And Sew It Goes...

As far back as I can remember, I have sewn. Probably starting off in grade school, going to my FHA meetings at Opal Bennets house. My first project, a cotton elastic waist skirt. White with black polkadots...I can still picture it. Makes me smile to think about it. Sewing has always been a constant in my life, no matter what else was going on around me. I made my daughter's clothes until till she hit Jr High, of course then it would have been totally embarrassing to wear home made clothes!!! I'm not sure what it is about sewing that I like, I just do. Making clothes, quilts or just goofy crafts, I love it. When I'm sitting there sewing on my fancy computerized machines, I think about my great Grandmother and how her head would spin if she could see the new things to make what was their chore, oh so easy. The tools, the gadgets and the fantastic fabrics they have now. No more feedsack dresses, although those fabrics cost more than new ones now! It all just makes me smile.

Here is my terrific sewing studio. I heart it! I could have cleaned it up better for the photo, but this is the normal state of things....when you're busy, who has time for cleaning. It's a terrific space and thanks to John for letting me redo the whole basement just so i could move to a bigger space. It is greatly loved and used.

Ahhh, the toys!!! This is my computerized Brother Disney Embroidery Machine. It's way smarter than me!!! But i have fun with it anyway.

OK, it's bragging time. My first quilt I ever made was a Red, White & Blue quilt. I made it to fit on the end of our porch for a 4th of July party, thought it would look cool....it did. After that I decided to enter it into the Winnebago County Fair...wholly cow, I not only got first place, I also got Best of Show. Not that there is a lot of competition there, but it was still special to me since it was my first real quilt. It holds a special place in my heart. Here is the BOS ribbon. cool huh?

The quilt is pictured below.

Here are other ribbons from various quilts at the fair.

These are my quirky thimbles and pin cushions. What started out as a "nice" thimbles only collection, got carried away with goofy ones our service guys would bring back for me. So, if you can't beat em', join em'. Now I have thimbles from all over the world, they are all special to me. I also have some in the Motor Home from our travels across the states.

Is there a Chicago Bears fan around here?!?! I thought so! These are things I made for Kerri, and anyone that knows her knows what a true blue fan she is. The first shot is her wallhanging I made for her office. It's enough to make the men fans jealous and was great fun to make.

This is Lucinda Dorinda! She's Kerri's cabbage patch doll from High School, all the girls use to haul them around with them when they were doing flag competitions. At that time she had a Hononegah flag uniform on, but has moved on to the Bears. She's totally cute.

And this is Kerri's newest quilt, hopefully to be done by her birthday in Oct to keep her warm through all the games.

This is one of my favorite wall quilts. It's just cute.

And there is nothing better than passing on the tradition to the little ones. Here's Emily with one of her projects for the school fair. BTW, the tradition seems to skip a generation....odd huh? lol

Walk for Autism

This is who it's all about....Mitchel. Mitch is my 12 year old grandson, he has high functioning autism. Kerri, Emily, Jo and I all walked a 5k today for the awareness and to raise money for the cure and treatment of Autism. We dont know if we'll see anything in our lifetime, but there is always hope. Here's a few shots from the day....starting off with Mitch and I.

Lots of people for the cause, i heard it was over 39,500.

heading into Soldier Field

Kerri, Scott, Emily and Mitch
Terry, Jo & Kerri
Well, ya never know who you will see.....
Kerri is so totally thrilled to literally be on Soldier Field.
And who says you cant have a little fun while walking!This is Tj, the traveling sock monkey

On the road again......

Well, here I am again, on another trip!!! This is the third and final stop on my spring tour!!! Albequerque, NM. Hope I spelled that right, but probably didnt. My niece, Anna, had gotten bumped up a year in high school, and this trip was for her graduation. OMG, i cant believe one of the kids is out of high school....just freaky! Anyway, it was a fast and furious trip, but we had a great time. Anna stayed at the hotel with me the whole time, I always enjoy hanging out with her. My sister, Jackie stayed one night with us too, it was nice to catch up and just have some girl time. Here are a few shots from my stay, mostly grad shots, but also some with the boys too. Hunter is quite the camera hog....cant imagine where he got that from!!!

Our first night Jackie was working late, so we went to a Mexican restuarant for dinner....very cute place, here's a shot from outside.

Our little graduate

It's official!

Whaaaa? ok, maybe not!

Jake, Tom, Jackie, Anna, Me & Hunter

Anna and Me

Jake, me & Hunter the hamAnna & the future graduate!

Hunter being oh so cute at the restuarant, he was playing model for me.Last but not least...Tj at the ABQ airport headed for home.


Next stop.....Florida in June.

A way out West.....

As you can see, it's very beautiful country out in Colorado...although really dry!!! Here's a few shots from our trip, as usual, we had a ball. And kept out of jail to tell about it!!!! We were in Manitou Springs where we were suppose to stay in the Keepsake Inn. Well, they decided we didnt need to all stay in the same room that we paid for....so we left. We had our scrapping weekend all set up, so we were ticked to say the least. But we sucked it up, found another hotel with ajoining rooms and all was well. Manitou Springs is a very picturesque little town with lots of shops. Mostly geared towards women, Leeayn and I had lots of places to shop. Here are a few shots from the trip.

Manitou Springs


Leeayn taking a sip from a local spring.

Manitou Cliff Dwellings
A really interesting place. Hard to believe families were raised in these.

Ok, you know we couldnt pass this one up!!


A Teepee

The Cliff Dwellings

This was a doorway!!
TJ and I discussing the tour!
The Cog Train, we didnt go up in it, but as you see we made a new friend.
She said "hop on, I'll get ya down"....so I did!!!
We were so tired....well, some of us were! Sadly, this was our first day!

Silly girls!
Damn, we were really tired! Must have been the altitude.
Woooohoooo, look at these babes!! Who made those cute outfits!

Like Kerri said, we are too cute!

Leeayn demonstrating the proper method for a pat down! Mommy!!!!


Naughty Monkey!

And the last day we finally got to scrap. It was an awesome shop and we had a really good time, it went by way too fast. Wish we had that place here.

And all good things come to an end. Can you believe we had to walk the tarmac to get on the plane? I was shocked. Not only that we had to walk a freakin mile to get there!!! We were worn out though, slept all the way home. Stay tuned for the next trip....Albquerque, MN.