Dog Tired

Just so you know, I’m watching the Twins play baseball as I write this.   MY JOE JUST HIT A 3-RUN DOUBLE!!!!!    That’s my boy!  (i wish i had a son like that.  not that my boys aren’t wonderful but still - they don’t earn $23,000,000 a year.  I’ll bet Joe buys his mother lots of good stuff.  Not that I’m materialistic but what’s wrong with a couple more pieces of fabric or a new perennial flower or 2?)  BTW, did you know that “my Joe” Mauer got more votes than any other player in both American & National leagues for the All-Star Game?  More than you wanted to know I’m sure.  I have lots of other useless info running around my brain.  I could be like your “go to” source for advice.  The phone lines are open…………………….

A week or so ago me & hubs were hard at work laying a brick landing at the bottom of our deck stairs.  Naturally it was the hottest day of the summer, like in the 90’s and about 90% humidity.  Let me tell you I wasn’t just “glowing”, I was truly sweating!  When our little Baxter gets all hot & sweaty from running in the fields, he looks like I felt:

He’s ok – thanks for asking.

It was a grand day today.  AND it was baby Woolie Penny’s birthday (#50).  Yes, she’s the last of us to pass the 1/2 century mark.  How’s that Penny?  Half-century?  HA, HA, HA.  In my mind I’m younger than Penny but apparently that isn’t how we keep score.  Well it should be!

We met at JV’s lovely home on the lake and weather was perfect in the 70’s and very small breeze.  Ah.h.h.h.  But before we get  outside, we were greeted at the door by Tiny -------

JV’s hubby brought down that big guy on a hunting trip to Alaska last year.  Wowser.  Glad he had a gun with a great big bullet!

I didn’t take a lot of pictures – I get so distracted – but this little footstool JV made just makes me think of Little Miss Muffet.  Don’t you think?

After a great salad and warm, fresh bread we headed out to the patio for a little show & tell.

Kari, New Leaf Stitches,  showed us a couple things that will be in her book that comes out next summer.  Wish I could show those pictures, but you’ll have to wait for the book!

Jean & a friend whipped this up at the lake last weekend.  I thought the fabric choices were really fun.  In case you don’t recognize her, that’s Jean behind the quilt………..

Jean always has show & tell – apparently she uses her time wisely…..This one just came back from the quilter.  It’s going to a baby in the South Pacific.  Lucky baby, I’d say.

Jean (again!!) inherited some grandmother’s flower garden blocks from her great-grandmother.  157 blocks.  Every single one is pretty and unusual fabrics which were no doubt scraps.  If I know Jean, she’ll have it put together next month!  Naw, not even Jean could do it that fast.

JV showed us a quilt that she’s worked on now & then and has a bit of hand-quilting left to do.  VERY NICE, don’t you agree?

Let the Party Begin ------------

No, no, no, no, we did not drink that beer.  Someone fished it out of a waste receptacle behind a bar in a very dark & scary alley.  The beer bottle was there so that we could play spin the bottle!  Not a kissing game, not a drinking game.  When the bottle pointed at you, you had to read a piece of wisdom for how to know when you’re past your prime.  And just in case Penny didn’t realize it, we made this handy little reminder for her to wear.  (can you say, “how fast did that come off as soon as she got away from us”????)

We also played “button, button, who’s got the button”.  I really think the less I say about that the better.  There was some confusion (unrelated to that empty beer bottle) about rules.  It may have been a matter of untrained actors.  It’s currently under investigation.

The first gift is the gift that keeps on giving.  It’s the gift you receive when you turn 50 and can’t wait for one of your friends to turn 50 so you can unload it on her.  Sweet!  Penny looks thrilled, doesn’t she?  Tee hee, hee.

The rule was that we should each make a small (under 6”) pillow for Penny.  The 1st rule of this group was that there would be no rules, so Jean made a table mat with “pennies”.  Huh.  It really worked out perfectly when we gave her a jar full of penny candy.  We really, really wanted to find some wax lips.  Remember those?  Also wanted bubble gum cigars or candy cigarettes.  Which are probably against the law.  As they should be.

 

The “conformists” of the group tossed all their pillows in an old metal colander.  Penny had to guess who’d made each one.  Nothing like putting a girl on the spot.

I don’t know if it’s because I’ve been working on this and not watching the game closely, but the Twins are behind the White Sox 8-6 in the 8th.  I suppose I’d better go pay attention and try to will that score to change.  We’ll see how that works……………

Do YOU have a plan???

