Catching up...and some new sewing....

This is a photo heavy post, believe it or not.....I have been sewing!!!  :)  I'll get to all of that in a few minutes but first I'm sorry that I haven't posted for a couple of weeks, but I do thank you for all of the emails of concern.  I have just been feeling a little down, just aggravated with life I suppose.

First my quilting machine was down for what felt like forever, then once I did get that fixed and back I had to rush and stress over getting the quilts quilted before my surgery.  If you remember I even had one lady to pick her quilt up at the hospital that morning.  Then I had my surgery and first she said I would be down for 2-3 days but it was more like a couple of weeks!  I wasn't expecting that at all!  Once I felt better and could get upstairs I planned on getting back to my quilting and then realized that I had forgot to place my thread order!  I had planned on ordering the day after my surgery but I guess I was just too out of it to remember.  So I ordered my thread, got it in and NONE of it was what I ordered!!!  They mixed my order up with someone else.  They were really nice about it and gave me a gift certificate for my troubles and I am now waiting on my correct order to arrive.

Then as I mentioned in my last post, Richard's truck was broken into and we lost about $800 worth of tools and such!  That really got me down.....  So I guess that is enough complaining about life, but I have still been busy!

We decided to clean out one of our outbuildings!  :(  Man, I don't know how everything was in there.  Some of the stuff belonged to Richard's grandmother so all of that had to be sorted.  I had tons of stuff in there too.    I had put things back in storage for a few years to save for when we got moved in the house.  I had lots of new stuff in there and lots of antiques too.  It was almost like Christmas getting to sort through it all.  That took us a couple of days.

I'll go ahead and show some quilting stuff before I get on the the family stuff.  :)

Do you remember me talking a few posts back about a quilt that I designed and was making for my granddaughter, Raelynn?  Well, here is what I have so far, I'll try to get a better photo of it once I get all the blocks sewn together.  I've decided to call it, Shades of Lilac.  As I was working on it all of those different shades of purples reminded me of the Lilac tree in my mom's yard and how pretty it is when it blooms.  This was a great use of all my purple scraps.  I didn't have to buy anything for it, just used what I had.  Anyway, I need to get the blocks sewn together and the borders on so that I can get it quilted.

The past few nights I have been watching the Hatfield and McCoy movie on the History Channel.  From what I have read a bunch of you watched it too.  I can remember in college I had to do a research paper on the Hatfield's and McCoy's which all happened right here where I live.  So while I watched it, I decided that I would work on something simple and mindless.....  So here is the story of how that all came about.

I am so sick of my older stash that it just makes me sick when I have to dig through it.  I did have a fairly large stash before Richard lost his job and I am very thankful for that because I would have gone crazy if I hadn't.  I read on someones blog the other day that she felt the same way and she jumped in a cut it all up and used it!!!  I don't even remember which blog it was, sorry.  I thought that was a great idea because no matter how much I hate it, it's not going anywhere unless I use it, right?

So I grabbed a stack of greens and started cutting...

I ended up with 350+ of these 3.5 x 6.5 rectangles before I stopped.

 Then I sewed them end to end in sets of two...

 Giggle, I'm still working on it so you will have to wait to see what it looks like!  I will tell you this though, I did end up adding one more color in it to give it a little "pop" and it will be pretty big once it is done.  The measurements that I figured up will be 94 x 103.  Even though I hate my old fabric stash, I really like how this quilt is turning out so far!  :)

As I mentioned we cleaned out the outbuilding and I found my old antique table and a couple of chairs that my great grandfather made.  They look a little old and rough but, hey they are antiques!  I placed them on my front porch and put this little quilt over the table top. This is something that I made a few years ago and it is about the size of a baby quilt.  My porch is 40ft long so I have plenty of room out there but I thought it might be nice to sit out there and have my coffee early in the morning or to even do some handwork too.

 Here is the quilting on it.  I used a panto called "on the forest floor"  it is one of my favorites!  I just love it, even though there is a ton of quilting in it.

