Shopping trip

Minnesota had a heartbreaking loss in the Insight Bowl, but Baby K is still a fan!



I went shopping today:

From left...the blue crackle fabric I want to use as a filler for the kaleidoscope leftovers, 3 batik Christmas prints (snowflakes, holly and poinsettias) for the "Turning Twenty Again" pattern, and self-patterning sock yarn called "Stars & Stripes." I know, I still need to finish the Jaywalkers, but my anniversary is on July 4th, so I'm a sucker for patriotic stuff.

We don't have any big plans for New Year's Eve, so I may get some more quilting done this weekend! I have my mom's One Block Wonder to put on the longarm, and I'm enjoying some time at the small machine. I am trying to think of a pose for an annual New Year's Day photo...maybe just the middle of the back yard. What are your traditions? I refuse to make a list of resolutions - too boring: lose weight, exercise, finish those UFOs ;-)

Old Mystery

(For baby update, scroll down!) This is the backside of a quilt I just finished on the longarm. I used meandering curly-cues to outline the blocks. The fabric is a new line with Beatrix Potter designs.

I dug out a year-old UFO...Jackie Robinson's "3 Ps in a Pod" mystery quilt. This was a 2-day class at the 2005 Quilt Camp in the Pines. My 3 Ps are pink, purple and polka dots. I am fairly close to having all the blocks done. I need to assemble the parts you see in the photo for the last 40 blocks, then find time and space to lay out the queen-size quilt and finish the top.

This is my "cheat sheet." I highly recommend this to anyone working with more than 3 or 4 fabrics...especially if you are busy with several projects (or life!) and your quilting gets interrupted. I cut a small square of each fabric and pin, tape, or staple the swatch to a master list of what the pattern calls each color. For instance, the bottom pieces are named "peach 1" and "peach 2" since that's how jackie Robinson refers to the colors in the instructions. This is a lifesaver if, like me, you don't follow the color scheme that the designer did!

Baby News: We were wondering if Baby K would crawl first or cut a tooth.

The answer is B!! I felt the sharp edge of her first tooth this morning! She is 20 weeks old today, in case you lost track ;-) This picture was taken a few days ago when she started blowing razzies. We're off to the store for Anbesol!

Finishing off the leftovers

I showed these leftover stack-n-whack blocks about a month ago...

I started to add another border, but since I was working with scraps of the blue background and some green, it just didn't work out, and I decided to leave it as is. The pattern is "Treasure Boxes" from Bethany Reynolds' Stack-n-Whackier Quilts.

I *still* had leftover blocks, plus the extra border strips that were supposed to go on the Treasure Boxes (until I got bored!). I came up with this:

I need some more of the crackle blue fabric to fill in, and this will be the end of the stack-n-whack blocks, just in time for the Small Quilt Auction in March. I used the rest of the kaleidoscope print as the backing for the first small quilt, and I'll go stash-diving for the back of the second one ;-) It's nice to start off the new year by emptying a UFO bag!

Family Portrait

Our first Christmas with baby K: We had a wonderful time with family...B's side on Christmas Eve, and my side on Christmas Day. We came home with lots of pink outfits, LOL. Baby K's new trick, which she debuted on Christmas Day, is blowing rasberries with her tongue. It sounds like "bbbb" instead of "bzzzz", but the way she sticks out her little tongue is so adorable! Of course, all us adults look pretty silly making faces trying to get her to "perform"!

The quilt-bloggers are starting to list UFOs to finish in 2007...I have 3 tops waiting to be quilted before I go back to school on Jan 3rd...yikes! Luckily, I can use a pantograph and get one done in a day. I also have grand plans of finishing a block for my guild exchange - if I can find the pattern, of course.

One...one..one

complete Jaywalker!

And one little ball of leftover yarn. I have fun winding up the remainder for my stash. I'll have to start knitting "dominoes" or some such thing to use these remnants. Maybe Barbie clothes in a few years when Baby K is older?? I know...I'm insane for even typing the words!

same cute baby

"How do I work this thing?"

One of these days I will piece again! I have managed to finish a couple things on the longarm, but I've had no time or desire to set up the regular sewing machine. I can truly appreciate why moms like to go on weekend retreats!

I have sqeezed in some knitting time, and I *finally* reached the toe of my first Jaywalker sock. (I got my oil changed yesterday...quality knitting time!) There seem to be lots of plateaus in sock knitting. First you are so anxious to finish the cuff and get to the pattern. Then you knit for a long time, measure compulsively and finally reach the heel. Heels are fun because they take a higher level of concentration and counting. Then, it's back to the pattern for the foot. LOTS more compulsive measuring to see if you're ready to start the toe. It seems like the toe should be quick, but there are about 47 rows to knit the decreases! I can't believe I started this sock in OCTOBER...three months, that's got to be a record! And let's not even think about sock #2. Since these are in my school colors, I'll hope to have them finished by graduation in May, LOL.

