I could just kick myself

 I'll start with the good stuff first.  Last night Richard put up the door to the main bath.  We didn't have any interior doors up and I was so excited to have a door on the bathroom.  That sure beats the quilt that I had hanging over the doorway.  

I tried to take a photo of it but it was hard to get the door at the right angle since it is down the hallway.  I had to take the photo straight in front of it and I couldn't get the bottom panel, just the top.  I also had a hard time with the flash on the doorknob.  I'll try to get the whole door later.  I love the antique hardware on it.  Did I tell you that I have skeleton keys to fit the doors?  I love the wood tones on these doors too.  

I also received more pillowcases!  I sure hope that I get these right because Hunter pulled them out of the packages to look at them and I'm not sure that I got which ones go with what name.  So if I don't, please correct me.  This first set is from, Faye in MI.  She even sent a little book along.  I'm sure the books will be greatly appreciated too.  Thanks Faye!!

This second set is from, Carline in WA.  She even sent along a piece of fabric for me.  Thanks so much, Carline!!  All of these pillowcases will be greatly appreciated.  In a few days I will post the big stack that we have.  I can't wait to deliver them in a few weeks.  

Now it starts going down hill from here....

Yesterday Hunter got off of the bus and was sick.  Again!!  This is the second time in the past few weeks.  He was running a fever and he just walked in the door and hit the couch.  I gave him some Motrin and he ended up sleeping until 8pm.  That is not like him because most of the time, Motrin hypes him up.  So this morning he was fevered again and I took him to the doctor instead of sending him to school.  He seemed to be feeling a little better tonight.  

After everyone went to bed a few hours ago, I wasn't sleepy so I decided to go upstairs to my sewing room.  That was a mistake.  Actually it started off pretty good but quickly went down hill.  

I finished up a few more blocks to my Rocky Road to Kansas.  I now have 20 out of the 30 blocks needed.  I was pleased with that.  

 Oh before I go on, I have another quilt on the frame.  It's not mine but I sure wish it was.  It is very pretty.  It is a big one measuring in at 102" square!!!  I'll just quilt on it a little at a time.  I couldn't quilt on it tonight because my sewing room is directly over the master bedroom and it will wake Richard up.  I know you really can't tell that much about it here but I have just started the quilting on it.  

 Now here is the bad part....UGH!  Do you remember in my last post that I was so excited to finish up all of my Green Scrappy Bargello blocks?  Well....

 Due to lack of attention or brains, I really messed them up!!  I didn't even notice it until a little while ago when I finished those Rocky Road to Kansas sections and decided that I would start sewing the green blocks together.  

 Do you see anything wrong with the photo below?

 Yep!  My blocks are NOT the same size!  When I did these last sets of blocks over the weekend, I forgot to change out the foot on my machine and was in too big of a hurry to notice that they were NOT the right size.  :(  They are NOT even square!  They are half an inch longer than they are wide.  

At this point, I just threw my hands up and came downstairs.  I have enough of the right sized blocks to make a 4x6 setting but I wanted a big quilt, not a lap quilt.  The way it looks, I'm going to have 2 lap quilts.  I figure that I can take the remaining rectangle looking blocks and keep them all turned the same way and make a lap quilt with those, even though that is not what I wanted.  At this point, I don't think I could stomach taking all of those seems apart and redoing the blocks.  I guess I'll sleep on it and deal with it tomorrow...maybe.  Good night...
Kristie

Sewing and some house goodies...

 Well, I survived the weekend....barely.  UGH!  It was crazy!  Sunday evening I did get a little bit of sewing done.  That felt great and I really needed that after the weekend.  So I'll fill you in on it all...

I'll start with the sewing on Sunday evening and go backwards.  After Hunter's busy time with his friends he decided that he needed some "mommy time"  we went upstairs to my sewing room.  He loves it up there.  He has a tote that he calls his art box.  Lots of papers, markers, glues, pencils and such.  He is a creative little guy so my sewing room is OUR creative space.  I love that he enjoys it so much.  

As I was piecing some blocks on the table next to him, he was doing some drawing while we watched, "The Nightmare Before Christmas"  Giggle...I think we had a little too much pop.  I see a can of his and 3 cans of mine.  

He decided that he wanted a bowl of cereal too.  See the cars on my cutting mat.  

Here are the blocks that I pieced!  I finally finished up all 30 of the blocks needed for this quilt!  It is a UFO that I had been working on.  Now I just need to sew all of those blocks together.  That may be a few weeks from now because I want to finish painting my sewing room before I put my design wall back up.  

