Tonight I tried a new Weight Watchers recipe and I wasn't excited about it...I felt it needed more flavor! Mark said it tasted really good. I made Orange Beef with Broccoli...it uses broccoli slaw. I think next time I will use real broccoli and more orange juice (fresh squeezed!). I squeezed the oranges and zested the orange! I felt like Martha Stewart - LOL!

I have another new recipe I want to make but I am a little unsure so I think we will be having stir fry for dinner tomorrow night. I am hoping I will be able to do some beading tomorrow night.

I was so excited that I was able to help Wendy, Jen, Judy and Tori cut fabric for the next three months of block of the month club at Frank's Sewing Center. I was so glad I got a chance to do some "quilting" related crafting. I have not had a lot of time to quilt...I have a lot of other things that have been taking up my time.

I did follow up with my insurance company today and I am working on setting up my sleep apena test. I am hoping to set it up for next weekend...this weekend I have other plans with my family! I also need to go to have my cholesterol level tested and other blood work as well. Tonight on Biggest Loser they talked about sleep apnea and how weight loss decreases how much you snore, etc. The doctor also explained that blood pressure increases when you have sleep apnea so there is hope that my blood pressure will go down.

Wow it's already Sunday

I was so looking forward to Friday and it was all I expected. I was so glad it was time to go to Wendy's Block of the Month at Frank's! Wendy made Fudgy Snow Balls...Ohh they were sooooo yummy! Wendy also showed us a lot of neat things at the store. I bought two Daydreams charm packs and one Daydreams jelly roll, also, one charm pack of Fossil Fabrics and a Debbie Caffrey pattern called September Song. Now my question is what can I make with two charm packs and a jelly roll???? After a fun filled evening Wendy, Jen, Sherry and I went to dinner at Mama Mia's...Yum. I am sure the garlic bread was not WW friendly. It was wonderful to sit and chat with friends.

Now the only problem I had on Friday was going home...it snowed and the ground was slippery and icy. This is a problem for a person who drives a Camero. I couldn't make it up a hill by my home...I kept sliding back and could only get to a certain point...no farther. Mark had to come and get me. I drove the truck home and Mark figured out how to get the car home. I had to turn the truck around and loop back to where Mark was. He was gone with the car but several other cars couldn't make it up the hill either. Once Mark got home with the car, we couldn't get it up the driveway. We tried pushing the car, backing the car in, pulling it in, etc. We ended up getting a parking permit and parking it on the street.

Saturday I did some organizing and cleaning off of our table we had a garbage bag full of papers, etc on the table. Then I decided to take the Christmas tree down. Yes it is finally down. I still have some Jim Shore Christmas decorations up and I need to take them down soon. The success is the Christmas tree being down. I also need to get a box from work to put my nutcracker in. My aunt gave me one for Christmas which is great and tall but I need something to put it in so it doesn't get broken.

Again one of the problems we had was getting the car up the driveway...it made it to the back door and got stuck...yikes...Mark tood the sand in a tube out of the trunk and used that - amazing - he got the car into it's parking spot in the driveway. I asked him what we are going to do as the car is having such a bad time this winter (getting stuck that is) and Mark said we just park it until spring. Nice idea but we often have two different places to be so we have to fix this!

Today I am doing laundry and watching TV and checking out other blogs. I still need to balance our check book and pay some bills but it will get done soon. I am feeling lazy today which is common on weekends.

All Day Quilt Retreat

Yesterday I was at an All Day Quilt Retreat at my friend and Quilting Mentor, Wendy Rieves' church. It was so much fun. We made these chicks...Jen is going to send me a picture and perhaps she is going to post it on her blog! They were so fun and easy to make unlike the quilt below. I had it all pieced, layered and the quilting begun...this is my nephew, Ethan's quilt. It is a really cute quilt and I am glad it is finally done! I finished quilting it and for some reason it took quite a while....it stuck to the bed of my machine, the thread had issues about clinging to the foot and wrapping around other things....all in all it just didn't want to get done...but I persisted. I love the fabric for this quilt and the backing is fun, fun, FUN!





For some reason this quilt waves! I am not sure why and it was suggested that I try steaming it but I just didn't want to do that. I figure it is a kid's quilt and it will be dragged around etc. I might try to steam it over the next few weeks but I am still unsure.

Okay I also got a block done for the BOM...two to go. I did cut out a bunch of 3" squares for a scrappy quilt I am making for my sister-in-law Terry. I know she will like it. It is all 3-dimensional box tie blocks. Needless to say it will take a lot of bow tie squares to make a quilt. I think that is all I got done but it is a lot when you think about all the putzy work that goes into the bow tie blocks. I did get 3 more of those blocks done.

All in all it was a good time...I sat at a table with Jen and really enjoyed myself! Okay the chicks we made were darn cute.

