Anniversary, Ikea, and Mail

Yesterday was my DH and my anniversary, but he wasn't feeling too well, so we decided to celebrate today instead. First we went and had lunch at Bahama Breeze, which was delicious as always and then we went to Ikea, as they were having their first sale ever since they opened in Orlando. The sale was a disappointment, but I did make a few purchases. The sale things that I got were the potholders 2 for .99 cents, and the fabric. Has anyone used the cotton fabric from Ikea. I hope that it is good, as I got 10 yards. it is 59 inches wide, and was on sale for 1.99 and I thought that it would make a nice backing on girly quilts. The little clock was 2.99, and I needed one in front of my sewing machine, so far so good it has run for about 3 hours, and the wooden box is for my paper storage by my printer.

When I got back home I had finally gotten my package from Connecting Thread. I have heard good things about their thread so I'm going to give it a try, and I got the yellow gingham for a baby quilt.

I haven't given up on my Orange Crush. I haven't exactly been keeping my shoulder to the wheel, but I have gotten my borders cut out, and my little extra blocks almost finished sewing together to use in the border. I'm almost ready to sew the borders on.

Key Rings and Gnomes and Giveaway

I hardly ever go on the back porch lately, as it is so hot, and it is so hard to get out the sliding glass door. We have 3 locks, and a rod, I guess we are security conscious or else neurotic. We don't live in a crime ridden area, but we like to be secure. Anyway, while I was out there watering my avacado tree (which I grew from a seed), I thought that I might as well take a picture of my new gnome that I got at Target yesterday on sale. I have another big one on the porch that I call John, the one in the planter is little John, and I am calling the new one Sean. John is after my father-in-law, who loved to garden and anything 'nature'. Sean is standing on top of the pot that my avacodo tree was in before we repotted it, and unfortunately the little tree isn't showing up too well, and I cut off it's top.
While I was out there, I looked up and noticed that I was being watched, so I took a picture of my visitor. The round circle thing on the left is a golfing contraption that my husband bought and never used much. It was supposed to help you have a perfect swing.

On Lynette Anderson Designs she got a new key ring, very pretty in the shape of a strawberry, and she is asking for pictures of others and then is having a giveaway of a new 'woof' pattern. The first picture is of a gift key chain from my son's youngest son Kevin, and a gift key chain from my son Robert and his wife Brenda. The second is a key chain with a flashlight that my mother 'won' at the casino. I can't understand the love of gambling, but she enjoyed her times at the casino, and so I'm glad that she had something exciting in her life. The last is my 'Hold to the Rod' key chain. It is not pretty, but it has religious significance and meaning. You can read it a little, I think.

I Just Found Another One - Giveaway

This one is Brenda's at Pumpkin Patch Primitives she is making up and giving away a kit for this beauty. Just leave a comment.

Contest

There is a very interesting challenge (contest?) on Donna's blog. It's DONNA'S - In The Attic , and she is challenging entrants to make any size Turning Twenty quilt top by July 11th. You can even use one that you have already made.


You can see the details on her blog, but the prizes are these fat quarters,


or a wall hanging made from fabrics similar to these. I don't know if I will be entering, but maybe, I would be able to do a small one.

Orange Crush Top Without Borders

My OC is now a complete top without borders. I am thinking on the borders, which could take a day or two. I am first of all thinking if I want a small white border, or black, and if I want to incorporate my leftover little blocks in some way. For now, I'm just enjoying the finish of a step completed. For many, this is just a blip on their quilting experiences, but for me it was a challenge. Maybe, it will give me the desire to try some more, more difficult patterns.

By the way. I checked the bird nest, and the babies are gone. I'm sorry that I couldn't get some better pictures, but I'm glad that they were able to fly away.

Candace

Orange Crush

I am now the proud owner of half an OC, the one on the floor is the half that is done, and the one on the bed is ready to start sewing together. It is amazing the difference the lighting can make, they sure don't look like the same fabrics. It was a slow process for me, as my confidence level didn't allow me to stack things up and sew, so I did a seam, and then laid it back on the bed and positioned the next block, and so on and so on. It got a little confusing a couple of times even doing it that way, but when I finish, hopefully I will have conquered my fear of 'on point'. I measured it across the bottom (couldn't measure lengthwise yet), and it measured 64 inches, and I want it to hang down my queen sized bed on each side, so I am thinking I will need about 12 inches of borders on each side. I may try to incorporate my leftover little blocks, but mainly, it will be a black border, a blue border, and a lighter orange floral border. The blue and orange are here, if you click on the picture, it should get larger and you can see the fabrics.

