Snowman Quilt - done!

The flannel Snowman Quilt is finished. I bought the fabric as a kit and began this quilt in January. Then it just sat and waited.... I put the borders on in February and it just sat and waited. I finally pinned it this past week and it just sat and waited but not long! I quilted it a couple of days ago.

My inspiration for the quilting came from this carpet pattern. This was the carpet in out room at the Chicago Marriott O'Hare in April.

I spent a lot of time in our room quilting while Ray was at Nikon School and the carpet just intrigued me so I took photos.

I quilted this with a walking foot - it was a little hard to move around with all of the curved stitching. Next time I think I will just free-motion quilt it. I do like the texture of the quilt.

I hope you can see the texture:

Here is a photo of the back.

The patterns is Yellow Brick Road. The flannel is oh, so soft!

Blue Cable Knit Hat

I spend an afternoon a month with my friend Nancy. First we have lunch at a favorite restaurant and then knit at the yarn shop. Tuesday was our day and I began this hat which I will donate to our church bazaar. This little project was FAST - I finished it yesterday morning!

It is Encore Chunky yarn - 75% acrylic and 35% wool.

Blue Cable Hat

It goes along with this scarf that I made a while ago.

We have a great "little" hospital

We live in a small town, actually it is a Village. We do not have a hospital. So when Ray cut his head a week ago, I drove him to our hospital. We actually have 3 hospitals, each about 30 minutes away in various directions.  We use the one north of us in a small Wisconsin town.

Memorial Hospital is a 25 bed critical access hospital with a full range of acute care inpatient and outpatient services.  It has an active, state of the art, Trauma Level 4 Emergency Department. Our youngest son was born in this hospital 33 years ago. For 34 years, our family has used this ER, been inpatients and been outpatients, but thankfully, not often!  It is really nice to use a hospital where you know many of the people - there is not a big turnover in staff.

If you have to use an ER, this is the one you would like to use! Last week, when Ray cut his head, I called to say we were coming with an ETA about 30 minutes. They were waiting for us when we got there. We arrived about 9:30 AM and left by 10:00 AM! There is another ER at one of the hospitals near us that we have used for Ray's parents. If you get out of there or admitted in four hours, you are doing good!

We went back to the ER this morning for Ray to get the staples out of his head. They told us to come back there so we didn't have to pay for a doctor visit - I guess this is considered as part of last week's visit! The ER doctors are all 'visiting doctors' so we had not seen this doctor before. Poor Ray had to once again tell what happened. It would not be so bad if that darn beeper wasn't warning him that the lift-gate was still going up. By the way, Ray is doing great and healing well. Note: 6-13-2013 Ray just put the lift-gate up on the van and it does NOT beep all the way up!

We got ER 2 and were there about half an hour again. There was only the one doctor and when we left the other rooms, both ER 1 and ER 3 were full. The nurse said they were REALLY busy.

We are so fortunate to have such a great "little" hospital. 

What have I been doing?

We have been home for a little over 2 weeks and I have been busy. Isn't it amazing what one can accomplish when one stays home!

The Flannel Snowmen quilt is getting bound. It is all quilted - I'll show you when it is completely done.

Flannel Snowmen

This table runner is quilted and needs binding. I started this a while ago.

Star Table Runner

Crazy Eights has a neat back and is ready to be pinned. You'll have to wait to see the back!

Crazy Eights ready to pin

 Starry Night is totally pieced and waiting for a back.

Starry Night

My new project for June is Black White Orange All Over. It is pieced and waiting for a back.

Black White Orange All Over

I've also finished a sweater I was knitting - it just needs blocking. When it is blocked, maybe I'll model it!

sweater

And the month is not half over! WooHoo! 

Looking ahead - 

• Ray gets the staples removed from his head tomorrow. Last week we were in the ER after he hit the rear lift-gate of our van resulting in a 4" gash in the top of his head. He is doing great.
• We will celebrate our 43rd wedding anniversary on Thursday.
• Next week I will be traveling with two girlfriends - a fun reunion of three old longtime friends.

If I can stay focused and not start anything new, maybe I can still make a dent in my pile of UFOs. (UFOs = unfinished objects)

Bacon-Wrapped Teriyaki Chicken Skewers

Tonight we enjoyed these Bacon-Wrapped Teriyaki Chicken Skewers from Our Best Bites. If you click their link, you can see pictures and their instructions. I didn't take photos - we were hungry!

I'll just give you the recipe in my much shorter format:

Bacon-Wrapped Teriyaki Chicken Skewers

1 - 2 lb. of skinless chicken breasts cut into 1" pieces

16 oz. of bacon cut the strips into thirds

16 oz. of pineapple chunks, drained

Lawry's Teriyaki Marinade

Wrap each piece of chicken with a piece of bacon and thread onto a skewer. Alternate with chunks of pineapple.

Put the skewers in a 9 X 13 pan and pour Teriyaki sauce over them reserving about 1/4 c for basting. Cover and refrigerate 4 - 8 hours.

Preheat grill to 350 - 400 degrees. Put the skewers on the grill and baste with reserved Teriyaki sauce. Cook about 7 minutes and turn skewers. Baste again and cook another 7 minutes. (If cooking in oven, preheat oven to 400 and bake about 20 minutes, turning once, following the same basting instructions.)

A big finish!

Spring Bouquet is finished! And I love it. I bought this quilt as a kit. The designer, Edyta Sitar, has an amazing sense of design and color. This is the first large (72" X72") quilt that I have appliquéd. This quilt is not my style at all - but the colors drew me in and I had to try it.

Spring Bouquet

The appliqué pieces were all laser cut with the fusible already on. I did have to cut the background pieces, iron on the appliqués and do the actual appliquéing. 

In the backyard

I really liked the quilt and then I added the binding - who would've thought that the binding would make the colors pop even more!

I was trying to get a picture on the back porch - I think I should have had Ray hold it!

This is machine quilted. First I outlined all of the appliquéd pieces and than I did small stippling - about a 1/4" scale - in all of the backgrounds spaces. The checkerboard border is done with a back and forth stitch just to add interest. 

Each little square is 3/4" square

I always wash my quilts. I used a Color Catcher sheet and it definitely caught color!  

Then I put the quilt in the dryer and hoped for a little scrunching - look at the texture! Wow!

And another close-up.

As I said this quilt really isn't our style but WE LOVE IT so we will find a spot in our home somewhere!

Knitted scarves

I am knitting some items for our church bazaar in the fall. Hopefully I'll have a few things finished since I decided to do this a few months ahead of time.

While in Washington DC/Alexandria, VA, I made this green scarf. The yarn is Plymouth Yarn Encore Chunky, a 12 ply. The pattern is Spring Revive Scarf by Jill Bujold - a free pattern on revelry.com. It it a darker green tweed than it appears and is heavy and soft - perfect for out winters. 

close up of green scarf

green scarf

I began the blue scarf a while back and finished it when we returned from Washington DC. The color is darker like the second photo. Again, the yarn is Plymouth Yarn Encore Chunky, a 12 ply. The pattern is Seeded Reversible Cable Scarf by Teryn Pierce, also a free pattern on ravelry.com.

closeup of blue scarf

blue scarf

I haven't had time or taken the time to block either one yet. 

I was able to get matching yarn and will start hats soon. . . as soon as I finish my sweater!