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I think today is my one year quit-iversary with smoking. Yay Me! I'd 'quit' and slapped on a patch around the first of February in '06, but I was out in Oklahoma visiting a friend at the end of the month when I grabbed one of her husbands cigs and went out back to 'enjoy' one with my glass of wine. I remember gagging and being grossed out and by the sixth puff this little voice inside (the devil, I'm sure) was saying, "Just hang with it...you'll start lovin' it again any second now." Yikes! I threw that sucker down and have never once turned back. For most of this year I haven't said "I quit smoking" because I knew how I might lose the battle and go back, but with a year under my belt I'm feeling pretty confident that I'm done. I am pretty proud of the accomplishment, but after 33 years of countless failed attempts, I honestly can't say why I was able to do it this time. Maybe, like I always say about people in general , all (most) relationships have a timeline and mine with cigs was 33 years. Then it was over. Period. I'm glad. Hey...if you wanna get grossed out, google "quit smoking" images. Egad on the overflowing ashtrays and bloody lip and throat cancers!

Good riddance Marlboro Lights!

I've been pretty productive so far this week. Here's something I bought a few months ago when the local kitchen gourmet shop was going out of business. Once they finally got down to selling the fixtures, I got this for five bucks. Had no idea what I was gonna do with it, just knew it looked pretty handy for five bucks.

I think it must've held marble trivets or coasters or something.  Well, I bought some 10/$1 card packs at Michael's with the intent of 'repurposing' them for some button cards I've been making and they just so happened to fit perfectly!

I really couldn't be more pleased with it. I'm having a booth at an antiques & collectibles fair in mid-April and then a craft fair in late April and will take this to both. By the way, I've already credited Connie Stuart for the button people card in a previous post and the idea for the cards with the pink buttons was pretty much copied from a gal named Stacey Bear. I thought it was a pretty cute idea for displaying vintage buttons.

I guess way back when I was a) getting heavy into beads and jewelry making and b) getting more serious about having my webstore built, I ordered a case of small and a case of largish kraft jewelry boxes. Before Christmas I covered a bunch of tops in holiday paper (what and where I thought I was going to sell so much of I have no idea really) and my purpose in showing you here is a good example of BE CAREFUL WHICH ADHESIVES YOU USE FOR WHAT! I just ran the blue Tombow permanent adhesive along the edges and look at how they all popped up in less than three months.

Yikes! Imagine if any of these had actually been sent to someone. Seems I just never quit learning these lessons about adhesives and their long-term abilities (or lack thereof). Well, I thought I'd crank out a batch of much prettier boxes so threw these papers away, pulled out the GOOD glues, and made these between last night and this morning. I've been trying to work FAST just for the exercise of not being so 'precious' about it all ( I always remember Claudine Helmuth lecturing us about that).

I may sell them for a couple bucks at the craft show or maybe offer them to some local retailer who does jewelry. Was fun working with paper again.

I'll leave you with one last photo. Remember how I showed you a pic of Mia in her nightly paws UP!  pose in front of the fireplace?  Last night John and I stood talking in the kitchen for quite a while, and I eventually looked down and saw Mia at the doorway between the fam room and kitchen like this:

We laughed and laughed, went into the other room to get the camera, and still she maintained the position. Gosh, she just cracks me up.

Hello! I thought I'd sit here and share my cinammon dolce latte with you, so to speak ;-) Sorry I was away so long. It gets to a point where it almost seems to much...to catch up on, you know, so I don't even want to try but I will.

