binding

3 binding strips ready

for 3 completed quilt tops.

any guesses on what I will be doing this weekend?

Have a happy and safe Labor Day. See ya' on Tuesday.

thanks for all of your concern regarding my son. he is doing just fine. his tongue is quickly healing up.

exercising gets me into trouble: part 2

Yes, there is a part two.


I can hardly believe it myself.

Yesterday it was sunny and 75 degrees at 3 in the afternoon. Perfect summer day. And I am thinking, "how many of these days are left this year? We really need to go on a walk." The baby had waken from her nap and we had a few hours before my husband got home from work. So we again set out on a walk.


Things were going pretty well, there was a lot less complaining that the previous day and I was convinced that everything would be fine.


We were dropping off our electric bill and my son was playing on the railings right outside the building. I had just told him to stop screwing around and to get down. Not even 30 seconds later he is SCREAMING and he has a mouth full of blood. Thankfully he didn't knock his teeth out or anything, but he bit his tongue REALLY bad. I mean, like a flap cut open bad. One of the ladies that works at the utility came out and asked if we needed anything. (People are really nice in this town.) She brought us some ice and the bleeding stopped pretty quickly. He was really shook up about it. It was gross. So he has the cutest little lisp now, because his tongue has a pocket in it. (I am cringing even as I am typing this.)





So, yes, I am a slow learner.
It is another perfect summer day.
But I refuse to go on a walk.
I don't want to have to write a 3rd installment.
(Sorry if I grossed you out.)

V is for...

vinyl. I can't get enough of the stuff.
I used some of the flowers from this card for the front.



The handles on this purse are also vinyl. What an exciting day that was when I discovered I could make my own handles! I have a lot of the vinyl and I dislike using interfacing.


More vinyl here and here.


W is for walking. If I had an exercise of choice it would be walking. I said IF.
W is also for water. I drink mainly water, save my one mountain dew in the morning.
(As you all know from yesterday's post, I prefer NOT to mix the two w's.)


X is for xhilaration-who happened to make my favorite flip flops. I wear them all. the. time. In fact, I just replaced them. I had the same exact pair that I wore for 2 years and they finally got so grungy I had to pitch them and start over.
And yes, I am feeling very clever for my x entry. :)

Y is for yarn. I have a lot of it. But mostly the crappy acrylic stuff. I can't afford to buy nice craft supplies all around, so the yarn stash has to suffer. One day I would like to learn to knit socks.


Z is for Zach. My almost 7 year old sweet, sweet boy.
Oh, I love him.

Z is also for zippers and zip pouches. But you already knew that.


And for those of you that asked about the shoes....they came from JC Penney.

exercising gets me into trouble

This morning I was planning my day and I decided the kids and I would walk downtown to get a few things. We all could use the exercise. I brought a jug of water, had the sunscreen and I thought I was prepared. It was pretty humid, but sunny. And we set out.

So we are walking. It's a lot longer than I would normally go with the kids, but last week when we were at my sister's, we walked quite a bit and the kids did great. So I thought today would be no problem.

We get closer and closer to downtown. Pretty soon it starts thundering. But it was still half sunny. I thought we might have a brief shower, but we could wait it out at the library or the store or something. At this point my son had been complaining about the side of his foot hurting.

Pretty soon it starts to sprinkle. Not a big deal. We continue running the errands that we set out to do. Post office. (We were a little wet at this point, but the boys thought it was a fun adventure.) Health food store. Grocery store.

We leave the grocery store and we are probably about a mile from home. It's dark. Really dark. We know we are in trouble. No two ways about it.

So I put my little boy (who was really complaining about his foot hurting now) in the stroller, I decided to carry the baby and my older boy had to push the stroller. We were able to cover the distance a bit more quickly. This lasted a few blocks. Then my older son got tired of pushing the stroller, so we put the baby back in the stroller, and the boys walked. Eventually I ended up carrying my 30+ pound boy (he had blister).

