the morning. He must like to hang out with old ladies. He says that he has fun when he goes. He wants to learn how to make a quilt. One of these days I will start working with him.

Weekend

Here it is the weekend!! For me anyway. I only work 4 days a week but 10 hours a day. Nick and I have been working really hard to get the pool ready for sunday. We are having a cook out for fathers day. I have it all brushed down and tomorrow I will vacume the gunk out. The bottom of it looked crappy this year. I think the cover was letting water through it. That means dirt and everything else. Nick is reading this as I write it. Can't write anything that I don't want him to know. He is getting too smart for his britches. I have quilt club on saturday. I think that we are having a sewing day. I have to find something to take. It is my turn to take the treat. I have to think of something really good. Joanne said so. Mom is going to help with it too. nickolas wants to say hi, so hi to who ever reads this. This meeting is going to be a good one. We get to show our challenge quilts for the first time. I can't believe that mine is done and has been done and I won't be up till 2 or 3 in the morning trying to finish it like I usually am. I even have my flag done for show and tell. I also have 7 blocks done for my retreat challenge quilt. I only have 17 more to do of that style and 17 of another to do. Can I finish it by Febuary? I can only hope. I will unless something else catches my eye. I am having fun with this and my FQ's are all bright colors so it is easier to work on that something dull and boring.

Quiet week

Not much has been going on this week. The kids came over and helped me take the cover off of the pool saturday. I do have a mess to clean up. After getting it filled with water I tried to get the pump going and had no luck. It seemed that the outside plug went bad and I wasn't getting any power to it. Mike came over tonight and put a new plug in for me. Now I can get to work and get it cleaned. I did get the chems. in it tonight so that will help. Today was Nick's last day of school and now he thinks that he is staying here for the summer. He said that he might go home for a day once in a while. I did get my retreat challenge quilt started and I have 7 blocks done. I can't wait to get it done now. My fq's are all bright colors and I am putting black with them and it looks good together. I am paper piecing it and that means that all of my seams should match up when i am done. we will see. I had to cut 1" noodles to use and Nick came out with a handful of them last night and asked if he could have them.I don't know for what but I couldn't let him have them cause I don't know if I willl have enough as it is. This is the biggest project that I have done this way.

What should I start next?

Now that I have the raffle quilt top done and my challenge quilt all the way done, binding and everything but the lable I have been looking for something else to start or finish. I have been thinking about starting my retreat quilt. It was my idea so i better get mine done. I have everything for it except for the outside border. I haven't found what I want for it yet. I have the long weekend to start it. The only time I won't be able to work on it is tomorrow when I am going to pick up my Pfaff machine. Yes it is done!. I hope it works longer this time. They said that they found the problem this time. And saturday when we are taking the lid off of the pool. I could have used it today. I was very hot when I got off of work. The 10 hour days are going to kill me. I know that it is only for 4 days a week but the hours poop me out. Its going to get ugly when it really gets hot out. I got our air turned on today. I had to change the filter before I could. It feels so nice. I think that I will sleep good tonight. So will Butch. He didn't sleep good last night, he said that he was too hot. I don't know if it was or not I was sleeping like a log! A while back I wrote about hanging things on our walls again. I have every thing hung up except for my quizzel which I can't find [Butch put it somewhere] and I need to find something for on a shelf above the couch. Probably a cow since the big picture has cows in it. Its not like I won't be able to find a cow for there I do have a few around here. I also need to make two small quilts to replace the two I have hanging now. They are getting old and faded. I think I made them around 12 years ago. I even hand quilted them, now there isn't enough money in the world to make me hand quilt something. Maybe when I really get old I will do more of that. Thank you cousin Lisa for getting your long arm quilting machine!!

Raffle quilt

I have the top done now it goes to the machine quilter for her to work her magic on it. Soon it will be a beautiful quilt. I will pass out the tickets and pictures at the next guild meeting so we can start selling them. I hope we do as good on this on as we did last year.

