The Long Winter

Did you ever read the Little House on the Prairie books?  I did.  Several times.  I read them to Sarah, and we even took a summer vacation to DeSmet, SD to see the location where several of the books took place.  I remember being so bored with the book, The Long Winter.  All they did was sit around the cook stove every day, eat the bread they made from Almanzo's wheat, and made straw logs to keep the fire going, all the while waiting for winter to end so that the trains could get through to bring food and fuel.  I was reminded of that after our 16" snow last weekend and seeing this on the Walmart shelves.........

No cheese, milk, butter, eggs, bread, etc..............for almost a week.  I sent the Hubs to the little grocery store in Slater (which was fully stocked, so don't know how Walmart could claim the weather was the reason for the food shortage) to get the groceries I needed.  

Happy New Year!

I can't believe that when I started this post, it was still the New Year!  Now it's halfway through the month.  We finally got a family Christmas photo on Dec. 29th at a wedding reception.  Shanon, the guy I work with at the Martin Center, and Allison were having their reception with a winter woodland theme.  They served chili and had a hot chocolate bar and wonderful decorations.

Here we are in color...........

with real "fake" snow!

Christmas Memories!

Somehow we made it through Christmas without a nice family photo in front of our tree this year!  So, I'll have to share a photo of our Christmas angel with the tree instead.

Oops!  Not so much of an angel is he!

Of course, Jason celebrated his 1 year anniversary with us on Christmas morning.  DD gave him a bubble machine because he had so much fun chasing the soap bubbles the girls did for him at college.  Unfortunately, the noise from the machine scared him.........reminds him of the vacuum.  

Waste Not, Want Not

I recently (finally!) got to visit my sister and family in Iowa and see both boys play basketball.  Jackson starts on the freshmen team and Carter is a junior and starts on varsity.  I was able to get a quick photo with them as they got home from school.

Of course, we are all standing on our tippy toes trying to be taller!  The varsity team won and I got to witness Carter's first varsity DUNK!  

Winter Weather

We experienced our first snow last Friday!  It was beautiful and very wet!

It was a good time to get lots of sewing done and some cleaning up in the sewing room!

I finished this pillow.  I had been working on the embroidery earlier in the fall and then used scraps from the plaid/reds from the Christmas quilt that I recently finished to complete the pillow.  Any finish is always nice even when it's a small one!

I also selected my fabrics for the new Bonnie Hunter Good Fortune mystery.  I am not doing the full size this year, only 1/4 to 1/3 of the blocks.  I also chose not to go scrappy.  I changed her oranges to the honeycomb yellow and then darkened her blues to more of a navy.  

Cici thought the honeycomb yellow was a good match for her!

I spent Saturday at the Open Sew at Sew Sweet Quilt Shop in Brunswick.  I worked on my block of the month and then these little tiny parts to the Secret Santa mystery quilt I started.  Some of these pieces finish at 3/4 of an inch!  I am now caught up on all the clues.  There is only one more Friday clue and then the big reveal/finish on Black Friday! -  Just in time to start the Bonnie Hunter Mystery!

With all the snow, Muffin has decided to work on achieving "house cat" status.
She has found Cici's sleeping basket on my fabric counter.

It's truly exhausting trying to achieve "house cat" status!

Christi

Travels of a T-Shirt

Well, the Greene County Rams finished their football season the last Friday night in October.  They ended the season 8-2, following last year's 1-8 season.  I wore this Greene County Rams t-shirt every Friday from Aug. 24 to the state playoffs on Oct. 26.

I know it's a track shirt, but it's the only Greene County shirt I have and it seemed to have a lot of good juice in it.  It's from my nephew's advancing to state track in 2 events last spring.  This shirt has been to D&T quilt shop sale - TWICE!, been to get a massage - TWICE!, been to get a mammogram, to the Ozark Quilt Show in Springfield, to help hang quilts at the Stitch by Stitch Quilt Show in Arrow Rock, to the Missouri Country Quilt shop to try out quilting machines, to the vet with a very sick Cici, and to a DAR meeting at the Historic Pennytown Church.  

And every Friday night I worked on this quilt...........named Friday Night Lights!  Actually the original pattern name was French Twist.

It was completed entirely while listening to my nephews' football games on the radio.  (well, I did the final pressing on Saturday morning after the last game).  I was a bit lost this past Friday, didn't know what to wear or what to do that evening!  

Quilting Catch Up!

A trip to the big quilt show in Springfield last weekend means there are lots of photos in this blog.............

The Hubs and I left early Friday morning to see the quilt show in Springfield that is held every 2 years.  We were going with the specific intention of looking at quilting machines at all of the vendor booths.  And we did.  We stopped at every single one and I quilted on each and every one.  Since it was a Friday, I was wearing my Greene County Rams t-shirt in support of my nephews' high school football team and had to try my hand at writing in my quilting...............

 We did learn a lot and really narrowed down the choices.  It will be quite a while before a purchase is made, but I gained lots of insight.  

Speaking of Greene County Rams football, my Friday night lights quilt is progressing.  All of the blocks are to this point now, and I will be adding the corner triangles this Friday night and starting to set rows together...............and the Rams are 6-1.  So, it's been a good season.

I also finished the black and red buffalo plaid quilt top.  It is designed to be a throw and will have flannel on the back.  I have the flannel washed and need to piece it together so it can be quilted.

But back to the quilt show........

We did find time to look at the quilts after looking at all the machines.  There was a special Van Gogh exhibit and I took several photos.............

 A Van Goat!

 Go Van Gogh!

And this cat.............

And this cat also wanted to say hi............

Muffin hopes you enjoy the next quilts which feature cats as well.............

And now she's bored with the quilts so does what she does best............

Someone had to partake quite a lot to make this quilt!

This one was amazing............and check out the quilting up close!

This next one needs a little explanation...........This is the quilt when you are looking at it straight on.  You should see a cute child.

Then when you move to the left and look at it from this angle, you see a man.

Then when you move to the right and look at it from that angle, you see a woman.

Three pictures in the same quilt!

And I took this photo for my nephews............just to let them know that football will be over soon and basketball will be starting and Aunt Christi is planning to travel to Iowa to see a game or two!

And I liked this Farm Girl Vintage quilt.  

I even made my own Farm Girl Vintage hot pads this weekend............

On Sunday that same weekend, we went to Rolla to visit Sarah and Paige.  We took them out to eat at the Roadkill Restaurant and then found an antique mall/flea market.  Here are some of the interesting things we found.............

 For someone who didn't think she wanted to spend time at a flea market, DD certainly was engrossed in something in this booth!

And on Monday, Oct. 1, I slipped away from work for an hour to take this cake to the coffee shop where my father-in-law enjoys morning coffee.  He turned 90 that day.  So, the guys got to enjoy delicious lemon cake with their coffee!

And that's what's been going on here.  This coming week promises to be busy as we have quilt guild meeting Tuesday where our CLUE challenges are due, and Kevin the Quilter will be our guest presenter.  Then, our guild quilt show will be Saturday and Sunday during the Arrow Rock Craft Festival.  So look for another post filled with quilt photos soon!

Christi