This Week

I always take this week off of work. It typically is slow and I don't like to sit around, at work any way. I like to sit around in my Quilt Shack. I am making big progress on quilting my Cactus Patch quilt. It is for my bed and is 112"X114''. Just the borders left to quilt.
I have made all the blocks for the Carolina Christmas quilt and put half of them together. I think I am going to stop here. I am tired of making big quilts.
A friend of mine, Marla made me a pin cushion. Isn't it nice and cheery? I know it is a small accent in a big room but it is perfect. I love it and now have a place to put all those flat headed pins. I have a selection in my other pincushion but can't bring myself to throw away all the round end ones that aren't sharp enough.

Christmas came and went. The children had a great time always lots of presents. Well, not as many this year because 2 of the grandparents sent money for us to take care of. When I gave the children the option they wanted door number one... the cash. With saving some, and giving some, they torn with what to buy themselves. Maybe they will be like Alea our 8 yo. She wanted a laptop and after a year of saving she got most of it so we kicked in the rest for her Christmas present.


We made yarn Christmas Ornaments. Now we are up to about 20. Hmmm good thing cheap yarn is cheap.

Today is my birthday and this is the ceremonial chair for the picture.And our annual bowling adventure. Eric won with a whopping 165.

Christmas Recital

Kevin and Alea had a music recital last night. The teacher, my friend Kelly started out the show with a nice resounding round of Christmas caroling.

Alea is playing the piano


Kevin with the guitar.
The children enjoyed themselves and did ham it up a bit.

Fun Long Week

have had a lot of fun since my last post.

We had a snow storm that closed the schools for two days. My DH is from MN and just rolls his eyes when they close the schools here in Ca. for a little snow and ice. Here we are walking down our driveway (the car parked at the bottom) going back to school.We had an 8th birthday.
Sewing away on Bonnie's Mystery. Here are the blocks.

Sore Butt.

I have been working hard on staying in my quilting shack this weekend and getting a lot of sewing done. I am working on Bonnie Hunter's latest mystery that we started this weekend. I have completed step one and two and anxiously waiting for the next step. It seems as though I never work at this pace when it is a regular quilt pattern. I am having so much fun! Most of you reading this know what I mean. Family on the other hand, is glad I have something to do that I like so much. They are even the recipient of a handy work once in a while.

The instructions are really well done, and easy to follow.

This is step one: 192 two patches, and 104 HST(half square triangles).
This is step two: Take those HST and make these thingies. There are 4 blocks here. I liked how they looked in this arrangement.


While waiting for the next installment I decided to cut 2 inch squares to use as a leader/ender project.
I had company while I sewed and watched the trilogy of Pirates of the Caribbean. The DC(Dear Children) came and went but mostly they entertained themselves playing Monopoly.....Together. The game we have has been trampled and pieces lost. For their sisters birthday they pooled their money and wanted to get her a new game. Do you know how many editions on Monopoly they have now? Well we got this one. No railroads, but airports. Property costs millions.

We celebrated Alea's birthday at the Black Oak Casino and Family Fun Center(Bowling alley arcade). Her Birthday is not until the 4th of December but I will be out of town at a continuing education requirement. Don't feel too sorry for me. I get to go San Francisco and spend a weekend with 2 very good friends. The days will be spent in a hotel conference room with excellent food and done at 5.

Alea is 2nd from the left.

Crumb Love

My chat group has been talking about crumb blocks and I thought I would give them a try. I am in love! They are so fun to make while mindless sewing. These crumbs are from shirts used making my cactus patch quilt which I am almost done with.
Each year my DSIL makes a family calendar. Here are the photos requested. DH and DS#2 have birthdays in June. One of DH and I to celebrate our anniversary in may. I was just wondering if a casual photo at the pizza parlor over a pitcher of beer is acceptable.

This or That?

Bonnie Hunter is at it again. She is going to start another mystery quilt the day after Thanksgiving. It is called Carolina Christmas. I have already made the announcement to DH and the DC that I will be sewing that day. He put it on our calendar.

Bonnie's colors suggestions are red and green, cream and gold for Christmas. I can't decide if I want to go with those or Blue and gold, cream and deep red/brown. Either would be fine. I don't have a red and green quilt yet so it might be the right time. However I am drawn to blue like the sea and sky. Which DH reminded me I recently finished this quilt with those colors in it.