Last week I drove with my friend Jeanette to a consult with an ortho surgeon 300 miles from here. It was snowing through the mountain pass and I sure didn't blame her for not wanting to drive it alone. Kinda scary in parts! We stayed in a hotel the night before the appt and then headed back the LONG way home(another 150 miles and this time through RAIN) because the other road had closed due to snow. When we stopped at a Starbuck's I just had to buy a pair of these pink heart mugs on clearance from V-day. They reminded me of John in the red underwear all those years ago. Some of you may remember that story. It'll always be my favorite one to tell. I still have those underwear on a hanger in my closet. Rest assured; noone but John will ever wear them again; and when he does I'll make sure and work these pink mugs into the scenario somehow. :-D

I've read the Freddy Moran/ Gwen Marsten quilting book from cover to cover this past week, although I should be reading all these books I've collected on perimenopause and adrenal fatigue. Bah! How boring! I wish I could just place my palm on a book and by osmosis suck up all the knowledge in an instant. Seriously, there's just not enough hours in the day. Also last week I found a great old quilt top at an antique store. It was kinda ratty and altogether unfinished but for $15-  and after an evening spent with a seam ripper I ended up with 26 of these quite lovely 9 inch butterfly squares. On Friday night I started sewing and without any real plan I ended up with this baby quilt by Saturday night.

And there it still sits today, all pinned and no idea of where to go. Tie it off the old fashioned way? Try my hand at machine-quilting? Pay someone to do a good job of machine quilting? Hmm. More'n likely I'll just tie it off. I do like the result...I was definitely inspired by the book but I really think my own style shows through. Sure was fun. Here's a great time-saver tip: I cut 25 different 1.5" rows of fabric (the 44" direction of a piece of fabric) and sewed them all together up the long sides. Then I just cut 3" wedges across, each 3" piece yielding the 25 different fabrics. Wow. I used to do them one little strip at a time!

Had a good time in Oregon last weekend. We need to go up there and visit more often. Here's a couple pics I snapped in John's brother's backyard.Wherever there was a bird feeder there was a squirrel. This first one all but came up to the back door. "HELLO!?" I know it;s the weekend and you have company and all but your squirrel fee..I mean BIRD feeders out here are seriously in need of replenishing!"

Let's see, what else. Well, the kitchen remodel plan is still coming along but haven't actually done anything yet. Just collecting supplies and ideas for now. The soffit up over the sink has been like this for 7 or 8 years.

I've always loved it but it needs to be changed because a) all yellow is going away and b)speaking of yellow; this has really yellowed over time. Yuck. Need a fresh one. Will probably do a different quote and font, too. Well, look at this adorable vintage wallpaper trim is that I found on ebay:

Isn't that just perfect?! And even more perfect, the roll is 12 feet and I needed 11 to redo the soffit. Kismet! It's quite brittle from age but it should work out just fine.

Also along the lines of old wallpaper, I want to put some on the back walls of these two black china cabinets that will be painted white-ish for the re-do. This red and silver that I also found on ebay is perfect with my red Hall and chrome, but can't say for sure I won't find a better one. I think I may need a pattern with a medallion style running through.

Gosh. My latte is long gone and now it's 5:00 so I must end this for today. It seems the less time I spend on this computer the less time I want to spend here, ya know? I'm actually thinking I might let this ol' blog go when it's time to renew in April. I don't know... Well, I hope you all have a great week!

Not a lot of energy or much to say. Got the results of my hormone level testing today and I have to admit I was hoping for a prescription for one miracle pill. One pill, taken once a day, and I would drop 40 pounds, not be in constant achy pain, sleep all night and have good energy all day. Well, I got a bagfull of over-the-counter adrenal support pills and drops (four different ones to be taken four different times throughout the day. argh). Also a scrip for progesterone, of which, according to the test results, I had zero. I'll not complain and I will take the pills, as often as I can remember to anyway, for at least a month before I complain again.

Larissa called to tell me my stuff was in the paper today. I checked online and it was there, too. Here's a link  if you want to see    I made the fabric heart in the upper left and the button bouquet in the center. It also mentions my name down toward the bottom. That was nice of her.

We're going up to Eugene Oregon for the weekend. John's sister and her grown daughter have developed basically a living room get together into a real ongoing performing arts youth group that sells tickets and has big ticket sponsors and everything.  Very cool, indeed.  They are known as Upstart Crow and we'll be seeing them perform Cinderella. I hope to scout a couple of good quilt shops either there or on the way there. Any suggestions?

