A Very Merry Maukmas!

Not much quilting going on the last few days. The clock's a tickin' and I'm not sure if I'm going to meet my deadline! (but sshhhh, don't tell anyone, I think the Juki might be already under the tree!!) Squeal!!!!

We're having our Christmas (A very Merry Maukmas) tomorrow, as my husband has to leave on the 25th to head to work for a trip.

I probably won't be checking back in here until after Christmas, so have a super holiday, blogland!

Dusting off the Pfaff

Hello!! Hello Hello Hello!!! It's been quiet around here. I'm not sure if this blog is even listed on anyone's reader anymore ~ but I just wanted to let everyone know that I've been quilting up a storm lately and I'm blogging all about it over at my new blog ~ please come visit. I miss my quilty bloggy buddies! Come see what I've been working on ~ and how I"m going to get myself a new Juki!!!!!!

Just a reminder....

That I'm blogging over at my other blog.

And its GIVEAWAY TIME!! WooHoo!!

Just a reminder......

......that I'm blogging over here now. I don't want anyone to get left behind. And I finally got a new camera so I can finally share the quilty projects I've been working on. Come on over for a chat : )

Keeping it REAL....

I've decided to change the direction of my blog just a wee bit. Don't worry there will still be plenty of crafty quilty stuff (well, "plenty" is a relative word 'round these parts). But I want to include some other things and I wanted to change my url (blog address). So, I'm gonna be packing my bags (widgets, really) and I'm heading out. I'm not going far. I do hope you'll follow me. The new page is still under construction a bit....but please stop by and look around. Feel free to leave a comment. I love those.

Do you have a favorite?

Do you have a favorite Christmas song? We have listened to this one over and over and over again. Ben has learned how to spell Christmas just from typing the title into youtube. He's obsessed with this song. I had no idea I had such a little social activist on my hands : )

(Ben doesn't believe me that Boy George is a boy! HA!)

Building & Drawing & Markers, oh my!

A while ago (ok fine, like back in Sept. I know) I bought a book case that I asked Jason to put together for me. Of course Ben helped and we called it Life Learning. Ben called it playing during school time. Either way, my book case got built and then Jason came up with the idea of tracing the boys' outlines and letting them color them in.

"This is a little more complicated than Legos."

Wow. Look at that mess behind Ben. My house doesn't normally look like that. Alright, alright. It does. Don't judge me.


Just realized I do not have pictures of the finished paper men. They are hanging in our kitchen. I'll try to snap some pictures of them tomorrow.

The Breakfast of Champs

I'm having a CT scan today to confirm a hernia diagnosis. Let's just add that to the list of random medical issues I've had to deal with this year. I have not chugged something this unpalatable since my college years. At least then I got to have a nice buzz and a killer hangover the next day. Now all I have is an unsettled stomach. And I get to drink another one in about twenty minutes. Yay me.

**ETA: I just drank the second one. Today will be a success if I don't throw up.**

Homeschool Stuff

Not much sewing going on here lately, I thought I'd share some pictures from our homeschool. As I get more comfortable with the new direction of my blog, I'll post homeschool stuff a little more frequently.


Just ignore the glare here. I had a hard time getting a good picture. Check out those lower case a's. I don't expect 100% perfect handwriting from my son, but I expect that he is taught the proper way to write his letters. Those first a's are what he was permitted to get away with last year in Kindergarten. He was shown the letter and then told to write his own. He was given no direction about where on the line to start, what shape to draw first and how big to make it. Pet Peeve # 1. We are starting from scratch this year with penmanship and trying to break bad habits he's already formed. Ggrrrrr......

