tea flowers, tea food, tea guests, final tumbling blocks

Michael and I hopped up early on Friday (5/30) to get ready for the big ‘unveiling tea’ scheduled to start at NOON.  He ran to the store for a few things, then picked what flowers we had left (after a torrential downpour last night!) 

2 kinds of roses, and one lone dahlia

our gladiolas out the back REALLY took
a beating!

We put a big blanket over the tumbling blocks wall hanging and I got 2 kinds of cookies made, some Arnold Palmer iced tea and another run of Devo Delights before the ladies started showing up at NOON.  We had lots of wonderful food,

the dessert bar is ALWAYS fabulous!

lots of happy guests,

Lynne B

Joanne & Jeanne

Gale & Deanna

Barbara, Mary, Beth, Carolyn

Sally (front), Sue & Ann Mary (back), Ginny & Karen (sofa

Ginny, Karen, Gale (standing)

Leslie, Nancy, Donna

and finally, about 45 minutes after everyone arrived…the unveiling. 

trimming the batting last Friday

starting to attach the quilt to the frame

ta - da!

I have to admit, it was really thrilling to hear the ooo’s and aah’s of everyone, and several people also said the more they looked at it, the more they saw, which is music to any quilter’s ear.  For all of the quilters at the tea, there was a second unveiling of the long arm downstairs.  It was a wonderful tea and I had a great time…and after a relatively painless cleanup, I flopped on my chair and read for a couple of hours.  I had made a plate of several of the desserts from the tea, and at 4:45 Michael and I and Bryce and Joe and Dee & Howard headed off to visit Anne at rehab.  She had a hip replacement last week (with an unfortunate fall on her injured hip her first day in rehab) but she seemed in wonderful spirits, and very appreciative of the goodies we brought.  We visited for about 1/2 an hour, then headed to Rippington’s in Waxhaw for our neighbor’s dinner.  There were 14 of us, and the food was wonderful.  We headed back to Ginny & Ken’s afterwards for dessert…and I was very glad I could resist both the cherry cream pie and the German chocolate cake!  We were home after 9 and Michael watched TV and I read for just a bit before bed.

I don’t know where Thursday (5/29) went!  First off, I went to bed at mid-night Wednesday night and woke up at 3 AM and couldn’t get back to sleep!  I wrote a long blog entry, used my extra Kohl’s bucks to order new tennis shoes, and got fabric for 9 pillow cases ironed and cut out.  By then Michael was up and I got showered and dressed, made a smoothie and loaded the car and took off for quilting.  Everyone was working on pillow cases or carpenter’s aprons (those were for Vacation Bible School).  I left early (around 11:30) and stopped to schedule Physical Therapy for next week, and also at the library to pick up a book and a movie.  Then it was home in time to pick up Ann Mary, Sally and Gale and head off to Cruisin’ Rueben’s for lunch.  We had a terrific lunch and sat there and talked for quite a bit afterwards.  When I got home, I just collapsed and when I got up I ran a few errands and by then it was 5:30!  I got a bit of energy back after dinner and got my strips cut and sewn together for my 5^th tumbling block.  By then it was 8 and Michael and I went upstairs and watched TV and I knit on the newest baby sweater.

Cookie, BG & Loree with new tumbling blocks, Michael's anniv card to me, champagne

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY TO US!!!  Yes, Wednesday (5/28) was our anniversary (or at least it started to be at 4:30PM)….but you have to slog through a bunch of other stories before we get to that one. 