 Now on to other things in my life the past few days....  My day lilies are starting to bloom!!!  Don't look at the mess in the flower bed.  This is just a temporary one until we get our dozer work done and the yard all fixed the way that we want it.  I am in the process of putting thick newspaper down around the flowers and then I will add some OLD sawdust over it all.  I've done it this way for years and it has always worked good for me.  I put a think layer of newspaper down to keep the weeds out and then put a layer of old sawdust over that.  It has to be old sawdust because the fresh stuff has too much acid in it.  The old sawdust just turns back into soil once it decays anyway.  This works great for me since we own a sawmill, it doesn't cost me anything.

I baked 5 loaves of Banana Nut Bread!  I put four in the freezer and cut this one to eat!

Here is a photo of Andrew and his yearling, REV.  Rev is the Tennessee Walking horse that he bought a while back.  He is doing great and will be sent off to the trainer in November.  Just in case you don't fool with horses much, in this photo he is "parking out"  He is doing great so far and Andrew just loves him so much.  BTW....see the background....I told you that I lived in the woods!  :)

Here is Hunter taking a break from playing.  As you can see he has his little toolbox and his toy gun beside him....that's my boy!

I've been babysitting Zoey, my sister's poodle for the past few days while she it at work.  Zoey likes to watch me sew!  She has seizures and Chantal doesn't want her to be alone during the day just in case she has one while she is at work.  So most days she is at my house unless mom is home.  She is a sweetie and my little dogs love to play with her.

This morning while I was making my bed, I kept hearing something and when I went out to see what it was, I found this.....Cocoa!  She had got out of her lot and was on my porch!  Maybe a little redneck but it's just farm life.  :)  I love it.  As you can see, we haven't stained the side of the house yet.  We'll get to it as soon as we can, just so much to do.  Anyway, the long windows on the front porch are my master bedroom windows and the french door on the side, you can see a little of it, that also goes to my master bedroom.  Eventually we will have a big wrap around porch all the way around the house.  I can't wait to the the porch done on this end, I think it would be nice to get up out of bed and go out and watch the sun rise...

I guess that is all for now, I need to finish up our late supper.  Richard has been working in hay all day and probably will not be home until dark.  I know he will be starved....
Kristie

A Little Bothered...

I had another post that I had scheduled to post this morning and for some reason it showed up on the readers last night but the post wasn't there.  I also had it scheduled to post at 5am this morning and had to post it myself around 8 something.... who knows????  So if you get really bored you can read the other post too, has lots of quilty photos in it.

Now I'm just depressed....don't really want to retype all of this but I just copied and pasted my Facebook status this morning.....just kills me...so here it is.....

Sad times....as you all know Richard has worked so hard and just graduating from nursing school and hoping to get back to work as soon as possible. He has been working nights at Highlands doing his practicum, which is not paid work, just part of the program. When he gets off this morning.....his truck had been broken into!! They stole EVERYTHING IN THE TRUCK, EXCEPT FOR THE BIBLE LAYING IN THE ...SEAT! Of course, I'm sure they didn't want that. So he lost somewhere around $700-$800 worth of tools and stuff like that. Completely cleaned out his big toolbox in the back and everything in the cab, except for the bible. State Police said probably would never get any of it back and the cameras were not angled towards the truck, so it is just a loss. Richard called and told me and all I could do was cry.....we have tried so hard the past several years since he lost his job and then to have someone do this.....just breaks my heart...

Photo Heavy Post...lots to talk about...

Just to warn you, this is a photo heavy post.  Let's just say, I am feeling restless and have lots to talk about and show.  First off let me fill you in on the past few days and then I will get to all the photo stuff.  Feeling a little better each day but when I spoke to my doctor I asked her, "what happened to 2-3 days and all would be back to normal?"  Monday will be 2 weeks ago that I had my surgery and I still feel like crap.  I wasn't please with her answer but she said, "a lot of it probably has to do with your age and also I had more to do once I got in there than I initially thought"  I'm thinking, MY AGE???  Then I started feeling pretty old....  :)  I turned 40 in March and she's got me thinking I'm 80!  LOL!  Oh well...

