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Friday, August 31, 2012

AUGUST REPORT

At the beginning of August my DH selected another WIP from the bowl with all many of the unfinished/in progress projects that I have in the studio.  The one he selected was listed as #8 on the master list.  It is a set of 9-patch blocks that  started with a Moda Jelly Roll.
I have tried several different layouts but did not choose one.  I still have to make a block or two more.  Inspiration has not been forthcoming on how to finish this quilt.  I kept setting it aside as other things began to happen during the month.

Early in August was the Longest Yard Sale and DH and I are vendors.  We were involved for two weeks with setup, selling, and breakdown.  It was a huge success for us, but indeed a lot of work.
These are our tents with twelve tables of merchandise.


Another thing that happened at the Longest Yard Sale was the purchase of a Yorkie Puppy.  Her name is Little Bit.

She was four months old when we brought her home with us.  Puppies require a lot of time and attention and she was no exception.  Now that she is a little older and trained, she is not a lot of trouble and she brings bundles of joy to our lives.

As the month progressed my life became a little more hectic.  I had a windfall.  An opening  occurred at a nearby retreat center and I was invited to go.  I accepted and thought I would work on this WIP there.  I love to work on a big project when I go to retreats. I went to Grand Oak Retreat in Scottsboro, AL.  I had a really great time and met some new quilters.

In the meantime someone commissioned me to make a quilt to give for a Christmas gift.  I thought I could use my time at the retreat to make the top for this customer.  Again I set aside this month's WIP.  So I spent my four days cutting and sewing on this:
I was really pleased with the way it turned out.  Scrappy quilts are so much fun.

During the next week after Retreat, I went to Birmingham for a day trip to visit my grandsons before school started and for Little Bit to meet the boys and their dog, Hoss.

This is Nick and he is nine years old.

Hoss is a Teacup Chihuahua.  He is a lot bigger than Little Bit.

A few days after I returned, my DH went to the hospital to have the first of two Hip Replacement Surgeries. 

 We spent two nights and three days at the hospital.  During that time I worked some on my Hexie project.  I almost finished one more section.


Our children came up and spent the weekend before surgery  with us celebrating our older grandson's sixteenth birthday.  What fun was that !!!

This is Preston and he is a Junior at Hoover High School.

During this month I taught a class making Zippy Strippy Bags with my Piecemakers Bee Group.  Still I did not work on the WIP.  I could not get any inspiration for setting it.


I have a full, rewarding, and exciting life!!!  I try to live each day to the fullest!!  This is not a dress rehearsal, life is the real thing!

This month's WIP will be carried over to September and will surely be completed during that month.  Somehow, I could not get it going for August.  Wonder Why????

                                        -sandi

Friday, August 24, 2012

LIL BIT'S SLEEPOVER

Yippee, yippee, I am going to a sleepover!!

  My papa is having hip replacement surgery on Monday and my mom needs to go take care of him and stay with him at the hospital.  He might be a little scared and Mom makes everything better when she is near.

This morning I went to meet my new friends who invited me for a sleepover while my papa and mom are at the hospital. 

This is Miss Susan and her daughter, Rachael, they are the grownups, and the other dog is Gigi.  Gigi is a poodle and she is over 10 years old.  She doesn't like to play much.


Meet Ebbie, she is Rachael's dog and she is a poodle mix and she is really BIG.  She likes to play.


This is all four of us girls together.  Mom let Miss Susan introduce me to her "girls".  I like them a lot.  And I love Miss Susan.  She gives really nice treats when you follow the rules.


I am following Ebbie to the doggie room.  She knows where all the good stuff is.


Ooohh!  Look what I found!  It is Gigi's bed.  Maybe if I move way over to the side she will get in with me.  Well, no, she wouldn't...


Miss Susan and I were playing sock tuggle and having a good time.  Then Ebbie wanted to play ...


This is so much fun.  She is really gentle when she plays with me.  She is ten years old, but still likes to play.


Miss Susan and Rachael wanted to play sock tuggle with Ebbie and me but we just kept the sock away from them.


