I am so glad to hear that you guys are still alive and not snowed in too much. Isn't the snow amazing. I can't believe youur wonderful sale on Moda fabric. You know that I will be getting some of that action. Hugs and kisses to each of you. Travel safe back home. Karebear

Embellishing FUN

I am trying to complete all of our projects that we started at the quilt retreat. Today I finished embellishing the wool pincushions that we made. These turned out so very cute. The color's in the pictures don't give this pincushion it's due justice. I truly love this little project! Wish I needed more than one just so I can see the colors meld together. Yummy!

Happy Anniversary

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY

TO ME! AND MY HUSBAND

This month my husband and I will celebrate our 27th wedding anniversary. I can't believe it's been that many years. I don't feel old enough to be married for that long. I am sure I was a child bride when I got married. Ha Ha. Anyway, I was able to choose my anniversary gift. Below are pictures of my new Janome!!!!

Am I lucky or what?

I am so excited to start sewing with it. It has a great applique stitch and some different decorative stitches that I haven't had before. Fun, Fun. Isn't my husband great? I made a great choice 27 1/2 years ago. Thanks honey!

Notice the great felted wool pincushions! We made these at our recent quilt retreat. If you would like to make one for yourself, go to Quilt Taffy blog for the website of the creative lady who is selling the kits for these. They are so easy to make. Thanks to Betsy for showing us how to make them.

Quilting Retreat

Once a year I have the opportunity to get away with my darling quilting friends for a 4 day quilt retreat. We rent a huge condo in the mountains and sew, gab, sew, eat and sew.

What a fantastic time. Some years we get alot of projects done and some years we don't. But no one cares, WE HAVE FUN!

This is the view we had every night.

We found this cute little door sign in one of our quilt magazines. The fine print says: unless you are delivering fabric or chocolate. Cute, Cute.

Winter table runner that I designed. I will be giving out instructions in a couple of days.

Fall table runner out of same pattern.

We made oven mitts that really work. We also made aprons with attached wash rag to wipe your hands. Isn't that a clever idea? Thanks to Lela for that wonderful idea.

We also felted wool to make our own pincushions. It was such an interesting process. They all turned out beautiful. I just need to embellish mine now. Thank you Betsy.

We also make cake plates. How creative. Dinner plates and glassware from a second hand store were used. Just a little glue and presto, a lovely cake plate.

Shelto, Stitch, Corrie, Lela, Judy, Johnboy, Karebear, and Betsy on top. Our photographer Des was going crazy taking pictures.

Sister's!

Production Queen

My fabulous longarm quilter

Two new friends

Broken toe girl

70's guru

Blogger extraordinare

Thanks to my sweet friends for an absolutely GREAT time. Looking forward to next year.

Back to the Real World

After spending the last month being very busy with a wedding, daughter's birthday, baptism, son's birthday and a 7 day cruise, it's back to reality time. Each event went well and we had a wonderful time. But, I am ready to be home and spend some time with my family. Today I am posting pictures from the birthday, baptism and wedding. What a wonderful family time! I have the best family!

Baptism day. Aren't I lucky to have such a cute family!

Happy Birthday to You 'Matilda Rose Ruth'. Notice she has more candles than the 8 years old that she is turning. She just loved all the colors so we put them all on.

Sweet oldest brother who let 'Matilda' practice an extreme makeover with her new makeup pack that she received for her birthday.

Just married!

Our growing family. Soon we will have to use an extra wide lens.


Mom, Dad and happy couple.

Bridal party. This was a theme wedding. Flapper girls and men in Zoot suits. Very cute!

Me and my cute little son the groom.

Fall is Coming Soon!

Fall is coming to Idaho! After waking up to cool weather today, I decided that it was time to bring out the lovely knitted wool socks to keep me warm. I was the lucky recipient of a pair of handmade knitted wool socks from one of the games that we had at a recent retreat. What a treasure. I have really creative, giving friends. Thanks Betsy!

We as a family are going to have quite a busy week coming up. At the 1st of the week, we have a birthday and then the end of the week, a wedding. I still have to make a flower girl dress for next week also. Our third son is getting married to his girlfriend of 5 years in the garden of his grandparents, my in-laws. We are praying for good weather!

UPDATE: Food Storage in 52 weeks

Week 8: lg bag of pasta and jar of jam or jelly

Week 9: 6 cans evaporated milk

Week 10: 6 cans of condensed soup

Week 11: 1 lg box laundry detergent

Week 12: 6 cans evaporated milk

Week 13: 2 lg toothpaste and 1 pkg toilet paper

Week 14: 1 lg baking soda and 1 lg pkg yeast

Week 15: 1 lg jar of honey

Remember to multiply each amout by the number of people in your household.

One more quilt finished.