Richard has been working some night shifts doing his practicum at the hospital so I get pretty lonesome.  It probably wouldn't be too bad if I felt more like doing something.  Hunter has had several friends over since school has been out.  None of them are very hyper, thank goodness!  ;)  Anyway this week he had a friend over on Wednesday.  He is a very good boy and a couple of years older than Hunter.  Richard and I grew up with his father and is mother is a wonderful person too.  Actually, they both are Hunter's Sunday School teachers.  So Wyatt came over and stayed Wednesday and spent the night.  I kicked back on the couch most of the evening and did NOTHING!  Then Wyatt went home on Thursday about 5:30pm.  Richard and Hunter got ready and went to our Thursday night Church service at 7pm.  I did not feel up to going so I kept the couch company.  :)  So when they came home a little after 9pm, Hunter had another friend with him!  LOL!  Another little boy from Church that we are good friends with his parents too.  Hunter and Tyler are also in the same class.  He went home today.  So after a long couple of days for Hunter, he took my couch away from me.  LOL!  He had a wonderful time but he was wore out!

This is right before Richard left for work this evening.  As soon as he left, I got Hunter up and we crawled inn my bed to snuggle and sleep!  We didn't get back up until after 8pm this evening.  I'm sure we will be up most of the night!  Oh well....Richard will get home about 8:30am so we can all sleep in, I guess.

Now on to the quilty stuff.  I ventured upstairs today and oh my goodness I wish that I hadn't!  Ewwww....not only did it feel like crap trying to get up those stairs but this is what I saw when I topped them......

If you remember I was in a big rush to get some of those quilts quilted before my surgery so there was not any time to clean or put things away.  Also since my surgery I had Hunter and Richard up there digging for stuff that I needed to sew on downstairs.  I would like to shove it all out the window and start over!  Is that possible?  This is what it looked like back in March, of course I've moved some stuff around since then but at least it was clean.

So I started here at the couch since it was the cleanest part.  :)  I did get that part cleaned up but had to get Hunter to help me get some stuff out of the floor because it didn't feel very good when I bent over.

As you can see I did make a little progress, but that is about as far as I got.

Then I thought about winding some bobbins so that I could clean off my frame and load a quilt on in a day or two.  I have a few more that need to be done!  So I sat down to do that and oh my goodness, I had planned on ordering thread right after my surgery!  Like I mentioned I worked on quilting some quilts right up to my surgery.  I even had one lady pick her quilt up at the hospital that morning.  Since my doctor said I would be down 2-3 days at the most, don't laugh but I figured I would get online and order thread that evening after my surgery and that would give me something to do.  Well......that didn't happen and I forgot all about the thread.  I am OUT of thread!!  I do have COLORS but what I need for the quilts that I have are whites/creams.  So I will order in the morning and it will take a few days to get here.  Hopefully, I can get my frame cleaned off and a quilt loaded and be ready to start as soon as it arrives.  After all of this, I got a little depressed and sat down to make a plan!!

I have so many things of my own that are almost finished but then I get sidetracked or loose interest before I get it finished.  I made a list of what I need to finish so that I can get them done one at a time.  So here we go.....Remember this?  My spiderweb is still in this state.  Well actually I do have all of the blocks sewn into rows, I just need to sew the rows together and sew the borders on.  As you can see everything is already cut.

And then there is this one, my Hugs & Kisses.  Sorry this photo is sideways but you get the idea.  You can also see it in the photo above with my spiderweb.  I love how this quilt is turning out even though I don't have much of it done.  I also need to dig out stuff to send to a few people that helped me in a swap of fabrics so that I could make this quilt.  I am soooooo far behind on everything.

Now lets move on to this one, my Log Cabin quilt.  This baby is huge!  It is all put together except for the borders.  If you remember I asked your opinions on what border to use.  I had planned on a green border when I started it but in the end I felt like the green that I had was too busy for this quilt and I just couldn't get past that.  I'll save that bolt of green for something else.

I decided on the navy fabric.  I felt that it nicely framed the quilt.  I'm not completely sure but I think I even have the borders cut.  I'll have to check on that, I did see the navy bolt up there today but I'm thinking that I already cut off of it.  Don't want to do that twice.

Here is another one that I'm anxious to get done.  Well, I say anxious but evidently not or I would have had it done by now.  On this one I need to sew the blocks for 2 more rows and sew the borders on and I know they are already cut.

Now my Farmer's Wife blocks!  I love working on these small blocks.  They are the same size as my new Civil War Anniversary Blocks that I started.

Here are those, my Civil War Anniversary blocks that I started after my surgery.  They kept my mind busy.  I think I will keep both of these close to my machine so that I can work on them a little at a time.

