January black&white swap

"P" received her goodies and was nice enough to take pictures (I forgot).
We swap a 1 yard total of fabric (preferably from our stash) along with a small handmade goodie. Somehow we end up sending more little goodies.... it's awful hard not to!
I quickly realized I had crap for b&w fabric so I crocheted 2 goodies to make up for it. "P" always spoils me on the fabric end.



The scarf is a pattern from Debbie Stoller's Happy Hooker and the pouch is a lined rectangle

so many fabrics...too little time!

My latest acquisition. Don't you love them?
I was emailing with Calamity Kim and we both have the same morbid thoughts....... what if we die before we use all of our fabrics (yarn, supplies, etc.)??? I really fear that I will run out of time! Either that or I will, God forbid, be crippled with arthritis rendering me unable to craft once the kids grow up. I have severe fabric anxiety along with a pretty fierce fabric addiction, I'm a mess.
Let me share some of my favorite smaller fabric retailers. These people know how to treat an addict right! The prices (especially the clearance!) are great, they all ship super fast and you can communicate with a real person if you need to.
Check out :
http://zandsfabrics.com/default.asp they have great sales!
http://www.sewmamasew.com/ I feel like I should buy some oil cloth!
http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=39604 Alison can help you with any of your fabric needs, she's really helpful, go ahead and email her!

Go ahead and buy something, you know you want to:)

"cold" day

No school today! Why? A snow day, you ask? No, there's no school because it's too cold out! It's something like 20 degrees below zero with the wind chill factor. brrrrrrrr. I guess they were afraid that all of the city kids who walk or wait at the bus stop would freeze to death. *shrugs* Whatever, I'll take a "cold" day!
I've been quilting at night this week while catching up on tivo'd recordings of Simply Quilts. Man, are those hard core quilters anal or what?? I know that precision is important but they are militant about quilting! That is exactly why it never interested me before I turned 40. After 40 I became less concerned with the rules and just jumped in and did what I thought would work and you know what? I wish I did it 10 years ago.
Look at these stitches:

They are big, unevenly spaced but I love them. I know I will never win a quilting award and that's ok, the recipients of my quilts have yet to complain. There, I'm glad that's out, now I can quilt as I wish without worrying about the quilting police coming after me.
Science Fair update:

This just in- plants don't like sugar water and cold drafty windows!

dreaded science fair!

I hate the science fair. There, I said it. It really is no fun for anyone involved. It starts right from chosing a topic. Everything we suggest is "totally stupid, ugh!" and everything they want to do has usually already been chosen. It's painful and I hate it. My daughters do very well in science but something about this fair turns their brains to mush. Then there is the whole building it, charting it, references and the making of the science board- I hate it. Never mind the painfully long evening of the actual fair itself, I hate it. Bah, science fair!

On the plus side, we get to work with pretty flowers for Gabby's project and at least she has started it. Sammy is doing some gravity/temperature/bouncing thing that she hasn't given a thought to. I think the bumble will have to take this one.

I managed to sew for an hour today!

Saturday is half gone already and I need to get some more housework done.

Bye for now.

Amy Heather Butler-Bailey Quilt WIP

I had 45 minutes of free time and a choice to make; cook, clean, do laundry or cut fabric for a new quilt.

Did you seriously think it would have gone the other way? I didn't have enough Heather Baily fabric so I mixed in some Amy Butler, hence the title of this post. I think they are getting along nicely! I am itching to get to my sewing machine now, unfortunately it must wait because now my people are starting to mutter about being hungry. Tonight would have been a good night to sew but I am being dragged against my will to a Pampered Chef Dem with promises of wine. I'd much rather drink wine and sew in my pajamas!
South Beach news: The scale did indeed move in the right direction, woohoo!
Kid news: The orthodontist wants $3,900.00 for round 2. This is really cutting in to my fabric therapy money. Cha-ching.

mmmmm donuts

Gabby and Julia had some fun making mini donuts yesterday morning. This was fun and easy and the best part was that we had all the ingredients. Oh yeah and they are edible as long as you aren't dieting!

Post-weekend ramblings

We came home Friday to some terrific news:

I guess I knew she'd be accepted but it really was a relief to see it in writing. We're so proud! Please check out my Ebay auction as I will be selling one of my kidneys to pay tuition.
Speaking of Ebay, I made these cute little criss cross coasters from some Ebay fabric squares:


The easy directions can be found here: http://allsorts.typepad.com/allsorts/2006/11/crisscross_coas.html I think I will make more with nicer fabrics now that I got the hang of it.