As you can see it is a big quilt. 96x96 done in pinks and browns. We had Mikey's birthday party yesterday, he was 16, so look out he will be on the roads soon. I would post a picture of him but that one didn't turn out very good.

Our Gabby girl is learning how to ride her bike without training wheels. Nick took this picture so it is not the best but he is learning how to use the camera. Now if only Korey would. He really doesnt have much to do with his bike. He would rather play with swords and knives. Not real ones .

We kept Korey and Gabby for 2 days and for once they were fairly good. That don't happen very often. Nick was here too. Usually when we have the three of them they fight about everything. I told you how Nick was learning how to take pictures, Well this one just showed up yesterday . I think he is doing a Brittany. She is always taking pictures of her self with my camera or my phone so when I use them there she is. I have the binding sewn on my challenge quilt now all I have to do is the hand sewing on it. I can't put a picture of it on here yet. I am not showing it to anyone till I show it at the guild meeting. I just love it. I got my counter put on last night thanks to Kare and Brittany. I got it as far as saved on my favorite list and didn't know how to get it on here. I do now! Thank you Kare and Brittany!!!

The Big Winner Is

Nick had his raingutter regatta today at East Side park. He is in cubscouts and this was one of the things that the boys get to do. He was telling us last night that he was going to win because he hates being a loser [he came in dead last in every heat with his pinewood derby car]. He got to race 3 times and won all of his boat races today. He was one happy boater. He won a nice backpack with a lantern and a compass in it. Thats him when he won his last race. He looks pretty happy.

I said that I would post a picture of my TB [Thimbleberry] wreath and I finally took pictures. Hve to find someplace to hang if for christmas but that is the easy part. I also finnished my flag that I bought the kit for when mom, aunt Rita, Lisa and I went on about 2 years ago. I want to hang the flag on the garage on days when you should hang flags out.I have to figure out how to do that. Its easy when I hang things on the deck or on the porch rail, I just use pins to hold them up there. To bad I can't put a pin through the metal that is around the garage door. You know back when I started this blog I thought I would only do it for a little while but it is really quite fun. I look for things to write about that I think others would enjoy reading about and I have always liked taking pictures. I guess I could finnish what I was trying to say about the flag kit that I bought . I got it at Red Rooster quilt shop. that is where mom aunt Rita, Lisa and I went, on a shop hop. We went to shops around Columbus. It was nice to get away with just the girls.

The zoo and Brittany's prom

Back again. On friday May 16 Butch and I went to the zoo with Nick's 1st. grade class. We had Nick and one of his friends, Logan, to walk around with. We had fun with the boys and wished that we had more time to spend there. In order for the kids to be back to school on time we only had 21/2 hours to see as much as we wanted to. Logan didn't care as long as he got to see the monkeys. Nick wanted to see everything. We had to take a sack lunch and Nick wanted to take a bologna sandwich so thats what we took. Nick is the one in front. On May 17 was Brittany's junior prom. She went with a group of girl friends and one of the girls cousins that was male but just decided to tag along with them. Brittany is on the right side in the black and white dress.

Sone of the girls didn't get to the picture place on time so I did't get them in the group picture. I think that they were all beautiful that day, but then I think that Britt is beautiful every day. When we got a granddaughter we got the best one of all. Her mom's friend, Angie, did her hair and I had to show it because I thought it was so cute. Look at that smile! Britt has a smile on her face almost all of the time. It was a proud moment for all of us last night. After many years of starting and stopping Brittany's dad Gary recieved his GED. After the ceramony we went to the Eagles for a little party of cake and laughter.