I plan to discuss the Wooly Girls “meeting”.  As I’ve told you before, I use the term “meeting” very, very loosely.  When people get together and talk, it’s a meeting, isn’t it?  Let’s go with that. 

We had a productive Wooly meeting yesterday.  We’re not always productive but we have made a resolution to become more so.  We sewed bindings yesterday for QOV.  Let me give you some background. 

QOV is Quilts of Valor.  It is a national organization committed to presenting our wounded soldiers with a quilt upon their return from war.   One of the 3 organizers of our local chapter is one of the Wooly Girls!  Miss Penny is our hero (as are non-Wooly Girls Ms. Gail and Ms. Paulette).  They meet once a month at the local mall where they have been given space to set up shop and leave their equipment all the time.    Ladies just drop in as they wish and can cut or sew or press or sew bindings – whatever.  But those 3 gals keep everything organized. 

Grab a Kleenex ‘cuz this will touch  you – one of our friends has a son who returned from the war and was given a quilt.  A short time later, our friend asked him where his quilt was.  Well, a soldier buddy of his had also returned and not yet received a quilt so he gave him his quilt “because, Mom, he needed it more than I do.”  This is the part where we all grabbed the Kleenex – we were all bawling like babies.  (He will be receiving another quilt!!!)

Continuing with the story – our local chapter of QOV as well as a neighboring town have been invited to take a bus  in May along with 400 of their finished quilts to Ft. Knox where they will have the opportunity to present some of those quilts to wounded soldiers on an individual basis.  Do you think there will be any dry eyes?  

So now you know the QOV story (condensed version) and now it should make sense to  you why we were sewing bindings yesterday at Wooly Girls.   We were able to finish up 3 quilt bindings.  In order to help the gals reach their goal of 400, we’ll be sewing at my house in 2 weeks for an all-day session.  I can’t wait.

A little show & tell to report – darn little really.  We (some of us anyway) are in a slump.  But Mrs. Farmhouse was working on a couple stitcheries that are just too dang cute!!

And our ever versatile Ms. Jean showed us a really darling sweater vest with a hood that she knit for a niece.  How cute is that?

Ms. Penny put us to shame with a quilt she made just because she wanted to.  Didn’t know we could make & keep!  Or, wait, maybe she’ll be giving it to me for some reason.  No??? 

This morning the trees in our yard looked like this: 

 

Once the sun came out, it was a great day.  We went over 20 degrees F. and you could just feel spring in the air.  I’m not kidding you southern people – it felt balmy.  It’ll be quite a while before spring actually arrives but at least we now have HOPE. 

Just had to throw in a shot of Mr. Baxter helping Mr. Picket Fence blow snow from the driveway.  He’s awfully good help – & I’m awfully glad to get them both  out of the house.

 

Now I’m going to tell you my “plan”.  The Mr. & I will pop over to Florida next Month to watch some spring training baseball games featuring “our” team, the Minnesota Twins.  In a previous blog, I told you about the (non)relationship I have with my favorite player on the Twins roster – Joe Mauer.  Here’s a picture of Joe’s reaction last summer when I waved my hanky and hello’d him.

What do you mean, you can’t see his reaction?  Well, you weren’t there and I saw what I saw.  Maybe it was, I saw what I wanted to see.  In any case, the stadium in Florida only seats 7,500.  Very intimate.  So I’m  hoping to resume my relationship with Joe.  I did mention to Mr. Picket Fence that maybe I have a couple too many years and a couple too many pounds on me to do a good job of attracting Joe’s attention or any of the other ball players.  How am I going to make this work, I asked him?  He solemnly replied, “get him drunk”.  Well, dang.  Why didn’t I   think of that?  Now I have a plan. 

Wish me luck.

Ms. Faye

That’s All Folks

When it’s been so long since I’ve posted, I almost feel like I should apologize for my absence. Of course that’s ridiculous – isn’t it? I write this for me – don’t I? No one says you have to read it – do they? I enjoy putting words to paper – and sometimes my words are funny and sometimes I just “report the news”. Either way, writing a post tends to make me stop & focus on what’s in my life that “might” be interesting to others. That said – I’ve got nothing. THE END.

OK, I’m kidding. I just got back from a visit with my daughter’s family in Denver. Perfect timing on that. It was seriously below zero here while I was gone and it was in the 50’s in Denver & I never wore a coat. I LOVE IT!! Did you know that when it snows in Denver, they only plow the major streets/highways? Residential streets are pretty much forgotten about. Of course they know that the white stuff will disappear in a couple days anyway so they just put up with it. Too bad for you if you have to get to work. Unless of course, you ENJOY shoveling. Not so much myself. You know? This ol’ gal ain’t as young as she used to be.

