A Major Award

I won a major award!  I actually am the first to win the WINKS Ugly Sweater Contest.

I didn't have a Christmas sweater to wear so I was told to create.

Create I did - the GW (GoodWill) had the sweater and $1.95 ornament bag.

Add a Dollar tree door ornament with bells and you have a 'tacky' sweater.

Now the mini sweater is my prize along with the certificate and a skein of yarn.

I'll post the yarn latter. 

Merry CHRISTmas everyone!

Dear Chrome I only use you for Blogger so there!

So after weeks of no browser I used to use taking my comments on blogs I downloaded Chrome.  Well Chrome I only use you for Blogger so there.

I hated that I was so involved in moving that I missed checking blogs, but now I'm back and with my new house Yes that's right my old one sold!!!  I have a sewing room of sorts in one end of our massive bedroom and when the house sells I'm shopping for a new machine.

I browsed the blogs tonight and it was so good to see my friends and inspiration. I just have to get my photos going again to show what I started for Halloween and such.

Happy November everyone!

Introducing Asus

Introducing Asus

My wonderful new 17.3" display that is easy on the eyes.

I have been with no home computer for a few years.

I'm in the process of figuring how to get the pictures from my work Mac to this baby.

I love it!

THANKS MOM!

We have money from her estate so I remember her with this purchase.

Earthquake in VA!!!

Here's the proof from the Geology department at the University.

Just felt like a train was going by right outside our building.

Beach 2011

Here we are at the top of the lighthouse on Hunting Beach.

See the short hair for the trip!

Love that man of mine...

Flip flop crafts for the girls again. Can you guess mine?

I'm the one with the pastels pinks.

Vacation here I come!

Vacations always start better with squishy package in the mail!

With a great pink container... and a message with a Hi!

and a beautiful heart necklace!

Thanks Em!

Updates to Sewing "Room"

At work they go through the library rooms the students study in during the year and we get to pick and choose before the items get donated to the Thrift Store. I grabbed this small bulletin board and...

...this wonderful caddy (it spins) to keep sewing stuff hand and I Love it What a find!

Lastly was the addition of a fan. I have no heat which I can deal with layering up, but the heat I need help. This is helping me with my 15 minute projects.

just because I Love you...

What can I say?

I've been through a lot the last few months and my wonderful husband sent these.

What I've been doing

So I haven't posted in forever. I do that sometimes, but thought I'd let you know some things I've been doing. I finished the pillows I started for my sisters family for last Christmas. I made a choice to not put myself under pressure to sew every gift this Christmas as it didn't work last year. Trying to take it slow in my 15 minutes of sewing a day and not worry if it's not perfect. I have a really hard time doing that! I did make a new nametag for our monthly meeting of the quilt guild. This month four members showed their completed or in progress Dear Jane quilts and they are stunning. I'm starting to look at some things for our home.

Speaking of home we have painted the front porch and Mike painted the bedroom. I'm still getting used to the fact that we might not be moving to China because the house has not sold.

I'm missing my Mom, but my sister and I are contacting each other more. My son is struggling with a possible loss of his job. My foot isn't healing as I think it should. I'm trying to make it until we go to the beach.

I'm just so thankful to know I'm not in charge God is and he's going to help me get through everything.

Mom's memorial

Today was my Mom's memorial service. It was a wonderful service that she had planed years ago. She had clippings and scriptures and song picked out as well as the location and the officiant. We had to make two changes in the soloist that she had wanted was to ill to preform and one of my friends sang the Lord's Prayer. I also added my husband of a little over a year singing Amazing Grace. Mom would have loved it. A few people spoke at the service their memories of Mom which helped my remember what an awesome woman she was. You see in the last month or so we were so focused on keeping her comfortable that I had lost sight of that. It was wonderful that her friends helped me to remember. Thanks Mom - you made me the person I am today. I love you and miss you...

Memorial Day 2011

Memorial Day is a United States federal holiday observed on the last Monday of May (May 30 in 2011). Formerly known as Decoration Day, it commemorates men and women who died while in military service to the United States.

My Thanks to those familes that lost someone who served our country.

My great aunt was one of those. My dad worked on the Manhattan project.

RIP Yvette Wise

My Mom passed away today - the nurse called it at 4:34. The three of us (I have a brother and a sister)were in the room with her from about 11 on. I had gone over with the boy around 9 when he said goodbye as he had to get back to work today. She had lived a wonderful 89 year life. Many happy memories. So glad for the Hospice organization in town.

Not the best reason, but the boy is HOME!

Well the boy came home Wednesday night. The reason is my Mom has been very ill. She has been calling out for Ethan for a week. I'll spare the details other than to say she is now in Hospice care. Ethan has been a trooper as he hates hospitals, but loves his grandma!

I get to buy fabric!

