What Are Quilters Blogging About Today?

A wonderful, quilting-filled long weekend—despite the monsoon rains.

I visited Katrina this past weekend for some good girlfriend time—and the bonuses included (1) a guild meeting where Katrina was the program speaker and both of us won door prizes, (2) attending the Q.U.I.L.T. Guild of Northwest Arkansas’s biannual show, and (3) quilting the Tattoo quilt! 

Katrina belongs to a longarm quilting guild, and she presented a topic near and dear to me—organization. I loved hearing her ideas as well as ideas from the other guild members. 

After the meeting, we slogged our ...

 This morning, Patrick wanted to go to the casino. It didn't turn out good. We were there 3 hours, but went through a lot of money. Which was okay, since we are still on the money we won in November, but it's starting to go down again. 

On the way home, I received a message to call Donna. When I did, she called to tell me Smiley passed away. Broke my heart. He was a very kind man. I met him when we were bowling about 15 years ago. Then I talked him into helping me with QOV ...

 This morning, I slept in. Patrick woke me up to get ready for our BE meeting at the grange. I headed out with the quilts I wanted mom to put labels on and my stuff. 

Arrived and Geralyn was right behind me. We chatted a bit before Sandy arrived and then mom. Mom gave me a pillow that her mother made with BE. She asked me a while back if I could fix it. I told her I would. 

It's beautiful! I need to find the flower pattern for the center flower. I know one of us has the ...

 This morning, Patrick woke and went back to bed. He was going to golf this morning but decided it was too dark and cold to go. I got up a little later and the left to pick up Sandy. We (I) decided to go and have a drink. We went to Fiddler's in Centralia were people go to get coffee/tea and can sit in the lounge as long as they want. I found a couple people who were studying and then fell asleep. lol We were there a good 2 hours just chatting and munching. Sandy and I ...

Yellow is the RSC colour of the month, and I've done a little  stitching for my  block sets.  Not much yellow at all in my bag of 2.5in squares to make my framed four patches, but it just had to do.  I'm using those squares up, not cutting new ones.  And I cut some yellow strips for my black and white blocks.

Yellow RSC blocks

I enjoyed a lunch out with friends this week, I have known these ladies for over 40 years, so we go back a while.  Robin and I have been meeting up with ...

This morning, I head to the post office to send out Bryan's stuff for the family history. Then went to DB to get my chai tea. Decided on iced tea. Then went on the grange where Sandy from Ocean Shores was waiting. We chatted a bit and then Sandy came with her arm in a sling.  Her surgery went well. We chatted out my family and all the issues there. We chatted about Sandy's surgery and chatted out Ocean Shores Sandy's husband and her wonderful time with her sisters. It was a very good catch-up meeting. I ...

 I've finished the last of the blue sewing for RSC this month.    I'm on a quest to use up the last remaining few selvedge strips this year and found a small handful of blue ones.  So, another double handed oven mitt was created.   Just like the pink  ones I stitched last month, there were just enough strips to use on the top of the pockets, and I used dark blue fabric for the rest.  Insulbrite and toweling in the middle, and hessian (sacking) on the back.

This morning, I was up and found Patrick was thinking ahead of me. I wanted to drop off the garage sale stuff for Colleen. He had it on the table before I even walked out in the living room. Then he put it in the car for me. What a sweet fella! 

He headed up to Olympia for his blood tests. I told him I would pick up his coffee from Starbucks since there was a free on. He couldn't get his usual, but I did get him the Pike's Place coffee on my way home. 

Went to ...

There has been much discussion about friends at this retreat. What is a friend? Do you have a friend you could call at 3 a.m. if you need help? As we went about our business yesterday, I looked at my pencil. Oh my!!!

Oh my!!!

I got quite a chuckle from that. 

But a bit of chaos happened at the house earlier in the day. You know what I'm talking about if you saw the picture on Facebook. Those red chairs around the firepit were calling for someone to sit in them. I had no takers. Seriously? We ...