More pictures of Emma and my trip to Frank's Sewing Center

One of my favorite things in life is my dog Emma. She brings me so much joy and happiness. Right now as I write this blog entry she is laying on the living room floor by one of my bins of fabric chewing on her Nylabone. We try to encourage her to do this because it keeps her teeth pearly white and she was really interested in one of Mark's socks sooo rather than have her eat a sock...which she would do if allowed I took the sock away and am encouraging bone chewing. I did put the sock in the laundry room so she won't be able to get it but who knows with Emma. The two pictures on the left are when I took Emma to the dog park.

She really enjoyed hunting in the long grass and sniffing the many smells available at the dog park. She has never hunted in long grass before so another springer named Bailey showed her how. Bailey is quite good at it and she had no problem diving right on in the tall grass. Emma wasn't quite so sure on that day if it was something she wanted to do but as you can see she figured it out really quickly.

Some of Emma's most memorable times occurred when she was a puppy. When we first got her, we bought her a wading pool. For her first birthday,

we bought her a second wading pool as we got rid of the first one. As you can see she really liked her swimming pool. Even though she is faced away from the camera you can see she was really enjoying her pool. She used to try to dig her way out of the pool...very funny to watch.

What do you think of the pool picture? All I can think is she was soo darn cute when she was a puppy. She still is cute but puppies are sooo cute!!!

Well I received an e-mail from Jen telling me she was going to the sale at Frank's Sewing Center and did I want to join her and her mom...well I called Jen on her cell phone and asked when they were going. They were on their way so of course I met them up there. I had to take Jen's challenge and go to Frank's and try to figure out which ones were hers...we will see if I am right...I sent her an e-mail with the answers so I done with that task I set for myself. Anyways with the sale I wanted to buy some jelly rolls but they sold out of all the jelly rolls by the time we got there. I did buy four charm packs...two of them in the tins and the other two are seasonal...one is Halloween and the other is Christmas fabric.

At the Madison Quilt Expo we saw a lot of quilts with crystals attached to them. Well I just had to have one when I saw they were on sale at Frank's and of course I had to buy crystals. I think this is going to be a whole new area of purchases. I also bought three patterns...two use charm squares and the other one uses a jelly roll. Needless to say I did well in purchasing stuff tonight.

Wendy was at Frank's working and I asked her if I could use 2 1/2" strips for tomorrow's class instead of 2" strips...she said yes so I was off to raid my poker strips for class tomorrow. I only had to cut two gray fabrics and one of my favorite floral. I put all the stuff in my new Quilt in a Day backpack to find that the left pocket the zipper doesn't work...how annoying. The first one I picked up had a small hole in the bottom. Anyways everything I need is packed up. We are supposed to come home with a binder full of ideas. I know a lot about color and have taken a Jinny Beyers color course in Rosemont at the International Quilt Show but I just want to take this for fun! I like to see what others have to say on various topics and Wendy is such a good teacher ... so I really like to take classes from her.

Well I should get ready for bed soon...I am rather tired and my feet are hurting again...I really don't like having plantars faciatis. Take care and I hope everyone gets a chance to quilt this weekend. I need to look for some batiks for my Egg Money Quilt so I can start that.

How do I follow up ... Here's Emma

Thank you for all the comments on Emma...she is quite the spoiled puppy! Okay she is a 2 year old dog but forever I will call her puppy. She is a lot of fun but she is very active except for right now when she is laying on the couch cuddling.

Last night was so much fun! I am a student volunteer for a Beginning Quilting class taught by my friend and quilting mentor, Wendy Rieves.

She has inspired me since the beginning...okay in the beginning she had to convince me that I could first sew a strait line and then cut a straight line and finally that I would definitely have a huge stash one day.

WELL my stash is huge and growing my leaps and bounds...but I think the most fun for me is seeing the excitement on the new quilters faces. I have been helping for about five or six years. As a student volunteer I help the students with threading machines, helping them learn to rotary cut, how to figure out a scant 1/4", color selections, etc. I think I get as much out of it as they do. I just feel good when I walk out of the classroom.

I was working on some of my homework for the class that I have coming up this weekend. It is a color confidence class...I just know that I really want to take it to firm up all the concepts I have in my head plus to see if there are things I don't know. I at one time was an art major in college...I ended up with a business degree and two majors one in Marketing and the other in Human Resource Management.

I am also going to look at my Egg Money Quilt Book again tonight and start thinking about fabric I want to use for it. I am thinking batiks. I also have to pick out some fabrics for the table runner we are making in the beginning class. I have a kit that Wendy put together that I am going to make for myself. I also need to make one for my Mom. It has to be in blues...she said a little yellow is okay too. Ohh I also have to start cutting strips for my class on Saturday but I will probably do that on Friday night. I am a procrastinator - unfortunately.

Maureen