Thanks again, Laura!



My sister, Laura, took a few photos of each of us girls a few years ago.  These are my photos.  Sometimes when I look at them, I'm surprised by how much I look like my sisters, even the ones who, in my mind at least, looked very different from me.  I always thought of myself as looking like my mom's family, while some of us look more like daddy's family.  Strange how now I'm think we all look the same, but I'm not sure which side of the family anyone favors. 

 

I needed to load one photo to a webpage that I can easily access, and what easier access do I have than my own blog?  So, feel free to skip on by.  It's quite alright that you may not want to look at photos of me.  At least I am dressed up and my hair looks like I bothered with more than a ponytail.  And let's just admit it....I was a few pounds thinner!

 

Give Laura credit, she did the best she could with the model she had.  I might note that I am not a good model: my ADD tendencies wanted to kick in and drive an already over-extended photographer right over the edge.  She handled me well, though.  I'd have probably sent me away, but no, she insisted that behave, which is about the only way to handle me!

I don't have a favorite, but I'll bet she does.  She is quite good at seeing every detail and choosing a best photo by eliminating those with the tiniest issues.

Did you get any quilting or sewing done today?  I didn't, again.  This teaching full-time is really eating into my fun times! 

 

Pin It Wednesday #8

It's a Wednesday, and I remembered!  Go me!  After seriously the negatives of posting pictures from Pinterest, I just can't seem to help myself.  I think I'll spend just a minute on Pinterest and an hour later, I'm still pinning.  I may as well share my pins, right?

Let's start with basket quilts.  There are some beauties out there!




Aren't these sewing basket blocks just too cute?  I'm thinking they will make great inspiration blocks for a larger wall hanging for the sewing studio. 

How about some fun craft ideas.  Understand that I pin craft ideas that I really like and would consider actually attempting.  It's one of the few boards that I've created for my own needs.

Directions for the wall hanging above: shoe box lids, scrapbook paper, modge podge, letters, ribbon, and a curtain rod.....change out what it says with seasons.  It would work well for a child's room, don't you think?  I like that the box lids are different sizes but are all evenly lined up along the bottom.

This plate is one of my favorite ideas.  Simply write on the plate with a Sharpie marker then bake in the oven at 150 degrees for 30 minutes.  It's permanent and safe to use.

The basket on the left is called a "bagsket," which I take to mean half bag, half basket.  Regardless, it's just as cute as can be.


Finally, one of my favorite patterns is the Dresden plate pattern, so naturally I have a board just for Dresdens.  I've found so many, though, that I couldn't show them all even if I were to post only Dresdens.
   
            
Happy Quilting,
Mary

Valentines for Vets, St. Jude and AAQI

I managed a few things today.  Unfortunately none of them had anything to do with quilts or quilting.  :-(  very sad face, indeed.  But there were a few high points: we bought a new computer!  Definitely a high point! 

We had to run to WallyWorld for a few things, including a charger for the small computer we've had for a while.  The puppies chewed the charger wire and the grandchildren played games on it whilst pulling on said wire.  In the end we were worried about someone getting a charge from it. I tried to fix it but managed instead to pull the tip completely off the wire.  Oh well. 

We put the darn thing away and now, months later, we decide the older computer is too close to cardiac arrest.  We can't chance being completely without social media: we are civilized people, after all.  Where might one purchase a computer charger, groceries, birthday gift and cat food?  In this town, no place.  A few burgs over, though is good ole Walmart.  Not a fancy supercalafragalistic Walmart, but we needed stuff, not fancyschmancy.  Off we go.

Wait, there's a part of the story I forgot to mention.  We've lost the small computer.  We put it away, remember?  Yes, well, it's WELL put away.  It's so well put away that we don't know where else we might look. 

I've looked in all the places Richard has looked, and he proved me correct by checking those places again.  I distinctly remember his taking the computer away from a pair of three year old hands attached to a redhead.  He remembers handing the computer to me after rescuing it. 


Neither of us remembers where any one put the stupid little thing.  So we didn't buy a charger; we bought a whole computer.  The whole, entire package!  Well, almost. 

We got the processor and the memory, just not any programs worth mentioning.  Now I need to cough up another paycheck for a program so I can write those lovely lesson plans that I so enjoy creating.  If I knew how, I'd "borrow" the programs from the computer with the broken heart.  Alas, I don't, and her blood supply is much too weak anyway. 

 Another accomplishment: I took pictures of the little AAQI quilts.  Not pretty outside pics as I had hoped, but do I ever get pretty pictures?  Not really. 

While I had the camera out, I also snapped a few pictures of the cards and activity booklets that the Beta students made while at convention last week. In the end we have about 50 activity booklets for preteens and teens at St. Jude's Children's Hospital and about 375 Valentines for Vets that I'll send to VA health centers in our state. 

Betas in my English classes created the activities and games which I copied onto colored paper.  The Betas at convention put the booklets together and decorated them. 

My Betas also provided colored paper, markers and stickers for Beta members to make the valentines.  I'm always impressed by how many valentines they make in the one day that the service project room is open.  Of course, we do have 5,000 or so teenagers at convention, but only about 60 can fit into the service project room at any given time, and the room is open only between general sessions. 