Way to go Gary!!!!!!! I think that I have picked out the blocks that I am going to do with the fabric I am getting from the family fat quarter exchange. I am going to do a puss in the corner block. The pattern that I am looking at makes a 6" block so I will need a lot of them. When the year is over I will have 84 hopefully all different fabrics. There is 7 of us in the family group now and every year we do some kind of exchange with fabric or blocks. We also get together every other month so it keeps us in touch. My aunt Carol has been bringing grandma with her so it also lets her see part of the family more than once a year. Of course we have some of the family that hasn't seen her since she got sick and went to live if Elmwood Asit. Living. That was 7 or 8 years ago. Close family, huh. I really have three different quilts that I want to make with my FQ's for this year. Too bad my Quilt Barn's not finnished. I still need to find some one to do my wiring. Once I get that done it should go faster. I would like to be moved in sometime this summer. I don't know if that will happen or not. It will be so nice to be able to work on things without having to move them when I'm done for the day. I keep going back to the nickle quilts books for quilts to make. I must love the scrap quilts.

10 hour days

Lucky me Global decided to put us on 10 hour days to help with gas use. We only work 4 days but the hours are killing us, and this is only the second day. Needles to say after I get home and fix supper and eat All I want to do is sleep. This early to bed and even earlier to rise is for the birds. I promise that some day i will post zoo and Brittany's prom pictures. I really did take some.

Brittany's Flip Flops

This story starts when we went to Hawaii in 2005. I bought Brittany and I matching flip flops and we wore them all of the time. Then in 2006 we went to Kings Island for a couple of days and one of the days we went to a big water park. Grandpa couldn't go in the water so I put my floppers on the back of the wheelchair to keep them with us. Brittany saw what I did with mine so she put hers in the chair beside grandpa and to make a long story short one of hers got lost. She was pretty upset about it. I have been trying to get her another pair just like the ones that got lost. I went on line and tried every way that I could think of to get them. Thanks to my friend Kare whose daughter lives in Hawaii I finaly got her a pair. I gave them to Brittany last night and she was really excited about getting them. My mission is complete!!!!!!! No one knew that I was still trying to get her some. I hope she don't try to wear them with her prom dress this saturday. I haven't done any sewing this week. Just at work and that don't count. The company that I work for decided that with the gas prices getting so high that we are going to work 4 ten hour days instead of 5 eights. Bummer, I hate working ten hours. the only good thing about that is we get a three day weekend. On friday Butch and I will be going to the zoo with Nick's class. Sounds like fun we haven't gone there since Nick was little. With all of the kids should be fun watching them. Hope it don't rain. My other plans for this weekend is to finish putting the raffle quilt together. Shouldn't take too long I don't have much to do on it yet. Then I won't feel guilty for working on my things. Lisa already has my challenge quilt so I am waiting for that to get done. She said it would be done by the end of this month. Lisa in my longarm quilter and cousin.

I had quilt club today. I really enjoy going to that. We had sewing time after the meeting and I didn't feel like taking my machine down and taking it with me so I cut binding for my TB wreath wall hanging that I did a while ago. I got it sewed on last night so I could hand sew the rest of it today. I got almost 3 sides done. I had to talk a little too. Tonight we went to mom's camper for a cookout. My brother and his wife was there with their dog, Andy. Mom had her 2 dogs there and the 3of them got along well. Nick wanted to stay the night but we made him come home. We are so mean! Mom wants to wait for it to get warmer out for him to stay. He took his bike out with him so he could go play with his friend that he met last year. Just had burgers and dogs but it was still good but then I like to eat so almost anything tastes good. Nick had to have a bologna sandwich. Go figure. Kare's daughter found some flip flops that are almost the same as the ones that Brittany had from Hawaii. Grandpa lost one of her old ones that were just like mine. She missed hers a lot because we wore them all of the time. THANK YOU, THANK YOU KARE!!!!!!! I have the club raffle quilt almost together. It is going to be Beautiful. If you are checking out my blog and want a ticket just email me at fabric_cow@yahoo.com I will post a picture when I get the top put together. Then I have to send it to the quilter. I took a walk around my back yard this afternoon while Butch was mowing and some of our plants are getting big already. I had to pick some lilacs to bring in the house so we could smell them. I wish they would bloom longer so we could smell them all summer.