I have a self imposed no fabric buying rule since the boxes are stacking up to ship overseas. I however got this wonderful e-mail from the FatQuarterShop advertising *How the Grinch Stole Christmas* my husbands FAVORITE!!! Well I showed him and to quote "Finally some decent fabric" I bought the panel and I'm on the list to know when the fat quarters come in. WIN WIN

Happy Mothers Day

Happy Mothers Day everyone!

April is Autism Aweness Month

I wore blue today to show my support. I know two young boys with autism. My son is on the extremely high functioning end of the scale with Asperger's. If there is an event in your area I urge you to support them. In Lexington we start with a pancake breakfast at Applebee's in the morning. Click the link to Rock Bridge Family Services. I was on the board until I resigned to get married and we thought move to China. Please if you are in Virginia and can make any of these events or make a donation please do so. One of the things we did while I was on the board was to help bring a specialized school to the area so the children were not transported an hour to and from school in another city and having to travel on the interstate daily.

New technology for today!

Did you see this announcement? What a timely new technology!

Purge

I'm purging some of the blogs I follow during my spring cleanup. I clicked follow on EVERYONE (crazy I know) I visited at first when I started blogging, but I realize that there are only a few I read on a daily basis. I skip this one or that to get to my favorites. Reading and learning and being inspired by other blogs is why I blog. Your blogs feed into my reading list. At the end of the day I sit down and read SMILE : ) and learn. My favorite blogs have energy, stories, colors, and time to sew. Their owners have taken time out of their busy lives to communicate with me a total stranger. I've recieved tips, patterns, won drawings, been sent a wedding gift, received prayers, been mentioned in their blogs. Blogging is a wonderful experience!

Anniversary

Well Sunday will have been one year of marriage. We are keeping it low key since I'm still in my walking book and had to change ideas more than once when we realized I couldn't get around. It's been great getting to live with my best friend. We are going out to eat tonight and then see a movie. The big treat is we will be staying in a hotel in the city we are visiting and then go shopping in the morning. The big purchase is a scanner - it's paper related so I'm counting it. We are going to use it to scan my quilt patterns I've cut out of magazines, recipes, etc. Less to take overseas and if we save as a pdf then I can send it to my Kindle. I love my Kindle! It has a scratch on it and they are going to replace for free... Love it. See you next week when I post a picture of our new scanner.

Giveaway notice

Another giveaway! Go check it out on the Material Girl Quilts! Great music on the blog.

Dots and Stripes No Plaids OH MY!

So Victoria issued a challenge for dots and stripes and plaids. Well I found I have no plaids. I've been dealing with my Mom being sick and recovering from surgery. In between I worked on two 6 1/2 inch squares which I put in the mail today.

Mom out of ICU

Mom is out of the ICU and into a regular room. She had a journey into her dementia yesterday. She is starting to not recognize us. She could go back to her assisted living room, but may have to go to the nursing home if the nurses don't like the reports from the hospital, but it up to them.

Mom

Mom is in the ICU for the second day. She's got congestive heart failure. My sister is flying up again from outside Atlanta Monday after two very extensive trips this past month. Mom has been slowly failing since her bout with shingles starting the week before Thanksgiving. Please pray for her...

Weekend

I'm sitting in a cool breeze with the window cracked opened listening to the birds sing. I've been enjoying reading blogs and such while getting better. I was reading something Victoria said and I put it together with something Bonnie Hunter told us at the workshop. That light bulb went off over my head. Yes I did buy someone elses scraps to learn how to play, but what I didn't do was manage them!!! I managed them to different sizes squares and bricks that Bonnie suggests and then bagged them. The scraps are now truely scraps. I'm going to be working on the dots, stripes, and plaids challenge Sunday. I realized I don't have any plaids and I don't have any reproductions. I have a little of everything else so I might pick up some fat quarters to put into my China box. I also have almost not solids. I love color and florals so much that I'll have to deal with that also.

Doctor visit

Well the foot is bruised big time. I have stitches for another week. The swelling in not as bad as the doctor said it could be. It already looks good to me and I can bend my toe down which I haven't been able to do for a long time. So I'm continuing to keep foot up and ice on it.

Toosday fun

It started with flowers being delivered from work and ended with ice cream. What could be better? I had a dinner and cake sent over after the flowers came. My sister came to visit as she is headed back to Georgia in the morning. Mom's update is that she is failing more every day. We know she'll have her medicines to make her comfortable and they'll encourage her to get out and about while she still can. While Susan was visiting my boss John came to check on me with his beautiful daughter Sarah. They brought me a card from work and wanted to make sure everything was going OK which it is. Not looking forward to Wednesday as I'm to get my stitches out if everything is healing OK. The stitches are what I feel right now. Everyone left and I got to watch NCIS and NCIS LA which is OK, but I really like NCIS best now the 24 is done. Mike came home from karate and fed me ice cream. All in all a GREAT TOOSDAY!

