Are You Bored Yet?

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I was reading another blogger’s blog and she wrote that this time was made for introverts.  She may be onto something there as I have been very content to stay at home and piddle around the house during this enforced isolation. Of course, that’s what I do almost every day, so this is not much of a change for me.  The only thing different is David is also at home all day, every day, but we have been enjoying this time together very much.  We certainly haven’t been bored.

We are catching up on some chores around the house we have said we needed to do and we are enjoying watching some new shows we are finding on AmazonPrime and Acorntv.  We painted a bedroom I’ve wanted to paint for a while.  It started out being a white room, but as I painted, I felt very discontented with it and so we bought some new paint in a soft, pink blush color.  I immediately felt more soothed by this color. It’s true that colors do affect how we feel in many cases.  Which is why I don’t think prison cells should be grey, but should be painted happier, softer colors to ease the savage beast.

Anyway, I was very happy how the bedroom turned out. I put a fresh quilt on the bed and we folded all my quilts and stacked some of them on an old trunk in the room. Lace curtains at the window and I’m going to hang a quilt behind the bed and it will be finished.  I just may sleep in that room tonight.

We’ve been working in the yard, raking and cutting down the big grasses so the new grasses can grow up.  Seems Spring has sprung as all the daffodils are blooming, the magnolia trees are budding out and you can see a tinge of green in all the bushes and trees.  My favorite time of year.  Forty-three years ago, I was expected my baby girl.  She was born March 30th so I am going to bake some cupcakes and bread tomorrow and David is going to make ham salad and we are going to take it over to her house and leave it at her door.  She lives up a hill where we also have property so we will check up on that while we are there.

This has been a crazy time for a lot of people.  Having children home all day sounds like fun to me, but I’m sure parents are having to adjust to it.   My grandson is missing a lot of his senior year which is a bummer. No prom, no senior day, maybe no graduation, at least on the day it was supposed to happen.  I’m sure we will have a party for him at some date.  I can’t believe some of the things that are being cancelled that are months ahead.  Do the powers that be think this crisis is going to go on that long?

Again no pictures today, but I have several I will be posting.  Someone posted this on Facebook. Nine months from today there will be a baby boom.  Will some crazy parent name his little girl Corona Virus?  Or Corona Vi for short?  Don’t be surprised!

Just checking in and hope you all are not feeling too isolated. There’s always the internet, Facebook or the phone. Call someone you haven’t actually talked to for a while and make their day.

Be safe, have fun and just know this will pass. Bye.

 

Sharing Toilet Paper

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What is it about toilet paper that has people so anxious?  And why are people hoarding it now?   You can only use so much toilet paper in a month, but some people are buying enough to last a year or two. Why is that?  Did you ever think toilet paper would be the most coveted item on everyone’s grocery list?

And what happens when the toilet paper starts to run out everywhere?  Will we have a government bill passed that ensures that every American would have a month’s worth  of toilet paper sent to them every month?   Will toilet paper take the place of the welfare check?    Or will we have a toilet paper exchange where you get so many sheets of toilet paper for so many eggs?  Or loaves of bread? Or anything?  Will toilet paper become part of the black market where people meet in dark alleys to slip a roll to someone for a few bucks?    I can see it now. The new mega millionaire who gets rich by selling underground toilet paper.  Maybe that’s what all these toilet paper hoarders have in mind.  Would you buy toilet paper on E-bay if it were priced 100% higher than the stores had had it? Would you really get that desperate?

I read where somewhere in the U.S. people were ripping up t-shirts and using it for toilet paper causing major sewer jams.   I call that desperate, but if you can’t flush, what’s the use?   You are left with a bigger problem.

So let’s all work together and buy ONLY what we need.  Don’t hoard. Share. Remember that word? We learned it in kindergarten.  Make this toilet paper scare a thing of the past.

Back So Soon?

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I don’t usually write two blogs so close to each other, but I hated keeping the coronavirus blog up too long. As far as I’m concerned it’s a downer and I don’t deal in downers very often.  I just hope I didn’t disturb or cause angst to anyone who is truly concerned about it all. I just can’t make myself get too upset about it.  I guess if the grocery stores continue to have empty shelves, I may get a little worried, but we are being assured the trucks are delivering and the stockers are stocking the shelves.

