Glasses, and Mother

 Hi there friends it has been a hard day today. I got a lot of little stuff done yesterday in the sewing room, then today happened. I got nothing done, and I can only hope I get some stuff done tomorrow. I felt like I had not rested when I woke up this morning. You know that morning when you wake up and think is it nap time yet. So I got up anyway, I called the Dr. to see if I could come in and have her fill out a form for me for out insurance, and while I was there I needed to talk to her about some health stuff. They had an opening in 20 min. So I started getting ready, and poured my self a cup of coffee for the drive. BIG mistake!!! I spilled half of that cup of coffee all over the night stand and my cell phone was in the middle of it all. I did the rapid clean up with the phone and all the other stuff, so I could leave. When I got in the car I took the phone apart and pulled the battery. Good news it was dry inside. Sadly the two jacks were full of coffee and I had to get a Kleenex and dry them out. It seems to be fine, shew, so glad.
  Well, while I was at the Dr. I got a email from my husband telling me to go get my mom and go order my new glasses. So that is exactly what I did, I called mother and told her what I was planning to do and did she want to go for a ride with me. She was up for it she almost always is. LOL
  We went to Costco and I got the glasses ordered, then mother and I shopped for a while and checked out. We headed off to our favorite chinese place. That was our mistake. When we got there everything was fine and we got out of the car to go inside. I thought" I need to give mother a hand so she doesn't fall when she steps up on the curb." I put my hand out too late and down she went. Fortunately for me a couple came out  just about the time she was ready to get up, and helped me. She was in pain and pretty sure she broke her rib. I was kind of worried about her, but she can make that proverbial mountain out of a mole hill, so tried to ignore it at first. Don't get me wrong I was concerned, but just not ready to call EMS. Besides I had not had anything to eat and it was already 1, my stomach was more concerned with getting filled than getting to the hospital. We went ahead and had lunch, and I gave her some ibuprofen. I wanted her to figure out what really hurt before we made any decisions to go crazy. LOL Just kidding! After lunch she still felt like she had a broken rib, and we were just a few blocks from her Dr.s office, so we went there instead of shopping like we had planned . Sure enough she has a cracked rib. I sure was glad her Dr.s office took her. While we were there she got a flu shot, which she had not had. So to end this long story, I left here a little before 9am and got home just after 4:40pm , long day.
  So tomorrow, I will need to cook for the parents, and if there is time I will come home and quilt. Still, I have two finishes for the week, and that is a good thing.
Until I talk to yall again, have a very quilty weekend.
Tennye

More Things to Slow Me Down

  Well, as you might have guessed from the title I have had some problems today. I told you I was off to get stuff ready for a small craft fair, and I had to fill out the PDF for them and send it back . I was supposed to be able to do that digitally, however I could not figure out how, and my daughter was never here when I had time to get her help. Today was the last day, so I thought, well I will just print it and take it to her with the cash. Such is life,  since we have all gotten new laptops and they all have the new OS Windows 7. The printer is so old that the drivers are not compatible with the new OS. I spent too much time with that and then just gave up and went to my parents house and used their computer and printer. I fiddled with the other stuff for so long it was almost 4 this afternoon getting to the hospital to turn in the cash and the form. That meant I was close to 5 getting back home. Needless to say I got very little done today toward any sewing or crafting. I did get all the newest fat quarters ironed and ready to use, when I do get to the sewing room. I should have plenty of pictures to post in the next few days. I have some cute ideas and some fun stuff to work on, as well as the stocking I plan to make for the lady who is collecting them for the foster children in the system in her county.
  I thought you might like to see what the husband is working on for a change since I have not done anything photo worthy recently. This is for our new granddaughter. She is kind of on the top edge of the make believe play, but so far our granddaughters have all been that old when we get them. The grandson due in Dec. will be our first baby to join the family since his mother was born. It will be fun to play with him and I am sure we will be making many things for him as he grows up. 
  Well, I will head off to get ready for bed and until the next time yall have a very quilty week.

Tennye

I'm Here, Really I Am

  Well, I really am here and have even been around a few times, I just didn't have any time to write while I was here. I am happy to report that the two quilts I have been working on are finally done, and on their way to the lady who asked me to make them. She will be happy to get them and give them to her grandsons. I love the way they turned out and I am happy that they are completed.  I wish they had gotten done much sooner than they did, but I gotta tell you for what ever reason I have no real memory of Sept. It really bothers me, but I just don't know what happened in Sept.
  I have decided to give a craft show a whirl. Not a big one, just a table and it will be office hours one day only. I have almost all the left overs from the last big show I did, and I have an idea or two for a few little things to add to the inventory I already have. Nothing big since it will be in three weeks and I am leaving for a vacation the week of the fair. Then I have about four weeks before I leave for my daughters for the baby. In that time I have to complete the two king size t-shirt quilts before I leave. So I will be doing some prep work on those t-shirts in the evenings after I finish the work in the quilting room. I will need to stabilize them and cut them up. That will take some time, and then there is the process of figuring out what fabric I need to put between them for sashing. I also have some robes to embroidery for the wedding. You see the girl who wants me to make the t-shirt quilts is getting married about the time my new grandson will be born. She has been part of the family for a long time and I will miss the wedding.
Well, I need to get going, so yall have a very quilty week until I get back to you.
Tennye