I got Collaborative Quilting by Freddy Moran and Gwen Marston earlier this week and have been hopped up ever since. Almost 250 pages and not one page without exciting color, design or ideas.  Seriously, one could almost replace the No-Doz in the medicine cabinet with this book! While I still doubt (for a few reasons) I'll ever quilt exactly like them, I sure do enjoy looking at their work and drawing my own inspirations from their pages. Just thought I'd let y'all know I'm alive and well, just having fun with my trusty old Sears Kenmore.

My little sewing alcove had just gotten crazy out of control. I've been eyeing the bookshelf up there for a while (to store the bigger pieces of fabric) so I went to Costco today for some plastic storage tubs. Thought "Oh, i've read them all at least once, I have no problem just getting rid of them." Nope. Can't do it. One by one I had a reason for why I had to keep each book --love the author. love the subject matter. Surely someone I can *fix* will come along and need to read this book. (I'm a self-help book junkie).  Sentimental about the book 'cause I've been dragging it around for so long --, etc. etc. So for the sake of getting it done this week...yea; this millenium, I just started piling them ALL into the tubs and will start thinking about getting another bookshelf for the living room or something. I came across a Memory Makers Scrapbooking magazine and a Stamper's Sampler mag both from 1997. Oh my. Talk about some hokey ideas. We've come a long way, baby! So, the only reason my alcove looks this good today

Is because this much stuff got pulled outta there... the fabric was literally piling up on the floor which bugged me no end. Wow, looks like I oughta get busy if I'm going to complete all the ideas I have in this lifetime! Ah well, for now I've gotta scoot down to the office and do my end-of-the-month rental stuff.  I'll leave you with pics of groovy findings at a local flea market last weekend.

Of the blue crochet trim there were 4 40" pieces for $4. (Same size as a pillow case edge). The brown trim is 80" for the same price and the fabric was basically free.

These games were $3 and $5 each. The tiddlywinks is marked 1958 and I think the Jack Straws is even older. Fun stuff!

Gosh, I can't believe it's Friday already...I started this post on Tuesday!

Around Christmastime John went to visit his folks in Oregon and he came back with the story of 'the red-headed angel'. I said, "John. Don't you remember I was the one with the red-headed angel story?" (Gosh it's amazing how often I am NOT right!). No, his father has a story, too. And it's a good one..read it here. Looking back at my redheaded angel story I see that I left out some parts. Like, she'd come in for a rental application, the house I had available for her and her kids sounded perfect for her, yet she never came back again. I cried and/or hugged her 4 different times in the 20 minutes she was in my office. And I'd never seen her before in my life! (yikes..maybe that's why she never came back!) Kidding aside, I just know God sent her to me at the exact right time that I needed her. My mom forwarded me a story this weekend about a guy who's car sputtered to a halt at a gas station where a mom and her three kids were trying to travel across country without enough money. He filled up their gas tank, bought them two big bags of hamburgers, gave her some cash, and when he got back in his car it started up just fine. How can anyone NOT believe in angels? It happens every day. We just have to avoid getting mired in the witnessing of the devil's work to be able to see it (hard to do, I must admit).