Enough of that. I’m sitting here this Saint Patrick’s Day watching John Wayne and Maureen O’Hara in the wonderful movie, The Quiet Man and thinking how different this Saint Patrick’s Day is from last years’ for many people. No celebrating in bars or wearing of the green so you don’t get pinched.  I guess I could have made green cupcakes or something, but I didn’t.  Happy Saint Patrick’s Day. We will all remember this one as the one where we were not allowed to gather and celebrate because of a nasty old virus.

I’ve been sewing up a storm in my shop.  I’ve got most of the 123 blocks finished for the six quilts I plan to make.  I’ve been sifting through my containers of fabric finding treasures I had forgotten about and today I found a quilt top I had forgotten I made years ago with my quilt class when I was teaching beginning quilting.  My class made a different block every week learning how to sew straight seams, do curves, match points and other things until they had twenty blocks and then they sewed it all together into a quilt top.  Then they’d come to my house and we would lay their quilt top, batting and backing together and baste them together. Then it was up to them to finish the quilt. I don’t know how many completed their quilt, but it was fun teaching all the ladies I taught.  I always made a quilt right along with my class and I have finished all of mine except this one, but it will get finished now.

This is what my shop looks like now.  Believe it or not my cutting table was clear of anything a few weeks ago, but since I’ve started making all the block, it’s a jumble of fabric right now.

A stack of the quilt blocks I am making.

There is work going on in this mess. Really.

Each of these piles of fabric will be a quilt block.

When I have them all completed then I will have to decide which blocks go into each quilt.

About two weeks ago my sister and brother-in-law celebrated their 62nd wedding anniversary. When my sister got married, I was in the fourth grade and she had been like a second mother to me.   When she got a job at a bank in the city right after graduation, she used some of her hard earned money and bought me a bride doll. I still have her. I’ll have to show her to you sometime.  Anyway, I wonder if this was a portent of things to come because she soon met my future brother-in-law and got engaged. When I learned she was going to get married and leave home I cried.  Then at the wedding I cried and cried.  I did not want my sister to leave me.  But she did and 62 years later we were sitting talking and my brother-in-law said, “You didn’t want me to marry Joanne,” and I told him he was taking away my sister.  But he’s been a good brother-in-law and I’ve forgiven him for taking Joanne away.   Seems like only yesterday.  I forgot to take any pictures of them because we were visiting and talking about everything.  My parents’ farm is right next door to my sister’s house and it was sold to a relative who did not take good care of it.  The barn fell down and the house is falling down and there are trees growing in all my daddy’s fields where he use to grow corn and hay and oats.  It’s sad to see it like that.  My parents took such good care of their home and farm when they were alive.

We drove some back roads as usual when we went to my sister’s house.

Saw this along the way.

Never heard of this place, but we came upon it on our drive.

We went through the town of Liberty where my mother grew up and I have a cousin who still lives there.

His father began this supermarket many years ago and now my cousin, Tim, is the owner and manager.   We stopped in to see him. Usually I don’t see him anymore except at funerals, the last one being his mother’s, my Aunt Suzanne, so it was nice to see him on a normal day.  He and I and another cousin were all born within months of each other and we grew up together and saw each other whenever we’d visit my grandpa and my other cousin was down from Detroit where she lived. He was so surprised to see us. We had a nice visit and then we had to go on.

I didn’t show you my birthday cakes so here they are.

David got the candles on there wrong.  It should be 17!  Ha!  Seems like I was just 17 yesterday.

This was a sweet little cake that I let David eat as I ate the entire chocolate by myself. And was sorry for it!

We’ve been doing some chores around the house getting ready for gardening time.

David cleared out what I call the kitchen garden. Right now it looks barren, but it won’t be long until the rhubarb is up and all the perennials I’ve planted  through the years will be coming up.

You can barely see at the bottom of the birdhouses day lilies beginning to pop out.

Daffodils are popping out all around the garden. Spring is only days away.

Hope you are surviving the coronavirus scare and looking forward to warm and bright days ahead.  Bye.

 

 

 

The Coronavirus and Me

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No, I still don’t have any pictures. I’d show you what the Coronavirus looks like if I could. It’s kind of pretty as viruses go.   I’m just writing to tell you how stunned I am at how scared people are and how panicked some seem to be.  I’ve been out and about and most people I see are going on about their affairs while all the news shows are telling us to stay home.

