Category: Uncategorized

The last month has been busy and full. First of all I did not escape the bug that was travelling around and ended up sidelined for a few days though, the bug did keep me feeling pretty crummy for a few weeks. Thank goodness the antibiotics did their thing.

I haven’t spent enough time quilting this month and only have the first border on my Elizabeth quilt but I’ll get there.

There was a baby shower held for Sarah last weekend and Jeremy and his mom drove up to be here for it.

The following Sunday evening 2 ½ weeks before her due day, someone was ready to make his presence known and Jeremy and his Mom made another trip up north!
I am officially a Grandma now to the most beautiful baby boy! He was born yesterday afternoon May 17th

Today was my Saturday, until now my day job has been Monday to Friday. This has recently been changed and starting this weekend there will be a weekend rotation and I’m first. So I had today off as well as tomorrow. I had planned to be busy here at home and I was. I started the day with a quick vacuuming of the house; you see my daughter and her little Kitties have moved into their apartment. I have to admit that part of me enjoyed the kitties’ antics but the allergic to cats part of me should be breathing easier…well once this cold leaves me that is.

Once I had the house put back in order, I got out the Elizabeth blocks and I have the top laid out on the Living room floor, its still there waiting to be sewn into a top, hopefully tomorrow. I like to look at the blocks over for a bit before I commit to their placement. I also finished loading a customer quilt and got a start on it. Then I thought I’d work on my fatquartershop BOM and did get a good start but my head feels so foggy today that I decided to quit while I was ahead. I sure hope to feel better tomorrow.

I’ll add so pictures tomorrow of my Elizabeth progress assuming I have the energy.

So for now I’ll tell you what’s happening with my original Summer Wind Quilt, The picture shows the top hanging on the line. You see when I made and quilted it, I was fairly new to longarming and I used a panto on it that I’m not really crazy about. I prefer more density in my quilting and when this quilt was washed it just didn’t look right to me. A friend of mine offered to take out the quilting for me this winter and I took her up on the offer. I’m hoping that in time all of the previous stitching lines will blend away and I’ll be much happier with my quilt.

Sarah asked for a photo shoot tonight. She is 35 weeks now and I think she looks beautiful. She keeps asking me if I remember this and that about being pregnant and its funny all I remember is how much I enjoyed expecting each of my girls. I was fortunate not to have any morning sickness or any other complications with my 4 pregnancies and I also thing that time has blurred my memories..

Thank you so much to Nichole at Sisters Choice for her post on my Elizabeth quilt and then so many wonderful comments from her and others on my work. You all really made my week. So much so that I did get the setting triangles finished last night despite the cold I have and being exhausted. I’m working overtime on my day job today so no quilting for me. Sometimes my day job really does interfere with my quilting passion J hopefully I’ll get the top put together this week.

One of the reasons for the cold could be the late night smelt fishing Erik and I did last weekend. It’s a spring thing to do around here, so at 2am last Saturday night we were down at the waterfront. You can see one of the grain elevators by night.

We (well Erik used the net I held the pail) accomplished what we set out for and got home around 4:30 am

They are pretty yummy when they are fresh so we had a couple feeds and froze some for trout bait for later in the season.

Sunday I uncovered the flower beds, how exciting to see the asparagus up and other perennials returning. The prairie crocus in bloom too. I am so loving my new camera!

I was able to zoom into this visitor from the deck

This last Wednesday was Professional Administration day and my team knows me well, they presented me with this gift

That is my Tag Sale quilt as background.

One last picture and then I’d better get ready for work. Last night I walked into the living room to find my youngest busy at work and ran back up for the camera. When I first saw them the kitty (Girdy) was totally posing for her. Katie my dtr is 15 and has been creating her whole life, she never really bothered with toys.

Have a great Weekend. And thank you again to everyone for so many visits to my blog and lovely comments too I really do appreciate hearing from you!

Wendy

I haven’t made a lot of progress on my Elizabeth quilt; I did cut out the setting triangles and hopefully will find the time and energy to work on them this week. Work really does take up a lot of my time and then there is life…

If you’ve been following my blog for any time you know that I have another passion, but I usually have to wait until June to indulge myself. This year has been different due to some very unseasonably high temperatures that cleared the ice off the lakes.

I worked some overtime on Saturday this weekend and then spent Sunday:

Fishing, here is my first catch of the season. (ok one of my goals for the year is to get over my fear of holding live fish!

It was a beautiful bright sunny day and time just flew by, but oh the fresh air and sunshine was wonderful and we did bring home a great catch. We know what we are having for supper tonight.