It was a fun morning getting acquainted with Miss Susan, Rachael, Gigi and Ebbie.  But, boy am I tired.  I came home and snuggled up with Snoopy and we are going to take a nap.  I want to be all rested up to go when Miss Susan picks me up on Sunday.  I get to stay for 2 or 3 days.  What a great time I will have!!!

                                           -lil bit

Thursday, August 23, 2012

LIL BIT MEETS THE HOSS

It's my turn to write again.  Oh, yes, this is Lil Bit.  Now my folks are calling me Bit-Bit, Bits, and Lil Bit.
They think I don't know the difference but I do.  It's okay with me, though, because they are so fun to play with.

Last week Mom and I took a trip to visit the grandsons down in Alabama.  It was the last week of summer break for them.

This is Nick.  He is in the fourth grade and I just love him.  He likes to play with me. He will throw toys for me to fetch.  I don't really fetch 'cause I keep the toys for myself.

This is Nick's big brother, Preston, who is a junior in high school.  He is really old.  I love him, too.  He knows how to play with me and tease me to get me to run and jump.  Someday, I think he wants to be a vet.  I love my vet so I know what that is.  I think he will be a good vet, too.

These guys are really neat, but I really went to meet "the Hoss".  He is a teacup chihuahua and he weighs about 5 pounds.  His name really is Hoss.  I guess it makes him think he is big stuff.

We had so much fun running and chasing and playing.

Look how big Hoss is.  We were running so fast that we were just a blur for Mom to take the pictures.

Can you hear him barking??  He was so loud.  Finally I had to show him I could bark too.  My mom told me when we came home that I was not going to bark so much.  She likes me to be a quieter pet.


He sure is a lot bigger than I am.  Can you see how fast we were running?  Mom couldn't get us in focus we were so fast.


It was my best day ever!!  Hoss is so much fun.  I want to go back soon and play ALL day!

I slept all the way home.  Whew, I was tired but happy.


                                                    -lil bit




Wednesday, August 22, 2012

GOING SCRAPPY

Last weekend I went to the Grand Oak Retreat Center in Scottsboro, Alabama for four wonderful, fun-filled days of sewing and creating.

There were ladies from Tennessee, Georgia, Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi working on quilting.  We did have a lady from Alabama who was a scrapbooker.  She did some beautiful alphabet pages for a gift for a friend's Christmas.

Look at this beautiful view overlooking the Tennessee River.  We gathered on this porch most mornings to have our first cup of coffee, tea, or soda.
This was our workroom.  There were fourteen of us having a ball.

All of us worked on our individual projects.  I took a project with me that was very scrappy -- anything goes kind of scrappy.  I was working with split-nine-patch blocks with a few regular 9-patch blocks thrown in.

I spent two days before retreat cutting out several hundred squares and making a large number of half-square triangles so I could start right into sewing. 


I lined up everything on my sewing machine table and started making my blocks.


This is what it looked like under my machine as I chain pieced the nine-patch blocks together.


This was my finished top.  I love the friendship star in the center.  I don't think I will add any borders.  It looks more interesting without a border.

Now on to doing the back and binding it.  Looking at the drawer of left-over bindings and thinking I might could use some of them. 

 This is the second one of this pattern that I have made and each one looks a little different.  I really do like it!!!!


                                              -sandi


Sunday, August 12, 2012

LITTLE BIT TOOK A TRIP







Hi, I'm Little Bit and I am blogging on my mom's blog today.

I have lived here about one week and I love this place!!  They mostly do everything I want them to do.

This is my new luggage.  I think it looks like a designer bag, don't you?


My mom said I needed it for all my wonderful travels with her and my papa.  She said we would take car rides and everything.  I love to explore.

Today's trip was to meet a couple of special people. People that my mom thinks will be important in my life.
The first person was my vet, Dr. Liz, and she just cuddled me and loved me and told me I was so cute!
She also said I was very tiny for my age -- that would be 16 weeks.  She said most Yorkies this age are almost twice as big as I am.  I only weigh 2.2 lbs.
She is embarrassing me looking at all my "special" parts.  Oh, well, a girl just has to endure it.



