Reentry was a little rough!

Oh, boy... the drive from Colorado really kicked my butt and I am just now coming out from under the cloud. I suppose a 16 hour drive in this heat and no air conditioning will do that... must make a note to remind myself of that little fact. More on that later, though. I'm going to do the trip all in one post, so hold on!

To start from the beginning... we had a great time. Having more than a couple of days to see everybody really made a big difference. We slept on a futon at Randy's, 'cause he's the only one with an extra room. We split the cost of the futon with Randy and R-Beth so we would have someplace to sleep while we where there... it was definitely cheaper than a hotel, although, perhaps not quite as comfy. It was double bed size and just a tad short for Glenn, but we managed. It was neat 'cause I got to wake up to Aiden standing in the doorway to say good morning on the last day... it's the little things, y'know? Here's a pic of Aiden with Cain, their dog. Both of them are chunks!



It took a few days for both Sophia and Aiden to really warm up to us, but they finally did and we were pretty good substitutes for Mom and Dad by the end of the two weeks... well, at least for a couple of hours at a time! ;0) Sophia is a handful but that pretty much comes naturally, considering who her Mom and Dad are... hee! Here's a pic of her styling for the camera... with spaghetti-o's on her nose! LOL!


We also got to see Josh and J-Beth's new little house AND their new little bundle of joy! We did alot of baby holding... I love babies! Here's Chloe with her loverly Mama.



Both Glenn and I got smiles out of her when she was awake enough, which was great. We ended up spending the night a couple of times... we went up for supper and then we were having such a good time (plus having a couple of drinks) that we decided to stay. I'm really glad we did because we got to see Chloe during the morning when she was really awake.



We did ALOT of cooking and eating... ribs on the grill were a hit...


as well as a delicious Beef, Portobello and Gorgonzola stew that Josh made one night for everyone at Randy's (along with some grilled chicken). It was the first time in quite awhile that the family was all together... a big meal with some late-night, early morning Wii action was just the ticket. Here are the girls somewhere around 1am or so... we were having fun! ;0) From left to right:
J-Beth, yours truly, R-Beth, and Mollie (Nat's girlfriend).


ETA: I didn't get a pic of Randy in here so I need to rectify that little oversight... here he is feeding Aiden dinner...

The tattooed Wild Child is a very good Daddy. ;0)

We also went out to dinner with my brother, Ed and his wife Dana, as well as my mother and Josh and J-Beth. We went to Bisetti's in old town Fort Collins and I highly recommend it. We had a private dining room and the food was stellar. We had a really good time and Chloe slept through the whole meal which allowed everyone to eat and chat. I forgot to take my camera, though, so no pics.

We also spent quite a bit of time (and money, ahem) getting long, lovely Luci ready for the road. Here she is on our carport...


Luci is a 1978 Cougar that Josh bought for himself a few years ago. It was a great car when he was single, but it doesn't work so well with car seats. Glenn wanted to buy it from him but then we had the idea to trade our 1999 Avalon for it. This would allow us to get the Cougar and Josh and J-Beth to have a good 4-door family car. So, that's what we did. Unfortunately, ol' Luci needed quite a bit of work done on her, as well as new tires; however, since the amount of money we spent on Luci doesn't even begin to touch what I have spent on sewing, crafting, quilting and stitching over the years, I consider it a fair trade. ;0) But she is home now, and that's what matters.

Last, but certainly not least, I managed to wrest Titania from Nat's hands. Here she is in all her glory, the voluptuous little minx!

I love it! It should be great fun to embellish. I'm not sure if the original Titania had red hair but it just seemed right to me so that's what I asked him to do. Now, to see if I can manage to get it printed successfully onto some silk for the Midsummer CQ... keep your fingers crossed! Here's the artist, doing that other thing that he does so well... video games...


