We're Ready

Yesterday and today we were busy getting ready for the big sale at Quilt Country this weekend. The batiks are right at the entrance of the shop and look so pretty. It will be hard to say goodbye to them. I took some photos this afternoon. I doubt that they will look this way very long. I also took some photos of our florals.

Batiks, YUM!!

I just love batiks, don't you? We have been working with batiks a lot lately. The employees at QC and also the group of retreat friends I belong to are working on birthday blocks. They are so pretty! We could choose from 4 color ways and we will receive 25+ blocks on our birthday. Some of us in both groups will get over 50 blocks! Last year we made a sawtooth star block and this year it is a churn dash. Below are some of the ones I have made so far. Tony and I are really excited to be adding a new member of our family. Her name is Porsche (Tony named her) and we will be picking her up THIS Saturday. She is just the cutest thing! Porsche is a Havanese and will be 8 weeks old. Below is a baby photo and also one of her a few weeks ago. Isn't she cute? I guess I am a bit prejudiced.

One of my friends, and a former Supergirl, Barb McCraw is going to begin teaching at Quilt Country. Another friend, Teresa Sherling will be co-teaching the classes with Barb. They are two very talented ladies. For some time they have been teaching a Baltimore album class in Denton. We have heard rave reviews on the class and also the pattern. They are also teaching several other classes with techniques that we are all interested in, paper piecing, 3D folded flowers and several others.

We are also working on several new patterns. One of them is called Eclipse. The quilt uses a curved piecing technique. The curve is very gentle and easy to sew. Paula made the beautiful model below. We are making several kits in different color ways. The quilt is pictured in the green/purple color way and the cool and warm kits are pictured below. We are also working on the kit for the bright/multi kit which is lots of fun! The main problem for me...which one to choose???

Cool batik kit

Warm batik kit

Holiday treats or why you should never flush jellied cranberry sauce down the toilet!

OK, after Thanksgiving I took all of my “fat” food up to the store and the girls have been eating on it for a few days. A few days later I tossed the leftovers but the really juicy ones I thought would be better flushed. We don't have a disposal at work and they were to liquidy to go in the trash bag. So I got two containers flushed and then it was time for the sliced, jellied cranberry sauce. The slices just perfectly fit in the hole in the toilet. The toilet started filling up, I took the lid off of the back and stopped the flow of water. All the time I am sort of yelling. Judy and Micki came running. We couldn’t even use the plunger because the water was at the top edge. So Judy scooped most of the water out and then we used the plunger. It just made each slice of cranberry sauce pop up. I reached in and got them and then we did another slice. We were laughing so hard they heard us in the front of the shop. It all worked out fine and I am SO glad the bathrooms were cleaned at lunchtime that day!

Vacation, Darth Vader and ornament

The past week some friends and I went on a vacation together. My brother has a wonderful condo on Anna Maria Island in Florida. What a beautiful location! There were 8 of us and it was so much fun. I highly recommend taking a vacation with friends if possible. There are a lot of photos at the links below, a lot!

http://krissysquilting.smugmug.com/

http://sannton.smugmug.com/

http://ocarol.smugmug.com/

This is a photo of me kissing the manatee on the Anna Maria sign. It is such a fun sign.

Four of us went parasailing. It was so great. We were on an 800 ft. line 500 ft. above the water. Then as you are coming in for a landing the dunk your feet in the water. I was a little worried about the taking off and landing but it was actually very easy!

Krissy was attacked by the man eating plant. ;-D Just kidding. Krissy is a really great photographer and has a knack of taking awesome and also funny photos.

The family came later and we all went to Disney World for 2 days. It was Joshua's first trip to DW. What fun. He is a bit taken with Star Wars right now and he got to actually fight Darth Vader! Too cool! I was so afraid they weren't going to choose him but he was the last one chosen so, whew! Below is a link to see him actually fighting Darth Vader with his purple light saver, ummmm I mean light saber. (he insists that it is a light saver)

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=XGy8Ph0R-TA

I have been busy making Christmas ornaments. Not quite finished. The really wonderful "Merry" by Patrick Lose inspired me. I am thinking of a wire hanger with a bead or two twisted onto the wire.

Pumpkin Patch

Saturday Joshua and I went to the Pumpkin Patch. It is a local place that has a fun, fall, free-for-all for kids each year. We stayed about 2 1/2-3 hours, which was a pretty long time for Granny! There were 6 bounce houses, 2 mazes made from hay, a merry-go-round, hay ride and the MOST copyright infringements I have ever seen in one place. As you can see from the movie below there is Mickey, Madagascar, and the Backyardigans. Also on display was Star Wars, Dora, Sesame Street, Ratatouille and lots, lots more.

Joshua had his first snow cone. He decided on grape but then noticed there was a guy with a blue one. He asked what flavor that was and I told him coconut. He lets me know that coconuts are brown. It is hard to argue with that type of logic.

WOW!!!

It was a crazy day at the shop. Since we are getting ready for the garage sale it was sort of busy and distracting all day. We also saw and ordered some beautiful new fabrics. Check out the garage sale photos below!

Linda stopped in and showed us two quilts she has been working on. They are both beautiful. This first photo is a king sized quilt made from silk ties. They are really pretty. She used a fusible interfacing on the back to keep them from unraveling.

The quilt below are blocks from a swap we did. Her quilt is stunning. She has an embroidery machine and embroidered beautiful blocks which she placed in between the swap blocks. Linda is one talented lady!

This beautiful block below is one of the larger embroidered blocks Linda made. Beautiful!

I wanted you to see a preview of the garage sale stuff!! IT IS AMAZING.

Serendipity!

I spent this past week visiting my mom and my brother in Georgia. It was a wonderful visit and we celebrated my brother's birthday where I also got to see both of my nephews, 2 aunts and a cousin.

I left to come home yesterday and when I got to the gate at the Atlanta Airport there was an exhibit there called Found Objects Transfigured. It was awesome and at the time it didn't occur to me that there was more of the exhibit in the airport. Time was very short and I was trying to take a few photos with my phone, keep an eye on my stuff and watch my coffee while they were starting to board my flight. I took one of the small catalogs near the display, which was behind glass, and when I looked at it on the plane I realized that there were several displays in the airport that I missed! Susan Shie has a piece in this exhibit but it wasn't near my gate so...

I have checked the web and can't really get a link with photos to give you but I will post my blurry, glarry, not so great photos anyway. If you are in the Atlanta Airport through August be sure to check out this exhibit in the T Gates area.

This one is by Jane Burch Cochran and called Rabbit Hash. There is amazing detail but of course you can't really tell in my photos.

This amazing "postage stamp" quilt is made with real postage stamps. I am so sorry I didn't get the name of the artist. It was really pretty too.

This piece is also by Jane Burch Cochran and I didn't get the name of the piece. It has a lot of yo-yos which I find amusing because it seems to me that most people do not like to make yo-yos and find them well...tacky and dated. Again sorry for the blur.

This really interesting piece is by Gordon Chandler. It is made from an old wooden hand truck. I thought it would look especially great in my friend Carol's back yard.