long arm, ombre cookies, working on long arm again!, new charity quilt blocks

I forgot to tell you about a call we got yesterday….I picked up the phone and a woman asked ‘is this the home of Michael Devokaitis from New Britain CT’?  and when I said yes, she said ‘well this is the home of Jim Mozdzierz from New Britain High School art club…is Michael at home?’ (As an aside, you have to know that NEITHER of these names would EVER be found in the south…..WAY too ethnic J).  Anyway, turns out that this guy was good friends with Michael in high school and he lives in Pineville North Carolina (about 20 minutes away!!)  He had been thinking about contacting Michael and his wife did a GOOGLE search and found him, but he didn’t believe that it was the same Michael…living so close by.  The upshot is…they’re coming for dinner next Friday….stay tuned!

 Michael left for golf here at SCCL around 8 AM on Saturday (5/10) and I putzed around with  a bunch of chores in the morning, and finally got sewing around 11 AM.  He was home by 2:30 with an 85 that he seemed pleased about, and spent the rest of the afternoon working on the sewing machine and watching golf.  Joanne visited with her once of her house guests, who showed me her beautiful quilt.  She is quilting it in 4 different sections and then will sew it together with binding.  I managed to get them downstairs…and my assumption was correct….Joanne has NOT been reading the blog while she has had company, and so was shocked and excited when she saw the long arm.  By the time Michael stopped working on it, he had attached the handles and touch screen for regular sewing, and all of the sensors for front and back movement and sensors for left to right movement when using the computer. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Neither one of us really felt like having dinner, so he made a giant bowl of popcorn and we munched on that while watching TV.

 

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Sunday morning (5/11) I hopped on my stationary bike while Michael took the dog for a walk.  Then I whipped up some pecan studded pancakes which we ate while reading the paper.  While Michael cleaned up the kitchen from breakfast, I finally fulfilled a 2 year long dream…..I made royal icing and iced cookies that I baked earlier in the week, and decorated them:

furst you have to pipe thicker icing around the area

then you flood it with slightly thinner icing

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

for the shower I will just use the wedding colors of pink and green

This is really the simplest thing to do….but didn’t my ombre cookies turn out well?  Even though I was not totally round/smooth with my outside piping…I love them!  We took plates over to Ann Mary and Sue so that Sue could decide if she wants me to make them (in the wedding colors) for her daughter’s shower this coming Saturday.  Michael spent much of the afternoon flat on his back

with his faithful companion sometimes at his side....

and sometimes sitting daintily (with her legs crossed at
the ankles like a true lady) watching...

 

taking out and putting back in and taking out and putting back in 16 screws which hold the tracks down for the long arm to roll on…we kept hitting a bump as we added more weight to the sewing machine (like handles) and he was finagling the tracks so that they were perfectly smooth.  The problem is, the screw holes are not lining up and it is getting VERY frustrating.  We finally gave up for the day at dinnertime, and Jan and I went out for an hour and put out flyers in all of our neighborhood and 1/2 of the neighborhood behind us.  I was back to sewing after dinner and finished up the 35 blocks (made up of 560 -  3 inch squares) for a new charity quilt:

 

After Michael lays it out I will sew it all together.