Wednesday, October 29, 2008

Short stuff...

Does this look like a bestseller?
How about this?


I had a book fair at school Monday night. It was fun and busy. Wendy came and helped me which was nice. The PTO had a chili supper to help attract people and there was reading in a few of the rooms too. I can only have the fair one night as there isn't any place on first floor where I can leave it set up, so I don't make as much as I probably would if I could have it all week like most schools do. But we did ok. The Diary of a Wimpy Kid Series was at the top of everyone's lists. The copies I have are always on wait lists, so I got a couple new copies of each.

Sunday, October 26, 2008

Weekend Stuff....Class...Shopping...Walking...Chatting...all in all a good one!

Saturday started with a UFO class. 6 ladies came and worked on UnFinished Objects and chatted up a storm for 4 hours. These days are always fun and yesterday was especially so because a gal who was in a motorcycle accident 10 weeks ago is finally feeling better and able to drive, so came in to see friends and work on her LeMoyne Star Stack~n~Whack. It turned out that 4 of them worked on that quilt, so we got to see the patterns as they got the blocks done. My sister Deb also stopped in, as she was down shopping with friends, so after class was over, I shopped with her for a little while.




Later in the evening, I went for a walk on the Pedestrian Bridge (a suspended bridge over the Missouri River linking Omaha, Ne and Council Bluffs, IA) with my sis-in-law Denise and her grandson. He had been to some Halloween parties so had camouflage paint on his face, not dirt! I have gone before, but always during the day. It was beautiful last night, coolish but not cold. The lights are awesome at night. There are some stick things in a garden that sway in the breeze and have lights on top. They are so cool, but I didn't get a pic as I only had my phone & I didn't think it would take well. Next time I will take my camera....

I have been busy today updating my website with some new classes, did some paperwork for class and last but the most fun, I did some machine quilting. I haven't done much lately as I have been babying my back, but did a table runner so it didn't take long. I did a meandering stitch, which I like to do and it works well on small projects.

Thursday, October 23, 2008

Just a fun friendly quilty night...



I got together tonight with some friends for a stitching and gabbing night. We did some string-piecing, some handquilting and just gabbed & ate! It was fun. We try to get together every month or 2.

You can see I am colorizing the sections, though you wouldn't have to. I just wanted to see how it would look. I made some where I mixed the colors and I like them too.

Tuesday, October 21, 2008

Working on stuff

I have been working on the supply list & flyer for the quick gifts class. Seems like getting the stuff ready to post takes as long as sewing the models for class!

Sunday, October 19, 2008

Quilty Sunday & Yesterday's Quilting


I have been busy today working on some quilty things for a class I want to do with some easy, fast projects people could make for gifts. The first is this wallhanging using pictures printed out on photo fabric. The outer border is actually dark purple, so maybe I need to take a pic when I have more natural light. This is my youngest daughter and I think she looked onry even at 2 days old! She was good at posing, anyway!





This is a fold-up carry-all to take with when going just about anywhere. I have it filled with quilting stuff now, but could also hold personal hygiene items (deoderant, make-up, lotions, shampoos....the list goes on.

We will also make a cloth gift bag cute enough to use after the gift is given.

Yesterday's Quilting



Just a quick post about the Starburst Quilt class yesterday. It was the second class for this quilt and it was interesting to see how much some of them had gotten done in the week in between. I posted pix at my website of all but one of the lady's progress...she wants me to wait and take a pic in a week...she promised she would bring it in. Anyway, if you want to see their quilts, my website is at quiltinjeanie3.9f.com They are on the photo page. The pic above is of mine. The darker color is more of a burgandy, not quite this dark. But you get the idea.

Saturday, October 18, 2008

State Marching Band contest was GREAT!





The weather was perfect, and the band was awesome. They did a great job and my nephew played about half a dozen percussion instruments on the sidelines, with a small solo on drums. I really do love marching band season.

Friday, October 17, 2008

Friday flows...prof. development...quilting...& a good book...

Spent all day in professional development today. We went to our local AEA and the librarian there gave us tips, showed us books we might not have seen, went over many interesting topics, well interesting if you work in the library of an elementary school! It is always fun for us to get together too as there are only 14 of us, and we seldom get together to compare notes.

Tomorrow I have the second half of my Starburst Class and then I am going to State Marching Contest to watch my nephew Ryan play. Hopefully I will get a picture or 2 to share. I love State Marching Band Contest, sitting outside in the crisp fall air, the music so....BIG and out there and toe tapping, well you get the picture. That was my favorite season of the year for the band...marching band. All 3 of my daughters were in band, so I watched a lot of parades and football games. It was great!!! The weather is supposed to cooperate too, about 60, so can't complain about that.

Then hopefully I will be working on a class project and/or quilting the rest of the weekend.

Oh yea, one last thing, I finished Me & Emma last night. It was a very good book with a strange twist at the end....no, I'm not telling, you will have to read it for yourself.