And now, about that trip home. See, there was this oil leak in long, lovely Luci... it wasn't much in Colorado; however, with the pressure of continued speeds around 75 mph the engine started knocking after we managed to get over Raton Pass (Luci doesn't like heights) and when we stopped to check, she was 3 quarts low on oil. Gah! We loaded her up with oil and over the next 9 hours or so, we added 10 quarts in all. She was NOT happy, so we weren't using the air conditioner and it was in the 90's coming across New Mexico and into Arizona... man, it was hot. By the time we got to Flagstaff and headed for Phoenix, Luci was verra upset... she REALLY DOESN'T LIKE HEIGHTS! (Flagstaff tops out around 7000 feet above sea level or something like that.) By the time we got to Phoenix at 9pm, it was 106° and I was really wiped; although Luci was doing better since we were much lower in elevation. Last weekend is a blur as I reacted to the heat and other stress. But... it's over, I can once again think straight and I know never to drive nearly 1000 miles in a car without air conditioning in the middle of summer in the southwest! See... ya' learn something new every day!

Whew... that was a long post! Thanks for hanging in there... see ya in a few days!

We're Back...

Sorry for the lapse, ladies. Things kind of snowballed just before vacation and I didn't have time to update. I have some pictures to sort and upload and then I will do a proper post, hopefully on Saturday. Suffice it to say, we had a great time, we held grandbabies, ate too much and definitely didn't sleep enough... it was great!! ;0)

We are back in one piece with Glenn's new baby (a 1978 Cougar) and a lovely drawing of Titania. Give me till Saturday, 'K??

Missed you guys!

Block 9... only partially done :0(

Well, I've been trying for several days to finish this block so I could show it to you; however, such is life that I present it to you only partially done.

There are a couple of pretty nice seams on this block. This one is the lock stitch, brought to my attention by Elizabeth at Quieter Moments. On this seam the threads used are #12 perle cotton for the straight stitches (that you'll have to embiggen to see) and a varigated Watercolours 3-ply pima cotton from Caron. It's lovely stuff!!

I think the varigations really worked well across this seam.

Here is another closeup for you... this is simply buttonhole with lazy daisy stitches in between, but I like the way it turned out.

The fabric is not flat along the seam, unfortunately, but at least its even enough it will look OK in the end. I used the perle cotton again for the buttonhole stitches, and then 4 strand silk floss for the lazy daisy stitches. It's simple but rather effective.

Other news:
Our air conditioning has been down and out... right through the recent record high temps here in Phoenix of 110°F/43°C. Wowzers! Heat and I don't get along very well... it got up to 88°F/31°C in the house and even with the fans blowing, I hardly slept. Blech! Anyway, it's fixed now so we are much more comfortable and sleep is once again my friend.

At least it was until yesterday when I had to go get new glasses. OMG! The prices are so high I almost had a heart attack. It's been several years since I bought glasses (I put it off as long as possible!) and needless to say, I was rather surprised when I started looking at frames. Gah... not nice at all. But, I finally managed to find a frame for my regular glasses, a frame for my computer glasses, and a frame for sunglasses. Up till now I either didn't get sunglasses or got the kind of glasses with magnets that hold the sunglasses on so they don't have to be prescription. But this time I wanted something a bit more stylish so I bit the bullet and ordered prescription sunglasses, too. Then I promptly went home and imploded. I think I need to find a cheaper way of getting my glasses. There are lots of places on the interwebs that sell glasses, but I'm rather leary of them. Have any of you had any experiences with online eyeglass sellers??

And now one last thing... I have found the inspiration for my next quilt. It probably won't be a crazy quilt, but it will be very colorful!!


Isn't it gawgeous? It's Cotton Candy Handspun from the magical spinning fingers of
Dave of Cabin Cove. It's 38 yards of hand spun merino wool and I love it! I'll use it as embellishment on a quilt of some kind... I'll have to wait for the muse to speak to me about it.

Later, Ladies!

Block 8 and a Travel Bag for Embroidery

Hey Ladies!

Surprise... I actually finished another block this weekend! I treated myself and stitched for quite a few hours, happily finishing off Block 8.

This one went pretty fast, the seams just kind of fell together. Here's a closeup for you of two of the better treatments.

This is the last dark block on the left side, so now I'm moving on into the light, moonlit sky blocks... cool!

I also put together a travel bag that will hold everything I need to work on the sky blocks for this quilt, at least the embroidery part. I picked it up at TJ Maxx the other day, it just struck me as the perfect bag for carrying supplies.

