Something About Nothing

When you have a baby you become obsessed with things that you would never have given a second thought about before. You think and worry about everything they do. When your child is active you wonder if they have A.D.D. or are they just a "normal" active child? And when lethargic you wonder if they have a cold, a fever, the flu, cancer? Or are they just tired? You worry about your child's eating and sleeping habits. Is (fill in number here) enough hours of sleep for a child? What is too much? Did they get enough to eat? Are they growing enough or too much? Will they be stunted if they miss a meal? Did they just throw up that bottle because they are allergic to the formula, because they are sick or because I tried to feed them too much? Or perhaps they have stomach and intestinal issues? Ask any mother of an infant about her child's poop and show real concern and you could spend all day on the topic. At least I did when my children were little. Well actually...

Imagine if you will, a round woman with unkempt hair, wearing a loose green t-shirt, black jeans and very cute, well kinda cute, running shoes, which have never been run in, dancing, if you can call marching legs and flailing arms dancing, around her kitchen like a crazy person singing "I did it, I did it, I like it, I did it!" Sorry if that image is too much for you, but that is what I looked like a few minutes ago when I was able to put my new background onto my blog. I'm just a little excited because I was able to follow my clever friend's advice and put together something cute and then get it to load onto the computer properly! It didn't want to load at first and I had to go into the html and change it out, and I am very proud of myself for remembering what I watched Ali do! I feel like a little kid after writing my name for the first time. Thanks Ali!

Notice anything different? Thanks to my clever friend, Ali, I now have a beautiful blog! And also thanks to my clever friend I am learning how to beautify my blog all by myself. I feel so grown up. Keep your eye out and see what I can come up with thanks to my clever friends' tutoring. My design wall is happy again. It has blocks on it to play with and isn't feeling lonely anymore. I decided to do a rail fence design for a baby quilt and didn't like the funky look I was getting at first and so I've finally decided to go with this stripy look. I love the look. I've also been working on my machine quilting skills. They still need lots of work. It's difficult to see from faraway, but I know my mistakes. The quilting hasn't made the difference in the look I was hoping for. I like how I was able to put some trees in the background but I wonder if they are too much in the background. I just feel that something is missing. I seem to have that thought ...

Walls with apologies to Joyce Kilmer I think that I shall never see A wall as sad as this may be A wall who once held beauty there Is now but empty and threadbare A wall whose purpose is sublime And gives me jovial pastime Upon whose surface stuff has lain Been moved about and sewn in chains Design walls can create a treasure and call to me for my own pleasure After months of working on a challenge quilt I have finished sewing it together! Yipee! Now all I need to do is quilt it and that may take a few more months. Once it is completed and the challenge is over I will post a picture, in the meantime it must remain a secret. Shhhh. For now my design wall looks very dull and lonely. I may have to start a new project just to keep it happy.

The Cub's lost, the economy stinks, gas prices stink, and airfares stink! It's enough to throw you into the pit of despair. This past weekend my girls had a very long weekend off from school and I wanted to go see my sistah and get out of town for a bit, so despite all the negatives I went anyway. Because of the lousy airfares I decided to drive and take my chances with the lousy gas prices. I was very fortunate to find great prices all along the way which made me think it was meant to be! I even found a place outside Winnemucca with gas under $3 a gallon! I never thought I could be excited to see gas below $3. It was a great weekend and I put up a slide show of photos from the trip (on the sidebar). We did some of my favorite things to do in San Francisco, like shop at the four story Williams and Sonoma store in Union Square, and eat my favorite pizza (forgot to take a picture of it), and my favorite breakfast from The Grove on Fillmore (see photo above). We also went to a fou...

I have been working for over a month to prepare a 15 minute demo to present at my quilt guild. First I had to come up with something to demonstrate that was easy to make and could be used as a holiday gift. I decided I wanted to do something with shirring because it was a skill I had recently learned. I found shirring quite easy and I wanted to share it with others. (Shirring is when you use an elastic thread in the bobbin of your sewing machine and sew it directly onto the fabric - it's what makes this cute dress cinch in at the waist, neck and sleeves - isn't it cute! It's a pattern from Pink Fig Patterns, and I made up this sample for Whimsy. When I get more clever with this blog I will put a link to her website here.) Finally after an extensive search for ideas on the Internet I decided I had to figure out something on my own. I concluded that I would make bottle covers with shirring at the top. You know the kind of cover one might put over a wine bottle when they t...

Circles are fun. Who hasn't enjoyed a game of ring-around-the-rosy in their life at least once, or maybe played with a hoola-hoop. Circles are also yummy, like the doughnuts that my girls and I made last night. Circles are serious too. Teachers like to use them with red ink to emphasis something you did wrong on a test, or to bring attention to the fact that you received a big fat F on same said test, or maybe an A, or a perfectly acceptable C. Circles are also symbolic. Stonehenge is built in a circle and people have been arguing about what these stones represent for many years. Wedding rings are circular and represent the commitment that a man and woman have made to one another. Often though, especially on Sunday afternoons, circles at our house mean that the sale ads have been scoured by the children. They will spend a few hours perusing the sale ads and circling all they would like to have. They want to make sure that Mom knows exactly what they like and think they should be al...

My other beautiful cat was reading my blog today and decided that there was not enough about her in here. She demanded that I take her picture, add it to the blog and include a little something about her. (I'm a little concerned however, can you see how she seems to be squinting? Maybe I need to get her some reading glasses?) Well I hope this post will satisfy her vanity. Probably not, I should include that she has a beautiful voice which she uses to wake me up every morning so that she can get her treats. She also loves to keep fit by running around the house like a mad woman at very random times, usually at night. You always know she is coming because she has these lovely paws which are HUGE and alert you to her coming. We affectionately call her "Sasquatch." Canning takes forever! Well at least for me it does. However the results are quite delicious and I should remember that before I complain too much. Friday I purchased apples at the farmers market, and th...

I went to the farmer's market in Murray today with my neighbor and her cute doggie . He rides in a stroller and we receive lots of comments about what a cute baby she has. We take him in the stroller so we have something to carry some of the farmer goodness in! Today the poor baby was squished in the stroller with a couple watermelons and some corn. We did give him some of our samples of bread and some of the homemade tamale she bought to make up for the uncomfortableness . He was very content. I bought some fresh corn and was very sad to hear that this is their last weekend at the farmers market. I considered buying more to freeze because the people at the stand were telling me how easy it was to do, but this is a crazy busy weekend and I didn't want to buy it and then have it go bad before I could put it up. This winter, I know I will be sorry I didn't do it because they sell the best corn and it's only $5 for a dozen ears. I bought a couple of seedless watermelons wh...