Beaded thimble holder

I am thinking of teaching this project at Quilt festival in September.  I have to send the proposal in next week.  I think I will also send a proposal to teach the Toni Whitney Grizzly bear "Autumn Eyes".

It will be hard, but fun.  I am teaching the thimble holders to my Knotthead friends at our quilt retreat in March, which will be at my house. We are actually the Knotts group but knottheads kind of fits. I have to clean my house and move out my furniture so there will be room.

That was fun!

Wow!  That was fun!  Everyone has picked a quilt and they liked doing it.  I got a kick out of the process so I will probably do it again.  I actually have enough quilt tops done already for next year, I just need to quilt them.
Just to clear a few things up.
Ben, These are "Use" quilts.  You will probably have to inherit the "Look at" quilts. Sorry, you will have to paint that wall after all.
I know it appears that the order was from whitest (Sarah) to not so white (Val), but that was pure chance, and also very funny. Maybe next year I will have someone from a remote area do the drawing. When Sarah was drawn first I expected someone to say, " Yeah, because Sarah is Mom's favorite." Sure enough, Sarah herself said it. But I let the draw stand even knowing I was going to get flack. And you have to admit, her excitement was pretty funny. Sometimes having children is a huge chore even when most of them are over 30!  I'm glad Val ended up with the Valentine quilt, cause she is Val.  I thought that was appropriate.
Abby already claimed her quilt.
Caleb is only 16, I'm not wasting a quilt on him yet. Maybe next year.
Love you all.  It sure was fun that you were excited to get one of my quilts.

Quilts for Christmas

 I'm sure you will all be happy to know that I now have teeth! 
 I have decided to give all my children a quilt for Christmas.  I am putting a picture and description here so they can pick which one they want. Since I'm sure they will all want the same one, I will draw names to see who will draw first, second etc.
This is the order of the draw.
Sarah
Andrea
Betsy
Hannah
Abby
Valerie

Here are the quilts.

                             Purple Mystery-56 inches x 56 inches

                                                              Crazy Hearts-54x69  (Abby)

                                                  Valentine Hearts-78x85 (Val)

                                  Cowboys-67x81 (Sorry for the bad picture) (Hannah)

                                              Civil War X's and O's- 75x83 (Betsy)

                                               Simple Frustration-71x86 (Andrea)

                                                   Purple and Turquoise Boxes- 63x75

                                                     Homespun clover-72x98 (Sarah)
Pick which one you want and I'll get it to you, starting with Sarah. There will be one left over. Love you guys 

I can't believe I'm sharing this

 I can't believe I'm sharing this.  Last week I had some teeth pulled and bone grafted.  I cannot have any temporary teeth until the graft is safe, another 1-2 weeks. I HAVE TO GO AROUND IN PUBLIC LIKE THIS FOR 3 WEEKS!!!!  I try not to smile at people and  I talk with my lips covering my teeth, but can only maintain that for about 4 1/2 minutes. So I get a lot of funny looks and spend a lot of time explaining my dental woes. It is painful to eat so I dropped another couple of pounds (not a bad thing). This time next year I should have a mouthful of beautiful teeth.

 In the meantime I am finishing a lot of quilts.  This cute bear is my souvenir from Alaska. Great fun to make and awesome to look at.

This is the Christmas quilt I finished last year but didn't get back from the quilter until January, so I didn't bind it until yesterday.

This is one of the quilts I sold to pay for my Ipad.

This is another one I sold to pay for my Ipad.

By the way.  I LOVE MY IPAD!

Also, I won another ribbon with my "In the beginning" quilt. I've entered it in 3 shows and came home with 3 ribbons. Nice....

.So I need to hide in my basement and finish a bunch of quilts.  I have 12 waiting to be quilted.

Alaska Cruise

We went to Alaska on a cruise.  I wasn't real excited about going someplace COLD on a cruise.  That just seems wrong somehow. Until I saw Ketchikan.  It looks just like Northern Idaho which I LOVE.  I absolutely loved the whole cruise.  This is Ketchikan.

We went with 10 people in Jim's family, and some of us rode in a float plane!  It was so fun!

We saw a family of Orca's.

We saw Humpback whales from the side of the ship everyday.  I got several pictures of "Flukes" which are their tails as they dive.  They were huge and magnificent.  I wish I could have touched them.

The scenery was nearly prehistoric. I couldn't catch my breath.

We saw several Glacier's.  We sailed down Tracy's Arm to see Sawyer's Glacier which was the biggest we saw.  This one came clear to the water and big pieces would "calve" off.  There were mini icebergs all over in the water.

Of course it was very COLD by the glacier.

We even saw fresh steaming bear poop on our hike.
I lost my cell phone, found a great quilt shop in Skagway and ate myself into a near coma.  All in all, a great vacation.