Thoughts on today

  I have been thinking today about how much I love quilting and how slow I think I am at it. There is also the whole thought that if I would just be more consistent with my work, then maybe I would be almost as fast as some of you. I have been looking around again at other blogs, and some of them show such amazing work. How is it that some of you make a quilt or two a week?? I am in aww of those of you who do. I will be completing two and maybe if I can keep up the momentum three this week. The thing is I have been working on them all for months, not days or weeks.  One is waiting for binding, the next is ready to start quilting, and then I will bind it as well. Then maybe tomorrow I can pin baste the last one and finish it as well. Yea!!!! that will mean I can begin the next two that I need to have done before I leave for TN for the birth of my new grand baby. Those will be king size t-shirt quilts, one for a friends wedding gift for her new to be husband, and the other for her brother in law to be. My middle daughter will be going with me to TN and then when she leaves there she will go to Dallas for the wedding of this girl, I am making the quilts for. This lovely young lady has been my daughters best friend since they were in high school, but we have known her since they were in elementary school.
  I have a project I am working on I have mentioned it before. I am making a top for my daughter and I am having trouble making it fit. Some would pay big money for the size of ..... how do I say it with out being rude, chest that three of my girls have. I have been looking for a book to help me learn the process of fitting clothes. Adjusting patterns to fit any body size or type, seems to elude me. I used to be good at it, so, this frustrates me to no end.
  Well, if I am to complete the quilts I want to today and tomorrow I must go and get busy. I need to go to the mail box and since I have to go out I will go get coffee too. The girls will go to girls night so I will be alone tonight and I can quilt while they are gone. Until the next time, yall have a very quilty week.
Tennye

Such a Week

  Well, here it is only Mon. evening and I can't believe it has been such a crazy week already. Does that mean that it will go on for the remainder of the week, well maybe. My darling husband sent me an email this afternoon and told me he would be at work until at least 1AM. Now he usually works his full time job from 12:30 PM to 9:30 PM and he has a side business doing odd jobs for people. He enjoys that work much more than his regular full time job, but it obviously does not provide insurance. We both have some problems that require we take medications on a regular basis. I was off of anything for almost a year. Then recently I was diagnosed with a thyroid problem that means I have to take med.s daily. Hubby has high blood pressure and high cholesterol and takes med.s for both. I wish he could quit the "real" job too, but such is life. He has it all figured out when he can retire, and I try to stay as healthy as I can so he can when the time comes. LOL
  I have not had the time to work in the sewing room very much, but did get a bag finished for my granddaughters birthday. That is tomorrow, and I have already told her it will be late, but to expect is soon. She will be 14 I think, I have trouble remembering the ages. Her sister will be 16 in Dec. and I am pretty sure she is 2 years older. Now it sounds like I am a bad grandmother, but I have only known her for 6 years. I put her mom up for adoption when she was born and we met in 2005. I am so happy to have them in my life, as I sure never thought I would. So tomorrow I will try very hard to get in the sewing room and stay there for a long time. I want three quilts finished by Fri. all they need is to be quilted and bound and that has been put off for too long already.
  I will do my best to get back on a more regular time frame than I have been lately. Yall have a very quilty week.
Tennye

Why Do You Quilt? 2

  Okay well, this time I am asking myself why it is I quilt, and what drives me? I was raised in a home with quilts around me all the time. Even if they weren't on our beds, which most of the time they were, they were around.
  This is my favorite and the one that was on my bed most of the time. I didn't want to try and take a picture of the whole thing, so here is just a corner. My great grandmother on my mothers , dads side did the piecing and embroidery for the blocks. She gave my mom the quilt and my grandmothers sister pieced the sashing and put it all together. Then the three of them Mother, grandmother and Aunt Ina Lee quilted it together. I don't use it daily any more, let me show you why.

I know it is a little blurry but the embroidery stitching is wearing off on some of the blocks. I am not a hand embroiderer and don't know how to fix that part. Other than that is is also beginning to get small holes in the cotton fabric and where they are the batting is missing.Once upon a time I thought I might try and duplicate it so I would have one on my bed. I created a pattern from the original blocks and started looking for the fabrics to make it. At that time I didn't realize that I could do the embroidery on my machine, by using a satin stitch. I was thinking I needed to do it all by hand. I gave up, on the idea at the time. Now I may be revisiting the idea. I am a much better quilter and I know more about how to manipulate my machine.
  Well, as I said there were other quilts that I saw daily , but this one was mine so I have it, and mother and daddy still have the other ones. Also I slept on the baby quilt my Aunt had for my cousin when I was at her house. That one was a colonial sunbonnet sue. Some day I may get that one and take some pictures and try to remake it as well. I would have to say that little quilt has had as much influence over me as any that were in my home. So much did I love that quilt I thought it was mine, and would fight the cousins if one of them tried to use it.