They can stay home if they want to, but I’ve got a life to live and no virus is going to stop me.  It may stop me from getting groceries when some of these scared people go to the stores and clear out the shelves with things they will never use.  More food is being bought than I’ve ever seen. Do people think they are going to be locked in their homes and not allowed to go to the grocery for months?  My preacher couldn’t find a roast. My son couldn’t find one piece of chicken for his curry.  Either there’s going to be a whole lot of cooking going on in the next few weeks or a whole lot of food is going to spoil and  be thrown out.

It really bothers me when churches close. Seems to me that’s where people ought to be during something like this manufactured crisis praying for common sense and patience with people who are so scared.  If you really think you might get the virus if someone breathes on you, then stay home.  I’m going shopping tomorrow in hopes of finding some things I need on the shelves.

How do you feel about this virus?  I’m just amazed that people are having to be told to wash their hands. What in the world have they been doing?   And I hear you should wash with plain old soap and water and not to use hand sanitzers too much as they tend to become useless after a while.  I agree with that.  Maybe we are too clean.  Maybe being exposed to a few germs might be healthier.  And stay out of hospitals if you fear germs because  they have more germs there than anywhere else.

Anyway, the Coronavirus and me might meet up one day, who knows and it we do, I will stay home and drink lots of liquids and take aspirin.  The only time I’ve ever had the flu was after I got the flu shot. Go figure.  I’ve refused a flu shot ever since.  From people who should know I’ve heard that the flu shot is only for one particular flu every year, so if you get another kind, it doesn’t do a bit of good.

I really hope you aren’t one of those who is panicking over this. You really shouldn’t.  As C.S. Lewis wrote, we all are going to die of something. It’s in our future, no matter what.  So should we fear this virus any more than the volcano that might erupt, the tornado that might fly overhead,  or the bullet that might fly?  As FDR said, “There is nothing to fear, but fear itself.”  Wise words because I think it’s the fear that is fueling this more than the disease itself.

I really hope and pray all who reads this will remain well, but should you get the virus, don’t worry.  If you are a relatively healthy person you will pull through as thousands have.  I will pray this all will end soon. And don’t listen to the panic mongers on the news shows. Go out and have some fun with your kids since all the schools are closed.  Bye.

I promise my next blog will have pictures.

I Write Blogs in my Head

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If you are a blogger, you know you are always looking for something to write about.  Anyway, I do. I write blogs while I’m quilting, while I’m laying in bed unable to sleep, at the  most strange times a story will pop into my head. I really ought to carry a pad and pen with me and write down what I am thinking, because I’ve written the best blogs when I’m not sitting at the computer. Honest.  I will think of something and it will grow and grow in my mind and I think to myself, “you really should write this down because you will forget it all if you don’t.”  But I don’t write it down and then later I forget what I was going to write.

So I was sitting in my Lazyboy on the computer when this idea for a blog popped into my head so here I am, writing it and now I can’t remember exactly what the aim of this post was supposed to be!   All I know is I have had some pretty amazing blogs pass through my brain and you would have been astounded how great they are, but sadly, none get on this site.

This is my birthday month and already I’ve had reason to celebrate as I went to my favorite antique store where a lady has a booth of fabric and sewing paraphernalia and I got a big pile of really nice fabric to use in the quilts I am  making now.  It’s almost like she saw me coming and stocked her booth just for me.   Tomorrow is actually my birthday and we are going out to eat at a restaurant where I have a coupon for a free salad bar and since I’m easy to please, this makes me so happy.   I also have two cakes, TWO, albeit they are small cakes that David slipped in on me and I just happened to see them in the cake stands.  One is chocolate and the other is a tiny white cake with one rose on top.  I’d eat a piece tonight, but I better wait until tomorrow to start gaining weight.

 

March, April and May are my favorite months of the year.  I love Spring so much and already the flowers are poking through the soil and we have a few daffodils almost ready to bloom.  For some reason this Winter has been especially hard on me. I’ve been cold all the time and can be wearing three layers and have two blankets on me and still be cold.  I’m so glad we have a heated mattress pad on our bed. Best invention ever. It’s like getting onto a hot pad for your whole body and while I usually have to turn it off after a while, when I first get into bed it’s an ahhhh moment for me.

