Holy Crap!!

I actually sewed! All weekend. And I have pictures to prove it. Stay tuned!!

Spending the afternoon in the ER is not exactly how I planned to spend my day today. Poor Carter broke his arm. Right above the elbow. The doctor came in and said "well, it is a break and this kind is considered a surgical emergency. When was the last time he ate?" I almost passed out. Then I almost puked. I held it together long enough to call Jason. He's working, because, you know. He always misses the "fun stuff". The ortho specialist consulted via telephone and decided he didn't need surgery. They put him in a splint and I have to call Children's Hospital first thing Tues morning to make an appt for a follow up visit and a full cast. Fun times. Fun times.

I'm just sick.....

**obscene language ahead**

I. AM. FUCKING. LIVID!!! There is no delicate way to say it. So there you have it. My mail today. Or at least what's left of it. My Mother's Day gift, I'm assuming. We have two dogs. Two big dogs and our mail carrier is terrified of them. I can respect that. We live in a rual area, so she just drives around the cul de sac and puts our mail in our box and the dogs can't get to her because of the Invisible Fence. On the chance that we have a box too big to fit in the mailbox, she sits at the top of the driveway and lays on the horn for about five solid minutes. Then one of us frantically runs out to greet her to get her to stop. I can handle that. Evidently today she got over her fear. Or she figured out the dogs were inside and we were not home. And she left a box and our mail sitting on the front porch. Just sitting there. With two hungry dogs inside.

See, we don't ever use our front porch/door. See that camper? It has been sold and that spot is now where I park my van. See that right hand corner of our house? The one closest to the photographer? If you can imagine that wall just a bit further from where the picture cuts off, there is a small stooop and a door that leads directly into my kitchen. We use that door exclusively. So, imagine backing my van into the driveway (because I had groceries in the back and wanted them closest to the door) in the dark & rainy night. Imagine me grabbing my groceries and high tailing it to my kitchen door. Then imagine my dogs' excitement to see me after being out nearly all day. Then imagine my dogs' bladders and how eagerly they wanted to go outside. Then imagine their joy when they discovered a new "chew toy" left on the front porch. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how my Mother's Day gift was ruined. I intend to march my hiney up to the P.O. first thing tomorrow morning and raise 15 kinds of holy hell. Oh yes, you may just find me on YouTube tomorrow. It could get ugly.

Winner Winner, Fabric Winner....

Wow, I just kind of mentally checked out for a little while there, didn't I? Sorry about that. I finally got around to chosing winner for the fabric giveaway. Drumroll please.......

And the winner is Allison Marie!
Alison Marie said...
How funny - I just wandered over to finally say thanks for the fabric from Rosy Little Things' vintage sheet swap (but not sure which was yours b/c I unwrapped them all right away, I was so excited), and you just so happen to be doing a give-away!
My favorite part of spring cleaning is when you find something special you'd forgotten about, like a card you'd been given, or even a lost button from a favorite sweater. My least fave is that chaotic time in the middle where it looks even worse than when you started, and you just have to muscle through it!

April 8, 2010 12:41 AM

Amen girlfriend! I'm currently still in that state of "where it looks even worse than when you started". I guess I gotta get those muscles out and get working : )

You have 24 hours to contact me and then I'll get your box of goodies out in the mail! Congrats!

More Pyrex

A Facebook friend asked me about my Pyrex collection yesterday so I grabbed my camera and took pics inside my cupboards. Note, this is not my entire collection as several pieces are being used right now.

Casseroles & Divided dishes:



Smaller Casseroles & bowls:

Mugs:

Misc pieces:

***And no, I have not forgotten about my pending fabric giveaway. Its been sheer laziness on my part. I'll try to get to it tonight : ) ***

Holy Moly Cow!!!

"A thrifting we will go, a thrifting we will go, high ho the diary o, a thrifting we will go."

WOW. That's pretty much all I can say. I have never gone thrifting on a Sunday evening before, but I'm beginning to think that's my new spot. The stores were dead and I hit the jackpot. More than once!! First up: PYREX!!

please ignore the mess in the background, we're having storage issues with our homeschool supplies

All of this Pyrex was found tonight. In a total of three stores. The majority of it found at one store. It was heavenly. I did observe a moment of silence. It was while I was attempting to stifle my screams. The most expensive piece was $6. Most pieces were under $3.

Check out all of the gorgeous, vintage bias tape and rick rack. Its polka dots! Seriously! They had a ton of it.

And the sheets....oh the sheets they had. I almost cried when I saw these beauties in their original packages! Seriously, I had a hard time composing myself.

