A Lori Holt Finish and Showing off the Granddaughters!

Barb did a great job quilting my Lori Holt quilt with I love you hands and hearts.  I love that pattern so much!  I made a matching binding and got it on a few days ago.
Here is Indie (standing so good!) on her quilt.  She loves it.

Here is she laughing on it.  My daughter can get the best pictures of these kids.

And here she is sitting.  Sweet girl!

 And her older sister had her first dance recital in June.  She did great!

                                

Chilhowie is a Flimsy!

I do not remember if I mentioned we finally got a new dog.  Meet Lady.  She is supposedly three, but we are not buying it.  She has a bit more energy than we expected but otherwise fits in nicely.  She loves Kathy!

Last Thursday I spent eight hours getting Chilhowie's center done.  Managed to get the border on too.  All the matching pieces were not my favorite, but it looks nice.

Yesterday was Kathy and I's eighteenth anniversary. She brought me roses!  

Today I completed the Chilhowie top.  Super happy with it and so excited to get it done before the next mystery as I was starting to think it was going to hit the UFO pile forever.

I then finally trimmed this quilt that I quilted a month or so ago and made the binding too.

I also got out my aqua for the RSC and am ready to go with those blocks next time I sew!
 

Chickie Art, Working on a Border and Quilty Gifts!

Hazel loves to do art so she painted a paper plate and got almost no paint anywhere else!  We are thinking she might be a leftie (or ambidextrous) as she seems to go back and forth some but has a preference for her left hand.  This runs in our family a bit--my great grandfather Clarence Rushman was able to write with both hands and my mom's generation does many things with their non dominant hands.  My youngest son Jay is also primarily left handed but he could not decide until he was about five with the help of OT at school since neither was more dominant for him. Here she is with her chickie (Gramala, or LaLa as she calls me helped put the stuff on in the right places since the paint was still wet).

I have been sick since about Feb. 20th.  Hazel brought me a cold (she goes to daycare three days a week now and is a walking petri dish) and it almost went away before I caught her new cold.  This one has lingered and so I went to urgent care Tuesday night and I have sinusitis so they gave me antibiotics and steroids.  I am sleeping in the recliner since the drainage wakes me up coughing all night long.  Looking forward to getting back to my usual sick self.  Speaking of which, I found out I medically passed the hoops for getting disability.  My claim is on the last step where they determine if I get back pay and how much I get per month if my income didn't exceed the limits while waiting (believe me, it didn't).  So relief is coming which is good since we have about run through savings in the past two years with me not working.  We decided to not move this year too since there was just nothing in the area we want that allows four pets.  We did not know for sure about disability at the time we had to give our notice and we did not want to increase our rent budget so...our current plan is to save money each month (one DA starts) so we can hopefully have a down payment and buy a house in the area we want near my daughter.   Then we can settle.  So crossing fingers that will work out or we are likely to struggle to find a place next year too--though we would have more of a budget at that point.

I have not done much sewing (and even my reading has slowed some) since I am so ugh!  This morning I am feeling pretty decent no doubt due to the steroids so may sew today!).  I made and attached the inner border on Packer Bliss and made and sliced up and joined into pairs the outer border.  I would love to get that completed and on today if I can.  

Barb (my sewing bestie) sent ma a FABULOUS box of sewing goodies!  I have not taken pictures yet, but it made my day yesterday.  She sent some red scraps in case I could use them for Ruby Jubilee, a few Eye Spy squares, An entire tablerunner kit and pattern of the type I want to make several of for Christmas gifts this year (I have two other patterns and may try to combine elements of them to use as one uses applique and one uses foundation piecing to do the bows).  She also sent her Grassy Creek parts that she had done up to the reveal.  She decided she did not care for it and did not want to finish it.  I love the colors and will be working on that soon!  She did not want to make the string pieced sashing so that was a huge factor for her.  I could buy the right kind of fabric to avoid doing that or change up the layout, but likely will just make a pieced one since I have plenty of strings.  She also sent me two pair of new hospital slipper socks--I love them and she hates them, lol.  There was also a Quiltmaker magazine which I never got and a few patterns.  Will share pics soon!
 

Sewing, Reading and Life Update

My UFO for March was my Packer Bliss (Quiltville's Winter Blues).  I grew it row by row slowly!

                                                  

I was planning to make this originally in green and then decided I would do a pair so I could do them with green and yellow.  The pieces are VERY SMALL and in the course of making one I decided I really did not want to make the pair--though the green sixteen patches are done and the sashings and cornerstones are cut. I thought maybe I could use those sixteen patches in the border, but them realized what I LOVED about the quilt was the braided border of Bonnie's pattern so I will eventually continue along and make that.

These are the 27 books I read in March.  Glad to have "War and Peace" off my TBR and enjoyed exploring many middle grades for middle grade March!

We got Hazel a little baby doll to celebrate being 18 months old!  She loves it.  She signs and talks really well now and can say her own name as well as all of ours.  She is the light of our lives!

The Rainbow Scrap Challenge color is pink this month so I whipped my blocks up yesterday for that.  Here is Log Cabin Love.

