Wednesday, June 28, 2017

Gift card, a Quilt Shop & RV Quilter's

It has been crazy weather around here. We have had so much rain this year my toes are starting to web together. Angel was going to come over today to help me with some gardening stuff but the skies opened up and canceled our plans. I am having a hard time keeping up the flower garden due to my back and leg problem. I am currently doing the KST treatments, which seem to be the only thing helping me so far. PT made things so much worse. I could hardly walk and the medication I was taking made me ornery. LOL! Stopped taking that. Things are improving , thankfully.

For Mother;s Day my son gave me a gift card for  The Fat Quarter Quilt Shop.  Here is what I bought with it.

AURIfil thread!!! If you quilt , you know this thread is the cat's meow! Seams lie flat, low lint. Needed some pastel colors.

They also have 80 weight that is great for applique. This will work well with the applique project I am working on.
Great for tracing those pieces to applique.
Just because I thought this was a cute pattern.

In my last post I wrote about going to the Quilted Dog Quilt Shop In Colquet, MN.
Wonderful shop with a lot of quilts hanging around for samples. I didn't buy any fabric. I had just gone through and sorted out fabric and got rid of a lot. I did find these goodies though.
A pattern for these button boats! She had some made up in the shop and they were adorable. I bought the kit.
I love Red Button patterns. This was a kit that also included their buttons to go with it. A cute little table topper.



Last but not least, these adorable little wool projects. I love doing these. Sitting in the evening and doing hand stitching is relaxing for me. I also bought the holder for these.
I almost forgot.
I got these also. Thought they were so cute. I bought 2 more also. One for Jessie and one for her sister. I have quite a collection of quilting mugs. I bought a few of the Connecting Threads mugs in the 2 different colors, another form Primitive Gatherings and now these.

This past weekend Kay and I went to Plover to visit Antoinette's Quilt Shop. We were going to pick out the fabrics for our Judy Neumeyer pattern we are doing. We stopped at Cottage Cafe for breakfast. Great food and quite the story about the house the cafe is in. It is haunted. The owner told of the encounter they have with the ghosts that live i the house. Nothing bad. They polished a floor one night for them. LOL! The cafe also has Mystery nights. It includes a dinner and a ghost mystery. Much the same as a Mystery Theater. Sounds like fun. We enjoyed hearing her stories and we will go back. We are thinking our quilt group should do a mystery night. We did get our fabrics picked out and had one hilarious time doing it. Antoinette's is a great shop. You always feel welcomed there. The help is a hoot, if you're looking for help . It was a great day trip.

Melissa is working on the RV Quilter's Get Together. September looks to be when it will happening. She will have a date as soon as she gets all the info from the campground. This should be a lot of fun. So many of us are looking forward to it again.

You have a wonder 4th of July.

Piece!

Lying doesn't make you look smarter.








Friday, June 16, 2017

RVing and quilting

We left home Tuesday and headed west into Minnesota. Arriving in Cloquet, MN.. Jessie and LeRoy have been here sine Monday. A beautiful park on an island. No mosquitoes! The temps have been in the 80's during the day and 50's at night. Being by the water we are enjoying the time outside and being cool. The 2 sites next to us are also quilters. How awesome! Jessie, Judy and I headed out to the quilt shop. Quilted Dog Quilt Shop. What an amazing shop. So many samples made and many kits of them or you can just buy the pattern. I forgot my camera, darn it. I got a few wool projects, and pattern called "Button Boats". It is like a small dish to hold whatever. Cute and quite a simple pattern. I also bought a really cute coffee mug. I will take pictures once I get home.

I love going to "Trunk Shows". You learn so much from the designers and see their amazing work. I have gone to a lot of them. Locally in my home town and around Wisconsin and even one in Texas. Designers have so many interesting stories to tell and share much information about the craft ad they are so entertaining. I am looking to some that will be coming up around Wisconsin that I plan to attend. Kaye England is always a wonderful show. New to me will be Nancy Clark McNally, Judy Niemeyer, Linda Pool and a mystery show!

I am starting a another Buggy Barn Crazies. Hearts and Stars. It will be done in Lynette Johnson's fabric line. (Kitties) Looking forward to getting it done. I have also been working on card wallets and ditty bags. So fun and fast to make. Do you use scraps to make rag rugs? I just got a pattern and tool to make them. I can;t wait to try that.

