A Quilting Weekend

Once again I left my family behind and headed up to Pennsylvania to spend the weekend with my mother and 32 other quilters. We worked from about 2pm Friday afternoon until 2pm on Sunday. You'll never begin to imagine the amount of work that was accomplished!

Here's my mom's first project: It's a nine patch (there are many more of these blocks!) that is then cut into 4 pieces and sewn back together before having borders added. She didn't finish this one since there was no design board available. She really needed to lay it out and plan it, so she moved on to her next project!

Here's Ann's project, called Circling Geese. There are twenty-five of these blocks! She's using 30's fabric for this project.
Mom's second project (I've forgotten the name) is a re-do. She did this one before and left out a step which resulted in her quilt being quite a bit smaller than intended. This time she's made sure to remember that step!

I finished two quilt tops. This one is way too busy and I'm thinking of taking it apart to change the sashing (that blue floral fabric between the larger blocks), but Caroline says she likes it the way it is. We'll see. I think the busy sashing detracts from the blocks and from the beautiful border.

The other is this sudoku wall hanging. I'm not really sure what to do with it...other than hang it on a wall!

That's my mom and Linda, the woman who organizes these quilt retreats. She's great asset, and helped me struggle through some incorrect instructions on the third project I started this weekend. It's not even close to near being done!

Morgan's Quilt Top

Morgan is taking an independent study this semester...in quilt making! We have a wonderful friend who is Morgan's mentor and who is teaching her how to do everything she needs to know to make quilts!

No School Today

I had planned to spend this entire day getting things done at home. No such luck. My boy needed a haircut (David wasn't able to fit it in on Saturday!) and so did Keswick Chicken's boys.

One opted out, so I took the two little guys into town.





The rest of the brood played computer games, decorated an umbrella and finished algebra homework!




Just like that the day was gone and nothing was accomplished at home. I need another day!

An Easy Day

We had a leisurely day with only one afternoon game. Caroline's team won!
Grandmama and Granddaddy came to this game as well as Katherine's and Morgan's games yesterday!

The Busiest Day So Far

Two soccer games at 9.

Will's Hot Shots - this time he's an Orange Shark!



Katherine's team still hasn't decided on a name!





Then on to Theory and Sight reading - Yay Caroline. She scored an Excellent on Theory and a Superior on Sight reading!

A Walmart Cookie Booth for Katherine! We left her there to fend for herself!



A Corner Cookie Booth for Caroline. Well, for all of 15 minutes before she and Molly headed off to Richmond for the Robotics Competition.

The girls loved being on the Corner and sold all but 2 cases of Shortbread cookies - we'll send the unopened case to some paratroopers we know of in Italy!



Down two, the rest of us met up at the MHS game! JV won!! That's Morgan #1!



Home for a nap before heading out to a birthday party!

Mermaids and Mermen

This is the project that started it all. Katherine had a science project due today. The assignment was given about three weeks ago - students were to self-select a project involving light. She planned hers early, but put off making the actual project until after her DI competition. As a result this thing has taken up the kitchen table for the last several days.

It took Will until yesterday to figure out that Katherine was using Crayola Model Magic for her project. Once he saw how much fun it was to use, he sat himself right down and decided to make "things".

His first creation was this.
I thought it was a shark. He went to bed telling us it was a shark, but woke up saying it was a mermaid. Originally there was no orange -the orange was added tonight when he broke the thing in half!

He had so much fun making the first mermaid, that he decided this afternoon to make a "collection." I heard "collection" and thought three or four more wouldn't be so bad. It looks like we now have a whole tribe of merpeople. There's even one with a mohawk!

This is K's mermaid -it's actually for another project she's working on for her word study class. She's making a triorama using her ocean meaning words - words like aquifer, aqueduct, mermaid, submarine and aquaphobia.

Here are Brenda and Eddie - king and queen of the merpeople. Did you notice how he's turned to kiss her cheek.

They are the only ones allowed to kiss - because they love each other. They aren't just kissing either - he's got them so intertwined that they'll reign together forever. The rest of his people aren't allowed to kiss - maybe because they have bronchitis and the doctor said not to!

Snip! Snip!

All this boy needs to be happy is a stack of purloined paper plates and a good pair of scissors. He saw the stack of plates at a recent party and carefully took just 6 so he could "make something." I'm still not sure what he plans to make, since it's a work in progress, but I'm sure he'll be able to tell me all about it! The last time he did this, he ended up with 3 paper plate puzzles.

Maroon Mustangs?

Today was K's first soccer game since she played in the second grade!! She's very excited about playing soccer again and was glad that the rain did not cancel her game. Today was also picture day. David played photographer and coach while I managed the cookie booth! The girl was all mud and smiles when they stopped by to say "hi" after the game!

Cookie Booth News

Today we held our second booth. It was cold and rainy but our spirits were bright! We sold 108 boxes and a case to one of the moms, so we matched our last booth! Our next and last booth is this coming Saturday - wish us luck. We still have a lot of Caramel deLites, Shortbreads, and Thanks-a-Lots, but we're out of Peanut Butter Sandwiches and Lemonades. I did have David pick up 2 more cases of Thin Mints, but they're already going fast. I'm hoping that we'll have only a meager supply by Saturday morning!