This picture just warms my heart. The boys have journal time every morning. They are allowed to draw or write anything they choose. Most pictures involve army guys, explosions and various bad guys. However, on 9/11 Ben chose to draw a picture of our nations flag. The caption reads "I am doing the pledge of allegiance". Now, I should tell you that because of my husband's job, we have sheilded the boys from any news coverage concerning that horrible day. My husband used to be based in NY and now he is based in Boston, so my children do not need to see those awful images of airliners plowing into the WTC. They have no idea that 9/11 is significant or any different than any other day. So the fact that my son chose to draw the above picture on that day leads me to believe that some higher power was at work here.

So I didn't manage to get a birthday post done for my little guy again this year. Thankfully we have relatives that are more on the ball than this guy's Mom. I tear up whenever I watch this. How did my little baby get to be 4 years old already. I love you "wee one".

Happy Thanksgiving!

Gobble Gobble

I have so many things in my life for which to be thankful. I have an amazing husband who puts up with more crap than any man should ever be expected to deal with. I have healthy and happy children and we have a home and warm beds to sleep in every night. I have made some wonderful friends through this blog and the online quilting community and through Facebook I have reconnected with many old friends. For all of this, and so much more, I am eternally grateful. Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours!

Getting Caught Up.....

I apologize if you've seen this post about 100 times in your blog reader. I've been toying with Flickr a bit and blogging from there. I didn't like it. I'm more of an old school kind of girl, I guess. So, this is my block for September of the Stash Busting Bee. I know. I'm behind. I'm getting caught up. Really, I am. Seriously. Don't laugh. I might even get to show you October's block in the next few days. I'm on a roll, kids!

Getting Caught Up

September Stash Busting Bee Block
Originally uploaded by jessicaquilts

This is my block for September of the Stash Busting Bee. I'm a little behind. But I'm getting caught up. Really, I am : )

Betrayal.....

Well, we all got sick again. And this time it looks like it was really the H1N1. The last time my doctor just said it was "highly likely", but this time the pediatrician actually tested Ben and it came back positive. All four of us got sick, so I'd bet my last dollar that my doctor was wrong and NOW, we've finally all had it. Our pediatrician basically admitted that we have all of the antibodies we need now and the vaccine would be redundant. So tell me, why is he still pushing the vaccine anyway? It just annoys me.

I've been able to sew the last few days and it feels so great! Its such an emotional outlet for me. I'm going through some things right now and I'd love to let it all out here, just get it all out and know that afterwards I'd feel much better. BUT, several of my local friends read my blog and nearly ALL of my local friends like to gossip. *sigh* It sucks being back in highschool.

Stay tuned for some yummy, quilty, gorgeous pictures soon!!

Ch, Ch, Changes!

It seemed last year around this time, everyone kept talking about Change. And while I'm still not on board with that particular brand of change, I do believe that changes are good and allow us to grow. Having said that, I've decided to make some changes. Both in my life and in my blogworld. Here we go (you ready?).

1. Education ~ we've kept Ben home this year and have begun our homeschool. It requires a great deal of my time, but I love it. I wouldn't have my life any other way right now. Carter still goes to his preschool. We absolutely love the school & the teachers and they've known him since he was just a few months old.

2. Blogs ~ I have this blog that was originally dedicated to my quilting and my life. I have another blog that was to be all about frugality and pinching pennies. I was also in the process of starting a THIRD blog that would chronicle my homeschooling adventures. It was my dream to show that any average everyday mom could do it. Because, without fail, everytime I mention to someone that I homeschool their response is "oh, I could NEVER do that." And I want to scream and shake them and say "YES YOU COULD!!!"

Each time I go to write a post on any of my blogs I always have to pause and think "which one should it go on?" For instance, I made a few great deals on some homeschool supplies, should I post that on the homeschool blog or the frugal blog? What about just our regular homeschool days? That's my life. I want to share it here, but it also should go on the other blog.

So, I've made a decision. I will have ONE blog. Afterall, this blog is about my life. I'm a quilting, frugal, homeschooling mom. I wish my life were so neatly compartmentalized, but its not. All of the little pieces keep overlapping. No matter how hard I try to keep them all seperate :P.