There’s been a lot going on around here and now we are getting ready to paint one of our bedrooms. I’ve grown to love the shabby chic look and want to make this particular bedroom look shabby chic.  I’m making a quilt for the bed and found some beautiful linen pillowcases with wide ruffles and I plan to paint some of the furniture white.  David’s not sure about that, but since I will be doing all the work, he won’t stop the progress!  I don’t know how long this is going to take me, but when it’s all done, I will TRY to remember to take some pictures to show you the finished project.   We bought an old chicken nesting box a while back and I plan to paint it and store things in it, fabric or linens or something.  The box needs a lot of cleaning as it was used, well, by chickens and they are not the neatest creatures on the planet.  I laugh sometimes when I see ladies have put curtains in their chicken coops or nice furniture or paintings on the wall. I tried decorating our chicken coop when we first built it. I bought a picture of roosters to hang on the wall which I thought my girls would like. I also hung posters of chickens on the walls.  Well, those hens made short order of the posters, tearing them to shred, pooped all over the curtains and knocked the rooster picture whopper-jawed.  Needless to say, all they get now is a good cleaning out of their coop and a -refreshing of their bedding every so often.  No more shabby “chick” for those girls.

I hope to have some pictures for you next time.  I know I like to read blogs that have pretty pictures to look at. There are some really pretty blogs out there and I love looking at them and  I look forward to these.  I try to stay away from the blogs where they are constantly selling something.  I like to read about people’s lives all over the world. We all really are not that much different.  We all are looking for beauty in our lives  and love in our homes.

Here’s to all you bloggers. May you continue to entertain and inform us.  Bye.

I Love Color

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I’ve been working with fabric all week. Something I find very satisfying and enjoyable.  I do have a rather large selection of fabric since we had a fabric store years ago and I have added to it since we closed our little shop.  Sometimes I miss the store and being able to order fabric. It was like getting to pick out my Christmas present just about every month and when the fabric would be delivered it would be like Christmas morning.

I ordered some fabric this past week. It’s dangerous for me to go on fabric store sites because I love just about all that I see.  No color is off limits to me.  I even like orange if used carefully in quilts.

These look like they could have been material used in my mother’s aprons years ago.  So bright and cheery.

These made me think of vintage French material.  So gorgeous. I wish I could have bought the whole line, but I will find a place for these in a quilt.

I bought six yards of this. It’s prettier in person. A dusty pink.  It’s going to be hard to cut because it’s so pretty.

This is Lori Holt’s fabric from her line of fabrics for Riley Blake.  Lori likes bright, cheerful colors and she has designed some of the cutest quilts.   Anyway, I got enough of this to back a quilt.  Don’t know which one yet, but who cares.

I’ve been making blocks for my Grandmother’s Fancy quilts.  I need 115 of them for five quilts.  It’s going to take me a while.  But it’s so much fun going through all my fabric to pick out what I need for each block because each block is a different color.   I’ve even come across fabric I forgot I had and it’s like, well, Christmas, once again!   I have found fabric I have never cut and didn’t remember buying.  But that’s okay. It makes it interesting.  I don’t know if you remember when I was cleaning out my fabric and I gave a lot to a local charity shop and several bags full to a friend who was making lap quilts for nursing home patients.   That still left me with boxes and boxes of fabric.  I will never use it all in my lifetime so my kids will have to haul it all to a charity shop because none of them sew or quilt.  I’m sure they will thank me. Ahem.

I told you we went to an antique show Saturday. Sometimes you kiss a frog before you find a prince and this time I was disappointed.  I have more nice antiques than this sale had. It was more of a flea market. But David and walked through the two buildings it was held in and saw some interesting things. One lady was selling bunches of flowers and she had planted a lot of little succulents in tea cups and other small dishes. Her booth was cute. Another booth had all old laundry items such as a wringer washer, old wash tubs, old clothes pins three for a dollar!  I had to laugh at that as I have so many of those in an old clothespin bag in my shop.

When we were just about to leave, I saw a box of books.  I always look at old books when I see them, especially when they are in a box all jumbled up because you never know what you will find.  I love old children’s books and in one box this man had was the book, “Bambi.”  Three dollars, the man told me and I snapped it up.  It was copyright  1929.  It was first published in 1923 just about the time Walt Disney was young enough to read it and start dreaming of making a movie.

Felix  Salten was an Austria writer and critic.  He is best known for his book, Bambi. I’m so glad he wrote it.

Deer even run across the inside cover.