 Oh, I found these little things at Walmart on clearance for .50 each.  They are the perfect size for my fat quarters.  I love that I have them right in front of me and can see them.  

 I snapped another photo of a few of my babies upstairs.  

 Now on to the rest of the weekend.  An elderly friend of the family moved from her home and the water plant bought the lot for the property, not the house.  The house was going to be torn down.  The house is a small house but it is 100+ yrs old.  So when my MIL called to tell us that the lady wanted to know if we needed some stuff, we jumped on it.  

Saturday Richard left early to go in town to the house and started removing some things.  As soon as all of those kids were picked up, Hunter and I headed to town to help him.  I know that this stuff looks old and horrible, but I promise by the time we get it all redone, it will not look so bad.  :)  

First off, here is the hardwood flooring that we pulled up.  The rooms were tiny so it took 4 rooms of hardwood just to get enough to do my living room.  Here it is still piled on the trailer.  See, it looks bad, doesn't it?  

 Then Richard grabbed a small piece and ran it through a planer to get the old stain and roughness off.  It looked good at that point.  Then I grabbed the can of stain and this is the end look!!!  

 So what do you think???  If you look close you will see that part of the board has 2 coats.  I'm loving it and can't wait to get it all refinished and sealed.  

 We also got this claw foot tub!  I've been wanting one for my master bath and finally found one.  Of course, it has to be refinished too.  That will come with time.  I'll post photos of that once it is finished.  

 I know it is hard to tell anything about this photo but here are some interior doors.  They need cleaned and waxed.  I'm loving the old hardware on them.  I also have the skeleton keys for them.  

 We also got the front and back doors and a set of pocket doors.  I can't get to those to take a photo.  So this is what we did on Saturday and then again Sunday after Church.  I'm excited about all of this but lets just say, my back is feeling it.  
Kristie

A few goodies...

So tired after yesterday that I missed my doctor's appointment this morning. I just didn't feel like going so I will have to reschedule it. Yesterday Andrew and I had to make a trip to the college that he will be attending in the fall. It is just a couple hours away but we were gone for a total of 12 hours!! He is now all set and ready to start August 22nd. There were several classes that he will not have to take because of his test scores so he was very excited about that. I'm not sure if I had posted them but here is one of his senior photos, this one is one of the proofs that I got from the photographers website, I'm just too lazy to scan one. So while we were out yesterday I stopped by the little red hen quilt shop in Ashland, just little over an hour away. I had received a flyer last week that they were having a big sale. Since I had to drive right by there I just had to stop. LOL! They had fat quarters on sale for $1 each and they are only $1.50 regular priced. I only bought 15 of them, I was in a rush to get back home but I am pleased with what I bought. You know how I like Civil War Repro fabrics so I was very excited! Of course it is all quilt shop quality fabric and is only $5 to $6 per yard regular price!!!! Hunter stayed home with Richard yesterday while I was gone and they worked a little bit on my ceiling in my quilting room. I'm loving it!!! After he gets it all finished he will be going back over it and touching up the screw holes with stain. See those yellow electric wires hanging down? I will have 3 recessed lights there and they will be centered over my frame for extra lighting. I can't wait to get this done and get the trim up!!!! It is hard to see in this photo but the ceiling goes from 6.5ft up to 12ft in the center. What you see here in the photo is the short side.

Have a ton of housework to do today so not sure if I will get any sewing done today. And I might just be a good little wife and go help Richard out in the house today too.

Kristie

Something New...

Andrew graduated on Friday night! I am so proud of him. It was hard to deal with the fact that he is old enough to graduate from high school. Seems like yesterday he was crawling, breaks my heart that he is growing up. He is already enrolled in college for the fall. Needless to say with school wrapping up for the year it has been a very busy time with the kids. Now I am looking forward to spending extra time with them this summer. Andrew plans on working this summer so that will take up a lot of him time.


With all of this running back and forth just makes me so tired. I've been lazy with what little free time that I've had. Like tonight we are having Rocky Tops Pizza. LOL! Been on the run all day and just didn't have the energy to fix supper. I guess once in a while I'm allowed to be lazy.As far as quilting goes...having a hard time concentrating on it lately. Seems like I just move from one project to another and don't get anything finished. So I was thinking last night that maybe I just need something completely NEW to me. Most of my older projects have a lot of the same fabrics in them or I've looked at them so many times that I am sick of them. :) So I decided to work on a kit that I had from Connecting Threads. I got it all cut out late last night even the binding. This evening after we got back home I started sewing some of the pieces together. Oh and I have a few more flowers blooming in my weed garden. LOL! If I can get a break in all of this rain I really need to weed it. Richard keeps calling it a "weed garden" and saying that it is an eyesore. :)Now I'm off to do some laundry and hopefully work on my new quilt!
Kristie

Thank Goodness it's over!

