Quilting stores

I've been to a few now and have learned that they all have their own sense of style and flavour, personality.

The one here in my community, is very country and traditional. I don't get the ooh and ahh feeling very much when I go there. I tend to go and look, and not get inspired. Lots of soft muted colours, and country flair.

Another one about 15 minutes away, is a mixed bag, really. A little more up my alley, but still a lot of folk and traditional styles...but they have branched out and have some more modern pieces in there.

Now one that I got super duper excited about was one called EarthlyGoods which is about 25 minute away. It was super. I got so inspired, it felt like i wanted to do every quilt there. Lots of bright colours, lots of fresh colours, odd mixes of colours like teal blue with lime green and pink which looks so amazing together and modern/contemporary looks. Art quilts, Japanese fabrics, a ton of batiks and of course my favourite retro looking lines Amy Butler ,Heather Bailey , Moda Fabrics

They even have a graduate program there for classes, is that not cool? Yeah, it's not a university, but you get "credit" for your courses and work up to getting a quilting degree. You must complete the basics like cutting, piecing, applique, triangles (blech), and then you work your way up into specialties like art quilting, fabric dying, embellishing, landscape desigin etc.

I was thinking about how the different stores really made me feel and how each inspired, or uninspired. The last one, really fit my personality and I'll be going back often.

How hokey is this post?

OMG.

I did the unthinkable.

I dove into my garbage just now. To rescue the cookies I threw out.

Really.


I made a recipe from the new Cookies book by Martha Stewart. LOVE the book. It's fantastic. But for some reason my Brown Butter Toffee Blondies didn't turn out. Everything was done to a 't'. I'm thinking it just wasn't baked long enough.

Anyways..they turned out way underdone. and the thought of having gooey underdone squares containing at least 2 cups of brown sugar and 1.5 cups of butter which haven't chemically reacted properly just made me ill. So I bagged up the entire 9x13 pan of it, minus a few bites from Trent and I, and chucked it in a big plastic bag and threw it in the garbage.

This evening. I had a craving. For one. last. bite.

I can't believe I fucking did that. I'm laughing histarically at myself right now.

Oh it was so righteously worth it.

They're back in the garbage again. without a bag, mixed in among the coffee grounds and banana peel so I won't dare touch it again.

OMG I cannot believe I admitted to this!

Phew!

Oh my gosh. It's done. Finally! Totally done. All I have to do is package it up and send it off to my friend. :)

So what took so long with this freaking project? Nothing, just shameless me wasting time. Got into a winter funk and was unmotivated. Then when I got motivated, I decided to try a "new" way to stitch the binding on by machine, and it looked like hell. So then I had to rip it all apart. Then...well, handstitching it really wasn't thrilling to me. But this weekend, I finally got the courage to tackle it, and believe it or not, I loved handstitching it. It was soothing, calming, and well, the outcome was way better than before.

I've been reading alot of quilting blogs about people who have UFO's and quilt forever but have all of these UnFinishedprOjects on the go. I just can't do that. I need to finish one completely before going on to the next. Now...I'm off to organize all my fabric and decide what ones to place for my bargello quilt pattern.

Toodles.

Oh yes...lots of new photos posted on my mac page....It just takes too long to upload them here..click on the top menu bar for the 3 different pages..Family photos

Ever have those days where you just feel like you're spewing orders all the time?

the following conversation (er...scoldings) just occured while on our trip to and from the library. Am I the only one?

Ethan, stay close, there's cars.
Cameron hold my hand. ow ow ow. hurting. owow well stop yanking your hand out of my hand. we're crossing the parking lot you need to hold my hand.
Ethan, walking feet. Slow down. Ethan, out of the mud, now you need to stomp your feet because it's stuck in your boots. Wipe your feet on the way in.
Cameron stay here. Cameron!! me doi it me do it okay you can put the books in the slot. me do it. ME DO IT
ethan cameron walking feet...walking!! (Ethan grabbing Cams jacket to slow him down) Shrieking.

Jibber jabber about the library..get books. sign them out.

Can you go wait at the red bench please. Cameron, this way. Cameron, away from the doors. No you can't have Dora yet, we need to give them to the lady. (shrieking)

Ethan, away from the doors, there's people trying to get through and they don't want to squash you.

hold my hand. Hold my hand. Off the slope. out of the mud guys! Cameron, walk forward (walking backwards) Ethan, slow down, we need to wait for Cameron. Cameron, hold my hand. want doraWANT DORA
you can have dora when we get home.
shrieking.
Hold my hand there's cars coming out. Ethan! Right beside me NOW! Pay attention, that car just about backed into you. It didn't see you!

Watch the door, it's a tight parking spot. Careful Careful!

(getting into the car now)
hurts. hurts.
lean back so it's not so tight then, Cameron.
want dora WANT DORA!
I put the bag in the front seat. You can have dora when we get home.

Close the door.

ahhhh. Silence. They're locked in, I can breathe a little. I take a deep breath before I open my door to get in. Take a moment to look at the clearing skies and try to calm myself and remember that this is just a little moment in the grand scheme of things. For some reason, I'm very agitated at this moment, but the deep breath helps. I'm on my way home again.

open the door. Step in.

mama picking nose! mama picking nose!
Mommmeeeeeeeeeeeah! Camerons' picking his nose and putting it in his mouth. Mommeeeeah, he just did it again.

The last hour was one of those Calgon take me away moments.[/i]

Ha!

All the times my husband laughs at me because I watch the Shopping Channel from time to time. (usually once a day to see the Today's Showstopper at 10pm for about 5 minutes) I've purchased a few things from there and really like some the things I've purchased. I like their 30 day money refund/satisfaction guarantee, and the shipping is not outrageous either.

Anyways...I filled out a survey online for them... and I won $100 gift card from them! It arrived today!!!! Yay me!!!

Can't do it

I'm back on the forum I thought I'd take a break from. I'm not going to take it so seriously now, and just read and post the fun stuff.

Weekend

What a great weekend...Trent and I spent most of the weekend dreaming and pondering our future, spent time with the boys.... When I mean dreaming and pondering our futures, we pick a possibility (today was open up a Cobb's Bakery in South Carolina) and then discuss all the pitfalls, and hopefuls as well with the idea. Weird I know. But that's how we got to where we are, so it can't be that weird. 11 years ago (omg almost 12 now!) we would lay in our bedroom of our basement suite rental and hash out how to get out of his mail room job and where we would be 10 years from then.


Trent made a divine roast on the bbq yesterday, with roasted potatoes/onion/carrots and a very fancy salad as well. Glass of wine and ice cream for dessert made for a great night. I love when he cooks, he's so good at it.

Bought Ethan&Cam a new toy yesterday, a playmobil dinosaur set. I'll probably pick up one more kit to go with it, they are just loving it so much. They set it up in and amongst the trains (or rather the trains amongst the dinosaur stuff). The next kit has a little safari type car with a trailer cage and a few more skeletons/dinosaur things for the dinosaur experts. I'm always amazed at the playability of some toys vs others.

We had an easy weekend, little to do, and Trent had little work on his mind, which is always good. I pointed out that he was less stressed this week. He pointed out that his boss has been away for the week. *lightbulb*