No quilting today

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Storms struck and I can’t be sure at least for the next few hours where the lightning will hit. It has been a beautiful display!

In less than 24 hours we got almost eight inches of rain. I know I prayed for rain, but boy! On the positive note the last week our pollen count was off the charts and too many of us could not go outside or were sick from it. Well you know what this rain did.. it cleaned that up for us! It smells wonderful. I’ve spent the last few hours on the front porch on the swing. I’m headed back there now.

Taking time to slow down and enjoy the sounds of the rain and relax..

Hope your day is as restful!

Related Articles

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Severe Thunder Storms

Image by Phil Romans via Flickr

So I have to make this quick. We lost power for an hour yesterday and it looks like another whopper is heading this way… only five inches of rain since last night! Trees are in the roads and north of us hasn’t gotten power back since yesterday.

Yep that means no computer and no sewing machine! This would be a good time to hand sew but my hands don’t work that well. I do real well to just attach the binding with a blind stitch!

The kids are at school and DH says it’s not gonna be as bad as yesterday so he’s leaving them there. At least there are no big trees there.. here  there are tons of them! I was on the porch when it hit yesterday and .. it was awesome! Just like they say! It sounds like a train coming! One minute it was clear and the next … WOW! I thought we were gonna lose one of our trees it bent over and I waited for the snap.. but it didn’t. Thankfully!

Gotta run.. tornado warning up again. Gotta unplug everything!

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via COLORCRAZED: NEW FEATURE – FREE for the SHIPPING.

Happy Anniversary!

Well I’ve been married for 15 years today. WHOO_HOO! Can you believe someone intentionally stayed with me for that long? We’ve actually been together  for 19 years and Ya know what’s really funny? This is the first anniversary in ten years that we actually remembered! It’s usually not until April one of us thinks of it. I only remembered it because Facebook reminded me. But don’t tell him that!

Well I didn’t get a new sewing/embroidery machine… financially not in the cards. I’m selling my Toyota 6 needle single head embroidery machine to add to my savings fund for it though. The dream doesn’t die here! That’s how I got my Tin Lizzie (Timmy).. just kept saving!

Selling for my Duetta Fund

What’s on our agenda? He’s working on cars and I’m quilting! Do we get each other or what? Oh yeah my “baby” got her first car actually it’s a truck. She is very excited to have a way to escape from here!

DD's new Truck

 

Today is a good day. Hope y’all enjoy it too! I’ll try to catch up with yall later!

Time for some music

quilted with dog bones.. this was fun

Todays rain is soothing.. I always enjoyed a rainy day as long as I don’t have to go out in it! My veggie garden is very happy though the Chickens not so much. They don’t get the weed snacks if I’m not out in the garden.

I’m going to try to get back to the Bubbles quilt today as long as DH doesn’t come home with another list for me. There’s rain in the forecast until the weekend so I don’t have the house painting hanging over me. I really need to clean the house since I haven’t done that in ages… but I just don’t see that happening today.

All my thoughts have been centered on my quilt. The humm of Vern laying down the seams and the points being perky on each of those remaining 9-patches. (Yes, it is still important for them to be perky) I love the smell of ironing with starch. There really should be a candle with that smell!

I think I’ll turn on the radio until he gets back… the humming goes so well with it…

I posted this to publish this afternoon.. so here’s the update.. I mucked the chicken run, poor new chicks were thigh high in MUD then changed the sheets on the bed. I also had to run out and send a UPS package of documents that had to go today. Yep, you guessed it DH came home with his own agenda… Truck shopping for DD. So, I am off to give my approval (or not) on the truck.

 So there goes the music!

Rainy Mondays

2009 Wedding quilt top

Yesterday was a drencher here in the Tampa Bay area. I’m not complaining, we really needed it

but (you saw that coming right) I had stuff to do that required me driving. I really don’t get out much but I do drive a dear couple to their doctors appointments as they don’t drive anymore. I’ve been there needing help so I do not hesitate to be there for others when I can. It just really made me nervous, we are talking white knuckles watching every car with extra attention. We got to and from safely, by Gods’ grace, but I had a hum-dinger of a stress headache and then I had to go do taxes for my Mom & Dad, well actually not the whole taxes  as theirs are quite complicated but I did have to assemble and total everything for the lawyer.

So that brings me to yesterdays post.. getting home yesterday afternoon with a whopper of a headache I remembered I had not posted anything yet. I had one of those poor poor me moments (again, I know!).  So I wrote the first thing that came to my mind.. I didn’t articulate it very well. The Quilt Skipper (Jenny Lyon) is a QUILTER. Her skill is an art form, seriously. She wins awards! She has experience. She has spent the time practicing and developing her skill into that art form. I have not. It’s as simple as that. Yes I am a quilter but come on, I can’t be the only one who goes to a quilt show thinking that those are not the same kind of quilts I make.