I love what John Galsworthy wrote about the book. Notice he recommends the book to “sportsman.”  Not Bambi!

Bambi’s mother.  When I saw the movie for the first time and Bambi’s mother became a victim of the hunter, I was too little to realize what happened and my mother would not tell me.

Could this be the model for Thumper who Walt Disney created?

Anyway, I’m looking forward to reading this.  Glad I found it.

Coming home we stopped at another antique store we like called Vic’s.  Outside it is parked all manner of old army vehicles, an airplane, old cars and this…….

 

Wouldn’t it be crazy to drive this down the road?   It would certainly make other drivers take a second look….or wreck!

And this caught my eye because it made me think of my sister-in-law.

About the only thing that looks like her is she’s blonde, but her name is Terry.

We had a fun day and ended it by eating out at IHOP.  And something happened there that was so cute. We were done eating and walking out and a little boy with Down’s Syndrome waved at us and said, “Hi,” and I smiled and said “Hi,” and as I passed him he grabbed my hand and would not let go so  I went back to him and patted his hand and said “aren’t you going to let me go?”  He had a big smile on his face. He was so darling.   His mother told him to let go and he said, “Bye,” and I said, “Bye,” and we left. I told David I wish I could adopt him he was so cute.

Here’s to beautiful fabric, wonderful books and darling little boys. Bye.

 

Sorry, I’m Lazy

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Here I am and it’s February already.  When I was learning how to spell February in elementary school, I thought it was odd there was an “r” after the “b” because I had always said Febuary and no one had ever corrected me. Spell check just corrected me! Ha!  But it was impressed on me so I never misspell it now.  Anyway, I’ve got nothing right now to show you because I’ve grown lazy taking pictures.

It’s not to say things aren’t happening around here. It’s just that I get up and before I know it, I’m going to bed again and I wonder where the day went.  I have a grand plan to make so many quilts this year and give them away.  To accomplish that, I need to get into my shop and sew like mad.  But right now I’m only accomplishing one or two blocks  a day so my grand plan isn’t going as quickly as I wanted.

David and I have been thinking about vacations and where we should travel to this year. We’ve been to every state but Hawaii and Rhode Island, many of them several times.  One of my favorite bloggers is having a special event this Spring and I just mentioned it to David and he said, “Let’s go. Put it on your calendar.”  So I did. I will tell you about it later when I’m sure we can get tickets and pet sitters and all that.  Whenever we plan a trip, our dogs and chickens are first on my mind. Who will watch them? How can they ever do without me?  Will something horrible happen to them if I go away?  So far we’ve  been pretty blessed with pet sitters and our animals have been well taken care of. I checked once with our vet on their accommodations and I was appalled at how small the pens were and the run for the dogs to get outside was about eight feet long. My dogs would go crazy there. So that was out. But I’ve found a girl who does sitting and she does a very good job, so I will be calling her. And my dogs can stay home where they are comfortable.

But back to February.  I do love the cold, wet, and snowy days that are part of this month. Even at that, there are days when you can smell Spring. David and I sat on the swing on my shop porch and I could smell the earth and hear the birds and it almost felt like Spring.  The other day I saw a flock of Sandhill Cranes go over.  We see them every year, but they are early this year.  They fly in large groups and there are several that fly over. If they are early, does that mean Spring is not far behind?  Part of me says, “I hope not” and part of me says, “Yay” I’m ready for warm weather.

We are going to an antique show tomorrow.  I know I don’t need one more thing put in our house, but I would like to see what they have for sale.  There may be that ONE thing I just need to have.  I got a box today with more fabric in it. Yes, I ordered more fabric. I love fabric.  The colors in the fabric I chose are so vivid. I’ll try to get some pictures taken and I will tell you where I get my fabric online.  There is a store where the fabric is one or two dollars less a yard than most other places. I only ordered it two days ago and already have gotten it.

Well, David and I are off to Sam’s Club.  It’s one of my favorite places to shop and I don’t like to shop.  I’ve rambled today, but that’s the kind of day it’s been.  I’ve just rambled through it.

And I’m only going to say this once. I am very thankful the impeachment fiasco it over and President Trump can do his job without being harrassed.

Have an almost but not quite Spring Day.  Bye.

