New Sewing Table

Ray and I were talking (or maybe I was talking!) about a Singer table for my 'new' Singer Featherweight machine. I looked online and on Craigslist - all were quite expensive. Then I remembered that I had seen a couple of tables right here in our town. So today we stopped by the florist/antique place and bought this at a very reasonable price. Ray suggested that we put it in the family room instead of tucking it away in my sewing rooms. The bottom is from a treadle machine and the peddle does rock. I'm sure the top is not original.

Welcome Wallhanging

I finished this wallhanging last night - it now has a home on our porch right outside the back door. I went to Alphabet Soup camp at Lucky 2B Quilting in Pecatonica on January 19. When I looked at the book, nothing would fit into my house so I designed this and used ideas from the book. I especially like the top and bottom borders with all the woodland animals.

Keeping busy...

We've been busy!













Last Saturday, grandson Mack came to visit by himself for a while. Grandpa, Mack, and I had a great time. Mack loves to color! We were so surprised when he told his mom bye with no tears!



He was a joy to have around.








On Sunday, we went bowling with our church. We had all ages there and a very nice time. The pizza was pretty good too!







Monday night Brent, Emily and Mack joined us for dinner and some Wii time. Mack tried the Wii Fit

and then tried to keep up with his mom on Dance Dance Revolution (notice he is on tip toes!).

Tueday, Ray and I were the judges for the middle school Spelling Bee. This is the 3rd year that we had done this - Ray does all of the talking and I monitor the spelling. It is fun to see the 4th, 5th, and 6th graders excel. That evening we went to see HCC beat Carl Sandburg. It's the first basketball game we've been to this year.

Yesterday we were both resting and fighting off colds that grandson Mack so graciously shared!

Today, I did errands, had lunch with a friend, and am ready to go to my quilting group.

A 'new' sewing machine!

My new featherweight machine arrived today! I got an email saying it should be here today or tomorrow so we had to go to the post office today and it had arrived! It is in fabulous shape and sews sooooo nice! I don't remember the machine I learned to sew on but threading this, filling the bobbin, ... all seemed so normal - I just knew how to operate everything! Guess I need to name this little beauty...


Well, I just had to sew something! I was at a paper piecing class Tuesday night and decided that I would like to try a miniature paper piecing project. So with my new little beauty, I have a third of my project done.

A new sewing machine!

After hauling my wonderful, computerized machine once again to a class last night, I decided to seriously look for a Singer Feather Weight sewing machine; I've looked casually for years. Well this morning, there was the machine on Ebay! Then, I also found one on Craig's list in Madison, Wisconsin! I did a little detective work and made a bid on the one on Ebay. A couple of hours later, the little black machine was mine! Now I am waiting to get it - it is only coming from a Chicago suburb so I should have it early next week. The seller is giving me 7 days to return it if I don't want it for some reason. My 'new' machine was made in New Jersey in 1949. It should be an oldie but goodie!

Quilt Camp

Today's Quilt Camp in Pecatonica, Illinois (Lucky 2B Quilting) was called Alphabet Soup. After receiving and going through the Alphabet Soup quilting book, we spent the day quilting and visiting. It was very laid back and lots of fun - as usual! I started a wallhanging that says WELCOME. I got the idea from the book but did my own design. I hope to finish stitching it together sometime this week. We (Sandy, Barb, and I) met our husbands at Mama Lena's for dinner on our way home. Nice ending to a great day!

Colorado Flannel

A while ago I was cleaning my sewing room!!!! It doesn't happen often! Anyway, I came across this fabric that I had bought in Lyons, Colorado right before we left Colorado in October, 2005. They were just unwrapping the bolts and I had to have some. I just put it together a couple of weeks ago and then quilted it with pearl cotton and big stitches. It is soft and warm.

Colorado Flannel:
A close up:

And a peek at the back:

Family

We have a hard time getting together with my three brothers and their wives. Seven of us were together at Uncle Bud's funeral. Betsy was suffering from chemo side effects and wasn't able to make the trip. If you replace Ray in the back row with me, then we are in age order, youngest to oldest.

Quilting with Friends

Yesterday I went to Eggstravaganza (a quilting thing) with some friends. Not very nice weather and the site, Winnebago High School, was rather cold but we had a great time. I learned how to English paper piece - very neat so now I need to find a pattern that I'd like to make (maybe I'll just draw one!). We saw some projects made from charm packs - I put together a table runner this afternoon from a charm pack that I bought yesterday. And we learned some new ideas for layer cakes. I hope to begin my layer cake project later this week. Just for the record, charm packs are packages of 5" fabric squares and layer cakes are packages of 10" fabric squares. It was a FUN outing!

Friday morning

We are getting lots of snow - AGAIN! The snow plow is going by right now!