Where has time gone

Where has time gone? I got an email from Joanne yesterday about Quilt club and never realized that our club meeting is this saturday. Then this morning I looked at my calendar at work and realized that Mothers day is this sunday. It seems that the older I get the faster time goes. Am I ready for either on? No!!! I better not turn around when the kids are here or they might age a couple years on me.I haven'tbeen doing much this week so I don't have too much to write about. We have Gerttie here tonight for awhile. We haven't seen them as often since Shawn and Dixie broke up. Butch put her on the scales tonight and she weighs 56lbs. She is only 4 and already a chunky monkey. Sewing Express called about my machine tonight and they found the problem with it. I broke a bracket that has a spring in it. Bad news is that they have them ordered but they haven't gotten them yet. Bummer now I will have to take my old one to club meeting to sew on. If I can think of what to take to sew on.

Hanging the new clocks

While we were on vacation Butch and I bought two clocks. Not cookoo clocks this time. We already have three of them. This time they play music on the hour. We couldn't agree on which one to get when the salesman made us a deal so we could get both of them. This morning we decided to hang them. No letting them stay in their boxes for three years like the last time. So after we hung them I decided that I should get the rest of my things put back on the walls that I took down in 2002 when we painted the inside of the house. I never put them back because right after that is when Butch had his first surgery and after over a year of running back inforth to all of the hospitals it was not something that I felt that I had to do. Now it looks like someone lives here again. Butch had to take a short nap on the couch after we got done. It was hard work cleaning the dust off of everything while I was crawling on things to get everything hung up. My new tatoo is driving me crazy cause it is starting to peel and itch. My other one didn't do that. I hope it gets done with this soon. Shawn had to go back to work tonight and Nick went home about the same time so we are having a very quiet night.

Another long lazy weekend

Wow I got back from vacation and went back to work on Thursday to find out that we had Friday off because we didn't have enough work. I haven't done a thing yet. Just been sitting around thinking about all the things that I could be doing. I could go in the room and work on a quilt or read a book or take a nap but I have been too lazy to get off of my chair to do any of them. Shawn and Dixie broke up three weeks ago so last night he got Korey and Gerttie and brought them over for the night. Nick got here right before they went home this morning and things got a little wild before they went home like they always do when the three of them are here together. Good thing Ryan wasn't here. I might have left. Sometimes it is too much for this granny. We haven't seen Brittany yet but she is always so busy with all the things that she is in.

This is all of Shawn's kids. Korey 5, Nick 7, Ryan 6, and Gabby 4. Looks like little angels, right! The picture to the left is Mikey, Nick and Brittany at the State Fair. Brittany's baton group goes there for a compitition almost every year. Most of the time they take Best of Show. Mikey doesn't do much although he did start bowling on the high school team this year till our only bowling alley burned down about a month ago. Other than that he plays vidio games and listens to his music on his Ipod. I have one other grandson but I don't have a recent picture of him. He lives in Chicago. He has been there about a year. I was out looking at the pool while Butch was cooking on the grill and I can't wait to take the cover off. Still a little cold to do that yet. Last year Gert took her cloths off crawled over the gate and went swimming on top of the cover. She got a good spanking for that one. We are lucky that she didn't go through the cover. I hope you don't mind my rambling on, I learned how to do that from my friend Joanne.

What I did on my spring vacation.

