Update and TAGGED

First the update. I managed to finish that cute pink baby quilt just in time for the new baby to come home from the hospital. I got my machine back and then ran out of the pink thread! But now it is done and given to the proud parents. But guess who forgot to take photos of the quilt?!!?!? Oh well. I asked my son to take some pictures of little Sophia with the quilt but so far haven't gotten any. We are going down there again this weekend, for Sophia's baby blessing, so I hope to get some pictures then. But for now, here is a photo of the happy family.

She was born on March 7th at 8:13 pm, was 7 pounds 8 ounces and 21 inches long. And she has tons of hair! Not something that is normal for either our family or her mother's family. But she is a cutie and a welcome addition to our family.

Now for the tag. My daughter tagged me and I think that I just have to put in my responses to what she had on her blog so here goes:

5 things I was doing 5 years ago:

1. Working at the City of Mesa Library's Dobson Ranch Branch
2. taking classes long distance from BYU
3. being a mom
4. teaching the spiritual mini lessons at Enrichment/Homemaking meetings
5. becoming a grandmother for the first time

5 Things on my to do list for today:

1. fill out this tag
2. work some more on the quilt for my daughter's baby
3. make dinner
4. get our van back from the garage
5. turn in another lesson for my class

5 Things I would do with a million dollars:

1. Help my kids with their various expenses
2. Put most of it in savings for our missions/retirement
3. get new furniture
4. get some new clothes for us
5. donate a lot to the LDS humanitarian fund

5 Places I have lived:

1. Provo, Utah
2. Laramie, Wyoming
3. Brookhaven, New York
4. Scottsdale, Arizona
5. Tempe, Arizona

5 Jobs I have held:

1. babysitter
2. hotel maid
3. refreshment stand attendant
4. library page
5. library clerk

5 Things I want to be doing in 5 Years:

1. finally be empty nesters (no kids living at home)
2. have all the kids married in the temple
3. finished with school at last
4. be a children's librarian
5. have lots of grandbabies come to visit

5 People I tag:

1. Jeannette
2. MiriLou
3. Crissi
4. Ben
5. Dave (this'll never happen!)

So there you go, a brief update and a tag. Enjoy!

Wouldn't you know it

I got the pink quilt top finished and then layered and ready for quilting. I started the quilting, outline stitching around the appliques. Then on Friday, when I went to finish the outline quilting, the needle bent! So I changed it out and then tried sewing again and the thread kept getting caught in the bobbin area. So I took it apart to clean it out, there was lots of lint in there, and while doing that noticed that there was a little metal piece that seemed to be loose, it was what the thread was getting caught on. I tried to get it back into place, but it wouldn't go. I fit it back in as best as I could and tried sewing again. The thread was still catching on it. So I took it out and tried again. Well, now the thread wasn't getting caught but it was doing all kinds of loops on the bottom of the fabric! So I re-threaded the machine and tried one more time, still some loops but not as bad. I was done!! My new machine just wasn't working. When my husband got home that evening and I told him my problems, he asked if I had called the store. Well, no I hadn't, so I called them quick and described the problems and they said to bring it in on Saturday. I was afraid of that. I had a feeling that they would want to take it and then I wouldn't be able to finish the quilt. So Saturday, after I put that piece back in, we took it over to the store and the manager sat down at it and had the same thread catching problem I had had. She took the bobbin area apart, like I had done, and found that loose piece. She said that it was part of the cutting mechanism (when you push a button, the machine will automatically cut the top and bottom threads for you) and was obviously broken so it would have to be sent in to be repaired. Great. Well, she did give me the store floor model of the machine so that I could continue working on the quilt so I wasn't out of a machine. I think it won't cost me anything to get the machine fixed as it has only been 4 months since I bought it, I was too afraid to ask. She said that she put a rush on the repair order so instead of 10 days from Tuesday, it should be less than a week. We'll see. I guess it is better for it to happen now, while still under warranty, than later. Up until now, this sewing machine has worked great, so I hope once I get it back, it will still work great.

As for my classes, I took the final for that other class and am now waiting for the grade to be posted. But I went ahead and signed up for the next class, a poetry class, and will be starting that this week. I hope to get it done within 6 months. Wish me luck!