Google Christmas Meme

Google Game:
1. Google for Christmas plus the year of your birth.
2. Post the most charming picture you can find.
3. Get misty with nostalgia over hot cocoa and peppermint cookies.

Here's a Christmas memory...

As a child , our tree had wooden hand-painted ornaments of the Wise Men, Santa, etc. My mom told me it was a set she had ordered through a catalog, probably around 1970 when I was born. Fast forward to college, when my choir was caroling and the house we were at had the same ornaments! It was a little weird, but it was a small piece of home at a special time of year.

(Another link to home while I was at college...the bank had the same print of a falcon in the lobby as we had hanging over our fireplace!)

Baby & Bunny 4th edition

At 4 months old and 26 inches long, the bunny is starting to look small

Ooh, what's this? A fuzzy bunny foot?

Must....taste....bunny....

Come here you wascally wabbit!

rest break...wrestling the bunny really takes it out of a girl!

Quilty Content

At my first Quilt Camp in the Pines (2004) I took a bargello class with Louisa Smith. So much fun! I used a green, purple and yellow pallette. This is now one of my long term UFOs...I need to sew the strips together, which involves LOTS of matching seams...yuck! And some of the strips may have gotten jumbled in the storage phase, so there may be some "design opportunities" when I start sewing again!





One of Louisa's innovations to the basic bargello is to add a twist. Notice that the teal color stays consistent while the other colors switch places. It would probably be more effective if the twist were a wider section, but I have found with my (limited) experience with bargellos that it is hard to make steep drops and long widths. So, I am going to finish this without the twist, but it's a fun variation to play with!

More about me

Visit this cool site...how many of you are there??

HowManyOfMe.com

There are: 16 people with my name in the U.S.A. How many have your name?

Christmas Meme

I saw this at Sue's blog:

1. Egg Nog or Hot Chocolate? Egg Nog...non-alcoholic, mixed with milk so it's not as rich

2. Does Santa wrap presents or just set them under the tree? Wrap!

3. Colored lights on tree/house or white? White on tree…no lights on house - too much work!

4. Do you hang mistletoe? Nope

5. When do you put up your decorations? Sometime before Christmas, LOL. This year I have being putting a few things out at a time, starting with the Advent calendar on Dec 1st, then some tabletop decorations over the weekend. The tree will probably go up next weekend.

6. What is your favorite holiday dish (excluding dessert)? Stuffing! Oh, and sour cream coffee cake with a cinnamon swirl.

7. Favorite Holiday memory as a child? Putting all my personalized ornaments on the tree

8. When and how did you learn the truth about Santa? I have no idea!!

9. Do you open a gift on Christmas Eve? Not as a kid. Now we spend Christmas Eve with my in-laws, and we exchange gifts with them that night. Those are the benefits of living in the same town as both families!

10. What kind of decorations are on your Christmas Tree? A variety of things from my childhood along with new ones to commemorate the current year.

11. Snow! Love it or Dread it? Love it…but in Arizona, I never see it!

12. Can you ice skate? Yes, I can stay upright and travel forwards ;-)

13. Do you remember your favorite gift? My parents bought me a silver open-hole flute when I was in high school. And my uncle was always good about getting those fun things that Mom and Dad wouldn't buy...like the huge Star Wars toys and the Barbie hairstyle doll.

14. What's the most important thing about the Holidays for you? Being in touch with family and friends.

15. What is your favorite Holiday Dessert? Pecan pie and/or tarts

16 What is your favorite holiday tradition? Sending and receiving Christmas cards

17. What tops your tree? I need to find a pretty angel to put on top.

18. Which do you prefer giving or receiving? Both...I love the whole process of finding the perfect gift and also the excitment of opening gifts.

19. What is your favorite Christmas Song? O Holy Night

20. Candy Canes! Yuck or Yummy? Yuck!

Tis the Season

Yesterday was our Kid's Christmas Party. Baby K got to meet Santa, and she grabbed for his beard right away. It felt silly, but I just wrapped up one of her toys to get from Santa. We didn't even bother unwrapping it at the party...she was ready for a nap after the photo session :-)

I went on a shop hop this summer and found the snowflake print. I also bought some Christmas batiks, which were not readily accessible for photographing, LOL. Then at our guild's fall meeting I found the other prints. I bought half yards, but I am thinking of using the Turning Twenty pattern...I heard there is a new version out called "Turning Twenty Around the Block." Has anyone seen it? Guess I'll do a google search soon. I'll be on the lookout during the after-Christmas sales for additional Christmas prints. I'll be lucky to get this done for Christmas 2007!!