OK, it can't be all happy news right? Here we go- I have been doing The South Beach Diet for 5 days and guess what???? I have GAINED two pounds!!! I know, I know.... it's not good to weigh yourself every day. Try explaining that to my OCD when it starts to tic. I don't really have OCD but I have a lot of those characteristics. Anyway, it's very discouraging. My metabolism is non-existent. I even exercised for 4 hours yesterday, yes 4 hours. You try walking around a mall lugging bags with 4 girls for 4 hours and tell me it's not exercise, go ahead I dare you!
*sigh*
The only thing that makes me feel a little better is a good fabric therapy session and just look at this:

12" squares of Heather Bailey's Fresh Cut fabric and some fat quarters from Denise Schmidt's Flea Market Fancy. The very nice Starlit Nest over at flickr owns a yarn and fabric shop (can you even imagine???) and sells on-line at http://starlitnest.etsy.com/
I suppose I'd better start cleaning my house, have a great day!

National jump in a puddle and splash your friend day

I have nothing new and crafty to share today. I do have this cute calendar that I got at work. It's pretty funny. I really thought bad back day was last Monday though......oh well.
http://farm1.static.flickr.com/151/353711938_3118f8f1ba.jpg

A little bit of Sammy news (oldest daughter):
Her basketball team is 7-1! They rock!
Acceptance letters go out this week from Sacred Heart Academy, keep your fingers crossed.

De-lurk

I saw this at Laurie's blog http://oldschoolacres.typepad.com/ and I'm copying her. Say hello if you're reading this!
I can't get that cool thing to work anymore......the one where you hide a link under a word. Something is screwy.
My New Year's Resolution is going strong. I wrote a letter to a school principal because I caught a basketball player going out of her way to be nice. She unintentionally knocked one of our girls down and sent her flying on her butt across the court and went back to offer a hand to help her back up. It sounds like a case of plain old good manners but it was a really close game and quite intense, you had to be there. Our team ended up winning but I swear I would have wrote the letter regardless.
Time to make school lunches, have a great day.

Way to go Marc!

http://cosmos.bcst.yahoo.com/scp_v3/viewer/index.php?pid=16598&rn=49750&cl=1623114&ch=61492&src=news

Check out cousin Marc on ABC World News. He served as an Army Ranger over in Iraq and is now some sort of consultant for the Army. It's so strange to see him on the news because to me he's just a regular guy at our family dinner table. Anyway, we're all proud of him!

Back to the world of crafts now.....a world that is a lot less complicated than trying to learn Arabic.

I finished Jacob's birthday robot

Spaceboy is next.

While I was sewing I saw a squad car stopped in front of the house. The car sat there for a few minutes and when it was driving away I noticed that it was the same car number as the one I witnessed doing a good deed (see previous post). Now I'm nervous. Do you think maybe I got her in trouble? Maybe they aren't supposed to stop traffic to help the people cross the street? Am I paranoid? OK, I already know I'm paranoid but am I in this situation?

resuming normal-ish life

whatever my normal is!
All traces of Christmas are almost back in the attic, almost everyone is healthy, house guests are gone and life feels more normal again.
I bought some new bedding with Christmas money. It's summery but I can't wait that long. Besides- it was 70 degrees in Connecticut yesterday. I wonder if we'll ever have winter.

I even started Jacob's birthday present last night, he'll be 4 in March, I'm good!

I'm making him spaceboy and robot from weewonderfuls. I have the robot all stitched and stuffed but I'm not loving the fabric choices that Julia insisted on. I think I'll give her this one.
New Year's Resolution update:
I wrote my first good news letter last week. It was to our police chief to commend a female officer who stopped 2 lanes of traffic to help a man in a wheelchair cross the street. It was a tough spot and he was having trouble, she got out of the car and helped him up on the curb, turned him in the right direction and waved him goodbye. It was really very touching and he was so appreciative.

Rabbit Rabbit!

Happy New Year!

I hope you remembered to say rabbit for good luck this morning. I'm not big on resolutions, why set myself up to fail? I do keep one resolution every year. I make sure that other people's kindness gets noticed. Be it a store clerk, medical staff or someone's child..... if they go out of their way to be nice, I make sure I tell their boss, teacher or mom. It's nice to hear good news from a stranger I think. Don't get me wrong......I bitch about people that go out of their way to make me miserable too! There's got to be balance, people!
Well, I'm feeling better now; not great but I can function. On top of being sick, I have been in a terrible sleep pattern lately, I am waking up anywhere between 3:30-4:30 am ............ FOR THE DAY!! Enough of that.
I have been spending a little time with my sewing machine. I had planned on finishing my delusional housewife quilt but haven't felt good enough to go out and buy batting.
I went through my to-do basket on my sewing table last night. I leave you with these embroidered towels that were sitting there for a year waiting to be hemmed. (slacker)

Oh yes, Julia would like to show her project for 2nd grade:

The class does a big Gingerbread Man event including a play and a village of houses made from juice cartons. Pretty cute and I love this old copy of the book!