forever and a week!

Seems like forever and a week
since I was down and out 
with the nastiest flu ever.  
It DID NOT want to leave!  
Also, seems like forever and a week since I've blogged...
I guess it was! :( so sorry, and thanks for all of you sweet folks 
who've checked in on me to make sure I was O.K.


NOW, my computer seems to have caught the viral bug -- 
UGH!  Hope it doesn't stay around as long as my virus did! :)
I've talked with my computer guru, though,  
and he's going to take it away today, so
I may be down and out for a few days or so...
Thank you computer guru!!
 Now, on the the important stuff - stitching!
I really haven't done much at all in the way of quilting...
(which means that I have not mailed out my Birthday Gifts yet, SO Sorry, Gals!!!
And, now with the computer problems, the mailing addresses are saved in a file on that infected computer -
soooo, really, I'll get them to you as soon as I can- promise!)
I did do a little hand stitching on my

Crabapple Hill-"How Does Your Garden Grow".

By the way, I do LOVE stitching with those Cosmo Threads...

The color variations are just wonderful!
Oh, I also I pulled together my fabrics so I can start the piecing.

Slowly getting back in the quilting motions...
And Oh, so glad.
Now, to get my computer back!!!

reverse trick-or-treating and chili cook-off

I live in a rural area. 
Not many kids come around trick-or-treating here. 
Too far to walk between houses.  
Evidently hitting a bunch of houses close together in a neighborhood is more fun?  Little beggars (he he)  don't realize that I give out the big, good stuff since I don't have many coming through. 
Not like the neighborhood houses that get hundreds of kids and have to resort to the bags of little, used-to-be penny candies.
Anyway, reverse trick-or-treating.........
since I have candy left over after the beggin' hours are done,  and I know I don't want all that candy sitting around here, I know I have to get rid of it somehow, before *I scarf it aaaaallllllllllllll*!  (my voice just dropped 3 octaves, scary).  
SOOO....
1--you gather up all most of the candy,
2--put it in big bucket or bowl that's easy to carry,
3--put on your hiking shoes and a jacket appropriate for the weather, and
4--start walking to all the neighbors houses. 
5--When you get to a door,
6--ring the bell,
7--smile, and when the neighbors answer,
8--GIVE them some candy! 
9--costumes optional
10--problem solved

In conjunction with reverse trick-or-treating we usually have a bonfire and wiener roast.  Family, neighbors, and friends stop by after the beggin' and have a little dinner to go along with all that candy they have eaten. 

This year I'm planning a chili cook-off to be our dinner. 
You, your chili, your family. 
Outside by the bonfire. 

So, the gauntlet has been thrown:

Saturday, October 31, 2009

7 o'clock p.m.**

BRING-IT-ON:  your best and favorite chili.

Judged by anonymous ballot.

Prizes may be awarded for best in catagories: 
traditional, non-traditional & vegetarian.

I'll have tables/chairs, table service, sodas,
electric for the slow cookers & ballots for voting.
Oh, yeah, I'll also have the bonfire and weenies to roast.

You can bring along side dishes if you'd like:  something you always have with your chili.

**if you'd like you can drop off your chili before begging,

I'll keep watch over it and keep it warm 'til you get back
(promise, no sabotage).
Please let me know if you think you may attend. 
It's gonna be a fun all Hallow's eve !  And good eats!
Oh, yeah, reverse trick-or-treating optional.

Fat Quarters, who has Fat Quarters?

Fat Quarters...I now have it, the book, and them, the fabric pieces...

This past weekend I was able to go to a local quilt shop and meet up with Jennifer McCann.  She has published a book and was here doing a meet and greet with a reading!  

That's Jennifer up front in the green and black.

The book is a short novel called "Fat Quarters". 

It also has a quilt pattern called

"Star Struck Quilt", with full size pattern pieces.  

Jennifer wrote this along with Tess Rich.  I saw the quilt in person and it is just a gorgeous piece!  Jennifer is a wonderful long arm quilter, teacher, and now... Author!  Pick up a copy soon for yourself or a great gift!

Also this weekend, I went to a nice quilt shop in Waynesville.  And, are you ready for this....I did not buy a thing!! 

I know, take my temperature!  I thought I was feeling fine, but really, nothing! 
I "needed" a couple of pieces of Kona tea-dyed for some stitching.  There were Kona cotton bolts filling at least a 12 foot shelf.  Just not the color I was looking for. 
Oh well, another day, another quilt shop. 

But, I did receive a huge stack of homespuns and flannels from a friend.  (Thanks, D!) (she doesn't do homespuns/folkart on a regular basis, so she was cutting her stash!)
Check out this picture:

Isn't that a great friend???? 
I will use these in my block of the month that starts the end of this month:  Sweet Land of Liberty. 