Do you remember the other day when I started piecing that baby quilt from scrap and felt like it looked more for a boy than a girl when it was finished?  So I started another one and I wanted it to look completely "girlish"  I'm not done but here is a little peak of it so far....

I'm making this quilt for my little granddaughter, Raelynn Grace.  Isn't she a cute?  Look at those cheeks!!  She will be 7 months old on Sunday.  She belongs to Breanna, Richard's oldest daughter.

Oh I almost forgot, I plan on using some of this bolt of purple for the borders for it, I think it will look nice and bright when it is finished.

I wanted to come up with a baby quilt that looked a little modern and that was a challenge for me since I mostly work with reproductions.  I was disappointed when I finished the other quilt and it looked so "boyish"  I looked and looked for a pattern to use my purple scraps on and I had a certain thing in my mind but couldn't find a pattern online with what I wanted and I couldn't go upstairs to dig though my books and magazines so I just sat down and played around with EQ.  This is my own design so we'll have to see how it all turns out in the end.  I most say it was pretty fun drawing out my own block.

I guess that is all for now.  It is 11:35pm and I'm wide awake from my nap.  It will be a long night.  Not sure if I want to go back upstairs tonight or not.  I may just try to do some laundry, watch some tv and surf the web....  I think I will also schedule this to post first thing in the morning since it is so late tonight.

Night...
Kristie

New Civil War Anniversary Book....blocks!!!!

 I'm feeling much better as time goes on.  Doing a little more each day.  I still haven't been able to go upstairs to my sewing room....trust me, I tried and I made it part of the way and had to come back down.  But the good thing is, Richard brought my sewing machine back down for me after his little graduation party.  I have some quilty stuff to show in a minute but first off here is a photo from Saturday!!!  He graduated!!!!  I am so proud of him!  It has been a long hard road for us both but at least now we are seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.  He was the student speaker at the ceremony so here is a photo of that.  I have it all on video but as soon as I feel like it I may upload the section of his speech on here.  It was great, I loved it.  They also gave him an original watercolor painting for speaking.  I'll try to take a photo of it too.  I have the photo were they are presenting it to him but you really can't tell what the painting is of.  Of course, I cried and blubbered through the whole thing.

 The only time that I have been out since my surgery was Saturday for his graduation and then of course, Sunday for Church.  We came back home after his graduation and had a little celebration.  If it had not been for mom, I wouldn't have made it.  She helped me get everything ready for it.  We had people coming and going for most of the day.  By the time that was all over with, I was exhausted!  When I got up Sunday morning for Church, I was miserable.  I think that I overdid it on Saturday but all is fine now.

I mentioned the other day that I was piecing a quick little baby quilt.  I finally got it pieced.  I wanted it for a girl but the scraps that I used looks more for a boy.  I'm thinking that I may end up just putting it back for a baby boy and starting with something else for the baby girl.  I'm always needing baby quilts for gifts so this wasn't a waste of time.  Here it is...

 Here is a closeup.  It does have a little pink and purple in it but not really enough for it to show up.  Oh well, back to square one!

 The Saturday before my surgery I was online and printed out an order form for the new book that I had been wanting!  One of my favorite quilt designers had a book released on May 1st.  I have talked with her for a long time about this book and I was just soooooo excited for it to be released.  So like I said I printed the order form out and told her that it would be towards the end of the week before I could mail it out because of my surgery and all of that stuff.  So I had my surgery on Monday and on Wednesday Hunter brought the mail in to me and guess what was there!!!!  The book and CD!  It is the new one from Rosemary Youngs, the author of "the Civil War Love Letters" and the "Civil War Diary" quilts!  This one is called "The Civil War Anniversary Quilts" 150 blocks to commemorate 150 years!

As soon as I opened the package I felt like crap because I had not mailed her money for it.  So I contacted her immediately thinking that I would just go ahead and pay with my paypal, not even sure why I didn't do that to start with.  Anyway, she said she knew that I had not planned on paying for a week or so but sent the book and cd anyway so that I would have something to look at while I was healing from my surgery!!  HOW SWEET IS THAT????  