(note that I had programmed my new camera for this shot, I really love the blues and how they were captured, I thought the camera was still set for this next shot but the colour doesn’t reflect it)

I also love old buildings esp houses/homesteads, this was taken at the end of the day at the boat launch:

My little holiday has flown by and now it’s back to the office.

I feel like I didn’t accomplish a lot but I did get some much needed rest, some outside time and of course some quilting.

The Elizabeth Quilt is well underway, I still need to cut out and piece the setting blocks which shouldn’t take too long and then add the border, maybe one evening this week. I still need to play with the block positions before put the top together, I just wanted to lay the blocks out today to show Alva when she came by to show me her latest blocks..and I’ll be sharing pictures of that quilt sooner than later I’m sure.

Alva also brought me a beautiful surprise

This is my moms Thimbleberry quilt from a couple of years ago that I quilted for her over the winter. I need to take better pictures next time I’m over, as the lighting wasn’t the best. But these pictures show some of the quilting.

My mom and my daughter Katie 2 very creative ladies, this is one of several pictures that I took during our Easter dinner at my parents and I really like the expressions that I captured.

My dad was interested in my new camera and had me take a picture of the bird feeder in full zoom, from inside the house and about 15 ft away. My dad is a wood carver and is very interested in studying birds; I still need to practice using my camera, what a shame that I have to work for a living instead of working on my creative endeavours.

This morning I read a post by Darlene @ Quilters Daze where she has written an excellent post about and 8th day of the week. You know the days that we would be able to do what we want to do or to be able to accomplish the things we can’t in 7. I so often feel like I live my life on a treadmill.

This week I’ve allowed myself time to do what I want totally unscheduled days. Yes I’ve had to say no to my girls about some of their requests (like my youngest who would like me to just taxi her around a bit more instead of taking the school bus home) I learnt a very long time ago that its alright for a mom to say no sometimes and to take care of herself and not feel guilty about it. Somehow I forgot to really learn that part the not feel guilty part, I think that’s part of being a Mom?

I had a visit with a very good friend of mine yesterday she has been my quilting mentor for almost 20 yrs now. We first met when Quilt Canada was here in Thunder Bay and I was at the very beginning of learning to quilt. She was a helper in one of the classes I took and after that I seemed to run into her in the fabric/quilt shops every time I was looking for help on a project I was working on. She has been an amazing cheerleader in my Quilting and a true inspiration, I love her quilts.

This quilt she brought to discuss the border colours and that it will be coming soon for quilting, and another that’s ready for quilting that I will share pictures of soon.

Alva is never shy in her use of colours and most of the time she uses very bright and vibrant colour. I wish that I would have gotten a better picture, and I hope she doesn’t mind being included in my blog.

I also finished the Stars yesterday for my latest quilt, and also started the next blocks delectable mountains with too many half square triangles.

It was a beautiful day so I went walking, a good fast pace and it sure felt good, when I got home I decided to tackle a bit of cleaning….under the stove/fridge and the outside of those appliances one thing led to another and I was exhausted. Thankfully my eldest daughter asked if I’d like her to make me supper!! She made her own version of gumbo and oh it was good. That husband of hers sure is a lucky man!!

I spent some more time getting to know my new camera; I think it will be a lot like my longarm……practice, practice, practice!

Today promises to be another bright sunny day so I’m going to walk again and maybe take my camera this time. And of course time in my studio without the phone!

Have a great day!!

This is one of the two customer quilts I finished today and I’m well on my way to the other half of the star blocks needed for my newest project.

I almost let myself get sidetracked by pulling out another little project. Its just a little wall hanging that would be nice to have up for spring time, so depending on how much I accomplish tomorrow I may be able to get it on and off the machine.

My camera is also taking up some of my time. Lots of practice shots and playing with settings. It will take some time to feel like I know what I’m doing with it.

This week is a gift to me. It’s like a clean page that I am allowing only myself to write on. I’m using up my comp days from work and I’ve made it really clear to my girls that this week is mine.

I had originally thought I’d use the time for some spring cleaning and painting but then I thought better so…….

I’ll be working on my next project; the above picture shows what I’ve done so far.

I will of course work on customer quilts and there are some cleaning projects that I do want to accomplish, it is spring after all and there really is nothing like nice clean windows in the spring and since I don’t live in a house that’s terribly large it isn’t that huge of a project. Also there are some dust bunnies that really have to be caught and released that have been living under the fridge. I just don’t want to get too carried away with spring cleaning and not get some piecing accomplished. Oh and there are a few recipes that I’ve wanted to try … I have 8 days left of my little break!

I played around with my new camera this weekend and also with photo shop. It rained almost the whole weekend but today looks more promising for a walk and some outdoor shots. Not that I’m counting but there are only 67 days til my grandsons approximate time of arrival!!!!