Dr. Liz was very nice to me, but she did give me a couple of shots and one of them hurt and I yelped.  My mom said "It will be okay".  Well, maybe it will and maybe it won't...she wasn't the one to get the needle in her neck.

After I met with Dr. Liz, Mom said I was going to meet Miss Debbie.  She is the groomer.  Mom told her I was a "matted mess" and I needed cleaning up.  The very idea!  Here is what I looked like.


Now, just tell me, don't you think my long hair is pretty?  It is a little curly and I think it is cute.


I don't think mom and the groomer agreed with me so Miss Debbie made me look like this.  Which do you like?  Long hair or short hair?
As you can see I am in the laundry room.  Yes, my mom is with me.  I have to oversee that she does the laundry correctly.  After all my blanket and quilt are in the load in the dryer.
I am watching her sort another load. . .
After 3 loads I want to know "are we finished yet?"  I want to go do something more fun like play with my Snoopy dog.
Snoopy and I are watching mom cut up fabric strips for the kits she is taking to retreat this week.  Wish I could go with her.
I will just stay home and hold on to Snoopy and keep Papa company.
She is still cutting fabric.  I am just going to rest my head on Snoopy.
She just said it wouldn't be much longer and we could go outside.  I love it outside.


I need to say bye now,  I think Mom wants to write a "real blog" about quilting and stuff.

-little bit   (i belong to sandi)

WIP #3 Progress

This is where it started.  Some 9-Patch blocks, some squares, and some jelly roll strips.










First set of blocks framed out in neutral colors.  Will probably need to make one more block.


The brown blocks were framed out and put on the design wall.
Hmmm, I don't know about this. . .

Had another idea
Maybe I will offset the rows and make a pieced border of the red and cream squares.


It is improving, but it still does not sing!!

Okay, let's try another layout.

Starting to hum a little tune here, I think. . .   This will require two more dark framed blocks.

Enough for now.  I will post as I reach the finish line!

                                     -sandi



Tuesday, August 7, 2012

A LITTLE BIT OF JOY

Last weekend was the Longest Yard Sale and my hubby and I were vendors.  We had four great days of selling.

On Saturday one of the vendors brought this cute little puppy to sell.  I fell in love with her from the get-go.  She has such a cute face and she only weighs 2 pounds.  She is personality plus!!

For several months I have been looking for the perfect little house dog.  I wanted one that would be a good lap dog as well as one that enjoyed playing games with me.

I have a cat, her name is KeeKee, and she is 4 years old and weighs 12 pounds.  She is not a lap cat.  In fact, she is a DIVA.  She was very affectionate as a kitten, but her personality has changed as she has grown.  She does not really even like to be picked up anymore.  Of course, she must initiate each quilt as it is finished.


The relationship between cat and dog is ongoing.  Right now, the dog is in control and the cat does not know what to make of this teeny little bundle of fur that is not intimidated by her hisses.

I wanted a pet that thought I was the greatest thing on the planet.  My cat clearly thinks I was placed here to serve her and she could care less about how special I might feel if she paid any attention to me.  This universe is only about her.

So the search was on.  I wanted a toy dog that thought I hung the moon and would always be happy and ecstatic to see me.
When I met this little four-month-old Yorkie she was all over me and her whole body was wagging, not just her stub of a tail.
She cuddled and licked and cuddled more.

She had been named Tess and for 3 days we had tried to call her Tess, but it just was not working.  The name was way too "big" girl for such a petite little feisty gal.  We have finally settled on calling her "Little Bit" and sometimes, we say "Bits".  It is working and she responds well to this name.

The process is on.  Walking her, training her, feeding her, and cuddling with her all take up my time.  This means I have not been to the studio all week.  I plan to get there tomorrow or the next day. Of course, Little Bit will be going there with me.  Another adventure for her and lots more smiles and laughter for me.

In the meantime I am having the time of my life with Little Bit.  She is such a tenacious and sturdy little bitty furry bundle!!




-sandi