We are getting closer and closer to home and it starts raining harder. And harder. It was POURING! Thankfully my kids were enjoying it.

We were a few blocks from home when a super nice lady stopped by and asked if we needed a ride home. I declined, since we were close and we were already soaked. I made sure to let her know that it was very sweet of her to offer.

We eventually got home. And just when we got there, it stopped raining. Of course.

The moral of the story: It doesn't pay to exercise.

I should be able to justify a good 3 days off now because that is how long it's going to take for our shoes to dry out.

R is for...

rubber stamps

I bought my first ones in 1995 or 1996.

I don't have the ones I originally bought. (Too country.) Many have come and gone. But many still remain in my collection. Obviously.
I have a lot. But I do use them. And it is rare that I buy a card. Once every 3 years or so.

Last week the kids and I went to visit my sister while my husband was out of town for work and we made some cards. About half shown here were made with her and the other half I made with my friend Hjordi, (who now has a blog). When I announced my favorite color was orange, my sister asked, "what happened to pink?" Well, it is apparent that pink is still in the running.


S is for shoes.
I picked up these new ones last Saturday.
I love how the plaid isn't lined up the same on each shoe.
(Do I notice this because I sew?)
These shoes make me ridiculously happy. I can't wait for fall.


S is for scraps. I love to use paper scraps as much as I love to use fabric scraps. They are my favorite. See the zipper package that I couldn't throw out? That is going to go into a collage someday.


T is for Talking. I talk way too much. So do my children.

U is for umbrella. I have a blue one from IKEA. If I used it more often maybe I could justify a pretty one. Umbrellas make great swords for little boys, or so they think. But really, what doesn't?

I've been in a funk....

...a blogging funk. As you can probably tell from how much posting I have been doing lately.

I hate it that it is such a time sucker.

I hate the pressure I put on myself for everything to be so super interesting.

Because things in my life are really not, at this point.

And as much as I would like to, I can't do it all.

So I am going to try to go against everything in my personality and try to be a carefree blogger.

I have the rest of my alphabet posts planned and it should resume to a somewhat normal pace soon. Thanks for hanging with me.

Q is for...

Quilts.
Here are my current works in progress.
(There are 9!)

Red Cross


Falling Oaks


House of Girls

Modas

what I have left to add to the modas

(seems like I will never get this one done-there are 1200 blocks)

gee's whiz quilt (my husband named this one. he doesn't appreciate the gee's bend quilts and he can't figure out why I would want to try to make something similar.)

inspired by these

this is just a quarter of the quilt...it's huge!

scrappy 9 patches (some of these blocks-ones not shown-are ugly, I don't know if I should throw them out or try to make them fit in with the not so ugly ones.)

hearts all around

I have all the hand applique done on all 36 blocks

log cabin half-block

I might make one more block and make a doll quilt out of these.

log cabin scrappy challenge

I thought about starting another quilt today...

I have the sickness.

O is for...

Orange.
It is my current favorite color.
(Favorite colors matter in my household for some reason.)
I really, really love it.




Love these oranges.

Oreos. I don't dunk them, though.


P is for....
Parker, my easy going, silly, laid back little boy. I love him lots.
Paper. I collect it. Like a lot of other craft supplies.
Purses. I don't particularly like making them, but I love having lots to choose from.

Tomorrow is Q. I'm looking forward to it. Go figure.

L is for...

Legos. We have over 3000 of them.
The kids spend hours playing with them.
Lego time for them = sewing time for me.

Laptop. I especially love it on a cool day like today, sitting under a quilt, blogging.
Oh, yeah.

L is also for lists. I love to make them.
M is for Mountain Dew. I have one almost every morning for breakfast.
(It's terrible, I know.)

N is for Naps. For the kids, or for me...it's all good.

F is for....

Fabric.