And here is Butterfly Bush. I accidently made two sets of four again instead of two sets of two as I did in yellow.  Oops!
                                         

My cousin's husband had a serious accident the end of March. He fell off a forklift and landed on his head.  He is forty something and is a great husband and father.  He has a long recovery after a seven hour surgery and hopefully will walk again one day.  He is hard working physical guy and I am praying for his full recovery.  Life turns on a dime.  

In other news, we gave our sixty day notice here and plan to move to Waukesha before summer.  We are going to look at a place today.  Smaller than here (oy!) and not as nice but only five ish minutes from Hazel and her parents which is our goal.  We hope to be able to save money up and buy again in a year or two in that area.  Still waiting for my DA hearing results--and much depends on that.  

                                                                                                

Grassy Creek Parts are Complete!

My sister Tina has apparently been Ambien shopping lately so I jokingly sent her my Amazon wish list.  She responded by sending me Chrononauts and a book and movie for Hazel too  I love this game and cannot get enough of it.  It is about changing events in time and sending time travelers home.  Really challenging and fun!

So for Valentine's Day I asked for more games.  It is an illness!  So I picked these out and they arrived yesterday.  Have not played them yet but will soon!

Yesterday I finally sewed (after a week or so of nothing) and got the rest of the parts for Grassy Creek made.

Next up top assembly!

My sister also sent Hazel this HUGE pink elephant.  She loves it!  This kid could not get any cuter--at least to us!

 

City Sampler UFO in Progress!

We met Hannah and Jeremy at the lake walk area and walked around and took pictures of her and them.  She is due in three weeks, we cannot wait!

Kathy and I played some games last night.  Tried out our new Villainous, which we enjoyed and then played Opale.  That one is a fast favorite of ours.

On Tuesday it is our fifteen year anniversary (give or take a year) so I convinced Kathy to buy me this lovely quilt display from FB marketplace for 80 bucks!  Super happy and now I have more room to store quilts!

Kathy has done a few of her Frolic blocks.  She has a bit to go so that he can join in the next Quiltville mystery, but she is liking how this is coming together.

Kathy (and Barb via facetime) helped me to organize the blocks for City Sampler.  What a  doozy of a time that was.  The picture in the book for the layout does not have numbers on the blocks and many of them look alike.  I did not always use the same colors as the book, etc.  Eventually we had piles of blocks.  One missing!  Turned out to be number 97 and I sewed it today.  A few got mixed up and sewn in but I am leaving 86 and 96 in each other's spot as it will not make a difference to move them.

Here are the first four rows with sashing in between.

After all the rows were together I had to add the long sash (still doing that part) and I was facetiming with BJ.  Luckily I mentioned to her that even with pinning I never get my sashings to line up when they are like this since the seams aren't touching due to the sashing in the middle.  She got some of her blocks and demoed for me something that Ros taught her!  You pin like this with the sashing folded up on the blocks you just sewed it to.

Then you open it up and carefully add the row matching the seams to the pins you already have so that they will align!

I opened it up while pinned so you could see that then it will line up right!  It is a bit fiddly, but wow I think these may be the best I have had line up!

So this is my stopping point for tonight...almost half way done with the rows.  Really tickled with how it is all lining up!  

Birthdays and Chunky Churn Dashes

 My birthday was last Thursday and I had a really nice day!  Kathy got me the Once Upon a Book Club selection and I saved it to read that afternoon.  If you have never seen this before, you get a book and several gifts to open on certain pages of the book.  The gifts relate to the story.  (If you get this and have not read August's yet, do not scroll down as I do post a picture of what the gifts were--do not want to spoil it for anyone!).  I loved this so much I ordered another one --the classic David Copperfield which I have never read.

 I decided to settle in on a quilt in the backyard with my ice coffee and start reading.  The dogs loved it! Here are the gifts I got.  The book was good "The Last Piece" by Imogen Clark.  Not one I would have picked out on my own, but a nice escape and well developed characters--so much so that when it was over I still wanted to know what happened in the lives of the daughters!

 I have also been sewing and made two Chunky Churn Dash baby quilt tops so far.

Bug is modeling with the quilt

 Kathy also made me a chair for my birthday (we had a pair and a table in AZ and sold them since we knew she could make another set).

 I read in it a bit today and then we painted it Packer green.  Will need some touch up tomorrow.  Kathy will make a second one and a table we will paint yellow too.

 My Mom and Dad stopped by and camped near Milwaukee for four days so we could see them.  We went to their campground twice and played lots of Play Nine.  They came here and toured Hannah and Jeremy's house and hung out here far from the kids since they have been with lots of family in Chippewa and the kids are really protecting my grandbaby--just in case.  Hannah is about 34 weeks along in this picture....it is getting close!

It was nice to have some time with my parents who are now heading back to Arizona early to be with my sister.  Mom hopes to come back when the baby comes, but with Covid and her health I am not sure it will happen.  Mom and Dad gave me a pretty crystal angel for my window and some cash--which was partly spent on the David Copperfield book.  Seriously I was spoiled this birthday and I got to spend it with my parents and Kathy.  Super special since we now live so far apart.

Dr. Scrappy Kathy completed her Jelly Snowflake quilt and it looks great!  The blues were a good color choice for this.  Love it!