First off….when your tummy feels bummy (she’s had diarrhea for 1-12/ days, there’s no place better to snuggle than on dad’s jacket:

 

And of course, we have to have the daily tumbling blocks update:

 

Bg's #4

Loree's # 5

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I had an early morning appointment in Ballentyne Wednesday....a friend had one last week and it took him an HOUR to get to Ballentyne.....it’s only 9 miles away, but there is mucho traffic in the mornings due to a local bridge being closed.  So I left at 5 til 8 for a 9 AM appt....and I get to Ballentyne at 8:15!!!!  No traffic at all….sailed right through.  Now, I used to stop at Wendy’s on Thursday’s to get a 99 cent egg/sausage burrito to take to quilting for breakfast.  Well, Wendy’s stopped serving breakfast and I tried Bojangles once….it was too greasy, too expensive…too something…so I didn’t go there again.  Then I remembered how a friend told me about this great breakfast sandwich at our Indian Land Harris Teeter (a local grocery store)so…I go into the teeter in Ballentyne to get one.....AND THEY DON"T MAKE THEM!!!!!  Instead...this is one of the Taj Teeters (as in Taj Mahal) and they have a hot breakfast bar....which was kind of bummy 'cause I was looking forward to the sandwich....but the good news is that I had the BEST bacon I think I've ever had in my life!!!!   It was yummy...along with eggs w/ cheese and a biscuit with sausage gravy that I got.  I wandered on over to the cheese kiosk afterwards, but guess it was too early for June (fellow quilter) to be at work.  I finally made it to the doctor’s appointment with 15 minutes to spare.  I went for my shoulder, which has been not perfect for at least 3 years, but since it wasn’t really impacting my life on a daily basis, I ignored it.  About 2 months ago it really started to go downhill to the point where it hurts 24/7, and is drastically impacting my ability to get a good night’s sleep (due to the pain).  The good news is, the doctor thinks with a cortisone shot, some anti-inflammatories and some physical therapy, it will be good.  If it is still hurting in 4 – 6 weeks, I am supposed to call him, otherwise I’m good.  I got home and started to iron fabric and get it cut out for our charity pillow case day at quilting on Thursday.  Around 3 PM I call Jan to see if she wants to ride along to CVS to pick up my prescription.  As I am dashing through the store, I see an employee stocking cards and I remember that I signed into the doctor’s office with a 5/28/2014 date and I stop short and say ‘OH CR-P…today is my anniversary!!!”  Last week I KNEW that today was the day….but that was the last time I thought about it…I bought a card, filled it out and sealed it and headed on home after dropping off Jan.  Michael was in the living room when I came through the kitchen and I saw the mail which he had opened containing an anniversary card from friends of ours.  He totally forgot himself and as he was reading the card, he said ‘oh…cr-p…what is today…is it the 26^th?  is it the 28^th (‘cause he never remembers the actual date).  We laughed and laughed about this and decided it was just one more example of why we are perfect for one another.  When I went downstairs, I saw the greeting card he improvised for me. 

In case they are too small to read, the 'happy' was on my main sewing machine,
and 'anniversary' was spelled out all across the long arm

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I changed our dinner from pierogi’s to champagne

and shrimp scampi (thanks to some garlic I grabbed at Paula's).  Dinner was great, and I ran up to the teeter right after to snag a 5 layer piece of chocolate cake that we split with some ice cream.  Nine perfect years of wedded bliss, preceeded by 2 perfect years of unwedded bliss!  We’ve both decided that we will actually mark our calendars for next year's anniversary and we’ll actually do something for the big 10….at least dinner out!  We snuggled on the couch and watched TV for the rest of our wonderful anniversary.

Nancy H, tumbling blocks #4 for me and Loree

Tuesday (5/27) started out so promisingly, and that promise ended very quickly L.  Michael left for golf at Edgewater, and came home around 3 PM with an 80 (including one birdie)…he was thrilled.  I got chicken/barley soup in the crockpot (for my neighbor whose wife is in rehab…and it was fabulous to be able to put in parsley, rosemary and thyme from my own garden J), had a quick consult on our driveway (which is sinking) with the builder, then headed up to Nancy H’s house to pick her up.  Their car is in the shop for several days for unknown issues, and Nancy was coming to start me off quilting.  We got the top all lined up, attached the clamps to pull it tight, and I turned it on and said ‘ok…I’m ready to start’.  It was at that point that Nancy gently said ‘don’t you think you want to thread it first?  So, we had to call the store to walk us through the threading because it wasn’t really intuitive at all…and I had missed putting in one of the thread spools. 

