The first one for the books

The memorial quilt is done. Hopefully it will be mailed out by the first of the week. This quilt had is hanging sleeve hand sewn on. Boy oh boy how time consuming! In the future I will plan a border big enough to have the sleeve machine sewn to the back in that area. At least the sleeve hides nicely. Can you see it?
This is the update on my knitting. I'm onto the last ball and it is 52" with a goal of 58"+, not much longer now. I hope you can see better this time. Once again length does not include the tassels. I have also been working on blocks for my Springtime 2009 Sampler. It's fun picking patterns. I have a pile of fabrics that match my "main" theme fabric, so when ever the mood strikes I pull out a pattern and pull out my fabric and away we go. The photo above is Churn Dash, with Jessica hollering in my ear this one didn't turn out as great as I would have liked but the embroidery I'd done before Christmas as a trial stitch out, worked here beautifully. This one is my favorite. It is called cactus basket, but I've also heard it called many other things. The basket went together beautifully, and the "flowers" in the basket are my main inspiration print. This one is called Anvil. I like it as once again I was able to use an old stitch out test. The light color is swapped with the dark one in order to use that center to it's best advantage so the directions were backwards, but I got through it.

Currently DH is off for a meet and greet for a little pt job at a big chain. Hopefully he will get it. Having him unemployed since June (father's day) has been really hard.

A word from one who knows, do not sew to the elastic all the way around the waist, if you do you end up with more of a waist band than a stretchy waist. So nearly as soon as I'd made Jessica a skirt she out grew it. Yesterday I decided I would remake her skirt. This time I used Red polka dots complete Minnie Mouse style. Here was the final outfit. I liked it enough to make the skirt long so she can wear it for a long time, perhaps even next Halloween. Can you see my trademark tail feather? Jessica on the other hand wasn't interested. Silly girl, doesn't know what she's missing. I'm certain a real Minnie outfit would be over $50.

What a time of it!

Good Morning Folks! This morning I was awoken by the ringing phone. My favorite sound in the morning not! Just when I was trying so hard to keep my eyes shut tight against the day (in spite of all that Jessica was doing to get me up). And who should it be? Well there's no telling, because the phone in the bedroom is dead. I race to find another phone throwing off the covers and chasing down the hall. Oh crud it's the Sears Repair guy, "HELLO!!?!?!?" Nope he's gone. Drat. I hurry to get dressed and pull a brush through my hair that has gotten annoying long. Then my eyes aloft on the rest of the house. ACK! The kitchen is covered in last night's trial of the New Mexican place down the road.

Bell Peppers make me sick and so I put myself to bed shortly after dinner. Rob's old boss asked him to come back, so he was off to work (overnight, ugh). The toys where a mess, oh it was just awful. So I race to dress Jessica, I race to pick up her toys. Oh no it's 8:30 AM when I call my mother. "Hello? Mom?" More racing to clean the goo off the dishes and hide them in the dishwasher. Race, Race, Race. Kitchen is okay, living room is okay, bedroom - we'll just close the door. Oh but what if he comes in through the front door? ACK! Oh well can't help it now. Off to the bathroom, YUcky, there's poo in the potty. UGH... Dealing... Talking on the phone... The things we do.

It's 9:00AM and I'm off the phone, no husband yet... Check emails... Do I have that book? Ummmmmmmm.... So I head off to Jessica's room. It's nice in there karmic precision has been obtained. Serenity now! Oh it's marvelous. My hair that never made it up is hanging in sweaty strands. Oh there's the book... That's nice, oh there's a bit of a breeze, I can feel it now. I love this room... I'll just sit here until something happens. Of course that was when the Sears guy drove past.

Why did I even need him you ask? Well they over torqued the cover on the water filter at the factory when they put the filter in, best get the part now, while I can still say it arrived that way.

Perhaps I forgot to mention? Sears tried so many times to fix the old fridge they were out 6 times in 3 weeks. After they changed out the compressed things went from bad to awful, and the entire fridge stopped working. Everything in there that hadn't already been lost by the freeze/thaw things that the freezer was doing was completely ruined when everything completely melted mere hours after the repair person left. Somewhere along the line, thank goodness the lemon clause kicked in and I got a completely new fridge. I feel a bit like Vana White. Look at the beautiful new REFRIGERATOR.

Which brings you up to the broken little cover thing at delivery. Hopefully that will be the end of the big bad fridge story. Currently we are all calling the new one the Big Cold Monster, as it it quite a bit bigger than the old one. The length and width measurements were the same, but somewhere someone fibbed, as it's taking up at least an extra inch or two of the hall way. No matter it's so cold I've turned it down twice. The seal on it is so strong you have to use two hands sometimes to get it open! EEEK!

After Rob got home and went to bed I fell twisted my ankle (the good one) on the last step into Jessica's room. It was a book completely hidden under her little rug that caused it. Hopefully it wont effect my luncheon when my mom on Friday.

Quilts? Oh you want to talk about what I did yesterday after the post? Well I told you about dinner. Before dinner I had Trusty Gem out. That's the name I've been auditioning for the 2001 Brother ULT. And I put the prettiest little butterfly near the basket of roses that I hand pieced for that blue quilt. So pretty. I'm going to do another in slightly different colors on the other side. Good thing everything I want to do today has me sitting, hu?

The pitfalls of learning.

Oh my, oh my... I'm not even sure what to say. I joined a Block Challenge Group, where we have to make 12 quilt blocks. No big deal, right? WRONG, these Blocks are the EXACT color of each member's selection. (for instance I have to make TWO long cabin quilts needing 42 different fabrics!) Not to mention how specific some of these requests are. And in case you didn't catch it above each block is the pattern selection of each individual in our group, so some are no big deal, but most are "oh my are you serious?!?!" My deadline is Jan. 2009 thank goodness!

I made the first one today. The request was to use the Buzzard's Roost Pattern, with a bright juvenile print and two coordinating brights. Now, this photo is my dh's camera phone and it make the colors crazy! That blanket is WHITE AND TEAL, not yellow, and the turtle that looks red is really brown and hardly shows at all. The killer whales look like they have white on them, but it's really all shades of blue, hence the blue and teal (that I spent at least 1/2 an hour last night matching...)


I've been very concerned about the above project, since the realization of just how many fabrics I need to buy... Of course I didn't mention my dh was fired on Father's Day. Yes, horror of my horrors, to have my husband without a job in this awful job market. (sigh) Since I blew up (again) over it this morning, I have been trying very hard to remain calm and pray. (sigh)