  Okay, I am off for today and wishing each of you a very quilty week, until I get back to you.
  You think she will want to quilt too??? LOL
Tennye

Friends swap

  Well, I have had a great week, for a change and thought I would share that with all of you. I told you about the swap I did with a lovely lady in the UK. She has let me know she got her box of goodies so I am free to show you what I sent her now.
 As I told you before the items sent needed to start with the letters for the word, FRIENDS . So to start with F, is fortune cookie, I made of fabric and used my machine to create the fortune of "fun is in your future"

 I am always trying to challenge myself, and I am not particularly good at paper piecing, so that is what I did. The Flamingo is a post card size paper pieced mini quilt. I actually had fun making this one, I guess I am maybe getting a little better at it. The pink ribbon you see here is a key fob. Kind of a out dated way to say key chain. My girls have all had me making them for them, so why not, make one for her.

  As it turns out I either didn't take some of the pictures I thought I did or they didn't turn out and I deleted them. I did get some of the little bag I made, though. It isn't big enough to be the sewing kit it was going to be, which would have been an S.

   Here it is closed up with the decorative tie I found in my box of decorative stuff.
I found a pattern for this and it was cute, but I thought I want to make it on my own, without their pattern. So I used my 45 degree triangle ruler and make the large and small sized then I put a backing on them so I would not need any hems. I loved the fabrics and she is using it for a jewelry case for travel and I think that is the neatest thing in the world.

The floral fabrics you see in the lower left corner are part of the fabrics I used to wrap each of the boxes, their is a matching green fabric too. The blue and white is a shall I sent her with a snowflake embroidered on the pockets.  You can also just barely see the red eyelet trim I also used as a flower for a bow on the top of one of the boxes.

I enjoyed this so much and I am so happy that my partner also enjoyed it and is enjoying the things I found to send to her.
F- fortune cookie, flamingo, frame, flash light, fob
R- riting tool ( Pen) Kind of a stretch 
I- ity-bity screwdriver
E- eyelet trim
N-notions (thread) note pads, note books
D-dress trims
S-scissors
I meant to add a seto fo dice, since that is one of my silly little collections, and I thought it would be good to share, but I forgot them . There are other things, but to be honest I can't remember what all there was. LOL
  Well, I hope you all have such a lovely quilty week. We have finally had rain, not just a smattering, almost 3 full inches over the weekend. Yea!!!
Tennye

Good Evening,

  Well, I had thought I would like to really whine about something that happened this weekend at the quilt show. Then I got on and started reading posts from some of you and it made me feel better so I changed my mind. I decided venting was counter productive, and I want to go for productive instead. ;)
  This week is Aften's birthday and she took the week off work, so this morning after she got home from the gym she and I went to run errands. I told her I would take her to lunch and she could pick where we went. We had a lovely lunch and when the bill arrived I grabbed my purse and ........... no wallet. Suddenly I couldn't remember where I had used it last. We came home and searched my van, since that was where I thought I used it last. No wallet there either. So we came into the house and started searching some more. I came to the living room and started praying and thinking. Suddenly I remembered that I used it at the post office when I mailed the package for the swap I signed up for. I did not take my purse into the post office, I put the boxes in my quilted bag, with my wallet and my phone. Sure enough we went in my bedroom and there was my wallet in that bag. Wheww, crisis averted. However now I owe my lovely daughter a lunch since she paid for today's. I think I have shown you the bag I am talking about, I would post a picture of it but I am not sure I have one on this computer. I may have one in my google photo storage, but I don't know how to retrieve it .
  So until next time yall have a very quilty week.
Tennye

Quilt Show Saturday

  Hello there friends, what a weekend it has been. Aislynn and I went out on Fri. night while Aften went out on a date. Then on Sat. Aislynn went off to a ladies retreat to help lead worship for the weekend. Aften and I got up so that we would be ready when her friend and her son came by to leave some stuff for me to work on for her wedding in Dec. Then we headed out for breakfast and off to the quilt show.  Then we did some shopping at the hardware store, and off to the grocery store. We were having a party so we needed food. Then home to get the rest of the house clean and start cooking. This was a kind of small party since we didn't decide to have it until Sat. Lots of people already had plans and others had plans all day and were just too tired. We had good food and it was fun, even though it was a small party.
I am not sure which guild it was that put this Quilt show on, but it was fairly small. I almost felt like they had more vendors than they did quilts. Any way I took some pictures of the ones I really liked. I admit some of them were in the vendor booths. Does that mean I plan to try and duplicate them? No, I may want to, but lets face it, even if I did, when would I have time to do all this designing. Because that would be the case, I would have to draft the blocks so I could size them . I must admit if I was going to go to all that much work, I would not want it to be from someone else design. I am not posting any of the ones from shops here, seems like that might be the wrong thing to do.
Here are some of the quilts I loved the most. I am not sure if you will notice, but the ribbons on the ones with awards are attached with tiny mini quilts, that are amazing.  

 Isn't that an amazing chili pepper, and of course the Yellow Rose of Texas is pretty amazing as well.

This last one is a Breast Cancer quilt. I just love these red high heels, and I wish I had thought about this one. I don't know if I would have ever gotten them made, but wow, they look so pretty.
Well, I am off for this time and will try to get back on soon. Until then have a very quilty week.
Tennye