Tuesday, August 17, 2010

Birthday Surprises

Monday was my beautiful, kind, thoughtful, caring, and generally all-around wonderful Mom's birthday.  We celebrated on Sunday night with the family by going out for Mexican food and Margaritas, both of which were muy bueno.  Mom doesn't care much for cake.  In fact, if there's a cake left around her for any length of time it will become a poor, bald version of its former self because she'll eat all of the icing off and leave the cake part behind.  That being said, she requested cookies for her birthday. Not just any cookies though.  She found a recipe for red velvet cookies (which happens to be one of only two flavors of cake that she likes) and dropped about a million hints that she wanted these cookies for her birthday, and would make them herself if she had to. So I obliged and made her Red Velvet Gooey Butter Cookies (click on the cookie name for the recipe).  They are by no means a pretty cookie to look at, but Mom said they tasted delicious, and even our waiter at the restaurant kept hinting around for more cookies after Mom gave him one.

After dinner we came back to my house so I could give Mom her birthday present.  She had been wanting rocking chairs for her front porch and I found 2 jumbo rockers at a local Thrift store.  We decided to paint them black to match the shutters.  Mom loves them and I'm so glad she does.  They're still sitting in my dining room now after receiving the last coat of paint on Sunday.  We're letting the paint cure for a week before we attempt to move them.  I can't wait to get my dining room back to normal!


Monday on Mom's actual birthday I showed up with Birthday Cookies Part II.  I had found a recipe for cookies similar to Girl Scout Thin Mint cookies and I couldn't resist.  These were so good!  I can't seem to get the site with the recipe to open right now so I'll post that later.  Again, these weren't the prettiest cookies, but very tasty.

To finish up the birthday festivities, my sister and I took Mom out to lunch and then we went shopping for a few hours.  We ended up at an accessories store taking silly pictures of ourselves in hats. We even got a great picture of Mom with a "Birthday Girl" sash and tiara on her head, but she's too chicken to let me put it on here (lol Mom).

 My mom's birthday is the start of the birthday season in my little family. Things are just going to get crazier and busier from now until the end of the year.  I seem to remember a time when it took FOREVER for my birthday or Christmas to roll around.  Now they seem to show up pretty quickly and always leave me wanting to scream, "Wait, I need more time!!!"  I guess it doesn't help that my birthday, wedding anniversary, and Thanksgiving are within two weeks of eachother.  What was I thinking?!

Tomorrow is my Aunt Ranette's birthday.  She too is a beautiful, kind, thoughtful, caring, and generally all-around wonderful lady.  Aunt Ranette I hope you have a great birthday and wish we could be there to help you celebrate.



And Many More ...

Saturday, August 14, 2010

Cupcakes and Coffee Rolls?

Hola Blogland!  Some changes at work have left me much busier there than usual this week.  These changes are most likely permanent so it looks like I'll be staying super busy, but that is great news to me.  Over these past two and a half years we've had more downs than ups it seems.  I'm hoping this is the start of better things for us.  One thing I think I've learned from this "Great Recession"  is to really be thankful for what we have and to appreciate the small stuff more.  But, enough about that.

Steven, like most men, doesn't really get into quilting.  He'll take a look at a finished top or have a fabric budget discussion every now and then, but thats about it.  Today we were talking about fabric and he starts talking about "cupcakes" and "coffee rolls", it took me a minute to figure out he was talking about pre-cuts such as layer cakes, honeybuns, and jelly rolls.  He just got the names wrong, but I thought it was kinda cute and made me laugh. A few months ago I got a quilting book by Carrie Nelson called Schnibbles Times Two.

Photo Credit: Amazon.com

 I was looking at it one night and left it on the coffee table and the next day I couldn't find it any where.  After turning the house upside down I finally asked Steven if he had put it somewhere.  He told me to look in the cabinet where we keep the cookbooks and sure enough, there it was!  I asked  Steven why he put it with the cookbooks and he said Schnibbles sounds like something you eat. LOL

Today and tomorrow are being spent working on a few surprises for my Mom's birthday on Monday.  Hopefully everything comes out good and I'll have some pictures to share next week.