I just finished my next quilt for my daughter's bedroom. She chose the flower material and the purple back. It was a little difficult to figure out what to do with all of the flowers and make it look half way reasonable. My quilter did a fantastic job in putting it all together!
I also belong to a stitching group consisting of ladies from work. Here is my latest stitching project. You embroider the pattern, tea dye it and then you chalk inside figures. The chalk we use is located by all of the scrapbooking supplies. You can add texture and highlights, shadows and anything else that you want to add. It certainly has been fun creating different pictures.

Starting third grade this week. Can't imagine that she is actually old enough to be going to third grade. She is so excited to be going back to school. She was getting extremely bored at home and loves being with everyone again. Tried to get pictures of the boys on their 1st day back to school, they hate their pictures taken and so that was a no go.

China Girls Reunion 2008

My daughter and I just returned from our annual China Girls Reunion. Everyone from our travel group to adopt girls from China get together every year to keep in touch and see how everyone has grown. This year it was held in West Yellowstone. It was really good to get the girls together to play and get reaquainted. It's amazing how they just pick up from where they left off last year and play and socialize. This year, they decided that they all needed email addresses to keep in touch with each other. We all agreed that they could do that under strict conditions. They all agreed and they have now progressed in the cyber world. Attached are some of the pictures that we took of our trip. Enjoy!

latest with a wave

I just completed my latest quilt and I decided to be bold and go out on a limb with this one. I tried the new ruler from June Tailor called the Fancy Frame for Decorative Quilt Borders. I read about this ruler on my favorite Quilt Taffy blog site and decided I would try it. Now note, there is a wavy edge and a scallop edge on this ruler. Remember - baby steps, baby steps. I tried the wavy edge. It was so easy I couldn't believe it! It really put a wonderful edge on the quilt. It is a gentle curve and doesn't stretch hardly at all. It really makes you feel like you have mastered something. I highly recommend this ruler!

I received these quilt blocks in an exchange that our quilt group does every year. Yes, I was pretty scared of the focus fabric that was chosen when I was away visiting my ailing mother back east. It is the border fabric of beach balls. Okay, I have to admit that it turned out pretty cute. Thanks everyone! I also have a wonderful quilter friend who quilted this. She is amazing. If you need a quilter, I can probably hook you up!

I gave this quilt away to a dear friend of mine who was in great need of a hug. She is such a great example to everyone and is helping everyone but herself. Hope it makes her feel loved and appreciated!

Peanut dolls

Recently I won a pattern from Quilt Taffy and I was so excited because I was thinking "Oh, these would make great dolls someday for my someday grandchildren." I decided to practice and make one up for my daughter. It worked up so fast and was so fun to make that I think that I have decided that I am going to make these for my alphabet challenge from Quilt Taffy. This doll made up at least 12 inches tall. You can vary the face and hair, and the clothes. They have ears that you can put on for lambs and monkeys etc. The pattern was made up by Bit of Whimsy Dolls. The patterns are available on etsy.com or they do have a blog by the same name. Check them out. Cute Cute.

I also have another thing that I would like to share with everyone. In our Ward, we have been working on getting prepared with our food storage. They have been writing in the bulletin once a week an item that we can purchase to add to our food storage. In 52 weeks, if we follow along, we should have a pretty good basic food storage. Each item is to be multiplied by the number of people that you have in your family. It has been really easy to follow and it makes getting prepared feel not quite as aminous as some of the other 10 page lists of things I need to purchase. Here is the 1st 8 weeks that we have been given. I will include the upcoming weeks when we get them. Remember to multiply each item by the number of people you have in your family!

Week 1: 10 lbs of all purpose flour

Week 2: 2 pkg. salt and 1 pkg yeast

Week 3: 1 Lg jar of honey

Week 4: 1 Lg bottle of polyunsaturated oil

Week 5: 1 box powdered milk

Week 6: 10 lbs of sugar

Week 7: 1 Lg jar of peanut butter

Week 8: l Lg bag of pasta and jar of jam or jelly.

This should be enough to get us all started. Sewing dolls for needy children and working on food storage, how exciting!

Froggy Fanfare

Thought I would post a little video of some of the cute fabrics I used to cut my little alphabet frogs from. I think that it will turn out fabulous! Would love to see everyone else's alphabet animals also.

Starting of the alphabet challenge

I actually got put on call today for work and decided that I would start on my alphabet challenge. My daughter and I went downstairs and and chose a variety of fabrics and away we went. We even made a list of names that we wanted to name these cute little critters. It really didn't take any time at all to cut out 26 frogs. Some are wild, some are mild and some are just beautiful. Some are purple for my friend (and you know who you are) and I even tried to get one that looked halfway 70's looking for my 'far-out' friend. There's even one that reminds me of my fantastic knitting friend. World traveler friend, I tried to get one that looked European or Mediterranean but I am not very knowledgeable about that so you can choose one that looks right. Thanks Quilt Taffy for encouraging us to give to other's.