So Which should it be? This one....or...

This one?
Well which ever one I decide on I would like to finish the cactus patch (Bonnie Hunter again) first.

Getting Caught Up

I have been spending bits of time in my quilt shack. I have managed to put my blocks together of Bonnie Hunter's Cactus Patch. This pattern is in her book Scraps & Shirttails. It is going to go on my bed when completed. I think a nice wall of periwinkle or maybe burnt orange will be the right accent.

Down Under

I recently went on a trip. Two friends and I went to Sydney Australia. Yea, that's right, I left the hubby and kids behind. A friend got an invitation to teach at the Chiropractic Pediatric Diplomat Program in Sydney and invited me and another friend to go along. A 15 hour flight and 4 nights stay.

This is me at the beautiful and unique Sydney Opera Hall. Shaped like sails. Did you know that if you took apart the pieces of the building you could put them back together as a perfect sphere.
Looking left from here you see the Sydney Harbor Bridge. We went on a twilight bridge climb and saw the harbor at sunset. WOW that was fantastic.
This is not us but it could have been. There were only 4 of us. It was spectacular.



This is Darling Harbor where we took a Ferry to Manly Beach
We took a bus trip around Sydney and saw the sites. This is Bondi beach.
We spent some time in Paddy's market.
Shopping.
The Queen Victoria Building for more shopping. Great floor, hu?

We tried to get to a quilting shop but did not have the transportation. There was a Lindcraft in the shopping mall but nothing special in the way of Australian fabric.
It was a great and a super opportunity to see a part of the world I may never had the chance.

Green Fancy

This week I got another finish. This one I call Lyndsy Green. I guess because I made it for my friend Lyndsy and her favorite color is green. Her birthday was last month and I had to give her a rain check.I started by calling this one and another one Flee Market Fancy because that is the name of the quilt the tutorial is from by Crazymomquilts. Little did I know the quilt was named for the fabric line it was made for. Well now I have to come up with my own quilt name.

It seems I always have a model or two when I try to photograph a quilt in the floor. After my heavy sigh I came to my senses and appreciate the charming little folk for their playfulness.
I did all this free motion quilting. It felt like it took forever. I went through about 2000 yards of thread. The quilt measures 86X68.A little free piecing for the back to add interest.

A little red thrown in for variety. This is probably the most photographed landmark in our area. It is referred to as the Red Church for obvious reasons. Learn more about it here.

Birthday Week

Nicole celebrated her 12th birthday. She was born and raised in California and is Minnesota Twins fan through and through. Go Joe Mauer. What she wanted for her birthday was a Twins cap and a Mauer Jersey. Such a happy girl.Eric celebrated his 14th birthday. I don't know he got so old. He just wanted cash. So that's what he got. With all the money he bought himself an iTouch. Another good leverage tool. I made cupcakes for his soccer team but the powdered sugar frosting was lumpy and not very attractive. So while we were at the soccer tournament DH Jeff scraped the frosting off, bought some canned stuff, and made a soccer ball out of them. Isn't he clever?
Kevin is working on his tooth pick project for school. He learned that hot glue is really hot. I know he has craft sticks here, but he is building two towers so he can make a tooth pick bridge across them.And Me? quilting, quilting, quilting...

Not An Ordinary Day

This weekend I participated in my first Triathlon. I know I have been kinda secretive about it but I did not want to commit myself publicly for the obvious reason. I have never done anythig like this before. I have never been an endurance athlete I have always been a very poor runner and never cared for it. I did not even own a bike. I did however swim competitively growing up. I have not swam laps in 30 years though.
I decided to do this in June when talking mater of factly about the physical condition of triathletes. After looking up what exactly a Triathlon consisted of I said to myself "I can do this". It was tongue and cheek for a while when I said I was triathlon training, my DH would give kind of a chuckle. But I did it and not only finished, I finished 21th out of 65 women competing in the short course, 4th in my age group.

I did well in the swimming leg. I am here somewhere but you will have to find me.Transition from the swim to the bike. It takes longer than you think to to put clothes on over a wet bathing suit.
After a run I crossed the finish line! Wooo Whooo. Here I am with a friend of mine who also competed in the race, his first too.