You can be a winner!

Go to this blog and try to win some great patterns. If I wasn't on drugs I'd try to do some pictures, but that's not happening with my pain killer. Have a great day all.

Vote for my friends story

This is for my friend Victoria. She has a friend Solange that is a writer and a single young Mother. I'm excited to support any single Mom as I was one for 16 years before God placed a wonderful man in my life. She is a writer and entered into a contest and is now a finalist. Go look and have a read and vote for her and pass along somehow on your blog would be great. She's in second place now...

http://www.warrenadler.com/writing-contest.shtml

If you don't have the time, I understand... But please have a look...before you delete...

Thank you,

Hope you all are well!

Hugs!

Surgery in the Morning

I'll be away from blogland for a few days with surgery. I'll look forward to catching up then.

Winner!

Oh I LOVE to follow blogs. I'm much better at that than maintaining my own. I enter contests now and then and Mr. Random Generator sometimes picks me. Well he did it again as Brenda

had this giveaway and I WON! in this blog. Go see her stuff it's great. Oh thank you Mr. Random Generator. Love you too! I don't know which one, but I'll show you when it arrives.

Valentine's 2011

A detail of my flowers.

My TDH knows not to buy me chocolate ever. I buy it if I want to make my hips bigger. LOL He's such a catch. I LOVE him!

Hearts

And here is a fun site Bonnie Hunter was playing with and you can make your OWN Candy Hearts with your own sayings! Click here to get to the Candy Heart Generator and spread more love to your friends!

Bonnie K Hunter in Lexington!

Here she is! Bonnie K Hunter in Lexington Virginia

Our quilt guild had Bonnie for a trunk show Friday night and Saturday they were having a workshop. I didn't have enough time to take the workshop, but the sample was beautiful. This is one from her trunk show. I wish I had more to show, but that women is a dynamo and a lot of my shots came out fuzzy. I'm learning the with my new camera.

15 minutes of play

Here are my rose fabrics

Here is my rose fabric.

Family

My Mom has not being doing well since her bout of shingles at Thanksgiving. She's going to be 90 in September. My sister came up from Woodstock GA and she has been evaluated and will be moving into assisted living. It been a tough decision. Well my niece was in town so we thought we'd get the family together. My sister Susan, my husband Michael (TDH), me, Mom, Lida (my niece), Dan Lida's special friend, Laura my sister-in-law, Chris my brother.

Here is a close up of the sibblings with Mom.

Here I am with my Mom.

15 minutes of play

This is what I call my fruit and bug group.

My fruit and bug fabric.

Christmas for Abigail and Laura's

Front of Abigail's chalk placemat

Back of Abigail's placemat

Laura's dish towel

Celebration!!!

Mail Call!

PINK!

IT'S YOUR (MY) DAY!

CELEBRATION!!!

I won a drawing from Em and this was what I got!

Ethan and the Road Trip

So my brother and sister say "let's take a road trip to Richmond to see Ethan". At first I wasn't going to go and then the bonus my sister was going to drive. I'm in!

This is my sister Sue and Ethan in front of his new 'second hand' car. We drove over to a Mexican resturant and then to Target to buy him a sweatshirt. My brother wanted to go buy some coffee. Then Ethan wanted to show us where he worked at the museum.

One of my favorite items at the museum.

Ethan went without asking to get me a wheelchair and pushed me around the museum. I have a bunion on my left foot that's going to need surgery. It's the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. He works security, not with the gun Mom. He's happy and I hope thinking about going back to school.

My 20 year old. I LOVE him bunches and got me some hugs!

Giveaway notice

My gosh it sure looks like fun! Go become a follower and you might win something! Check out the Material Girls Quilts

15 second square

This is what I called my teal/orange/space grouping.

Here is the square so far.

1st making fabric square in 15

So here is my 1st making fabric square groups of fabrics.

I called this my blue and red group.

Here is my first square in 15.

I had a lot of straight lines in this group and I ended up hand sewing one of the seams.

I'm happy for my first attempt and with the scraps I cut I tossed them in the bag to use again.

My problem is I love some of the prints so much I have a hard time cutting them down...

15 minutes of play

Here I am on Saturday working on my bag a scaps.

Thank goodness my allergies don't show in this picture.

We were trying to get the flash to not flash so it would show the colors better.

Here is the bag a scraps I bought from Stephanie after reading her blog which lead me to her etsy shop.

So the first things I did was find the fabric with the selvages and took off 1 1/2 inches. Anyone that doesn't use their selvages I'd love to have them. When I collect enough I'm going to be making something - not sure what yet. I made a bunch of bags of scraps to make fabric. I tried to upload a bunch of pictures, but it didn't work for me so I'll do it in bits and pieces.