MLK Day Break

Martin Luther King Day and I am home from school.  That is a good thing.  I am sick.  That is a bad thing.  I have gotten nothing done today and I am okay with that given the circumstances.  I had planned on going to get soup in Midland - Harvest Café - Bahama Chicken Enchilada soup, yummm! I had planned on sewing a few more blocks in the 4 patch variations segment.  I had planned on taking out the trash, washing clothes, cooking. . . . none of this got done. Well, I did wash one load of clothes, but that wasn't even a drop in the bucket on the clothes front.  I may have to stay home tomorrow, too - depends on how the night goes, if I am still running fever - and that is not the best thing.  There are way too many things to get done this semester and it is already cut into by FCCLA regionals (I have to work two other ones beside ours) and possibly state. That means I will be out at least 8 or 9 days just with FCCLA.  Then there are the quilting things.  You know I have to have my quilting things.  That is another 4 days of being out.  I have to attend the FCSTAT Mid Winter conference so add in a couple more days and I am going to miss about 3 weeks of school just attending to other things.  That doesn't even include in case I get sick.  Which, knock on wood, I haven't had a sinus infection so far this year!  (I was really, really sick with a couple of them back to back last year and then had a reaction to my meds.  It was not good.  I even had to miss out on some of the FCCLA and ALL of the quilting last spring which is why I am NOT going to miss out on the quilting this spring!  If I can help it)  Even though its a nice break and it's mostly for the kids, it's still hard to get the rhythm going and flowing in the classroom.  We were just picking up speed and then we have this day off from school.  We will just be picking up the speed again and then it's spring break.  Don't get me wrong, I love the breaks we get.  It's just hard sometimes to keep the flow going when you are in and out of the classroom.  But that is life. 




Here is the top for my word of the year quilt.  I just need to quilt and bind it - hey strips are cut at least!  Then I will have one completed quilt for the year. 

I had planned on posting the 4 patch variations I have been working on, but apparently I deleted them from my e-mails and will need to resend them from my phone again.  On the good side, that will be another post!  I will try not to be so whiny in the next one.  Maybe by then my body will feel better.

Words and Water

Today was the first day back at school with students after the Christmas Holiday break and I introduced the concept of one word for the year to my students.  Tomorrow, they will have to write in their journal what their one word is and why.  It will be interesting to see what they come up with and their reasoning behind choosing their word of the year.  I will have them periodically check back in - through their writing about once a month.- to see how they are doing with their word.  They won't have a quilt wall-hanging in their face to remind them of their word, which is why I will have them write in their journal about how they are progressing in their year.  I have never done this before, but since my word is "better", maybe this will help me make (mold) them into better students, people and family and community members. 


Of course, being the first day back (actually the second, I had to be at work yesterday, too, just no students yesterday) I stayed up too late last night and hit the snooze a few times this morning.  I will have to work my way back into the routine of going to bed earlier and getting up earlier again.  I allowed myself to get out of it during our two weeks off. (by Saturday and Sunday I was way off my schedule.  I went to bed Sunday morning at 3!!  That is summertime schedule!)  In this instance, every time I do this, it is usually on Thursday that I have the absolutely hardest time getting up and moving.  We will see if that holds true this time, too.  Okay, as I look at the clock on the computer, I see that I am already late getting in bed tonight.  (10:42) And I still need to move the wash to the dryer, kennel the dogs and find some more water!  (that is in the garage - so a cold trip out there for me! - for those of you not in Odessa, Texas - our water is horrible!  I only drink bottled water - I refill my gallon jugs with RO - reverse osmosis - water and I keep my full jugs in the garage.  Since I ran out this morning filling up my quart drinking bottle, I forgot to bring one in when I got home from school)  So, since I still need to get some stuff done tonight, I will sign off for now. Hey, two blogs this week.  Doing Better!