Orange Crush and Sand Cranes Again

I have come to the conclusion that other than laziness, what is holding me up on my OC is fear. I have never done a quilt on point, and part of me wants to finish out the OC as given, but I've been trying to chicken out. Last night, I put some blocks on the bed straight set, and asked my husband if he thought he would like the orange in our room. He gave it the seal of approval, so I decided to go for broke, and do it Bonnie's way. I'm going to suck it up and do the on point. Bonnie says she lays it out and then does half at a time, so as I only have a small space, and no design wall, I am going to try to lay out half and sew it and then lay out the other half and sew it. I hope I'm not getting into more than I can chew. I'm not doing the border she recommended, although, I may use the leftover blocks in some adaptation of it.

Also, a lone sand crane made it back to our yard yesterday, and since my last pictures were so bad, I took some more. This time I made sure that my camera was on the correct setting. They are about 36 inches high (my estimate), and that is the road in front of our house behind him. I am going to try to get a picture of the baby birds today if I can get my husband to get out the ladder. I saw that they are actually still there a day or two ago. Hopefully, I won't be too late.

Vintage Thingies Thursday

At Confessions of an Apron Queen there is a 'Vintage thingies Thursday', and these are mine. My new old featherweight, my grandmother's and then my mother's blue canning jar, a quilt that my grandmother started, and my mother finished, an egg plate that I bought my mother for Christmas when I was a child, and a little Fairmont Dairy creamer from Omaha, that my aunt gave me.

Iowa Trip

We are back from our trip to Iowa, and even though it was for a sad reason (my mother's memorial service), it was a good trip, and we enjoyed seeing everyone. Last Thursday we started out by picking up my son, which was about a 3 hour round trip, so he could spend the night and then we got up at 3:00 AM Friday morning, and went to the airport. Our flights were good, and we flew into Kansas City and then drove about 3 hours to my niece's in Diagonal, Iowa. She had it set up with 3 RV's (hers, her SIL's, and the neighbors, Iowa people are very helpful), one for my DH and I and our 2 children, one for my oldest brother (who is younger than me) and his son, and one for my youngest brother and his 2 kids. She had a party going on for her son who was graduating from 8th grade so there was a crowd already.

The picture above is one I thought that some of you ladies who have jeans parts around, and like the country style might be interested in. They made a real cute valence, and the loops were already there, just a matter of cutting and arranging. This picture is from my niece's living room.
My youngest brother's daughter is a horsewoman, and so while we were there my niece's husband decided to bring his horses from their winter pasture to their yard. They have 3.5 acres in town. I was teasing my niece telling her about the blog, Confessions of a Pioneer Woman, and how she calls her husband the Marlboro Man, and telling her she had one of her own, but I was too late, as she said the guys at work already called him the Marlboro Man (he doesn't smoke either).
The dog is Gus. He is one of the best dogs I have been around, even I, who am afraid of most dogs felt comfortable around him. He seemed like a puppy, but is 5 years old. Nick, the Marlboro man says that he takes him bird hunting, and Gus is a natural. The hunters with well trained expensive bird dogs are jealous, as Gus usually is 1st to do whatever bird dogs do, and without training. The palamino, Nick raised from a colt, and I don't know if he is really not a smart horse or if the kids just don't give him credit for still being young, but his name is Blaze, and they call him blockhead. He was not happy at all to be kept from his pal. This is Nick and their 3 year old Logann, she is a fearless little girl.

The picture above is me, I usually don't do pictures, but this one wasn't as ugly as usual. Maybe because I have my hand in front of my face. The other picture is my DH. Kerri, my niece, has a beautiful yard, the little girl across the street says she is going to the park when she visits, and the weather was beautiful, so we spent a lot of time outdoors. It rained one time while we were there, a pretty windy storm, but their part of Iowa, so far has escaped the floods. There had been a small tornado a day or two before, outside of town, and we passed a little damage, but no one had been hurt.

