A Few Pictures

I'm home alone tonight - first time in ages! I've had my bath and am dressed in new navy plaid flannel pajamas with lace trim! Mark and Chet are at the Colts football game tonight. It doesn't start till 8:30 so it will be late when they get home. Mark will probably stay over night and go to work from here in the morning. Mark is so patient and good with his father, takes a special person to tackle some of the projects he takes on with him!

Posting just a few pictures from our Thanksgiving Day with family and friends. Tracy, Jon and Anna Grace arrived about 1:00 a.m. They drove straight through from Mississippi - Jon is a licensed driver now and did about half the driving so they were able to do it in one shot. Mitch arrived about 1:00 p.m. Nate deep fried a turkey (shown in photo below) and Mark and his friend Brittany, made a beautiful ham. Tracy brought cornbread dressing and it was very tasty. Tia made a cheesy potato dish. I cooked cranberries (twice). And we had many veggies, rolls and the usual dishes. Mitch brought Wisconsin sausage and cheeses - oh so good!





Anna Grace 'sharing' her Stained Glass Windows quilt with Nate, Jon and Tracy. She fell in love with this quilt before it was finished - now the quilt is in Mississippi!




The guys: Mark, Nate, Jon, Mitch, Chet and J.D.



The Gals - Tracy, me, Tia, Anna, Kim (JD's friend), Brittany and Tori.

We had a lovely weekend and enjoyed being together! Tracy and family left at 3:00 p.m. on Saturday and drove half way and spent the night at a hotel. They arrived home about 11:30 today. Mitch's flight left at 7:00 p.m. and he got home about midnight. I'm sure they happy to be in their own beds, too.

That's it for this week. Thanks for stopping by. Stay well and warm.

Happy Thanksgiving

I imagine everyone is writing menus, grocery lists and looking forward to a big day with family and friends later this week. We are having a house full with our children and friends coming. Nate will deep fry a turkey and Mark is doing a ham. Tracy is doing Mississippi corn bread dressing and Mitch is bringing Wisconsin Brats. And of course we'll have all the usual side dishes and trimmings. The kids will do most of the cooking this year because my treatments leave me zapped! The Michigan Granddaughters spent a few hours with me yesterday going through cabinets, cleaning the refrigerator and stove and etc. It's nice and sparkling clean in the kitchen now. I could have kept them for a few more hours to hit a few more rooms but didn't want to scare them off for good.

Am proud to announce I finished block #12 for the Rocky Mountain Sampler quilt a group of gals have been working on this year. I've not laid the blocks out together to see how the completed top will look. This block is a bit 'blah' - think it's because I didn't use a red and I did in all the other blocks. The block looks a tad off kilter but a good spray of starch and a hot, heavy iron should fix it up. . . the power of persuasion!

Photos below are parts of my fabric stash - I think it's time to go through the stash and 'share' with other quilters. I've not been able to do as many donation quilts this year as planned but do have a few to give to our local Cheer Fund for Christmas baskets.

This picture is just the top half of a big cabinet I had built to house my stash. I also store books, magazines and an assortment of other goodies in it. Perhaps next week I will show a picture of my quilt books - and that's frightening, too. Oh well, I've enjoyed every book and magazine; and every piece of fabric that has come into this house.

Too Tired To Post - A Bit Of Sewing

Yes, I was too tired to do a post last week - and I see several of you visited the blog and checked up on me. I continue to deal with health issues and will for a while to come. Thanks to those of you who sent well wishes, thoughts and prayers my way. I really do appreciate it.

We've had some lovely weather - in the 70's a couple of days last week and that was a treat. The family has been keeping in touch and most of them will be here Thanksgiving weekend. Be a treat to see them all together again. Mark is taking Chet to a Colts football game that weekend and Chet is all fired up and ready to go.

Belated Happy Birthday wishes to sister Ellen and brother Wally - and anyone I may have missed. . . I do have b'day cards for you - right in front of me now!

I haven't had too much energy but did do a bit of sewing this past week. Block #11 for the Rocky Mountain Sampler is now complete and shown below.

This morning I pulled fabrics and cut for block #12 - the final block for the sampler. Pieces are laid out and ready to be sewn together. It took 2 1/2 hours to sew up block #11 and this one has more pieces so imagine it will take a bit longer to stitch together. This is just the center section, know as Card Tricks and finished, it will measure 6" - can you see the pattern?

The blocks finish at 12" each so it will be a nice throw size. I do have to find border fabrics to finish it off. Picture below is showing the cut pieces for the outside of the block. I hope it's a pretty quilt as I've just not been too fired up about this quilt. I think the idea of having the fabric, directions and etc. laying around for such a long time is just not my style! Not that I'm neat and tidy; perhaps it's that I'm not a patient person.
Till next time - be safe and warm.