Here it is closed up - not the greatest picture, but you get the idea:


Then it opens up to this - the booklet lays perfectly on the top:


And here it is completely opened up, with plenty of room in the bottom for folded CQ blocks:


See that booklet laying there? I have had that booklet, in one iteration or another, since the sixties. Here are the three of them:


Upper left is the 1964 edition, upper right is the 1975 version, and bottom is the 1979 version, bought just a few years ago when I couldn't find the other ones. The funny thing is, they all have exactly the same stitches in them (I checked)! They have a good, rounded set of stitches, with both the basics and enough more advanced stitches to keep things interesting. I like them because they are thin and flexible, fitting almost anywhere. The most recent one is easiest on these aging eyes, so that's the one I'll carry with me, just in case the aging memory needs help. ;0)

Later, Ladies!

Hello World!

I wish to introduce any remaining readers to the newest edition to the clan... Miss Chloe Ann, born May 2nd and weighing in at 7lbs 1oz and 20 3/4" long.

Her little eyes are soooo slanty; however, she does come by it naturally... see?

They are very happy, albeit very tired. It looks like Chloe will be a blonde, too and I don't think there is any way she can escape being "blessed" with massively curly hair. Both Ma and Pa have wondrous curls, she's gonna be a doll!

Mom was here for two weeks and, other than forgetting that I was related to her the first day she was here, she did OK. I stayed home on Monday and Tuesday, to help her get acclimated to a different house, but I was very nervous when I left her alone to go to work on Wednesday. She managed to feed herself, though, so that is always a plus. I think she spent a lot of time out on the patio. It is beautiful in the spring, with the sun coming down through the leaves, the doves cooing and the breezes tickling the wind chimes. On her last day here, she even said it had been a very nice two weeks, something she has never said to me before. I truly didn't know what to say I was so surprised. It was nice to hear it though. I think quite a bit of her bitterness has slipped away from her, along with her short term memory, so there is a silver lining there.

I have been doing some stitching, but not much. I have finished Block 18 now, but here it is with a couple of seams to go:

and here is my favorite seam on this block. It's a raised chain stitch done in #12 perle cotton.

I really like this stitch variation; however, next time, I'll run one side or the other down the seam instead of straddling it. It will make for a cleaner line I think, as well as showing off the stitch a bit better.

The next block on the right is the top corner block, so I have switched back over to the other side and am working on Block 8 (I think). My plan is to get all the blocks that have any black fabric on them done before we leave for Colorado in June. Hopefully I'll be able to work on the sky blocks while we are up there, as they are going to be super simple seams in only a couple of colors and some metallics. They should go quickly because I'm not going to try and make each seam unique. I'll probably just use various stem, straight, chain and feather stitches on them. I am so looking forward to finishing them up so I can move on to the next phase. Nat has promised that the center panel of a most voluptuous Titania will be ready for me when we get to Colorado. I can't wait!

I think that's all for now. This coming weekend is a "drag all the junk to the alley for pickup" weekend so I don't know if I'll have anything to show you or not... at least in the way of stitching. I may have a clean concrete slab though... WOOHOO!

Later, Ladies!!

Hello again!!

Hello, ladies. Long time no post... life gets rather busy for me around this time of year, apparently... one of these days I'll remember that.

Anyhoodles...

There has been a little (a very little) stitching going on... I have proof!

Block 19 for your viewing pleasure:

As I'm going up the right hand side of the quilt, I'm blending the seams a bit more. My favorite seam on this block is feathered chain stitch with extra chain stitches added.

The perle cotton looks blue but in person it shows as a steel grey. I likes it!!

In case you've forgotton just what this quilt is going to look like (if I ever get it done!), here is a mock-up of the plan:

and here's an explanation of the quilt.

Want to see what else has been happening? We had the Modern Phoenix Home Tour on April 5th and 6th this year. The first day was seminars and vendors galore, while the second day was the actual home tour. Glenn and I volunteered to take tickets and give out maps, so we only saw a few houses. Actually, we were more interested in the outside of the houses, since we want to do some front yard landscaping this year. Well, at least get it planned. It will soon be too hot to really work outside, at least for Glenn and I, old fogies that we are.

Here are a couple of photos, the whole set can be seen on my Flickr account, if you are into modern/contemporary/desert landscaping.

I love this little courtyard... I want to have a place like this in front of our house... it seems so welcoming to me!
I love this purple wall at the same house. So cool...

And I love this little set up in the back yard. We've been talking about putting a firepit out in our back yard, and this really fits the bill.