My plan was that after I finished that baby quilt that I would work on my Farmer's Wife blocks, but my sewing room is a mess and I didn't really remember where I had put them and Richard could not find them, so what was I supposed to do?????  I started working on this new Civil War quilt!!!  LOL!  Of course, I do plan on working on both of them at the same time since I am using Civil War reproduction fabrics for both it will be easy to do that way.  I also want to work on my Hugs and Kisses quilt with the calicoes but I really need to be upstairs to do that, there are just too many strips to drag that downstairs.

So here are my first 8 blocks from this new book!  Oh and she even encloses the Lincoln fabric along with the book to use in a couple of the blocks!!!

This one is called "Most Welcomed Letter"  Block #100

"No News of Importance" Block # 108

"Home on Furlough" Block # 110

 "William & Catherine Brand" Block #99

 "Flesh Wound" block # 122

 "The Keys of my Heart" block #109

 "Four Brigadier Generals and 1 Major General" Block # 124

 "William Henry Huntzinger" Block #1

 Sorry that some of these are blurry!  I'll try to take a photo of them all together on my design wall once I can get up there.  These are all 6 inch blocks, just like her other books and like the Farmer's Wife blocks too.

I guess that is all for this evening.  Richard is at the hospital tonight doing a 12 hour shift.  I sure miss him while he is gone.  It is hard to get used to him being gone during the night again.  His shift ends at 7am so I'll try to have his breakfast ready when he gets home so that he can get and lay down for a while.
Kristie

Up most of the night...

 Well, I'm still sore and slow moving but I'm sure I'm probably getting a little better everyday.  It just probably doesn't feel like I am.  LOL!  I am getting restless and eating everything in site!  I hate that!  I did work on a few yo-yo's for Hunter's quilt.  I didn't really get many done before I lost interest in them.

 Richard had to start his practicum last night so I had him to bring my sewing machine downstairs before he left.  :)  The funny part was trying to tell him which fabric and stuff to bring me.  LOL!

 I made him let me snap this photo before he left.  I am so proud of him, can you tell????  LOL!  This has been such a long hard road for us but at least we can now see the end of it.  The Lord has truly Blessed us during this time.  It has been hard but well worth it in the end.  Hmmmm.....I'm not sure what Donkey is even doing in this photo!  LOL!  Crazy cat!

 So here is my little setup for the evening!  I just scooted my table runner and stuff over to the side and had everything that I needed right there.  I needed to make a baby quilt and I had him to bring down a little box that I had sorted and labeled "kids scraps"  Most of what was in there was small scraps so I decided to do a simple "stacked coins" design.  Very simple and easy.  I plan on setting it up in solid white to make the prints really stand out.

 I couldn't really lay the strips out on the floor because I can't bend over so I used magnets and put them on my refrigerator!  LOL!  It worked!

I'm not really sure how pleased I will be in the end with this.  I need this quilt to be suited for a girl and even though it has a few girly fabrics in it, from a distance it looks more suited for a boy!  Don't you think?

So I'm wondering if I should try to border it with something that will go with the scraps and pull it more towards "girly" which I don't have a clue what I would use to do that.  I'm sure I don't have anything in my stash that would work so I would have to pick something up.  Or should I just start over with something else that screams "GIRL"?   BTW...these strips will not go in this order and I have another strip to sew together.

Hmmmm....I guess I will have to think on that.  I've been up most of the night.  I just can't sleep.  Of course, I am hurting and can't seem to get comfortable but I also miss Richard!  I am used to him being home with me at night....I'm sure I will get used to it again.  He used to work mostly nights when he drove a coal truck but that has been a few years ago.

Back to sewing....
Kristie

Post Surgery Update

No pics in this post.  :(  I have gotten several emails so I thought I would update you on my blog.  I had my surgery on Monday.  I had my right ovary and a golf ball size cyst removed, nothing major just routine surgery.  The doctor wanted to salvage my ovary if possible but couldn't, which is not a big deal to me really. 

All went well as far as the actual surgery, but I woke up in severe pain so I had to stay at the hospital a little while longer until they got it under control.  I have a big problem with pain medication not working.  It never has worked well for me and Hunter has the same problem and he is only 9.  Neither of us can take Morphine or anything like that, we might as well drink water or something.  So after they finally got it under control I came home. 