Things are moving along

I have been going to chastize my kids for not putting up new posts and then realized that I hadn't put up a new one either, so here it is. I have been working on the first baby quilt, a pink one for our first granddaughter, and the baby shower was last Saturday. The quilt wasn't done but I took it anyway. I put it in a pretty gift bag but then when Lindsey pulled it out, I had to explain that it was a work in progress and that if she wanted it finished, she had to give it back! Nothing like being an Indian giver, is there? (I suppose that is not politically correct.) Anyway, one of the reasons that it is taking a while to get done is that there are several appliques on the quilt top and most of them in pink, and guess what, I didn't have ANY pink thread!! In all my years of sewing, I have never made anything pink. I guess that is to be expected when you have 6 boys and only 1 girl and she doesn't like pink! Even when she was a baby, I didn't make pink things, I made a yellow smocked dress, and several light purple dresses, but NO pink anything! Hence the lack of pink thread. So I had to go find some and after looking around at a couple of different stores finally found some that matched. So now I can get back to work. Less than a month now until the baby comes, so I need to hurry up and get this quilt done. Then I have to work on the next one, that baby (a boy) is due at the end of April, so time is getting short! Luckily the 3rd one isn't due until August so I can take a breather between the 2nd and 3rd ones, but not a long one. At least I like making quilts!

Onto another subject, I finally took the final for one of my classes, just have to take the final in the other one and then I only have 3 classes left until I can graduate!! The end is in sight, yay! Oh, and I have to get them all done by April of 2010, if I don't want to take 4 more classes! So I really need to get on the ball with the classes. Nothing like a lot of pressure in your life. Oh well, it is what makes us (me) get things done.

Lastly, HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY to one and all!

Sewing Room

Well, my sewing room is all put together for the most part so tomorrow I can start sewing, I hope!! Woo hoo! I'm excited, can you tell? Oh, just a side note, my grandson asked me the other day if his and his dad's new room would soon be their old room and they would get moved into a third bedroom!?!? I told him no probably not. Interesting the things that go through their minds.

More Quilt Photos

Well, I finally got my husband to transfer some photos to my computer so I could post them. The first quilt, the one with the trucks, is the one I made for my first grandson for his 3rd birthday. He still loves it two years later and it is none the worse for wear other than being slightly faded. Not too bad, considering all the use it gets and all the washing! Pattern from the Nov/Dec 1998 Quiltmaker magazine which someone gave me about 4 years ago.

These next ones are for the first bed sized quilt I made. I saw the pattern in a book from the library--Eleanor Burn's Quilt in a Day-Still Stripping After 25 Years --only hers was for a smaller quilt. I have a friend who works at the Quilter's Ranch (quiltersranch.com) who helped me enlarge the pattern to fit a bed. I think it turned out pretty well consideri

ng it was the first time I had made such a big quilt and therefore it was the first big quilt I machine quilted. There are a few oops in it but overall, it is pretty. It took me over a year to make the quilt as I put it aside for a while since I was scared to start doing the machine quilting but I finally got up my nerve and got it finished just in time for my husband's birthday, which was a lucky coincedence, I thought. As you can see I also made a matching pillow. My husband photoshopped the pictures to take out all the "distracting" stuff around the bed so that it why it seems to be floating in space! Also he changed the flash between the two photos when he took the pictures, that is why one seems more yellow than the other.

I'll post more quilt photos as I get them.

I couldn't resist!

My daughter changed the background for her blog the other day and it is cute so I thought I'd look and see what the site (thecutestblogontheblock.com) had for Valentine's Day and there on the next to the last page was this background with an owl!!!! I couldn't resist it and so had to use it. Anyone who knows me, knows that I like owls and so this was a nobrainer choice for me. It will probably be here on my blog for longer than just Valentine's Day, just to warn you! :)

Sewing room mess

With 3 grand babies on the way, I'm anxious to get started on making them some quilts but my sewing room is nonexistent at the moment! With all the moving around of stuff for when we had the house re-piped, we thought we might as well rearrange rooms since everything was already moved around. So my oldest son and his son moved into what used to be my sewing room and now my oldest and youngest sons are tiling the floor in what used to be my oldest son's room which will then become my sewing room! Did you follow all that? So needless to say, there is no place at the moment for sewing. But since I couldn't wait, this morning I cut out the fabric for the first baby quilt. Yay! My husband says that by this weekend my sewing room should be up and running so then I can start putting the quilt together. Yay again. So that's how things stand around here.