The Gift That Keeps on Giving

There has been a lot of gift giving this year. Maybe (hopefully) the economy is improving. My favorite gift so far? Betty cut up all her smallish scraps into various sizes and gifted them to me! A whole bag full! 

They are divided into ziploc bags by size. The ones I took out first were the 2-1/2” squares. 

Lights and darks. I started on some 16-patch blocks—just for fun, and because other people’s scraps are more inspiring. 

I haven’t had a lot of sewing time, but I have managed to make 10 of these so far. I think I have a plan to use them for next year’s Rainbow Scrap Challenge. I can make star points with whatever the monthly color is. It would make a 16” star block, so I could end up with enough for a quilt top if I can stick with it all year. Sticking with it is almost always the challenge. 

Also in the bag was potato chips in two sizes. I already took out the 2-1/2” x 4-1/2” ones 

added them to my potato chip box. There are some sizes like 3” x 3” that I don’t use, but I will trim them down to 2-1/2”. 

It’s been a busy week. My mom, granddaughter, Sherry, and I went Wednesday night and saw the Grand Old Christmas Show. 

It has become an annual tradition for us. It was at the Welder Center.

We went back to the Welder Center on Thursday night for my daughter’s graduation from nursing school. 

She already has a degree in psychology and in real estate, and now she is an RN. I think she has already enrolled in the BSN program. I think the end goal is to be a nurse practitioner with a mental health focus, but I’m not for sure.

My other granddaughter had her school Christmas program. She played a hotel concierge. 

She is generally shy, but she did have a speaking part and seemed to comfortable with it. I was happy to see how comfortable she was with the performance. I had to miss the two grandson’s Christmas programs due to other conflicts, but there is always next year. 

Bookmarks

I have ended up down another rabbit hole! I was meeting with the membership group and church, and Pastor asked if Mary and I could make fabric bookmarks for the visitor packets. My first thought was to sew two pieces of fabric with the right sides out and pink the edges. That seemed like the fastest and easiest way to accomplish the task. Then, last week I found a video on YouTube for three different bookmarks.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NI7cBQJCYKY

I think they’re really cuter than what I was thinking of, so I tried it out and ended up making several of them. 

I gave the dark green ones to my volunteer group at church yesterday. I have nine more cut out, and I hope to get that done soon. I may still try some with pinked edges and see how that looks. I think either will be okay.

We have had a little cold snap, although it warmed up quite a bit yesterday afternoon. It was too cold to walk Monday night, and I ended up in the recliner under a blanket watching tv. 

Can you guess what those lumps under my blanket are? My thighs are not that big! Here’s a hint:

I can never get a blanket to myself—there is competition! I had two under there, and they generate quite a bit of heat. I finally gave up and let Reba and Ruthie have the chair and the blanket.

Today is another busy day. I have a doctor appointment this morning, Serenity’s school Christmas program this afternoon, and I am joining my mom for a Christmas program tonight at the Welder Center. I went with her two years ago, and it was a lot of fun. Last year I was sick with RSV and had to miss it, so I’m happy I can go this year.

Just Around The Corner

Christmas is coming fast! I have all my shopping done, but not wrapped. To be honest, I usually finish the wrapping on the 24th. My main priority is getting the gifts bought, and everything else is secondary. 

Everyone wants their quilts finished before Christmas, but I haven’t made any promises. I got five quilted and bound this week. 

This was for a new customer. She is not a quilter but decided a jellyroll race would be easy enough for a beginner. She didn’t have a very extensive variety of strips, and when she got it put together she hated it! She cut it into smaller squares and sashed it and brought it to me to finish. She warned me it was neither flat nor square, but I told her I would do my best. I had to take a few tucks, but nothing too drastic.

Rhonda has a new grand baby coming in March. 

This one has a bright green minky backing. 

I got an Aggie quilt done.

It also has a minky-type fabric on the back.

I took an hour or so for myself yesterday morning and got my car cleaned up. I cleaned up the interior and washed and dried the exterior. The only thing I failed to do was the wheels. It is a little cooler this morning, but yesterday it got up to 80 degrees. It was super humid, and I turned the a/c on for a while to get the creepy damp feeling out of the air.

I have gotten a few Christmas cards —more than usual for this early in the month, I think. I put them on the little sewing table in my family room. 

Okay, full disclosure: one is from my insurance company and one is from the BMW dealership. Basically the places that want my money! We’ll see how many more I get. I didn’t mail any until yesterday, and not very many due to the cost of stamps.

I have some sewing I want to do today, but my main goal is to get home from church in time to watch the Texans game. It starts at noon against the Cardinals, and it is going to be a good one!

Be Careful!

As I get older, I am more careful about falling. I really don’t need to fall and break anything. I was rushing around the house yesterday getting ready to leave, and oh boy! I felt my right foot start to slip. I was able to shift my weight and regain my balance, but I thought for a second I was going to crash. The culprit was a piece of tulle that was on the floor. 

The pale yellow color blended in the floor and I didn’t see it. I haven’t used tulle in a few weeks, and I vacuum every day so I don’t know where it came from, but it’s in the trash can now. I am going to have to rethink how I do things around here. I have already removed all the loose rugs so that’s not a problem. I do an exercise class on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday that incorporates cardio, strength training and some balance work. It definitely helps me a lot.

I did go to Gloria’s Christmas party last night. I saw several people I knew and got to visit with them, so that was nice. We had a nice meal—steak and chicken.

Gloria always dresses so nice for every occasion; me, not so much. 

I got a lot of cookies baked yesterday, and I delivered a tray to the quilt shop.

You can see I remade the fudge, and it turned out okay this time. I need to get a couple of trays ready to take to the neighbors, but it may not happen until tomorrow. 