my 'teach'...scoping out the threading

OK….we got done with that and I tried to get started.  Now there are buttons on the handles, one on the left, one on the right.  First, you should hit the left hand handle button to get the needle to go up and down (you have to pull up your bobbin thread)…no dice!  Needle doesn’t move, and no beep when I hit it….I eventually hit the right hand button (which starts and stops the stitching) and that worked (for just a bit...it eventually stopped and the screen was locked up)….but we didn’t have the bobbin thread pulled to the top, so the tension was all screwed up.  We tried a few things and nothing worked.  In the meantime, Jan had stopped by to see the excitement….of which there was none  L.  I finally turned it off and Nancy and I just sat and talked until it was time to take her home.  I skipped Stitch & Chat (and that was bummy because I not only had show and tell, but I had stuff to give out to 3 people) because the furnace/air conditioning guy was supposed to come between 2 and 4 (he finally showed up at 4:30  L) and I watched a video on the operation of the long arm machine.  I called the store around 4:30 and Barry (store owner) said he would stop by on the way home.  Good thing he brought the handles from the machine in the store….because I had a bad cable in my handles….so maybe the great quilting beginning will take place on Wednesday.  By then it was 6 PM and I got the soup all packed up for Bryce (as well as some leftover rolls), and Jan came over to get 2 quarts for her dinner as well.  Michael left at 6:30 to pick up Larry to go and see the new XMEN movie and I spent the evening working on my 4^th tumbling block:

I really love how lame looks....but it truly is a pain in the behind to work with!

I’ll tell you…BG and Loree are whipping these things out like there’s no tomorrow…I should ALWAYS do a sew-along on my projects…peer pressure really keeps you hopping!  I was finished with the block by 9:30 PM and went upstairs to knit on my baby sweater until Michael got home around 10:30.  Loree's #4 block is also finished:

Loree's #4 block

BG finished her, but didn't get it ironed, so hopefully I'll post a picture tomorrow.  It takes her a little longer sometimes because, after all, she IS still working a full time job!  There's only one more color to go for all of us...we each will have 5 colors in our quilts.

BG & Loree's number 3 tumbling blocks

Let’s start off with some other tumbling blocks:

Bg's number 3 blocks

Loree's number 3 blocks

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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One of Michael’s golfing buddies invited him to play together this week.  The guy’s 2 sons are in visiting, so Michael took off for Stonebridge early Sunday (5/25) morning.  He managed to eke out an 85, even with 2 - 7’s.  I read for a good bit of the morning and finally got showered and dressed and picked up Jan at 1 PM for the wake of a friend.  Anne was someone from Thursday quilting…and her hand stitches exist in the binding of the wedding quilt I made for Marc & Kate.  She was a fabulous quilter….did a lot of hand work and hand appliqué, and was an all around nice person as well.  She will be a great loss to the Thursday quilters.  After I got home, Michael came home and Phil came over with his bag of tools to loosen a nut that we were stripping because it was on so tight.  Just after he left, I turned on the machine and Voila….it had corrected itself and looked good!!!!  I finished pinning my backing to my leaders and started to work on sewing my odd pieces of batting together.  Have I talked about my ‘training program’ for the long arm?  If I already did…you can skip the next part.  My friend Donna gave me 2 lengths of upholstery fabric (probably each 3 yards long) and I am going to quilt those lengths together with batting in between…then cut it up into dog beds and serge the edges (our local shelter uses them so that the animals don’t have to lie directly on the cement floors).  Then I have 9 charity quilt tops to do (some backed with polar fleece) then finally 4 single bed sized quilts…2 for the front bedroom, and 2 that I recently completed to hang over the new chairs in the living room.  By then I hope to feel confident in my abilities and may do some quilts for others.  BG is already bringing me 3 quilts when she comes down in July J.  Michael got the movie POMPEII from Red Box as he thought we would both enjoy it.  I was interested in Pompeii, but before the volcano erupted, the movie was so violent and bloody that I didn’t watch much of it and even left the room a couple of times.  But during the rest of the scenes…I did get a new baby sweater cast on and started.