I went through all my fabrics and sorted and folded. Decided what I woud keep and what I did not want anymore. I sent a good sized box to Katrina in Ohio. She is our friends daughter and does all her piecing and quilting by hand. Amazing workmanship. I will be going through books and patterns when we return home. This downsizing stuff isn't easy.

Have a wonderful day and week end.

PIECE!
The person you think is your enemy, may be the only person trying to save you!

Saturday, May 27, 2017

The Search

We have always had a cat. I love cats. After our last cat was put down I said I can't do this again. Now, I want a cat again. I am starting a search.
Until the  "purr"fect one finds me, I will enjoy Crookshank and Wiggles our grand kitties.

This past week has been busy running around getting errands done and shopping for things we need. This weekend our roof is being done on our second garage. One of the guys that works for our contractor needed a weekend project. He arrived on Friday afternoon about 2. By 8:00 that night he had one side done.

We started the coach this week, It has been sitting in it's spot for a year and 2 months. It started right up. We took it out for drive. Mel is doing the un-winterizing on it now. We hope in the next week or two to head up to visit friends in northern Minnesota. We have trips in the planning stage. An RV friend we haven't met yet and only know through FB is wanting a get together. She lives in Michigan. We will plan out a trip to meet up sometime this summer.

Have a fun and safe holiday weekend.
Till next time....Piece!



Sunday, May 21, 2017

May is almost gone!

Time flies! Only 10 days left in May.
Mother's Day was great. We had a beautiful sunny spring day. DIL Rose and granddaughter Rachel came by. We had a nice visit and they brought me some wonderful gifts.
This plant hanger and a hanging plant. I love it. It even has a shelf to add another pot or whatever you want to put down there. Cool!
A cute bird feeder. I will hang it outside but not fill the feeder. We have so many squirrels the birds don't have a chance to get something to eat. I do feed the hummingbirds.
Now I can make 2 different pies in one. Mel loves apple pie and I love razzelberry. Now we can both be happy. How cool is that!

Later son John  and Sara came over. They brought flowers.
Pretty! I also got a really nice gift card from them from the Fat Quarter shop. I will post pictures when my goodies arrive.
John also came on Monday and brought us dinner. Sara had to work late. That was also really nice.
Mel took me out for dinner on Mother's Day. Then we had a quite evening.

Monday was crazy. We had guys here installing our new air conditioner. We are getting a new furnace and a/c. The past 3 years we have had to have the a/c re-charged. Time for a new one. The furnace is 18 years old so we may as well do that also. The furnace wasn't due in till Thursday but they had the a/c on hand so they came and installed that. Good thing. We had temps in the 80's  and very humid weather Monday through Wednesday. We used that a/c and it was fabulous. Thursday morning we woke to 38 degrees and turned on the furnace to heat up the house before the guys came back to install the new furnace. They arrived about 9. We had 3 guys here working all day. We actually had a lot of fun. I had made a rhubarb cake in the morning. I gave them each some in the afternoon. It is a recipe from my grandma. I have never seen anyone else make this and it is always a hit. The guys loved it. Once the furnace was installed Eric came to check everything out and do readings to make sure it was putting out accurately. The guys told him about the cake so I gave him some also. ( I got a call the next day asking for the recipe. All 4 guys wanted it.) Randy came back the next day with a case of filters. This new furnace takes a 20x20x4 inch filter. According to the manufacturer of our Ruud furnace we only need to change the filter every 9-12 months unless we have pets. Then it should be changed every 6-9. We don;t have pets so with the case of filters they brought the new one in the furnace we have a 7 year supply!

I am working a new system of cutting and piecing for quilting. I love the system and made a small project to try my hand at it.
It finishes at 25x25. The coolest thing about this is the points come out perfect every time.

I love this system and will be testing out another project with it. Flying geese come out perfect. I love this.

Saturday was a big day for our grandson Alexander. He graduated from the University of Wisconsin and has a degree as an engineer in paper science. He did 2 internships in Rhinelaner, WI and last fall was offered a full time job after graduation. He will move into his apartment soon and join the working world on June 1.
He is in the middle of the picture looking at us.
We are very proud of him.
Granddaughter, Rachel will graduate from UW Milwaukee in December with a degree in Journalism. She got her Associate degree in one year from the UW Marathon campus in 2015 and then went on to Milwaukee.She will complete her college education in less than 3 years!!

