Counting down...

When the kids were little, we always took pictures of the boss pretending to hang them on the tree. We decorated the tree on Saturday and according to tradition...Andrew tried to hang his girlfriend Liz on the tree! She was a good sport and let him... Saturday evening the boss's sisters came for a visit. Rhonda (on the sofa) is here from Arizona and we hadn't seen her for quite awhile. It was good to catch up!

She brought her son, Noah, along with her...it was only the second time I'd met the little guy. He's a cutie! We corrupted him though...this was the first time he ever played with a Gameboy!

He loved it so much, he took it with him to keep himself entertained on the flight home! Of course he warmed up to Grace quickly, which led to tickle fights....

In the midst of the preparations for Christmas, I haven't made it into my sewing room, but I did cast on a feather and fan scarf for Ellen, in her favorite...hot pink!

The pattern can be found here. It's very simple and is working up quickly...I hope to have it finished before Ellen returns to school on January 2nd. I've had all the kids home for a few days and the boss is done travelling for the year. It's been strange to have so many people in the house...and to have to cook! I'm loving it...

I hope you're spending your holidays with those you love!

Coming Up for Air

Here's a gratuitous dog playing with his pepper picture so you don't remember that I haven't been here for over a week...
I've finally finished the last customer quilts of the year...

A shot of the back....

And I've attended the staff Christmas party for work. Now, here's a dilemma...when you're asked to bring a dessert to the work meeting, and you work for Weight Watchers, what do you bring? I settled on these little Snickers pies from the Hungry Girl website, which were quite easy to make. Take a regular size Snickers bar and cut it into 10 pieces. Put each one in a phyllo cup...

Bake for 10 minutes at 350 degrees...

Let cool and serve. They were pretty good...and only 1 point each!

The Christmas tree is up (but not decorated), the cards are mailed, the gifts are wrapped...so now I get some time to play in my sewing room. If I don't come back in a few days, send chocolate!

December Ramblings...

I'm finding it hard to believe that it's December already! I've hardly started getting ready for Christmas yet, the decorations are still in the attic, although a few presents are bought. I picked up Christmas cards over the weekend, but the task of writing them out seems daunting!



The Thanksgiving holiday around here was fun. After the high school football game in the morning, I met my son and the boss at Ott's Tavern. It was the first time Andrew had been home since he turned 21, so it was our turn to take him out and buy him a beer. Life certainly feels different when you can go drinking with your kids! Afterwards, we headed to my parents' house for a delicious dinner of Crown Roast of Pork and all the trimmings. On Friday I cooked a turkey...what fun is Thanksgiving if you don't have leftovers? I didn't get the camera out all weekend...I'm just not a good blogger!



During the week I had painted my laundry room cabinets black...wish I could find the before pictures...these cabinets were hideous. Now that the doors are back on, with new hardware, I can't believe I waited almost 10 years to paint them...what was I thinking?





I've been doing a lot of customer quilting...here's a sneak peek of the quilt on the machine now. This one should be done in a day or two, then I'll only have two more customer quilts to quilt before Christmas. After that I will quilt the quilt that I'm giving as a Christmas gift. Why do I have a feeling that I'll be binding it on Christmas Eve?







About 2 weeks ago I spent a day at the hospital, having a biopsy and other procedures done. Yesterday I found out that everything is fine...no cancer, no tumors...and that with the proper medications, I'll be fine. Now that the stress is relieved, I'm looking forward to the holidays. I feel like I just received the best gift I could be given...anything else this Christmas will just be icing on the cake!

Stash Report Sunday

I realized the picture that I posted last night was of the quilt top, not the finished quilt! The backing that you see here is gone from my stash...

I've also pulled my pile of flannels and cut most of it into 2.5" strips to make Bonnie's Strip Twist as a Christmas gift. I'm working on that one tonight and hope to have the top done by the end of the week.
Once finished that will be a nice bit of flannel out of my stash. I don't plan to keep track of yardage as some others are, I'll just be happy with a little more shelf space!

The house is as festive as it's getting, I spent most of the day putting out the Christmas decorations. The tree is up and lit, but has no ornaments. That will happen when I get tired of looking at it with just lights. I've come to the conclusion that I should have made some tablerunners for myself this year...I only have one that my mother made for me many years ago and it's a little worn around the edges. Maybe that should be my next project...

Orphan Train...

I decided to get this one done over the weekend, so here is my first orphan train quilt, completely finished! I quilted swirls all over the quilt, then I got lucky. I was going to sew together orphan strips from old bindings, but then found a binding strip left over from a quilt I made last year that was long enough to bind the entire quilt! I don't know why I made so much binding for that quilt, but I'm so glad I did!

I hope to have another finish in the next day or two...I quilted my Christmas rings table topper quilt and I'm working on the binding. This week is Vacation Bible School at our church, so I can't sew in the evenings. I guess that means I'll have to sew all day!

Trimming the tree

Our tree has sat without ornaments for 2 weeks. Saturday night we finally decorated the tree. Sorry the picture is blurry! The tree stands out much better this year because I painted the paneling a lighter color over the summer and it doesn't blend into the wall anymore!

I've been sick for the last week and haven't done much at all. I called in sick today because I just didn't think I'd make it through the morning...and I didn't want to share what I have with the kindergarteners! So, I thought I'd share something with you...a few of my favorite ornaments.







First I have my little tree. There are just a few smaller ornaments on it, but this is the first year we've decorated it, usually it just has lights on it.






















This is the first Christmas ornament we bought. We got it on our honeymoon. Since we were buying a house, we cancelled our trip to Bermuda and drove up through New England. We found this in a little shop in Newport, RI.











When my children were little, before I got lazy, I made ornaments for each of us every year. Often they were done in counted cross stitch. This was the year of the gingerbread ornaments. They were stitched on brown Aida cloth...wish I could find more of this because I would love to make one of these for my youngest, who wasn't born when I made these!








And this little glass snowman was one that I bought 2 years ago for Christmas. I find that I'm accumulating more of these antique looking glass ornaments in recent years...they are so pretty, but fragile!

Yesterday we had our Christmas pageant at church. The children did a wonderful job. They told the story of the nativity with a twist...it was a takeoff of "Charlie's Angels" and was very cute. My daughter was one of the 3 angels and did great.

Today will be spent finishing a customer quilt (the last before Christmas!) and taking naps on the sofa. A rough day...I know. :o)