 Each day I walk into this quilt room I hope I am developing my craft. I am trying to improve. I have just begun to think maybe my improvement is too slow in coming. I am physically deteriorating sometimes as fast as I’m improving my craft. So that thought brought me back to my challenge. It did get me back into this room with positive results but it also showed me that it will not (for me) be the number of quilts that give me the experience to improve but the time I spend with them. I’ve been working and thinking on this last quilt for what seems to me like an eternity. I don’t usually spend more than a week on a quilt. But this quilt is sinking into me. No, it probally won’t be exactly what I intended but it has taught me to slow down and think more about each aspect. Quilting is not a hurry up and wait thing. It’s a step by step process that is an adventure. It’s not the end result but the process that is fufilling.

I’ve decided to stop rushing and enjoy the process.. who knows when I’ll get there in fact it really doesn’t matter if I do. The people who receive my quilts will feel the love I’ve stitched into them and really that’s all that really matters to me. I want my quilts to be carried around, used and cherished for their comfort not for their perky points. But one little award sure wouldn’t hurt my feelings

I want to be a Quilter…

King quilt for Mom

When someone asks me what I do I would like to say “I am a Quilter”. I’m tired of saying “nothing”. I am a nothing.. or sometimes I say retired. Yep, I’m retired.. but even then they still want to know what you DO.

Generally when someones asks a question like that they expect you to say something they can comment on. Or at the least they know of others that “do that thing that you do”. I don’t have that issue at the guild. It’s why I like going there. But if I was a quilter.. then..

I’m guessing you have a list of things you have to check in order to say you’re a quilter..

Right now, I guess I make quilts.. but I aspire to be a QUILTER!

There was a little rumbling.. then alot of rumbling..

Yall were not gonna believe that I wasn’t exaggerating.  So, of course I took a picture. DD was mortified that I took a picture but I’ll tell ya.. all that rumbling was almost rejuvenating! As  you can see it is a “Club House” for a motorcycle group. They seem to be a bunch of really nice people, they play music but it’s not too loud or when it is I like the music they play..  

As seen from my driveway.. just a little get together at the neighbors!

 DS#3 and DH had to do a brake job so it was just DD and I painting the house but we had “the gathering” to interest us as we painted. Though it was the others who normally walk and ride bicycles down the street that were the most entertainment! It was like they hit a wall in front of our house and turned around and went back the other way. We did get our goal completed with two coats. This house is going to look huge white. I can tell ya that!

2 coats including the entire porch to the ceiling

So It’s time for me to get the bigger ladders out. DD will continue down the front of the house as high as she can reach. Doesn’t she look happy about it! (I hope, I hope, I hope we can get some help…but DD wouldn’t let me go ask the neighbors)

DD wants it done... she just doesn't want to do it!

Back to quilting..

Quilting is the only language I speak fluently.

Time to drop the “stuff” at the door and feed my fabric lust. That’s what it is; a lust.. a coveting of fabric. I just love to feel the fabric! I can’t say there will be a lot of productivity, with the fam home not a lot gets done .. Actually I am supposed to be painting with them today. Y’all remember the house painting I was supposed to be doing? They push those rollers and I do the cut work. Maybe just maybe DH won’t remember?

I slept in.. it’s almost nine in the morning.. Daylights’ burning! But my fabric calls to me! I was reading Quilt Skippers blog yesterday and she turned me on to this idea she got from Feathered Fibers. An inexpensive way to organize and store fabric! I just can’t stop thinking about how neat my fabric would be and I could see it all! Not to mention I could spend time with every piece of fabric! Think of the treasures I would uncover!

I remembered Carla Barrett had blogged about a system she discovered using comic book cards. I found them at a local store and my starter pack was (gasp!) 300 cards. I won’t tell you how many times I went back for more…

They also have these cool boxes into which the cards fit perfectly-it’s a great system of storage. I can easily see and access my fabrics.

via Quilt Skipper | quilting makes me skip for joy.

I just want to sew … lose myself in the texture and colors.. but alas.. quilts may be my thing but there are other things that have to get done. So responsibility wins out today.. YUK! It’s not fun being the adult, well maybe when I get to eat chocolate cake for dinner.. but not today!

This is the goal.. paint this much of the house this weekend. Naw, it won't get done but ya gotta have a goal!

Do you see the length of the house.. it may take months to paint just the front!

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I’m here.. You’re there.. Now What?

My Daughter in law "gets" me! She painted this for me!

The Best Kids in the World!

I’m sitting here in front of a blank screen and have NOTHIN”. This is not like me! I usually have something I’m chewing on (mentally). Something to say… but I am worried I shared too much. This blog is supposed to be about my becoming a QUILTER. The quilts that are going to get me there. The steps I take to improve and trust myself in the process.

But life intruded.. and with the postaday 2011 I have to say something everyday so I spewed forth and then published it! I can not believe I published it! Just the writing was cathartic I didn’t have to hit that stupid publish button. But I did and was blessed beyond measure. People who barely know me prayed for me. I can not explain how that healed my heart.

Now, I’m starting to believe that this is more than a quilting blog. It is lifes’ intrusions that influence my quilts, not to the naked eye always. But you all know my proclivities to punt when having difficulties.  Blogging opened up the picture. This thing I do isn’t only quilts but it’s also the people that surround and interact with me. I had no idea I couldn’t separate them from this blog! Seriously!

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