Here's a walkway/patio treatment that really caught my eye. There are lights hidden down in the gravel that shine upward at night. Oh, yeah!


Hokay... that's enough pictures for today. I have some more saved up, but don't want to post too many at one time.

Mom arrives next week for a two week visit. It will probably be her last visit with us, since even the short, non-stop flight from Denver to Phoenix is worrisome for us. She has been diagnosed with Alzheimer's, and her short term memory is practically non-existent. I've seen it coming for a few years now (we watched my father-in-law's struggle with it ten years ago), as she turned more toward the past and became even more socially tactless and forgetful. Of course she doesn't really believe it, but the rest of us can see it happening.

Well, didn't mean to end on a downer note. So, here's something to make you smile. Java, my Boston Terrier/Pit Bull cross, likes to roll around on the carpet in our bedroom when she is happy. Well, several days ago I had sorted clothes for washing, putting them in appropriate piles on the bedroom floor. Glenn and I were in the livingroom talking, and I saw Java walk from the hall into the kitchen and she had something around her neck. She sauntered around the corner from the kitchen and I couldn't believe my eyes.

You're not gonna believe this...


This is what we saw...





ROFLMAO!!!!! SNORK!!

Here she is doing a happy dance 'cause she's the center of attention... silly dog!



There... now you're smiling!!

Stitching and Furniture

Alert the media... stitching has been seen about Ms Marty's palace! No really... see?

Isn't it cool? It looks just like the last 7 blocks, doesn't it? Hee!

Anyhoo... this is my fave seam treatment on this block...

It's a detached raised chain stitch (I think) with lazy daisies alongside. The detached raised chain stitch in white #3 perle cotton was too stark, so I added the lazy daisies in a smaller, grey perle cotton and that really toned it down. It's neat the way the addition of another color changes how a seam looks, isn't it?

Since Rian asked if the model home furniture (from an earlier post) was small, I went back and took a few pictures. This armoire is enormous... it must be 9ft at least!


a beautiful dining table that could probably seat 10 in a pinch...


plus sectionals...


Lots of colors, too... green is popular for the modern styles...


We also have yellow...


and purple...


and this is my favorite piece (that I won't be buying)...

a "french lounge chair." Gorgeous!

So, if you're ever in Phoenix, do check out Furniture Affair ... it's a very eclectic bunch of furniture and it's great fun wandering around!

Hmm... that kinda sounded like a commercial... sorry!

Allie's Gift

I received a most welcome gift in the mail on Saturday. Allie had asked me for my snail mail addy last week so I was all atwitter with anticipation. The package was nice and squishy and when I opened it there was a lovely surprise inside. (click on the picture to embiggen - go to all sizes)

Isn't it beautiful? It belonged to her grandmother who was a world traveler in the 50's. This looks like it might have come from Egypt since it has depictions of the Egyptian god Horus. At first I thought his name was Osiris but after Googling (I love Google!) it I realized he is Horus. We think it was part of a jacket since there is a pocket on it. Whatever it was, it is beautiful and it's from Allie and that's all that matters!! Here's some closeups... each depiction of Horus is done in slightly different ways... they used a varigated thread to great effect!




I'll have to see if I can figure out a translation of the hieroglyphics, too. Thank you soooooo much, Miss Allie... I think I have the perfect place to showcase it!

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I don't have any stitching to show off today; however, I do have a before and after shot in the "what we did Sunday" file. Glenn is determined to reclaim the house from the cat's claw vines that have begun taking it over! This is a before shot of the east side of the house (with ancient air conditioner) from when we first moved in. The vines had doubled in size from this photo!


and here it is now...

As you can see, we still have to attack the other side of the wall in the front of the house. There was a big mat of roots, leaves and dirt between the A/C unit and the house... it was nasty!! Some of those vines were as big as my wrist! I'm quite sure I'll be spending the rest of the summer using Roundup on a regular basis on them as they grow back. We think they may be the cause of the small cracks in the walls of the house. Lovely!

Anyhoo... it's a start on the landscaping that needs to be done. The next big step is getting rid of this olive stump...

and it's partner in crime, a mulberry tree that was butchered by the previous owners. We have an arborist coming to take a look at them and the other trees in our yard next week. WooHoo!!

Hopefully I'll actually have some embroidery to show next time... this IS a crazy quilting blog after all!