I had alot of pain Monday evening and night but Tuesday (yesterday) wasn't too bad once I got out of bed and moved around.  Richard has been great with taking care of me and making me get up and walk even when I don't want too.  Mom got called out to work Saturday but Chantal has been here with me during the evenings which is nice to spend time with her.  She is keeping my dishes washed and stopped by the grocery store of my yesterday after work.  LOL!  Richard is keeping everything else done. 

Today has probably been the worst day of it all.  I cried when I got out of bed this morning and it took a while for my pain medication to kick in.  I am doing fine now, just taking it easy, watching tv and on Facebook.   I've eat a ton of food and probably will gain 10 lbs!  LOL!  Actually my stomach is swollen right now and I feel like I am 9 months pregnant!  :(  I can't wait for that to go back to normal. 

Richard is trying to nap right now so Hunter is babysitting me or so he says.  LOL!  Richard has to work tonight at the hospital doing his practicum.  He has to be there at 7pm and works a 12 hour shift.  I sure will miss him being gone all night.  I'm so used to him being home during the nights.  When he drove a coal truck he was gone alot through the night but that has been a couple of years ago.  I'm sure I will live, it will just take a little getting used to again.  He has 120 hours of this to do before he can take his state board exam and stuff like that.  Anyway, my sister will be here with me tonight if I happen to need anything and she will be leaving for work in the morning about the time that Richard will be getting home.  Mom will also be back home tomorrow evening. 

Mom will be helping me get things ready for Richard's graduation party Saturday evening after his graduation.  I figure by Saturday I should be feeling alot better than I am now.  His graduation is at 10am and we will be coming back home and having a cookout with family and friends!  Saturday is also our 11th wedding anniversary too!!  He will be speaking at the graduation too so he has been working on his speech the past few days.  He is a little nervous over that but he will do just fine. 

That is all for now!  I think I will get up and walk through the house a few times and then settle down and work on some yo-yo's!  I have a basket of yo-yo's that is one of my long term projects.  My sewing room is upstairs so I can't get up there right now.  I had my basket of yo-yo's brought down to work on.  I have made 2 huge yo-yo quilts over the past years.  The first one has 2500 yo-yo's in it and I gave it to my mom.  Andrew loved it and wanted one so I made him one with 2000 yo-yo's and it is put up in his room.  The one that I am working on now is for Hunter!  I think I have about 500 yo-yo's finished.  I want his to be about the same size as Andrews. 

I'll check in later...
Kristie

Catching Up...

Here it is almost 3:30am and I can't sleep.  That weird pain that I have been having for months on my LEFT side and back is driving me crazy tonight and I just can't fall asleep.  But I'm not up alone, Hunter has a friend spending the night and they are still up playing the PS3.  :)  Thursday was the last day of school for him and his little friend came over after school.  They are really having a great time.  He is the son of a good friend that is also a Deacon and he and his wife are Hunter's Sunday School Teachers at Church.  So it's all good.  :)

As I mentioned in my last post things have been busy and hectic around here.  I'm trying to get a ton of things done before my surgery on Monday and I feel like I am running out of time.  At this point there is no way that I will get everything done before then.  I have been quilting like a crazy lady and still have 6 more quilts to do.  :(  So here is an update for the past few days...

Monday:  Hunter had a dentist appointment early that morning.  He needs a tooth pulled but that didn't happen.  He has a jaw tooth that is NOT loose and the permanent tooth is trying to come through the gum below it...sideways.  They could not pull it Monday because he had a little bit of an infection in that area and it would not numb.  He is on antibiotics and goes back on the 16th to have it pulled.  I also met a lady that morning and dropped off 3 quilts to her.  Honestly, I've not had time or even thought about taking photos of them all, but here is one that I did get.

 A very pretty quilt and she is excellent at piecing.  Her quilts are always so easy to quilt.

 Like I said, I have been so busy quilting that Hunter even came upstairs to visit with me while I was quilting. He had been outside playing in the dirt as you can see he is so dirty.  He came upstairs and fell asleep in the sofa in my sewing room.