Until we meet again,

Monday, August 9, 2010

Fuzzy Wuzzy

Fuzzy Wuzzy lives at my house.  And he sheds constantly, as in all the time, as in on EVERYTHING.  The poor guy can't help that he's so furry.  Just look at these paws.  They kind of remind me of the the Grinch.

After not feeling so well on Saturday, on Sunday I had to spend the day cleaning and de-furring our lives. I'm always telling Steven we should buy stock in those little lint roller sheets. We use them all the time.  Another total lifesaver in the battle of the fur has been our Dyson vacuum.  We got it as a bridal shower gift from my parents and its one of my top 10 favorite things that I own.  I'm always amazed at the amount it picks up.  It keeps me sane.  This whole de-furring ritual we have going is a weekly thing, sometimes twice weekly, and always before company comes over.  It's a big job.  After I've been at it for hours and right around the time I'm ready to start locking all 3 cats in a closet and never let them out again, I see this face and I can't stay mad.



At least I got to start my week out with a nice clean house.  Today I got the chance to sew for a few hours with my Mom.  I've been needing to get a start on a quilt I'm making for my nephew for Christmas and today I finally got the ball rolling.  I started out with 111 five inch squares ...


And by the time we finished for the day I had 111 half-square triangle blocks.  Now I just have to square them up and then they'll be ready to start sewing into rows for a boy's version of the Zig-Zag quilt.


I wish I could sew all day every day.  But then I guess it wouldn't be as much fun as it is now.  Hope everyone enjoyed your weekends. 

That's all folks!

Thursday, August 5, 2010

Hexies and A Treat!

Wow this week has really flown by!  It's been another busy one here with work and appointments and, well just life in general.  You know how it goes.  It seems like this year just started, and its already August.  It's been another hot and sweltering week here.  Yesterday the temperature was in the triple digits, and the heat index was 118 degrees.  When I saw that number on the screen I had to look again to make sure my eyes weren't deceiving me.  We had a nice little rainstorm this afternoon that cooled things down a bit for a few hours at least.

On the sewing front all I have to show for myself this week are hexies.  They're so convenient to get out and work on.  I even got a cute little bag this week at Target to keep my little hexie kit together, and it fits into my purse so its easy to grab and go. I heart Target.  I'll take it over Walmart any day.

WARNING: CRAPPY PHOTOGRAPHY AHEAD!
PROCEED AT YOUR OWN RISK.


And with my little kit so handy I've been able to pop out more of these




Lately I've been drooling over a quilt called Swan Lake that a very talented lady over at Buddy and Me has been working on.  When I did a little research via the internet I saw that it was a version of an antique Australian quilt called Dancing Dollies.  I started looking for the pattern, but couldn't find anything until I came across one on Ebay, but the auction had already ended =(  I contacted the seller (who I later found out wrote replica pattern) and she had more (yay!!) So, when the mail arrived today I was in for a treat.  My Dancing Dollies pattern book arrived!! I know that it's waaaaaaaay beyond my skill level right now, but someday I'll definitely be making this quilt. 



Steven always gets to the mail before me and he was so funny, "Um, honey... why do you have mail from AUSTRALIA?!"  We don't get out much. lol

Peace!

Monday, August 2, 2010

First Time For Everything

My Madeline quilt is completely finished!  This wasn't my first quilt, but it was a lot of other firsts for me in quilting.  First time making flying geese, first time making star blocks, and the first time completely putting a binding on by myself (thanks to some good instruction from Mom and YouTube).  I just love this little quilt and I'll definitely  be making another one someday to keep for myself.  This one gets to go live at my bestie's house now.




Steven and I both had the weekend off of work which is very rare, so we enjoyed spending the time together and I didn't get much sewing done.  I did however learn how to make little 1" hexies with paper hexagon pieces and I got about 100 of those made.  I'm finding with doing the binding and then the hexies that I think I like hand sewing.  These little hexies will be a great project to keep around and work on while watching tv or waiting in doctors office waiting rooms, etc. After making 100 this weekend, my hands are a little sore, but I'm sure once I get used to hand-sewing more often they'll be fine.  I hope everyone had a great weekend, and I'm wishing you all a happy Monday as well!

See ya later!