Moving on. My one & only granddaughter is 7 and is quite a doll if I do say so myself. We decorated a tree in her room. It’s very pink and very pretty. We had to take all the stuffed animals out which was rather traumatic but we over-came that trauma.

Winter wear in Denver…

If you like classic but subtle outdoor Christmas displays, you may as well skip these photos. I’m certainly not saying there’s anything wrong with them, I’m just saying the style is probably not for everyone. But my absolute favorite part of this neighbor’s yard in Denver is the inflatable snowman with a orange hunter’s cap and a rifle. I’m not sure of the statement it makes or what the connection is to Christmas. I just know it was never part of my nativity scene. Ok, enuf said.

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There is a truly beautiful shopping area 5 min. from Kristi’s house called Southlands. It’s built like a little old-fashioned city with gorgeous streetlights and buildings, etc. It has very well known retail stores, restaurants of every kind, a large cinema, carolers at Christmas and an ice skating rink rimmed with the decorated trees. It’s exactly like Rockefeller Center – only different. LOL. It was all decked out for Christmas and I could not get any pictures to live up to the real thing but this is a peek at it anyway:

Speaking of Christmas trees (we were?) – well here’s one for you. DD and I went to the outlet shopping center in Castle Rock. This was their main tree. I can pretty much guarantee that it didn’t grow anywhere near my house!! Again, it was so much prettier in real life. Hey, a photographer I’m not.

This is my garden shot for this week – Well, it is in my bird garden and they love the heated birdbath for a little bit of open water.

We had Woolies today at Mrs. Farmhouse’s. If you read her blog – and I’m sure you do – you know that her house is decorated “to the 9’s”. Whatever that means – I assume it means it was the BEST. AND I forgot to bring my camera. AGAIN. Bad Faye, Bad Faye.

So let me just tell you that we started with a touch of grape juice – or a variation thereof, if you know what I mean and a hot artichoke dip. Seriously good. And the food just went downhill from there – from a diet, let’s lose some weight point of view. Otherwise, it was delish! A little cherry/chocolate cake mid afternoon and just in case, some Christmas cookies, fudge, etc. THEN I had to go home and fix supper for my Mr. I’m telling you – it’s not easy being me. Sigh.

IF I’D HAD MY CAMERA, I could show you the snowman exchange we had. Or I could show you what people brought to show as one of their favorite Christmas ornaments. Or I could show the show & tell stuff. Not that any of that was the least bit interesting or anything. Still, I would have shown you if I could. Just in case you wanted to see. You hear what I’m sayin? (I feel like such a failure…sob)

Just because I know how to insert pictures, I thought I’d add a few of my own decorations. Why don’t you just hum a favorite Christmas Carole while you scroll down…..

My plan is to spend tomorrow in my woodshop. I went wood shopping in Denver and had to bring it home in my suitcase. And let me tell you – it is heavy!

Housecleaning 101

I have discovered that the best way to get myself to sit down and write is to start some serious housecleaning.  Which is some serious un-fun stuff.  So when I work at it for a little while, then I’ve earned the right to work on a blog post.  Ta Dah – here I am.  Floors are vacuumed.  Good enuf for this minute. 

Mrs. Farmhouse told me that it’s easier to write if you don’t wait so long in-between because now I have so much to show/tell that I hardly know where to start.  Since I last wrote, I’ve gone to Loose Threads, then to Woolies and throw in a trip to Minneapolis besides. Lordy, girls, there’s some good stuff happening.

Firstly (is that a word?), just a quick farm report.  It’s been a horrible fall for farming.  The sugarbeet harvest that started Sept. 29th and should have taken about 10 days – is still going!  This is unheard of – it’s been over 7 weeks now and still counting.  Our own sugarbeets are mostly harvested but there are many acres still waiting in our area. The soybeans are still being worked on.  Enuf.  Enuf.  I’m so.o.o.o.o bored with farming, aren’t you?

When the Loose Threads met this month, we were working on continuing our project from last month.  We had each cut out fabric for 12 blocks, then sewed them as a group.  We’d all go home with different blocks than we started with, making for lots of variety.  The scrappy look is good, you know?  Did I mention that the blocks are 4 1/2”?  Just cuter than a bug’s ear.  Which, when I think about it: are bug’s ears cute?  Do bugs even have ears?  If you have the answer, I guess you can let me know.  But in the meantime, here’s what I’m saying about cute:

Carole showed us the baby quilt she’d made with an adorable fabric set in an attic window pattern.