Tuesday: I quilted most of the day and my back and hips where killing me from standing at the frame so long.  So that evening, Mom, Chantal, and I all went to the spa!!  I so needed that!  Mom picked me up around 4:30 and we stopped by and picked my sister up after work and on to the spa we went.  It was a nice evening having "girl time"  We all had some kind of herbal body wrap and then hit the sauna.  They put us on some kind of whole body vibrating machine, that thing was CRAZY!  :)  Also we had an aqua massage and a deep tissue massage.  Oh and mom had a foot massage.  It was all so nice.

While I was at the spa, Richard surprised me when I got home late that night.  He had finished painting the living room.  We had two walls in there that still were not painted.  One of the walls is 24ft high so I'm sure it took forever to paint.  He also painted the inside of the front door!  We still don't have the wood trim around it but at least it is painted.

Wednesday: Hunter has Award's Day at school early that morning.  Richard and I went for that.  It was nice and as you can see in the photo he was happy.

He ended up with 3 awards...reading, science and math!  I am so glad that school is out for the summer!  I always enjoy having my kids home.

Also Wednesday morning, mom and my cousin went to a little JCPenney outlet place.  This lady that we know buys this stuff by the pallets and most of it is either discontinued, returned, or overstock.  Anyway, I'm sure you know what I am talking about.  So mom called me on her way back home and said that she had huge braided rugs up there really cheap.  I'm talking room sized rugs for $60!!  Can't beat that!  Mom said that there was one really big one that had a small place on it that had came apart, she said it would be easily fixed.  She came by, picked me up and we went back up there.  So here is what I got!!!

A 8ft x 11ft oval braided rug, made by American Living for JCP.  Here it is in the master bedroom.  My bedroom is pretty big, as you can see it is in the middle of the floor and nothing is sitting on it.  But here is the deal....

The rug was damaged, it had a place that had pulled loose.  You can see it in this photo right down below the doggies.  There is a place a little over a foot long that needs to be stitched back.  Not a big deal to fix at all.  So like I said the rug measures 8ft x 11ft and is made by American Living.  I looked it up online and JCP still sells it!  It is priced for $500!!!  Of course, I would and could NEVER pay that much for a rug!!  But because of this place that needs fixed, I got it for........are you ready???......$25!!!  I was so excited!  I thought it was a great deal.  I haven't had time to sew that section back, but it's not like it will be a big job.  I'm happy with it and as you can see my little doggies love it too.  

After that I spent the rest of the day quilting.  :)

Now this brings me to Thursday!  So yesterday I had to drive the 90 minutes to the hospital where my surgery is scheduled and preregister and have bloodwork done.  I got all of that taken care of and on the way back stopped by the quilt shop to deliver a few more quilts that I had finished.  Actually, I delivered 4 of them.  One of them was that barn quilt that I showed the other day and the other 3, I didn't get photos of.

While mom and I were gone doing all of this stuff, Richard was home painting my kitchen and hallway!  He got the ceilings done in there and the hallway walls.  He only got one wall done in the kitchen but I'm sure he was tired.  I hate painting ceilings and my kitchen ceiling alone is 20ft x 20ft.  Anyway, the hallway walls are painted the same beige as my living room and all of the open area.  I have a paint color picked out for the kitchen but since we have so much of the beige paint leftover I'm going ahead and painting the kitchen with it until I can get the other.  I would rather have it painted with the beige than see the drywall!  I'll try to remember to take photos of it and show you next time.

So I guess that pretty much catches me up on the past week.  Since I have been up all night I figure at some point I will have to have a nap sometime today, but other than that I plan on quilting and cleaning.  I know that there is no way that I can get the other 6 quilts done before Monday but I want to do all that I can.  I also want to have my house nice and clean before my surgery Monday morning.  I don't want to come home and have to look at a messy house and not be able to get up and clean it.  I know I am just starting to panic over it.  My house isn't really dirty and mom and Richard will be here so they will do whatever needs to be done for a day or so.  I just don't want to have to have someone else do it....you know what I mean.  The doctor said I would be down for probably 2-3 days, but Richard said more like a week.  That will drive me crazy because I don't like to be unable to do what I want.

My weekend will be spent quilting and cleaning and then surgery one Monday.  I'll post as I can and actually I will probably post again over the weekend.  I am so far behind on reading blogs, hopefully I can catch up on those after my surgery.

It's now 4:30am and I think I will start some laundry......
Kristie