Quilting

At a recent JoAnn's sale I picked up two long arm quilting books.

Mindful Meandering by Laura Lee Fritz

and

Quilting Inside The Lines by Pam Clarke

Obviously I had to try out my new techniques.  Fortunately for me I never seem to have a shortage of quilts to practice on thanks to quilting family and friends.

This quilt was done out of Theater t-shirts my sister had kept.  Mom made them into a quilt when she came for a visit this time.  I quilted musical notes, bass and treble clefs in a sheet music pattern all over.  This turned out well, but I really need to study more of Jack's sheet music prior to my next attempt.

This is a ready made quilt panel I purchased of the bolt at Hobby Lobby.  They had several designs in both boy and girl patterns.  I love that they are flannel, chenille, and terry cloth.  So soft!  I quilted a leaf pattern around the border.  For the body of the quilt I used a meandering Banana Leaf pattern that turned out Fabulous!

I am sure you all recognize this quilt top.  Thanks to a friend and die hard OSU fan,  I have quilted about 12 of these this year!  This one is for Mark!  I have had this for about 6 months and now I am finally quilting it!  Only another 6 months and it should be bound!  (Yeah, yeah, the shoemakers kids don't have shoes either.)  This was fun to quilt.    I used a different pattern for every border and and fabric in the quilt.  Lots of practice here.  I didn't change thread color, which I usually do but I am happy with the results.  Most importantly, Mark is too.

I also quilted this solder quilt, which mom graciously offered to assemble for me.  I just did a basic loop meandering.  I was experimenting with polyester batting, which I rarely use and wasn't sure how that was going to work out.  It is a little "puffier" due to the high loft of the batting but I was surprised the polyester worked out well.

Golf in El Paso

It seems that this year is the year for golf in the Hoog house.  The boys took golf lessons over the summer, which lead to Emma's request for her own set of clubs.  Thanks to Grammy Emma's wish was fulfilled this Christmas.   Mark received new clubs for his birthday.  And now it appears everyone is outfitted with a new set of clubs.  Daddy has been bombarded with requests to go golfing for weeks, therefore this past weekend we made a trip to the driving range.  Now, it a city that is built in the desert you wouldn't think golf would be that popular, and you would be correct.  Even so, we were able to find one and indulge our kids requests.  The driving range is far from what one would consider a driving range in the Midwest.  Basically what it consisted of was a trailer for the office, a patch of over-watered muddy grass, and a ground water collection ditch (very high end). As you will see in the pictures, the kids and all of those at the "driving range", set their tees up on the edge of the culvert and proceeded to hit their balls into the cement ditch.  Sound appealing?  The other interesting feature the driving range had was the markers it used for judging distances.  Most driving ranges have flags or posts to mark the distances.  Well according to the wipe-off board in at the trailer the patch of AstroTurf was 150 yards, the red metal snow plow blade was 100 and the broken down truck was 137 yards.  Always an adventure here.

Needless to say the kids had fun, and we were able to escape without anyone getting hit with a club or ball.  An all-around good day.

All Boys

Sunday Jack had a piano recital.  Funny how kids think of things.  Jack says he is not nervous about playing in front of an audience because no one knows what it is supposed to sound like.  However, when he went to the Texas Student Affiliation Concert where he had to play alone in front of a Judge, then he was nervous.  This weekends recital was a Boys only recital.  It was very encouraging for Jack to see the large number of older boys who enjoy the piano as much as he does.  And what talent they had!  Jack played a piece called The Juggler with a few modifications in octaves higher and lower.  He enjoyed the piece and was pleased that Nonna even new the words!  He said, "Nonna said it is a really old song they used to play when she was a kid.  How old is Nonna anyway?"  All went well, for Jack.  Mom, however was not so lucky.  The family was less than pleased when we all got ready and showed up at the Church a day early!  Jack even exclaimed, "Awe man, you mean I brushed my teeth for nothing!"  Next concert I check the date (and Jack's teeth) before we leave.

Jack with Ms. Booth and fellow students.

Creativity Abounds!

This weekend everyone seemed busy doing projects.  I knitted and quilted away while assisting with various projects the kids had going on.  Here are some of our results.

Mark finally finished his market bag.  He started over Christmas break and then would work on it from time to time.  After his part was done it was up to mom to sew up the bottom and knit the handle.  Now we have a spiffy new bag to help save the environment.

Jack, as always, was knee deep in Legos.  While I'll admit he doesn't really appreciate my design advice, I do come in handy when looking for parts he needs.  Here are two of the vehicles he built this past weekend. The Dragster being from a Lego pattern and the Tank a "Jack Original" complete with missile hatch.

Emma decided to paint this weekend.  Here is her picture entitled "Falling Sky"

MIZZOU!

As promised here are pictures of the MSU quilt I made for friends of ours.

Awesome embroidery done by Mary!

Murphy's Law

Our dog Ginger is a woman after my own heart.  She loves SHOES.  Not to wear obviously, but she picks out shoes and hides them.  Sometimes I think she is thinking,"Oh, I love these, now they will never find them."  

Mom, came in last week and is currently set up in our downstairs bedroom. Thursday, Ginger discovered her shoes.  While, I don't mind so much if my shoes are scattered around, and perhaps decorated with a little dog slobber, it is really not something everyone enjoys.  Mom, and I set to work and gathered her shoes to find a NEW hiding place, where hopefully Ginger couldn't find them.  Unfortunately for myself, Ginger is much faster than me.  She was sneaking into the room and taking off with the shoes at a rate much faster than Mom and I could retrieve them, and hide them from her.  On one such attempt at sneaking out of the room with a rather attractive pair of boots, I stuck my leg out to try and block her from exiting.  I rammed my toe into the door jam.  Well, anyone who has stubbed their toe can certainly sympathize.  I hobbled after ginger, retrieved the shoe, helped mom finish hiding the shoes and then we moved on to quilting.  After about 15 minutes I noticed the bottom of my sock was wet.  In mid sentence I stopped, sat down, talking all the while and took off my sock.  BOY-OH-BOY!  It was then when I looked at the toe in question, noticed the wet sock was actually blood not water, that the pain finally set in.  I had blood on my newly knitted socks!   The socks were not actually my only source of pain.  My big toenail was hanging on by a cuticle, really.  My plans for the day were scrapped as I decided where I would go to receive medical treatment.   Just when things are going smoothly....

Now, I have a rather large swollen toe, covered with  an equally large bandage.  The Urgent Care Dr. said it could take 6 months to a year to grow the toenail back or on the other hand, it may not grow back at all.  Lovely.  Comically, now the only shoes I can fit my sore and bandaged toe into is a love pair of Adidas flip-flops.

If there is a possibility of several things going wrong, the one that will cause the most damage will be the one to go wrong.--Murphy's Law

Wanted!

I have a good friend who sent me several skeins of yarn, in Gryffindor colors, to complement my new Harry Potter Knitting book, Charmed Knits.  I had been eyeing the Hermione hat and mittens set and knew instantly that is what I would make with one of the skeins of yarn.  My downfall was that I had no idea how much yarn was left on the skein.  When I finished the first mitten with the end of the skein you can imagine my sorrow.  Here are the lonely hat and lone mitten.  See how sad the look, because they are incomplete without their mate.

Now, I could go out and buy a new skein since there is no dye lot of this brand and color.  But, what is the point of having lots of knitting friends if not to share from each others stash.  I am begging and pleading if anyone has in their stash a yarn from TLC ESSENTIALS by Red Heart in claret that I could have and use to complete my mittens I would forever be grateful. Please let me know by post, email, or owl.  Thanks a million.