Thursday, October 16, 2008

ER tonight!

I will admit to being an ER fan from way back. There is another new show on tonight, though it looks like now Abby is leaving. She is one of my favorites and has been on for years. I know it is the last season, but do we have to kill or move everyone off before the end???? The first episode saw Dr. Pratt die, so what's next? What's up with that, anyway? Why do we need new people at this stage of the show? Why can't the old ones just fade out with the show. I also heard that some of the old people from years back are coming back too. Might be interesting...

Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Class, class, class



It's been a crazy week with classes 3 nights in a row...I love it but it gets kinda busy what with the day job and all. It works out this way sometimes as I do monthly classes, so this week the 2nd Monday of the week, the 2nd Tuesday and the 3rd Wednesday all ended up in the same week. Luckily all the ladies are nice and the time goes quickly once we get going. The class tonight is the Row by Row Sampler #5. This is a picture of it, though I admit not the best picture. I need to take a better one, but you get the idea.

Saturday, October 11, 2008

Starburst class & apples

Had a great time at class today. Everyone got a good start on the quilt & now have a chance to work on it some more before next week. There are so many beautiful combinations of colors, I can't wait to see them next week.

Then Jo, De & I went to the apple orchard and got some apples. They taste so good when they are fresh. Doesn't this just make you want to dig your teeth in a juicy apple? Ok maybe my pix can't do them justice, but believe me they are good. Jo was going to get some caramel dipping sauce.....yummmmmmmy!


We ate one on the way home!

Thursday, October 9, 2008

It's almost Friday....yea!

Have had an uneventful week, not even much sewing going on, though I did do some work on some patterns and started working on a new design for a quilt. My daughters came home last night from Seattle. Sounds like they had a good trip visiting my oldest daughter and husband there. They visited some places I haven't been yet, so will be fun to look at their pix.

Monday, October 6, 2008

Monday's a slow news day but I'm reading a good book!


I am reading a really good book right now. It is titled Me & Emma by Elizabeth Flock. It is an interesting book that at the onset seems to be a story of 2 sisters who have lost their father. They are poor, good friends and playmates who always manage to find something to do. The story is told from a child's perspective by 8 year old Carrie. As the story unfolds you realize there is some sexual abuse going on with Emma (age 6) and her stepfather. Though Carrie doesn't really understand what is going on, she knows that it is bad for Emma. He also locks them in their attic room for hours on end. So the girls come up with a plan to run away. That of course doesn't go as well as they had hoped and Carrie is thinking it might be a good idea to go home. But Emma is determined so they plug on. This is where I fell asleep last night!

This is my second week in a row with only one evening class...I could get used to this! I did have a chance to start looking through those old quilt magazines that I got at the garage sale last week. The oldest one is from 1993, so not really that ancient. It is interesting how the graphics have changed over the years, though. The one magazine I was looking through had a lot of templates being used when it could've been strip pieced.

Ok, I confess...I am a quilt magazine junkie!

Sunday, October 5, 2008

Sunday walk

It was such a beautiful day today so I wanted to go for a walk. I decided to go see the new Pedestrian Bridge as it opened last week and I have been dying to walk over it. We have been watching it go up all summer, and I have seen it lit up at night, what an awesome sight. This bridge spans the Missouri River that separates Council Bluffs, IA and Omaha, Ne. On the Omaha side they have been working on their Riverfront project for many years. They have achieved a beautiful area of parks, and walkways. Hopefully the Council Bluffs side will be beautiful as well once they finish it. Some work has been done, but we have a long ways to go.

On the IA side, the ramp starts near Playland Park and takes you over rough riverfront ground that will someday be a park.

The bridge curves around and gradually rises over the river. It is a suspended bridge, so you can feel a little movement on it. Today there were many people crossing from both directions. It was windy today so once out over the water, the wind was pretty strong.
I am coming up to the first tower.
Boy it is tall, it sort of freaks me out to look up at it.
This is the Omaha side ramp that curves around to bring you down from the bridge (or up to the bridge, depending on which way you are coming from). I am not sure but the circular area seems like a meeting place or arena area. There was an Indian tent on the other side, but I didn't go down to see what it was. I assume it was monument of some kind. I will go check it out another day. What a great walk!

Saturday, October 4, 2008

It's Saturday!

and I am lounging around like I have nothing to do....lol....it is sorta nice once in a while. Taught Beginning Quilting class Thursday night. It is going well. They will learn to make their own binding and sew it on next week and they are done. They have done a nice job. I am going to teach it again starting Oct. 30.

Today was the second session of the Tshirt Quilt Class. They are looking awesome and the ladies got a lot done today. They were sewing the blocks together with sashings and sashing rows. It is amazing how crisp and fresh the shirts look after they are faced and squared up. It is definitely a great way to preserve memories.