Yesterday Caleb and I went to see my friend Jeanette who'd just gotten a new puppy, the cuteness of which I hadn't seen in a long time. Oh those two (Caleb and *Rusty*) had such a grand time running back and forth chasing a ball in Jeanette's backyard. Jeanette lost Murphy, the love of her life shih tzu dog, about a year ago. It depressed her deeply. I remember a couple of years before that when Murphy lost an eye while playing with a bigger dog, Jeanette sat on the couch and held her dog for a solid week. I guess Murphy was about 13 years old when they finally made the difficult decision to put him, deaf and blind (in the remaining eye) and in allover pain, to rest. Hard stuff.  As the boy and the dog played in the yard Jeanette told me the story of how she came to aquire Rusty. A couple days prior, she'd dropped off her pics at the drug store for 30-minute developing. It's right next door to the dollar store, which she'd never in her life been in (can you imagine!?) but her friend had been telling her she should go check it out so to kill time she did. Went up and down the aisles filling her cart with all sorts of doodads (OH! what she's been missing!) and in the last aisle a young woman bumped into her. Just saying "excuse me" was not enough. The girl started in with all the current woes in her life, "Oh here I am out in public, don't even have makeup on, bumping into people like I own the place, I'm disabled even tho I don't look like it. My husband's getting his hours cut so money's scarce right now. we have to move out of our home because of mold issues and can't find a place that'll rent to us with a dog.blah blah blah." Luckily, Jeanette is the kind of person that is open to what the universe may be trying to bring her, so she keyed in on "dog? I want a dog!" The girl said "Really? He's a nine month old lhasa apso. He's right out in the car if you want to see." Jeanette went out and the dog jumped right out of the car and started licking her face. She says he looks just like a little Murphy only dipped in brown. Of course Jeanette's husband Victor (being a man and all) was skeptical that it was just a ruse to get money so before anything else Jeanette checked with the vet and sure enough the puppy had been going there routinely and was current with all his shots. Even tho the original owners had paid $500 to a local breeder for the dog they only asked Jeanette for $200. I'm here to tell you, I haven't seen Jeanette beam like that in a long time. I personally would've paid a thousand to see her that happy again. Yes, angels walk among us and do good things for good people every day. And you know; I think we can be those angels; too, if we just pay attention to where we might be needed.

Oh my gosh. These are downright addictive! Every time I get near to finishing one I try and tell myself "This is the last one!" but then I think up another fun thing to do so of course I have to make another one. Here's pretty much how my worktable has looked since Friday night.

I keep coming across all sorts of stuff that's clearly just been waiting to become part of a one-of-a-kind valentine! ;-) Here are some of them. I've made them into pockets (stitched on a backside)so a little somethin' could be enclosed. They're about 10" tall (not including the wire hanger).

Pretty fun, huh? I bet you're already thinkin up some ideas for your own! Thanks again to Jen Paganelli for sharing her awesome creations that got my juices going!

I took several photos earlier today to share but now it's 11pm and Caleb's still awake and I gotta start wrappin this day up. But real quick, I just had to share this with someone out there who would understand. John and Caleb just look at me like "whatever".

So, superbuzzy had THE MOST awesome fabrics offered for sale last Thursday. They'd recently been to Japan on a buying trip and in the spirit of fairness they emailed everyone (who is on their email list) and let them know that everything would be up and available on Thursday at 1. Oh yes. You can be sure--I was so THERE! Got everything yesterday. Love love LOVE it all! one of the pieces I got was this 1yd piece of 45" wide border strips.

I've no idea why I bought it. I bought half yard pieces of the yellow and pink, too. I just think it's darling and charming and sweet and nostalgic, too. Well, when I got it in my hands I thought "Wouldn't this be nice in some kind of curtain for the kitchen redo?" Fairly extensive internet search for a coordinating fabric to this Yuwa of Japan piece (a girl can hope), and still; I didn't want to give up. Took the piece to the quilt shop, wandered around holding it up to stuff. Came across this piece from the Grandpa's Dots line of P&B fabrics.

Hmmm. Could it be? Nah...nothin's THAT easy! Just one store? Well folks, looky here and see for yourself. I think we have a winner!

I'm not dead set on puttin it together in this particular way, just had to lay it down and see if it was really true that they will go well together. I'll be dipped. How lucky am I?! If I wasn't in the thick of tryin to do seven different things I would totally be planning on painting this weekend!

Okay. Just one more quick photo. All three of the thrift shops I go to toss all the old sewing bits and pieces in these rubbermaid tubs.  I love that they take the time to price everything, no matter how small...19 cents, 29 cents, as opposed to "buy the whole lot for $5". This handful of lovelies cost just under two dollars.

The b&w crochet doily was half off so only 38 cents!:-D Love that old pink velvet ribbon and especially love the 10cent curling ribbons. The colors are just aged so perfectly. Am sitting here piled amongst those and many other doo-dads while making some of these fun pockets like Jennifer Paganelli. She's SO talented and inspiring!

Okay, I've got to get off this thing. Have a great weekend!