Karen brought a couple things to show.  One, an old top that she & others hand-quilted and two, a quilt she started at our retreat last winter:

   In this group, we are very, very health conscious.  For instance, we arrived at 9:30.  At 10:00, we had coffee and shortbread.  At 12:00 Denise served us a delish chicken casserole a salad and some wonderful bread still warm from the oven. Then a tasty apple bar from Carole to top off our meal.  Denise also served us each a little fat 1/8th bundle as table favors. 

Back to our health – at about 3:00, we decided to stop for a coffee break – along with, yep, you guessed it – PIE!  Jean brought the pie which was a recipe that Ms. Penny served us last month at Woolies!!  (another health-conscious group)

I wish I had a picture, but really, it is so very delicious and actually it is about as low cal as a pie can get:

Miss Penny’s Turtle Pumpkin Pie

• 1/4 C plus 2 Tbsp. caramel ice cream topping, divided
• 1 graham cracker pie crust
• 1/2 C. plus 2 Tbsp. pecan pieces, divided
• 1 C. cold milk
• 2 pkg. (3/4 oz) vanilla instant pudding
• 1 C. canned pumpkin
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp nutmeg
• 1 tub (8 oz) Cool Whip

Pour 1/4 C. caramel topping into crust; sprinkle with 1/2 C. nuts.

Beat milk, pudding, pumpkin and spices with whisk 2 min.  Stir in 1 1/2 C. cool whip.  Pour into pan.

Refrigerate 1 hour.  Top with remaining wool whip, caramel & nuts just before serving.

 

As I said, we are a very health conscious group.  It’s all about the quilting – not about the food.  Ya, uh-huh.

I had a few days rest after the excitement of Threads before making a quick trip to Minneapolis with Karen, aka Mrs. Farmhouse, aka Farmhouse Woolens.  I know, this is confusing, but trust me, if you don’t know Karen, you want to. 

This is where we went first – our favorite woolen store filled with hand-dyed wools and hooked rugs:  L J Fibers at the Wooly Red Rug.

Yes, I know there’s a reflection of me in the window but I was in a hurry to get inside.  I mean, look who got to the door first…………..(Ms. Karen)

Well, not to worry, there’s wool a-plenty for all.  Well, maybe there’s enuf – Denise & Kari were also shopping with us.  Oh dear.  Oh, don’t worry about me – I did just fine.

Farmhouse Woolens was considering adding a “couple” greens to her inventory.  Yes, she made some excellent choices.  How could she not when she had such helpful and knowledgeable assistants?????

This is just one section of delicious things……

And this awesome hooked rug (hooked by LJ herself) is just one of many, many more.  Well, I’m telling you that rug hooking is calling my name.  Denise has already jumped in with both feet and I think she’ll have several more joining her real soon.

We headed over to gift market from there to “help” Karen buy some things for her store that will be opening in February.  Obviously, since we were such good help with the wool, she knew that we would continue to help her with “top notch” advice.  That is what you were thinking, isn’t it Karen?  Whatever.  She was stuck with us and she did very well in spite of it.

SO THEN, on Thursday, we had Woolies.  More good stuff.  Oh yeah, we ate well too.  Let’s see. Arrive at 11:00.  Eat appetizers and iced tea.  12:30, eat lunch of 2 different casseroles, to-die-for bread and other assorted good things.  Topping it off with 2 kinds of bars.  A really rich pecan bar and a pumpkin bar with cream cheese frosting.  Don’t worry tho – we had a little snackey-poo mid-afternoon.  Whew.  Anyway, it’s not about the food!!!!

The show ‘n tell will knock your socks off:

 A sample of a kit Karen will have in her store:

 a Ms. Jean stitchery:

Karen’s quilt:

2 punch needles from Penny’s hands:

A wool bouquet & quilt from Shod:

Wool pumpkin banner quilt– Joyce:

Denise gave us a great rug hooking demo but I must have lost my camera but we all learned a lot from this advanced beginner and we can’t wait to try it ourselves.

A couple things I just finished in my wood shop, a tray and a chalkboard:

 One more thing.  Our hostess, Ms. J, had the most awesome Christmas Cactus I have ever seen.  What do you think?

Holy Samoley, girls, do you think this got a little long?   If you’ve only got a minute, just look at the pictures.  They’re worth a thousand (of my) words!

To all the Americans, if I don’t get back to you before then, have a wonderful Thanksgiving Day on Thursday.  To all my other friends, I wish a great week and the time to reflect on everything in your life you are thankful for.