I'll leave you with a collage of the three AAQI quilts although it's awfully small, but at 12.05 in the morning, it's beginning to look much better than it did three hours ago when I started this post.  I have no idea where the time went, except to say that most of it was spent uploading literally 1000 pictures to find the three I needed and creating the collage.  It's insane how long it takes to figure out a program like Picasa.  And I still can't make the collage larger in Blogger.  Oh well, enough already, goodnight!

Until tomorrow.
Happy Quilting,
Mary

Computer Cries

Ever get a scary message from your computer?  I get one about every 10 minutes.  It done for, I'm afraid.  We squeak by day by day, but it won't be long before I'll have to cough up the money for a new one. 

The message reads something like this:
Windows detected a hard disk problem. 
Back up your files immediately to prevent information loss, and then contact the computer manufacturer to determine if you need to repair or replace the disk.

If you don't hear from me for a while, you'll know why.  In the meantime, I've been more than a little busy at school.   It's amazing what is required to teach these days, and I'm not talking about the patience!

I did get a little sewing done.  Hopefully tomorrow I'll find a minute of daylight to photograph the projects....yes! plural! I finished a couple of AAQI quilts and have one waiting in the wings.  All it needs is binding.  So if all goes well: the sun shines and the computer works...I'll snap a few pics for you.

Sunday Quilt Inspiration

Welcome to Sunday Quilt Inspiration!  I've been stitching up some small quilts lately, so it seems fair game to include small projects for today's inspiration. First up, a couple of darling little quilts from www.favecrafts.com I discovered the site this afternoon while reading some of my favorite blogs.  

This rubber ducky quilt is just precious, and the website includes a pattern for the duck. Accuquilt also has dies for the duck applique. The directions for this wall hanging could easily be modified to make a baby quilt for either a boy or girl, so it's a good go-to pattern if you like to have baby quilts ready made for when a new one arrives.  

And last from favecrafts.com is this little blue modern quilt.  I really like the satin binding.  One of my children liked to rub the satin borders of his baby blankets.  Apparently it soothed him quite a bit, so I made sure to add satin edges to his sheets until he got to middle school.  Maybe I should have continued that practice right up to his wedding day.....

A couple of just-for-fun pictures from www.pinterest.com, which has been my favorite website for inspiration for a while now.  Although I have issues with the fact that no one has to give credit for the work, I can't seem to give it up completely.

And finally, quilts with birds on them.  I don't know why--I just realized that there are many pictures that fit the description and created a board for them.  Here are a few of the whimsical quilts that are just so much fun!

Happy Quilting,
Mary

New!!! Winner!

http://quiltinggallery.com/

During our last Blog Hop with Quilters Gallery, I won a packet of Cherrywood Studio fabrics from Marija at http://marijasfabricreations.blogspot.com/.  The package arrived earlier this week, but I've been a bit busy.....at Beta Convention since Wednesday. 

http://marijasfabricreations.blogspot.com/

I was very happy to see this package on Tuesday.  I'd gotten an email from Marija last week, so I knew that it was on the way.  

As soon as I opened the package, I wanted to call in sick and let someone else go to convention!  Well, almost.

What I did instead was to play and fondle and pet the pretties for, oh, an hour at least.  I fanned them out in a pretty rainbow....

but there were too many!


So, I made a second fan of different fabrics.

They certainly were pretty all spread out like that, but I wasn't done.  I found a really quirky way to spread them out.  Isn't this funny?  


The little corners poking out between the layers remind me of tongues--kittens licking up milk or maybe puppy kisses.

The stripes were doing something for me, so I played with stripes a bit more.  Since I'd used gray and brown for the tongue design, I used pink and purples for the simple stripes.



But there were more left, and I figured they'd be upset if they didn't get to play stripes, so they became skinny stripes.

Why not do opposing fans?  I would like this design more if it didn't remind me of the pile of file folders sitting on my desk, waiting for me to grade the papers inside.  No, this one is not a happy design, although it is a pretty one and I love the blue/purple color combination.

I'm not sure what this "V" does for me, but it gives you a close-up of the fabric design.  

A special thank you to Marija for having the giveaway.  These fabrics are gorgeous!  I can't wait to get started with a pretty little AAQI quilt.  I may even get going this weekend, especially since it just happens to be a three-day and I'm about to crawl into bed....at 8:30!  I really need a few extra hours of sleep.  Somehow it's difficult to sleep when 35 teenagers are your responsibility (and there are about 250 more in the building).  My Betas were awesome!  Not a moment's trouble with them and they did every thing I asked (we're in charge of Service Project and Games).  Plus, they were on time, every time!  Teens!  gotta love 'em sometimes!

Thanks again Marija!  I'll be posting my AAQI project as soon as I get something quilted and bound.  These beautiful Cherrywood fabrics will be stunning, no matter what my brain cooks up.  

Everyone else go by and visit at Marija's blog:

http://marijasfabricreations.blogspot.com/

Happy quilting,
Mary