Time sure goes fast when your having a blast. Almost at the last minute we decided to go to North Carolina for our neices wedding. We left last thursday and got back yesterday. It was a nice time for a road trip. We stayed with Butch's younger brother Terry and his wife Darleen. They live in Lincolnton NC. Tonya the one that got married lives in Belmont NC. Tonya and Ryan got married on saturday. She not only gained a husband but she got two stepdaughters in the deal. She already had a son. On sunday after a small family get together of the ones that traveled and the ones that live there we left and headed to Gatlinberg and Pidgon Forge for a couple of days. We really like the Smokey Mountains. We did all the usual tourest things like siteseeing and shopping. We didn't do Dollywood this time because time didn't allow us to. I had to be back to work on May 1st. We did do a different show this time and if you ever go there I recomend it to everyone. It was the comedy barn and it is a show that you can take the little ones to. I don't think I laughed that much in a long time. Whats more the kids that was there thought it was as funny as the adults. While in Pigeon Forge Shawn got the brain storm that him and I should get tattoes together, so we did just not the same thing. I got a sunflower and a bluebird on my ankle. I am not sure what his is supposed to be. That is kind of hard taking a picture of my own ankle. If this would have been my first one it might have been my last. This one hurt when he was doing it. Shawn said it was because he really drilled it in and it is closer to the bone than my other one. One of the best parts was that the Peace Frog store was still there and I got 2 shirts and two stickers for on my car. This is the house that we stayed at . This is a brand new house and very nice inside. I was a little afraid that I was going to spill something and mess it up somehow. I made it with no messes or anything else. They put us in the Disney Room. It was filled with all things Disney. Believe it or not but it went really well with 7 adults and 4 kids all trying to get ready Saturday for the wedding. We had no bathroom clashes or anything else. Terry made us breakfast every morning. He is a pretty good cook. It was a nice weekend with them. We don't see them often enough. Their little boy is growing up faster it seems than if we saw them all of the time. He will be 4 this month. I looked for quilt shops the whole time we were gone. I only saw one sign for one but it was around 7pm on Sunday and I didn't even go to find it cause I knew that they was closed. I went to work today and when I got there I found out that I don't work tomorrow. I could get used to this one day a week!!! Until I get my paycheck.

Family Quilters Gather At My House

Today is over at least the quilting part. 7 of us get together every other month at my house to talk, exchange fabric [this year we are doing a fat quarter a month] and to eat. Some of our husbands and kids and grandkids come too. We talk about quilting and we do some gossiping about some family thats not here. We show our latest quilts and praize cousin Lisa who is our longarm quilter. She does great work. I had my little bowtie quilt top to show. The picture is of a bowtie quilt that my quilt group did for a raffle last year. Mine is not that big and I set my blocks different but you can see that they make a pretty quilt. Nick went home today. He didn't want to but finialy decided to cause his mom was taking him to the zoo. The house seems quiet when he 's not here but we need that sometimes.

The last post was not finished. Nick wanted to say hi and when he went to put his name in my keyboard froze up. Called my friend Kare and she told me what to try and it worked . The picture in the last post is Nick. We are getting ready to go to North Carolina for our neice Tonya's wedding. We waited almost till the last minute to make our plans. It will do us good to get away for a couple days. Shawn will be home to take care of our kitties so they don't go hungry. I have to show him how to give Sammy's pill. He will have fun with that.

This picture is Gabby the one that helped me with my bowtie blocks. Looks like an angel, right? I call her Gerttie or witchy poo.

Getting ready for the family

My group of family quilters are coming over tomorrow. As usual I am running about a day behind. I thought I had everything I needed when we left Walmart, but on the way home at 9:30 pm I realized that I forgot to get my fabric for our exchange and the ground chuck for our lunch. Guess I have to run out in the morning. I did get everything I needed to make pasta salad. That is what Butch wanted me to make. hi

My saturday

My machine has to go back to the shop. It sewed ok at first then after about 15 minutes it started doing the samething that it was doing before. Makes me more than a little mad. Nick went with me to the meeting and again he was my presser. He does pretty good. My oldest granddaughter came over for a while tonight. Hadn't seen her in a couple of weeks. She is very busy with school, batons, and cheerleading. She is a Junior this year so next year will probably be even worse. Thats her on the left. I don't know how the barn pic. got on here, it happened when I was trying to get Brittany and I don't know how to delete it. I will have to learn how to do that. I was going to put one of Nick on too but I am afraid to try now, maybe latter.