Sunday, February 26, 2012

My new toy

While I've been sick and whining, and not getting anything done in the sewing department, I have been doing a lot of reading and playing on the computer, the I-Pad and on my new phone.
Some background:  I've had a cell phone for a few years -- the first one I used only for emergencies, never kept it on and paid $20 a month for it at Sprint.  Bill didn't want one.  Then Steve got sick, I saw the need to have a better phone and a better phone package, so I bought a nice LG model, signed up with Verizon because Steve had good luck with them out where they lived (when you live out in the boonies you have to determine these things that aren't issues for people who live in the city!).  I signed up for a full package for texting and data, but cancelled that after a month and just stuck with the cell phone part.  I don't live on my phone.  I did buy an I-pad2 a couple of years ago and I do have a Kindle that I love.  Problem is that I still live in the boonies -- I have satellite internet because I can't even get dsl on the phone lines out here, no cable, etc.  Let me tell you what satellite internet is like -- 5 times the price of dialup, 1/2 the speed of dialup!
So, mostly I don't do much on the I-Pad because the wireless connection is bad!
Fast forward a few years -- the kids all LIVE on their phones -- texting is the new talking, Facebook is king, etc.  I finally succumbed to it and bought myself an IPhone 4S -- with Siri no less.  You can see by the fingerprints that it gets some usage!  I stayed with Verizon, am now back to having a text and data package and oh boy, a hot spot booster.  I can now use my I-Pad and my phone and they work faster than my computer!  And oh boy is Words With Friends addicting on Facebook!  Not only that, but it's been wonderful having something to play with while I'm coughing my brains out and I don't have to expose any one else to it! LOL


Whining is over -- still coughing but at least I can text someone and whine about it now!

Saturday, February 25, 2012

Lent

I'm a fairly private individual when it comes to religion, political views, etc.  I'm a Christian, in fact, I'm Methodist, but I don't wear it as a badge or use a bullhorn to announce it.  My friends and I have religion discussions fairly often and I have friends from many denominations.  It's just not something I'm usually public about.  I was raised in the church I attend.  I left it for many years after my first marriage, and after trying other churches and other denominations over the years, I came back to my church when Steve was diagnosed with the brain tumor.  (We had been back before because Steve was confirmed in this church when he was 13).
Anyway, Bill and I joined this church again in 2008.  We had a female pastor at that time, but in 2009 we got a new pastor.  His name is Christopher Druce-Jones and I have to tell you that he is the most dynamic speaker I've ever heard.  He leads our bible study groups and I hate to miss any of them because we have such great discussions and I have learned so much since he came to our church.  In our regular bible study we are reading "Heaven is For Real" by Todd Burpo.  I read this book a couple of years ago and loved it and now we're reading it together and discussing it chapter by chapter.  We have all walks of life in our bible study groups -- so many stories.  It's really wonderful.

For Lent we have a special Lenten study going.  This year we're reading this book.  Adam Hamilton is a Methodist minister in Kansas -- young, like Pastor Chris -- it so amazes me the knowlege they possess.  Pastor Hamilton started his own church and his congregation numbers in the thousands.  (My church is very, very small -- we might have 60 - 75 people on a Sunday).  This book is accompanied by a dvd --each chapter shows the actual sites that we read about in Jesus' journey of the last 24 hours of his life.  I would recommend the book and the dvd.

Like I said, I hate to miss any of the bible study groups and I had to miss last week's Heaven is for Real and chapter 2 of the 24 Hours because of this lousy cough -- now I only have my thoughts on it and nobody else's insight -- I miss it alot!

Okay - enough whining!

Friday, February 24, 2012

The adventures of me...