It’s a Beginning

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I love to start quilts almost as much as I love to finish them.  I love every part of quilt making. The picking the pattern.  The choosing of fabrics. The cutting out of the quilt.  The piecing of the quilt.  And finally, the quilting or tying of the quilt.  It’s called a comforter when a quilt is tied. At least that is what my mother always told me.  It’s only called a quilt when the fabric, batting and backing are sewed together in tiny quilt stitches.

If you have ever made a quilt, you understand what I am talking about.  And once you make one, you almost always have to make another one and another one and another one.

Right now I am working on a certain quilt that I have made before called Grandmother’s Fancy.  I found the pattern in a quilt magazine I bought almost twenty years ago.

I use to buy this magazine all the time. I don’t know if it is still sold.  It always had some interesting stories about quilters and at the back it had several of the quilt patterns that were shown in the magazine.

As you can see, I wrote Grandmother’s Fancy on the front so I would know this particular pattern was in this particular magazine.  I have done that a lot through the years when I wanted to keep a pattern I found in a magazine.

And I write myself notes in the pages while I am working.  Sometimes I write something I have heard on the radio or some advertisement I am interested in. My quilt magazines became sort of diaries through the year.

This magazine was good about showing how to put each quilt together.  This may look hard to some, but it’s really an easy pattern.  I would love to make one for each of my grandchildren, but the ones I am making now are for our bed.  As it’s a king size I haven’t made very many quilts for it because it’s getting harder for me to quilt a big quilt on my home sewing machine.  I may have to hand quilt these.

This was the first quilt I made from this pattern.  I made it many years ago and it’s been used and washed several times and is beginning to get the vintage look I love in quilts.

It is on our guest bed in our guest bedroom.  We haven’t had too many guests to stay here for a while and the bedroom started to look like a storage room until this week when I put everything away and cleaned the room and made up the bed again.  I’m glad I did because I like how it looks.  Maybe now I will have guests again.

This is a king size version of the pattern.  I plan on finishing it this year.  It’s on the top of my list of quilts to finish. Because…….

I’ve made enough of the blocks to make yet another one.  One that will be more Spring like.  I really love making these blocks.

I still have a few more I want to make before I decide what fabric I want for the borders and sashing.  I’m thinking I’ll use some shirting material for it.  I’m reading a book right now about some people during the WWll times and one of the women in it is a seamstress and she said, “Textiles are a woman’s delight.”  I wholeheartedly agree with that statement.  I delight in textiles.

David took a week off for his birthday and we thought we might do something, but we haven’t done a darn thing except go out to eat a couple of times, but that was all right with both of us.  It’s been so cold all I want to do is stay in where it’s warm and work on quilts or knit and David has been working on our taxes and almost has them done.  I’m so glad he likes to do that because I would be lost if I had to do them.  I’d have to hire someone to do my taxes even though I actually took a class on taxes in college. A lot has changed since then.

We did go see our two youngest grandsons in their orchestra concert.  Children from all the elementary schools, middle schools and high schools in Bloomington joined together to put on the concert.  Each class had a song to play and at the end the whole group played together. It was awesome. The middle school group played a song from Star Wars and their bows were lit up and they turned down the lights and it was just wonderful.

This was his debut performance on his cello. Our youngest grandson.  He’s so cute and funny.

For some reason the picture is sideways, but that is his brother smiling. This is his second year of cello and I am proud to say he has signed up for orchestra in middle school next year.  I love that they are learning an instrument.  My biggest regret of my life, and I have very few regrets, is that when I had the chance to take piano lessons I refused to take them and my poor mother could not talk me into it.  Now, when I hear our church pianist play, and she is wonderful, I think to myself that could be me up there if I had listened to my mother.  I can pick a few songs out on the piano and can read music a little, but not like I could have if I had taken lessons.  I did take violin lessons when our boys took them.  I was in the same class with them at one time and I could play somewhat well, but I found that getting the time to practice was getting harder and harder and violin fell by the wayside.   I gave my violin away.  Now I wish I had it again.

David and me and the parents of our grandsons, our daughter and son-in-law.   Sara took piano for eight years and violin for a couple of years.  Jeremy plays the drums.   Out oldest son played cello in orchestra and our youngest son played the Bass.  I use to haul them to class every week, the bass bigger than our son until he grew into it.  They both were pretty good. I guess you could say we are a musical family.

What have you been up to?  Do you have any projects you are enjoying these Winter months?  Here’s to musical grandboys and quilts to made. Bye.

