Middle Names

Let me begin by saying that this post should come with a warning.  Danger!  Proceed at your own risk!  This ol’ gal has nothing much to say and you just might be sleeping before you get to the end!  If it’s nap time anyway, I guess you’ll be ok.  I just don’t want you reading this at work and then blame me when your boss fires you ‘cuz she’s caught you napping!  Just trying to cover my _ _ _, ah bases.

Seriously boys & girls, it has been a quiet month for me.  I had surgery on my leg (#3.  O, God, surgery #3, not LEG #3!!!!  H.e.l.l.o) so that took up a good bit of time.  I’m doing very well even tho I still need a little support from my good friend Mr. cane.  Thanks so much to everyone that wished me well.  I really appreciated it.  If you didn’t wish me well, you had the manners not to tell me, so thanks for that too…..tee hee.

If it was early December, I’d probably think this was just great……….

Apparently, Mother Nature didn’t get the memo that we’re tired of snow.  Consequently, she did that to us over the course of a couple days.  I know there are lots of snow storms across the country right now so there are a lot of us in the same boat.  But it’s time to row that boat ashore!!  Just a couple shots here

 

Front Door

           

Back Patio Door

The round circle in the bird bath is from the heater that keeps open water for our fine feathered friends.

 

Snow is close to the top of the fence…….an easy jump for Mr. Squirrel……but a bad plan if Baxter is outside.

Evergreens are so pretty with snow on them…….

I started a quilt for son #2 a couple years ago, somehow got distracted – hard to believe! – and stuck it in a basket.  Hey, at least it was all in one place even if it wasn’t getting worked on.  I felt that the fabrics had aged perfectly by now so I dug it out & started working on it again.  There are 3 basic elements in the block and since it’s scrappy, I dumped each type in a pile to be assembled at random.  Unless of course I didn’t like the randomness.  Here are the piles:

All those seams are going to make things bulky, so I’m pressing all seams open.  A very time consuming activity.

Here are 5 elements put together which makes up 1/4 of the block.

Here are 9 blocks.  Only a gazillion more to make.

What else have I been up to?  A little stitchery that I’ve almost finished:

I little wool-work that seems to have a ways to go: 

My mother-in-law just celebrated her 90th birthday with family & friends over the weekend. She’d absolutely kill me (& I’m not kidding) if I showed you her picture.  Here’s a table:

 I decided at the last minute to make a “memories” book for her that she could look back on after the fun day was over. 

I used a small photo album book, had everyone write down a memory they shared with Helen.  I put each of those on a decorative 4x6 photo to put in the book.  For example: 

I still have a few more that were turned in later that I will add to the book.  (unless I get distracted!!)

Just for the heck of it, I should tell you about our doggy, Baxter.  To be precise, his name is really Baxter Maynard (insert our last name here).  Does your dog have a middle name?  And just like with our kids, we basically only use his middle name when he’s naughty.  Which really is so seldom as he’s almost perfect you know.  Just a couple little issues maybe.  Anyway, I suppose you might wonder, “why Maynard”?  There’s a perfectly logical reason and my SIL in particular will understand this.  When I was just a  young pup myself (that’s just an expression.  And I certainly hope no one has ever called me a dog.  If you hear what I’m saying..), we went to a small country church.  You know the kind in the Norman Rockwell paintings?  It was exactly like that only most of the people were like the spin cycle on a washing machine – a little unbalanced.  Where was I?  Oh, yes, Maynard.  Maynard was an older gentleman – & I use the term gentleman VERY loosely – who was married to his long-suffering wife Anne.  They had been married about a 100 years or so and hadn’t had children so I’m assuming that over the years they may have had a touch too much quality time.  You know?  Well, Maynard was a fun-loving sort of guy and Anne was as straight-laced as a shoestring and when Maynard would do something questionable, Anne would say “now, Maynard, you don’t want to do that, do you?”  Well, obviously, he did want to but it tended to suck the fun out of the current entertainment when she said that.  But it sure didn’t stop all of us young pups from loving Maynard.

So, like I said, we really love Baxter cuz he’s a ton of fun but sometimes you just gotta say, “now Baxter Maynard, you don’t want to do that, do you”?  Which is what I said (or would have said if I hadn’t been cursing) when he chewed this: 

Miss Faye