lime green and turquoise

pucker up, buttercup ... and
give a little whistle!

so ... sew already

last night was the Friday Night Sew-In for february ... and i didn't make any plans this time ... yeah ... i decided to not decide ... go with the flow ... let the dice fall where they may ... let fate decide ... and guess what?!? that doesn't work for me, either!
i wandered about aimlessly for an hour ... and then i baked some cookies ... by the time WWE was on i knew that piecing was out of the question due to the roar of the crowd coming from the magick shoppe where Auntia was working on her BOM blocks ... so i closed the door to my room and put An Echo in the Bone disc 6 in the player ... then i picked up Morgana's Apothecary and started stitching ...

i stitched and stitched and stitched ... through 5 cds worth of Davina Porter telling me the story ... at 1 in the morning i was stabbing my fingers more often than not - the bats and the potions would have to keep till this evening ...... i just finished the last of the french knots...morgana's materia medica
this is what it looked like before the sew-in...
my roof's got a hole in it
i'll be happy to put this one away ... this is the fourth Hocuspocusville block that i've finished ... i have eight more blocks to stitch ... i think i will take a break from them for a while even though i didn't work on Morgana's Apothecary for three months - she was missing in action because i am kinda weary of DMC #3371 and my fingers are sick to death of being stabbed by that sharp little dagger of an embroidery needle ...... last week i managed to finish the machine quilting on Mr. Husker's Homestead...mr. dinner maker and his herd of cash cows
a very special little buffalo just for my brother-in-law - the Husker fan
when i took it off the frame and started to trim it i became quite ill ... pounding head and angry stomach ... the same thing happened when i trimmed Born to be Wild ... i dunno why ... it could be because i spread quilts out on the floor to make the trimming cuts and leaning over them makes me sick ... or maybe because it scares the beejeebies out of me to take a rotary cutter and whack away at something that is so close to being finished ... anywho ... the binding is machine-sewn to the front and it's waiting for me to hand stitch it down on the back ... maybe i'll start on it tomorrow ...... but now i'm gonna go watch Legend of the Seeker even though the stories are wrong, wrong, wrong and munch another cookie or two

please, Mr. Custer

i didn't wanna go ... but i went ... and i gotta say i did better than the 7th cavalry...blue and white ... fight fight
i'm a hair twister when i get nervous ... and lemme tell ya i had a fist full wrapped around my fingers which makes it really hard to sew before i finished the chicago pavement block ... but it turned out okay ... and i'm not bald ... yet

i don't wanna go

the paper-pieced BOM meeting was nine days ago...

i think they put the pink flamingo pitcher up high so i wouldn't break it
we were greeted by those blocks ... up there ... on the design wall ...... i dunno why the design wall is grey - it washes out everything and makes colors look flat ...... anywho, there were those little red and white blocks and the swatches of blue and white fabrics staring at us with evil looks...
wee, wicked little blocks
and Sheri demonstrated how to start putting the blocks together with the blue and white fabrics ... she strongly urged us all to buy a boo boo kit (band aid included) for when not if we mess up ... Auntia had her notebook and spiral and page protectors all together and took notes like she was working on a degree or sumpin and i sat there with the pencil that she loaned me and an index card that came with the first kit and muttered ...... later on we took our book and our foundation papers to copy the pages that we need so far ... i don't think Mr. Kinko is gonna let us back in the store cuz his copiers do not like foundation paper not one little bit ...... Auntia has already named her quilt and has replaced some of the fabric with her own choices and has the first block made ... i'm not gonna show any of her stuff cuz it makes me look bad and she's gonna blog about it someday ... so i guess i oughta take this stuff...not very inspiring, is it?
and make an attempt ... please Mr. Custer, i don't wanna go*


*for the lyrics to this incredibly politically incorrect song go here

boot scooter

i filmed this a couple of months ago ... LuLu's take on the boot scootin' boogie...

she was my little swiffer duster for a couple of weeks ... now she crawls like other babies which isn't nearly as entertaining and is much less effective at gathering up dust bunnies

warning!

too late for me ... i've been megged ... by Gretchen at Stella Bella

go here and here

just when i thought i was over Jason
Yenter's Eclectic Garden

sigh ... my heart is all aflutter


did i meg you?