And then check all of these out! My kitchen/dining room is such a cluttered mess right now. It looks like Goodwill threw up in my house. And I'm lovin' it!!

I'm Purging!!!

Its Spring Cleaning Time and I'm purging big time! I can not handle this clutter anymore!! And along with purging comes some destashing!! I just realized that this week marks the two year blogiversary of my very first blog post. Holy Crap! So I thought I'd combine my destashing with a fun giveaway! There are scraps and yardage included. Some really ugly fabric and some gorgeous fabric. Some quilt shop fabric and some larger chain fabric. Its truly an eclectic mix. Just like my stash : )
You know the drill. Post a comment here if you'd like to be entered for the giveaway. How about you tell me your most favorite part and your least favorite part of Spring Cleaning! And if you want a second entry, go ahead and mention it on your blog. But come back and leave a second comment telling me you've done so. Let's see. Its Thursday afternoon here. I'll leave this open until Sunday evening. Then I can get it out in the mail early next week. Ready, Set, GO!!!!!

Coo Coo Cachoo....

You'll have to excuse me while I have a Mrs. Robinson moment. New Moon comes out on DVD today. "Coo Coo Cachoo Mrs. Robinson......"

Spring Clean-athon

Did you all finish Monday's tasks? Wonderful! How about yesterday's? What? What do you mean I didn't give any instructions yesterday? Oh yea, we lost power. Again. It wasn't quite as dramatic as last time, but it wasn't any less fun. No really. A nine hour outage when my head and chest feel like they could explode and I'm being followed around by two small children with heads full of snot and drippy noses is simply not my idea of a good time. So, what did I do Monday? Nothing. What am I going to do today? Well, having been sick and then having a power outage (which means no water because our well is run by, wait for it, ELECTRICITY) I haven't done dishes in over three days. Its gross in here. Seriously, its disgusting. So, I'm going to put my Spring Cleaning on hold and catch up with my daily chores. And no, I'm not really feeling any better, but its time to put my big girls panties on and suck it up buttercup. Have a good one!

Clean A Thon...

Well, the boys and I all woke up sick this morning. What a bummer! That seems to happen whenever I schedule a clean along. Maybe I'm mentally adverse to cleaning? Huh, something to ponder!

Instead of postponing today's Clean A Thon, though I'm going to post the things I was planning to do today so you can all still play along. If I feel better this afternoon, I may try to tackle some of these chores.

Junk Drawers: We all have them. Some are junkier than others. Some have more than one. I have three. Two in my kitchen (you know, those small tiny drawers that just take up space but have no real purprose.) They just seem to collect junk. I also have one in my bathroom. Well, that's more of a whole junk space! LOL!! So today's first assignment is to go through your junk drawers and clean out all of the junk and reorganize the essentials. That means tossing out that electric blue mascara circa 1987. What? I'm the only one? Rubbish!

Pantry: I know I'm not the only one that has obscure random ingredients hiding in my pantry, scratching my head trying to remember why I bought them in the first place. Right? RIGHT? Let's cull those ingredients and put them in a bag or box heading for our local food bank. For those of us that are still thriving in this downturned economy, let's do a little sharing while we're doing a little Spring Cleaning, shall we?

Oh, and while your pantry is empty, let's wipe down those shelves, too. There you have it. Easy Peasy, right? If I get this stuff done this afternoon I'll let ya know. Stay tuned tomorrow. We're diving into our world of plastic containers! You know, the ones who eat their own lids and multiply when we aren't looking? Yea, their days are numbered!

Spring Clean-aThon

Starting on Monday I will be cleaning my insides, so I figured it was as good a time as any to start on my Spring Cleaning as well! I'll be blogging all of chores and do hope you'll play along, too! I will link to everyone's blog on Monday so we can cheer one another along and know that we are not the only ones that have let our houses get this unsightly! I'll be doing a little tidying, a little surface cleaning and a little deep cleaning. It will not be comprhensive, but it will be a good start! And maybe I'll host another one down the road to keep our momentum going.

Female driver shaving genitals causes accident in Florida

Female driver shaving genitals causes accident in Florida

Posted using ShareThis

"We've got a problem; we need to reboot"

Its a bit lengthy, but ssoo worth the watch. I can't wait until his show airs later this month!

The best part of homeschooling????

Kids in traditional schools love snow days because they get to play hookey, right? (Well, maybe not this year, as from what I gather on FB all of my East Coast friends are totally OVER snow days). BUT, as a homeschool family, we play hookey on SUNdays! Not Sunday, as in church day, but SUNday as in "OMGoodness, we live in the Pacific Northwest and its Feb and its acutally sunny outside!!" We got our lessons done quickly and headed to the park! Its a picture heavy post because I'm having way too much fun with my new camera!