 This morning, I was enjoying sleeping in. It felt good, but I was still up before 9 am. lol 

Patrick went golfing around noon. Then Debbie called and asked if I would like to go get "coffee" and I told her "sure." So, she picked me up and we went to Dutch Brothers. Then we stopped at the museum, and I paid my dues. I hadn't gotten a reminder, but told Sam I would pay. 

Came home and I was watching my British shows - "Vera" and "Marple" which I like. Patrick doesn't care for those, and I don ...

—they hit every January. 

This morning, I needed stop and get gas before heading to the Grange. I got gas and coffee for Sandy. Once that was done, I headed to the Grange. Sandy E had just arrived when I did. So, we chatted for a while. Then Sandy V arrived, and we had a good visit. Poor Sandy E wasn't in the mood to work on anything, so she chatted. Mom can in about 30 minutes after we did. It was a good visit, and mom had the baby quilt about half done already. She wanted me to draw the bunny rabbit ...

 This tablecloth dates back to 2012 when we traveled to the South Island with three other caravans for a three month trip.  I took along some pre sewn  rail fence blocks made up of strips of New Zealand inspired fabrics alternating with pale grey and my Micron ink pen. 

Table cloth documenting our mammoth South Island trip

 Our old cat Muffy was 16 years old back then and we had always placed her in a cattery when we traveled.  But I worried that at her age she might die while we were away, so we took her on  her very ...

I am hopeful that 2025 is a year of discovery, fun, family and friend gatherings...but mostly, quilting!

Hey, it is what it is! I spent the bulk of my first month of retirement just relaxing, and that was good for me. Very little happened in the way of quilting other than tearing off the foundation paper from the Tattoo Quilt and adding sashing to the blocks. In the crafting area, I played with my ScanNCut and cut out names from vinyl for each of our granddogs and grandcats (and our own Jolene and Jedi) and adhered them to bandanas ...

Recently a former co-worker-turned-friend called me and asked the standard opening question - How are you? Unable to hide my sadness, because I had received yet another rejection email, I replied - I've been better.

I've been better

In a year so dark, it is easy to pinpoint the two bright spots:

1. Our long-awaited trip to Hawaii ...

 This morning, we were up bright and early. Patrick had his kidney doctor appointment, and it was at 8:30 am.  We were out the door in time. Got up there and were in and out pretty quickly. Even Patrick's blood draws were done fast. I like his kidney doctors, she's a kick and she's on it with his medications. She's the first one to call him when his electrolytes are off. Too bad she's not a GP, or I would go to her! lol 

We then went to Costco! OH, MY! It was crowded ...

Back to forgetting to post at night lol.

Yesterday was cleaning up in the morning.  Trash day is today so needed to clean up. Played my games for an hour before I needed to get to the Brit Bites in Centralia.  We were early.  They were getting everything set up because the ones before us were just leaving.  They had it at 11 am and 2 pm. We did 2 pm. 

Sandy V, Sandy E, Geralyn and myself.  Geralyn and I had earl Grey tea while both Sandy's had a blackberry type tea. I am not a fruity tea ...

 This morning I was up early. One of those mornings, but I needed to be. I had things to do today. 

I headed to the bank to find out why 3 checks were not cashed. It was a month since I wrote the checks. Then I stopped at Phils to give him his ornament.  Once that was done, I headed to the grange. 

Sandy was there already and ironing her fabrics. I pulled out my bonsai tree embroidery and worked on it. 

 This morning I was up, played a bit, and went back to bed. Before I did, I wrote a piece in the kingdom chat letting them know how ticked I was that because I didn't spell out the name, and put "..." they assumed I said, "@%$!" which I didn't. I let them know who wrong that was to go after someone over spelling. I don't know it if will help - but it made me feel better and I went back to bed. I slept another 2 hours. lol 

When I did get up and become part of this ...