To the dump. To the dump. To the dump, dump, dump!

After many, many years of putting off the inevitable we cleaned out the storage room on Mill St yesterday. It was totally amazing, sort of like a clown car type of experience.

I wish I had thought to take a photo showing what it looked before. Suffice it to say that it was to the point of opening the door, throwing something in and shutting the door quickly. There were 6 of us and it took us 2 hours. Not bad.

First we took everything out. Oh my! I think the space is about 12' X 20'.

So after filling Joan's truck to the brim for the dump, Debbie's van for Goodwill, Sharon's van for the shop, Micki's cute little convertible trunk with quilts and my car for my house, we are done!! Doesn't it look great??? The boxes in the center are documents to be shredded.

In just a few short hours...

SO much can happen. Yesterday I realized the if Joshua and I were going to dye Easter eggs it would have to be that afternoon. When I picked Joshua up at school I told him we were going to dye eggs and also plant our 2 tomato plants, 1 cherry and 1 Celebrity. He was very excited.

We got all of the egg dying paraphernalia together and he decided to color them before he dyed the eggs. So he was busy coloring while I was getting things set up. He did a great job, as you can see. If you look at his hands you can see the progression of dye migrating.

Cool! Look what happens when you "accidentally" drop the egg in.

Who needs to use the spoon when I have opposable thumbs???

I don't think this dye is permanent...


Next we moved outside to plant our two tomato plants. Porsche was very interested, as you can see.






As you can see Joshua did a great job!


Now this is when all of the trouble started. Joshua and I got the hose and I turned it on very low. He watered the plants and did a fine job. I held the hose while Joshua went to turn it off. It seems that Joshua didn't know which way to turn the hose and turned it the wrong way! The water was pouring out and Porsche freaked out. She was running around trying to catch the water and getting more and more wet. We got the water off and then tried to catch Porsche. She was running everywhere getting all of those VERY irritating little oak tree pollen thingys all stuck in her hair AND then she went over and rolled and rolled in the mulch. Next it was back in the house to try to get the trash out of Porsche's hair and it was quite a pain. It took about 15 minutes. Joshua was really excited and was squealing the whole time and begging to get in the tub with her. We got all clean and I blow dried Porsche then we sat down calmly and watched the end of Chicken Little. Whew!

When Jesse came to pick Joshua up I decided to try the hat I knitted on Joshua. It looked pretty cute and was my first attempt at knitting on the double needles. The mittens? Well these were one pair of 4 1/2 pairs we found in the den!

Celebration of Life

Today was Joshua's birthday party at school. Instead of calling it a birthday party it is called a Celebration of Life. All of the children in the class, except for the birthday boy/girl. sit in a big circle. Joshua sat in a chair outside of the circle. The teacher put a tray in the center of the circle and on the tray was a large white candle with several smaller candles and a dish of sand. Around this she places pieces of paper with the months of the year on them in order. Then she asks Joshua questions about the earth and sun and how many days it takes the earth to go around the sun etc. Then she lights the center candle. Next she asks about being one year old and what you remember and/or did. He has to go to the circle of candles and walk slowly around them while the children all say the months of the year in order.

Then she lights one of the smaller candles. It continues like this until all of the candles are lit and then they sing Happy Birthday.

Then he puts all of the candles out.

It was really neat and he was embarrassed by the attention and kept trying to hide behind me. Once he even fell on the floor on his head. His teachers are so great and seem to take everything in stride.

Next he got to pick something from the "treasure chest" because he had gotten the certain number of stickers it takes to get something from the treasure chest. Apparently it is a big deal!

Next it was home to Granny and Granddaddy's house for a hug from Porsche and our little birthday party.

We got him a cream filled choc covered donut and had 5 candles on it.

Then he opened presents.

Grandaddy is so funny...

Grandaddy helped put the bionicles together. They are new easier with only about 12-14 pieces each.

Sunday is his big party. I am really glad we had the quiet party.

Congrats to Connie, Dallas Show and more

This month Connie was in Des Moines, Iowa at the Rep Rally for APQS American Quilting Systems for classes and training Connie was awarded the Top salesman award for the company.
I asked her what her thoughts were and she said, "This is a job that I JUST LOVE!!!! I feel so fortunate everyday that I get to come to Quilt Country, work with so many incredible women and share my passion and love for quilting."

Congratulations to Connie Keller for receiving top honors at the APQS Rep Rally!! We are very proud of her and all that she has accomplished since she began representing APQS at Quilt Country.

Our new Quilt Country rulers by Creative Grid arrived this week. They are SO cute! The ruler is 2 1/2" X 6 1/2", the perfect size for carrying to retreats or classes and also just to have hear your machine for paper piecing or checking seam allowances or the size of that piece that just doesn't seam right. They sell for $6.25 and are the great quality of all of the rulers we love from Creative Grids.

The Dallas show is coming up, fast!!! The dates are March 13, 14, and 15. If you haven't ever been you should do your best to go. It is a great show and there are a lot of beautiful quilts of all types and also lots of vendors.

They also have a live mini auction on Saturday of the show every year. It is really great and the minis are so cute!! I made one this year, it is a bull's eye, 16" X 20".

This weekend we have two classes that I want to tell you about. On Saturday Joan will be teaching the Bella, Bella Bargello. A photo of her quilt is below. The photo doesn't do it justice!

Then on Sunday Debbie will be teaching the Strip-a-Rama class. This is a class, held once a month, designed to help you use those great fabrics in your stash. Below are photos of the design you will be learning this month.

Wurggling

Porsche is getting more and more brave outside. At first she stayed right next to us when we took her out but now she wanders and just sits there when we call her to come in. If we head toward the door she still just sits there but when we go in she runs as fast as she can, which, by the way, is pretty darn fast!

I am trying to get a video of her stalking in the monkey grass. It is so cute! She is really into wurggling right now.

Our newest family member

Saturday we drove to Houston to get our new puppy. She is a Havanese, not a very common breed and that is why we had to drive to Houston to pick her up. I have been researching dogs that don't shed much for over a year. Her hair is like human hair, with no undercoat, and this breed sheds about as much as a human does. The hair feels like long Minkee, which we all know is sooooooo wonderfully soft. We named her Porsche, or should I say my husband, Tony, named her. I was thrilled that he was thinking of names and I didn't really have a name for her so Porsche it is. He named her for his favorite car. It is a cute name and we spell it a little differently than the common spelling, Portia.

She weighs 3.8 pounds and is about 14" long and 8" tall. When she is grown she will weigh about 12-14 pounds. Porsche is very energetic, like all puppies, and loves to walk right beside you and I mean RIGHT beside you. The nick name for this breed is "The Velcro Dog". I can certainly see where they got this nick name. I think she is very intelligent and possibly smarter than we are because she seems to be holding out for hamburger. ;-/ I am confident we will win in the end but between the eating (or should I say not eating), playing and the potty training it is a full time job. Hmmmm, seems like there could be a lot of "I told you so" comments right here. It is almost like having a baby but you can leave them all night, if you can stand the crying. It is so amazing how loud such a itsy-bitsy, tiny puppy can be. The moment you put her in the play yard she starts and it is LOUD!

I will keep you posted on our progress.

Here she is on her first night home.

Here she is on her batik flannel blanket. (Being a member of the Quilt Country family, she had to have batik blankees!)

Playing with Joshua on the kitchen floor.

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.