Well the weekend didn't go how I had planned. Got hit with a kidney stone late Friday night. All I can say is.....OH MY! I finally passed it earlier today. This is the first one that I had ever had and I can say I really don't want anymore of them!!! Luckily I was able to pass it on my own here at home. Now on to the rest of the weekend...of course I didn't get any quilting done. I really didn't do anything but cry and pace the floor. Hunter and Cocoa had a nice day of playing in the yard on Saturday. She is so funny and I love to watch them play together. Oh, Hunter named the other two goats....Sweetie and Fudge! I don't have a clue how he come up with those but he did. These goats in this photo belong to a friend of ours. They have a bunch of them and Hunter loves going down there to play with them. He just climbs over the fence and runs around with them. They love it too!After a busy day of playing with the farm animals, Hunter got some snuggle time with Smokey. Smokey is my baby, he is the sweetest little dog and he follows me everywhere that I go. If I get up to go to the bathroom he goes with me. Since the weather has turned off cold again, I had to put Smokey and Jazz some clothes back on, they freeze, especially Jazz. Richard worked on the house. It killed me that I was not able to go out there and work too, I am really getting anxious to get this stuff done. He got the girls room done and it is now ready for tape, mud and sanding. Their room is the same size as Andrew's, 16x20, it is just a mirrored image of his. Hopefully tomorrow things will be back to normal. I had planned on getting the customer binding finished and delivered to her on Monday but since my problem with the kidney stone I didn't even touch it. I tried but I just could not sit there long enough to get anything done. We will see how it goes tomorrow... Kristie

What a day!

Yesterday I finally got the top all sewn together! So that makes me 31 tops that need quilted. :( But I'll eventually get them quilted. I think I will add a simple border to this before I quilt it but I'll have to dig through my stash to see what I have. When I add the border it will make it a queen size quilt. I like nice big quilts.Also yesterday evening, Richard, Hunter and I took a walk in the woods. A nice little walk in the other direction from where I went the other day. It is so peaceful and relaxing here in the woods.Today Richard's sister, Vanessa had a minor surgery. So we went to Pikeville hospital to visit her. She is always there when he needs her so we wanted to be there for her. She is such a sweet person and is always one to count on. This was about a 65 mile drive from the house. While we were there we stopped by the lookout in Pikeville. You can read about it here on this sign.

Let's just say....I AM SCARED TO DEATH OF HEIGHTS!!! I really get freaked out! As you can see it is pretty high.
Last year we went to "The Breaks" and it was higher up but I did pretty good there. I think my problem today was that this cage thing was not on a flat ground underneath! Here you can see Richard and Hunter on it and Hunter crawled to the edge! LOL!

Richard took this photo from the edge. You can see the river and the tiny cars below.
I started out on it and freaked out!!! Had a panic attack, started crying, and couldn't breathe! Richard took this photo of my big butt hoofing it back to the truck!!! Took me a good 45 minutes to calm down. I'm fine and can laugh about it all now.
It's been a long day and I am really tired. I think I will go to bed early tonight. Hope it is a beautiful week. I just love this nice weather!

Kristie

Shawl for Mom

Hunter has been sick for a few days. I hate to see the little guy feel so bad. Took him to the doctor yesterday and he will be out of school for a few days. So hopefully he will start feeling better real soon. Today I took mom for her physical therapy appointment and also for her x-ray. She should have the results from the x-ray by Friday. Hopefully all is well with that.


So after I got back home today I started sewing her shawl together. I cut it out the other night but just hadn't had a chance to sew it together. I have a customer quilt that I need to load on the frame but with Hunter being sick he is keeping me busy. So I needed something mindless to work on. LOL! Anyway, I plan on loading that quilt on Friday and getting it done.


I didn't actually use the pattern in the book because I needed something that would go together a little faster so I did a simple churn dash block. This is one of my favorite blocks. As you can see it is not quilted yet and since it measures only 24x72 it will not take but a few minutes to quilt it. After the quilting is done then I will sew the pockets on the ends, do the binding and it will be ready for her to use.

