Still not too many signs of spring here, so I'm posting the bunny who lives with us. Hopefully he will be in his outdoor habitat soon! Nigel is a bit unusual, we think he is blind in one eye, however since he isn't awfully cooperative with vision tests it's kind of hard to tell. The veterinarian who took care of him after an unusual medical situation last summer said his eye was gone, so we started calling him our pirate bunny. The whole family wanted me to make him a little quilted eye patch! However, once his scabs healed up we found that he did indeed still have his own eye! Seems as though we can never have a normal pet.

Yesterday was one of those wild spring days I think we only get in Wisconsin. We broke temperature records, I think I saw 81 degrees, but the Wisconsin part is that there was still snow on the ground in a number of places. Of course everyone was wearing shorts and tank tops and having a great time, and then whammo, just like we all figured, it's windy and cold today. Mother nature likes to tease us like that.

quilt show

Today begins the quilt show for my local guild. I'm doing security tonight, which means staying overnight with the quilts, finishing up anything the "day crew" didn't get done, and (now this is the best part) checking out all the quilts and looking at all the venders things without anyone else around!

We do a "quilt walk" prior to the show, where we put quilts in the windows of local businesses, that's what the picture here is. The last several shows I have had high school age kids who were going to solo and ensemble the next day and I have always been exhausted for that. This year the 3 oldest are either on their own or in college, and the youngest is in 7th grade. So, of course, I thought this would work out great! Wrong! I'm working on Saturday, which is my own fault. This is a "recreational employment type part time job" so I usually take whatever they offer me. I forgot I'd be up all night the night before.

My New Home........ in my old home

Someone asked for pictures of my treadle machines. Well the one at the right is my New Home machine. I have it in my sewing room, someday I would really like to use it to make a small quilt top. I just don't know enough about treadles to try it yet. This machine was purchased by my sweet husband at an antique shop. It came with a bunch of parts that I am completely clueless about, it also came with the needle case in the picture. What is really cool is that there are still needles in that needle case! I am working on a shadow box/picture type thingie (highly technical term that) to display some of these cool finds. I also have vintage thread spools and buttons on cards.

Sewing Machines, let me count the ways....

Yesterday when the sun came up it looked soooooooo neat, my husband said it was a sun column formed by ice crystals in the air. Whatever it was, it was beautiful and I had to share a picture with my online friends....

Topic of the week:

I have 5 sewing machines. The one I use all the time is my wonderful Viking. What else would a girl whose family is from Minnesota have??? I also have a serger that I absolutely HAD to have, and never use, My husbands grandma's little sewing machine, and two treadle machines. I really hope someday to use one of them. I've never gotten around to finding the time to work with that though. There is one other sewing machine, wait, two other sewing machines in my sewing room. They belong to my 13 year old daughter. One is an antique toy sewing machine that I got her on eBay years ago thinking that it would give me more time to sew if she had her own little (safe) machine. No such luck! I had to sit right with her and help because it was actually harder to use than my big machine. sigh, then a few years ago we got her a Janome for Christmas and she has been sewing ever since.

A post script for the cat lovers on the list- sweet Cassie caught a mouse yesterday also. Now I know that doesn't seem particularly impressive, but Cassie has been completely de-clawed all her life! Every spring and fall those pesky teeny critters attempt to come into this 100+ year old farmhouse and she catches them!

Thank you to everyone who leaves comments! This is such a nice supportive blog ring.

Spring is on the way! We saw 6 Robins hopping around before church last night! I was wondering what they were doing this morning though when we woke to snow on the ground again! At least it was so warm (36 degrees) today that it melted. whew!

This is my sweet puss, Cassie. Wouldn't she make a great circle quilt? hmmmmm I think I am off to my sewing room again...........

Happy St Patricks Day

When I was a kid, yeah, eons ago- St Patricks day meant that if you didn't wear green you got pinched. I am not Irish by definition, and I hated St Pat's day! It seems to be better now. ;-)
It's Saturday, 3 of the kids are home and still asleep (yippee), my sweetie is at work, and I am heading up to my sewing room before I get sucked into computerland never to be seen again. Honestly it CAN happen! Where DOES the time go when you are surfing? And it's not like we have a great dsl connection or anything, honestly we are still on DIAL UP!! egad and erlack!
My goal is to get something done, sewn, whatever in there that is picture worthy so I can publish something here to take the place of the snowlady who is a teeny pile of snow in the front yard now. Hmm, spell check thinks that computerland and erlack are not words! who-da-thunk?

I got some star blocks done for my music baby quilt! woo hoo! The colors aren't as bright in the picture, but I can't tell if that is my monitor or the camera.

Well, it's a good start and I'm happy!

That snow lady needs to go!

I wanted to wait for some real signs of spring to take pictures of before I got rid of the snow lady picture, but the first signs of spring in Wisconsin are mud, mud, and well, more mud. And to be honest, mud is just not that photogenic. sigh! The snow lady went the way of the wicked witch in Oz....... she just went melting and melting and melting.
What I am grateful for today:
*My sweet husband who honked and waved at me as he sped past on his way to the bank
*The tax mistake that got fixed today and resulted in a refund instead of a payment!
*My lovely cousin Anne
*My girls going out together and not fighting (anywhere that I could hear)
*Tundra happy to see me and feeling spry again
*Waking up to the smell of coffee, made by my sweetie
*Lots of ideas
*An interesting book on CD

UFO's

Hmmmmm, UFO's,
If I were to choose my oldest UFO, it would be sort of mine by default. I inherited some old hand pieced blocks from my husbands grandmother, who was hanging on to them from her mother. I'm the only one on this side of the family who quilts, so I was lucky and got those along with a crazy quilt that needs to have the edges finished, and an absolutly gorgous hand pieced hand quilted full size one that is still in excellent shape. The nearest we can figure for age of that one is well over 100 years. I've gotten these blocks out several times, and I just need to have something hit me as to how to finish them. There are several different "sets". Among them is a set of 3 very old polished cotton basket blocks that I have thought about framing instead of sewing. Most of the others are bow tie blocks or 4 patches.
I'm really not sure how many UFO's I actually have. Some people count them only if they have started cutting. But I have so many ideas, and fabrics pulled to go with them, that I feel like they are "started" even though I haven't actually done any cutting or sewing.
My biggest problem with finishing these is that I always seem to need to start something else for a gift or an occasion or something. I had planned to really get moving on some things this winter, but I was interrupted by a wedding, and now there are 2 babies coming this year that I want to do something for......

quilt guild

Last night I went to my quilt guild meeting (this would be the local guild, not the "one of the worlds smallest quilt guilds". I very judiciously took a tote bag full of quilt magazines, and patterns that I no longer need or want. Good way to clean out the sewing room right?
Well, wouldn't you know it, as I was putting them on the sharing table, someone else came in with an even bigger bag of FABRIC!!! Yikes! I lost all sense of will power and snatched up some pieces big enough for backings, then some cute as a bug cat fabric, then there was some pretty pink woven ribbon looking stuff, then there were some strips that I knew I could put in with my scrap strings, then there was this one piece that was sooooooooo ugly that I just knew no one would want to take it home....... well, you are getting the picture right? Yes, I went home with an even bigger bag of stuff to find space for in my sewing room. sigh sigh sigh.
Oh well, I'm over it! Time to go see if it really was as ugly as I thought it was last night.
If it is........... there's always the sharing table at next month's meeting................