A Happy Anniversary & More!

Oh My! I've been off having fun on vacation to sunny Arizona where we grew up. 

Hubby and I celebrated our 29th Anniv...

...and my Dad celebrated his 80th.

Both on Super-Bowl Sunday! Can you say P A R T Y!!!!!

Yes! We got married on my Dad's birthday and never has a year gone by without the ongoing "joke" that my husband gets a "check-in-the-mail" every month for taking me off his hands. ARG!

We traveled together as a family and our little guy so enjoyed his first plane ride from Oregon to Arizona. Lucky me! He INSISTED that he had to sit by his Meme on both flights!

I especially love this photo taken of the two of us on "family picture day".

Oh man we just had soooo much fun! We ate cake. (My niece making sure I got a corner piece.)

We enjoyed seeing old friends and our cups were overflowing with fun!

This is me with my son-in-law and maid of honor from 29 years ago!

Our little family of six traveled so well together and we truly had a great time on our adventure.

Our new guy, already eleven weeks old, traveled amazingly. His mother so patient.

Annndddd I absolutely love that my mom got to see and cuddle her new great grandson!

We stayed with one of our family friends, who is also a quilter, and I can't believe I didn't take a picture of the gorgeous king size quilt she just finished! (Darn it!) But is was fun to talk quilting and rummage through her stash and talk about projects as we wished we had more time together.

But as every good vacation entails, we must repack our bags and journey ourselves homeward.

I have two whole days of work this week (Thank goodness as I'm exhausted! LOL!!) and plan to spend a better part of Saturday doing laundry and sewing my February OMG project. Easy sewing which I'm sure will prove to be rejuvenating. Thanks so much for stopping by! I'm looking forward to visiting your blogs and catching up with all of you. Seriously, I even missed my own Tuesday Archives this week! LOL!!! Oh well, life is good!

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Organized for a New School Year!

Aughhhh, the first day of school is behind me and the new school year has started.

 I'm happy to report that our district redistricted some students and I did NOT start the year with the projected 36 students...but 29. (I know, that's still a lot of second graders, but  I'm use to 28-30.) I have to tell ya though, it feels good this Sunday morning to be sitting here at the blog, finding myself getting back into old routines of spending the morning visiting your blogs and completing misc. household chores, looking forward to a long walk with Jackson and some afternoon sewing!

I'm grateful to start my school year organized and ready to go. Thanks to my Dad! During his visit in June he made those wonderful green, classroom shelves pictured above. I'm trying something new this year: no individual desks. I turned all the kids desks around and they are all raised to the same height with the legs are zip-tied together. This year the kids will be working as four individual teams. (Oh man...and no more messy desks!!!)

As I watched my Dad work this summer, I was reminded of the importance of Math in my teaching.  I'm very right brained and well, need to remind myself of this often!! LOL!! I'm totally looking  forward to this opportunity of having "tables" for my students to work on as they discover and learn, especially when working with Math manipulatives. (Okay, and art projects too!)

 Whether quilting, knitting, or building, Math really is an intertwined skill isn't it?

The building begins.

Thank goodness, some right brained fun of painting always seems to follow!

Anddd as I get back into my studio, without a doubt I'm particpating in Lorna's Dog Gone Cute QAL/Blog Hop! I can't wait to make a Jackson quilt!!! I'm looking forward to picking out fabrics and getting my coloring page done this afternoon! Until then...happy sewing!

Everytime you link and share here at Tuesday Archives you will be entered you into a monthly drawing for a $15.00 Gift Certificate to: (pretty cool huh!)

Winners will be announced the first Tuesday of every month! Thanks for stopping by!

Underground Railroad Sampler Quilt

I took my first quilting class in the Fall of 2009. We used a simple pattern and learned about patchwork and quilting. We started with fabric selection and were guided through every step of the quilt-making process. Following this six week class, I was immediately hooked and found myself  immediately signing up for the only class available to this wee beginner, an Underground Railroad Sampler quilt class. (I know talk about jumping in with your feet first!)  Over the next ten months, seven of us met every Monday night at our LQS. We compared our progress. We discussed our challenges and of course, praised and cheered eachother along. 

I used the Kansas Trouble fabric line for this quilt.

I finished this sampler 10 months later, just in time to gift it to my parents for the 50th wedding anniversary. I made it specifically for their motorhome, as they travel 5 months out of the year, and there's nothing better than a home-made quilt by their "favorite" daughter (LOL!!)to make a place feel like home. My mom loves it so much, she uses it on their bed at home during their non-travel months! (Yes, this was one of those ultimate moments for me!)