I am loving my Juki machine. I finally got my hand speed and machine speed together and can stitch 10-12 stitches per inch!  Perfect! I still have quilting rulers from when I had my longarm machine. I have also played with them on the Juki also. This is going to be an awesome machine to work on and do quilting.



****I will never apologize to you, for YOU being untruthful.  My attitude is a result of your actions. If you don't like me, blame yourself!



Piece!



Thursday, May 11, 2017

A Crazy Busy Week

In our younger years we had a group of friends that hung out with every chance we could. Then life hits. Marriage, children and before you know it you just don;t get together much anymore and we each develop new friendships. Last we got together with Danny and Dawn was about 5-6 years ago. We got caught up in each others lives.  They were spending summers at Wisconsin Dells in their permanent trailer at a camp ground and traveling in their coach to Gulf Shores every winter. This past winter they came back to Wisconsin in December for a family situation. Dawn contacted me through Facebook in April. She said they were in Rib Mountain and we should get together. She called and when I asked where she was she said, " we rented a duplex over here on Big Pine in January". That is about a half a block away from me. We knew exactly where they were. We picked them up and off to lunch we went to catch up. We spent almost 6 hours doing just that. The following Friday they were driving back to Gulf Shores to pick up their coach and bring it back. Dawn brought her plants over for me take care of while they were gone. They came back for about a week. We got together again and now they off to South Dakota to visit friends till the 19th. We keep in touch most days. What a wonderful surprise to get reunited again. Mel and Danny go back a long way.

Last Thursday morning I got up really early, picked up "Chicklet" (Linda) and we were off to Beaver Dam to the Nancy's Notions warehouse sale. We had a blast. We each  found what we were looking for.
My "loot". The floor lamp was a door buster. ( will work well in our coach)  A circle cutter, pattern, 2 books, a travel bag for a travel iron that I also bought, coasters with quilts printed on them, steam a seam and 32 fat quarters. All for just over 100.00!!! Oh! and a bottle of Retayne. I need that if I am working with Red, dark blue or black fabric. I also saw a neighbor of mine there along with a friend from Madison.  After, we headed over to Applebees for lunch. It was a great day. Lots of laughs.

Friday, Sarah Bohman came over. We went through some fabric she was looking for. She stole my latest quilt top and said" I want to quilt this one!". She is awesome and a real hoot to be around. We both have dreams of going to Italy and we are actually getting a game plan together.

Saturday was quiet. I cleaned house, did laundry. Hung all the light stuff outside. My last 2 loads were jeans and towels. I went down to get the jeans out of the dryer and they were cold and wet. Arg! The thermal fuse blew! Happened about 10 years ago also. I hung the jeans on my drying rack. Called my neighbor and took the towels to her house to dry in her dryer.

Sunday was also quiet. I did some sewing and played with quilting on my new Juki machine.

Monday was my usual errand day. Got going early and was done by noon. My friend Melissa from the southern part of the state set up a group chat for planning an RV quilting retreat. We have about 9 people already signed up. Melissa did this last year and had 20 people. She said it got out of hand with that many. This year the most will be 15. We will have potlucks for lunch and dinners. Dinners will include our husbands. Melissa has 2 campgrounds that she is checking into that will work for our retreat. Looking at north of the Madison area. Makes for a central place for all to meet.

Tuesday was getting the rest of my errands done.You see, Tuesday is senior day at our grocery store. Gotta get that discount.  We also picked up the new thermal fuse and got the dryer put back together.

Wednesday I sewed all day. ALL DAY! It was wonderful. I have been working on some new things besides quilts. I am making these wallets. They are fabulous for credit cards, quilt shop punch cards and stashing money for those quilt shops.
It is amazing how much stuff they hold.

When we met with Dawn she was showing me a "ditty" bag she uses while she does her knitting. She also spins. She does the most beautiful knitting and you should see the beautiful yarns she spins. Anyway, she uses the ditty bag to put in a small project along with her needles and yarn. Wherever she is she can just pull out her project and work on it while leaving the yarn in the bag so it doesn't get dirty. Here is what those look like. I made 2.
The bag stays on her wrist while she knits.

Today, Lois are I are heading off to Paquette's for our annual plant shopping.