I wanted to share a message from a card that a dear friend sent me after my uncle died:
Though we know heaven has welcomed a very special person our hearts still feel the sorrow.

That is so true. I still keep my aunt and cousins in my prayers.

Home again

We arrived home last night. Yesterday morning we ate breakfast at the motel and my brother Jim joined us (we didn't know he was in the area yet)! Betsy didn't make the trip due to side effects from her chemo. As funerals go, Uncle Bud's was very nice. Dave, Eric, and Jim spoke, as well as a few friends - all spoke with great feeling and love for this wonderful man. My uncle is buried in a very old country cemetery which is very small and the terrain was covered in snow and ice. It was quite remarkable that no one fell and that the pallbearers made it down the hill to the gravesite without incident- I know they were concerned. At the visitation and the funeral, I was able to see relatives that I haven't seen in a few years. At the funeral yesterday, a friend of my aunt's got up to speak and it hit my brothers and me at the same time as to who it was - Roxanne is my aunt's age (about 10 years older than me) and grew up across the street from us when we were in grade school. None of us had seen here in maybe 50 years! At the luncheon, we all were reunited and had a wonderful visit.

It was nice to get up today and not get into the car. We put away all of the Christmas decorations and the tree. Late this afternoon, we put on our Yak Trax and walked to the post office - it was COLD! We're not supposed to be here but we have things already happening tomorrow, Friday, Saturday...!

Home

We are home. We left Indianapolis in dense fog this morning and stayed in fog for a few hours. The sun started coming out as we were north of Bloomington, IL. Then we stopped for lunch in Dixon, IL and found ice! So the rest of the trip was on ice - quite a mess! Ray had quite a time getting the van into the driveway and then into the garage but he finally made it without mishap!

We will head for Wisconsin tomorrow for the services and funeral for Uncle Bud.

Indianapolis, IN

We got up to heavy fog this morning that began to lift by the time we got on the road. As we traveled through West Virginia, there was patchy fog all morning and some low clouds too.


We stopped in Jackson, Ohio at a quilt shop that was closed. Looking through the window, I decided that was ok! Ray was willing so we tried another quilt shop in Chillicothe, OH. - Creations Sew Clever. Nice shop - they also have an online business. The shop is in an old funeral home so the building is also very interesting. We asked the owner where to eat and she gave us two places that are right next to each other on Water Steet - Dock at Water and Old Canal Smoke House. Ray chose the Smoke House and it was awesome! Of course we had pulled pork...Tonight we are on the north side of Indianapolis. We just came home from a walk around the mall, dinner, and a stop at Trader Joe's. It was Ray's first trip to a Trader Joe's so we had fun and bought a few interesting groceries. We are at a Jamieson Inn - nice, clean, and very quiet. Right now there is only one other car in the parking lot!

Beckley, WV

Brad came by this morning about 7AM to leave a few things off for us to deliver to Illinois. Then we had breakfast at the motel and talked with Stan. He is the maintenance man at the hotel and we see him every time we stay there so he always has to visit with us...

We got on the road early (for us) and things went well until we got north of Winston-Salem, NC. We started getting freezing rain and the temperature dropped to right around freezing.

We saw these signs before every bridge. Well, they mean it! The roads were pretty clear but the bridges were not! We saw many accidents - imagine fire trucks, ambulances, police cars, tow trucks. Then add pickup trucks on their roofs, SUVs on their sides, trucks that have rolled, cars that are smashed. Now multiply that by 10 or more.















We spent time waiting more than once ....



























When we would finally get past an accident, people were cautious - they hit their brakes at every bridge. FINALLY, people seemed to realize that slowing down before the bridge was better! We made it but it was stressful driving for Ray - not so much the ice as the NC drivers!





We stopped in Wytheville, VA. and visited a neat little fabric shop with lots of batiks. They recommended the Log House restaurant - it was very good. We were warned the service was very slow - they were right!












Inside the Log House restaurant.








In West Virginia every county seems to be a Certified Business Location. What's with that?















Well, we are in Beckley, WV. tonight. We went to the mall and walked for a while. There is a lot of traffic and a lot of people around here - LOTS of skiers. So it takes a while to go anywhere and do anything. We are now back from dinner and plan to just relax.

Fuquay-Varina

It was 15 degrees last night and there was frost on the car this morning - a little cold but a bright, sunny day. About 11:30 this morning, we found out that my uncle passed away last night. We are happy that he no longer has pain but so sad for his family. We decided to go on to Brad and Sheila's because we were only 3 hours away and then head for home tomorrow morning. We arrived around 3PM and had a great visit that ended way to soon about 8:30PM. We didn't get to talk with Brad or Sheila very much. Our time was spent mostly with the kids...