Better

Life got really busy this last 6 months since school started back up and I dropped a lot of balls.  One of which was blogging.  I have really missed it, believe it or not.  I would think about what I wanted to blog about, but never made it to the computer to put those words into the blog.  Most weeks I didn't make it to the computer to do anything!  I know that this spring semester is already jam packed with things I have to get done for school, quilting group, FCCLA, the dogs, and life in general.  I know I am going to be super busy, but I also knew as this new year was coming at me fast and furious, I needed a word for the year.  I originally thought I would use the same word from last year as my word for this year since I didn't really get to "create" much for more than half the year, but the more I thought about it, the more another word kept popping into my head.  I had gone on the blogs and written down words other people had chosen over the years and filled up a full scrap page of words I could choose from.  I read through them again and again, but nothing seemed to fit.  Then I started thinking about how I wanted to be.  What I wanted to do.  Yes, I want to create.  I am happier when I am creating.  It relaxes me and makes me more complete.  Therefore, in order for me to be able to do that I needed to manage my time better and carve out some space just to create.  I want to get healthy.  No more knee braces - even though I have done well in that area this past year.  This means I need to make better choices about food - come on - I teach foods and nutrition.  I know how to do this, I just don't always have time.  So, I need to plan better to make the time.  I want my courses to flow better.  That means I need to work better at planning out the year so it coordinates with what we want to accomplish in class, competition and restaurant.  I need to make time to get together with friends and be a better friend.  Quit hibernating so much.  Okay, I don't really want to totally go back to my "social" year, but I can do better about getting out.  Maybe have a girls night out from time to time or a girls lunch on Saturdays. 


There are so many things I would like to accomplish in this year and the one word that kept jumping out at me was, BETTER.  I could do better, be better, work better, eat better.  Yes, that word is my word for this year.  I want to do, be, etc. BETTER. 


What about you, do you have a word for the year?  Instead of having an entire list of resolutions that I am unable to keep - or don't want to keep - I have chosen just one - see, easier if you only have one - one word for the year that I need to work on.   I proposed to my quilting group that they come up with a word for themselves this year,  make a wall quilt so they can see it, refer back to it from time to time during the year and next December, evaluate how they did during the 2016 year. 


In 2015, I didn't do so well on my word, create.  I started off the year with a bang, but it fizzled.  So this year, I am going to do . . . BETTER.  Happy New Year! 

Happy New Year - First Finish





 

Happy New Year!! This blog will either be really long or short and picture heavy one of the two.   I promised you some pictures of items from the Stocking Swap so we will start with that.  These are just a few of the items I received.  I love this pillow cover.  I have stuffed a 14" pillow form inside and it is fantastic!!  It's very bohemian and is so my style.  There is also a pincushion you will see in the next picture.  This is just strips of fabric sewn down the middle and randomly placed so the edges of the fabric are left loose and flappy.  (bad description, but truly that is how it is)  The little balls are fabric stuffed with fiberfill and then sewn around the ends and sewn onto the edge of the pillow cover and pin cushion. 

 

 

Here is the pincushion along with the journal cover and pen (you can just see the end of the pen on the top left of the cover. It writes in purple and that has become my favorite color to write with the last couple of years and is Kathy's favorite color - Kathy is the person who made the items and who I got the Swap items from)

 

The bag part of the Swap was a jewelry bag that gathers up to create a flower.  Here it is all gathered

 



Here it is opened up.  The edges of the inside fabric creates little pockets to store your jewelry plus being able to store it in the center section.  In the background you can see my new pink television!  I love it!!  On the screen is Ellen and her look back at Robin Williams' appearances on her show and how he made her laugh every time he came on.  It was a touching look back and very, very funny.  I was laughing at him and at her.  At one point she was almost curled up in the fetal position laughing so hard at what he was saying.   Anyway, I really love my new pink television.  My "gift" to myself this holiday. 

 

 

Every year Victoria of Bumble Beans and 15 Minutes Play chooses a word and makes it her word for the year.  Every year I would say, "I am going to do that" and then not follow through until last year when I chose the word "Social".  I worked at being more social almost the entire of last year.  This year I have chosen the word "Create".  I plan on creating many new things in the coming year, not just with fabric and quilting, but with paint and food and many, many other things.  I want to bring out more of this side of me.  Being creative makes me happy.  So, for the new year, I have made my new word quilt hanging.  I pieced the letters this year instead of appliqueing.  I really should have used Tonya's book  (she hasn't blogged in a really long time, but I just wanted to reference her blog here) and my letters may have been a little bit better, but I think they turned out okay for my first try at a word.  I love this background fabric and had picked up a few fat quarters for cheap (less than a dollar each) when a store was going out of business and knew that I wanted to use it as my background fabric.  That meant the other colors needed to stand out a bit since that was a busy print. 