For Chocolate lovers

A local DJ was saying yesterday that no one he knows eats Dark Chocolate. Whatever!! He must live under a rock. The new trend of dark chocolate varieties has its good and bad points. I have ALWAYS preferred dark chocolate. Buy a bag of Hershey's miniatures, and the milk chocolate will stay in the candy dish for YEARS. Kisses...ehh...give me a bag of semi-sweet chocolate chips any time. So I love the fact that dark chocolate is readily available. But, I don't like to follow the crowd with my preferences. I hate to fight over the 4 Special Dark bars that come in the variety pack. Sigh...such are the problems with popularity!

This post is what DebR would call "Random Items from the Junk Drawer of my Mind." It's amazing what you find in there! I wanted to write a WIP Wednesday post yesterday...I have about 10 more rows done on the Jaywalkers - woo-hoo! But no quilty content. There are 8 days of school left, then I can drag out the sewing machine and UFOs. It's a toss up between my Underground Railroad sampler and my 3 P's in a Pod mystery quilt. Plus, I have several tops waiting their turn on the longarm. I really like to do custom designs, but the time crunch is pushing me towards pantographs.

So how is everyone doing with their Christmas shopping? My dad is the hardest person on earth to shop for. I usually alternate between gift certificates for books or movies. This year he got his first Hole-In-One, so it would be fun to do something golf-related...maybe one of those fake magazine covers? Probably too late to get it before Christmas though. I did alot of online shopping this week, so I've started the marathon. Just have to hit the mall for hubby's requests. I have a few little things for baby K...mostly clothes. B. and I were saying that it is kind of weird this year to buy her something, wrap it up, then open it for her a few weeks later! We'll let the grandparents be Santa this year, and next year it will be much more exciting with a toddler to buy for.

Holiday Traditions

Phoenix has a holiday Electric Light parade, and the weather was decent, so we met some friends and got in the Christmas Spirit. I tried to adjust the photo in Photoshop to get rid of some of the flash glare, but it (obviously!) didn't work. I wish I were a better photographer!













The second picture is Baby K and Daddy. With those little hats on, she looks like an elf!









Sorry, no crafty content...I'm hoping to get a quilt on the longarm this afternoon. Check out www.animas.com - it's Jackie Robinson's website and she has some new fabric and patterns available. I took a mystery class with her at Quilt Camp in the Pines. She's fantastic!

In the name of science

How fast does a meme travel?

First, you have to know that a meme is a survey that bloggers use to share information about themselves...rather blatantly stolen from the chain-emails that go around asking "What time did you wake up? What song is playing on the radio" and asking you to send the answers to everyone in your address book. And if you remember the days before internet, a meme is like those notebooks you sent around in school with a different question on each page and you had all your friends sign it. (Now that's a study...how the same games have evolved over the last 50 years or so!)

I use memes because a) I like to join things...if there's a bandwagon, I'm on it! and 2) memes provide ready-made content when I don't have cute pictures to share with the blog-iverse

Memes generally travel among groups of bloggers, such as the Quilting 4 Pleasure ring that I joined. The premise of a webring is that members visit all the sites in the ring on a regular basis and leave comments. It's a way to build an audience for your blog :-)

Then there are the blogging superstars... like the Yarn Harlot and Crazy Aunt Purl, two of my personal favorites. These bloggers get hundreds of comments a day, so if they post a meme, their readers are likely to do the same. And so it spreads...

If you would like to participate in this scholarly endeavor, link to the Measuring site (as I did in the beginning of this post) then enter your blog address at Technorati.

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Alas, I did not do any knitting in front of the TV last night. During commercial breaks, I perused the catalogs and made notes for Christmas shopping. And since I have been updating this blog from my school computer, there are no baby pictures available. But, Baby K is 16 weeks old today...10 days til the next bunny-growth picture!

ABCs about me

I might have done this before, but I thought there were some good categories this time around...
I found this at the Mother-daughter blog, where they are celebrating Arts and Crafts Day today. Unfortunately, I won't have much time to be crafty since I have a bowling tournament after school :-( Maybe I'll get some knitting done in front of the TV tonight!