 

 

I’m Wondering

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Here it is, the middle of January in a brand new year already and I’m getting nothing done.  I find myself dreaming more than I am doing.  Does that happen to you?  I wonder when I will get energetic enough to get all the things done I want to do.  I want to clean out closets. I want to begin my walking regimen again. Now that’s a good question. I wonder when that will happen again.

Just a few years ago I was walking at least five miles a day and then my health went all downhill. After getting a pacemaker in I thought I’d be walking miles again real soon. Well, it hasn’t happened yet.  I can barely walk a mile without getting tired out.  I have got more done this past year than I have been able to do.   But I want to walk again without wearing myself out.  I want to stop whining about it also.

I wonder if I will finish many quilts this year.  I have been working on blocks for the same quilt for the past several weeks. It’s called Grandmother’s Fancy and I’ve completed one quilt from this particular pattern that I love and another that is just waiting to be quilted so, of course, I started another one.  The blocks are just so much fun to make and are using a lot of my scrap fabric.  It’s like a display of a lot of my old fabric.  I have flour sack fabric in it and fabric we sold at our store twenty years ago and fabric I got from my mother’s stash after she died.  If I get the energy to take pictures, I’ll show you the quilts in my next post.

I’m wondering if David and I will take a vacation this year.  We didn’t take one last year because of, well, you know, my medical problems.   We are planning on buying a new car, maybe a Jeep this Spring and we tell ourselves we need to break it in by taking a really great trip somewhere. Alaska again?  Maybe.  Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia.  Sounds wonderful.  Martha’s Vineyard?  That’s somewhere I have always wanted to visit.  Who knows.  I just know If we don’t take a trip I will feel like we are getting too old to try again and I really don’t want to think that.

I remember my mother’s and daddy’s last trip to Colorado. They got into a blizzard and had to stay in a church for a while. Mother always had snacks with her and shared them with people around her.  It was a trip they talked about a lot, but it was their last one.  They visited some friends in Colorado and went out to dinner with them and the man got choked on some food and my daddy performed the Heimlich maneuver on him and saved him.  Yes, it was their last trip.

I’m wondering if this trial against our president will ever come to an end.  No president has had to go though what President Trump has had to endure.  I know some hate him so much they will believe anything about him that they hear, but he’s done so much good since he’s been in office. If only the media told the truth.  I’m praying it will all end and he will be allowed to do his job without being harassed constantly.

I wonder how many people decided they weren’t going to read my blog anymore because of the above paragraph.

I’m wondering if we will have a blizzard this Winter.  I know some people really don’t want to see snow, but I’d love to see one really big snow before Winter is done. Last year Winter was so mild, we had very little snow and it just didn’t feel like Winter.   Just one day where everyone has to stop and stay at home.  Just one day to snuggle down with a cup of hot chocolate and a good book before it’s time to get outdoors and plant a garden and work in the yard.

I’m wondering if I will lose the weight I really want to lose.  Well, not enough that I didn’t eat a big piece of David’s chocolate birthday cake I baked for him.  It is really good!   I have to stop baking which I like more than cooking.

I’m wondering what other people in blogland will be talking about this year.  I read several blogs. Some I never miss because they are such good writers. I wonder about their lives and how they are doing all the time.

I wonder just how quickly this year will pass by. If it’s like the last one, I will be writing my 2021 blog before long.

What do you wonder about?   Life if full of wonder and delight.  Hope this new year is going well with you.  Bye.

 

Remembering 2019

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The end of the year is a time for remembering and looking forward.  While there were many blessings in the past year, I must admit it was not the best year I’ve ever had what with spending so much time in doctors’ offices and in the hospital. Having a pacemaker put in was not on the top of my list of fun things to do, but it was a last resort sort of thing so I did it.

But now that is all past and just  a memory as I look back on Christmas and the wonderful times we had with friends and family.

We had Thanksgiving with family and friends. This is our oldest son’s girlfriend’s son with his dog, Annie. Annie is so cute. I made her some scarves for Christmas.

My son and his girlfriend. They love Disney World and last year they had a season pass to it and were down there almost every week it seemed.

The tree was up with the help of two of our grandsons.

These two are growing up way too fast.

The stockings were hung by the chimney with care.  I knit 24 pairs of stocking this year and I’ve already started for next year.   I just let everyone pick out the ones they like.