Friday the 13th #2

What was so unlucky about today?

I woke up not feeling well, which meant I missed my volunteer time in Will's class. It also meant that I didn't remind him to bring his share. Lacrosse was cancelled and I was late getting to the bus stop for the middle school bus. As a result Caroline didn't get off and rode to Molly's and ended up staying over night. That I think was good luck for them*.

The worst luck though was that it was game night here and the family decided to play Monopoly. The only thing worse would be if they'd decided to eat bananas and dunk cookies in milk while playing Monopoly.


* It turned out to be bad luck for those of us who had to spend the next day at the cookie booth with two overtired teenage zombies! At least I didn't have to get them out of the house for the 9:30 start time!

Good Reads

Thanks to Tara, I now have another stack of books to read.

One is Katherine's - I thought I should read it too.

The others: Mary, Called Magdalene, and Peace Like A River, will have to wait until I finish A Prayer For Owen Meany. I love John Irving. Its been at least 20 years since I've read anything of his. It's about time, I think.

Potatoes! Bread!

Caroline's social studies class has been studying immigration and as a bonus project the kids were allowed to bring in a cultural food from their own background. Since we have ancestors from all over, and no real ties to our ancestors' recipes, Caroline had to decide which country's food to use.

While France was a contender with its cheese and bread and crepes, nothing could compete with Ireland's potatoes! Caroline chose to make Irish Champ, which really is glorified mashed potatoes -the single most favored food in the house, and Irish Soda Bread. We'd never made it before, but after tasting it realized it tasted much like scones!

Induction Ceremonies

Morgan and many others were inducted tonight into various honor societies. Morgan was inducted into the math, English and Spanish honor societies. There was a lot of parading back and forth and reciting oaths in foreign languages. And then there was dessert!

Still Trying

String?

First came the brackets, wires, and the rubber bands. And now nearly a year later we've added ... string! I'm trying not to think about how gross that bright, white string will look by the time Katherine goes back for her appointment in 6 weeks!

DI 2009 - Regional Tournament

Katherine's team, The Groovy Sprouts, participated in the ViDIo Lit Hits challenge this year. Their performance was supposed to "bring literature alive" as they retold their chosen story in their original Live Music ViDIo.

They received another special award this year, the Renaissance Award, which "recognizes those who demonstrate extraordinary amounts of effort and preparation in their solutions or outstanding skill in engineering, design or performance."

As a result of their hard work, they earned second place and get to go to the DIVA State Final Tournament in April! I'm hoping to be allowed to wash my van before then!

Time Enough for Quilting

I began piecing this quilt top last October when I attended a quilt retreat with my mother. My hope going into that retreat was to quickly finish my first quilt, and then start on this one Friday night and be done with it by Sunday. Knowing that I had very little time to give to quilting during my regular life, I figured I should pick a quilt design that I could finish in a weekend.

The problems began when I realized on Friday night that I would not finish the first quilt. In fact it would be late afternoon Saturday before I could put that one away and pick up the pieces to this one. I did succeed in picking a fairly easy quilt to finish in a weekend. The trouble was I just didn't have much of the weekend left! So, this quilt came home partially finished - as in, not even close to being put together - and stayed that way until today. It seems I just haven't had time for quilting since I came home from last fall's retreat. Since the next one is coming up in just a few weeks I knew I just had to get something done. So here it is.

But where's the first quilt? Well, I left it in PA to be machine quilted (the best invention for people like me who love to piece quilts but don't much care for the quilting part!), and got it back just before Christmas. All it needed was a few stitches here and there, and then to be bound. Well, I misplaced my binding fabric (either that or I never had enough in the first place!) After spending hours looking online for more of my favorite fabric, I chanced the local quilt store where I found 2 half yard pieces of the exact fabric that I needed. That's all I needed and that's all they had! So here it is...still waiting to be bound, but being used just the same:


Reason 40,865 why Gracie's my favorite dog. Doesn't she look like she's just daring me to shoo her off that quilt? That's the back btw - and the reason I picked all the front fabrics!

Oooh...Aaaah!

Only One Fun

Will came in from the snow play after an hour or two. He was done. I wasn't surprised given that he'd been under the weather for the last week. I welcomed him inside and helped him out of all his layers. When I asked about all the fun he had, he replied, "I only had one fun."

I'm not sure which fun he was talking about, but it sure looked like everything the kids were doing out there was fun!















After the kids exhausted the front yard they moved to the bigger and bumpier hill in the backyard.







Will thought it would be fun to throw a snowball at David.

I think David was a bit surprised when he looked down and saw snow on his shirt.







This is Katherine's snowman Timmy. Not five minutes after I took this picture Timmy was carrotless. Doc, our canine neighbor, came over and ate the veggies right off of Timmy.

**Updated 3/3 to add: Katherine went out today and fixed Timmy - he's back to his old self once more! At least until Doc comes by in the morning!