As you can see, I was pretty proud of my accomplishment too!

September 2010

I always kinda miss the comaraderie of taking classes with quilty friends. Unfortunatly, I'm just too tired (or maybe I'm just getting older) at the end of school/work day to take a class until 9:00pm. We don't have a local guild. Saturdays are the only day off my husband and I have together. Store closed on Sundays. So thus, I'm grateful for blogging and our virtual guild of sorts we find here. Also, like many of you, I'm thankful for the opportunity of Tuesday Archives to document this sampler quilt here on my blog as I write a new post about an older quilt to share with you...

my "oohhh and aughhh" comaraderie of quilty friends.

Quilty Hugs to start 2015!

We welcome 2015 with a household of family. Mom and I are just enjoying sitting by the fire, drinking our tea and visiting as she knits and I bind my Christmas Quilt. She and her pup are keeping warm under her Chevron Quilt I made last summer.

We thought the boys were in the "Man Cave" watching their marathon of New Year's Day football, but instead I caught them watching through their eyelids as they were obviously cozy warm under flannel twister quilts. (My son-in-law is cozy under my husband's which you can see here and my dad's was made this past summer and you can see it here.)

These are certainly one of those ulitmate moments we quilters cherish.

I'm returning to my spot by the fire, but wanted to a take a moment to share some quilty hugs happening around my house and wish everyone a happy, happy, New Year! I'm certainly looking forward to another creative year together in blogland!!

With smiles,

Val:)

Flannel Twister Quilt Finished

My parents have been visiting for two weeks and my mom cracked up when she got to see for herself how Jackson thinks every quilt I lay out is for him! She snapped this picture as I was cutting the batting off my finished flannel twister quilt

The Front

Here it is all finished. Cousin Amber had to get in the picture and we really love the scrappy binding! This quilt is soooo soft and warm!!

The Back

I used all my left over flannel and created strips for the back. I really like how it came out.

This quilt will see many more adventures than me, as my dad will use it in their motorhome during their summer travels.

The Quilting

 I quilted it using a dog pantograph:

 and loved that it had bones

and a doghouse too!

Here's where it will "live" on my parents' motorhome bed on the Underground Railroad Quilt I had made them for their 50th Anniversary earlier:

And here's where it will be used by my dad in their motorhome while he spends afternoons watching golf and baseball all cozy and warm.

The perfect quilty hug don't ya think!

With Smiles!

Val:)

Sewing Cabinet Refurbished

Before

 After

THANK YOU for all your comments on my previous post. The wood of the cabinet was not in very good condition, so my dad decided to sand it down and restored it to "fit" into our primitive decor using a black satin spray paint. I love it so much that I decided to set it up next to a window in our diningroom. I plan to follow up on all your references and once I get the machine up & going I think this will be a perfect spot to start sewing my eye spy quilt. 

Meanwhile, the rest of my weekend will be spent enjoying a household of family. Umm...no body told me being a grandma meant rearranging all my lower kitchen cabinets! LOL!

Happy Weekend!

With smiles,

Val:)

Rebuilt Rocking Chair

One summer day last month, I happened upon an old rocking chair at a garage sale down the street from my house. I fell in love with it's character and found myself actually carrying it home! I couldn't help but imagine rocking my future grandson and maybe later find him cuddled up in it reading books. I bought it for $5.00! 

I was so pleased with my find...that was until I asked my dad during his stay last week (He's an awesome woodworker btw), if he would set me up to sand the chair down. His look was one I saw many times during my childhood when I'd stump him with, what he calls my "crazy ideas". It's a look that said:  Valerie are you kiddding me....this thing needs to go in the dumpster!  (ha!ha!) After probably ten minutes of serious contemplation the challenge was on! He set forth to rebuild the darn thing!!!

As he took pieces apart, I set forth sanding....and sanding....and sanding! I think he used an entire bottle of wood glue!

  

This is me getting OUT OF PRIMING the chair:  (HAHAHAH!!!)

Ta Da!

I love the colonial red color I found! My mom laughed, literally out loud, at the fact my new cushion cost more than the chair.(I did too!) But I LOVE IT!!! I can't wait for it to be moved into the house (Today I had a few paint touch-ups to complete after school) But can't ya see a quilt finding it's home draped on it's back and a toddler all cozy looking at picture books in it? And maybe even a quilted cushion cover in the future!?? Aughhh the creative thinking never ends does it.

It was a fun weekend! Thanks dad.

With smiles!

Val:)