This picture was on the way home. We passed a bunch of high tech looking windmills, and my daughter wanted me to take a picture.
It was a very nice trip, and we got home about 1:30 AM on Tuesday morning, took my son back home after we slept, and have been recupperating since then. I missed everybody, it's funny how attached you can get to people you haven't met.


P.S. My niece is pregnant, so I think she did very well with all that was going on. She had about 30 or more people at her house 2 days in a row. I gave my cousin the Crazy Big Block quilt, and she seemed to like it. I hope that she uses it a lot.
P.P.S. My daughter took the pictures of me, DH, and Gus. Also, when we got home it looked like the baby birds were gone. The nest is still there, so I hope that Mama Bird moved them.

Baby Birds and Poor Photography

No quilting today, we are getting ready for our short trip to Iowa. I decided to mow the yard again, and while I was out front the Trugreen guy came and did the bushes and trees. He asked me if I knew that I had some baby birds in the crepe myrtle by the driveway. I had no idea, and had just a few days ago been pulling the low branches off it, and would have gone up higher if I had had clippers on me. I'm glad I didn't, I probably would have hurt these babies. I had my husband bring me a ladder, so I could get above them and take pictures, but in my excitement, I guess I forgot the rule of halfway down for the macro and then pause. This is the best I can do until I get back though, as I don't want to disturb them anymore. I have seen mama, and I can't tell if she is a dove or a mockingbird, as she seems from a distance to be the color of a dove who has been around, but has a tail like a mockingbird. Sorry the pictures aren't better, I think there are 3 of them, and they seem to be hungry little critters. This kind of critter I don't mind, but the neighbor came by, and he said he had a black snake go in his house when he opened the door, and then luckily came back out and ran in the bushes. He thinks its a rat snake, so hopefully, he will get the rat I saw last weekend.

New Ironing Board and Giveaway

I finally got around to making my version of the 'big board' ironing board. Mine is 14x47 inches, and it is a big improvement over my little mini ironing board. I got a shelf from Ikea, and covered it with heavy duty foil, then covered that with a layer of cotton batting, which I stapled down so it would be permanent. Then I covered that with a layer of the silver ironing board cloth, which I taped down so that I could change it easily if necessary. I have also read that someone uses freezer paper, and then just keeps replacing that to keep the ironing board from getting nasty looking. I am going to try that as I have a box that I have had forever. I was going to use a 24x48 inch piece of pressed board, but that was very heavy, and this is pretty light so can be removed easily to cut big pieces of fabric. For small pieces, I have a small cutting board that I can just lay on top. At least, that is the plan.
The fat quarters below are a giveaway from Embroidery Treasures. Serena says you can sign up until June 16th by leaving a comment on her blog. It is only open to US residents.

Sand Cranes

I get very excited when we get lucky and the Sand Cranes visit our neighborhood. They are big birds probably at least up to my waist. They were here a couple of months ago with babies (probably about knee high), and my brother and I tried to get pictures but missed them. Today I was on my computer and looked out the window and there they were in my front yard. I grabbed my camera, and ran out, and got several pictures, but unfortunately when I came back in and loaded them on my computer they were all blurry. I had my camera on the wrong setting. Here is a link to see a good picture of a sand crane.

http://tinyurl.com/49lppx

You can click on him down at the bottom left.

Yard

The ridiculous is here, if you want to see the sublime, you have to go to Okperi's Place and see the pictures of her yard. We have been emailing back and forth, and she has requested pictures. Here are 2 of the emails:

From Me Your yard was the final straw. It looked so pretty, that I spent 3 hours working in mine today, and it is looking much better. I kept putting off weeding because I am afraid of critters, and I was waiting for help. It didn't come, and once I got started it wasn't too bad.
Although, the first thing I did was mow, and the first thing I saw near our garbage cans was a rat. Not an auspicious beginning for a chicken.

Here's hers Oh Candace, that is funny, lol. I know it really isn't but it is and I have to laugh. I think I would not work in the yard either if I saw a rat.
I am glad I gave you some inspiration, but if I were you, I would be unhappy that I felt like I had to do something, lol. I am still laughing, you have made my day!
Please post a picture so I can congratulate you on your blog lol.

There are also a couple of gratuitous flower pictures from after our rain today, so the crepe myrtles got a little beat up. And here is also another picture of a critter who stayed still long enough for his portrait to be taken. I pulled lots of weeds today, but there is still a lot of work to be done. It was a good start.