In between all of this, my daughter in law , Sara has come over to help go through everything in the house for downsizing. We have gotten a lot taken care of. We pack up things to go to Goodwill and things she and John want. I think she has taken more home than I take to Goodwill. I am not doing garage sales anymore so it goes to Goodwill. It is just to difficult for me to set them up with my health situation.  The house is sold  as soon as we are ready to surrender it to an easier life in an apartment or condo. Nice knowing we do not have to worry about that.

 Have a wonderful day. Till next time.... Piece!

BTW: soon I will be going through my quilting stuff and downsizing that also. Fabric, rulers, books etc.. I am trying to decide what to do with the items I no longer need. If you know of anyone wanting any quilting items they can contact me through this blog.


Wednesday, May 3, 2017

What happen! And quilting!

After a friend read my post she suggested I explain what happen to  Mel. About 5 years ago he had what we call a "mini" stroke. We were eating out when he tried to tell me something and his speech was  slurred to the point I could not understand him. Then after testing was done he also had a blocked carotid artery on his left  side. Surgery was scheduled. When we hear "mini" stroke we usually do not think much about it but, it is as dangerous as a full blown stroke.  It causes damage and changes to the brain. I noticed changes in him after the surgery. He had some personality changes and anxiety about things that never would have bothered him before. It got worse through the past couple years along with depression. We saw a neurologist that our doctor recommended. He said the brain goes through changes after a stroke. Most changes he sees are people either get overly joyous, tearful or depression and anxiety. Mel got the latter. Now that we found a drug that appears to be working for him, things are improving.  He is actually wanting to go places and see people.

I am still working on my quilting. I enjoy being able to sew and make quilts to share with my family and friends. I have been working on my Farmers Wife quilt. Slowly! Actually we have a group of 4 that are doing it. We divided the blocks up and we each make 4 of the blocks in the grouping we are in. One of the ladies found paper piecing patterns for them. She gave us all copies. I like to paper piece but I found these horrible to do. So I am doing it by using the templates. I also working on other quilts while doing this. Another friend, Kay and I are also doing a Judy Niemeyer wall hanging. She has a unique way of paper piecing and I know why it is suggested you take one of her courses to under her technique. Between the 2 of us we will figuring this out. LOL 
Here are a few pictures of some quilts I have made since my posts a few years ago.

 A table topper I made from fabrics I fell in love with. I just decided to make 9 patches and go from there.
 Using the Strip Smart ruler. A fun project.

My Daughter-in-law found this pattern. She picked out the fabrics. That's my handsome son John and his wife,  Sara, peaking around the other side.

More to come next time. Till then... Piece and Hugs

 

Sunday, April 30, 2017

It has been a long time.

I has been a long time since I blogged. I went back and read all my posts. Wonderful memories. Then I thought, why not just use this as a journal. I really don't mind if anyone reads my words. I am not one to value myself on how many people read my blog or how many friends I have on Facebook. I am me.
So I will journal. Many of my thoughts. Some maybe nice thoughts and some may not be nice thoughts. But, they are my thoughts.
Last April (2016) we arrived home form a winter of snow birding the south. It was a good time. We spent a lot of time in Florida. We started out going to Mandeville, LA. to met up with friends for Christmas and the New Year. Worked our way east form there slowly. 
Once we arrived home in April we parked the coach and it has sat there ever since. We did take it out for rides, just to exercise it.  We spent the winter home. Mel has had some medical issues and it was decided we would spend the winter home. It was a long winter. Through the grace of God and our friends and family that came and helped, visited and just gave encouragement to Mel , the time went by. I has been a tough road. Not only for Mel but for me also. It is difficult when your spouse is 13 years older than you and is losing the ability to do so many things. Most upkeep around here was up to me. I did it the best I could. We had conversations about selling the house, moving into an apartment. Mel is not ready to do that yet. Although, I am. We have started to do some downsizing. I have taken many a load to Goodwill after our kids go through what we are getting rid of.
I still do my quilting. it is my "me" time. I enjoy it very much when I can get in my room and just create.
Mels health is slowly improving and I think we finally found the right medication. We are making plans for our summer trips. Our friends in northern MN are anxiously waiting for us to do a camping trip. We also have a trip to Iowa to see friends Ron and Jan. We will also do a road trip with them. We have other trips planned and we will see how many we get to.
I am looking forward to summer. Camping, seeing friends and relatives and traveling.
Till next time..... Piece!