Off to do a little stitching before hitting the sack! 
Thanks for stopping by!

meetings

Today was a busy day.  As I mentioned yesterday, I was working as a vendor at the Circleville Quilt show today for Always In Stitches Quilt Shop (Grove City, Ohio). 
It all started with being on the road by 7:15 a.m.  I arrived at the show by 8:30 and the show started at 9.  Not a rip roaring start customer wise, but was a good way to "break me in" since I hadn't worked a trade show for MANY years. That was the first hour, then it was hopping!   There were so many nice people working and shopping and helping out from the quilt guild. 
I had a surprise meeting with a fellow blogger  http://sheilaquilts.blogspot.com/.   Sheila was my first blog "comment" from someone that I didn't previously know or wasn't related to!  Anyway, she introduced herself, was very nice and it was very thoughtful of her to stop and introduce herself at the quilt show.
Later in the afternoon it had slowed down a bit and I was working on a stitchery (surprise, surprise) while tending the booth and I showed a customer the way I do my stitching for redwork.  She thanked me and went merrily shopping along.
 A while later a group of 3 or 4 women came and sat at the "lunch table" behind the booth.  I joked with them that they were a little late for lunch since it was after 4 o'clock.  They said they were there for a class.  I thought that was great, a little class was going to be close to where I was working...maybe I could listen in! 
Soon there were 6 ladies at the table, one of them being the original shopper-Cindy, that I had shown my stitching... and you guessed it, I was teaching the little class!!!.  What a hoot!  I showed them my stitching and we laughed and shared and visited until almost closing! 
As we talked, one of the gals, Karen, told me that she knows of me (Me? I say, looking around). While she was somewhere (and who knows why this came up, but my husband talks to everyone, and evidently she does too) she talked to someone, she is a quilter and told whomever to invite me, also a quilter, to the guild she is in north of where I live.
So, she put it together that
ONE-She knew that I live near her from the address on one of my patterns,
TWO-I work in the Grove City quilt shop,
and THREE-she had told someone that they should join the quilt guild that she is in. 
I vaguely remember my sweetie did remember to mention this, but this was two or three months ago!
After a quick call to sweetie he remembered the conversation - in the local dentist office!!!  Isn't the world such a small place? And aren't quilters just amazing people?

Oh, I almost forgot, I did purchase a little at the show, so here are a couple of pics of purchases:

Some wool cut-outs for some applique' on this great fabric. 

It has no manufacturers' name in the selvage, so don't know what it is before you ask.

And in the pic below: 

the top fabric is
"Through
the Woods" by Maywood

and the bottom fabric is "Ancient Calligraphy" I think, by Lakehouse.

But no, I didn't get my camera out at all during the show! Boo to me!

Don't know why I didn't snap any pics.

So anyway,  here's to meetings! I just love 'em. Seven degrees of seperation and all that!

Hope everyone has a great holiday weekend and keep stitchin'!

Isn't life great?

Lister

Are you a list maker? On paper? In a document on your computer? In your mind? Out loud to yourself? Hoping that someone besides yourself will answer back?

From the North American Encarta dictionary -- List: as a verb - to arrange a series of related words, names, numbers, or other items one after the other. To catalog, record, register, roll, make an inventory. IE: She listed the things she needed to do.

I didn't use to have to make notes for myself. Except maybe a list for Christmas gifts purchased or made in June and July. Then that list is kept until December to remind myself that I already have something chosen for that particular someone, not to get another gifty gift. Not to freak out at midnight on the 24th that I have forgotten someone when really I am six months ahead of schedule!

Well, today.... I am admitting that I am now a "lister".


I have to catalog, I just Have to!


I record the incoming commissions of quilts lined up awaiting their turn for my hands to work their meandering magic on the H.Q. quilt machine.


I make a roll call of all the items I need to do before the next whatever meeting.


I take an inventory of my kitchen supplies - what I need the next trip to town and grocery.

Suppose, just suppose, our brains really could keep track of all of the above. Maybe the making of lists just helps us to FEEL more organized in our very hectic lives! It's just a way of psyching ourselves out.

grocery

butter
eggs
flour
leaf lettuce
tp
toothpaste

hardware
paint-frosted pine 1 gal
blue tape

bank
post office

And our brains just said: "PSYCH!, didn't really need to do the list, I have it handled right up here". Is making lists just adding to our things to do list? So when making the list above I should add at the bottom: make lists?

I don't really know, but I think that my becoming "a lister" has helped a little. If only to make me feel better, like something is accompllished. An order put to meandering thoughts. And then as I check things off the list I again feel that sense of accomplishment.


Psych!
Any thoughts?