I have lots and lots. I have put myself on a fabric buying ban, seriously. And my husband is in firm agreement. Nothing like moving your stuff to take stock of all the stuff that you have. A LOT of supplies (and not just fabric) in this household. So, while it may not be in effect for the rest of the year, I will not be buying (many) supplies in the near future. Just to finish a project. That's it. (Are you all going to hold me to it?)

G is for grapes, guacamole. Yum. But not together.

H is for home. It's not a house, but it's where your family is. Cliche, sure, but it's a hard lesson I am in the midst of learning. (I'm trying to be content living in an apartment. It's a stretch, but I am getting there.)

I is for ice cream. It tastes especially great with warm peach cobbler. (I was baking with my boys today.)

J is for JUKI.

I love my sewing machine. I had never heard of the Juki brand until I started shopping around for a new machine. I would buy another one tomorrow if needed. This baby is great. It sews like a dream. Worth every penny. And then some. A decent machine does make a difference.

K is for Kevin. My wonderful husband. I won't get too mushy here, but he is so good for me. I love him. LOTS. I joke with my sister, "Is it possible to be infatuated with someone after 10 years?" He and I had a great get away this past weekend. We enjoyed some much needed alone time. First time in years. It was wonderful. Thanks for all the anniversary wishes.

More alphabet madness tomorrow. Thanks for reading and for your comments. I appreciate each and every one.

E is for....

elated!

My husband and I are celebrating our 10 year anniversary tomorrow. Woo-hoo!
My sister is watching all 3 of our children for the next several days (isn't she sweet?) so my sweetie and I can go away for some much needed relaxation.

D is for...

Denyse Schmidt. My all time favorite quilter. I love her book, and after making a quilt modeled after one of her designs (below), I have to say that she makes it look deceptively easy.

Dressers. I would collect them if I had the space. (Well, I'd collect any kind of furniture, if I could.)

Dairy products. I love 'em all. Butter, cheese, milk, oh, my. (My dad and my brother are dairy farmers, so I need to support them.) I now live in America's Dairyland, where they hand out cheese curds and chocolate milkshakes at the parade. How wonderful is that?!

Decorating. I love it. I wish I was better at it. I can't wait to get into another house to start the process all over again. (By the way, we finally had our first house showing yesterday-after 2.5 months on the market. They liked it, but have a house to sell themselves. We have another showing tomorrow morning, too. I can't tell you how relieved I am that something is finally starting to happen on that front.)

Daughter. After having 2 sons, it is wonderful to have a girl, too. She is going to give us a run for our money, being a determined little one, but she is so special. I am looking forward to having girl time with her. She already helps me sew by pushing the auto cut button on my sewing machine.

C is for...

corn nuts
corn chips
corn on the cob
yeah, I am corny. (sorry, I couldn't resist the pun)

creating

crochet

cardmaking

cloud watching

{notice that chocolate didn't make the list? I much prefer salty over sweet.}

and something I am sooooooo thankful for, especially today: air conditioning.

B is for...

my boys

my boys on bikes (this starting to sound like a Dr. Seuss book)

buttons

barns

books (and IKEA bookshelves)

{I am currently reading this book.}

and blocks, for the kids, of course.

a little late to the game

I'm joining in on the alphabet meme thingy going on because I am feeling not only blog burnout, but burnout all around. I am going to be adding my own twist: I will be listing some of my favorite things, just to narrow it down a little bit.

A
Artwork from my little artists. (I know I posted this picture before, but I love it. And to be honest I am too lazy to take a new photo and post it.)


Apples.

Apple picking at the orchard with my (very excited) boys.

Autumn. I love the season and almost everything about it.

Avocados.

Alphabet (children's) books.

Architecture.

And of course, my little A. This photo was taken a few months ago. I have this photo on the desktop of my computer. It makes me smile every time I see it.

One of my favorite TV shows: America's Got Talent.

Wanna play along? What are some of your favorites?