This boy has loved to swing since the day he was born. He cried when we finally took his baby swing out to the garage. When I found him standing up in it, looking over the back of the swing, I knew it was time. He still loves to swing, though.

That's right, boys. Run, run like the wind. Run now, so you'll STOP doing it in my house!!

REAAAAAACCCCHH!!! Carte tried to jump and grab the monky bars at least five times. Each time he thought he was "so close." Finally Jason lifted him up. It was getting sort of pathetic to watch.

Different monky bars, same idea........REEEAAAAACCCHHH!!!!

Hang on buddy! Hang on!!!

Look at those faces! How could we stay inside at the table doing math problems and writing spelling words?

Bee Blocks

November's Block

January's Block.

Phew....I am finally caught up with my blocks for the Stash Busting Bee. I still have Feb's to make, but I have until the end of the month. I have already decided on what block to make, so the hard part's done : )

In other news, Ben made this sewing machine for me out of legos. Isn't it cute? He actually made it for me last month. One the day my camera died. And I've kept it safe until I got my new camera because I loved it so much and wanted to share it with you here on my blog.

Happy Valentine's everyone!

I got a new camera!!!

I'm so excited! I've been sewing, and crafting, and homeschooling, and thrifting, and...and...and...!!!

And now I can show you pictures of all of it! Yay me!

Hello????

I'm still here, but maintaining a craft blog without a camera is really really hard!! Lately I haven't done much sewing or knitting, but today I finally cut into my vintage sheet stash. I'm in the Rosey Little Things vintage sheet FQ swap. I cant' wait to see what goodies I get! And I haven't forgotten about the vintage sheet quilt a long. I'm just waiting to see what I get in the exchange and waiting for a new camera!!! Ugh!!

I promised to keep it real....

....and blog about what's bouncing around in my head. Well, pretty much all I've been able to think about for the last few days is the special election in MA this week. I am so totally obsessed! Who's gonna win? Martha Coakely or Scott Brown? We shall see!!

Its a Green Smoothie Giveaway!

If you've ever had any questions about my green smoothie habit. Now's the time to head over to my smoothie blog because I'm celebrating having reached 100 fans on the facebook page with a fabulous giveaway! Hurry over!!

Remember when I was twitching the other day? This top is the reason why. I made this top over two years ago. I was still a new quilter and didn't know anything! I had originally planned to donate this quilt (once finished) to the Ami Simms Alzheimer's Art Quilt Initiative. However, she has ceased taking large quilts and now only accepts small ones. So, this quilt has sat in my closet since Dec '07.

So, what's the big deal with this quilt, anyway? My husband's grandfather passed away of Alzheimer's right before our first son was born. He had been declining for years and the death wasn't unexpected, but it did send shock waves through the family. So, I made this quilt in honor of Barney (Barnes Everett Mauk). I made three additional blocks and have them framed individually. One for Jason, one for his father and one for his aunt.

See, Barney loved plaid. He loved to dress in the most obnoxious way he could find. He mixed plaid with everything. Every.Thing. The tackier the better. So, I stumbled upon some funky plaid wrapping paper and knew that was what I had to use. That's also why I used so many different plaids in the quilt top.

I didn't get the quilt top done that year as I had hoped and then (as mentioned above) Ami stopped accepting large quilts. I wasn't sure what to do with it at that time, so I did nothing. I thought about selling it and donating the money to Ami's project, but that just didn't feel right. In the end, I decided to gift the finished quilt to my husband and send a donation to Ami. And it became a permanent UFO. Well, its on the top of my list for 2010.

So what's with the twitching? Remember I said I didn't know what I was doing, right? I pulled this quilt top out the other day, pieced the back and went about to press & baste it. I'm not sure I pressed a single seam in the entire top when I made this thing. So many seams have been flipped and turned by cross seams, its all homespun fabric, so they are unravelling at the speed of light. This quilt top had more strings than a piece of wilty celery. So, I spent several hours trimming up the strings and pressing each block and each seam individually. Then I was sick of looking at it so I folded it up and set in on my sewing table. Which means when I pull it out this afternoon, I'll probably have to repress it. AGAIN! (I'm thinking just a quick quilt in the ditch, the top is so busy anything else would be lost, what do you think?) But I want it finished for my husband. It means a lot to him as he was very close to his grandfather growing up. My only regret is that I didnt' meet this amazing man until the disease had already taken control of his mind and body. The stories my father in law tell about his father could fill volumes. This one's for you, Barney.

Blogging is hard when you don't have a camera. I shall return soon. We've decided to use our Costco rebate this year to purchase a new one. Stay tuned, my friends. Stay tuned.