 

 

Along with the pink fabric, I picked up a couple of this blue/green floral fabric in fat quarters, also.  This would be just right for the borders and I could pull the colors for the letters from this print.  Here it was on the wall last night when I went to bed. 



Today, I knew my mission was to get this quilted and bound and finished.  The quilting isn't the best - that is one of the things I need to work on this year in my year of "creating", but I like it "warts and all" as they say.  I used the pink to bind it and bring that color out to the edges and I loved how the little pig on the shelf is looking around the edge of the quilt.   I used a blue/green thread to do the circles and swirls on the outside and black thread to go around all the letters since they definitely needed an outline of black to stand out.  Now the only thing to do is make a label and a hanging sleeve - forgot about that until now -  and it is ready to put up on the wall.  

 

 

What is your word for the year? 

2014 Last Finishes and New Project Plans

I don't know about you, but I have a ton of projects in the UFO (Un-Finished Object) stages.  Some of them are finished blocks that just need to be sashed or sewn together and then borders added (or not) and some of them just need one or two borders added to be a complete quilt top.  This year (2015) I am going to complete a few of those items (mainly because I need the plastic tubs they reside in for more fabric and projects).  Below is one of those items that just needed a few steps to be called complete.  I have blogged about this one before (picked up the jelly roll at the Lovington, New Mexico store on a shop hop a couple of years ago, tried to find yardage of this fabric - no luck, just need to finish blocks, add a border, etc.)  Well, now it is a finished QT (quilt top) and the next thing I will whine about is having to make a back for this thing and get it quilted, but not today. : )  I know this isn't the best picture, but I promise to get one made as soon as I return to school and can post it up on my white board.  I just don't have the space here at my house to do that.  Truthfully, I just needed to post a picture of the colors so my mother could see them.

 

 

 

 

While I have been on winter holiday, I have scrolled through some blogs and pinterest (just a bit) and found a couple of items I wanted to make.  The first of those was a trash bag for my car.  I read through the directions while I was writing them down and asked myself, why?  So, being me, I threw away what I had written down and did it my way.  Below is my prototype.  The fabric is from a pair of pants that had ripped, but I thought the fabric was interesting and would make cool grocery bags. So, I cut apart the pants and kept the usable bits.  Then I cut them up even more and made this bag.  Instead of having a separate lining and a timtex insert, I did a self lining and inserted the timtex in between (next time I will sew it in instead of trying to line up seams)  I have also included a handle with button holes that attach to a button sewn on the back (sorry no picture of that) The handle can go around the stick shift to hold the bag in place.  If anyone knows me, you know I have a problem with trash in my car (I have a lot of it) Maybe this will help me keep it corralled and make it easier to dispose of.  I can put a plastic trash sack inside this bag to keep it all in one place (and not all over the passenger floor like it is now)

 



 

 

 I need to try it out in my car - in a few days after all the ice has melted and it is safe to drive in town again.  (yesterday afternoon, according to the news, the police were working 20 wrecks that happened within a one hour period  AND by the 10 o'clock news, Midland police had worked over 100 wrecks!  That is how inexperienced and crazy people around here are on the ice and why I choose to stay at home!  I think most of these people think that if you just speed up, you can slide to where you want to go) I had a great time at the store yesterday morning (about 8:30 or 9 - before it iced over) meeting up with friends who were also stocking up on supplies and trying to get off the road before the crazies woke up.  I wouldn't have had to go if I had just remembered to get black eyed peas when I went a couple of days ago!  Oh, well, it was good to see my friends at the store. 

Now to go work on my word of the year.  Last year, you may recall, my word was

And even though I struggled with this at the beginning and ends of the year, I did get out and be more social.  (my friends may not think so, but I really did do a bit more stuff)  I will continue to try being more social this year, too, but I am adding another word to my list.  I will post it as soon as I have my quilted word done.  I think I will do pieced letters for this one.  (a new technique!)