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Tuesday, February 21, 2012

What true sacrifice can I make for Lent?

I've contemplated over giving up facebook yet again for the 3rd year in a row for Lent.... but sorta wanted to do something else... something new... but can't think of anything. In past years I've drank only water for 40 days, given up using the elevator when I was in college and lived on the 6th floor, no chocolate.... and several other things...

But for this year, a *real sacrifice* for me would be to give up using the computer all together for leisure time. I don't watch a lot of TV, instead I enjoy reading blogs and commenting... Sure, either David or I have to use the computer to make sure the bills are all up to date and paid... but this year for Lent, (starting tomorrow, Ash Wednesday) I'm gonna give up my time at the computer! 
That includes Facebook both computer and my phone, so if you need to contact me, text or call me or email. I'll read those on my phone and reply.  I will surely miss Blog Hopping the most!  I may just have to bag up my laptop and tell David to stick it in his truck for the next 40 days to help my temptation! lol
I'm hopeful that this year's Lenten Journey will be one of the best yet. May each of you reading this also enjoy this time to prepare our hearts for Jesus this Easter. ♥ to all of my facebook and blogger quilting friends!!! 
See you again in April after Easter!
Love from Indiana!

Has it really been 15 years??

15 years ago tonight, David and I said "I Do" to a life together as Man and Wife.  We choose 2/21 because both his mom's parents, and dad's parents (both sets of his grandparents) also married on February 21st :)

How can time pass so quickly??  How is it that I can remember so much from some of those years, and yet have ave no recollection to some of those years in-between???  I know that it was a long wait for us to become a family - 8 years waiting for our first baby and then, BAM within 3 years we had 3 kids!  Life since then has been so fun, and challenging at times, but so worth the wait!

I'm so thankful God choose David for me and the kids.  He is truly a great, great man!!  I love him so much.  Thanks David for putting up with me this long and being my best friend..... I hope we have many more years together! 

Wow - I had to log back in to edit this and share two more photos.  Just a few moments after I posted this, there was a knock at the front door....  Are you Mrs. Minor?? the girl asked.

Thanks to Olivia having my camera in her hands, you can see my reaction after bringing them into the living room and setting them down on the marble coffee table. ;)

Thank you David!!!  You totally caught me off guard and totally surprised me! I've forgotten how long it's been since I received roses, but the feeling is the same as I remember.... I'm a little bit giddy now :D  Thanks again honey.  I love you always too!



Love from Indiana!

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

We're having SNOW much fun on Valentine's Day 2012

Guess who's having SNOW much fun today on Valentine's???  It's really the first big snow of the season. 
Olivia
 
Paul Thomas
 
Nora
 
Who, just couldn't wait to start throwin snowballs at each other, and me!
 
Happy Vlaentine's Day!!!
 
Love from Indiana!

Monday, February 13, 2012

Design Wall Monday - TWO Tops to share!

Today is Monday which means for quilters time for show-n-tell also known as JudyL's Design Wall Monday :)  But today instead of taking a photo from my sewing room design wall, I'm gonna take you outside and show you two tops that I've put together.  It feels so good to have rows sewn together and to this stage!

 
First up, my most recent blocks on the design wall - this top is called Hand Me Downs and comes from Bonnie Hunter's first book Scraps & Shirttails.  It will have another 12 star blocks that will become part of the outside border.  The pattern calls for a 9x9 block setting, but I only had enough navy homespun setting fabrics to make mine an 8x9 block setting.  It will be perfect "sofa size" :)
 
After getting the shirtings cleaned up and put away for now, I spent time looking for the solid shirts I'd saved to use for my outside borders, but could not locate them. (Remember I'm not 100% unpacked in the sewing room, and anything still boxed up is just gonna have to stay that way until we buy our new home.)
So I opened up the next USPS Priority - that was labeled "My Blue Heaven" and thought I'd see about putting more of those blocks together.  You may remember that before we moved from Texas, I borrowed a few Priority Boxes from the USPS and used them to kit up a few projects so that I'd have something to work on here in the rental house... and b/c those boxes are red/white/blue they are easy to spot! :)    To my surprise, the blocks were already partially sewn into segments and several had pins in them from the last time I'd had them out on the sewing room floor - so it was easy to spend the afternoon sewing them together and getting these rows into a TOP! :)

Did you see my little "Monkey Helper" in the photo above???  Olivia was so willing and ready to help hand me pins off my magnetic pin holder Sunday afternoon. :)  I sewed together 5x5 large stars and it was taking up the whole floor and then some.... and thought surely this was big enough....
...and couldn't wait to take it upstairs with me to see how it fit our King size bed.   You can't tell from the photo but the side closest to the camera has a nice hangover and should be perfect after I add a 2" border of blue and then 2" finished HST's and another 3" of blue.... but the opposite side of the bed the blocks are ending right at the edge of the mattress - so it needs another row to be wide enough....  GOOD thing I have more sets of blocks left in my project box!! :)  Yeaaa! :)  

We only have my 1st ever quilt that I made for David before we married that we use on our bed and it's not quite wide enough but we make it work... at the time he had a King size waterbed so hangover amount wasn't considered - just enough to tuck in each side.... but this one will fit the bed or ELSE. lol
I took this photo today, outside hanging over the neighbor's fence.  Aren't all those scraps scrumptious!  ;)
  
Lastly, above are two photos of EQ7 design plans that my friend Crazy'boutquilts came up with :)  This will give you a better idea of where I'm headed with the "My Blue Heaven"quilt.

EDITED TO ADD - I'm so thankful that Crazy'boutquilts and I spent a year swapping these blocks!!  It was a lot of fun getting envelopes of blocks made for me every few months and certainly helped to make this project have not only more variety, but less of a challenge.  :)  She is also the one who introduced me to Triangulations software for making many HST's at once!  Thanks Sandie!!!

Be sure to click on over to JudyL's blog and take a look at what everyone else has shared for Design Wall Monday. It's my favorite place to visit on Mondays! :)  Have a great week everyone!

Love from Indiana!