I was gifted this beautiful Christmas cactus. I saw one on Facebook that was one hundred years old and had been in the same family all that time. It was huge.  I’m not sure this one will make it that long, but I hope I can manage to keep it going until next year.

This was our front entry this year. I bought the cubby at an antique store and it held a lot of my smaller Santas and other paraphernalia.

My daddy made all the little wooden houses and the church years ago. He use to make them and sell them and they were quite popular.  I made the trees from a pattern I found on Ann Wood’s blog.  She’s a very talented and creative artist who provides free patterns as well as selling them on her blog.

Packages under the tree and I just love the way the sunlight comes in this window in the Winter.  This is the room I most often am in, cutting out quilts or knitting or just watching tv.  It’s not the warmest room in this old house though.

While hurrying to make gifts, wrap gifts and prepare for the holidays, I  sewed this pillow from a dish towel I bought in Nashville.  I don’t know why I always have the urge to sew something entirely not to do with Christmas when I’m right in the middle of the hustle and bustle, but I always do.  I think it’s my way of calming myself because sometimes the days can get hectic. I really tried this year to slow down, take it easy and just enjoy the real reason for the season.  I tried reading the entire book of Luke in the Bible. There are 24 chapters and if you read a chapter a day before Christmas, you’d get the full story of Jesus and why He was born and how He died for everyone.   I didn’t get it all read, but I’ve read it countless times before so I know the story.

This is the time of gray, cloudy days, but we have had some beautiful sunsets.  I can’t get a picture of just how beautiful this one was, but it was gorgeous.  This is our lone tree we have that was left after our neighbor cut down all the trees on his property. This one set right on the property line and I asked him not to cut this one down.  This makes me think of that one scene from Gone With the Wind where Scarlette and her father are talking about the land and Tara is in silhouette.

I did most of our shopping online this year and I think I found some very good presents for my loved ones.

David likes to play Santa.  He wears this hat at his workplace and all the children think he’s the real one.  True story. We were in line at Wal-mart and there was a little boy about three years old sitting in a cart in front of us and he was eyeing David up and down and then he blurted out, ” You’re not the real Santa Claus!”  His mother was so embarrassed, but David looked at him for a few seconds and then said, “No, I am not. I’m one of his helpers.”  Well, that little boy just kept starring at him.   It was so cute.  David gets a kick out of things like this.

He also likes to play Santa at our family Christmas gift giving.

He surprised me Christmas Eve with this….

Flowers that I used for a centerpiece on our table.

I love watching the grandkids opening their presents. The big hit this year were woolen hats with beards attached.

Oh, my.

Our daughter’s son thought she ought to wear one of the beards, soooo….

She did!  Everyone had fun with them.

He looks like he belongs to the group ZZ Top.  And guess what movie we are watching on tv.

Our granddaughter got a beret. She looks so cute in it.

This is an alarm clock that has a sonic boom sound when it goes off. It can also shake your bed. I bet this will make my grandson popular in his dorm at college next year!  Ha!

I always seem to get a chicken themed gift every year.  I don’t know why?!

So, Christmas is over for another year. Sometimes I wish it would last longer and that the days before were not so hectic.   I’m going to try to buy gifts throughout the year so that I won’t be scrambling for gifts a week before Christmas.  I believe Christmas has become way too commercialized and I want to get away from that and focus more on what it means.  It’s like no other day.

So the new year is here and already almost a week old.    We did some antiquing yesterday at one of my favorite antique stores.

We found this little buggy. David thinks it was for some rich little girl’s dolls at one time. Part of it is missing, but I thought it would be something I could decorate for Christmas next year. And it fits right in with our old house.

The little Radio flyer wagon behind my snowmen was another find.  This is my small collection of snowmen I put out after Christmas.

I found this little snowman at the antique store.

A friend gave me this Jim Shore snowman years ago and I love him.

I also found some red fabric at a booth where  the lady sells all things to do with quilting and sewing. I have found a lot of fabric at her booth.  I just completed a quilt with flannel backing from flannels I found in her booth and I’ll probably be back for more.

January brings seed catalogs. Even deep in Winter one can dream about the garden.

I’m thinking I want to try to grow pumpkins again.  My last try was a bust.

So many kinds to choose from. If I had a lot of acres, I’d plants lots of pumpkins.

So I hope the new year will be good to you.  I hope your dreams will come true and God will pour all His blessings on you and your household. Happy New Year!