I've had these fabrics in my stash for a long time so I didn't have to go out and buy anything for it. I plan on using the green for the backing too. I'm really anxious to get it done and to give it to her. I think it will be great for her to use because sometimes it is hard for her to slip things over her arm and shoulder. Perfect to use when laying around the house.


Well, I'm tired. I think I will give Hunter is medicine and go to bed...
Kristie

The Quilting is Finished

I got the other customer quilt off the frame on Saturday! The customer requested it be quilted with music notes and honestly, I think that is the only design that would look right on this quilt. She did a wonderful job on the piecing of this quilt, it was very flat and even. I believe she said this was a gift for a choir teacher. I finished the binding on her other quilt, the one with the birds, last night. I will work on this binding today and hopefully they will be ready for pickup tomorrow! I have one more customer quilt that needs quilted but I need to do some prep work to it before I get it loaded on the frame.

Another photo of Hunter. As you can see by the look on his face, he was tired of me snapping photos of him. LOL! Poor kid, he was praying for snow last night! And they have not had a full week of school since way before Christmas!!!Mom has two appointments today. So I will be gone most of the day. I do enjoy spending the time with mom, I just hate it is spent taking her to appointments. I guess I could take the musical quilt with me to work on the binding, but I don't think I want to have lug it around all day, it would be too much bulk for me. I figure I will take a book or yo-yo's to work on instead.

Richard and I have been talking about work on the new house. I figure that as soon as the weather starts to break and warm up a little, my quilting will slow down a lot. Of course, there are a lot of things that I can't do on the house but so much that I CAN! Over the past several weeks, since we have been talking about trying to get moved in sometime this summer, my mind has been in a whirlwind. Thinking so much about paint colors, wood stains, light placements, furniture placements and all of that stuff. It is all a little overwhelming for me. I can do a lot of the painting but not climbing real high on the step ladder. Since my living room has an open ceiling to the second story, Richard will be painting that up there.

I'm off to get my day started...

Kristie

Quilting Right Along...

First off, I am very happy to have been selected as one of the 50 Best Quilting Blogs ! How exciting!!! You really should check out this website, there are lots of wonderful bloggers listed from all over the world.

Yesterday I took mom back to the doctor. He said she was doing fine but still can't lift over 1 lb!! He said lifting a gallon of milk could tear the whole thing loose. It has been 10+ weeks since her surgery and she has really had a hard time with it all. Today I have to take her in for physical therapy. She dreads it everyday and it is so hard when she comes out and I see her crying because the therapy has hurt so bad. Just breaks my heart but I know she has to do this to get it stronger. A few times she has had to stop them because the doctor said that they are pushing her too far and could end up hurting her shoulder again.

So yesterday while we were out, I picked up two fabrics for my stash. The one on the left is a Peter Pan fabric that was marked down to $1 per yard. I got what was left on the bolt which was 1 3/4 yards. Don't have a clue what I will use it for unless I just cut it up small and use it in some of my scrap quilts as background fabric. The writing is actually blue but looks purple next to that purple fabric. The purple...well, I just liked it so I got it to put in my stash!
I know I am slow with machine quilting but between taking mom to the doctor and therapy, not being able to stand too long because of my hip, and just family things, it does take me a little longer than usual. But I am almost finished with it now. I think about another 45 minutes of quilting and it will be finished. This is a customer quilt and I also need to do the binding. It will be done by hand so it will take a little longer. I also have one more for this lady to do. They are both very well pieced, that sure make it easier when quilting.
I've also been working on these little applique baskets. As of right now I have 22 blocks ready to do the machine applique. I want to get all of the blocks ready and then I will do all of the machine applique on them. That way I can sort them into colors and I will not have to change my thread as often in my machine. I still have several more to go before they are all finished. This is something that I can work on and not make a big mess right now while I am doing these customer quilts. Here is a cute photo of my little Hunter this morning before school. I can't believe how fast he is growing up. He is such a little sweetie.I am soooooo ready for Spring!!! I was thinking about it last night, I missed doing so much last year because of my fall. As soon as this weather breaks I want to start walking again to loosen up my hip and strengthen my leg. I would love to ride Storm too! I didn't get to ride at all last year, after my fall, horseback riding was not possible. I miss it so much! I want to get out and enjoy my animals and farm. And also as soon as this weather breaks we are going to bust our butts working on the house!!!! We really want to get moved in it sometime this year! So lots of work there! Anyway my mind is just in a whirlwind right now!

Better get back to quilting this quilt before I have to take mom for therapy!
Kristie