More of the Same

I’m still in the Christmas rush—maybe more so this week than I was last week. We had our Tuesday Friends lunch yesterday at church, and guess what I was asked to bring? If you guessed dressing, you would be correct. 

I love dressing, but I’m getting tired of making it. I’ll probably have to a make a pan or two more when it gets closer to Christmas. 

I spent some time last night trying to get some cookie baking done. I usually take a tray to my neighbors and to the quilt shop, although I missed last year because I was sick with RSV. The ladies at the quilt shop mentioned a couple of times that they had really missed the cookies. Haha, I can take a hint. Unfortunately, the fudge didn’t turn out. I have been making the same recipe for years, and it has never failed me, but this time it was grainy and a little oily. I threw it away and will go but the store sometime today to get more ingredients. I also still need to make another batch of cookies. I won’t have as much variety this year, but I feel like I’m running short on time.

I’ve gotten a little work done. I have people wanting quilts for Christmas, and I’m trying to finish as many as I can. This one was small:

Joycelyn was happy to get her nativity panel back in time to hang it up for Christmas. 

I haven’t done a post since I had Christmas with my stepchildren last Friday. I only have a few pictures. Mostly of my grandkids, William 

and, Serenity.

The grand dogs got gifts too. Remmy and Romeo.

Romeo finally got tired enough to jump up beside me and lie down.

I have made a couple more of the Merry Trees table runners, but I don’t have borders on them yet. I have enough left over strips to do one more, and then I will put the borders on all three. 

I have a dinner date tonight with a friend. Her financial advisor hosts a Christmas party/dinner at a local restaurant, and they can bring a date. I told her I would go if I didn’t have to dress up! 

Holiday Rush

The holiday parties have started. We have our quilt guild party today. It includes a catered lunch, so that will be nice. Tomorrow I have a get together planned with my stepdaughters. We’re doing it a little early this year, but I have all the gifts bought and mostly wrapped. Another party Saturday night with girl friends, and then I can rest until the church luncheon next week! I knew I would be busy, so I got as much work done this week as I could manage. I got the binding put on one I quilted last week. 

She will pick it up next week sometime. I also got a baby quilt quilted and bound.

I’m not sure when this one will be picked up, but at least it’s done and ready to go. 

I also got Susan’s Anna Maria quilt quilted. It’s already been picked up. 

So pretty, and the back is pretty too

It is also an Anna Maria fabric, but I don’t know if it’s the same line or not. 

I have another finished but I haven’t taken it off the frame yet. I’ll do that tomorrow and get another loaded. That gives me three to bind. I am amazed at how many people don’t want to do binding. I do it all by machine so it’s not too bad, but it has never been my favorite part of quilting. Apparently a lot of people feel that way.

Shop Hop Projects

I had high (naive) hopes of finishing my shop projects over the Thanksgiving holiday. Ha! I was a little too optimistic. I had bought three potholder kits, four tea towel kits, and the free shop gift was materials and pattern to make a table runner.

I did so much cleaning and rearranging over the weekend, I think I misplaced two of the potholder kits. I’m not complaining—I needed to clean worse than I needed to sew, and they will turn up soon enough. I did get one of them sewn. 

I got the bird cut and pieced over the weekend, and then yesterday, I quilted it and got the binding put on. 

The binding wasn’t cut very straight, but it’s cute in spite of the misaligned plaid. I stitched in the ditch around the bird and the holly leaves. 

I got the trees for the table runner pieced Saturday night while I was watching a movie

and then I put the border on Sunday afternoon.

I’m not sure at this point when I will get it quilted or what I will bind it with. I think I have some red and green plaid that might work for the binding. I also have enough strips left over to make at least one more runner and possibly two more. It’s a cute runner, and I wouldn’t mind making a few more. Especially when the strips are already cut. 

I couldn’t work on the tea towels because the pattern had no pictures and no written instructions, and I couldn’t remember what it looked like. I will go back to the quilt shop and see if they have one I can at least look at. 

A New Week and A New Month

I think I just realized this year is almost over. It just passed so fast, and I am a little sad about that. There’s just not enough time to do everything I want to do. The only solution is to prioritize everything. Unfortunately, I am not very disciplined about sticking to my priorities and sometimes end up doing whatever strikes my fancy at the moment. I’m sure I’m not the only one who struggles with staying on track.

Our church potluck went well. We had about 70-80 people who stayed to eat, so there weren’t so many leftovers.

I had no hashbrown casserole left, and this started out as a full cake pan of ham. I really don’t like bringing home a lot of leftovers so this was good.

Five or six people brought sausage, and that pretty much got eaten too. The crockpot had chicken and dumplings which were really tasty. There are usually a lot of desserts, but this time there weren’t many. 

I think there were three pumpkin pies. I assume leftover from Thanksgiving. I don’t care for pumpkin pie so I didn’t eat any.

I watched the Texans game when I got home. Final score was 20 to 16. I’m not sure how the Colts got 16 points. They must have scored a field goal in the fourth quarter that I missed. Anyway, I’m hoping next week’s game against Kansas City will be an easy win. 

After the game I got all the fall decorations put away and did some dusting so I could start getting out the Christmas stuff. I got a little done, and that may be all I do. 

The red tree needs new batteries—C cells—which I will try to get today. I don’t know right off the top of my head where the rest of my stuff is, but I need to at least look for the wrapping paper. I went to Walmart for some gift bags and got these candy bars for the girls. They were $14.97 each.

The young man who checked me out (I don’t do self check) said, “man, these better be good for that price”. I have no idea if they are good enough to justify the price, but I will put them in the gift bags with their gift cards and maybe a few other small things.