Vacation Part 2

So, how was everybody's festivities?! I have to tell you everything was even better than I could have anticipated for and it was nice to spend time with family.

So, Meg (the SIL living in Egypt) was home and brought her boyfriend and his Mom to meet the family. The crazy thing is not only do they both study Egyptology and live in Egypt, she met him there and their parents live a mere 5 hours apart on the other side of the planet. How weird, right?

Well, did I ever tell you how much I love this girl? For one, we did Christmas with her while she was home and I gave her Candy-Coated Dreams which was made just for her. And then she gave me the most beautiful Egyptian Cotton scarf, handmade earrings, and an awesome bag from a local Market in their neighborhood. And with all of the excitement, I forgot my camera! I know Meg took some pictures and I'm going to force her to take pictures of her and her quilt in Egypt and e-mail them to me so I can show them to you! And I will take pictures with my new scarf (it's very Ruby Blue!)

Alright, well my belly has been overflowing for a good week now and I hope yours is too. Well, actually now that I think about it, I was well stuffed before Thanksgiving ever came around. No matter what you've hear about food on cruise ships, it's true. It's so good, so rich, and you can't stop eating! The great thing is you can be a bit adventurous too and try new things in small doses.

 My saving grace was where our room was located. See those balconies all the way at the back of the ship? Ours was the last one all the way on the bottom left. Lots of walking, unfortunately I think I justified a bit too much over-indulgence with walking, but it was a vacation...

 I still cannot get over the sunrises and sunsets...

 Our next port was to be Half Moon Cay, but if you notice the seas in the sunset picture above, we didn't make it. Luckily for us we were able to detour into Freeport.

 Small town, beautiful hotels, lovely beach, another casino, and shopping!

 It would have been a great day to spend at the beach but it was really sunny, and hot, and my Hubbin and I would have looked like lobsters in 5 minutes flat...but it was nice. Then we were on our way.

 We went back under the bridge just as the sun was coming up.

 And saw a couple of dolphins... (YAY!!!)

And the colors continued on our way home, this was somewhere over Charlotte, NC and the end to a wonderful few days away from it all. But I do have to say, it's good to be home!

Friday is here!

I'm so glad it's Friday! And to make it better I have tomorrow off for the first time in a long time! And I'm planning on spending Sunday in my pj's and sewing until I can't sew no more! (Yet another sentence my High School English teacher would just love me for :] ) Tomorrow the Hubbin and I are heading to look at yet another car, love my Rendezvous, it's just not loving me right now. And then we are heading to the outlet mall for a little retail therapy!

I'm really looking forward to this weekend, I see big things getting accomplished in my future (or I can hope)! *Candy-Coated Dreams should be hitting stores this week, ask for it at your local store. *Hoping to get another quilt quilted this week. *Attempting to at least get the blocks made for my largest quilt yet. *Went from working out on my new elliptical for 3 minutes to 17 in a week or so. *We'll see where else the wind might take me this week.

This past Tuesday I had another Wonder Woman Day (before 9am I cleaned 2 bathrooms, washed the dog, trimmed the other dog's nails, washed sheets and towels, vacuumed the house, scrubbed the kitchen floors and managed to eat breakfast and watch the news for a bit too). I'm crossing my fingers at this moment in hopes that another one of these amazing days will hit me this week as well. I love progress, it makes me happy.

So, sorry for the rambling today, just relaxing right now with an adult beverage after a long week and enjoying the night jamming to my new music bought from iTunes. Not much else on the docket for tonight. And that is perfectly fine with me. Hope you enjoy your weekend and let me know what you've been up to. Oh, and just a thought, since fall will be here before we know it and it's my favorite time of the year to cook, I was thinking of sharing some of my favorite recipes. Let me know what you like or would like to try. Maybe we could make it the Fall Featured Recipe on here? Thinking and typing, can you tell? Take care and until next time!

And they're off!

The quilting machine that is! I truly honestly forgot how much fun it is to quilt (that is when it's going good) but I also forgot how physical of a process it is. You really do not realize how involved it is or how many muscles you use doing it until you REALLY feel it. Or it could just be that it's reminding me how out of shape I am - nah, that couldn't be it!

I attempted to quilt three projects on Tuesday within a very short window of time. (error #1) And then I still had to do a final press on all of them before each one was loaded onto the machine. (error #2) Also, I changed threads, top and bottom, for each quilt. No two quilts used the same color in them at all, and I forgot how much time that took. (error #3)

But aside from those small things I seem to usually forget about when my Wonder Woman persona comes into play - you know those days when you get up and have a to do list that's a mile long and think you're going to get it all done and then some - HAHAHAHA - I should know better, really. I couldn't finish the biggest project, the quilt, and I had to call it quilts for the day. It was over half done, only had a little bit left to go, but I was done. I was physically exhausted and I had a husband at home wanting some dinner soon, so we left it til tomorrow.

My one job is just down the road so once I got off of work yesterday, no biggie, we went and finished it and I LOVE IT!!! I'm giving this one as a gift, and I really hope she'll like it. This is just a shot of the back that I added this little pieced stripe into with a label already in it (my good thought for that day). I will show you the front soon, it needs to get trimmed, a couple threads need to be buried, and it needs the binding added. Then I can take pictures and send it to the printers - and then you can see the front. I hope you'll like it too! It's a brighter quilt, some of the fabrics used on the front are in the pieced stripe on the back. Be on the lookout for the preview of Candy-Coated Dreams in the near future.

You remember this one I showed you a couple weeks ago? This was the latest version of the Charmed Living Runner, now it's all quilted. I just free handed this puppy (as I do with all of mine that I quilt) I added some loops and the occasional holly leaf every so often. I tried to get a close up of the quilting detail so you could see it, but you'll have to look closely (If you click on the pictures, it should enlarge them). I used a Signature Variegated Thread called Woodlands. It has a little red, tan, and black in it that worked really well with the fabrics I chose. This runner will be for sale at the Wildwood Quilt Guild's Annual Show this November so if you're in the Mentor area, stop in at the Senior Center on the 7th and take a look at all of the wonderful quilts on display. We also have a quilt that will be raffled, other quilted items for sale (like the runner) and about 15 vendors selling all kinds of goodies as well. Stop on out and see us, this quilt could be yours!

Well, now that I have quilted these projects, they are in need of binding that I'm wishing the binding fairy would show up and take care of, but I hear she's off duty this week. Figures. I guess that means I know what I'm tackling today, and tomorrow, and the next day, but I enjoy it so it'll be fine.

As mentioned before, I will be working on releasing the pattern to Candy-Coated Dreams in the near future as well as working an another Moda Bake Shop project. Stay tuned in for that too! Well, this day has to get started at some point and I'm thinking there's no better time than the present. Tata!