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MEMORIAL DAY!!  The weather was bright and sunny and Paula asked a bunch of neighbors/friends to her driveway for a party to watch the golf cart parade.  I made some white chocolate/raspberry scones and mixed up a new batch of Devo Delights and we headed down around 9:20.  There were a lot of people there and I had a great time.  Michael left around 10:30 to run errands, but I stayed and talked and didn’t get home until just after NOON.  I got the chicken off of the back porch (leftover rotisserie chicken from Anne/Bryce) and got the stock chilled and the carcass picked.  I will make a crockpot of chicken soup for Bryce on Tuesday (Anne is in rehab for the next 1 – 2 weeks after having a hip replacement).  By then Michael was home and we talked for a long time and I finally got down to the studio around 3 to get some work done.  I got a bunch of leftover batting sewn together, and started to cut my strips for tumbling blocks #4.

tumbling block#3, long arm leaders, woven scarves

Saturday morning (5/24) Michael left for golf here at SCCL.  When he came home, it was with an 85 which included 9-1 putts and a chip in!  I rode my bike to the bank and the library before settling in to sew.  I sewed all day and managed to finish my 3^rd tumbling block:

 

 

as well as the leaders for my quilting machine (that's the green patterned fabric you see):

 

I decided I had been procrastinating just a bit with my long arm, because I was afraid of it.  I got the leaders done and attached, as well as attaching all of the other poles, and collecting all of the leftover supplies and all training materials into one place…and fired that puppy up!!  To say that I was disappointed when my display screen didn’t function (which is what you need to make the thing start and stop sewing), would be a GROSS understatement of how I felt  L.  By then it was 5:55 PM and no one was answering at the store.  And of course, they are closed on Sunday and Monday.  The 2 days I thought I would have to quilt just went up in smoke.  Of course as always, food came to the rescue and I was totally cheered up by the cold meatloaf sandwich I had for dinner (heaven!!!)  I spent the rest of the evening watching TV with my honey and un-knotting the fringe on my recently woven and blocked scarves:

 

 

 

 

 

 

tumbling blocks #2 for the three amigos, Larry & Peggy

I finished my library book Friday morning (5/23)…it takes a long time to get through a book reading it only 20 minutes a day on my stationary bike (I have another, very light read upstairs to fill in)…it was THE LAST LETTER FROM YOUR LOvER by Jojo Moyes…the same author who wrote ME BEFORE YOU (which you HAVE to READ!!!!  Get it from your local library…don’t read the blurb ahead of time…don’t listen to anyone talk about it…just read it…it was FABULOUS!)  The ‘last letter’ was a wonderful read….she puts in these perfectly reasonable twists that you never see coming.  While I was biking, Michael was upstairs making potatoes and carrot mash for our dinner.  Peggy & Larry (the man who built the frame for my tumbling blocks) are coming for dinner and Michael wants to go to a golfing tournament all day.  So he made the P&C in the morning and we popped it into a crockpot for later reheating.  He left for the tournament around 9:30 and I headed downstairs to sew.  I decided I don’t have to start cleaning and making the rest of dinner ‘til around 2 PM…so I had fun in the morning J….have I said lately that I LOVE being retired?  Here’s what I have to show for my sewing:

my second block

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Loree's second block

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

BG's second block

 At 2 I went upstairs to start cleaning and after that it was time to make the meatloaf, salad, asparagus and rolls for dinner (and make sure the P&C mash was hot).  Larry & Peggy:

 

came at 6 PM and Peggy loved the wall hanging.  We had a wonderful long discussion about all sorts of things during dinner and playing SCREWED afterwards, and they left about 9 PM.  Michael watched TV until 10 and headed for bed…I stayed up reading until 11, then headed there myself.  Michael got me up at 2:30 AM for what was supposed to be a great meteor shower.  This was coming from around the north star, so we lay on our lounge chairs on the deck for 1/2 an hour…and only saw 2 meteors.  The peak was supposed to be at 3 AM…but the clouds were moving in and obscuring anything we might see, so we headed back to bed.