ID ten t error

for the past couple of weeks i've been working on quilting Mr. Husker's Homestead ... i quilted a herd of birds in the sky ... snowflakes on the mountains ... pine cones on the log cabin trees ... a flock of deer...doe ... a deer ... a female deer ... or threehey girls ... i'm over here!look out for that deer!
the light isn't good enough to really see the deer - but they are there ... then i moved on down to the willow trees and the lake, quilting leaves and fish and a couple water birds and a frog ... next up was a turkey and some corn stalks in the stack of hay bales ... some veggies in the garden ... and a couple of tools in the woodpile ... and then i quilted some fireworks in the tall pine trees and a bird nest in the big tree ... and i rolled the top and backing and batting forward ... what the?!?i know better

when i removed the bamboo batting from its bag, i didn't measure it to make sure that i was placing the 90" side at the top of the frame and the 108" sides on the sides ...... and now the batting is too short for the length of the quilt ...... the technical term is an ID ten t error

id10t

how much longer?!?

the required block for SS3 BOM at TQS is finished...groan
and i keep asking myself how much longer till this BOM is over???
i like the blocks
i hate the fabric that i chose
i like getting a free black fat quarter every month
i'm not crazy about working with templates
it is good to meet other people with like interests
it is not good to hear quilters pick pick pick other quilters' choices and techniques

some saturday morning i'm gonna bring the portable DVD player and make More Than a Gardener and Peggy Perfect watch Bambi ... anywho ... tomorrow is the first meeting for the next Saturday Sampler - it is paper-pieced blocks from Sylvia's Bridal Sampler ... i had to decide whether or not i wanted to commit to another saturday morning each month for a year ... i had to chose between red/white or blue/white ... and i will have to decide whether or not to buy extra fabric for the goofs i will (inevitably) make - actually, that's a given - mistakes will be made and i'll have no one else to blame and extra fabric will come home with me ... i had the book spiraled it took my Kinko guy 4 minutes and 17 seconds which is a new record and i told him there would be a little sumpin' extra on his paycheck - ha ha ha!!! so it will lay flat for copying ... the paper-pieced BOM is so popular with TQS customers that they've opened up an additional meeting ... Sheri has promised that it is easy and fun and that she will walk the walk and talk the talk

Mrs. Rabbit: Thumper!
Thumper: Yes, Mama?
Mrs. Rabbit: What did your father tell you this morning?
Thumper: If you can't say somethin' nice ... don't say nothin' at all.

yesterday

all my troubles seemed so far away ... wait ... no they didn't ... they were right here smacking me in the face like they always do ... anywho ... yesterday was my birthday and now i am plenty-eight ... again ... it's been ten years since i've been plenty-eight ... and before that it was another ten years ... when Auntia learned to count to 100 she asked her preschool teacher when she was gonna learn the plenty's ... we had to have a parent-teacher conference about that ... anywho ... Auntia baked me a cake...that lights up...in the dark...and i ate birthday pancakes...with Land O'Lakes butter and 100% pure Canadian maple syrup ... because i'm worth it

and one morning last week my sister showed up at my door with my favorite great-niece Itty Bitty and donuts...yep - the box is empty
and there were phone calls telling me how old i am and one from my mother asking me if i was mad at her for the gift of life (what the?!?!) and a couple emails and some cards and presents...yes ... yes that is a cowboy with no shirt on and he has one thing on his mind - a tasty pan of really hot biscuits ... and there is a moo-shoe pig in there somewhere, too
i've wanted a prayer drum every since i watched The Karate Kid II ... and i'll be able to grow my own dragon ... and feed it pink sno balls ... and i was given lottsa hugs from my favorite little people
getting older is such a blessing
it really beats the alternative
any time after 54 is gravy, baby!