New Summer Challenges

I have decided to participate in a new summer challenge that was started by one of my dear friends. What a wonderful idea to make items for other children. We are so blessed in our lives and I would love to use some of those blessings to help other people in my own little way. I think that everyone needs to participate to bring some chear to helpless little children. So to Quilt Taffy blog to learn the rules so that you can participate also. Have fun!

New Project

Since I work the night shift alot, I have been looking for projects that I can take with me to work on while my patients are asleep. They need to be extremely portable and fast and easy to do. While browsing on one of my favorite websites - www.crochetpatterncentral.com, I found this pattern for kitchen dishcloth/scrunchies. They really remind me of my grandma's kitchen. I have really enjoyed the new apron, dishcloth rage that has been going on. It has really reminded me of the cute things that my grandmother had in her kitchen. I remember her baking with her apron on and the cute crocheted dishcloths that she used. She taught me how to crochet by making dishcloths. This has been a fun project and I plan on making quite a few for myself and my friends. Yes Bill's Babes friends, you will be receiving one at our June meeting.

I would encourage everyone to go to this site. It has such a various array of free crochet patterns that have fantastic instructions and have been tested before they put them on the site. Fun, fast and easy. That's my motto for this month.

New Pattern on Etsy Store

I finally finished the pattern for the Wonky Triangle quilt - thanks to Des - and have put it on my Etsy store. Check it out on Karebear Kwilts. This is a pattern for a lap quilt. It is extremely easy to make and you can use any scraps from your stash. We made it into a block exchange at our last quilt retreat. It was fast and fun! Hope you all enjoy my new pattern.

A new member of the family

Announcing another new member of our family. This is Abby. She belongs to my son and daughter in law. Isn't she adorable. She is a white boxer pup with striking blue eyes and an adorable black nose. This is like my first granddaughter. I was able to babysit her over the weekend and she was absolutely a joy. My new puppy Bella and Abby are really good friends. It is really cute because Abby is almost twice the size of Bella already and they just tumble and run around. It will be interesting what is going to happen when Abby is full grown and Bella is still the same 4 pounds. Isn't it nice to see that these two can be good friends despite the differences. We can surely learn something from these two. Have a great week and try to love everyone.

New Member of the Family

We just got a new member of our family. Some people say that I am crazy, but yes we now have three dogs. We have named her Chloe. I wanted to name her Bella after one of the characters in my favorite book, but the majority ruled and her name is Chloe. She flew in from Texas yesterday. She is 9 weeks old and absolutely tiny. She can jump like you wouldn't believe too. She only woke up once last night. Hope that continues. Have a wonderful day everyone!

And The Winner Is!!!

YOUR DREAMS HAVE COME TRUE!!!!!! THE WINNER OF THE SPEEDY AND STYLISH APRON IS: Kara from Idaho. Congratulations! I will be getting in touch with you today via email for shipping instructions.

It was so nice to read about all of the memories that everyone wrote about aprons. As a general rule, they reminded us of happy times and families getting together. How nice. The pattern for this apon will be on my etsy site next week. Remember Karebear Kwits at etsy.

Almost Giveaway Time

Just wanted to let everyone know that I will be giving away the apron tomorrow (Sat the 26th) at noon. Good luck to everyone who posted. It was warming to me to read all of your memories. Have a wonderful day and happy sewing.

My Giveaway This Week

I have decided to join in with the fun and giveaways. My giveaway will be a homemade apron like the one that is listed below. The only requirments that I request for you is to comment on one extreamely happy event that you can remember someone: either yourself, your mother, your sister, your grandmother etc wearinng an apron. Please leave any email address with your comment so that I may get shipping information to the winner.

Speedy and Stylish Apron

After a recent shopping trip with my friends, I was so inspired by this new fabric line, I wanted to make something that I would use all the time and could enjoy the colors. This is what I came up with. Using 4 fat quarters, a small amount of matching stripe for pockets and waistband and cute rick rack, presto: a cute apron.

This apron took me approximately 1 1/2 hours to create. It was fast and easy and fits my tall legs. How fun! I could make alot of these. I think this will be my gift for Christmas that I make for my sisters. Every year, we each make a handmade gift for each other. It is a real personal gift and we all like being creative. Last year, I chrocheted bath puffs and made homemade bath salts and placed it in an old glass bottle that I found at a craft store.

The fun thing about this apron is that it is a 'one size fits all' pattern. It is also reversable. That way, you can change your look every other day. My daughter really wants one and I think that I can downsize the pattern by using only 2 fat quarters instead of 4. She also really wants to learn how to cook. I don't know if it is because she really wants to wear an apron or what, but if it helps her learn how to cook, I am all for that.

The weather is taunting us with the hopes of Spring. I guess if it doesn't come, you can always make your little piece of the world like springtime. Enjoy!