Twitch....twitch....

The next time I decide to make a whole quilt out of homespun fabrics hit me. Hard. In the head. With a frying pan.

I'll explain later, when I'm done twitching.

Rockin' Out

Crrreeeeepppyyy

Do you remember that Haley Joel Osmet movie, The Sixth Sense? Remember that line, "I see dead people."

Imagine him saying that line, but with my face. And my voice. And with the words "I collect bed sheets." *shivers* I KNOW! Its totally creepy, right? It gives me nightmares.

I do. I collect them. Vintage ones. Puuuuurrrty Ones. Percale blend ones. Mmmmmm, percale. Anyhoo, does anyone else collect them?

I've been thinking its probably time I do something with them. Because I'm drowning. I can't stop buying them. I have a huge plastic tub filled with them. And I just bought three more yesterday. Its a sickness. So, I have a pattern in mind. Does anyone want to quilt a long with me? Its a quick and easy pattern I designed several years ago. Its a simple one block pattern. The blocks are 10" and there is no secondary design, so you can make as many or as few blocks as you like. Of course, you don't have to use bed sheets, but then your quilt won't look as pretty as mine. (I'm kidding!). This quilt looks great scrappy, or with a fat quarter pack of a single fabric line. Or you could just go nuts. I'm known for doing that occasionally. So anyway, do you want to play along? Leave a comment, link here on your blog, tell your mom, rent a plane with one of those flaggy message thingy's. Shout it from your rooftops. Oh, sorry, I got a little carried away. If you want to play along just let me know. It will probably be at least another week or two before I get started. Go sit and fondle your stash (you know you want to) and find a good selection of fabrics and then come back here and tell me you want to play. Because otherwise I might cry.

It died.

The camera, that is. Our camera is dead. It bit. the. dust. Or rather, maybe hit. the. floor. is a little more accurate. Either way, it really put a damper on a post I had planned for this week. I wanted to do a "day in our life" post about our homeschool. It was going to be awesome. I mean balloons, streamers, fireworks....ok, not really. But I mean we're an average, suburban family who homeschools their children. What person wouldn't be fascinated by reading that post? HA!

Oh, and here's a funny story with which to leave you. Its no secret that we're cheap. We prefer frugal, but come on. Its time to call a duck a duck, right? We're cheap. Anyhoo, my family totally thinks we're all of bunch of crazy people. They do. Its true. My brother even commented about it on my very first blog post. So anyway, we don't have cable because we don't want to spend the money and I know if we did, I'd sit and watch Food Network all day and make everything Paula Deen can dream up. And we all know that's not a good idea! We also happen to have DSL for our internet service. We're on a desktop because the dog killed the laptop a few years ago. We just haven't gotten around to upgrading yet. So how did you like my funny story? Just kidding. I haven't gotten to the funny part yet. My mom comes out to visit for each of the boys' birthdays. Its very convenient that they are exactly six months apart. A co worker asked her if she was going to bring her laptop so she could answer work emails and my mom said "No, I'm visiting my daughter and they don't have cable, they don't have wireless, they don't get a newspaper and they homeschool their children!!!" Jason says "Wow, that's when I realized we were 'those people'!!" Ok, that's the funny part. I'm sorry, but I just think that's hilarious. Is it only me? Maybe. Humor me, ok? ; )

DOH!

**smacks forehead with heel of hand**

I totally didn't sync up my email and comments when I switched blogs. I had been a little disappointed that I wasn't getting any comments. at all. And then I was just looking around on my blog and moving some things and I saw "4 comments" and "2 comments". Hhhmm, and so I read them (imagine that!).

To answer some questions about my smoothies:

• they taste awesome
• its not really a "weightloss drink"
• its spinach and fruit and other good stuff blended up
• I've challenged myself to drink one quart of it. Everyday. For 365 days.

I have a whole other blog to journal that adventure. I know, I know. But its all about my smoothies. Life happens here. Smoothies happen there. If you are interested, click here to read all about The Year of Green Smoothies Challenge. You can also become a fan on Facebook.

So there you have it. Sorry I didn't get back to any of you about your comments. I'm usually really good about answering them.

Rebound, anyone?

Jason's aunt & uncle are very into health and wellness. They own a really cool online store and are currently working on getting their products into several national retailers. They sent us a Needak Rebounder for Christmas and we finally got the time to get it out of the box and built yesterday. The boys and I have been bouncing ever since. Its a lot of fun and more of a workout than you would expect. Oh, and let me just tell you. Rebounding can really stimulate the bowels. I'm just sayin'. You've been warned!