When last we left our heroine (that's female hero, not drug), she was being productive in the sewing room.  That was last Friday.  I unearthed these blocks from one of the plastic drawers there were stashed in and put them up on the design wall.  Wonder how long they'll stay there before I either do something with them or take them down and bury them again.  I can't remember if Kris gave me these after buying them on E-bay or at an auction, or if I bought them from her at a garage sale.  Note to self -- do something about this memory (or lack thereof) thing.
Irregardless (don't you hate when people use that non-word?!  I do!).  Regardless of what I do with these blocks, I did manage to pull fabrics and cut out a quilt for Mikey -- who will be 2 in June and I thought it was time to make his baby quilt.  I even started sewing it.
And then it happened....from out of nowhere I was hit with the creeping crud.  "They" all say "its" going around -- but none of them say how to avoid it, or how to get rid of it.  It's the cough that starts in the throat, moves to the chest and takes up residence; the sinuses that fill up and then drain whenever they feel like it; it's the don't bother trying to sleep for at least 2 nights because the cough is not going to allow it; it's the rib-hurting, chest congesting, unproductive cough, cough, cough; it's the get out the Depends because at my age I can't squeeze those muscles and cough at the same time cough! It's probably a good thing I live alone and I have an idea JR would probably plan a trip about now if he could!  The pharmacist said Mucinex -- I should probably buy stock in the company.  I know it just takes time and the congestion will break up, but boy am I tired of coughing.  It's been a week now, and not only is my cough unproductive, but so am I.  Nothing more has been done in the sewing room.  I haven't even opened any of the hand applique -- it's too hard to stitch or do anything else when you're coughing or your ribs hurt!

So that's my post and my whine for the day.  I have a couple of more things to write about -- but I'll leave them for a different post!

Friday, February 17, 2012

A more productive day

I spent most of the day today playing in the quilt studio :-)! I had to do a search and rescue attempt the other day to find a certain applique project I knew I had started. In the process I found a few other projects, of course. So, for most of the day I prepped the next blocks on four applique projects, and sorted and checked two others in progress. So, yeah, I have 6 different applique projects going at once! But that's okay, because they are great take-along items to work on and if I don't feel like working on one, I can always work on a different one!

Then I decided to make a block called Pinwheel Star from the Fons & Porter's Sampler Quilts & Blocks Winter 2011 edition (page 40) magazine.  I really like the block, but I'm going to design it with fewer bias edges -- I want to use this block as a leader/ender project while working on other things, so I don't want to mess with all the bias edges -- I'd rather sew and flip the corners of the flying geese blocks, whereas the design calls for cutting triangles.
I have a couple of other things I want to prep, too and hopefully I'll be able to do that tomorrow -- I'll be digging through scraps for another quilt!

Gratitudes:
AJ is 8 years old today -- he was a 10 week preemie and now he's a second grader taking advanced judo lessons, playing baseball, and doing well in school!  Happy Birthday, AJ! 


Being in my own little world, with the cd player on and listening to some favorite tunes while playing with fabric -- what could be better? (Plenty of things, I know!)

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Boring News Day

How boring you ask?  I'm sure I heard you!
I have no quilts to show you, nothing fun even on Valentine's Day except for a pic of my big toe -- I had toe surgery a couple of hours ago to remove an ingrown toenail! Whoopee on the excitement scale!  Doesn't it just look lovely.  Maybe I'll actually do some quilting this afternoon, or maybe I'll just take a nap!


Gratitudes:
I finally had the surgery done -- it doesn't hurt although it did take more than the usual amount of needle pricks to get it numb -- and that's the part that hurts.
It should be completely healed by the time spring finally arrives.
JR is always happy to see me come home!

Thursday, February 02, 2012

Another Project

I have a stack of unrelated projects always staring me in the face.  You know the ones:  go through the pictures and organize them; clean out that shelf of sewing related stuff and find a place for everything; go through the decorations and toss the stuff that's falling apart and you never use...., etc.

I have a big table in my clutter room (mud room/former sewing room), and I dumped most of the photograph books and boxes on it in hopes I would start cleaning them up.  Been there since November!  Today, I took some of the loose pages of one of the books and started cleaning them up.  These were pics of quilts I made back in the nineties.  This was before I ever got a digital camera and I used to get double prints free every time I had the film developed.  Why I need 48 pics of the same quilt is beyond me!  So, today while I was waiting for my meatloaf to bake, I sorted out the keepers and tossed the rest.  The stack on the left is the one I tossed!  I still have a picture of all the quilts in the stack, but only one or two!  Now if I did that every day for the next 6 months, I might make a dent in the photo department! vbg


I did get my little Valentine quilt quilted yesterday and today I stitched down the binding and the hanging sleeve.


Gratitudes:  My daughter -- she was my sounding board today and she helped me make some decisions I've been wavering on.