3. Another recent change has been the daily addition of Green Smoothies to our routine. They taste fabulous, they make us feel better and it gets some veggies into the kids. Something I've rarely been able to do in my 7+ years of being a mother.

So, if you've made it this far in this post, I congratulate you. It took me several tries to get here myself, and I'm the one writing it! Quilting has been put on hold while I'm trying to get everything caught up still from being sick. But I hope you'll continue to join me & my family on our random adventures!
Cheers!

OINK OINK!!

It appears my house has been infiltrated with the SWINE FLU!! I've been in bed for the better part of two weeks. I'm just now starting to feel human again, but I fear the kids may be getting sick. I haven't even touched fabric or looked at my sewing machine in weeks.....I'll be back. Soon.

I'm alive.....barely

There is something pollenating here in our small town that has KO'd half of my friends. My allergies haven't bothered me at all since we've moved here until this year. Ben and I are both miserable. It rained last night and I woke up finally being able to breath, but I have a nagging cough that is irritating my asthma.

So now that you've heard all the gory details of our funk, go back and enjoy your coffee! : ) I'll be back when my head either explodes or drains empty!

How do you design??

I decided to throw my hat in the ring for DQS 7.

I had an idea in my head, so I started with these (which is evidently where I start with every doll quilt swap...

I put them together like this......

....and then it grew into this. Which is absolutely nothing like the orignal design in my head. But I love it. And I don't want to send it away.

Sometimes when I have an idea in my head, its hard to get it to work with fabric. So I don't stress about it. The fabric and the blocks will tell you how they want to play, you just have to open enough to listen. So how do you design? Do you tell the fabric what to do? Or do you let the fabric call the shots?

Some Eye Candy....

These pictures were all taken last week before my emergency cleaning spree, but I didn't get a change to post them. Since I haven't done anything blog worthy all week, I thought they would make a good filler post until my life becomes interesting again!



This fall I will be making the boys matching bed quilts to go on their bunk beds. I need 21 different fabrics. Ben vetoed one of the fabrics in this stack (the yellow one under the red & white stars), and I've since purchased a few more. I'm almost ready to start cutting. There will be a little bit of extra fabric from each cut, so I think I'm going to make a Bento Box out of the scraps for a floor quilt or picnic quilt.

This is another set of strings for my CYOC swap. This was random purples around a white center.

I've also mentioned in the past that I'm involved with the Sunshine Charity Quilts (online group). For the month of June (I know, I'm late, don't judge me) Bonnie was collecting string blocks to donate to the Heartstrings Group (of which I am also a member). We're only requested to send in two blocks each month, but I was on a roll with my string piecing and I wanted to make a dent in my strings stash. The dent was negligible.....

We are actually able to breath today, even the though temps are still in the high 90's. I'm considering turning on my sewing machine tonight or maybe tomorrow. I sure hope I don't melt.

I'm here....

I'm here, I'm alive, but I'm melting! The house showing went off with out a hitch. But we won't be selling. I don't think we'll be able to come together on a price. They want to pay fair market value (and I can't blame them), but we aren't really prepared to move, or sell. So, in order to do so, we'd need a little more financial motivation. And they aren't willing to pay that. So, we're ok with it. This is where we are supposed to be. My friend, Sarah, just had a beautiful addition added to her house and she gave her contractor a glowing recommendation. It just so happens that she's not only a great bloggy friend, but a Real Life friend as well. And we live in the same small town. So, we're going to talk with her contractor and seeing about doing an addition here. Then our house will nearly be perfect. And we could live here indefinitely, you know. In case this market never really does turn around!

So, I got the house all tidied up and lookin' spiffy. But I haven't sat down with my machine yet. Good Lord, its been so HOT here! The thought of sitting in front of a machine, with a hot computer and hot light. Next to a hot iron. ...... ugh, I couldnt do it. I think the heat has peaked and so hopefully it'll only be a few more days before we're back to "normal" ~ whatever that is....