A - Age:mid-30s
B - Band listening to right now:nothing...I'm at school
C - Career future:solid, LOL. Math teachers are always in demand!
D - Dad’s name:Kevin
E - Easiest person to talk to: my hubby
F - Favorite song:Right now it's "Would you go with me" by Josh Turner
G - Gummy Bears or Gummy Worms: Bears
H - Hometown: I claim Phoenix, but I was born in the UK
I - Instruments: flute, my voice
J - Job: teacher
K - Kids: 1 baby girl!
L - Longest car ride ever:from Washington D.C. to Phoenix AZ. Longest at one stretch was from the beach in North Carolina to Lubbock TX (yes, I was young and insane!)
M - Mom’s name: Mary
N - Number of pets you’ve had: 10...4 dogs and 6 cats (only 3 at any one time)
O - Oldest friend: that I talk to regularly...Kat (10+ years), that I send Christmas cards to...Liza (high school friend)
P - Phobia: being in a small space (such as airplane bathrooms, LOL, we talked about this at Thanksgiving!)
Q - Quote: The universe is transformation – our life is what our thoughts make it. (Marcus Aurelius)
R - Reason to smile: holding Baby K
S - Song you sang last: the Sanctus from my church Hymnal
T - Time you wake up: with a 3-month old it's every few hours all night! My alarm officially goes off at 5:30 and I hit snooze twice, so I'm out of bed at 5:48
U - Unknown fact about me: I was on TV twice with my college choir...the 1992 CMA Awards and the 1992 Miss USA pageant
V - Vegetable you hate: beets
W - Worst habit: procrastinating
X - X-rays you’ve had: dental, spine
Y - Yummy food: pasta, ice cream, dark chocolate (I'd die on the Atkins diet, LOL!)
Z - Zodiac sign: Libra

Hodge Podge

Here's the beautiful girl in her christening dress! The chiffon overlay had embroidered flowers on it. Baby K entertained herself by putting fistfuls in her mouth.


I did not knit this sweater, but I needed some fiber content :-)

Grandma made it for Baby K. With a cold front moving through, there's a good chance she'll get to wear it while it fits, too!

Happy feet:

I thought these shoes would show off my hand-knit socks...if I ever finish another pair!

And finally, our lone cat, all ready for winter curled up on a fleece blanket. B. went to the Humane Society today to see if they had picked up our run-away...no such luck, but he did see several possibilities for a new addition! We decided to be strong and wait until after Christmas to decide if we need another animal. We may have our hands full when Baby K gets mobile!!

Leftovers

I couldn't post the Thanksgiving menu until today, because I don't cook. But, we always have our choice of invitations for holiday meals...my brother in law is a gourmet cook, and my dad and some buddies take charge of Thanksgiving. This year we stayed with my side of the family. Dad and buddies started the feast on Wednesday over coffee. They moved into the kitchen for two days of preparations, and we sat down to eat last night at 5pm. The buffet included tossed salad, chorizo-sweet potato stuffing, apricot herb stuffing, mashed potatoes, layered sweet potato casserole, roasted green beans, cranberry-covered pork loin and your choice of BBQ or sage-roasted turkey. Everything was DELICIOUS!!! Alas, no turkey sandwiches for me this weekend unless I go to the sub shop ;-)

So, my leftovers consist of quilting UFOs. I had some time yesterday, so I poked around and found the bag of scraps from a stack-n-whack. I used the Treasure Box pattern. When I started sewing the extra blocks, I didn't want to take the time to do y-seams, so I left out the green sashing. I have a couple more kaleidoscope squares to put together, then I can play with the layout. I have a few squares done with sashing, so they may become a central piece, with the extras around the edge and the remaining fabric as borders. BTW, the fabric was Alexander Henry...generally a good choice for any type of stack-n-whack/one block wonder/kaleidoscope type quilt!Besides not cooking, I don't shop...so all the bargains are available for those of you brave souls who venture forth on Black Friday and keep retail America happy. Thanks for supporting our economy :-)

Scheduling

I wanted to sew on Sunday afternoon...it was a nice quiet afternoon at home. I got this block put together for our guild raffle next month, and then I hit a creative blockage. I have lots of UFOs, but nothing was calling to me. It seemed like too much work to get things out of the closet and figure out where I left off. Instead, I was a couch potato...sat with the baby and caught up on "Grey's Anatomy."

Gidget found a new place to nap! She is an only kitty now...our other cat, Tony, ran away. We let him out Sunday and he never came back. We're hoping he found a new home, because the alternatives are too sad. (Cars, dogs, coyotes...)

I want to say thank you to the Quilting 4 Pleasure web ring (notice the new button in my sidebar!). I have been "surfing the ring" and leaving comments. I'm looking forward to getting to know you. If you drop by, please leave a comment so I know you were here! I try to keep the content quilty, but life (read = baby) has a way of interfering!!

You can't win if you don't play

I just found out that my pineapple won "Best Rookie" in our longarm guild's President's Challenge!






Everyone had the same pattern for the square-in-a-square, but we could choose our own fabrics and quilting designs. You can see my pineapple, and I used some radiating lines in the black background. The pink and yellow border had spiral flowers. The blue triangles had a wineglass pattern of interlocking half-circles, and I used parallel lines in the green outer border. There are lots of areas for improvement, LOL, but I won't point them out here. I am just going to bask in my first ribbon!